disgusting actions. since the uproar which included this question, are you okay with a racist president republicans? only a handful of republicans have actually come out against the president s words. let s start at the white house where nbc s kristen welker joins me now. kristen, this was not what the president or at least not what was planned for the president to do. it was an event about something else. but clearly from the tweets and then the president s comments. this was on his mind. what s the fallout been since he made these comments this morning? reporter: well, ali, i think you make an important point. the president wanted to talk about these products that were made in america, wanted to talk about the economy. and yet he wound up answering a number of questions about his tweets over the weekend which a number of democrats announce and some republicans have come forward and said were in fact racist. so president trump digging in, insisting there was nothing wrong with say
congresswomen of color should go back to where they came from, most born in the u.s. with the exception of one. they re all u.s. citizens. so he has been on defense with this, ali. and so have senior administration officials. look, i was just in a briefing with secretary mnuchin. he wanted to talk about bitcoins. but what was the focus of so many of the questions that he got? so many of the questions focused on these tweets from over the weekend. so he was forced to defend the president saying, look, he has no problem with it. he understood what president trump meant. mark earlier today, a senior official who works with the vice president also on defense forced to defend these comments and to say, look, president trump does have people of color working in his administration, but of course we pressed him on that point and said what does that have to do with the president s tweets? so the fallout deepening by the hour, ali. and you do have republicans coming forward and saying, look, the
2016 after appearing on fox news where i wouldn t support then candidate trump. it just came for me, ali, the way in which people came for me talking about the color of my skin saying i should go back to where i came, from calling me a muslim when i m in fact a practicing jane. and i believe that what this president is doing is fanning the flames. he cannot denounce white supremacy, white nationalism. this is a moment in which he could have kept his mouth shut. he didn t need to engage in it. if i was advising the president, if i were one of his advisers i would have said stay out of it. but he doesn t listen to anyone around him, and that s the problem. the president seemed to own this, and something kristen got to at the end of her comments is that the president s got a history with this. it sort of seems to come relatively naturally to him. he was asked very specifically are you worried about the things you re saying about being construed as racist and being embraced by white na
look. i have personal problems with staying silent. i think that gives rise to this. i think it makes it okay and normalizes it. but they are worried about their re-election. and, trump, he gets another term, right? say he gets another term. but then we re done with him. so it s going to be up to principled conservatives like myself to rebuild the party, to talk about what makes a patriot. i am a patriot because my family s situation. just because my skin is brown doesn t mean we go back to india. my dad s side is ugandan. we were kicked out of that country because he said he wanted us to go back to where we came from. always a pleasure to talk to you. rina shaw is a republican strategist and board member for republican women for progress. while the president goes after those four congresswomen, the justice department says it s making a lawful exercise to restrict eligibility for asylum. in less than 24 hours, a new rule from the administration will take effect that could effecti
it s so wrong, so wrong. the president of the united states is supposed to bring this country together. it s clear this president won t, doesn t want to, and revels in dividing us. no american president has done this. no american president has resorted to open and bold-faced bigotry so often. his goal, president trump s goal, sadly, is not to unite but to divide. that s how he s climbed the ladder politically. all right. we re going to continue to monitor senator chuck schumer in the senate. i want to bring in clara long, continuing our conversation about asylum. she is the acting deputy, washington director at human rights watch. thank you for being with us.