Well get to those stories in just a minute. We start with new questions today about just how President Trump plans to deploy those troops to our border with mexico. The president just left washington a few moments ago, bound for West Virginia. He did not take questions from reporters there as he boarded air force one. At this point, it is unclear where those troops would be deployed a long the nearly 2,000milelong border with california, arizona, new mexico and texas. The troops would be National Guard units and they would serve in mostly a support capacity were told and the move itself actually mirrors efforts made by president george w. Bush and president obama during their administrations. The pentagon set to have a briefing that is going to start and it actually has started. You see a look there at the podium. We are expecting that some reporters are going to be asking questions about the border wall, about the president S Immigration plans. In just a few moments. When those questions start, well take you to the briefing. Nbc News White House correspondent Kelly Odonnell is with us from white sulfur springs, West Virginia, where President Trump is headed. Hes going to speak at an event there today. How did this issue rise to the top of the white house agenda and is there even a timetable . First, if youll allow me a moment here of breaking news, we learned from our colleague, as you were delivering the intro to this program, that the president did speak on the issue of scott pruitt. The epa administrator. During his travel with our pool colleagues who are responsible for being up close with the president. They asked, if he remains confident in scott pruitt whos been under fire for his rental agreement, other questions of using personal and taxpayer money. Two word, i do. The president saying he remains confident in scott pruitt. So thats some breaking news thats just happening in the last couple of minutes. To get to your question, craig, there has been a longstanding view from the president that the border is central to who he is as a politician and to his presidency. But this simply bubbled up quickly over the weekend. With the president we believe base on his tweets over the weekend that were matching some Cable News Television conversation about a caravan of migrants heading north. That has now been stopped. And that seemed to get the ball rolling for a more urgent plan that had been discussed for quite a while behind the scenes. As you pointed out, president s bush and obama also used National Guard troops for Different Reasons for Border Protection or to augment the work of the officers from the Border Protection service who are there day in, day out. So it is a power that the president has under whats known as title 32, working along with border state governors who have three of four who are republicans and are on board. And the numbers have not been provided to us yet. And that will be critical. But my sense is, if obama had 1,200, bush had 6,000, the number likely to be greater than that, simply because of the attitude of this administration when it comes to the border. Nancy pelosi, the democratic leader, is calling this needless and cynical. It is controversial for those reasons. At the same time, this is a function the president can take and especially where hes got cooperation from governors to do a supporting role, to reinforce the border. Think of it also in the fact we did not have in the spending bill that was passed much of a downpayment on the border wall. And so in some ways the president is adding a human border wall by sending reinforcements there, craig. I want to go back to the news you broke on pruett. We know in the past just because this president says that he has faith or confidence in one of his cabinet secretaries or another member of his administration, that doesnt necessarily mean that he or she is going to be saved from termination. Did we get a sense from the pool whether i do means that scott pruitt is not going to be canned here in the next week or so . Well, lets put it this way, if the president said anything other than i do get the banners at the bottom of the screen ready. It would be a five alarm news fire if yet another member of a cabinet level position was out. So the president is sort of boxed in that way. We know in terms of some of the regulations that pruett has been a part of dismantling and removing at the Environmental Protection agency, that part of his work has been something the white house has been happy with. But the white house has been very unhappy about pruitt attracting negative headlines. A range of things from spending at his offices which would be taxpayer money, his travel, using first class travel while on official business. He said he didnt book the travel, it was a securityrelated matter. But typically government officials are not flying in first class. And there has been a lot of attention paid to an apartment, a condo, where he rented a room at the beginning of the administration in 2017, where he paid, by every account of the marketplace for apartments, 50 a nice, from a woman who herself was a Health Care Lobbyist but married to an Energy Lobbyist who has a lot of business before the federal government. Theyd been longtime friends. But these are the kind of things that raise ethical questions and has attracted a lot of negative attention to scott pruitt about his decisionmaking in these areas, his use of federal funds, but also these were his personal funds for a place to stay. But when you have a lobbyist involved, that iz ra raises que. The president says i do when it comes to confidence. We know white house officials have been very displeased by the negative attention. As i would suggest, anything short of i do would mean hes on the way out and the president would want other issues front and center today. His tax reform event here and immigration and Border Patrol security that we have been talking about, craig. Kelly odonnell there for us in West Virginia with some breaking news there as well on the president s confidence in scott pruitt. More on that in just a moment. Lets talk a little bit about more about border plan. Michael singleton, with housing and urban development, and matt welch, editor at large at reason magazine. First of all, lets start with what we know, because heres the thing, matt, at this point, theres a lot we dont know about precisely what these troops are going to be doing along the southern border. Based on what weve seen the role be in the past under bush, under obama what do you surmise their role is going to be and do you think this is an appropriate use of the president s power . I think the primary role is security theater. Theater . Yes. I mean, we have 37,000 apprehensions happening per month right now. When barack obama did this, there was 55,000 per month. When george w. Bush did this, there was 125,000 per month. Do you know what the average number of apprehensions per month better Border Patrol agent is . It is two. It is two. The National Guard, people who will be deployed there. They will be conducting some sort of support for the people who are apprehended. Probably those who are coming and seeking asylum. So for me its not appropriate to waste taxpayer money to make a political stunt of course. I think thats selfevidence. We should realize we have doubled the size of the Border Patrol. And both agencies have had all kinds of vetting and hiring problems. Weve thrown so much money at this problem and so many personnel at this problem, politically, that we havent actually started to look at the effectiveness of it and this is just adding, in my opinion, to the ineffectiveness of how you approach this problem. Kevin barrett is with me. Executive editor, defense one. You raised an interesting point. I want to call our viewers attention to this statistic. The president has been focused on border skrut security. Real and perceived to a certain exte extent. Tweeting this morning, board of the truck administration action, border crossings are at a still unacceptable 46 year low. These statistics are from the department of Homeland Security itself. Theres the peak in 2000. Almost 1. 7 million you could say illegal border crossings. Its down to just over 300,000. Almost 304,000. So michael, why does the president of the United States continue to continue to push this narrative that he has to know isnt actually true . Well, look, craig, i think if we analyze this objectively, we have to think about it from the perspective of a trump supporter. One of the no, we dont, thats not objective. Wait a minute. You cant say we have to analyze it objectively and then do it from the perspective of a trump supporter. Give me a second to finish. If you are a trump supporter, then i think they have the expectation the president does indeed follow up on one of the main comb poe noeptponents of h, which was quote unquote building a wall. I personally think supplying troops to the border is a waste of taxpayer dollars. But the president has a mandate from individuals who supported and voted for him. Like most politician, when they are given a mandate, they typically try their best to follow through on those mandates. I think thats exactly what the president is attempting to do. Whether i agree with it or not. Kevin there does seem to be some confusion about what precisely these troops are going to be doing along the border. This is what Homeland Security secretary nielsen had to say this morning. Take a listen. The technology, the surveillance, pieces, the rough terrain down there. We have a picture you can see the train and the Law Enforcement will they be armed thank you, guys, we have to head out. Keep walking. Okay, we are working what id like to hear from the governors is what it is they want. It was difficult to hear so ill read it to you. Theyre going to do help with a look at the technology, the surveillance, in some case, rough terrain down there, but we can free up an officer who is trained to do Law Enforcement by having someone whos trained will they be armed, and she didnt answer that question. Kevin, whats likely to be the role . What are the limitations of using federal troops on u. S. Soil . The likely role is no secret. A lot of it is, you know, isr, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance. Which means drones and watching the horizon, perhaps some satellite technology. Dont think of a line of troops or a line of vehicles or tanks that are going to protect the physical border. Limitations are posse comitatus. A lot of admirals and generals have gone on tv saying that. Look, troops are trained to kill, to go into combat. Some are trained to do Stability Operations or some version of what this is. National guard troops are different. Theres a long history of using the National Guard to help with civil, you know, situations and riots and disasters and unrest. Disasters and unrest including Border Control. Its true, this is an option. My concern is i think this is yet another example of trump said it way before anybody in the government knew about it. Now theyve got to come up with a plan. Just like in the last week we had to deal with syria. You know, he said look, im done, i want the military involved. Were going to get tough on this because its trump. It is, you know, its as was said, its a main date of his electoral base to get it done. So now the dod, dhs, the white house, is trying to figure out what the options are. Do you share this sentiment that this is all merely theater, especially in a Midterm Election year . Well, i mean in what sense . That the idea is will it actually make a difference to Border Control and stoppages . You know, im not a border expert. I think that would have to be seen. I mean, more people, more technology, more capability, probably makes things more security. But hes right and we all know theres been a steep decline in border crossings. This isnt the same problem of 5, 10 years ago. But its still a problem. This is one solution that should surprise nobody. And, you know, there was a little bit of freakout at the beginning of wait, you cant use the military, so everybody did a little bit of research and went, owe, actual oh, actually, the last two president s did something similar. Im taking a pause to see what the plan is. Its not up to me to decide whether its a good idea or not. But well report it and let you know what happens. Matt welch, i would have to i dont want to see something i know not to be true so let me preface this by saying i need to go back and check whether this is completely accurate. But i believe that under at least one of the administrations, there were border governors who had requested this. This is a case border governors are saying hey, mr. President , please send in the National Guard to help us. Rick perry when he was governor of texas broughtne in s National Guard. It has to be paid for by states, not the federal government. The governors have to approve this and decide they want this to happen. Three of the four border governors are republican. Certainly in arizona, politics are tend to be pretty tough on the border. Because of the construction of a lot of the wall and the fencing on the border, a lot of the passages and crossings have happened now in the desert areas and so were talking about scattered farmers who have seen their property hurt. So they have more of a felt a need of someone helping them out with that. But this will have to be approved by republican governors along the boarder. Matt welch, thank you. I apologize for cutting you off earlier. Thats okay. A publicity problem for pruitt. Well go back to that breaking news off the top. The president insists that he does, in fact, have confidence in his epa chief. But his latest interview about that controversial housing and travel decision, its reportedly made some white house officials quite uneasy. Also, Big Questions about facebooks future. Mark zuckerberg gets ready for hearings on capitol hill. 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Still yes xfinity delivers gig speed to more homes than anyone. Now you can get it, too. Welcome to the party. As we just reported, the president when asked moments ago by the pool if he had confidence in embattled epa head scott pruitt, President Trump said quote, i do, even though the scandal keeps growing. Politico now reporting the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection agency is investigating his 50 a night condo lease. It is at least the fourth such inquiry into pruitt by the agency he runs. The Inspector General is also looking into his taxpayer funded travel, his use of a special hiring authority, and his spending on a sound proof phone booth for his office. All of this comes after the epas ethics lawyer released a memo on wednesday stating he was, quote, missing key facts when he rules there were no ethics violations in condo lease. Pruitt fired back last night on fox news. So why did you then accept 50 a night to rent a condo from the wife of a washington lobbyist . Well, lets talk about that. That is something, again, thats been reviewed by officials here. They said its market rate. Youre renting it from the wife of a lobbyist. It was like an air bnb situation. When i was not there, the landlord, they had access to the entirety facility. You only paid for the nights you were there . Thats right. Thats a sweetheart deal. No, its not. Aaron blake, washington post, is with me. So is dana milbanks, syndicated columnist, also with the washington post. The white house told pruitt not to do tv. He forged ahead. That fox news interview was widely seen as a disaster in the building. And senior white house officials believe he was involved in staff raises contrary to what he says. If hes going against the white houses wishes, is he nearing the exit door or do you buy what we heard from President Trump a short time ago . Yes, i think if theres any lifeline for scott pruitt, it may be the comments that the president just made saying he has confidence in him. Basically Everything Else that the white house had says this week has suggested that his job is very much in jeopardy. The Inspector Generals comments, the new memo that came out on wednesday, basically totally undercuts the defenses that pruitt and his defenders had been offering here. They say this is basically been run through the ethics process. The ethics guy now says it wasnt completely approved. It didnt address the actual ethics concerns about renting from the life of a lobbyist. Also i would point out in that memo point out by the ethics official, there is one point at the end where the name of the lobbyist is actually scratched out and replaced with that of his wife. Scott pruitt said in that fox news interview that this was not anything that involved business that the epa had. Well, if that wasnt a concern, why cross out the name of the lobbyist and replace it with his wife . There just seems to be a whole lot of things falling apart here as far as his defense of this arrangement. One of the things that seemed to be a bit curious is the white house sort of changing its tone on pruitt. Deputy press secretary hogland gidly a few hours ago said he couldnt speak to pruitts future. This was sanders yesterday. Take a listen. Does the white house have confidence in the epa administrator . The president thinks hes done a good job, particularly on the deregulation front. Again, we take this seriously and were looking into it. Again, to note here, President Trump, a short time ago, saying he does have confidence. Dana milbank, you follow this administration very closely over the past year. That doesnt necessarily mean you have job security in this administration. Do you think with scott pruitt its a question of when, not if . Well, not necessarily. Because it doesnt really matter what the white house is saying. What it matters is what the president is thinking. We know that now within the 1 00 p. M. Eastern hour today, he has confidence in scott pruitt. That does not mean he will have confidence at 2 00 p. M. Or 3 00 p. M. Or at this time tomorrow. The president has been known to be quite fickle. And capricious. Pruitt is playing an interesting game here in defying the white house. Which sounded like it was some good advice, not to go out on television. He is essentially playing conse. The fox news, the conservative times. He does have a lot of credibility with the conservative base in a way that others like mcmaster, tillerson didnt have. So hes sort of using that as leverage i think in a way to keep his job. Even though it is really very hard to defend, as aaron was laying out, the things hes done. It does not seem that its Getting Better for him as the explanations come out. Aaron, in light of growing white house departures, you noted recently that when a lot of these folks do leave the administration, they are not always just going quietly into the night. A number of them have been speaking out after they leave, outgoing Trump Administration officials keep sending distress signals. Theres the headline. Heres some of what theyve said. This can be a very meanspirited town. [ applause ] but you dont have to choose to participate in that. Russia brazenly and implausibly denies its actions. And we have failed to impose sufficient costs. These appointees had a belief that there was a different way to do it than i was approaching it. If pruitt does depart, aaron, what can we expect to hear from him . I wouldnt necessarily expect him to speak out against the Administration Even in veiled terms which is what a lot of these officials have been doing. I think that, you know, dana made a really good point here. If anything, Scott Pruitts saving grace in this whole thing is he is the guy who makes liberals eyes bulge out. This is a guy who can make a credible claim theres a concerted effort against him. But that doesnt really change the fact that the things hed been doing have been pretty questionable in the eyes of many. And now it seems even the ethics official who supposedly signed off on this agreement is now questioning it. So the white house needs to decide whether it wants to go to the mat for scott pruitt or whether it decides this is just too much of a distraction and this is really headed in the direction that they would rather not take it. Aaron blake, thank you. Dana milbank, thank you. New pressure on facebook today. The number of users whose information may have gone to bad actors, that list is growing. So whose job is it to protect your data . 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Starting monday, if youre a facebook user, youll find out if you are among the 87 Million People whose personal data may have been improperly shared with cambridge analytica. Anna shekter is with me as well, nbc news producer, a big thanks to all of you. Anna, i know you were on this call yesterday with mark zuckerberg. This is one of the things he said i find found interesting. Take a listen. I think the thing that people should assume, i mean, just given this is a feature thats been available for a while, a lot of people use it for the right way, but there is also weve seen some scraping. I would assume that if you had that setting turned on, someone at some point had access to the information. What is zuckerberg talking about . What is scraping . What does this mean for users . This is a stunning admission. Basically anyone whos ever used facebook could have their profile information, thats the name, where you live. Also if you entered your phone number, your personal email, that could have been scraped. And hes saying basically everyone could have had this happen. So its hundreds of millions of facebook users. Were just at the beginning. The term scraping . That means they could have looked you up just by the phone number they could have gotten on the dark web and find your profile. This is really troubling to americans. As we know, zuckerbergs going to be appearing before the senate. And house committees next week. Next tuesday and wednesday. Should we read into that that zuckerberg is now open to congressional regulation . I dont know about that. I just want to make two quick points. First, on the congressional hearings. These things rarely go well. Ive been covering these congressional hearing now for almost a decade. If you go back, youll see youll look at the Big Oil Spill in the gulf of mexico. Or back in the day where there is a recall of air bags and cars. Air bags were i cant remember the car company but were randomly going off and hurting people. These kinds of hearings, people are out for blood. Lawmakers are out for that moment where theyre going to be able to say they held the big bad facebook in this case accountable. So zuckerbergs going to be under fire like probably hes never been before in his time leading facebook. Number two, im not speaking directly about facebook here, but ive traveled a lot to the west coast and to Silicon Valley for playbook which i write for politico obviously and theres a culture in Silicon Valley, an almost disdain of government and a thumbing of the nose to government and washington among Silicon Valley people. Facebook has been around for a while so they obviously have a big presence here. Generally speaking, Companies Think they do not need to worry about the regulation and you dont want that to come across if youre zuckerberg. You want to be almost deferential, frankly, to members of congress, many of them, are going to have real questions. Its a high wire act for zuckerberg. Heres a guy who its hard to think zuckerberg has been in a lot of positions like this throughout his professional career where hes going to be forced to sit and answer questions. Heres Something Else thats striking. You would be hardpressed to find a target that democrats and republicans both seal to disdain in equal amounts. I think thats right. I also want to make one point on your original question on regulation. Were a couple months out from an election here. Not a couple, but six or seven. And to get something that has to get any sort of regulation thats going to bring together republicans and democrats, because youre going to have the centers on both sides, i think thats also a highwire act. To me, im not sure this has risen to the top of peoples agenda legislatively. Although theres not much going on on capitol hill so they certainly have the time for it. But when it comes to zuckerberg answering these questions, youre right, hes only had to deal with his board of directors which is generally a pretty friendly audience. Members of congress again in election year, big bad facebook, theyre going to want to hold somebody accountable and zuckerberg is the person thats going to be in front of them. Tony, macro question here, is it the governments responsibility to regulate the use of Data Collected on social media . Not just facebook but social media . Look, the governments function to perform the role of Consumer Protection watchdog. Facebook has found itself in the u. S. Governments cross hairs precisely for misusing its users data. This happened in 2011, the federal trade commission penalized it for taking information users had uploaded to the site and displacing it in a way that didnt mesh with their privacy settings at the time. The ftc settlement projected on facebook 20 years of checkups. Yes, maybe its the case of the election gets in the way or zuckerberg gets dragged on the coals when he appears before the house and senate next week. The ftc and other bodies can penalize this company. It can put forward fines. Those fines can be well into the millions of dollars. European regulators are asking the same questions and they certainly have no qualms about stopping down a u. S. Tech company. The stakes are quite high. Theyve proven they can go after a company like this. The question is, will they hold facebook to account this time . In the past, i mean, heres i think its one of the things were struggling with here in this country. Because you have again, were talking about facebook, but amazon, google, there are a lot of Tech Companies that know a whole heck of a lot more about us then wed like to think that they do. The idea of regulating these companies, thats a new frontier. We dont know what it looks like. We know what it looks like in europe. But we dont know what the appetite is going to be in this country. A majority of apps on facebook, they require users to give up private data. In some cases, access to phone numbers, locations. How much data does a user actually own . Well, facebook will say is that anyone who goes on the platform knows that theyre entering information that other people are going to be able to see. The owness is a little bit on the user. I think people are just coming to reckon with how they dont really understand. You put your name, maybe you put your email. You think thats what it takes to sign up. They dont realize there are bad actors who come in and scrape that kind of data and use it to sell it off, use it for the comes like even procter gam e gamble, to sell you products. Tony, what were you about to say . Its not even just malicious actors. The big question with facebook is what should it have done years ago when it allowed Third Party Apps on its platform. One of the things we heard from zuckerberg when he spoke on that call was the Company Really didnt think it had a responsibility to ensure that those apps and others who were using data continued to use it right after they first asked for it. So this is one of the questions lawmakers are going to ask. Why didnt they tackle this in the first place . We know were going to get the dog and pony show. But lawmakers you talk to, do you get a sense of appetite for regulation . Do you get the sense there are lawmakers on both sides of the aisle that want to use this as an opportunity to regulate heavily regulated new industry . I know tony will agree with me here but i dont think many lawmakers have a good grip on what the issues are. I really dont. I think that many members of congress, lets be honest, are up there in years and might be on facebook but might not have a good grasp of data privacy laws and what social media takes from you and what facebook has of yours or might not have. So i actually think there will be a lot of questions. People will have a lot of questions. I think it will take a while for congress to wrap its arms around just what the issue is when it comes to facebook. But listen, i really tony might disagree with me here. I really do not believe that congress is going to get its act together. I know you could copy and paste that from a million different times. Im mostly right. I think ahead of an election, unless zuckerberg totally steps on it next week, i think its just going to be difficult to corral both sides together in both chambers for some sort of big regulatory push ahead of the election. I could be proven wrong. You probably wont be. Jake, well leave it there. Jake, tony, anna, big thanks. For more on whats next for fab, savannah guthrie, she sat down for an exclusive interview with sheryl sandburg, facebooks operating officer. Tomorrow, only on today. She was at that pentagon briefing we mentioned at the top of the broadcast. Any headlines from that briefing . Was there a lot of talk about the border proposal . There was a lot. The majority of the briefing touched on the border proprossal. We still have a lot moredo answ. We know the pentagon has stood up a Border Security cell, which is supposed to be a 24 7 cell. We dont understand what its doing right now other than in the early planning stages. Its being headed up by a politico here in the pentagon whos in charge of Homeland Security ken wampano. There will be some members of the joint chiefs involved. We dont yet know who is paying for this mission for the cell itself or the mission along the border. We dont know whether the troops will be armed. Its unclear whether this will be one large sort of umbrella of rules of engagement that all four states will operate under or whether its possible they will have different policies. We had a lot of questions. We did not get a whole lot of answers. Are you saying cell . Whats a cell, forgive my ignorance. No, believe me, i wish i could explain it better. It seems to be some sort of planning group. They continue to say in the briefing its going to be 24 7. But we dont know yet know whos involved in it. Seems like right now its a group of people meeting here in the pentagon and theyre planning everything from whos going to pay for this mission, how many National Guard soldiers will be involved, exactly what they will be doing. Some of that is a little bit clearer today based on both what secretary Homeland SecurityKristin Nielsen said earlier today and then what were hearing about the National Guard soldiers hearing about more of a support role. They might drive and whatnot but they wont actually be involved in Law Enforcement or interdiction of immigrants that might be crossing the border. It seems like the cell is the one who is going to coordinate all these efforts here and that, you know, dod, the pentagon, and dhs are the ones who are going to have the lead for all this. But, you know, it doesnt seem like the planning is really moved along in knee specifics. Certainly not to be shared with us. Did you get a sense during the briefing whether the president had actually spoken with folks at the pentagon before he made that statement yesterday . Well, so we know he spoke with secretary mattis last week about this, about the potential for a National Guard or u. S. Military to be involved in more specifically the border wall. Whether that would be actually building it. We know, we were told last week during the briefing that secretary mattis and President Trump has spoken about that. We dont yet know whether they had a conversation prior to the president s speaking about this at a press conference at the white house. Whether he actually spoke to secretary mattis again about it. Specifically about using the National Guard forces for any something that will be more along the lines of Border Patrol than actually building the wall. We do know of course now theres some facilities along the border with mexico that the u. S. Military might actually build a border wall with, but thats unclear. Unfortunately, we dont have a lot of answers still, craig. Courtney kube, we appreciate that. Switching gears here. Another fatal police shooting. Another unarmed black man. This time in new york city. New york police are facing heat today after fatally shooting a man who was carrying a metal pipe. They were responding to several reports of a suspect pointing what appeared to them to be a gun at people on the street. Officers fired ten rounds at the man who, when he took on a, quote, twohanded shooting stance and pointed at officers. Police later discovered 34yearold tahed basil was holding a pipe with a knob at the end. And he was known in that neighborhood to have dealt with mental illness. At least one witness criticized police response. They didnt say freeze, they didnt say put your hands up, they didnt say stop, look for a minute, nothing. Just started shooting. Jim cavanaugh, retired atf special agent in charge, joins me now. Jim, at least four officers respond here. Were still learning more about the specifics of the response. But based on what we do know, what do you make of the circumstances . And why police would resort to firing shots here . Well, tragic and sad for the family and this mental ill man killed. He was not armed. That should get anybody, you know, sad, excited, you know, wanting the answers. Thats all normal. We certainly heard from the family. We look at the circumstances here, craig, and we have three separate 911 callers, not the police, who say the man on street is pointing a gun at people. You can see from the still photographs, it does look like a gun. It has a, you know, like a pipe barrel. Hes holding it in a position, pointing it at a persons head. When the officers approach, he pulls he goes into a shooting stance. Thats also on the videotape. And, you know, the officers fire. This is a selfdefense. We have citizens reporting he has a gun. We have those pictures, those still pictures. There he is in a shooting stance where hes got both arms up at the officers. You know, the officers then fire. Tragically, hes killed. You know, id be surprised if any charges could come out of this against the officers. Theyre defending themselves. Its tragic. Its awful. And we want to ask the question could this be stopped. You know, sometimes, craig, you cannot approach so quickly. Sometimes, you cannot approach so quickly and stay back a little and have time to assess. Especially with a handgun. But on a busy street in brooklyn, on utica avenue, you know, were therehere theres a pedestrian, the officers have to take the risk to approach. They cant always hold back. When they approach, if he pulls that object out, you know, theyre making a life or death decision for themselves right there. Jim, really quickly, going back to this guys mental illness, experts who study these kinds of things, they have concluded that more than half of these kinds of shootings where the individual dies at the hands of police, that they have some sort of disability. Are we doing enough to train our officers to prepare for these kinds of situations . I think i think not. Heres what i say. Sometimes we need to go it a distance. Look at the shooting we just had at youtube. We had a woman i would say when the facts are in, more of her shots would miss then hit the target and she was standing right in the crowded lunch area. And she had been at the pistol range earlier. Shooting a pistol accurately is difficult to do. Its hard to be proficient. The more distance there is, the harder it is. If you have a subject with a handgun, lets take tamir rice in cleveland, the child that had a toy gun, and you have a distance, you keep that distance, you can ascertain those things. That person is not putting you in grave danger if you have cover and you can take a verbal engagement. Or use a small glasses, binoculars to see and you might be able to defuse it. Dont always rush in. I dont think the nypd had the choice. They had to move in. And thats what was forced the situation. Jim cavanaugh, retired atf special agent in charge, always appreciate your insight, thank you. Thanks, craig. President trump insisting he has confidence in scott pruitt. 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More now on epa Scott Pruitts deepening troubles. Politico reports today the epa Inspector General is taking another look at possible ethics violations. Im joined by senator thomas car per, democrat from delaware, ranking member. Public works committee. Senator, the president says hes got confident in pruitt. Your committee oversees the epa. Do you think he should stay or go . I think a lot of us in the senate, democrats and republicans, feel like he should have never been confirmed in the first place. As attorney general of oklahoma for six years, his job was to undermine the Environmental Protection agency any way that he could think of. We should not be surprised given that track record that his job as the administrator itself has been to further undermine the agency. You also remember the Homeland Security committee. Sending National Guard troops to the border. This is something president obama also did. President obama sent troops to the border. 1,200 National Guard troops. Why is it different this time around . My recollection when president obama sent about 1,000 National Guard men and women to the border, we were understaffed and undermanned with customs and Border Patrol officers. They are having difficulty filling all those positions. So what we ought to be doing is making sure now that the authorized number, that we are doing whatever we need to do to hire and train people to fill those positions. Theres different training with customs and Border Protection that we use as National Guard. I was chairman of the National Governors association, so i have familiarity with the National Guard. This is just very different. The idea we can somehow freeway them down there for a couple weeks, good luck. Besides that, the number of people trying to get into this country is down. What we ought to be doing is using the money we provided in the budget for forced multiplers, technology. Youre using the term forced multiplier, youre talking about drones . Not just drones, aircraft out across the ocean to track soviet submarines and work off vietnam and cambodia. Search and rescue, people in the water, dingies in the water, lift rafts in the water. We would go with biknonoculars,t easy to do. We have to have the most advanced surveillance systems. If we do, then they can look from altitude all the way to 30, 40 kilometers into mexico. Senator, thanks for your time. My pleasure. Well be right back. So thats the idea. What do you think . I dont like it. Oh. Nuh uh. Yeah. Ahhhhh. Mmmm. Oh. Yeah. Ah. Agh. Ddd. No. Hmmm. Uh. Huh. Yeah. Uh. Huh. In business, there are a lot of ways to say no. Thank you so much. Thank you. So were doing it. Yes. Start saying yes to your companys best ideas. We help all types of businesses with money, tools and knowhow to get business done. American express open. To get business done. If your adventure keeps turning into unexpected bathroom trips you may have overactive bladder, or oab. Ohhhh. 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He has seen this happen before and he had seen it happen. The concept is Border Patrol so they can do broad patrol work. Im hopeful and see what we can work out. The thing is there are more questions than answers right now. How many troops will be deployed . I dont know. How long will they be there . How much will it cost . We dont know. Will the troops be armed . We dont know. And is it necessary . The president himself says border crossings are the an unacceptable 40year low. Is he sending troops to the border for i see own political purposes . Well talk about this with former cia director john brennan