>> that does it for this edition of andrea mitchell reports. hallie jackson is up next right here on msnbc. >> hi, everybody, i'm hallie jackson. we are seeing lots of action in midtown manhattan this afternoon. senator tom cotton walking into trump tower. mike huckabee in trump tower as well. cabinet speculations swirling today after jeff sessions tapped to be the next u.s. attorney general to the delight of some on capitol hill. >> if those who serve in this administration have even a fraction of his integrity and his commitment to principle, we are going to see an administration that does remarkable things for the people of this country. >> that's ted cruz loving it. but democrats, some of them, now previewing their attack lines

against sessions and against donald trump's two other appointments today. we've got it all covers. katy tur here with me at 30 rock. kristen, you're kind of monitoring the ins and outs. who have you seen? >> reporter: just a flurry of activity in the last few minutes here. we saw senator tom cotton and mike huckabee going in here to trump tower. we're told that the president-elect will be having those meetings and then he will be heading to new jersey for the weekend where we expect another flurry of meetings. take a look at this list of people that he'll be meeting with on saturday. we've got mitt romney, of course who has been an outspoken critic of the president-elect. this at least an olive branch. also michelle rhee, betsy devos, general james mattiss.

so what the trump team is telling us, that should show that they're really meeting with a diverse group of people, not based on affiliation or support of donald trump while he was candidate trump. they say they're really going to be meeting with a lot of people. not all, of course, are going to be appointed cabinet members, but could be potentially advisors. so he's got a very busy weekend ahead in new jersey, hallie. >> mike huckabee apparently walking in, when asked about his meetings with the president-elect, told the pool of reporters there he's just there for the starbucks. katy -- >> he's always a joker. >> i'm looking at my e-mail here. a statement from the congressional black caucus, standing ready, they say, to oppose senator sessions' confirmation. the congressional black caucus chairman saying we adamantly believe his appointment will set

us back in civil rights and race relations across the country. this is exactly the opposition we had been talking about when it came to the possibility of senator jeff sessions being nominated as attorney general. what's the campaign doing? >> this should not come as a surprise given jeff sessions' history. it probably will happen given how long he has been in the senate, since 1997. and also because this is a republican-controlled senate. that being said, he had a problem with confirmation back in the '80s over some comments he made that were considered to beinsensitive. calling the naacp communist inspired, un-american, also saying he was fine with the ku klux klan until he found out that they spoked pot. he dismissed that as a joke, but it does indicate the complicated history sessions has in terms of race. but he has been a very loyal

supporter of donald trump. >> first -- >> maybe the first high profile elected official to come out and support him. that giant rally in mobile, alabama, that donald trump had in the summer of 2015, that first huge rally where they were expecting 40,000 people, got 20,000 people. still quite a lot of people. senator sessions was a surprise guest. he came out onto that stage in that arena and he put on the make america great again hat. here's a little more about who he is. the chairman of the senate judiciary immigration subcommittee. the chairman of the arms service strategic forces subcommittee. i'm sorry. >> you can't see katy. she's trying to peek over to the laptop to read off the screen. >> he's going to have a lot of influence and control over immigration policy in this country. and that is where a lot of folks who are on the other side of that issue -- hard line issue

are going to have a big problem with senator sessions, dreamers, people who are here on executive orders from president obama, things that are very easy to overturn once donald trump gets into office. remember, he campaigned on this pledge of, you know, deporting undocumented immigrants. he softened that a little bit in that 60 minutes interview, but we still don't quite know what his immigration policy will look like in concrete terms. >> when we look at other appointments being made, cia, he is an ally of mike pence's. do you see this as the president-elect being able to flex some muscle here in this administration. is this a sign that the vice president might be kind of pulling some of the strings? >> we always knew mike pence was going to be somebody who has a real role in this mrpadministran and a serious leadership role within the white house. someone more along the lines of

dick cheney, al gore. so this should not be surprising in the sense that he has the ability to put these people in strong positions. remember, donald trump -- he's not a politician. even though he knows a lot of these figures, he doesn't have a deep history with them. mike pence does. this is somebody that mike pence knows quite well. in terms of pompeo's appointment to the cia, intelligence officials say this is the best possible option donald trump had in his arsenal. he's a three-term congressman from kansas, he graduated first in his class from westpoint. he's somebody who knows the world. he is trusted by intelligence officials. they believe that he has the right judgment to fill this role. they do not -- listen, there's a lot of broken hearts out there for mike rogers. mike rogers who had been a leading contender for cia until he was purged with this purge of

christie loyalists. so there are some broken hearts over that still. but given the options donald trump had in front of them, they are feeling pretty good about pompeo. >> with me now, bill crystal, editor of the weekly standard, and political reporter for the "new york times." gentlemen, a lot to discuss tod today. bill, i want to start with you. we talk about policy and what might actually happen in a trump administration, what kind of changes do you see coming under antho attorney general jeff sessions? >> i think he believes in the rule of law. and i think will probably get confirmed. someone always doesn't get confirmed. we forget this. 1989, tom -- >> do you think there's danger he won't get confirmed? >> you never know. i think sessions is in pretty good shape.

pompeo i think will be an easy confirmation. the cabinet officials have a lot of say. trump's election was so personal, but i think we may see a trend away from the last 30 years even where power gets centralized in the white house. bob gates in his memoir, talks about people in the white house telling him to do within his administration. you may see people like that who really are given quite a lot of leeway to run their departments. >> nick, another appointment, another nomination we're seeing is lieutenant general mike flynn. he was seated next to russian president vladimir putin at a dinner in moscow. critics say he's compromised. >> he's certainly close to putin, a russian government sponsored media outlet where he's a contributor. he has consulting ties, i should say, to the turkish government.

i do think that with his appointment, it kind of augers for a shift kind of away from the hot relationship with russia and more towards seeing them as an ally in the fight against islam or radical islam. >> stay on that subject, bill. here's what congressman adam shift told my colleague andrea mitchell within the last hour on this network. listen. >> this is someone who within the intelligence community, i think, was known as kind of a bull in a china shop. someone who didn't work well with others. he doesn't seem to be able to distinguish between the perversion of islam and the religion of islam altogether. >> you're looking at a tweet from february, tweeted about an anti-islamic video. he also tweeted out a fake news article claiming the nypd found

evidence in hillary clinton's e-mail that links her to money laundering and other things. should americans trust him? >> he was director of the defense intelligence agency under president obama. i don't think this is simply a guy who has no idea what's going on. it wouldn't have been my pick, but he will be an advisor to the president. to me, a lot depends on what actually has the authority. are they going to let the state department do its job under a good pick. i would, your honor -- you know be happy enough with it. or a trump, steve bannon directed administration that i would be uncomfortable with. i really hope trump thinks seriously about the fact that successful administrations do depend on having strong cabinet members who can run their agencies. you might have a white house that's a little chaotic and people in it who we can

criticize, but you could end up with an administration that's pretty sound. >> you don't sound convinced, bill. >> i'm open minded. distrust but verify. which of those two, i don't know. >> when we talk about foreign policy, ivanka trump sitting in on that meeting with the japanese prime minister. conflict of interest potentially, still holding these meetings and being involved in her father's transition? >> reporter: it's not a blind trust if she's running it. a blind trust is run by someone who's not connected to the person whose assets are in the trust. they've got to figure out this assets thing, has got to figure out the clean lines between the business and the family and the administration. if they don't, they run the same risk that the clinton family did with their fundraising and the clinton foundation and her work as secretary of state. there were always these blurred lines and yielded a lot of

reporting that her people thought were unfair. if they can't figure out the business goes over here and the presidency is over here. >> thank you very much for being with us. i think we could go another ten minutes or so, but i'm being told i have to wrap you. today, we're talking about the president-elect's personnel. do those picks make you feel confident about a trump administration? we want to hear from you. head over to pulse.msnbc.com. i'm curious to see what the percentage split is going to be later in the hour. also, a lot of eyebrows being raised over the nomination of senator jeff sessions to attorney general. we're going to take a deeper dive into some of the issues that may or may not impact his conversation. we have an interesting interview coming up later. donald trump's data guy, the person who essentially called it, he says, from the very start. we're going to chat with him coming up in just a bit.

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we've been talking a lot this hour on senator jeff sessions' confirmation hearing. is it going to be an easy confirmation? could it be explosive? back in 1986 he had a confirmation that ended his nomination for a federal judgeship. one african-american testified mr. sessions called him boy, something senator sessions denied saying. he said civil rights groups could rightfully be called un-american when they involve themselves in promoting un-american conditions. larry thompson said sessions was a good man and an honest man, untainted by prejudice. jeff sessions is in the

spotlight today. chip, big picture question. 30,000 feet. when you see these reports coming out, reading more and more about sessions, you know him personally. what's he like behind the scenes? >> i know more as his time as majority leader. he is a good man. he's a man that is very thoughtful. i think the hearings are going to be more about his four terms in the united states senate than something said in 1986 this was 30 years ago. >> at the top of the hour, we broke some news they are coming out with real concerns about what they describe as racism on the part of senator sessions. so it is still affecting him currently to this day. >> congressional black caucus said some things about donald trump as well. they're going to continue to say things about other members pointed to the cabinet. at the end of the day, the senate is the one that confirms this. the colleagues in the united

states senate both know jeff sessions for his four terms. he's a law and order guy. he's going to stick to those principles and he's always going to tell you exactly what he thinks. those are all the qualifications we need in an attorney general. >> what are his priorities going to be? >> i think it's going to be law and order. i think he's a rule of law kind of guy. one, i think they're going to make sure the doj picks really good, strong u.s. attorneys. i think he's going to make sure we enforce the laws we already have on the bookings right now. i think he's going no be a partner with donald trump and help fix this illegal immigration system throughout the country. again, what i've worked with him on a limited basis, jeff sessions will tell you exactly what he believes. he's going to tell you what he's going to do and then he's going to go do it. >> do you think the president-elect chose him more out of loyalty? senator sessions was one of the

earliest supporters back during the primaries. how did that play into this decision? >> jeff sessions endorsed donald trump early in the process. it was a big endorsement right before alabama voted in the primary. obviously a big boost to donald trump. what i've known and i'm not in the inner circle, what i've heard is they are very close and they really enjoy each other's company. a good qualification to have in your first cabinet choice. >> the hollywood reporter is out with an exclusive new interview apparently with steve bannon, named chief strategist. he's quoted as saying, i am not a white nationalist, i'm a nationalist. i'm an economic nationalist. i want to get your take on bannon's appointment as chief strategist. >> look, i think steve bannon did a masterful job getting donald trump elected, as did the whole thing. we had these conversations with

karl rove was appointed to the white house. this is the president's pick. when jared went into the white house, we had republicans going after him. the president and chief executive officer should have a lot of leeway to put the team he decides in place to run this country. that's what all our presidents, they are the chief executive and should make those choices because it's their team. >> thank you very much for being with us. senator sessions is not the only one under scrutiny today. donald trump's choice for national security advisor, lieutenant general mike flynn is getting criticism. up next, we're going to talk to a former ambassador to iraq about that nomination joining us here onset. stick around. ♪ ♪

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cancer. and it hazma tsa sized. -- metastasized. >> the self-described maverick. >> busy man, thank you for joining us here. >> my pleasure. >> overall take on flynn as national security advisor. do you have some concerns? >> i think first of all, the president needs someone he's going to be very comfortable with. flynn has been with him for some time. the key part of that job is to

coordinate with other national security agencies. he's got to have good relations with the state department, not only with the secretary of defense, but also the joint chiefs of staff. he's got some work cut out for him. >> does he have good relationships with members of those communities? he's been around a long time, right? >> yeah, but i wouldn't go that far. i'm not sure he's got the relationships he's going to need. so he's got a lot of work. there's a lot of skepticism of him, including among some of the generals who know him very well. i think the jury is going to be out for some time on this selection. >> can the jury be swayed or have people made up their minds about him? >> i think there's a desire in this country to make sure this president is successful, certainly president obama set that -- set that standard early on. so i think everyone wants to see these things work out. but this is kind of a controversial choice. the key thing is as dia, as the

head of the defense intelligence agency, he obviously has some experience briefings, absorbing, intel, he certainly worked in iraq doing that. that was kind of tough to absorb. so he's got some experience there, but he hasn't been on this kind of much broader platform which is going to involve a lot of relationships and ability to kind of square the circle between sometimes defense and state. it is not going to be an easy task. >> you talk about the state department and the department of defense. as we talk about the cabinet speculation, okay, if we know flynn is going to be the national security advisor, what does that mean for the picks for state and defense? how important do those becomes and those relationships? >> there are two models. the president can go with the white house model, strong national security council staff, or go with a cabinet type of government where you have a very strong secretary of state who has a very good relationship

with the president, very strong secretary of defense who's able to manage an enormous operation. we don't really know which way trump is going to go. we have a feeling he's going to try to go for stronger cabinet positions. i think we'll know in the next few days. >> who do you see, yeah, that person would be a great defense secretary or a secretary of state? >> well, i mean, whoever the president wants. but i would say, you know, there's a lot of talk of this team of rivals. let's get someone who has some stature, and there's certainly a point to be made there. the best secretaries of state in my opinion are people who have extremely good relations with the president. i'm thinking of jim baker who is very close to president bush. i'm thinking secretary george schultz, who is very close to ronald reagan. i think those are the best kinds of secretaries who can work closely with the president. because team of rivals, which is

kind of a nice idea, often ends up being no team at all. >> you talk about good relationships with the president-elect, but also maybe with the vice president-elect, from what we're seeing in mike pompeo being selected as cia chief. all signs point to smooth sailing for his confirmation. >> he's an impressive guy. i got a little worried about his role in benghazi. i think he tried to say there was a lot of -- again, these things come down to judgment. how are these people going to break on the fly balls. >> on jump, where are you personally? >> i'm a little concerned. i'll certainly give him his chance, but i'm a little concerned. judgment is something you have to have instantaneous judgment, you have to be able to think things through, absorb a lot of material. we'll have to see whether he's up to that. >> what does that relationship due to the u.s. relationship

with russia, what do you think? >> well, i'm not too worried about these issues with putin. five minutes in dealing with putin will convince them they've got a problem there. but the real question is, what are we going to do about it. there is our concern. we don't want to create situations where we look like we're moving to world war iii. we need to work through these things. i don't think there's enough of a sense in some of these incoming people of what they need to do in the coming weeks, months, and years. >> okay. former ambassador to iraq, chris hill. we want to check in right now on today's microsoft poll question. do they make you feel confident about donald trump's upcoming administration? 85% of you say no. only 15% of you say yes. only three so far. let's see what you say later on in this hour at pulse.msnbc.com.

coming up, new developments in the lawsuit over trump university. a hearing for the case scheduled in california in just a couple of hours from now. could donald trump be getting close to a multi-million-dollar settlement? and the president-elect says he'll boost manufacturing jobs in the u.s. can he? what will it take to get more cars made right here in the usa?

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this, despite his claims while campaigning that he would never settle. the news comes as a san diego federal judge is set to hold a hearing on whether to push off a trial for the lawsuits. sources say trump will not admit to any wrongdoing in the final agreement. let's break this down with ari. i think i can say friend. >> friend and colleague. sure. >> maybe more colleague than friend, fine. what can you tell us? break it down. >> what we're hearing here first reported by the daily news and confirmed by nbc, is that there are advanced settlement talks. that would mean that donald trump is doing the exact opposite of what he said he would do for many, many months throughout this litigation. there are two cases. one where people who were students suing him saying he defrauded them, his organization lied to them, basically said they were going to get things they did not get, and another

that relates to the new york attorney general's suit. what he would be doing is paying millions, maybe tens of millions of dollars back to these people who said that he defrauded them. >> okay. so as you pointed out, this is the opposite of what he said he would do. what changed? >> we don't know exactly what changed. on his side, the money matters. in the range of $25 million, that would be nearly a third of what he put into his presidential campaign itself. so this is not nothing. in these kind of settlements it's quite common to have a statement that says the person paying the money, the defendant, in this case donald trump, did no wrong and that the money itself is not an admission of wrongdoing. you have that legal jargon, okay, i'm not admitting to anything wrong. on the other hand, you have instead of going to trial to prove my innocence, which is what he claimed he was going to do, you have the prospect that he's paying out a lot of money. we have the response from some

of the students. they are demanding a speedy trial. they are saying nothing has changed yet. and until there is a settlement and real monly agreed upon. they say his life's going to get more complicated as time goes by. they say this trial is past due. >> trump has said he would reopen the university after all this. what are the chances? >> if this were a court transcript, we would say, show me laughing. that is a prediction he made that doesn't look very viable. trump university was a business that offered business advice that went out of business. that fact is not in dispute. i doubt they will reopen it. >> ari, thank you. appreciate it. president-elect donald trump taking credit for keeping afford plant in kentucky from moving to mexico. the president-elect tweeted last

night he just got a call from bill ford, chairman of ford, who advised him he will be keeping the lincoln plant in kentucky. no mexico. the company never really planned to move the entire plant, just the production of one car model. candidate trump at the time promised to keep auto manufacturing jobs here in the u.s. during his campaign. can a president trump actually follow through on that promise. >> i'm a friend. >> more friend this time. i pose that question to you. can president trump keep auto manufacturing jobs here in the united states? >> so the big problem talking about manufacturing jobs in general leaving the united states is the cost of labor. our labor costs more than labor in mexico or pretty much anywhere else in the world. there are really big companies that make cars in the united states. nissan is one of them. i spoke to the ceo of nissan who also happens to be the ceo of mitsubishi. so this is a big deal.

they got a big plant in tennessee. i asked him, why would you stay in america, why would you create factories in america where labor costs are so high. this is what he told me. >> every single company want to be localized. so if you want to bring more cars to be built in the united states, you have to look at how can i make it be more competitive to be in the united states versus other options. competitiveness is infrastructure. competitiveness is incentives to develop technologies. this is where competitiveness is. >> he was saying lot of the stuff germany does. their manufacturing workers are higher trained than ours are. as a point in america, you got infrastructure, you can get your cars in and out through ports ands. >> let's say it's not just cars. where else could we see job growth -- >> well, if everything goes well, there are a few things. donald trump talks a lot about

defense. you'll find towns with large defense installations are very happy he's there. so more building of airplanes, boats, things like that. he talks a lot about infrastructure. we saw those stocks go up. construction, brick laying, electricians, plumbers, things like that. whether it is defense or it is infrastructure, you need engineers. looks like there be -- those are places where you can see jobs. here's one that's interesting. that is that if he succeeds in lowering the tax rate to the corporate tax rate to 15%, it becomes very attractive for people to become independent contractors because they don't pay the high 30% tax rate. they can become contractors, write off their business expenses. if you make enough money that way, you could conceivably employ other people. you might see people becoming independent contractors as

opposed to staff workers. i've been getting a lot of people who say it is not good to go down this road. people who are staff have certain protections. if you earn a good amount of money, you might take the i don't have that many protections, i'll just take more money. so different strokes for different folks. >> and that sums it up. the last word. >> i think i'm going to say that at the end of every one of my reports. >> thank you for joining us. coming up, we're going to interview somebody who takes some credit for being one of the driving forces behind donald trump's victory. the man who analyzed data for the trump campaign here with me onset in a rare interview, i think we can say. that's coming up after the break. for over 100 years like kraft has, you learn a lot about what people want. honey, do we have like a super creamy cheese with taco spice already in it? oh, thanks. bon appe-cheese! okay...

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at clorox 2 we've turned removing stains into a science. now pre-treat with clorox 2! watch stains disappear right before your eyes. remove 4 times more stains than detergent alone. welcome back to msnbc. i want to pull up this tweet from senator jeff flake saying senator sessions, the person whom president-elect trump tapped to be attorney general,

is well liked and well regarded even by those who don't always agree with him, i look forward to supporting his nomination. why are we pulling this up for you? this is really interesting. senator flake was somebody who was a never trumper. he criticized trump and the president-elect throughout the campaign for things including his immigration policy. it's notable that he supports senator sessions here given that sessions' immigration policies are similar to trumps. this is a sign that perhaps the confirmation hearing is going to be somewhat smooth sailing for senator sessions. lots of action here this hour. and we have more from donald trump. he said during the campaign he did not believe in polls, depending on the day and depending on the polls. his firm was able to identify people in 16 battleground states they believed were persuadable. these were the very people that

helped donald trump win the white house. joining me now and nodding here onset with me, the man behind that marketing and website design firm, the donald trump campaign digital director brad parscale. >> thank you for having me on. >> the biggest story the day after the election one, pollsters got it all wrong. why did you get it right? >> that's how i met you, if you remember correctly. that day i walked in, i said the story after is going to be how pollsters got this wrong. they were assuming everything was going to look just like 2012. when you start looking at that data and you start analyzing it afterwards, you start to see they were incorrect. >> but do you fault the pollsters for that? because that is what political pollsters do. what made you say, no -- >> i think it's gotten more difficult. they -- to analyze the data and to get enough sample size and determine what's happening becomes more and more difficult over time.

what we had to do is get a considerable amount of data and model that in a way to see what the results would be. when ab/eb started coming, we could recognize pretty quickly, hey, we can analyze and change this and see how we're going to win. >> reality what that looked like was donald trump heading to michigan when people thought that was insane. >> to get michigan and pennsylvania and to win those states, we had to recognize quickly that they were in play. we had to take voter content, tv, and know, we need to be efficient in buying in those states to drive the correct numbers. we were doing this at the individual voter, kind of individual person. when you do that, you start to see, hey, we can move these people over to our column, get them out to vote and win this. and the models start to spit back this data. >> i talk to a lot of data folks, especially on the gop

side. you don't work in politics. you've not been on a political campaign before. what gave you the confidence to think you were making the right moves even when for weeks leading up to the election there was a lot of concern in fact it wasn't going to go your way? >> great leadership in jared kushner and donald trump. they helped me understand where our direction was. the second thing was the republican national convention. they came in and said, brad, you have a great strategy here, this is a great way to take a consumer world and mix it into politics, but let us be here to support you with what we need to win this election. all those things intermingled in and we had a political team and the consumer background to, as i've said to you, money ball it a little bit. >> we'll talk about that. because your team spent more money on facebook than any other candidate. why was that specific outlet so important? and was there voter suppression happening as well?

>> no. that -- there was no voter suppression ever coming out of our campaign. that was a comment i didn't make. >> was there voter depression? if you lower turnout in certain demographic communities it would help the numbers on your side? >> when you identify individual voters, these are the voters we need, you create content that focuses on what they want to see. you know, and in our case, we needed to show mr. trump was a change candidate. he was about urban renewal. he was about jobs and trade. when we do that, we could start to move those people over into our win column. >> your candidate -- your now president-elect, the united states' president-elect said also during the campaign that he didn't believe polls. yes at the same time, the campaign was spending more than $100,000 a week at some point. >> on polls. >> and on polling. >> it's a different -- different kind of data thing. our point and main design was to build models out of it. the polling that you see online

with 100 or 200-person sample sizes and saying, oh, you know, hillary's going to win by a landslide was just ridiculous. what trump was trying to say was, i'm not going to believe this stuff. i continued to show mr. trump there was multiple paths to victory. >> you are feeling very confident. how do you draw the lessons that you learned from the campaign into the next administration? do you have a role in the next administration? >> at this point, i'm still working on the campaign, spending my time in trump tower and doing things. if there's a role mr. trump wants me to help, i'd be there in a heartbeat. >> do you see a way to revolutionize? >> i haven't even gotten that far. it's only been ten days. >> it's already been ten days. >> they're busy up there trying to set up a government. my job right now is to see what we can do even better the next time, how we fund raise and

different things that need to go forward. there's still a lot of things that need to be done. that's where my focus is right now. >> data guy for donald trump's winning campaign. president obama wrapping up the european leg of his final over seas trip

president obama is on his way to peru on his final trip as president. he spent a couple of days at germany. remember, we brought you that press conference during part of

this hour yesterday. one of his biggest campaign fundraisers and the current embassador, john emerson, greeting the president. chris jansing, i hate that your over seas trip is wrapping up here, you have been bringing great exclusive interviews to us all week long. >> reporter: thank you very much, i have to tell you it is fascinating sitting with the ambassador. he's somebody working in finance and he knows a lot about the key issues here, he's been here for three and a half years. he affirmed at ease and not just the government here but citizens on the streets. one of the big issues as you all know is that will donald trump stop the u.s. stance to russia. i can report the big news out of this meeting today between the president that they decided to continue sanctions against russia for its intervention in

ukraine. obviously, a blunt statement to the president elect, even as president obama is sending a message to european leaders to give them a chance. when i sat down with john emerson, that's the same message he says he's been giving both to germans and americans who have called him very concerned about the results of the election. take a listen. >> what we have been saying and what the president has been saying is that the importance of the german american relationship will not change. th this is a fact that will not change of our relationship. now there maybe some things that we'll be working on together that we won't be working on together in the future because of differences and priorities of the administration but i think it is our job as ultimately out going ambassordorial couple that

it is incredibly important to the united states of america and do everything we can to ensure that solid relationship moves forward. >> reporter: i thought it was fascinating that emerson told me he had lunch with the president and the last people who saw him road back with the car with the president. i asked him how he is personally reacting to the election. privately, and the same thing, he's urging everyone the most important thing is that we do this peaceful transition and show the world what democracy is. >> yeah, chris echoing what we do here since after the election. chris jansing is joining us there live over seas. much more ahead coming up on msnbc, we are keeping an eye on all the spot where all the action is happening at the center of the global universe right now, donald trump is ready

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now's your chance at completely clear skin. just ask your doctor about taltz. all right gang, that does it for this hour of msnbc, i am on my way over -- for now, i am going to kick it over to my colleague, peter alexander. halie, thank you very much, on the move, the president elect trump set to leave trump tower pretty soon. we are live outside white house north as i like to say. donald trump will soon head out for what will be a working weekend. he heads to his exclusive golf course in new jersey a short time from now. donald trump sitting down with mike huckabee, that's capping off a busy day so far. three names for