History. Massive storm. The heaviest rain in years, set to drench california. This morning, fears of major loading in los angeles and san diego. And farther up the coast, the first big test of the repairs to that damaged dam. All systems go. Elon musks spacex team, preparing for a key launch. A mission after spectacular successes and failures that may be a huge step towards sending humans to mars. And marks manifesto. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg outlines running his company. Why it is fueling rumors that his eye is really set on running the country. Today, february 17th, 2017. From nbc news, this is today with matt lauer and is a van savannah guthrie. Live, from studio 1a, in rockefeller plaza. Hello, everyone. Welcome to today. Happy to have Hallie Jackson back in, while savannah is on maternity leave. Nothing to talk about. Ready to hop on a train back down to d. C. We have ooh la lot to talk a. A former navy officer has rejected the president s offer to be his National Security adviser. But a lot of the talk is focused on the fireworks from mr. Trumps first solo News Conference. Our Political Team standing by. We have it all covered. Lets start at the white house, with nbcs Peter Alexander. Peter, good morning to you. Reporter matt, good morning to you. For somebody that followed President Trumps campaign, that News Conference was shocking and surprising. This was a rare glimpse into the mind of the president. The verbal equivalent of a tweet storm. And the morning, the president s team is hunting for a National Security adviser, as President Trumps choice, weighing call of duty to white house dysfunction, according to a senior u. S. Official, chose to take a pass. This morning, the white house is again looking for a National Security adviser, after the president s pick to replace Michael Flynn, vice admiral Robert Harward, declined the president s office. It comes after a freewheeling, at times, jawdropping, 77minute News Conference. Theres never been a presidency thats done so much in a such a short period of time. Reporter after announcing his second pick for labor secretary, alexander acosta, he dismissed the controversies engulfing his white house. This administration is running like a finetuned machine. Reporter while defending his decision to fire Michael Flynn for misleading the Vice President the thing is, he didnt tell our Vice President properly. Reporter mr. Trump aired a laundry list of grieve vanances. Im not a bad person. Reporter blaming leaks. The leaks are real. The news is fake because so much is fake. Reporter blaming the media. Tomorrow, they will say, donald trump rants and raves at the press. Youre dishonest people. Reporter and blaming his predecessor. I inherited a mess. Its a mess. Reporter by comparison, president obama inherited a bigger mess in 2009, facing the deepest recession since the great depression. The Unemployment Rate then, nearly 8 . Upon President Trumps arrival, 4. 8 . Another fact check on this false claim about the president s electoral victory. I guess it was the Biggest Electoral College win since ronald reagan. You said you had the biggest electoral margin since ronald reagan, with 304, 306. President obama got 365 in 2008. Im talking about republican. Obama, and george w. Bush, 426, when he won as president. Why should Americans Trust you. I was given that information. I was just margin. Why should Americans Trust you when they accuse the information of being fake when you provide information thats not accurate . Ive seen that information around. But it was a very substantial victory. Do you agree with that . Youre the president. Reporter more than three months after his upset victory, the president still appears obsessed with his past opponent. Does anybody really think that Hillary Clinton would be tougher on russia than donald trump . Nobody mentions that hillary received the questions to the debates. Can you imagine if i received the questions . It would be the electric chair. Reporter President Trump raising eyebrows again and again, reprimanding a reporter who asked about the administrations plans to combat antisemitism. Quiet, quiet, quiet. He lied about asking a straight, simple question. You know, welcome to the world of the media. Reporter an americas drug epidemic. Drugs are becoming cheaper than candy bars. Reporter and when questioned about his agenda for inner cities and whether he would meet with the Congressional Black Caucus. Do you want to set up the meeting . Are they friends of yours. Set up the meeting. Reporter the white house later thought better of it and reached out to the Congressional Black Caucus itself. No date or time set for that meeting. A little back story here. Aides tell me yesterday morning, the president over the objections of top advisers, singlehandedly called for the News Conference. He announced it himself, putting the presidency in the hands of the person he trusts the most, himself. And early this morning, this tweet from the president , praising his own performance. He writes, thank you for all of the nice statements on the press conference yesterday. Rush limbaugh said one of the greatest ever. Fake media, not happy. Matt and hallie, back to you. Peter alexander at the white house. Thank you, peter. During the News Conference, President Trump tried to distance himself from concerns of his campaigns contacts with russia. But this morning, new questions are coming up about former security adviser Michael Flynn. Kristen welker has that part of the story. Reporter good morning to you. Russia is back in the spotlight this morning, with a new report about former National Security adviser, Michael Flynn. And what he told the fbi. It was yet another flashpoint in yesterdays extraordinary News Conference. This morning, new scrutiny of u ousted National Security adviser, Michael Flynn. The Washington Post citing current and former officials. Reporting in a fbi interview, he denied discussing sanctions with the Russian Ambassador. The agents felt his answers were ambiguous but did not conclude he was lying to them. At this point, agents are not contemplating charges. In his marathon press conference, President Trump repeatedly coming under fire for flynn. Did you correct mike flynn to discuss sanctions with the Russian Ambassador . No, i didnt. Reporter would you have fired him if the information hadnt leaked out . I fired him because of what he said to mike pence. I didnt direct him. But i wouldnt direct him, thats his job. Reporter the president deflecting broader questions about russia. Its all fake news. All fake news. Reporter and pushing back on reports members of his Campaign Staff had contact with russian intelligence. Youre not aware of contacts during the course of the election . How many times do i have to answer this question. I know you have to get up and ask a question. Russia is a ruse. I have nothing to do with russia, to the best of my knowledge, no person that i deal with does. Reporter the president didnt say whether he would react to a recent naval provocation, after a russian spy ship was spotted just 30 miles off of the east coast. The greatest thing i could do is shoot that ship thats 30 miles offshore right out of the water. Everyone in this country is going to say, its so great. Thats not great. Thats not great. Reporter the president also defending his business practices. I own nothing in russia. I have no loans in russia. I dont have deals in russia. Reporter its impossible to know if that statement is true. The president never released his tax returns. At a 2008 real estate conference, mr. Trumps son, donald trump jr. , says russians make up a pretty disproportionate about of a lot of our assets. Trump jr. Was saying, we see lot of money pouring in from russia. And mr. Trump says he has a relationship with russian president vladimir putin. I do have a relationship. And i can tell you that hes very interested in what were doing here today. I spoke to putin twice. He called me on the election. I told you this. And he called me on the inauguration. Reporter while russia was a major focus of thursdays News Conference, the president also set his sights on leaks. Were going to find the leakers. They will pay a big price for leaking. Reporter the president still, to some extent, blaming flynns ouster on the intelligence leaks. Saying he has directed the Justice Department to look into the leaks while he launches his own independent review. Hallie . Matt . Kristen, thank you very much. Lets bring in ari melber. He has todays factcheck. There was a lot of talk about russia at the press conference. One popular comment from the president caught your eye. What did he say . Whats the fact . Thats right. As we look at the press conference, a lot of different claims. The president repeatedly turned the conversation back to Hillary Clinton. I think for russia, Hillary Clinton gave them 20 of our uranium. That claim, we can tell you, is false. Clinton did not give away any american uranium. Russias Energy Agency bought a company that produces uranium. And that was during the period that she was secretary of state. Another subject, the leaks. Leaks versus fake news thing. One comment about leaks caught your attention. Give me the fact and the fiction. Theres different types of leaks. The president slamming disclosures of private calls with heads of state. I called, as you know, mexico. It was a very confidential classified call. I called mexico. I spoke to the president of mexico. Had a good call. All of a sudden, its out there for the world to see. Its supposed to be secret. How does the press get this information that is classified . How do they do it . You know why . It ees anprocess. The press should be ashamed of themselves. It is true this is a crime. Federal employees who leak that material to the public can get up to ten years in prison. It is not illegal for the press to cover the stories once theyre out. And the president has a point, leaks of secret diplomacy can complicate and undermine u. S. Foreign policy planning. While a lot of the leaks have basically shown us that can be interesting, they can be criminal and damaging to u. S. Policy. Thank you. Were joined by steve kornacki, mark halperin. We want to get to the News Conference and dissect that. Theres some key, issuerelated topics to discuss. We dont have a National Security adviser. Bob harward rejecting that offer. What does it say about the state of the administration, that somebody with broad bipartisan appeal, wouldnt come work for the white house. Anyone who works in National Security would see that as a dream job. The president and his team had the good sense to look for someone that qualified. He did some good recruiting early on. Yesterdays press conference, some of the other chaos, despite what the president says, is going to discourage people from taking jobs, particularly in National Security. Thats causing alarm on capitol hill. After the ninth Circuit Court of appeals upheld the freeze on the president s travel ban, he said, see you in court. Meaning the Supreme Court. No. A new executive order is coming this tuesday, that will be written in a way to avoid some of the herdurdles. This is a bit of pragmatism on the part of the white house. And the white house is looking into the administration saying, we want to have something tangible to show for the first few weeks. If you get an executive order that meets the courts requirements. If you go to the Supreme Court and you lose there, youve taken three steps back. This president and this white house are attuned to wins and losses. But theres also the substance. He needs to get things done, particularly on the core promises like immigration. Lets talk about the press conference. The first photograph in the New York Times lead story sums it up well. President trump and peter alluded to this, moved his surrogates aside on thursday, and assigned the rescue to the monthold presidency, to the only spokesman he trusts, himself. Every time there was turmoil or crisis, donald trump said, they cant handle it, i can. And the one big difference than the campaign and now. He views the campaign as the ultimate vindication. But what mark was talking about. When youre president , when you have to fill out an administration, you need big people, for key roles likes harward, for National Security adviser, they can say no to you. Its about getting something done as president. Thats a complication. This was 77 minutes. And was planned around that time, it sounds like, what were getting from reporting of Peter Alexander. Take us behind the scenes in that session, when President Trump came to his advisers and said, i want to talk to the media. Let trump be trump, has worked for him his whole life, including getting to the white house. Theres some saying, let trump be trump, does not work in every instance. He wanted to go out and be his own spokesperson because he looks around him and says, i can fix problems myself. Hes done it his whole career. This is a different set of circumstances, though. Is he listening to those people who say, maybe we shouldnt let trump be trump . Hes not like all president s, he thinks he knows best. And there are some people around him who are giving him advice. And he is largely ignoring it. He ignored it yesterday because he believes that when things go bad, he can fix it better than anyone who works for him. President obama had the same attitude which is, i got here. I did this. I know what works best. The attention point will come if it backfires. And the biggest thing about the press conference was, he was himself, no one on capitol hill that i talked to, liked the way he performed. Really quickly. If you were listening to that press conference in moscow or beijing or pyongyang or tehran, what do you take away from that . Ive never seen an american president talk like this before. And im not sure what the message is. And thats not good. Uncertainty is not good. You need to talk about jobs, the economy and security, not picking fights with people in the media. Not picking fights about the past. Not making factual errors that overwhelm any message on jobs, and the economy and security. Steve, mark, thank you both. Have a great weekend. Want to get to an alleged bomb plot. A florida man planned to set off explosives at several stores on the east coast, to tank the companys stock. 48yearold Mark Charles Barnett built at least ten explosive devices. And then offered somebody else 10,000 to put the bombs on store shelves. The other man went to police instead. Barnett thought the explosion would cause targets stock to drop, letting him buy cheap shares in the company. He faces up to ten years in prison. There were scary moments on the taxiway of phoenix airport. A Frontier Airlines flight clipped wings with a southwest flight that just arrived. A passenger took this photo of what appears to be damage to the left wing of the plane. He says the plane shook when the two jets collided. The airline helped customers catch up with other flights to denver. No one was injured. Dave price in for al this morning. What are you following . Were following big news in southern california. This is not good news. 24 Million People at risk, as we head through the next 24, 36 hours. This is the strongest storm weve seen this season. And in fact, it may be the strongest storm since 2004 or even back to 1995. Were watching for flooding and mudslides, a whole slew of things. This is part of a onetwo punch or two punches at once. Number one, we have the rain. And number two, strong winds. The winds will be stronger in san diego. The rain heavier in los angeles, where we could see gusts up to 50 Miles Per Hour downtown. And san diego, upwards of 60 Miles Per Hour. This is just the beginning. Light rain this morning. Again, the heavier stuff rolls in today and continues through tomorrow. We could see significant amounts of rain. Lets look at the numbers right now. As we head through sunday, upwards of four inches of rain in los angeles. And again, in some areas of the foothills or the mountains, we could see close to ten inches of rain. It is certainly problematic for people out west, as we head into the weekend. Thats a look at our natio