take a lisn to erin burnett outfront last night. >> there is a phone call from inside the consulate we understand from our sources from one of the individuals part of this hit teamli cal back to saudi arabia trm con to a senior aide to mohammed bin sa tanhat the assassination had taken place. >> now, this is interesting. the postlso says that the saudi ambassador to the u.s. urged khashoggi to go to istanbul and assured him that he would be safe there. the ambassador has now denied those claims. >>> 9:07. president trump says he's very easily he answered written questions in the mueller investigation, but he says he kesn't submitted them yet. the president so reporters from the oval office yesterday after a bill signing. d hen't say when he would send in those answers, but he assured people his attorneys did not write out the answers, he did. >> t'm surey're tricked up because they like to catch people -- ge was the weather sunny or was it rainy? he said it may have been a good day. it was rainy, therefore he told a lie, he perjured himself. okay. so, you know, you have to be careful w

congressional correspondent lisn desjardins begs our coverage. >> desjardins: in the basemeol of theit, senators arrive for a tense and critical briefing. two topics: u.s. support of the saudi-led war against houthi rels in yemen. and the murder of journalist jamal khasoggi in october. multiple outlets have reported the c.i.a. believes saudi crown prince muhamman salman ordered the assassination. but c.i.a. director gina haspel was not at today's briefing, somethinriating both parties.>> t's outrageous that the senate can be stonewalled from hearing from the c.i.a. director. >> i cannot recall a briefing on such a sensitive measure where we have been denied access to the intelligence agencies of the liited states. >> desjardins: repn senator lindsey graham, often an ally of the president's, has broken with him on muhammad bin salman, or m.b.s., and says he will withhold his vote on other issues to try to get answers. >> i'm talking about any key vote, anything that you need met for to getf town, i ain't doing it until we hear from the c.i.a. >> desjardins: secretary of state mike pom

let's lisn to whasecretary mattis had to say about that. >> we do not have arres authority.etention, i would put it in terms of minutes. eonether words, if som beating on a border patrolman, and if we wre in position to have to do something about it, we could stop them from beating on them and take them over and deliver them to a border patrolman who would then arrest them. there's no violation of the act here at all. >> again, is that goodo enugh? well, look, this is a manifestation of what is embedded in certain department of defense regulations andin ructions called the commanders emergency response authority. so what secretary mattis, ain, is emphasizing is that it really is a common-sense principle.un if a jior commander or a squad leader is out in the field conducting a logistics pigs, and they observe somebody's life being put in jbyopardn unlawful act of violence, what wod we expect them to do? to stand by and watch a borolder pagent be beaten to death? of course not. if this is all this means, then i thk it is consistent with the kind of v customay, very narrow limi

i know you've been lisning in on some briefings they've been happening. what have you heard so far? >> so i pu this whole issue about voting into four fferent columns right now. so the first is hacking, the thing we feared the most, the assians getting in and cnging votes. we're see nothing evidence of that. there's more activity, people are looking in and, you know, sort of on web sites and stuff, but nothing that is viewed as nefarious. that's the good news. the second pool is fae news and misinformation. your polling booth is closed. immigrations and customs enforcement is at this polling place, so don't go there if you are worried about yogrur imion status. facebook, twitter, and others have over the last week tried to bring down some of those sites. it brings like whack a mole. they see sakmething andit off and it's always responsive, and that's something that we know the russiansvere very,y much engaged with todaya and this i systematic challenge for those social media platforms. the , ird piece that we saand we saw the president play this game, is allegations of voter aud to