A tour. Usually well into the ceremonial part of the inaugural hoopla. But this year with this outgoing president that is not our fate. So things right now are much more nutty than they usually are. Lets jump into the nuttiness. Friday night we got late word the president received a unusual visitor at the white house. It was the fervently protrump guy who runs the Pillow Company that advertises 24 hour a day on the fox news channel. He was photographed enter the white house where it was reported he met with the president , also with the National Security adviser and with the white House Counsel. Yes, the pillow guy. And part of the reason this made waves late on friday was because the pillow guy was photographed carrying into the white house a folded piece of paper that appeared to be his notes for the meetings. Those notice included reference to implementing the insurrection act and something about martial law. And so that got a lot of attention. A lot of people zooming in on that photo on friday night and talking about how strange it was this guy in particular was there to meet with the president about Something Like that. Heres the thing though in addition to the play army nonsense about martial law and the insurrection act, this idea that the president s going to somehow use the military the seize power and not let joe biden become president and the military is going to go along with that, in addition to that nonsense, what this guy was also bringing in to see the president about and the National Security adviser and the white House Counsel was also in addition to the military stuff what appeared to be a whole bunch of demands about intelligence, about the intelligence agencies, again, based on these notes caught on a telephoto lens. He appears to want to talk about the president about installing a new acting head aft National Security agency, the nsa. Reference to ft. Immediate, where the nsa is located. Although thats not how you spell mead. He wants the head of the cia to be remove and replaced by cash patel who jump just installed as pentagon chief of staff. Now, again, to be clear, these are the notes of the pillow guy. Why with less than a week this office is anyone meeting with the pillow guy, let alone him meeting with the white House Counsel and National Security adviser and the president . Like i said, this is not a normal end of any presidency. But what im curious about is what do these guys think theyre actually going to do if they somehow wrest control of the nsa and cia and put it in the hands of loyal trump lieutenants who will do whenever theyre told . At least the other part of it, declaring martial law insurrection act fantasy is something you could write a bad movie about. Ousted president commands military to seize power and turn u. S. Into a dictatorship with rule by force. It would be a terrible movie, but you could at least imagine what the plot would be. It would be a good video game plot maybe. But anything to that ridiculous fantasy, the same guys around the president , who are pushing that ridiculous fantasy, theyre also really prioritizing the nsa and cia. They want, at the very last minute as their theresditch effort to control of the nation they want trump people put in at the last minute at the top of the intelligence agencies, right at the end. For what this what do they think theyre going to do that . What could they do if theyre commandeered by trump lackeys . This weekend the Washington Post was first to report that the president met with the new defense secretary, Christopher Miller. Youll recall that miller was suddenly installed as defense secretary right after biden won the election. It was a weird reaction to losing the election, right . Immediately fire the defense secretary and install a new guy. The president installed this sort of junior level guy Christopher Miller to become the defense secretary after the election. He fired mark esper and installed this new guy. Well, president , apatiently, according to the new york times, met with the acting defense secretary who he recently installed, Christopher Miller and met with him at the white house friday. And apparently, very soon there after, miller, the acting defense secretary, called over to the nsa at ft. Meadee and gave them an ultimatum that by saturday at 6 00 p. M. , the nsa had to install another trump guy at the nsa as the nsas general counsel. That was issued friday. The trump guy had to be installed by 6 00 p. M. On saturday. And the nsa apparently aceded to that. The general didnt want that. But they got this demand, ultimatum. You have to do it immediately and they went along with it. Now with one day left in trumps presidency on the last full day that trump will be president , unless he quits, that trump guys name is ellis, Michael Ellis, is due to be sworn in tomorrow as the top Legal Counsel at the National Security agency. Why . Why do they want to force this . On literally the last day that trump is president . Why do the forgive me. Why do the wing nuts who are telling the president they can still stop biden from being sworn in, keep power by force somehow, why did to wing nuts talking to the president about this stuff think that putting trump people in at the top of ns ark and cia at the last minute will somehow advance that cause . I dont know. But they are in fact going ahead with doing it at least to the extent they can. And we now know tonight that House Speaker nancy pelosi is trying to stop it. Pelosi releasing this letter to the acting defense secretary today. It says dear acting secretary miller. I am writing to follow up on my phone call conversation with you today during which i expressed my deep concern about the irregularities involved in the selection of the general counsel of the National Security administration. I ask you immediately cease plans to improperly install Michael Ellis as the nsa general counsel. Additionally, with a copy of this letter to the Inspector General i am also requesting an investigation into the circumstances of the nsa general counsel selection process. I have serious concerns about your statement that this process was free from political interference. The circumstances and timing of the selection of mr. Ellis, this 11th hour effort to push this placement in the last three days are highly suspect. The efforts to install him or burro him into a highly sensitive position 72 hours into a new administration are a disturbing disregard for our nas. Therefore this placement should not move forward. Thank you for your attention. Best regards, nancy pelosi, speak of the house. It is ccd with the Inspector General who she is asking to investigate miller for whatever hes trying to do herer apparently at trumps insistence. Pelosi is trying to stop it. The question is, why are they trying to do it . At the very last minute theyre trying to swear this guy in 24 hour before biden is inaugurated. And, you know, yes, as a surface level that will stick biden with the annoying job of having to find a way to fire that guy or, you know, reassigning him to some very important job in antarctica watching paint dry outside. Or Something Else they can do with that guy. Think where the impetus for this is coming from. What do the trump folks think they can do with the military agencies in the last few days. Why bother installing all these new ones right at the end before biden gets there . We will see. With d. C. Locked down nown in red zone zones and green zones and with troops marching in the streets of downdown d. C. As 20,000 something Armed National guard troops are on site for the inaugural, no one knows what weirdness the president might try from his last hours atop the federal government. We dont know what weirdness he will try from within the white house in his last 40ish hours or what weirdness his supporters will try outside. The state capitols were quieter than expected this weekend, but i guess thats a matter of suspected now. We had Trump Supporters show up in body armor with loaded rifles at state capitols but at lease they didnt mount an organized attack on those the way they did a week and a half ago, so we see that as progress. The arrests of Trump Supporters who participated in the violent attack on the capitol im sorry to have to tell you the bomber is still at large, though. Whoever placed operational pipe bombs at the headquarters of the republican and democratic parties, that person has not been apprehended so we can say the bomber is still at large. As is a woman want in the conjunction with what may have been the theft of a laptop from the office of House Speaker nancy pelosi. In a truly bizarre turn, the fbi affidavit file in the support of federal charges against this young woman from pennsylvania says this about the womans purported plans for pelosis laptop. Quote, witness one claimed to have spoke ton friend of the suspect who showed witness one a video of the suspect taking a laptop computer or hard drive from Speaker Pelosis office during the Capitol Attack. Witness one stated the suspect intended to send the computer device to a friend in russia. Who then planned to sell the device to svr, russias foreign intelligence service. According to witness one, the transfer of the computer device to russia fell through for unknown reasons and the suspect still has the computer device or has destroyed it. This matter remains under investigation. Get me rewrite. This cant actually did anything we try to pass off as a real plot. This is ridiculous. But this is this is how the Trump Presidency is careening into its final wall. We still dont know what the timing will be on the Senate Impeachment trial for President Trump. The senate comes back into session tomorrow. If Speaker Pelosi decides that shes going to deliver the article of impeachment to the senate as early as tomorrow when the senate comes back, that will start a clock ticking where basically the senate has 24 hours to start trumps impeachment trial. Theyve am got 24 hours to start it once the article has been formally conveyed to them. Neither Speaker Pelosi nor the democratic leader in the senate, Chuck Schumer nor the republican leader in the senate, mitch mcconnell, nor anyone else is talking about when that might happen. So we really, really do not know when the expect the president s impeachment trial to begin. Similarly we do not know what to expect in terms of the president s defense in that trial. Or honestly if there will be one at all. On saturday, the president s lawyer, rudy giuliani, told abc news that he would be the president s defense counsel. In the president s impeachment trial in the senate. That was on saturday. Then saturday night, giuliani went to the white house and spent saturday night there. And however much fun that might have been, the following day on sunday, mr. Giuliani had changed his mind and said, actually, he wouldnt be serves as the president s defense counsel afterall. The thing is, apparently nobody else is sering in that role, either. No one has come forward to say theyre doing that job. The lawyer jenna ellis who paired up with giuliani for their comically failed legal efforts to contest the election in multiple states. She tweeted a Statement Today saying she would not be representing the president s Campaign Going forward either. The statement made it seem like she wouldnt be representing trump in any capacity going forward. I guess there was supposition that she would be the president s lawyer for his impeachment trial. I dont know. Wont be him either. Wont be giuliani. Wont be cipollone. He wont be white House Counsel. Honestly, there is no one at this hour who was apparently lined up to be the president s defense counsel, which does raise the weird possibility that maybe he wont even mount a defense, i guess . I mean, did i mention that the trial might start as soon as the day after tomorrow . You dont have a lawyer yet . You cant even get giuliani . We are still on pardon watch. Multiple news organizations now reporting that tomorrow and wednesday morning we should expect a gigantic tide of dozens of pardons from trump, possibly more than 100. New york times reporting theres a brisk market on people selling access to the president so people can get one of those pardons. Thats a nice way to go out. The president does decide hes going to write a whole new chapter of constitutional contests by trying to issue a pardon to himself, a lot of legal observers are warning that may raise the chances that trump could face federal criminal charges after he leaves office. The only way to determine the constitutionality of a selfpardon by a president would be to actually charge that president with a federal crime and thereby test it. If that were laying around untested and nobody knew if that selfpardon from trump was effective or just an assertion or it wasnt a constitutional thing, thats like in a play leaving around a proverbial loaded gun. You wouldnt do that constitutionally. If the president is going to try to pardon himself, dollars to donuts say that that pardon, that selfpardon is going to be tested in the courts. Because nobody can leave that laying around not knowing whether or not the president has been able to effectuate that sort of selfimmunity. So if he selfpardons. He is probably increasing the chances that he will face federal criminal charges. And i imagine that is not a position this president wants to put himself in. I would be therefore surprised if he tries to pardon himself, but what do i know . It still seems to me the cleanest way out for trump in terms of criminal exposure remains for him to resign some time before noon on wednesday in exchange for a promise from mike pence hell give President Trump a pardon in the short time he holds the presidency before biden is sworn in. Thats the cleanest way out of this, but the president apparently cant bring himself to do that. Theres no reporting he is heading toward that decision. Abc news is actually reporting now that President Trump doesnt trust Vice President mike pence, that he would actually follow through with a pardon even though he promised it to him, which is amazing in its own way. What we are heading into is weird, unsettled in all sorts of unpredictable ways this is supposed to be a predictable kind of boring time, a ceremonial time where we know whats going to happen and its not fraught, not dangerous. In this case, though, knowing were doing has been done before. For example, we do not expect the president and first lady, mr. Is mrs. Trump to welcome the new president and first lady, mr. And mrs. Biden to the white house. President haves done that for generations, the trumps withl not. We do not expect the tea, nor do we expect the outgoing first lady to give the incoming a tour. Nor do we expect them to share a ride tort capitol for the the swearing in. What we do expect is for the president and first lady to bug out of the white house early wednesday morning before the bidens arrive. We learned today they have been sending out invitations to what they want to be a Sendoff Party for President Trump at, like, 8 00 in the morning at Andrews Air Base on wednesday. So i think the idea is that he would leave the white house really early and chopper or drive over to andrews. And at andrews, ultimately hell get on air force one to fly himself to florida, and hell be president because this will happen before biden is sworn in at noon. Before they put him on airplane, the white house has started sending out invitations to people to try to get them to cheer trump byebye at the air base, and it is not clear the effort has been going well. Do you remember the mooch . Remember Anthony Scaramucci . Hes a former trump friend who served for five minutes at press secretary . And since then has become a scathing critic of President Trump. Today he marvels publicly he was sent an invitation to the sendoff at Andrews Air Base, which is hilarious. Are they going to invite Steve Schmidt and mary trump and Michael Cohen and mitt romney, too . Have you googled what scaramucci has been saying about the president . He said today, quote, trust me, that had to be a mass email if one of them got sent to me. We dont know how many people theyve invited to go to this sendoff at the air base. I dont know where they got the invite list for people they asked to come cheer out President Trump, but each invitee is told they should bring five guests in addition to themselves, which is kind of asking a lot and which does suggest they are having trouble generaing a crowd. One Administration Source telling us tonight, quote, there havent been many rsvps. Today Kamala Harris resigned from the u. S. Senate. Sign in her seat, alex padilla. California has never had a latino u. S. Senator before today, and now they do. We also learned today that Sonya Sotomayor will be swearing in Kamala Harris. She swore in joe biden for his second term as Vice President in 2013. Shell do the honors for Kamala Harris tomorrow. Ron klain has outlined in a memo some of what will be President Bidens first actions after hes sworn in, and its a lot. Day one, were told, he will rescind trumps muslim ban, his travel ban on muslim majority countries. Biden will also, day one, have to United States rejoin the paris climate accord. He will also extend the moratorium against evictions and foreclosures that went into effect because of the covid pandemic. He will extend the pause on the requirement to pay back federal student loans. Again, a pause put into effect because of the covid disaster. Biden will instate a mask requirement on federal property and interstate travel. He will order federal agencies to figure out how to reunite the families the Trump Administration tore apart at the border. Its going to be an executive order to federal agencies that they need to figure out how to find kids taken from their parents by the Trump Administration and find ways to get those kids and parents back together. Theres also reporting tonight that President Biden will top the permits for the keystone Tar Sands Oil pipeline either on his first day in office or shortly there after. And were told there are going to be two major pushes for legislation. The previous things i described i think can be done out of the oval Office Without congress for the most part. But theres two big legislative pushes they want to put in Congress Hands day one. One the covid relief and recovery bill that biden outlined last week. And the other, at last, a proposed reform of the nations decrepe it and dysfunctional immigration laws. Its not that long ago that republicans said they would support Something Like that. But that will be introduced day one. Day one as in, Inauguration Day. As in, the day after tomorrow. In just a moment, were going to talk with jay johnson, former Homeland Security secretary about the security concerns around Inauguration Day last year. He was in charge of security in 2017 after the 2016 election. He was the designated survivor from the cabinet that day as Homeland Security secretary. Jay johnson is going to join us live in just a moment to talk about what hes expecting in terms of threat and security on wednesday this week. But Vice President elect harris and president elect biden will arrive in washington tomorrow on tuesday ahead of wednesdays solemn and this year kind of worrying ceremony that is the transfer of power. And this is interesting and i think important what they are going to do tomorrow in washington, their last day as private citizens, their last day before the inauguration, their first act together in washington as a new soon to be governing team, what theyre going to do tomorrow is theyre going to lead a National Memorial service to honor the 400,000 americans who have been killed by the coronavirus already. Imagine the outgoing president even trying to muster the courage and the decency to even try to do that. To even think of it, to even gesture in that direction. But thats what biden and harris will do tomorrow. Theyll help light 400 lights at the reflecting pooling at the lincoln memorial. The archbishop of washington, d. C. Will give an invocation. All around the country landmarks like the Empire State Building in new york, the space needle in seattle, other buildings will light up around 5 30 eastern time for a National Commemoration to remember the dead. That is what they will do tomorrow. And then the next day, well see how it goes. Its a day and a half from now, less than two days, but boy, does it still feel like a long while yet. Boy, does it feel like a lot can go wrong. Hang on. Lottes to get to tonight. Onight. Free access to every platform. Mhm, yeah, that too. I dont want any trade minimums. Yeah, i totally agree, they dont have any of those. I want to know what im paying upfront. Yes, absolutely. Do you just say yes to everything . Hm. Well i say no to kale. Mm. Yeah, they say if you blanch it its better, but that seems like a lot of work. Now offering zero commissions on online trades. We charge you less so you have more to invest. judith at Fisher Investments, we do things differently and other Money Managers dont understand why. money manager because our way works great for us judith but not for your clients. Thats why were a fiduciary, obligated to put clients first. money manager so, what do you provide . 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And while her friends are doing the heavy lifting, jess is busy moving her xfinity internet and tv services. It only takes about a minute. Wait, a minute . But what have you been doing for the last two hours . Delegating . Oh, good one. Move your Xfinity Services without breaking a sweat. Now thats simple, easy, awesome. Xfinity makes moving easy. Go online to transfer your services in about a minute. Get started today. In texas, they showed up wearing off the shelf Tactical Gear and carrying ar15s. In oregon it was ski masks and body armor and upside down american flags and signs saying, disarm the government. Same thing in ohio, where about two dozen armed men gathered at the statehouse in columbus on sunday. At least one guy dressed up in sort of revolutionary war garb except thats not definitely a musket. In lansing, michigan, youll recall a domestic terror plot there to kidnap the governor. Armed protesters showed up at the Michigan State capitol as well. This weekend could have been scary. It was billed as potentially round two of the violence from Trump Supporters we saw january 6th. Fbi issued a bulletin warning of armed protests, armed shows of force at all 50 state capitols. And yes, there were armed, sometimes very almost comically heavily armed protester at state capitols across the country, but mostly what we saw an sunday were very, very small numbers of them. And they were wildly outnumber by both lawmaker and, in some cases, members of the press, and in some cases peaceful counterprotesters. Meanwhile, the show of force actually is overwhelming in washington, d. C. Roughly 25,000 u. S. National guard forces deployed on the streets of the Nations Capital in advance of the inauguration. Thats at least two and a half times the number of National Guard forces that have been on hand for previous inaugurations. This year with stakes this high, threats this real, making sure the transfer of power goes off without more violence is a different and daunting task. Are we ready . Joining us now is jay johnson. He was Homeland Security secretary and pentagon general counsel under president obama. As Homeland Security secretary he was the man effectively in charge of Inauguration Security when donald trump and mike pence were sworn in in 2017. Nice to see you tonight. This, for your time. Rachel, i got begin with this your leadin was truly stunning. Why does the pillow guy, who apparently cant even get his act together to tuck in his shirttails, even know there is a person whos the general counsel of nsa. I hired two of them. It is an apolitical appointment in collaboration with the director of the nsa. That is that really troubles me. Among a number of things, obviously. Well, let me just pressure you on that a little bit. We saw right after biden won the election, we saw the president in one of his first acts fire the defense secretary, inspire Young Political trump loyalist guys as chief of staff of the pentagon, as other Senior Pentagon jobs. Weve now seen this move at the nsa to get this young man installed as the general counsel at the nsa. Those kind of jobs the president filled in with these, forgive me, seemingly quite unqualified people right after the election, are those the kinds of jobs from which significant mischief could be made . I would say that the senior legal official of the National Security agency is a very significant and relevant position. And it should be and always has been an apolitical appointment. You note the lastminute appointments and vacancies. I think part of the reason we saw the disaster a week before last is because we had an acting secretary of Homeland Security we have had six of them in the life of this administration, an acting secretary of defense, and an acting attorney general. And this president seems to feel that he can just cycle people in and out like this with no continuity whatsoever. So yes, it is extremely troubling, and i hope and expect that the Incoming Biden Administration will clean this up and fix it. Are you worried about wednesday and about the security threats . Obviously we are seeing an overwhelming intimidating show of force with all those National Guard troops now setting up on cots inside the capitol building, and i know that you know as well as anybody what it means to deploy that much force, but for an event like this, do you feel like its the right approach . I believe it has to be. Wednesdays of will be what we refer to as an nsse, a National Special security event. The secret service will have overall responsibility for the security of the event in coordination with a whole lot of other Law Enforcement agencies, d. C. Metro, fbi, martials, tsa, the coast guard, fema. I could go on and on. And they will make the event virtually inpenetrable from land, sea, and air. This will be an nsse, i suspect, on steroid and i suspect the ratio of attendees to gun carriers with badges will be about one to one. Thats unfortunate, but given the threat environment it is probably necessary. In terms of the threat environment more broadly and as it pertains to the president himself, theres one other thing in the news i really just want to get your take on. A woman who served as the Deputy Director of national intelligence, sue gordon, respected intelligence professional, has made a provocative call saying as an ex president , President Trump shouldnt receive Intelligence Briefings the way other ex president s do, that hes essentially too much of a risk to american National Security to be given any ongoing access to sensitive information. Do you think thats worth considering . It seems like the Incoming Biden Administration is at least not dismissing that possibility out of hand. I think there is something to that, quite frankly. This is not going to be like, you know, kennedys need to consult eisenhower during the cuban missile crisis or bush 43s occasional consultation of bush 41 during the iraq war. I cannot imagine a legitimate worthwhile circumstance under which any of Donald Trumps successors will need to consult him on a classified matter. Classified materials, security clearances, are on a needtoknow basis, and historically former president s have a need to know for purposes of consultation and the like bum its difficult to imagine that here given some of the things we know this outgoing president has done with classified information to which hes been entrusted. Jeh johnson, former secretary of Homeland Security under president obama. Sorry, its a huge week. Lot going on. This can for making time for us tonight. Thank you. Good to see you. More to get to. Stay with us. Want to make a name for yourself in gaming . Then make a name for yourself. Even if your office, and bank balance are. Far from glamorous. That means expensing nothing but pizza. Your expenses look good, and your books are set for the month . Going up against this guy. And pitching your idea 100 times. No, no, no no. I like it. He likes it . And you definitely love that. Intuit quickbooks helps Small Businesses be more successful with payments, payroll, banking and live bookkeeping. Man whats my safelite story . My truck. Is my livelihood. So when my windshield cracked. The experts at Safelite Autoglass came right to me. With service i could trust. Right, girl . Singers safelite repair, safelite replace. With less than two days left in office, tonight donald trump issued a new executive order that claims to end the travel restrictions placed on people coming into the United States. The president ploked some foreign travelers from entering the country as a protection against covid. The president repeatedly touted that policy as if it were a major victory, even though we quickly grew to have the largest coronavirus epidemic. President trump didnt do much else besides that initial travel ban but now tonight hes undone that. Per the executive order signed by the president tonight, the travel restrictions will officially expire next tuesday, january 26th. I think the idea must have been that they wanted to dump an awkward decision into the lap of the incoing biden harris administration. Let the travel restrictions lapse because of the executive order at the last minute because of President Trump or undo the executive order and leave the travel restrictions in place. I think maybe the president thought this would be a huge conundrum from biden and harris. Hed show them. Turns out its not that hard. The incoming press secretary jen psaki says biden and harris will reverse lifting the restrictions and leave them in place. Quote, with the pandemic worsening and more variants around the world, this isnt the time to be lifting restrictions on international travel. On the advicer our medical team, the team doesnt intend to lift the restrictions on january 26th. We are on day sub zero of the Biden Administration, and right out of the gate, these are the kind of owngoal would be policy quagmires that trump is trying to leave behind to mess them up. Heres another good one over the weekend, Vladimir Putins main opposition in russia, his top critic, the charismatic and very effective russian politician Aleksey Navalny returned to russia. He had been in germany this summer after he was poisoned with a russian made chemical weapon. He believes Vladimir Putin gave the direct order for him to be poisoned and killed. But he survived. He flew back to russia yesterday after this months long recovery. Before he made it back on the ground, things went wonky. His night was originally set to fly into moscow, but they diverted his flight to another city. The flight crew said it was for technical reasons but there were thousands of navalny supporters waiting at the moscow airport to welcome him. Shame that flight got diverted, huh . Before he made it out of Border Control at the airport, Police Detained him on one of a long series of trumped up charges. He was held overnight without access to a lawyer. He had a hearing this morning at a Police Station instead of a courtroom. His lawyer was told about the hearing minutes before. The judge ruled navalny will remain in jail until trial where he faces years in prison. Our outgoing President Trump of course has deferred, totied to Vladimir Putin for four years. It is that has upended years of americas efforts to tray to push back on some of russias worst behavior. During trumps presidency, putins aggression remained unchecked by the United States. Its emboldened him to get more brazen like throwing his political opponents in jail. Were about to have a new president to figure out what to do now that putin dropped this huge provocation right at joe bidens feet. Locked up navalny the week that biden is being sworn in. With the dawn of a new presidency upon us, what should we expect in terms of our countrys new terribly fraught and terribly weird relationship with a hyperaggressive russia . Michael mcfall, former ambassador to russia joins us next. Stay with us. Xt stay with us man whats my safelite story . My truck. Is my livelihood. So when my windshield cracked. The experts at Safelite Autoglass came right to me. With service i could trust. Right, girl . Singers safelite repair, safelite replace. And they found themselves in a magical land. And then what happened . Wheres our family from . Was he my age . So nana and pops eloped . And then what happened, daddy . Well, before us, there were your great, great, great grandparents. Turn questions youve always had into stories you cant wait to share; with ancestry. announcer do you want to reduce stress . Turn queshed pounds . E always had into stories do you want to flatten your stomach . 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Thats the kind of behave from Vladimir Putin that the United States would have previously led the world in condemning but now after four years of bizarre behavior and bowing and scraping from the u. S. President towards a emboldened russia, what options does the Incoming Administration have . How much does the new playbook they have to deal with and they have to work from look anything like the way that america would handle threats and provocations like this from our rivals around the world in the past . Former u ambassador to russia, michael mcfaul. Professor, its great to see you. Thanks very much for being here. Sure. Glad to be here. So, Alexei Navalny is calling on his supporters to protest in the streets in russia. Thats expected to happen as soon as this week. Do you think that this is going to turn into a major event, a major source of protest, a major, potentially a major crisis in russia . Well, its hard to predict. Its very cold in moscow and in other cities in russia right now. And theres a lot of uncertainty about his ultimate fate. We dont really know what theyre doing with him. Theyve put him in jail for 30 days. But it wont go away. I want to be clear. Maybe it wont happen this weekend. Maybe it will happen in months and maybe it will happen in years from now. But i do think this is an Inflection Point in the struggle between putins autocracy and the Russian Democratic movement personified by their leader, Alexei Navalny. Remember, everything needs to remember he was poisoned by this regime. Barely survived. Went to germany. Recovered and then said im going back, i have no choice but to fight for that. And the regime looks like they do not know what to do with him. I suspect i dont know what will happen on saturday but im quite certain this struggle will go on for months and years to come. Do you have any sense of what what playbook the Biden Administration is going to have to play from when it comes toward russia . Obviously, after four years of whatever that bizarre soap opera was between donald trump and Vladimir Putin, putin clearly feels emboldened. He clearly feels like he has enough room to maneuver to do whatever he wants in terms of dealing with International Response to it. But how much has the u. S. Capability and orientation toward russia changed . How do you have any sense of what the new normal will be like between biden and putin . Well, there are two really important aspects to your question, rachel. In terms of our capability of being the leader of the free world, President Trump has done tremendous damage to that. Four years of the way hes behaved particularly at home, as we all have seen most recently, makes it very difficult for us to now say, to reclaim the mantle of the leader of the democratic world. Number two, President Biden, president elect biden, soon ill be able to say President Biden, he has a very different view with russia. I was in the last meeting he had with Vladimir Putin in 2011. 30 minutes after that meeting he met with democratic opposition leaders right after that meeting. People like navalny. So hes going to bring morality back, hes going to bring human rights back to his foreign policy. Number two, were not going to have these divides between the president and his administration as we did for four years with respect to trumps policy toward russia. Biden is not going to try to be putins friend and the rest of his administration is not going to have to whisper to people like me to say, hey, thats not what we really meant, this is our real policy. That will change. And third, hes going to try to bring our allies together so that we have a common front of liberal democracies against putins russia. All these changes i think will be easy and clear in the beginning. The hard part is to get putin to change his ways. Thats another matter. Thats going to be very difficult even for President Biden. Well, speaking of changing his ways, theres this fbi bulletin within the last few days that says that russia, as well as china and iran, they go out of their way to describe what russia has been doing, hs been doing everything they can online to augment the crisis as represented by the u. S. Capitol attack to to augment the de vicive claims, to hype more disinformation about the attack. In at least one instance a russian proxy claimed that antifa members disguised themselves as supporters of President Trump and were responsible for storming the capitol building. I mean, the fbi says that russia is basically trying to use the Capitol Attack on whatevers going on with the president s supporters to try to make that wedge even wider and try to fan the flames as much as they can. Is that is that something we should just expect forever now . Well, that is most certainly what putin will try to do in the coming months and years. Most certainly. What i hope is that the Biden Administration will have a much better strategy for repelling that, for deterring that, for more greater resilience here at home in containing putins belligerent behavior abroad. Whats been missing in the trump era is no strategy. Its been about a bunch of reactions. He says one thing. His National Security adviser says another. I think this Administration Needs to come in i hate to say it, i think we have to go back to cold war strategies and a strategy of conta belligerentsy of putins russia. Cooperate when we must. Stand up for values. It means a multidimensional strategy that will have to be in place for years and i suspect decades to come. Former u. S. Ambassador to russia michael mcfaul, its great to see you, sir. Thanks very much for your time tonight. Its a big week. Sure. Thanks for having me. All right. Well be right back, actually, and i should tell you on the other side of this break, sort of a story has just broken in the Washington Post about what intelligence agencies are recognizing about the threat on wednesday on the inauguration. Sort of ill have it for you right after the break. Its just broken. Stay with us. Im really busy in my life; im always doing something. Im not a person thats going to sit too long. In the morning, i wake up and the first thing i do is go to my art studio. A couple came up and handed me a brochure on prevagen. Ive been taking prevagen for about four years. I feel a little bit brighter and my mind just feels sharper. I would recommend it to anyone. It absolutely works. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. Man whats my safelite story . My truck. Is my livelihood. So when my windshield cracked. The experts at Safelite Autoglass came right to me. With service i could trust. Right, girl . Singers safelite repair, safelite replace. New reporting within the last five minutes from carol leonig and Matt Zapotosky at the Washington Post. Im going to read you the headline. Qanon discussed heres the lead of what carol leonig and mad are reporting. The fbi privately warned Law Enforcement agencies today that farright extremists have discussed posing as National Guard members in d. C. And others have reviewed maps of vulnerable spots in the city. Sign of potential efforts to disrupt wednesdays inauguration. The Intelligence Report obtained by the Washington Post is a summary of threats that the fbi identified today. It warns that both lone wolves and adherence of the qanon extremist ideologies, some of who joined in the siege on the capitol on6th indicated they plan to come to washington for the inauguration. The fbi said its also observed people downloading and sharing maps of sensitive locations in washington and discussing how those facilities could be used to interfere in security during the inauguration. Qanon members have discussed posing as National Guard soldiers, believing it would be easy for them to infiltrate secure areas together to the document which adds that members have been crowd sourcing images to surveil the security perimeter. One defense official speaking on the condition of anonymity acknowledged that National Guard members have been warned to watch for anyone in uniform who looks like they are out of place. The fbi has also observed an increase in surveillance of Law Enforcement