Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20181115

Kicked out . He came wearing a mustache. Donald trumps not even trying anymore. These are so preposterous. Again, doing it all to benefit a senatorial candidate in florida whos going to end up winning anyway. When i saw that quote from the president yesterday and the interview to the daily caller, i thought it was the onion. I thought it was made up. What he did say is people go to their car after they voted. They put on a different hat. They put on a different shirt. And then they go back in and vote again. Quote, its really a disgrace whats going on the president of the United States said of the voting. Its unbelievable. He claimed that he talked to a professional golfer who said a couple of people cut in line and voted twice in california and out of that of course the golfer denied it. The professional golfer denied it in 2016 and out of that donald trump said that, like, what 6 Million People voted i illegally. Right, right, theres always a straw man thing he can make up. Whos his buddy that never goes to paris anymore, tom or doug. Jim. Later on in this block theres going to be a guy whos going to show up here whos going to look a little like donny deutsch. But wait that guy has no hair. Maybe thats heilemann rather than deutsche. Its really a disgrace whats going on at this table. Its a disgrace with all of these counterfeit donny deutschs. It really upsets me. Hes got these stories. Hes got the guy that comes backstage and talks to him, the guy that doesnt go to paris, and one of my favorites whr, whe first started talking about north korea and reaching out to north korea, he said that he had parents with children who were still over in north korea. Thats a good one. That are coming up to him and saying please, please bring my son home. They, of course, would have had to be 125 but that never seems to get in the way of donald trump. Its amazing. Well get into that story. Weve got National Affairs analysts. We should actually maybe somebody should come up with a name for him because he spins these tales. What would it be . Whats his publicist name . Disney don . John miller. I think there are a number. Didnt he have like three or four different names . John baron, john miller. National Affairs Analyst for nbc news, msnbc, the cohost and executive producer of show times the circus, John Heilemann, former aide to the george w. Bush white house elise jordan, richard haas and reporter for the Washington Post. And the first ever to represent the state of new jersey. The updated count in californias 39th district shows the lead of korean american republican young kim has shrunk to just 122 votes over democrat gil cisneros. Katie porter is nearly 4,000 votes ahead of mimi walters. But in an interview with nbc news this morning, Vice President mike pence says he thought the democrats failed to make sizable gains. We made history by expanding our majority in the senate. We won some great elections in governors offices around the country, and we didnt really see that blue wave in the house of representatives come our way. I think its because the American People see the results. But those results tell a much different story. The democrats gaining at least now 34 house seats with seven still undecided along with flipping seven governors mansions, 336 state legislative seats for a total of 380 in the trump era and multiple state house chambers. Joe, if you look at just Orange County, for example, which we started with there. There will not be republicans in Orange County representing those districts, which is a shock to you and other republicans who viewed that as a cradle of conservati conservatism. In the state of new jersey now there will only be one republican representing that state in washington. Yeah, i mean thats the lowest for republicans since woodrow wilson. Youd have to go back 100 years to find the republicans in a worst state there. Orange county, an earthquake, nevada an earthquake, republicans just getting thrown out of statewide offices, local offices. You name it. John heilemann, you know, i look at mike pence, and i just im saddened by the fact that mike feels like he has to lie to a reporter, degrade himself for donald trump, and saying that, well, we didnt really see that blue wave. We had a great tuesday. It would be funny if it werent so sad for this guy who was actually once not only a respected politician but a respected man, but now he is giving baghdad bob a bad name saying that they had a great tuesday, and this is i dont know. I just an editorial comment here, this is what rappelled so many educated suburban voters, that mike pence and people like mike pence and their representatives would lie to try to line up with donald trump, and it catches up with them. It always catches up with them, and they keep doing it. I mean, tuesday was a massive blue wave, was it not . Especially in the house. It was. Unequivocally and without any reservation you can say that, and the numbers keep stacking up. Joe, look, there are two things to say. One is, i mean, you said mike pence was was a bunch of things that were all complimentary. Its been a pretty long time since that was true. I watch this show pretty carefully and you guys have pointed out, we have all pointed out the number of times in which mike pence over the last two years and dating back to when he was put on the ticket, has mimicked, echoed donald trump in his various misstatements and lies, and so this is kind of the pattern for mike pence. I know mikas always fond of the one of the shot of pence, you know, doing the thing with the water. The water bottle thing. Thats his now thats the visual manifestation of what he does all the time, which is he has to do exactly whatever donald trump does. Apparently hes afraid if he contradicts in any way physically or verbally the president hell get in some kind of trouble. This is like looking at the sky and saying the sky is red when its blue or saying that down is up. At this point im not surprised by anyone. I dont want to say that its not outrageous and ridiculous, but it is really now par for the course with mike pence. Elise how bad was tuesday for the democrats . Ive got to say, this is the slowest rolling blue wave. It reminds me of the scene of the first austin power where the Security Guard screams no and a steam rollers coming at him, and then they do a side shot, and the steam rollers actually 20 yards away going one miles an hour. Thats how this blue wave has had to feel for republicans because every day brings more bad news. Well, im going to steal a line that one of my strategist friends shared with me describing the blue wave, more the blue tornado. You look at where this blue tornado hit, and as it hit it took out any republicans, and it clearly hit in a big way in Orange County, and it also hit in new jersey, and what do those areas have in common . Suburban voters who traditionally vote republican and are possibly shifting away from the party in a permanent realignment or at least a temporary realignment because they do not like republicans in the era of donald trump. Yeah, they certainly dont. You know, willie, Something Interestings happening on the democratic side of things, and you know, you leave it to some democrats, they remind me of republicans in this way. Some democrats to try to clutch the feet from the jaws of victory. You actually have quite a few democrats now talking about replacing nancy pelosi saying shes divisive. First of all, its not like every republican didnt run against nancy pelosi in 2018, and yet what happened . They had their largest wave since watergate. So and also, shes like one of the most competent speakers of the house as far as getting things done and knowing how to hold her troops together in recent memory. Yeah, but theres a long list now, a growing list of democrats who say she should not be the speaker. She appears unfazed by it. The number of democrats who say they wont support him is reportedly now at 17, at least 12 Incoming Democratic freshman say they will not support her, in fact campaigned on that. That number could grow as more democrats continue to win their races. On tuesday congressman seth molten of massachusetts says he is quote 100 confident pelosi does not have the votes. Pelosi said she will be the speaker no matter what he said congresswoman marsha fudge told the cleveland this, people are asking me to do it and i am thinking about it. Eugene scott, what are the chances nancy pelosi is not the speaker of the house come january . I dont think its likely at this point, because what nancy pelosi will do is communicate to those lawmakers who arent on board with her right now that she has been able to deliver in the ways that many of the democratic voters are expecting the Democratic Party to do. When you look at seth moulton one of the issues he has is he wants to represent many of the people the Democrat Party has not been able to rely on for victories. The reality is the Democrat Party successes were because of women of color, were because of minorities in millennial communities, and many of these White Working Class voters that seth moulton is hoping that could see someone like them more reflected in leadership just cannot deliver the votes consistently for the dems, the dems need to push back on trumpism. And richard haas, we have seen, you and i have seen others have seen what happens when you put somebody in as speaker of house that may be there because of certain political positions. If you dont have someone who knows the ins and outs of running the peoples house, anarchy breaks out very quickly and you have something that looks a lot like Newt Gingrichs last couple of years in as speaker. If the democrats arent careful, joe, theyre going to have to start looking like republicans. Uhoh. And its going to basically look like politics as usual, and it will be so much better if the democrats essentially started talking very carefully about policy, that it didnt look like a political free for all, that they had more important things on their mind. That would be a way they would distinguish us. One of the messages of the nonblue wave blue wave is that people are tired of washington politics. Why would the democrats now have this enormous demonstration that they didnt get their own message. This isnt the beginning of this noise. Weve heard this idea of challenging nancy pelosi quite a bit in the past couple of years. Tim ryan has talked about a need for a new generation. Where do you put the odds of her not being speak er . Low. Nancy pelosi, although she is a woman, she was also a white woman in a party thats increasingly diverse and younger by the date. This blue wave is filled with an incredibly diverse cast of very young up and coming candidates. There were people who were concerned about the possibility that the wave would not be that big and there was talk about it in advance. A lot of candidates were asked if they would support her if they won, and some of them wanted to get on what they thought was the right side of history, which was to be in the vanguard of this new wave of democratic politicians. Now she has delivered not just even despite all of the attacks on her, the fact that she was attacked as joe said by every republican candidate out there, the president of the United States, everyone focuses on nancy pelosi and the party has won this giant victory, and shes someone that a lot of Democratic Candidates owe their seats to. She is a fundraising power house. There is no one in the Democratic Party that raises more money. Thats part of the reason why the odds are low. There are a lot of sitting and reelected Democratic Congress who know she has provided for them in this election, past elections and will provide for them in future elections. On top of that she knows how to run the house. The position shes in given the size of this victory and given what lays ahead, she will face a challenge, but i think the likelihood that shes not the next speaker for democrats is very, very low. Willie, just to use a sporting analogy, of course, this really would be like the red sox asking whether they were going to keep alex cora or not. Of course la mere thinks hes completely botched the offseason already, but it really would. Again, the democrats best performance since 1974, which of course the democrats were just coming off of watergate and Richard Nixons resignation like two or three months earlier. This is an extraordinary day. They could end up with 38, 39, 40 seats picked up. Running the house of representatives has nothing to do with ideology. It has everything to do with competence, to borrow a phrase from michael dukakis. Its all about being competent and tough and knowing how to keep your caucus together in very difficult times, and Nancy Pelosis better at that than just about anyone. Certainly better than anybody in the Democratic Party right now, so why get rid of your alex cora after a championship season . And the other thing to say because of her toughness that you just talked about there is when she does move on or when she does hand that fwagavel ove she will do it on her terms. Weve got some other headlines this morning. The l. A. Times has new reporting on the difficult decisions officials had to make when the camp fire, the deadliest in california history first began to spread. To prevent roads from being clogged, officials staggered evacuation alerts in the city of paradise ordering residents to evacuate from the areas closest to the fire first. According to the l. A. Times it soon became clear the fire was moving too fast for that plan, and a full scale evacuation was ordered. By that time the report claims the city already was being consumed. Meanwhile, more remains were discovered in torched homes yesterday, and butte county officials added more names to the list of those who are unaccounted for. That number now stands at 297 while the death toll has risen to 56. The sheriff is warning evacuees that more remains may be discovered by residents returning to their community. Lets bring in bill karens with a look at the current conditions. Yesterday we got away with the another windy day in Southern California. Today weve gotten rid of our red flag warnings. Notice the winds are coming from onshore. Thats more moisture in the air, temperatures are a little bit cooler and winds will be in the 20 to 35 Miles Per Hour range in Southern California. Were going to continue with these fire threats until the rainy season begins. Heres a good little maybe piece of good news. This is next week into friday looking at the possibility, at least, of a rainstorm coming into california. Thats the point were at now. Were hopeful for a seven to eightday forecast to give us rain. Up until then, nothing. Lets talk about our big storm, our noreaster. Overnight st. Louis three to four inches of snow. Ice storm indianapolis to cincinnati, a huge rainstorm going up the east coast. It was cold enough for ice, though, overnight in the areas of the mountains of virginia and northern virginia, and right now in washington, d. C. Is a mix of light rain and sleet depending on your elevation. Heres the snowfall map for today. The snow is really going to break out over central pennsylvania this morning heading spoo new englahea heading into new england as we go throughout the evening. The evening commute will be difficult. The big cities are not that bad. Were going to get it good near the hudson valley, central portions of new england. Everyones going to get a quick three to four inches with sleet on top of that. Then it will get rwindy and raiy later tonight. New york city you look for the snow to begin right around 1 00 to 2 00 p. M. And rain by 6 00 p. M. Its going to be a mess on the roads this morning, this evening, and the airports a lot of delays, too. It looks ugly out there. Thanks so much, bill. Michael avenatti has been arrested in los angeles on suspicion of felony domestic abuse. The alleged incident took place on tuesday. The details have not been publicly disclosed including the reporting party or any potential injuries. Avenatti who has risen to fame as the attorney for Stormy Daniels and is considering a run for the 2020 democratic president ial nomination has been released on 50,000 bond. He released a statement denying the quote bogus allegation. His estranged wife says she was not involved in the alleged incident and she ask his first wife released statements saying he never had been violent. The l. A. Times reports avenatti is set to make his First Court Appearance on december the 5th. Coming up on morning joe what james mattis told troops about why they are deployed at the border. Mitch mcconnell blocks a vote to protect the special counsel. What that means for the future of the russia probe. All that and a lot more when we come back on morning joe. Going off with the spirit in the sky going off with the sp the sky today, 97 of employers agree that skills like teamwork, attention to detail, and Customer Service are critical to business success. Like the ones we teach here, every day. Always a catch. Like somehow you wind up getting less. But now that i book at hilton. Com, and i get all these great perks. I got to select my room from the floor plan. Very nice. I know, im good at picking stuff. Free wifi. Laptop by the pool is a bold choice. And the price match guarantee. How do you know all of this . Are you like some magical hilton fairy . Its just here on the hilton app. Just available to the public, so. Book at hilton. Com and get the hilton price match guarantee. If you find a lower rate, we match it and give you 25 off that stay. If [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. Ve you it powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. I am a techie dad. N. I believe the best technology should feel effortless. Like magic. At comcast, its my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. My name is mike, im in Product Development at comcast. Were working to make things simple, easy and awesome. I had given instructions. I do not want to put this mission in some arcane military terms. I want you to tell them we are operating in support of customs or of border police. Do not say we are supporting a federal agency the right now the only thing weve been asked for is to put in obstacles, provide transportation, and to provide housing, so obstacle placement, transportation helicopters basically and some c130s that would move larger number of troops longer distances. Weve been asked for nothing more right now. Thats defense secretary james mattis and Homeland Security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen who visited the southern border meeting with u. S. Troops sent there by President Trump to defend, he says, the United States against the caravan of migrants. Secretary mattis says there are currently 5,900 troops deployed to the border. He anticipates that number will go up to around 7,000. Joe, he was asked, defense secretary mattis was asked by the troops when he addressed them there at the border, whats our objective here . What are we doing here . And he said quote, that is somewhat to be determined. He said in the shortterm, lay the wire. In the longterm, quote, somewhat to be determined. I saw a lot of outrage from active duty and veterans groups online yesterday about that comment, sort of an open ended commitment, not even being able to tell the troops themselves why theyre there. And the answer is that hes there, he was there and nielsen was there, and the troops were there simply because they are political props for a president that used this threat during a campaign that is over. So the president makes this creates this threat of a migrant invasion. It ends up being a horrible political move for him. He loses basically every suburb from coast to coast, destroys the republican majority, biggest wipeout since watergate, and the president , i guess, doesnt feel like he can back out of it now. Thats the president. We know donald trump. We know who he is. Tell us about james mattis. How should james mattis be handling this. James mattis, the secretary of defense who truly is a good man in an impossible situation. What you saw was a good man struggling yesterday. He doesnt want to out basically explicitly say this is a terrible idea. The commander in chief misused or abused his power, using the troops if you will as a political prop. On the other hand he couldnt give him a sense of their mission. The idea that theyre there to put wire up. I dont think thats why people volunteered for the army. Youve got a border patrol. Youve got a National Guard. These people are far away. No matter how you slice and dice it, theres no way you can justify this deployment. What you basically saw was a decent man trying to avoid saying just that. It puts him in an impossible it puts him again, its a sign that those who work for donald trump, shall we say, its hard to get out of there unscathed. Why doesnt he walk away in protest . Why doesnt he quit . My guess is two things. One is for someone who spent his entire career serving, im just guessing here, its very hard. Its not in your dna. Its something you tend to do, even though hes a civilian, and i think he and a lot of people around him genuinely believe, they know the full range of issues there that theyre dealing with, if he were to go, depending on who was his successor, as problematic as things are across the board, bad situations can get worse. My guess is and i havent spoken to him about this my guess is hes had to have thought about it under these circumstances. Richard, i think thats a pretty generous defense of secretary mattis at this point because whats happening is pretty shameful, and he knows better, and he could choose to resign by what is a blatant misuse of the u. S. Military. He cannot explain why National Guard would not suffice. If you go through the transcript of the presson the plane, the g just astonishing how he says with secretary nielsen, thats a question for secretary nielsen. He cant answer what the objective is, and then with the troops, i really have so much admiration for those troops yesterday who asked him tough questions, and they werent mincing words. They were saying, why . What is the mission . Are we going to take this wire down . Whats the deal here . And thats a hard thing to do, and im glad that they are asking secretary matutis the had questions that we need to be asking, too. Richard lets move to breaking news, just broke an hour or two ago. The New York Times, wall street journal, the Washington Post reporting that the prosecutor, one of the top prosecutors in saudi arabia are going to be seeking the Death Penalty for five saudis who they claimed were responsible for the killing of khashoggi. Is that enough . Will that be enough, or does saudi arabia continue to remain on the wrong side of not only the law but also on the wrong side of the International Order . Saudi arabias strategy is to basically weather the storm, and this is part of the charade of weathering the storm. It will be enough for a lot of people in saudi arabia. It will be enough for a lot of people in the sunni arab world, particularly those getting supported by saudi arabia and maybe enough for the Trump White House and jared kushner. It wont be enough for most people in europe, for people in congress and anyone who has anything remotely like 20 20 vision. They can go through the charade, because of their oil, because of their financial wealth, and also theyre going to be part of some antii antiirani coalition, theyre betting if they hunker down they can get through this. This is a charade. No one will believe it except those who want to believe it. Is President Trump betting on the same thing, this storm will blow through . In other words this is the front story on every newspaper. We had a shooting in a synagogue, we had a shooting in a bar out in california. Is the white house going to take this up as an issue and punish saudi arabia . Theyre going to do the minimum amount possible annou e announced in the last 48 hours, theyre going to send the general who used to head Central Command as the American Ambassador to saudi arabia. His confirmation hearing will prove to be rather interesting. Its clear to me that the nr administration has decided they are better off with nbs. Theres no real alternative. They, too, are part of the weather the storm strategy. I dont think its a recipe for stability in saudi arabia or the region, but thats the administrations policy. Just how filthy the whole thing is. Its just, you know, everybody with eyes to see believes mbs was behind ordering the assassination of this journalist, right, and now the saudi prosecutor also at the direction of mbs in order to cover up is now going to order the Death Penalty for a bunch of people who were ordered initially to commit the crime. Its just the moral atrocity here, which is horrible enough in the first instance, is just compounded by the way theyre handling this. Again, maybe those people deserve the Death Penalty because they carried it out, but the idea that the crown prince is just pulling the puppet strings here and dispensing with human life all over the place. Casually. Casually and taking no responsibility whatsoever. The whole thing is so how weak does donald trump look that he isnt willing to confront in any way, shape or form this absolute atrocity . You agree with everything you said, and whats worse is this is not it. Youve got the saudis rather than winding down in yemen, theyre amping it up. This is part of a pattern, of reckless impulsive behavior and this is one of our allies in the middle east . This is not a relationship that will do the United States good in the end. Well pay an enormous price and it wont work for us. After donald trump, whenever that comes, the saudis must realize we can never have as mbs is running that country in any way shape or form. We just cannot do it. Well never be able to do it. Right now the saudis have a leader who ordered the murder, the abduction and the murder of a Washington Post columnist. They tortured him. They chopped him up. They buried him, and no, it will never. This will never be okay, and we will never have a normalized relationship with them again as long as mbs is running that country. Except for the moment theyre learning it is okay. Put out a sham report. And it will go away for you. Exactly. Still ahead there was russian meddling, data sharing and hate speech. Facebook has seen crisis after crisis in the past several years, and now the New York Times is looking at how top executives responded namely by delaying, denying and deflecting. That explosive story is coming up on morning joe. Here we go. Discover. I like your card, but im absolutely not paying an annual fee. Discover has no annual fees. Really . Yeah. We just dont believe in them. Oh nice. You would not believe how long ive been rehearsing that. No annual fee on any card. Only from discover. Youll make my morning, buty the price ruin my day. Ou . Complicated relationship with milk . Pour on the lactaid, 100 real milk, just without that annoying lactose. Mmm, thats good. Ive used this leverage once with regard to judges. It was to receive a vote on tariffs, which we did, and i didnt vote on any until we received that vote. Im fully prepared to carry through with this. That is senator jeff flake of arizona yesterday saying he will not vote to confirm any more of President Trumps judicial nominees until the senate votes on his bill to protect special counsel Robert Mueller. That bill was blocked again by Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell. The move and the need for flakes vote complicates mcconnells top priority of confirming dozens of conservative judges before the end of the year. The senator from arizona says he is ready to stand firm on his threat. Lets bring in New York Times reporter Jeremy Peters and columnist at the Washington Examiner kristin. Whats the impact of jeff flake making this stand yesterday . Hes only in town for a couple more months. In those couple months leader mcconnell wants to get some judges confirmed . Thats exactly right, and the window that jeff flake has here for relevance is quickly closing because once january rolls around theres going to be a senate with at least one or two more republicans in it. So this is not i mean, its a principled stand. The kind of which youve seen so few republican senators take, just a handful of these guys really now that john mccain is gone and jeff flake is retiring and Lindsey Graham is back on trumps side for the moment, at least, its kind of hard to see where the objections of conscience are going to come. The thing is is Mitch Mcconnell can kind of do what he wants skpshs he h, and he has a history of doing what he wants on judges anyway. They dont have to go through the judiciary committee. Mcconnell can just bring them right to the floor. Weve seen this in the past. Mitch mcconnell has been willing to break historical norms on this kind of stuff. And so then we see kristin soltz sanderson where you have Lisa Murkowski or somebody else whos willing to take the same stand in regards to Robert Mueller. I guess the biggest sqquestion if jeff flake were going to do this, why didnt he do this six months ago . Im assuming the reason hes taking the stand now, my guess is it has something to do with perhaps wanting to preserve that senate seat in arizona, not wanting to draw more fire toward himself prior to the election being resolved. Im assuming thats why. Ive not spoken with him. I dont have any special sort of crystal ball on that front. What i also know is in the exit polls that were taken last tuesday what we saw was that actually the political winds have shifted on this Mueller Investigation. Previously it was pretty consistent when you asked people in polls do you want bob mueller protected . Do you think hes doing a good job . The majority of people said yes. The exit polls on tuesday, despite having tons of bad news for republicans, showed the majority of people thinking disapproved of how bob mueller is handling it. Whether thats because of anything bob mueller has done or the political rhetoric around it is i think an open question. You can see why Mitch Mcconnell is not feeling political pressure to pass anything to protect bob mueller. The appetite operate of the American People doesnt seem to be there. It could be John Heilemann out of sight, out of mind, bob mueller did exactly what you would expect prosecutors to do around the time of an election. He did exactly what james comey did not do in 2016, and he kept his head low. You can look back and see Robert Muellers, the ratings for the investigation going up after indictments come out, certainly happened after the indictments of the russians came out. People understood in real terms why the investigation was so important. I suspect were going to have a flurry of activity soon that will make any exit polls irrelevant. Right, joe, to your point its not just that he went quiet, mueller did, over the the course of the last two months before the election. He hasnt issued any indictments since the summer, the powerful indictment of the russian intention officers that came out late june or early july. Its now been a while since weve seen anything, and those indictments have been the strongest form of speech that weve had on behalf of the special counsel. Jeremy, i want to ask you, pick up on something you just said when you were talking earlier, which is referring to senator flake as taking a position of principle or conscience. I want to cast a question with a little bit of a cynical tinge to it. Joe pointed out or suggested that jeff flake throughout the last couple of years has not done quite as much as he might have done to try to put a brake on donald trump in various ways. I cant help but wonder if whether knees lain these last c months that jeff flake has on the National Stage that his behavior does not suggest that he has some other political ambitions in mind for after he leaves the senate that might include challenging donald trump as an independent candidate, perhaps in the republican primary, and that this is the way he wants to be remembered as taking a kind of futile but potentially high profile stance against President Trump and trying to protect the special counsel. Exactly, and he has a whole book that hes written talking about his conscience and how as a true conservative trump has really troubled him, but john, i think youre exactly right. The history of his voting record doesnt quite line up with the aura around his reputation as some kind of maverick willing to buck his party. I remember very vividly, i think an example that sums up a lot of jeff flakes career, during the gun control debate after sandy hook when Gabby Giffords who could barely speak at the time because she was so gravely wounded came up to him. This is his arizona colleague, comes up to him, grabs his arm in the hallway and cannot even get the words out to say vote for this bill. And he doesnt do it. Kristen, wanted to follow up on some of the exit polls you were discussing. Since those exit polls were taken, Jeff Sessions has been fired by donald trump. Have you seen any polling on how the public has been responding to that move . Not yet. Has not been a ton of data thats come out postelection on that front. But i would say i think it would surprise me a bit if numbers moved a whole lot. What this really, i think, shows, is that you have seen a lot of republican support for the Mueller Investigation that six months ago, a year ago certain will i exily existed ha gone away, and this has just become another typical partisan issue split roughly down the middle with independents switching one way or the other depending on what day of the week it is. I would say it would surprise me if there was a dramatic shift in the numbers post the firing of Jeff Sessions. All right, Kristin Soltis anderson. Great to talk with you this morning. Wone of the reporters behin that big facebook expose in the New York Times. Theres a lot to get to. Minimums and fees. They seem to be the very foundation of your typical bank. Capital one is anything but typical. Thats why we designed capital one cafes. You can get savings and checking accounts with no fees or minimums. And one of americas best savings rates. To top it off, you can open one from anywhere in 5 minutes. This isnt a typical bank. This is banking reimagined. Whats in your wallet . On the new sleep number 360 smart bed. It senses your movement and automatically adjusts to keep you both comfortable. And now, the queen sleep number 360 c4 smart bed is only 1299. Plus 24month financing on all beds. Ends sunday. [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. The greatest wish of all. Is one that brings us together. The lincoln wish list event is here. Sign and drive off in a new lincoln with 0 down, 0 due at signing, and a complimentary first months payment. Only at your lincoln dealer. A front page investigation this morning by the New York Times dives into the compounding crisis that faced facebook in the last year involving russian interference and privacy breaches. Based on interviews of more than 50 people including facebook employees and lawmakers the times details how top executives attempted to right the companys wrongs while creating other problems. The times reports while chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said publicly it was a crazy idea that facebook had anything do with deciding the 2016 election, securities experts at the company knew otherwise. The times found that facebook gathered evidence of russian activity as early as spring 2016 before executives opted to share what they knew with the public and even with their own board of directors. When the Company Finally came forward with that information it reportedly sought to deflect blame and mask the extent of the problem. While zuckerberg apologized in public, facebooks chief operating officer allegedly was on a different mission, combat the companys private foes in private. The social networking site hired Republican Opposition Research Firm to depict george soros as the force behind a broad antifacebook movement and published stories praysing facebook while criticizing google and apple on a conservative news site. Lets bring in the Political Writer for New York Times nicholas co nicholas. Nick, for you whats at the center of this. This is a big takeaway and a big look into a business that spans the globe, reshaped politic, the advertising business and daily life. But works in ways were still coming to grips with and which they are still coming to grips with. This is a company that knew there were goings on with misinformation as early as 2016 but didnt even tell their own board or public what they knew until the fall of 2017 when the damage was already done. Back then facebook hadnt even had any policy internally on what to do if they found this kind of thing. It shows how they transparent r should have been communicated up the chain . So what they found were some early signs that there were russian people or russian agents that were using accounts to try to get into theccers and leaders. And it progressed from there. There were later signs that Facebook Accounts were being used to spread hacked information of the Democratic Party and from there it went on to disinformation and trolls and Everything Else we heard about over the years. Nick, whats so surprising is and it starts in the first paragraph, it starts in the lead of your story,er and that is that every time there was an executive at facebook that tried to right wrongs it seems in this story that Sheryl Sandberg was seething, Sheryl Sandberg got angry. She was angry when the board was finally told what the truth was. She was angry when an executive began to have concerns and started investigating the extent of russias interference, of russian agents interference in the democratic process, and she was lashing out at people who were trying to be transparent a year later. Its really amazing. This problem was bubbling up under the surface. They tried to get a handle on it but for a very long time through the election and well after it seems that sandbergs main concern and that of other executives was to contain the damage to facebook and not to contain the damage to our democracy. That was their focus. When the problem finally got so big and they realized how big it was they admitted a piece of it and then had to revise and revise and then said it was worse than that. So we see the slow drip. Its very damaging to the company, as you know. And leigh gallagher, what do you do . What does a corporation do . The answer is pretty easy. This is a terrible scandal for facebook. It interferes with american democracy. And you have someone at the top of the food chain in a corporation that did everything she could do to keep the truth from the board. To keep the truth from americans. And would lash out at others inside of facebook that actually were trying to get answers to how much the russians did extension our democracy. Who survives that . Joe, it is a really i mean the allegations of nick and the team found here are damning. But this is a complicated question because Mark Zuckerberg controls 60 of the voting shares of facebook. One of the best examples of how founders are controlling their companies these days, everyone seems to think hes going to stay. Nick, my question to you is that still the case . Today do you think thats still the case . Its very hard for that not to be the case because of his control of the company. What do you think will be the fallout here in terms of running the company . Its a great question. He picked Sheryl Sandberg to manage the outside world, keep the government off their backs and make money. Facebook has done those things pretty well. For a long time. The profit hit a record this year. Heres the real issue. The same machine they built that makes them so much money which is having all this data about you and to know everything about you and what you want to read is also what makes facebook an amazing machine for spreading hate and propaganda. So their Business Model is implicated here and thats the trouble. Hard problem to solve, by the way. Hard to figure out how they can get rid of the bad stuff without undermining their own business. Everybody sit tight. Well continue this conversation. We only scratched the surface on this huge New York Times expose. Well be right back on morning joe. Insurance that wont replace the full value of your new car . Youd be better off throwing your money right into the harbor. Im gonna regret that. With Liberty Mutual new car replacement, well replace the full value of your car. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. With my bladder leakage, the products ive tried just didnt fit right. They were too loose. Its getting in the way of our camping trips. But with a range of sizes, depend fitflex is made for me. With a range of sizes for all body types, depend fitflex underwear is guaranteed to be your best fit. Moving . Thats harder now because of Psoriatic Arthritis. But youre still moved by moments like this. Dont let Psoriatic Arthritis take them away. Taltz reduces joint pain and stiffness and helps stop the progression of joint damage. For people with moderate to severe psoriasis, 90 saw significant improvement. Taltz even gives you a chance at completely clear skin. Dont use if youre allergic to taltz. Before starting, you should be checked for tuberculosis. Taltz may increase risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, symptoms, or received a vaccine or plan to. Inflammatory bowel disease can happen with taltz, including worsening of symptoms. Serious allergic reactions can occur. For all the things that move you. Ask your doctor about taltz. [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. Makeup now optional. New aveeno® maxglow™ infusion drops with kiwi to lock moisture. And soy to even skin tone. Unleash dewy, glowing skin from within. New aveeno® maxglow™. The United States Postal Service makes more holiday deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country. With one notable exception. Mr. President , you just said people used disguises to cast illegal votes. Do you have any evidence of voter fraud like that . Do you have any evidence of people doing voter fraud . Why make a false claim without evidence. We spotted your beach boat and decided to investigate but who is that this . This is the end of the mystery. Well, well, if it isnt our old friend blue stone the great an exmagician wanted in six states. Who actually voted, willie, about 12 times and he would have gotten away with it if it wasnt for donald trump and those meddling kids. Its gotten to that point. And that meddling dog as well. Its so absurd. Almost like he stopped trying. He doesnt expect people to believe him. He just has to spin conspiracy theories and, unfortunately, you got other people in the Republican Party who may actually have a future in the Republican Party who are spinning conspiracy theories too. Forepeople who dont know what were talking about, well get to this in a moment. The president gave an interviewer with the daily caller that made an accusation that people often vote once, go to their cars, change their hats and their shirts and come back and vote again. He went on to say its really a disgrace whats going on. Well get to that in just a moment, joe. Lets continues our conversation about the front page piece in the New York Times titled delay, deny, deflect how facebook leaders leaned out in a charisma. Nick, whats been the reaction from facebook to the story so far. Have you heard from them in overnight facebook cut ties with the pr firm in the story while also saying that they had not specifically asked the finers to do this or that research. Look, what theyve said they accused us of having things wrong in the story. They did not identify anything in the story thats wrong so far. They are under a lot of flack. Theres a lot of outrage for people who work for george sore jobs for example, who are outraged george soros was used to try to discredit this story. How sleazy is it that facebook, one of the top corporations in america, is doing what the sleaziest republicans did regarding the caravan trying to pin a Conspiracy Theory on george soros. And at the same time trashing apple, trashing google on rightwing sites. This is as sleazy as it gets. Again, i just wonder if zuckerberg is not going to do anything to clean house, what about the board . Does anybody have power to bring accountability to this corporation . Well, he and sandberg picked most of the board. I dont think well see much accountability there. Peter teal a board member said he agrees with zuckerbergs past statement that the russian information on facebook was not a big deal in the election. I will point out two things, joe. The Research Conducted on soros does not appear to be made up or a Conspiracy Theory. They are basically saying some of the groups that are protesting facebook have gotten some money from soros philanthropies. Its in their bad luck just before the caravan smear and the catastrophe which is ridiculous and i also point out it is ironic when this company is being asked to take own fake news they are paying a pr company to write pieces for them, propaganda on a synthetic news channel online. John heilemann, they are so cynical in they are playing both sides. They trot out the name of george soros, that antisemites would be offended by and then reach out to Antidefamation League and try to get any attacks against facebook turned as antise antisemitic. Now if that sent as sleazy as anything weve seen in pr show me a Major Corporation that has done anything sleazier in terms of pr . Well, i wouldnt want to go down too far that particular cesspool. These things are pretty sleazy. Part of the thing is, joe, for a lot of these companies in silicone valley when they get this big, this powerful and they start to get sucked into the world of politic, they do something that facebook has done which is accumulate an extraordinarily large number of advisors, outside consultants and in that scenario you end up kind of almost always with a race to the bottom. Its like the high minded advisers always lose out to advisers who want to play knife fight politics because thats the argument. Youre in a knife fight and you have to get down in the gutter and fight your way out. Nick, you were talking about antitrust enforcement. I heard a specific thing not about antitrust but the Political Landscape. Microsoft is tgot in trouble wh the Clinton Administration on one side and orrin hitch, they had a bipartisan problem and when they looked you up and saw republicans were intent on antitrust enforcements and the Clinton Administration which took them to court and tried to break them up also was intent on it thats when the company was in trouble. They didnt have any allies. As you look at this new congress and you look just at the Political Landscape in general Going Forward is facebook about to get in that place where they are facing equal criticism or similar criticism from both sides of the partisan aisle. Yes. Conservatives think they are being censored on facebook. Liberals think facebook handed the election to donald trump. We saw a press release yesterday from the incoming chair of the antitrust committee in congress from the house blistering press release that suggests theres more trouble ahead. I think facebook believes they can get around privacy rules successfully. I think they are deathly afraid of being broken up into smaller companies. Thats a mortal threat to their business. Or regulated. Who can be accountability to this company. Very good question. The government. I think that is what were looking at now. So well have to see what happens. Well get to that side of it with kasie hunt in a minute. Nick, incredible piece of reporting. Election updates still coming in as democratic candidate makes history and Vice President mike pence joins the president in denying defeat for his party. Four term congressman jeff denham conceded his race in california to the democrat. In new jersey representative tom mcarthur one of the architect of the 2017 Republican Health care bill has conseeped his race to the democrat. A former aid to president obama, kim will be the negative Interest Rates korean to serve in congress in 20 years and firstever to represent new jersey. The updated count in californias 39th district shows the lead of koreanamerican young kim has shrunk over gil cisneros. And katie porter is ahead over walters. My extending our majority in the cincinnati we won some great governor races and we didnt see that blue wave in the house of representatives come our way. Its because the American People see the results. The results tell a different story than the one that the Vice President is telling. Democrats gaining 34 house seats as of right now, with seven still undecided along with flipping seven governor mansions, 380 pick ups in the trump era and a number of state house chambers. Lets bring in white house reporter, and chief correspondent for the New York Times and capitol hill correspondent and hokasie hunt. Is that snow behind you . Yes. Freezing rain, actually. Its really depressing. Just made a meme out of your face. I do want to ask you, is that actual actually lamir. E or c irclamire confessore who went to his car and changed clothes. I can prove that. Jonathan, let me ask you a question. Did red sox make a mistake . He only managed a team that won 118 games. I dont know what they are thinking. I was going to say youre worried hes botching the offseason. He could have spent time preparing for next season. He didnt win manager of the year. I dont know what they are doing. We have to set our expectations as low as possible next year. I think it may be fourth place. Hopefully fourth place if were lucky. Jonathan, how is the white house responding to this ongoing blue wave. We know the president is throwing out conspiracy theories left and right. But there is little doubt, is there not, inside the white house, this was a drumming. Is there any talk, does anyone believe they can get the president to modify his behavior moving forward so republicans dont get wiped out two years from now . No. I think its the exact opposite. People around the president before the election did expect the democrats to win the house. No one around him thought that would happen. They were bullish on the senate. They held on. More than that, theyve been trying to prepare for what that means Going Forward. The onslaught of investigations that are on the horizon here from the democrat controlled house. They are trying to set up some sort of war room Going Forward. Not happened yet. They believe they can vilify these new committee chairman. That effort conclude the president going on twitter and assigning them nasty nicknames. They want to make those chairman and chairwoman famous for all the wrong reasons. But theres little expectation that the president will modify his rhetoric. Little small steps towards bipartisan you saw the criminal Justice Reform yesterday. There may be some issues on opioids. Some doubt that a grand plan like infrastructure can come together. Theres not much appetite from democrats to work with the white house. Expectations to people around the president is hell dig in further, only heighten trerk. Only inflame the partisan divides, that thats how he thinks he won the last time around and how he can win again in two years. He certainly is not looking at the maps we all saw last tuesday, and those maps continue getting worse, kasie hunt, for the republicans. Whats the mood of House Republicans . After all, the Republican Party controlled the house of representatives for 20 of the last 24 years. This is going be new for several members and most of those republican members are going to be in a position they are just not used, to being in the minority and for the most part being irrelevant. Its remarkable. I was thinking through that as i talked to mark meadows at the capital yesterday when they did their leadership elections. The Freedom Caucus in particular, this grouch rightwing republicans has been used to being able to frankly steer the direction of almost everything that was happening in the house. And thats just simply not going to be the case. The hallway outside the meeting that they had in the morning which usually packed full of reporters was basically empty which tells you a lot. But, you know, joe, i do think one thing we shouldnt lose sight of is that its not clear to me that democrats with get this project off the ground without having a real crisis point themselves. This battle over nancy pelosi becoming speaker has escalated in the course of the last 24 to 48 hours as members have been here. I think its going to be bloodier than we expected perhaps it to be. I think she and her team have insisted over and over again shes going to be the next speaker, that theres really no alternative, and its true that no, you know, very viable contender has stepped up. Congresswoman marsha fudge is considering running against her but not clear she would get the support. More members are coming out saying they want to vote against her on the floor than we expected and i think it will be something to watch. The president of the United States has an inventive excuse for these republican loss. He claimed yesterday without providing any examples or evidence that people are voting illegally by wearing disguises. Speaking to the daily caller the president said this, quote, the republicans dont win and thats because of potentially illegal votes. When people get in line that have absolutely no right to vote and they go around in circles. Sometimes they go to their car, put on a different hat, put on a different shirt, come in and vote again. The president continued, if you buy a box of cereal you have a voter i. D. They try to shame everyone by calling them racist, anything they can think of. When you say you want voter i. D. But voter i. D. Is a very important thing. Not making up a word of those quotes even the part about the shirts and hats and the cereal box. A box of cereal. So, peter baker, lets just broaden this out a little bit. President s state of mind right now, a president who didnt show up in france at a ceremony to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of world war i. A president who didnt go across the bridge on veterans day to lay a wreath at Arlington National cemetery. A president who tells us is frustrated by the results of the midterms. A president who knows the Mueller Investigation continues. A president who now sort of is confronted by these written questions by the special counsels office. Where he is right now as you talk to people around him . Its a great question. He sort of is flailing in his postelection period. He came out strong the day after election trying to reframe the results considering it a big victory not a defeat. Then took the aggressive action by firing his own attorney general and installing a replacements who is known to be skeptical of the mueller probe. Youre right. He hasnt quite figured out where hes going to go. He endorsed yesterday this bipartisan judicial reform. You can see in that moment the possibility of how he can govern Going Forward with a split congress if he chose to in areas of possible agreement but it doesnt last. We saw in the first two years is every time he flirts with the idea of bipartisanship or compromise or consensus reaching across the aisle it doesnt last very long. Yesterday i was struck by his twitter feed. It was filled with tweets that any president would said. He called the governor of california on these wildfires and told him were behind them. Remember this is an antagonist, governor jerry brown instead of attacking him as he has so many times in the past he offered a president ial were in it together kind of message. Then he gives an interview to the daily caller and comes up with this notion of voter fraud to explain away his election defeat. Were only chuckling because as you speak the president is doing exactly what youre describing. Hes back on twitter with a different tone. He wants the country to know the white house is running very smoothly. Results for our nation are very good. Were the envy of the world. Any time i think about making changes the Fake News Media goes crazy. The second tweet, the inner workings of the Mueller Investigation are a total mess. They found no collusion and have gone nuts. Shouting and screaming at people. They are a disgrace to our nation says the president of the United States about bob mueller and special counsels office. All of it, actually, not true. Richard, again, the president has become a parody of himself and its very easy to laugh at a man who actually believes that if you buy cereal youve got the ability to get voter i. D. I dont know. Its actually getting harder and harder to follow what he says. Some of it is so preposterous and has been rejected by the American People so strongly that, again, he and his party suffered the biggest defeat in the house since watergate. That said, i will i got to admit, you know, mika always talks about lasting damage. What do we do when we hear that theresa may calls the president up to congratulate him, which is laughable, but shes trying to be a good ally, to congratulate him on republican gains and he acts rude and just absolutely efiscerates her on the telephone. Whats the impact of that . Whats the exact of how he treated macron. Who is going to continue trying to keel with the president of the United States when this is what they get in response . Well the short answer is not just has everyone decided to wait out this administration but they essentially decided to work around it and go their own way. The only question i have is someone who is taking a step back to what extent does this last beyond the Trump Administration. My guess, particularly if hes a two term president. But if hes only a one term president its not just for these four years the world deteriorates but we set in motion all sorts ever trends and nobody will look at the United States the same way. If this could happen once, it could happen again. Weve and the ourselves out of say the whole asian economy by not being in tpp. There are fundamental questions by our willingness to abide by International Undertaking or obligation. We trashed our european allies time and time again. So, essentially, this sends to them a major signal that after 70 years this is a qualitative different United States. They got to increasingly take matters into their own hands which among other things may not be good things, but bad things referring to powerful neighbors. Were rapidly bringing about a postamerican World Without any sense of what its going to look like. So donald trump is well on his way to being one of the most consequential modern president s of the United States. The only problem is most of those consequences will be bad for the security and National Interest of the United States. Were watching a president perform this way in good Economic Times for people in this country with low unemployment, High Consumer confidence, the dow is doing obviously doesnt cover everybody, a lot of people are struggling in this country. What happens if this run fades . What happens if we hit a recession . It will be bad. There was a lot of talk about how the economy was not a central story line in the midterm elections and thats because in midterms the president s approval matters much more than the economy, actually. I think thats what well see, will really force a bigger change and more, you know, i mean if everyone is suffering. Right now business is doing great although business is not happy about the trade, the tariff policies. That was the one thing that they really started to really, really worry to a serious degree about. But, i think thats a great point. And i think everyone is saying, this bull market isnt going on forever, how long can it last . The economy is still very strong but thats a risk. Peter, its John Heilemann. I want to ask you as im sitting here looking at this most recent trump tweet that willie read. Hes got an account here, the inner workings of the Mueller Investigation being a total mess. You know, it feels to me like that is as you called his description of the voter fraud last night in the daily caller, you called it fanciful. I would say this is equally fanciful, somewhere between a ludicrous fabrication and kind of a delusional. Just pin this one thing down here. What would be Donald Trumps basis for alleging that people inside the Mueller Investigation are screaming and shouting at people horribly threatening them. How would he possibly know enough about whats going on inside the Mueller Investigation to even make such an accusation. I know its ridiculous to dissect such a tweet but is there any basis he can make this allegation or something made up in his fevered mind. We do need to deacon struck this. I dont recognize even the narrative story line. Did it come from a prosecutor conservative news source. Did it come from info wars posting. I didnt watch fox news this morning to see if theres something on this. Sometimes he takes things, an allegation or assertions and then expands it to create a whole narrative out there that isnt even based on the original source such as it is. I dont know what this is based on and clearly, though, a renewal of this war hes having and has had with the special counsel. We had a two month during the election, mueller kept his head low. Now that the election is over we saw with the whittaker appointment and now this tweet hes going to be engaging again and were headed back into that full fledge battle the prosecutors who are pursuing him. The president s description in that tweet is based on nothing could be used to describe the white house. Peter baker thank you. We started this segment with facebook and the problems it has. At fortune you have named a business person of the year. We have. Trisha griffith who is ceo of progressive the Car Insurance company. We know from the Advertising Campaign it went slow. A great story. She became ceo a few years ago. Has turned around the cull purr. Sales growth over the past one year and three years has beat apple and microsoft. This is based on how these companies are performing along with a few intangibles. She started as a claims clerk 30 years ago and worked her way through the company which is very common among these female fortune 500 ceos. Weve seen this before. So, its a really, really great story and the company, its performance speaks for itself. Nice to see a number of women in your top ten list. Yes. Were starting to see more of that and will continue to see more of that. Lseveral could be contenders for the white house are biding their time but not our next guest who already has jumped in. President ial candidate richard ogetta. Ogetta why didnt you book your Family Vacation on a travel site . At hilton. Com, i get the price match guarantee. And i can choose from their 14 Different Hotel brands, so i get the right hotel for every member of my family. Like a doubletree for my cousins who love their warm chocolate chip cookies. A homewood suites for my uncle who likes a long stay. A hampton for my sister and her kids. Thats a lot of syrup and the waldorf astoria Beverly Hills for me. But i thought your Family Vacation was in miami . It is. I hear theyre having a great time. Book at hilton. Com and get the hilton price match guarantee. If you find a lower rate, we match it and give you 25 off that stay. With my bladder leakage, the products ive tried just didnt fit right. They were too loose. Its getting in the way of our camping trips. But with a range of sizes, depend fitflex is made for me. With a range of sizes for all body types, depend fitflex underwear is guaranteed to be your best fit. Youll make my morning, buty the price ruin my day. Ou . Complicated relationship with milk . Pour on the lactaid, 100 real milk, just without that annoying lactose. Mmm, thats good. When did you see the sign . When i needed to jumpstart sales. Build attendance for an event. Help people find their way. Fastsigns designed new directional signage. And got them back on track. Get started at fastsigns. Com. And got them back on track. I am a techie dad. N. I believe the best technology should feel effortless. Like magic. At comcast, its my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. My name is mike, im in Product Development at comcast. Were working to make things simple, easy and awesome. Approve this message. I never dreamed i would come home only to find children in my own backyard having it worst than children in afghanistan. I spent decades fighting for this country and new its time to go to d. C. To defend our homeland. This is what you all are fighting for. So make no mistake about it, i will stand with the working class citizens overall else. If they dont like it, hit the road. Democrat Richard Ojeda lost his u. S. Congressional bid in last weeks election for West Virginias 3rd district. But the race saw the largest swing of trump voters towards democrats anywhere in the country and now hes set his sites on the Nations Highest Office announcing a run for the presidency in 2020. West Virginia State senator and retired u. S. Army major Richard Ojeda joins us here in new york. Honor to meet you. Thank you for being here. The its an honor to be here. You lost your race but in many ways the most impressive race run by a candidate in the country. President trump won your district by 49 points. You lost by 12. Thats a 37points swing if my math is correct. What did you say to voters in your district to make that big swing . It comes down to being able to relate with the voters of the district. They know who i am. They know what i am about. Im the type of person that puts boots on the ground. I believe of being accessible. I did live videos constantly. Washington lobbyists have better to myself than i do and people saw that. Regardless of the fact that, you know, the president of the United States decided to come down there and campaign against me, i think many people realized what was going on and they saw with the things ive done in the past. How did you handle donald trump because there would be a lesson for a lot of people running for president. You voted for President Trump in 2016. You were transparent about that. What changed for you in those couple of years where you said i need to run as a democrat and run against this guy . Im a democrat period. Ive always been a democrat. I believe, you know, the Democratic Party has got to get back to what being a democrat truly is and thats taking care of our working class citizens. I stand with joins whole heartedly. Taking care of our elderly. Lets stop letting people putting their hands in the cookie jar of Social Security and medicare. You know im in the area where we were the lab rats. They threw third oxycontin on our people like candy. Then also if youre going to send people to war and break them then were going fix them when they come home. Thats what ive always been about and thats what being a democrat is truly about. Thats the way im going stay. The line that jumped out the me the first time we heard you speak is where you said i saw kids in backyards of West Virginia that were worst off than kids i saw in average. What did you mean by that . In iraq and afghanistan a village will raise the child. Thats a fact. In America Today due to the opioid epidemic, you know, we have mom and dad completely out of the picture. Were talking about they are either dead from overdo, they are in jail or they are just not there because they are addicted. Grandma and grandpa are trying to raise the children on Social Security. Already cut their meds in half. I can take you five minutes from where i live and show you children who have it worse. Its one of those things where you retire from the military and you come home and you realize im sick and tired of hearing america is the greatest nation in the world because we can whip you. We have an opioid epidemic. We have a Health Care System thats a joke. A big reason why its a joke is because the very people that cast votes, the very people that are responsible to try to fix this arent in that system. They have their own Cadillac Health care plan. You know i garnlts yuarantee yo every congressman and senator fell into the Affordable Care act we would fix it quickly because the decisions they make they knew would fall on their own family. So thats the issues we have. Kasie hunt is in washington with a question for you. Good to see you, sir. Im wondering based on what youve seen on the campaign trail in your own home state a lot of people like you used to vote democratic. In the last election we saw them swing hard to President Trump and republicans. What are temperatures doing wrong . Why is that . Whats the disconnect between, you know, blue collar working folks in america and the Democratic Party . I love this question. And i will tell you, ive said this quite a few times. The Democratic Party got away from what being a democrat was. But heres another thing they do and the mistake they made. They placed it on money. Its about you got two people running for office. This guy right here has the most money and this person here doesnt. But this person here is hungry, they will knock on every door, they can relate to the people. The only thing the Democratic Party was thinking of is this person has the most money. So they jump on board with this person. In the end the person who doesnt have the most money ends up being drowned out. But then you have the democrat with the most money running against the republican that outfundraisers him 3to1 and gets every commercial on whewl of fortune and in the end its the less are of two evil. Youre running for president and as a former military veteran what do you think of the deployment of u. S. Troops on the border by donald trump . I think its a political stunt. The whole thing right before the midterms about the caravan. You dont hear about it now, do you . Its a political stunt that they use and they did a great job because it was the talk of the town all across the United States of america. But right now were taking people away from their families and putting them on a border. Are they going to miss thanksgiving for a political stunt . This bothers me. This is not how you take care of our service men and women. By any measure your candidacy will be considered to be a long shot. As i under it youve never been to iowa or new hampshire. The democratic field will be very crowded. People have been quietly running for quite some time. How do you break through . How do you run against members sort of democratic leadership as well as donald trump . How do you stand out in a field that will be crowded and you come in with less name recognition and fewer resources . In terms of underdog ive never been anything but an underdog. Im going to do exactly what i did in the congressional race. Im going to put boots on the ground. Im going to go out and speak to people. Thats the best way to be. I understand that theres going to be a big field here. Were going to have to figure out how we can let everybody okay differentiate between the candidates. But i think i can do that. I really believe i can. I think i already offer things that the others dont bring to table. I will tell you this. In 2020 if we continue going and using the same typical models that we used in the past, then get ready. Get ready for tears in 2020. Its time for us to get away from that. I think i bring something complete lie different. Tactically the way you addressed donald trump. Theres two camps who say a lot of people ignored him in the midterm elections. Talk about the economy and health care. Then another camp that says in 2020 you got to be combative ugot to play trumps game, fight the way he fights. Im going to fight. Im going fight. Were not going to be able to beat this guy by being nice. Hes not nice. The Republican Party is not nice. Its like we got to stop fighting a battle where our enemy is wearing brass knuckles and were carrying a pillow. Time to knuckle up. Senator ojeda, a pleasure to meets you. Good luck with your run. President trump has conclupded his tweet on special counsel Robert Mueller. He began with the inner workings of the Mueller Investigation is a total mess. They found no collusion and gone nuts. Screaming and shouting at people threatening them to come up with answer they want. They are a disgrace to our nation and dont, then he just continued, care how many lives they ruin. These are angry people including the highly conflicted bob mueller who worked for obama eight years. They wont look at bad acts and kriemgs on the other side. A total witchhunt like no other in american history. The president has provided no evidence for the claims specifically in the first part of that claim about screaming and shouting and all the inner workings of the mural investigation about which the president would have knowledge. I would note, first of al fo president s punctuation its true he worked for president obama and worked for george h. W. Bush before that. The notion hes a partisan factor is belied by the facts. Whats going on with the president right now . Whats happening ahead . Between the costumes and cereal discussion and voter i. D. And voters fraud accusations last night based on nothing whatever is going on inside his head and then this tweet today which is more predictable we knew once mueller started to gear up again trump would go after him again. Whats your sense of what the factors and forces are that are kind of bearing down on President Trumps psyche and how thats manifesting it several in these kind of various reactions . First of all, im not inside the president s head. Im happy to not be. Very disappointing. Thank you. Very disappointing. But i think what youre picking up on is right and we did know that the president and his team has been involved or at least we reported that theyve been involved in answering these written questions from Robert Mueller that are related strictly to russian interference, not to obstruction of justice. And from what i can tell, these tweets do come when hes preoccupied with something. They do take us inside his head a little bit. So, you know the other piece of this thats going on capitol hill as well are these questions about Matthew Whitaker and is it necessary for there to be legislation to protect Robert Mueller and there are, there is some noise going on, jefr flake has told Mitch Mcconnell he wont back judicial nominees. That could be a real threat especially if somebody else joins him that causes some problems. Mcconnell is saying we dont need that. My question is, well okay youre arguing that you dont need it but whats the harm in passing legislation that would protect Robert Mueller. The answer is it would provoke the president into more of these tweets. The leader has never shown any willingness to go along with a bill like that. Thank you very much. Enjoy the snow. Senator, great to meet you. Still ahead well go live to california where the death toll is climbing as the camp fire tears through the state. Thousands of homes have been destroyed. Hundreds of people are unaccounted for still this morning. Well get the very latest next on morning joe. Latest next on morning joe engine roaring horn honking okay, okay, okay. clatter feeling unsure . Oh. nervous yelp what if you had some help . Introducing the new 2019 ford edge with the confidence of ford copilot360 tm technology. The most available Driver Assist technology in its class. the new 2019 ford edge. Means they wont hike your rates over one mistake. see, Liberty Mutual doesnt hold grudges. For drivers with accident forgiveness, Liberty Mutual wont raise their rates because of their first accident. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Discover card. I justis this for real . Match, yep. We match all the cash back new cardmembers earn at the end of their first year, automatically. Whoo i got my money hard to contain yourself, isnt it . Uh huh let it go whoo get a dollarfordollar match at the end of your first year. Only from discover. [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. Wat t. Rowe price, hundreds of our experts go beyond the numbers to examine Investment Opportunities firsthand. Like a biotech firm that engineers a patients own cells to fight cancer. This is strategic investing. Because your investments deserve the full story. T. Rowe price. Invest with confidence. Crews in california are making some progress against those massive wildfires burning at both end of the state. The full scope of the disaster is still coming in this morning. Joining us from oak park, california is our nbc national correspondent. Miguel, what does it took like . Reporter this is what search teams are dealing with. They are combing through wreckage of homes that are unrecognizable. They dont have a precise number of those missing or unaccounted for but they believe its at least 130. As the fire danger subsides the search for the missing Takes Center Stage in mountain towns around paradise. Forensic teams have been carrying out the grim task of combing through ash and rubble for human remains. The death toll from the camp fire stand at of a. Communications in paradise remains difficult with phone lines and cell Service Largely knocked out in many areas, many searching for their loved ones believe theres reason to be hopeful. Im looking for my brother monty. I know they made it off the mountain. I havent talked to him. So i hope, monty, if you can see this, please call your sister. Carol is still searching for her son. More than five days after she evacuated. I dont know what im going to do. You know. Im just at loss right now. Reporter meantime with Evacuation Centers overflowing and hundreds sleeping in tents a growing chorus of residents is calling on pg and e to take responsibility for the fire. Betsy ann whose property is near the origin of the blaze says the Utility Company told her about problems on power lines just a day before the camp fire cambodiaed. Pg and e, this is their fault. They need to be held accountable. Reporter pg and e declined nbcs request for comment. The cause of the fire remains under investigation. In Southern California where many also believe that power lines may have caused the fires here, concern about exposure to toxic smoke. The state daepts of toxics substance control said there were no elevated levels of hazardous compounds in the air other than those normally presents after a wildfire. But thats little consolation for thousands who lost almost everything and everyone. Despite all of the destruction and damage you see here firefighters are making progress. The blaze here in Southern California is roughly 50 contained, in Northern California its approaching that number. Really we could see rain here in the next couple of days or week. That would be a major relief for crews on the front ground. As you say in the meantime hundred unaccounted for. Lets hope they find their families. Thanks so much. Stimulus ahead on morning joe in september President Trump said he and kim jongun quote fell in love. But the north Korean Leader may not be sharing that sentiment today. Many reports say pyongyang is continuing its missile work. Well talk to former u. S. Ambassador Christopher Hill about that next on morning joe. I am a family man. I am a techie dad. I believe the best technology should feel effortless. Like magic. At comcast, its my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. My name is mike, im in Product Development at comcast. Were working to make things simple, easy and awesome. I like him. He likes me. I guess thats okay. Am i allowed to say that . I was really being tough. So was he. We go back and forth. Then we fell in love. No, really. He wrote me beautiful letters. And theyre great letters. We fell in love. He said he had fallen in love with kim jongun. Yet, there are reasons to be scentable. If i may have you fallen in love with kim jongun . What the president says is there is a Good Relationship there. Look, President Trump made his feelings about north korea known before the world and before the United Nations if you will recall and hes spoke in language that kim jongun understood, clearly. And the days of threats against the United States, the days of developing Ballistic Missiles with Nuclear Weapons that would threaten our people and threaten our allies in the region were over. If you are in the car listening on the radio like a lot of people do, you might have missed the Vice President there 75 himming a laugh when vaughan hilliard said the president said he fell in love with north korea. That was mike pence speaking on the side lines at the summit in singapore. He is there in place of the president who decided not to attend. It comes on the heels of multiple reports that secret missile bases and programs, which u. S. Officials tell nbc news are ongoing, citing recent intelligence. Outgoing Ambassador Nikki Haley said President Trump will meet with kim for a second time in 2019. Vice president pence told nbc news the u. S. Will not provide a complete list of the nuclear and missile sites before that sum, adding that will be one of the goals for the meeting, itself. Joining us now the deep of the school of interpret National Studies at the university of denver, former u. S. Ambassador to south korea and former assistant secretary of state for east asia. Mr. Ambassador, good to see you. Joe has the first question for you. Joe. Mr. Ambassador, were going to get to north korea and also going to ask you if you, yourself, have fallen in love with kim jongun . But before we do that, lets step back just a little bit and talk to you about asia generally as a region. The president , obviously, had a catastrophic sequence of events happen diplomatically in france last week. Let me ask. Just how bad is it that the president of the United States decided to skip this asian summit after american leaders have been talking about a pivot to asia now for about 20 years . I think its very problematic. Namely because the whole u. S. China relationship is in tatters. On the one hand wed like them to work with us on north korea. Then all this economic stuff with the tariffs. So china is out there talking to all these neighbors, talking to the Southeast Asian countries. Talking to north koreat a real the president has chosen to skip this. Because i think ultimately, if were going to make any progress on north korea, were going to need chinas acquiesence in this if you think its hard working with them, try working against them. That seems to be the game plan right now. We certainly seem to be in a better place than a year ago, when a lot of knowledge and foreign policy, our thinkers were suggesting programs we had a 40, 50 chance of going to war on the Korean Peninsula. Obviously, were in a much better situation today than we were then, but where exactly is this relationship . The president has told us we never have to worry about north korean Nuclear Weapons anymore. It appears they continue moving forward in developing their program. Well, i would ask the same question tina turner asked. Whats love got to do with it . This is, frankly, really about getting a list. By the way, that was your thesis, right . You got it. You got it. The turner doctrine in. The turner doctrine, exactly. But the question, you know you need to know what theyve to le the hook by saying, well, if they tell what theyve got, then well go hit them with bombs or something. Thats not the point. We need to know. We need to have a list of the nuclear programs. We got a partial list back in 2008. The problem was, it doesnt include any of the uranium enrichment sites that were very concerned about. Now weve got nothing. So i think there needs to be a real effort. I understand now that theyre going to go ahead with a sum without getting a list. But a list is, thats pretty basic stuff if you are if denuclearization. So, yes, were not having missiles flying. Were not having nuclear tests. Thats all good, but i think, clearly, for people who thought there was some legs to this process, we would have been a lot further today than we, frankly, are. Ambassador hill. Thats kind of been the problem to understand where the legs are in the process all along. Because after the first summit, everyone is still a little baffled. What were the specifics that were agreed upon . Because both sides had a different interpretation of what had actually happened and what Going Forward do you think a second summit would accomplish or do you think it will be more of donald trump saying he solved the problem but giving no specifics . I think hes going to have a tough time selling that one some six months after hes already said it was solved. After all, they have not shut down their nuclear facilities. In fact, theyre building new missile launching sites as we now know. By the way, the government has known that for some time some i think it will be very interesting to see what he intend to get out of that and certainly if i were on a Congressional Committee in the house, id want to know, you know, what itself the plan here . What are we trying to do . So far we dont have any progress in terms of the key question of denuclearization. Instead, we seem to be making progress on the idea were going to have some kind of peace treaty, whose purpose from the north korean perspective is to say, okay, americans, now you dont need your troops on the Korean Peninsula because we signed a peace treaty. I hope the president doesnt go down that road. Ambassador chris hill, thank you as always for your perspective. Good to see. You the baseless claim of voter fraud from people disguising themselves to cast multiple ballots to the claim americans need an i. D. To buy cereal. You dont . You didnt know that, joe . No, i didnt know that. Wow. Where are you getting your fruit loops, on the black market . I got fruit loops, trix. I know a guy. I go to the docks late at night heilemann cold me about this guy who knows a guy. I know a guy. Fell off a truck . He runs the trix Distribution Network for the entire east coast. Hes incredible. You guys on Staten Island like lucky charms. Though. All the way, democrats continue to pick up seats in the house. Morning joe coming right back with snow and cereal talk. Oh, its beautiful. Back with snow and cereal talk. Oh, its beautiful. Every road in the world is now an information superhighway. And the car has become an accessory to the smartphone. Ride hailing, car sharing, carpooling. Mobility services are proliferating. And theres a new generation who dont seem to want to own cars in the first place. It all means massive disruption to the car industry, cities, businesses and investors. Its a revolution in sleep. The new sleep number 360 smart beds are on sale now during sleep numbers veterans day sale. It senses your movement, and automatically adjusts to keep you both comfortable. It even helps with this. So you wake up ready to put your pedal to the metal. Its the final days of our veterans day sale where the queen sleep number 360 c4 smart bed is only 1299 save 400. Plus, 24month financing on all beds. Ends sunday. Sleep number. Proven, quality sleep. Mr. President , do you have any evidence of people doing voter fraud . Good man, might i trouble you for a drink . Oh, get out of here, homer. Homer . My name is don incognito. My goodness. Its unbelievable, willie, there are moments when Donald Trump Tweets things i suppose we should be shocked by. It just makes you laugh. Yesterdays was so preposterous. Is he suggesting theyre doing homer or sort of like the Bobby Valentine going back into the dugout after getting kicked out . Wearing a mustache . I mean, Donald Trumps not even trying anymore. These have so prep pos truss and do preposterous and doing it to benefit a senatorial candidate in florida. I sister to admit i saw that interview he gave to the daily caller. I thought it was the onion, made up. There was no way he could have said what he said. What he did say is people go to their car after they voted. They put on a different hat. They put on a different shirt and then they go back in and vote again. Quote, its really a disgrace whats going on the president of the United States said of the voting. Its unbelievable. He claims he talked to professional golfer who said a couple of people cut in line and voted twice in california. Out of that, of course the golfer denied it in 2016 and out of that, donald trump said its like what 6 Million People voted illegally . Right. Right. There is always some strawman thing he can make. Who is his buddy that never goes to paris any more . Fred, tom, doug in. Jim. Later on in this block, there will be a guy that will show up here that will look a little like donny deutsche, baby gap teeshirt and be like, but wait that guy has no hair. Maybe thats heilman dressed as deutsche to try to get in two comments in the ablock. Rather than one. John, its a disgrace its going on. Its a disgrace. Its a disgrace with all of these counterfeit donny deutsches. It upsets me. But hes got these stories. Hes got the guy that comes back stage and talks to him. The guy that doesnt go to paris and one of my favorites, when he first started talking about north korea and reaching out to north korea. He said he had parents with children who are still over in north korea. Thats a good one. That are coming up to him and saying, please, please bring my son home. They, of course, would have had to be 125 but that never seems to get in the way of donald trump. Its amazing. We will get into that story. We should actually maybe somebody should come up with a name for him. He spins these tales. What will it be . What is his publicist name . Disney gone . John miller. I think there were a number. Didnt they have three or four different ones . John miller. Johnson. Yes. So we got as you can see here National Affairs analyst msnbc the cohost and the executive producer, big shot of showtime the circus, John Heilemann. Aide to white house and states department, elise jordan. The council on foreign reemgs Richard Haase and reporter for the Washington Post eugene scott. Mika has the morning off. Election updates coming in as a democratic candidate makes history and Vice President mike pence jo insurance the president in denying defeat for republicans. Four term congressman jeff denham conceded his roo rachis. And the representative tom mcarthur conceded to andy kim. A former aide, andy kim will be the first korean to serve in congress in 20 years and the first ever to represent the state of new jersey. The updated count in californias 39th district shows the lead of korean american republican young kim has shrunk to 122 votes over democrat gil sisn cisneros. But in an interview with nbc news this morning, Vice President mike pence says, he thought the democrats failed to make sizable gains. We made history by expanding our majority in the senate. We won some great elections in governors offices around the country and we didnt really see that blue wave in the house of representatives come our way. I think its because the American People see the results. But those results tell a much different story. The democrats gaining at least now 34 house seats. Ats gaining t now 34 house seats joe, so if you look at just Orange County, for example, with i we started with there. There will thought be republicans in Orange County representing those districts, which is a shock to you and to other republicans who viewed that as a cradle of conservatism. In the state of new jersey now, there will only be one republican representing that state in washington. Yeah. I mean, thats the lowest is thatb for republicans sin woodrow wilson. Youd have to go back to find republicans in the worst state there. Orange county, earthquake, nevada, an earthquake, republicans thrown out of state wide offices, local offices, you name it. John heilemann, you know, i look at mike pence, and i just, im saddened by the fact that mike feels like he has to lie to a reporter, needs to degrade himself for donald trump. And saying that, well, we didnt really see that blue wave. We had a great tuesday. It would be funny if it werent so sad for this guy, who was actually once not only a respected politician but a respected man. But now he is giving baghdad bob a bad name saying that they had a great tuesday and this is i dont know. I just, an editorial comment here. This is what repelled so many educated suburban voters that mike pence and people like mike pence and their relationships would lie to try to line up with donald trump and it catches up with them. It always catches up with them. They keep doing it. I mean, tuesday was a massive blue wave. Was it not . Especially in the house . It was. Unequivocally and without any reservation you can say that. The numbers keep stacking up. Joe, i mean, look, there are two things to say. One is you said mike pence was things complimentary. Its been a pretty long time since that was true. I watched this show carefully when im not on. You pointed out. We all pointed out the number of times in which mike pence over the course of two years, dating back when he was on the ticket mimicked, aped, echoed donald trump if his various misstatements and lies. So this is now kind of a pattern for mike pence. I know mika was always fond of the shot of pence, you know, doing the thing with the water thats exact. The water bottle. The water bottle thing. Thats his now the visual manifestation of what he does all the time. He has to do whatever donald trump does. Apparently hes afraid if he ever contradicts in anyway physically or verbally the president he will get in some kind of trouble. This is like looking at the sky and saying that you know the sky is red when its blue, or saying that down is up. But at this point im not surprised by it anymore. I dont want to say that its not outrageous and ridiculous. But it is now par for the course with mike pence. So, elise, how bad was it . How bad was tuesday for the democrats . This is ive got to say, this is the slowest rolling blue wave. It reminds me of the scene in the first austin powers where the Security Guard screams no and the steam rollers coming at him. Then they do a side shot and the steam roller is actually 20 yards away going o onemileanhour. Thats how this blue wave has had to feel for republicans. Because every day brings more bad news. Well, im going to steal a line that one of my strategist friends shared with me describing the blue wave. More as a blue tornado. You look where it hit. If it hit, it took out any republicans. And it clearly hit in a big way in Orange County and it also hit in new jersey and what do those areas have in common . Suburban voters who traditionally vote republican and are possibly shifting away from the party in a permanent realignment or at least a temporary realignment because they do not like republicans in the era of donald trump. Yeah. They certainly dont. Willie, Something Interesting is happening on the democratic side of things and you know, you leave it to some democrats, they remind me of republicans in that way. Some democrats to try to clutch defeat from the jaws of victory. You actually have quite a few democrats now talking about replacing nancy pelosi saying she is divisive. First of all, its not like every republican didnt run against nancy pelosi in 2018 and yet what happened. They had their largest wave since watergate. So, also, shes like one of the most competent speakers of the house as far as getting things done and knowing how to hold her troops together in recent memory. Yeah, but there is a long list now a growing list of democrats who say she should not be the speaker. She appears to unfazed by it. The number of democrats who say they wont support her is reportedly at 17, at least 12 Incoming Democratic freshmen say they will not support her and campaigned on. That that number could grow as more democrats continue to when their races. On tuesday, congressman seth moulton of massachusetts says he is quote 100 confidence pelosi does not have the votes. Pelosi responded yesterday saying that she will be the speaker. Quote, no matter what he said. Also, yesterday, congresswoman marsha fudge told the cleveland dealer, people are asking me to do it. I am thinking about it. Eugene scott, what are the chances that nancy pelosi despite all this noise we are hearing is not the speaker of the house come january . Reporter i dont think its likely, what nancy pelosi will do communicate to those lawmakers on board that she has been able to deliver in ways many of the democratic voters are expecting the Democratic Party to ultimately do. When you look at vovest moulset. He wants to deliver to the people they have not been able to rely on for victories. The democratic successes were because of women of color, because of minorities, and millennial communities and many of these White Working Class voters that most of us is hoping can see someone like them more reflected in leadership cannot deliver the votes consistently for the democrats the democrats need to push back on trumpism. Still ahead on morning joe, james mattis reportedly was very clear with the president. We need u. S. Troops in south korea to prevent world war. So what is his explanation why American Forces are needed at the southern border of mexico . We will dig into that next on morning joe. We will dig into that next on morning joe. Molly my np spends a lot of time with me and gives me a lot of attention which led to my diagnosis. She initiated tests and found out what was wrong. Shes treated both my children since they were born. Bridgette i feel that my np cares about me as a person and not just if im sick or not. Molly and i really love my Nurse Practitioner because we have such a strong connection. I know that whenever i call, shell be there for me. My name is molly and we choose nps. Np consider an np. When patients choose, patients win. engine roaring horn honking okay, okay, okay. clatter feeling unsure . Oh. nervous yelp what if you had some help . Introducing the new 2019 ford edge with the confidence of ford copilot360 tm technology. The most available Driver Assist technology in its class. the new 2019 ford edge. the new Capital One Savor card. Earn 4 cash back on dining and 4 on entertainment. Now when you go out, you cash in. Whats in your wallet . I am a techie dad. N. I believe the best technology should feel effortless. Like magic. At comcast, its my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. My name is mike, im in Product Development at comcast. Were working to make things simple, easy and awesome. Thats defense secretary james mattis and homeland secretary Kirstjen Nielsen meeting with u. S. Troops there at the border to defend he says the United States against a caravan of migrants. Secretary mattis says there are currently 5900 troops to the border and anticipates it will go up to 7,000. Joe, he was asked, defense secretary mattis by the troops when hes addressed them there at the border. Whats our objective here . What are we doing here . He said, quote, that is somewhat to be determined. In the short term, lay the wire. In the long term somewhat to be determined i saw a lot of outrage from veterans groups online about that comment. A sort of an open ended commitment. Not being able to tell the troops why theyre there. The answer is hes there. He was there and nielsen was there and the troops were there simply because they are political props for a president that used this threat during a campaign that is over. And, Richard Haase, so the president makes this, creates this threat of a migrant invasion. It ends up being a horrible political move for him. He loses basically every suburb from coast to coast, destroys the republican majority, biggest wipeout since watergate. And the president i guess doesnt feel like he can back out of it now. But, thats the president. We know donald trump. We know who he is. Tell us about james mattis. How should james mattis be handling this . James mattis the secretary of defense, who truly is a good man in an impossible situation. What you saw was a good man struggling yesterday. He doesnt want to out basically explicitly say this was a terrible idea. The commanderinchief misused or abused his power. Using the troops if you will as a prop. On the other hand, he couldnt give them a sense of the mission. The idea that they are there to put wire up. I dont think thats why they volunteer for the army. You have a border patrol. You have a National Guard these people are fair away. No matter how you slice and dice it, there is no way you can justify this deployment. What you basically saw was a decent man trying to avoid saying just that and it puts him in an impossible. It puts him again, its a sign that those who work for donald trump sham we say, its hard to get out of there unscathed. Why doesnt he walk away . Why doesnt he walk away in protest . Why doesnt he quit . My guess is two things. One is for someone that spent his entire career serving. Im guessing here, its hard. Its not in your dna, its something you tend to do even though hes a civilian. He and people around him generally believe, they know the full range of issues, they are dealing with, if he were to go as a successor, as problematic as bad as things are across the board. As you know, bad situations can get worse. I havent spoken to him about this. My guess is hes had to have thought about it under these circumstances. Richard, i think that thats a pretty generous defense of secretary mattis at this point. Because whats happening is pretty shameful and he knows better and he could choose to resign by what is a blatant misuse of the u. S. Military. He cannot explain why National Guard would not suffice. If you dont go to the transcript of the press briefing yesterday on the plane, the gag him, it is astonishing how he says, well secretary nielsen you know thats a question for secretary nielsen. He cant answer what the objective is and then with the troops, i really have so much admiration for those troops yesterday two asked him tough questions and they werent mincing word. They were saying, what is the mission . Are we going to take this wire down . Whats the the deal here . And thats a hard thing to do. Im glad they are asking secretary mattis the hard questions that we reall need to be asking, too. Coming up on morning joe the latest from california on the Deadly Wildfires there. What officials are saying about the conditions today and the fight to beat back those flames. Morning joe is coming right back. Those flames. Morning joe is coming right back music throughout thats where i feel normal. Having an annuity tells me my retirement is protected. Learn more at retire your risk dot org. Its a revolution in sleep. The new sleep number 360 smart beds are on sale now during sleep numbers veterans day sale. It senses your movement, and automatically adjusts to keep you both comfortable. It even helps with this. So you wake up ready to put your pedal to the metal. Its the final days of our veterans day sale where the queen sleep number 360 c4 smart bed is only 1299 save 400. Plus, 24month financing on all beds. Ends sunday. Sleep number. Proven, quality sleep [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. Welcome back to morning joe. An update on the wildfires in california. Crews are making gains on the 130 acres scorched. So much for tweets conditions out there. For that we turn to meteorologist bill karins. Now is it looking this morning . It looks better than yesterday. Today we will be in the 20mileperhour range. We need it to rain. That wont happen probably until the end of next week. So lets get into our snow forecast and all the problems we have here in the east. Washington, d. C. Currently seeing snow out there. An inch or less outside, inside the beltway. 88 people are at risk. We have thousands of School Closings through the ohio valley. Now were watching the blue here, the areas of pennsylvania from d. C. Northward, thats going to shoot up here through new england as we go throughout the rest of the day. The areas of red, thats up to 8 inches of snow. Very impressive snow totals. A huge foot print, pennsylvania, Central New York and northern portions of new england. This will be there evenings evening commute. Everyone will be driving home in that. D. C. The worst of it now. New york city to boston. Watch out, in areas of those commutes. Back to you. All right. Bill, thanks, a lot. Coming up on morning joe, piers morgan took President Trump to task last year for retweeting videos. Pierce is sounding off about the president s response to the deadly california wildfires. Pierce joins us next on morning joe. A wildfires. Pierce joins unes xt on morning joe. Joe joe. Joe. Joe. I just got my cashback match, is this for real . Yep. We match all the cash back new cardmembers earn at the end of their first year, automatically. Whoo i got my money hard to contain yourself, isnt it . Uh huh let it go whoo get a dollarfordollar match at the end of your first year. Only from discover. [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. Publicly praising the bravery of firefighters in california and offering his sympathy and support for the people who have lost their homes or their lives in that fire. But that was not his initial response. Tweeting on seat about the cost of the fires inaccurately blaming Forest Management and threatening to pull payments. That led to our next guest column titled if you are too much of a narcissist to feel empathy, mr. Trump, try to fake it. Editor at large daily mail. Com, piers morgan. Great to see but good to be here. Joe. We have so much brex it to talk about. Pierce has actually a shocking not news yet but a conclusion of what may be coming in the next 24 hours. Heres a tease for you. Take it away, joe. Breaking news, New York Times right now talking about two uk cabinet ministers quitting. The pound falling right now. Perfect timing for you, pierce to come on and tell us what is going on the britain . Heres the truth. Nobody knows. Its a complete basket case. I cam to here america to find political stability and normality. The reality is Prime Minister may has come up with her big brexit plan we have been waiting for. Its dead on arrival. Half of her cabinet and government are resigning. My guess is the dominos are falling so fast and furiously she will be gone i would think possibly by the end of the week if not even today so dramatic scenes back in england. You know, pierce a couple summers ago, we were talking about football, talking about your love for arsenal. I remember commenting to you then that i was shocked that every time the topic of donald trump came up over in britain and the summer of 17, it never went the way i expected. I expected it to be what ive heard my whole life when ive traveled over to england ore europe that is you americans this, you americans that. Everybody said the same thing. Everybody, they were like, you know what, you guy versus a problem with one guy. Hes going to be gone. Thats how america works. We have a much deeper problem with our system and we dont see anyway out. I couldnt believe it at the time. But here we are a yearandahalf later, and ill be darned if you and everybody else that said that werent right and were seeing it still unfolding. Why cant britain move forward . Well, the fundamental problem was brexit split the country right down in two. A bit like america with the arrival of President Trump. Both positions, both sides are so intense now there is no room for normal democratic debate or conversation. No room for, well, are you right about this but wrong about. That are you all in to leave or you are all in to remain. Of course, politics life is a little bit more subtle than. That a little more complicated than that. What we found in britain is unfortunately these two polarized positions have crashed to this Tipping Point the Prime Minister to remind your viewers, teresa may voted for this, we put somebody in charge of the brexit train that didnt want to go in the direction which the train was heading, which i always felt whats a fatal flaw in this person. Far better to put a person in charge like boris johnson, programs, who believes in the principles of brexit. We are where we are i dont think we be doing this at all. We referendum. 17. 5 Million People in voted voted. The biggest vote my country ever had for anything. So the concern now is if we dont actually do what the referendum verdict said we should do, where does that leave brik british democracy . I think its a real problem. Just a labor versus a conservative issue. You have a lot of tories supporting brexit. You have a lot of laborites supporting it as well. So its sort of like trumps america, you cant just break it down as right versus left. You cant just wash it away. It was an election, as Donald Trumps election was. This was a referendum democratically voted on. The significance, pierce, of the two cabinet minister was left today. This was the chief brexit negotiator who goes into that meeting, presents a plan and walks away. You had the pension ministers walk away as well, why are those two positions so significant and why do you think it automatically leads to the end of their ressa mays run . David davis, her initial checkers plan when the cabinet first signed up for about three hours to a collective agreement about something. He went. Now we have the same again with his replacement. Domenic robb a capable domenic raab, a capable up and coming gentleman. It unfortunately ties us still to the european union. People like me think we shouldnt be doing this, great, happy days. This is really staying in the union in all but name. But, of course, if you voted leave or if you are a politician who drove the leave campaign, you are feeling right now cheated and betrayed. You feel the democratic will of the british people have simply been ignored. That is i think a constitutional crisis for bridge. It may ends up for another vote a peoples vote, because we have no other answer to this 23 ends up having another referendum within two years of the last one. Its a complete mess. As i say, ive come here because by comparison the Trump Presidency seems relatively normal. Happy to help, pierce. Pierce this plan seems to be make knock one happy. Right. And is it your conclusion that it would be worse to go forward with this plan with all of its problems, with, you know, i almost will compare it to a divorce where the party, one party, the eu, is still going to have a lot of say over the uk that wants out for many years to come in. This is like getting divorced. Then having three or four things that tie to you your exwife or husband, which means have you no control over the rest of your life without their say so. And i think the analogy is probably perfect. The options now, we have another referendum. Or that we accept this deal, which nobody wants to accept. As you say its universally despised by everybody. Its the only unifying thing, everybody hates it. Or we crash out with no deal on march 29th, where we literally go into the complete unknown. Which most people. Most independent panelists and experts say would be the financial assumption of all. So, look, i dont think anybody knows what is going to happen. I dont think anybody know what is the reality of a no deal would be. We are into uncharted and i think very perilous waters in britain right now. So, brexit, a lot of americans dont understand what that is. A lot of americans do understand the nature of these wildfires in california. Im from california. In fact the wildfires have come up a block from the place, where i grew up. When i read your piece, i was with you. Because although you may say a lot of things about teresa may. She has not taken the side of a wildfire against people losing their homes and losing their lives. So talk about your sense of outrage over the way the president initially reacted to the fires and what your advice is to him . I got a place in l. A. , not near the fires, thankfully. It else to me that there are also difficult things about the president of the United States. Its a tough job. We can all agree with that. We may disagree how President Trump does this, that and the other. Its a tough job. There are so many things when have you the president of the United States. One is show basic human empathy when your own American People are suffering or in this case literally being burned alive in their cars, as some people were being at the time that you tweeted. Yet his first gut reaction to this was to try to score a cheap political point. I personally like donald trump. I have known him a long time. But that aside for a moment, this was crass and inhuman. You dont start the blame game at 3 00 in the morning when your fellow americans are literally dying, burning alive in their homes and cars. I thought it was another example im afraid of Donald Trumps inability to just show basic empathy. And we saw it again in paris when he was supposed to go to a Memorial Service on the 100th anniversary of armistice, remember to go to a place where American Military men and women that lost their lives in the First World War were buried. All you have to do isshine, look president ial. He couldnt do that, it was raining. The combined effects, one a rain excuse, one hideous fires. The common theme was a basic failure of gut feeling and empathy. Let me ask real quick this question, dont you think there is hardly a political thing here. Question of empathy. There is california is never going to vote for donald trump. Right. He blames them for giving her the popular vote margin, illegal voters in california. If these wildfires were different. We saw this on saturday night live the pete davis thing. Where actually they came together a week later and they showed a bit of unity over what happened been a very unpleasant incident. A denigration of a war hero on americas number one comedy show. And that gave you a bit of hope. Finally, somebody, somewhere, actually is not reacting by punching everyone in the nose all the time. And then we get the reaction from President Trump to these fires and my heart sank again, yes, he knows california doesnt like him. I walk around california. You dont find many trump people. But he had a chance there to actually win over perhaps some of the people who dont hate him with just kind of whatever. You know, he could have just come out and said, my heartaches for these people in california. What can i do . The entire power of the federal government is here, ready, now what do you need the tell me. What would be the reaction even from people that dont like him in l. A. . I think they would have gone, you know what, fair enough. A bit like the criminal Justice Reform overnight. You know, there are things that hes doing which if hed get it right the basics, maybe, maybe some of the appalling toxicity which is engulfing your politics as it is indeed britains politics right now could be slightly tempered and we can somehow weech points of consensus and agreement and feeling a bit of common civility and humanity on stuff. On paris, he also tweeted an attack on president macron, a terrorist attack in france. We saw macron rebuke him to his face about nationalively and he and murkel take care of more of their own business. Are you seeing a separation between the continent the uk and the United States . A little bit. I think macron place trump quite well. I wish more people would do what macron discuss. He shows him respect personally and the office of the presidency, but he doesnt hesitate to whack him on policy or statements hes made. And i think that is a sensibleplasensible place to start with trump. If you right the artd of the deal, if you whack him, he will keep whacking over until you all do, or one of you does. Its what he always does. Take celebrity apprentice, the possible analogy, for six weeks i was in that boardroom for 100 hours with him. I watched how he operates him. If you were respectful to mr. Trump the apprentice host. Then you can be critical of his decision making. If if you called him donald and being disrespectful, disrespecting the show, if you like, bang, you were straight out the door. What it taught me was, thats just the way he is. You can say its wrong. You can blindly hate him for it. But its the way he is built. And i this i the more people that they treated like macron, just respect the office. Thats what the white house said last week. I kind of agree with him. Look at the media wror with jim acosta and cnn and trump. Its relentless, so boring. Its not the big story. How trump could hose lose the house is the biggest story a cnn reporter having an argument. It wasnt from us. We have been talking about the midterms for a long time. Thank you. How extraordinary we continue to talk about managing the emotions of the leader of the free world. Thank you, pierce will be guest hosting daily mail tv today and tomorrow. Coming up next, we spent time confronting facebook, including privacy concerns. We sat down with kara swisher os well as anyone. That conversation next on morning joe. Well as anyone that conversation next on morning joe. Plaque psoriasis can be relentless. Tremfya® is for adults with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. With tremfya®, you can get clearer. And stay clearer. In fact, most patients who saw 90 clearer skin at 28 weeks stayed clearer through 48 weeks. Tremfya® works better than humira® at providing clearer skin, and more patients were symptom free with tremfya®. Tremfya® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections. Before treatment, your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection or have symptoms such as fever, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough. Before starting tremfya® tell your doctor if you plan to or have recently received a vaccine. Ask your doctor about tremfya®. Tremfya®. Because you deserve to stay clearer. Janssen wants to help you explore cost support options. Yeah, ive had some prettyeer. Prestigious jobs over the years. News producer, executive transport manager, and a beverage distribution supervisor. Now im a director at a Security Software firm. Wow, youve been at it a long time. Thing is, i like working. What if my Retirement Plan is i dont want to retire . Then lets not create a Retirement Plan. Lets create a plan for whats next. I like that. Get a plan thats right for you. Td ameritrade. [narrator] meet sharks newest robot vacuum. It powerfully cleans from floors to carpets, even pet hair, with ease, and now for cleaning surfaces above the floor, it comes with a built in shark handheld. One dock, two sharks. The shark ion robot cleaning system. If youre waiting patiently for a liver transplant, it could cost you your life. Its time to get out of line with upmc. At upmc, livingdonor transplants put you first. So you dont die waiting. Upmc does more livingdonor liver transplants than any other center in the nation. Find out more and get out of line today. Discover. O. I like your card, but im absolutely not paying an annual fee. Discover has no annual fees. Really . Yeah. We just dont believe in them. Oh nice. You would not believe how long ive been rehearsing that. No annual fee on any card. Only from discover. So, with the midterms, for the most part, behind us, the focus now is going to be turning to a voter of issues that the Trump Administration and the Democratic House will be focusing on next. Undoubtedly, all eyes will be on the white house and congresss approach to Silicon Valley and some of the worlds most powerful companies as the issue of consumer privacy, Data Security and competition continue to loom large and we saw it spill out all over the front page of the New York Times today. We recently sat down with Technology Journalist and cofounder of recode kara fisher, who joined the New York Times as an opinion contributor recently. How does the relationship between Silicon Valley and both Political Parties especially look as it pertains to election meddling . There is a lot of different things, election meddling, hacking of voting booths the idea of how we vote. Whether we should change voting to the blockchain. There is all these questions of how we should change the way people participate. Get more to participate via cell phone, thats the mechanics and meddling by russians, iranians, whoever, and so i think there will be a lot of regulatory scrutiny on tech companies. Talk about data privacy. Thats another. We were sort of in the first wave, to ask a question, will you give us access to every personal record you ever have . We dont ask anymore. So we request have this game of tetris. Well, weve awakened now, suddenly there is too much access. Its a nightmare. How do you regulate that ar smart about tech. If you watched those hearings with Mark Zuckerberg, you saw what happened there. It was the lowest bar ever. They didnt know anything to ask him. At the same time, states like california and europe are doing these incredible privacy bills that are happening. California has one of the strongest around. In europe, for example, its the right to be forgotten, which i think they couldnt do here because of the first amendment. Cant do that here. Wish they could. Yes, they can do various things. Opt in, the ability to know data portability, the ability to know where your information is going. And thats what happened with Cambridge Analytica and facebook. It went off to a third party that you never agreed to have it go off to. I dont know if you were impacted by it. I was. So the question is, where your data goes and where it travels to. And what they combine it with. By the way, i talked to you certainly have a lot more, but ive talked to chief marketing officers who say, hey, you get the data from facebook and then have somebody like cambridge come behind it, we dont even have to advertise on tv anymore. We know that you want to fly here. We know where to reach you. And hes like, its extraordinary. And thats not the deal you made with facebook, precisely, when you signed up for it. You do get free things, you get your newsfeed and things like, but what they do with the data and how it moves is something more consumers need to understand, especially as we move into more sensors and things like that. And you look at Something Like china, which is a surveillance economy with facial recognition and all kinds of stuff, it starts to get frightening. Theres the mechanics of voting, and you wonder if that can be shored up even more. And also, made indestructible. Presumably. And make people vote more. Yes right. Right. But in terms of influencing elections, and, you go back to Mark Zuckerberg and how much they didnt get on capitol hill, i understand on that. But i had a conversation with cheryl saSheryl Sandberg and i we were talking in circles. There was no problem in the conversation, but isnt there some responsibility when you hand your data over. Thats right. Thats right. Theyre abrogating the responsibility of what theyve done. Theres a law that gives communities broad immunity, and the question is whether they should continue toimmunity. Media companies dont get immunity when they make mistakes. Internet companies do, for whatevers on their platform. The question is, is it time now to say to internet companies, you dont get broad immunity anymore. You have to pay for the mistakes you make. And they dont want to. Theyve made all the money, they have all the power, and yet they dont want the responsibility for the things their platforms do. Its not precisely like a cigarette company, but reminds you more of a Chemical Company thats spilling stuff into the river and we have to clean it up, so who has to pay for it . Also its exactly like what it is. Over 50 of americans get their news from facebook. Yes. And yet no regulation. None. No standard. They can put as much fake news out there as they want to. And people understand that. But its more than that. Its bots. Like, first of all, the lowhanging fruit are fake news, fake accounts, bots that just run around. And what they do is say you had a controversy, yourself. Bots would start the controversy, and then humans come into it. They used to design the system for accuracy, context, and other things. Now its designed all of the systems now are designed for viralty, speed, and engagement. And what do you think youre going to get, if those are your pillars that you create something on, youre going to get fake news. The problem is, theres so much information washing around and a lot of this is being done by algorithms and a lot of it how people search and Everything Else, so you dont have control of it. And i think the dirty secret is they dont have control of it. So ive got four kids and like any parent ive seen, and theyre from 30 to 10. And a lot of parents are growing more and more concerned about screen time. It seems no parents are more concerned about screen time than the people that run Silicon Valley. And my argument has been that this is like the cigarette industry in the 1950s. They know how bad, how addictive the cigarettes are. But the rest of us dont. Were still smoking it. Are we going to look back 10, 15 years from now and say, wait a second, those Silicon Valley executives knew how bad this was for their chirp and how it rewired their brains in negative ways. Gave them anxiety and all sorts of issue. But they kept selling that garbage to us and didnt give us the warnings. Right. Is this going to happen . Theres some really Interesting Data being collected about what happens with screen times. And its not just for children, its for adults. You walk down any street, and everybody is on their phone. These are these systems are designed that way. There, they have anthropologists. They know exactly its like casinos. Its a slot machine of attention. Its a slot machine of attention. So they want to keep you, again, engaged in it, so youre constantly leaning into it and using it, instead of using it like a utility. Now, look at an app like uber. Do you spend a lot of time on your app on uber. You just click it and you go. Thats a utility app. So one of the things the phone makers could do, which would be apple and google, essentially, is to start to move all the addictive stuff away from you or put gray scale on your phone, so its not as easy to like. Is elon musk one of the more fascinating people youve interviewed . Indeed, he is. Tell us about him. Hes had a hard year, hes sort of gone off the rails. Hes had a very difficult time with his company, tesla. By the way, isnt it good that Thomas Edison and henry ford didnt have twitter . And steve jobs . Thank god he never would have. Steve had a lot more control. He had a lot of discipline . Absolutely. He would have had no interest in twitter whatsoever. So why elon musk . He likes it. He finds its a way to look at humanity. He likes engaging people. And he was entering a period where he was exhausting himself, 120hour workweeks trying to get the model iii, the next tesla off the working so he could sell it. And he thinks the future of tesla matters to humanity. And he says tesla cannot die. Not many people why . Because hes very interested in Climate Change and the idea that weve got to electrify cars and move our Transportation System away. And he thinks its a pressing issue, so he worked himself into exhaustion. Everybody that has a tesla loves their car. Its a great car. Why is it so hard for him to build that . Its not a photo app or a dating app . Theres all kinds of parts, thats why i like talking to him. Hes not landing rockets. Hes now built a boat that has a net on it that catches the nose cones of the rockets that he sends up to save money. Because theyre tens of millions of dollars. And he says, i havent caught one yet, but hes trying to catch a nose cone in the middle of the ocean. What drives him . What is that . You know, i met him when he did a version of paypal. He ended up merging with a Company Called x. Com. And at the time he was not like this. But what i like about elon and what is controversial about him, hes trying to go for the big stuff, rockets and cars. He has a Boring Company where he has a tunnel digger where hes digging tunnels under los angeles to get rid of traffic. These are big, giant, fantastic ideas. So i think what drives him is that youre supposed to do this in life, to change the planet. And make it better. Yes, he does. He thinks that. And eventually, what he wants to do is fly is mars and eventually die there, just not on landing. Thats what he would like to do. No, hes going to mars. And you think hell do it . I think hell live on mars, yeah. So of all the people youve spoken to, who do you think steve jobs. Steve jobs. So mikas mom just finished reading isaacsons book. Ah, yes. And i was asking her about him. And it was just, again, theres some it was a guy that was he was not very polite to people around him at work. I think one of the things that was wrong about steve jobs. He had too much heart. He had the same passion to change things. At least you knew where they were coming from. People like to know where they stand. Did he change our world more than anybody in the past century . Bringing not just the mobile phone, but the mobile phone the way it is today. Even though people had come before him, there were people at ore companies who had sort of had these concepts, i think introducing it to the public. The iphone debut, i think it was 2004, i forget, was the most important thing to ever happen in this particular age of computing. What was it about him . What drove him, what made him so special . What made him so different than the rest of us mere mortals . I think the combination of art and science. Thats really hard to do. A lot of Silicon Valley people are all about science. And thats why were having the current problems. Theyre not human . You know what i mean . They dont act like humans. So i think he would have whats the one company whos been complaining about whats happening . Tim cook. He gave a great big privacy speech. They understand the implications are adults. And i think one of the things that was great about steve jobs is that he combined art, which was the beauty of it, look how beautiful those phones are, and the poetry of these phones and Everything Else. Not just that, but the poetry of all of this stuff, and science in terms of useful tools that you need. And soy enj i enjoyed that. Not everything he did was perfect, but they had issues in china and all kinds of things they did wrong, but i think that company is going to go down as one of our most important. And amazon, jeff bezos is amazing. Thats another conversation. Kara, thank you so much for coming in. Its always great talking to recodes kara swisher. We thank her so much. And this sunday, make sure you check karas discussion with salesforces ceo. Revolution salesforce changing the world. It premieres this sunday at ten oclock p. M. Eastern only on msnbc. That does it for us this morning. Stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. Stephanie . Thanks so much, joe. Good morning, everyone. Im Stephanie Ruhle and i am starting with moving fast, breaking things, and new shocking revelations from the New York Times about just how badly facebook bungled the response to russian meddling. Not only did they fail to act while Mark Zuckerberg was on