Highly classified information with russian officials last week. You know, at this point, id give anything to return to the simpler days of the campaign. Ah, yes, there you go. [ light laughter ] the days when the only thing he gave away was his autograph. [ laughter ] i just want to see you sign hats again, mr. President. Resign that hat. Youve got to resign. You have to resign. [ cheers and applause ] still a lot of hats out there you can get back to. National security adviser h. R. Mcmaster today defended President Trump for sharing classified information with russia saying, quote, the president wasnt even aware where the information came from. Well, that doesnt surprise me. [ light laughter ] i would bet trump isnt even sure where babies come from. [ laughter ] first, you marry a model and then a stork drops off a baby with the doorman. [ light laughter ] and then you give the baby a giant job that theyre unqualified for. [ laughter and applause ] a new a new gallup poll finds that President Trumps Approval Rating has dropped to 38 . 38 . You know its bad when your Approval Ratings reach the numbers where you get concerned your phone is going to die. [ laughter ] oh, this is not good. [ applause ] Representative Trey Gowdy said yesterday that he is not the right person to replace fired fbi director james comey. He is however the right person to portray beaker in a live action reboot of the muppets. [ laughter and applause ] a new poll found that 55 of voters wished former president obama was still in office instead of President Trump. But not this voters. [ cheers ] hes good. Fox news host Kimberly Guilfoyle said yesterday that she is in talks with President Trumps administration about replacing sean spicer as White House Press secretary. I dont know if thatll solve their pr problems, but it might finally get melania to move in. [ laughter ] the fashion house chanel was criticized, recently, for appropriating indigenous australian culture by selling a 1,000 boomerang. The controversy has died down but i have a feeling its gonna come back around. [ laughter and applause ] and finally, Florida Police say a man attempted to bribe an officer with taco bell after he was caught with cocaine. [ light laughter ] so now hes also being charged with attempted murder. [ laughter ] ladies and gentlemen, we have a fantastic show for you tonight. [ cheers and applause ] her new single, remember me, is available now. Jennifer hudson is back on the show, everybody. [ cheers and applause ] hes on a fantastic new show here at nbc called great news. Hes one of our alltime favorites. Horatio sanz is in the house tonight. [ cheers and applause ] and he is a very funny writer and currently the showrunner of hbos veep. David mandel joins us this evening. [ cheers and applause ] so youre here on a very good night. But before we get to all that, once again the white house spent the day in damage control after a bombshell report about President Trump revealing highly classified information to Russian Diplomats during a meeting in the Oval Office Last week. And tonight, news broke that trump asked the fbi director to drop an investigation into his former National Security adviser, michael flynn. For more on this, its time for a closer look. [ cheers and applause ] seth for the last week the Trump White House has been desperate to change the story from trumps decision to fire fbi director james comey to literally anything else. And good news, theyve succeeded. Tonight, breaking news involving President Trump. Did he reveal highly classified information . Stunning reports that the president of the United States shared classified information with the russians in the oval office. Current and former u. S. Officials reportedly told the paper the president went off script. Seth and it doesnt shock me that donald trump went off script. This is a man who reads off the teleprompter like its an eye chart. [ laughter ] god bless the United States of sorry, i cant read that last one. Antarctica . [ applause ] but lets just take a second to think about how insane the last eight days have been. On monday, we learned that thenpresident obama warned trump not to hire former National Security adviser michael flynn. On tuesday, trump fired fbi director james comey, which comey found out about on tv. On wednesday, he met in the oval office with Russian Diplomats, including an accused russian spy. On thursday, he admitted that he fired comey, specifically because of the russian investigation. On friday, he threatened comey with secret tapes of their conversations. On saturday, the Justice Department began interviewing new candidates for fbi director. Yesterday, we learned that trump gave the russians highly classified information. And today we learned that trump asked comey to shut down the fbis investigation into flynn. And, if youre wondering why i didnt mention sunday, that was mothers day. So obviously, trump was doing what all normal husbands do spending the day alone on the golf course in a different state. [ laughter and applause ] which which in fairness, is the best gift he could have given her. [ laughter ] now, before we get to the news about the flynn investigation, there is the fact that we currently have a white house that seems to be drowning in nonstop chaos caused by the president s recklessness. And white house staffers seem constantly overwhelmed and unable to deal with that chaos. Last night, a senior trump aide told the daily beast that when the news broke, Communications Staff and senior staffers at the white house were literally hiding in offices. [ audience groans ] and hey, that might sound bad. But at least sean spicer was hiding in an office and not the bushes like he did last week. [ laughter ] and in fact, i think we have a picture of his new office. There you go, there he is. [ laughter and applause ] according to the daily beast, things were so grim in the Trump Administration last night that an aide described the scene at the white house as tense and a morgue. I guess that explains why steve bannon looks like hes already been embalmed. [ laughter ] dude looks like he gargles with formaldehyde. [ laughter ] but just think about how demoralizing it must be to work for trump right now. A man who has proven himself repeatedly to be temperamentally unfit for handling issues as serious as National Security. Even before this latest crisis, working for trump was already a nonstarter for most serious National Security professionals. For example, in february, trump offered the job of National Security adviser to retired admiral robert harward. But harward turned the job down. Cnn reported at the time that a friend of harwards said he was reluctant to take the National Secure advisers job because the white house seemed so chaotic. Said harward called the offer, a [ bleep ] sandwich. [ laughter ] fine, if you dont want it, someone else will eat it. Paul . Paul. [ applause ] i i got to be honest, ill eat anything if it comes with tax cuts. Mmmm. Thats some good [ bleep ]. So what about the guy who has the job of National Security adviser now . That will be leiutenant general h. R. Mcmaster. And it doesnt seem like the job is going much better for him. Reporters last night said that after the news broke, they saw mcmaster in the white house and as he walked by the gathered reporters mcmaster said, this is the last place in the world i want to be. [ light laughter ] wow at least sean spicer only says that with his eyes. [ laughter and applause ] and just and just to give you an idea of how big a deal this is, the intel that trump gave the russians was reportedly code word information, which is highly sensitive to say the least. So what could possibly have been going through trumps head when he did this . Well, apparently, he was trying to brag to the russians about the great intel he gets. And now trumps aides are actually defending him, by claiming that he probably did not realize what he was doing was bad. A trump adviser told politico, he doesnt really know any boundaries. He doesnt think in those terms. He doesnt sometimes realize the implications of what hes saying. He doesnt know boundaries, he doesnt know the implications of what he says, when a ball rolls behind the couch, he thinks its gone forever. [ laughter ] you know, president stuff. [ laughter ] now, obviously, this is awkward for trump for a number of reasons, especially since he seemed to take the handling of classified information so seriously during the president ial campaign. When he was running against Hillary Clinton. Hillarys private email scandal, which put our classified information in the reach of our enemies, disqualifies her from the presidency. We cant have someone in the oval office who doesnt understand the meaning of the word confidential or classified. I dont think its safe to have Hillary Clinton be briefed on National Security, because the word will get out. I know at some point theyre going to be calling theyre going to want to brief me. But im not a talker about the stuff. This is like watergate, only its worse. Because here our foreign enemies were in a position to hack our most sensitive National Security secrets. Seth of course, it turns out, the russians didnt need to hack hillarys email server, they were able hack trumps mouth. [ laughter ] the password is tell us. [ laughter and applause ] now, trumps team has tried to claim that nothing he discussed with the russians was out of bounds. But remember, when hillary made that same argument, trump was not buying it. In fact, he insisted that whatever was on hillarys server must have been highly sensitive and dangerous for National Security and rejected her infamous claim that the many of the emails were about Wedding Planning and yoga. Her staff deleted all the emails and wiped it clean. Why would anybody thats getting rid of emails that had to do with the wedding and also wasnt it remember, right . Yoga, yoga. Yoga and the wedding. Why are you when you delete 33,000 i figure five for the wedding and two for the yoga, right . So thats seven. Seth trump thinks it takes five emails to plan a wedding . [ laughter and applause ] thats it. Five emails. Four kids, one wife, same subject line. Let me know when and where. Also, eric is not invited. [ laughter and applause ] and let me point out, i love that trump thinks this is yoga. [ laughter ] donald, were actually doing downward dog. Oh, no, im just going to do baby hands. [ laughter ] my favorite clip, though, is trump describing in detail what would happen if we elected a president who inappropriately shared classified information. Hillary clinton is unfit and unqualified to be the president of the United States. If hillary is elected, she would be under protracted criminal investigation likely followed by the trial of a sitting president. This is just hey, this is just what we need, just what we need. The investigation will last for years. Nothing will get done. Government will grind to a halt. And our country will continue to suffer. Seth its amazing the only thing he got wrong was the president s name. [ cheers and applause ] gotta give it up. This is like this whole thing is like a horror movie where the police call trump and say, the killer is calling from inside the house and also, were pretty sure youre the killer. [ laughter ] so far gop leaders have been almost completely silent despite their supposed outrage, during the election, over hillarys handling of classified information. But behind the scenes, at least some gop Foreign Policy experts are expressing shock at what trump did. For example, when reached for comment by politico a former Senior DefenseDepartment Official in the george w. Bush administration emailed simply wtf. [ laughter ] and thats a guy who worked for george w. Bush. The w stood for wtf. [ light laughter ] also, pretty soon donald trump is going to exhaust the nations supply of exclamation points. Soon were gonna have to tap into our strategic asterisk reserves. [ laughter and applause ] so publicly publicly republicans dont seem to be budging from their support for trump. But privately, at least, there are signs that it may be dawning on republicans that they will be held accountable by voters for every one trumps reckless and chaotic acts. Republicans are no doubt and you see it in corkers statement there, others as well wringing their hands a little bit, getting a little nervous here. These guys are in a raging panic right now. They recognize that at any moment donald trump can finally snap and run to the run down pennsylvania avenue in a gold speedo and these guys are gonna be held responsible for his crazy actions. Seth yeah, i dont know. If trump ran down pennsylvania avenue in a gold speedo, i feel like paul ryan would just run after him with a bottle of suntan lotion, yelling, sir, can i protect you from the damaging uv rays . [ laughter ] and then just before we started taping tonight, the New York Times reported that President Trump asked fbi director james comey to shut down the federal investigation into trumps former National Security adviser, michael flynn, in an Oval Office Meeting in february according to the memo that comey wrote shortly after the meeting. The memo was a part of a paper trail comey created, documenting what he perceived as the president s improper efforts to influence an ongoing investigation. So trump fired comey, thinking that would get rid of him. And instead he just freed up comey to start telling everybody what he knows. [ cheers and applause ] thats like cutting our your victims tongue and forgetting he can still write stuff down. [ laughter ] its like handcuffing somebody to a rolling chair. [ laughter ] where did he go . Just because you put him behind the couch doesnt mean hes not there anymore. [ cheers and applause ] we need we need republicans to stand up and do something, because right now, weve got a president who is deeply unfit for the office. Just in the past week, weve learned that he fired the fbi director to obstruct an investigation into his own campaign. Threatened that fbi director with secret tapes. Gave highly classified information to the russians. And tried to interfere to shut down an fbi investigation into his former National Security adviser. This scandal is like oh, what . Whats a good way to describe it . This is like watergate, only its worse. Seth yeah, yeah, thats good. [ laughter and applause ] this has been a closer look. [ cheers and applause ] well be right back with jennifer hudson, everybody. [ cheers and applause ] madetoorder 100 beef burgers that are 100 from dennys. Starting at 6. 99, which is 100 awesome. 100 beef burgers with fries starting at 6. 99. 100 seriously. Music volume rises ] you guys wanna go . [whistles] get all summer essentials 30, 40, and 50 percent off. Hi, fashion. Old navy first you start with this. These guys. A place like shhh no. Found it and definitely lipton ice tea. Lots of it. A lipton meal is what you bring to it. And the refreshing taste of lipton iced tea. How do they make starburst taste so juicy . They use wicked small fighter jets to shoot the juiciness into every starburst. [ pilot ] its about to get juicy. Whoo i feel so aliii. It takes guts. [ female announcer ] starburst. Unexplainably juicy. Ooh, is that a galaxy s8 . A world traveler, start by. Handsome screen. Well, pack that. Oop, oh ok, were moving fast. Youll need a tour guide. Apparently not. Dont forget a big camera. Or that phone will work. Traveling by yourself can be lonely. And. Youve already made friends. Ok, i guess you have the world traveler thing covered. [ cheers and applause ] seth welcome back, everybody. Give it up for the 8g band right over there. [ cheers and applause ] also, so happy this week, we are joined with one of the most highly regarded drummers in the modern jazz community. And you can hear his grammy awardwinning playing on the icon david bowie no plan ep. Mark guiliana, everybody. Thank you. [ cheers and applause ] our first guest is a goldenglobe, grammy, and Academy Awardwinning actress and singer who recently released her new single, remember me, from her highly anticipated upcoming album. Please welcome back to the show jennifer hudson, everybody. [ cheers and applause ] seth welcome back, jennifer. Thank you for having me back. Seth it is so great to see you. I saw you i did not see you personally, i saw you on stage on monday morning. There is this thing called upfronts, for people who dont know, where the Networks Talk about their new fall schedules. And you open the morning at 10 00 a. M. On monday and you sang at radio city music hall and you brought the house down. Was that fun to sing at 10 00 in morning on monday or awful . You know what, i just sing when im told to sing. It could be four in the morning, ten in the morning. But i thought i would be yall alarm clock and wake you up. Make sure yall was ready for the upfronts. Seth yeah. Did i wake up . Seth you woke me up. Yeah, i was ready. Were you have you ever been to the upfronts before . You ever been to something i have. I did lets see, fox upfronts before. Own upfronts before. And now nbc upfronts.