i'm going to ask the former director of national intelligence, mr. james clapper. what kind of impact is the worsening trade war with china having on americans? we're going to hear directly from a farmer and the owner of a manufacturing company. is joe biden losing his big lead atop the democratic presidential race, and who is surging? we have the results of a new poll for you. why is it that hundreds of people who have quit their memberships at trump's doral golf resort in florida, why can't they get their deposits back? and the landmark judgment against pharmaceutical giant johnson & johnson. how much has a judge ordered the company to pay for that company's role in the opioid crisis? we want to turn to the big picture and talk about the g7 with former director of national intelligence, mr. james clapper. good evening, director. good to have you on this evening. president trump is at odds with the g7 over the trade war, the iran deal, russia. he made wildly conflicting statements during the meetings and told some outright whoppers. is all this erratic behavior hu

director the national intelligence. let me read tough the series of two tweets from the president he writes "our great republican congressman is being treated very unfairly by the lame stream media. rather than going through months of slander and libel, i explained to john how miserable it would be for him and his family to deal with these people. john has therefore decided to stay in congress where he has done such an outstanding job representing the people of texas and our country. more than that, when you started digging into his bio, into his past, what he claimed as national security expertise was his time as a u.s. attorney in the eastern district of texas, right on his congressional page. he writes in his buy ie biothat bio that he put terrorists in prison. his office couldn't give us any examples of him being a prosecutor. on top of all that, he has spent years behind closed doors and congressional interviews with intelligence officials, as well as repeated appearances on fox news blasting the intelligence commu

that comes down to the position itself, the director of national intelligence sometimes is put in a positionat was true with dan coats, who previously held the position before he stepped down. as far as mr trump was concerned, dan coats did not back the president on issues like russia and north korea, there were times that the director of national intelligence contradicted the president and perhaps adjusted a hard—line approach than that of the white house. john ratcliffe on the other hand was seen by many as being a trump loyalist, and actually he had really come to the president attention in recent weeks because of his grilling of the former special counsel robert mueller during that congressional hearing in which he was quite aggressive against mr mueller and mr trump felt he had done a good job essentially of protecting the president. that led some people to be a little uncomfortable, combined with the fact that some people felt he had patted his cv and suggested he has more experience as far as counterterrorism was concerned, finally led him to say he was not going to go ahead with this

the highest ranking intelligence official in the country. the president says the nation's number two intelligence officer is leaving her post. oh! oh! oh!

the director of national intelligence leaving in two weeks. the president has been critical of coats. there is already controversy over who might get that job next. phil mudd is back with us. in his new book "black site" phil mudd describes the many changes that agency faces and we quote, after a half-century of chasing the traditional targets of the post world war ii, the agency now hunted an adversary that had no government sponsor, no clear lines of control or organization chart, no well-defined capital or geographical center, a hazy chain of command and equally fuzzy linkages to affiliated groups across the globe. phil, i don't think it will give too much away to tell the audience you begin with a fire in an elevator shaft at cia, a tiny event in the scope of things. that suffices for a kind of wake up call. that was the wake up call before 9/11. 9/11 arrives, you warn the readers to remember kind of you had to be there, you had to be in the moment. that gets us to black site. describe what they are to viewership of lay people. did they su

president trump telling you he has a new short list for the director of national intelligence. right there he hinted at it. he says the vetting process, he believes will be easier? >> reporter: that's right. the president acknowledged to me when it comes to national intelligence, ratcliffe wasn't in that world that much. the president also telling me he is now considering three very well known people for the job and that the vetting process won't be an issue because they are already within the intel community. david. >> thank you. >>> in the meantime, the call to impeach the president is gaining ground. more that half of all the democrats back impeachment. that is 118 of the 235 democrats. tonight house speaker nancy pelosi putting out a statement making the same argument to stay the course, to legislate, investigate and litigate. adding the president will be accountable. >>> the house caucus will lose a republican. an ex-cia under cover officer says he wasn't to work. he was one of four to condemn president trump's tweets targeting four democratic congress women of color. >>>

whatever there is seems not at all to have been what we think of for a director of national intelligencend of, you know, little incidents in which maybe there's some kind of radical thinking by a local citizen or whatever. so i think it's going to turn out to be a shred of truth to it, but really that shred kind of puts the bigger lie to it. there's no hands-on experience of the sorts of cases that he's touting he's actually handled and that the director of national intelligence has to really understand. >> it looks like more questions are mounting rather than less, and this will be -- >> yeah. >> -- a really interesting confirmation process for a very important post, the director of national intelligence. harry, thanks so much. >> right. this is the number one post to tell the truth. >> thanks so much, harry, really appreciate it. >> thank you, kate. >>> still ahead for us, a new jobs report is out and it is good news for president trump, but how will his new threats of even more tariffs on china impact the u.s. economy now? more on that right after this. (gasp) (singsong) budget meetin

and trump then offered him the job of director of national intelligence. like most jobs, the interview isn't everything. you got to pass a background check. and this week multiple news outlets combed through ratcliffe's record something everybody wasn't familiar with because a lot of people didn't know this guy. and found numerous times he embellished or misled the public about his career in federal law enforcement. now this is important. because under the law anyone nominated to the dni job shall have extensive national security experience. this is actually one of the jobs that you can't just appoint anybody to. today, the president announced he would be withdrawing ratcliffe's nomination in a tweet blaming unfair treatment by the lame stream media, one word both lambie and stream capitalized within it. but on comments on the south lawn a few hours later trump credited the media saying they were doing his vetting for him. >> the vetting process for the white house is very good. but you're part of the vetting process, you know. i give out a name to the pre

. >>> president trump's pick for director of national intelligence is no longer up for the job. trump tweeting last hour our great republican congressman john ratcliffe is being treated very unfairly by the lamestream media. rather than going through months of slander and libel, i explained to john how miserable it would be for him and his family to deal with these people. john has therefore decided to stay in congress where he's done such an outstanding job representing the people of texas and our country. i will be announcing my nomination for dni shortly. let's get right to the white house. kelly o'donnell is standing by, and we just heard from congressman ratcliffe. kelly, we have learned the white house is now seeking to prevent the principal deputy sue gordon from becoming the acting director. no one better you than you to try and make sense of this for us. >> reporter: who got a lot of attention during the mueller hearing because of his questioning of the former special counsel, vigorous questioning, he had served as a u.s. attorney in texas and has been in congress for a

the office of director of national intelligence 2019 national intelligence strategy i like diversity and one of its seven enterprise objective in order to provide the foundation for integrated effective and efficient management of mission capabilities across the intelligence community. it committee for many years has focused on this issue. and as the iccompetes to employ brightest individuals from diverse backgrounds , experiences and intellectual perspectives, i'm glad that we can hold this hearing in the public today. we're going to have votes coming up soon and so because of that i willyield back once again . >> i think the ranking member. i wanted today to welcome a distinguished panel of witnesses to discuss different facets of our hearing tonight. first, honorable carrie lincoln and i'm going to apologize for making introductions brief so that we can get to the testimony. principal deputy undersecretary of defense intelligence , the honorable carrie bingen was confirmed by the senate in 2012. we're also joined by miss rita sampson, chief of equal opportunity and diversity office

shal have, quote, extensive national security expertise and my understanding is susan collins, from maine on the intelligence committee, wrote that statute and was -- did not necessarily think that mr. ratcliff had extensive national security expertise. >> yeah, i highly doubt that the president has read that statute or even knew that was part of the qualifications. this is a president that makes decisions based on what he sees on television. he saw ratcliff defending him on tv against the mueller hearing and going after robert mueller during the hearings. he saw those clips of that exchange played over and over on cable news. and he saw someone who is defending him and wants that type of person at the head of the dni and that is part of the reason this decision was made, not with regard to the stutes or with regard to any vetting or not even with regard to his qualifications for this position. this is a president that makes these type of impulsive decisions and then decides what to do based on the backlash and he saw the backlash was not only from the media but also from republican senators who were likely

we will have to see who that you pick for director of national intelligence ‘s.ington, thank you very much. people in puerto rico are celebrating the formal resignation of the island's governor, ricardo rossello. he agreed to stand down in the face of mass protests over vulgar text messages he shared with his advisers. let's speak to laura rexach — podcast host for wkaq based in san juan. laura, thank you so much for your time. good to see you again. do you think people are happy with the new governor now, is that going to put people's fears to rest? no, sadly, not at all. as we speak there are riots forming and ijust not at all. as we speak there are riots forming and i just saw not at all. as we speak there are riots forming and ijust saw police putting on the right gear as i was searching for a quiet street. do you think that protestors perhaps ought to give the new governor, pedro pierluisi, a chance perhaps to deal with some of the broader concerns? no, honestly, not at all. he appointed himself governor in a com pletely appointed himself governor in a compl

president trump's pick to become directorf national intelligence withdraws his name from consideration. and top honors for highflying photos. putting the focus on birds and their habitats has led to some amazing images. nada: for those watching on pbs and around the globe, welcomes o "world nerica." today the u.s. has made it official, it has withdrawn from an arms control pactrussia that dates back to the cold war. the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty was a landmark agreement at the time, but now e u.s. accuses russia of violating it, which moscow denies. the fear is that without the restrictions, a new arms race could get underway. the bbc's diplomatic correspondent james landale looks back at the treaty's history. james: it was a crucial moment towards the end of the cold war, the moment in 1987 when leadersi of thed states and the soviet union signed the treaty. ronald reagan and mikael gorbachev promised to destroy all missiles with ranges between 300 miles and 3400 miles, eliminating at a stroke la entire of nuclear weapons. the mobile ground launch nuclear weapons were h

this is the the picture we have here act being director of national intelligence. president just announcing that by tweet now. >> well it's better than rat cliff. let's put it that way. if we had to take. >> or is it. >> mcguire is better. anybody is better. we need professionals in there. this administration's foreign policy is failing everywhere from iran to north korea. and we need somebody to tell the truth. to the president and to the public. and if he is the one to do it so be it. >> all right thank you both very much i appreciate your time and democrats moving closer to impeachment. jerry nadler, according to a source now backing an impeachment inquiry. he is outfront next. plus the fight for 2020 tom steyer new to the race but surging ahead of some really big well-known names like cory and beto and amy. and he is outfront. beep goes off ] now that you have new dr. scholl's massaging gel advanced insoles with softer, bouncier gel waves, you'll move over 10% more than before. dr. scholl's. born to move. of course he's got plans. with labor day deals starting

earlier this evening, president trump announced he is nominating the acting director of national intelligence. on twitter, the president stated admiral maguire has a long and distinguished career in the military, retiring from the navy in 2010, he commanded at every level, including the naval special warfare command. he has also served as a national security fellow at harvard

congressman john ratcliffe didn't even a make it as week as president trump's choice for director of national intelligence before the president pulled the plug. >> i asked him, i said, "do you want to go through this for two or three months or want me to maybe do something else?" he thought about it. i said, "it's going to be rough." >> reporter: ratcliffe's nomination, embattled from the start. the president picked him just four days after the congressman lashed into robert mueller. >> donald trump is not above the law. he's not, but he damn sure shouldn't be below the law. >> reporter: democrats called ratcliffe partisan and unqualified. >> the president is more interested in getting a loyalist than someone who will speak truth to power. >> reporter: republicans grew concerned as ratcliffe's resume came under scrutiny. abc news reporting the congressman falsely claimed to have prosecuted and "convicted" people funneling money to terrorists. >> republicans did express

the current director of national intelligence dan coats and sue gordon. so what's the real world impact of this? the director of national intelligence is tasked with coordinating the overall intelligence effort within the united states, coordinating the work of 17 different federal intelligence agencies. >> it was created after the attack on september 11th to improve communication between government agencies and avoid the missteps that could have prevented the terror attack. next week when both intelligence leaders step down, trump's picked will step in, joseph maguire, the current director of the national counterterrorism center and a former official in the office of the director of national intelligence warns that this is a very dangerous situation if it is a way of politicizing intelligence by installing an acting dni who will do the president's bidding. joining me now is ali, former senior director for counterterrorism at the security council who has over 20 years. thank you for joining me. let me ask you about this. intelligence of all the government

donald trump's embattled pick for director of national intelligence, congressman john ratcliffe, is now withdrawing his nomination. that announcement after the president spent the better part of his week fighting off legitimate questions about the

about representative ratcliff becoming the head of the director of national intelligence. minutes, we a few will bring you live coverage, we will look at the u.s.-japan alliance, former military leaders talk about some of the global security challenges the country has faced live from the senate -- center for strategic and international studies starting in a couple of minutes here on c-span. we will take you over to see sis now, that event on the u.s.-japan alliance getting underway shortly. just a note about president trump, heading to new jersey, bedminster, we will re-air our conversation with the president, our interview from earlier this week and that is coming up tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern. our campaign 2020 coverage this weekend includes the two democratic debates from detroit this week, night number one hosted by cnn will re-air on c-span tomorrow at 10:30 a.m. number two night will be sunday morning at 10:30 a.m. eastern and both of those again here on c-span.

director of national intelligence resigned, his deputy, sue gordon, has resigned as well. s more than 30 years of experience in intelligence posts. she handed in her resignation when it became clear that president trump would not allow her to take over as acting director of national intelligence, a post the law dictates that she is in line for. a handwritten note gordon addressed to the president alongside her resignation letter indicates her departure was not her choice. you see the note right there in part saying i offer this letter as an act of respect and patriotism, not preference. you should have your team. joining me now is cnn's national correspondent, alex marquardt and samantha vinaigrette. there are a lot of folks democrat and republican voicing strong support for gordon as she is on her way out and concerns about what her departure means. what are you hearing about why she is leaving? >> well, it appears that she really had no choice but to leave and she makes it pretty clear in that handwritten note, which was extraordinary. that was released by the white house

intelligence and intelligence agencies. the nation's official stepping down. president trump making the announcement on twitter writing, sue gordon is a great professional with a long and distinguished career. i've gotten to know sue over the past two years and have developed great respect for her. meanwhile within hours trump naming joseph mcgwire as his pick for acting director of national intelligence. yet one more acting head of agencies in this government. alex marquart with me now. so tell me about sue's departure because it does not sound this was voluntary. >> we were sitting here talking about who's the next director of national intelligence and now we're asking who's going to be that person's number two. it was clear that departure was not her choice. the reason we know that is because of a hand written note she left with her letter of resignation for the president. this was a note released as you can see released by the white house, and she says in part i offer this letter as an act of respect and patriotism, not preference y

records of americans now this is being echoed by dan coats he is the outgoing director of national intelligence and he is urging the renewal of the usa freedom act in his letter urging the renewal and he did acknowledge that the act was used the provision in the act allowing the phone records of americans to be collected that that was utilized and he basically urged congress to give the authority back to the n.s.a. out to renew their authority to engage in this program should they need to engage in it in the future of this is how damn coach put it in his letter as technology changes. and communications habits will continue to evolve and adapt. to these dynamic environments the administration supports reauthorization of this provision as well. now a letter was sent to the house judiciary committee by the u.s. civil liberties and privacy protection organizations that argued that the program actually represents a threat to americans freedoms they called for meaningful surveillance reforms and said that this puts the civil liberties of the u.s. public in jeopardy this is how they put it. the govern

while the trump white house as well as dan coats the outgoing director of national intelligence are urging congress to renew the freedom act of 2015 and this ability of the national security agency of the united states to conduct spying on individual citizens now essentially dan coats in his letter argued that even though the program is no longer in effect it. necessary or could be necessary at some point to reinstate it and that it would be in the interest of the country overall for congress to renew the freedom act this is what dan coats said as technology changes adversaries trade craft and communications habits will continue to evolve and adapt. to these dynamic environments the administration supports reauthorization of this provision as well now civil liberties groups have argued that it is necessary for congress to not renew the freedom act of 2015 they argue that there are sections in the act specifically the spying and surveillance section of the law that put the privacy and civil liberties of millions of americans into jeopardy the government's implementation of the cool detail r

believed was on his side to be the next dni. >> and the law that established the director of national intelligencelly stipulates that that individual must have extensive intelligence expertise. >> look, one of the things president trump might want a loyalist, might want a trumpist in that role but i think he's learning he's not going to get one of those people confirmed. we've seen him go through this process before, he floats some names, nominates people via twitter when when those wash out, he loses interest and ends up with is effectively an establishment pick. >> just yesterday we heard the president once again publicly express doubts. i'll play the clip. watch this. >> mr. president, robert mueller said russia is interfering in u.s. elections right now. >> you don't really believe this, do you? >> reporter: he said that last week. >> we didn't talk about that. >> what are you thinking? >> it fits into the pattern where the president has repeatedly cast out on the notion that russia interfered in the u.s. election despite the widespread conclusion by the intelligence community that's what happ

president trump's pick to become the next director of national intelligence withdraws his name — justs after being chosen. celebrating in puerto rico as the island's governor resigns after weeks of protests. desperate efforts to shore up the dam that's still threatening a british town — authorities warn of a substantial risk to life. and a swedishjudge orders the release of the american rapper asap rocky. hello and welcome. russia's arctic north and far east are being ravaged by huge wildfires, with up to four million hectares ablaze and vast areas engulfed by smoke. the prime minister, dmitri medvedev, has ordered police to investigate whether the fires were started deliberately to hide evidence of illegal logging. russian militaryjets are providing back—up to firefighters battling the blazes, which have been burning in some cases for weeks. fires are common at this time of year, but record—breaking summer temperatures and strong winds have made this year particularly bad. our moscow correspondent steve rosenberg has travelled to the remote irkutsk region of siberia and he sent this

. >>> a new director of national intelligence has been named to replace the outgoing director dan coats's another acting appointment by president trump. he picked joseph maguire, the current director of the national counterterrorism center. coats' number two will also now be leaving. her name sue gordon. she resigned as two other officials joined the exodus from the administration. secretary of state kimberly breier is out after a reported clash with the white house over immigration policy. and a foreign service officer of the state department also quit, chuck park is his name, saying in a pretty scathing new editorial he wrote, he says he can no longer justify being part of the president's, quote, complacent state. he writes, quote, the complacent state sighs when the immigrant shakes his head when he defends crown prince mohammed bin salman, children in detention camps then complies with orders. i'm ashamed of how long it took me to make this decision. >>> want to bring in the cnn political affairs analyst max boot. the director of national intelligence, traditionally she would have t

he is just the kind of guy i need as director of national intelligence, a person who would take the intelligence and turn into it the president's own private toy. that we really couldn't have. >> well said. it's like he was going to turn the intel agencies into the injustice department of william barr. and my question back to you, ken, it looked to you when he was dropping all that stuff about the horowitz, ig investigation he was going to spend whatever influence he had, was going back into the roots of the russian influence and trying to find hillary's role in this. >> that's a real nightmare for the intelligence agencies and also question what he was going to say about russian election interference. donald trump doesn't believe the russians are interfering. doesn't want to hear about it. it's really frightening. >> let's hear about this guy's ability or not. this guy is not running an executive search firm, this president. the president today defended the white house's vetting process by saying the press does it for him. the press he has been knocking two minutes ago does the job of cleaning

president trump's pick for a national intelligence is no longer his

tabs™ another shakeup this time among his top intelligence officials. the nation'so intelligence officer sue gordon announcing late yesterday she is leaving. a source tells nbc she made the decision after learning president trump wasn't giving her the top job. in a letter to the president gordon announced her official resignation but in an accompanying, handwritten note, she clarified. this move was an act of respect and patriotism not preference. writing this. you should have your team. shortly after the news broke of gordon's resignation the president appointed current counterterrorism center director joseph mcguire as acting director of national intelligence. he'll replace former director dan coats who stepped down last week. joining me to discuss, nbc's senior white house reporter and former senior director on the national security council and special assistant to president george w. bush michael allen. sue gordon was next in line to take the post. what do we know about her relationship with president trump? >> for some reason the white house didn't want her ste

joseph wire will step in as the acting director of national intelligence. head of the national counter terrorism center. the president still has not said who he wants to nominate as a permanent director of national intelligence. >>> this morning a manhunt is under way for a gunman who shot and killed two people in the middle of a busy interstate during rush hour. apparently this started as a crash, two cars involved. the situation escalated from there. horrified drivers actually trying to swerve around the gunfire. police say they found drugs in the victim's car but at this point they're still not sure about the gunman's motive. >>> the fda is cracking down on companies illegally marketing vaping. the companies were given 15 days to correct the violations or face further action. this comes as the fda is facing greater juteany over its response to the epidemic of youth vaping. >> a former vietnam fighter pilot is finally home and the son who waved good-bye to him last time 52 years ago as a little boy actually had the honor of flying him home. he was declare

urning to politics in th united states, president trump's pick to become director of national intelligence is no longer going for the job. today mr. trump tweeted that congressman john ratcliffe has been treated unfairly and has to stay in the house. but it is another presidential tweet which is raising controversy after congressman elijah cummings confirmed there was an attempted burglary at his home early last saturday before the president unleashed a series of attacks on him. the president tweeted, "really bad news, the baltimore house of elijah cummings was robbed too bad." to which even former u.n. ambassador nikki haley responded, "this is so unnecessary." mr. trump clarified his wor b weng misinterpreted. i spoke earlier to the bbc's anthony zurcher. walk us through what happened from five days ago when john ratcliffe was nominated to the -- this decision. reanthony: tere stories in tithe media quing his credentials, saying he inflated qualifications, particularly intelligence and national security qualifications, and at played into concerns in the senate that his resume was thin on

this is more important under the director of national intelligence who is superior to the director ofcia. would it be so from the dni's perspective. that is a work in progress. we will talk about how that dci or directors of central intelligence have tried to manage that issue with the president as a factor. leslie very important oversight element. i already alluded to this. the cia being a white open organization and what it gets in trouble through the oversight process, does the president support it and how does that dci or the cia tried to manage that difficult balance between consolidating congress and relying on the president for backstopping. let's start with the legal authorities. back in 1947 the national security act is passed. in addition to creating the air force as a separate branch of military and the office of secretary defense, not the defense department, that came in 1949 and establishing the national security council, the national security act also created the cia. in that language you find and interesting dynamic here. if you want to interpret a law, i would suggest

history, oxford intelligence and national security. he's taught intelligence history at george mason university and georgetown university and written a biography of chief justice john marshall. please join me in welcoming our speaker tonight and enjoy the program. >> good evening. i appreciate everybody turning out tonight. it's good to have such a large audience for what i hope you'll find to be a pretty interesting presentation i spent a good deal of time studying directors. i did a biography of the director during the 1960s, during vietnam war, jfk assassination and run up to the cuban missile crisis. i got very interested in looking at the different ways in which shaped by political environment and in particular their focus with the president. i should say before i start, what i'm not going to be covering today, a lot of current stuff. i'm not going to be talking about the president and his relations with the agency currently, because that's not histo history. i'll look at that in a few years. i'll have another talk on the update, w

she was deputy director of one of the premier intelligence agencies, the national geospatial intelligence agency, and the number two leader of all 17 components. she has energy, she has wisdom, she has judgment, and i think fundamentally, brian, to understand what happened to sue is to understand what donald trump has done to the intelligence community writ large. he started his presidency by standing in front of the cia officers memorial wall and talking about how many times he had been on the cover of "time" magazine, he didn't compare intelligence community professionals to nazis and took the word of vladimir putin over the cia in his assessment of what happened in 2016. this was the latest insult, the latest effort to undermine, ignore the judgment of intelligence professionals. >> what is your knowledge of the new acting guy, admiral mcguire. >> i think john brennan's assessment is right. the president wants someone who is a care taker until he can nominate his own political ally. sue gordon was not going to be anybody's ally. that's why she was asked to leave. >> robert costa, what

and so frankly he's looking for a way to diminish the role that die ctor of national intelligence has. the problem is that anybody who ninates, if that person doesn't have the approval of republicans in thes senate, i not going anywhere. so he's realized he does need to work with the head of the senate intelligence committee. pierre: whoever he hires, that person will face the pressure from the people doing the wor to s these are the facts, this is what you need to know about this threat and we will not have it fudged. robert: thanks, ever yody. apprecia being here on a friday night. thanks for watching us but next on the "washington week era," we will talk with reporters from texas and ohio about how those communities in el paso and dayton are coping with this week. otch it on our website, facebookr youtube. i'm robert costa. have a great weekend. announcer: corporate funding for "washington week" is provided by -- >> babbel, a language program that teaches real life convsations in a new languag such as spanish, french, german, italian and more. babbel's 10 to 15-minute lessons are a

president trump saying he's narrowed down the list of possible replacements for director of national intelligence his original nominee dropped out. this as the president faces backlash including from a key supporter over his tweet about a break-in at a top democratic congressman's home. abc's white house correspondent tara palmeri is in new jersey where the president is spending the weekend. tara, good morning. >> reporter: good morning, whit. president trump attacked the press for revealing damaging information about his choice for director of national intelligence and then thanked them for doing the white house's vetting. he said it saves them money. now, he just adds to a growing list of presidential appointees who failed to make it through senate confirmation. >> americans need to know this. >> reporter: president trump's top pick for director of national intelligence, texas congressman john ratcliffe withdrawing his name for the appointment. this comes just less than a week after he was tapped to replace outgoing director dan coats. leaving for his new jersey golf club, trump defending ratcl

. >>> president trump said his pick for national intelligence director has decided to withdraw from the running. republican charisma and john ratcliff was tapped to take over the job of national intelligence dan coats. pleasant blamed the withdrawn what he calls unfair media scrutiny. >>> in york police department is suspending one of its own in the chokehold death of eric garner. that after the department administrative judge committed the officer be fired. officer daniel petroleos is captured a video putting air garner what appears to be a stranglehold while trying to arrest him. he can be heard saying he could not breathe and he died that night with the issue came back into the national spotlight and federal prosecutors announced they would not press criminal charges. >>> a hearing is taking place in the battle over a homeless encampment located in a waterfront park in oakland. for years, union point park and the east neighborhood has been a haven for the homeless and lately, the number of occupants has jumped. the city can no longer legally cleanup the encampment and that is because

. >>> this time next week, we will no longer have a director of national intelligence. is out effective next week. the president's first choice to replace him was a rapidly pro texas republican named john ratcliffe. then it turned out he bragged about lots of things on his resume which were not things he had actually done. given the human illtation of what happened with ratcliffe, you think the president might be extra careful with his second choice for this job. hah! now actually one of the names they're floating for the job is a man named pete. remember him? his name started popping up in press accounts last week as a potential new director of national intelligence. this morning reporters asked about him from the white house transcript from the president said, quote, i like him a lot. i want to get somebody that everybody can come together with. i like pete a lot. he is great. it's possible there's a different pete than the one we're all thinking of. i hope so because the pete i'm thinking of, the one i think the president is talking about for director of national int

donald trump's embattled pick for director of national intelligence, congressman john ratcliffe, is now withdrawing his nomination. that announcement after the president spent the better part of his week fighting off legitimate questions about the congressman's lack of experience, his padded resume and partisanship, not exactly desired characteristic for the nation's top intelligence job. here was the announcement a short while ago on twitter -- our great republican congressman john ratcliffe is being treated very unfairly by the lamestream media. i explained to john how miserable it would be for him and his family to deal with these people. john has, therefore, decided to stay in congress where he has done such an outstanding job representing the people of texas be announcing my nomination for dni shortly. this, of course a big reversal from what the president had said about ratcliffe just 24 hours ago. >> congressman ratcliffe is an outstanding man and i'm sure he will be able to do very well. i think he's just outstanding. highly respected that everybody that knows him. >> the presid

congressman john ratcliffe of texas is out-- noti longconsideration to be the director of national intelligence. that, just five days after president trump nominated him ti the po. foponents said ratcliffe had too little experiencthe top u.s. intelligence post and he had been accuse misrepresenting his experience as a federal prosevitor. before l the white house for his new jersey golf club, mr. trump blamed the media for ratcliffe's withdrawing but rtso praised res for their vetting of his nominee. >> i could see that the press was treating him, i thought very unfairly. no you vet for me, i like when you vet. no, no, you vet. i think the white house has a great vetting process. you vet for me. when i give a name i give it out to the press and you vet for me. >> woodruff: we take a deeper look at this latest about-face with gg miller, national security correspondent at the "washington post." hello again, greg. h so what happene? >> what happened here is something actually we've seen happen time and time again with this white house and even back ine trump campaign. i mean, trump has a long recor

newshour tonight: out before he's in president trump's much- criticized pick to be director of national intelligence withdraws from consideration less than a week after he was named. then, an island in crisis. the embattled governor of puerto rico steps down, a new one sworn in, but legal challenges to come. warnings from greenland-- billions of tons of ice lt into the ocean, sparking fears of how it will exacerbe the global climate crisis. plus, after president trums attacks on members of congress who are racial minorities, how are his words heard in the rust belt communities he needs to win? i >> construed as a racist, bigot, homophobe, you name it, but if you knew me that's not who i am at all. woodruff: and it's friday. mark shields and david brookshe ar to consider a full week of news and the democratic primary field after the second round of debates. all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour haseen provided by: >> text night and t y. >> catch replay. >> burning some fat. >> sharing the latest viral cat! >> you can do the things you like to do with a wir

i was the one no vote on the national intelligence post. i do think my colleagues now on the intelligence cumulative committee say no ratcliff, no nune nunezs. trump will have to make a call. do i go with those who say we're not going there? >> one of the concerns when they looked at ratcliff, he would have access to all of the information about the ongoing investigations. national security investigations that still relate to what happened in 2016. is there any chance that mcconnell and the republicans would allow someone on that wouldn't underlie the committee? they would protect the store from that kind of information. >> so far the republicans on the intelligence committee have drawn a line. they have said, look, we are supportive of the trump administration. we understand that the president sees things differently than we do on a number of occasions, but now they're going to have to actually fight back against people who aren't objective and aren't willing to have some connection to the facts. it comes down now timely america, you if wan

the director of national intelligence opposed created after 9/11. to prevent another attack on the american homeland. one of the most important jobs in the u.s. government. trump gave less attention and less foresight to choosing a nominee. than he would to choosing an interior decorator for mar-a-lago. he did it spur of moment last sunday. he called the chairman of the senate intelligence committee and said what do you think about ratcliffe and he said i have no idea. and trump tweets it out that he's nominating him. he didn't give this the kind of consideration that the important job entails and you're seeing the disaster. there's a good reason why in the past president's typically did the vetting before announcing a nominee. not after. to avoid these kinds of catastrophe. >> i don't know. he should not tweet before vetting in. >> novel idea. >> crazy town. >> very old fashion. >> listen to what the president said about vetting process. >> you vet for me. i like when you vet. the vetting process for the white house is very good. you're a part of i