Reporter drawing on his experience as a College Football star to play a prison Team Quarterback in the longest yard. All right, all right reporter and drawing on his hollywood years to shape the role as a panographer with integrity in boogie night. It won him late acclaim, including an oscar nomination, after years away from the headlines. This has been a long journey for me. Im very, very happy. From smoky and the bandit to boogie nights. Burt reynolds will be remembered as a legendary leading man, whose career spanned more than half a century. Miguel almaguer, nbc news, los angeles. Weve got a little more on this in just a moment. Burt reynolds was 82 years old. Youll know him the from deliverance, the longest yard. He received an oscar nomination for boogie nights in 1997. He lost that to robin williams, who got it for goodwill hu hunting, but it is noteworthy that reynolds was, according to the hollywood reporter, hollywoods top grossing actor every year from 1978 to 1982. And that was the longest stretch in the business since bing crosby in the 1940s. In 1978, Burt Reynolds had four movies playing in the theater at the same time. He definitely was a little bit dissatisfied. He sort of felt that for all the success he had and all the earnings he had and all the movies he had been in, he didnt always feel he got the recognition he deserved. As i said, he was nominated for an oscar. He did win a golden globe for boogie nights, but he did not win that oscar that year. He he was sort of hollywoods leading man for many of those years, even outside of the years that he was the top grossing actor. This is a guy whose career spanned from the early 70s all the way to the late 90s and into the 2000s. So this is a guy who i wasnt expecting this news today, but all of suus have a lot of memors about Burt Reynolds. He was, by the way, born in lansing, michigan. I want to go to just checking with my control room. Steve patterson is on the story. Hes joining us from the los angeles bureau. Steve, this is, like i said, this is news that i wasnt expecting. But, boy, a lot of memories come flooding in. I have the fortune of being a little older than you are, so this is a guy in the years i was watching movies as a young man and a teenager going into it, Burt Reynolds was that guy. He was possibly the biggest name in movies back in those days. He was the ultimate mans man actor. My generation, i think, best remembers him in boogie nights, where he got that oscar nomination, but certainly growing up through the years, you heard movies about deliverance and the longest yard, all of that trickles into pop culture, so you get to see him over the years and really relate to him as kind of the ultimate mans man. He did a lot of commercials and things like that in his later years, that my generation certainly remembers and appreciates him for. But i think he set the standard for sort of that rugged leading man that could do comedy, that could do action in many cases did his own stunts in the 70s. And so just a guy, i think, that was broadly respected in hollywood. We did get a statement just basically from his representation saying that it is true that he passed away and no comment beyond that. But again, i think youll start to see hollywood tributes and tweets and twitter messages start to pour in here in hollywood, as people are just starting to learn the news, as you mentioned, very surprising that Burt Reynolds passing away at age 82, ali. In florida, we understand, which is where he was living. He had jupiter, florida. Jupiter, florida, right. He had a mansion, some people will ebb aremember, in florida. He declared bankruptcy in the 90s. For all his movie success, he had a lot of financial problems, but in the 90s, a lot of that was based off of his very public split with Lonnie Anderson in 1998. Hep ended up not being able the to recover from that very easily. A lot of people will remember him from the 1977 smoky and the bandit. Youll remember the sleek pontiac transam that he drove, creating a generation of guys like me who wanted a transam, as a result. Do we know anything about what led to his death . At this point, no. I mean, all we have at this point is, again, that statement that he did pass away. We are, obviously, awaiting word to hear more about what led to this. And you know, obviously, he was up in years, 82 years old, but i think were still waiting to hear more about what exactly happened here. I think, again, as you mentioned, this is sort of a shock. It didnt seem like he was sick or in ailing health, or at least news had not broke in that way from all the rags in hollywood here. So i think thats just something that were waiting on at this point, ali. All right, with thanthanks v for that. Well stay on top of that we get more information, but Burt Reynolds has passed away at the age of 82. All right, switching gears. It wasnt me. A number of Top Trump Administration officials have rushed to deny their role in an anonymous oped published this time yesterday in the New York Times. The author, known simply as a Senior Administration official, has yet to be uncovered. But we know that the president is livid and even described as volcanic by multiple aides and allies familiar with his thinking. And while we may not know who wrote the oped, the picture it paints is one that we have heard before. The author writes this about trump. Quote, the dilemma which he does not fully grasp is that many of the senior officials in his own administration are working legitimately from within to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations. The author goes on to describe the president like this. Quote, meetings with him veer offtopic and off the rails. He engages in representative rants and his impulsiveness results in halfbaked, illinformed, and occasionally reckless decisions that have to be walked back. And if you heard this before, its because you did, two days ago from the new book by bob woodward. The president is leaving soon for a Campaign Event in montana. Well see if he has more to say on the matter. But for more on this topic, im joined by chris whippel, the author of the gatekeepers how the white house chiefs of staff define every presidency. Chris is also an msnbc contributor. Chris, this is interesting, the criticisms and support for this anonymous senior white house official, i dont know that they break down along party lines. There are some who feel that this was an irresponsible thing for someone to do, because it was an unelected person. The president himself used the word treason. Where do you stand on this . Youve looked at relations within the white house. This is unusual by all standards. The first thing to say about it is its absolutely unprecedented. A lot of people have talked about Richard Nixon wandering the halls of the west wing talking to the oil portraits. But i really think about lbj at the height of the vietnam war when the late, great speechwriter, richard goodwin, was convinced that lbj was sett certifiably paranoid, he was irrational and couldnt make wise decisions. The difference is, we didnt learn about that until years later. But this is a story thats in realtime. Its obviously unprecedented, to have an anonymous official writing in the New York Times. It may become the most famous, anonymous article since george canons famous long telegram from the soviet union, which he signed mr. X back in 1947. His warning was to contain the soviet threat. This persons warpg is to contain donald trump. Its incredible. In your book, your book has been reissued, because republished, because you have new information that you published in terms of your interviews with reince priebus, who said that you should take everything that youve heard and multiply it by 50. What does that mean . Well, what he was saying was that this is even wilder than youve heard. And priebus certainly gave lots of examples of woodward wrote about how papers would be taken off the president s desk, because they thought they were afraid he might sign them, illconceived orders. By very senior white house officials. Gary cohn taking a document off that he wouldnt sign. Rines priebus told me on day one, donald trump wanted to rip up nafta, impose 25 tariffs on automobiles and steel, and they had to sit him down and explain, remember michigan . Remember ohio . Remember wisconsin . If you rip up nafta, you will kill the farmers in those states. And he reluctantly agreed to renegotiate. I assume you dont know who the senior official is, but if you do, please tell me. When you hear senior white house official, what do you believe their responsibility and the degree of loyalty to the office and fealty needs to be . Weve heard this with don mcgahn said, my responsibility is to the president s seat, not the president. When you read this oped, is that somebody going against the president . Heres the thing you need to understand. A senior white house official, obviously, has to try to execute the president s agenda. But it is his or her job also to impede the president s agenda when the circumstances call for it. The president of the United States is not a mafia don who can order the assassination of bashar al assad. Richard nixon ordered hr holderman of chief of staff to firebomb the brookings institution. And halderman was smart enough to ignore that order. National security decisions have to go through a rigorous process where principles and deputies weigh in with information. And then a decision is made. But for donald trump, the problem is that process and discipline are an anathema. In those circumstances, a senior white house official has to try to walk back illconceived or halfbaked decisions. So you dont think its, like some people say, really bad and this person should be rooted out and as the president said, maybe something bad should happen to th them . No, its that persons job is to slow walk rash decisions or illconceived decisions. Its really your responsibility to try to slow walk those decisions and get the president to reconsider, if necessary. Chris, thanks for joining us. Chris whippel is an msnbc contributor and author of the gatekeepers, which is always a good read, but increasingly more important to read these days. Talk of the 25th amendment is once again taking over washington after the author of the oped wrote this. Given the instability many witnessed, there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th amendment. Now, the 25th amendment is the section to have the constitution nah removes power from a president if they are unable to serve. It was originally adopted after the assassination of jfk and has been used just a handful of times since being adopted, most notably after the resignation of president nixon. To help us talk more about this, im joined by jeff rosen, the president and ceo of the Constitution Center and the guy i go to when i need to understand the constitution. Hes a law professor at George Washington. Jeff, good to see you. Thank you for being with us. There are four sections of the 25th amendment. Its the Fourth Section thats never been used. But top cabinet members can remove the president if they feel, quote, the president is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. In the context that we are talking about, is that how it was imagined . And has it ever even been implied or thought of that it might be used that way . Its a great question. It was imagined, as you said, in the wake of the Jfk Assassination and also the illness of dwrooiight eisenhoweo the framer of the amendment was thinking mainly of the president being ill, but they did contemplate the possibility that he might be mentally disabled, and they decided that would be a political judgment by the Vice President and members of the cabinet. So thats why section iv says, if the Vice President and members of the cabinet by majority vote and say the president is disabled, they can remove him. If he says, hey, im fine, im not disabled, then congress decides by a twothirds vote of both the house and senate. In other words, its hard to remove the president through the 25th amendment than through impeachment, which requires a majority vote in the house and twothirds in the senate. But ultimately, birch bye says its a political decision about whether they think the president is unable to discharge his office. So because the bar for removing the president is as high as it is, higher than impeachment, does that give you pause when reading this oped to say, probably not true or likely that the cabinet was thinking about this . Probably not likely or true. Because they know that the bar is so high and they know if the votes are not there to impeach, theyre not going to stick their necks out there. Donald trump tweeted and had a couple of interesting tweets. One just had the word in capital letters, treason. The other one he asked, does the socalled Senior Administration official really exist or is it just the failing New York Times with another source. If the gutless, anonymous person does, indeed exist, the times must for National Security purposes turn him or her over to government at once. Talk to me about constitutionally, treason. When you read this oped, does that rise to the level of treason . Or how should we be thinking about that . I think i can be confident in saying that criticizing the president the not treason. The constitution says the that committing treason is committing war against the United States or aiding and abetting its enemies. And the broad definition is you have to be at war with a company and officially aid them with two witnesses or a confession in open court in order to constitute treason. Im pretty confident stating in a bipartisan way that simply criticizing the president doesnt qualify as aiding any of the u. S. enemies, that is foreign enemies, and therefore cannot be treason. Jeffrey, great to have you. Jeffrey rosen is the president and ceo of the national Constitution Center in philadelphia and a professor at the George Washington law school. In a few mister, were expected to see the president for the first time today. Hes on his way to montana for another Campaign Event. Were just weeks away from the midterm elections, and making this weeks revelations about the west wing all the more impactful. My good friend, nbcs hallie jackson, our chief White House Correspondent is there at the white house for us. Hallie, whats the mood there . Whats going on at the white house. Ive seen your reporting over the last the few days. Whats going on . Okay, lets start with whats going on in the last hour or so, ali. Number one, the white house is pushing back on reporting that each of these denials, call it the loyalty list, right . These top officials publicly pledging allegiance to the president , saying they are not the ones who are behind this New York Times oped, the white house says, no, those are not being printed and put on the president sether. One senior white house official also told our team here, my colleague, peter alexander, that hey, this is a functioning white house. That is a line you heard from the president over the last 24 hours. But heres the thing, ali, it is entirely true that there are other meetings happening that are not related to this oped. The work of the white house continues on. But the president himself, where is his head at . Livid, volcanic are the words that we have used. I was told by one source close to the president that the president is the totally furious, not just at this oped, not just at what it says, but at the New York Times itself for publishing it, and that is what the tactic seems to be today. A unified tactic, ali, everyone from the president , to the Vice President , to the secretary of state, mike pompeo, taking what is basically an alarm bell, right, sounded and turning it into a weapon to attack the media. Going after the times, going after the paper. You saw that in the press secretarys statement today, blasting what she called this gutless coward and saying, if you want to know who he is, call the New York Times opinion page, going after the media for what she described as a wild obsession with the source of this editorial. I would note, there are people in this administration who also want to know who this person was. Well, thats what i wanted to get to. Because as you heard from my conversation with jeff rosen, the president tweeted that this person, for National Security purposes, should be turned over to the government at once. Thats frightening language. Regardless of where you stand on who this person is, whether they did the right thing or whether theyre gutless or whatever the case is, is there a National Security reason that the white house has stated or defended, to back up this tweet . Yeah, the president s tweet is basically the foundation of that claim, ali. The president saying that its a National Security threat. There are questions of sort of what that is. You know, there may be a question, and you talk with some folks in conservative circles about this, about, for example, if there are this secret cabal of people thwarting the president s moves when they believe theyre making destructive decisions, those are unelected officials. As one person talks about, this is still obviously problematic when you take it as a whole, ali. All right, hallie, thanks very much. Well be watching as the president leaves for montana for a Campaign Stop very shortly. All right, up next, guying republican opposition. Senate democrats force the release of previously confidential documents related to this man, the Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaughs views on the topic of roe v. Wade and on racial profiling. What were learning from those documents after the break. Youre watching msnbc. Docuntmes after the break. Youre watching msnbc. This isnt just any moving day. This is moving day with the best inhome wifi experience and millions of wifi hotspots to help you stay connected. And this is moving day with Reliable Service appointments in a twohour window so youre up and running in no time. Show me decorating shows. This is staying connected with xfinity to make moving. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and twohour appointment windows. Click, call or visit a store today. This is a live look at the kavanaugh hearing. Senator ben sasse is doing the questioning at the moment, republican of nebraska. Were going to monitor for anything you need to know. This is the third day of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaughs confirmation hearing, and it began with a new battle over documents and the release of some emails that appear to contradict some of kavanaughs testimony. Yesterday, kavanaugh was asked if he believed that roe v. Wade, the decision that legalized abortion, was settled law. Heres how he responded. Planned parenthood versus casey reaffirmed roe and did so by considering the starry starry decis factors. Casey specifically reconsidered it, applied the starry decesi. Thats latin for let the decision stand. That decisions should be guided by precedent. But this morning, the Senate Judiciary committee released a 2003 email chain on a draft oped, supporting one of president bushs judicial nominees in which he wrote, i am not sure that all legal scholars refer to roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since court can always overrule its precedent. Heres what kavanaugh had to say about that this morning. In that draft letter, it was referring to the views of legal scholars and i think i was saying that may be overstating the statements of legal scholars. Joining us now is New York Times washington correspondent and msnbc contributor, Charlie Savage, whos been covering this hearing and broke the story for the newspaper. Hes also the author of power w wars the relentless rise of president ial authority and secrecy. Charlie, let me just ask you this. The votes are the votes, right . In olden days, they didnt even have these hearings in public. Theres a lot of grandstanding that goes on. But this feels big. Does the release of this information change anything about the fact that Brett Kavanaugh is on the road to becoming the next associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States . Well, i think youre right to put your finger on the real politics surrounding this. It doesnt seem to me like theres any chance that Brett Kavanaugh does not get confirmed, based on what has come out to date. And hes almost already all the way through this hearing. The brutal reality is right now, or the good reality if youre judge kavanaugh is that republicans have a simple majority in the senate and thats all it takes now to confirm a judge. So the release of this sort of smattering of documents, some of which were leaked to us last night, a lot of which were then blessed for relief late this morning and are trickling out some more, even as we speak, are giving democrats a little bit more fodder to ask tough questions about what his views might be. Hes very skillfully turning aside those probing questions, including in that clip you just played. Hes clearly very well prepared for this hearing and i have not seen anything that changes my view that hes likely to be confirmed. Senator Susan Collins of maine and senator luisa murkowsi have both stated theyre prochoice. If you are them, does this give you pause in their opinion . Well, they havent shown any indication of alarm or concern. It is the case that that email does not say, i, Brett Kavanaugh, believe this is not settled law and is ripe for overturning. He observes that legal scholars, you know, third person, may not agree across the board charlie, let me interrupt you for just a second. Theres another protest going on. Lets listen in. Special protection for, against firing, and i think thats become the model for the regulations. Im not recalling the specifics of the cox regulation in place at the time. Ill tell you that there were forcause restrictions in place in regulation at the time. Given that, do you think firing the special prosecutor violated the law or the constitution. Okay, charlie, they happen so quickly now and they are dealt with so quickly, that a protest starts and yanked out. And ends very quickly. Yeah, yanked out of the room the fast. The Capitol Police have gotten very adept at pulling people out of the back of that room in the last few days, as seems to be happening regularly. Let me ask you about this sorry, go ahead. No, with finish your thought. Go ahead. Cory booker and john cornyn, senators, got into this battle over the release of these documents. Particularly a particular email on racial profiling. We, then, heard from bill bourke, who represents the office of former president george w. Bush who was sort of the lead on the kavanaugh records, regarding what cory booker said this morning. And he said, we cleared the documents last night, shortly after senator bookers staff asked us to. Were surprised to learn about senator bookers history onyx this morning, because we had already told him he could use the documents publicly. In fact, we have said yes to every request made by the Senate Democrats to make documents public. In fairness, charlie, some people may not be following this because the hearings have been going on. Whats going on here about documents and legality and cory booker . Theres a lot of confusion about what documents have become technically, formally public and when, over the last 12 hours. Democrats put in a lot of requests yesterday, and the New York Times was leaked a big tranche late last night, which we started publishing last night and published some more early this morning. Then we had this exchange with cory booker and also a similar one with senator hirono of hawaii. Who seemed to be putting out documents unilaterally, saying, you know, screw the rules, this is an outrage and were not going to abide by them. And now we have burck saying, no, we already told them that they could do that. So that was a charade. But adding to confusion, republicans were certainly respondenti i responding to booker as if they thought he didnt have a right to put out those documents. I dont know what to make of it. Charlie, with thanks very much for your reporting on. Lets listen in again. Senator kunz of delaware is asking about the mueller investigation. Wrongly decided . Ive said stfit was one of t four greatest decisions and correct decisions in terms of the specific relation at issue in the case and the Courts Holding in the context of a criminal trial subpoena that the subpoena for the information, the tapes was enforceable if that context. And thats what ive said before, publicly, about the nixon case. And that 1999 sou you would agree that it was correctly decided . Did i just hear you right . Yeah, of course. When i say somethings the greatest, that means i agree with it and the point was, under the specific regulation at issue in this case, a criminal trial subpoena for the information and it was a moment of judicial independence, a moment where the court came together for unanimous opinion, written by chief justice burger, thats an important moment in the courts history so you would agree that a court could order a president to produce records in response to a grand jury subpoena, or it can be compelled to testify in front of a grand jury. Im not going to answer hypotheticals about how to apply u. S. V nixon. But that is the holding . The holding of u. S. V nixon is that the subpoena for the information in the context of the criminal trial had to could be enforced and that, therefore, given the regulation at issue in the case, the case w was justiceable and the subpoena could be enforced. By the way, i should add that that the kynect of what you have up there is incorrect. But ive so. But ive said nixon was one of the four greatest moments in Supreme Court history. Ive written that several times before, including in 1980 you have. 99. The context of that, if you want to know, was a roundtable with me and some lawyers who had represented the clinton administration. We were just talking, reflecting on the independent counsel investigation. And my point to them, they were concerned that the subpoenas that were enforced by the courts during the star independent counsel investigation had weakened the presidency. That was the position of the clinton lawyers. And i said, well, we were just following u. S. V. Nixon. That was my position. So my position was, either youre wrong or nixons wrong, to the clinton lawyers. And thats the context of that comment, the tone of voice there makes the printed words look much different from how they were intended. And i think thats been seriously mischaracterized and the striking thing about the context, which weve discussed before and ive made clear in a letter i was going to question about, is that phil lackavara, who argued u. S. V. Nixon, in a later interview said, he didnt just think you were being provocative. This was some academic give and take with some criminal lawyers. Hes been quoted saying that that statement, that perhaps nixon was wrongly decided was brett staking out his jurisprudence approach since law school. It seems lakavara thought you were serious about raising a question about whether u. S. V. Nixon was wrongly decided, because what you said at the roundtable, nixon took away the power of the president to control information at the executive branch. Right, and thats why the clinton lawyers, i thought, were wrong. So that was my point. So why should the person being investigated the point i was making is that the clinton lawyers, who were saying that the independent Council Office had weakened the presidency, i was saying to the clinton lawyers, it wasnt the star office who had done that, it was United States versus nixon who had done that. And then i pointed out to the clinton lawyers, and i think weve discussed this in the office, had a good discussion in your office about this was, i had said, but you are unwilling, i said, you are unwilling to challenge the United States versus nixon. That was the governing precedent and the precedent we were litigating, and thats the kynect in which that line was said. With all respect to mr. Lakavara, i think hes misunderstanding what i was saying there. And heres how i know he was misunderstanding, because of the contemporaneous law review article at that same time, i specifically talked about u. S. V. Nixon and the importance of that precedence, so thats how i know he was misunderstanding the point of what i was saying there. Well continue to listen in on this. This is delaware senator chris kunz questioning Brett Kavanaugh. I want to bring harry litman in, an assistant attorney during the clinton administration. This is an interesting conversation theyre having about documentary evidence of something that Brett Kavanaugh said during the investigation into president clinton that he said that he meant in a certain tone and someone else has said, he actually this was his position. What do you make of that back and forth . Well, i think its a very interesting discussion and kunz now h coons has a huge opening, but i dont if hell take it. Judge kavanaugh has said he personally believes that u. S. V. Nixon was correctly decided. It was decided around the same time of roe v. Wade, before other cases as to which he steadfastly said he wont discuss whether he believes theyre correct or not. This is whats so important about some of these documents that are coming out now, they give personal views, the sorts of things that the committee is so hungry to try to get, and it makes it, i think, much harder for the judge to say, now, well i cant discuss the correctness or what i believe about any opinion. Hes right now saying clearly, i think nixon was correctly decided. On the specific back and forth there, theyre talking about, he suggested at this roundtable that maybe it was wrongly decided i actually think he, here, ive read it carefully, has a good point. He was making a real inside baseball argument about justicy ability. And i understand why he wasnt taking the heretical position. But the bigger point here, ali, theyre now dealing with real documents where he says real things from before his time on the bench. Which begs the question, why shouldnt these senators have access, as the democrats have asked, and by the way, as some republicans have asked for, why shouldnt they have access to all the documentary evidence on Brett Kavanaugh . Precisely. The questioning today has been so much more vivid and informative by graham, by booker, specifically because of these documents, which, by the way, as Charlie Savage just mentioned, bill burck has decided when they come out or not. He said, first, anytime anyones asked, they let it out, suggesting theyve been overprotective to date. And whos bill burck, hes the former lawyer to president bush and Brett Kavanaugh. Hes not accountable to anyone. Weve totally mangled or the normal case in which theres some accountability for deciding what comes out or not. And the basic point is, under 10 of judge kavanaughs documents have come out. More than almost 100 of justice kagans and others and these documents today show, its really important things to be able to talk to judge kavanaugh about, to get very Important Information about his views. Heiarry, good to talk to youa former u. S. Attorney and former Deputy Assistant attorney general under the clinton administration. Up next, reports that the white house is preparing for defense secretary jim mattis resignation, expected by many insiders to happen within the coming months. Theres already a short list of possible successors in the works, from a retired army general to some sitting senators. Well tell you whos on the list. Plus, more on the life of actor burt reynold who is died today at the age of 82. Youre watching msnbc. Day at th2 youre watching msnbc. Ahh. Summer is coming. And its time to get outside. Pack in even more adventure with audible. With the Largest Selection of audiobooks. Audible lets you follow plot twists off the beaten track. Or discover magic when you hit the open road. With the free audible app, your stories go wherever you do. And for just 14. 95 a month you get a credit, good for any audiobook. If you dont like it exchange it any time. No questions asked. You can also roll your credits to the next month if you dont use them. So take audible with you this summer. On the road. On the trail. Or to the beach. Start a 30day trial and your first audiobook is free. Cancel anytime, and your books are yours to keep forever. No matter where you go this summer make it better with audible. Text summer17 to 500500 to start listening today. As the president s message to kim jongun seems out of step with the message coming out of his Justice Department, trumps defense secretary might be on his way out. After weeks of rumblings about a deteriorating relationship, the Washington Post reports that internal speculation about james mattis imminent departure has intensified. Quote, the speculation about who replaces mattis is now more real than ever, said a senior white house official, who was not authorized to speak about internal matters. The heightened speculation comes after damning revelations in Bob Woodwards new book, fear. It included reporting that mattis told close associates, quote, that the president acted like and had the understanding of a fifth or sixth grader. Mattis has called the book fiction. With me now is evelyn farkas, shes a assistant deputy of defense for russia, ukraine and eurasia. Mattis is one of the people in the administration, close to the president , who are thought of as by people who dont like this administration as one of the adults in the room. Obviously, he has had views that differ from the president s on a number of issues, but this book sort of paints both the president and mattis into a corner. Right. Well, first of all, ali, hes so general secretary mattis has denied the statements that were attributed to him by bob woodward, so we have to make that note. Nevertheless, he is the sober man in the room you can well imagine that if the other things that are described in the book truly occurred, that he would have taken the actions or not taken the actions, so in the case of eliminating assad from the face of the earth, its easy to imagine that he would have ignored such a suggestion on the part of the president. Does that happen, evelyn . Like, if you think back in history, obviously, you pick a cabinet secretary because they either have some expertise, particularly in defense, in an area, so you want their counsel, but does it ever happen that somebody slow walks something or doesnt wan something that the president actually wants done . Absolutely, all the time. So thats not unusual. And it wasnt as if it was an order that was given by him, a written order signed by the president. That would be, frankly speaking, unconstitutional, treasonous if he disobeyed the president in that fashion. But, so, in the case of overlooking, slow rolling, you know, that happens all the time. I think the thing to remember with secretary mattis is that his highest allegiance, if you know the man, his highest allegiance is to the constitution, to the american people. He wants to protect american National Security prerogatives and frankly, the men and women of the armed forces, as well as the civilian personnel who worked in the department of defense. And thats why you dont see him getting involved in a lot of other fights. He has a very clear sense, i think, of what his mission is. Right, he doesnt seem to veer off of defense issues. You say youve heard this rumor already. It wasnt about this book from woodward. You had already heard maybe the tension with bolton. Yeah, i mentioned to your team, i had already been hearing, for at least a month now, certainly when bolton came into the position as National Security adviser, there were there was a lot of media speculation about whether he and secretary mattis would get along, based on some of their divergent viewpoints and styles. I dont know whether that continued, but i do know that there were rumors that the tension continued. And at least a month ago, i was hearing that, i guess, bolton kind of had the upper hand and somehow, secretary mattis was maybe on the outs. So there were people in kind of the washington, d. C. And republican circles who were concerned that are mattis position was in peril. All right. Evelyn, thanks very much. Evelyn farkas, former assistant deputy secretary for defense for russia, ukraine, and eurasia during the obama administration. I want to get back to the breaking news at the top of the hour. The death of hollywood legend, with burt reynold. He passed away at his home from cardiac arrest, according to his agent. He was 82 years old. Reaction to his death is pouring in on social media. Arnold schwarzenegger tweeted, Burt Reynolds was one of my heros. He was a trailblazer. He showed the way to transition from being an athlete to being the highest paid actor and he always inspired me. He also had a great sense of humor. Reynolds is one of the biggest stars in the 1970s and 80s. He starred in movies like the longest yard and more recently, boogie nights. Joining me now is ben mankiewicz. This is now the second time im talking about it on this show and i mentioned that handful of movies. Burt reynolds has been in lots of movies. Yeah, you know, i excuse me, for tcm, we did an interview with him in tampa, florida, before we screened smokey and the bandit. It was a giant theater, it was packed, we had to turn people away. This was probably 2010, 2011. Burt was injured by that point. All those stunts he had been in had really taken a toll on his body, the football he had played in college and high school. And we had to walk up the stairs from the green room to get to the stage and we were going over some of the movies we might talk about, and he said something like, you know, ive made 80 or 90 pictures. Then he said, and only four of them are worth a damn. And i you know, i laughed, like you did there, and then i just thought there was something sad about that, because we know, of all the roles that he turned down, you know, he never what he got at and what he was not willing to talk about on stage, but was willing to talk about on stage was he never challenged himself enough as an actor. He could have you know, james bond was dangled in front of him, Jack Nicholsons role from terms of endearment was dangled in front of him, han solo, diehard, and even the role he got nominated for in boogie nights, he turned that down a ton of times. He didnt always trust himself as an actor, and that was a mistake. Because when he was in good movies, he was great in them. And it is hard to overstate the case, ben, that for a generation of people, myself included, this was hollywoods leading man. I mean, i think i was just reading earlier that there was a stretch of years between 78 and 82 where he was the highest grossing actor. It was one point in that stretch where he had four or five movies out at the same time. Yeah, you know, were, i think, basically the same age, ali, and i dont need stats to tell me what you and i know instinctively, is that he was the biggest star in hollywood for a big part of our lives, an important part of our lives. He was funny. You know, he got that role in deliverance, the director told me, in part, because he saw him filling in for Johnny Carson on the tonight show and thought, wow, that guy has the personality and the attitude that were looking for, even though he hadnt necessarily seen it in reynolds work, up through the late 60s ands into the early 70s before deliverance. Well, i hope he came to peace with the idea that he was that influential and that big a deal. Ben, thanks for sharing some remembrances with us. Ben mankiewicz, host of turn classic movies. Coming up, while apologizing to be slow to respond to russian efforts to disseminate russian propaganda, members of facebook promise senators theyre working aggressively to stop the spread of misinformation in upcoming elections. Youre watching msnbc. Rmation i elections. Youre watching msnbc. Lean on me, when youre not strong and ill be your friend ill help you carry on lean on me. But prevagen helps your brain with an ingredient originally discovered. In jellyfish. In clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. The smoother the skin, the more comfortable you are in it. And now theres a new way to smooth. Introducing new venus platinum. A premium metal handle boosts control. To reveal up to 100 smooth skin. Venus after President Trumps multiple baseless claims on Silicon Valley alleging censorship and political bias against conservatives, it appears attorney general Jeff Sessions looking into it. A Statement Released by the Justice Department revealed sessions would meet with state attorneys general late they are month to, quote, discuss a growing concern that these Companies May be hurting competition and intentionally stifling the Free Exchange of ideas on their platforms. The announcement came in response to hours of testimony on capitol hill from facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg and twitter ceo jack dorsey. Those executives fielded questions on the spread of foreign influence campaigns on their platforms ahead of the 2018 midterms. Now to to take about this with me is roger mcnamee, Elevation Partners and center for humane technology. An early investors in facebook and current investor in google. Also special agent msnbc National Security analyst, author of messing with the enemy, surviving in a social media world with hackers, terrorists russians and fake news. These two guys are our experts on social media and manipulation. Roger, on one hand, im glad were realizing that everything na happens on social media isnt great, but Jeff Sessions wading into the waters now on this particular issue seemed more partisan than concern about the larger issue. Ill be curious to hear what clint thinks. My own perception of this, there are so many things wrong with the social media platforms today, itll really impressive sessions could come up with something that isnt actually a problem. In fact, trump and the republican parties have enormous beneficiaries of the actual flaws of social media. Its impossible to imagine trump having gotten elected without social media. Its impossible to imagine him doing what he does every day without twitter. And so i look at that part and just go, thats laughable. But there are real issues we should be focused on some of which came up in the hearing, not all. Clint, i do want to get your point on this. Let me play a little of what jack dorsey of twitter said in that hearing about political viewpoints on twitter. Lets play that. We dont consider political view points, perspectives, or Party Affiliation in any of our policies or enforcement decisions, period. Impartiality is our guiding principle. Let me explain why. We believe many people use twitter as a digital Public Square. They gather from all around the world to see whats happening, and have a conversation about what they see. Twitter cannot rightly serve as a Public Square if its constructed around the personal opinions of its makers. So, clint, i want to get your take on this, on the idea of why Jeff Sessions is involved in this. One can be skeptical about it. To rogers point, social media dont make themselves the heroes in the scenario either. Theyve gotten themselves backed into a tough spot. Everybody has come to play on their platforms. Now theyre having to decide where the lines are going to be. Theyre not really judicious in that. Its very hard for them to come up with the rules, terms of service which we know are hundreds of pages long now. What i see with what sessions is doing, President Trump said donald trump, jr. , steve bannon, what theyre trying to do is move people off those platforms, in my opinion, to conservative apps. If they can move this this partition happened in cable news. We saw people move their audiences to different information outlets. If they can do that, it is a way to bypass these social media platforms when it comes to Campaign Time and you can hone your message. That feels like a bad world. Im concerned about how People Choose cable tv based on their politics. Is there a way to avoid it . Maybe people should go to a conservative facebook or conservative twitter. So, ali, i personally think that will be a lot harder to execute than people realize, and it will be deeply unhelpful to the partisans who do it. I mean, the thing we need to remember is that the key to trumps election and to the 2016 campaign was the use of disinformation and micro targeting to suppress the vote of a lot of people who werent sure about who they liked in the campaign. And that was incredibly effective. And obviously, if you create hermetically sealed, you wont be able to do thats as effectively. The problem i had with yesterdays hearing was it focused entirely on foreign actors behaving badly. And i think we were ignoring the almost certain bad acting thats going to come from domestic players in the 2018 midterms. Using the russian play book, potentially even using the Cambridge Analytica data set. Especially using micro targeting on instagram, on facebook and other platforms in order to essentially target things people care about that have nothing to do with the campaign. It could be puppies, right . Then you accuse the opponent of being on the wrong side of the issue people care about. Its immensely difficult virs i have and its built into the architecture, these platforms, and they have not yet begun to find ways to deal with that. Clint, inherently divisive to the extent roger and i talked about this is how they make their money. Yet if you take that russian play book and apply it domestically, you dont have the same tools, you dont have everybody ram iing to say keep them out of our election. We will be doing it to ourselves. Not only is this designed for the domestic scene, they have the technology. The one thing the russians did struggle with is they didnt have artificial intelligence. They dont have chat bots that is more sophisticated. They dont have the data ag aggregation techniques. Campaigns will. Theyll be able to merge all this data together. Roger is exactly right. The real threat is the regulators. Whats funny about that yesterday, theyre bringing social Media Companies up there and beating them up. All of them will wand to spend on their platforms or via their platforms on app. Weve unleashed a creation here we may not know kpashlexacw to put back in the bottle, roger. I dont know how we address this at this point. And incredibly, google had the temerity, the arrogance not to appear at this, as though somehow theyre above, you know, getting involved in the regulatory functions. And i think its amazing. Google was actually in a better place politically than facebook but theyve managed to bring themselves down to that same level. Facebook caught a lucky break. Im worried about this. I encourage everybody, ali, i encourage everybody to vote. A lot of these are about voter suppression. We need everybody in every state they want to be involved. That part of the trickery doesnt work. Thanks, great to continue the conversation with you. Roger mcnamee is an early and current investor in facebook and google. Clint watts author of messing with the enemy surviving in a social media world of Russian Hackers and fake news. Ill see you back here tomorrow at 11 00 a. M. Eastern with Stephanie Ruhle and 3 00 p. M. Eastern. Thanks for watching. Deadline white house with Nicolle Wallace starts right now. s hi, everyone. Its 4 00 in new york. A real witchhunt to talk about. Donald trump is on the hunt for a witch in his own ranks, someone with the audacity to share with the nation and the world the president s own cabinet discussed removing the president from office by invoking the 25th amendment. At this hour, no one is presumed innocent. The vicepresident taking the extraordinary step of denying that he was the author of that anonymous oped published by the New York Times almost exactly 24 hours ago. Heres the list of other Administration Officials who sought to get on the record today saying that they had not written the piece that claimed, among other things, that the president is essentially unfit for the office he holds