joining us now is wendy sherman, former u.s.er secretary of state for political affairs and ambassador sherman is a senior counselor at albright stonebridge group. investor sherman, your reaction to the scheduled phone call with vladimir putin this weekend and what we might expect, what we might hope for and what we might fear. >> i think probably there's a lot to be feared, lawrence. indeed as your whole program has talked about tonight, donald trump doesn't yet have really the instincts the fingertips, the sentence se of how you don negotiation than a building. he has put out earlier on that maybe he'd give up sanctions on russia if they would build down their nuclear arsenal. that is -- putin has said, the official spokes people have said that's laughable. we have so much at stake here. not only are the u.s. and russia the largest nuclear weapon states and gorbachev has a piece in "time" magazine calling for a build down further of those nuclear weapons if that should be our focus but we have seyria to discuss and importantly

wendy sherman you're familiar with a the love the issues. >> indeed. think that senator mccaskill did a terrific job in really saying, tell us what you believe in, and we know that congressman price has wanted to take a whack at medicare, at medicaid, at patient care, and making sure that working people have the care they need in the united states and around the world is part of what we stand for and i think that's what senator mccaskill was pointing out. i think andrea we've got a big problem. even though we're going through the cabinet nominations at the state department, at the defense department, all of the undersecretaries, the deputy secretaries, the assistant secretaries are not filled out. so the president being able to move on really key national security issues, including prime minister may coming here tomorrow from great britain is really quite tough. >> a quick question. what are you hearing about the staffing of the national security council, where there are people deployed from other agencies and it has become bloated and criticized in th

joining us is ambassador wendy sherman, former u.s. undersecretary of state for political affairs.ere. >> good to be here. >> the idea that the u.s. president is basically questioning the underpinning of our democracy of free and fair elections, how does the world see this? >> what's so sad about this is the world looks to the united states as the strongest democracy in the world. we go all over the world urging people to create a system that allows their people to have a voice. when the women's march happened last saturday, there were similar marches all over the world because there's a sense of solidarity and purpose. so when the president of the united states questions his own legitimacy, not others, but questions his own legitimacy by saying there was voter fraud, then we're giving license to authoritarian leaders all over the rest of the world to say that the united states isn't such a great country, isn't a strong democracy, that their authoritarianism isn't the right way to go. it undermines ourselves. i don't understand why he's heading down this world. >> it's not speculat

. >> ambassador wendy sherman, thanks for joining us. >> thank you. >>> we're following a lot of news. let's get right to it. >> this is cnn breaking news. >>> good morning everyone. welcome to your "new day." breaking news, president trum tweeting he's calling for a major investigation into voter fraud. the president has peddled a light for months claiming that millions of people voted illegally in the election without providing any evidence. >> the irony is this news of this investigation is overshadows the president's expected executive orders today on the border wall and immigration and different deliveries on his promises during the campaign. just six days into the trump administration. we have it all covered. let's begin with athena jones live at the white house. athena. >> reporter: good morning, chris. we talk about doubling down, tripling down, now tripling down on the debunked claims that three to 5 million people voted illegally in the november election. the president tweeting in the last 45 minutes or so, i will be asking for a major investigation into voter fraud includin

, mark preston, our senior political analyst, nia-malika henderson, senior political reporter, wendy sherman, the former undersecretary of state for political affairs for president obama, she was in the march today. kayleigh mcenany, conservative contributor for the hill. shel shelly coombs, and republican rick santorum. wendy, let me start with you. you were marching. what made it -- how did you make that decision, that this was the place you wanted to be today? >> it was really quite extraordinary, as i think anybody else who went to the march felt today pip made the decision because, quite frankly, i was watching way too much of "say yes to the dress," drinking way too much wine, really needing to find some solidarity for the future. and some energy that i've long had and seemed to be dissipated by the darkness of the rhetoric that i was hearing, not only during the campaign, but as donald trump became president of the united states. and if you look at the difference -- and quite frankly, the person who really got me to do this march was my daughter. who lives on the web and knew about th

we will talk to ambassador wendy sherman.hen robert shiller weighs in on interest rates and the health of the housing market. at 8:00 a.m., tom barrack. "squawk box" will be right back. >> you're watching "squawk box," live from the nasdaq market site in times square. we'll be right back. >>> welcome back to "squawk box." time for the executive edge. yes. yes. the world economic forum releasing its annual risk report ahead of next week's highly anticipated gathering in davos. andrew? >> you're going. >> i know i am. you say it with such sarcasm. >> i gave that a read with a lot of -- gathering in switzerland. >> sarcasm. >> among the top risks, dividing societies, fears for the world's climate. the report highlights the possibility of an anti establishment backlash in elections is possible. but they're talking about now the netherlands, france, germany and italy. among the guests at the meeting, china's president ji jinping, a theresa may will also attend. are they going to land from the private jets this time or solve income