>> all right, manu raju, stick around. thanks so much. let's go back to cnn chief political correspondent dana bash. and, dana, obviously what we just heard from the republican congressman there praising president trump, praising the house leadership, we're going to hear a lot of that on camera, but off camera we're going to hear a lot of finger pointing, a lot of blame about why this colossal failure was allowed to happen. it is a big deal for such a momentous vote to be pulled twice two days in a row. >> reporter: pulled twice with no end in sight, no vote in sight, and as you just heard from manu, and we'll hear from the speaker here, it really sounds like they want to move on to other issues. and you talked about, you know, the public versus the private. let's be clear, the blame game is already happening. my phone is blowing up. i bet yours is, too, jake. it started a couple of days ago as they saw this incredibly messy, unbelievably messy process going down. and what does that mean? it means we're hearing from conservatives saying t

david chalian, very political director, i cannot wait to hear your impressions and let's fist go to manu raju breaking news on the house intel committee. what have you learned. >> reporter: the department of justice complying with request from members of congress to provide information whether there's any evidence at all to back up president trump's charge that he was spied on under barak obama, they made a request to respond by monday which they failed to meet that deadline. they have now responded we are told by a source in the house intelligence committee as well as the justice department. the justice department is also saying they have responded to the senate judiciary committee each of which has raised their own questions. a spokeswoman has said they have complied -- seeking information related to surveillance during the 2016 election. this comes right before a hearing monday where james comey will testify on a public setting on the issue of wiretapping but largely on russia meddling in the campaign and what we understand what the fbi is doing as well. comey had been under pressure to re

let's go straight to our manu raju.lying his own brand of pressure to nunes this morning, keeping up with him at every step. what did you make of his answers and nonanswers to you this morning on his position leading this committee? >> reporter: well, it sounds like he's going to stay as chairman of the committee and continue to run this russia investigation, despite these democratic calls for him to recuse himself, angrily rejecting those calls, believing that they're really out of bounds. he continually said, ask democrats those questions, don't ask me. i'm moving forward with this russia investigation, and republicans on the committee support him staying in that position. a number of republicans going into this conference meeting where republicans just met signal that they do support him, including pete king of new york, who said to me, absolutely not should nunes step down. this would be just giving in to democrats. so, nunes really rejecting any notion that his standing is undermining this investigation, believing

cnn's manu raju has more from capitol hill. >> reporter: good morning, christine and dave. there was push back on capitol hill yesterday to the idea of doing a compromise immigration bill to provide some legal status to undocumented immigrants. this was an idea that suddenly was proposed by the white house in a meeting with journalists moments before the state of the union. when republicans caught wind of this, they did not know what to think and some frankly pushed back aggressively thinking they cannot move on this first without moving on issues like securing the border. one of the conservatives was ted cruz of texas. i talked with him yesterday about this issue and about the white house floating the idea which he discounted. >> i don't make it a habit to respond to rumors passed on by reporters. >> it wasn't the rumor. it was the president of the united states. >> you are welcome to testify and give your views. i'll wait until i see proposals to comment on them and not chase down every press rumor. >> what about the idea of giving status? >> we need to secure the border.

we saw paul ryan being pressured by manu raju at a few hours ago, our own manu raju and he says he himself at least so far has seen no wiretapping and last night we saw donald trump extending the story by two weeks saying you're going to see information come out in the next two weeks and see sean spicer the spokesman for donald trump has gone out and backed up his boss on that and so it will be interesting to hear what sean spicer has to say today but to your point there's so much going on right now. they are releasing a budget that's going to be fought tooth and nail on capitol hill and yet again we're seeing president trump make himself off message. >> thank you. i want to bring in mj and shelby to talk on health care. he alluded to speaker ryan. speaker ryan isn't budging on the health care bill but heaping a ton of praise on the president. in the meantime the president in nashville saying we'll keep the praise. >> it was interesting how speaker ryan's comments this morning he said say that he is almost giving president trump credit for wanting to negotiate on the health care bill and t

our manu raju, i think i recognized manu's voice, asked him directly if he showed the members of the intelligence committee that data that made him so angry and he said he didn't have it. manu, we have manu here, is that how you read it? >> reporter: yes, he did not show the members of the committee the information. it looks like it was just a discussion about what he actually saw. so he said we don't have those documents. when i asked him, do you have those documents, have you shown those members, he didn't have those. also he refused to say how he got this information. now, as you know, there's been a lot of suspicion, particularly among democrats, that perhaps this was engineered by the trump administration, by the white house to give him information, to muddy the waters, to create a narrative that president trump was being surveilled, being spied on, and to give him some political cover. now, he did not quite -- he didn't say where this is coming from because he said we need to protect our sources and methods. he said that we as an intelligence committee take that very, very seri

manu raju on capitol hill with this. manu? >> real skepticism whether this house committee can come to a bipartisan consensus and rejecting the calls to step aside and some of his colleagues are saying why should we give into democratic pressure and some of the democrats calling to in back on the books and the one that was canceled involving john brennan and james clapper and as well as sally yates. that is not being scheduled yet, but what nunes wants to have is a private briefing with james comey and mike rogers, the nsa director and there's dispute whether they can have a private classified hearing and a private hearing and the senate investigation is moving forward and taking shape and starting to move forward and potentially interview jared kushner the president's son-in-law in the coming weeks and there are negotiations happening to have them come in and talk on the staff level with the staff on the senate side. while that's happening quietly, the acrimony is happening on the house any chairman richard burr and the top d

manu raju up on the hill. it may take all of president trump's deal making ability to sell the obamacare replacement plan being pushed right now by republican congressional leaders. democrats obviously, they have been digging in their heels, but the real resistance is coming from plenty of republican conservatives. let's go to our senior white house correspondent jim accosta. jim, a very tough sell for the white house right now. >> absolutely, wolf. president trump met with congressional republicans today as gop opposition appears to be building against the white house plan to repeal and replace obamacare. the white house claims the gop is not trying to rush the bill through congress when, in fact, that's exactly what they're doing. making only brief appearances in front of the cameras, president trump is scrambling behind closed doors along with top republicans to sell the gop plan to repeal and replace obamacare. >> okay, thank you very much. >> reporter: tweeting, despite what you hear in the press, health

first, let's go to manu raju, he's covering a stunning new cur curveball and the very angry reactions from the top democrats. manu, walk us through the breaking story. >> tonight, devin nunes, the chairman of the committee, creating an uproar by going public with what he learned from a secret source that some of trump's communications with officials were picked up incidentally in communications that were surveilled by the united states intelligence community. tonight democrats are concerned that mr. nunes went public without briefing them first and briefed the white house just as the house intelligence committee is conducting its own investigation, into russia, russia meddling and any improper contacts that may exist between the trump campaign and the russian officials. the question is who exactly was picked up by the incidental collections by the intelligence committee. when i asked to ask mr. nunes committee was the president of the united states picked up? this is what he said. >> was the president part of that incidental collection, his communications? >> yes. >> this -- they were

. >> manu raju on capitol hill. >> reporter: good morning. a contrast, there's gridlock on the house side a partisan fight over devin nunes and whether he should go forward leading the investigation. democrats accuse him of being too close to the white house. nunes saying he's not going anywhere, the question is how. the senate side leaders are moving forward in a bipartisan manner. i asked whether they will look into the issue of the russia collusion and do you believe whether there's nothing there? >> we would be crazy to try to draw conclusions where we are in the investigation. i think mark and i have committed to let this process go through before we form any opinions. and i would hope that that's what you would like us to do as much as we would like to share minute by minute even the snap sho shots we get are not always accurate. >> reporter: really leaving open the possibility there could be some collusion between the trump campaign and russians. the white house has said it's a hoax, says nothing there, say it's made up, fake news, but

manu raju on capitol hill. >> reporter: good morning. the stand on the house intelligence committee after devin nunes made the surprising revelation yesterday saying he met with a source on white house grounds to discuss information pertaining to the incidental collection of information regarding president trump's associates during the time of the transition with foreign officials. now this came of course as the house intelligence committee has been investigating any trump ties with russian officials and democrats were outraged by nunes' move to brief the president of the united states on this issue and now the discussion of happening on white house grounds has led adam schiff to call on nunes to recuse himself. he is suggesting he's not going anywhere telling wolf blitzer yesterday this is all very common. >> i've been working this a long time with many different sources and needed a place i could go and knew what i was looking for and could actually get access to what i need today see. i'm kwequite sure that people i west wing had no i

cnn senior congressional reporter manu raju live on capitol hill. manu, what's going on here? >> reporter: well, the house investigation coming to a total stand still, john, over this fight between the democrats and republicans over the role of devin nunes, the chairman of the committee who did say yesterday that he wanted to hear privately from fbi director james comey, but james comey telling cnn that he's actually not gotten that invite yet and does not want to be in the middle of this tug-of-war between republicans and democrats about how to move forward. now, this is a marked contrast to what was seen on the senate side of the capitol. the leaders of the senate intelligence committee said they are conducting a thorough deep dive into the russian meddling in the elections, something that the chairman of the committee richard burr said is the biggest -- one of the biggest investigations he's seen in the last two decades. the leaders of the senate intelligence committee vowing to answer this fundamental question. did the trump campaign coordinate with the russians to meddle

this is a clip where my colleague manu raju tried to catch up with her and get her sense, get her take on whether or not she will support this plan as it is written now. >> no, no, no, no. >> are you supporting the health care plan at this moment? >> would you give me a minute to get to my constituents please? >> just yes or no. >> would you please be respectful. >> i'm sbg very respectful. >> -- for two hours, come on. >> reporter: clearly senator murkowski not ready to sign on to this. what she has a problem with, which many other senators have a problem with is you have a rollback of medicaid expansion. that is a big problem for her. what he'll see on the democratic side, house democrats will be holding a press conference at 10:30, they'll be making their case this is too harsh, specifically targeting republicans who will be vulnerable, up for re-election. those who are from states where hillary clinton won for 2016, also states that have lots of seniors and who are counting on their health insurance, and finally those states that decided to go ahead and expand the medicaid under ob

but before that, manu raju, because we have the statement from chairman nunes. manu, he had seen these documents from the department of justice. what is he saying? >> reporter: that he got them and that's about it. we're not learning about the contents of the documents according to what mr. nunes just said. i'll read you this brief statement from chairman nunes saying the committee is satisfied that the department of justice has fully complied with our request for information from our march 8th letter on possible surveillance related to donald trump or his associates. he also said the committee has not received information from the cia and fbi related to a separate matter. that matter involving the issues of leaks and whether any of his information was mishandled in the way this information was leaked. he said the nsa had partially met their request regarding leaks. but saying that he is satisfied that the department of justice has fully complied with our request for information related to the surveillance of president trump. let's unpack that. he's saying he got

let's go to manu raju live now, following. so, manu, house speaker paul ryan was asked about this awes well. his take on this, because devin nunes for his part is standing firm. >> reporter: yeah, he is, and paul ryan's standing behind him, only saying no and no when he was asked a question about whether or not mr. nunes should recuse himself from this investigation or if he knows of the source of that information, this coming after ryan's office issued a statement yesterday saying they have full confidence behind nunes running what they consider a credible investigation. but notably, also, ryan was nearly an hour late for this press conference, only took four questions, only one on nunes, and of course, that was something that a lot of reporters had questions on, whether or not this intelligence committee can move forward. now, nunes is, of course, signaling that he's ready to move forward, continue as chairman, but there are a lot of questions about whether he can do that and whether the committee can produce a bipartisan rep

let's get over to cnn's senior congressional reporter manu raju. iff just put out this statement, manu. what is he getting at? >> reporter: well, he thinks he may have actually revealed classified information if this is true. now, remember, president trump said this last night, "i just want people to know the cia was hacked and a lot of things taken, that was during the obama years." schiff is saying in his effort to blame president obama, president trump may have revealed classified information that the cia was hacked. schiff was careful in his statement about saying whether or not the cia was actually hacked, but his warning to president trump is this, if you want to declassify something, it should be done in a thoughtful manner, not done shooting it off your head and just saying something that could be classified and something that ordinarily would be considered in a leg an illegal leak. remember, kate, the president can declassify anything he wants. the question is if the president wanted to declassify this key piece of information, if it's true

let's bring from cnn's jeff zeleny and manu raju. it's been almost two weeks, gentlemen, since this wild and apparently baseless claim has been made. the white house has gone through several responses. first they were trying to find out just what it was the president trump had been tweeting about. then they demanded a congressional investigation to find out what happened. then they switched to no comment with people including vice-president pence refusing to say that they agreed that this allegation had happened. then when it became clear that both the former director of national intelligence and the current fbi director were saying this did not happen, they started trying to walk it back by claiming that wiretapping was in quotes, and therefore, what president trump was referring to was any kind of surveillance, and moreover, not only did president trump not mean, hey, i was wiretapped at trump tower, me personally. it now, of course, the definition had been expanded to include there was surveillance conducted and maybe somebody, so

we get more from manu raju. >> reporter: good morning.omey on capitol hill as part of the growing investigation in russia and russian attempts to influence the elections. also the questions that still remain about the alleged contacts that occurred with the trump campaign an soeshssociate people tied to the kremlin. comey met behind closed doors with the top eight leaders in the house and senate who get that highly classified information. two meetings conducted behind closed doors. also at a time of growing tension with the members and fbi and whether the fbi is giving them enough information for them to conduct their own reviews. after that briefing, we talked to the members who left. they would not comment. we are still trying to learn more details about what was discussed. we do know part of the larger effort to figure out what happened in the attempts to influence the elections. >> manu, thank you. >>> four months after early reports of a computer server connection with the trump organization and russian bank widely dismissed. did you

but i want to put you on hold and go to manu raju on capitol hill who talked to the top democrat on the intelligence senate committee who just came back from the cia. >> reporter: that's right, going through reams of intelligence and this on going investigation of russia and hacking, tom warn said he has as a lot of questions because he saw data that he suggests aimed at helping one candidate and hurting another candidate. >> just came back from the cia, there were four senators we got a chance to look at some of the raw intel product and in many ways we have got even more questions now. we've got more information we've got to get access to. i know as the committee gets into the next stage of listing who we want to have conversations with, but the main thing is that we're all committed democrats and republicans to keeping this by parson, a lot of what we saw was evidence how russia manipulated the news, hacked into the dnc and john podesta and leaked out in favor of one candidate against the other candidate but these efforts of whether there were contacts between the campaign and the ru

let's go to our senior congressional reporter manu raju. san split is widening as three key witnesses are offering to appear before the panel. >> those three witnesses, carter page, paul manafort, roger stone, trump advisers from the campaign season who have agreed to come forward if the house intelligence committee wants to hear from them, carter page telling me earlier he wants to have a public hearing to clear his name, believes he's been smeared by lies and innuendos in his words. this comes as a lot of tension between republicans and democrats on the committee. devin nunes earlier this week decided to brief president trump over new information that he obtained from a secret source showing that some trump communications may have appeared in some intelligence reports, something that he believed was alarming enough to brief president trump before his committee members. this came as today mr. nunes also they also canceled a meeting. democrats are sounding off but some saying nunes should step down as chairman of the committee. adam schiff,

manu raju outside this meeting right now on capitol hill. manu, what's going on?r roughly 50 minutes at this point, john and poppy. this is the first time democrats on this full committee will be able to meet with devin nunes, talk to him about what exactly he revealed publicly, that the president's own team's communications were incidentally picked up, legally, during the transition period last year. of course as we saw last night, this prompted an uproar among the committee democrats who revealed that nunes should not have revealed this publicly, should not have briefed the president of the united states, and believe it could have undermined this bipartisan inquiry that's happened into russia and alleged contacts between russian officials and trump officials. what i've been told about the data information that mr. nunes has looked at in these reports include communications about president trump, the forming of his new government from senior level transition officials. this information appeared to have been disseminated widely within the intelligence community, s

let's begin with our senior congressional reporter manu raju. manu, why are senators personally now going over to cia headquarters? >> reporter: well, wolf, tonight the intelligence committee are pushing forward into investigations on russia's involvement. whether or not there were campaign contacts with trump officials when russian officials at that time while russia was trying to apparently help elect donald trump, that in the view of the intelligence community. now, today four senators went to cia headquarters in langley, virginia to pour over raw intelligence to look at exactly what russia was doing. one of those was senator mark warner, the top democrat in the committee who told me that it looks like from that data that russia was trying to help one candidate over another. >> a lot of what we saw today was the evidence underlying how russia manipulated the news, how it hacked into the dnc and john podesta and leaked out in favor of one candidate against another candidate. but i think these efforts beyond even the whole question about whether

that's what white house told manu raju tonight. let's discuss the wiretapping claims.ening evan and jack. welcome back. evan according to reporting james comey is going to disclose what he knows about the investigation into president trump and russia. what do you want to hear? >> just the truth. like many americans i think needs to be more transparence, american people need to understand to the degree they can, nopt compromising any investigation, what is happening and what isn't, what is being looked into it. that describes what the justice department is doing through the fbi. i also think needs to be select committees in congress to investigate what russia did during the election and potential trump connections. what doj and fbi do is more an criminal and potential criminal activity. that's important but congressional investigation is far more expansive and could address things that need to be looked at but may not be criminal in nature. that's why both are important. >> jack? >> i think what comey is going to say, there is an investigation going on. i don't think wi

first, republicans are now turning up the heat on attorney general jeff sessions, manu raju joins me. i want to ask you about republican senator lindsey graham, he met with the fbi director jim comey, what do we know about this, manu. >> reporter: graham is not talking about that. he is going to put out a statement explaining exactly what happened, that he would not comment further. comey just made rounds and democrats frustrated with comey, they wanted to know more about the hacking, and contacts between trump officials and russian officials. and calling for jeff sessions to recuse himself and independent indication into the russia issue as well as these potential contacts. now some republicans are joining that call for recusal. they're not going as far as an independent investigation but are saying it is time for jeff sessions to recuse himself in the aftermath of these reports showing he did in fact meet with russian ambassador suggesting otherwise in his sworn testimony at the senate judiciary committee. take a look. >> i don't think you need a special prosecutor but he should rec

list ton her reaction when cnn's manu raju asked her where she stands. >> to get to my constituents,lease. >> yes or no on the house bill? >> would you please -- i've been in there for two hours, come on. >> hey, man, long days on capitol hill, add a snowstorm to it, senator murkowski considered a conservative swing vote on reform. a lot of tensions on capitol hill. there's a lot of things they work on on capitol hill. >> that's how i feel after a two-hour hearing, too. if you want questions answered about the health care bill be sure to join us tonight for what promising to be an interesting secretary. dana bash and wolf blitzer with house secretary tom price. join us tonight at 9:00. >> good stuff. hopefully, we can stay up for that one. >>> we could find out within hours whether the fbi is investigating ties between the campaign and russia. shelton whitehouse said james comey promised to hell him and republican lindsey graham by today. the two are leading one of two investigations into interference into the election. it's not clear whether comey plans to release anything publicly.

look, chris, we saw manu raju talking nunes. he could not answer basic questions that manu was putting to him about why the hearing was postponed and impartiality he had. you have paul ryan come out yesterday saying we support devin nunes running the investigation. that is a circling the wagons. >> why do they want sally yates? people know about her in terms of refusing to enforce the travel ban. that's not even the subject of the hearing. >> this feel s bungling right now. people feel sally yates will testify under some arrangement. right now, it feels like sand bagging both ways. it looks like the republicans can't get their gist at the white house. they can't get their stories straight. >> devlin, what could sally yates say? >> i have been told that sally yates is obviously key point of interest. what was the conversation with the white house when she warned them about the issue of possible bla blackmail of michael flynn because his statements regarding his contact was the russian ambassador did not match up with what was pick

let's bring in cnn's senior congressional reporter manu raju. manu, with whom is the fbi director meeting and what are they meeting about? >> reporter: well, jake, we know that it's the top eight members in congress who deal with intelligence matters. that means four republicans, four democrats, and the house and the senate, the leadership, they get these roughly quarterly briefings about some of the major investigations that the fbi is currently undertaking. what we know right now is that one of the investigations, of course, is russia and exactly the russia meddling in the elections and whether or not there were any campaign contacts between trump associates and russian government officials during the presidential election and whether or not there is any evidence suggesting one way or another if there was any collusion as well. we know that's all part of what investigators are looking at right now. now, this comes as a senate intelligence committee also had a closed door briefing today, this after a number of senators went out to langley, virgi

let's go to our senior congressional reporter manu raju, who is working the story for us. you just had a chance to speak to the top democratic on the house intelligence committee. what did he say? >> well, he said that he does not believe that the justice department document will actually show what donald trump was been saying that he was wiretapped under the orders of president obama. i talked to him and also devin nunes as they read the letter and received the letter. nunes was skeptical that it would back up the president's claim. adam schiff went further, being very critical of president trump of saying, suggesting on the world stage alongside angela merkel that and the fact that he does believe he was wiretapped. take a listen. >> i'm not sure that we need in writing that which we are all too aware of and there is no basis for what the president has said and what the president repeated today and i just have to express my moretive indication in the presence of angela merkel. to repeat this outlandish claim with one of our allies of this claim of wiretapping. it reflect

manu raju up on capitol hill.'s talk about this and more with the top democratic on the house oversight and government reform committee congressman cummings. thank you for joining us. >> good to be with you, wolf. >> have you seen any evidence that trump campaign associates were in contact with russian operatives to coordinate the release of hacked clinton campaign e-mails? >> i have not seen that information. it does not mean that it doesn't exist. keep in mind, wolf, that the intelligence committee gets a lot of information that many of us in the congress will never see. and what congressman nunes did, he's a good man, let me say this first, but i think he made a very bad judgment call today. and what he did i think just shocks the conscience. >> has your chairman of your committee, jason chaffetz done anything like that to you? >> no, no. i would be extremely upset if he did. you know, wolf, we have a situation here where chairman nunes is investigating president trump. you don't run to the person whom you're i

after reviewing raw data from intel officials, cnn senior congressional manu raju just spoke with senator warner. he joins me now. manu, how much would the senator reveal here? >> well, jake, he didn't say specifically what he saw, but he said that the information that he did see leads him to more questions about exactly how russia meddled in this election and in his words, attempted to help one candidate over another. take a listen. >> a lot of what we saw today was the evidence underlying how russia manipulated the news, how it hacked into the dnc and john podesta and leaked out in favor of one candidate against another candidate. but i think these efforts beyond even the whole question about whether there were contacts between campaigns and the russians -- >> reporter: is there anything to suggest that the trump campaign was involved in coordinating that released information? >> at this point i'm not going to get into that part of the discussion. that's part of our investigation. it's always been about the misinformation. it's been about the hacking and selective release of e-mails. an

. >> our senior congressional reporter manu raju on capitol hill. what is the latest, manu, on this? >> reporter: wolf, james comey just left a classified briefing with two top senators, senator die ev diane feinstein and chuck grassley. they just talked to reporters, said they could not discuss what they actually were talking with comey about other than it was about, quote, sensitive matt erpz. even question that i asked, did you discuss whether there is an fbi investigation ongoing into russia, the connection between russia and the trump campaign, they would not discuss that. the intelligence committee chairman told me moments ago he has seen no evidence to support president trump's claims that he had been wiretapped and, wolf, he's not alone. today members of president trump's own party are openly challenging his claim that trump tower had been wiretapped under the orders of president barack obama. >> we don't have any evidence that that took place and, in fact, i don't believe just in the last week of time the people we talked to, i don't think t

we're covering the developments with manu raju on capitol hill and sun sevlen serfaty. let me begin with manu. there is a growing chorus of republicans, leading republicans saying this is not okay, sessions must recuse himself. >> reporter: that's right, they're saying he should recuse himself but not go so far as to say there should be an independent prosecutor, what a lot of democrats are calling for, an independent prosecutor or to resign altogether. instead they're saying it is time for him to step aside. a couple of key republicans in the last hour pushing for this recusal, including raoul labrador, a top conservative, a members of the freedom caucus, member of the house judiciary committee, saying he should recuse himself from investigating alleged contacts between the trump campaign and russian officials. you mentioned jason chaffetz, he said he should recuse himself. i asked him if that means there should be an independent prosecutor, he says he's not there quite yet. i said, your committee, will it investigate it itself, he left that option over, didn't say whet

let's begin with our senior congressional reporter manu raju. what are you learning about this nighttime mogot over at the white house complex involving the house intelligence committee chairman? >> reporter: wolf, tonight we are learning that devin nunes did in fact meet with a source on white house grounds where he obtained that information suggesting that some trump team communications may have been picked up by u.s. surveillance on issues up related to russia. now this causing an uproar among democrats who wondered idea he had to brief the president of the united states on this, even as they are investigating the issue of russia and his ties to the trump campaign. now, nunes also coming under fire for cancelling a tuesday hearing on the issue of russia and instead deciding to have a private briefing with james comey and mike rogers, the head of the national security agency, but today, wolf, those two officials say they are no longer going to brief the committee in a private session. tonight a strange twist in the house intelligence committee

plus our own manu raju hearing from both democrats and republicans for reaction to this quickly developingy. with e*trade you see things your way. ♪ ♪ you have access to the right information at the right moment. ♪ ♪ and when you filter out the noise, it's easy to turn your vision into action. ♪ ♪ it's your trade. e*trade. ♪ ♪ that goes beyond assuming beingredients are safe...ood to knowing they are. going beyond expectations... because our pets deserve it. beyond. natural pet food. itbut one i think with quesa simple answer. we have this need to peek over our neighbor's fence. and once we do, we see wonder waiting. every step you take, narrows the influence of narrow minds. bridges continents and brings this world one step closer. so, the question you asked me. what is the key? it's you. everything in one place, so you can travel the world better. >>> breaking just moments ago. a new republican house member, a conservative stallworth calling on the attorney general to recuse himself from any investigation into russian campaign contacts. >> our manu raju is prowling the halls of capitol h

done. >> manu raju, thank you very much. before we go down this rabbit hall of people pretended that the president said are intending something other than said, let me be clear. the president put out false information and over the last few weeks, fewer and fewer people have been willing to defend him. for those remaining who are inclined to make excuses for the president or buy into his miss interpretation, let's put the president's words for everyone to see, for you to see. tweeted, terrible, just found out that obama had my wires tapped just before the victory. nothing found. this is mccarthyism. it refers to a former senator joseph mccarthy what bock in the 1950s systemically accused people of subversion, of being communists without evidence, destroying countless lives. mr. trump then wrote, is it legal for a sitting is president to be wiretapping a race for president for a new election. turned down by a new court order. new low. accusing the president of a federal crime. then he writes, i bet a good lawyer could make a g

here's what he said on manu raju today.are you going to stay as chairman and run this investigation. >> why would i not? you guys need to go ask them why these things are being said. >> can this investigation continue with you as chairman? >> why would it not. aren't i briefing you guys continuously and keeping you up to speed? >> but they're saying it -- cannot run with you as chair. >> you got to go talk to them. that sounds like their problem. my colleagues are perfectly fine. they know we're doing an investigation and that will continue. >> so he has confidence in himself. the question is do you have confidence. i'm wondering what your colleagues are saying or know about this investigation. don, i like chairman nunez. i worked well with him in the past. but for the independence and credibility of this investigation he should recuse himself. the republican also is calling for that this evening. a lot of what we do doesn't involve russia and for him to be the chairman of the committee, i think italy also serves us well if

. >> cnn's manu raju has more on the controversy surrounding the attorney general. >> reporter: under mounting political pressure, attorney general jeff sessions stepped aside from any fbi inquiry into russia and the trump campaign. >> i have now decided to recuse myself from any existing or future investigations of any matter relating in any way to the campaigns for president of the united states. >> reporter: the decision came after new revelations that sessions met twice with the russian ambassador during the campaign season. sergey kislyak, the russian ambassador is considered by u.s. intelligence to be one of russia's top spies and spy recruiters in washington. according to current and former senior u.s. officials, russian officials dispute this characterization. sessions failed to disclose those contacts with kislyak during his confirmation hearings in january. in sworn testimony, sessions was asked about russia's meddling in the elections and alleged ties between trump associates and the kremlin. >> i have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign, and i didn't

manu raju, thank you. we turn now to sara murray.a murray. she's got new reporting, some breaking news on what the president is saying about russia trying to really have another reset with russia. sara, what are you hearing? >> reporter: well, we do know that the president had hoped to, in his words, make a deal with russia. he was hoping for some kind of grand bargain where you could deal with issues like syria, like ukraine, like combating isis, things he talked about on the campaign trail. but now administration officials are telling us that his hopes of this deal are really beginning to fade. this was first reported in the "wall street journal." we're also told that there was actually a private meeting in the oval office with his new national security adviser, general mcmaster, and others in which the president expressed his frustration. this was after russia deployed cruise missiles last month in an apparent treaty violation and made the point that it's much harder to make amends with russia when they are being aggressive in tha

up on capital hill manu raju is joining us.w more about the whereabouts of devin nunes before his strofcontroversial announcement that the communications may have been swept up in foreign nationals. nunes was on white house grounds the day before. that raises lots of new questions. what was he doing? >> that's right. he actually was getting his information from a source on white house grounds. this according to a spokesman who put out a statement saying that chairman nunes met with a source at the white house grounds in order to have proximity to a secure location where he could view the information provided by the source. the chairman is extremely concerned by the possible improper upmasking of names of u.s. citizens and the statement goes on to say he had been looking into this issue even before president trump tweeted that he had been spied on by president obama under the orders of president obama. this is significant for several reasons, but one is because of this investigation that's ongoing in the house intelligence commi

. >>> let's begin with our senior congressional reporter manu raju, he's up on capitol hill where there's been a steady drum beat of calls for the attorney general, jeff sessions, to resign or at least to withdraw from any investigations. manu, bring us up to date. >> reporter: that's right, wolf. calls had been intensifying all day from jeff sessions' own party for him to at least step aside from this investigation into russia or anything involving the trump campaign's contacts with russian government official. now, republicans are not going as far as democrats who want sessions to either resign or appoint a special prosecutor, but sessions taking the step today to recuse himself to calm the political fire storm. under mounting political pressure, attorney general jeff sessions stepped aside from any fbi inquiry into russia and the trump campaign. >> i have now decided to recuse myself from any existing or future investigations of any matter relating in any way to the campaigns for president of the united states. >> reporter: the decision came after new revelations that sessions met twic

. >>> breaking news right now, also from capitol hill, our senior congressional reporter manu raju just spoke exclusively with adam schiff, the ranking democrat on the house intelligence committee, about their second meeting with fbi director james comey. does he feel stonewalled again? >> reporter: he didn't say that remember didn't want to talk at all about the meeting explicitly. but i talked to him about the issue of wiretapping that president trump raised over the weekend when he accused barack obama of spying on him last year during the election. i asked congressman schiff if he's seen any evidence of wiretapping. take a listen. >> reporter: is there any evidence to substantiate what he's been saying about president obama spying on him? >> i haven't seen any evidence whatsoever to substantiate that. i think when sean spicer isn't even willing to talk about it, you know there's a real problem. >> reporter: do you think that that hearing in march, comey will be prepared to talk about this issue? >> he's certainly prepared for the question. i don't see any reason why he can't answer

manu raju up on capitol hill. thanks very much. >>> meanwhile, president trump's revised travel ban hits a legal roadblock. federal judges in maryland and hawaii have temporarily blocked the ban that was supposed to go into effect today. our justice reporter laura jarrett broke the details on the maryland decision very early this morning. glad you were up very early. you were way ahead of the curve on everyone this morning. tell our viewers here in the united states and around the world what these two federal judges have now decided. >> so these two federal judges, wolf, have really looked at this and said there's some serious constitutional problems with this revised executive order. and they say, look, the administration did a lot of work. they've exempted green card holders, they've exempted those with valid visas. it still has a 90-day ban on those traveling from six muslim majority countries, plus looking at all of these statements from trump on the campaign trail combined with what senior advisers have said

manu raju, and jim acosta, thanks very much. coming up later today in "the situation room," i'll be speaking live with representative adam schiff about the russia investigation, t"the situation room" airs 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. eastern. schiff will be live during the 5:00 p.m. eastern hour. tomorrow the intelligence committee digs into the russia situation with two hearings. as they look into ties between russia and the trump campaign. a story sean spicer says is media manufactured and president trump calls fake news. joining us now, the wyoming republican senator john barrasso. a member of the foreign relations complete. thanks for coming in. >> thanks for having me. >> is all this fake news media manufactured that russia interfered in the election. >> i believe russian did interfere and tried to do more in the election. they're also trying to interfere in the upcoming election in germany and in france. >> this is clearly worthy of congressional investigation. >> absolutely. the senate intelligence committee is moving along with the

let's bring back in manu raju, jeff zeleny, and sun censor fatty. m sunlen serfaty. >> reporter: after the meeting with house republicans moments ago talking about the need to pass this bill from members who left the room. they said the speaker made the case that they need to stay on schedule, this is critical to getting this done this month, because if you don't, then it delays and derails other aspects of the agenda including doing big things on reforming the tax code and the like, also people who made the pitch in that private meeting are two other architects of that bill, greg walden of oregon, kevin brady of texas. i'm told in the room that the speaker also told his members that if they raise money in march, however much money they raise collectively, he will actually try to match that amount of money for the entire house republican conference. this was a political meeting as well as one on policy. but clearly the challenges remain not just from conservatives but some moderates as well. charlie dent, a pennsylvania republican, told me as he was

manu raju is there. devon nunes, the house intelligence chair, on white house grounds the day before that major announcement. >> reporter: that's right. he's now confirming this, telling our colleague, jake tapper, in a phone interview that he was, in fact, on white house grounds. what he's actually saying now, john and poppy, is that he was reviewing this in a secure facility on white house grounds, reviewing this information that he revealed publicly the next day, that information that perhaps some communication, something involving the trump transition team were swept up, inadvertently picked up, sdins incidentally in intelligence reports, so he wanted to review this document in a secure facility. now he is telling jake tapper that he was not in communication with any white house staff that d day, he was not in the white house, but he was in the secure facility. and this comes with a lot of questions about how he got this information, who his source was, and whether or not it was anyone who was sympat

a lot unclear, but manu raju thank you much.just listening to all of this, reporting all of this out for the first time today, what's more alarming that this potentiality happened over at trump tower or that we have a house committee intel maybe getting out ahead of himself? >> it's hard to say. and it's really, you know, i was kind of struggling and i don't know about you david, but struggling to parse exactly what chairman nunes meant because he went out of his way to say this wasn't about russia and went out of his way to say these seem to be legal fisa taps so what he seemed to be saying i think was that these names were unmasked and circulated and therefore the content of these conversations were somehow circulated with their names soeshassociated wit for whatever reason. >> which we don't know. >> could it be gossip? could it's be to do harm to the people in the trump transition, to do harm to the president, i don't even know whether he's part of this or not so we're kind of left reading behind the lines. >> nunes did say

cnn's manu raju joins me now live from capitol hill. manu, do we know the focus of this meeting? >> reporter: well, jake, the reason for this meeting is because of frustration voiced by the senate judiciary chairman chuck grassley that he was not getting enough information about what the fbi was doing in its investigations including any investigations that are ongoing about russia and its ties to the trump campaign. now, grassley had threatened to hold up the number two nominee at the justice department, rod rosenstein between the deputy attorney general if he didn't get a briefing. so, as a result, james comey here behind closed doors in a classified setting with diane feinstein, the top democrat on the committee. we'll see if they answer the key questions some members on the judiciary committee were hoping to get today, is there an investigation ongoing into the trump campaign? that answer did not come by this afternoon, a deadline that apparently comey gave to sheldon whitehouse, a democrat on the committee, we'll see if he does it in this classified briefing that's happening

first with cnn senior congressional reporter manu raju after which we're going to speak with chairman nunes himself. manu, chairman nunes says this does not back up president trump's evidence of a claim former president obama wiretapped him. he seemed most upset it seemed to me that trump team members were picked up in what he called legal incidental surveillance of others and that they were unmasked, meaning their names were included in intelligence reports instead of, say, individual a. >> reporter: yeah, that's right, jake. i've spoken to some members on the committee who are aware of exactly what is -- what are in those reports and what they are saying is trump transition officials were discussing talking about president-elect trump at that time. president-elect trump, his plans for the new administration and those were disseminated widely within the intelligence community. also some of those discussions were about president trump's family, discussions that chairman nunes believes should not have been disclosed widely within the intelligence community. of course, some of these com

i want to go to cnn's senior congressional reporter manu raju. he's also live up on capitol hill where the chairman of the house intelligence committee is now explaining his decision to brief the news media and the president over at the white house before actually briefing members of his own committee about surveillance that may have picked up trump team communications. apparently devin nunes now offering some sort of apology to his colleagues. what are you hearing? >> yeah, that's right. they had the closed door briefing of the full house intelligence committee earlier today in which mr. nunes told the members he's sorry. sorry for telling the president of the united states and the press about this new information that shows that there was some surveillance activity that picked up some communications of trump officials talking with apparently foreign nationals some time during the transition period last year. nunes went out and told the press and president of the united states but did not tell democrats on the committee an as this committee is i

manu raju is on the hill with more. so, you don't have congress in session today. he's back. thinking about this a lot, i'm sure, in his home state of california. what are you hearing? >> reporter: yeah, that's right, and democrats trying to figure out this particular question -- what did devin nunes know and how did he get to learn it? meaning exactly the information that he saw that only he's seen so far that nobody else on the house intelligence committee has seen, that this information with some trump communications or apparently incidentally collected during u.s. surveillance operations. and how did he come into possession of that information and who arranged for his visit? now, the reports show that at two or eaven three white house officials were involved in this effort. the question is why the white house would engineer this to give to mr. nunes to give to the president before the committee meeting. all of that in light of the unsubstantiated claim that he was wiretapped under the orders of barack obama. adam schiff addressed all the questions that are surrounding thi