trips, but he s been two-timing the department of justice by going into the white house, into the oval office and apparently whispering sweet little nixonian nuggets in the president s ear. i ll interrupt you to go to phil here. you had the president yesterday embarking on this trip to washington. that s not true. how well do they know each other? they know each other pretty well. whitaker has been in the oval office several times to meet with the president. and the reason he s in there to brief the president is because the president didn t want to talk to jeff sessions. he s so mad at jeff sessions, the attorney general, he didn t want to talk to him so he deferred to the chief of staff whitaker to deliver briefings about the updates at the department of justice. my colleague called a white house source yesterday about why the president is saying he doesn t know matt whitaker and my source just laughs. it reminds me of sergey
kislyak. and i feel like matt whitaker, policy aside, is a guy that stands out. i have behind me folks who have pledged their loyalty to the president in some way. you think about that exchange, that james comey said he had with the president. let s play a clip of james comey talking about his interaction with the loyalty. he said, again, i need loyalty and i said, you will always get honesty from me. and he paused. and then he said, honest loyalty. last hour, we had somebody positing that there would be people in the president s base who would be fine with this. someone even described him as a mini trump. how do you react to the president s decision to put this person in this position for 220 days? if you are a trump enthusiast, you are very
know. this is trump s m.o. to distance himself from people when it gets too hot. but the reality is trump selected whitaker for this job. he knows whitakew. he s met with whitaker many times in the oval office and he was drawn to whitaker because he said so many things on television and in writing about the mueller problem. he saw whitaker as an ally. on this subject of loyalty, let s dig into this a bit more. paul talked a while back about loyalty. he wrote, quote, the more trump is threatened, the more intense his demands for loyalty are likely to become. he wants to know how far you ll be willing to go to protect him no matter what you ll have to justify or how unprincipled you
president obama and i have great respect for that. i ll be honest. as robert mueller s investigation continues, president trump wants an attorney general who will serve and protect him. on friday, chuck schumer questioned the legality of matt whitacre s appointment. he sent a series of questions to the president. among them, kwet, did you ask or receive from mr. whitacre a pledge of loyalty to you? if you look at what matt whitaker has said, he comes as cross as a man to kiss the ring. let s talk a bit about loyalty. let me ask you about that piece, your piece in the washington post today. what accounts for that, the surprise that those who surround the president have at this point? it s a apparently, you see. donald trump in the past, when close associates have become embroiled in controversy, paul manafort, the campaign chairman who he really didn t know, michael cohen the personal attorney who he didn t really
released that you have whitaker in this position. relief that hsessions is out? yes. and notice i am saying trump enthusiast and not republicans. if you are part of that trump base, you are happy with anything he is happy with because you believe in trump and anything trump is trying to do. with that said, i feel like they thought that jeff sessions was a traitor to trump, that he would never have put himself in the position and trump was honest. trump said, if i would have known he would have recused himself, i wouldn t have put him in there. so his base is like, boo, sessions is bad. now they re looking at whitaker and saying finally, someone with a backbone. this is just if you are for trump. you are looking at this thinking