Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20181220

Journal, which has for some time, the editorial page at least has at times dvenefended President Trump when few others have. They editorialized about trumps syriairan retreat. The Islamic State is not defeated, says the wall street journal. And the molas are delighted. Retreat in syria is a sign of weakness, the wall street journal concludes that friends and foes will notice and who is celebrating more about their early Christmas Present than Vladimir Putin and russia. And theyve said as much. This is a massive geopolitical win . For putin and russia. And weve just gone through the season of fire fight in california. And weve watched this massive devastating blazes. What the president is doing is the functional equivalent of weve gotten the fire contained, prosecute were all arou were all around it and now the embers are smoldering. Were going to leave. What do you think is going to happen . Theres a prehigh chance of what we call in the navy a reflash where the fire comes back. Thats the tactical problem. Back seat as you pointed out correctly, the geopolitics of this are terrible and its not just Vladimir Putin can doing high fives with the mullahs in tehran. Its also the impact this will have on our kurdish allies and friends in the region who will see this as a betrayal. It will be written globally as a walk away and a betrayal. This is geopolitically the worst move ive seen from this administration. Thats a high bar to get over. That is a very high bar to get over. If you look, mika, at who has helped here, its a Pretty Simple list. Isis has helped. My god, once again, retreat in the middle east, barack obama and the United States, 70 of americans wanted us to get out of iran. Isis went right into that vacuum. President trump went back and continued to put them back on their heels and donald trump continued that. But here we have isis not defeated. So this is a big day for them. Iran. I thought donald trump saw the iranians as an enemy. I mean, i thought that was almost the centerpiece of his Foreign Policy. This is massive news, good news for the iranians. And finally, who is happier about this than Vladimir Putin on the world stage . Absolutely nobody. This is a give away. This is Foreign Policy welfare for Vladimir Putin. He cant even believe miss luck. Or, im sorry, maybe he can. Maybe this is connected to something none of us know about. And well talk about this and the admiral said something a few weeks ago on our show about people staying in there for the good fight. This shows the dysfunction in the white house at the highest level. President trump took to twit ir yesterday to announce that he was ordering the withdraw of all u. S. Ground forces from syria in 30 days writing, quote, we have defeated isis in syria, my only reason for being here in the trump presidency. That was followed up by a tweet that someone in the white house conducted and posted like youve got a whole Communications Department that is not in sync with the rest of the white house, including the National Security council and foreign cabinet policy heads. This is incredible, right . Could they be on board with in . I dont think so. On the president s official twitter page, this was posted. It was shot by a government camera. There was no press present. Take a look. Weve been a fighting for a long time in syria. Ive been president for almost two years and weve really stepped it up. And we have won against isis. Weve beaten them and weve beaten them badly. Weve taken back the land and now its time for our troops to come back home. These are great heros of the world. They fought for us, but theyve killed isis who hurts the world. Were proud to have done it. You know, i think george w. Bush would tell you that these sort of ceremonies are much more effective if you have a banner behind you. That says mission accomplished, mr. President. Because the mission is not accomplished. Just last week, President Trumps special envoy to syria brett mcgurk told reporters at the state department that it would be, quote, reckless to simply declare victory and leave. This was just last week. The Trump Administration also stated just last week that there was months of fighting still left. Just look at what the Trump Administration was saying just last week. If. We really are now down to the last 1 of the physical territory. Were prepared to maintain the stabilization effort in iraq and syria. This will take a period of years. So the enduring defeat of isis means not just physical defeat, but make sure we are training local security forces. We also have other interests in syria. But the military mission is the enduring defeat of isis. We have learned a lot of lessons in the past. We know once a space is defeated, we cant just pick up and leave. I think its fair to say americans will remain on the ground until we have the physical places on the ground to ensure that defeat is enduring. Our parents taught us if something seems too good to be true, then its not true. I always tell my kids, if something doesnt make theres, theres a reason it doesnt make sense. You have the pentagon, the nato community, everybody across the world except for the mullahs in iran, the terrorists of isis and Vladimir Putin in russia saying this is a terrible move. Yesterday donald trump is doing it, anyway, when his own administration is saying what a dreadful mistake it is to cut and run. Nobody supports this in the Foreign Policy establishment. None of our allies support this. Nobody was given advanced notice of this. Donald trump himself just decided to cut and run and scream retreat when we were about to defeat isis. And really and truly does seem like i he did it unilaterally. Your defense secretary is not for it. Your National Security adviser john bolton has been on the record saying he doesnt support it. France was blindsided. Every senator says we were blindsided. This is a terrible idea. And very angry about it. And it raises the question who was behind this if not the president alone . Who supported this decision . We heard from brett mcgurk. Hes been on the record not just in that bite we showed, but as saying not only can we not leave, but when we do leave, when we do win the physical space, we need to stay and keep a presence for the foreseeable future. So who supported there decision beyond the president of the United States . This is a donald j. Trump production starring donald j. Trump. This was a shock to the u. S. Military. You remember yesterday morning when we started to get word between 7 00 and 8 00 that this was coming. The pentagon officials who were becoming aware that the night before, tuesday night, the president had on his own, basically, decided to pull the plug on this mission, shocked those pentagon officials and people around the world as word began to seep out. This carries the risk of a significant the blowup. I mean, we havent talked much about the turks. Turkey had been preparing to invade northern syria. Turkey has pretty much made a mess of every part of syria that its tried to get deeply involved in. Its a blood feud with our allies in syria, the syrian kurds are t who who are now very vulnerable. So the worst of this, i fear, is yet to come, but the initial reaction for the Purpose Military and the state department was shocked. Some of the biggest koo congressional backlash to President Trump is coming from within his own party. Ben sasse called a hypothetical approximatelio pullout reckless. Today, were leaving. The they believe the winners are iran, hezbollah. A lot of American Allies will be slaughtered if this retreat is implemented. And several other prominent republicans were left furious following a high scheduled gop lunch with Vice President mike pence. The decision to withdraw american an american presence in syria is a colossal, in my mind, mistake, a grave error that is going to have significant repercussions in the years and months to come. I dont know who advised that this decision be made, but its a terrible mistake and, unfortunately, i think were going to pay a price for it if its not reversed. Ive seen the president tweet and that unnerved me. In my view, isis is not defeated in syria and iraq. I was there just a few months ago. If we do, in fact, withdraw, the biggest winners are going to be iran, isis, physical tassad. If youre tired of fighting radical islam, i understand it. Theyre not tired of fighting you. If you dont get that, theyre making a huge mistake. 2200 troops is a very small footprint. Its an insurance policy against isis coming back. Above all else, i want to defend the nation against threats and i want allies. And what youve done if we withdraw, youre going the make it harder to find allies. Honestly, this makes what obama did in iraq its replicating that, but in many ways its worse because were in a situation where were very close. Its a terrible thing for our nation. Its a terrible thing for the. Allies that weve been working with. Its hard to imagine that any president would wake up and make this kind of decision with this little communication, with this little preparation. I mean, my understanding is were, like, beginning to move out right now. Z z. Geyerly . Yes, entirely. Ive never seen a decision like this where nothing is communicated in advance and all of a sudden this type of Massive Decision takes place. Its obviously a political decision. Corker told reporters that yesterday the white house canceled a long planned meeting with President Trump while the senator was sitting in the waiting room for him. Admiral, what should mattis, pompeo and others in the Foreign Policy community the do . Lets start by youve got steve ratner there. Lets start by doing the numbers for a minute here. You heard Lindsey Graham correctly says just over 2,000 troops. To put that into perspective, we have 6,000 troops on the Mexican Border facing a mythical enemy in these, quote, caravans that are coming, but somehow we cant afford to have 2,000 troops doing arguably the most important Counterterrorism Mission we face. What they should be doing is saying to the president , look, mr. President , youre a businessman. Lets look at leverage. This is only a few thousand troops, but you leverage the creation of allies, partners and friends. You get nato into this deeper, the french will do that. The brits are doing it. We can bring the rest of nato in. This is a very winnable proposition. We ought to be using the argument of leverage with this president and hopefully we can turn this around. But frankly, the odds of that seem low. And if i were secretary mattis, my head would be exploding right now. Should secretary mattis resign . Speak out or resign. So he can speak out. I think he has to be contemplating that at this point. And i feel his pain as a leader and one of our great generals. He must be saying to himself, if i cant convince the president to do something this important, perhaps its time for someone else to come in here. I hope that does not happen. We need secretary mattis where he is. But it has to be a pretty dark day in the pentagon as they contemplate this. I can understand his looking past some decisions like sending troops to the border if youre saying, at least thats keeping putin in economic in syria. But then he gives away the game and there is absolutely no leverage when it comes to donald trump and Vladimir Putin. We saw him cower, kowtow to putin. Saying i trust the kgb agent, i dont trust my own intelligent. Now hes turned syria over to the russians, the iranians and isis. How far do we have to go . Who wins a republican primary in 2020 when that is on your resume that you turn seyria ove to the prussianrussians, the ir and isis. You also expose your most valuable ally on the ground, the kurds, to a potential invasion from turkey. Admiral, the confusion when the president of the United States says we have defeated isis, you can defeat isis by territory. You can take towns, you can take counties, you can take provinces, but thats not defeating isis. Could you please talk to the issue of maintaining a substantial force on the ground in syria for intelligence gathering and for defensive operations. Absolutely. As you well know, there are still 15,000 to 20,000 active Islamic State fighters. And they tend to just melt into the distance. If we walk away from this, they need to reform and come back together again. There were isis tank columns. Heading towards baghdad two years ago. This is a careful, lethal force. Theyre highly connected on the internet in cyberspace. Its very easy for them to disappear momentarily and come back together again. And with our allies on the ground, disheartened by this cut and run move, its going to be very did you s very difficult to do this a second time when the bombs start going off in europe like they were two years ago in paris, lets not forget. So when we talk about the list of people pleased with this decision, joe talked about russia. A Government Spokesperson there said they applauded the decision and they said this creates a real prospect for a political view in syria. Turkey, though, as you pointed out earlier, last wednesday, so eight days ago, president erdogan vowed to remove kurdish fighters in syria. The next day, President Trump and erdogan have a phone call during which erdogan said why are you backing the kurds there . Erdogan said the conversation focused on those people. Yesterday, the state Department Approves a 3. 5 billion arms sale to turkey and on the same day, President Trump announces that the United States is pulling its out of syria. How much impact do you think president erdogan had leaning on President Trump here . I think that may have been the decisive push. And thats part of what bothers me the most is that we could be intimidated bay Regional Power like turkey which has this historic, in some ways irrational blood feud with our kurdish allies. This has been something the President Trump has wanted to do, lets be honest, pretty much since he came into office. In april, he decided thats it, im out. And he was talked out of it. And people really thought they had his support for a longer term mission. Up until tuesday night, if you had asked any senior official of government, whats our policy, they would have said stay until iran is contained, until the area is stabilized. And the president on this conviction, President Trump does not want to abandon any campaign promise, no matter how wrong it is. So he sticks with the wall. He sticks with his insistence hes going to get troops out of everywhere. I think thats what happened. I think he was pushed in that direction by turkey. The fear i hear from friends in the military is that we could have a real ignition point in northeast syria. I mean, thats of hundreds of people who have depended on us in an area that became stable. What do we do then, mr. Pt president , as people begin dieing in large numbers. David, what does general mattis do now . Whats the purpose of staying around if one of the most important Strategic Decisions made is done without his advice . So i think this is agony for general mattis. He bears this kind of thing in silence. People were pointing out to me last night, look, often its the case that the president thunders an order, makes a tweet, but theres a slow role going on in the state department unless what was ordered ends up happening. I dont think thats the case here. Its scary for people, i think, to imagine a strong person like secretary mattis leaving the pentagon, but if he has so little influence in the 11th hour to talk the president out of this mistake, you wonder whats the difference. But ive rarely incurred so much unified protest that in this instance everybody is against it. Steve, you have general mattis in the pentagon, which weve applauded from day one. But right now, you have three times as many people on the american border fighting as admiral sevitis said, an imaginary foe, as you do in syria fighting holding off in an extraordinary manner russia, irans aggression, which really does hurt israel if left unchecked and isis. The rebooting of isis. So you wonder if james mattis cant take out the troops on the border. What is his purpose there . Maybe he should just leave and tell us how dysfunctional this white house is. David certainly knows more, but mattiss relationship with the president has deteriorated, although mattis would like to stay. David, when you boil this all together, you have everybody with any knowledge, credibility, thoughtf thoughtfulness, opposed to it. You have the process nonexistent, that the president walked out and decided on tuesday night he was going to do this thing on wednesday. You have this interesting question of turkey and whether the arms sale played any role in this and what the relationship is there. And it makes no sense for all the reasons weve been talking about for the last 15 minutes. When you boil it all down, why do you think trump did it . Do you think hes trying to distract the world from Michael Flynn and all the other stuff going on or is there something were missing and it makes so little sense, how do you explain it . Steve, i think President Trump was coming back to home base for him. He sees himself as the president who was elected to end these middle east wars that are not popular. Tragically, the campaign in syria, although its been very successful, has been seen by almost nobody. So theres no real constituency and support for it. People dont see it. They dont get why this is valuable. Let me also note that there is a problem here that we are about to defeat isis. The sustained campaign of another few months is whats required. At that point, its very hard to justify the deployment of u. S. Forces overseas. Theyre there under the 2001 authorization to use military force against terrorists. Pentagon lawyers have been saying look, youre going to need some new legislation and nobody was sure they would get that. The problem is, this really is just about the worst moment to do this. Negotiations are about to begin diplomatically that are really important for the future of syria, for saving lives there in a still chaotic period. At the very worst moment we have given up our leverage and basically handed it to russia. As joe has been saying, russia, iran, go down the list. How crazy is that . Its the worst moment and the worst way. If youre worried about the authorization to use military force, theres a process you go through. And then you dont just on tuesday night decide to do it. There is one big benefit, though, mika, we spend 25 minutes and we havent talked about the investigations. These are deflections we have seen before. And thats what were going to be doing next block. But, again, the world order might be at stake. Im wondering at what point when does a cabinet secretary who vehemently disagrees, who has been quiet so far, at what point do they do hinges irchthings di speak up and step down. We have stumbled after 9 11 time and time again. And it seems the pentagon had timely gotten it right. Theyve deployed a small group of forces which David Ignatius will tell you have done more with less than perhaps any American Fighting force in 50 years. Yeah. And youre pulling them out . And keeping 6,000 troops at the boardser . Well, nice christmas president to Vladimir Putin. And im sorry, you have to ask the question why is donald trump the only person in washington, d. C. That wants to give this massive favor to Vladimir Putin . Why is donald trump the only Foreign Policy thinker in washington, d. C. That wants to help a Vladimir Putin in a way that has russia celebrating openly . You have to ask the question. And im sure were going to find some answers in the future. Admiral, thank you very much. Still ahead on morning joe, more from the president s taped announcement on syria policy where he invokes the memory of fallen american troops to justify his decision. That is so repulsive to justify his decision to help Vladimir Putin, isis and iran, he talks about fallen american heros as if fallen american heros and their families would want to help Vladimir Putin . Isis . And iran . That is grotesque. Yes. Plus, is bob mueller preparing to make another move . The special counsel wants to know exactly what roger stone told Congress Last year. Well run through that. Youre watching morning joe. Well run through that youre watching morning joe. This holiday season, families near you need your help. Visit redcross. Org now to donate. Not long ago, ronda started here. And then, more jobs began to appear. These techs in a lab. This builder in a hardhat. The welders and electricians who do all of that. The diner staffed up cause they all needed lunch. Teachers. Doctors. Jobs grew a bunch. What started with one job spread all around. Because each job in energy creates many more in this town. Energy lives here. Sglo President Trumps attorney was forced to walk back a statement that wait, but rudy said he never signed a letter. If rudy said it, its true. So its not like he signed a letter. I think its getting to a point where, like others, theres not much to be expected to be true of what he says. Why dont you put rudy on the air . Hes wandered into Kellyanne Conway territory. Cnn just received a copy of the letter posing theel development signed by donald trump. But rudy said he never signed a letter. So theres a lot of things he says that turn out not to be true. We have to wonder like the interviews now are kind of like this tv that people cant stop watching. But he doesnt say anything true. People who support donald trump, they see the lies every day. They come at them every day. And then when you say, what about his lies . They go what lies . Or he wasnt under oath so we can lie. Thats what rudy says. They say the lies every day. He lies. Every day. On the same day, the President Trump. Appeared three days before the Iowa Caucuses on sunday. Giuliani went on to tell the daily news that it was a bull you know what letter because that was the end of it. But he himself said that this continued on until november of 2016. . Yea yeah. But truth is not always truth. This is not good. Donnie deutsch is here. I think we cant amplify their lies. I dont know. Donald trump has been lying through his teeth about moscow. If for the past several years, lying about Michael Cohens contacts with russians, first. Mike pence lied through his teeth saying we never spoke to any russians during the campaign. Lied about this project from the beginning. Donald trump lied time and time again in front of republican audiences saying he had never had any contact with russians. There he had no business in russia. They had not been in contact to have any business with russia. The lies have continued. Donald trump has been lying about his relationship with russia and his contacts with russia now for well over two years and it has continued. It has tumbled into this week. Even with Robert Mueller throwing people in jail and dragging them into court left and right because they keep lying about russia. And you have Donald Trumps if lawyer, like, throwing out three or four lies. Giuliani is a buffoon at this point. As far as though lies, once january comes and once more of these 17 investigations heat up and once this subpoena power, youre going to see how much hes been lying for the past 30 years. The scariest lie of all, though, was the lie that he said yesterday, that weve defeated isis. And you guys have obviously covered this very much. This is the scariest thing. Hes not beyond a wag the dog where a politician was in trouble and they created a fake war against albania. The had goes back to his buddies, but also a diversion. What is the one thing in his mind that could stop the headlines about mueller . What is the one thing to stop the headlines about his destroy policy . I beat isis. He works back from the headline. He produces. Hes not in the real world. He produces. And his latest production is an absurd lie that will end up possibly costing american lives. We might be able to do a dotted line six years from now from a terrorist attack in this country that happened because we didnt finish the job there. Six years from now . It will be a lot if its isis, it will be sooner than that because as somebody pointed out just two christmass ago, they blew up paris. Now we have them on the ground and were letting them up because donald trump wants to do a favor for Vladimir Putin. And create a lie. And air due won. And create a lie that says i defeated isis that is going to cost lives. This is his biggest lie so far. And also, follow the money. As always, when you look at Foreign Policy, why is he taking it too easy on the saudis . Because the saudis gave him millions and millions of dollars. They buy a lot of his toys. Why is he taking it easy on russia . Because as the sun said, we get most of our money from russia. Robert mueller knows, too, all the other money that donald trump has gotten from russia. So we see that he does Vladimir Putin a favor, undermining u. S. Foreign policy. And we gets a call from turkey saying theyre terrorists. All of a sudden, donald trump goes, oh, theyre terrorists. Thats terrible. Were going to pull them out. No. Theres a trump tower in turkey, as well. No way. There are two. There are two trump towers in turkey. As we always say here, its not about Foreign Policy and its not about political money, its about his money. Ill say it again. Hes not running for reelection. Everything hes doing right now is to line his pockets. Two years from now. Joe, as youve been talking, breaking news, russian president Vladimir Putin was asked about President Trumps decision to pull out of syria. He said, quote, as for defeating isis, i agree with the president of the United States that theyve been defeated and he calls the withdraw of United States the, quote, correct decision. Thats from Vladimir Putin talking about donald trump. So our Intel Community disagrees with putin when it comes to interference in the elections. And our entire Foreign Policy appear r apparatus agre apparatus disagrees with trump. But hes there, alone. President putin and president air due w air of turkey safrtisfied, as well. As for this, putin agrees with the president of the United States. Coming up, roger stone will join us. Well be right back. Will join us. Well be right back. [ snow crunching ] [ load crunching ] [ whispers ] this is the loudest snow ever. So shark invented duo clean. While deep cleaning carpets, the added soft brush roll picks up large particles, gives floors a polished look, and fearlessly devours piles. Duo clean technology, corded and cordfree. Test. Test. A newly reported request frommel special counsel Robert Muellers Office Appears to indicate more action could be just around the corner. Some people familiar with the request tells the wthe washing post that the special counsels office asked the House Intelligence Committee on friday for an official transcript for roger stones if testimony. Joining us now, carol linen. Good morning. So walk us through this a little bit. Its one of the first times weve seen some crossover, some confluence between the Mueller Investigation and investigations by the intel committees in congress. Yes. Its really interesting because in a way, this sounds so technical, you know, request for a certified official transcript. But, really, what it means is mueller has known for a long time what roger stone told congress about his contacts with wikileaks and how he somehow accurately predicted wikileaks coming release of a lot of damaging information about Donald Trumps challenger in the weeks before the election. Mueller has known that information for, i would assume, months. The testimony was in august 2017. But here, the special counsels prosecutors are making an official request for an official copy of the certified transcript and theres really only one reason to have that kind of record, according to several former and current prosecutors. And thats when youre getting ready to indict somebody. So this long running swirl of investigation around roger seems to be coming to a head. Yeah. Maybe a charge that he lied to congress, for example. Heidi has a question for you. Hi, carol. As you said, this could precede some charges against roger stone, but do we know anything additional about what stone may be able to give up on the president himself . It was curious the other night when Rudy Giuliani was interviewed, i believe it was on fox, and he was paused when he was asked about what trump knew ahead of wikileaks and whether roger stone specifically tipped off trump on wikileaks. Well, you know, heidi, its such a good question. In the last few weeks, weve written some stories that i think were putting some of these pieces together. Everything is like a puzzle piece. But remember, the president iif said he didnt have any early knowledge of what wikileaks was going to do. On august 3rd, roger stone, we now know through the investigation, was alerted by email by his friend jerome corsi that word is our friend in london is going to release some damaging information in second in the the text is confused, but it looks like october 2nd or the second week of october. In fact, it was the first week of october, exactly right. How did jerome corsi know that . And on august 2nd, we now piece together ooanother piece of evidence which is months and months and months ago, roger stone was on a conservative broadcast and said he had just spoken with President Trump on august 2nd. So whats going on exactly . You have an email one day and you talked to the candidate the next day. Does roger stone have information that the president lied about saying that he had no advanced knowledge about wikileaks . These are the questions. Carol, thank you so much for your reporting this morning. Coming up, far right conservatives demand the president hold his ground overboarder wall, even if it means the Government Shutdown before christmas. Where those negotiations now stand, ahead on morning joe. Stand, ahead on morning joe. The greatest wish of all is one that brings us together. The final days of wish list are here. Sign and drive off in a new lincoln with zero down, zero due at signing, and a complimentary first months payment. Only at your lincoln dealer. But when i started seeing things, i didnt know what was happening. So i kept it in. He started believing things that werent true. I knew something was wrong. But i didnt say a word. During the course of their disease around 50 of people with parkinsons may experience hallucinations or delusions. But now, doctors are prescribing nuplazid. The only fda approved medicine. Proven to significantly reduce hallucinations and delusions related to parkinsons. Dont take nuplazid if you are allergic to its ingredients. Nuplazid can increase the risk of death in elderly people with dementiarelated psychosis and is not for treating symptoms unrelated to parkinsons disease. Nuplazid can cause changes in heart rhythm and should not be taken if you have certain abnormal heart rhythms or take other drugs that are known to cause changes in heart rhythm. Tell your doctor about any changes in medicines youre taking. The most common side effects are swelling of the arms and legs and confusion. We spoke up and it made all the difference. Ask your parkinsons specialist about nuplazid. Shes doing it again no cover up spray here. Its the irresistibly fresh scent of febreze air effects. Cheaper aerosols can cover up odors, burying the smell in a flowery fog. Switch to febreze air effects febreze eliminates even the toughest odors from the air. And it uses an allnatural propellant to leave behind a pleasant scent youll love. Use anywhere odors can spread. Freshen up, dont cover up. Febreze air effects. Were going to get an update from vlads press conference. Vladimir putin asked about President Trumps declaration that isis has been defeated. Quote, donald is right and i agree with him. Asked about the decision to withdraw u. S. Troops from syria putin said its the right thing to do. Good god. We move on. But well be getting back to this. Lawmakers in the house could take up a short term spending bill to keep the government running. That would punt the battle over President Trumps battle over the border wall until next year. Joining us now adrian elrod. Also with us, author of the Washington Post early newsletter power up jackie. So starting, i guess, jackie with the border wall discussions, where is this going to end up and how does the president save face . Despite the roller coaster that weve been on with President Trump attempting to take one last stand to get 5 billion in funding for his highly campaigned on border wall along the southern border, it looks like there again is not support in congress to secure this funding. Congress embraceed a short t emd a short term funding bill. Theres no support for this on the democratic sign or on the gop. You guys played the clip of the president saying that he could do everything alone, multiple times. Paired with Kellyanne Conway saying just yesterday that actually he cant do this alone. He needs the hill. So his allies, steven moore, ann coulter, his whole rightwing gang are not happy about this. This goes against what the Trump Campaign was built on. But it doesnt seem like the president will be able to secure this. Yet again we never know what the president will do here. He did say he would be proud to shut down the government. Its unclear if hell sign this bill. Of course, we still dont understand why they have to go the hill because mexico is going to pay for this. Hes already said it. He couldnt get the wall when the republicans owned washington, d. C. Thats right. Now that nancy pelosi is speaker hes not getting wall. Hes not getting the wall. This is his time to get the wall. Hes had complete control of congress in the last two years and the white house. If he was going to get the wall it would be now. How does nancy pelosi move forward . She will get sworn in as the next speaker june 3rd. There will be a balance. She wants to get legislation done. Shes thinking we didnt hold on to the house too long last time, lets build a lasting majority. Thats what Newt Gingrich said in 95 and he was successful with it. How does she balance legislation with a call we all know shes going to investigate and impeach. This is why we need somebody experienced like leader pelosi. She knows how to walk and chew gum at the same time. Theres a lot of questions about the this administration that need checks and balances and need investigating but at the same time she also knows she won, democrats won based on Kitchen Table issues. They want to see wages raised. They want to see health care fixed but not repealed. Shes got to have this balancing act. Thats why we need somebody like her running things in congress as opposed to somebody else. Jackie, what about the wall then . Whats the future now . We had Mitch Mcconnell passing a budget that doesnt include any funding for the wall. Well see if the president signs it. What are the republicans on capitol hill thinking . But a lot of republicans campaigned on this in 2018. What are their prospects right now and how upset are they that theres no wall here thats right. Quite frankly were not seeing all that much outrage on the this. We havent seen that much urgency in the past month to secure funding for the wall. Theres not much of an appetite to secure this 5 billion. While the president is in d. C. Playing politics and republicans have campaigned on this unrealistic promise between funding different loopholes from other agencies, secure funding to pay for the wall, to claiming that mexico will pay for the wall, theres a humanitarian crisis thats unfolding at the border at the moment. You do have hundreds of people from south america coming in through the border and now they are not just going through these ports of entry but because of certain tactics they are going into even more remote places which has positioned trumps customs and Border Patrol in a precarious situation where they are not totally equipped to handle the intluks, the hundreds of people coming in. At a time. I do think that there is a recognition that funding could be better used in other ways, perhaps to dedicating more resources, more personnel to prevent things auch as the death of the 7yearold girl. Im concerned there could be an overplay of their hand coming in as far as investigations and impeachments. What your hearing within the circles as how they will approach. Is there a chance they can overplay their hand. Theres this notion democrats cant do both is overplayed. Again, this is the oversight power of congress. Congress is the only check and balance right now on this administration. So its important that democrats especially the three leaders of the Oversight Committee chr their Constitutional Authority and have a check on this administration. At the same time thats not why we won back congress. And the American People especially the swing voters to decided you know what we may have supported republicans in 2016 but were supporting democrats this time around. They expect us to get something done and they expect us to work across the aisle. Again going back to what i said earlier i do believe this is why we need somebody like leader pelosi in there to make sure everybody is playing by the rules but getting the job done both for the American People and to keep a check on the administration. Adrian, jackie, thank you both. Coming up this morning the president is tweeting about two republicans who agree with his decision to withdraw troops from syria. But there are far more who disagree. Well be joined by one them. He has putin on his side. A press conference that goes on. The president is tweeting very defensively. He should. Hes actually played into Vladimir Putin and isis hand and irans hand. Republican congressman and air force veteran Adam Kinzinger is next on morning joe. This holiday season, families near you need your help. Visit redcross. Org now to donate. When president obama pulled our troops out after iraq, what happened . We had to fight our way back in and reestablish it. Youre talking about way more than 2,000 troops. In iraq 5,000. In syria combined they managed to do a very good job pushing back on isis. The president said he wants to bring the company be wrong. Hes doing exactly if not worse than president obama did. What good is reelection if you go ahead and give syria to iran, lose iraq again. Look at this stunning news. They are reforming everyone this is according to our friends like the kurds, everybody is upset and afraid. Can you make a note for me . I need to put fox friends on my list. The last couple of weeks. Let me tell you something. Like Brian Kilmeade said, thats what somebody in New Hampshire will be saying against donald trump. Of course. Everybody criticized barack obama for leaving iraq when the iraqis wanted us out there. Even Donald Trumps own administration is saying today they are concerned by his decision. Saying eight days ago what Brian Kilmead src drckilmeade ib not over. Its worse than if we cut and run. How do you as president of the United States ignore your secretary of defense and just about everybody else on the Foreign Policy landscape that matters . And then you help Vladimir Putin, you help isis regain their foot hold there, and my god, you help iran. You talk about in 2018, i dont mind saying the word, you talk about an axis of evil, you got the russians thinking about if vading ukraine right now. You got the russians trying to undermine american democracy according to Donald Trumps own intel agencies and his secretary of department of Homeland Security and we give him that gift. We give putin that gift . We could not help our enemies any more than donald trump did. And Brian Kilmeade is exactly right. Its unspeakable what hes done. Were walking away from our friends the kurds. Heres what the president tweeted exactly the opposite of what youre saying. He says quote russia, iran, syria and others are the local enemy of isis. We were doing their work. Hold on. Russia has not been in the middle east since 1973. Russia is in the middle east right now because of donald trump and donald trump is calling russia the quote local enemy of isis . Yes. He has ceded syria and that part of the middle east over to Vladimir Putin. He said we need to turn it over to russia, injury and iran and bring our men and women home. The press secretarys father, Mike Huckabee is publicly disagreeing with his daughter. Thank god btime. Tweeting, i want troops home too but leaving syria abruptly is betrayal to kurds who have sacrificed and shed blood for americans and it leaves syrian christians as sitting ducks. Please donald trump rethink this. Your friends and supporters hope you reconsider. I will say this for the first time probably since we had him on talking about frying squirrels. Frying squirrels in ten years. Amen. Hes exactly right. Were abandoning as weve done time and time again abandoned the kurds who stood by us. Our strongest ali. Helped us. Our strongest allies when the sunnis ran, when the shia ran the kurds always stayed there and fought for us. In new tweet moments ago conservative attorney George Conway who is married to president s top counselor Kellyanne Conway tweeted an excerpt from a new analysis writing, exactly right. The extent to which republicans are distancing themselves from the white house is a poor sign for a future where even more of the administration is under investigation. The signs of a collapse are here. The question is what pushes everything over the brink . I could not agree more. Is David Ignatius still with us . David ignatius, again, here we are, were an hour into this. And got the entire Republican Administration the entire republican establishment speaking out. Youve got even people that arent part of the republican establishment, those that have been on the outside fighting in, you got Mike Huckabee, Mike Huckabee out there telling the president please reconsider. This is a betrayal. American allies consider this a betrayal. As you said shocked. They are absolutely shocked. Then you have donald trump david, please explain the insanity of this. Donald trump is now calling russia a quota local in the middle east. I can only cite some more voices for you, joe, and i just want to turn to the people who have actually been doing this fight who ive had a chance to see, just a couple of snapshots. Im thinking of a Sergeant Major i met back in february at the front lines fighting isis, still fighting isis. A guy who has four purple hearts, six bronze starks as. I was thinking of a guy flying back with a guy who was flying home to see his mom. He had to leave his buddies at the front line to continue this fight alone. Thats what hurts for the people who were involved in this fight. Walking away from what they were doing, an unfinished job and walking away from the syrian kurds who theyve seen risk their life day after day and, you know, to walk away from that brotherhood of battle for these american soldiers is really painful. And i will say Mike Huckabee brought up the betrayal of the kurds. Our allies. The betrayal of syrian christians. The betrayal of allies all across region. Really the betrayal of israel. The betrayal, again, of all of our allies. All hes doing is helping Vladimir Putin. My god, here republican senators from yesterday saying the same. The decision to withdraw american presence in syria is a grave error, in my mind, that will have significant repercussions in the years and months to come. I dont know who advised this decision be made but its a terrible mistake and unfortunately i think were going to pay a price for it if its not reversed. Ive seen the president tweet. It unnerved me. In my view isis is not defeated in syria and iraq. I was there just a few months ago. If we do, in fact, withdraw, the biggest winners are iran, isis, assad. If youre tired of fighting radical islam i understand it but they are not tired of fighting you. It takes two to end the war. 2,200 troops is a footprint. Its a small insurance policy to defend a nation against threats and i want allies and what youve done if we withdraw, youre going to make it harder to find allies. Honestly, this makes what obama did in iraq, replicating that. In many ways its even worse here were in a situation where were very close and youre close to finishing clearing out. Its a terrible thing for our nation, terrible thing for the allies that weve been working with. Its hard to imagine that any president would wake up and make this kind of decision with this little communication, with this little preparation. I mean my understanding is were like beginning to move out right now. Entirely . Yes. Entirely. Ive never seen a decision like this since ive been here in 12 years where nothing is communicated in advance and all of a sudden this time of Massive Decision takes place. Its obviously a political decision. Joining us now is Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger of illinois. Hes an air force veteran and currently a major in the international guard. I understand you were surprised by this decision as well and dont agree with it. What your hoping for from the white house, from cabinet officials who may disagree with this as well . You know, ive said the president has a right to make that decision. Im not questioning that. This is a bad questions. If im a cabinet official and i think every one of them had their advice disregarded or not asked i would be furious about it. This is a big deal. Seems the president , this bromance with rand paul got completed they played golf and ran with his very out there Foreign Policy that is libertarian and has nothing to do with republicanism but is masquerading as a republican got in the president s ear. Instead of the president going in front of his Foreign Policy team that knows this he says its done, were going to do it, were going to pull everybody out. Rand is excited. Laura ingrahm is excited. But the rest of the people who understand how the world works and 2,200 troops is a small investment to destroy isis and keep them at bay the rest of us are confused. One of the elements of this decision other than the announcement by tweet was a video that the president of the United States cut announcing that, weve done this wonderful thing and everyone who has sacrificed, everyone who has fallen on the field of battle over there is thrilled with my decision, his decision, the president s. Im wondering a, if you saw the video and b, what was your reaction . I was offended. I was almost trembling after i saw it. I dont know if he intended this to be the case. But i wear on my wrist a buddy of mine that i flew with in 08. He was killed in iraq in 2018. His name is captain okeefe. The president cannot speak for captain okeefe in terms of whether he wants to continue to prosecute the war against terror or not. When somebody gives their life for the country lets respect them and not drag them into the politics of whether fighting isis is wrong or right. The president has a right to make this decision. I would say he has the right, even if it was president obama. But i have the right and responsibility to say this is poor, this is a bad decision. Will you and members of the house and the members, likeminded members of the Senate Pressure him to change his mind . Hes changed his mind before. Yeah. Ive been trying to pressure since this all came out yesterday morning in terms of legislation. Theres not much we can do. Its a decision by the president. Is there a chance he might change his mind . I dont know. Probably not. Maybe. Depends if rand paul talks to him. It depends how that cycle goes. What are you talking about, rand paul . Are you really youre not really he attacks rand paul all the time. He calls him weak. Are you really saying rand paul is running u. S. Foreign policy right now . I dont think hes running u. S. Foreign policy but for whatever reason he got into the president s ear and thats an impetus. Because i dont know what happened. Literally the president woke up and i dont what happened. Rand is celebrating. I understand what youre saying and its sort of who is in his face at the moment to trigger him to do something. That might be the concern that that has had. Maybe Lindsey Graham needs to go golfing with him today. Heres the bigger question. Ill post it to adam but also to the table. At what point, at what point are members of this administration concerned that a snap decision like this was made and can be made again . And condemn and not only our place in the world, but put lives in danger because this seems like an incredibly snapped decision and weve seen this before from this president. They are concerned. So the question is what do you do . Should pompeo continue at state. Should mattis continue at the dod if this president will send 6,000 troops to the border to fight an imaginary enemy and take out 2,000 troops that are holding iran, syria, isis and russia in check. Yeah. I mean thats a tough one to answer. I would be concerned especially if im sitting in the administration and i wasnt asked about it or my opinion was disregarded or i see a repeat of what we were so argumentative. Congressman, this is willie geist. I want to read you a quote that came across from Vladimir Putin at a press conference. He was asked about this decision by the president of the United States. First asked about the president s declaration that isis has been defeated. President putin said quote donald is right and i agree with him. Then asked about the pledge to withdraw u. S. Troops from syria. He said its the right thing to do. What is your reaction to putins reaction to donald trump . Its amazing. Next you know, we may as well as pull out of ukraine and call georgia ukraine and nato enemies and russia will praise us even more for that. The russians wanted us to leave, they want the middle east. If they think isis is defeated they are feeding in to this so the president believes it. What is there to say. It speaks for itself. Putin is not our friend. Thank you very much. We want to bring in two reporters into the conversation. White house correspondent for pbs news hour and Senior Writer at politico and coauthor of the playbook jake sherman. Jake, where did this come from . A good question but its important to think about the politics here and think back to 2003, 2004 and 2005 when the Bush Administration was on the hill constantly answering questions in 2006 and 2007 too from Democratic Committee chairmen about the background of decisions that they were making. Forget mueller for a second but if you think about military decisions, brass, military brass will be called to the hill constantly in open testimony. Secretary of state pompeo, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and asked tell us about the decisionmaking and what is your strategy in pulling out of a place like syria and its going to be quite embarrassing for this administration because they wont have the answer because these people being dragged to the hill were not involved as kinzinger said. It was a rand paul push and thats a difficult thing to answer for this administration and it will be on cable tv all day, every single day and thats a very difficult thing for this administration to contend with. I actually dont think they are prepared to answer questions like that or they are even aware questions of that nature are going to be asked by congress because this Republican Congress has not done so for two years. So its going to be a very rudd awakening for an administration thats been coddled and thats not too strong of a word by a Republican Congress. Jake, this is a major policy decision about a vital region in the world that were involved with announced by tweet. According to your sources and reporting, do we know when the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, the outgoing chairman, general joe dunford when was he informed about this, how did he find out about this . It was reported this morning he was made aware after the fact and the Washington Post reported European Defense secretaries were calling the administration trying to understand the decisionmaking process here. I talked to a bunch of republicans yesterday on capitol hill who were completely dumbfounded and unaware and people in positions of power and people who get briefings and say what you want about the Obama Administration and the Bush Administration, but they had an operation by which they got Key Stakeholders bought into decisions and if they werent bought in they were at least informed. This is the kind of things thats going to engender rage in both parties on capitol hill and to some extent the president is lucky that hes going to be leaving presumably in the next couple of days because this congress has its hair lit on fire except for ran paul. So theres one person thats happy. Ive not found anybody else that ive spoken to over the last day thats been happy about this. Anger is an important thing and i dont think generating rage would upset him one bit. In fact, i think he likes it. He doesnt mind the rage. Theres two pieces of this that are hard found. One is the substance of the decision for all the reasons we talked about and why we would be taking troops out at this moment, why we would be helping Recep Tayyip Erdogan with the kurds and all these things. The second part is that more mi mystifying, everybody in his circle say its a bad idea. He goes off and makes a different kegs. I dont believe it was rand paul alone who got him to do this. So people like dunford find out after fact. European defense ministers calling us what are you guys doing. Even if you make a bad decision you want a process to roll it out and explain it to the world and defending to it world. Hes doing it by tweet and without telling anybody. This is in the course of three months. You have a president who has made a snap decision that could impact the world order, that puts lives in danger, that Foreign Policy experts and members of administration are staggered and horrified by, and yet he has placed troops at our border to get ready for a caravan that never came. This is where we are at this point. I wonder if members of the administration are going to think this is now the time to do things differently. Whats happening has not worked. I think that this is what you get when you have a president who governs by tweet. You have this idea that hes thinking about whats politically expedient for him. The caravan and scaring people into thinking immigrants are coming to a Shopping Mall near you got him wins in the midterm election. Democrats took a lot of wins but in the senate that idea of ginning up fear of immigrants helped him politically. Hell keep those troops there even if they are twiddling their fingers. Were looking at a president governing by tweet and the only person thats happy other than rand paul is Vladimir Putin. Its shocking to remember that the president of russia is now saying that isis has been defeated. As a reporter who covered arlington cemetery, somebody who went to funeral after funeral for people who died in iraq, there are military families out there who feel so abandoned by the government and feel so invisible a lot of times. Im thinking about those people. Thinking about the people whose loved ones died in syria because they were told they were fighting for freedom, told they were fighting for isis. Now it seems this government saying and President Trump is saying were sorry these troops passed away but were done here. Thats a hard thing for military families who i talked to personally at funeral after funeral. Jake sherman, thank you very much for being on this morning. Up next, a leading member of the Foreign Relations committee, senator chris coombs joins the conversation. Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. These techs in a lab. This builder in a hardhat. The welders and electricians who do all of that. The diner staffed up cause they all needed lunch. Teachers. Doctors. Jobs grew a bunch. What started with one job spread all around. Because each job in energy creates many more in this town. Energy lives here. The meeting of the executive finance committee is now in session. And. Adjourned. Business loans for eligible card members up to fifty thousand dollars, decided in as little as 60 seconds. The powerful backing of american express. Dont do business without it. Joining us now member of the judiciary and Foreign Relations subcommittee democratic senator chris koovs chris coombs and also joining us is ian brzezinski. North korea has now come out and said it will not denuclearize unless the United States removes its troops and Nuclear Umbrella from south korea and japan. Who could have ever seen this coming, first of all. Isnt it amazing how weakness, just being so weak and pathetic and just cowering under the sight of Vladimir Putin. Isnt it amazing how it encourages other tyrants. Kim jongun is sitting there. Watching what happened yesterday and before that. New demands for donald trump. Get your troops out of south korea and japan or theres no deal. Could you ever imagine he would seem so weak and impotent as a president , the very guy that ran on strength to the point, now hes getting kicked by the other cool yard bullies. Lets go to senator coombs. This is whats so devastating politically for donald trump. This guy ran on strength and donald trump cower at the sight of Vladimir Putin in helsinki and now we see him cowering once again and turning the middle east, turning syria over to russia and he actually in a tweet this morning called russia a local power there. By the way, just for our friends watching at home, until donald trump, russia had been locked out of the middle east since 1973. Thats right. I couldnt disagree more with this decision. Its a terrible decision, both in how the president made it and in what hes decided to do. I only pray that our president will reconsider, because he managed to you night all of us in the senate in the last two days. First we had a very positive day where we all came together and passed a big bold bipartisan criminal Justice Reform bill and managed to avoid a Government Shutdown, so the mood was pretty positive yesterday. And then just like a shot of electricity, the message that the president in a tweet announced he was going to withdraw from syria and hand a Great Big Christmas gift to the ayatollah khomeni and Bashar Al Assad i think unified our senate in concern even outrage. Youve played earlier in this segment the statement from a wide range of senators. Ill add my voice to them. I pray our president reverses this terrible decision that simply cedes the ground of syria, iran and isis to russia. Ian brzezinski those of you associated with the Atlantic Council were very concerned leading into this week about what is going on in ukraine. Concern that putin may show aggression to you crane in the coming weeks or months. Weve seen how Donald Trumps weakness has nurjd a tyrannical leader in north korea to issue a new statement, new demands. How will this weakness impact Vladimir Putin who is already praising it. Doe it give him a green light to go into ukraine . Joe, putin feeds on week naes and d weakness. If you look at the situation around ukraine today you see the following. You see a sustained build up of Russian Forces along ukraines eastern frontier. For two years russia has been Building Bases and roads and deploying large amounts of tafrpgs, forces and just recently more tanks, more aircraft into that area, air troops into that area. From putins Vantage Point he sees a west in political disarray and paralysis. He sees germany in disarray. He sees the protest in france. He sees britain frozen by brexit and he looks across the ocean and sees a president faced with distractions at home. You look at the west response when russian seized those three ukrainian ships. No response. Eu had a big summit they did nothing. Yesterday president decreased and increased sanctions. Winter is a bad time for ukraine. Least capable at that time to defend its territory. Senator coombs let me ask you how this decision was made by the president of the United States . He dont know. The only person weve seen come out in support of it is senator rand paul. But otherwise its been almost consensus that this is a bad decision including from his secretary of defense james mattis, the general was against this policy. The president s own special envoy to syria just eight days ago said it would be reckless to leave syria and here we are the president announcing. Do you have any sense from talking to people around washington and on capitol hill how the president arrived at this decision . I dont. My strong impression from other senators i spoke with last night was that none of the relevant senior senators had been consulted or informed before this decision was announced. I think it was announced on twitter. Its possible because i havent spoken to every senator that there were some that he consulted with but the idea that it was senator rand paul and senator mike lee cheering this and other 90 senators i expect will denoun it question its wisdom and the process and say this was a grave mistake tells you something about the ways in which President Trump who ran as an unconventional candidate, our only president with no experience before getting into office is uniformly condemned by the United States state. It shows a lack of consultation. Im more concerned if he made this decision in direct opposition to advice from the senior levels of our armed forces and our Intelligence Community who i strongly suspect advised him urgently against making this brazen and ill considered move. David ignatius. I want to ask a question of ian brzezinski. Listening to your careful diction and precise language, i cant help but think of your dad. Exactly. Your dad was wary of using military force but when he felt it was necessary he tried to do it with that similar precision. Im just wonder what sort of advice you think woe offer based on your study of his career, his instincts about politics. What would he be saying now . You know, i look back to the Carter Administration when they deterred a soviet invasion of poland in 1980. And thats an interesting analogy because poland of not a member of nato, it was actually an occupied territory of the warsaw pact. The russians mobilized divisions of east german forces, i guess soviet Russian Forces and deployed them right on the side of polands frontiers. And the administration undertook a very impressive strategy to deter that invasion. They warned on solidarity. They leveraged Pope John Paul ii voice to communicate to the polish people to warn them. They clearly articulated readiness typical pose a very serious economic sanctions on the russians and i have to assume in light of those soviet mobilizations nato force were put on a higher level of alert. That significantly contributed if not drove the soviet decision not to invade poland at that time. So its possible to deter aggression against a nonallied state like ukraine today. Thats how my father would have approached it. Senator coombs, whats next . What does the United States senate do today with 90, at least 90 of the senate opposed to the ceding of syria, completely to the iranians, to the russians and isis . Joe, youll hear today very strong, very unified message to the president begging him to reconsider his decision before he heads off for his two week golf vacation at maralago. He put out a video referencing those who fought and. Sacrificed and died in the fight against isis and youll hear voice from our armed force, from the congress, and from the general public saying that the war against isis is not won, and that we should best honor the sacrifice and service of our men and women at arms not to cede this ground, not paving a highway for syria with iran and threatening israel. We have the worlds most powerful military for a reason. The fight against isis was an important and noble and significant effort where we pulled in dozens of countries. The United States did manage to bring some measure of stability to a part of the country that was destroyed by isis, but that fight is not over and not won. For us to unilaterally withdraw and abandon the kurds to an almost certain advance by either the turkeys or the iranians or both, i think is just why would anyone stand alongside us and fight in such an important conflict as our work against sistine future if this show you we treat our partners, the kurds in this important fight against isis. So youll see a lot of effort today to try to persuade the president to reverse this decision. Of course the answer is they wouldnt because of this and i fear many people, senator, that saw that video in the military thought it grotesque the president summoned up the memories of men and women who sacrificed their all for this country, to fight against isis, to fight against russia, to fight against iran and then claim turning that country over to Vladimir Putin and isis and assad is the last thing their loved ones would want. Senator coombs, thank you very much. Ian, thank you as well. Thank you all. Good to have you both on this morning. Coming up its not only troubling signs for urs Foreign Policy theres also indications that the u. S. Economy may be in deeper trouble than first thought. Steve rattner will explain why next. My mom washes the dishes. Before she puts them in the dishwasher. So what does the dishwasher do . Cascade platinum does the work for you, prewashing and removing stuckon foods, the first time. Wow, thats clean cascade platinum. This holiday season, families near you need your help. Visit redcross. Org now to donate. Weve had some bad news to cover today so now heres some news. I dont know if you call it good news or not. You promised you would bring him. Baby debut. And your baby girl is here. How old is he . Hes 18 weeks. He just spit up on me. Healthy looking dude right there. Look at this baby. This is my wife. How are you doing . Very good to meet you. Bringing some festive cheer. Good to see you. Making his tv debut with his hat on. Hat looks good. This is the morning joe first family. Thank you so much. You can all go im keeping the baby. So, im serious. So now we move on to stock futures. Here you go. I got it. I got it. Here we go. Thank you. Now come to me. We have a new show. Pick a side. Youre not getting that baby back. Never. Are you ready, willie. Well pretend that never happened. Children are the future, thats why we go Steve Rattner because children are the future. Okay. We need to hand him back. That baby is going to get sick again. Stop it. Stop it. Youre asking for it, mika. Youre going to get thrown up all over. Mika is over. Mika needs to adopt a baby. I think we need to get the lipstick off the babys forehead. Here we go. Well pretend that didnt happen. Dwhiet do . What do i do . Stock futures are up in the u. S. Singling another tough day for wall street. Thanks guys for coming. We appreciate it. Looks like another tough day on wall street after the Federal Reserve once again raised Interest Rates. The fed announced yesterday that as the market had expected it was going raise the benchmark rate. That was the fourth increase this year and the ninth since the central bank normalized rates. Steve you have some charts for us. What in the world is going on . Now i have to be serious. Nor babies. First lets take a look what happened. The stock market has had a rough several months and, in fact, when you add it all together the stock market is back so where tass 15 months ago, back to where it was before Donald Trumps tax plan that was going to make America Great again was put in place. By the way, its down what what percentage is it down since . 2 , 3 , 4 since the tax cuts . Since the tax cuts, yeah, down, 2 , 3 , 4 , Something Like that. This is the worst december since 1931 for stock market. Which wasnt a great year. No. Not a great year, 1931. Why is this happening . There are a lot of reasons. Always to decipher the stock market even after it happens. Global growth, slowing Global Growth is playing a role. Well take a look at those numbers. If you look over here on a global basis, growth is coming down from, is projected to come down from 3. 2 to 3 . That may not sound like a lot but thats a couple hundred billion dollars when you look at it across the worlds economy. When you look at china, it wasnt so long ago that china experienced 8 , 9 , 10 growth. Now its down a couple percent to 6. Quite a change over five years. Also china makes up their numbers to some degree. Many fears china is in much worse shape. For the u. S. Were looking at growth somewhere in the 2. 5 range which is a long way from 3 plus that donald trump told us. Lets ask. Is this just you look over 100 years and theres an ebb and a flow. Theres a version. Theres a recovery. Then we go back down towards the recession. Isnt this just part of a natural Business Cycle . To some degree it is. Economists say recoveries dont die of old age except they do. Were at the tail end of a long Business Cycle. Nonetheless its very possible donald trump will be facing a recession in 2020 as he runs for reelection. Why . Lets look at this last chart for one second and you can see what the world thinks will happen i want to be rates which is an arbiter of the future. The fed has been bringing down its Interest Rate projections and that was part of what it announced yesterday. But the market thinks this is whats happening to Interest Rates. The market thinks that Interest Rates might go up a little more but in 2020 they will be actually lower than they are today. Thats good news for borrower, good news for people getting a mortgage but a signal that the market thinks theres weakness coming. Globally whats the biggest driver to stagnation that were starting to see . It varioes. Europe is a mix. You know whats happening in france. China has a set of problems where xi is trying to manage the economy but not working very well. In the u. S. We this sugar high from the tax cut, from the spending, thats worn off and now were drifting back towards 2 growth maybe worse. I know we have to go. I just have to ask this question. Die the set up. So, you look at what the world is looking like, what the eu is looking like, what britain, germany, china, russia. The United States of america still is the safest port in the storm, right . Well china has higher growth but among the developed world well have the fastest rate of growth even under these circumstances. As far as long term stability we dont know what will happen to china. But we also have one of the worst fiscal positions. The bottom line to some degree is board of trustees is not going running two years from now with a 3 plus growing economy and wages havent gone up a lot for tanch american. Steve, thanks. That was great. Up next, we have a pair of u. S. Congressmen from opposite sides of the aisle and the push to avoid a Government Shutdown now just one day away. 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President trump tweeted yesterday, quote, we have defeated isis in syria. This morning, he tweeted that because the United States is pulling out open his order, quote, russia, iran and syria will now have to fight isis. So they will be fighting a group, the president claimed yesterday was already defeated it appears. Joining us from while democratic congressman John Garamendi alongside tom reed of new york. Gentleman, thank you so much. Congressman garamendi. Your reaction to the president ice announcement that those 2,000 troops or so, american troops will be coming home from syria. Well, once again, its a big head shaking. What in the world is this man thinking . Created a vacuum in syria so iran can have further influence in the area and turkey and russia. It makes absolutely no sense what soevgs given all the effort america put into defeating isis. Its not defeated. It is one of the most well, there are so many foolish things this man has done. This ranks high and extraordinarily dangerous going forward. Congressman reed, your view from the republican side. I disagree with my congressman here today. When we were out of syria, i saw no strategy of disengagement. So i appreciate the fact that the president is calling an end to this engagement and brigg our troops home. I think our men and women have completed their mission. They need to be brought home to their families. Going forward, i think there is a joint concern. We make sure we work with our ally, our nato allies to continue to confront isis wherever it exists. We can do this in a Partnership Way without potentially having boots on the ground in syria. Congressman reed, what do you say to members people from inside Donald Trumps state department but also the secretary of defense . I do agree, isis is obviously going to exist. Its almost like whack a mole. You have a great success, you put it down in one area. The extremism, the ideology is there. We have to be rise and looking over the horizon as to how we can confront it. I think we can do this in a Partnership Way. I only wish tom was accurate about there. Isis may be there, maybe 20,000 or so fighters still in the area. But ceding na territory to isis or iran makes absolutely no sense in the short term or long term for america. Clearly, russia is enthusiastically influencing the president. Why . Their influence in the area will grow even more. There is turkey sitting on the border already prepared to invade but actually not doing so because the United States is there invading, doing what . Taking on the kurds who did the fighting for a large part of the fighting for america as we pushed isis out of iraq and out of most of syria, but not all of it. Gentleman, we have a question for you. So after this decision on syria, north korea is now saying the u. S. Is suggesting the u. S. Should pull out troops in south korea. Do you see other foreign nations saying the United States has to pull out their troops from other areas now . Well well, you know, obviously, having a nation like income will use every opportunity it can to try to pitch that argument. But thats not going to go anywhere. You know, obviously, north korea is a totally different situation than we have in syria and our commitment there is long term and it will remain because of the threats of a nuclearized north korea represent. But when we talk about syria, i recognize the concern about isis. But we have to make sure we dont get into longterm entanglements with our men and women in harms way in perpetuity. We need to make sure when the mission is accomplished, we bring our folks home but continue to have the influence around the world. I think thats what people have been missing with this decision aarticulated by the president. You stand almost alone in your own party. Before we let you go, i want to weighing in on a Government Shutdown, we know Mitch Mcconnell, continuing a resolution to kick things into february. Where do you view this budget process playing out . Well, my view is, well get this done probably today and then well kick the ball down or can down the road to february 8th. There will be another fiscal cliff. A budgetary cliff at that time. It will be different. The democrats will control the house at that point and negotiation will be somewhat different. No, there will not be a christmas shutdown. I think john and i were on tv about a week ago, this is exactly what we saw coming. We were working together then. We will continue to Work Together forward to avert another crisis. The theater and the politics of it has taken over. What we need to do is focus on solving these issues first hand. I agree. Lets hope you do so. Thank you so much for your time. We appreciate it. Still ahead on morning joe, the president is on twitter playing major defense this morning over his decision to withdraw troops from syria for what seems to be his willingness to negotiate over the border wall. Morning joe is coming back in just a moment. He has a responsibility to get border security. If he can do it by himself, he would have done it already. Nobody knows the system better than me. Which is why i alone can fix it. If he can do it by himself, he would have done it already. I alone can fix split the if he could fix it himself, he would have done it already. I can fix it. The white house says the president needs help from congress for his border wall. But when it comes to war policy in syria, the president seems perfectly content to go it alone. I know more about isis than the generals do believe me. Welcome to morning joe. No, you dont. The consequences are going to be pretty devastating. Joe, willie and me, we have msnbc contributor mark barnacle, morning joe economic analyst steve radner. Nbc News National political reporter heidi pryzbilla. Communist, associate editor for the Washington Post David Ignacious and former nato supreme allied commander retired four Star Navy Admiral james stavrides. We will get to syria in one minute but rupert murdocks own wall street journal, which has for some time the editorial page at least is at times defended President Trump and a few others, the main stream media has, editorialized admiral about trumps syriairan retreat. The Islamic State is not defeated says the wall street journal. Mullahs are delighted. Retreat in syria is a sign of weakness the wall street journal concludes that friends and fauxs will notice. Who is celebrating more about their early Christmas Present than Vladimir Putin and russia. And theyve said as much. This is a massive geopolitical win for putin and russia. It absolutely is, joe. We have just gone through the season of firefight in california and weve watched these massive dev78 blazes. What the president is doing is the functional equivalent of weve gotten the fire contained. Were all around it. Weve kind of built it down but the embers are still smoldering and now were just going to leave. What do you think is going to happen . I think there is a pretty high chance we will see what we call in the navy a reflash, where the fire comes back. Thats the tactical problem. The Islamic State comes back. As you pointed out the geopolitics of this is terrible. Its not just Vladimir Putin doing high 5s with the mullahs in iran. Its the impact on our kurdish allies and friend in the region, who will see this as a betrayal. It will be written globally as a walk away and a betrayal. This is geopolitically the worst move from this administration. Thats a high bar to get over. That the a very high bar to get even. If you look at, mika, who is helped . Its a simple list. Isis is helped, my god, once again, retreat in the middle east. Barack obama and the United States, 70 of americans wanted us to get out of iran, created a vacuum, isis went right into that vacuum. Then president obama started the last year fighting back and pushing back and put them back on their heels, donald trump continued that. But here we have isis as the wall street journal says not defeated. So this is a big day for them. Iran, donald trump, i thought donald trump saw the iranians as an enemy . I mean, i thought that was almost the centerpiece of his Foreign Policy. This is massive news, good news for the iranians, and finally, who is happier about this than Vladimir Putin on the world stage . Absolutely nobody. This is a give away. This is Foreign Policy welfare for Vladimir Putin. He cant even believe his like, art, im sorry, maybe he can. Maybe this is connected to something that none of us know about. It certainly shows, well talk about this and admiral said something a few weeks ago on our show about people staying in there for the good fight. This shows the dysfunction in the white house at the highest level. President trump took to twitter yesterday to announce that he was ordering the withdrawal of all u. S. Ground forces from syria within 30 days, writing, quote, we have defeated isis in syria. My only reason for being there during the President Trump presidency. That was followed up by another tweet, which included video somebody conducted and posted. Like you have a whole Communications Department not in sync with the rest of the white house, including the National Security council and Foreign Policy cabinet heads. This is incredible. Right . I mean, could they be on board with this . I dont think so. On the president s official twitter page, this was posted. It was shot by a government camera. There was no press present. Take a look. We have been fighting for a long time in syria. I have been president for almost two years and we have really stepped it up and we have won against isis. We have beaten them and weve beaten them badly. Weve taken back the land. Now its time for our troops to come back home. These are great heroes of the world. Because they fought for us. But theyve killed isis, who hurts the world and we are proud to have done it. You know, i think george w. Bush would tell you that these sort of ceremonies are much more effective if you have a banner behind you that says mission accomplished, mr. President. Because the mission is not accomplished and the president s claim that isis is totally defeated doesnt appear to be backed by any evidence on the ground. Just last week, President Trumps special envoy to syria brett mcgurt told reporters at the state department it would be quote this was last week reckless to simply declare victory and leave. This was just lost week. The Trump Administration stated just last week that there was months of fighting still left. Just look at what the Trump Administration was saying just last week. We really are now down to the last 1 of the physical territory. We are prepared to maintain stabilization in iraq and syria. This will take a period of years. So the enduring defeat of isis means not just the physical defeat but training local security forces. So that will take to him someti sometime. We have the military mission is the defeat of isis. We have obviously learned a lot of lessons in the past. We know once the physical space is defeated we cant pick up and leave. We are doing all we can to endure. I think americans will remain own on the ground to make sure that defeat is enduring. Our parents taught us if something is too good to be true, its not true. I always tell my kids, if something doesnt make sense, there is a reason it doesnt make sense. This doesnt make sense. Have you the pittsburgh the secretary of defense, the entire Foreign Policy community in washington and across nato. You got everybody across the world except for the mullahs in iran and the terrorists and isis and Vladimir Putin in russia saying this is a terrible move. Yet, donald trump is doing it anyway, when his own administration is saying, what a dreadful mistake it is to cut and run. Nobody supports this in the Foreign Policy establishment. None of our allies support this. Nobody was given advanced notice of this. Donald trump, himself, just decided to cut and run and scream retreat when we were about to defeat isis. And really and truly it does seem like he did it unilaterally, when your defense secretary is not for it and john bolton is on the record for not doing it. The allies said they didnt see it coming. France said we will stay and fight in syria. When every senator from Lindsay Graham to marco rubio to ben sass, to bob corker, are blindsided. Very angry about it. Very angry about it. Lindsey graham saying its weak and dangerous. It raises the question, David Ignacious, who was behind this, if not the president alone . Who supported this decision . We heard from brett mcgurt. Hes the special envoy to syria. He has been on the record, not just in that byte we showed but saying not only can we not leave, when we do leave, win the physical space, we need to stay and keep a presence there for the foreseeable future. So who supported this decision beyond the president of the United States . This is donald j. Trump production starring donald j. Trump. This was a shock to the u. S. Military. You remember yesterday morning when we began to get word between 7 00 and 8 00, that this was coming. Yeah. And that the pentagon officials who were becoming aware, tuesday night the president had on his own basically decided to pull the plug on this mission, shocked those pentagon officials and people around the world as word began to seep out. This bears the risk of a significant blowup. We havent talked much about the turks. Turkey had been preparing to invade northern syria. Turkey has pretty much made a mess of every part of syria that its tried to get deeply involved in. Its a blood feud with our allies in syria. The syrian kurds, who are now very vulnerable, who are frightened that theyre facing enormous Turkish Military power without american support. So the worst of this i fear is yet to come. But the initial reaction from the military and the state Department Yesterday as i made dozens of calls was shock. Still ahead on morning joe, Lindsey Graham blasts the administrations syria decision and bob corker would have done same in person if his meeting with the president wasnt cancelled while he was waiting at the white house. Well show you the tough reaction from capitol hill. But first, bill kierans with a check on the forecast. Bill. Good morning to you, mika and joe. We are watching the worst of the Holiday Travel today and tomorrow. It clears out, Christmas Eve on monday looks okay, too. By far, already we have a tornado watch issued, a current Tornado Warning near lakeland, florida. That line of storms will be going throughout the Morning Hours and continuing this afternoon and heading down to ft. Lauderdale, west palm, later in miami. The rest of the southeast, its a soaking rain. Heres our Severe Weather risk area. Right where we have this enhanced risk is where we have our great tornado threat this morning. We have to watch eastern North Carolina and down here in south florida n. All, 17 Million People so obviously with all this weather going on, we have the possibility of major airport delays, tampa and orlando, atlanta from the rain, the val cume, we have some delays. Tomorrow morning, heavy rain and thunderstorms, some significant delays. Up toward boston. As far as the Holiday Outlook goes, as i mentioned, once we got to saturday, a big storm for the rest as we go through sunday, weak stuff in the areas of the east. There is Christmas Eve, just a huge storm in the west. With the rain and the snow, depending on your elevation. Christmas day, east of the rockies, you are in the clear, definitely a white christmas, many places like Salt Lake City and boise, too. Tomorrow morning, our Christmas Tree will be blowing around, 40mileperhour gusts with heavy rain and for anyone going to any of the airports. So again, keep that in mind, do any of your plans accordingly, make some changes if you possibly can. You are watching morning joe. Well be right back. At fidelity, we help you prepare for the unexpected with Retirement Planning and advice for what you need today and tomorrow. Because when youre with fidelity, theres nothing to stop you from moving forward. So shark invented duo clean. 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I dont know who had advised that this decision be made but its a terrible mistake and, unfortunately, i think we will pay a price for it if its not reversed. I have seen the president tweet unnerving, my view, isis is not defeated in syria and iraq. I was there just a few months ago. If we do, in fact, withdrawal the biggest winners will be iran, isis, assad. If you are tired of fighting radical islam, i understand it. Theyre not tired of fighting you. If you dont know that its a mistake. It 26 two to make a war. 2,200 feet is an insurance policy on isis coming back. What you have done if we withdraw, you are going to make it harder to fight allies. Honestly, this makes what obama did in iraq. Its replicating that. Many many ways its even worse, because here we are in a situation where we are very close in the Euphrates River valley to finish clearing out. Its a terrible thing for our nation. Its a terrible thing for the allies that we have been working with. Its hard to imagine that any president would wake up and make this kind of decision with this little communication, with this little preparation. My understanding is were like beginning to move out right now. Reporter entirely . Yes. Entirely. Ive never seen a decision like this since i have been here in 12 years where nothing is communicated in advance and all of a sudden this type of Massive Decision takes place. Its obviously a political decision. Corker told reporters that yesterday the white house cancelled a longplanned meeting with President Trump, who ill the senator was sitting in the waiting room for him. Admiral stavrides what should mattis, pompeo and others in the Foreign Policy community do . Ah, lets start by, you got steve radner there. Lets start by doing the numbers for a minute here. And you heard Lindsey Graham correctly say just over 2,000 troops, to put that in perspective, we have 6,000 troops on the Mexican Border facing a mythical enemy in these quote caravans coming. Somehow, we cant afford to have 2,000 troops doing arguably the most important Counter Terrorism mission that we face so what they should be doing is saying to the president , look, mr. President , you are a businessman, lets look at leverage. This is only a few thousand troops, but you leverage the creation of allies, partners and friends. You get nato into this deeper. The french will do that. The brits are doing it. We can bring the rest of nato in. This is a very winnable proposition. We ought to be using the argument of leverage with this president and, hopefully, we can turn this around. But, frankly, the odds of that seem low f. I were secretary mattis, my head would be exploding right now im so frustrated. Should secretary mattis resign . Speak up or resign. So he can speak out . I think he has to be contemplating that at this point. I feel his pain as a leader and one of our great generals, he must be saying to himself, if i cant convince the president to do something this important. Right. Perhaps its time for someone else to come in here. I hope that does not happen. We need secretary mattis where he is. But its got to be a pretty dark day in the pentagon as they contemplate this. I can understand him looking past some more risk decisions like sending troops to the border, if you are saying at least thats keeping Vladimir Putin in check in syria. Then he gives away the game. There is absolutely no leverage, mike, when it comes to donald trump and Vladimir Putin. We saw him cower, cow tail to Vladimir Putin in helsinki saying i trust the lying exkgb agent. I dont trust my own Intel Community. Now hes turned syria over to the russian grass to the russians to the iranians an isis. How far do we need to go . Who wins a republican primary in 2020 when thats on your resume that you turned syria over to the russians the iranians, and isis . You also placed israel in more danger than they already are in, ceding this territory to isis. And you also expose your most valuable ally on the ground, the kurds to a potential invasion from turkey as David Ignacious just pointed out. Admiral, let me ask you this, though, if you could clear it for people watching. The confusion when the president of the United States says we have defeated isis. Can you defeat isis by territory. You can take towns, you can take counties, you can take provinces, but thats not defeating isis. Could you please talk to the issue of maintaining the substantial force on the ground in syria for intelligence gathering and for defensive operations . Absolutely. Mike, as you well know, there are still 15 to 20,000 active Islamic State fighters and they tend to just melt into the distance and if we walk away from this, they will reform and come back together again. We need to remember, it was just over two years ago there were isis tank columns clampgi clanking towards baghdad. Its a lethal force. Lets not forget theyre highly connected on the internet in cyber space. Its very easy for them to disappear momentarily and come back together again and with our allies on the ground, disenheartened by this cutandrun move, it will be very difficult to do this a second time when the bombs start going off in europe like they were just two years ago at christmas in paris. Lets not forget. Coming up on morning joe, roger stone hasnt been nailed by the special counsel, but that hardly means hes on bob muellers radar. New reporting suggests he very much is. That conversation is next on morning joe. Much is. That conversation is next on morning joe. 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Some people tell the Washington Post the special counsels office asked the house intelligence in the on friday for an official transcript of official adviser roger stones testimony. A potential seen prosecutors could be moving to charge him with a crime. Joining us now is the Investigative Reporter msnbc contributor. Carol leddy. Walk us through this a bit. Its one of the first times weve seen some crossovers, confluence between the Mueller Investigation and investigations by the intel committees in congress. Reporter its really interesting. In a way, this sounds so technical, requests for a certified official transcript. But really, you know, what it means is mueller has known a long time about his contacts with wikileaks and how he somehow accurately predicted wikileaks coming release of pa lot of damaging information about Donald Trumps challenger in the weeks before the election. Mueller has known that information for i would assume months. The testimony was in august, 2017. But here, the commercial counsels prosecutors are making an official request for an official copy of the certified transcript and there is only one reason to have that kind of record according to federal and former prosecutors, thats when you are getting ready to indict somebo somebody. So this long running swirl around roger seems to be coming to a head. Seeming he lied to congress. Heidi pryzbilla has a question. Reporter hi, chairman, as you said, this could precede some charges against roger stone. But do we know anything additional about what stone may be able to give up on the president , himself . I was curious the other night when rouge rouge was interviewed i believe on fox and he was really paused when he was asked about what trump knew ahead of wikileaks and whether roger stone tripped off trump on wikileaks . Reporter heidi, its a good question. In the last weeks, weve written stories, we are putting these things together. Everything is like a puzzle piece. Remember, the president has said he didnt have any early knowledge of what wikileaks was going to do. Yet, there are some interesting dates here. On august 3rd, roger stone we now know was alerted by email by his friend jerome coursey that word is in london that our friend in london is going to release some damaging information in seconds, the sect confusing, it looks like october 2nd or second week of october. In fact, it was the first week of october. Exact ily right. How did jerome corsi know that . Thats in a draft charging document of Robert Muellers. Forgive me the email was august 3rd. On august 2nd, we piece together another piece of evidence which is months and months ago, roger stone was on a conservative broadcast and said that he had just spoken with, forgive me, with President Trump on august 2nd. So whats going on exactly . Have you an email one day and you talk to the president , im sorry, the candidate the next day. Does roger stone have information saying he lied about only in of wikileaks. These are the questions. Thank you so much. Coming up on morning joe, from Mass Shootings to me too, the ap is out with the top ten stories of 2018. Well run through the lists straight ahead. Morning joe back in a moment. Straight ahead morning joe back in a moment alright, i brought in ensure max protein. To give you the protein you need with less of the sugar you dont. [grunting noise] ill take that. 30 grams of protein and 1 gram of sugar. Ensure max protein. In two great flavors. Ensure max protein. Not long ago, ronda started here. And then, more jobs began to appear. These techs in a lab. This builder in a hardhat. The welders and electricians who do all of that. The diner staffed up cause they all needed lunch. Teachers. Doctors. Jobs grew a bunch. What started with one job spread all around. Because each job in energy creates many more in this town. Energy lives here. Earlier in the show, we played for you comments fox and friends cohost made expressing his skepticism about President Trumps decision to withdraw from syria. He now is tweeting about it. He responded to the president s claims by posting, quote clai we didnt win anything, they are still there. That from the show the president watches every morning. Welcome back to morning joe. Donny deutsche joining our conversation, nbc Foreign Correspondent keir simmons, rick stengel. And the cohosts of morning joe first look welcome. Keir, big picture here, weve seen senator to senator, republican democrat, we had one Republican Congressman on who supported the president s decision a little while ago. Hes certainly the outlier. Lets talk about how the world sticks with this. France said they were blindsided by the decision. They will stay in syria. What is russia thinking . Assad thinking . A few points, we know what russia has been thinking, president putin has been holding his never ending News Conference he holds once a year. On this, he said in general, i agree with u. S. President , hes welcoming the withdraw, hes reupping his previous statements that america doesnt have a right to be there. He argues that forces that president assad doesnt want forces in syria shouldnt legally be there. Interestingly, classic putin. Well see whether america really does withdraw. So hes looking at whats happening domestically, politically and kind of reflecting that. Another point i would make is the kurds. You know, i think the nature of a democracy is that democracies get to change their minds, but one of americas great Foreign Policy challenges is quite often it gets seen as unreliable. What president putin does and other auto kratz, they say, come to us. We will always support you, no matter what you do and a decision like this that is seen if you like abandoning the kurds is going to be interpreted as another example of america is walking away from its allies, so it makes it harder for the u. S. To do things in the future. And then you ask about the other allies. Thats the view they will take as well. I think they will be extremely worried about it. The president has been all over the place to put it mildly, since he announced this decision saying isis is defeated, we can walk away this morning saying we cant stay there for jevgs lets leave it to syria and iran, walking back that isis is defeated. Can you make heads or tails out of this decision . I just came from the east. Its a dprim situation. Lets start with the kurds, their unofficial statements this is a stab in the back and its an insult with american soldiers to liberate areas from isis. Secondly, they have a few thousand prisoners of isis and family members. They are discussing releasing them, which is another problem. Isis, we have to understand, its not all of a sudden ideology that came out of the blue. It was a manifestation offal al qaeda,nous ra and isis. Now it will manifest itself in other ways. The ideology is there. We may have won militarily, not strategically. We have do not have political civilities nor economic civility in the region. So the likelihood this will continue and there will be an insurgency of wars in the region is very likely. A lot of people in the region are very depressed, they see this decision the likelihood of peace in syria will disappear actually. Its more a lever annual plus its strategic and military and political. The trump keeps 5100 kids locked up in this country yet his move, hes going to liberate isis prisoners. 6,000 at the border in mexico. Now the rest coming home from syria. To make one point about isis prisoners, sorry to interrupt. A couple isis prisoners are members of a gang that are accused of killing hostages, including american hostages. There are American Families who are waiting for justice to tie to see those prisoners put on trial, potentially they wont be put on trial if theyre released. There is the decision of how this came to be. We have not yet this morning. We have asked a lot, found the source of this decision. In other words, defense secretary mattis wasnt behind it. John bolton wasnt behind it. Brett mcgirt saying eight days ago it would be reckless to walk away from syria right now. Can you even fathom the process how this came about . Maybe it was a president ial impulse and a tweet that set all of this into motion . In order to distract people. I worked with brett mcgirt and john alan assembling the nations, it was 64mations. The battle was a successful part of the obama Foreign Policy, obamas Foreign Policy in syria was fought successful. Trump inherited a policy that didnt make much sense. What i find strange this man claims to be the consummate deal maker unilaterally withdrew American Forces without making a deem, without saying, hey, vlad, ill take my guys out of syria if you take your guys out of ukraine, if you dont invade our allies who sacrificed to protect american soldiers, i find it as its kind of a threecard multiForeign Policy, hes trying to trick people. There is no remark nail behind it and the way we work best is when every part of our Foreign Policy Organization Works together. So were working with the military the state department. Trump just did this by fiat, by tweet, which doesnt make sense to our allies or anybody else. People dont trust our policy anymore. Because it doesnt make sense. I have a question about our allies, kurds do not trust our policies, but when i was in turkey a couple days ago, the headlines saying were going to invade the kurdish area, tushish troops. We want u. S. Troops to withdraw so we dont have to clash. It could be a deal with turkey. It could be. Its a kind of strong man Foreign Policy, what these big guys want, ill do. Trump doesnt think he represents the nation. He thinks he represents himself. He is talking directly with these people who do represent their countrys interests. He doesnt get that. To joes point earlier, follow the money. Trump can never build again in this country. Theyre ripping his name off buildings, he has two in istanbul. He wants one in moscow, it was always about the money. Id let him build a hotel in syria. I think that would be perfect. So the point about turkey the president , in fact, talks to erdogan last week. There was a phone call and erdogan reported afterward he had informed President Trump that the kurds are terrorists and he asked him why would you be supporting a group of terrorists . We dont know if thats the reason the president made this decision. We dont know any reason that he made this decision. You certainly have to factor that . You have to factor in the geopolitics of the region. I think there is Something Else weigh shouldnt forget. The United States is trying to get turkey to back off off saudi arabia with the killing of the saudi journalist jamal khashoggi. So there have been attempts by the u. S. To find ways to get the government some concessions on things they care about to say, listen, lets try to move away. We know have you the damming everyday against the saudi crown prince. You have called for an international investigation. You called for him to step aside. This administration is definitely not buying it. So at that point, what is it that we can offer the turks in this geopolitical framework that would give them leverage inside syria. This is something they have been calling on since day one. They wanted to get a foothold in syria to contain what they considered to be terrorist groups fighting inside there as well as in turkey. So we should not lose the geopolitics of it. I think everyone else is making the points about the strong man relationship the president likes to look up to. He admires these leaders in putin and the president s of turkey. There is this systematic competitive problem. I want to make this point, which is the beginning intervention of america and syria was a mistake. Subsequently, every way we look at it, it builds on that mistake. There is only one you know measuring stick that were using to look at how we can contribute to syria, now its through the military prism. That also in itself is short sided. Military intervention will not solve the problem. So military withdraw is not going to solve the problem. You and i talk about these things all the time. Its our job to predict what might happen. Talk to me about where you see this going . Because the potential for turkey to intervene in syria, if the u. S. Has withdrawn in order to, you know, get control of the kurds, if you like, that is not without huge consequences if that was to play out. Yeah, i think you will see now the three main players, the russians, iranians and turks effect e essentially get together and tolerate from each other. The syrian president feels he has one this war, meaning he has contained the Opposition Forces with the help of iran and his proxies and the russians. If he feels he can assert his sovereign and control over the entire territory. You will see him make that push. That will be a strategic decision for turkey whether or not they want to confront that. It will depend on whether the syrians can reign in the kurds. If they bring them back into control, which means they do not pose a threat. It is likely the turks will stay on their side of the border. But because its a lawless situation right now, turkey is angling to get in there. The more important question for us here in the west and western europe is going to be the issue of what happens to the extremist ideology that isis proliferated. What we have seen in the ab sense of any kind of stability, extremist ideology flourishes. It is in these areas where there is no local governance, no local justice, that strong hold extremist groups can get a foot hold we seen it in iraq, afghanistan and lawless parts of countries like egypt and even if pakistan in their confined areas. So whats going to happen now is that while isis as an organization, maybe even as a caliphate may be destroyed. What we have done, though, is not necessarily drained the swamp of that ideology. Its more likely than not we will see in the years to come another type of Extremist Organization pick up where isis left off and move that goal post. This takes different names . The likelihood of what aymon described is huge. There is 41 unemployment in the region 60 of the population under the age of 30. When isis came, they offered jobs, identity. There is no one replacing that. There is more fear than ever in the region right now. I mean even in countries like uae where it used to be often all of that, now they are afraid of their own cell phones let anybody talk about mbs or Something Like that. So the president s decision has neither short nor longterm direction. Its just a loss. Its a loss for america, basically. When john allen led the group against isis, he says, its not defeating them oak. Its defeating the idea. We havent defeated the idea. The idea is the grievance throughout the middle east. Sunni muslims disenchanted see a shia caliphate been born, thats the idea we need to reckon with. A great group. Great to see you both. Aymon, stay with us if you can. Coming up, one of the a. P. Stories of the year, a judge is set to decide if the Sexual Assault case against Harvey Weinstein should move forward. The movement that sparked that and the other top ten stories of the year when morning joe comes right back. S of the year when morning joe comes right back the greatest wish of all is one that brings us together. The final days of wish list are here. Sign and drive off in a new lincoln with zero down, zero due at signing, and a complimentary first months payment. Only at your lincoln dealer. I got beaten up because i was different. Based on a true story. So, i created a world where i can heal. About the power of friendship. Are all of the dolls people you know . Yeah. I got your back. To the women of marwen. But allstate helps you. With drivewise. Feedback that helps you drive safer. And that can lower your cost now that you know the truth. Are you in good hands . So shark invented duo clean. While deep cleaning carpets, the added soft brush roll picks up large particles, gives floors a polished look, and fearlessly devours piles. Duo clean technology, corded and cordfree. And fearlessly devours piles. This holiday season, families near you need your help. Visit redcross. Org now to donate. Last year was a surge of Sexual Misconduct allegations that headlined the associated presss list of the top ten stories of 2017. The annual poll is a longrunning tradition dating back to 1936. Joining us now, david krrary with the top ten stories hot off the presses. Glad to be here. Number ten is the Khashoggi Killing. That was a twophased thing, the period where the saudis denied that anything bad had happened. Finally bit by bit the story leaked occupy. People were shocked about some of the details and now theres phase two, the departmentic repercussio repercussions. Its a twophased story. And the president s reaction or lack thereafter. We were talking about the impact of the Khashoggi Gill and the fear of mbs that not permeates the entire middle east. People are handing over their cell phones, theyre afraid to talk anything about it. Basically if im to summarize, its a group of people, usually the eneat, but not completely, the royal family is important to saudi arabia, and we need to find a way to work with them. Theres other people who are afraid that are saying absolutely not, hes untouchable, and theres all people on both said saying this man is not reliability. Even if you work it out, he has never delivered anything he promises, he promised the war in yemen would take two months, it takes three years. Whatever he says does not deliver. So there is a lot of fear and and theyre putting all their bulls in americas hands. Dave, number nine is Climate Change, which drought a lot of people to the polls. I was almost surprised this made the list. It wasnt one or two headlines, i think it was this gradual consensus that Climate Change is real and linked to some of these national disasters. And that parlayed into number eight, the california wildfires. The Climate Change was the subtext of these horrible fires. The imagery, photos really hit people. It was a pock lippic, literally. Number seven was the kavanaugh hearings. People were rooting for kavanaugh or Christine Blasey ford. There were really engaged emotional. Number six is u. S. Immigration. That was a yearlong story, again, a initial phase with the separation of families that moved a lot of people, angered a lot of people. That morphed into the caravans coming into the border. Its not going away. Number five is the u. S. Midterm elections in which democrats flipped 40 seats, but the president declared victory because they picked up a couple seats in the senate. That might have been a bit higher in another year. Yet it was important, as you said, some seat changes, and not to mention the seat changes won at the local level. Number four was Mass Shootings. We felt bad about that you because each one should have been on there itself. You almost get numb. Its hard to imagine they happened in this year, when you think somebody was reminding us that parkland happened in this year and you think how far remo removed we are from that. A story thats playing out this morning, in fact Harvey Weinstein is due in court to see if his trial will move forward. Number three is the me too movement. I think a lot of people questioned whether it would have staying power. Bill cosby is in prison, so the is sports doctor from gymnastics. Hundreds of victims there. And les moonves. And number two is the trump russia probe. We dont know the final act, but that was literally a yearlong story. It kept morphing into different investigations. I think a lot of people at this poi point are understandably confused. It keeps spreading all these tentacles. And number one story, according to associated press, which you have separated out. There was a very strong reason. It was the aftermath, the students who survived, some of them almost immediately organizing, spreading the word to their peers across the country. We have to react differently. They organized the march. And i think it changed the momentum of the gundroll movement. It revitalized it. Its still going on how that will play out, but it was remarkable who those kids did. Donny what jumps on off the list to you. The kavanaugh hearings was only two, three months ago, if seems like five years ago. The saudi, the Khashoggi Killing is redefining the u. S. saudi relationships. Tal have implications for years and decades to come. How about you for you . It seems a lot of paradigm shifting. Its a new beginning i hope for a lot of these discussions. David crary, thank you. Good to see you all. Stephanie ruhle picks up our coverage right now. Good morning. We have a lot to cover today, starting with the commander in isolation, an increasingly isolated President Trump announces hes pulling u. S. Troops out of syria by releasing a video on syria, catching his aides, military leaders, even some of the his ardent supporters all off guard. Isis would not be allowed today if it were not for obamas decision to withdraw from iraq. If trump withdraws from syria, hell be one of the reasons they came back. A clearliage stated president spending his morning executive timeen