nbc's hans nichols got a look at some of the new tech. >> reporter: they look like two normal military transport trucks, but the second one is driverless, guided by the first. the goal, to reduce the manpower needed to drive supplies across dangerous battlefields. for army secretary mark esper, the challenge is to achieve autonomous driving before russia and china. >> we're in a new arms race here. how can you ensure the american army will be first?e it's competition we retain overmatch on the battlefield in the future. o a tank.er: a future that could or a combat vehicle with cameras embedded in its armor. giving the soldiers inside a sense of what awaits them outside. >> it's a brave new world in terms of this next generation of technologies that will change the warfare as we know it now. >> reporter: this is the army's tank research development and engineering center. it has worked with america's auto industry for more than 70 years, transferring the latest commercial technology from under the hood to under armor. engineers work out the kinks by playing simulated war games. for the

nbc's hans nichols got a first-hand look at some of the new tech headed to the front line t >> reporter:y look like two normal military transport trucks, but the second one is driverless, guid by the first. the goal, to reduce the manpower needed to drive supplies angoss ous battlefields. for army secretary mark espert, the challenge is to achieve autonomous driving before russia and chi nachlt. >> -- and chi nachlt. >> and china. >> we have to, it's important we retain overmatch on ine battlefiel the future. >> reporter: a future that could include ard bieye view from a drone tethered to a tank or combat vehicle with cameras embedded in its armor, giving the soldiers inside a sense of at awaits them outside. >> it's a brave new world in terms of the next generation of fundamentally the character of warfare as we know it now. >> reporter: just outside motor city is the army's tank automotive research development and engineering center. it has worked with america's auto industryor for me than 70 years, transferring the latest commercial technology from under thend hood to armor. engineer

joining me now with the very latest from the white house is my friend and colleague, nbc news' hans nichols. hans, thanks for being here. let's start off with what you and i witnessed today. we were both on the white house south lawn. president trump was there taking that big victory lap on the economy, the strong gdp number, but of course refused to answer questions about all of this, about michael cohen. and this is the ninth time reporters have been shouting questions at him. he hasn't responded. he is responding on twitter, though, hans. what's the strategy here? >> it seems on twitter he is trying to question michael cohen's overall integrity. you have that as well from giuliani talking about how he's a pathological liar. but it seems like there is a shift in communication strategy from this president. bill shine is starting to exert his force and at that moment earlier in the south lawn, at a certain point bill shine and john kelly walked toward the president and gave him a thumbs up. as you know, the president was almost protected by a moat there. there's some asphalt between the pre

let's bring in nbc's hans nichols at the white house on this busy afternoon. so just last night the president was praising him. he praised him as we just heard in that statement he put out on twitter. so why now? why is scott pruitt gone? do we know if he was asked to leave or he decided to leave? >> we may have two hints on that. number one, today is the first day of the new deputy chief of staff bill shine. it may be that he wanted to clean house and stutterart afred this was one of his first acts, convincing president trump to finally let go of his epa director. we've also heard from congressional democrats saying that they had uncovered additional information, additional cases of scott pruitt asking people in the a.p., employees, to take out personal tasks for him and his family. what's also clear now, this news broke a little over two hours ago, yes, the head of the epa is resigning but the direction of the e. -- epa has not changed. andrew wheeler is a former coal industry lobbyist. he's a lawyer, he's a lobbyist. what's clear from the president througho

hans nichols at the white house. i want to take a moment to look at who the three top contenders are now for the supreme court justice seat. let's start with the guy who a lot of people are thinking is the front-runner, this is brett kavanaugh. he's 53 years old, a former law clerk to justice kennedy. he was associate counsel to ken starr and helped draft the impeachment against bill clinton. he served as a close aide to president george w. bush for five years who nominated him for the d.c. district court of appeals where he now serves. this is working against him in some circles. he's considered the most establishment pick. to much of president trump's base, the establishment is kind of as bad as being a democrat. he proposed congress consider enacting a law to protect a sitting president from criminal investigation, indictment or prosecution while in office. that's got to be good for donald trump. recently "the washington post" reports conservatives have raised concerns about his past rulings, including on the affo

hans nichols is joining me now from washington.terms of that report, our degree of certainty, how confident are officials that they are doing this? >> well, nbc reported this and in a day after "the washington post" reported something similar. north korea is continuing with enrichment of nuclear materials. it seems like several news outlets are reporting it. we astandby our reporting on nb. the u.s. have always known this. this is internal deliberation and something that secretary pompeo knew and trump knows. they know this information. whether or not it changes this, the information is public is different. the white house and as well as the pentagon, this pompeo trip is really the real test to see how serious, how specific north korea is willing to get. after that they're going to be faciing lawmakers who'll have a lot of questions of what was accomplished. >> doubts that the north is not going to fulfill that pledge to denuclearize? >> they are not expressing any doubts. we heard from the state department experienspokespersone se

hans nichols and ashley and all of you, thank you. and now, we welcome in cornell and john. and now, ambassador huntsman is being asked to resign and you work for a pawn and not a president. time to come home. and his daughter is a anchor on "fox and friends" on the weekend and severely criticized what the president did yesterday. should there be resignations? >> there should be. i mean, the president of the united states should resign frankly, and beyond our own am bas dor, but the reality is that we may see some at the national security level and career and diplomatic corps who can not accept nor continue to further this president's ad jen dand the president who stood on foreign soil and made us less safe and less secure nation. k katy, this was either done out of deliberation in which case the president of the united states knew that he was embracing interests adverse to our security, or he is unfit. if you are a national intelligence agent, you wonder if you can wake up and go to work under this president. >> and cornell, good to have the resignations from the national s

we start with our man at the white house, hans nichols. hans, walk us through what the president is saying today. >> well, craig, he's heralding the summit as a success, but he's also hinting, as you mentioned, that you may need to have a passport ready for a potential summit. i know you're a guy with two passports, but this is a president who telegraphed things via twitter. he said the summit was in russia -- or was a great success except for the real enemy of the people, the fake news media. i look forward to our second meeting so that we can start implementing some of the many things discussed, including stopping terrorism, security for it's really, new proliferation cyber a tacks and so forth. but they can all be solved. craig, he hinted earlier they would have a follow-up meeting. this is a little bit firmer. i'm joking about having a passport because we don't know where the potential meeting could be. it could be in the states, it could be internationally. what we know from the summit that president trump hosted -- not hosted but had

joining us now with the latest from the white house is nbc news' hans nichols. where are we? the president has promised and reiterated that 9:00 p.m. tonight is when he does the big reveal. could you think he's made a decision? >> i have no idea, ali. i've got to be honest about that. what we do know is they're starting to plan the post-decision optics and what the strategy will be. former senator jon kyl, a staunch conservative, who will be shepherding whoever the nominee is through the senate. we saw that last night. it was a successful cooperation they ran with the former senator from new hampshire. ayot could speak to moderates, females. what jon kyl brings is an institutional knowledge of the senate and what conservatives want to hear. the question on this choice i have is the challenge going forward for the president and whoever his choice is, isn't necessarily going to be with conservatives. it's with moderates and conservative democrats. jon kyl doesn't necessarily have relationships, especially with those democrats, because they're new to the senate and he was from a

i want to get straight to my colleague, hans nichols, at the white house right now. hans, if you can, break down what we know. what's the latest from the president and from the west wing about this second meeting with vlad mer putimir putin? >> reporter: one agenda is an end to russian meddling in u.s. electi elections. peter, i'll tell you why it is important. that'd suggest you'd have this meeting before the mid-term elections. now, we don't know that. the white house hasn't said when the meeting will be. they just said a place, washington. they haven't been much more specific about that. it is clear this has been on president trump's mind. listen to how he hinted at it during the interview yesterday with cnbc's joe kernan. >> is that in the works? is it planned? >> yeah. >> has it been talked about? >> it's in the works. >> a second meeting, you've broached the subject? >> we got along very well. the fact is, we got along very well. we, i think, can do great things for his country, but for our country. >> reporter: you know, peter, you think about what the presiden

joining me now from the white house is nbc news hans nichols. hans, we just found out the white house formally rejected vladimir putin's request from the russians to interview bill browder, mike mcfaul. what do you make of all of this? >> it's another day, another cleanup. now we're at thursday. this press conference happened earlier in the week. the white house is still trying to clarify things. as of yesterday, they're openly entertaining the idea of having those individuals that you mentioned go to russia and potentially be investigated. that was the intriguing proposal that mr. putin made. what you heard from sarah huckabee sanders today is that donald trump has now disagreed with that proposal. a few days ago he thought it was something that was worth pursuing. now they say it was made in sincerity, to use sarah huckabee sanders quote. it was made in sincerity but something they disagree with and will not be pursuing. at the same time, there's talk of a second meeting. as all this is -- everyone is trying to figure out what actually was said

nbc's hans nichols is at the pentagonalso joining us is a contributor to nbc.com.ople are waking up after reading the report and asking, why now? why is this happening? what did the dod have to say about it? >> reporter: the pentagon hasn't been clear if there is a change on the program, which started at the end of the bush administration. it was a way to bring in immigrants with specialized skills. if you were a doctor, if you had language skills, if you were here in the u.s. heel legally, student visa, you could enlist in the military and it'd be a pathway to citizenship. 10,000 individuals have been enrolled in the program. the lawyer who set it up thinks it is a great success. a former lieutenant colonel. she is out in alaska now, bringing suits to reservists who thought they were on the way to citizenship and, for some reason, had their contracts cancelled. what we need to find out is just why these specific recruits have been cancelled. did anything happen. ♪ i'll read you a quote. due to ongoing litigation, the defense department cannot provide anything furt

hans nichols at the white house. and, sarah huckabee sanders is singing the same song before, but with the significant of the calendar, what are you seeing? >> well, the tone is more and more in stride here nor this president, but sarah huckabee sa sanders is saying the same thing that the was said by president barack obama. and he is saying that it is about fairness, and looking at the countries signaling out, and they have the main defense in the case of germany is this idea that they contribute other ways and not just to defense spend spending. so for example, they participate in the nato mission in afghanistan, and the norwegias s will say something similarly, and that we don't make the 2%, but we contribute to nato in other ways, and looking at the top the line number is not all that useful. and another way to look at this is the considered gdp so that the country aside from the united states that has the highest defense spending of the percentage of the gdp is greece, and why? because their gdp has cratered wit

joining me, katy tur, hans nichols of the white house and on capitol hill garrett hank. the president also said that he misspoke, katy tur. he said, when he said i see no reason why it would be russia, he said he meant wouldn't be. i want to play this back. let's listen to what the president actually said yesterday that basically turned the world upside down and then what he said about it. listen. >> all i can do is ask the question. my people came to me. dan coats came to me and some others and they said they think it's russia. i have president putin, he just said it's not russia. i will say this, i don't see any reason why it would be. i said the word would instead of wouldn't. the sentence should have been and i thought i would be maybe a little bit unclear on the transcript or unclear on the actual video, the sentence should have been i don't see any reason why it wouldn't be russia, sort of a double negative. so you can put that in and i think that probably clarifies things pretty good by itself. >> well, that sorts the whole thing out. thanks for watching msnbc. wh

nbc's hans nichols joins me now from the white house along with msnbc's garrett haake from capitol hill chief foreign correspondent richard engel live from moscow along with charlie sykes. rod rosenstein was at the white house earlier today. what do you know about that? >> an official tells me he was here for a regular scheduled meeting. what we don't know about what the president is going to be talking about is he will clarify, simply address these comments? we do know he's getting a lot of advice. advice from allies that typically aren't very critical. for example, in the last hour or so, we've heard from a conservative talk radio host. she's saying the president needs to clarify. now, lindsey graham in the senate is saying he needs to fix it. laura ingraham is also making this point, that he went a little bit too far. and i think if we watch the morning develop, we've seen more and more republicans and importantly conservatives in the media space increase and amp up their criticism of the president's performance at that news conference. now at 2:00 p.m., he'll be talking about it. ou

joining me now to explain is hans nichols. hans, what's he talking about? >> he's talking about the nord stream 2. this would end up in a town which is in northern germany. the important thing about nord stream 2 is not where it goes, it goes under water, the important thing is where it doesn't go. it doesn't go through ukraine or poland. that's why this is controversial inside germany and berlin and bonn but not for the reasons that president trump is talking about. the concern among some allies and even those inside merkel's government, the foreign minister in particular has expressed concern about this, is if you have nord stream 2, you don't need the initial one and that means that russia won't have any disincentives from marching through the ukraine. there's some very hot rhetoric in the german press about the potential dangers of nord stream 2, it's all being reviewed. but the idea that germany is dependent on russia and therefore has an incentive to work with russia because they only have their gas, the trade is much more in the other direction. russ

we start with hans nichols, at the white house right now. we have confirmed that it's fair to say the three most serious contenders in this race have been narrowed down by the president. >> reporter: peter, based on your reporting, these three represent three different options. so you have bret cavanaugh, he's sort of the establishment choice, highly credentials, bush administration official, yale undergrad and law school, and then amy coney barrett. she had a great of success in her senate confirmation. she's catholic, mother of seven children. from her you get the sense the religious right is rallying around her, and raymond kethledge, from michigan, they represent different paths to the court. they're all serving in some capacity in federal district or appellate court right now. the decision that the president will have to make may come down to feel. at the same time there's a lot of back-and-forth here in washington. it seems believe cavanaugh does have in enemies, if not enemies, some adver searses, ted cruz and rand paul, so some conse

nbc's hans nichols is at the white house. hans, we'll start with you today. again, the president is contradicting of what we heard from dan coats on friday. this is what coats said. >> he was in the months prior to september 2001 according to the cia director, georthe system wa blinking red and here we are nearly two decades later and i am here to say the warning lights are blinking red again. today the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack. >> that was friday. this one appears to put the president at odds with his intelligence officials. how is the white house explaining that or are they? they are not quite yet. we just flattered the president and sarah hucklebee sanders when she had a chance to answer this. one of the president's key arguments that vladimir putin actually wanted hillary clinton to win because he'll be so tough. that was cotntradicted in the helsin helsinki's summit. yes, there is sanctions put in place and they did expel 60 russian diplomats/five and they agreed selling lethal weapons. whether or not dona

joining me now is nbc's hans nichols. live at the without and gabe sherman. again, i want to be careful here, hans. we were talking yesterday when it happened. i truly don't believe the president clarified anything. he further muddled it. because if you were listening to the whole press conference, it's no the believable that if the president meant to say wound instead of would, as katie said to you and me yesterday afternoon that would assume the rest of us were listening to the press conference with ear plugs in. there's nothing-dp -- what he s about russia not being responsibility was consistent with everything else. >> he reviewed that press conference transcript once and watched the tape. so by implication, the president has endorsed everything else he said in that press conference. let's take a look at some of the sames th statements that came out. do they believe president trump has clarified the position. when you say i hold both countries responsible, i think that the united states has been foolish. there's one on the mueller probe. it's a disaster fo

. >>> nbc attorney general rod rosenstein leaving yesterday morning, hans nichols says he was summoned. he met with the president was still in the white house residence, press secretary sarah sanders said rosenstein did not meet with the president. he was at the white house for routine meetingles. they came four days after rosenstein announced the indictment of 12 officers in the mueller investigation. meanwhile, bloomberg citing two people reports that rosenstein allowed president trump to decide when those indictments would be announced. the president gave the go ahead to make the announcement the friday before the putin summit, hoping it it would strengthen his hands in the talks. mishlgs crazy storm that swept through the northeast in new york yesterday, if you were leaving work around 4:00, you might have gotten wet. you were talking about warmth in the south this morning. >> reporter: hi there, louis, we had the heat, humidity, flash flooding, funnel cloud over new york city. we are left with a beautiful day in the northeast today. one place that could use relief from the heat wo

joining me now is hans nichols, and with us at the table, jason johnson, politics editor, and jonathan capehart. most msnbc contributors. i have to start with you, malcolm. let me read you this list. who says russia meddled to help trump? the cia, fbi, dni, senate republicans, senate democrats, house democrats and trey gowdy, who doubts that russia meddled to help trump? vladamir putin, donald trump, and devin nunez. did i miss anybody? >> you can throw in there everybody that voted for trump, because whatever he says goes. and whatever vladamir putin says goes for president trump. you know, this is very disturbing, especially that comment about nsa a little bit earlier. first off, 6 million phone calls and e-mails is about ten seconds of collection of nsa. so that's not very significant. but it just goes to show, they are declaring war on anything credible in america. and it will undermine us. it will damage our national security. and mark my words at some point, it will kill someone. >> that's a chilling thought. matt miller, i feel like we started having this conversation before pre

we start with hans nichols, at the white house right now.rmed that it's fair to say the three most serious contenders in this race have been narrowed down by the president. >> reporter: peter, based on your reporting, these three represent three different options. so you have bret cavanaugh, he's sort of the establishment choice, highly credentials, bush administration official, yale undergrad and law school, and then amy coney barrett. she had a great of success in her senate confirmation. she's

i want to bring in hans nichols at the white house and ken delaney following the in and ouo ins and outs. >> hahns, let me start with you there. what has been the response from the president and his son? >> well, craig, as you mentioned there is a denial from the president but really there is a tone of the denial and counter punching that we have from president trump taking aim at his old aid and former top adviser, and someone that knows a lot about the president's past. look at what he said in the tweet. it is not so much he is criticizing but the suggestion that he retain bill and crooked hillary clinton's lawyer. gee, i wonder if they helped him made -- that i can that choice. the president is openly questioning his motives and intentions. when you see what don jr.'s statement is, his lawyer claims that he did not do anything wrong. i am going to read that statement to you. "donald trump jr. has been professional and responsible throughout the mueller and congressional investigations." i will go to how quickly this story has moved. here we are at the end of july, these two sides are

. >> i want to bring in nbc's hans nichols at the white house. the president is meeting with defense secretary mattis and secretary of state pompeo today. you've got to assume russia is at the top of the agenda. >> in part because every time secretary mattis has an opportunity to talk about the threat russia poses, he brings it up. mattis has reor yepted the entire defense department to look towards a high intensity conflict. that means conflict with either russia or china. everywhere he go, he talks about russia, the threat it posed, and also the importance of alliances. just recently we had the presidential comments about montenegro, wondering why we would fight for montenegro. when mattis was on the plane flying to croatia after that summit in brussels, what did he do, he welcomed montenegro, celebrating their coming into nato. stephanie, if you were to juxtapose that with what the president says, you'd almost think they were from different administrations. as you well know tomorrow is the anniversary of that july 20th meeting where the presid

nbc's hans nichols is at the white house. axios reporting even though the president said he is going to be making this announcement on monday, aides would not be surprised if he jumped the gun and named his nominee in the next few days. quote, when the president has made up his mind, he wants to go. an aide said. anyone there telling you they wouldn't be surprised if the president dropped this name early? >> that might explain a wall of reporters just a few feet where i am. right behind me, the president is leaving in about five minutes for his motorcade. it's possible he shouts out his pick to us. it's more likely he does it in a more formal way. when you look at how neil gorsuch was done, it was very formal. that was their way to do it then. we're going to hear from the president around 6:00 p.m. tonight, he'll be at that rally. he really has a delicate task. yes, he wants to get jon tester out of the senate but he may need tester for the vote for whoever he ends up nominating. you saw the awkwardness when he visited north

including our own hans nichols, who has moved to the north lawn for us. president trump did not show any sign of dialing back. >> no. >> some of the tough talk. he is ready for a fight. it is going to happen, based on what raj shah told us a couple minutes ago, too. >> reporter: the president is clearly hinting at how difficult and contentious the meetings welcome back with nato, by suggesting his meeting with vladimir putin could be the easy one. listen to how he had to say it. >> i have nato. i have the uk, which is in somewhat turmoil. i have putin. frankly, putin may be the easiest of them all. who would think? >> reporter: now, when peter alexander followed up and said, look, does he think vladimir putin is a friend? remember in 2013, president trump said putin would be a best friend. president trump said it is too early to tell whether he'd be friend or foe. it is still to be determined. when you look at the situation that donald trump is going to be walking into, he's been very critical of nato all along. in a lot of ways today while, yes, it was r

. >> that's why nbc's hans nichols is here because he works at the building where words matter the mostves are on the line literally, the pentagon. since helsinki there have been real questions from the military, from the pentagon, about just what was agreed to and those decisions and those agreements have real-life consequences in that building behind you. >> well, what they say here is until they get something official, and by official they mean in writing and not in twitter, to answer that question, they treat it as notional. we know it because of the transgender debate. the pentagon slow walked that until they had official guidance from the president. they said nothing is going to change. so here the view is very clear that when there's a presidential tweet, it doesn't equate to policy. now, in terms of what actually happened in that helsinki meeting, officials here are still waiting on an official order to somehow take it to the next level. we've talked to general votel who has been very clear that nothing has come out of that, nothing secretary mattis had had his briefing from the

joining me with the latest is hans nichols. lots to talk about right now.et's start first with the supreme court issue, the idea that the president is looking for somebody with whom he's got chemistry. why is this important to him? >> reporter: well, the president wants to present someone to the public and do it in a dramatic fashion that he feels meets the criteria both intellectually and physical -- the appearance of a supreme court justice. we saw that happen with neil gorsuch. he brought him out. he looked like someone from central casting. we've seen this throughout the trump administration. we also know that trump places a great premium on having a rapp

. >> nbc's hans nichols at the white house. walk me through the fallout inside trump's own team, especially from someone like dan coats. dan was essentially humiliated by the president. i spoke last night to people formerly inside the administration who said at this point i don't know how dan can stay on in the job. >> i was prepared to come out and say the president has been conspicuously silent on twitter, that has changed, and he's just tweeted out what appears to be a preview of his defense of his performance. here's what he just tweeted out. he said, thank you, rand paul. ese ceasing on the. so he's basically seizing on the one comment. a year and a half of investigations. what is he supposed to think? so stephanie, the president is not in the residence yet. excuse me, he's not in the west wing yet. he's tweeting from the residence. you're getting the sense it's starting to set in, this negative criticism, this chorus of criticism really. when the president initially left helsinki, he did these two interviews with fox news

joining me msnbc contributor hans nichols, mark landler, white house reporter for "the new york times," an david fromm. yesterday we were on the air when the president tried to wipe away everything that happened in helsinki with the addition of one word. the "would not" instead of "would." he went on twitter after that. he has been on twitter all this morning. he is asked point blank today if russia is still meddling, and he says no. what's going on? does he not know what his own director of national intelligence has said, or is he just blatantly defying him? >> katy, the interesting thing about president trump saying no there is that gina haspel, the head of the cia, was in the room. when we look closely at that cabinet, those cabinet officials, she was in there. she has real-time intelligence on what the russians are doing. who also has real-time intelligence? mike mccall. just a few hours beforehand they say they see increasing evidence that russia may be at it again. not only is president trump in contradiction of his own dni dan coats, but also members of his own party on the hil

nbc's hans nichols joins us from the white house along with "the new york times" chief white house correspondent peter baker and with us on set careen john pierre senior advisor to move on.org and michael steel, former chairman of the rnc. hans, let's start with you. this news not surprising, but it seemed to take a crush of negative press for donald trump to push out someone with clear flagrant blatant and repeated ethical problems. >> ethical problems, ethical challenges, however you want to couch it, nicolle. it was clear that scott pruitt was causing problems for the trump administration. the only real question was how was he able to last for so long. and the answer to that was always that president donald trump really liked what he was doing in dismantling the regulatory state and environmental protections. inside conservative movements, inside conservative circles scott pruitt was a hero, he was a champion. he was undoing a lot of the regulations of the obama administration. you heard the president in that tweet flick at that when he said he'd done an excellent job at the epa. fundamentall

hans nichols at the pentagon.weeted, the remains of american servicemen soon loving north korea headed to the united states. after many years this will be a great moment for so many families. thank you to kim jong-un, tweeted president trump. >>> still ahead this morning, much more on michael cone's reported willingness to inform the special counsel donald trump as a candidate new an inn advance of the infamous trudge tower meeting in 2016 with russians. >>> plus, president trump has a history of making personal attacks on twitter. now it seems robert mueller may take a look into that. "morning joe" is coming right back. >> i love this twittering and tweeting. i love it, because, you know, i'm bigger than the "new york times." i got tons of people. >> if i didn't have social media i probably wouldn't be standing here. i wouldn't be able to get the word out. >> you see all over television. we have breaking news, and i may be tweeting from bed, okay. >> if i put out like a 140-character tweet, they go crazy. we have