Top of the hour. Good morning, everyone. Im poppy harlow. Im john berman. The phrase of the morning is you cant make this blank up. That is reportedly a quote from former press secretary sean spicer, something of a mantra to him according to this new book, fire and fury by Michael Wolff, he reports what he says he saw inside the white house nearly a year inside the west wing doing reporting he says he saw white house that was aimless and clueless, beset by feuds and really with senior staffers mocking the president. Remember, this is on top of those quotes yesterday attributed to steve bannon, that left the president furious and disgusted, those words from the white house, going after the president s family, calling the meetings between donald trump, jr. , Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner and russians unpatriotic and treasonous. Today the president s former chief strategist is clearly trying to mend fences. Listen. A. By the way, nothing will ever come between us and President Trump and his agenda. Dont worry about that. Kaitlan collins at the white house. Im not sure the president sees it that way, but what else can you tell us . Yeah. Especially after the president issued a very lengthy statement yesterday saying that steve bannon had lost his mind. Poppy and john, the excerpts are continuing to dominate the news cycle and this book has not even been published yet with more coming out this morning including one where Michael Wolff writes that Jared Kushner and ivanka trump not only two of the top aides to the president in the white house but his own family, were trying to distance themselves from the president just six months in to the administration in trying to save themselves from them, and Michael Wolff quotes steve bannon saying the daughter will bring down the father. Steve bannon and ivanka trump were on two different sides in the warring factions we saw in the early days of this white house with steve bannon spearheading the more nationalist type group and ivanka trump, Jared Kushner, gary cohn, being part of the more globalminded group. Youre continuing to see just what the level of animosity was between the staffers in the white house in the early days of the administration. Kaitlan, were learning that president is trying to take action through a private attorney to get to try to get this to stop, cease and desist letters, not just to steve bannon now but others as well . Yeah. Thats right. A familiar action by the president when something is said about him he doesnt like, but overnight his lawyers did send steve bannon a cease and desist letter telling him to stop making defamatory statements about the president and his family because as you both know the president was furious yesterday after it was revealed that steve bannon had said he believed that meeting that donald trump, jr. And Jared Kushner participated in, in trump tower, was treasonous and unpatriotic and the more these excerpts are coming out were really seeing the fallout between the president and someone who was his former top political ally, with the president issuing the lengthy statement yesterday alongside saying that steve bannon had lost his mind, also seeking to really downplay any role he had, not only in the campaign but here in the west wing saying that they rarely met oneonone, but we know that steve bannon actually had walkin privileges to the oval office and often went in there to speak with the president and he played a very big role in his campaign. Were continuing to see that fallout and right now the president is staying behind closed doors today with Nothing Available to the press for right now, john and poppy. Kaitlan collins outside the white house, thank you very much for the reporting. With us now is matthew, the editorial director of the Hollywood Report reporter and personally edits Michael Wolff who penned this explosive new book. Thanks for being with us. Look, the white house has sent this cease and desist letter. Do you know if Michael Wolff has received a letter directly . I dont actually. Thats something that his publisher would probably receive. Okay. So can you talk to us about the factchecking process that went into all of this . Well, thats a question for the book publisher, but i do know that when ive edited Michael Wolff for the Hollywood Reporter and he interviewed trump he got the trump interview on tape, so we understand there are tapes that have been made from his time in the white house. The other thing is, i know the president issued a lengthy statement but as we know and cnn has reported, a lot of times this white houses reputation for pushing out the truth is not stellar. You talk about the book, but there was also this article posted this morning in the Hollywood Reporter written by Michael Wolff a summary of what were about to see in the book that comes out. Talk not about the factchecking process but how he got in there. He was inside the west wing as he says it, sitting comfortably on a couch for much of a year and then back and forth between across the street. How did that work . Right. The process started when michael wrote a piece for the Hollywood Reporter in june of 2016 pegged at the california primary and sat down with trump in los angeles when he was here campaigning. That piece, we didnt realize at the time, but trump apparently loved it and invited, through his people, michael to come to the white house and spend some time for reporting for a potential book. That opened the door into this world where once trump had blessed him being there, he pretty much got Carte Blanche to go where he wanted, set up meetings with whomever he wished and spend as much time as he could in the white house. This lasted for much of the first year of the presidency. Yeah. Its remarkable access. Talk to us about, for anyone who hasnt read the article you edited, as you were editing this, what struck you the most . To me, its alarming. Its alarming the extent to which those closest to trump have been frightened and have come to the conclusion that he is not fit for this role. Thats due to a number of things, including the infighting that he not only allowed but apparently encouraged, some of the decisionmaking process, the way that he would sequester himself and, you know, take in the amount of cable news that he has, and, you know, this apparent decline in even everything from his speech pattern to, you know, not recognizing someone at maralago, a lot of the things that he has reported are pretty alarming and disturbing. Some of the people who are mentioned in this book are suggesting, you know, whether it be on twitter or through friends that they thought a lot of it was off the record. They thought a lot of these conversations were off the record. Now whats not said is they specifically stated it out loud which you need to do. As far as you know for michael, speaking to him about the book or about the piece he posted this morning in the Hollywood Reporter were these conversations off the record . My understanding from michael is that the feeling in the white house was that some things were off the record, then put on the record, some people were not professional enough to even though when they were speaking on the record. Michael has been doing this a long time. Hes very diligent. You know, i think this happens a lot when people regret what they say or they dont like how its categorized. But i you know, he was there in the white house. That is the mosts professional setting you can imagine and these were professional people doing the with work of the government. And they learned a lesson if they thought they were off the record and didnt specifically clarify it at the time. Matthew, thank you so much for your time, sir. Here to discuss with us now political commentators mary and paul and cnn political analyst carren. Paul i want to start with you, youve been a part of some sort of tellall books from inside the white house or political operation before. It doesnt always feel good. No. But its nothing like this. Nothing. Lets talk about what makes this different. Bob woodward wrote a book about bill clintons economic policy, a group that was a little more populist like me and we had our fights over policy. What policy should we follow to stimulate the economy. And thats one thing. Sometimes those fights can get personal. Thats what woodward covered. At the time i was a part of that and still regret that. I said mean things about my colleagues. This is very, very different. This is as matthew said earlier, about the president s fundamental fitness to serve as president. No one on either side of the fights in the clinton days or frankly the reagan days or bush days, when there was always a war for the soul of the presidency, we have never seen a white house where the senior most officials believe that the president is unfit to serve and thats what this book is telling us. To that point, Mary Katherine, it is the central argument that paul gets to here, and some of the quotes attributable to folks, sam who advised the president for a time saying hes just an fing fool, senior staff, almost all of them according to wolffs reporting, said the president was, quote, like a child. What does this leave you thinking about this white house that we knew was different than any prior white house, but these are from some of the people at the top . I dont think anything terribly new. Its one of the reasons i didnt vote for him, i didnt think he should be the president. Some of the things sound a little on the nose. The part where he doesnt know who john boehner is even though hes treat tweeted about him many times and gold with him. Theres that. The idea hes semi illiterate. He mentioned where he went to school quite often. He synthesizes information in a different way. Some of it seems like its a bit of a reach. Look, this is an unconventional white house. It was not going to shape up into the kind of white house i thought like this president should be leading and i think were finding out more about that as we go along here. You know, it is interesting, because we also see in the new piece that came out this morning by Michael Wolff and the Hollywood Reporter some we saw yesterday, the divide between steve bannon and the president s family, the kids. There was a quote here, i dont know if i have it in front of me, about jared and ivanka, right. Yeah. By july jared and ivanka, less than six months [ inaudible ] to the most powerful people in the world engaged in a desperate dance to save themselves which mostly involved blaming trump himself hisses idea to fire comey the daughter bannon declared will bring down the father. Again, you know, youve seen battles and infighting inside a white house before but sort of the bile being spewed is remarkable. Its almost shakespearen in the way were having these very the commentaries are being made. We knew there was a division in the white house already, the bannon wing of influence, trumps family and that they were not in lockstep with each other. Having the details and seeing the how colorful really it was and how vicious it got to be at times is kind of putting that in a whole new light and bringing that to a much more vibrant light. The thing thats notable to see that right now is its still very relevant. Were heading into a Midterm Election season right now. What which side of the who has more influence over the president can have more influence over the gop and that can have an effect on how the primary season runs in the next several months and that has an effect on basically many things in 2018 including potentially congressional control which Party Controls which the chambers of congress. So again, this is building on stuff that we already had inklings of through other reporting, but its much more vivid now after seeing these accounts come out. Thats one word for it. That is one word for it. Paul go ahead. I was going to say, i think perhaps the bigger implication at this moment as you were saying is for the political side of this because when we were talking about postdoug jones winning in alabama people saying is there an appetite for bannonism and there always will be an an tight and these candidates who will say whatever it is they want to say but they need to make an argument to the people who want that candidate, look, maybe donald trump can get away with this but no one else can and youre going to lose. Bannon was making the argument we can win this way. Trump telling those voters no, this isnt working as he did in that burn letter yesterday, that is the thing that might change their minds and might change those primary seasons. Why republicans were high fiving each other or close to it on capitol hill yesterday when all this was happening. Paul, to you, for americans watching this morning and looking at this and some of them saying, i can see some folks saying, this is just more gossip inside the beltway, doesnt affect my life or matter to me at all, talk about why you think it does or doesnt . Well, Mary Katherine makes a point the politicians in the Republican Party can we follow trumpism without trump . Foreign leaders are watching this. Our adversaries around the world are looking i want my president to succeed. The North Koreans are evil, the iranians are evil, we have enemies in this world. And this will embolden our adversaries and frighten our allies. This has a huge effect on our lives and its not really about this person or that or this feud or that, its about the president. The reason the Trump White House looks dysfunctional and dishonest and dirty and dumb is because the president of the i need is dysfunctional and dishonest and disloyal and dirty and dumb and the conclusions adversaries will take and allies and does tremendous damage to the United States. Other political news that happened and maybe because of this, maybe the president was trying to use the clout of this to get other news out as he disband the Voter Fraud Commission not great news for him. Not great news but hide something in not great news right there. He said the Voter Fraud Commission which he said 3 million votes he didnt lose by 3 million votes because illegals voted in the last election that panel is done but put out a statement this morning where he still says that he believes the vote was rigged. Your take on all of this . The president has to thread a delicate needle here, he has to distance himself from some of the policies and some of the campaigns that were more bannon pushed because there is now this wide gaping rift between the president and steve bannon, but he also cant completely do a 180 turnaround or people will say youre contradicting yourself and thats hypocritical. This is an example of that sort of dance were going to be seeing played out probably over and over again as we head into other areas where bannon had a lot of influence over what the president was saying and doing and demanding in terms of policies and in terms of political campaigns that he was making from the oval office. Mary katherine, also just coming out in the last, you know, 30 minutes or so, youve got representative jim jordan of ohio and representative mark meadows calling on Jeff Sessions to resign saying he has, quote, no control at all of the premier Law Enforcement agency in the world. We knew he wasnt aen i fan and wanted him to appointment a special counsel on dnc and Hillary Clinton and emails, what do you make of them saying he cant control Law Enforcement and needs to go. Im a little surprised by it and not sure that sessions, after having weathered the trump storm, succumbs to the meadows jordan storm. Hes been beat up about as much as you can be beat up and still in that position. Once youve survived bombogenesis, they may not upset you too much. It is interesting to see this. The president tweeting about it is one thing Mary Katherine, but see some of your firmest supporters in congress coming out and saying it, particularly when congress was a group defending Jeff Sessions before. Thats true. May have an impact. Well, yeah. Its also just symbolic of the fact that as i always say, and probably the gop won the presidency of the United States, while having a giant ugly divorce and they continue to have that ugly divorce while in office and its just a question of whether they can coparent the United States of america successfully. A lot of scrutiny right now generally coming from the gop of the house and doj and fbi. One thing about Jeff Sessions if he goes, whoever replaces him, probably does not have to recuse himself over the russia probe and could have implications down to what mueller is doing which is definitely a focus for the republicans in the house right now. Paul begala, the cease and desist letter from the president s private lawyer, to, you know, over this book, its a little late for that, the book is written about to come out, that aside and the letter says threatening imminent legal action a president who threatens imminent legal action all the time rarely to follow through on it since hes been a candidate and in office. First off as a lawyer who never has practiced but trained as a lawyer why normal people hate lawyers. Lets compromise. Ill ceases but not desist. Okay. This is redundancy and after the fact as you point out. If, in fact, mr. Bannon is defaming the president i suppose he has a cause of action but i wouldnt bet a lot on that. The bar is high for that. The president is upset because this violates what he believes to be a nondisclosure agreement, he is telling the truth. This is just its not going to scare steve bannon. Hes not going to shut up. Although hes not talking this morning. Hes talking about how much he likes the president. Sure. Just keep talking, steve. Thats all we want. Keep generating this. Its not going to work. He may be trying to intimidate lower level people from talking but thats not his problem. They have to talk to Robert Mueller under oath in that grand jury and no cease and desist ord ord order stops that. We will dive in more to the calls for Jeff Sessions to step down coming from republican lawmakers. Also more on the stunning details were hearing about the inner workings of the white house. And bracing for bombogenesis. How do you prepare for a word with so many syllables . The monster storm bearing down on the east coast. At whole foods market, we believe in food thats naturally beautiful, fresh and nutritious. So there are no artificial colors, no artificial flavors, no artificial preservatives in any of the food we sell. We believe in real food. Whole foods market. Went to ancestry, i put in the names of my grandparents first. I got a leaf right away. A leaf is a hint that is connected to each person in your family tree. I learned that my ten times great grandmother is George Washingtons aunt. Within a few days i went from knowing almost nothing to holy crow, im related to george washington. This is my cousin george. Discover your story. Start searching for free now at ancestry. Com we know that when youre spending time with the grandkids every minute counts. And you dont have time for a cracked windshield. Thats why we show you exactly when well be there. Saving you time, so you can keep saving the world. Kids safelite repair, safelite replace breaking news just in. The president s attorney private attorney, has sent a cease and desist letter to the company, the publisher, of this new explosive Michael Wolff book about the Trump White House. Brian stelter broke the news and with us now. Another escalation here, trumps attorneys trying to take down this book. You were talking about steve bannon receiving a threatens letter from trumps attorneys, charles harder, who represented hulk hogan against gawker and Melania Trump in the past and this morning he sent me this letter he sent to the publisher of the book as well as to Michael Wolff directly that says the book is may be defamatory and accuses wolff of malice which is a Legal Standard that would suggest a future potential lawsuit. The more immediate concern here is they are demanding the publisher not release the book. Remember, thousands of copies have been shipped to book Stores Across the country. Number one on amazon. There are tens of thousands of preorders. This is the president of the United States personal attorney saying do not publish this book or well see you in court. Be clear, though, theres a history here of President Trump before becoming president sending cease and desist letters to people. He frequently threatens lawsuits, doesnt always follow through. Remember he threatened to sue the New York Times last year and did not follow through. But by any measure this is a pretty serious escalation of his war against the media to have one of his attorneys send a cease and desist letter to a book publisher. And shines a new light on the book and makes people more interested. I think so no the legal issues here, joining Us National Security legal analyst susan hennessey. You know, this is interesting, the president writing the letter now not just to steve bannon but the book publisher and the author here. Any way that a judge would say this book cannot come out . Well, that actual malice standard he references regarding defamation is extraordinarily high whenever it comes to a public figure so the odds of a lawsuit on those grounds being successful are relatively low. The notion a cease and desist agreement is enforceable in this circumstance is probably not. We would need to see the language of that. One thing this does illustrate is sort of the trump doesnt understand the difference between the rules regarding a private business and the rules regarding running the government. In a private business you can enter into contracts with people expecting their secrecy. In the government we have a broad assumption or presumption of transparency. The American People are supposed to be able to know this information except in executive privilege or classified information. Were seeing trump and his lawyers acting like businessmen in a realm of sort of white house staffers, government officials, where this is really not supposed to be sort of the relationship between the American Public and the white house and sort of the facts on the ground. I mean, thats fascinating. They would need to prove this was a National Security violation or classified information or Something Like that, but the other thing is, this isnt just an article, this is a full book with a years worth of information that Michael Wolff got sitting on that couch in the west wing. I mean, could they ban the whole book or bar the whole book from being published if say one excerpt from it was proven to not be accurate . Or just have that i mean nixed, how do you do that because the book is at the book stores. The horse is sort of out of the barn in terms of the information that bannon has provided and other white house officials. This was probably more about messaging to other people, other individuals, right, saying you cant share these stories, you cant publish this information. Maybe they can prevent the broader release, the actual publication of the book. Again, legally thats quite questionable but if they were to prevail they could prevent the book from being sold in stores. That said, the notion they could prevent the information from coming out into the public when literally thousands of journalists have advanced copies at this point theyre not going to be able to do that. Opens you up to Michael Wolff trying to make the case these things are true whether he has tapes he can show his notes and that may not be ultimately what the president would like which brings me to the Paul Manafort lawsuit against Robert Mueller. Something similar sort of at play here. Paul manafort suing the special counsel saying that the special counsels indictments issued are outside the per view of the original investigation, so your take on that but also, again, does this open Paul Manafort and the white house up to Robert Mueller saying hey, wait a sekts seco second let me tell you why this has to it with the russia investigation. The tell thats sort of the manafort lawsuit is maybe more of a pr stunt than something genuine, he chose to file it as a standalone lawsuit as opposed to a motion to dismiss in his ordinary criminal trial. Thats what we would expect if he expected to prevail. Now hes sort of making an argument regarding kind of the broad constitutional argument regarding the scope of prior special counsel regulations and sort of asserting that mueller has exceeded his jurisdiction. Ultimately that decision is one thats made between the special counsel Robert Mueller and Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein. Theres specific provisions in doj regulations for when theres conflict over jurisdiction and a need to change that. Weve seen absolutely no evidence Rod Rosenstein has affirmed he doesnt think that mueller is exceeding the scope of his jurisdiction and so, you know, sort of for the relevant actor, there appears to be no conflict whatsoever. Really, even if you could imagine Paul Manafort prevailing on this lawsuit and frankly from a legal perspective you cant, there would be nothing but to prevent Rod Rosenstein from appointing a new special counsel with a broader mandate that he didnt exceed. This is really sort of less about a real legal issue and more about pr posturing. And a civil case, not a not moving to dismiss this which is also interesting about the approach here. Susan, we appreciate the expertise as always. Dow wow. You said it. Pointing to 25,000. That key mark has been crossed. Whats behind the surge, next. Your Insurance Company wont replace the full value of your totaled new car. The guy says you picked the wrong insurance plan. No, i picked the wrong Insurance Company. With Liberty Mutual new car replacement™, you wont have to worry about replacing your car because youll get the full value back including depreciation. Switch and you could save 782 on home and auto insurance. Call for a free quote today. Liberty stands with you™. Liberty mutual insurance. Or a little internet machine . It makes you wonder shouldnt we get our phones and internet from the same company . Thats why Xfinity Mobile comes with your internet. You get up to 5 lines of talk and text at no extra cost. So all you pay for is data. See how much you can save. Choose by the gig or unlimited. Xfinity mobile. A new kind of network designed to save you money. Call, visit, or go to xfinitymobile. Com. New this morning, a stunning account of a year in the white house by journalist Michael Wolff. A picture of chaos to say the least inside the west wing. Bring in democratic senator Tom Carpenter from the state of delaware. Thank you for joining us. A lot thank you very much. In this book from Michael Wolff thats not yet. We saw an essay he wrote in the Hollywood Reporter. This morning he talks about senior staffers saying the president acts like a child inside the white house. There are other stories in there too that question his memory and his mental capacity. You have been in meetings with the president at least on the phone, observe him and work with him over the last year, ahave yu personally witnessed any of this. I have not been that close in person. Ive talked to him a time or two on the phone. These are concerning things and you read and say how much of this is true. I think mark warner said you cant make this stuff up. Im not one that focuses all that much on this kind of i guess journalism. What i focus on are the things we need to get done, a budget plan in place that xwins begins ratchet down the deficits, not a very good tax plan but the way people and companies can understand it. The c. H. I. P. Program, a budget not in place, we have just all kinds of things that we need to worry about. Bob mueller doing an investigation. The key thing here is not so much the book thats just out and going to get a lot of attention, but i think the key is to make sure that the investigation of bob mueller is conducted is funded and able to have the resources to continue. The people in this country deserve to know the truth about what happened not just last year but even more than a year ago and mueller is a great guy, decent guy, i know him, worked with him when i was chairman of the Homeland Security committee. He needs to do his job. Thats the most important thing. You say somebody once said to me, poppy, once said the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. And the map thing here is to find out what happened to get to the truth of what happened in 2016. The president has said in the last week he thinks bob mueller will be fair. Well be watching. Senator, do you the president and i agree. Okay. There you go. Question, though, on you saying like im not really focused on the Michael Wolff book, et cetera, i hear that but you do have analysts, paul begala on our air, saying look the real danger in this for the American People and for the nation is that you have foreign leaders watching this and thinking less of the United States as a result or thinking, you know, how can i work with the United States if this is the situation inside the white house. Do you give that any credence . Ever since the election of 2016, the foreign leaders i talked to said surely youre not going to elect this guy trump, are you. I said i dont think so. When he became president they said to me, you know, what is he really like and have you lost your minds in the United States of america. And i reminded them weve been through worst than this, 200 years ago, civil war, 150 years ago, civil war, president assassinated, impeached, we got through that and well get through this as well. The folks who wrote the constitution in philadelphia just north of pennsylvania all these years ago, they didnt want a king. They wrote something that wouldnt let one person screw things up forever and we have the system of checks and balances. Senator, something that just happened over the last few minutes, two republican members of congress, mark meadows and jim jordan, have essentially called on the attorney general Jeff Sessions to step down. They say he has no control of the premier Law Enforcement agency in the world, upset among other things he hasnt called for a special counsel to investigate Hillary Clinton, i believe. Your response to this . Do you want to stand up for Jeff Sessions . Jeff and i were hes not the person i would have picked to be attorney general. Hes my colleague in the senate for a number of years. Known him for governor eight years of delaware and i thought governors ought to have a chance to select the team around them as long as the folks in the mainstream are smart and people of good value. Mark meadows, like mark, think a lot of mark. He can say all he wants to about Jeff Sessions stepping down. At the end of the day jeff works for the president and if the president wants a new attorney general i think thats not so much our calling here in the house or the senate, thats more with the president. Do you agree with them, that Jeff Sessions has in their words no control of the premier Law Enforcement agency in this country . Do you agree with that assertion . I think i think were lucky to have an fbi, were lucky to have the leadership of the fbi weve had for years, that includes jim comey and includes bob mueller and includes the guy thats running the place now. Theyre good people and need our respect. And i dont know that the involvement of all that much of the attorney general is all that important. Theyre going to continue to go to work and continue to go to work and do their jobs and work hard. Senator, i want to ask you a question about something that has come up in the news in the last few weeks, a unique moment, the metoo movement, you have admitted to a mistake in your past, happened 37 years ago, again something you admitted to, slapping your former wife in an argument 37 years ago. You put out a statement saying this is a difficult topic that dredges up feelings from many years ago, but sunshine is the best disinfectant. Given the moment were in, does it cause you to reflect on your own past in a different way . We all make mistakes. I made one. Circumstances im not going to get into that. Out of a difficult marriage. My wife is deceased. Were in the middle of a child custody battle with the exhusband and the fellow i was running against to try to unseat a congressman was interested in using a child custody battle anything to put their hands on to defeat me in the battle for his seat in the house of representatives. Caught up in the politics. Out of the bad situation and marriage for five years came a wonderful thing and the boy i raised as a son for five years is my stepson. Hes raised and grown and has family of his own and successful business. Like high third son. Hes actually had things to say of late about the kind of dad that i was and the way i treated his mom and treated him and his sister. And i would let that speak for it itself. Senator, we appreciate you joining us. Thank you for being here. Thanks so much. All right. Market milestone. The dow hits 25,000 for the first time. Its up 36 since the president was elected. That is quite a gain for the market on such a short period of time. The rally fueled in big part by strong corporate profits, the promise of the increased profits this tax cut will bring to them. So, likely a lot of boost ahead for this market. Corporate tax rate now down to just over 20 . Right now brutal winter storm slamming the northeast. Millions are in its path. Were on top of bombogenesis. When a cold calls. Achoo . Answer it. With zicam cold remedy. It shortens colds, so you get better, faster. Colds are gonna call. Answer them with zicam zicam. Get your better back. Now in delicious fruit drops. I have to tell you something. Dad, one second i was driving and then the next. They just didnt stop and then. Im really sorry. I wrecked the subaru. I wrecked it. Youre ok. Thats all that matters. vo a lifetime commitment to getting them home safely. Love. Its what makes a subaru, a subaru. [burke] abstract accident. Seen videoit. Covered it. C we know a thing or two because weve seen a thing or two. We are farmers. Bumpadum, bumbumbumbum to find smarter solutions. To offer more precise and less invasive Treatment Options than before. Like advanced Genomic Testing and immunotherapy. See how were fighting to outsmart cancer at cancercenter. Com outsmart all right. News from inside the white house. If you know people inside they may be harder to reach by telephone. Kaitlan collins joins us to explain why. A personal cell phone ban. The press secretary Sarah Sanders issued a statement this morning announcing that the white house will no longer allow staffers or guests in the west wing to use their personal cell phones. Our sources tell the cnn White House Team this is a move that the chief of staff john kelly has long been thinking about ever since he first entered the administration over the summer, but they are just now deciding to enact it leaving a lot of staffers unhappy because as ayo both know working in the west wing means long hours and how are they going to stay in touch with their family and spouses. In the statement this morning, Sarah Sanders said that its because of the security and technology of the west wing that is a top priority for the Trump Administration and that, therefore, starting next week no longer going to allow those personal cell phones, but sources inside the white house do not believe that security is the reason that theyre not going to allow them to use their personal cell phones while at work but because they want to stop leaks to reporterses with one source saying, quote, its not about being secure, its about being suspicious. Kaitlan collins, thank you. I was actually saying im surprised this didnt happen sooner after the spicer leaks. It is hard on staffers. Its hard. Of course. All of a sudden the phone people have been reaching you on to find you. Of course. Right now 58 million of you are in the path of this bombogenesis theyre calling it, monster winter storm, barreling up the east coast. Parts of new york, new jersey, declaring a state of emergency. Countless schools closed, air traffic from new york to boston at a standstill, 3,000 Flights Canceled so far. The storm has winds 70 miles per hour, gusts possible, and snow, an hour some places will get up to a foot of snow and then cold. Temperatures as low as 3 degrees in some places. Meteorologist Jennifer Grey in the Weather Center with the details. The storm is very powerful. It intensified rapidly during the overnight and today and it is now basically over the northeast. The low is offshore but all of the snow is on shore. See new york, hartford, rhode island, all in the snow. Boston getting it as well. So very heavy snowfall will continue through much of the day. This will push out this evening. This is a fast mover, but its going to dump a lot of snow and going to have some very strong winds associated with it. We could see Hurricane Force gusts as the storm races off to the northeast. This is 7 00 tonight and you can see new york on the tail end of it. Then during the overnight it is going to be pushing out completely. So we should be in much better shape by the time we get to tomorrow. But nearly 3,000 Flights Canceled for today. It has been a rough day across the northeast and will continue to do so. 45 to 50mileperhour winds, a forecasted winds throughout the afternoon. New york city, 20 to 30. These are wind gusts. 40 to 45. Nantucket, 50, 60 mile perhour gusts through the Late Afternoon and evening. Here are your snowfall totals. Three to six inches in philadelphia forecasted, new york city four to eight and more than a foot possible in boston. The other side of this will be the very cold temperatures on the backside of this system. Temperatures will be in the single digits. These are high temperatures for boston. Saturday only getting up to 6 degrees. New york city could only reach 10 on saturday. With the gusty winds we could see Power Outages all up and down the east coast and keeping warm throughout the weekend for a lot of people will be a huge, huge concern. John and poppy. All right. Jennifer grey, thanks so much. We will be living through it in the northeast. Talk about a warm welcome. The basketball playing family got quite a reception after they arrived in lithuania. Details in the Bleacher Report. So, dathe family up to the lake for the weekend. But without the White Knuckles this time. cuz his new 2018 ford f150 has blis with trailer coverage. Its brainiac smart. Not only does it watch your f150s blind spots, its got your trailer covered too. One less thing to spoil the weekend. No, it cant make the fish bite but maybe theyll work on that. This is the new 2018 ford f150 it doesnt just raise the bar, pal. It is the bar. Bleacher report update brought to you by the 2018 ford f150. It is the bar. Follow the nfl news stream on Bleacher Report team stream app to see the standouts named to the offensive line of the week. Lavar ball and his basketball playing sons didnt have such a happy experience on the last international trip. But that has not stopped them from traveling again. Coy has that and more in the Bleacher Report this morning. Good morning, my friend. Good morning. Poppy and john, this Bleacher Report presented by the 2018 ford f150, liangelo ball made headlines after arrested when his College Hoops team took a trip to china, resulted in la var pulling him out of school sending him and his brother lamelo to lithuania. Lavar ball whose oldest son plays for the lakers was acting like he was a hollywood star. Listen. In the house. Lets go. Which way we heading . Were happy to be here. We happy to be here. Lets keep it moving and grooving. This is great and awesome. Happy to have a new chapter in our lives. My expectation for my boys to have a lot of fun playing in front of people. I tell them basketball is Just Entertainment and we coming to lithuania to entertain. Lavar ball sent his 16yearold son lamelo and 19yearold liangelo to play in a city with a population of about 9800 folks. Next to poland, near russia. These kids are a long way from home. Imagine being the kid growing up in the city of angels, los angeles, leaving that california sunshine and your friends to go to play in a place thats essentially in the middle of nowhere. Some locals are even saying hey, they better be ready for something different. Translator i dont know how other basketball players will live but they wont have the comfort theyre used to. This here is different than where theyre from. He said it might harden them a bit. They will likely make their debut next week. Well keep an eye on that. Talk football. The cleveland browns, perfect season, perfectly imperfect with a winless 016 season, fans, theyre having a parade to celebrate that. This saturday, when playoffs start, this is a legit parade. They contacted the city for approval, got security clearance, roads will be closed and parading around the stadium. They needed money for things like security, medical staff so they started a gofundme page and raised the 10,000 they were seeking. They said the season was full of utter embarrassment but still full of fun too. Why not celebrate. Speaking of celebrate, one team either georgia or alabama is going to be celebrating after mondays College FootballNational Championship game here in atlanta and this is the trophy one of the teams will hoist above their heads. It sits over two feet tall, about 50 pounds, 24 karat gold, bronze, stainless steel, i cant touch it, though. Those are the rules. Says Charlie Green. He says dont touch it. Hes mean and knows karate and been doing this for 19 years. All the way back when it was a crystal ball. Im not messing with it. Ill touch him. Dont even look at it. I cant look at the trophy. Avert your eyes and look away. They should not trust you. Coy will try to lock that up in his office. Im glad Charlie Green is there. Thank you so much. Youre welcome. New revelations from inside the white house. And new stories about chaos in the first year of the trump presidency. Were following all the developments next. 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At this hour a hug looking like a death grip today. The president going scorch earthed on steve bannon and threatening to sue over explosive accounts of chaos and possible crimes within the trump inner circle. This morning that author reveals cringe worthy news stories from the Trump White House. And hear that stickiticking sou . A socalled bomb cyclone is going off along the east coast. Rare snow in the south, with fierce winds, up to a foot of snow hammering the northeast. And were keeping a close eye on wall street and the big board. The dow making history surging past 25,000. Todays milestone, 120 years in the making. This is cnn breaking news. But first and happening right now, breaking news. It all comes down to this, a random drawing to dec