Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20170113

Morning joe economic analyst, steve rattner. Political writer for the New York Times nick cansori and shane harris in washington joins us this morning. Did you say Donny Deutsche . I need Something Better than ad min. No. It was a Third Straight busy day on capitol hill. General james mattis and mike pompeo and ben carson, all facing tough questions. A Third Straight day, trumps cabinet picks broke from policies the president elect campaigned on. Even statements that there soon to be commander in chief was making as recently as this week. Take a look. Donald j. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of muslims entering the United States. Although the pause is temporary, we must find out what is going on. I have no belief and do not support the idea that muslims, as a religious group, should be denied admission to the United States. I dont think its ever appropriate to focus on Something Like religion as the only factor. When mexico sends their people. They are bringing drugs, they are committing crimes and some, i believe, are good people. Do you believe mexicans are criminals, drug dealers, and rapists . I would never characterized an entire population with any single term at all. We are going to build a wall. If they ever get up, they are saying, oh, man, how do i get down from this wall. A physical barrier will not do the job. It has to be a layered defense. If putin likes donald trump, guess what, folks. That is called an asset, not a liability. The most important thing is that we recognize the reality of what we deal with mr. Putin and we recognize that he is trying to break the north Atlantic Allian alliance. As far as hacking, i think it could have been russia. Do you accept the russian interference in our election . With high confidence. This was action taken by the Senior Leadership inside of russia. I think its pretty sad when intelligence reports get leaked out to the press. This allegation is that the agency, itself, has become politicized. Do you believe that . My experience, i have not seen that. I have a very, very high degree of confidence in our Intelligence Community. The 28 countries of nato, many of them arent paying their fair share. We are defending them and we should be at least paying them what we are supposed to be paying. If we did not have nato today we would need to create it . The commitment is invaluable and the u. S. Is going to behind that commitment. They called about taking away lethal weapons to ukraine to defend themselves. I have my own idea. The people of crimea from what ive heard would rather be with russia than where they are. I would recommend ukraine put them on that eastern border and provide that asset with defensive weapons that are necessary just to defend themselves. Announce that the u. S. Is going to provide them intelligence and either nato or u. S. Will provide air surveillance over that border. Wouldnt you rather, in a certain sense, have japan have Nuclear Weapons when north korea has Nuclear Weapons . And they do have them. We simply cannot back away from our system for the reduction to see these weapons on the planet. Seems like a lot of daylight between them and the president elect. There is a lot of daylight. If youre trying to figure out what is going on, though, every one of those people that went to the hill to testify were prepared for those hearings by trump people, trumps staff. Rex tillerson, all of them, they all went through it and they all went through whatever answers could happen, so nobody was shooting from the hip on the hill. Steve rattner, as you know, through these process, they would not have said that on the hill if that were not the official position of the Trump Administration because, again, it was the trump team, Transition Team that sat down and went through the answers with all of these people to make sure that they were consistent with the policy, not only that was said on the campaign trail, but what they are going to do over the next four years. Sure. They were totally prepared and everybody mu what they were going to say and they said it. It was kre cavery calm. They clearly and calmly laid out in effect another set of policies which are the ones his cabinet are going to follow. No surprise or trick questions. All very straightforward. Donald trump tweeted this morning and says all of my cabinet nominees are looking good and doing a great job. I want them to be themselves and express their own thoughts, not mine. Mike barnicle, if they are expressing what will be the administrations position moving forward because it was the administration and transition that was preparing them, certainly across the world are a lot of sort of sighs of relief. Thats it. On nato. Thats it. When you have Rex Tillerson saying our commitment to nay to is involumab and if we didnt have nato, we would have to create it and that is something trump licenses to on everything. All of europe this morning is breathing a sigh of relief. Joe, just talking to a few people in washington yesterday, the ripples of relief began in washington and extend around the globe, specifically to europe. Youre absolutely right. With the testimony of generals mattis and general kelly and congressman pompeo, each of those three in their own way in the testimony, in the questions and answers they were provided, the answers they were providing to the committees, looked professional, responsible, not crazy. They werent going to do anything, you know, off the cuff. And i think they gave a great degree of confidence to the people who are voting on the nomination, as well as to our allies overseas, especially mattis. Mattis on the iran treaty, unequivocally. He was unequivocally. Trump did move on the muslim ban and at the end say we are looking at countries where there is war fare. Also on the iran deal, ed we made the deal. At some point in the campaign, i dont remember exactly when, but he said we made the deal and we just got to figure out how to make it a better deal. Donny, explain donald trump. This is donald trump, out of the campaign trail is looking at the audience and reading the audience and playing the audience and selling the audien audience. Then you get behind closed doors and how am i going to build this 90Story Building and a completely different skill set you have to employ. Before we take a collective total sigh of relief, he has walked back one or two things. First of all, advi first of al first of al first of al first of all, visserly when you watch. We somehow feel better because we have guys who he has brought in who were saying the opposite of what he got elected on and that makes us feel good. He hired the grownups. No, wait. No. No. Please, let me finish, though. We say that and that is a good thing but wait a second. The guy we elected, yes, he has walked one or two of them back for the things we dont believe in but we feel better he has brought in things we do believe in so what does he believe in . Do we know the next day whether he is coming out on anything . I dont feel better about any of those things. Makes me more disturbed. Would you rather him have john bolton talking about how we need to invade iraq . No. I have a guy would you rather have him had had these people, like, for instance, a guy he was talking about for Homeland Security, actually was a supporter of a Muslim Registry and a muslim ban. Would you rather that so you have it lined up perfectly with what he said in the heat of the campaign, or would you rather have i would rather have a president who says what he believes. You dont have to have a cia director no, i like most of those appointments. Nobody is giving donald trump a free pass on the stuff that he said. I guess my point. But, no. Here you are worried about what has happened in the past and here we are trying to read through all of this to figure out what the world looks like for the next four years. And what you are doing is what the media is doing which is we are with going to hold on to everything he said, which you should, in june of the campaign or july, but we are going to do that to the exclusion of actually telling our readers and telling our viewers, based on everything that we are seeing and the trend lines we are seeing, this is what we are telling you is most likely going to happen over the next few years. As you said, these guys have been prepped and they are saying the things they know they need to do to get confirmed. I guess this goes back to the whole tword, the whole truth word. When do we believe who says what and when and that is the disturbing issue. I would bet everything i own, everything i own on generals kelly and mattis. By the way james mattis walks into Donald Trumps office and says, mr. President , nato is just as important today as it was in 1947 when harry truman and general marshall created it. We know already what donald trump is going to say. I hope so. Okay. I hope so. Im with you, general. I hope so. Again, none of us here are doing Donald Trumps bidding, but what is the responsibility at this point . Is it to go back and look what happened six months ago or tell your people and leaders across the world that watch this thosh what we are going to do the next six months with our country . I agree but i wont say in support of donny but say its not going to be a Straight Line. No, its not. From these guys testifying to suddenly a set of policies we all can understand. As recently as this press conference, trump hugged putin and people on the capitol hill saying putin is a bad guy and saying he is hugging putin as a friend as an asset. You have mike flynn and bannon who we have not heard from. It is not going to be a Straight Line. Lets bring in shane harris right now. One of the areas smelits not g tor a Straight Line is with russia. While you have Rex Tillerson and others, general mattis saying the right things about nato and the right things about russia, we also have reports that general flynn made contact. David ignatius writing in a column this morning, made contact with the russians the day that barack obama was actually expelling diplomats and talking about sanctions. Which is a fascinating revelation. If that is true, a man who is not yet the National Security adviser maybe engaging in Foreign Policy. The russia question loomed large over every one of these areas and particularly for mike pompeii on where you got prcket president elect trump at war with an Intelligence Community he still hasnt fully embraced their view that russia is behind the political hacks of the dnc and john podesta. This extraordinary tension that has now erupted into the surface where youve got a president elect essentially thinking that the cia is out to get him. Mike pompeo walks into the middle of that fire storm and has to serve the president and the work force he is about to lead. What senators clearly wanted to know yesterday, where do you come down on this idea of whether russia is a foe or an ally and where do you come down whether they were behind the hacks . Like the other nominees you saw at the beginning in that reel he says russia not an ally and thinks he is behind the hacks. That puts him on the other side of the president elect. Donald trump is sort of out there alone right now on this russia question. You have general mattis talking about russia is an adversary. Nick, how do we sort through all of this, especially in light of David Ignatius column this morning that general flynn was in contact with the russians on the very day that Russian Diplomats were being expelled from the United States . That is pretty stunning. Its not clear if these calls were in violation of those rules. Its a serious deal. I would just say that mike flynn is going to be in the west wing. Gary is going to be in the west wing. Cabinet secretaries, in general, historically the last 10, 20 years, have had less power than the west wing staffers and sitting policy. James mattis is not going to be president and either is pompeo. Trump is going to be president. Im wondering at the table i have wondered there who really sets policy in this administration . If trump, president , or the cabinet secretaries . What is going to be interesting, nick, is what approach is taken by this president because as you said, the last president made most participants in the Foreign Policy apparatus irrelevant. The secretary of state was basically out on his own. Even susan rice was largely irrelevant. You had ben rhodes and barack obama and, occasionally, dennis mcdonough. Its going to be fascinating to see whether these big personalities that trump has brought in, mattis, tillerson, even pompeo, whether they are going to actually change management back to what you saw with the first bush and that is where these people matter. I suspect i dont suspect. I know. If james mattis is uncomfortable with Donald Trumps russian policy, james mattis will require. Hes not going to sit there and salu salute. I share donnys feeling we cant look at comments made at confirmation hearings which is to parlay democrats and get confirmed as full statements of the administrations policy. I dont think we can do that yet. Not yet. I think two of these nomin s nominees, if not three or four of them that we are talking about here, would get up and leave if they thought he was going to do something that was completely against everything they have worked for all their lives. And i would does she my prediction is what we saw in the News Conference this week is possibly a glimpse of how he is going to handle some major things. For example, when he was putting together a presentation on exactly how his business is going to be sgrated from his presidency, he brought up an expert to talk about it and joined that person in it but did not go it alone on that. Let me just finish. That is a perfect example. But in reality, nothing has changed. He is going to go about his business secket as he wants. That is my point. We had that person come up to basically lay out a policy he designed essentially himself with some advice but that is what he wanted to do, which is in contrast to what all of the ethics people say he should have done so he is still going his own way on a lot of the stuff. One of the more interesting things Going Forward that we all have to Pay Attention to is this. Its going to have to be 24 7 basis because things are going to change, things are going to be so fluid. Joe, you eluded to the Obama Administration and one of the problems, one of the critiques of the Obama Administration is that, indeed, Foreign Policy, diplomatic policy was geared right out of the white house more so than with the agencies and more so the department of defense or the department of state. I think, from what ive been told, that is changing under the Trump Administration given the strength of general mattis at the pentagon and ive also been told by several people that general flynn, who that is a shocking revelation in david ignati ignatius column this morning, flynn is going to be layered and people around him from acting usually one or two fall off in the first year. What we have heard for some time is that general flynn will defer to general mattis in times of conflict and he recognizes not only the fourth star on general mattis shoulder, he also recognizes him to be the brightest general hes ever met in his life. And so if what you hear from inside the transition is true, then youre exactly right. There is going to be a layering. I hope, not just for the sake of the next four years, but for the sake of administrations down the road, i hope we go back to a Foreign Policy that is not as dysfunctional the last eight years have been where you have a president im sorry ill say it. A kid sitting around deciding what they are going to do in syria, instead of calling in your secretary of state. No, its basically it. Ben rod. He and ben rhodes decided what they were going to do. Ben rhodes basically said it as much and people saying it for years they have a dysfunctional Foreign Policy where you have the president , maybe one or two other people in the white house and you cut out your secretary of state, you cut out your secretary of defense and you cut out your National Security adviser. We dont have a kid. Now Jared Kushner is doing our Foreign Policy. Still ahead, james comey is back in the spot where the Justice Department washdog announcing an investigation into the matter. This is a big, big story. Again. We will be joined by democratic senator al franken who will reveal his decision on the Jeff Sessions nomination for attorney general. And democratic senator rex murphy. Plus Andrea Mitchell unpacks her interview with Vice President joe biden and katy tur and nancy gibbs. I think for the sake of the country, franklin, as much as anything. A lot of division and a lot of acrimony around this and i think good to get it all out. If you really want to look at something that affected the outcome of the election you look less at Vladimir Putin and you look a lot more at james comey. Sure, but even as a clinton supporter, i think there are two sides to the question whether james comey acted appropriately or not. Wall street journal calling for his resignation today in their editorial. Youre watching morning joe. Did they really . The long brown path before me leading wherever i choose. The east and the west are mine. The north and the south are mine. All seems beautiful to me. Now . Excuse me. 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Try cool mint zantac. No pill relieves heartburn faster. Dr. Carson did his best this week to woo the senators with charming personal stories like this. I went from the bottom of the class to the top of the class, much to the consternation of all of those students who used to call me dummy. They were now coming to me, benny, benny, how do you fix this problem . I said sit at my feet, youngster, perhaps a little obnoxious but it was a good feeling. That is man who knows how to work a crowd coming up not a smiling crowd. Somebody should have cracked a smile up there for him president obama talks about how he lost the pr battle. Plus, we will dig into why the Inspector General is reviewing james comeys handling of the clinton email server. Youre saying the New York Times says james comey needs to resign . Lead article in wall street journal. Lost his credibility. Here is the kicker line. What is the tease. Come on now, mike. Lets do it lets go mr. Comey can render his country now is to resign. Failing that, jeff session should invite him for a meeting after he is confirmed as attorney general and ask him to resign. If mr. Comey declines, donald trump can and should fire him. In the best interests of the nations most important Law Enforcement agency. That would be your wall street journal, not the New York Times. It should be mike reading the paper. The kid will just flock to the tv set. We will be right back. When it comes to healthcare, seconds can mean the difference between life and death. For partners in health, time is life. We have 18,000 people around the world. The microsoft cloud helps our entire staff stay connected and Work Together in real time to help those that need it. The ability to collaborate changes how we work. What we do together changes how we live. Comes complete with six benefits in one bottle. So you and your family are completely ready to rise to the occasion. Perhaps thats why listerine® users are more likely to lend a helping hand. Six bold benefits. One takecharge family. Bring out the bold™. Thank you, anthony weiner. I have to give the fbi credit. That was so bad what happened originally and it took guts for director comey to make the move that he made in light of the kind of opposition he had where they are trying to protect her from criminal prosecution. I was not his fan but ill tell you what, what he did, he brought back his reputation. He may have brought back the campaign. That was donald trump less than two weeks before election day. Read quickly in the New York Times lead editorial and goes what we were talking about in the first block. Toughness and restraint of defense. General mattis has a potential to act as restraint on an administration led by a leader and general mattis in the hearing where he answered questions felt like a quick reprieve. It was encouraging had he no qualms stating views at odds with issues that mr. Trump campaigned on and including the relationship with russia and the iran nuclear deal. It was to mr. Trumps credit that he would appoint a strong assumption who is held in the white house when has happened across the board here. So we dont know. Its better than picking a bunch of yes men that would take extreme positions. Yesterday, the Inspector General announced there will be a wide ranging investigation of how fbi director james comey handled the probe of clintons email server. Under review, his News Conference in july deciding not to recommend charges, but describing clintons behavior as extremely careless. His lastminute letter revealing the discovery of more emails believed to possibly be linked to their investigation, and then the announcement sunday, before election day, that the emails didnt worry any new action. Behind closed doors on thursday, comey briefed senators about the russian hacking during the lex but senators asked comey pointed questions about the investigation with one senator inside saying there was a level of anxiety in the room. For his part, comey said in a statement, quote, i am grateful to the department of justices ig for taking on this review. He is professional and independent. And the fbi will cooperate fully with him and his office. I hope very much he is able to share his conclusions and observations with the public because everyone will benefit from thoughtful evaluation and transparency regarding this matter. Clinton Campaign Manager robby mook said its a troubling pattern that the fbi has chosen a horse in this investigation and we welcome this investigation so this doesnt happen again. He did also say that the trump was the legitimate winner of the election. Support for the probe came from both sides of the aisle, including Republican House ethics chair jason chaffetz. There are things from the political aisle they didnt answer and they need to answer those. I think steps were taken by the director of the fbi near the election which were not unprecedented and it did not ever happen before. His statement whether there was an open of an investigation or closing of an investigation, i dont think, was a fair, professional, or consistent with the policies the federal bureau of investigation. Mike, this is botched up in every way possible. I remember back in july, us complaining that comey seemed to be tipping the scales in Hillary Clintons favor with the timing of, you know, fourth of july weekend, allowing cheryl mills and other principals to actually sit in on her testimony. Things you just dont do but he did it. And then he doesnt indict her, despite the fact that 55 , 56 of americans think she should be indicted. As you say, more importantly, a lot of the professionals in new york that he holds his bizarre prs conferee which i think we said at the time, you either indict or you dont indict. He tried to have it both ways, tried to do that again 11 days out. It seems like this was a guy who was tortured by the fact he didnt indict her. He was also way in over his skis in terms of his public pronouncemen pronouncements. At the july press conference, one thing to get up and say we found nothing to proceed with further but his editorial comments in that press conference about her sloppiness and no responsible prosecutor would have indicted her, well, with he is the head of the fbi. He is not a prosecutor or not the u. S. Attorney or attorney general. That is the beginning of it. Remember, the attorney general is effectively reconfused because of the plane flight. Which, by the way, we cant underline that fact enough. I believe donald trump is president of the United States because Loretta Lynch met with bill clinton. And recused herself. Met with bill clinton on that plane and recused herself and comey was running the whole show. That took her out of authority in terms of the fbi director once she recused herself. What we have for everything, for the Incoming Administration, for the country, you have a never ending story. This is just going to go there are going to be hearings, more hearings, multiple hearings. The comey Inspector General thing is going to drag on. I agree with wall street journal. The best interest of the country, he should step down. I was with one of the top clinton aides and a real inner circle person and said to me the tracking numbers in terms of the early voting were shattering any thoughts they had in terms of you had that she said wikileaks i said that. I dont think we can exchange one vote. They said the minute that comey thing came out, it stopped. Literally, the numbers went off the cliff. She also said that she never heard robby mook ever hysterical or nervous or out but they knew that was t button that freaked them out and the numbers swed it. It changed evething 11 days out. Everything. Do you put this all on comey . I dont want to sound like a broken record, but i think we are kind of missing the point here and i have a feeling that this investigation is just going to lead to more pain for team clinton, which, at this point, lets move on. It probably will. I think mike is right, this is going to keep going on a long time. Remember that jim comey faces another set of questions right now which is interesting from democrats about why he didnt speak up more about any possible investigations that were going into donald trump during the campaign and these alleged ties to russia. We have seen unsubstantiated and highlily explosive and provocative allegations coming out this week which a lot of reporters including us at the journal have been chasing around trite substantiate what was the fbi doing in terms of donald trump may or may not have been doing up to his associates . Comey testified this week, the eye rolling that was going on from senators when he said he couldnt comment on whether there may or may not be an investigation or was into donald trump when he was so public about what was going on with Hillary Clinton. And lets not compare, you know, this isnt apples to oranges situation a little bit but politically speaking he is coming out looking that the perception clearly he somehow was invaing against Hillary Clinton and seemed to be maybe indirectly helping donald trump. I dont think that is how he would see it and bristle at the suggestion, but the optics of this are just so untenable for him and i think a clear question to ask whether he survives his ten years at fbi. When you think back at the last couple of months on the russia stuff, there was a point where the fbi was pushing back against, you know, sort of other agencies in the Intelligence Community on the early assessment of russias efforts to do some hacking at the democrats. Now, of course, they are speaking to the united front for president elect trump. There is inconsistency there. I think the probes internallily with the ig can be a huge deal. A couple of year, the irs was on the hot seat. A similar probe by the irs internal watchdog led to the resignation of several top irs officials and was a huge black eye for the agency. Its very high stakes. Nick, thank you. Shane harris, thank you very much. Still ahead, we go live to moscow where Vladimir Putin is playing politics both there and here at home. Nbcs bill neely has more on that and a former british spy on the run reportedly after his unverified dossier on donald trump went public. Morning joe is coming right back. With my moderate to severe ulcerative colitis, the possibility of a flare was almost always on my mind. Thinking about what to avoid, where to go. And how to deal with my uc. To me, that was normal. Until i talked to my doctor. She told me that humira helps people like me get uc under control and keep it under control when certain medications havent worked well enough. Humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. Serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure. Before treatment, get tested for tb. 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Liberty mutual insurance. With sleep number, theres an adjustment for that. Tilt your tormentor and put those snores to sleep. Does your bed do that . Come into a sleep number store and save 600 on our best selling mattress. Its a no brainer. I would like to have gotten that one last Supreme Court justice in there and i would like the Supreme Court to take a look. Couldnt even get a hearing. We couldnt even get a hearing. Trying to get the other side of the aisle to work with us on issues, in some cases, that they professed originally an interest in. What that did i think make me appreciate, ive said this before and its worth repeating because this is on me. Part of the Job Description is also shaping Public Opinion, and we were very effective and i was very effective in shaping Public Opinion around my campaigns, but there were big stretches while governing where even though we were doing the right thing, we werent able to mobilize Public Opinion firmly enough behind us to weaken the resolve of the republicans to stop opposing us, or to cooperate with us. There were times during my presidency where i lost the pr battle. That is recognition of something that we actually have been talking to his people about for seven years. I think they thought that somehow i dont know if above is the right word, baugh it makes them sound a little bit too arrogant, but we dont do theater is what we heard a lot of. What we constantly heard of. We dont do theater. A huge part of it. A lot did get done. Congress is barreling toward the repeal of the Affordable Care act. Can we talk about that for one second, though . Yeah. How important it is to do theater. Donny, fdr, the fireside chats on the radio. And you can go through jfk. He understood the importance of television. The new medium. Ronald reagan, who was extraordinary at theater. And, of course, now donald trump has even in transition, he has got people in the midwest, a lot of people thinking he is fighting for me. I think theaters undermines it because it suggests something without gravitose attached to it. When youre the ceo you set the tone and get people to feel a certain way and one of the top three or four things that are that job and give obama selfawareness credit there that was a failure of that administration because the score card, domestically, at least, was stunningly positive but they couldnt sell it. Its a source of power for president s in the modern age. Since the invention of television. Its a source of power. If you dont engage in that theater, you lose access to that source of power which is a problem. That is the thing about Donald Trumps tweets. The press keeps asking why does he tweet those things out and why are they little inflammatory . That is added benefit for donald trump and the press hasnt figured this out, that when the press freaks out about it, that only makes his supporters happier. He not only gets the tweet out and gets the message to his people, what, 15, 20 Million People . He then has a press freakout so he gets to live off of that for the next 1968 days as well. Theater, theater, theater. I think he is legitimately found twitter or theater, whatever you want to call it that works for him in advancing his points. I think as you transition from president elect to president , i think you have to conduct your theater a little differently and we will see. That is not going to happen. Steve, that is what all of us around this table believe. I personally dont think he should be tweeting at all. But, again, his audience is not any of us here. His audience are the voters that voted for barack obama and then him in wisconsin, in michigan, in pennsylvania. Downed what im saying. Nothing has changed. We are not his audience but he was elected with the minority of the country. He needs the other 52 of the country to be an effective president. This is a key point, though. His Party Controls washington completely. Democrats cannot be for him because they dont have any power. Right. The media is his foil for the next four years if the media allows itself to be played that way. Hold on. That is the key. The media has to figure out how to sort through this. Damn if you do and damned if you dont. We used to be attacked for having him on any time he called and would be attacked if we were covering this story. Youre covering too much. Then i made the suggestion a couple of weeks you should just ignore the crazy tweets because you all are spending too much time. That is the smoke that is not the fire. And then you get attacked for doing that. I think that is the same problem with the editor of the New York Times and editor of the Washington Post. What do we do with these tweets . What do we do with the outrageous statements . If we spend too much time on it, we are playing into his hands. Its not changing. Can we finally recognize that there is he is going to be doing this tomorrow and six weeks from now and seven weeks. The same way he did not change once he was its not changing and lets figure out how we manage it. To nicks point, yes, he has control of washington for the most part, he does have 60 votes in the sfrat senate b in the senate and he still needs the country and needs to elevate that and i dont know if continuing to act like this is going to help him. I will say that is the one thing that they dont have. You know . Donald trump would go in these sort of waves. Hed be bad donnell for three or four weeks. His numbers would go down. He would lose a couple of primaries. Then he would be good domed for a couple of weeks and he would win new york by, like, 55 or 60 and then bad donald for a couple of weeks. You notice the last two weeks, he went silent for the most part, right . He would go out and do his speeches but there wasnt a lot of controversy. He has tweeted five times this morning already. Thats what im saying. There is no there is there are no tests for him. So thats a real danger for him. It does get to a point you can lose enough independence and he is losing independence now. You can lose them and never get them back, if you dont have some restraint. Coming up on morning joe i mean, he says that he can get obamacare repealed and replaced on the same day in the same hour. What is he missing here . That is the central legacy. When you pass around your yearbook to be signed, do you remember that and people say lots of luck in your senior year . Lots of luck in your senior year, mr. Trump. Msnbc Andrea Mitchell sat down with Vice President joe biden as he leaves office just one week from today. By the way, wake up the kids. Wake them all up and get them out of bed and run downstairs and this is like christmas morning. Steve rattner will be here with his charts along with andrea. Thanks for loading, sweetie. Oh, bakedon alfredo . Gotta rinse that. Nope. No way. Nada. Eactions have occurred. Tell your doctor if youve been someplace where fungal infections are common or if youre prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for. Heart failure, or if you have persistent. Fever, bruising, bleeding, or paleness. Dont start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. Joint pain and damage. Can go side by side. Ask how enbrel can help relieve joint pain and help stop joint damage. Enbrel, the number one rheumatologistprescribed biologic. Why pause a spontaneous moment . Cialis for daily use treats ed and the urinary symptoms of bph. Tell your doctor about your medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. Do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, or adempas® for pulmonary hypertension, as this may cause an unsafe drop in Blood Pressure. Do not drink alcohol in excess. To avoid longterm injury, get medical help right away for an erection lasting more than four hours. If you have a sudden decrease or loss of hearing or vision, or an allergic reaction, stop taking cialis and get medical help right away. Ask your doctor about cialis. In a way i love my enemies. I go after them with vigor. Sometimes im criticized because i go after them too strongly but i love my enemies and i love having enemies for a certain extent. That is probably a mental sickness to be honest with you. Who loves having enemies . You need it and it really inv invigora invigorates. The media is horrendous and horrible when they write incorrect stories and you should sue that newspaper or book publisher because if you dont, they wont respect you and if you dont they deep writing falsities. That was in 2007. Good thing he has changed. This reaired last night on cnbc. Steve rattner and Nick Confessore and donny butch is still with us. Anything donald trump says or does they have not paying attention to him for 30 40 years. He is who he is and you watch him talking to jane pauley in the 1980s how japan is screwing unand saudis are screwing us and the deals we negotiate are idiotic. He in that vain like Ronald Reagan said he gave a wonderful speech but the same speech he has been giving the same speech for 20 years and donald trump has been giving the same speech for 40 years. Not the things he said back then. I think i did three or four interviews with him and its the same guy. Another side has come out we dont need to litigate here the last 18 months changed the way i looked at him but in those days i found him to be charming and refreshing and honest and actually nice. And a different guy emerged to me during the campaign. A third busy day on capitol hill. General james mattis and mike pompeo and ben carson, all facing tough questions. A Third Straight day, trumps cabinet picks broke from policies the president elect campaigned on. Even statements that there soon to be commander in chief was making as recently as this week. Donald j. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of muslims entering the United States. Although the pause is temporary, we must find out what is going on. I have no belief and do not support the idea that muslims, as a religious group, should be denied admission to the United States. I dont think its ever appropriate to focus on Something Like religion as the only factor. When mexico sends its people, they are bringing drugs, they are bringing crime and they are rapists and some, i assume, are good people. Do you believe mexicans are criminals, drug dealers, and rapists . I would never characterize an entire population. We get the point. We talked about this a good bit last hour, too. The New York Times toughness and defense a great oped if youre a supporter of general mattis from the New York Times. It was encouraging that mattis had no qualms in stating his views at odds with positions of donald trump that he campaigned on, including americas relationship with russia and the nature of Irans Nuclear deal. Its to mr. Trumps credit. He should appoint a strong minded defense secretary who is likely to challenge assumptions held in the white house. Bob costa, you could say the same thing for pompeo who is very positive about the cia. I think pompeo probably has a lot of people inside the agency rooting for him because he is so strongly supportive of the work that they do. You could talk about general kelly and the wall. You could talk i mean, you could go down the list. So try to explain to us what is going on here where donald trump, not only selected people who were at odds with him on what he said in the campaign trail, but also it was his Transition Team that sat and prepared them to say all of the things that they said on capitol hill yesterday. The president elect almost seemed to acknowledge this reality in a tweet this morning saying his cabinet nominees could have their own views and he doesnt necessarily need them to reflect his own view. It seems to be an acknowledgment that trump is a celebrity populace outsider who doesnt come to the mainstream and not a lot of donald trump politician to stock your cabinet with. Also to pass a republicancontrolled senate, its controlled by republicans, not by Donald Trumpstyle republicans. Even as trump is change is his own party he knows that to get confirmation for his own cabinet he has to have people who have kind of a conservative othrthod who are like mike pompeo who doesnt have a clashing of the Intelligence Community. Any feeling inside from what youve picked up reporting that donald trump is going to defer to his secretary of state, his secretary of defense, his cia director more than, say, barack obama did . I think defer wouldnt be the right word. Based on my conversations with trump officials, trump wants to have a group around him that understands washington, that understands the world. He has privately said to many of his friends that as much as he wants to be the decider in the white house, washington is still a new town to him in many respects and he needs to have counsel from the party, from people who have experience in all of these fields because he just hasnt been in this world. Steve . Well, that may well be true. I wouldnt disagree with robert on that on the Foreign Policy side. But when you look at the domestic policy side, he has effectively two chiefs of staff, bannon and Reince Priebus one who never been in the government and cohen is a very good guy but never been in washington and treasury secretary from Goldman Sachs never been in washington. You did pretty good as a car salesman, didnt you, rattner . Never been in washington. I was one. Talking about i had tim geithner and a lot of people. Do you know who the glue is who holds it together from the people ive heard . He leans heavily on Reince Priebus and he leans heavily on mike pence. Mike pence, we have been talking a good bit about the f35 and how its, you know, eludes radar because its stealthy. Mike pence may be the most stealth figure in the history of modern politics because this is the guy that is doing more to fill up the bureaucracies and, i mean, he is the go to guy who is quietly assembling a cabinet for donald trump. To be powerful you had to find ways to get out there because of the heat shield of the president. I think in this administration it comes from personnel appointments, the bread and butter of governing and stuff trump is not used to and make pence a very powerful guy indeed. Paul ryan is starting the discussion on tax reform with Jared Kushner this week and steve bannon on. I hear from trump insiders that they already agreed on the tax cuts and tax reforms take a while but corporate ralt and individual rates already on the same page. I agree with nick. Pence, i ran into Vice President elect mike pence at the capitol this week. Most underreported story. Not only is pence helping people get on board with trump but he went to meet with joe manchin and West Virginia democrat and joe donnelly, indiana democrat until 2018. He knows in the senate a lot of the big things you need 60 votes, taxes. Not for taxes. Reconciliation for tax reform, correct. But other aspects beyond tax reform you need 60 votes for. On budget and fiscal issues you only usually need a majority. Moving on to charts. Oh, my god. Congress is barreling toward the repeal of the Affordable Care act. I need to go to the bathroom so this is a perfect time. Sit down steve, im joking i can take a joke, as long as you can. Paul ryan last night in a town hall wants to repeal and replace the law at the same time and in some cases in the same bill. Steve rattner has a deep dive into the numbers. Steve, is that possible . Its possible but a lot of confusion about whether youre going to repeal and replace at the same time. Lets start with the positives of obamacare, what republicans are dealing with on that aspect. We can do that in one chart. Take a look at this and the percentage of Americans Without Health Insurance and what has happened going tack to the creation of medicare and medicaid and crept down a good bit and here is what happened when obamacare took effect. You had 20 million americans go on the Health Insurance rolls and half of them through medicaid and half through the exchanges. The uninsured rate dropped to below 10 the lowest in history. These are the 20 Million People that have to be dealt with. Lets talk now about the cost of republicans doing what they have been promising to do for six years. How much will the repeal of obamacare cost americans . You actually youre ready. Youve like giving me great leadins. He has looked at the charts. He has looked at the charts. No. Just these are just questions. Do you have a chart for that . Wow, you have a chart for that too . A bar chart. Why did you choose a bar chart on this . Oh, my lord. An art. Trade secret. Oh, my god. This is what happens. If you completely repeal obamacare, both the taxes as well as the benefits, it adds 350 billion to the deficit the next ten years. How does it do this . The tax offsets. The revenue they created mostly by taxing people around this table but cuts to medicare and things is great to cost of the benz 1. 55 trillion. You lose 350 billion. What is worse than that no, stop there. Because saints that the problem put the chart back up. That 350 billion, arent republicans if republicans are going to make sure that their republican constituents in wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania and ohio who voted for trump and them, but are on obamacare, dont vote democratic in 2018, dont they have to basically pay 350 billion to make their supporters feel whole . Remember, this is a repeal of everything. To hold it up. This is a repeal. I know. You want to then put something in its place is going to cost more money. If they want to put something in its place they start with 3 50. That is with people uninsured. They repeal the taxes and get to that in a second. But they also want to continue to have coverage and there is a ying and yan there. Who would be helped the most by the repeal of obamacare . I love this would it be people like you . This is almost like a real thef television show. Would it be you and people in mansions. It would be people like me but people like you and mika. No, no, no. Here is what happens. If you repeal only the top 90 . If you repeal the taxes those at the upper end get huge tax breaks. You and donny will have even more money. The top 1 get a 200,000 tax cut on average. And then a tax cut on average. The middle class gets nothing im im right there 0. 1 look at this. The people at the bottom, because they lose the tax credits they are getting actually end up worse off michael gersin argues in the Washington Post that trump tacked the deck against himself. He writes this. Well, bob costa, the swigs regardi situation regarding the deficit and the debt as a beautiful sunlit sunrise rises over your shoulder in washington, the situation where the debtand the sunlit sunrise rises over your shoulder in washington, the situation where the debt has been horrific for conservatives like myself. I got into office because of the debt. The scenario was bleak. No cut. Nobody is really talking about cutting anything. They are talking about spending more on defense and talking about spending more on infrastructure and talking more about spending on everything. They are talking about massive tax cuts. Are there going to be conservatives in the Republican Caucus that are going to fight back on all of this spending . This is economics run amuck. Joe, this isnt 1995. Some of the biggest stories are not what is said in this trump era but what is unsaid. Where are republicans talking about entitlements or medicare or Social Security what they ran on in 2012 . This is the trump party right now in washington. Yeah. But i think they are going to have some trouble with the Freedom Caucus and hawks on the right. This is part of the problem with roll right over them and get democrats. Democrats for massive tax cuts for the rich . Democrats for massive infrastructure spending. In some instances for masses increases in defense spending. Maybe. If they tie the infrastructure to one big ugly bill at the end of the session with tax reform and obamacare repeal. Its possible. All end up in a big jumbo and make it harder for democrats to vote. The trump tax cuts if that is the plan that emerges are egregiously tilted toward the wealthy i cant imagine them voting for it. If you look at trump as a person, joe, i dont think there could be anybody that would be less concerned about the future versus his slice and his legacy. I dont care if he builds up a 50 trillion dollar deficit. The last thing this man, if you look at him as a human being and thinking about anything that has happened. Ive said it as it pertains to the deficit and the debt, trump thinks big. Go big or go home. He is, in a sense, every time you make these historical comparisons, you get in trouble. But i will tell you, im not saying im not drawing a Straight Line there. But as far as thinking big, think teddy roosevelt. He thinks big. He campaigned on beating isis and expanding Social Security and building a wall. That is his platform. The infrastructure, he is not going to want to worry about the sort of things. Bob cost ampla you talk about what we obsess on and how do you cut a Million Dollars from this program and 10 billions a year from that program. Not how he thinks and apparently not how the senate and house think either. I think youre on an idea with the idea of republican unease. If you want a clue to some of that Pay Attention to the house vote today on the budget measure that includes starting this repeal president for the president S Health Care law and see how many republicans, moderates, conservatives like steve was talking about from the Freedom Caucus who break from the trump ryan agenda today on this vote. A lot of republicans are the hill, when i was there yesterday and today saying, look, we dont really have a replacement for the Health Care Law but a lot of deficits coming up on the horizon. We got to maybe think about these things before we start going full bore with all of these different pieces legislation. Trump has had multiple bankruptcy. One thing donald trump does not seem to worry about is how do you pay for things. Hes in a very unique club there because george w. Bush and barack obama are right there with him. Bush comes in with a 5. 5 trillion debt and leaves with 11 trillion dollar debt and obama comes in with 11 trillion debt and leaves around 20 trillion. Congress put their foot on obamas neck on spending . The last few years huge spending restraints because of the people on the far right and i think youre going to see that again. The definition of putting their foot on the spending still exploded. Not the last couple of years. Where spending counts. You know this as well as anybody. Entitlements count. We are going toward a 20 trillion dollar debt. Which donald trump also rails against. And donald trump will jack up to 30 trillion dollars because i dont see anybody in washington, d. C. Willing to stand up and say, stop to anybody. Youre going to have democrats and republicans, both gleeful about tax cuts and democrats and republicans both gleeful about infrastructure spending. Both gleeful about i mean, nobody is there to say no. Bad news for our children. Its been bad news. It has. Going to get worse. On that happy note, robert costa, thank you. Im glad you were fix the debt during the obama years, right . I chaired it. Is that true . Still ahead on morning joe senator al franken and jeff merkley will join us whether they support trumps cabinet nominees. Plus was Vice President bidens reaction when president obama surprised him with the nations highest civilian honor for receiving the president ial medal of freedom. The Vice President sat down with msnbcs Andrea Mitchell and she joins us with more from her wide ranging interview with joe biden. Youre watching morning joe. We will be right back. Its neve. Except when it comes to your retirement plan. But at fidelity, were making Retirement Planning clearer. And it all starts with getting your Fidelity Retirement score. In 60 seconds, youll know where you stand. And together, well help you make decisions for your plan. To keep you on track. Time to think of your future its your retirement. Know where you stand. Th. Oh, bakedon alfredo . E. Gotta rinse that. Nope. No way. Nada. Really . Dish issues . Throw it all in. Cascade platinum powers through. Your toughest stuckon food. Nice. Cascade. I wanted to know where i did my ancestrydna. The most shocking result was that im 26 native american. I had no idea. Its opened up a whole new world for me. I provide for my family. I will use my education to help my community. I will inspire our next generation of leaders. I am a college student, but i am only 1 . Only 1 of College Students are american indian. Donate now, and help our numbers grow. Someone we have worked with on special projects on the show, dina powell head of investing at the bank is leaving her post to join the Trump Administration. The president elect intends to appoint powell. In this role she will build new efforts around entrepreneurship and Economic Development power of women. She loves you guys, by the way. We have known her, ive known her for 20 years. The thing i always liked about her 20 years ago when she was working in congress and she worked for somebody that i was trying to throw out of congress. So what are you saying . She was always polit and respectful and she always had a lot of friends on the democratic side. Very interesting last night. I tweeted out dina powell, known nor 20 years and great addition to any team. Nick retweets that and says im glad to have somebody like that around and worked with warren buffett. She is great. Who do we know has a more impressive resume prior to the age of 40 than dina powell . And what is fascinating she comes from egypt. Came and i guess they went down to texas. Couldnt speak the language. Wow. Its a really Great American success story. I think this is a good sign for women who are concerned about the Trump Administration and whether with certain issues that are important to women might be overlooked in the coming years. Dina powell is going to make sure that doesnt happen. Joining us now at the table is somebody wow. Who has been there from the beginning speaking of that. Nbc correspondent katy tur. We were just talking about donald trump. We were. And explaining, you know, its always a complicated relationship, how personally away from the camera, still charming. On camera, hes at war. Let me get a book plug in here. Im writing a book. Im going back and looking at all of the various things that happened during the campaign trail and im finding very the variety of interactions that we had over the 17 months. And i keep fighting over and over again, even at the tensest moments between me and the Campaign Reporting on leaks and reporting on holding him accountable for some of the things he said, behind the scenes when i was ruled rould rm there was times he was taken aback . We were in atlanta and i cant remember what the exact report was but this was outside of atlanta. Back in 2015. Its early on. And they were upset at me about something and werent really answering my phone calls too much. Donald trump comes out and talks to the media. At that point he was talking to us all the time. He sees me in the crowd a small crowd he tries to literally grab me and pull me up on stage essentially on stage with him so he could wave at the crowd. I thought this is very weird. As if i was his wife or something, like wave so there is a variety of this is going to be a good book. Its going to be a good book and a lot of inner actions. I remembered you were on the golf course and very tense relations between the campaign and you. Suddenly, he has a couple of friends on the golf course and he is excited to introduce them to you. This is a great story. We are in scotland. The day after the brexit or i dont know. You day before or day after the brexit vote. Hes on his Scotland Golf course turnberry and i stay on the golf course to do shots there and the only reporter there. Lo and behold trump comes by on a government cart with some of his executives and he sees me and he waves me over. He is like, katy, great reporter. She is wonderful she is the best reporter. I want to meet katy and then he caught himself. Sometimes. Sometimes. You realize you are now going to get in trouble for normalizing . No, its not. Hey, listen. You have to be very clear. Donald trump, the person that is on stage, the person that is running, going to be running the white house needs to be held accountable for the things he says and does and the inconsistencies and the variety of controversies and scandals that are out there. He needs to answer questions on russia more specifically. But behind the important question is, though, a lot of journalists would want to know that havent had as close of interaction with him as you have, is what trump doing, is that him playing the press or is that just donald trump . Its just donald trump. Its not him playing the press. He will say that to anybody that criticizes him he tries to win them over behind the scenes and when he cant win you over back stage, when he cant win you over with a phone call or an offer to go somewhere to one of his properties that is what he doesnt understand. When you continue to push back at him, which i continued to do during the campaign, that is what got under his skin. And that is what we have been saying through the course of the past year, year and a half, that donald trump, behind the scenes we have said this to our great frustration when with we have been really upset about whether its muslim ban or judge curiel or you name it. Kahn, whatever. Donald trump behind the scene is one person. But when he goes in front of the camera, its almost like he puts his helmet on and he transforms almost into this reality show character who he says, okay, this is my public persona and if somebody fights me, im going to war. I think its very interesting when you Ask Donald Trump a question you may not know the immediate answer to or might not have thought through before, say, on a myriad of issues, planned parenthood being one of them. His intermittent action is a more modern position but isnt later until somebody in his ear or in front of a crowd he doesnt hear that roar he became more of a conservative. He wants to get the reaction. Is that better or worse . There is arguments for both sides. But i talk to people that are close to trump and they say that he is not as conservative as he made himself out to be on the campaign trail. Not at all he was going to change but he never did. He never did. That is a point. As much as Donald Trumps companions and aides might say he is against the muslim ban that doesnt exist any longer, donald trump, himself, has not come out and said that and that is very important. Its the roar. Thats what he plays for. Shifting now. Fascinating and i cant wait to read the book. Lets bring in msnbc chief Foreign Affairs correspondent and host of Andrea Mitchell reports, Andrea Mitchell. We want to talk about the joe biden interview. Oh, my gosh. First, lets talk about the crazy last couple of days. The intel communitys back and forth. The twopage dossier. All of the press. I would love to get your read on what youve seen over the past few days and what it means, lets say, for pompeo. Gosh, i want you to talk about everything, actually. The conflicts between the Foreign Policy team and what they are saying on the hill. Take your pick. And what donald trump said on the campaign. Well, i was really interested in you guys talking bjts because i think there could be a shift toward more cabinet government. We have seen how white house centric it has been. A lot of Foreign Policy decisions by the centrality behind barack obama and we saw this in the past white house with condy rice and the others. Could you give our viewers a Historical Perspective . Because you know as well as anybody. Ive been dismayed and Foreign Policy leaders have to at how the Obama Administration was so closely held in the Decision Making process on Foreign Policy. But bush did that as well. That has been the trend. Was george w. Bush the last or was bill clinton the last president that actually had secretary of state and secretary of defense, nsa director and everybody around the table, and they were all equal partners in Foreign Policy . Clinton, to a certain extent and certainly george h. W. Bush, and Ronald Reagan, because of the importance of those relationships. When you got George Schultz and battling a lot of the time and a lot of dissention but maybe that healthy debate is good for an administration. Im fascinated. We dont know you would know better than i, joe, and mika, how donald trump will manage this because its been so unpredictable. Katy and the others who have followed him far more closely than i have, but hes got strong players in jim mattis and if he gets confirmed, we will see what Rex Tillerson proves to be. I think there was some concern among supporters of tillerson about the confirmation hearing because of the way marco rubio went after him and because of the way he answered in one instance to tim kaine. He was not as diplomatic, shall we say, about handling all of the variations between donald trump and his own views, perhaps his past views and what certainly what the committees wanted to hear. Pompeo, i think, was a ten strike. He just proved right away that he can gain the support of a battered Intelligence Community and the cia. There is a lot of hope there about pompeo. And i think a lot of support in the committee. But ben carson, that is another troubled confirmation hearing. That is a whole other story. Lets get tour interview with Vice President joe biden. Here is a portion of it right now. Take a look. Looking back now, president obama said that he could have defeated donald trump. Could joe biden have defeated donald trump . Oh, i dont know. I dont know. Im not going to speculate on that. In your heart of hearts, the criticism is there was a lack of an economic message, that is your ballpark. Pennsylvania, the rust belt . Look. Your home territory. Look, i dont know regrets . I have no regret in the sense that i made the wrong decision. I made the right decision. And but do i regret that my point of view is not going to be reflected in the next administration because we have mr. Trump . Yeah, i do regret that. I mean, he says that he can get obamacare refield and replaced repealed and replaced in the same hour. Do you remember when you passed around your yearbook to have it signed and people say lots of luck in your senior year . Lots of luck in your senior year, mr. Trump. He lost the popular vote and but for 170,000 votes in three states, it would be a different outcome so there is a thousand reasons why you could attribute our candidates loss. It could be anything from the failure to speak to the constituency im giving credit for having a relationship with, working class and middle class people. It could be what happened with the fbi. It could be a whole range of things. But, you know, this is one election, andrea, where i dont think the issues really intruded. Ill lay you eight to five you ask any informed person not in the news med and say what was hillarys position on free college . Can you explain it . What was hillarys position on helping people with child care . What was hillarys those issues never never got into the game. All of the outrageous things that were said and done by the candidate sucked all of the oxygen out of the air. So there was never a discussion about the economic issues. It never got there. It wasnt the press fault. If you get a chance to have to talk about whether or not a candidate groped somebody or whether or not the other candidates position is how they fund college tuition, what is going to get in the news is whether or not somebody groped somebody. And so we never got a discussion. One of the big issues is he said drain the swamp. Yesterday, he repeated that he is not going to release his taxes, ever. And says he doesnt need a blind trust. Hes going to just turn it over to the sons. Has he done enough, the office of government ethics which is n nonpartisan said what he has done is meanless. If you dont drain the swamp, you sink in it. With all due respect, sir, youre one of the poorest people to ever emerge from public office. You were one of the poorest guys in the senate. You have a house. I dont know what other assets you have. He said he could run his business, as well as run the government. The laws do say he can. I dont doubt that he could but you shouldnt run both. Youre going to be president or be a businessman. You don do both. You ran for the most coveted office in the world, the most Important Office in the world. The thing that the American Public looks to most for their security opportunity, guarantees, and focus on your job. Thats the job. I found it bizarre to talk about, well, i could have made 2 billion dollar deal and i could have don both but i decided not to as if youre doing me a favor. I mean, the country a favor. I just think look. This is a place where the public is going to decide whether or not the failure to divest, the failure to meet what are considered to be the basic minimum ethical standards of disclosure, and if the public turns around and 50 say no problem or if 80 say this is a big problem, that is going to alter the outcome. And joe biden also told me that he has strong support for the Intelligence Community and he is hoping that donald trump, once hes in office and behind that desk rounded by smart people, that he does appreciate the level of the quality of intelligence and the way they brief, the facts they do tell you, we think this with high confidence, we think this with low confidence, that they give you a real matrix and that is what he thinks trump has to better understand. Speaking of smart people. Andrew, we love having you on. Thank you so much for coming on this morning. Thank you. A great interview. We hope to hear a lot of you next week. Pretty important week. Great. Katy tur, thank you as well. What is the book going to be called . Unbelievable. I love it i think you need a different title. No, that is good. I like unbelievable. Submit your suggestions. In the next weeks, youll have i love it. You could do unbelievable and underneath the subtitle, believe me, it was unbelievable. Thats pretty good. I might use that. Coming up, democratic senator jeff merkley called Rex Tillerson a friend of put ain tell him why he is not supporting Donald Trumps secretary of state nominee. That is next on morning joe. The microsoft cloud helps us stay connected. The microsoft cloud offers infinite scalability. The microsoft cloud helps our customers get up and running, anywhere in the planet. Wherev there a phone, youve got a bank, and we could never do that before. The cloud gave us a single platform to reach across our entire organization. It helps us communicate better. We use the microsoft clouds advanced analytics tools to track down cybercriminals. This cloud helps transform business. This is the microsoft cloud. Juswho own them,ople every business is different. But every one of those businesses will need legal help as they age and grow. Whether it be help starting your business, vendor contracts or employment agreements. Legalzooms network of attorneys can help you every step of the way so you can focus on what you do. Well handle the legal stuff that comes up along the way. Legalzoom. Legal help is here. Madam clerk. Mr. Franken . How am i recorded . The senator is not recorded. I vote no on behalf of the the debate is not allowed. 3 Million People from minnesota who can no longer be discriminated against the clerk will continue the roll. The senate in order. Mr. Franken, no. Senator al franken was one of the democrats who stepped out of order early yesterday morning to push back at republican efforts to repeal obamacare. He joins us on set at 8 30 with the latest on that tough fight. He is going to be here. I love that. Senator jeff merkley first will join the table. He is going to be here. Every tv doctor knows that when it comes to hospital romances, the more complicated, the better. I love you. But i love him. I love him, too. So do i. They also know you should get your nual checkup. It could save your life. Its a new year. Schedule your checkup today to learn your four Health Numbers and start the year off right. Cigna. Together, all the way. Be the you who doesnt cover your moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. Be the you who shows up in that dress. Who hugs a friend. Who is done with treatments that dont give you clearer skin. Be the you who controls your psoriasis with stelara® just 4 doses a year after 2 starter doses. Stelara® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections and cancer. Some serious infections require hospitalization. Before treatment, get tested for tuberculosis. Before starting stelara® tell your doctor if you think you have an infection or have symptoms such as fever, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough. Always tell your doctor if you have any signs of infection, have had cancer, if you develop any new skin growths or if anyone in your house needs or has recently received a vaccine. Alert your doctor of new or worsening problems, including headaches, seizures, confusion and vision problems these may be signs of a rare, potentially fatal brain condition. Some serious allergic reactions can occur. Do not take stelara® if you are allergic to stelara® or any of its ingredients. Most people using stelara® saw 75 clearer skin and the majority were rated as cleared or minimal at 12 weeks. Be the you who talks to your dermatologist about stelara®. My understanding is that when you employ lobbyists who submit law, you are taking a position. Is that not correct . If the form clearly indicates whether we were i dont know, i havent seen the form youre holding in your hand. I dont know if it indicates were we lobbying against the sa sanctionors against the sanctions. I know you werent lobbying for the sanctions. All right. Joining us now, member of the Senate Foreign relions committee, democrat jeff americaly of oregon. Also at th table, author of the president s club, nancy gibbs. This weeks new issue is entitled incoming Survival Guide to the white house from team obama for team trump. I love it. How are you going to vote when it comes to Rex Tillerson . Im going to vote no. I was deeply disturbed by his testimony. He was testifying as an oil executive, not as a leader among the free world, the foeperson t guide the United States in bringing the world together i was one disturbing commentary after the other. Not being able to put his arms around the hands of barrel bombs in aleppo or bypassing the sanctions on russia. Were you heartened by the fact that he seemed to understand the importance of nato . Well, he did he did seem to come back to that. I know that when i first this just more of a general question from where you sit. Isnt that one of great challenges for the Incoming Administration to convince europe, nato and the world that they respect that organization that, they respect that audience . Absolutely. Members of nato are very nerv s nervous, very disturbed, not sure that incoming president understands article 5. Is going to stand up when there is a problem or understands the nations that have recently come into nato that were goingo therwith latvia and lithnia. Again, i understand why youre voting against him. Im relieved when i heard him say that he considered article five involvable. I was glad to hear. That when i spoke to him in my office and asked him about how he would respond if russia were to invade those states, he said im surprised it didnt happen already and no article five. I think hes coming into some good briefings. By the time get to to committee, he was ready to talk to article five. But its still a know . Yes. Given the president elects posture on undoing the iran accord, what sense do you get from tillerson . Why does he stand on that . Well, hes very cautious about it. Hes going to see how its performing, pondering, go back and do a little bit of interagency conversations. Its a tentative situation, i would say. Nancy, you have written a great book, the president s club. Talk about what youre seeing and how it lines up with everything youve written before about barack obama and donald trump forming this relationship that search closer than anybody would have expected. It is so interesting. Every president ial handoff has certain rituals where they meet. But this one, is you know, two people who were so hostile during the campaign. Trump is calling obama a terrorist sympathizer, obama is calling donald trump p unfit. Two days later after the election trump is in the oval office and have their first facetoface conversation. There have been phone calls since then. And it really is remarkable sort of watching an outgoing president doing what other outgoing president s have done. Help us. Help viewers know when this began. Obviously truman and ike very intense tradeoff. Ike had little respect for jfk. You could say the same for lbj and nixon. Even jimmy carter and reagan. We heard about that very tense drive to the inaugural platform. But in every case, the guy leaving office knows what that office does to you. Knows what is waiting the new guy. Its going to land on him. You cant help but feel a little sorry for him. And wants to get him up to speed. Whether do they start . It started with truman. You think about how truman took over with fdrs test and he doesnt know that were Testing Nuclear devices in new mexico. He was determined when he handed off to ike that there would be a seamless transition. And he organized these meetings, not only between him and eisenhower but with respective cabinets. Eisenhower did the same thing with kennedy. It has happened since then and in a way the best example is what we saw eight years ago when obama was coming in. Right. And president bush invited all the living president s. They all had lunch at the white house. And they all said to him, regardless of party, we know the office transcends the individual. Thats the message. The office is bigger than you are. Thats what the Obama Administration said to us. We have friends in the Obama Administration who said, you know what . George w. Bush gave us a gift of silence. We owe that much to donald trump and america. How do you avoid the mistakes of the Republican Party. How do you find areas where can you work with congress, the new president . Weve been putting out a conversations about lets come together. Lets talk about infrastructure, lets talk about rewriting the tax code. And i think we can find the areas to Work Together. If the republicans dont decide to overreach and go too far, if the infrastructure is all tax credits that are going to be very expensive for the work perform, were going to wrestle with. That we wament to be most Cost Effective infrastructure that can be put forward. Nancy, this issue is amazing. I dont know where to begin. I think its the letter from first daughters to first daughters. Explain first of all just the framework in which you put this issue together. So we went to a couple of dozen white house staffers from, you know, ben rods and rahm emanuel and said what was the best advice you got when you came in . They spoke highly of how bush officials helped them in their transition. You walk into the white house, theres a postit note on the computer with your pass word on it and youre now running the government. You dont know horrifying. You dont know where the printers are and you dont know how to get someone access into the white house. And the leadership of the free world is now on your shoulders overnight. And to this is their Survival Guide. Its everything from the importance of getting to know the situation room staff. Theyre going to be your life line in a crisis to knowing that the white house mess closes between 2 00 and 3 00 in the afternoon and thats when youre going to hit the wall and need some coffee. So you better be prepared for. That its a Survival Guide to working in the most intense workplace in the world. And the most intense work shop in the world is going to have a lot of people who are unused to being in washington or unused to governing. I want to know, have you had any interactions with the incoming Vice President mike pence who will sit with you and seems to be assuming sort of a prime ministers role in this government. Well, no. I havent seen him yet. Hes certainly been on capitol hill. He seems to be focussed to bring the Republican Party together to a vision of how theyre going to move forward. Move forward on health care, move forward on taxes. But the outreach to the democratic side, not yet. Thank you very much. They have their handsful just uniting the Republican Caucus first. No kidding. You can see it on the health care plan. Several weeks in and theres no vision of how theyre going to replace the plan that theyre planning to repeal. Thepeal strategy is still moving along. Ahea in our next hour, your colleague senator al franken joins the table. Nancy gibbs, thank you as well. Thank you, nancy. I love it. This is great. Incoming. Were back in just a moment with a packed 8 00 a. M. Hour. Now . Excuse me. Again . Be right back. Always running to the bathroom because your bladder is calling the shots . You may have oab. Enough of this. Were going to the doctor. Take charge and ask your doctor about myrbetriq. Thats myrbetriq, the first and only treatment in its class for oab symptoms of urgency frequency, and leakage. Myrbetriq mirabegron may increase Blood Pressure. Tell your doctor right away if you have trouble emptying your bladder, or have a weak urine stream. Myrbetriq may cause serious allergic reactions. If you experience swelling of the face, lips, throat or tongue or difficulty breathing, stop taking myrbetriq and tell your doctor right away. Myrbetriq may affect or be affected by other medications. Before taking myrbetriq tell your doctor if you have liver or kidney problems. Common side effects include increased Blood Pressure common cold symptoms, urinary tractinfection, constipation, diarrhea, dizziness and headache. Its time for you to make the calls, so call your doctor to see if myrbetriq may be right for you. Visit myrbetriq. Com to learn more. Asmy family tree,ing i discovered a woman named marianne gaspard. It was her french name. Then she came to louisiana as a slave. I became curious where in africa she was from. So i took the ancestry dna test to find out more about my african roots. The ancestry dna results were really specific. They told me all of these places in west africa. I feel really proud of my lineage, and i feel really proud of my ancestry. Ancestry has many paths to discovering your story, get started for free at ancestry. Com its friday. January 13th. With us on set, we have veteran columnist and msnbc contributor mike barnical. Are you in . Legend aary. And steve ratner. Political writer for the New York Times, nick confasori and on kpocapitol hill, shane norri joins us. Whether we say johnny deutsche, everybody goes i need Something Better than admin. No you dont. Media mogul. I like. That please, alex, media mogul. It was a Third Straight busy day on capitol hill. With general james mattis, nominee for defense secretary, mike pompeo, nominee for cia director and ben carson facing tough questions. And also a Third Straight day trumps cabinet picks broke from policies to president elect campaigned on. And even statement thats there seemed to be commander in chief was making as recently as this week. Take a look. Donald j. Trumps calling for a total and complete shutdown of muslims entering the United States. We must find out what is going on. I have no belief and do not support the idea that muslims as a religious group should be denied admission to the United States. I dont think its appropriate to focus on Something Like religion is the only factor. Whether mexico sends the people, theyre bringing drugs, theyre bringing crime, theyre rapists and some i assume are good people. Do you think mexicans are criminals, drug dealers, and rapists . I would never characterize an entire population of people with any single term at all. Were going to build a wall f theyre going to get up, they say how i do get down from this wall. A physical barrier in and of itself wont do the job. It has to be a layered defense. If putin likes donald trump, guess what, folks, thats called an asset, not a liability. The most important thing in s. That we recognize the reality of what we deal with and mr. Putin and we recognize that he is trying to break the north Atlantic Alliance. As far as hacking, i think its russia. It could have been others also. General kelly, do you accept the conclusions of the Intelligence Community regarding russian interfeerns in our election . I think its pretty sad when intelligence reports get leaked out to the press. This allegation is that the agency itself has become politicized. Do you believe that . I my experience is i have not seen that. I have very, very high degree of confidence in our intelligenceommunity. The 28 countries, you know, many of them are not paying their fair share. They should be paying us what. We would need to create it. Article five commitment is invalable and the u. S. Is going to stand behind that commitment. They took away the part of the platform calling for provision of lethal weapons to ukraine to defend theramselves, why is that a good decision . The people of crimea would rather would be russia. I would have recommended that ukraine take all of the military assets they had available, put them on that eastern border, provide those assets with defensive weapons that are necessary just to defend themselves and announce that they are going froi them intelligence and either nato or u. S. Will provide air surveillance over that border. They do have Nuclear Weapons. We simply cannot back away from our commitment to see a reduction in the number of these weapons on the planet. Okay. Seems like a lot of daylight between them and the president elect. Yeah. Theres a lot of daylight. If youre trying to figure out whats going on though, of course every one of those people that went to the hill to testify were prepared for those hearings by trumps people. By trumps staff. They have the murder boards, Rex Tillerson, all of it theflt all went through it and went through whatever answers could happen. So they were shooting from the hip on the hill. From the process, they would not have said that on the hill if that were not the official position of the Trump Administration. Because again, it was in trump team, Transition Team that sat down and went through the answers with all of these people to make sure that they were consistent with the policy that not that they said on the campaign trail, but that theyre going to do over the next four years. Sure. They were totally prepared. Everybody knew what they were going to say. And they said it. It was very calm as you saw. There was no real confrontational aspect between them and trump. But they very clearly, calmly and carefully laid out an effect on another set of policies. There were no surprise questions. There were no trick questions. Donald trump just tweeted this morning and he says this all of my cabinet nominees are looking good and doing a great job. I want them to be themselves and express their own thoughts, not mine. Well, mike barnicle, if they are expressing what will be the administrations position moving forward because it was the administration in transition that was preparing them, there is certainly across the world are a lot of sort of sighs of relief. Thats it. Nato is involumable. And when you have jhave james m saying if we didnt have nato, he would have to createit. By the way that, is somebody that trump listens to on everything. All of europe this morning is breathing a sigh of relief. The relief began in washington and extend around the globe specially to europe. Youre right. With the testimony of generals mattis, general kelly and congressman pompeo. Each of those three in their own ways in the testimony, in the questions and answer thats they were providing the answers they were providing to the committees, looked professional, responsible. They were not going to do anything off the cuff. They gave a great degree of confidence to the people voting on the nomination, especially mattis. Dont forget the iran treaty. Mattis on the iran treaty. We made a deal. We have a responsibility to these people, to our allies. And to be fair, trump did move on the muslim ban. And he did say in the end were going to go look at countries where theres warfare. Also on the iran deal, he said we made the deal. At some point in the campaign, i dont know, when but he said we made the deal and we just got to figure out how to make it a better deal. But donnie, explain donald trump. Ien in en into i mean this is donald trump who out on the campaign trail is looking at the audience, playing the audience, selling the audience. But then you get behind closed doors and you try to figure out how am i going to build this 90 Story Building . And its a completely different skill set you have to employ. Before we take a collective total sigh of relief, i think we there is, yes, hes walked back one or two things. First of all, viscerally, when you watch the contrast between when trump saks and how he speaks versus grownups at the table. It is interesting. Every time he would speshgs you go speak, you go, what . And we somehow feel better because we have guys who hes brought in who are saying the opposite of what he got elected on and that makes us feel good. He hired the grownups. No. But wait. No. No. That did not happen by descent. Let by accident. We say. That but we say wait a second, the guy we elected and he walked one or two of them back for the thing we dont believe in but we feel better that he brought things in that we believe n but what does he believe in . Do we know where hes going to come out on anything i dont feel better about those things. It makes me even more disturbed. That makes me more disturbed. Would you rather have him have john bolton talking about how we should invade iran. No. Joe, no. What makes me disturbed is i have a guy would you rather have him have the people like, for instance, the guy he was talking about for Homeland Security was a supporter of a Muslim Registry and muslim ban. You would rather that . So you have it lined up perfectly with what he said in the heest tat of the campaign . Id rather have a president say what he believes. I like most of those appointmentes. But as we walk forward and say this is all youre creating nobody is giving donald trump a free pass on this stuff that he said. I guess thats my point. See, here you are worried about whats happened in the past and here we are trying to read through all of that to figure out what the world looks like for the next four years. Were going to hang on to everything said, which you should in june of the campaign or july. But were going to do that to the exclusion of actually telling our readers and telling our viewers based on everything that were seeing and the trend lines that were seeing this is what were telling you is most likely going to happen over the next few years. And by the way, also do we know we believe . As you said, theyve been prepped. And, of course, theyre saying the things they know to they need do to get confirmed. So when i guess this goes back to the whole truth word. When do we believe who says what and when . I think thats the disturbing issue. Ill tell you this. I would bet everything i own everything i own on generals mattis and pompeo. When james mattis walks into Donald Trumps office and says, mr. President , nato just important today as it was in 1947, when harry truman and secretary and general marshal created it, we know already what donald trump is going to say. I hope so. Okay. I hope so. Im with you, general. I hope so. And again, none of us are doing Donald Trumps betting. But whats our responsibility at this point . Is it to go back and look what happened six months ago or tell our people and the people quite frankly, leaders across the world that watch this show what were going to do over the next six months. Well start a different way. Look, its not going to be a straight livenlt. No, its not. Theres a bunch of guys that is hugging a guy and he is saying a friend is an asset. You have mike flynn, you have people we havent heard from this week to weigh in on this. This is not going to be a Straight Line from here to there. It is not going to be a Straight Line. And lets bring in shane harris right now. Shane, one of the areas specifically where its not going to be a straight hiline, obvious lus, is going to be with russia. While you have Rex Tillerson and general mattis saying the right things about nato and saying the right things about russia, we also have reports that general flynn made contact, David Ignacious wrote a column saying that president obama was expelling diplomats and talking about sanctions. Which is fascinating if its true. The man thats not yet the National Security adviser may be engaging in Foreign Policy. The russia question loomed large over every one of the hearings and particularly for mike pompeo where you have president elect trump essentially at war with an int Intelligence Community that he hasnt fully embraced by the way their view that russia is behind these political hacks of the dnc and john podesta. This extraordinary tension that is now into the surface where youve got a president elect saying that the cia is out to get him. He walked into the firestorm and has to serve both the president and the workforce that hes about to lead. And senators clearly want to know yesterday where do you come down on this idea of wheth russia is a foe or an ally. He clearly says russia is not necessarily is not anal lichlt he thinks theyre behind the hacks. So that puts him on the other side of the president elect. Donald trump is sort of out there alone on this russia question. You have general mattis talking about how russia is an adversary. But nick, how do we sort through all of this in light of davids column this morning that general flynn was in contact with the russians. Its pretty stunning. Its not clear if these calls were a violation of those rules and its a deerous deal. The last 20 years theyve had less power than the west wing staffers in setting policy. James mattis is not going to be president. Pompeo is not going to be president. Trump is going to be president. Im wondering who really sets policy in this administration. Is it trump, the president , or the cabinet secretaries . Still ahead. As to whether or not the russians did it, ive come to conclude after this briefing that a person of reasonable intelligence who does not conclude that the russians did it really doesnt want to be believe the russians did it. Now top kremlin Officials Say theyre disappointed that donald trump says russia was involved in interfering with the election. Bill kneely joins us live from moscow with his interswrut krvi the kremlin spokesman. And bill karins with a check on the forecast. Sfwhil. All eyes on the middle of the country. The storm hitting the west is heading into the cold air in the midwest. We have a ice storm underway. Its already begun. The pink on the map is freezing rain from joplin and springfield area. St. Louis has a wintry mix right now. That goes over to ice during the day to day. Watch out oklahoma and kansas n all, ten Million People under ice storm warnings. We have another 16 million under freezing rain advisories. So slick stuff from the southern ohio valley all the way through, right through the heartland. This is how much Ice Accumulation we could get. The key is once you get above a half inch of ice, thats when the trees start coming down and power lines come down. Thats when we get people sleeping in the dark in the middle winter with no heat. Central missouri, kansas city, witch take area. The bulls eye appears to be oklahoma and southern portions of kansas. Thats the area well watch the closest for especially as we go through saturday into saturday night. For the east coast weeshgs cooli, wee coolg things off. But even you tomorrow have a chance of wintry weather mix for your saturday. A little snow, a little ice. Youre watching morning joe. Lk your keys in the car, geicos emergency roadside assistance is there 24 7. Oh dear, i got a flat tire. Hmmm. Uh. Yeah, can you find a take where its a bit more dramatic on that last line, yeah . Yeah i got it right here. Someone help me i have a flat tire well its good. Good for me. What do you think . Geico. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. Dont just eat. Mangia bertolli. After becoming one of the largest Broadband Companies in the country. After expanding our Fiber Network coast to coast. These are the places we call home. We are centurylink. We believe in the power of the digital world. The power to connect. And thats what drives us everyday. Yesterday the Inspector General said there will be a wideranging investigation of how james comie handled the probe of clintons email server. The News Conference deciding not to recommend charges but describing clintons behavior as extremely careless. Comeys last minute letter revealing the discovery of more emails believed to be linked to their investigation and then the announcement sunday before election day that the emails didnt worry any new actions. Behind closed doors thursday comey briefed senators about russian hacking efforts during the election. But senators also asked comey pointed questions about the investigion. With one senator inside saying there was a level of anxiety in the room for his part comey said im grateful for the ig taking on this review. He is professional and independent and the fbi will cooperate fully with him and his office. I hope very much he is able to share his conclusions and observations with the public because everyone will benefit from thoughtful evaluation and transparency regarding this matter. Clinton Campaign Manager robby mook said, its troubling pattern that fbi seems to have chosen a horse in they election and we welcome this investigatio investigation so this doesnt happen again. He also said that trump was the legitimate winner of the election. Support for the probe came from both sides of the aisle including Republican House ethics chair jason chapits and high profile democrats. There were some strange things that neither side of the political aisle liked and they need to answer for those. I think steps were taken by the director of the fbi near the election which were not precedented. It did not ever happen before. His statement about whether there is going to be an opening of an investigation, closing of an investigation, i dont think was fair, professional or consistent with the policies the federal bureau of investigation. Mike this is just botched up in every way possible. I remember back in july us complaining that comey seemed to be tipping the scales in Hillary Clintons favor with the timing of, you know, fourth of july weekend, allowing cheryl mills and other principals to sit in on her testimony. Things you just dont do. But he did it. And then he doesnt indict her despite the fact that 55 , 56 of americans think she you be indicted. As you say more importantly, a lot of the professionals in new york holds this Bizarre Press Conference which i think we said at the time, you either indict or you dont indict. He tried to visit both ways, tried to do that again le 11 days out. Seems like this is a guy tortured by the fact that he didnt indict her. He was also way out over his skis in terms of the pronouncements. Its one thing to say we founding in to proceed with further. But his editorial comments in that press conference about her sloppiness and no responsible prosecutor would have indicted her. Hes the head of the fbi. Hes not a prosecutor. Hes not the u. S. Attorney. Hes not the attorney general. That was just the beginning of it. Now what we have remember, the attorney general is effectively recused. Becausest plane flight. Sitting on the plane. Which by the way, that we cant underline that fact enough. I believe donald trump is president st United States because Loretta Lynch met with bill clinton own that plane, recused herself and comb i didnt remember was running the whole show. That took her out of the line of authority in term of the fbi director. But now what we have, unfortunately, for everything, for the Incoming Administration, for the country, you have a never ending story. This is just going to go there are going to be hearings, more hearings, multiple hearings. The comey Inspector General thing is going to drag on. I i i agree with the wall street journal. Its in the best trf the country to step down. Coming up. Show us your plan. You know, your health care plan. You must have one. We would like to hear it. Senator al frank season not laughing over first moves. Thats funny. Hes awesome. He joins us live just ahead on morning joe. Scalpel. I have no idea what im doing. Im just a tv doctor. I never went to college. scream i dont do blood. But now, thanks to cigna, i can do more than just look the part. Is that a foot . We are the tv doctors of america. And were partnering with cigna to help save lives. By getting you to a real doctor for an annual checkup. So go, know, and take control of your health. Doctor poses. Cigntogether, all the way. Well explain it later. Were on tv. How would stewart smally say what youre feeling right now . Stewart would feel a lot of disease with whats going on now and he would point out disease spells out disease. You see . I dont do stewart smally. Im a senator. I know this about you which is why i feel very honored here sfwlchlt were very honored. Have they instructed you are never able to do bits . You cant do any old bits . We have i mean, you i was put through something called the dehumorizer. That is called washington. Welcome. Weve been talking this morning about the it failed. Were all laughing at you. It failed mizerbly. All right. Weve been talking this morning about contrasts on policy positions between donald trump and his cabinet nominees. Heres another interesting one. From general mattis when pressed by senator Lindsey Graham on the president elects push to move thu. S. Mbassy in israel to jerusalem. Mr. Nominee, was the capital of israel . Capital of israel that i go to, sir, is tel aviv. Thats where all the Government People are. But do you agree with me the capital of israel is jerusalem . Sir, right now i stick with the u. S. Policy. Okay. Do you support moving the u. S. Embassy from tel aviv to jerusalem . I would defer to the nominee for secretary of state on that, sir. And that is what you is a correct answer. That is somebody who actually plays within the lines. Lets bring in al franken. Weve been talking about the difference between what donald trump said on the campaign trail and what a lot of his nominees have been saying on the hill. Mattis especially with the New York Times wrote about it to day seemed to be sort of a breath of fresh air. I think thats why he sailed through on the waiver. Yeah. When you look at when you look at what mattis is saying, general kelly is saying, some skepticism about a wall, when you look at what pompeo is saying, the great confidence he has in the intel kmupcommunity, should people in minnesota sort through that . What the president elect said in the past and what his nominees are saying . Also, you have to remember there is a difference between what the president elect said in the past and what he subsequently said and what he said in the present and what hell say in the future. Even on the muslim ban he moved on that. Yeah. We got Jeff Sessions and those hearings said he would not do muslim ban. And we got him to commit, my colleagues got limb to commit to a number of things like that that were sort of at odds with what the president elect had been saying during the campaign in of late. You going to vote for him or against . Im going to vote against senator sessions. I just dont feel comfortable that he would protect all americans rights. What about the past week . Weve had a lot to digest over the past week. Setting aside that wild press conference. But especially but whats been said on the hill, mattis, pompeo are tillerson. Lets talk about tillerson for a second. Some disease among many by some of his answers regarding putin. Were you concerned . I am. I mean, im concerned about the president elects relationship with russia. Thats sort of an understatement. Right. Disappointment of tillerson and his views on russia also. Not saying that there are war crimes in aleppo sh thats disturbing. The president elect during the Campaign Said that russia hadnt invaded crimea. He threatened nato. He praised putin all the time. What do you think is behind all that . Gee, i wonder. I dont know. You know, there has to be an investigation into these charges that his campaign coordinated with russia. He should be more he has to release his taxes because we not going to happen. Well, heres it may not happen now. But if we put enough pressure on him, heres why. The American People should understand this. The taxes first of all, you can release your taxes if youre under audit. Also, he is not producing any proof that hes under audit. So right now hes not going to release his taxes. But lets put pressure on him. One of the things sessions said that he would do would would investigate trump. If it was called for. And, you know, if youre a developer who has gone bankrupt several times and left your creditors holding the bag, you have to get money from somewhere. We want to know wani want to know where hes getting that money f the sources are russian and if his campaign coordinated those kind of questions, i think, are really important questions. I think theyre really important questions. Thank you. They raise a number of key questions. How do you compel him to release his taxes . He does nothing. Hes not even president yet. So were going to see are you going look into ways to force thissish snu. Force this issue . I think they unravel and well see what happens. But youre already beginning to see these charges surface and were beginning some time will pass and there may become pressure. There should be tremendous pressure on him to release his taxes. With regard to russia and the president elect. This morning in the Washington Post David Ignacious has a piece in which he says december it 29th general flynn, the incoming National Security adviser, made several calls back and forth with the russian ambassador. We dont know the content of the calls. We know the timing of the calls seems to be rather odd given that was the time when we were talking about, you know, what was going to be done about russian collusion or russian interference in our elections. Does that concern you . Im concerned with all of this, of course. This was a very big part of what happened in this election. This is unprecedented. This kind of foreign interference and the trump teams relationship i think is of import. Yeah. Donnie . Senator, we spoke earlier about the investigation now into comey. We around the table agree that had that not happened we would have a different president do. You agree with that . That was obviously hillary did a lot of things wrong, but that was the Tipping Point . Well, im not a commentator like all of you and dont have the kind of that kind of wisdom. We have none. See . They havent taken you through the dehumorizer. That was not intended that was intended to be humble. Dry. Youre very humble. Look, nate silver and others have said thats when the momentum turned. Thats when the momentum shifted. Of course, i think that made an enormous difference, yes. Im with you guys. So what about the republican efforts to repeal obama care and replace it . Have you seen any plans see . You have seen any plans we love your statement on the floor, by the way, which was very funny zblme. Theyve had six years to do this. We would like to see this. It is a secret plan . Its nixon secret plan. Look, 2. 3 million minnesotans have had limits on their policies before aca. Right. There are people who alive today because of the Affordable Care act. There are 2. 3 million with preexisting conditions that benefit from this. This isnt just about the 20 Million People who are newly covered and the fact that we have you know, president obama said if you come up with a better plan, fine. They have not come up with a plan. And this idea that were going to repeal and replace simultaneously is ridiculous. Also, sometimes they say we have a lot of plans. A lot of plans is not a plan. Its like a quarterback going back in the huddle going okay, were going to run four plays this down. Thats a bobby bowden question. If you have a lot of plans, you have no plan. Exactly. So help me out. 80 of americans, we showed something on the way too early this morning. 80 of americans either want obamacare as is or want it improved upon. Yes. So how can you be a part of the process . Obviously, theres some problems. I mean, in a lot of states you have Insurance Companies that are dropping off. How can you be part of the process to when the republicans dont come up with an adequate replacement that to make this better . We could have improved this. And those companies wouldnt have fallen out if the risk corridors had not been eliminated zblflt here we go. Only 18 want all of obama care repealed. Close to 80 want to keep it in part. This was not hard to address. And republicans tried to undercut the that market. Right. By taking away the risk corridors which i dont want to get into the weeds on this. But thats why these Companies Dropped out they were supposed to what do we do now . I would do a public option . What do we do with this congress and this president . Thats desperately going to be looking for a solution that they dont have. So what would you how do you help out . Well talk about nominees who disagree with president elect, tom price wants to privatise medicare. He wants to block grant medicaid which cuts. The talk about his plans to replace aca are horrible. Those numbers would skyrocket to 90 of americans would das prove of wh disapprove of what he wants to do. Ill be on the Health Committee and ill be asking him some questions a little later on. We look forward to that. Senator al franken, thank you so much for being on the show this morning. Congratulations. You were not funny at all. It was fun. Shew. The defunnizer. Washington will beat it out of you. Yeah. I lost my sense of humor during the recount. Really . Thats where it happened . Yeah. Whether did you lose it . Palm beaaeceach county. Not that recount. Your recount. You forgot my recount much thats good, actually. Thats cute. All right. Good. Thank you so much. Still funny. Still ahead we look forward to watching you question price on those issues. Thank you. Meet the man behind the story on donald trump that up ended the political world. I think its a dossier. Its a real dossier. See how he is using it. It is two pages of really gross stuff. But is it apocraphyl . I dont know. Using big words improperly. I hope so. Bill neily joins us with a pro fiflfile of a former britis. Hes laughing at him hefl. Whether did that happen . It just happens. I didnt know where i was from ethnically. So we sent that sample off to ancestry. My ancestry dna results are that i am 26 nigerian. I am just trying to learn as much as i can about my culture. I put the gele on my head and i looked into the mirror and i was trying not to cry. Because its a hat, but its like the most important hat ive ever owned. Discover the story only your dna can tell. Order your kit now at ancestrydna. Com. Into a real guys night out to see if they could find the guy who uses just for men. Its me. No way. Just for men gives you a natural grayfree look. Just lather in. In just five minutes. Greatlooking hair, made easy. Just for men. Hey, need fast try cool mint zantac. It releases a cooling sensation in your mouth and throat. Zantac works in as little as 30 minutes. Nexium can take 24 hours. Try cool mint zantac. No pill relieves heartburn faster. Istart at the new carfax. Comar. Show me minivans with no reported accidents. Boom. Love it. [struggles] show me the carfax. Start your used car search at the allnew carfax. Com. After an official briefing last friday, james comey took mr. Trump aside and spoke with him oneonone about the existence of unverified allegations about his ties and activities in rush yachlt director of National Intelligence James Clapper said the Intelligence Community didnt consider the 35 page document about trump reliable. A summary of which was included with the top secret report on russias influence on the election in an appendix called disinformation. So that just read that clapper said it was not reliable . Right. Correct. I think it was labelled disinformation. Were talking about the dossier . Yeah. Okay. Just to be exact, i dont want to split hairs, but i dont think clapper passed judgement on that, right . He said it was unsubstantiated. Zblun unreliable. There say big difference. I want to be careful here. I think so anyway, take it however you want to take it. But clapper has not passed judge ment on whether that is reliable or not. Correct. I think that is the best way to put it. And the former British Intelligence agent that put together that controversial dossier is missing amidst the fallout. Joining us from moscow with more, nbc news chief global correspondent bill neily. Bill, where did he go . Good morning from a cold moscow and a story really that does sound like something from the cold war. A former spy collecting information from russia on a man who would be President Donald Trump tweeting this morning that these are phoney allegations from a failed spy. He is furious this morning. The exspy, whos british, is missing. There are few images of Christopher Steel reportedly the author of an explosive report, the former spy who prefers the dark but whose cover is blown and who fled his home. He runs a British Intelligence business with this man. It wouldnt be appropriate for me to make any comments. And was reportedly hired by a u. S. Company to investigate donald trump. He was the real james bond who was a case officer running one of the most important defectors and suppliers of information relating to russian organized crime. That was alexander poisoned a decade ago. He knew this dirty world well. Two informed sources tell nbc news Steels Company was responsible for a 35page report first commissioned by donald trump. His findings, now seen by the fbi and u. S. Intelligence agency and the president elect. What we dont know about this report is who are those sources . Who are those subsources . What kind of faith does he have in those sources . So thats where the problem lies. Donald trump says allegations about him in russia are lies. I saw the information. I read the information outside of that meeting. Its all fake news. Its phoney stuff. It didnt happen. It was a group of opponents that got together, sick people. And they put that crap together. The kremlin spokesman told me the report is rubbish. Did any russian official, any intelligence agent gather any information on donald trump when he was in russia at any time . No. Donald trump wasnt bugged . No. Wasnt followed . No. Have your intelligence agencies got anything on donald trump . I have never seen a file. One russian intelligence expert says trump could have been targeted. I think it might be possible. But steels report is flawed. There is some information and its completely wrong. The exspy has fled with his children leaving his cats behind and theyre saying nothing. Whatever about the cats, russian officials i talked to arent happy about this report. Putins spokesman told me it was pulp fiction. Donald trump tweet nothing proof. And there never will be. He was even quoting those russian dismissals. But something about this dossier made the fbi alert the president elect. It remains a great mystery. Back to you. Wow. Bill neily, thank you very much. Thank you, bill. And just to clean up the reporting, joe is correct. James clapper said yesterday the ic has not made any judgement that information in this document is reliable. And we did not rely upon it in any way for our conclusions. So they have not passed any judge ment. They basically said this is what is floating around. Here it s you take it. We have not relied on it. No idea. I will say, its hard to find a mike, its hard to find any intelligence expert across the globe that actually believes this. Because what the wall street journal reported and they talked to a lot of British Intelligence officials and what others have reported is theres just no way russia basically equivalent to the kgb is going to open up their files to a retired brit retired british agent. Correct. Ive been told by multiple people the reason this became was given and made aware of it to the Vice President and the president of the United States and to the president elect is that just an informational thing. You should know this kind of stuff is around. Yeah. All right. Well be right back with much more morning joe. Its never been easier. Except when it comes to your retirement plan. But at fidelity, were making Retirement Planning clearer. And it all starts with getting your Fidelity Retirement score. In 60 seconds, youll know where you stand. And together, well help you make decisions for your plan. To keep you on track. Time to think of your future its your retirement. Know where you stand. Time to think of your future its my decision ito make beauty last. Roc® retinol, started visibly reducing my fine lines and wrinkles in one week. And the longer i use it, the better it works. Retinol correxion® from roc. Methods, not miracles. ™ th. Oh, bakedon alfredo . E. Gotta rinse that. Nope. No way. Nada. Really . Dish issues . Throw it all in. Cascade platinum powers through. Your toughest stuckon food. Nice. Cascade. Share the joy of real cream. With reddiwip. So alex said the funniest thing ever. No. Were having a conversation about something we cant say on the air. And he said seven second delay is off, i cant help you. Thats why were going to go to dominick chu. Another company accused of violating emission standards. Fiat chrysler used software in 100,000 vehicles that allowed excess diesel emissions to go undetected. The ceo flat out jekt erejects allegations. The stock is down. Traders still watching that dow 20,000 level. Bank of america both reporting earning thats beat wall street estimates and by the way, guys, the nasdaq had the first losing day yesterday. All of this year. Back to you. All right. Dominick chu, have a great be d weekend. You got it. That does it for us. Thank you for sock patient with thus week. Im sorry. Stop talking. Im sorry. Dont say a word. Im not saying anything. The delay is off. I dont want to hear it. Okay. Stephanie pucicks up the covera. I love wlit you say stop talking to the table. This morning, under investigation, guess what im talking about . The head of the fbi now in the hot seat. The Justice Department set to prove his agencys hand willing of clintons emails. There were a lot of anomaly thats happened. Several things that raised eyebrows. Surprise, surprise. Donald trump reacting this morning. And was trump told . News nbc news reporting it was james comey who told the president elect about the unverified allegations in that report. This hour the heads of the intelligence agencies will brief the congress on what