U. S. Senator to announce his support for mr. Trump but he has been dogged with decadesold allegations of racism which well get into here in a judgeship he didnt attain. Meantime, retired Lieutenant GeneralMichael Flynn will become would like to become Trumps National security advisor. Flynn, a registered democrat, often introduced trump on the campaign trail. And then theres kansas congressman mike pompeo. He is up for cia director and according to a source, pompeo doesnt know president elect trump very well, nor did he do much campaigning for trump. Reaction to these choices ranges from complimentary to caustic. Take this tweet from former Michigan Democratic congressman john dingle. He tweeted forget the basket, the truly deplorable ones end up in the cabinet. Ouch. He, of course, is referring to Hillary Clintons now infamous campaign comment about some of trumps supporters. We will be learning much more on all of trumps choices in just a moment, but first to trump tower and our National Correspondent sunlen serfaty. Any moment now, sunlen, we know donald trump will be leaving for new jersey, tell me more about what you know. Thats right, brooke. He has one more meeting here at trump tower today before departing at this hour. He is sitting down with governor huckabee whose name has been floated for a potential pick for commerce secretary. Potentially for secretary of health and human services. Earlier today president elect trump held a two hour long meeting with his transition staff to look at where theyve come in the week and a half since election day and where theyre going in terms of filling out the rest of Donald Trumps administration. Now, heading into this weekend, trump will be holed up at his golf resort in new jersey where he will be headed later this afternoon where one transition official says the pace of the meetings will be nonstop over the next two days and certainly among those meetings will be socalled auditions or interviews for some of these key top cabinet posts, including with mitt romney who we know is being under consideration for secretary of state, michelle rhee, department of education and james man us in for undersecretary of defense. Lets drill down on alabama senator Jeff Sessions. His nomination isnt without controversy. Lets me tea take you back 30 years. A black former u. S. Assistant attorney testified sessions called him boy when he worked for him. Sessions adamantly denied these allegations of racism against him and still does to this very day. Im not a racist, i am not incent since to blacks, i supported civil rights activity in my state. I have done my job with integrity, equality, and fairness for all. Lets go to pamela brown, or justice correspondent with more on senator sessions. Hes been a u. S. Senator for nearly 20 years. How likely is it that these decades old allegations of racism will hurt his chances. These allegations will makely come up during the confirmation hearings. As you point out, this was in 1986 when he was up for a federal judgeship and his colleagues testified that he called the naacp unamerican and that communists inspired an africanamerican who had worked under sessions testified that he called him boy and joked about the kkk, saying he was okay with them until he found out they smoked weed and as you heard there, Jeff Sessions at the time has said those allegations are false, that he is not a racist, that he despises the kkk but that doesnt mean, brooke, that this wont resurface during the confirmation hearings along with his civil rights record. In 2009 he voted against expanding the hate crime laws to cover gays and lesbians. Hes called the Voting Rights act intrusive legislation but weve seen senators that have worked with him over the years, hes been out n the senate for 20 years, applaud this nomination. Mitch mcconnell has said that has said no doubt he will be confirmed and he cares deeply about the country. Donald trump who nominated him says he has a great legal mind but others have come out and said even though he is a colleague and well respected in the senate, that doesnt mean he wont undergo the same kind of strict scrutiny that others would seeking this position. You perfectly laid it out for me setting up my next conversation. Pam brown, thank you. But before we get on to that, so were all on the same page, you have Lieutenant GeneralMichael Flynn, hes the only trump selection who wont have to go through those confirmation hearings because the National Security advisor is part of the white house staff and not the cabinet. Lot to talk about now with me. Steve cortez, former member of tr trumps hispanic advisory council. Lanhee chen used to serve as Public Policy director for mitt romney. Political analyst david gergen who has been an advisor to four president s and political commentator angela rye, used to be the executive director of the congressional black caucus. Awesome to have you on. Steve cortez, pam will l. Ela br it up, the list of pros and cons for senator sessions as a. G. , especially with the allegations of racism from decades ago. How would you defend him . I defend him thusly. If the best they can do is come up with something from 30 years ago, i think it shows this man has an incredible record of public service, attorney general, state of alabama, u. S. Attorney and two decade long senator. Number one, he denied them and i believe him, i take him at his word, hes shown himself to be a man of honor. Secondly and this is important he didnt lose a full senate vote. He lost in committee. His nomination was killed there. Two republicans crossed over and voted with the democrats, one of them, former senator Arlen Specter later recanted and said it was a mistake. I would also point out two of his Current Senate colleagues who are vociferously antitrump, senator flake from arizona and senator graham from south carolina, both of them immediately come out strongly in support of senator sessions. These are not folks who are willing to just de facto back a trump nominee. Angela rye, you feel differently . I do. I think its not even about feelings, its about record. So for example, and pamela brought this up in her commentary. For Jeff Sessions to say that the Voting Rights act was an intrusive piece of legislation and that is the very thing that was just before the Supreme Court in 2014 the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights act and you havent been able to get consensus in the house or senate on moving something forward to fix what they said was wrong with the Voting Rights act. So here you have someone running to be in the running to be the attorney general nominee and he doesnt believe in Voting Rights legislation. So what does that mean . That means that the civil rights division, which i would argue is one of the most important right now thanks to attorney general eric holder and attorney general loretta lynch, is he going to gut those if he doesnt see the point . So while steve mentioned he declined to admit to some of the things hes been accused of, he did admit before the Senate Hearing go ahead. Im listening to you and im thinking adding on to this and david gergen, i want your voice senator sessions made comments in the wake of the fbi investigations that the james comey, the letter that we reported on and private email server, he is on the record saying comey hasnt completed the full investigation and that it should be more fully investigated. Are you taking that into consideration . Should the senate take that into consideration if they move forward . Absolutely. The senate must have a comprehensive hearing and as it does with other major nominees. The attorney generals position is one of the most important in the u. S. Government and in particular, brooke, as you well know its long been seen as the custodian of civil rights in the country. So that i i think the question before the group in terms of civil rights would be okay, we know what the record was 30 years ago, and we know its in controversy. He did go down in a Republican Committee and thats important. But what has been his record since then . And i think in fairness, people ought to scrutinize that and then make the judgment not simply go back the 30 years but weve had lots of people who have been major civil rights advocates over time who came out of the south and changed their minds over times, there are others that weve seen whove had conversions in effect, and have become much stronger defenders so in fairness to him we ought to have the complete record out there. At the same time its important to explore what is his view on comey . Is he would he lean, in fact, then, to having a special prosecutor . Thats a huge question that had been raised by the trump people themselves but the other thing is he has very strong conservative views about undocumented people here in this country. And those questions are going to be swirling around, too, so in fairness to him there ought to be complete and full hearings and then congress can make up his mind. Well, you have now in these first three names that have been selected sessions, flynn, pompeo, lanhee who are all core soldiers for mr. Trump, hardliners, anything but mainstream and then now you have your former boss, governor romney, add him into the mix meaning with mr. Trump over the weekend. Possibly even considered for a cabinet position maybe even secretary of state. Lets give mr. Trump the benefit of the doubt that this is an olive branch. How would mitt romney wrap his head around working in a Trump Administration . Brook. Brooke, let me start with what governor romney has done since the election. Obviously you saw governor romney issue a congratulatory tweet and then the two had a phone conversation. Mitt romney is a patriot at heart. He believes strongly about trying to unify the country. So his priority is going to be as he said over and over again to help the president elect be successful in implementing those policy priorities that he agrees with so i think thats where we have to start with. The other point i would make about these appointments, brooke, is that we have to give the president some deference in this regard, right . Because you think about the priorities of a Trump Administration, they are going to be different from an Obama Administration so the kind of people hes going to be appointing are going to be different and so we have to allow the president elect that latitude and the people hes selected are not unreden shled at this point we ought to, as david said, give him the benefit of the doubt. How would this signal to democrats . Thats the big issue. He is going to be different but are you going to be so different that you undermine democracy . That you continue to do just that. David mentioned we need to look at his current record. In 2015 he was talking about putting people who illegally immigrated back into this country in jail for five years. Thats a law and order presidency donald trump has talked about, hes clear he would be a law and order a. G. And that undermines democracy in a way that forgets everything weve learned of recent about mass incarceration and overcriminalization of things that arent worthy of criminalizing. So thats a flag and i cant wait for the Senate Hearings where democrats around republicans will join together to ask tough questions. Angela, i dont want to relitigate the election but we just had an election that was largely about the very issue you mentioned which is illegal immigration and the people of the United States sided with donald trump and senator sessions the states did, look at that popular vote. And they decided we dont have a popular vote here, were a republic and we have an Electoral College. We do have a popular vote. Read the constitution. They decided via our Electoral College that our victims are not the illegal aliens, the victims are legal immigrants theyre people, steve. We decided that as a country and we have a mandate to continue forward. We didnt. We won, are you saying we didnt win . No, im saying that you did not win the popular vote and i dont subscribe to the term illegal alien, im talking about undocumented people. We dont try to win the popular vote, we won the electoral vote. Congratulations, nevertheless you dont have to congratulate me, congratulate the constitution, thats our system. The point is sometimes theres a whole thank and we cant get into it here but theres an argument thats existed for centuries about the strict constructionist nature of the constitution. We dont have time to go into it now but there are people who believe the constitution is a living and breathing document and sometimes it requires change. Well we dont believe that. Im sorry you dont believe that. But. But who cares what i believe . The American People voted us in based on those principles of strict constructionism and i think thats going to be run of the reasons that senator session will be a great attorney general. Hes going to uphold the bill of rights which has been under attack whether its religious liberty, gun rights, the bill of rights is in danger. Well fight you all the way. We can do a constitution segment at another time. We have to go but appreciate the healthy disagreement and this is foreshadowing to these tough questions that will arise. Thank you so much. So much more to get to today. The president elect right now meeting with governor Mike Huckabee over at trump tower. Trump expected to be departing this location shortly for new jersey. We will obviously lots of cameras inside there. Well sneak a peek to see if anyone passes by and turn that around for you. Also, general Michael Flynn and kansas congressman mike pompeo. Who are they . What are their resumes . What are their National Security chops that they could bring to this country . We have the back story on both of them. Also he was an outspoken critic of donald trump but this weekend mitt romney and the president elect will speak and meet face to face. Well talk about that with ari fleischer. So much for ari today. Well be right back. Youre watching cnn. I have asthma. One of many pieces in my life. So when my asthma symptoms kept coming back on my longterm control medicine. I talked to my doctor and found a missing piece in my asthma treatment with breo. Oncedaily breo prevents asthma symptoms. Breo is for adults with asthma not well controlled on a longterm asthma control medicine, like an inhaled corticosteroid. Breo wont replace a rescue inhaler for sudden breathing problems. Breo opens up airways to help improve breathing for a full 24 hours. 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President elect donald trump shoring up his future National Security team. What do we know about his selections . I can tell you that kansas congressman mike pompeo has been nominated to become the next cia direct director. Impressive resume. West point grad, army vet, he was an early supporter of trump in the house and is a member of the House Select Committee on intelligence, hes linked to the tea party movement, rode that waive into congress. His selection forrize inner is Lieutenant GeneralMichael Flynn, a retired three star general with extensive military experience. But he was forced out of his job at the Defense Intelligence agency two years ago. He supports aggressive military action against isis and wants to work more closely with russia. I have with