sometimes the hugs are lingering. all right -- >> you have to hug it out. >> made it so much worse. thank you, appreciate that buddy. >> thanks, stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage on time, right now. >> thanks, joe. thank you, mika. good morning, i'm stephanie ruhle. breaking news overnight. demanding answers. listen to this. republicans officially calling for an investigation into the leaks that took down general mike flynn. >> it's criminal action, criminal act. >> amid bipartisan calls to investigate the russia connection itself. an intel overhaul. president trump reportedly set to put this guy, a billionaire businessman in charge of revamping the spy agencies. as brand-new secretary of state goes face-to-face moments ago with russia's foreign minister. he is out. trump's labor secretary calls it quick. the white house searching for a

replacement as democrats celebrate a victory. >> there is some good news today for workers, women and families in america. good morning. we are coming to you live from washington, d.c., where the white house and congress are targeting u.s. intelligence agencies as they try to figure out who leaked the information that brought down national security adviser, michael flynn. your luck, i have the best team with me this morning. i want to take you to nbc's kristen welker at the white house. kristen, i want to start slow. it appears congress wants to go after is not the russia itself, not was it mike flynn or who else, but who from the intelligence agencies may have leaked it. >> reporter: well, that's certainly some of the investigations that are being requested, steph. there's a lot going on on capitol hill. let's look at all the members of congress who are requesting investigations. jason chaffetz, the chairman of the oversight committee, as well

as bob goodlattie. they are requesting information into the leaks, as you point out, not necessarily who was doing, why flynn was talking to russia and what he was talking about. other investigations have been requested, including by nancy pelosi, as well as richard burr. they are actually asking for a broader look into what, specifically, went down with flynn, what consisted of his conversations with russia. but, this is striking, steph, because this comes as you have the president really ramping up his fight with the intelligence community. yesterday, during that press conference with the israeli prime minister, benjamin netanyahu saying it was the media's fault and those leak that is were to blame for the oust of michael flynn, not michael flynn himself. he was the one who asked for

michael flynn's resignation. a lot of moving parts here. the president, himself, moving forward with his own probe into those leaks, steph. >> when he went to see the cia after his inauguration, he said i'm going to love you guys, i'm going to have your back so much, you are going to say, enough, enough, i don't need it. now, there's reports he's bringing in someone to do an overhaul of the whole joint? >> that's right. there's a lot of skepticism. this is a wall street guy. he's someone who is the co-founder of capital management. skepticism about whether or not he is the right person to head up this probe. again, this is something the president has been talking about a lot, that he wants to investigate these leaks of intelligence communities now. we are seeing him move forward. look at the tweet from earlier where he doubled down on the accusations of the intelligence community to blame, he tweeted leaking an illegal classified

leaking has been a big problem in washington for years, failing new york times and others must apologize. so, the president not backing down from those accusations as he prepares to move forward with stephen fineburg, the question is is that the right person for the job and how will he be received as he digs into what the president says are leaks. >> i want to dig into what it means. i have a great panel. "washington post" political reporter, chris liza and secretary defense for russia. we are going to our correspondent in europe in a moment. steve, co-founder, what he does is distressed assets. he looks for broken companies, cuts them up and puts them together somewhat. he's not a builder.

it's not like president trump is saying let's bring a jack welsh type of warren buffett who can sit down with the agency and the generals and ask common sense questions. rex tillerson is speaking now. i want to take you there. >> the interest and values of america and her allies. as we search for new common ground, we expect russia to honor the commitment and work to de-escalate the violence in ukraine. thank you very much. >> that, of course, was secretary of state, rex tillerson. i want to talk about another corporate guy, steve fienburg. president trump is saying i want to clean house, i want to clean this up. steve fienburg is a big republican donor. he gave over $1 million to the campaign. he served quail and john snow

and knows steven bannon. this is a true outsider. help me understand, when he sits down with the intelligence agencies, this is a different language. he doesn't have government. he doesn't have military. he doesn't have intelligence experience. >> i consult for dine corp. when i'm not here. i know steve fienburg. it sets up a relationship and the intelligence community is feeling under assault and under siege. again, what i think donald trump is doing, what the president is doing is deflecting. the problem is not leaking. it's the relationship they have with russia. let's talk about the real issue. what is this administration's policy going to be and why are they motivated to fall all over themselves to cooperate? >> i mean, look, i get it in that it's someone he trusts, right? that's the key. he's big on loyalty. someone he trusts, you put them

in there. the problem is, even if you put someone who knew the intelligence world better in there, donald trump spent lots of the campaign, the transition and being in the white house running down our intelligence agency. they are doing a bad job. they are not organized well. so, it's always going to be that type of relationship. look, at the end of the day, yes, investigating the leaks and how the intelligence community works is a worthy endeavor. but, it's not the most important thing here. the foreign government hacking into our election with the expressed purpose of electing one person and not the other and oh, yeah, the person they were working to elect, the guy who is a national security adviser was having conversations that he deceived the vice president about. >> should we not look at these leaks as more like whistle blowing? >> yeah. >> i mean, these leaks led to mike flynn having to resign. if this was a fake news media

drummed up issue, couldn't president trump say i'm sticking with this guy. 4:00 p.m., kellyanne conway, we are with him, then sean spicer, reviewing, then he's out. why? >> the reason sean spicer says we let go of mike flynn, we asked him to resign. there was question, did he resign. we asked him to resign because he lost the trust of the president. donald trump comes out on wednesday and says the fake news railroaded a good man. you are the one that said you fired him because you don't trust him. both of those things can't be true. it can't be the media's fault for railroading a good man and he was fired because you lost trust in him. those things do not add up. >> on the whistle blowing thing, they are cries of concern. they worked with me in there as a political person. they have seen the intelligence.

they know what the administration is not addressing. they know that the hill, because of the security clearances they have up there, has access to information. but, they are afraid the american public is somehow not going to know the full extent of what this administrations entanglement with russia is. srk it's not like president trump doesn't have his own guys there. he has cotes and copompeo. is that not a little like instituted the travel ban the night before rex tillerson gets sworn in? >> here is what we know -- yes is the short answer. here is what we know about him. he acts, then sees what reaction is. he does that. he has done that throughout the campaign and did it in the transition and in the white house. >> you mean trump? >> trump. he does stuff, then sees how it shakes out. that's how he works. it does seem like you are

putting the cart before the horse. i remind people, they are like, why not have a staff shake up. he's been president 26 days. normally, we are talking this person figured out where the bathroom is, not this person is out of the white house. already, we have a list of people to replace reince priebus. one claimed he was hired as the white house press secretary. you are seeing unprecedented levels of cart before horsing. this strikes me as sort of a mediocre level of that. you know? it's not like "the washington post" says we are looking to replace chris lizza. i still work here. don't rule that out as a motivational factor. >> can i say about the swamp? trump said drain the swamp. if you do, you are putting in professionals. it consists of intelligence professionals, serious people

you need to run the government properly. >> maybe that's why "time" magazine is talking about anxiety levels going up. secretary of state rex tillerson, we saw him a few moments ago at the g-20 in germany and james mattis is meeting with nato counter parts in brussels. lucy is in germany. we got the tail end of the statement from secretary tillerson. what else did he say? >> reporter: hey, stephanie, if only one could have been a fly on the wall, this is the meeting you want to sit in on. that just wrapped up. tillerson talked about,vaguely, what they focused on. this was the first face-to-face meeting with sergey lavrov. they discussed the situation in ukraine. no talk of lifting sanctions. they focused on issues of cooperation the two companies could work together on for

example, fighting isis. more than that, we don't know. there was a brief press availability before this meeting where one reporter managed to squeeze in a question whether lavrov was concerned about the turmoil in washington and the controversies. he said we do not interfere with the domestic affairs of other countries. they are tight lipped about the details. rex tillerson has strong ties with russia. this is the first meeting. he's no stranger to the country. the chief of exxon mobile, gave no leverage. we don't know. there are a lot of questions about what trump's america first policy means for allies here, what it means for the relationship with russia going forward and what it looks like on the ground. we have to give it a few days to play out because they did not reveal any new details about what they might have agreed on. stephenie? >> rex tillerson has a close

relationship to vladimir putin as henry kissinger did. i want to return to nbc news pentagon correspondent. >> reporter: james mattis ruling out military cooperation with russia. he did that here at the nato summit. it was the final press conference, making this point the military conditions simply are not there for mill-to-mill cooperation with russia and asked about russia's interference in the presidential election. he thought that to be true. he would expect it in the other democracies of nato. it's a clear warning to france and germany, who are both going to host presidential elections this year. on the issue of isis and what to expect in terms of additional ground troops. remember, special forlss are in syria. he said he's not the right person to ask. it was a strong indication,

almost to a, the decision has been made, b, he doesn't want to tell us or c, he wants to talk to allies in the region before a public announcement. a final note on the issue of more defense spending by other nato countries, he says the message, the ultimatum was well received. steph, back to you. >> thanks, hans. you know russia well. he's been quiet up to now. how difficult is it for rex tillerson to come out, given all the noise, donald trump, never denouncing russia or vladimir putin. things are hairy. >> i have a piece on the foreign policy, the shadow government for people who used to be in government. in the piece, i say we don't have a policy on russia. we had the president say certain things and the u.n. ambassador said things about ukraine and crimea. we don't know what the policy is.

tillerson, what i read this morning in the papers was, basically, he's on a listening tour. i guess he has to be. i don't know that he has clear instructions from the white house about what our policy is toward russia. i hope he said something to the russians about ukraine. there's an up tick in fighting. that's been fueled by the russian accept separatists. then there's syria. i don't know what he's saying to them, but i hope he's at least putting them on notice that we are going toecome more active in syria and hopefully telling them to cut it out in ukraine. >> rex tillerson worked as one company his whole life, truly a boy scout, now he's in the wild, wild west. >> you are looking at elizabeth warren and bernie sanders. they are holding a rally defending workers rights. one day after the labor

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this is washington and the crowds are out in force this morning here. this is a live look at the worker's rally going on now by senators bernie sanders and

elizabeth warren. the goal, holds president trump accountable to the working class, this as president trump is looking for a new labor pick. his previous choice abruptly withdrew his nomination. who is next for labor, that's the question. i want to bridge in the president of voter latino. back with us still, chris lizza. andy puzder, the news has been out there around him for weeks, who he is, he's not the man who works for the common working person. there's issues with the housekeeper. he had a domestic violence, then it went away. then he withdraws yesterday. what do you make of it? >> don't you think the cross in congress of crossing a nominee dropped the last three days? all this has been out there.

we know the kind of executive he was. if that's not the kind of executive you want in that position, that position was available to you a long time ago. also, we have known, as you point out, about the nanny for a while. i think that there might have been senators on the fence, people like tim scott who might have wanted to hold up the party line, but had personal objections the way puzder treated minorities at restaurants and found maybe there's not that high of a price to pay right now. >> what is your take? >> i think it's right. we are starting to see that the administration had has so many cracks from within, the republicans are feeling they have the ability to put a line in the sand and say that is not what we are going to do. in all fairness, the secretary of labor, it's an easy one to knock down. it says look american people, i'm on your side. they don't have to pursue bigger item issues like investigating the russian leaks. >> look, the goal was to take

one of these down because the truth of the matter is, this is going to be the most conservative cabinet you have seen because of harry reid and making it 50 votes. a lot of them would not have gotten through with 50 votes. tillerson, i think was a long shot. devos, i think thought thought mnuchin, price at hhs. so, labor is important. it's an easy one. we are standsing up for the little guy. it's right in the wheelhouse. if you ask donald trump who would you rather have, mnuchin or puzder? the answer is mnuchin. >> looking at the people floated to replace puzder, personally less objection able but they want the exact same thing for the labor market. >> that's not wrong, but again, it's representation saying we have backbone against this

administration. it's a low hit for them. >> we are going to have this conversation. the senate is going to sit down and we'll have an interesting conversation about creating growth in america. the steve puzder motto is if you drive down cost, you get economic growth. we have been trying it. >> regulation stood in the way from industry expandsing without a doubt, you can talk to ceos in that industry and say guess what? given the regulation i face, i'm not expanding in certain states. >> this is where we have to have a broader conversation with american people. you are saying the economic growth, we are talking hand linked to automation. it's not jobs for the american people, it's automating the jobs. is that an appetite we are ready to have when they say i'm struggling to make ends meet? the other thing i say is, i think that you are looking at a white house that is, and a chief executive that is consolidating power. you are not going to -- the labor secretary is not going to

largely be like, now i will decide what labor policy. this is true with obama, too. the chief executive is consolidating power, power, power. this is what donald trump thinks on that question. >> this is more about power to the employer. >> right. >> casey is live on capitol hill. help us understand who is on the short list to replace andy puzder. those replacements are still going to represent the same sort of policies. >> reporter: steph, i think that's right. the issue here was more what came to light in the course of mr. puzder's confirmation hearing that started to give republicans pause z. i think it's entirely possible, plausible, really, that donald trump will be able to nominate somebody in the same policy mold, but maybe brings a different personal background to the table. a couple names, peter kirsanow. my apologies if i pronounce his

last name collectly. he's a cleveland attorney. a leading candidate right now, somebody who had been looked at. a couple other names, though, when we asked the administration we were told were close catherine templeton and joseph guzman of michigan state university at their school for human resources and labor administration. he was at trump tower in january. waiting to see. i think it's likely they want to avoid the challenges they faced with republicans. look for that to be a calculation in this pick. steph? >> you may apologize to peter about a mispronunciation. i'm going to compliment him. that's an outstanding moustache. people in the world of politics say chaos in the white house. the markets are in the green,

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welcome back. i'm stephanie ruhle. it is time for everything you need to know to get your day started. we begin with house and senate leaders calling into investigations of the intelligence leaks to the made ya about the phone conversation with the russian ambassador. >> the spotlight has been put on the low-life leakers. they will be caught. what the attorney general told the white house council. in an hour, the senate will vote on the nomination of mike

mulvaney. he's expected to be confirmed easily and president trump will be traveling to orlando for a campaign-style rally at the airport. the president makes his way to his florida home. across the country, immigrants are expected to stay away from work and school and spending money touted as a day without immigrants. the goal is to show how important they are to the economy and the american way of life. authorities in malaysia, this story is extraordinary. they arrested a third person in connection to the killing of the north korean leader kim jong-un's brother. the 26-year-old is the boyfriend of one of the two fe maul suspects. happening now, we take you to the streets. the opening bell, i hear it at this moment t. dow, s&p 500 and nasdaq are posting record highs for the past five days. that kind of record-setting

streak hasn't happened since 1992 and more good news for president trump. this has been the best first month stock performance of any incoming president since lyndon johnson in 1963. trump is taking notice tweeting, stock market hit asz new high with the longest winning streak in decades. optimism before the tax plan rollout. joining me now, my friend cnbcs dominic chu. dom, let's start with you. listen, the markets are doing so well. the s&p is heavily waited to financials. dodd-frank helped them. >> they have been among the best performing stocks in america you and i both know it. regulations like this really weighing them down.

when the prospects of a trump administration became more clear, the banks took off and the stocks going higher. we saw record highs with jpmorgan and goldman sachs. the bank stocks have been the biggest underpinning. it's all whether or not the trump administration can start to detail out the plans for how they are going to either de-regulation or reregulate these type of banks. that's the key. >> they hit the ball out of the park. the fact we are facing a board tax, that is going to kill companies here. >> if we stay with financials so much is about regulation and making decisions at the regulatory level and decisions

of whether to enforce them there.'s a lot of discretion there. i was at the fed five years ago and i asked them, how do you make sure there are memories of this crisis that go on. we are tempted to back off on regulation. we don't know how long that cycle of memory is. with daniel out of the governor's board, we are going to see a change in the way the fed and the fed ra regulatory agencies think about finance. >> dom, is this about liquidity? the fact in terms of the markets, you could sell tomorrow. if the wheels come off the white house, the markets could say forget it, i'm out. the financial crisis happened eight years ago, about recklessness. dodd-frank was put in for protection. >> when we refer to liquidity, we mean whether or not the markets or banks, the overall

economy can absorb a shock like the financial crisis. there is no doubt, today, the environment for being able to sustain those types of shocks is better than before the financial crisis. that's because america's central bank, the fed, also other big banks around the world have been putting cash into the system. so, those kinds of shocks don't happen very often anymore. the optimism with regard to the markets is based in part on that. also, in part, the promises of more policies down the line. we talk about financials quite a bit. remember material stocks, the guys who make concrete, asphalt, they are doing better as well because there's perhaps a hope of optimism about infrastructure spending. when we talk about the overall portfolio, the american economy is running on the idea things could be getting better and more money spent going forward, not because of the central banks, but tax policies and spending policy is going to be different

as well. >> you have ceos showing up and smiling at the white house. they are afraid of the trump tweets. they don't want to get on the wrong side of the president. how much fact is based into the market or is some of this hot air? >> i think one of the things we are waiting to see is how much of the lack of growth in the u.s. is due to the inability to get credit. one theory, if you loosen credit conditions, people get the loans they need and start small businesses. there isn't evidence they are desperate to get loans and they can't. there's a theory, if we take this boom in financials, it may find its way into the broader economy. the other way of looking at this goes back to the possibility of andy puzder or a puzder-type person. it's a way to pay people more who work in the service industry. more money into the economy spurs growth. we are about to run this experiment realtime. >> indeed we are.

friends and former colleagues of mine, thank you both. we are going to take a breek here. next, more pause for investigation into russian influence on american politics. those calls coming from democratic senators. chris murphy is going to join me next from the state of connecticut. liberty mutual stood with me

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influence here in the united states and potentially moscow's ties to president trump. well, the gop is promising that current investigations will be wide ranging. democrats aren't so sure. some are calling for an independent commission. i want to bring in democratic senator chris murphy. senator, when you look at what congress is calling for, it's investigations into the leaks, not into general flynn or wider ties to russia. what do you make of this? >> well, this is an attempt fwi trump administration to distract the public from the most important underlying issue. we have no idea what relationship existed between donald trump, his campaign and the russian intelligence services who were actively manipulating the american election in favor of donald trump. we have had good news in the last 24 hours. i seems republicans, at least in the senate, are taking more seriously the idea they have to let the facts lead wherever they

lead. yesterday, the chairman of intelligen intelligence committee said he is not going to putry strixs and boundaries on the intelligence. no one that has ability to see what they are doing. many think we have to have an independent bipartisan commission that is going to look into the entirety of what connection trump had and his campaign had to the russians and whether this bizarre positioning on russia we have seen from the trump administration is being silenced as they advance their interest around the world has a connection to that activity. >> i want to share a tweet president trump just put out. fake news media, which makes up stories and sources is far more effective than the discredited democrats, but they are fading fast. what do you make of this? i want to, you know, just remind the audience, it was acting attorney general sally yates that weeks ago alerted white

house council of mike flynn's conversation and we heard nothing about that. >> remember, this is republicans and democrats raising concerns here. it's lindsay gram, chuck grassley, john mccain. it's not right to suggest it is partisan. both parties have a big problem with the idea michael flynn was communicating with the russians, trying to undermine obama administration policy and they were talking to the russians during the election. i think both parties want to get to the bottom of this. listen, i understand the question of leaks is a je jit mat issue. i don't like the fact u.s. intelligence services are at war with the president of the united states. it's not good for u.s. security. the fact of the matter is, they watched as the administration was not telling the truth. for two weeks wasn't revealing the fact they knew flynn had been talking to the russians after the election. they saw it as their recourse to

get that information out so the public could understand what the real story was. listen, i hope this gets cleared up. one of the reasons i want an independent commission is so they can send it there rather than just to the newspapers. >> auz you said, you don't like leaks. do you think the intelligence agencies need a real overhaul if president trump brings in steve fineburg, you may know him, he's a greenwich guy. do you think that's a good idea? he doesn't have intelligence experience. >> i don't think this is anything that can be solved by people that come in underneath the president of the united states if the president of the united states is going to continue to politicize the u.s. intelligence services. remember, a lot of this started back during the period between the election and his swearing in, when he was attacking the u.s. intelligence community, saying that they were out to get him and that the report they issued about the russian interference and the election

was not true. president trump, himself, has to get his relationship with the intelligence community straight. i don't know if there's anybody underneath him that can do that for him. >> in terms of being politicized, cabinet nominations are. talk about your take on andy puzder withdrawaling yesterday and what it meant to you. >> if you could invent the perfect secretary of labor, it would be the exact opposite of andy puzder. he is someone who made his name attacking workers and he had to hire the worst of the worst to staff his restaurants, he would be better off if they were replaced with robots. 50% of his restaurants were in violation of labor laws. you couldn't invent a worse candidate. eventually republicans recognized that as well. yesterday, republicans went to the white house, told the white house that puzder was going to fail if he came up for a vote and they withdrew his candidacy. even republican administrations

generally put somebody in that position who respreects, at the very least, people who do these jobs. frankly, he's representative of a cabinet that is stocked with millionaires and billionaires. >> help me understand, how does that argument work if betsy devos was confirmed? there was so much pushback against betsy devos, but you couldn't get the votes in terms of her confirmation, but you could block andy puzder. how did that work? >> good question. i don't know why puzder went down and betsy devos was confirmed. i do think the flynn story has snog do with it. trump is getting weaker and less popular. a lot of republicans are not terribly interested in having confirmed every single one of his choices. it may be the political circumstances are changing. their interest in voting 100% in

lock step with the president on his nomination is changing as well. >> before we go, yesterday we saw this law get pulled back and it's made its way through both houses, just has to get signed by the president. people who suffered from mental issues will be able to purchase guns. it wasn't just the nra or gun supporters who wanted this to happen. it was the aclu, they were on board for this. what is your take? >> well, it isn't just people with mental illness here. we are talking people with serious mental illness who have been judged by the social security administration to not be able to handle their own financial affairs. they are so mentally ill they have a conservator who accepts their social security check because they can't handle their own financial affairs. we pass zed a law years ago saying those individuals shouldn't be able to buy a gun. if you can't handle your financial affairs, you probably

can't handle an assault web. democrats and republicans agreed on that. the nra feels they have chips to cash in after this election and this week, they got that law rolled back. now, here is the law. people with serious mental illness are going to be able to walk into gun stores and buy expensive, dangerous weapons. that's not where 90% of the public is, it's where the republican congress is. >> serious issues and serious business. thanks for joining me. >> thanks a lot. >> after several delays and controversy, i want to go back to the andy puzder situation with him dropping out. i'm going to talk to a billionaire and what he thinks the real reason mr. puzder withdrew was. american express open cards can help you take on a new job, or fill a big order

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what powers the digital world? communication. like centurylink's broadband network that gives 35,000 fans a cutting edge game experience. or the network that keeps a leading hotel chain's guests connected at work, and at play.

or the it platform that powers millions of ecards every day for one of the largest greeting card companies. businesses count on communication, and communication counts on centurylink. andy puzder began losing republican support around those growing questions you've been hearing about for weeks, about his business record and personal issues. joining me now on the phone is host of "billion dollar buyer" tillman fertita. i know you don't know andy

puzder but you know the restaurant business. it would be about the policies put in place. >> after eight years of the obama administration and you went so far to the left and you tried to dry a wedge between the employer and employee and as typical, you need somebody very strong to bring things back to the middle. you never want to put a situation where it makes it so easy for the plaintiffs lawyers to get in between. that's one of the reasons i liked andy coming in, he's a true operator, he understood the problems, he's an attorney but not an academia who had never run a big, huge -- >> because he had been the decision-maker, why would he be the middle -- one of the issues people had was he posed things

to take a mandatory break. if you can't pay your employee enough money that they can get off welfare and public assistance, couldn't one argue you that just isn't enough money? >> i don't think he had a problem with people taking breaks. if a waiter is in the middle of the shift and has five tables and i don't want to take a break -- you can't pay a waiter without tip credit the same amount you pay a boiler man in the kitchen. he operated a huge company. y -- he understood where the issues are. right now you can have an arbitration policy with your employees. the department of labor issued, no, you can't do that anymore. the department of labor said if a tipped employees does 20% of their work look filling salt

shakers or wiping the tables, you no longer can pay them. when it goes in front of the judges, they look at it as law. it is not. all andy was going to do, i think, is bring things back to the middle a little bit and straighten things out. the department of labor has as much input of what goes on in this country more so than any other cabinet member. >> the regulations that have been put in place in the last eight years, have they been so overwhelming that they have forced guys like you or andy puzder to cut jobs? >> 100%. every single one of us has cut thousands of jobs. all andy would have done is looked at it with experience. i hope the president does to the

put someone in there who teaches this at a college but someone who has run a company and understands the issues. >> all right, tilman, we got your point of view. thank you. >> and a day after meeting with president trump, benjamin netanyahu meets with our own greta van susteren. but we've never been the type to just sit back... not when we've got so much more to give when you have the right financial advisor, life can be brilliant. ameriprise

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that wraps us up for the hour. i'm stephanie ruhle here in dc. you can find me all day long on twitter. more news with my friend hallie jackson. we're balancing the universe. i'm in d.c., she's in new york. >> it's a flip flop. coming up, the director the national intelligence, coming out overnight and denying that they are keeping spies secret. and the republican lawmakers are at the white house. we'll bring you the news from that meeting. we have all angles covered with our powerhouse team, including developing news. i want to start with that. just confirmed now at nbc news, a senior administration official telling us stephen feinberg, a billionaire executive will lead

the broad review of u.s. spy agencies. feinberg has to be cleared by the office of government ethics first. you saw our team a moment ago. i want to go to kasie hunt on capitol hill. we expect perhaps reaction from these republican lawmakers headed to the white house in just a few minutes from now. >> reporter: that's right. there's a handful of republican house members, mostly early supporters of donald trump. everything that's happened over the course of the last 48 hours is going to be on the table. and i think the question here for capitol hill is going to be how does this evolve, what is the next turn here? we know congressman chaffetz has sent a letter wanting to know more about leaks. he want the