administration appears to stand by its policy. casting blame on country. we re covering all angles of this developing story. jacob is here with me. gabe gutierrez is in mexico. garrett haake on capitol hill. maria teresa kumar, president of voter latino. and immigration activist tonya chavez is with me as well. kristen welker is standing by for us in washington. kristen, let me start with you, if we can. walk us through some of what we heard from president trump. again, this appears to be, again, the president unplugged. second time here in six or seven days. he is digging in, craig. there s no doubt about that. this is a mounting controversy engolfing his administration. but he s not backing down. that is the message from the president based on those remarks that we all just heard from him. and a couple of headlines. i would tick through. the fact that the president really harkens back to the very
account. he s a decent person. he s a family man. all three of those things argue for the step he just took. my first reaction is with the tax bill having passed,s that pretty clear signal that nothing else is is going to get done. the second thing is regardless of whether he loses the speakership or not, the the majority will be so narrow that caucus will be almost ungovernable. the institution is more and more partisan. his instincts aren t that way. and with these young kids, they only growup once. if he has to tolerate behavior, he s going to miss his family growing up, that argues for the step he took. kristen welker is standing by. what are you hearing? no official reaction yet, but i can tell you they are obviously tracking this quite closely. i would be surprised ifwet didn t get some type of statement or tweet in short
rattling the west wing, author michael wolf on the today show. what he s saying in face of the threats from the president. the book as of 61 minutes ago on sale coast to coast. days earlier than expected. my credibility is being questioned by a man who has less credibility than perhaps anyone who has walked on earth at this point. reporte with us now to kick off the show, michael schmidt, nbc s kristen welker is standing by at the white house, also onset here, former deputy assistant attorney general, robert driscoll, and our panel for the next 60 minutes, white house reporter for bloomberg, shani pettypiece and nick johnson. let s get to it and drill-down on the new york times report. because you need to know what is in it and what we didn t know before. so michael, i want to start off with this graphic here. this morning president trump is telling the white house lawyer apparently back in march to instruct the attorney general jeff sessions to stay on in the russia probe.
a bit puzzling. all right. former congressman barney frank, thank you for coming here, explaining what s on your mind when this was getting done. former democratic congressman from massachusetts and co-author of the dodd/frank legislation. to the briefing room, kristen welker is standing by. what are we expecting? reporter: not only will sarah huckabee sanders get asked about that power struggle at cfpb and based on my underscorings here at the white house, believes the president is well within his right to appoint an interim director under the federal vacancies act saying that takes precedence over dodd/frank. i anticipate you ll hear about that and the high stakes for tax reform. president trump meeting behind closed doors with members of the senate finance committee today, all hands on deck to try to get this passed. the senator hoping to vote sometime this week and the house and senate have to mend their two bills. the president pushing for a
for being on. thank you, george. appreciate it. we ve got to ask, who do you think is going to win the american league? cleveland. national league? the nationals. over the dodgers? gutsy move. dodgers may not get past the diamondbacks. i agree. still ahead on morning joe that would be an incredible series. we re going to go live to las vegas where today president trump is set to meet with victims of the mass shooting there. nbc s kristen welker is standing by with a preview of what to expect. and kristen shares the byline of exclusive reporting on rex tillerson s near resignation from the state department. we ll ask her about that. also, nbc s andrea mitchell, foreign correspondent, joins the table as well. ron! something s going on at schwab. oh really? thank you clients?