in your experience in intelligence, what do you see in the trump tower moskow story?i see a president or presidential candidate who was carrying a lot of the water for russia in its attack against the country. i mean, i say this over and over. i still don't think we've fully come to terms with it here in this country, but russia was the biggest asset, the biggest weapon in russia's attack on the country. i mean he repeated their propaganda and their disinformation the whole way through. and you couldn't have avoided it if you lived in america during the campaign. and, you know, that was on everything from sanctions to russia's invasion of ukraine to all kinds of issues, but especially sanctions and nato. and then the divisive rhetoric, trying to divide americans and turn us against each other. so all the while trump is carrying this water, and i think he knew it. i think he understood exactly what he was doing. and i think he then therefore saw an opportunity to advance his business interests in moskow, in russia. he saw that because i believe, because he was doing th

president's formal answer under oath about when he talked to michael cohen about that trump tower moskowand giuliani told me that although they had told the mueller team no more answers from there president, on this one they would make an exception. he said the answer is simple, the answer is we don't know, we don't remember. >> okay, so the question whether giuliani is lying to the president now involves you'll giuliani's tombstone. >> he was asked in a puplication, maybe the new yorker about whether this is his legacy and whether he's worried about that. the way it came across is the suggestion is he admitted he's lie frg the president. so i asked him if that's that's what he meant to say. and he said i am not lying for the president. the reason i said that is because everyone's concerned with legacy. i can't figure out why because you don't get tachance to taegs whatever you do in life you don't get a chance to shape the way people see it later so do what you think is right. so that was his answer to that. remember he was the only guy to go out after the "access hollywood" tape came o

was secretly working on behalf of russia. >> no, there certainly hasn't been any reaction here in moskow so far. something that came out over the weekend. we are expecting at the earliest you might get any reaction from the russian government, probably not even from the kremlin itself is when political talk shows might pick up on it. so far the russian government has been saying the whole question of russian election meddling, of russia meddling on behalf of president trump is something that is absurd. vladimir putin of course himself has said that, yes, he did want president trump to win the election in 2016 because he heard president trump saying things that are positive about the relationship between russia and the united states. but for president trump to be an asset, that's certainly something i think the russian government would shoot down. if you look at russian political talk shows and other russian politicians they do believe some of the things the trump administration has been doing in the past couple of years it's been in office has been beneficial to russia. in fact there's s

buzzfeed news that the president himself told his personal attorney to lie to congress about the moskow tower project. >>> plus, with the government shutdown now nearly a month long, the president grounds the speaker of the house. critics from both parties say canceling her trip to afghanistan after she suggested he postpone the "state of the union" is petty, childish and inappropriate. and with officials now unsure how many thousands of children were ripped from their families at the border and with thousands of american families now suffering in this shutdown, we try to make some sense of our current state of the union. "the 11th hour" on a thursday night starts now. >>> good evening once again from our nbc headquarters in new york. day 27 of the partial government shutdown. we'll have much more on the longest shutdown ervin just a moment, but we begin with some significant breaking news coming from buzzfeed news within the past hour or so. buzzfeed news posted a story that says president trump directed michael cohen to lie to congress. quote, president donald trump directed his long

"bbc news," moskow. >> what happens whenatour entire rnship is a lie?rnalist abby ellen thought she was engaged to the per man, but later found out he was not who he claimed to be. drawing from personal experience, her new book investigates the people whoad ouble lives and why those around them can't detect it.r earlspoke with abby to learn more about the dupping phenomenon. thank you very much for joining me. >> thank you >> in writing this book, what did you learn about the people who engage in this type of deception? >> they are very smart. they are very creative, and they know how to tell a story. and they are ability -- able to compartmentalize, and they don't think twice about deceiving people. >> how common is it? >> you know, it is very co ion. every tialked about my book, every time i told someone about what i was working on, everybody had a story. everybody knew somebody who had been deceived, whether by a spouse, family member, neighbor or a politicians.yb evy had a story. >> why do they do it? >> well, for a variety of reaseys. sometimes re

donald trump proclaimed back in march of 2016 was one of his foreign policy advisers, went over to moskown july, it was reported at that time that he was spouting anti-american talking points from putin. the republicans changed their platform at the republican national committee to make the language more favorable to putin. donald trump questions the legitimacy of nato in the summer, and of course michael flynn. you know, we've made a lot about him beginning to work with mueller. he was appearing on russian propaganda television regularly. he was at a dinner with vladimir putin. i mean, the list -- i could keep listing this on and on. donald trump, jr. said how their business was largely funded with russian money. i think it was staring us in the face all the time, it's just hard to believe. but i think in today's world when we see it, we need to start believing it. >> go ahead. >> it's -- i don't disagree with anything robby just categorized. it's all open source fact at this point. i think it's not hard to believe. it's been an object of great concern to many of us for a long time in ad

intelligence community sites what they call moskow's long-standing desire to undermine the u.s. led liberal democratic order. to undermine, to disrupt, to divide us, a world in turmoil. and here's the latest example of turmoil in our government. speaker of the house nancy pelosi flexing her muscles today urging this president to postpone the "state of the union." that hasn't happened since the challenger disaster more than three decades ago. the speaker putting the blame squarely on the shutdown. >> this is about hundreds of people working on the security and logistic of it. most of those people are either furloughed or victims of the president's shutdown. this is house keeping matter in the congress of the united states so we can honor the responsibility and invitation we extended to the president. he can make it from the oval office if he wants. >> honestly, think about it, what does he say, the state of our union is shutdown? what do you say in the state of the union? it is, it's shutdown. the fact even though nancy pelosi framed this as a request to the president, it's reall

sanctions against moskow. our patterns in this administration show exactly the opposite.nt is unafraid to take on vladimir putin. >> you think this president is unafraid to take on vladimir putin. i mean, i don't see really any -- you're talking about a few specific actions. in general, this president has never said anything negative about vladimir putin. has he, steve? >> i will concede, for example, the helsinki presser was to me -- >> no. has he said anything negative about vladimir putin to your knowledge? >> i don't know. but i know what he's done. and a thug like vladimir putin and he is a thug, he respects actions and force a lot more than he will pay attention to maybe some harsh words from president trump. believe me. he cares a lot more about the ukraine being armed and about his soldiers being killed directly in combat with america than he cares about maybe getting some disturbing comments out of president trump at a gaggle. >> just interesting. i mean, kirsten, just interesting the president who, you know, is more than happy to insult just about everybody else

israel operates in syria with russia's approval moskow turns a blind eye when the strikes don't weaken the syrian government and when the israeli military gives the russian military prior notice the russian defense ministry doesn't usually comment on the operations but this time they didn't just provide details about syrian army casualties but that syrian air defenses destroyed israeli missiles russia will send some messages to israel. course it will. continue providing syria with. more than missile systems or more. rockets. there are reports that russia wants israel to stop targeting in and around the damascus airport it's a difficult balancing act for moscow it has a good relationship with israel but it wants commercial planes to start landing to end syria's isolation but the airport is also important to iran israeli officials have said civilian cargo planes are used to transfer weapons from to her and to iranian backed groups in syria including lebanon's hezbollah they also say iran's privately owned mahaan air is one of the carriers suspected of carrying war material to syria the a

israel operates in syria with russia's approval moskow turns a blind eye when the strikes don't weaken the syrian government and when the israeli military gives the russian military prior notice the russian defense ministry doesn't usually comment on the operations but this time they didn't just provide details about syrian army casualties but that syrian air defenses destroyed israeli missiles russia will send some messages to israel. course it will. continue providing syria with. more than missile systems or more. rockets. there are reports that russia wants israel to stop targeting in and around the damascus airport it's a difficult balancing act for moscow it has a good relationship with israel but it wants commercial planes to start landing to end syria's isolation but the airport is also important to iran israeli officials have said civilian cargo planes are used to transfer weapons from to her and to iranian backed groups in syria including lebanon's hezbollah they also say iran's privately owned mahaan air is one of the carriers suspected of carrying war material to syria the a