Sunny or was it rainy . He said it may have been a good day, it was rainy, therefore, he told a lie, he perjured himself. Okay . So you have to always be careful when you answer questions with people that probably have bad intentions. It didnt take very long to do them and they were my answers. I dont need lawyers to do that. Now, you need lawyers for submittal, you need lawyers to go over some of the answers, but theyre not very difficult questions. And before that disclosure President Trump spoke of just how happy he is at the white house after a reporter said he appeared, quote, agitated as indicated by his stream of tweets he sent just yesterday, slamming the mueller probe. No im not agitated. Its a hoax. They should have never been any Mueller Investigation because there was never anything done wrong, there was no collusion, there never has been. You would have known about it a long time ago if there was. There was nothing they should have never had it. Theyve wasted millions and millions of dollars. They should have never been a socalled investigation, which in theory its not an investigation of me, but as far as im concerned i like to take everything personally because you do better that way. The witchhunt, as i call it, should never have taken place. It continues to go on. I imagine its ending now, from what i hear its ending, and im sure it will be just fine. Lets go to the white house and cnns jeff zeleny. Jeff, the president says he hears that the probe s quote, ending now. Do we know where hes getting that from . Reporter well, ana, good afternoon. I mean, clearly the president believes this is nearing an end. Hes hearing that from his lawyers who are working with the special counsels team on all of this. I mean, one central question hanging over this entire investigation, i mean, for indeed months, is is the president was the president going to sit down facetoface with bob mueller. When he decided against that he decided to answer some written questions here. Now the president confirmed for the first time that he is done answering those, but says they have not been submitted. He obviously has reason to believe that this investigation at least the first phase of it is nearing an end, but look at just what he is hes been saying and tweeting more importantly all week long. Its clear that he knows more than we do at this point, that he has a sense of if not where this is going, when this report is going to be issued. So the president was not clear on his timing there, but he said he believes its coming to an end, so he certainly hears more from his lawyers than we hear publicly because the special counsel is the only one in washington who has not said a thing about this entire investigation, but just judging by the president s actions and words and mood this week, it seems to be nearing a finish. Now, the question is when that will be and what that will be, more importantly. Will there be any collusion found . Never mind the obstruction of justice. But the president there putting a voice to some of the things he has been thinking about behind the scenes and tweeting about yesterday. And, again, emphasis on the answers being to the earlier point the question of collusion, not about obstruction of justice. Only collusion. Who knows where that part of the investigation is right now. We dont have any clues necessarily. Jeff zeleny, thank you for that update. Lets discuss this further, joining me now article bernstein, the Pulitzer Prize winning veteran journalist who helped break the watergate story. Its always an honor and pleasure to have your insight with us. Carl, whats your reaction to President Trumps assessment of muellers questions calling them easy to answer and emphasizing that he answered them, not his lawyers . Well, they go from him to his lawyers, so what will be submitted to the special counsel will be submitted and vetted by his lawyers. So i wouldnt put too much stake in what President Trump is saying there, hes spinning something a certain way. I think that what is particularly interesting, with he should not get out in front of our skis right now and speculate about where this probe is beyond what we know. He may well be getting information from the new acting attorney general, mr. Whitaker. He wanted whitaker in this position because trump has been driven crazy by the fact that he does not know whats going on in muellers investigation. He now has in whitaker eyes and ears, a spy, as it were, who can look into the investigation and presumably, i dont know this is a fact, but its been suggested to me by people in the white house, that mr. Whitaker has a way of getting back to the white house or to mr. Trump or the lawyers and say, here is where the investigation stands from what i am able to see with this new pair of eyes and no one in your orbit, mr. President , has had a good look before. So that may be part of the equation. Do you think thats where his tweets came from yesterday, then . I cant speculate. Yeah. I think we need to back off the speculation. I think whats important about his tweets are to follow them from election day to the present. What we see in those tweets is a rageaholic president who is becoming enraged day by day, who is lashing out anything and everything near and around him, to an extent that even in this president we have not seen it at this level and with this kind of sustained over the top tenor that we have seen in the last week. There must be some reasons for it. Now, he says here hes happy being president. I have no doubt that thats the truth. He is happy and hes settled into the job in i think a way that he finds somewhat comfortable, but part of that comfort is to appeal only to his base, not to the country as a whole, not to be the president of all the United States. To lash out and to govern by fear, by intimidation, by dog whistling racist pronouncements, et cetera, et cetera. Thats where we are. But what we have seen is a sustained rage, such as weve never seen, and perhaps its ending today. He seems to be in a better mood perhaps today. You know, we are not doctors taking his temperature every day. Well, we all can listen to what he says and take what we can from that. Right. So when we talk about mueller, he talks about mueller talking about the questions, they are easy to answer, but he also said even if theres some trickery, implying there is some, i guess, nefarious, you know, intent in some fashion and we also heard from Rudy Giuliani according to the Washington Post telling them, quote, that some of the questions create more issues for us legally than others, he called some questions unnecessary, irrelevant and possible traps. Well, i think thats right. Also in a daily caller interview we see how upset trump is at what he is being asked about because it goes to questions of collusion or conspiracy to undermine with others our electoral process. But what we see repeatedly is the president of the United States saying theres no collusion when, in fact, we have no basis of knowing whether or not there is no collusion found by mueller, nor do we think that he has any basis of knowing what mueller has in this regard. What we can see in the last few days, though, is he seems to be unraveling and that unraveling is taking place against huge spills of information in the, quote, collusion area. So something perhaps has been introduced into what he is seeing and hearing up until today that has exercised him on this question. He is determined to convince his base and the rest of the congress of the United States that there is no collusion, even if there is collusion. So we have to wait and see whats going to happen here. He is a master of marketing, of branding, of putting out a message that seems to stick. He also, we know, values loyalty and so he gets rid of Jeff Sessions because he didnt recuse himself because he recused himself, rather, and didnt tell him he was going to be recusing himself. He appoints whitaker who is described as a loyalist and now theres New York Times reporting that trump has been asking people about whether the Vice President , mike pence, is loyal to him to which the white house says the president supports pence and thinks he is doing an incredible job. This comes as Senior Administration officials tell our jake tapper that, quote, in this administration there are arsonists and there are firefighters. The president is looking to get rid of the firefighters, the more he does the faster his administration is going to burn down. How do you think mike pence fits into that . Is he an arsonist or is he a firefighter . I think when people like jake happener and Maggie Haberman are hearing what they are hearing that theres usually whack to the arson equation theres usually fire where theres smoke. That there indeed is talk about pence initiated by the president , i think thats very clear, and nothing is a sure thing in this white house. What is less sure than anything are what the president s words mean. They mean very little in terms of truthfulness, they mean very little in terms of everything except perhaps looking at him in a kind of barometer fashion. Taking his temperature. His words, et cetera, et cetera, despite what i said. But we dont know, and i dont think trump knows, you know, is pence going to be on the ticket . I think it probably depends on the situation going into the election. We are a long way from 2020 and that election. Mr. Trump is a long way from knowing what his standing is going to be among the people of the United States of america because right now as we saw in these elections his standing with the people of the country has suffered in the past few weeks. He is aware of it. Thats one of the things that figures in this lashing out. He also has lashed out at the press yet again and we have the very important decision in the cnn case, which this network rightly filed, to ensure that the First Amendment obtains in the way that the press has access to the president. Theres a decision today upholding the first step of that. Thats right. But hes infuriated above that as well. So we are back to the rageaholic president. Carl bernstein, good to have you with us. We always appreciate your experience and expertise. Kellyanne conways husband calls the Trump Administration a Dumpster Fire. That is a quote. Hear his no holed barred interview next. Happening now the House Ethics Committee issuing judgment against two members of congress involved in Sexual Harassment related complaints. Details on that next. Nancy pelosi coming facetoface with critics within her own party. One of them is a congresswoman who made challenge pelosi for the speakership role. Here what happened next. Being detected was not an option. If i was recognized the whole operation was blown. The element of surprise was imperative. Wow. He wont even recognize you. Seriously. I dont even recognize myself. And thanks to my cashrewards credit card from navy federal with neverexpiring rewards its gonna be a killer honeymoon. Woo maui boom Navy Federal Credit union. Our members, are the mission. Were watching developments on capitol hill at this hour where House Democratic leader nancy pelosi just met with prominent democratic critics today including a congresswoman who is considering challenging pelosi for speaker of the house. Cnn is on capitol hill. I understand you had a chance to speak with congresswoman marcia fudge who met with pelosi, also may challenge her for her leadership. What are you hearing. Reporter it was an intriguing meeting earlier today and i spoke with the congresswoman shortly after meeting with throwsy privately, she said that she went into pelosis office today and made it clear that she is considering potentially challenging her in the run to be the next speaker of the house. That she has not made up her decision yesterday and said the conversation with pelosi was essentially pelosi saying to her what do i have to do to get you to a yes . Marcia fudge left that meeting saying she is not discouraged from running for speaker but she is not encouraged, either. Here is what she said earlier today. The meeting went very well, we had a very open and frank discussion. So i feel good about the meeting. Certainly i talked about the growing support that i have and why im considering a bid to run for speaker. You know, she was to her credit, she wanted to know what my concerns were, we discussed them, and we had a very open and frank conversation. Obviously i discussed the issues that i have, but certainly said that i wanted to think about it for some more and talk about it. Is there anything that you need specifically from her . Did you walk in with think we talked about some succession planning, with he talked about some other things. I think that the Biggest Issue that we discussed was the feeling in the caucus of feeling who are feeling left out and left behind. So that was my biggest thing. Im an advocate for the members this have caucus as well as im an advocate for the American People. So i just want to be sure that we are moving the caucus in a direction that the American People want to see it go and that members of our caucus will feel good about it. Reporter one thing very notable from what she said there, a small part where she said she specifically wanted pelosi to put in front her succession plan. Thats important because a lot of democrats here not coming around to supporting nancy pelosi, they want a new generation of leaders or they want some prom skes from pelosi on how long she potentially would stay in speaker. Fudge asking would it be in you have in pelosi said this last session of congress would be her last and she said, yes, absolutely, that would be enough to get her support. And whether or not she runs key to Nancy Pelosis future as the next speaker up here because as of now she does not have Anyone Running against her. She has a lot of pressure from a lot of people up here on capitol hill to potentially, you know, have someone else in the bid in the mix. We know that group of small group, but Important Group of about 18 House Democrats who are saying we want someone else. Ana. I do remember nancy pelosi prior to the election saying the idea of her being a transitional speaker was something she would be willing to consider, floating that out there, without providing details. Thanks for staying on top of it for us. We have this just into cnn, the House Ethics Committee issuing judgment against two members of congress involving Sexual Harassmentrelated complaints, one of them is a ep radio, the other a democrat. I want to bring in mj lee, cnns National Political correspondent to tell us more. Fill us in. So two members of congress have been reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee in two separate reports, the first report involving congressman mark meadows, he is a republican from north carolina, for failing to take prompt and Decisive Action to deal with alleged Sexual Harassment in his office. Now, all of this has to do with his former chief of staff, his name is kenny west, and the report says that his behavior was, quote, inappropriate in every sense of the word. Now, making matters worse, according to this report from the House Ethics Committee is the fact that congressman meadows did not terminate west. This is the former chief of staff, but rather demoted him to the title of senior advisor, and then continued to pay him even though the report says there was little evidence that he was actually performing official duties. Now, congressman meadows is being required to pay back the 40,000 that he actually continued paying this former chief of staff to the treasury department. I just want to read a key portion of this report regarding congressman meadows, here it is, there is no place in any Congressional Office for looking up skirts or down skirts, staring at a womans chest, unwanted touching or making sexual comments, even if subtle or in jest. Then it goes on to say just as between members and their staff, a power imbalance exists between senior staff and junior staff in Congressional Offices. This i thought was such a good reminder that Sexual Harassment on capitol hill does not just involve members, sometimes it can be between staff. Obviously, ana, this is politically significant because congressman meadows is not some Junior Member in the house, he obviously has a lot of clout. He is the chair of the House Freedom caucus and he is also a key ally to President Trump. Moving on to the second report that came out from the House Ethics Committee, this involves democrat ruben cuwin a congress from nevada. He is not seeking reelection so he will not be coming back. This is an important report involving his own actions. That he was himself accused of Sexual Harassment and the report says that he made persistent and unwanted advances towards women that he worked with and, again, in this report, too, it says that there is an inherent power imbalance when members romantically pursue individuals who have to work with them. I just want to read a key portion of the statement that we just got from congressman cuwin as well. It says after much reflection and introspection i re