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tv   Hardball With Chris Matthews  MSNBC  October 27, 2017 4:00pm-5:00pm PDT

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>> exactly. >> that's true. >> maybe everyone should fallback. just everyone. >> i'm just going to say woody allen should fallback maybe every friday. >> maybe every day. >> thank you both. you can catch joan's new show -- >> "hardball with chris matthews" starts now. the word from dallas, let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. journalists, scoreless and historians have been comb through it the 2,800 documents all related to the snaengs of president john f. kennedy which was released late last night. much of the material reason flekts what government officials and law enforcement authorities were thinking in real time in the immediate aftermath of the
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assassination. on thedy that lee harvey oswald was shot by jack ruby, fbi director hoover dictated a memo about how the bureau should proceed. it's not clear kaib hoover was concerned that the public would be skeptical of the initial conclusions. quote, the thing that i am concerned about is having something issued so we can convince the public that oswald is the real assassin. it's also clear that the cia had deducted surveillance on oswald and were aware of his associations with soviet and cuban officials. however, the documents show that lee harvey oswald was not on the list of potential threats to the president. and he was only added after he had killed the president on november 22nd. i'm joined by andrea mitchell, joy ansly, and john meech um. i want to get as much as we can get done tonight here.
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starting with what is your understanding, andrea of what hoover was trying to say with that memo? >> well, he was trying to say at least if you read the words is that he was concerned that americans would not accept the finding that oswald acted alone and he wanted to rule out any suspicions of a conspiracy -- >> why? >> and assure the american people. why is what with he don't know. >> that's what we have to speculate on. was he afraid that people would go shooting russians, would they start ginning up the cold war again, turning it hot. >> that's why this document is so interesting. it gives us a window into the time and the time was at a height of tension during the cold war. he was worried that it was going to become more of a nation losing a president. >> that's how i remember it. i'm old enough to remember it. i knew that leaders were worried that we were right at the edge of the cold war turning hot and
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if the word had ever gotten out in any way that the nations are killed our hero, there could have been real trouble. >> yeah. well, you were only 13 months away from what arthur slas inninger called the most dangerous hours in human history, the cuban hifl crisis of october 19 of 2. diem had been assassinated in vietnam. it was one of the darkest and scariest times ever. and when you think about what was going on in the united states, you had fear on the far right, you had fear on the far left. these documents show that there was a lot of speculation. was this a far right assassin? was this a far left assassin? people were genuinely concerned and rationally that the country was facing an exist essential crisis. >> we all know that oswald went to mexico city and met with a man named cast akof, a memo drifd to the director of the cia the day after the assassination
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says that cast i kof was an identified kgb officer and had worked with the department responsible for sabotage and assassination. however, oswald discussed passport and visa matters. that is information we would have liked to have had at the time right after wards. he's meeting with the soviet kgb guy in mexico city two months before he asass natures kennedy. >> that's what makes me so suspicious of hoover's least reassure the public that it's just oswald. is he covering up for the fbi or the cia. >> the incompetent. >> the incompetent. he must have been in mexico because those other documents they know exactly -- >> he was with that play write at a party. we know that. >> did they drop the ball and was he covering up for the fbi or the cia? >> and in these other documents whoa looked at overnight, he's on the phone with the soviet people, the soviet embassy,
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people down there. he's writing a letter to the soviet embassy in washington. he's dealing with them on visa matters and stuff like that. but also complaining that he's under surveillance by the fbi, complaining to the soviets that his fair play for community participation was getting him watched. >> right. >> why is he telling them that? >> it all also begs the question if he is under surveillance by fbi, cia, they know about these conversations, why is he just showing up on the secret service watch list the day of the assassination. >> after. >> right. after the assassination, after the fact. >> he spends a couple years in russia, marries a russian woman comes back disillusioned with soviet kmuchbism. but becomes an activist for castro. i understand all of a sudden this guy is working with him
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down in mexico city. he's our enemy. >> the context, which i know you do and john does, coming at that point when we were just having come through in the 50s this height of the cold war -- >> anti--- they were the enemy. >> yeah. mccarthyism. there was suspicion around. people were being followed and put on watch lists. so the fact that he did not pop ip as someone that the secret was concerned about with the president going to dallas given his movements is very suspicion. >> let's take a look at some more documents. another document we just got sum riegsd the soviet reaction that unfolded in dallas on that day. quote, officials of the communist party of the soviet union believe there was some well organized conspiracy on the part of the ultraright in the united states to effect a coup. our source further states that the soviets were fearful that without leadership some irresponsible general in the united states might launch a missile at the soviet union. what do you make of that?
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do you believe that was proper true soviet fear that there was a right wing conspiracy in this country that led to the assassination? >> well, you know, fear is often projection. and i think the soviets worried about that in their own country and i think they probably looked at the united states and wondered. you know, seven days in may was not that remote a possibility. >> right. >> in those days. the other thing i think that's a big part of all these documents, kind of a unifying denominator is that this is a dark forest, right. the early 60s is a dark forest in american politics. you think of it as a golden age of camelot and mrs. kennedy's marvelous formulation. but you had an enormous amount of loose factors, if you will. you had the mob running around. you had the cia and the bay of pigs. you had fear of soviet and far right agents provac tour in the united states. i think one of the things that probably hoover and the other
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authors of these documents didn't know is really what had happened, and they didn't know what they might have set in motion at some point or another that might have reepd the whirlwind in dallas that day. >> you know, what i'm struck by in the middle of the night. there i'm reading the real documents. i'm reading how, you know, jean can notice, who the cia had hired to kill castro. >> the mob boss. >> the mob boss. the godfather was hired by the kraib to hill castro. he wouldn't say the 150,000 bucks they offered him because he wanted to have them on the hook. bobby, meanwhile who has been chasing them and then putting him on the list of people that he went after -- what was it, the irs. he was trying to get his tax returns, just trying to nail him just like they nailed ka pony and then they found out they're all in the take they're all working with us. and bobby said don't do that without talking to me again.
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he didn't say don't kill castro without talking to me. don't go after using the mob to go after them. and then all these questions that swirl afterwards. was the mob getting even with jack ken i. and i'm sure bobby, although he went along with the warren commission, so did teddy kennedy, he must have, he was always in the back of his mind thinking did i do something to disturb that whole aweful under world that somehow led to hee harvey oswald doing what he did. >> you've forgotten more about this than i know. i will say about this about robert kennedy, it always seemed to me that his deep grief was exacerbated by fear of guilt. and i think that his i am mergs in the an chents, in the wake of the assassination and reading edith hamilton, the great quotation he ended up using when martin luther king was killed. >> right.
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>> when rfk was in indianapolis about grief and sorrow. the quotation that is there at arlington. i think that has some connection to exactly that, the fears that perhaps he set something in motion or may have helped something along. >> i agree with that. >> ended up with those shots in dallas. >> catholic guilt goes a long way. another document shows in a 1975 deposition richard hems was asked, quote, is there any information involved with the assassination of president kennedy which in any way shows that lee harvey oswald was in some way a cia agent or an agentment is that point the sentence stops. it's the end of it. my friend, andrea, this is what gives conspiracy theorists lives. >> when i saw that, it just -- the last page of this deposition. >> who rippled the page off. >> is missing. this is the former cia director, richard hems who is a legendary figure, spy master -- >> okay. they left the cia part on, but
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the other possibility -- >> there's only one possibility really. an agent of the soviet union. because you wouldn't say an agent of the mob. >> in 2017 trying to defend a soviet union which doesn't exist anymore. >> well, to avoid an eruption, i presume. this was in 1975, so at the height of the cold war to avoid some sort of huge con flag rags which could have led to a warment you had two nuclear powers, and this was still so raw. and the fact, by the way, that we're not going to see the rest of the documents for six months and there will still be redactions is so tantalizing and so mysterious. what is the purpose of any redactions. >> why six months? can't they speed it up a little bit. >> they had 25 years to do this. don't they have enough people at the cia and the fbi -- >> what do you think? we grew up with this. these are the same old theories we had. the soviets were involve. they didn't want a third world
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war. they didn't want to keep it from us because we're all children, of course. >> you can understand that reason in the 60s. you can understand that reasoning even in the sefbts. why in 2017 are we setting an arbitrary deadline six months from now that has nothing to do with the law in 1992 that was supposed to give us -- >> you weren't here at lunchtime. peter was here. i learned one thing in digging through this stuff in the middle of the night. jack ruby, how did he get in that room when lee harvey oswald walked by. according to this informant he had a nightclub and b girls. guys would come in alone and they'd sit there, you're nice, talk to. buying them water down drinks. and it wasn't off. it was just a little bit sleesy. and the police protected that racket, so he had a good, quote, good in with the dallas police. so it explains how he could go carousing with these guys, find his way into the hallway.
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oh, that's just jack ruby. he's our buddy. >> and what about the hoover note saying that upset that the fbi had warned the dallas police that there was, quote, a committee to get jack ruby, to kill jack ruby, and he was upset that the dallas police -- >> j. edgar hoover looks pretty good in all this. i know he had his critics. i thought he was trying to do his job. he didn't want to start some craziness until he had the facts. what we can tell from these notes he was trying to find out if there was a conspiracy. he wanted to know what was behind it because the fbi didn't look too great beforehand. andrea mitchell and my pals, thank you so much. we've been through this all in real time. we really were. thanks for putting their wrapping around this story. it's an amazing storyment coming up, it's official. the republican party has become donald trump's party. last night i called it the invasion of the body snatchers. regular republicans now in the
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grips of the triumphant right wing. any way, marching to the beat of the man in the white house. trump's hold on it is getting tighter. this is "hardball." plus the trump distraction strategy as robert mueller escalates its investigation into collusion with russia. the trump crowd is going back to a tried and true game. blame hillary. believe it or not they're doing it again. and the "hardball" roundtable tonight takes on unity. the president's awkward interaction with the children of the press corps. finally, let me finish tonight with trump watch. this is "hardball" where the action is. david. what's going on? oh hey! ♪ that's it? yeah. ♪ everybody two seconds! ♪ "dear sebastian, after careful consideration of your application, it is with great pleasure that we offer our congratulations on your acceptance..." through the tuition assistance program, every day mcdonald's helps more people go to college.
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show also here on msnbc. this is a beautiful book inside and out. i think it will revive the spirit of a country that needs to believe again in leadership, unite us, not divide us, who show compassion for those overlooked. who believe a great country must also be a good country. bobby kennedy, a raging spirit afbs next tuesday. we'll be right back. from our eyes every day. i should know. i have chronic dry eye caused by reduced tear production due to inflammation. so i use restasis multidose®. it helps me make more of my own tears, with continued use, twice a day, every day. it's also what i prescribe to my patients who have this condition. restasis multidose® helps increase your eyes' natural ability to produce tears, which may be reduced by inflammation due to chronic dry eye. restasis multidose® did not increase tear production in patients using anti-inflammatory eye drops or tear duct plugs. to help avoid eye injury and contamination, do not touch the bottle tip to your eye or other surfaces.
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welcome back to "hardball." as the smo smoke clears it looks like the republican rebeal yon has been broken. it's been three days since corker and flake publicly credit side the president of the united states. >> we must stop pretending that the degradation of our politics and the conduct of some in our executive branch are normal. they are not normal. and when such behavior elm natures from the top of our government, it is something else. it is dangerous to a democracy. >> it's obvious his political
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model and governing model is to divide, and he has not risen to the occasion. i think the worst of it is just going to be the whole did he basing, if you will, of our nation. >> wow. but it was a call to arms that fell on deaf ears. in fact, it seemed to do the opposite. president trump rallied republican congressional republicans around him. let's listen. >> i think people should settle their differences personally. i think it's better that way. i think it's in our interest to have party unity so that we can continue to work forward on an agenda. >> we're here to try to accomplish things for the american people. we're all on the sage page on the issues that i've mentioned. >> i think that there are always going to be differences of opinions and agreements and that's true in any family. but i just think it's better if you can to keep those family feuds and fights within the family. it would have been better if either sides in some of these
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disputes if they would just have those conversations in private rather than having them in public. >> the one thing i would say to both of these of my colleagues, i admire you. i like you. you've got guts. to do president, you won, you bheet me. i want you to be successful. to all three of you, knock it off. >> well, 12 months since the election and the met amorph sis of the republican party is complete. it's trump's party now. monday his base trump it stronger than anybody thought with most polls showing him at 80% of republicans approve of the job he's doing. the republican tent is getting smaller, not bigger. according to a recent poll only 40% of independent voters approve of the job the president is doing while 60%, of course, disapprove. kathleen, you know, you would have thought after that dramatic indictment accused of senator
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flake, it would have had the waulg tumbling down. in fact, he's just leaving. that's all. that's all that's happening. >> yeahel. he got 24 hours of oh, you're awesome, you're so brave, cure ages. of course, he had started this long ago with his book in which he took on the president. >> he took on the president and won't do it so he wasn't quite sure of his attack plan. >> well, and then upon realize gs he's not going to be re-elected, he decides to make a stronger statement. but, you know, virtue only lasts about 24 hours in washington, and i think that he's going to now discover that it's a lonely place for the next -- for the duration of his term. >> is it your sense that there was a rally that was done organization alley that all the republican leaders like thune and all the rest of them all were called together and say i want positive statements from you about the leadership? because it seems like all were rolling out, including lindsey graham. everybody was ready to go let's rally together. >> i think they have to. if they want to get anything done.
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and as long as trump let's them get done the things that they want, they're going to still be -- they're still going to carry the banner. they might not like it and they may talk about the president behind his back and in fact they do often with great passion, but they're nonetheless going to protect the party to the extent they can. >> george, is it the one thing they do agree on, they need to get something done here? they have to agree on the tax bill, which means they need 50 out of 52. >> look, these vee shee republicans would be excused if they were getting things done. but remember, they're going to do repeal and replace obamacare by march, tax reform by august and the infrastructure by christmas. they're going to get one-half of one of those, that is tax reform, understood as tax reduction, understood as further inflating the national debt and go home and say we advanced our agenda. mr. thune in that quote you just had there says well, we have differences of opinion. they're not arguing about how much to subsidy eyes soybeans.
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this is about a persona. this is about an approach to public rhetoric. this is about manners in public life. this isn't a family argument about what's for dinner. >> well, to bring back an historic point, winston churchill left the to her party for a while because he believed in free trade and he didn't believe in protectionism. that was an issue for him. now you have a republican party cho is going to switch to concern for deficits to we're going to blow out the budget and don't care. that's a lot of orthodoxy thrown out the window. >> yes. >> for one guy. >> yes. a great kathy like thee low january once said about the liberalism of the church. the dog mass fly out the window, but the parishioners don't come through the door. and we'll see if this attracts people in the republican party or they lose an equal number of convictions in voters. >> it looks like the republican party is still the republican party of falling in line rather
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than falling in love. i don't think any of these senators love trump. i don't think they go to bed at night reading his cat can i seeism. why is it as a reporter do you see them falling in line? >> they're falling in line because they're looking at their base and when they go back to their districts and reporters like me ask them questions they are looking at constituents who say why didn't you support the president with the healthcare bill, why didn't you stand up for president trump when he was fighting with corker? i want answers from you. and that's because while president trump's numbers -- well, you show that they might be good among republicans, there's an approval nationally that he still has an a low approval rating but congress's is worse. you have the leadership like mitch mcconnell also not being very strong. they have to fall in line with the person at this point who is leading the party. >> roads svelte was trying to do -- he didn't get rid of anybody. he was the most powerful president we can imagine. it does seem although he's not
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perjuring people there's an atrophying going on. you've got strong loose. you've got the guy heller in trouble now. orrin hatch is going to retire at the end of the year probably it looks like it. they're all at the edge of trumpism and they're falling off the cliff. >> something is definitely happening. >> and of course flake and corker. >> and president trump can use those exits as evidence that, you know, we're getting rid of -- >> scalps. >> in our way -- >> steve bannon calls them scalps. >> and he's out there recruiting kapds who are even further to the right than these people who are actually true conservatives but not quite conservative enough. but most important, not loyal enough. >> george, do you think it will be a trump party three years from now? >> yes. four years from now is another matter. he's way underwater in approval of the national electorate. about 38, 39 in the real clear
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politics average. if he goes into 2020 like that, he will not be re-elected. now, the democrats seem to me have figured out in their slud and self-destructive way how to have another mcgovern moment. >> i know. >> because they're going to say we have a bright idea. let's make everybody sign up to get into the nomination contest for single payor system. that immediately foends 15 -- 157 157 million americans who get their insurance from their employers and are happy with that. >> the virginia governors race coming up very soon is proving to be a dry run on how republicans adjust to trump's gop. democratic candidate raffle north um is going after the president. let's watch. >> making progress means taking on tough fights and as governor i won't let donald trump stand in our way. >> his republican challenger is taking a different route despite avoiding the press, not inviting
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them into the state, he has embraced the president's issues. he echoed the president's stance on immigration, even running in northern virginia by the threat posed by the gang ms-13. let's listen. >> ms sp is a mess yet raffle north am voted in favor of letting dangerous illegal immigrants back on the street. >> why would they run that in the washington suburbs? we have a lot of minorities here, we have a lot of people who are sensitive to what looked like ethnic politics. >> they're running it because ed gils pea almost lost the race to cory stewart. he has to indicator to this base -- >> even up here around the potomac river. >> they're voting with the idea that they don't have to answer to some of the cultural issues that we have. and northern virginia is changing a lot. if you look at the schools that people are starting to send their kids to are getting
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browner. >> then why are they running against brown people in this ad? you know we all know virginia. they figure out which group to play to, which not to play to, are the white working class, the rural class, why are they playing up north here with this rabblerouser against hispanics. >> it's right out of the refer madness movie making. it's comical. the decision was obviously, yop, a ridiculous one. >> george, what do you make of this programming here? >> ed gils pea speaks frumism as a second language awkwardel. he has a problem. he barely beat a trump ken in the primaries. now, he has to appeal to them without offending everybody who is offended by them, which is a very difficult thing to do. and he's running against a man who is militantel vanilla. doctor nart am, he's a pediatric neurosurgeon. >> i know. i know. the ads are vanilla.
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i know. >> he's a pediatric neurosurgeon being advertised as a friend of international criminal gang. >> here is the thing. i think that part of why this might work if he wins is because donald trump is at his best when he's doing cultural wars because he didn't win on policies. he won on that american -- they're also the same thing as a ten-year-old girl who is maybe looking to get surgery but is undocument. they're meshing those two populations together pretty masterfulel. >> thank you. this is an amazing -- go ahead. >> it's just the most extreme example of horrible people that you could possibly come up with. >> i think speaking trumpism as a second language reminds me of trump trying to speak empathy as a second language. up next, with the mueller investigation intensifying, president trump and his associates are returned to their own playbook, distract, distract
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if that isn't a case for impeaching and removing a dangerous president, then what has our government become? i'm tom steyer, and like you, i'm a citizen who knows it's up to us to do something. it's why i'm funding this effort to raise our voices together and demand that elected officials take a stand on impeachment. a republican congress once impeached a president for far less. yet today people in congress and his own administration know that this president is a clear and present danger who's mentally unstable and armed with nuclear weapons. and they do nothing. join us and tell your member of congress that they have a moral responsibility to stop doing what's political and start doing what's right. our country depends on it. can make anyone slow downt and pull up a seat to the table. that's why she takes the time to season her turkey to perfection, and make stuffing from scratch. so that you can spend time on what really matters. marie callender's.
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it's time to savor. welcome back to "hardball." we've got three late breaking stories right now relating to the trump russia investigation. byron i don't recollect of the washington examiner is reporting on the genesis of that opposition research that eventually produced the dossier on donald trump. quote, the conservative publication the washington "free
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beacon" informed the house intelligence committee today that the organization was the original furnd for the anti-trump opposition project for fusion gps. wow. that's a blockbuster. thereafter the clinton campaign and the dnc picked up the tab. the free beak on has also confirmed that they were responsible but say none of the work that they received appears in the steele dossier. separately, nbc news is exclusively reporting toned that former cia director james wools i has been interviewed to discuss his allegation that michael flynn proposed a potentially illegal plan to send a turkish clerk back to turkey from the u.s. against his will. nbc news also reports that former trump adviser carter page, there he is, met with the senate intelligence committee today for five hours. i'm joined right now by nbc's investigative reporter. first of all, the washington free press, that's bill
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kristol's organization. why were they investigating trump? >> well, chris, "the new york times" is reporting this hour that that publication is financed by paul singer, who supported marco rubio. now, the times says that singer also had no knowledge of the dossier and as you said, the "free beacon" says in their statement that they funded -- they fired fusion gps to do opposition research on trump, but they had nothing to do with the dossier, with christopher steel, that former british intelligence officer or anything to do with the russia research. >> who was putting out the word that it was a republican candidate? we all got the idea it was one of the candidates against -- remember we were going after marco rubio and he denied it. how did that trail lead to another republican candidate rather than this neo conservative ti organization. >> well, the bank roll of this organization was a rubio supporter so maybe that's -- >> okay. let me ask you about jim wools i testifying. he has been a major player in this town. what about this thing that
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michael flynn he's bringing up where michael flynn apparently suggested or went along with some turkish plan to reclaim one of their nationals here in the united states against his will? >> here is why this is significant, chris. we've known that michael flynn has a russia problem. it's also pretty clear he has a turkey problem. he was made more than half a million dollars to lobby. he has this meeting where according to wools i a plan was discussed to send this clerk back, a potentially legal plan. now we know that special counsel robert mueller is investigating this as parted of his probe into flynn and we know that because wools i is telling us in a statement that he's been interviewed by the fbi and fbi agents working for robert mueller, chris. >> you know especially this spy stuff, but this looks like a scene from the americans where they grab somebody and exfiltrate him against his will. it sounds like kidnapping. >> it's incredible. don't forget, mike flynn became the national security adviser and there was a proposal on the
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table, the turkish government wants to extra diet this clerk through legal means and the open question is what did he do when he got in the government to advance this cause. >> let me ask you about carter page. it's never clear to me what role carter page played in anything except sort of being around. there he is walking away after his testimony today. >> you're absolutely right. and you know, i'm in regular e-mail correspondence with carter page and he completely denies any collusion with russia, bt he did take that trip to moscow in 2016 and he made a what has been described as a pro russia speech while he was advising the trump campaign. and i think it's interesting that they talked to him, the senate intelligence committee did forego like five hours we're reporting. clearly he's got something that they're interested in. >> what do you make of the trump peoples' charge that hillary clinton was somehow in cahoots with the russians with regard to the uranium deal and also with regard to the dossier? >> look, it's bogus.
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in terms of that uranium one thing, i mean, look, it's a story that doesn't look good for the chin tons because they got money while this thing was going through the government, but there's no ed that she played any role in aing proving that -- >> and the uranium wasn't going to russia anyway. >> it's staying in the united states. absolutely. >> thank you so much. comparing her to the rosen bergs. up next, there's a lot to go with the "hardball" round. let's to talk about from the love fest between trump and the republicans to the growing list of gop senators throwing their support behind this guy, roy moore, the ten commandments guyel. they're giving him the 11 aerd commandment, say no evil. dollars with most insurance. plus, when you get a flu shot at walgreens, you help provide a lifesaving vaccine to a child in need through the un foundation.
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we have actually great unity in the republican party. if you look at what happened yesterday at the meeting, i called it a love fest.
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it was almost a love fest. maybe it was a love fest. but standing ovations. there is great unity. >> welcome back to "hardball." according to president trump, of course, the republican party is perfectly unified. you just heard it. but one of his strokest allies, governor chris christy of new jersey disagrees. he warned his party they could pay the price in the 2018 election. >> gop unity on a scale of one to ten. >> five. five. you know, i think we're unified on a lot of issues, but we're not unified on how to approach those issues. and if you're not unified on both, you're not going to get things done. i want to see these things done and we're not unified on how to go about this and if we're not we're going to pay a price at the polls. >> who is right? let's bring in tonight's roundtable. let me start with you right down the line here. is the republican party in good shape? >> there is a battle for the
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heart and soul of the republican party going on right now certainly. there is unity to some extent around issues. these are all still republicans. they all still believe in some core issues. one of the biggest divides among them is how do they deal with trump, though. do they speak out against inflammatory tweets and rhetoric and concern about national security -- >> but they're not doing that. you know the answer -- circling the wagons around him. >> and if you are jeff flake and john mccain and bob corker, probably not after what happened to flake. >> after giving those dramatic speeches, especially senator flake, it was right out of the movies. it was like mr. smith goes to washington. the republicans have unite. >> they have not. governor christy is in a position where he can give a little more honest assessment of it. members of congress have their spit waensz to please. >> he's gone. >> right. he's not here.
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and so, you know, voters so far think that the president is doing an okay job and that it's the congress that's the problem that's keeping him from passing his agenda. they're blaming them not him. they have a lower approval numbers than the president. so they really don't have the ability to speak out. >> the republicans are grappling with how fully to embrace roy moore. this is the same question to you. the alabama senate candidate who backs criminalizing homosexual behavior and once argued a muslim shouldn't be able to sit as congressman. he was proud to offer his support. he joins senators ted cruz, mike lee and rand paul in endorsing moore? what do you make? are they together or not together? >> this is a problem for republicans because if roy moore is elected he's going to say some controversial things and a reporter is going to go to every republican senator do you agree with him. on health care if they were united they would have pad that bill. they didn't. mitch mcconnell said earlier
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this year if we unite, we win, and they haven't been able to unite. >> 50 to 52. i remember the ronald reagan phrase, the 11th commandment, speak no ooel of a fellow republican. >> if you're a republican who is facing a primary in 2018, i think you keep your mouth closed. because the people who show up for republican primaries are the trump base, are the far right wing of the republican party. now, elected in a general election, that we don't know yet. >> now for something on the lighter side. for kimberly in the spirit of halloween, president trump met today with the children of white house press corps people. let's watch that enter mingling. >> i cannot believe the media produced such beautiful children. how the media did this, i don't know. >> she's japanese of the beautiful. i'm going to be in japan in two weeks.
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i'll be in japan. >> i know. >> you know that? that's beautiful. these are beautiful, wonderful children. you're going to dproe up to be like your parents? don't answer. that can only get me in trouble, that question. who likes this? you have no weight problems. that's the good news, right? so how does the press treat you? i'll bet you get treated better by the press than anybody in the world. right? i think so. anyway, well, congratulations, folks. you did a good job. >> well, thank you. >> you did a good job. >> well, kimberly, is your heart melting, come on? >> oh, my goodness. it's nothing new the president against the press the fact that he's doing it to the faces of their children is a little uncomfortable to watch the but the weight comment, come on. didn't he learn anything from the controversy about weight shaming people. he said that there's no weight
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problem in the room, so that they can have their candy. i mean, come on. >> he touched all the wrong areas there. >> michelle obama's healthy eating. >> right. >> maybe. >> that's a strep. >> when republicans used to complain about the press, it just didn't work. for trump it's worked. i mean,it's worked certainly with his base. he keeps going back to it. >> he's smart. he's using the kids against the parents. that's like grandparents too. roundtable is next. and these three will give me three scoops they'll be talking about tomorrow. this is "hardball." oh, that's really attached. that's why i rent from national. where i get the control to choose any car in the aisle i want, not some car they choose for me. which makes me one smooth operator. ah! still a little tender. (vo) go national. go like a pro.
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we're back with the "hardball" roundtable. shannon, start this off. give me a scoop. >> okay. next week watch for the fed chair. we reported today that jerome powell is the first pick in the running or the lead horse there. important ziks next week. >> not gary cohen. >> democrats aren't all in agreement programs about how to push back against the tax bill as it comes up next week, although nancy pelosi is saying that the bill is essentially looting middle class americans. some democrats know that there are a lot of voters who want a simplified tax code, who want a middle class break and they're afraid if they rally too hard against it they'll be label as obstructionists, just as the president is trying to do -- >> they shouldn't have to hire accountants when they make moderate incomes. >> congressional oversight over the executive. darryl ice sa's bill the trump white house has not said whether
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they support that bill. >> thank you. up next, what should democrats be doing to take advantage of the
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the republican party is fighting a civil war split between loyalist to president trump who worry about the danger that president poses to the party. but will democrats be able to take advantage? joining me now is one of the authors of the great big one nation after trump, a guide for 'perplexed desperate and not yet deported. also a "washington post." ej, i only have a few minutes, about three minutes, and this is the challenge of your night. how do you reunite white working class people, poor people, whatever, who have become
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enamored of donald trump with the same economic interests again? >> well, you've got a book about bobby kennedy and he knew how to do it because both groups trusted him. why? they trusted him because he was for civil rights but also for measures that were going to help white working people. and there is no reason why democrats should choose between one of those commitments and the other. the slogan of the great civil rights march in 1963 was jobs and freedom. and what that was is a message that if you care about racial justice, you got to care about economic justice. but if you care about economic justice, you have to care about racial justice. and donald trump has opened the door wide for progresses and democrats to make this case. because he talked about working people in the campaign, but what he's done on tax cuts, on health care, and on pretty much everything else, and by the way
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where is infrastructure program, nothing he's done has helped white working class people. >> i agree with you. because two things i did like about trump, not him but message, no more stupid wars, which i thought was good one. and also rebuilding our public infrastructure, doing stuff. the democrats like roosevelt used to prodly say we are going to do and don't do it anymore. don't talk about building anymore. . your thoughts. >> if trump had actually started with infra structure he would have put democrats in difficult position. instead he tried to repeal obamacare. and doing that was going to hurt his own people like in places like kentucky and west virginia. and democrats have put out an infrastructure program but they need to talk about that a lot more. also need to talk about ideas about share ron brown and michael bennet have put forward about a child tax credit of
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3,000 bucks. that would help working families more than this bush tax cut. they need day after day, the democrats, to say he's not doing anything for you. here's what we are going to do for you. and it's going to be credible. i think that's the other problem a lot of people in the working class don't trust government. >> well said. and stop talking to your donors and start talking to your voters. thank you. i know you because you said it you are like on me. one nation after trump, thank you so much. anyway, when we come back, we are going to finish tonight with trump watch, he won't like it. you are watching hardball. today, a focus on innovation in the southern tier is helping build the new new york. starting with advanced manufacturing
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trump watch, friday october 27 t 2017. with halloween on the way we should have anticipated the masquerade, that the trump would have ready for the investigation. presidential election, a role verified by everyone of our intelligence agencies, and what do the trump people and white house decide to do? well, rather than deal with the investigation, they try to disturb russian dressing and squeeze it on anything to do with hillary clinton. why not? people will buy that. christopher steele dossier is being portrayed as russian dressing. and have you ever heard anything from talking from national political figure as this guy
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gorka saying hillary clinton could should go to the chair because of the trade over uranium that does not trade it to russia. this is to ghastly for donald trump. that's hardball. thanks for being with us. all in with chris mace right now. tonight on all in. >> i have information on your opponent. >> return to trump tour. >> he took a meeting with a russian lawyer, not a government lawyer. tonight new reporting that the kremlin played a role in the meeting with don junior. >> it's called opposition research. the white house caught scandal as fox says execution. >> and those people got the chair. plus, is the bannon trump white grievance playbook backfi


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