he ignored questions yesterday from kristen welker after he talked 25 minutes about his asia trip. the president's daughter ivanka did weigh in telling the soeshtsed press, quote, there's a special place in hell for people who prey on children. i have yet to see a valid explanation and i have no reason to doubt the victims' accounts. >> on the ground in alabama, the state's 21-member gop central committee met late yesterday to discuss options but took no

kristen welker has more. >> reporter: while president trump hit the links with tiger woods in florida, the cloud of the russia investigation is growing. a source familiar with the legal proceedings tells nbc news a lawyer for the president's ousted national security adviser michael online notified the president's team they would no lo nger share information. the change reported by the new york times so signal a significant shift in flynn's cooperation with robert mueller. >> what might it indicate. >> it could mean that he's cooperating with prosecutors. on the other hand, it might just mean he's negotiating with them. or trying to secure some favorable plea deal. in order to do that, though, he's going to have to demonstrate to prosecutors that he has some valuable information. >> reporter: the white house is down playing the very many one officialing telling nbc news, even if flynn is cooperating with mueller there is no concern at the white house that flynn will implicate. the president mr. trump's former campaign manager, cory lewandowski. >> there is no liability because he didn'

for more let's turn to nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker. kristen, good evening. >> reporter: lester, good evening to you. president trump took a victory lap today. in a nearly 25-minute speech here at the white house, the president insisted his 12-day trip to asia was a success. mr. trump clearly frustrated by headlines that suggested he didn't secure any concrete results. the president saying his trip laid the groundwork among allies in the region to get tougher against north korea and to pursue fairer trade deals. >> the momentum from our trip will launch us on our continued effort to accomplish the three core objectives i outlined. to unite the world against north korean nuclear threat, to promote a free and open indo-pacific region and to advance fair and reciprocal economic relations with our trading partners and allies in the region. >> reporter: there were no new announcements today, but the president again reiterated that time is running out when it comes to north korea and again said all options are on the table. now, tomorrow presi

i'm craig melvin alongside kristen welker. dylan drier dylan dreyer is here. >> did you observe some black friday shopping? >> no but i'm hoping do small business saturday. >>> tens of millions getting ready to head home after thanksgiving. many of you waking up this morning. dylan standing by with a look. >> most of the country is actually looking okay. but we do have a cold front that's going to make its way to the northeast that will cause some minor troubles but it's really the north west where we're going to see most of your problems today. especially late today and into sunday where we will see just heavy rain gusty winds. we could see gusts up to 50 or 60 miles per hour. expect some airport delays especially in seattle and portland later today if you have afternoon or evening flights. as for the roads the mountain passes will be slow going. from seattle to portland it looks like mainly a rain event, but a lot of rain. on sunday still very rainy and windy. it looks very warm through the middle of the country with high te

kristen welker is at the white house and nbc's kasie hunt is on capitol hill. kristen, when what are you expecting from the president? he said he was going to make a statement when he came back from asia, he's back from asia. what are you hearing? >> well, i just heard he is going to talk some time today, i don't know if he'll talk about the roy moore scandal. reporters will do their best to shout some questions at him. where does he stand right now? i think the sean hannity remarks were telling, the fact that you have hannity saying, look, you have 24 hours to explain the inconsistencies and if that can't happen him -- >> kristen, i'm sorry to interrupt you and we're going to come back to this topic in just a moment but the lauch players are back from asia. >> i'm going to start off by saying how embarrassed and i shamed i am for disappointed my family, my teammates, my coaches and the entire ucla community. i feel terrible and i'm sorry to everybody who i've let down. with that being said, i take full responsibility for the mistake i have made -- shoplifting.

kristen welker in washington. correspondent for "the new york times" magazine, mark leibovich and evan shore. evan mcmillan, a former chief policy director for the house of representatives and most recently an independent presidential candidate. zerlina maxwell, now director of progressive programming for sirius xm and tara set meyer, republican strategist and former communications director to congressman dana rohrbacher. kristen welker, let me start with you. can you just tell us how this would work and what you're hearing from your sources in and around the white house about the degree of concern about this now days long political scandal? the story in "the washington post" hit thursday afternoon. it's blocked out coverage of just about everything else. donald trump never likes to be ellipsed by anything or anyone. and this is now a full-blown washington scandal. >> here's what i can tell you. i've been trying to drill down on that "new york times" reporting that, as you said, two white house officials, accordin

joining us is garrett haake and kristen welker. first to you, garrett, nancy pelosi cancelling the meeting this afternoon. >> reporter: this is part of a tweet that the president wants to get done today. you had the president tweeting about this meeting saying the democrats wanted more borders and less crime, and he said, why would we want to go to a show meeting at the white house if there is no real deal to be discussed? and their statement says as much, that they don't see much value to go to the white house to essentially be a photo op for a president who a lot of folks on capitol hill can see, especially on the democratic side, has not been especially involved in this process, especially on these spending deals, from the get-go. so you have chuck schumer, nancy pelosi saying we would rather just go ahead and meet with paul ryan and mitch mcconnell and continue some kind of good faith negotiation rather than be a pawn in a presidential political gain. >> and, garrett, to kristen welker at the white house, the other side of this

kristen welker in the white house. back to the cfpb conversation. the roots began a decade ago then harvard professor elizabeth warren wrote an essay about protecting consumers from predatory practices's follows the financial collapse and passage of dodd/frank, established the cfpb, warren spearheaded development of the agency. massachusetts senator elizabeth warren joins kn s me now and wi meet with leandra english after this interview, the woman at the center of this set to become the acting director now has sueded president to take that position. senator warren, thank you for joining me. in that brief bio, you were prevented from taking leadership of the consumer financial protection bureau by exclusively republican senators who never gave us a good reason as to what the objection is to consumer protections. >> ali, do you remember the idea of approved credit cards? >> right. >> i was the pre-rejected nominee. >> that's right. >> i hadn't even been nominated when senate republicans said, never, ever, ever will elizabeth warren be allowed to run t

lester. >> kristen welker at the white house. thanks. >>> less than a day after report of at least eight women accusing broadcaster charlie rose of sexual harassment, rose has been fired by cbs where he hosted the network's morning program, and pbs has canceled his long-running interview show. rose has spoken albeit briefly for the first time since the allegations surfaced. we get our report from stephanie gosk. >> say anything to the accusers? accusing you of wrongdoings? >> it's not wrongdoings. >> reporter: less than 24 hours after a "washington post" article alleged charlie rose sexually harassed female employees for years, the 75-year-old is out of a job. president of cbs news announced rose was fired. writing in part, no one may be able to correct the past but what once may have been accepted should not ever have been acceptable. >> doesn't get a pass here. >> reporter: cbs coanchors spoke out, with a mix of anger and sadness. >> let me be very clear, there is no excuse for this alleged behavior. it is systemic and pervasiv

our white house correspondent kristen welker has those details. >> send him to gitmo. i would certainly consider that. >> reporter: with the white house calling the terror suspect an enemy combatant, president trump said today he's open to sending him to the military prison at guantanamo bay, a move seemingly backed by some on capitol hill. >> if you act like a terrorist and you say you're a terrorist, that's enough for me. we ought to treat you as a terrorist. >> because he's an enemy combatant. he killed americans. >> reporter: mr. trump also called on congress to dismantle the diversity visa lottery program, which allowed sayfullo saipov into the united states from uzbekistan in 2010. >> diversity lottery sounds nice. it's not nice. it's not good. >> reporter: the program randomly selects applicants from countries with low immigration rates. there are some requirements like criminal background checks, but mr. trump says it isn't tough enough. >> we have to get much less politically correct. >> reporter: the president called the diversity program a chuck schumer beau

our kristen welker has the story for us. >> reporter: president trump making the controversial comment during a white house ceremony honoring navajo code talkers, the native american veterans who developed secret communications that helped win world war ii. >> and i just want to thank you because you're very, very special people. you were here long before any of us were here. although we have a representative in congress who they say was here a long time ago, they call her pocahontas. but you know what? i like you because you are special. >> reporter: that pocahontas quip he's hurled at elizabeth warren before. she came under fire for claiming native american ancestry during his academic career. >> pocahontas, that's elizabeth warren. i call her goofy. >> reporter: today in the oval office, those native american veterans didn't react but senator warren lashed out. >> it is deeply unfortunate that the president of the united states cannot even make it through a ceremony honoring these heroes without having to throw out a racial slur. >> reporter: moments later, the white house responded

>> kristen welker at the white house. thank you, kristen. >>> tonight a race against time to find a submarine off the coast of argentina with dozens on board. it's a growing mystery in the deep, and now there's late word from searchers that they've detected sounds that could be from the sub. nbc's keir simmons has details. >> reporter: tonight rescuers battling rough seas, waves two stories high. a race against time to find the missing submarine. and now hopes raised. a u.s. military official telling nbc news the argentine navy hearing hammer-like noises from the ocean, perhaps banging from inside the missing submarine. the search area, once larger than california, now narrowing. the sub had been heading north before it disappeared wednesday with 44 crew on board. but today news it reported a battery failure five days ago and was told to turn back. since then, nothing. the search expanding to include seven countries, among them the u.s. with the u.s. navy's sophisticated poseidon aircraft known as a submarine hunter. amer

here's nbc white house correspondent kristen welker. >> reporter: president trump touching down in hawaii, sounding off before taking off on his landmark trip to asia. now a former trump advisor who was in the room tells nbc news then candidate trump listened with interest as papadopoulos floated the idea of a meeting between trump and vladimir putin. jeff sessions immediately shot down the idea. today mr. trump who just last week boasted about his great memories -- >> one of the great memories of all time. >> reporter: -- said he has little recollection of this encounter. >> mr. president, do you remember george papadopoulos during that march meeting? >> i don't remember much about that meeting. it was a very unimportant meeting. >> reporter: in february the president insisted he wasn't aware of any campaign advisers contacting russian officials during the campaign. >> nobody that i know of. >> reporter: asked today if he stands by those words -- >> all i can tell you is this. there was no collusion. there was no nothing. it's a disgrace, frankly. >> reporter: also under mounting scrutin

lester. >> kristen welker at the white house. >>> in alabama the governor there says she still plans to vote for candidate roy moore even though she's bothered by the allegations of sexual misconduct against him. this as moore's wife spoke out today in his defense. nbc's gabe gutierrez has the latest. >> we will not stop fighting for the people of alabama. >> reporter: amid allegations from at least nine women against her husband, today kayla moore fired back. >> even after all the attacks against me, against my family, against the foundation and now against my husband, he will not step down. >> reporter: surrounded by women who support his campaign, she defended her husband of 32 years. >> he is a loving father and a grandfather. most important, he is a christian. >> reporter: roy moore has denied the accusations ranging from inappropriate flirting to sexual assault that go back decades, some involving teenaged girls, one as young as 14. governor, do you still plan to vote for roy moore? >> that's what i plan to do is vote for the republican nominee, roy moore. >> reporter: governor

>> all right, kristen welker, thank you. >>> tonight, there are increasing signs a republican tax plan will pass the senate this week, but major differences would still need to be worked out between the house and senate bills as we continue to take a closer look at the potential impact. tonight we're focusing on college education. the house plan would do away with many deductions that lower and middle class families rely on to make college more affordable. today students came out in vocal opposition. here's nbc's tom costello. >> reporter: 12 million americans would be affected no longer allowed to deduct student loan interests from their taxes. including graduate students. who work on campus in exchange for a tuition waiver. republicans want to treat that waive tuition as income. hitting them with 400% income increase. at american university, she would have to pay tax on her $50,000 grad school tuition which is waived. >> i already have a student loan that i'm trying to pay off. i don't know if i could take out another student loan. >> reporter: 70% of students leave with some form of

nbc white house correspondent kristen welker has details. >> reporter: tonight, four people familiar with the investigation tell nbc news that special counsel robert mueller is looking into whether ousted national security adviser michael flynn agreed to an alleged offer of roughly $15 million for a quid pro quo with the government of turkey just weeks before donald trump's inauguration. under a microscope, an alleged meeting at this upscale new york restaurant blocks from the transition offices at trump tower where flynn, then advising the transition, and turkish officials allegedly discussed removing a chief rival of turkey's president from the u.s. and sending him back to turkey. turkey's president recep erdogan blames that rival, fethullah gulen, who lives in pennsylvania, for the attempted turkish coup in 2016 that was aimed at ousting erdogan. gulen denies the coup allegations but erdogan has reportedly asked the u.s. to extradite him. the obama administration resisted. did turkey turn to flynn? >> any government official to make any kind of deal that accepts money to carry out

nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker now on what they were allegedly communicating about. >> reporter: tonight, stunning new revelations of months of correspondence during the campaign between the president's eldest son, donald trump jr. and wikileaks, the hackers which the u.s. intelligence community believe was used by the russian government to disseminate information. according to "the atlantic," the direct twitter messages were turned over to congressional investigators by trump jr's lawyers. according to the atlantic, trump junior largely ignored the frequent messages from wikileaks. but in one instance, wikileaks direct messaged trump junior a link to their database of leaked emails. writing, "strongly suggest your dad tweet this link if he mentions us." trump junior didn't respond immediately but his father tweeted 15 minutes later. "very little pickup by the dishonest media of incredible information provided by wikileaks." then, two days later, on october 14th, 2016, trump junior tweeted out the link wikileaks sent him. on election day, wikileaks wrote to don juni

we get more from nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker. >> reporter: just days after the world learned george papadopoulos, a volunteer trump campaign aide, pled guilty to lying to the fbi about his contacts with russian officials who offered him dirt on hillary clinton, the ripple effect with attorney general jeff sessions under fresh scrutiny tonight. a source familiar with sessions' thinking tells nbc news during the campaign sessions rejected a proposal by papadopoulos to use russian contacts to set up a meeting between then-candidate donald trump and russia's vladimir putin. according to court documents, papadopoulos floated the idea during this meeting chaired by sessions and attended by mr. trump. it's significant because sessions told congress in june he'd never had any conversations with russians or foreign officials about interference and -- >> further, i have no knowledge of any such conversations by anyone connected to the trump campaign. >> my sources are telling me that jeff sessions rejected the idea of a trump/putin meeting and then moved on. >> reporter:

nbc's kristen welker has the story. >> reporter: the white house on defense after president trump dubbed senator al franken al frankenstein on twitter. franken apologized for inappropriate sexual misconduct toward a former model and radio host during a 2006 uso tour. so why has mr. trump stayed silent all week on republican embattled senate candidate roy moore? >> he did it while he was on a foreign trip in asia. i did it repeatedly yesterday. >> reporter: the president briefly told reporters while in asia he was aware of the story and indicated he would speak further. that hasn't happened yet. though, sanders called the allegations deeply troubling. still, the disparity is renewing focus on the president's own controversial past after this "access hollywood" tape surfaced during the campaign, more than a dozen women came forward, accusing then-candidate trump of sexual misconduct, including jessica leeds. >> it's just indicative of this culture that allowed this behavior. there were no repercussions. >> reporter: so what's the difference between franken's accusers and mr. trump's? >> i

let's get reaction from the white house, kristen welker joins us from there, kristen, the president sayingll handle this, that's the word. any idea what that means? >> reporter: well, he gave us an indication earlier in a tweet. let me read you the tweet, the president tweeting just spoke to president xi jinping of jamaican spe concerning the proinvolve tick actions of north korea, additional major sanctions will be put on north korea today, this situation will be handled. what will the specific sanctions look like, the state department has not announced any specific sanctions. will china will a part of those sanctions? we know that president trump has been trying to turn up the heat and pressure china to apply pressure to north korea to abandon its nuclear program. that was the point of his 12-day trip he just took to asia. the white house wants to see china not only impose new sanctions but to cut off it's oil shipments as well. yesterday we heard from president trump about all of this and steve, it was interesting he abandoned some of the fire and fury rhetoric that we have heard from h

here's nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker. >> reporter: president trump sounding off before taking off on his landmark trip to asia. >> i think we're going to have great success. >> reporter: but unable to leave behind the russia probe after new revelations about this march meeting with george papadopoulos, who has pled guilty to lying to the fbi about his contacts with russia, now a former trump adviser who was in the room tells nbc news then-candidate trump listened with interest as papadopoulos floated the idea of a meeting between trump and vladimir putin. jeff sessions immediately shot down the idea. today mr. trump who just last week boasted about his great memories. >> one of the great memories of all time. >> reporter: says he has little recollection of this encounter. mr. president do you remember george papadopoulos during that march meeting? >> i don't remember much about that meeting. it was a very unimportant meeting. >> reporter: in february the president insisted he wasn't aware of any campaign advisers contacting russian officials during the campaign. >> nobo

our kristen welker has more. >> reporter: the white house on defense tonight after president trump dubbed senator al franken, al frankenstein on twitter last night. franken apologized for inappropriate sexual misconduct toward a former model and radio host during a 2006 uso tour. so why has mr. trump stayed silent all week on republican embattled senate candidate roy moore? >> he did it while he was on a foreign trip in asia. i did it repeatedly yesterday. >> reporter: the president briefly told reporters while in asia hes with aware of the story and indicated he would speak further. that hasn't happened yet though sanders called the allegations deeply troubling. still the disparity is renewing focus on the president's past after this "access hollywood" tape surfaced during the campaign. >> grab them by the [ bleep ]. >> reporter: more than a dozen women came forward accusing then-candidate trump of sexual misconduct, including jessica leeds. >> it's just indicative of this culture that allowed this behavior and, you know, there were no repercussions. >> reporter: so what's the difference

our white house correspondent kristen welker has details. >> should have happened a long time ago. should have happened years ago. >> reporter: tonight president trump trying to further isolate north korea. during a meeting with his cabinet, the president designating the country a state sponsor of terror which will mean stiffer sanctions. mr. death of american otto warmbier. and -- >> in addition to threatening the world by nuclear devastation, north korea has repeatedly supported acts of international terrorism including assassinations on foreign soil. >> reporter: the move is a reversal of a george w. bush policy which lifted the terror designation to foster diplomatic talks over its nuclear program. that effort failed. so will this attempt work or is it purely a symbolic move? >> the practical effects may be limited, but we hopefully are closing off a few loopholes with this. >> reporter: also front and center at the cabinet meeting, the president pushing for tax reform. >> we're going to give the american people a huge tax cut for christmas. >> reporter: at the same time, the w

kristen welker has details. >> reporter: the president not commenting on the new uproar. after sparking international outrage for retweeting a series of unverified videos purporting to show violence by muslims. those videos originally posted to twitter by jada fransen, a leader of britain first, a fringe ultranationalist group in the uk. convicted for shouting insults at a woman wearing a hijab. >> i was pleased to see the leader of the free world had retweeted from my twitter account. >> reporter: but the backlash immediate on capitol hill. >> it empowers fringe elements on the right. >> reporter: and a stunning rebuke from the british prime minister who says britain first seeks to peddle lies and it is wrong for the president to have done this. this afternoon the dutch embassy saying at least one of the videos, titled muslim migrant beats up dutch boy on crutches, was not authentic and that the perpetrator in the video is not an immigrant. press secretary sarah sanders. >> whether it's a real video, the threat is real, and that's what the president is talking about. tha

nbc white house correspondent kristen welker has more. >> reporter: the legal vice may be tightening on michael flynn. multiple sources familiar with the investigation tell nbc news federal investigators have gathered enough evidence to bring charges in their investigation of flynn and his son michael g. flynn. the elder flynn was fired after just 24 days on the job for lying about his contacts with the russian ambassador. mr. trump has downplayed any connections between flynn and russia. >> i do think he's a fine man. >> reporter: under scrutiny, flynn was paid nearly $34,000 to speak at a 2015 moscow gala, and seen sitting next to the russian president vladimir putin while he was informally advising the trump cal pain. sources indicate special counsel robert mueller is zeroing in on flynn's lobby work and whether he laundered money or lied about overseas contacts and whether flynn attempted to orchestrate i the removal of a chief rival of u.s. flynn's son who worked on the trump campaign and briefly on the transition could also face charges. >> if michael flynn, the elder michael f

. >> kristen welker standing inside the briefing room where we're waiting to hear from press secretary sarah huckabee sanders any minute now. i'll let you know when she comes out if you don't catch it yourself, kristen. what are we expecting to hear about reaction from this new york attack? >> i think a lot of questions about what you just played, ali, the fact that the president says he's open to sending the new york terror suspect to gitmo. according to an authority when nbc spoke, that is not legally possible. there is no legal authority for that right now. the suspect at this point will be charged through the regular process. so we'll ask sarah huckabee sanders to clarify, to delve into how seriously the president is really considering that possibility. we're also going to ask her about the president's other call today. he called for an end to the diversity visa lottery program, said he has already made that charge to congress. of course, that is the program through which the terror suspect entered the united states back in 2010. it essentially allows for 50,000 permanent visas eve

nbc's kasie hunt and kristen welker are here with the latest.apitol hill where the president is expected soon, you have a house track and senate track. what can we expect from the vote in the house today and for republicans, they've got to be really concerned to see ron johnson on the senate side coming out. is that the start of a flood gate on the republican side in the senate? >> reporter: well, a couple things here, steve. first of all, on the house side, it's expected to be something of a celeb bra tore day. they moved the timing on this bill and it's the signal to everybody that they feel very comfortable and confident that the votes are there to pass this plan. it's hard to overstate the difference between how this feels, covering this bill in the house compared to how it was with health care. people were dreading taking that vote. that does not seem to be the case here. there is not a problem with the freedom caucus on the right. there's a little issue on the left with moderate republicans from new york districts primarily who have been v

nbc's kristen welker has details. >> the bill is passed. >> reporter: celebration on the house floor after republicans passed a bill that would cut taxes by more than $1.4 trillion over ten years, slash the corporate tax rate to 20% from 35. and simplify the number of tax brackets. >> it's about giving people more take-home pay. it's about raising wages. >> reporter: today president trump was on capitol hill before the vote to rally the house. behind the scenes, he's also focused on the senate where tax reform faces the highest hurdle after republicans inserted a surprise provision to repeal the obamacare individual mandate. tonight, another obstacle. the joint committee on taxation estimated the senate bill would raise the average tax rate for those making between 10,000 and 30,000 in 2021 and on all income groups making under $75,000 in 2027. the leading republican on the finance committee, orrin hatch, calling the findings misleading. republican ron johnson opposes the bill. >> i worked my tail off over the weekend to fix this problem so we can move forward with a tax reform. >> r

nbc's kristen welker is at the white house and garrett haake is on capitol hill. kristen, let's focus on what's exactly in the bill. let's remind folks of what it has right now. the president has promised huge tax cuts for christmas. what he doesn't want to say is that it ends in some very popular deductions. it ends popular deductions on moving expenses. alimony, student loan interest tuition and fees. while republicans have been claiming this is a relief for middle class americans, this chart shows that the poorer you are, the more you have to lose under the plan. for example, by 2021, a family making between $10,000 and $20,000 will lose nearly $440 compared to a family making between $500,000 and a million, gaining -- gaining -- $20,000. republicans say it will all trickle down to average americans, but in a recent survey 65% of ceos said they would take those tax deductions and pay off debt. 45%, they would use capital on stock buybacks and 35% say they'd use it to hire more people. the cuts will also, the gop claims, will help out main street, but they are no

kristen welker, thank you. the we want to listen to senator schumer on the senate floor now speaking live talking about all this. let's listen. >> we pledge to do whatever is in our power to help our city. president bush in a moment of national tragedy understood the meaning of his high office and sought to bring our country together. president trump, where is your leadership? the contrast between president bush's actions after 9/11 and president trump's actions this morning could not be starker. again, mr. president, president trump, where is your leadership? i would say in closing, i have always believed that immigration is good for america. i believe it today. president trump, instead of politicizing and dividing america, which he always seems to do at times of national tragedy, should be bringing us together and focusing on the solution, anti-terrorism funding which he proposed to cut in his most recent budget. so i am calling on the president trump to rescind his proposed cuts to this vital anti-terrorism

joining me, kristen welker, correspondent kasie hunt. kasie, first to you, because they just rolled out this big tax proposal and you've been writing and briefing us this morning. they were working on it until the last minute. this is thrown together, if you will, over the last 24 hours. >> reporter: they're still working on it, andrea. there are still, you know, some final details that were not included in the handouts that were given to members this morning. there were quite a few questions that we put to republican members of the conference about the contents of this bill, and they said, look, frankly we don't quite have the answers yet. but they are pressing ahead, anyway, and it has made a great deal of progress in figuring it's sorting through this framework, and it's clear that they are feeling a lot of pressure to make sure that this is something that middle class families feel like helps their bottom line, that this is, at the end of the day, a middle class tax cut. some of that pressure came from the white house, some of it cam

bring in kristen welker, garrett haake on thrill and von is aughn the phone. and begin whip you, kristen. once again the president asked several times yesterday about sexual assault and someone brought up the president's own accus accus accusers. he had not condemned roy moore and then about 10:00 p.m. last night decided to tweet about al franken. >> reporter: right. a new name for al franken dubbing him al frankenstein, of course, not usual for the president to come up with nicknames for people when criticizing them, but you're absolutely right. we have yet to hear from president trump on the issue of roy moore. the issue that impacts his own party. sarah huckabee sanders yesterday was pressed about this over and over again and said, look it is the president's thinking that it's ultimately up to the people of alabama to make this decision. we know this comes as we're learning that steve bannon has been sending a strong message to the establishment, essentially, back off. you're seeing some of that, i think, play out. sean hannity backing off some of his critic