shock in congress as the director of national intelligence now says he is cutting off briefings on election security issues to top members of the u.s. congress. only written updates will be going forward. even with the top intelligence official on the election saying just this month that china, russia, and iran are now looking to interfere in the u.s. presidential election just 66 days away with some people actually starting to vote earlier. all this as coronavirus cases in this country now near 6 million. more than 180,000 lives lost in the united states, nearly one thousand yesterday alone. the reported death toll so far this saturday is already well over 250. first let s go straight to kenos kenosha, wisconsin, where people have been marching nearly for a week after the police shot jacob blake. he s now paralyzed from the waist down. sara sidner on the scene for us, she had a chance to speak to blake s father. what are you seeing, first of all, sara, what are you hearing?
russia is once again trying to interfere, not just in the november election but in the primaries that are happening as we speak. president trump, he doesn t want to hear it. after an intelligence official briefed a house committee on their concerns, president trump took his anger out on that official s boss, the acting director of national intelligence, joseph maguire. five days later, the president announced his replacement. what is president trump angry about? he was mad the official, shelby pierson, told lawmakers russia developed a preference for president trump. the post quotes an administration official as saying the president told mcguire he didn t believe russia wanted to help him and said the intelligence community was getting played. ken delaney covers national security for us at msnbc. tell me more about the briefing and specifically what got the president so ticked off. this is an earthquake across the intelligence community, stephanie. it is raising the specter
tonight the new york times is reporting late today, in fact on this disturbing revelation, that has huge implications for our country. according to the times, five people familiar with the matter, intelligence officials warned house lawmakers that russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get president trump re-elected. most disturbing was the president s reaction to the news that the intelligence had been shared with congress. according to this report, the disclosure to the house intelligence committee angered mr. trump who complained that democrats would use it against him. quote, the day after the february 13th briefing to lawmakers, mr. trump berated joseph maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place. additionally during the briefing mr. trump s allies challenged the conclusions, arguing that mr. trump has been tough on russia and strengthened european security. this news paints a devastating portrait of a
part of his speech. bing bong bing bong bing bong. apparently someone on fox crit siresed his poll numbers which inspired that last night in colorado. wait, wait, is that where he was talking about the rigged call-in polls that he rigged and that i guess michael cohen said that he was working with other people to rig? oh, back in 2016? oh, this is about how lousy he s been in debates. and then had rigged the polls, so he s still upset about the fact that people on fox news and everywhere are saying he actually is horrible in debates? well. because he is. i think there s a lot of other stuff that s going on that might be distracting him. welcome to morning joe, friday february 21st. we have columnist and editor for the washington post, david i go naishus, and former c.i.a. and department of defense employee, jeremy bash. we ve got fallout from the las vegas debate. great ratings for that debate. i will tell you people that don t usually come up to me, members o
already knew from reporting last night, very explosive. last week, where the person responsible for election security in the intelligence community went to the house intelligence committee to give an update on what is going on with interference in the 2020 election. as we speak, real time. and i m told by a source familiar with the meeting that it was very comprehensive but that the briefer twice said that their observation is that russia had a preference for donald trump. now, i m told that the briefer was not ambiguous about that, that the kremlin had a preference for the president, but this person who understands the complexities and the kind of how intelligence is presented made clear this is an assessment and always an assessment, it is never clear cut. it is based on the intelligence and the data that they have gathered. on that note, i m told that republicans were shell shocked, very upset to here that being delivered as bluntly as it apparently was, will hurd, who in