i've been hearing about it for seven years. >> look, phil mudd, that would be an unreasonable expectation, because phil, on many points, you've got to give the fair balance of criticism to what we're hearing from the panel. whatever is done in the interest of style doesn't seem to be productive. here i think would suggest the president has high ground. the republicans had been promising to do this. this was a big part of the campaign. he did also go heavy on it. the president himself as a candidate. mcconnell hasn't delivered. he has high ground and winds up being how does he deal with this relationship, what do you make of this back and forth. >> i think you're right, he has hi half high ground. >> how do you have half high ground? don't vacillate on me, mudd, that's not who you are. >> i understand you took your ugly pills this morning. >> oh, why do you laugh? >> i wasn't laughing. you're on my side. >> it is what it is, chris. >> it is what it is and you're hideous. i think there's something critically important. i don't think the issue here is repeal. i think the issue is replace. if

phil mudd is in siberia.ng, showing off and some are suggesting, as you well know, he's sending a message to president trump. >> i'm paying 20 bucks down that the president doesn't take that message. i don't think we're going to see him shirtless on the green. i think there are two messages. one is to the russians themselves. if you look at his approval ratings, they are sky high. he does this stuff every year. the power image, it relates to ukraine, crimea, siberia and relates to him going around scuba diving and i think it's a message, i'm a tough guy and if you want to threaten me, you're not going to get to me. i'm the big guy on campus. >> what do you think, jamie? what message is putin sending? >> it's august. he does this every august. and we play it every august but i do think that, you know, these are two men who are good at sending messages but in very different ways. every august, putin takes off his shirt. i will note that while donald trump did a lot of tweeting today, the white house, last i che

want to bring in former white water independent council robert ray and cnn counterterrorism analyst phil mudd. phil, what does it mean that robert mueller is using a grand jury to issue subpoenas for the june meeting between don junior and the russian representatives. >> first of all, alisyn, it can't be just about that one meeting. we have information on one day, one session with a couple of people. i'm looking at a campaign that goes on months and months with allocations about russia involvement and inserting data into an election. i've got to believe director mueller is looking for information that relates about an expansion of contacts with russians beyond that one meeting. that's the only thing we know about. the second thing i would take from this, the guy i worked for doesn't do fishing expeditions. as evan said, this investigation is going into year two. i will lay money it won't go into year three. the fact they're going into a grand jury suggests to me they have enough information to ask the right questions. the right questions about people and the right questions about things like

as we await that, phil mudd, our own jake tapper, he reported that a prankster in the u.k. able to trick a bunch of white house officials into believing they were getting e-mails from colleagues on the white house staff, pretending to be other white house officials, including the now former communications director anthony scaramucci and the homeland security adviser to the president, tom bossert, who is an expert supposedly on cyber warfa warfare. what concerns does this raise that they were duped by this prankster in the u.k.? >> my concern is not on the duping. this happens all the time in america. i think we have a couple questions. number one, i assume, you got to hope that people in these positions are trained to look at what we call phishing e-mails. which is what this is. the cyber folks at the white house have a question to answer about when this stuff gets through, is your software good enough to flag it? i think anyone who wants to come and attack the white house better sit back and ask themselves one question. are you sure, with the quality of some of these e-mai

phil mudd, let me go to you first, former cia official, former fbi official. your reaction? >> well, a couple things. i'm watching the man who led the agency i served in so long. he was not only respected, but loved at the agency. he'd seen so much, he'd been under so much pressure. he had a lot of humor under pressure. when you look at his response today, it gives you a sense of the gravity of the situation. this guy spent decades in government as chief of staff during the impeachment of president clinton, as cia director, defense secretary, you see the emotion in his voice. i can tell you why you see that emotion. when you see the president embarrassing himself whether it's making mexico pay for the wall, a woman, talking about his genitalia, he was destroying his own reputation via social media via public statements. within the same week he's using the same media, social media, to damage security people like me because he's threatening a fourth rate national power and ensuring kim jong-un realizes, the president is going to elevate his profile internationally by engaging

we have cnn political analyst david gregory, counterterrorism editor phil mudd. will ripley, for people just joining us, you had breaking news about the first chinese response to all this. tell us what they're saying. >> i'll read you the response once again. china, what they tend to do in situations like this, they stand in the middle and tell the united states to calm down, tell north korea to calm down. what they don't want to see is an accidental war break out on their doorstep. there's growing fear here this morning that this is exactly where this path is leading, not that either side necessarily wants a military conflict, but one action could lead to a chain reaction. the statement reads, quote, the current situation on the korean peninsula is complex and sensitive. china calls on all relevant sides to uphold the broad direction of resolving the north korean nuclear issue through political means, avoid remarks and actions that could aggravate conflicts and escalate tensions. that aimed obviously at the effort to promote the issue r - through dialogue and ne

that's for sure. >> phil mudd, i want you to listen.his is president trump back in april speaking about north korea in an interview with john dicker son of cbs news. >> what do you make of the north korean leader? >> i have -- i really have no comment on him. people are saying, is he sane? i have no idea. i can tell you this, and a lot of people don't like when i say it. he was a young man of 26 or 27 when he took over from his father, when his father died. he's dealing with obviously very tough people, in particular the generals and others. and at a very young age he was able to assume power. a lot of people i'm people tried to take that power away, whether it was his uncle or anybody else and he was able to do it. so obviously he's a pretty smart cookie. but we have a situation that we just cannot let -- we cannot let what's been going on for a long period of years continue. and frankly, this should have been done and taken care of by the obama administration. it should have been taken care of by the bush administration. it should hav

. >>> phil mudd, i want you to react to this story. you seem to be smiling. >> i am.his is a classic amateur move by the congress of the united states. remember we had devin nunes from the intelligence committee go over to the white house. this isn't about partisan ship. this is about learning how russia was involved in the american election. months later we have staffers going overseas to conduct the same kind of investigation. why do they want to pickup information independently about the election? the second thing most viewers would miss, really significant. what did they tell the british government? if you're going to collect information overseas related to u.s. investigation as a courtesy, wouldn't you tell the brits and what are you going to tell the brits? mees don't tell the democrats? this doesn't make sense to me. i think there are a couple people whoever traveled over there have some answers. why weren't the democrats involved? pretty simple. >> good question. you know, rebecca, i want to play a clip from you. this is the president speaking about the russia

. >>> and, phil mudd, it looks like the north koreans in this lengthy at the same time basically explaining they're going to launch four intermediate range ballistic missiles towards guam, they have crossed the red line the president drew yesterday. >> what's he going to do about it? that's the problem with ratcheting it up. we discussed this last night the law of unintended consequences. the president rach et cetera tc you have a pair of 2, we have a pair of 3s and throw it on the table. when the north koreans say this he has a couple option. one, talk. doesn't seem like he wants to do that. the secretary of state talked about that. number two, military action. we don't understand the implications and i don't think he does of military action. we're not only talking about going against a ballistic missile capability. you're talking about ensuring that the regime leadership is gone so they can't rebuild the capability. that means an american engagement like the one we had in iraq. no mob nobo nobody in this town is going to talk about that. as soon as we ratchet up, what's the end game? >>>

. >> i always agree with phil mudd. >> i do not. tell me why you do. >> at least two instances.clear and allows for unmasking. it allows unmasking, recognizes it may be unnecessary because a crime is being committed or to understand the totality of the intelligence, you need to know who the person is, right? this has to do with what steve was saying about the investigation into russia. so the law recognizes it as a right and as an important authority for national security officials to know. >> all right. >> that's why in this instance i will agree with phil mudd. >> juliette kayyem, steve hall, thank you for helping us understand it better. appreciate it. we will take a quick break. when we come back, more on tonight's big developments in the russia investigation. a grand jury is impanelled. subpoenas have been issued over donald trump jr.'s now infamous meeting at trump tower. investigators are also examining financial documents related to the president, his family and the trump organization. we're going to show you how the president is responding. remember, he said, messing wi

let's bring back john avlon, karo karoun demirjian and cnn counterterrorism analyst phil mudd. >> got phil smiling. you know it's a good line if you get that sour puss smiling. >> as funny as the john lovitz retake is, phone call in person, who cares? what's the distinction? >> i think the distinction is the white house got to admit things out of the president's mouth are not true. if he's lying about something small, that's an indication of where we are with this presidency. it's the canary in the coal mine. these comments line up with a pattern the president has which is saying people have been coming up to me and saying at very high levels that it was the gl greatest speech ever given. of course, that strains cred utility. people are coming and talking about personal angers. everyone talking about john podesta's e-mails. the greatest speech ever given. you've got lying about small things and a fluff rate that doesn't rise to the level of reality. >> what the president used to refer to, karoun, a truth. hyperbole. in "the art of the deal" he wrote or somebody wrote with him, people

. >> phil mudd, what do we know about who did this and the use of the vehicles? is this about circumstance, convenience, is it a trend? >> i don't think it's about convenience. let me pick up on something paul said because i think it's critical. i think the police operations and the explosion the night before might have avoided more deaths. it looks to me like these guys were building truck bombs and when they got busted, they realize they had to move quickly until the police moved in. what i'm learning when i see this is, if you've got a cell this size, i've got to believe there are more people involved in the second echelon, who provided money and training? did they travel to syria and iraq? who facilitated that? i don't think we've seen the end of the identification of this cell, no that there are more operators out there, but a peripheral element that would support them. typically in one of these you'll see one, two, three people. as paul said, we saw this in paris. the first question i would have is there not only a larger operational piece but a bigger supp

phil mudd made the point that subpoenas are issued like this for document the and witnesses, unless the investigators already have information, already have some leads that they're following. the so some broad based fishing expedition might not be fair here. is that something you agree with? you don't think he would be having the grand jury issue these subpoenas unless he was looking for something specific. >> i agree with that. i think there had to be some predicate in bob mueller's mind and he is an extraordinarily a careful lawyer. i've worked with him and served along side him under president bush 41. the he's a total professional. you can say mr. mueller we disagree with this expanded scope as we soo it. he will listen to those arguments and make a determination, but i will also say that it's frequently said about grand juries they'll just do whatever the prosecutors want. that's not been my experience. i think it's not the experience of most prosecutors. those are 23 citizens. they are there, asking questions. and the prosecutors are keeping them very well informed or the prosecut

it's jim and john and me and mike morrell and jeremy bash and phil mudd, a whole bunch of folks, manyhom appear on cnn. and i fear we've created this impression that the intelligence community is at war with the trump administration, and that's a very, very bad impression. the intelligence community exists to support, to make the trump administration better, but you do have this image that you just suggested. >> but the president has also gone after the intelligence community. the sense that there's a war brewing is a two-way street. the president has tweeted about his criticism of them. >> it is. i've tried to stay away from that. for jim, director clapper, it was a little more personal because he was actively involved in that transition and he actually called the president-elect to complain about the tweet with the nazi reference, and jim tells the story that it was actually a fairly productive call. >> let's pin this down. clapper talked about worrying about trump with the nuclear codes. from an intelligence point of view, from relationships with foreign governments, what kind of i

. >> jeff toobin, phil mudd, thanks. >> thank you. >> coming up next, a new response from north koreaat of fire and fury like the world has never seen, a message containing a very specific threat to guam. also a live update from guam, ahead. there's nothing more important to me than my vacation. so when i need to book a hotel room, i want someone that makes it easy to find what i want. booking.com gets it. and with their price match, i know i'm getting the best price every time. now i can start relaxing even before the vacation begins. your vacation is very important. that's why booking.com makes finding the right hotel for the right price easy. visit booking.com now to find out why we're booking.yeah! i have age-related maculare degeneration, amd, he told me to look at this grid every day. and we came up with a plan to help reduce my risk of progression, including preservision areds 2. my doctor said preservision areds 2 has the exact nutrient formula the national eye institute recommends to help reduce the risk of progression of moderate to advanced amd after 15 years of clinical st

cnn counterterrorism analyst phil mudd and will ripley is back with us from beijing. gordon, there have been so many developments over the last 24 hours and it's felt like things have ratcheted up. but then we heard secretary of state tillerson trying to tamp things down. this is what he just said on this surprise stop in guam. listen to this. >> do you have any advice for americans? should they be worried? >> i think americans should sleep well at night. i have no concerns about this particular rhetoric of the last few days. i think the president, again, i think he felt it necessary to issue a very strong statement directly to north korea. but i think what the president was just re-affirming is the united states has the capability to fully defend itself from any attack and defend our allies and we will do so. so the american people should sleep well at night. >> are you sleeping well at night last night? >> no. first of all, there is an issue that i think the president was, with that fire and fury comment, really talking to the chinese more than the north koreans. >>

phil mudd, to you first, you heard the spokes woman defending the president's phraseology of fire andury saying that the president used the same language that kim jong un would use so that he would understand the message that the pressure campaign is working. do you agree? >> that's downright goofy. let me explain why. >> goofy. okay. >> there's a theory that the president is violating every day and it's called the rational actor model. the president assumes that an adversary that he doesn't understand and a potential adversary who does not have a good window on the world is going to interpret the message the president offered in the same way the president meant it. the president wants to speak to his base and potentially intimidate kim jong un. why would we assume that kim jong un takes that comment and interprets it how the president wants. if i were him, i would say, i don't understand this guy. he speaks off the cuff. he's engaged in military exercises, and maybe he actually does want to topple me, so why shouldn't i accelerate my military operations, including the development of

phil mudd put it in "the situation room" will we see the president tonight or just trump?e the hall. what do we expect from the president tonight? we saw the crowds outside. obviously thousands of people inside waiting to hear from him. >> reporter: well, i think that will be what's interesting, look, there are teleprompters set up for the president, maybe we will see

us is retired navy rear admiral john kirby, and cnn chief political analyst, gloria borger, and phil mudd. if anybody thought the president was going to change his tone, he seemed to have doubled down on fire and fury and set up some sort of, whether challenge, or basically kind of drew a line under the north koreans' own date of august 15th in guam. >> it's five days away, anderson. it's interesting, because this is a guy who was elected because he was a great businessman, and a great negotiator. and he's already going to the final option. it would be as if he was in his business and already going to suing before he tried to negotiate. the war of words is not good. it's never good on the diplomatic front. i'm not sure what he's trying to do. i thought he would tamp it down. i thought some of his aides would get him to get it under control, especially general kelly, maybe general mattis and secretary tillerson, but they didn't. he should be the guy being quiet and let, in my view, and let his secretary of state and his secretary of defense be either the good cop/bad cop and him weigh in a

. >> clearly, phil mudd, the president's reaction, some of the comments he made last tuesday involvingle violence that erupted thanks to the white supremacists rally that was taking place. that's exacerbated, further exacerbated some of these tensions between the president and republicans. he's got a rally that he's going to have very soon out in phoenix. he's going to try to rally his base. what is that going to do to the tensions that currently exist right now? >> let me give you one question, wolf, and the answer to that question will answer your question. will the president be trump or will he be president? when we saw the reaction to charlottesville, we saw a president who stepped back and said, i'm going to ad-lib and i'm going to talk about what i'm interested in, what my base is interested in. and he stepped out in a way outside of what his advisors would have suggested, horrible mistake. when he spoke last night about afghanistan, i was rereading it right before the show. whether you agree or disagree with what he said, a more presidential statement. the question is for a man

phil mudd put it in "the situation room" will we see the president tonight or just trump? let's two to sara murray inside the hall. what do we expect from the president tonight? we saw the crowds outside. obviously thousands of people inside waiting to hear from him. >> reporter: well, i think that will be what's interesting, look, there are teleprompters set up for the president, maybe we will see sort of reserved delivery. sarry hu rah huckabee sanders, secretary, pointed to the president's message of unity last night when she was asked what he might talk about tonight. also there's a pretty big crowd already building here. there are still people streaming in. we know this president has a tendency to go on rifts, tendency to flee the teleprompter if he hears a big cheering crowd. one thing the white house took off the table today, though, they said president trump will not pardon joe arpaio at this event today, joe arpaio held in contempt of court. anderson? >> the president has been o outspoken against both arizona senators. they're not going to be there tonight, are th

. >> joining us now is phillip mudd and daniel hoffman. phil, you spent years in the fbi. is it standard practice to have a command center on electionday monitoring fake news? >> it would be standard practice to monitor threats. i remember sitting around the fbi and cia and you would say whether it's the turn of the year on january 1 when you're concerned about threats, especially going back to y-2-k, or hooking to see if there's anybody trying to disrupt the inauguration to the voting, to monitor social media in this way is a new world for the fbi. i think there are two quick aspects of this that are kr critically important. the fbi should be talking to the congress about whether there are lessons learned in terms of controlling this information when they talk to people like facebook and twitter in the future. another final point on this that is lost but critically important. that is metta data. i would want to know as soon as i saw this story, did we identify who is involved? can we identify it down to knowing what their internet activity is, and were there any hops, one