Transcripts For MSNBCW First Look 20181210

It is monday december 10th. Im Ayman Mohyeldin alongside Yasmin Vossoughian and louis burgdorf. We begin with the recent Court Filings by the special counsels office. Theyre now raising new questions about the trump ga campaign and russia as the president denies any wrongdoing. Here some of the key takeaways. In those documents filed on friday, prosecutors say trump directed illegal hush money payments to two women with whom he had alleged sexual relationships before running for president. The filings allege that trump was involved in discussions about a trump property in moscow during the president ial campaign. Prosecutors also said an unnamed russian offered Michael Cohen political synergy between russia and the Trump Campaign back in november of 2015. The documents claim cohen was in contact with people connected to the white house and circulated his response to congressional inquiries. Prosecutors also allege that former Trump Campaign chairman Paul Manafort had been in communicate with a Senior Administration official throughout february of 2018 along with other contacts with Administration Officials the. And he had lied about it. Amid these new filings and accusations from prosecutors, President Trump continues to deny any wrongdoing and insists, as he has all along, there was no collusion with russia. Sir, did you direct Michael Cohen to commit any violations of law . No, no, no. On the mueller situation, were very happy with what we are reading, because there was no collusion whatsoever. There never has been. The last thing i wanted is help from russia on a campaign. But as far as the report that we see according to everybody ive spoken to, i have not read it, theres absolutely no collusion, which is very important. So according to the Washington Post public records and interviews show that russians interacted with at least 14 Trump Associated during the 2016 campaign and president ial transition. In fact, on november 10th of 2016, just two days after the election, a top kremlin official told a news agency that Trump Associated had been in contact with the russian government prior to the election. Russias Department Foreign minute city said, quote, i cannot say all of them but quite a few have been staying in touch with russian representatives. Hope hicks responded it never happened, there was no communication between the campaign and any foreign entity during the campaign. And in february of 2017, President Trump also denying that his campaign had contact with russia. Watch this. No, no. Nobody that i know of. So youre not aware of any contacts during the course of the election . How many times do i have to answer this question . Russia is a ruse. I have nothing to do with russia. To the best of my knowledge, no person that i deal with does. The view at the Justice Department is that a sitting president cannot be indicted. That does not mean a president cannot be charged after leaving office. The prosecutors in new york have examined the statute of limitations on the Campaign Finance violations and believe charges could be brought against mr. Trump if he is not reelected according to a person briefed on the matter. Rudy giuliani denied the president is implicated due to the acquittal and mistrial of john edwards for money used to pay off his pregnant lover. No responsible prosecutor would premise a criminal case on a questionable interpretation of the law. However, Michael Cohen has pleaded guilty under the law. Russias a ruse, by the way. Yeah. And there was no collusion. Joining us now danny cevallos. We got a lot of new information out of those Court Filings on friday, to say the least. I want to pick up on what could potentially be one of the biggest problems for this administration, the information that President Trump directed Michael Cohen to pay hush money to two women he reportedly had sexual encounters with, the significance of that. Why is that so important . Could it be so problematic for this administration . Michael cohen has long been the biggest problem for President Trump. And on friday last week, for the first time the government stated in as many words that the governments position is that the president or individual one directed and orchestrated these payments with Michael Cohen. Those payments are a crime. The only real remaining question is whether or not the president knew what he was doing was a crime, which is the standard under that particular law. But its not a very large hurdle for the government to get over. This is a very serious statement by the government, which just barely falls short of openly accusing the president of a crime. So you now have Top Democrats basically talking of impeachment here and saying that there could actually be prison time if its proven that he directed these hush money payments. Whats the likelihood of that happening . Its hard to say, because the doj says that the president cannot be indicted. There are a couple more arguments in favor of that. One is that the constitution appears to require that a president has to be impeached, then removed, then he can be prosecuted. As you saw Rudy Giulianis tweet, which i thought was very interesting, the precedent of the john edwards case is not that Campaign Finance law isnt a crime and it cannot be prosecuted. The precedent is that prosecutors will bring these charges, but its not certain that you can always get a conviction. But make no mistake about it, the government, the doj and u. S. Attorneys, view Campaign Finance law violations as crimes that are prosecutable. With the written answers that President Trump has laid out, are the prosecutors looking for the president in his written answers to corroborate everything that they already know . On the one hand, you can expect that the president gave the blandest, most noncommittal answers possible to those questions. On the other hand, you can expect that the prosecutors were aware of that and they made sure they surgically prepared these questions so they could get the answers that they needed. I dont think the timing is completely random that all of these things are happening after the president submits the answers to these questions, because it may have established Bedrock Foundation for positions that prosecutors are going to take in the future. All right. Thank you very much. We are learning new information about the upcoming exit of white house chief of staff john kelly. His departure has been expected for some time now. The Washington Post reports that kelly did not show up to work friday. Instead met with the president friday night to iron out details of his departure. The two men agreed that kelly would announce today that he was leaving. But two advisors tell the post that the president , eager to change a flurry of bad headlines after the recent mueller reports, broke his agreement with kelly and made the announcement himself on saturday. Watch this. John kelly will be leaving. I dont know if i can say retiring, but hes a great agree. John kelly will be leaving at the end of the year. Well be announcing who will be taking johns place. It might be on an interim basis. Ill be announcing that over the next day or two. But john will be leaving at the end of the year. Kellys frustration with the president has also been widely reported amid reports that the president spends only six or seven hours in the oval office daily. The post reports that kelly reports the less time spent in the oval some days, the better. Kelly wanted to quit less than three months into his tenure last year. Its been interesting to see all these memes that have circulated around the internet of faces john kelly has made when the president is speaking with his hand on his face. Were also learning more about nick ayers, the chief of staff to Vice President mike pence. Hes not going to be john kellys replacement. It was first reported by the wall street journal that ayers and the president could not agree on a time frame. The president wanted a twoyear commitment, but ayers would not commit to serving more than the first three months of next year. He tweeted he will leave the white house at the end of the year. The president also tweeted im in the process of interviewing some really great people for the position of white house chief of staff. Fake news has been saying with certainty it was nick ayers, a spectacular person who will always be with our maga agenda. I will be making a decision soon. Current candidates include mark meadows, white house budget director mick mulvaney, david bossy, steve mnuchin, Matthew Whittaker and new york yankees president randy levine. Interesting. Joining us from washington, White House Reporter for politico gabby orr. Good to see you. I think were beginning to see a clearer picture about what happened during the 2016 campaign of donald trump. And that is that there were several overtures made from russian officials, people with close ties to russian intelligence to members of President Trumps campaign, oftentimes top aides and senior advisors on the campaign and those that are really in that inner circle and that very few of these overtures were ever rebuffed by the president s aides and advisors. We learned this in the filing on friday of Michael Cohen. In november of 2015 he said he was approached by somebody with ties to russia and he continued to have discussions with this perso person. That seems to be the case with others as well. Paul manafort is one of them. Michael flynn. So many Trump Campaign advisors have been in touch with people from russia. This is really painting a picture that could create dire circumstances for this white house as we move forward. Lets talk a little bit about the white house intrigue following all these shakeups inside the west wing over the last few days. Nick ayers taking his name out of contention. When you look across the entire spectrum of everybody from u. N. Ambassador to chief of staff and all the names in between its worth saying this is a regular time for there to be a great deal of turnover in any white house. After the midterm elections as the president gets ready for his reelection campaign. But it is still unusual in the Trump White House because were now looking at getting a third chief of staff in under three years. President trump criticized his predecessor barack obama for the number of chiefs of staff that he cycled through during his presidency. Here we are at a Record Number in three years. I do think it creates southerly of a morale problem in the white house. Weve heard in our reporting at politico that a lot of people are wary of who trump might pick for his chief of staff. If he goes in the direction of picking somebody like mark meadows from the freedom caucus, it could mean he is positioning himself and his chief of staff to be an attack dog heading into 2020. Especially with all the possible inquiries coming out of congress in the next two years. Really theres in whole narrative that whoever is chief of staff is still really donald trump at the end of the day. Still ahead its been nine months since Rex Tillerson learned he was fired from a tweet, but now he and the president are bickering back and forth. Were going to have that coming up. Plus the biggest takeaways from james comeys latest testimony in front of congress and how President Trump is responding. 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Youre more than just your bipolar i. Ask about vraylar. This is moving day with the best inhome wifi experience and millions of wifi hotspots to help you stay connected. And this is moving day with Reliable Service appointments in a twohour window so youre up and running in no time. Show me decorating shows. This is staying connected with xfinity to make moving. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and twohour appointment windows. Click, call or visit a store today. Welcome back. Former secretary of state Rex Tillerson is speaking out about how his relationship with President Trump has soured. Watch this. It was challenging for me coming from the disciplined, highly process oriented Exxonmobil Corporation to go to work for a man who is pretty undisciplined, doesnt like to read, doesnt read briefing reports. We did not have a common value system. When the president would say, well, heres what i want to do and heres how i want to do it, and id have to say to him, mr. President , i understand what you want to do but you cant do it that way. It violates the law, it violates a treaty. He got really frustrated. I didnt know how to conduct my affairs with him any other way than in a very straightforward fashion. I think he grew tired of me being the guy every day who told him he cant do that. Wow. Quite a revelation there. President trump responded, of course, to that on twitter. Writing, quote, mike pompeo is doing a very great job. Im very proud of him. His predecessor Rex Tillerson dent have the mental capacity needed. He was dumb as a rock and i couldnt get rid of him fast enough. He was lazy as hell. Now it is a whole new ball game. Great spirit at state. All that was needed was hashtag be best. Geez. Former fbi director james comey spoke with Nicole Wallace about the lingering questions he has had about his january 2017 briefing of President Trump about russias 2016 attack on democracy. What did you think when the president of the United States started working on a press release instead of asking one question about an american adversary trying to hurt this country . It was really troubling. I started going to the whys. Something really weird is going on here. And that weirdness continued where he would not even criticize putin in private. And trying to understand that just kept running through my head, so why is this . Comey told the house judiciary and oversight committees that he launched an investigation into leaks about the Hillary Clinton email investigation that he suspected originated in the fbis new york field office. After Public Comments from top trump surrogate Rudy Giuliani and others back in october of 2016. Comey said that giuliani appears to be making statements at the time based on his knowledge of workings inside the fbi, raising concerns to him that we may have a leak problem. Comey dismissed President Trumps repeated accusations of an fbi conspiracy against them from Senior Leaders like peter strzok. Telling the Committee Peter strzok hupd draft my latter to congress in october 2018 that Hillary Clinton blames for her defeat. In some of his weekend tweets, President Trump alleged that comey lied to congress, but the committees have made no formal accusations against comey. Lets get a check on your weather now. A big snowstorm in North Carolina, virginia, places that dont normally get snow like this. Record breaking. We still have a quarter Million People without power. Thats pretty significant when its this cold. The snow fell from greenville, really heavy in areas of virginia and North Carolina. It even snuck up into central virginia. It was close and knocked on the door in d. C. But didnt quite get there. Roanoke at 15 inches. Winstonsalem at 13. Richmond at 11. 5 inches of snow. That was your second largest december snowstorm of all time. Raleigh and charlotte mixed in with ice, your totals were a little lower. We still have rain and freezing rain north of raleigh, snow in the mountainous areas. Thats why we still have 13 Million People under winter storm warnings. Its going to quickly improve during the day today. Temperatures will warm up above freezing. The roads continue to improve. The problem is going to be later on tonight. Even a little bit of snow possible tonight around columbia, south carolina. Tonight it refreezes. Thousands of schools in the region are chosed toda eclosed. Theyll be digging out and the kids will be playing in the snow. Snow day. Still ahead, some stunners on the gridiron. You dont want to miss what everyone is talking about around the water cooler this morning. Sports is next. 25 of your mouth. Listerine® cleans virtually 100 . 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Talk to your doctor about preventing migraine with aimovig. And be there more. Brushing only reaches 25 of your mouth. Listerine® cleans virtually 100 . Helping to prevent gum disease and bad breath. Never settle for 25 . Always go for 100. Bring out the bold™ seven seconds left. Tannehill will throw it. And this will end it after the shovel. Or will it . Miami running around, circumstancing. Didnt have the angle. Touchdown a miracle oh my god. Time now for sports. What an ending with the schoolyard lateral dream coming true. Whats being dubbed as the miami miracle. We have it topped off a big day around the league. Lets go to chicago for sunday night football. The bears hosting the los angeles rams. The bears were able to control the rams charging offense, forcing jared goff into throwing a career high four interceptions. Chicago also sacked goff three times including a safety. We have to give it up for chicagos bradley sowell. The bears topped the rams 156. Look at that catch there. Finally from the hardwood to the diamond and bans and smith are heading to cooperstown. Todays Game Committee of baseballs hall of fame previously known as the Veterans Committee voted at the winter meetings to elect baines and lee smith to the hall of fame. George steinbrenner also did not make the cut. Induction ceremonies are scheduled for july 21st at cooperstown in new york. Im ready for the water cooler. Amazing highlight. Im sure the defensive coordinator for the new England Patriots is going to be lets see it one more time. Anyone waking up this morning that missed this is going to be in shock. You dont see this working in the nfl. Wow. You definitely dont see it working in the nfl. Also the Patriots Defense was very lackluster there. You see gronkowski there. And the jets actually won against the bills. So im just going to throw that out there. My husband is waking up very happy today because the dolphins is his team. Okay. In case everybody wanted to know that. Still ahead, much more on the russia probe. Well show you how lawmakers are reacting to the latest Court Filings by the special counsel. President trump announces william barr as his attorney general pick. music throughout dealing with Psoriatic Arthritis pain was so frustrating. My skin. It was embarrassing. My joints. They hurt. The pain and swelling. The tenderness. The psoriasis. Tina i had to find something that worked on all of this. I found cosentyx. Now, watch me. Real people with active Psoriatic Arthritis are getting real relief with cosentyx. Its a different kind of targeted biologic. Cosentyx treats more than just the joint pain of Psoriatic Arthritis. It even helps stop further joint damage. Dont use if youre allergic to cosentyx. Before starting, get checked for tuberculosis. An increased risk of infections and lowered ability to fight them may occur. Tell your doctor about an infection or symptoms. 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In wake of fridays Court Filings by the special counsel, a growing number of President Trumps republican allies are reportedly becoming increasingly worried about the legal and political dangers he may face. According to the Washington Post, anxiety is spiking as Trump Supporters feel that the president and white house have no firm prlan to deal with robet muellers investigation as the administration faces other issues at home and abroad. The post says that rather than building a war room to manage the intersecting crisis as past administrations have done, the Trump White House is understaffed, stuck in a bunker mentality and largely resigned to a plan to wing it. Political Communications Operatives are mostly taking their cues from the president and letting him drive the message with his spontaneous broadsides. Moments after the Court Filings from Robert Mueller were made public on friday, the president tweeted this. Totally clears the president , thank you. Without any other context. Earlier in the day he tweeted we will be doing a major counter report to the Robert Mueller probe. This should never again be allowed to happen to a future president of the United States. That tweet came after reports that trumps personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani is not prepared to release a counter report. In that same Washington Post report republicans senators expressed concerns over the disclosures from Robert Muellers team. Some gop senators were particularly shaken by the revelation that former National Security advisor Michael Flynn had met with muellers team 19 separate times. The paper says that while republicans on capitol hill are still inclined to stand by President Trump and give him the benefit of the doubt for now, one problemtrump senator privately said that a breaking point for him would be if the mueller documents show conspiracy with the russians, adding, then theyve lost me. Danny, i want to get your reaction to that tweet that came out because i actually thought of you when i saw it. Totally clears the president , thank you. Considering the level of cooperation that we have gotten from Michael Flynn and Michael Cohen and then you see Something Like that. So my theory is that the president believes the person named in the filings individual one is a first name and a last name. Individual one, mr. One. Its not me, its individual one. Mr. One, whoever that is. That could be the only way the president believes that he is absolved by these filings. Because a plain reading of these filings reveals that the government now believes that President Trump or individual one directed Michael Cohen to commit Campaign Finance law crimes, which are crimes that the government cares about. They are defensible crimes, as weve learned from the john edwards case. They are crimes you could possibly get a not guilty on or a hung jury. But they are indeed crimes. Its safe to say that winging it is not a sound legal strategy, right . Not at all. The strangest part to me is the notion that theyre going to prepare a counter report. This is perhaps the largest white collar style investigation in history. And the notion that Rudy Giuliani and donald trump will be sitting in front of a computer with microsoft word typing out their own counter report seems bizarre to me. The president s team hasnt learned from the past, from the clinton approach, which is get the best lawyers, put them in a warehouse, just section them off, wall them off from the activities of the day to day presidency and let that team do what it does best. Thats what this white house should be doing. None of the lawyers seem to want to work for him. And theres a conflict problem any time you take on a client as huge as this president. On friday we talked about we felt like the Mueller Probe could be wrapping up. We were septembkeptical of that though. At this point, does it seem like theyre nearing the end . When you see people having these filings and the documents and the personnel that remain out there, have we reached the Halfway Point . A year is not that long of an investigation. Not at all. Ive had cases, just a run of the mill drug case or bribery case involving a single defendant that lasts at least this long. Just to point to two pieces of evidence that we may be in this for quite a bit longer is the significant redactions in the filings last week. Theres no reason to redact unless you think its going to compromise an investigation. Almost the same thing is the very General Information in some of the other filings without getting into specifics. Thats another technique to avoid showing the hand of the government. So with that need to redact items or seal documents or not reveal information, the government is concerned about compromising an Ongoing Investigation. So we can safely assume that it will continue to be ongoing at least for the foreseeable future. When you go to bed at night, do you think about the Mueller Probe constantly . We have newborns. We dont go to bed at night. You know that. Stay up reading documents and playing with the kids. President trump has announced his pick for his next attorney general. Trump announced on friday that he was nominating william barr who served as attorney general under former president george h. W. Bush to replace Jeff Sessions as the head of the Justice Department. I want to confirm that bill barr, one of the most respected jurists in the country, highly respected lawyer, former attorney general under the bush administration, a terrific man, a terrific person, a brilliant man, he was my first choice from day one. Respected by republicans and respected by democrats. He will be nominated for the United States attorney general and hopefully that process will go very quickly and i think it will go very quickly. Before the president tapped barr to serve as his next ag, he reportedly tried to get him to step into a different role. Barr was previously offered a position as trumps defense attorney. The report says the president met privately with barr in the spring of 2017 and asked if he would serve in the position and help defend him against Robert Muellers russia probe, which barr has been a critic of. Barr reportedly said he had other obligations but added he would think about it. A long time friend tells yahoo that barr rebuffed numerous offers from the white house to be attorney general in large part because he didnt want to be attacked on twitter by the president , adding that something changed his mind. Joining us gabby orr. Hits pick up on that last story, trump announcing biing w barr has his next attorney general. How might barrs open krechl cr of the Mueller Probe when he was a private citizen become an issue for the Ongoing Investigation . Is there going to be pressure from capitol hill before his confirmation that he recuse himself over the Mueller Probe . I think thats going to be a key question that comes up during his confirmation hearing if not before that in meetings with various senators. I imagine that the white house is going to assign somebody to sort of sherpa bill barr through the confirmation process, similar to how weve seen them handle Supreme Court nominees previously. They want him to address these concerns. He has been critical of the Mueller Investigation, but it is also worth noting that he overlapped with Robert Mueller during his first round as attorney general in the h. W. Bush administration. Although hes made some comments that are likely to come up and resurface during his confirmation hearing about executive power, about the Mueller Investigation, about any special counsel or independent investigation into a president. He has also a history with Robert Mueller and im sure a lot of republican senators are going to highlight that and say that any effort to sort of clip the wings of the special counsel investigation would be appropriately handled by somebody like bill barr. Hes a pretty wellliked guy from what i understand in washington, d. C. Its not necessarily a predictable trump pick for him. Yeah. And he was somebody who was approached by the white house many times before he was picked ultimately as the president s attorney general nominee. He essentially told the white house earlier this year that if you want me to be attorney general, im open to that, but please go look at other candidates before you land on me. This isnt a position that he necessarily wanted, but he does feel according to people close to him like it is his duty to say yes when called to a role like this. I think that sort of plays well in the eyes of republicans and democrats. And going back to that service as attorney general under the hw bush administration, this gives democrats a whole record of his period of time there to look at, to review as they head into his confirmation hearing. Most of it for the most part has been very positively received by democrats, although they are likely to seize on those comments about the Mueller Investigation. He also drew some praise from james comey over the weekend during that closed testimony. He had some praise for bill barr. Still ahead, tough times on wall street looking to roll on as Global Markets start the week off in the red. Whats fuelling the continued selling by investors. Bill karins will have another check on your forecast. tand in your garage,son a brand new john deere. 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Trade relations as it prepares for the release of an executive detained in canada. A tense balance may continue when markets open this morning. Good morning. So u. S. Futures indicate its going to be another weak session state side. This of course follows fridays very weak session which saw all three major indices close the day more than 3 lower. One of the key drivers of last weeks weakness was this story about the cfos detention in canada facing extradition to the u. S. While chinese leadership has been trying to keep a somewhat conciliatory tone around u. S. china relations, over the weekend beijing summoned the u. S. Ambassador to beijing to protest the cfos detention. Its not completely clear at this stage how these different efforts will tally out. Thats something thats firmly on investors minds, feeding into an already fragile narrative hitting markets. Plenty of concern still weighing on investors mind is poised to materialize in more losses today. With that, lets switch gears and bring in nbc mol meteorologist bill karins. This storm did deliver for the mountains of virginia and North Carolina. White top, virginia, 24 inches. Wintergreen, 21 inches. Very impressive. Its not completely done. 23 inches of snow overnight just in areas heading outside of nashville to the east of knoxville. You see the blue on the map. Still some light snow at high elevations and some freezing rain in between raleigh and richmond. Richmond picked up a foot of snow yesterday. Very impressive. During the day today we will warm it up above freezing in most locations. The roads after they eventually get plowed, we will see some improvements. We still have a quarter of a Million People in North Carolina without power. 38 in charlotte. Tonight we get the refreeze because its just that time of year. With winds coming in out of the north, we drop into the 20s. There will be a lot of new ice forming out there and a lot of black ice on the sidewalks. It wouldnt surprise me to get more School Delays and cancellations into tomorrow. The week ahead forecast, the middle of the country looks pretty good. Were pretty quiet into wednesday. On thursday and friday this time a rainstorm heads for the east coast. Its a big warmup for the eastern seaboard starting next week. Its been a cold start to december. I think we can deal with some rain and warmth. Ill take it. Ill take the warmth. You guys are hard to please. You guys should be miami anchors. [ laughter ] any job openings . Still ahead the Trump Administration is handed another legal defeat over its immigration policy. chime [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. This is moving day with the best inhome wifi experience and millions of wifi hotspots to help you stay connected. And this is moving day with Reliable Service appointments in a twohour window so youre up and running in no time. Show me decorating shows. This is staying connected with xfinity to make moving. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and twohour appointment windows. Click, call or visit a store today. Welcome back, everyone. In a dividing ruling late friday night, the u. S. Appeals court refused to immediately allow the Trump Administration to enforce its desired pan on granting asylum to immigrants who cross americas southern border illegally. The ninth u. S. Circuit court of appeals ruled that the ban is inconsistent with existing u. S. Law, in addition to being an attempt to bypass congress. A lower Court Previously temporarily blocked President Trumps november proclamation saying it violated federal law. Judge j. Bibe says, quote, just as we may not, as we are often reminded, legislate from the bench, neither may the executive legislate from the oval office. Lets go to North Carolina, the republican candidate at the center of the election scandal in North Carolina says he would wholeheartedly support a new election if the investigation shows proof of voter fraud. The district 9 congressional race has beeen royaled by allegations that republican Mark Harris Campaign may have benefited from a fraudulent collection of mailin ballots. Here is what harris had to say about this entire investigation. If this investigation finds proof of illegal activity on either side to such a level that it could have changed the outcome of the election, then i would wholeheartedly support a new election to ensure all voters have confidence in the results. As we move toward resolution, i look forward to participating in a transparent, factual, and fair process. So harris comments come amid new federal election filings that show his Campaign Still owes the Political Consulting firm Red Dome Group more than 34,000 for their specific absentee work in Bladen County which is at the epicenter of the probe. The vicechairman of the board of elections resigned friday because, quote, things have gotten way out of his. Harris opponent dan mccready withdraw his concession from the house race. The state elections board has twice delayed certifying harris win and could call for a new election depending on the outcome of the probe by the end of this month. Dan mccready will be joining morning joe coming up so it will be interesting to see what he says after the developments this weekend. Also coming up, Axios Jim Vandehei has a look at this mornings one big thing. Coming up on morning joe, the russia probe moves into trumps inner circle. 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With a range of sizes for all body types, depend fitflex underwear is guaranteed to be your best fit. The united explorer card makes things easy. Traveling lighter. Taking a shortcut. Woooo taking a breather. Rewarded learn more at the explorer card dot com. Shaquem get in here. Take your razor, yup. Alright, up and down, never side to side, shaquem. You got it . Come on, get back. Quem, you a second behind your brother, stay focused. Cant nobody beat you, cant nobody beat you. Hard work baby, it gonna pay off. You got this. With the one hundred and fortyfirst pick, the Seattle Seahawks select. Alright, you got it, shaquem. Alright, let me see. Welcome back. Joining us now from washington, d. C. With a look at axios a. M. Cofounder and ceo of Axios Jim Vandehei. Freight to have you with us. What is axios one big thing . Were taking a look at the at how the big cities, sort of big tech, big business, are all getting bigger. This really is a problem, i think it really helps explain this divide you have between cities and rural, democrats and republicans, because you have almost all job growth going to these big cities, we just saw it with amazon choosing new york city and washington, d. C. You obviously see the growth of big government. You see big media getting bigger in new york and in l. A. , while all the Rural Communities are losing their newspapers. You see all these new technologies whether its 5g, which is high Speed Internet or Autonomous Vehicles starting in the cities, not in Rural Communities. Longterm this basically pulls us at even a bigger divide because you have democrats here and republicans out here and it really exacerbates the inequality, such as income inequality, location inequality, tech inequality, education inequality. Sticking with that, then, how do democrats and republicans do they have a plan as to how to deal with this. To reach voters in opposite areas. They really dont. If you look at what happened even in this last election, republicans got wiped out around l. A. And now you have basically no big city area where republicans really have any kind of presence. Basically democrats are packing themselves in as tight as possible in cities and reaps run for the hills. Thats why when people talk about maybe things will get better posttrump in terms of the attitude of the two parties against each other, i dont think so. Almost every trend line is that were growing further and further apart. When people feel like the cities have an advantage over Everything Else, it does create and fuel that us versus them. Ian bremmer over at the eurasia group, his group has speculated that this could get so bad that you could see big cities if not here somewhere around the world wanting independence from the rest of other countries, because they have have such advantages as far as their income, technology. Good news. Always. Lets talk about john kelly and the politics of the white house. He is obviously out as chief of staff by the end of this month, president announcing that over the weekend, nick ayers thought to be his replacement, shot that down, said he is not interesting at this point. Take us through your reporting of this. We say this with a lot of stories, its just weird. You have a chief of staff, the chief of staff said was going to stay there, john kelly, until 2020. Theres been stories almost every week that he doesnt like trump, trump doesnt like him. Then it was clear through everyones reports that it looked like nick ayers was this close to being able to get the job and then he pulls out. Theres really nobody else on that list. Jonathan swan reported last night that there isnt a plan b. That nick ayers had been so much the focus of it. Yeah, maybe its a mnuchin, maybe you get a Chris Christie to come in. You might say who cares. Trump should probably care, you are about to have a democratic congress, you are facing an economy thats sliding and you have this Mueller Investigation hitting you from every angle. A chief of staff is a person who brings order, thats why john kelly was brought into the white house. What makes a lot of republicans nervous is that this white house is just not prepared for whats about to hit it. You need a chief of staff, you need economic advisers, you need a legislative team, you need a unkmoo igs can as team, they all need to be cooking with grease if you are going to take on a party that has subpoena power. That will be the bring to watch for in january. Is trump ready, is the Trump White House ready for whats about to hit it . What type of chief of staff does the Trump Administration need right now considering what its facing. A former military chief of staff didnt work, former political operative didnt work with Reince Priebus. Trump should name Trump White House chief of staff. It seems like thats who has been the chief of staff. Its the one person he is routinely happy w i said that only halfjokingly. He was frustrated with Reince Priebus who was the first chief of staff, frustrated with kelly, he often gets frustrated with his staff. He essentially operates as his own chief of staff, his own communications director. Different times people in the white house have speculated maybe he doesnt need a chief of staff, Everything Else is unorthodox, why not use a new structure. With the democrats taking control of the house a lot of people are saying you need somebody like mark meadows as a possible chief of staff. Thank you very much. We will see you on morning joe in just a bit. You can sign up for axios a. M. As signup. Axios. Com. Im Yasmin Vossoughian alongside Ayman Mohyeldin and louis burgdorf. Morning joe starts right now