this is cnn breaking news. >> hi, everyone i'm pb. you're watching cnn here on this thursday afternoon and here we go. another hour, another bombshell on this russia investigation right now. here's what we've got for you. sources say top white house aids are worried that the director of the fbi, christopher wray could quit if this highly controversial republican memo is released. chris wray who the president hailed as having impeccable

credentials has said through an official statement that the fbi has grave concerns about the memo's accuracy. the memo alleges that the fbi abused his surveillance power. let's go straight to the man breaking the news here evan perez. evan, beginning with you, tell me everything you know. >> reporter: brook, i think what is happening is that the white house folks are getting a sense of the frustration from chris wray the fbi director. he certainly made that abundantly clear in his meetings with white house officials and certainly with the justice department because he believes that he obviously was picked by the president and yet his advice to the president to not release this memo certainly not in the version that devin nunes has prepared shouldn't be done and he believes that that is -- that his advice is being disregarded. in fact, the republicans are sort of casting this as some kind of partisan fight including sort of tarring the reputation of christopher wray.

he has not threatened to resign i'm told from talking to people familiar with those conversations. he's not directly threatened to resign but he certainly let people know that he is very frustrated and i think that is what's causing people some people at the white house to be very concerned that if this memo comes out and we expect that it might come out in the next day or so that chris wray could say that he's had enough. again, the white house doesn't want this. they do not want another vacancy of high level. they know this will be politically disastrous. >> reporter: we do know that there is frustration as evan was saying and the fbi director has indeed voiced that frustration directly to white house chief-of-staff john kelly who we are told is trying to foster, if not some type of compromise, trying to soften the edges on this a bit and there's still a discussion about potentially redacting parts of the memo or

changing parts of the declassified memo but it is clear, we do know now the president has read the memo. he's been in several conversations with his advisers about the memo and he is planning on going ahead to release the memo, at least that is the understanding here. all of these objections that his own fbi director have -- has raised have not been enough to persuade the president differently. we are looking for the timing of this, likely in the next 24 hours or so. officials here do not believe it will be later today. likely tomorrow but again this is all somewhat fluid, it is the sense of the white house here that they do not want the fbi director to leave over this and as evan said, there are no reports of him threatening that directly but he is making his d displeasure pretty loud and clear to the white house chief-of-staff and the chief-of-staff knows how difficult it would be to confirm a new fbi director. imagine, brooke in this climate trying to get a new fbi director on board.

that is what they do not want to have happen. as this is scheduled to be or likely to be released in the next day or so, anything on this could happen, brooke. >> here we are in this post-comey world where, let's remind everyone, chris wray is someone who president trump picked to head up the fbi. these fbi directors, evan, have this ten year -- to keep them -- i don't know in their own sort of bubble away from politics and day-to-day pressures from the president, which i suppose got thrown out the window once jim comey got fired. >> right. exactly. i think you're pointing to exactly what the frustration here is. chris wray was brought in to help, again, turn the page at the fbi, the complaints from republicans and from the president was that james comey and the leadership there had turned the agency, the bureau, into something that it wasn't supposed to be.

so chris wray is the guy who's supposed to help change this and he is telling them that this memo is inaccurate, that it has omissions that make it inaccurate and he's not being listened to and that is what the frustration is here. jeff just mentioned there's some redactions being made to this memo. the problem for the fbi is that, again, the problem is that they're omissions in what the story that devin nunes has crafted in this memo according to the fbi. they believe that redactions probably will not cure all of the problems that they have with this, so the big question is, how does this work? what kind of compromise, perhaps, can the white house figure out to reach in the next 24 hours? >> okay. both breaking that news on the frustration on behalf of this current fbi director. gentlemen, thank you so much. add to this bitter fight over the memo, the top democrat on the intelligence committee, the house intelligence committee

says that congressman devin nunes altered it before actually sending it to the white house and after their committee voted along party lines to reveal it publicly. congressman adam schiff tweeted wednesday, quote, discovered late tonight that chairman nunes made material changes to the memo he sent to the white house, changes not approved by the committee. white house therefore reviewing a document the committee has not approved for release. chairman nunes calls the complaint strange saying the changes were, quote, minor edits including grasmaticcal fixes and to edits requested by the fbi and by the minority themselves. okay. let's just dive in. i have with me chris eliza and shawn turner. and gentlemen, chris, first to you, from what evan perez just told us, are we potentially

functioning in a reality where this administration may be saying good-bye whether it's they're on their own volition to not to not just one but two heads of the fbi? >> i think we could be, brooke, because i just don't -- knowing what i know about donald trump over the last, you know, two and a half years of covering him, i don't see how he reverses from his public 100% promise that this memo is going to be released. the reason why he doesn't is simple, because it affirms what he believes to be true, whether it's true or not. it bolsters his case that there is some sort of deep state conspiracy going on within the fbi to undermine him, that people within the fbi at high levels aren't doing their jobs well, are not following the rules and need to be called out for it. so he -- he takes information that he likes and makes it true

in his mind and damn the torpedos. that's always been his approach. i think it would be stunning, remember, james comey was the fbi director he inherited. chris wray is the fbi director he picked. >> he picked? >> whatever you thinking of the firing of james comey and the circumstances surrounding it, a chris wray resignation based on his -- the fbi's desire not to have this memo released, i don't know how you spin that one if you're donald trump. >> you can understand, though, shawn, the frustrations -- i can't begin to imagine on behalf of the fbi, they released this public statement, grave concerns over the memo's accuracies, evan making the point misleading information despite any kind of redactions that they agree upon, if you're chris wray and you're ahead of the fbi and the president goes ahead and says, sorry, i'm releasing it, how do you not resign? >> that's a good question. if it is the case that the information in this memo is so

egregious and if chris wray finds it to be so misleading that he thinks that it's worth quitting, worth walking away from, you know, i think that any objective person whether you are a supporter of the president or not, you have to take a step back and you have to look at this process and you have to look at the purpose, the motivation for wanting to put this memo out, but, you know, it's also the case that, you know, i hope that the president is listening because, you know, look you have more than 30,000 people who work in the fbi who are committed to doing this work and supporting the president and his efforts and for chris wray to walk away from the fbi, you know, really would put the organization in turmoil having two directors gone in such a short period of time. i think it's a good sign that this memo has not come out yet despite the fact that we've been hearing for days that it could come any minute and my hope is

that that's because cooler heads are prevailing and people are getting to the president and he's giving this serious thought. >> maybe of the people getting to the president you have the third ranking in the -- listen to these warnings coming in from the intelligence community. the number of people against this release seems to be quickly outweighing folks in the white house. >> well, yes and i think it's important to note too that we have a tendency to create everything as a democrats say one thing, republicans say another partisan battle because most things are at this point but this really isn't. this is sort of an institutional fbi, law enforcement clump that democrats are aligned with and then donald trump, devin nunes -- you know, that group. this is not a strict d/r split. the reason i think he's going to go forward with it is because he

has repeatedly trampled in his first year in office on the idea or the tradition of the fbi and the broader law enforcement community within the justice department operating independently. he views it as a corporation. everybody reports to him. he's everybody's boss. it's why you ask andrew mccabe who he voted for, it's why you ask rod rosenstein whether you're, quote, on my team. these are not things that presidents typically ask but he -- whether unknowingly or knowingly he has sort of not just blurred, he's taken those lines, those lines between president and justice department and just totally wiped them out. giving that, if past his prolog i don't see how he reverses course on this. >> on my team thing, does the president still not understand the line a year in between the

executive and justice? >> if you'd ask me that question six months ago i would have said, well, perhaps he's still learning but after more than a year i just -- i don't think there's any way that we can reasonably believe that the president does not understand this distinction. one of the things that makes the fbi the best law enforcement agency in the world is because the vast majority of the people who work at the fbi, you know, without regard to their personal politics, they don't care what team the president's on. they do their job, they workday in and day out and they just want to make sure that they're doing their part to protect the country. when the president asks someone like rod rosenstein if he's on his team, first of all, that's a reflection of the president. this president does not like the idea that you have people -- this government construct where you have people who are loyal to the mission but not necessarily loyal to a person or to a team

and for this president that's unusual. that's not the kind of thing that's he's accustomed to. in asking that question it's clear to him now that rod rosenstein say man loyal to the mission and i don't know that set well with him. >> by the way, just to add quickly to his point, james comey donald trump asked james comey or said to james comey i need your loyalty pledge. gone. he asked andrew mccape who did you vote for, gone. he asked rod rosenstein, are you on my team, rumors that he may be gone. >> i feel you. >> at some point you have to say, wait a minute, one plus one definitely adds up to two all the time. >> yep, chris and shawn, thank you guys. >> thank you. >> thanks. >> we have more breaking news this afternoon. chuck schumer is firing back at cia director mike pompeo after he defended agency officials meeting with russian intelligence counterparts as a way to keep americans safe.

cnn's senior congressional manu raju is on capitol hill. >> reporter: this started earlier this week when the russia embassy tweeted that sergey who is the head of the russian intelligence service, someone who's under sanctions in the u.s. they tweeted that he was having meetings with his american counterparts, chuck schumer raised some serious concerns saying why did this happen and also raising concerns about the lack of implementation of those sanctions on russia that were improved overwhelmingly by congress last year that the president reluctantly signed into law. pompeo today wrote back to schumer saying that it's normal for him to have these meetings. he said that this is what predecessors have done in the past and he's doing it to keep the country safe and it would be a bad idea to ignore these opportunities to work together in the name of terrorism. chuck schumer just moments ago firing back saying, if this administration is ignoring

sanctions that's very serious. director pompeo's refusal to answer that question is deeply troubling and book no real response yet about whether or not the issue of sanctions themselves were a topic of that discussion but who democrats suspect that could be one reason why these have not been fully implemented. one thing democrats will continue to push on. so that letter from pompeo not satisfying concerns from the top democrat on capitol hill. >> it's what i heard from one democrat senator who we talked to early in the week. thank you so much. also, just a heads up, moments from now we'll hear remarks from house speaker paul ryan and mitch mcconnell from that republican retreat in west virginia expected to weigh in on this memo controversy. we're going to monitor that for you. also ahead was she obstructing justice, the trump teams former legal spokesman is ready to talk and address concerns he has surrounding white house communications director hope hicks.

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we're back watching cnn. i'm brooke baldwin. special counsel robert mueller is deer owing in on this possible covering up at this trump tower meeting between russians and the trump campaign. white house communications director hope hicks, here she is, told the president that e-mails written by the president's son, done junior about that meeting will quote/unquote, never get out. of course she was wrong and that phrase could be an admission that the trump team new what they were doing and knew what was wrong and hope hicks is guilty of obstructing justice.

former spokesman from the legal team is expected to tell the special counsel all about that conversation. so with they seth brenzwick. the bottom line is what this could potentially show here that both trump and hicks had knowledge of these, you know, get some dirt on hillary clinton e-mails and wanted to cover-up? >> exactly. this all came about when there was an indication that mark corallo as you are noting is going to be speaking to bob mueller and there was an indication also that there's going to be an allegation that hope hicks made the statement that the e-mails were not going to come out. if that statement was made, of course it does raise a potential obstruction of justice issue. it would not be a defense under the law of obstruction as to whether she was young, inexperienced or naive. the statute cares about whether she was aware of an ongoing pending criminal investigation and whether there was an attempt

to have some kind of an impact to inhibit or cover something up, so that's going to be a part of what those conversations will be taking place when mr. ca role lowe speaking with bob mueller. >> isn't this service value today, corallo versus hope hicks's word unless ca role lo has tapes of this. >> right the only way i think hope hicks has a lot of exposure here is if there is multiple corroboration, if there is and she failed to disclose that during her interview with robert mueller then she could be looking at for example, not only obstruction issue but also a false statements issue but i think that what robert mueller is looking at in this regard hope hicks fits into a broader port trait of obstruction by the president. this is a piece of a larger puzzle.

and at the point that the statement was prepared by the president it was demonstratively false and way off base. his own sons e-mail demonstrate that it was not for adoption. there's a lot that goes on there. >> also corallo up and quit right around the time we're talking about, he ups and says see you, maybe demonstrating an actionable response, would that give him an upper hand at all in terms of credibility? >> absolutely. i guarantee -- one of the questions -- there's two things that would bolster his credibility, one contem per rainus statements to other witnesses in realtime and two the immediate departure. he left within a day or two of that incident that happened on air force one. i guarantee you that one of the questions that robert mueller's going to be asking mark corallo in the interview is why did you abruptly resign within the couple of days of what happened on air force one, what did you see that led you to be so disturb that you would have an

abrupt departure? that witness has a story to tell. >> yes. also, hope hicks was apparently texting with don jr. according to the "times." if she was using a government phone, are those texts on record? >> oh, absolutely. they're on record and they have to be preserved as a matter of federal law and the special prosecutors already has those and they probably reviewed those before they interviewed her. we have a piling on of a lot of evidence and now robert mueller is going to have an additional unique perspective when he interviews mark corallo. he's going to be able to add further context to both the conversation that happened on air force one and what that meant to how the president was mischaracterizing that relative to the obstruction investigation. the only other point i would add, it's ironic we're talking about this issue of obstruction today with the nunez memo

because one of the things prosecutors look at in trying to get to state of mind is a pattern and practice. when you start to put these things together they tell a story too. >> right. good to see you. thank you so much. back to our breaking news this hour. sources tell us that top white house aides are worried that christopher wray could quit if this memo becomes public. stay with us. wow kaley, this is a fancy hotel. must have cost a lot. actually, i got a great deal. priceline saves you up to 60% on hotels, but that's something the hotels don't really want other guests to know. i saved about 120 dollars a night! did you say you saved 120 dollars a night on a room?

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announcer: this is cnn breaking news. we're back with the breaking news on this thursday afternoon. its concerns are growing over

whether the trump administration will release this republican memo attacking the fbi. cnn is now reporting that the white house is concerned that fbi director christopher wray could up and resign over all this. we now have a new statement in, this is the president from the fbi agents association releasing this. let me just read it for you. the fbi agents association appreciates fbi director chris wray standing shoulder to shoulder with the men and women of the fbi as we work together to protect our country from criminal and national security threats. as director wray noted, fbi special agents have remained steadfast in their dedication to professionalism and we remain focused on our important work to protect the country from terrorists and criminals, both domestic and international, special agents take a solemn oath to our country and to the constitution and the american public continues to be well served by the world's preeminent law enforcement agency. so with me, someone who actually knows christopher wray is garrett graph. he's our cnn contributor and we

keep talking about his frustration and we know that the president is frustrated because obviously he wants to release this memo, but chris wray, what kind of man is he? tell me what you know. >> i think that there was a perhaps a misunderstanding last summer when christopher wray was initially put up for this job that he was going to be some sort of sympathic trump stooge, sort of a trump plant at the white house but christopher wray has a long and distinguished history within the justice department. this is someone who was the assistant attorney general for the criminal division in the years after 9/11, which was actually the unit overseeing the counterterrorism portfolio at the time. it was before the reorganization that led to the national security division and so this is someone who was right there in that post-9/11 crucible with men like robert mueller, with men

like jim comey and many people don't realize that christopher wray actually in the famous 2004 hospital incident that saw james comey and robert mueller prepared to resign over the nsa domestic program that christopher wray who is assistant attorney general then was prepared to resign with them. he was not read into the program. he didn't know what the controversy was but he stopped -- >> he was with them. >> he stopped james comey in the hallway and he said, look, i know there's something going on here, when you pull the rip cord make sure to tell me so that i can jump with you and that he knew that if robert mueller and james comey were prepared to resign over something that it was worth resigning as well. that's the man of sort of in defense of the justice department's prerogative as the defender of the constitution that he is. >> so given everything you've just told me and the fact that wray, according to our justice correspondent is saying wray's

frustrated, top white house officials are worried he'll resign over this because you have this clash of the president of the united states who wants to get this memo out there to discredit the mueller investigation and you have the top of the fbi saying no. >> this is an unprecedented moment. i think that we -- in these stories often get caught up in, like, this is more democratic/republicans partisan squabbling. >> no this is intelligence. >> this is something we've never seen in american history before. i think it's quite notable, brooke, that christopher wray is right now standing there by himself, the fisa process, the foreign intelligence surveillance act process since watergate has been the only legal way for u.s. intelligence agencies to gather foreign intelligence information on u.s. persons. >> and this isn't just the fbi, this is the cia.

>> this is the only legal way to do this. this is an important intelligence community equity to defend the -- the sort of integrity of this process and i think it's really notable that you're not seeing director of national intelligence dan coats, you're not seeing nsa director mike rodgers, you're not seeing cia director mike pompeo. >> come behind him and say we agree with you don't release the memo. let me hit pause on this conversation. let's go to west virginia where the house speaker is talking. >> so take home pay is going up, wages are going up, benefits are going up, businesses are expanding. consumer confidence is at a 17 year high while unemployment is at a 17 year low. tax reform is working but one of the reasons we're here in west virginia is because we want to build on this success of 2017 in 2018. we want to make sure that secretary mattis, who we heard from this morning, has the tools and resources he needs to

rebuild our military. we need to close the skills gap in this country and we need to help people to move from welfare to work so they can tap their true potential. we've made great progress but there's more to do and that is why we're excited about having the president here today to work on this shared agenda. i want to thank him, the vice president and all the members of the administration who have joined us here in west virginia to talk about this agenda. i want to thank mitch mcconnell for joining us here. we're very excited about making more progress for the american people in 2018. >> mr. speaker, thanks for inviting us to join your retreat. i think the speaker's done an excellent job of outlining all the good things that are coming about as a result of the comprehensive tax reform bill that we passed in december. having been here a while, i'm in a good position to compare 2017 with other years and if you prefer a right of center america as virtually every republican

does, there was never a better year than 2017 in the time i've been here which would cover three decades. starting with the supreme court, now 13 circuit judges but the 12 we did last year were the most in the first year of any administration since the sir cut court's were established in 1891. we used the congressional review act 15 times to try to deal with the regulatory rampage that occurred during the obama years. it had only been used once in history and finally, as the speaker outlined, the incredible success of this tax reform legislation. you mentioned ups which happens to be the single biggest employer in kentucky and the employees all across the country are benefiting from what we did last fall. it is the reason for optimism, for growth, the opportunity to get our country growing again.

think of it this way, taking your foot off the brake and putting it on the accelerator and giving america the opportunity to reach its potential. >> does anyone have any questions? phil? >> thank you, mr. speaker. president trump saying the memo should be released posed a great danger. >> let me just step back for a second. first of all, let me tell you what this memo is and what it is not. what this memo is, is congress doing its job in conducting legitimate oversight over a very unique law fisa and if mistakes were made and if individuals did something wrong then it is our job as the legislative branch of government to conduct oversight over the executive branch if abuses were made. remember, fisa is a unique situation which involves americans civil liberties and if american civil liberties were

abused, then that needs to come to light so that that doesn't happen again. what this is not, is an indictment on our institutions of our justice system. this memo is not indictment of the fbi, of the department of justice, it does not impune the mueller investigation or the deputy attorney general. what it is, is the congress's legitimate function of oversight to make sure that the fisa process is being used correctly and that if it wasn't being used correctly, that needs to come to light and people need to be held accountable so we do not have problems again because this does effect our civil liberties. carrie? >> [ inaudible ] to remove chairman nunes from his position, what's your response to that? >> they're just playing politics and they're looking for a

political distraction is whatty get out of that. the tax cuts are working. we've got isis on the run. things are going well. economic confidence is at a 17 year high. they would love nothing more than to play politics and change the subject. devin nunes helped shepherd through a reauthorization of 702 which is the foreign terrorist form surveillance law so he's focused on keeping our country safe. what they're trying to do is side track us with some political game. >> you don't get called on. >> yes. >> where do you guys stand on [ inaudible ]? >> we've been both talking about the c.r. for first of all, the reason we're having these c.r.s in the first place is because the democrats have been holding the cap agreement hostage for an unrelated issue. so if we would've had our cap agreement in place by now we would not be having to do these c.r.s. having said all of that i think we're making progress on a cap agreement and even if we get everything figured out by

tuesday, we still have to have a c.r. if only for the fact that we have to get the appropriators time to write another appropriations bill. there will have to be a c.r. just to give the committee a time to write an proemgss bill. we're still negotiating the contents and duration of that. >> i might just add, i don't think we'll see a threaten in government shutdown again over this subject. one of my favorite old kentucky country saying there's no education in the second kick of a mule so i think there will be a new level of seriousness here in trying to resolve these issues. the speaker outlined as we go forward. >> immigration bill soon can you tell us which bill that's going to be? >> no. what i've said, what i said friday, last friday or a week

ago tomorrow was, if the immigration issue was not resolved inside the global discussions that the speaker's been talking about that we had going on, which the democrats have trying to shoe horn the immigration issue into that collection of discussions. if those are not resolved, i'm perfectly happy provided the government is still open on february the 8th to go to the subject and to treat it in a fair way, not try to tilt the playing field in anybody's direction and we'll see who can get to 60 votes. >> jake? >> any reaction to the reports that knew necessities changed this memo after it was voted on. >> my understanding was before. the question was the memo it's important that we scrub these memos for any sources and methods that could reveal

national security our compromise national security. that scrubbing has taken place in consultation with the fbi they made a change to register those concerns and then they voted on releasing the memo to the white house. so the process is exactly what it should have been. scrub to make sure that there are no sources and methods being revealed when a matter was brought to the attention of the committee, they addressed that matter and then they went through the committee process. >> mr. speaker, republicans are traditionally the party of law and order. you have an fbi director saying please don't release this memo. it is misleading and incomplete. he was appointed by republican president. doesn't that give you pause? >> no, what concerns me is if we are violating american civil liberties. this fisa law is very unique. the fisa law title one, there's been some confusion about different titles in this law. this law allows the government

to go to a secret court to get a wiretap on a citizen, so this is incredible power that the people of this country through congress has given our executive branch of government. we have to make sure that this power is being exercised properly and judiciously if there are institutions or if there are instances or individuals who have abused that power, it is our job in congress to shed light on that and bring transparency and accountability to the process. let me just say, the vast, vast, vast majority of the men and women of the fbi are doing a great job. these institutions, the department of justice, the fbi, very important institutions for the rule of law but it's also very important that we guard peoples' civil liberties as we exercise these institutions. like i said to you on tuesday, the men and women over at the milwaukee office, at the field office, they're the ones helping to keep opioids out of our school. they're doing a fausk job. we also have to make sure if

there are certain individuals who did the wrong thing, who either brought bias or cut corners or did something wrong that implicates an american civil liberties it is our job as congressional overseers to bring people to account so it doesn't happen again. molly? >> yes. senator mcconnell, have you seen the memo and secondly, do you agree with senator -- [ inaudible ]. >> no, i haven't and i don't have any suggestions to make to the speaker. i think he's handling this just right. >> last question. >> mr. speaker, do you really believe that this memo has nothing at all to do and no impact on the special counsel's investigation. >> what i'm trying to say is people should not draw lines. people should not implicate. >> they are drawing lines. >> they should not be drawing lines or implicating independent issues. this does not implicate the mueller investigation.

this does not implicate the dag. this is us holding the system accountable and reviewing whether or not fisa abuses occur. the government has been given extraordinary power over citizens' civil liberties. it is our job to make sure that the process is followed properly and if it's not followed properly, then we need accountability. let all of it out so long as we're not involving sources and methods or revealing sources and methods to protect our national security, the more transparency the better. so the people can see their civil liberties are being protected, the constitution is being followed. it's the correct anecdote for this and that is why the legislative branch of government, dually elected branch of government conducts its oversight over the executive branch of government. thank you very much. i appreciate it. okay. so you just had the top republican both in the house and the senate there and really

mostly speaker ryan and this is the line that i think is key that i just jotted down talking about this memo, right, and the release. the speaker said this doesn't implicate the mueller investigation, it doesn't implicate the dag, deputy attorney general rod rosenstein but that goes against what the president from the white house our sources is hoping it will absolutely discredit the mueller investigation so let -- i've still got garrett graph hanging out with me let me bring in two more voices. amanda carper. she's the former communications director for senator ted cruz and cnn political analyst brian carum who is the executive editor for sent nell newspapers. brian, starting with you, again you heard my point, right, it's like speaker ryan says, no, no, no this doesn't effect the mueller investigation with what we're hearing from the president is yes, yes, yes this should discredit it. >> and you're hearing that from the fbi. that is the most disingenuous piece of verbiage i've heard

today. this is a tipping point for our democracy. are we going to be a democracy after today or is this going to be demi godry? he talks about transparency and this is an administration that hasn't had a sole lowe press conference in a year or press briefing in the last week and a half. they don't talk to the press. we have to go on the south lawn to try and get in touch with the president and shout questions at him. if you're going to be transparent then you release the democratic version of it as well. you release all of it if you're going to be transparent. this isn't transparency. this is obfuscation. this is simply and nothing else but a power play. a demi god pushing back against the democratic process and you've got the fbi and you may say a lot of things about the fbi, but corrupt, no. i'm sorry. they do their job and they do their job very well. if the head of the fbi you appointed is telling you not to do it you don't do. he doesn't care. this is a mafia boss gone mad. >> amanda, what are you

thinking? >> it seems to me that the republicans getting behind releasing the memo are putting a lot of faith that is not deserved into devin nunes and carter page. everyone pretty much suspects that this whole fisa debate has to do with whether fisa was appropriately obtained to keep tabs on carter page. this is the same carter page that was under fbi watch since 2013 when he was hanging out with russian agents attempting to recruit americans. this is the same carter page that lied and misled about his meetings with russians and let's keep in mind this wiretap was not obtained until carter page left the campaign. so i think speaker ryan is possibly trying to thread the needle here in saying this doesn't have to do with the campaign or the investigation into trump's campaign because carter page wasn't a member of a campaign at the time, but throw out carter page from the whole debate. carter page has nothing to do with paul manafort. he has nothing to do with michael flynn lying about his

contacts with russians. carter page has nothing to do with george papadopoulos and carter page has nothing to do with the trump tower meeting that really should be more concerning to everyone. i would almost quit asking questions about the memo until we see the stupid thing and pay more attention until, you know, the trump tower meeting is much more concerning. listen, i wrote a whole article about this. i think it's a huge gas light. a big decoy to get people not to pay attention to the appropriate things. >> hey, maybe you're right on the money. speaking of the stupid thing to quote you, we're now hearing the administration official saying the white house will tell congress that the release of this memo is probably tomorrow and so there you have, probably tomorrow. the president is okay with the memo. doubts there will be redactions. garrett, that flies in the face obviously of what we heard from the public statement from the fbi, the semi-private meeting monday night at the white house. flies in the face of it.

>> one of the things that's important to remember in this is that the fbi's objection isn't so much the sources and methods that the redactions, even if they exist, even if they happen, the fbi's objection, christopher wray's objection is that its fundamentally misleading. >> explain that. >> that the memo leaves out key evidence that it has omissions of fact and that he has grave concern. now that grave concern in government is a pretty specific phrase. grave is often a term that deals with top secret information. top secret information by definition being something that its release could cause grave damage to national security. >> can you give me an example? when you say misleading information, like what? >> i think one of the things that it seems like, again we haven't seen this memo.

>> right. >> but from sort of what we have ascertained so far that this is a memo dealing with so-called abuses of the fisa process dealing with carter page as amanda was just saying. this memo, though, what we believe it contains is sort of the idea that republicans on the house intel committee are alleging that basically the fbi took the steele dossier and signed me want warrant across the top of the document and handed it in to a federal judge who rubber stamped it and sent it off to be implemented as a fisa warrant and that's just fundamentally not how these systems work. as amanda said, i'm old enough to remember two years ago when carter page was unidentified male number one on the audio

tapes that the fbi made of russian svr agents speaking in the new york resident torah about trying to recruit carter page as a asset to russian intelligence. this is someone who this is not something that just popped up last summer and was rubber stamped by the fisa court. >> one thing i would say, republicans, if you're going on the steele dossier, any way that could read the reports from the carter page can read. let maybe they should do a lexus nexus search before they lease this stupid memo. >> if you're going to release it, release all of it. the more important thing is again, don't listen what amanda was talking about earlier. this is all obfuscation to keep the real issue at hand away. this is an administration that does not enjoy or respect the rule of law. this is an administration that wants to run as a des pit and

this is an administration that doesn't care about the department of justice. you're either on the president's team or you're off the team. how many people involved in the mueller investigation has this president already gone after and how many more will he go after until he puts it to an ends? he thinks it's a witch hunt? let it go through till the end and let's find out. >> let's talk about the house intelligence committee, amanda. it's like a straight-up mess. we're getting word that the democrats are now claiming that chairman nunes made five material changes to this memo. republicans say that they're minor, insignificant and there will be no revote. >> i would say for the democrats they better be subba tif changes. they made this a big counterargument. it better be a lot more than the changing of a comma.

again, like we're all just speculating and everybody's playing politics with it based on a memo written by devin nunes's staff who's already been caught misleading the public about intelligence matters because of tampering from the white house. >> exactly. >> wasn't he tiptoeing around the white house -- >> he was jumping out of his car. the staff didn't even know where he went. >> that's right. >> why is everybody trusting devin nunes? >> exactly. >> there are many other republicans who are credible who have experience on these issues. he isn't one of them. until i see their faces pop up and doing interviews rather than matt gerts, i just don't believe it. show me the credible republicans willing to go out and do an interview and talk about this. i'm not ready to read it until then. >> amanda carper came to play today. >> i'm ready to read it. i want to see the whole thing. if you're going to talk about it let's see the whole thing. in regard to brooke about the

intelligence committee, the only thing i found worse than republicans in this matter are democrats. it's like watching two houses on fire and they're throwing gasoline on each other. it's amazing. and at the end of the day if you're going to be transparent, show us everything. if you're not going to be transparent you're not going to show us anything. if you're going to show us and cherry pick information then you're only -- you're only going to fan the flames. at the end of the day people are going to be screaming on either sides of the aisle and at the same time as at the beginning as i said, we keep saying it but this is a tipping point for our democracy. rule of law or rule by mob? and i prefer the rule of law. >> brian, i think we all do. brian, amanda, garrett, thank you all so very much. we're going to stay on this breaking news here. sources say top white house aides are worried that christopher wray could quit if this highly controversial memo is released. stay with us. we're rolling on next.

announcer: this is cnn breaking news. hi, there. i'm brooke baldwin. you're watching cnn. more breaking news. major development in this russia investigation. sources tell us the top white house aids are worried that the fbi director christopher wray could quit if the highly controversial republican memo is, in fact, released. this memo alleges that the fbi abused its surveillance warrant powers to monitor a trump campaign member and it's possible the president could release this memo as early as tomorrow. let's go to our cnn chief political correspondent dana bash, caitlin collins and cnn manu raju with breaking news on the content of this memo but first dana, beginning with you, what have you been learning about chris wray and a possible resignation. >> this is a story that i did with jeff zeleny and evan perez and what