jason miller, to one of the problems sarah murray was reporting on.nks the investigation is going to be over soon. he thinks he is getting a letter soon that he is cleared in the investigation, yet "the washington post" reports it's going to go on for another year. how much of a problem is that? >> i don't think it's a problem. because i don't think that president trump did anything wrong. so whether this goes another couple weeks or another year i don't think that's going to be an issue for him -- >> the issue is will he get upset? if it doesn't end soon as apparently his lawyers have told him it will, is that going to set him off? >> no, i think the american public is who is going to be upset. because we have the booming economy and after a year, we have nothing to say the trump campaign did anything to include with a foreign government in the election. let's go to the transition team e-mails. i thought the purpose of this was to talk about the campaign colluding with a foreign entity we're talking about transition team e-mails. this is well after t

sarah murray joins us from west palm beach, florida. taking aim at the fbi and the deputy fbi director in particular. fill us in. >> reporter: that's right. hardly the usual activities of a christmas holiday, but when it comes to trump, not out of the ordinary. spending the weekend and the run up to christmas day taking aim at the news media and the fbi in particular. the outgoing deputy director. the president aired grievances about the fact that he had a very successful, very productive year and doesn't believe he is getting enough credit for it. he needed to get all of that out of the way and out on twitter before he headed to his christmas eve dinner last night. >> sarah murray, thank you for that report and merry christmas. enjoy the nice weather down there. president trump is touting accomplishments as he approaches his one-year mark in office. he said he deserves more credit than he is getting. let's discuss that. commentators ben ferguson and teeth. merry christmas to you both. >> merry christmas. >> thank you to both of you. le

sarah murray. this is fascinating reporting and we should give the context that over the weekend the president tweeted that he fired his former national security adviser michael flynn because he had lied to the fbi which of course raised the question we are talking about now. did he know that flynn was being investigated? what are you hearing? >> we understand that doug mcgann spoke with sally yates in january. after that meeting he informed the president that he believed that michael flynn had misled the fbi and lied to the vice president. we understand that sally yates who was the acting attorney general never characterized flynn's testimony and he never saw flynn's testimony. this was his belief. he did not tell the president he believed flynn was under investigation or that he committed any crime. that's the general essence of what we know. they later received a transcript of the conversation that flynn had with the russian ambassador. this centers around the sanctions in december. after having

cnn's sarah murray has details for us. >> reporter: on the another sleepy day on the president's vacation-lago, the white house was left grappling another "the new york times" bombshell and centered around george papadopoulos who was a former policy aide to trump when he was in his campaign and revelations telling people he was aware moscow had damaging emails about hillary clinton and may have helped attract law enforcement to this information whether any collusion between trump campaign officials to meddle in the election. before this report came out, the white house went out of their way to downplay papadopoulos role during the campaign. here is what sarah sanders had to say about it months ago. >> it was a volunteer position and no activity was ever done in an official capacity on behalf of the campaign in that regard. >> reporter: now the white house took a cautious role in its response to this bombshell report over the weekend. ty cobb, who is the president's counsel within the white house, put out a statement that said the following. if you dig into "the new york times" report, a c

cnn's sarah murray joins me now from west palm beach. sarah, give us sop insight into what bottomed this tweet. >> reporter: well dana, as you mentioned, this is a tweet that was sent from the president's account when he was at his golf course today. here's what it said, caught red handed, very disappointed that china is allowing oil to go into north korea. there will never be a friendly solution to the north korea problem if this continues to happen. so, of course the question is what set the president off? what got him thinking about this issue? there are reports coming out of south korea saying that there were chinese and north korean ships that linked up and attempted to transfer oil, but there was also a report from the treasury department last month that noted that there were north korean shipping companies that were trying to do these kinds of ship to ship transfers likely of oil to try to avoid these u.n. sanctions. now as for china, it insists that it did not sell oil to north korea in violation of these sanctions, but we still d

sarah murray is live from west palm beach where the president is spending new year's. fill us in on the white house response to this. >> let's remember how they dealt with this initially when it came to light. they thought the down play his role in the campaign. one adviser referred to him as a coffee boy. the white house insists he was a low level volunteer. look at what they said next. >> just explain what george papadopoul papadopoulos' role was? >> extremely limited. a volunteer position. gep, no activity was ever done in official capacity. on behalf of the campaign a in that regard. sxwl t. >> he was the coffee boy. i mean, you might have called him a foreign policy analyst, but in fact, if he was going to wear a wire, all we'd know now is whether he prefers a caramel over regular american coffee. he had nothing to do with the campaign. >> now today, the white house has taken a pretty cautious approach in how they're responding to this story. the president's counsel within the white house said this. out of respect for the special counsel and his process, we are no

cnn white house correspondent sarah murray is joining us live in west palm beach where the president is spending new year's. sarah, what is the white house saying about the report? >> well remember how they referred to george papadopoulos before when it first became clear that he had pleaded guilty? they certainly went out of their way to try to minimize his role during the campaign deriding him. essentially a low-level volunteer. some even called him a coffee boy, look at how sarah sanders, the white house press secretary and campaign adviser responded at the time. >> can you explain what george papadopoulos' role with the campaign was? >> it was extremely limited. it was a volunteer position. and again. no activity was ever done in an official capacity. on behalf of the campaign. >> the guy was -- he was the coffee boy. i mean you might have called him, a foreign policy analyst that in fact you know if he was going to wear a wire, all we would know now is whether he prefers a an espresso or a coffee. in conversations with his barista. he had nothing to do with the campaign. >> now t

this is according to new exclusive reporting from cnn's sarah murray and raju manu. the president is insisting not only he's going to be exonerated but special counsel robert mueller is going to write a letter clearing him of any wrongdoing that he can wave around as proof that he didn't do anything wrong. a christmas miracle. there is no indication from mueller or his team that they believe in miracles or that the investigation is in its final stages, only mueller and his team know for sure but some legal experts say the investigation might actually be ramping up with michael flynn's guilt plea in cooperation. as to the best christmas card ever, this magical letter of exoneration, it's unclear where that idea even comes from. the real problem, though, according to one source, is that if the president doesn't get what he wants for christmas or soon thereafter if this letter doesn't come, he'll have some kind of a meltdown. that's a direct quote. he thinks his attorneys have lulled him into a false sense of security and unrealistic expectations which could backfire sp

let's go straight to sarah murray in west palm beach. sarah, this health care tweet, the dossier tweet, what do you make of it? >> reporter: the president didn't have anything on his public schedule today, but he has plenty to say on twitter. he started with a nod to his legislative agenda if you think it's back on the agenda. that didn't seem likely, but the president is taking aim at obamacare once again saying he as all but undone it with the tax reform plan and predicting there may be a wave of bipartisanship and republicans can come with democrats and make a health care plan. that may be a stretch with relationships the way they are like between democrats and republicans. that was not his only feeling. he remains distracted and upset and infuriated by this russia investigation. he was taking in cable news and railed in the dossier that talked about the collusion and coordination between trump and his officials. much of that has been uncorroborate although investigators confirmed some of those contacts he called are a pile of garbage.

sarah murray is live in west palm beach. sarah, significant changes unfolding at the fbi and you learned the deputy director plans to retire and one of the top lawyers, jim baker is being reassigned while the president continues to attack the institutions of the fbi and the free press. what does the white house have to say? >> that's right. this is a president who has not held back since taking office of his criticism of the department of justice as well as the fbi. he is taking aim at top officials and the white house insist that is the president has more confidence now that he hand pick picked his own word to lead it. here's what the department of legislative affairs had to say. >> he is pleased to have chris wray and pleased at the changes taking place. we put all of our faith in the department of justice knowing there should be no bias there. he is making serious concerns about whether there was or was not. is he telling him to clean house? >> in the meantime this is the 108th day at one of his properties and calling it a

. >> sarah murray near mar a lago. i top the get more from jessica snyder. you heard sarah movie with the president blasting the dossier. >> he said the dossier is bogus. that's not entirely true. it's true that the most salacious allegations have not been verified, but the broad assertion in the dossier that russia waged a campaign to interfere in the election is tep accepted as fact by the u.s. intelligence and it's penitentiary to note that law enforcement and officials did their own work separate from the dossier to support the findings that russia tried to meddle in favor of trump. plus it was cnn who reported other aspect like russian officials and other russians mentioned in the memos. they did take place. the fbi last year used the dossier as part of the justification to win approve to monitor for the associate. carter page said the dossier was cited in the application to monitor the page. the president calls it bogus, but claims have been verified. >> he seems to be on the campaign to delegitimize what the counsel was doing. he was saying that it was

. >> i want to bring in sarah murray. sarah, how'd it go? are they going to solve this problem? better footing today than the botched meeting and the president made a show saying everyone is here, everyone is unified, cracking jokes. they did make it clear they are trying to get together, put their heads together to avert a government shutdown. we will see if they are successful. >> sarah on saturday, president trump's going to be at the opening of the mississippi civil rights museum, the civil rights icon, john lewis, democrat of georgia, is not going to attend just reminder for viewers. this is the man who was beaten by police officers for protesting jim crow laws in the south. he was one of the 13 original freedom rioters and he walked with the obamas on the 50th anniversary of the bloody sunday march. what's going on? why isn't lewis going to be there if trump is there? >> that's quite a move by lewis. he has made clear he does not want to be on stage with president trump. that he still looks back at the president's reaction in the wake of those rallies from white supremacis

let's break down what he said with sarah murray joining us in west palm beach. sarah, what are the facts? >> reporter: well, look. obviously the president is riding high on the victory of passing a sweeping tax overhaul and no small potatoes in washington. we know that this is a president who likes to embellish the record and obviously can't stop talking about it. listen to more about what he had to say. >> i truly believe that the first 100 days of my administration has been just about the most successful in our country ice history. >> reporter: now, he may have had a successful first 100 days by his own right and may have had a successful first year looking at the tax reform victory but in terms of how this stacks up to previous administrations, the notion that this president has been more successful in the first year than any of his predecessors doesn't hold water. this president signed fewer bills in the first year in office than any administration dating back to eisenhower. now, this is the president who's obviously very sensitive to the fact and a key griev

sarah murray is live for us in west palm beach near the florida resort. significant changes at the fbi. the deputy director andrew cabe plans to retire. one of the agency's top lawyers. jim baker being reassigned while the president continues to attack the institution of law enforcement and the free press. >> reporter: that's right. obviously we haven't seen the president hold back in his criticism of the justice department broughtl broadly, bu taking aim at the law enforcement in the united states. he still has confidence in the fbi now that he got his own person to lead it. here's what the director of legislative affairs had to say. >> i think he is very pleased to have chris wray in the fbi, but at the same time when we put all of our faith and confidence knowing there should be no bias, he is make the point that we need to make sure there is no bias and there are serious concerns about whether or not there was or was not. >> was he telling the fbi director that it's his appointee and telling him to clean house? >> he has full confidence. >> you see it

. >> sarah murray, thank you. >> here is part of our conversation. >> this sort of helps fit a big piece of the puzzle, the narrative of 2016, why did the fbi gets so concerned about trump and potential russian contacts that cause them to launch the investigation, this was a key piece. do we know why australians wa waited two whole months to tell their counter partner about this conversation? >> we don't. >> that's one question we'll continue to report out. >> it is possible that the australian, who's the top diplomat in the u.k. heard the information, it was not considered urgent until two months later when we saw e-mails spilling out publicly that were damaging to hillary clinton's campaign specifically of the dnc e-mails. after that, it became clear that it was what papadopoulos was talking about and they put two and two together and urgently going to the united states and speculations and it is possible. >> what did the fbi do after they got the information from austria. >> what's reported and spoken of by senior officials that in late july of 2016, the fbi open the counter investiga

. >> cnn's sarah murray, gnat viser of the boston globe, and eliana johnson of politico are here. sarah, i'm going to start with you. you covered president trump as a candidate. what do you make of his embrace of roy moore? we saw that on friday and in the robocall coming out tomorrow. >> the white house was trying to navigate how to deal with the bombshells coming out on roy moore. but it seems the president has gotten clear and brought his aides along with him. look, we need this guy, we need his vote, and we're going all-in on that. the president has made a political calculation in this. they need as many republicans as they can get in the senate. he wants to try to notch more legislative victories on the cusp of tax reform. and it's very clear he's not going to let allegations of molesting teenagers get in the way of that. >> sort of the calculations that you imagine a lot of voters in alabama are making, too. the voters in alabama tomorrow, some of them will hear from the president with his robocall apparently releasing tomorrow. and he's going to say, if alabama elects libera

first, i want to go to cnn white house correspondent sarah murray with the president in florida. so sarah, the president was discouraged from holding a year-end news conference, but he's found other ways certainly to vent in these closing days of 2017. >> reporter: that's right, breanna. this president has been largely out of sight this week, but in an unplanned encounter with a reporter, he clearly had plenty to get off his chest, including a number of complaints about the russia investigation. president trump in full vacation mode hosting military members at the palm beach club. >> i said to come use my course. that's okay, you guys have a good time. >> reporter: pausing long enough to rail against the russia investigation in an interview with "the new york times." while he didn't call for an end to the special counsel's probe into potential collusion between trump's presidential campaign and russian officials, the president insisted its damaging. i think it's a very bad thing for the country, he told "the times," because it makes the country look bad. it makes the country look

mary katherine is a federalist and mj lee and sarah murray. the president of the united states decides what he wants to talk about when he sets the tone of the day with his morning tweets. the senator calls it sexist and boorish and reprehensible. she did call per him to resign. this is the counter punch. >> i don't think the president feels like there is going to be ramifications when he does something like this. he has good reason to believe this. he was elected president of the united states when more than a dozen women came out and said he sexually harassed and abused them and he won anyway. i think he sort of feels unleashed to be able to do this kind of thing at least on twitter and then turn around and turn to his legislative agenda for the day. they have to say no, no, no. what he tweets is not the agenda for the day. you can't ignore things like that. you can't ignore it in the way the president has in the past. >> you don't know what he meant when he said that. there are some words that might be in a gray area. you are talking about

sarah murray is live from west palm beach mere mar a lago. do we know when he is heading back to washington? >> we are expecting him to say here in mar a lago at least through the new year and then going to camp david and meeting with mitch mcconnell and paul ryan about how to move forward with their agenda in the new year. there is plenty of stuff on that list. they left town in washington with a lot left undone including government funding and a fix for the dreamers and disaster reand health insurance bill for children. the president also made clear he wants bipartisan deals done in the new year. now that could include infrastructure and a broader immigration fix and maybe even fixes to obamacare. this could be a little bit far-fetched though. we have seen democrats willing to appear at the white house with the president and sound open with cooperating with him, but the white house thought they were going to get democrats on board with tax reform and that did not go as they had hoped. what we are seeing as the president is on his florida va

with us to share their reporting, sarah murray. cnn's manu. let's start with that moment and expand out to what it means for the big effort moment. the president spending his holiday. why did they do it this way? why not a big signing ceremony. he could have scheduled it differently. >> it was funny and normally you would be with leader mcconnell. you would be signing the bill and offering them pens. he offers the pens to members of the media who were in the room and he didn't have his partners in this legislating process with him. it was a bizarre way to do this, but the president wanted to get this done before he left for florida and it seemed like an opportunity to be honest and dodge questions from the press. whether he would do a press conference along with the signing of this legislation. by doing it in a quieter way and inviting the small pool of reporter, he had this broader scene with the press conference which was what they were toying with doing. >> from the beginning to the end of the year, the president will have an active week i'

sarah murray is live at the white house. and sarah, i have to say, it's rather unusual, the vice president making this trip before the president. >> it is. it's extremely unusual, jake, and extremely unusual when you think about this president and what he ran on, supporting the troops and keeping america safe. it's note that believe we are now almost a year into donald trump's presidency. he has not been to iraq. he has not been to afghanistan. and that mike pence is making that trip before him. now, this is a break from the norm from prior presidents, george w. bush went abroad to visit the troops eight months into office. former president barack obama i think was in office about three months before he went abroad to visit the troops. the president has opted for opportunities a little bit closer to home, obviously we know he was at walter reid today, and so he certainly has spoken with troops, we've seen him give national security speeches, but it is a little bit bizarre to see the vice president out there to see him making

. >> sarah murray is "outfront" in west palm beach, florida and what can you tell us about why the president is issuing this warning to china today. these images aren't new. >> well it's a little bit of a mystery as you pointed out, there were these reports coming out of south korea media. the chinese deny they were taking part in any kind of sales of oil that would violate u.n. sanctions. the treasury department note d last month that there were north korea ben shipping companies that were attempting these ship to ship transfers likely of oil to evade u.n. sanctions, but the president is on vacation here in mar-a-lago. he was on the golf course when the tweet was sent. we've reached out to a number of of his aides at national security counsel. was there something new that set off the president? some new piece of information he had confirmed? did he know there was a new transfer attempt and we got no response ch it's worth remembering that the president travel wg a very thin staff when he goes on vacations like this. so it's possible that even his own staffers don't knowd the pr to send this

. >> thank you very much sarah murray. >>> now, more breaking news in the russia investigation, we have gotten some court documents in a few moments ago. from k.t. mcfarland. the deputy adviser under michael flynn. when she was asked if she was aware of any communications between flynn and the russian ambassador. well, it appears she's saying different things. manu, what are you learn willing from these documents? >> that's right, k.t. mcfar land was nominated to be the ambassador to singapore. as part of her confirmation proceedings, she was asked this, according to documents that we have just obtained, it's a question from cory booker, senator on the committee, did you ever discuss any of general flynns contacts with russian ambassador sergei kislyak directly with general flynn? in response, i am not aware of any of the issues or events as described above. now, this is significant because in those court documents that were unsealed on friday, they revealed a senior transition official in late december did speak with general flynn about what flynn should talk to sergei kislyak about, i

holiday feuding with the fbi and sending a litany of tweets to andrew mccabe and correspondent sarah mu murray is there and how is the white house responding to the backlash from these tweets, sarah. >> if the white house is at all concerned, they are not letting on and this is not a president who is a stranger to tweeting things that set up controversy. we did see them over the weekend and going out and talking about the fbi and saying look, the president has confidence in chris wray, but he is concerned about instances of bias and looking to root that out within the agency. that has been a concern to members of trump's own party. it's pretty clear the white house is not backing down from this line of criticism. >> what we saw the first lady as we get back to the holiday spirit, she tweeted out a christmas selfie where she is wearing a santa hat. very festive here. tell us about what the first couple hare doing for christmas and what they have planned for the rest of the day. >> very festive. we have not seen the first couple yet. no public events on the president's schedule. we don't anticip

thanks so much for that, sarah, sara murray reporting. let's get some more on all of this congressman jeffries is joining us democrat on the judiciary committee. congressman, thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me, wolf. >> so "the new york times" is reporting this past february the fbi actually briefed hope hicks who is now the president's communication director about russians contacting her during the tran sticks. what does that tell you? >> well, the entire sordid episode involving russia and trump campaign is some involvement during some way shape or form during the transition and perhaps russian attempts to influence the administration once donald trump was sworn in. i'm employees ds of course that the fbi took steps to try to defensively prevent the level of in filtration that may have occurred during the trump campaign. but it's all very troubling and needs to be unravelled which i expect will be done by the special prosecutor bob mueller. >> "the new york times" congressman is it also reporting that hope hicks was intervie

i want to start with sara murray. sarah, the blame game and the second guessing has already begun. >> yeah, that's absolutely true. we know even the president's own allies outside the white house warned him, great, you passed tax reform, that's not going to be enough to save your party's control in 2018. we know the leadership in both chambers, we've been talking about the house, concerns about keeping the house. now that has moved to the senate. control of both chambers, leadership is concerned. rana mcdaniel, the head of the rnc, was handpicked by the president for that role. this is according to politico warning him, look, the party's support with female voters is collapsing. this is a real problem. so, yes, the president got his tax reform win. he's sort of riding that wave of victory, but it could be short lived and we could see republican infighting as soon as january when they have this whole list of priorities they kicked down the line come to fruition. >> also lots of other reports, mcconnell versus steve bannon, c

and also sarah miller director of philanthropy and special projects at 5000 broadway. would you please stand? thank you. [ applause ] murray horowitz, would you please stand and be recognized, a mentor to lin-manuel? [ applause ] >> we're honored that all of you are here this evening to share this evening with us. it's now my pleasure to introduce senator lisa murkowski, chair of the aappropriations subcommittee on interior, environment and related agencies. among the related agencies are the two national endowments for the arts and for the humanities. she's a dedicated advocate for the arts. in lisa's words, there's nothing ha holds us together more as americans, as human beings, as what comes to us through the arts. the u.s. capital historical society was honored in 2004 to be awarded the humanities medal with a ceremony in the white house, a very exciting moment for the society and personally for me. so i would like to now bring to the podium senator lisa murkowski. [ applause ] >>> ron, thank you for that. it is indeed an honor to be with you this evening. and to the family, mr. and mrs. miranda, wonderful to have you