vociferous in their criticism of donald trump. angela merkel who is a cautious leader who doesn t like to get into these public confrontations, criticized trump, you know, for his behavior at the nato summit where he berated those european leaders for not doing more to spend on defense. he s giving the european leaders a difficult political choice and, you know, what we know from politicians is the first thing they think about is, you know, their own political fortunes before they consider the wider issue of is it really a good idea to be having a huge transatlantic spat with the president of the united states, who after all, is the gare ran tor of european security. macron takingon putin and trump separately, is there any symbolism here? not only symbolism but very important for him politically. remember in two tweaks from tomorrow there is a major weeks from tomorrow there is a france national election where they will elect their parliament and this will decide going
house press secretary. spicer s friends tell cnn that being the press secretary is his dream come true, yet the first full day was like a nightmare. there is a lot of talk to hold donald trump accountable. i m here to tell you that it goes two ways. a quickly arranged meeting, a direct meeting from the president. this is the first time in our nation s history that floor covering was used to protect the grass on the mall. after getting pounded, spicer came back looking for a do-over. there are certain things we may not fully understand when we come out but our intention is never to lie to you. at the rnc during the primaries, spicer publicly criticized trump. as far as painting mexican-americans with that kind of a brush, that doesn t help the cause. when trump won in november,
time with them. he takes a real sense of pride in everyone who works here. reporter: both coda and ben will be sting with the obamas after january 20th. ey ll join the former political director of the white house who is now ceo of the obama foundation. ayman? nbc s skris jansing in washington, d.c. thank you. a programming note an intimate look boo into the challenges and successes of barack obama. if you missed andrea mitchell s powerful interview with vice president joe biden, you re in luck. we ll bring it to you in it entirety today at 4:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. that s full for me this saturday afternoon. i m ayman mohyeldin. thanks for joining me. richard lui picks up our coverage from here. he ll have much more on the preparations for next week s inauguration, including the celebrity who just canceled her performance.
certain institutional traditions don t get eroded, because there s a reason they re in place. so one of the things that jumped out this week was we saw congressman jason chavis its making a veiled threat after its director criticized trump s ethics plan. is that an indication of things to come under a donald trump presidency? will we see the erosions president obama is warning about institutional norms and what have you? one of the big questions heading into the trump presidency has been the idea of oversight, whether republicans on capitol hill are going to have the political will to take on their president. you know, it s important to note of course there are a number of investigations that are going to be under way and hill hearings that will be under way right at the beginning of the trump presidency. in part he won t be able to outrun the 2016 campaign. they re going to be as we heard friday even investigations of contacts between perhaps russia
it is a far cry from the heat of the gop primary when trump tweeted the people of south carolina are embarrassed by nikki haley. and haley, who initially backed marco rubio s presidential bid delivered a verbal jab at trump during her state of the union response. during anxious times it can be tempting to follow the siren call of the angriest voices. we must resist that temptation. criticized trump s poems as un-american and unconstitutional and dismissed his claims the election was irresponsible. despite her claims she still cast ore ballot for trump. the best person still is donald trump. that doesn t mean it is an easy vote. and following trump s victory earlier this month she sounded an optimistic note. get excited.