Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20190128

Monday morning im Yasmin Vossoughian alongside Ayman Mohyeldin and Louis Burgdorf morning joe starts rig startsw is the president prepared to shut down the government in three weeks . Yes, i think he is. No one should underestimate the speaker, as donald trump has learned. Have i not been clear on the wall no, ive been clear on the wall. Any chance youll cooperate with Robert Mueller if asked thats a question ill have to determine after my attorneys have some discussion i am seriously thinking of running for president. I will run as a centrist independent outside of the twoparty system so, lets do this [ cheers and applause wow well, there we go the president is weakened, the House Speaker is empowered, the special counsel is advancing, and as you saw, the president ial race is getting interesting. Good morning and welcome to morning joe. Its monday, january 28th. We have David Ignatius, sam stein hes great. Hes great, too you knew it was coming, sam its monday, man. Try harder come on, the shutdowns over, joe. Former chief of staff at the cia and department of defense, now an nbc news correspondent jeremy bash and host of Andrea Mitchell reports, Andrea Mitchell and, joe, great to have you back im glad youre feeling better are you feeling better you know, im old im just old no, youre good i guess im feeling better. You know, mika, one of the things you learn as a young firstyear law student with an undisciplined mind is you learn to read these huge just these massive legal cases, just page after page after page after page and really the gift of what a great law professor can do, they can help you tear it down to its bare essential by saying, okay, i know youve read 130 pages, this is the sentence that matters, this is the holding to take out so you take that skill with you in your life and youre able to sort through everything. Im looking through all of those clips that up showed in the first dont worry, mika, this plane is coming in for landing are you sure youre feeling better i dont know ill go to Dave Ignatius because dave is more disciplined with his facial expressions. David, so much was coming at us in those clips youre trying to say, wait a second, thats what were going to be talking about, you know five years from now. But theres so many things, whether it was stone or whether it was, my gosh, Kamala Harris announ announcement, schultz causing cle clear panic. What a weekend i had a feeling we were watching the beginning of a change of regime this weekend. The Mueller Investigation now becomes very tight and donald trump with roger stone, people so close to the president are now in muellers jurisdiction and we have this chain of lies thats now the story thats told in muellers legal actions, one close person to trump and another alleged to be lying. At the same time we find the Democratic Party trying to find new voices, new ways to connect with the public. We have no ideas whether Kamala Harris, joe biden, who will emerge from this i thought it was a weekend where you had that sense of washington changing a turn. Yup. And, hey, joe, its back to school day the 35 days of dysfunction are over thank god this is the first monday federal workers have worked in a long time. It was that kind of weekend for me it wasincredible weekend. A lot of people dont have any reason to know this but, mika, today a really important day certainly for your family. I wish i could be in washington with you this morning to be celebrating what were going to be celebrating later on, and that is 40 years ago tonight you caused an International Incident that almost finished u. S. Had much u. S. Chinese relations forever. But 40 years ago was the unofficial opening, the state dinner that the chinese decided to hold at your mom and dads farm house in virginia instead of the white house to open up relations between china and the United States and were going to be celebrating that this morning. Yup thats why im here in washington ahead well look back at that key moment in American Foreign policy my family literally had a seat at the table we reflect on that night and how we all survived it, quite frankly. It was rough trying to do a state dinner at a small farm house in mclean. Also, Andrea Mitchell, its tough when little Mika Brzezinski was wait staff and spilled caviar on the leaders lap and then tried to wipe it up history was made in the farm house and the runup to it and all of that diplomacy and jimmy carters legacy there overshadowed later by a lot of other stuff, obviously the terrible things in iran but that may be a Lasting Legacy in u. S. China relations it may be lets go to news now, mika. Im doing it, im doing it. Look at these poll numbers a now Washington Post has President Trumps Approval Ratings sinking to 37 and giving him the lowest twoyear of average. Among independents, 63 dise disapprove of trumps job approval and one in five say they were personally inconvenienced by the Government Shutdown. And 63 said the nation is heading on the wrong track, matching the record high for the Trump Presidency so the government is now temporarily reopened, but President Trump is again ramping up the pressure on lawmakers to strike a deal that includes funding for his border wall. The agreement with congressional leaders will last three weeks until february 15th to allow for them to continue talks over Border Security. On saturday the president tweeted 21 days goes very quickly. Negotiations with democrats will start immediately, will not be easy to make a deal, both parties very dug in. The case for National Security has been greatlyin hanced by what has been happening we will build the wall at one point in the middle of hiS White House speech last friday, the his teleprompter stopped rolling and the president , oh, boy, decided to rift on some of his talking points on Border Security. Based on operational guidance from the experts in the field, they will put together a Homeland Security package for me to shortly sign into law over the next 21 days i expect that both democrats and republicans will operate in good faith. This is an opportunity for all parties to Work Together for the benefit of our whole beautiful, wonderful nation the walls we are building are not medieval walls they are smart walls women are tied up, theyre bound, duct tape put around their faces, around their mouths, in many cases they cant even breathe, theyre put in the backs of cars or vans or trucks. They dont go through your port of entry they make a right turn going very quickly they go into whatever desert areas or whatever areas you can look at and as soon as theres no protection, they make a right or left into the United States of america theres nobody to catch them, nobody to find them. Wow and nothing to get hung about, Strawberry Fields forever. I have absolutely no idea, sam stein, what all of that meant. Thats a president seeing his poll numbers absolutely battered, his high 43 but thats an out lior and the Washington Post poll has him this morning at 37 . This is what i dont understand, sam you go through everything demographic group, things are getting worse for him. If kpr nancy pelosi is not going to be negotiating on the wall and she shouldnt, how does this end in three weeks from now . Obviously it doesnt, unless he declares an emergency declaration. If it was an emergency hereby would have declared it over the past five weeks, which he hasnt done but that speech is very surreal, right, the whole duct taping in right and left turns they enter the country, none of it really makes sense. He spent five weeks doing the shutdown fight, he got the hopes of his base up, he then killed the hopes of his base by giving in he ruined his poll numbers, he took an Economic Impact, emboldened nancy pelosi and said to everyone im going to do this again in three weeks that is insane politically i dont know what theyll have in three weeks that will be new to them they didnt have four or five weeks ago one thing that remains the same is Nancy Pelosi Nancy pelosi is not going to move an inch on the wall you know, trump has to know that this has to be a threeweek strategy figuring out a strategic retreat. It will end up being some kind of a semantic variation you saw a couple of people on meet the press talking about a fence. Well, in that case if there is some money for a fence and they call it a wall or some sort of Additional Border security, money isnt the issue. Thats the interesting thing theyre not worried about the fiscal side of this, theyre willing, the democrats to spend a lot of money on Border Security, just not call it theyre really fed up. And i dont think wool people ive spoken to who are willing to override a president ial vote owe or in the worst case convict in an impeachment trial. So he still has republican support. But the Senate Leadership and throughout the Senate Caucus are really fed up. You saw that in last thursdays lunch meeting and they are not going to let this go to a shutdown let me make a quake point in the republicans part. What was an interesting byproduct of his cave is there was an erosion of support but last night they went after ann coulter for being mean to him. Im so glad you brought that up David Ignatius, lets stop for one second this is not personal to anybody. Its just the truth is we all know it as just a matter of fact that it was ann coulter and Rush Limbaugh that actually get donald trump to move away from a deal that would have averted all of this, all of this and if you are just donald trump or one of Donald Trumps closest advisers, you look at the incalculable damage that those two have done to this president and to this presidency and his ability to govern over the next two years, industry, you look at how much it savaged his presidency hes been so weak, he cant stand up to them hes been like a yoyo played by these rightwing commentators he had a deal with mexico to finesse the whole order of the border the mexican president was coming to washington, the deal was set and there was rightwing condemnation of it and trump just absolutely freaked out. He just cant handle the criticism from and the deal was scuttled, the mexican governor kran cancelled his ill make a crazy prediction, which is that by february 15, the deadline, we will have a deal. I think the democrats would be foolish not to take this as a win. Its a way in which they can craft a win. The country is so sick of what theyre watching if the democrats extend that or seem to extend it i dont know on what planet him closing down the government again or declaring a National Emergency would help him in any way. Speaking of republicans getting a little fed up, then theres the fbi, jeremy, as the political deadlock gave way on friday fbi director christopher wrait broke his soy silence to address the strain and some people remaining at home without pay. It takes a lot to make my angry, but im about as angry as ive been in a long, long time now, i know theres some question about why you havent seen the fbi leadership out there in the press, fighting the good fight over the past five weeks, but there are real costs to doing that. For us you know better than most that weve been thrust into the political spotlight more than we would have liked over the past few years, and the lastthing this Organization Needs now is its leadership to wade right into the middle a we are activity advocating for you left and right at every lef and experts would tell you with border crossings down, i could go down the list, and yet this shutdown that he caused by creating a phony crisis actually did cause one danger after another. There we saw the fbi director. Of course, as you or, you know, leads against gang members you can talk about the coast guard and being not being able to do all that they do on stopping the flow of drugs and Human Trafficking into this country. You could talk about the Pilots Association talking about air traffic. I mean, there was one example of another example after another example of vow this created a real National Security chris being. And again, im just got to wonder is this really a risk that donald trump or any republican is going to be allow to be roo peated again in three weeks . I disagree with david i dont think the democrats are going do go. I dont think were going to see a national and im going to toss this to the court and and dir t directand were going to devote it to building the ball prm and but to your point, joe, that move like the past two weeks, will also undermine National Security security because it will take something pak for the point gone, joe, it and would be under this term moving into Something Else that is going against, you know, the kings of congress, the appropriators. Its an abuse of power is what it is actually. Its an abuse of his ability to do that. The statutes that provide for that with you know where this ends up. It ends up in the courts can you bet that there will be Federalist Society Court Justices who will overturn any emergency declaration. Conservatives, moderate, liberal judges whether they were appoint appointedtheres only one way out of that corner he has got to deal with nancy pelosi and on terms that he is not going to like. Tell us, meekia how do you think that looks it looks like it going to be absolutely fascinating and i dont think it ends well for him. I think hes met his match in and hes used to billying for a whole host of reasons. And its actually perfect placement for her matched up against dpromt youre optimistic im eternally optimistic so lets just you and me talk here as optimists just between us why couldnt why couldnt democrats go to donald trump and have said, okay, you say 5. 7 billion for your wall, ill tell you what were going to do were going to give you 6 billion for Border Security. But heres the deal, were going to focus on ports of entry where 90 of the heroin comes in that kills our kids and kills our fathers and kills our messed also on Drone Technology and the sort when were using that is the war and, yes, there are parts of the fence that actually do work and have been proven to stop Illegal Immigrants from coming into the United States and democrats and republicans have agreed on that. And parts of those fences are actually in disrepair right now. So well spend some money to repair that as well. And well do allof that and al you have to do is say what you said you were going to do on dreamers and on daca, you know, a year ago why cant that be a grand bargain, david, where Everybody Wins so it can be. I just have this hunch, i could be wrong, i could be too optimistic, that rather than take the country back in the shutdown land, that nancy pelosi, who is a deal maker, she is what donald trump pretends to be you heard donna schala, saying we want Border Security, we want to spend the money, we want to be there on this issue and come out of it with a formula that is very hard to trump to turn down the only other thing i wonder, given how upset the public is about the shutdown, whether we wont see more efforts to say this tactic is just not acceptable anymore in american politician, that whatever else we do. The reason it cant work, joe, is because donald trump had a deal like that presented to him at the end of 2017 but the deal was for 25 billion on border wall funding so if he were to accept anything under 25 billion at this point, it would be a lot of egg on his face and a massive failure the reason it wouldnt work from the democratic perspective, its about using a government shut shutdown to negotiate. What they want to see are not just policies gains they can point to but also a commitment from the president to never use the shutdown as leverage before. We saw nancy pelosi where she said she would support legislation from allowing government wayins it sh down. The past is the past. What were looking at is a threeweek deadline. Donald trump knows, as do reb senators, we cant do to the fbi and the coast guard and air Traffic Controllers and the tsa what we did over the past month. So there is a possible way forward. Donald trump was holding four aces a year and a half ago when he was demanding 25 billion right now hes got a bussed plate strait, and you dont got the car that wanted to draw. And one other thing. Too there in states like virginia, in states like georgia that want a republicleaning district they need to be able to go back and they need to be able to say, hey, its not just word when we democrats the asks for 5 billion for a medieval wall . You know what we gave him . We gave him 6 pl at Homeland Security and that all the experts said will actually make the border safer, will make vote me 2020. Thats what the democrats need to get out of this they cant overreach they need to make a deal, too. Thats why count me of team ignatius this morning. Exactly so far well see instead of a wall he got a gave still ahead Jared Kushner reportedly told Chris Christie that firing Michael Flynn wouldnd. 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With faith in god, with fidelity to country and with the fighting spirit i got from my mother [ cheers and applause i stand before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the United States [ cheers and applause we are at an inflexion point in the history of our world we are at an inflexion point in the history of our nation. We are here because the American Dream and our american democracy are under attack and on the line like never before. We are here at this moment in time because we must answer a fundamental question who are we who are we as americans . So lets answer that question. To the world and each other right here and right now america, we are better than this senator Kamala Harris officially ti officially kicked off her 2020 campaign with a rally in Oakland Campaign her campaign stated oakland official estimated 20 Million People look at trying to figure out who is going to suck sod and its not of the it factor that somebody feels what it takes and they dont to fill the stang ive seen 64 men on the stage, ive seen women standing on the stage and you either rook the second i saw her up there, wow, shes got what it takes. She filled that stage, she can play in the big leagues. Absolutely. She had a couple of uncertain along the way coming from this point. There she was in oakland with a huge crowd and a very good peach. And the we are looking bad to the world and she confronted all of those issues. Shes clearly bright and, you know, has a new feeling about her, but this really came together now, does this play in ohio, in msh began, i think certainly in michigan and pennsylvania. I dont know whether but right now cam la i think the real over development over the weekend that we can talk about is Howard Schultz. We have that, former starbucks c ceo. An independent schultz tells the New York Times that he plans to crisscross the u. S. On his book tour over the next three months before deciding whether to formally enter the race, but he has already laid the groundwork for a campaign in all 50 states. Heres what he said about a 2020 run in a recently taped 60 minutes interview that aired last night i am seriously thinking i will run a and were living a at most fragile time, not only the fact that this president is not qualified to be the rest, but the fact that both parties are consistently not doing whats necessary on behalf of the American People. And are engaged every single day in revenge politics. Some democrats are uneasy about schultzs interest in running as an independent. Theyre worried that he could pope voters that would otherwise vote democrat and ultimately slidify another tour your the service proclaimed life long democrat said it would be disenken and hoose interested in revenge politics on boo. Fmt and there are obviously going to be a lot of crass who are going to be very importantthis breaks of course you never know until you actually won the race and you have the election. I know the bush family Still Believes to this day that ross perot helped elect bill clinton. In we can say this pb. They are not registering, majorities are not registering as republicans and democrats theyre independents, theyre nonaffiliated this is the future at some point, at some point there will be an independent president , sometimes very soon, but i dont know if its in 2020 and i dont know if either one would be the guy that had the reelection of donald trump pinned around him. Well, people will be angry at hib who is get a second term with a minority of the country behind him by running a third par i think, you were sick of the two party, the alignment that weve got, but what i think theyre looking for is certainly what id say, id like to see more of is the bug, prmt and thats the stanz ard by which ill be grading Kamala Harris. She gave a big speech, she knew how to build that big tent wrr and thats how goo going that takes some away from both side seems like a difficult time to run as an dipt i think of peacekeeper tur that snm the gors and the clintons standing next to each other with their arms all head high in the air and the caption only one got to sit in the oval office i mean, the electoral college, yes, thats as well but also people taking votes away from al gore and taking votes away from Hillary Clinton. Yeah, i mean, listen, empirically we dont know who would lose more if Howard Schultz were to run, whether it be the democrats or trump. I think we do we kind of do no, we do but either way the idea that no one really wants to find out basically, and even centrist minded democrats who i was pac and a trat and so no one is really into this game. Just to button this up a little bit, i do agree theres a pool of people who dont associate themselves with Political Party prp but i just happen to think that they also dont flock to a mutt million whose sold agenda is to tell them we cant afford this thats not the galvanizing message for that become when its a year from now and sudden litz mike pence against Kamala Harris or Elizabeth Warren and suddenly it seems to fit a little bit better in the middle. And when bill clinton decided to jump in in 1991, you were there. Everybody thought he was crazy he was running against a guy that had 89 Approval Rating so you never really know actually sheshes got a lot of problems as well but he has certainly the name recognition what are you hearing, andrea . Thats the question of the month. Whats joe going to do he told some people the week before that hes 75 to 80 wanting to do it there are some family reasons that are holding him back. He wasnt to see who else is rying to the sur stas, youve got terry mcauliffe, who is oo. Thats a first out. You got a lot of other people out therewho really want to do it it seems to be becoming together very quickly now, you have three prominent pick. Im sorry. Can we add one more name to this mix were about 30 minutes over in this block alone john kerry, theres a possibility of john kerry jumping in whats the latest you hear on johner that i dont think that once youve been nominated you goat another chance to do that Adley Stevenson did. Once youve won the nomination, i dont think he would have a chance with this party all right, final thought, whichly leave hanging with no comment, is that there is also word hillary might jump back in. Howard schultz will be our guest on morning joe this coming well talk to jeremy bash about what officials are saying about morning joe will be right back at t provides edgetoedge intelligence, covering virtually every part of your finance business. 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Hurry and get 20 off with coupon at Office Depot Officemax the New York Times is reporting this morning the americans and taliban officials have agreed in framework to a peace deal the deal reportedly includes the taliban guaranteeing from afghan territory from being used by terrorists, point that could lead to the full withdrawal of american troos in terms of a ceasefire the americans envoy tells the paper, quote, we have a draft of the framework whats that to be fleshed out before it becomes an agreement, adding that the tell grap have committed to from ever becoming a platform for International Terrorist groups or individuals joe, a Big Development it is a Big Development jeremy bush, im curious what do you think about the possibility of a peace plan between the two and how in the world is taliban going to stop terrorist organizations from operating within their borders when the pakistani government cant do it in their own by mid 8011, they had actually discussed in thatthe United States pivot had had nrnl but the showers has been how would the table at the political place in afghan sta with concerns about womens rights and human rights and would they. Having watched this for so many years, the idea of getting a towel and ive renounced zwrb be appearance to be mabbing more progress a my sense is maybe this is for real what do you think . He is clearly a very effective negotiator hes got the heritage, the none in all afghanistan so we have our potentially best team on the field. I also think the president has played an Important Role here and theyve been an important pli i think this is going to hard it have one of the things that almost screwed this up was the president with his precipitous withdrawal from syria announcement also said and afghanistan, too, just when the tiks were at a very critical stage. Why would the taliban give anything at the table when they think were getting out anyway against so jeremy, we still havent talked about theory rest of roger stone what does it mean for roger stone . I think the key paragraph is paragraph 12 i talked about a senior trump official was directed by somebody who was empowered to direct a campaign official, was directed to check in with roger stone, to figure out how they would work with wikileaks, an of aious and known Russian Foreign intelligent assets we have the the under lying mechanism was not the basis for indime butt lie and we have these own liars who were now fuchl and whats weird really fundamentally is that the president of the United States surrounded himself with that cast of characters mueller is being meticulous about this hes got obviously he has receipts its not sprizing o me that this the question i have is what does roger stone do when hes pinched like this . Hes saying im never going to almost confidently. So what can you you a groub grvgs this is not what he wants actually andrea, he may try to put on a brave nixonian face, but weve all been around long enough to hear people talking tough. We heard sam nunberg talk to d had. We have a president sitting in the white house Whose Campaign manager that got him over the top that was running his campaign during the rnc is in jail the number two, his number two campaign guy, rick gates, guilty the guy that he said was one of thinks two top torch guilty. His National Security adviser guilty his longtime lawyer and fixer and a guy that actually held a picture in the and his longtime political adviser guilty this is just the beginning ought this is not the way prosecutors usually write indictments. For them not to say so and so number one, so number two to do this to number two to do this to roger stone, it was in that passive voice. So theres a lot more there. But this was the first time that mueller actually took what had been established in the previous indictments bast rear that wk leaks in and took that and tied it to someone in the inner circle wow and that means theres a lot more to come right jeremy bash, Andrea Mitchell, thank you for being on tonight and kasie hunt droujoins us fore next round to strike a deal for Border Security. And House Republicans managed to stall even though the democrats are in power morning joe will be right back as someone in witness protection, i cant tell you anything about myself. But believe me. Im not your average consumer. Thats why i switched to Liberty Mutual. They customized my Car Insurance, so i only pay for what i need. And as a man. Uh. Or a woman. With very specific needs that i cant tell you about say cheese. Mr. Landry . Oh no. Hi mr. Landry Liberty Mutual customizes your Car Insurance so you only pay for what you need. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. I saw my leg did not look right. 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So with hilton there is no catch. Yeah the only catch is im never leaving. No im serious, i live here now. Book at hilton. Com and get the hilton price match guarantee. Is the president really prepared to shut down the government again in three weeks . Yeah, i think he actually is. Keep in mind hes willing to do whatever it takes to secure the border im not sure that would be very smart welcome book to morning joe. Its monday, january 28th. Along with joe and me we have columnist and associate editor for the Washington Post David Ignatius, capitol hill correspondent on msnbc kasie hunt, Senior Writer at politico and msnbc political contributor jake sherman is with us and White House Correspondent for pbs Newshour Yamiche alcindor trumps approval is at an alltime low and the lowest Approval Rating of any president in the 72 history of political polling. 63 of independents disprove of trumps job performance, up 10 since november and more than one in five say they were personally inconvenienced by the 35day Government Shutdown. Now congressional leaders have three weeks until february 15th to come up with a new deal on saturday the president tweeted 21 days goes very quickly, negotiations with democrats will start immediately, will not be easy to make a deal, both parties very dug in the case for National Security has been greatly enhanced by what has been happening at the border and dialogue. We will build the wall. Can he build the wall . Is it possible and can he really shut down the government again and declare a National Emergency no, hes not going to be able to build that want but secondly, kasie hunt, as far as a shut down goes, talk about the any desire for another shutdown fight, do they understand just how badly things got for donald trump and the party in the polling over those three, four weeks . Theres absolutely zero appetite among Senate Republicans for another shutdown, joe. They were fighting about it over lunch the day before it all finally got solved Mitch Mcconnell in the room saying you think im happy about whats gone on here . He frankly thought this was a terrible idea from the beginning. How many times have we heard him save you dont learn anything from the second kick of the mule the reality is they were fighting over the idea of a republican shutdown. The president is on an island by himself here and, jake, the maddening thing for republicans is there was no lodge touk agic to any os they had to deal with democrats, they were going to keep the government open and then ann coulter and Rush Limbaugh gave him a hard time and you look at how badly his poll numbers have suffered because of it how do they deal with a president who just wanders off into the field and can never be trusted to keep his word first of all, paul ryan, Mitch Mcconnell, as kasie noted, did try to turn him off of this. If you are in the president s position and you promised a border wall for all of these months and, frankly year you still have gotten basically number but, jake, heres the thing, i mean, again that would be a great argument for donald trump and republicans to push except for the fact as we all know, republicans were in charge for two years. Up. Republicans like john corewin said walls dont work, they just wanted the political fight surrounding the wall i think thats 100 true. Over the past few years the president had almost shut down the government in multiple times. He feels he was treated poorly by his party if you talk to hem, theyll say the president made an unreistic promise and refused to get things close to this wall many times. He had a deal for 25 billion and he refused that. So this has been mr. Call and i feel many member of the president S White House are misguiding him in all of this. Lost in all this is the loss of the stun were looking at a president who is willing to send troops to the border to prepare for care vans that never came and was even talking about them last week like got thing we got those two i mean, these things, actually he says them and he actually put troops at the border is it possible he will shut down the government again or declare a mags think that Everybody Knows that the state of the union is chaotic, its petty, its Political Warfare so in some ways, every time donald trump gets up there, nancy pelosi has the final say of when the president gets up there, whenever it because so many people have seen for 35 days the government to the have to extend restaurant weeks lets not even talk about the 800,000 or so workers who suffered without a paycheck. I dont think that President Trump will did, the idea that democrats got him to go on camera to say i will own this shut down i think hamstringed him. Its incredible the idea hes not saying mexico will will pay for the wall anymore, i think he stunds mexico will not reissue the wall. So knapp p nancy pelosi has to reissue her invitation and she hasnt done so yet and i think shell get around to saying, okay, heres when you can come to my house talk about being schooled i just wanted to ask, David Ignatius, what did you think about that im glad yamiche brought it up donald trump makes a political decision that obviously puts him in a terrible position and it is almost immediately after that that moment takes place nny really kick him where it hurts talking about rogerstop and, im not suggesting she doesnt have the right to do that im not suggesting in trumps washington maybe she would have been seen as wk i just wonder, might that have been an opportunity to old a bunch and put out. Shes got Donald Trumps number and i think shes getting so many pats on the back for having navigated there so skillfully politically, but the base inc. To turn toward helping the country find a way out of this take the win, as it were, and then turn that into approximately m vanity wall is what ive come to think of it as thats putting it nicely. He cant give it up and we have a real crisis caused by the shutdown. Right we havent begun to hear all the things that were happening in the air as air travis got, the spacing between db that were real air security, we were a couple of days fromming is a real crack in the air Traffic Control system i any when you compare the two, the manufactured crisis, the real crisis, the idea were going to go back to the real crisis, which would be even worse the next time around, i still think pelosi should understand thats not the pli pelosi, emergency and the problem is you assume a rational act of the president joe, thats the thing she cannot let the pressure she has off him and being pretty tour and only let up when hes been port of a deal. Hes been proven time and time again that he is not sfwrmgt and think that fair is fair. Well, we all know that and we also know that nancy pelosi is the best politician on capitol hill, and we said it in realtime while there were some democrats talking about possibly replacing her, that we thought that would be foolish and again, i just want i understand democrats have rightly attacked donald trump over the past serve months, eefr the bor over ther issue. Over the shutdown. I will say, though, that a democratic majority in 2020, democratic success in states like wisconsin and minnesota and michigan and ohio and that rests on them being abable this is an opportunity to do itmy only point is you downdo that when your opponent is negotiating from a position of strength. You dough do that when the no prp if democrats are looking at that or if that your going to keep trump shoved up against the wall so much that we could have another Government Shutdown. I understand again and weve ben been saying every day, this plays against Donald Trumps post office. I was going to lets talk about whats happening with children at the border, lets talk about, you know, working class wages, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Just a footnote. Lets talk 2020 senator Kamala Harris officially kicked off her 2020 president ial campaign with a rally in oakland, california. With faith in god, with fidelity to country and with the fighting spirit i got from my mother [ cheers and applause i stant before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the United States come painst made harris joins what is expected to be a crow d crowded. In the first major speech of her came pain, the california senator took the opportunity to speak about her Progressive Agenda and also hit trump and his device hif we are at an inflexion point in the history of our world. We are inflexion point in the history of our nation. We are here because the American Dream and our american democracy are under attack and on the line like never before. We are here at this moment in time because we must answer a fundamental question, who are we who are we as americans . So lets answer that question. To the world and to each other right here and right now ameri america. David ignatius, you have seen more than a few of these president ial announcements in your time. Tem us what you saw yesterday with Kamala Harris, first of all, and, secondly, tell us how does she separate herself from a field of possibly 20, 25 challengers . Joe, i felt the strongest thing about that speech was that it showed you a person who knows why she wants to be president. She was able to outline some basic themes that came out of her own experience, the Different Things she done in her career all fit together in the story that she wants to tell the country. I think her challenge over the coming months is going to be to show that she can be a candidate who can broaden her appeal and she had that opening speech in oakland with folks who know her. She needs to lets watch her in iowa, litz watch her in new hampshire, lets watch her campaigning in states where she needs to say im the person who can govern this whole country. All of us, yeah but, joe, id say you cant have a better start than that but those are the questions we look for in the next period ahead. A great start and there is, yamiche, a purpose. There is a reason she are about just a month into this 2020 cycle activity and you take the candidacies of two women, lets talk about Elizabeth Warren and also we can talk about Kamala Harris yesterday. Everybody knows what they both stand for already. They no why they are running Kamala Harris, we are better than this. And of course Elizabeth Warren has been criticized because of her Bumper Sticker style mentality of campaigning but she keeps that is a plus that these two women have figured out how to do this out of the gate and thats something that vexed Hillary Clinton for two years. Its a criticism that mika had for two years, what does she stand for . Im with her and theyd say, well, go and look at her policy papers, go and listen to this speech, but hillary could never boil is down to what Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren have already done in their first couple of weeks of campaigning i think especially in Elizabeth Warrens case what youre going to have is someone who is going to be able to say ive held these progressive beliefs for a very, very long time, i dont have anything to apologize for. There are some dna issues shes going to have to confront. But long terms in ternls of her progressive politics, can you believe this with Kamala Harris, im someone who is going to announce on mlk name, u and im then independent going to hold my 20,000 person rally. What shes saying is im not going to run from diversity. She saying that the future of america is diverse, that we are supposed to be people who look at all the different dimensions of ourselves and question and figure out and say, yes, i can be all these things and americans. I think the interesting thing will be where is the rule set . Can you take billions from any organization and again, to joy a poin point,terps of helping the American People where they are casey, they are strong americans out of the box and the fact that they are women are not even part of the Bumper Sticker. Its unremarkable these the third i think its a real victory. I also they Political Consultants and Kamala Harris is really staking out one side which has as be and hes not saying, well, we lost in michigan, wisconsin and pennsylvania among male voters and therefore we need to bend over backwards to those people in order to win. She is making a bet on the other side of this spectrum. Its going to be an interesting test he p she does potentially have a clear pass to the nomination the Foreign Policy women are the single most important constituency i have a lot of women. Final thoughts and is there a democratic freakout going on by the president who is known to punch his owe owe pen to the only for his own theres a Broad Coalition of had find on and the and still ahead, with the shut down over, speaker of the house nancy pelosi is turning herself to the russian probe asking what does putin have o, congressman jim himes next on morning joe. vo were carvana, the company who invented car vending machines and buying a car 100 online. 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A Business Owner always goes beyond what people expect. Thats why we built the nations largest gigspeed network along with complete reliability. Then went beyond. Beyond clumsy dialsins and pins. To onetouch conference calls. Beyond traditional tv. To tv on any device. Beyond lowres surveillance video. To Crystal Clear hd video monitoring from anywhere. Gigfueled apps that exceed expectations. Comcast business. Beyond fast. Any chance youll cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller if he asks you know, thats a question i would have determine after my attorneys have some discussion if theres wrong doing by other people in the campaign that i know about, which i know of none, but if there is i would certainly testify honestly id also testify honestly about any other matter, including any communications with the president. Wow indicted former trump adviser roger stone has apparently not ruled out possibility of cooperating with found Robert Mueller. Meanwhile, new analysis from the New York Times found that trump and his oshts had more than 100 contacts with the russians before the inauguration the contacts included more than 100 inperson meetings, phone calls, text messages, emails and private messages on twitter. Among the president s own contact was a letter of intent he signed for a trump tower in moscow, despite tweeting i have nothing to do with russia, i have no deals, no loans, no nothing in addition to saying this i have no deals with russia i have no swegs or ails, no question been and also with us former Justice Department spokesman an msnbc justice and security and theres this moment when sherlock says never is the universe so lazy we have trump team lying about those meetings and here we find ourselves possibly near the end of an investigation and its just impossible to come to the conclusion that all of this is a coincidence, theres something there. Of course the question is what is it . The sheer number suggestions its extraordinary its obviously extraordinary. And the president s remarks that we just played, you know, once he took office were obviously a lie. They had a number of contacts with the russians. He was trying to do business in russia, campaign his son were meeting o had on friday when we found out that someone, a very senior official in the trump can pan and found out what was coming next the question that we still dont really know the answer to is why all the lying . Are a couple reasons the less benign, maybe not criminal but still quite toxic politically explain would be theyre lying because the political scandal is just too damaging and they didnt want any of to come out, even if they didnt cross line into committing a crime thats the question i think we need to focus on if we are getting to the end of this investigation. We are going to see evidence of crimes thahere may be other evie of behavior by the president , behavior of people andh, direct just showed on tv and theres so much of are of of it, of the president lying about his contacts with the russians we have the Vice President on tape lying about the campaigns contact with the russians. The attorney general, former attorney general lied in testimony before congress about meetings with russians his son lied about a meeting with russians in trump power soninlaw lied about meeting wi with. What did you do i mean, theres so many Different Directions that your committee could go in. Where do you start well, matthews right i mean, thats the big question. Its no longer a news story that people, including the president , are lying. The president lies on twitter pretty m ino sent lies i havent been sort of in and o and this sgsis a highly calibrated, wellexecuted massive spiry. Prp spsh and the question is, i think the big remaining question because were pay past collusion, right, if collusion is helping each other out, there was lots of helping each other out. The question is was there coordination and quid pro quo . Is Michael Cohen or roger stone or anyone else, the president , on record as saying, hey, if we do this, we will get that . That when you move from conclusion until criminal conspiracy song juan, do were you surprised at you a that himself ban roger stons invent, that he is is there are no thanksgiving that mueller discovered that he has laid out in that indictment were you surprised by any of that and do you buy that that exonerate him in some way . Well, it certainly doesnt exonerate him in any way remember, Michael Cohen is going to come on the president continues to say i know collusion, calling it a witch hunt, et cetera. Does it tell you as somebody who has been all of these meetings, in the testimony that they didnt hit roger stone with a collusion or against anybody for swircy and thats the clesing act of this drama and were but if there was in fact a conspiracy on the part of a president ial campaign to conspire to defraud the American People or defraud the government, that, believe me, is the claes at,that is the closing act of this whole thing. We should be very clear, just because everybody is lying doesnt man a lot of slopey behavior, do anything for the boss so to your point, your question, casey, if that is out there, that is the collecting act th status of your committee, is it up and running and are you able to actually do the work you need to do . Thats a good question. As of this morning, it is not up and running. Nancy pelosi appointed members of the committee im told Kevin Mccarthy is doing that tomorrow. We not done real photographer sit o congressman jim still ahead, President Trump apparently thought the russia controversy would be over when he fired Michael Flynn chris krasy hayes he broke the bad news to trump telling them probably would not be the case well have more details from the former governors new book strayed ahead on morning joe. I didnt really know anything about my family history. Went to ancestry, i put in the names of my grandparents first. I got a leaf right away. A leaf is a hint that is connected to each person in your family tree. I learned that my ten times great grandmother is George Washingtons aunt. Within a few days i went from knowing almost nothing to holy crow, im related to george washington. This is my cousin george. Discover your story. Start searching for free now at ancestry. Com at panera, we treat soup differently. With vine ripened tomatoes, signature cheddar, simmered to perfection. With big flavors, not artificial ones. Enjoy 100 clean soup today. Panera. Food as it should be. This round is on me. Hey, can you spot me . Come on in find your place, today, with silver sneakers. Included with Many Medicare plans. Call the number on the screen now or visit getsilversneakers. Com 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. In his new book, former new jersey governor Chris Christie said he and his soninlaw thought the controversy around russia would end afternoon the firing of Michael Flynn. On february 14th, 2017, the day after flynn was dismissed for lying to the Vice President about his contacts with the russian ambassador, christie and his wife mary pat had lunch scheduled with the president Jared Kushner decided to attend. According to crihris christie, said this russia thing is all over because i fired flynn. And trump responded what do you mean flynn met with the russians . I fired flynn, its over and kizy were the and said he was crazy when he said they would most likely still be discussing the russia issue in 2018 Chris Christie will be our guest tomorrow on morning joe. This feels like a conversation that trump and jared would have, very blind to the fact that there are other people looking at the russia questions that go beyond mike flynn and that the firing of mike it really just got beginning. Bad bloog, though again, were going to have christie on in a couple of days and we can talk about his reporting through the lens of his feelings about the kushners in general, but that being said, Jared Kushner was the person who encouraged the president to fire james comey saying it would help put the russia investigation behind him and perhaps now in this book is to be believed, he suggested the same thing about firing flynn this is a white house from the beginning that just never really had any grasp on how sprawling this russia investigation was going to be. Its shocking how ignorant they were about what they put themselves in the middle of. They kept thinking that they could turn it off. Well, if we fire flynn, its over well, if we fir copy its opinion. And they put out individual parts of this while behind them the blaze just keeps getting bigger the fascinating thing about the Christie Book is obviously its another story in the shakespearean revenge. Thats fascinating im sure youll talk with the governor about that. But i do think this particular moment is i asked myself did Jared Kushner really believe when he said that to Chris Christie, that it was over, or was i mean, this a more they say something, the more team think it will be and isnt it interesting and because rogers tone has changed a bit over the past 24 hours. Ill be quite ill be surprised if he carries his arrogance into the Mueller Investigation, but well see but, you know, matt miller, i thought it was very interesting what we heard from congresswoman himes who said, who knows, maybe these are just a bunch of liars, a bunch of goofy, dopey people who were lying because thats what they felt the president wanted them to do. And i have through the years when people have said, well, youve known trump and youve known people around trump, explain what theyre doing and i have said that more often than not if the choice is between just pure evil and sheer stupidity, youre not going to lose money by pushing your chips across the table to sheer stupidity. I wonder if this is another example of their just absolute, it have and an called for and unjustified arrogance that has gotten them into all of this trouble. Thats the deep tirey that more often than not, that tends to be the right explanation. Look, when it comes to them lying all the time and this indictment that was released on friday and to the congressman as point, i think ever since we assault weapon the indictments of the russianofficials by bob muleary team, we seen a conspira conspiracy would there be and i think the shoe we were all waiting to drots roger step. And when we saw the shoe drop on friday, it didnt include that conspiracy so i think there are one is theres nor and the second is that you had these two actors, the rush and possibly otherthey never entered into that conspiracy together. Matt, let me stop you right there. What youre saying could be true it certainly is a fair reading of a possibility i have, though, read over the weekend some outrageous opeds but conservatives suggesting, well, now is the time for mueller to come forward and say there was no collusion, there was no conspiracy, there was no untoward influence from putin. Thats important to understand is what i think people like you have always said, we dont no, we dont know the evidence thats in himself hand and we shouldnt prejudge it one way or the other until its over. Unless you want to be proved wrong, you shouldnt be making predictions about what hes going to do because we dont know it could ainappropriate of the people around him but not crossing a line because think didnt get drb it doesnt ma nn and in bd it dons. Just because he didnt cross the line into a crime, the standard for congress to look at the pret as paas andy mccarthy, who has written very strong, compelling arguments for the president of the United States has said from time to time, if youre not guilty, stop acting guilty there are so many times where donald trump has just added fuel to the fire. It seems that hes been obsessed in adding fuel to the fire so again, well see where this ends but at the same time, so much damage sp if they could have just taken the phone out of his hands on im serious on january the 20th, if they could have done that, if we could make cars that were fueled by milk chocolate, i could eat as many steaks as i wanted and never get fat, what a Wonderful World it would be. But just think about the difference between what donald trump has given us over the past couple of years and just a simple communication discipline. A simple communication has given since january 2017, my god, the political world, washington, d. C. , the world itself would look so different today. Well, yeah, they couldnt contain him. If they were able to contain him and his urges, it might have helped and i think it will be fascinating to hear from Chris Christie tomorrow and talk about the conversation you guys just had with his insights because he really did see a lot and did sea lot. Tomorrow morning well be joined by white house aide cliff simms. In the book simms writes that President Trump relishes giving friends, acquaintances and strangers tours of the white house. This we know we had one ourselves making sure to point out the spot where oh, god, really . Where all that Monica Lewinsky stuff happened simms the subject leads to lengthy often crass conversations. I can see him doing that hes obsessed. Unfortunately that part of it all we saw, mika, we just saw all the pictures lined up of the crowds on Inauguration Day and he said look at the crowds from this angle. Yes we were just given that tour of all the pictures of the large crowd. That have not that large trump also reportedly claims to his guests that his private dining room near the oval office was quote in rough shape and former president barack obama used it to watch sports. He just sat in there and watched basketball all day, trump recently told a tour group he loves giving tours. Thats for sure. And talking repetitively about certain things matt miller, thank you very much up next, she says she told white lies to protect the president but now hope hicks is working in hollywood. And what worked in the trump west wing is apparently not working on the west coast. Vanity fairja ne fox joins us with her new reporting next on morning joe. Show of hands, whos a future comcast Business Customer here . I think we all are. Yeah, definitely. Sign us up. Yes. Two hands. Two hands. Yay. Double hands. Get fast reliable internet and add voice for a low price. Just one more way we go beyond for your business. And now you can also enter for a chance to win 10,000 from comcast business toget your year off to a fast start. Theres a new 10,000 winner every day in january. Go online now and enter for a chance to win. Comcast business. Beyond fast. Joining us now Senior Reporter at vanity fir and msnbc news contributor is emily j. Fox. She has a new piece out. Hope hicks west wing alum begins her second act on the west coast. Emily, what did you fine what is she doing and how is it going . It was an open we do me, what happens when people leave the west wing and try to create life after Donald Trumps white house. And you see some people who, obviously, others have written books about their experience and try to attach themselves to it youve seen someone like sean spicer who has not landed and found his footing. There are a group of people who have worked there, have tried to find actual corporate jobs and whats interesting to me in reporting this is hope hicks landed a very big job. Shes now running communications for new fox. And if by all accounts she is fairly skilled at doing these sort of big communication jobs where you have to manage one single principle and do communications for the boss, essentially. But it has yet to be seen if she is able to shake the stench of the white house. All the reporters shes working with, the Hollywood Trade press are not willing to welcome someone with someone who worked so closely with President Trump for so long. They have questions about her honesty. The fact that she worked for a man like donald trump for so long and i think as good as she is and is as capable as she is in her job is she going to be able to shake the trump name from her brand . You would think hollywood would be a hard place to go with trump as your last job it sounds like it because it sound like shes in some ways struggling to get this idea you just cant float out kind of vague ideas of what you think might be the truth or if you dont know you may need to say you dont know which is a question i have for you, emily tell me about the anecdotes where shes accused of telling falsehoods you were talking about this idea there was possibly someone who was let go and she said thats not true right now and ill get back to you and it didnt work out in her favor what happened people arent willing to give her the benefit of out because she worked there. Someone was going to leave the company and reporters caught wind of the situation and asked her about it and she said theres no news there yet but things are fluid so ill let you know when theres a final decision what happened was i think from my reporting is things moved quicker than she thought they did. That person was out. The reporter said she wasnt honest things moved quicker than she thought. Because of where she worked for so long people assumed that she was lying. So i think thisis the problem for people who leave trumps west wing. No one willing to give them the benefit of do your and thats why it makes it difficult to start offer even if youre capable and very good at your job. Emily j. Fox, thank you very much well be reading your new reporting in vanity fair and still ahead the president faces some of his lowest polling yet. Well have the new numbers we could be facing another shutdown as the president expresses little hope that lawmakers will reach a Border Security deal that he would sign morning joe is coming right back hydro boost water gel from neutrogena®. With hyaluronic acid it goes beneath the surface to plump skin cells from within and lock in hydration leaving skin so supple, it actually bounces back. The results will blow you away hydro boost and our gentle exfoliating cleanser from neutrogena® when did you see the sign . When i needed to jumpstart sales. Build attendance for an event. Help people find their way. Fastsigns designed new directional signage. And got them back on track. Get started at fastsigns. Com. And got them back on track. This simple banana peel represents a bold idea a way to create energy from household trash. It not only saves about 80 in carbon emissions. It helps reduce landfill waste. Thats why bp is partnering with a California Company fulcrum bioenergy. To turn garbage into jet fuel. Because we cant let any good ideas go to waste. At bp, we see possibilities everywhere. To help the world keep advancing. Is the president really prepared to shut down the government again in three weeks . Yeah. I think he actually is over the next 21 days i expect that both democrats and republicans will operate in good faith. No one should ever under estimate the speaker as donald trump has claimed. Ive been very clear on the wall any chance youll cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller if he asks i have to determine after my attorneys have some discussion im seriously thinking of running for president. I will run as a scecentrist independent outside of the two party system so, lets do this wow there we go the president is weakened. The House Speaker is empowered the special counsel is advancing. And as you saw the president ial race is getting interesting. Good morning and welcome to morning joe. Its monday, january 28th, 2019. Along with joe and me we have columnist and sorry editor for the Washington Post David Ignatius politics editor for the daily beast, sam stein. Hes great too not so much sam, you knew it was coming. Its monday, man. The shutdown is over, joe former chief of staff at the cia and department of defense now an nbc news National Security analyst jeremy bash and chief Foreign Affairs correspondent and host of Andrea Mitchell reports, Andrea Mitchell. Lets go the news now, mika im doing it. Look at these poll numbers a new Washington Post abc poll has trumps Approval Rating sinking to 37 one point above his all time low. Giving him the lowest two year average Approval Rating of any president in the 72 year history of president ial polling. Among political independents 63 disapprove of trumps job performance. Up ten points since november the poll also found that 22 of americans more than one in five say they were personally inconvenienced by the 35 day Government Shutdown. And 63 told the nbc wall street journal poll that the nation is heading on the wrong track matching the record high for the Trump Presidency so the government is now temporarily reopened but President Trump is again ramping up the pressure on lawmakers to strike a deal that includes funding for his border wall. The agreement with congressional leaders will last three weeks until february 15th to allow for them to continue talks over Border Security. On saturday the president tweeted 21 days goes very quickly. Negotiations with democrats will start immediately. Will not be easytomake a deal. Both parties very dug in the case for National Security has been greatly enhanced by whats been happening at the border and through dialogue. We will build the wall at one point in the middle of hiS White House speech on friday, his teleprommer stopped rolling and the president decided to riff on some of his familiar and unsubstantiated talking points on Border Security based on operational guidance from experts iran the field they will put together a Homeland Security package for me to shortly sign into law. Over the next 21 days i expect that both democrats and republicans will operate in good faith. This is an opportunity for all parties to Work Together for the benefit of our whole, beautiful, wonderful nation the walls we are building are not medieval walls they aresmart walls. Women are tied up, they are bound, duct tape put around their faces, around their mouth, in many cases they cant even breathe. They are put in the backs of cars or vans or trucks they dont go through your port of entry they make a right turn going very quickly they go into the desert areas or whatever areas you can look at and as soon as theres no protection they make a left or a right into the United States of america. Theres nobody to catch them theres nobody to find them. Wow thats just and nothing to get hung about, Strawberry Fields forever. I mean, i have absolutely no idea, sam stein, what all of that meant yeah. Thats the president , obviously, who is seeing his poll numbers absolutely battered his high 43 thats an out liar the ap him at 48 . This morning hes at 37 this is what i dont under, sam. Hes getting pounded, you go through every demographic group. Things are getting worse for him. What changes over the next three weeks . If nancy pelosi is not going to be moving on the wall, which she isnt and she shouldnt, then how does this how does this is any different three weeks from now it obviously doesnt unless he declares an emergency declaration, which, you know, he should if it was in fact an emergency he would have declared it at any point over the past five weeks which he hasnt done that speech was very surreal stuff hes talking about, doesnt touch reality, duct taping and left and right turns doesnt make sense i guess i dont understand who is giving this president strategic advice in the white house. He spent five weeks doing the shutdown he got the hopes of his base up. He then killed the hopes of his base by giving in. He ruined his poll numbers he took an Economic Impact he emboldened nancy pelosi and then says tomb ill do this again in three weeks thats insane politically. I dont know what they think they have to win this fight. That will be new to them in three weeks that they didnt have four or five weeks ago. One thing that remains the same is Nancy Pelosi Nancy pelosi is not going to move an inch on the wall and, you know, trump has to know that this has to be a three week strategy, figuring out a strategic retreat. It will end up being some kind of a semantic variation you saw a couple of people on meet the press, you know, talking about a fence. Well in that case if there is some money for a event and they call it a wall or some sort of Additional Border security, money isnt the issue. They are not worried about the fiscal side of this, they are willing the democrats willing to spend a lot of money on Border Security but just not call it a wall the difference is the republicans in the senate have had it they are fed up. You dont have and i dont think well ever given the current circumstances have 20 republicans, according to people i spoke to, who are willing to override a president ial veto or worse case, you know, do Something Like an impeachment numbers because they see in his numbers strong republican support. He still has republican support. The but the Senate Leadership and throughout the Senate Caucus are fed up you saw that in last thursdays lunch meeting and they are not going to let this go one quick point on the republicans part. What was interesting about his by product of his cave there was an erosion of republican support in all demographics. Last night trump went after ann coulter for being mean to him. If thats the type of bickering youll see in the aftermath of these fights im not sure republicans will be allied to trump so much in the future. Im so glad you brought that up David Ignatius, lets stop for one second and this is not personal to anybody. Its just the truth is we all know it as just a matteroffact that it was ann coulter and Rush Limbaugh that actually get donald trump to move away from a deal that would have averted all of this, all of this and if you are just donald trump or one of Donald Trumps closest advisers, you look at the incalculable damage they have done this president and his ability to govern over the next two years, history books will be written about it i wonder if donald trump understand how much those two savaged his presidency on that one day. Well actually he savaged his presidency by being so weak that he couldnt even stand up to them he has been like a yoyo played by these rightwing commentators its true from the very beginning. He had through Jared Kushner a deal with mexico to finesse the whole issue of the border in the first weeks of his presidency. Mexican president was coming to washington the deal was set and there was rightwing condemnation of it and trump just absolutely freaked out. He just cant handle criticism from the right oh, my gosh my base is injured and the deal was scuttled. The mexican president cancelled his visit. Its a prelude to what were in now. Ill make a crazy prediction by february 15th, the deadline, well have a deal. I think democrats would be foolish not to take this as a win. Still ahead on morning joe, we know jim comey injected him into the political conversation when he led the fbi. His successor chris wray said he was determined not to do that until the Government Shutdown forced his hand. The latest fallout from that 35 day debacle. From the very beginning. It was always our singular focus, to do whatever it takes, use every possible resource, to fight cancer. And never lose sight of the patients were fighting for. Our Cancer Treatment specialists share the same vision. Experts from all over the world, working closely together to deliver truly personalized cancer care. And these are the specialists were proud to call our own. 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Comcast business. Beyond fast. Over the shutdown gave way on friday, fbi director Christopher Wray broke hiscy thrones address the strain on Law Enforcement agents and personnel who had gone more than a month without pay. Making some people stay home when they dont want to and making others show up without pay, its mindboggling, its short sighted, and its unfair it takes a lot to get me angry, but im about as angry ive been in a long, long time now, i know theres some question about why you havent seen the fbi leadership out there in the press fighting the good fight over the past five weeks. But there are real costs to doing that for us as an institution and for our 110yearold brand you know better than most weve been thrust into the political spotlight more than we would have liked over the past few years. And the last thing this Organization Needs now is its leadership to wade right into the middle of a full on political dispute. But let me also be very clear, were actively advocating for you left and right at every level. So, jeremy, i mean, think about this donald trump is talking about declaring a National Emergency of something that every expert will tell you is not a National Emergency with border crossings down, 90 of the drugs coming through legal ports of entry i can go down the list and yet this shutdown that he caused by creating a phoney crisis actually did cause one danger after another there we saw the fbi director. Of course, as you know, the fbi not able to pursue all the terror leads that they usually would pursue or, you know, leads against, you know, gang members. You can talk about the coast guard and not being able to do all that they do on stopping the flow of drugs and Human Trafficking into this country. You can talk about tsa agents not being able to do their jobss that cause there was one example of another example after another example of how this phoney crisis created by donald trump created a real National Security risk and, again, i just got to won, jeremy, is this really a risk that donald trump or any republican is going to allow to be repeated again in three weeks . I think where were headed is National Emergency declaration i disagree with david. I dont think the democrats are going give in to what they see as a concocted phoney crisis that under mines National Security the president is going to toss this to the court. Ill direct the department of defense, department of army and take money that would be used for military readiness and operational ability and well fight this in the curt he wants this issue off the table politically. To that point that move like this past three weeks will also under mine National Security but it until take something from pentagon and use it for a Fake Campaign promise its a direct challenge hes taking money that congress appropriated for specific things and would be under this term moving it to Something Else. That is going against, you know, the kings of congress, the appropriators. Its an abuse of power is what is it its an abuse of his ability to do that. The statutes that provide for that were not envisioned to fulfill a Fake Campaign promise. Coming up on morning joe the california crowd loved her but can Kamala Harris win over voters in the heartland too. Well break down her position heading in to the president ial race what if numbers tell only half the story . At t. Rowe price, hundreds of our experts go beyond the numbers to examine Investment Opportunities firsthand. Like a biotech firm that engineers a patients own cells to fight cancer. This is strategic investing. 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So we can all keep advancing. Senator Kamala Harris officially kicked off her 2020 president ial campaign with a rally in ooakland, california she stated oakland officials estimated 20,000 people attended the kickoff look at that crowd she was home i think she was really strong, joe. What are your thoughts its so interesting, trying to figure out who is going to succeed, who is going to fail on the president ial stage, and, andrea, its that it factor about either somebody has what it takes or not to fill the stage. Weve seen 64 men fill that stage and look small ive seen 54 women standing on the stage delivering a statement, looking like giants you either have it or you dont. Theres no predicting until that moment that person walks up to the microphone and announces they are running for president i dont know you about, but the second i saw her up there, i said wow, shes got what it takes. She filled that stage and she can play in the big leagues. Absolutely. And she had, you know, a couple of uncertain steps along the way coming to this point but there she was in oakland, huge crowd and a really good speech she had they and the people around her and her core message was very, very strong about america is better than this. We are better than this. We are looking bad to the world. Were encouraging racism i mean she confronted all of those issues shes clearly bright and, you know, has a new feeling about her, but this really came together now does this play in ohio, in michigan i think certainly in michigan and pennsylvania i dont know whether it is all across the country or if this is a west coasteast coast thing. Right now Kamala Harris is in a great position in this field the real other development over the weekend we can talk about is Howard Schultz absolutely. Put democrats in a total panic. We have that. Former starbucks ceo Howard Schultz is weighing a potential 2020 president ial run as an independent. Schultz tells the New York Times that he plans to crisscross the u. S. On his book tour over the next three months before deciding whether to formally enter the race but has already laid the ground work for a campaign in all 50 states. Heres what he said about a 2020 run in a recently taped 60 minutes interview that aired last night i am seriously thinking of running for president. I will run as a centrist independent, outside of the two party system were living at a most fragile time, not only the fact that this president is not qualified to be the president , but the fact that both parties are consistently not doing whats necessary on behalf of the American People and are engaged every single day in revenge politics some democrats are uneasy about schultzs interest as running as an independent. They are worry he could poach voter that would vote democrat and solidify another four years for President Trump. To his critics the selfproclaimed life long democrat said it would be disingenious to run as a democrat because the party has shift sod far to the left. Im interested in his comments about revenge politics on. Both sides hes absolutely right now is a perfect time to have the interview, right after Government Shutdown. And there are obviously going to be a lot of democrats who will be very concerned about how this breaks of course, you never know until you actually run the race and you have the election and you see who takes from whom. I know the bush family Still Believes to this day that ross perot helped elect bill clinton. So its hard to say. We can say this, though, David Ignatius, that there is no stronger brand in american politics right now than the independent. You look at young voters, they are not registering, the majority is not registering as republicans and democrats. They are independents. They are nonaffiliated. This is the future at some point, at some point there will be an independent president , sometime very soon. But i dont know if its in 2020 and i dont know if i want to be the guy that helped the reelection of donald trump wrapped around my neck like the albatross i shot for the rest of my life. Well, people will be angry at anybody who is seenas having helped donald trump get a second term with a minority of the country behind him by running a thirdparty candidacy. I put it a different way, joe. I think, you know, yes, Younger Voters are sick of the two party, the alignment that weve got but what they are looking for, certainly what i would like to see more of is the big, probably create a big tent under which everybody can gather thats the standard by which im going to be evaluating Kamala Harris she gave a great speech. She knows why she wants to be president. Democrats from lots of different viewpoints from all over the country can gather, people who may have voted for trump but are sick of him can gather one that tent thats how im going measure Kamala Harris. Pretty much everybody else Howard Schultz i like a lot of things he said in his speech but as you say its tough to be in that place in the middle that takes votes away from both sides. Coming up on morning joe, roger stone has had a throat say over the years the big question will he Start Talking to bob mueller how his arrest reshapes the russia probe next on morning joe minimums and fees. They seem to be the very foundation of your typical bank. Capital one is anything but typical. Thats why we designed capital one cafes. You can get savings and checking accounts with no fees or minimums. And one of americas best savings rates. To top it off, you can open one from anywhere in 5 minutes. This isnt a typical bank. This is banking reimagined. 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Steve martin on saturday night live playing long time political confidant of donald trump roger stone after stone was indicted on friday with seven counts accused of lying to congress and obstructing investigations into his discussions with wikileaks and the 2016 trump campaign. Stone is asked to be be arraigned in washington, d. C. Tomorrow when he says hell where he says hell plead not guilty on saturday morning President Trump broke his silence on stone in a tweet writing if roger stone was indicted for lying to congress what about the lying done by comey, brennan, clapper, lisa page and lover baker and so many others what about hillary to fbi and her 3,000 deleted emails what about lisa and peters deleted text and weiners laptop much more. Hes the king of deflection. On saturday night the president continued to rail that the investigation looked into the data meant to damage Hillary Clinton and not information and Media Coverage related to his Campaign Trump added roger stone didnt even work for me anywhere near the election, concluding in all caps, witch00. Joining us now staff writer for the atlantic covering National Security and the intelligence community, natasha bertrand. Former assistant u. S. Attorney for the drik of columbia now an msnbc legal analyst Glenn Kershner and jennifer taube. And, joe, wow, we havent spent that much time talking about roger stone, but the president seemed, sure seemed defensive over the weekend well, i want to go to glenn because glenn may be the only person old enough to be steve martin and Steve Martins wild and crazy guy and his excuse me, from excuse me to pardon me. That was quite a wonderful moment on snl. I want to ask you, though, again, theres so much speculation since these indictments came down on friday. Give us the headline give us the big idea give us the holding. What matters most about the indictments against roger stone . So, joe, heres what matters most as i have read and reread this indictment. Ive been carrying it around since it came out. Have indictment, will travel i keep looking for the conspiracy charge, because this is a conspiracy indictment when we prosecute sort of what we call standalone cases, and roger stone at this moment looks like a standalone case because hes the only one charged in this indictment. And we have, for example, a witness tampering charge heres how that indictment would read it would say Something Like on january 1st, 2019 in the District Of Columbia defendant john q. Public tampered with a witness by attempting to impede his truthful testimony before an official proceeding. Thats not what this indictment is this indictment reads like a conspiracy indictment and names other potential coconspirators its Julian Assange, its corsi, its Randy Credico and importantly its darn near Senior Trump Campaign officials who participated in what seems to be a two way street of information flow not just passively receiving information from roger stone about wikileaks, but pushing him to find out more so i dont i dont even need to put my glasses on at this point to see the bigger conspiracy indictment coming down the pike. Wow so, natasha, lets move from this one puzzle piece we were just talking about with glenn to looking back, taking a step back and looking at the entire board, and everything that youve been investigating, everything youve been reporting on over the past several years. What does this mean for the entire operation, trump operation where you now have a president , we showed the clip off the top of the show, lying about contacts with russians and having no Joe Ianniello russia a Vice President lying about the fact that nobody ever talked to russia Julian Assange lying about meeting with russians. Soninlaw constantly lying about his contact with russians on declaration forms an attorney general lying in front of the senate. I can go on. It never stops it continues nsa had lying. How does the roger stone piece fit into that larger puzzle that youve been reporting on now for a couple of years yeah. I think you hit the nail on the head, joe. I think its really about why all of these associates of donald trump have been lying about their contacts with russians over the last two years and why they concealed all of these contacts during the campaign and i think mull certificate doing a very good job right now of laying out all of those lies in realtime these are not trivial lies when we found out that Michael Cohen had lied, for example, about the timing of the trump tow mont towermoscow deal that was a reason why trump was cozying up to putin now we know roger stone was lying to the committee about who his real back channeling was to wikileaks. We know now that he was saying that Randy Credico essentially basically was his cover story, saying Randy Credico was his back channel when, in fact, he was trying to get information out of wikileaks months easterly via jerome corsi i point out jerome corsi earlier this week on msnbc, actually, when he was being interviewed that his story is completely unbelievable about how he came to predict that john possible defendant jos emails would be released in october of twoik because john podesto, offense course had no role in the dnc. Now youre seeing this picture come together of roger stone and jerome corsi working together in a significant way. Randy credico the fall guy lining and the conspiracy comes together i dont think this is the end by any means of, you know, or even reaching the end of the Mueller Investigation. I think theres a lot more to come especially because the arrests, the stone arrest was not just an arrest warrant it was also a search warrant and carting out his Electronic Devices and things he had been withholding from investigators for the past two years there might be a lot more on his devices especially because he was so, he used encrypted apps so often to talk to his contacts that may incriminate the president and his associates directly i want to get on glenn why the fbi raided his house jennifer you said dont dial down on your enthusiasm on what mueller can fine a lot of folks, we want to stick with facts it could be we dont know what it could be but yet you say and he given the picture that natasha just painted in terms of what we know, you think it could be explosive. I really do i agree with glenn and natasha this indictment of roger stone lays out a conspiracy story and i see three different conspiracies that end up linking the russian intelligence officials who hacked into the dnc and Clinton Campaign emails all the way to the white house the three conspiracies that seem to be revealed although not charged is being part of this, the conspiracy to hack and stage the release of the democratic emails and thats conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, namely the Computer Fraud act the second conspiracy sure looks like a conspiracy to defraud the United States which is a stan alone defers sort of to interfere with our election process the third conspiracy, this draws on what benjamin observed is really this idea that maybe the obstruction is the collusion so i think what were seeing most importantly in this stone indictment is a conspiracy to obstruct justice were seeing a lot of defenses coming up from the trump side, this is a journalist platform. Even if they are pushing back saying there was no coordination on the hacking or release, it was just tell us what you have, which i dont believe, theres still the lying about it yeah. And the coordination i expect that to be charged did it seem they knew i mean, what are they looking for in roger stones stuff and why isnt he upset so, first of all, let me talk momentarily about this sort of complaint that it was a predawn raid with guns drawn let me tell you. When were executing search warrants, safety first, okay why does Law Enforcement do predawn raids because people are asleep. They are less likely to have weapon less likely to be able to destroy evidence there is a reduced chance that innocent guests will be there visiting the house so this is keeping with protocol ich its not unusual or heavy handed what are they looking for . I have every confidence that stone recklessly communicates with others. Encrypted apps one hes trying to hide what he says to others one, it would incriminate him. Two the mueller team can go behind the encryption to find out what he was talking about. When i saw the indictment returned by mueller against the 12 russian operatives for what they were doing in russia right down the key stroke that was investigative genius in my experience mueller has now reached the stage where hes been investigating don jr. And Jared Kushner and the president himself and roger stone and corsi. Thats like investigating fourth graders. These men are so reckless in their communications and we saw some of that in the indictment that was just against stone. They keep going on tv well have to have you all back. Thank you all. We only really scratched the surface here up next before the u. S. And china could talk about trade, they had to start talk in the first place. That can be traced back to something that happened exactly 40 years ago today well look back at that moment in history which hits very close to home. For me, thats my home, morning jo ies back in a moment house. We had heads of state to our home we had don jan ping. Oh, that delicious. Oh, forgive me im so dumb joe loved that joke David Letterman having fun at my expense. The Trump Administration says china has until march 1st to come up with a deal on trade they will meet again this week since they announceed a temporary truce to the trade war. The fact that the u. S. And china are even talking to each other at all is of note. That wasnt always the case. A big part of that can be traced back to 40 years ago when the chinese president reached an agreement with president carter. He had dinner with my family at hour house in mclean, virginia very stressful in a moment ill bring one of my brothers to be that night. But first heres tom brokaw a look back on the carter presidency reporter it was a visit that changed the world. Good evening, chinese vice premier is in the United States. Reporter 411 but a giant in international politics. The leader of china in 1979 arriving to the United States at the invitation of president carter we transformed the political and economic picture reporter it was a Long Time Coming reporter the first lady of america greets the first lady of china. Reporter 1943 the last time a top chinese official visited washington we in china like you want a better world reporter but in 1949 mao mao tsmao ts mao tse tung had china become americas enemy for decades. President ford visited china relations stalled until the rise of the vice premier in 1978. President carter announced a stunning break through United States of america and the people of the republic of china have agreed to recognize each other and to establish diplomatic relations reporter tonights announcement coincides with major changes. This move towards New Friendship with china is a very good, very positive development for world peace. Reporter he was someone that the u. S. Could do business with. More pragmatic still ideological, but eager to modernize china. His arrival in washington was a very big deal. There was a pause and a wave for the cameras. But later in the evening he slipped off for dinner with brzezinski brzezinski, carters National Security adviser was instrumental in forging the new relationship, visiting china in may he invited dong to dinner. He accepted. Helping to serve that night, 11yearold daughter Mika Brzezinski her dad was fascinated with all things chinese up to a point that nights state dinner was the hottest ticket in town with some controversy over one best it in particular Richard Nixon returned to the white house for the First Time Since he resigned in disgrace 1 2 yedisgrac disgrace 4 1 2 years ago i have no apology i think it was the proper thing to do. I look forward to seeing president and mrs. Carter again and to meet vice premier, whom i have never met. Reporter nixon met the premier that night and so did most of official washington. Vice premier, on behalf of all americans, i welcome you to our house. Reporter then it was off to the Kennedy Center where dun was treated to a night of entertainment john denver introduced the National Childrens choir. They would like to sing a song for you well known to the children in your own country its called i love Tiananmen Square. Reporter a decade later, of course, Tiananmen Square was the scene of a massacre. A crackdown on dissidents ordered by dunn zhou ping. But that was far in the future his visit to washington was a whirlwind of meeting, interviews, photo ops, sightseeing and a visit to capitol hill where congressional leaders were worried that the president was selling out taiwan some time foreign visitors think the president can just press a button and they get anything that he wants reporter but this historic moment belonged to jimmy carter and dun. China and the United States of america are now meeting on the basis of equality with full diplomatic relations with the agreements, china will buy American Science and Technology Worth billions of dollars over the next few years. And with that will come perhaps huge changes in chinese society. From washington, he went shopping a ford plant in atlanta. The space center in houston. Boeing in seattle. The first steps in chinas road to becoming an economic powerhouse carters road was rougher. The landmark nuclear deal that he signed with the soviet union soon after the visit was never ratified after the soviets invaded afghanistan. Senator ted kennedy, a guest at the state dinner, would challenge carter for the democratic nomination. And on the very day that dun left washington, in the middle east, the Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile to a heros welcome in iran. His radical followers later seized the u. S. Embassy, taking dozens of americans hostage and crippling carters presidency. Still, reimagining the u. S. Relationship with china, home to almost a quarter of the worlds population, stands as a singular achieveme achievement, transforming china from an enemy to Strategic Partner and, in time, a formidable 21st century competitor wow, brings us back our thanks to nbc news senior producer Andy Franklin and editor rob caflin for that great piece. Joining us, mark brzezinski, my brother. Mark also served on the National Security Council Staff under president clinton. Joe, this event and this dinner at our house 40 years ago today it does go beyond spilled caviar in many different ways. It really does. It was a wonderful recap of that time with by tom brokaw i did want, though, David Ignatius, in looking at brokaws package, tom brokaws package, you know, when people assess the carter presidency, when we talk about dr. Brzezinski, the focus is always it seems first or out of the gate the camp david accords because it was such an extraordinary landmark peace agreement, but my god, it is hard to find a diplomatic breakthrough more significant to the world we live in today and the world we will live in a century from now than what happened 40 years ago tonight. That wonderful time capsule was a reminder for me of the importance that personal diplomacy makes. The fact that dr. Brzezinski, mika and marks dad, reached out personally to dun and brought him into his house that was something that clearly was powerful to him personally, to the chinese people, that their leader was being welcomed in this way. I think it just took the relationship into a new space. The other thing i have to say, its painful today when china was emerging as an adversary for the United States to remember the hopes that we all had that free people would make a freer country. That china was opening up. It was entering our world and we were helping i think your dad would be sad to see the way in which china increasingly is seen as a potential adversary. Absolutely, joe mark, lets go back though 40 years and at your fathers funeral, i thought president carter was so extraordinarily gracious toward your father, talking about the vital role that he played even joking about how dun wanted to go eat at your house first. Talk about the relationship, the special relationship, between your father and deng xiaoping, as David Ignatius just related to, the importance of personal diplomacy that could make Something Like this happen. Based on two things, first, chemistry. These were two people who saw an alignment in advancing shared objectives despite ambiguity the americans wanted to contain the soviets who were trying to expand into south asia, into africa the chinese wanted to unleash dengs developmentish initiati and bring it from a fourth world country into a first world country. The strategic piece was how could you advance. Major differences on taiwan. The taiwan lobby in washington at that time was Even Stronger than it was today. Second, the chinese were thinking about a military aggression against vietnam which had itself been aggressive against cambodia the americans wanted to normalize relations with vietnam. The president , president carter, and deng, wanted to advance key shared interests and carters chief strategy, zee brita z zeebrinski, were the right people for the job deng arrived in mcclaen, virginia, the flue in the fireplace opened i just dont think we opened it correctly, actually and theres brzezinski with newspapers trying to get the smoke out the window and despitethat, the dinner wa a great success. That happened, we were all affixa affixated. Of course president carter talked about you almost running him over and also the caviar incident set the scene for us personally what it was like any way a little girl like yourself or mark could understand what you were in the middle of . I could feel the stress the whole household. Because my mother made us do everything there were no caterers it was stressful, couldi could l the tension of it. Looking back, we really were at the seat of the table of history. For our father, diplomacy was so much about personal relationships. Remember it was, dinners, yes. The secretary of state in the 1950s refused to shake the hands of the chinese leader. Our father knew the importance of personal connections and personal relationships and he fully maximized the potential of that. With maritime collaboration, commercial collaboration, geopolitical collaboration you see between the chinese and americans today. Important lessons for today regarding what happened 40 years ago between america and china. Absolutely. Important lessons for today also important lessons for future leaders, for future president s president carter had sent the secretary of state over. As the president said it did not work he didnt give up. He then sent dr. Brzezinski over and of course there was an historic breakthrough. Were going to continue this conversation on wednesday, alex, i believe we have secretary albright on, is that correct that is correct, yes. We do we would love mark, if you could come back on a wednesday and David Ignatius, as always, love to have an extended policy discussion about what went on, the impact it had and if mika could ever be trusted at a state dinner again. No, i cant