to do something for gary. this explains why he is so thrilled and why he has that jersey. i want you to watch. when he found out he got tickets to the super bowl after the parents teamed together and bought them up. watch this. >> i don't believe -- what the families have done for me. go birds, baby! go birds. go birds! oh, my gosh. fly, eagles, fly! >> he was balling in front of the bus earlier. by the way, i love that old school throwback philadelphia eagles hat. fly, eagles, fly, come sunday. photo courtesy, david swanson for the philadelphia inkwiquire. love to hear your thoughts. we're starting sunday at noon, all eagles, all the time. right now, more news with ali velshi and stephanie ruhle. i took 30 seconds of your time. >> you can take 30 minutes of our time. i split my time. i'm in philly every weekend. >> i know. >> eagles fans are crazy. my wife tells me the other day, let's have a super bowl party.

i think my wife hasn't watched a game in her entire life. >> can i come? >> i don't know where it is or what we're serving. >> i have a barf bucket, basically, from the anxiety. >> time for us to move on with the news. >> hallie jackson bringing it low r ther than we can. >> is she going to a game? no. to a party? no. i told nbc, you don't have to pay me, i just want to go. >> good morning, everyone. i'm ali velshi. >> i'm stephanie ruhle. it is friday, february 2nd, which means it is groundhog day. let's get started. >> the drama is escalating here with the president set to defy the fbi and the justice department. >> what we're seeing is, obstruction of justice unfolding in real time, right before us. >> do you think that there has been some coordination between

the house intel chair, devin nun nunes, and the white house with this memo? >> i suspect it. i suspect it because of the prior history of nunes working together with the white house. >> the president slamming the leaders of his own -- one more time -- own -- he chose them -- intelligence community. >> the president of the united states wanted to release this memo before he knew what was in it. he believes it is a way to strike against the mueller investigation. >> republicans were saying -- >> also the fbi. >> -- it is reckless. >> i don't think we should use this for partisan advantage, either side. >> it is going to be showing misconduct on the part of top people at the doj and fbi. you'll see a need for change in certain practices. >> we haven't seen it either, the senate side. this is a house issue. >> this is congress doing its job. what this is not is an indictment on our institutions, of our justice system. >> just about everything paul ryan said in the press conference was a lie. >> there is nothing russia can do to us that rivals what we are

doing to ourselves right now. >> wow. all right. on this groundhog day, here we are, waiting for the release of the controversial secret gop memo involving the russia investigation we've been talking about. all week, republicans have been saying that it shows, it proves, misconduct at the highest levels of the fbi. democrats are saying, it is a cherry picked a eed ahemttempt undermine the russia probe. >> a lot of other people, as well. >> yeah. >> president trump is expected to give the final approval to release that four-page memo today, ignoring warnings, to his point, of his own fbi and justice department, who said it could jeopardize our national security. and we already heard from the president this morning. guess where? twitter. he said, the top leadership and investigators of the fbi and the justice department have politicized the sacred, investigative process in favor

of democrats and against republicans, something unthinkable a short time ago. rank and file are great. i would say hillary clinton would not say they were working to hook her up. that is a guess. i'll point out the leaders of the justice department and the fbi, jeff sessions and christopher wray, both republicans who were specifically chosen by the president. as for the memo's release, at last report, the white house was still evaluating potential redactions for classified material. that at the fbi's request. however, a senior white house official tells nbc news they're leaning against any redactions. >> this is a truly remarkable story. let me show you about what's weird about this. i'll credit ken, who is with us on set, with outlining to us how weird this all is. how unusual this all is. let's look at what is not normal about all of this discussion. first of all, the fact we're talking about it is not normal. the obscure house rule has never been used before.

that's the first not normal thing. the house intelligence committee, chairman devin knew niece, -- nunes, refused to share the contents of the memo with his senate counterpart. it is not normal. >> back up. why? wouldn't he have to make an argument as to why? if i didn't want to share something with you, ali, i'd say, no, because x, y and z. >> i can't tell you. this is a good question. save that for ken. i'll go through this, because i think this is the key question. he's not sharing it with a fellow republican, who is in the intelligence business in congress. then you have the fact that the source of the memo's content was material that the fbi and justice department had but they were not consulted in the process of declassifying the information. also not normal. now you have the fbi and justice department, as we told you, publicly objecting to the memo's release, countering the president. again, this is not normal. among their objections, the government could be exposing

material that sheds light on surveillance methods and context. despite this, house speaker paul ryan has been defending this memo. listen. >> what this memo is, is congress doing its job in conducting legitimate oversight over a unique law, fisa. what this is not is an indi indictment on our institutions, of our justice system. it is not an indictment of the fbi, of the department of justi justice. it does not impugn the mueller investigation or the deputy attorney general. this is about us holding the system accountable in reviewing whether or not fisa abuses occur. >> paul ryan, if it is about holding the system accountable, if it is about transparency, why not release all of the document? why not let the democrats share their memo? joining us now live, nbc news, we mentioned it, national intelligence and security reporter, ken, and former senior director of the cia -- legit

job -- ned price. also served as national security counsel spokesperson under president obama. now he is an nbc news national security analyst. that's a mouthful. ned, you resigned a year ago, after more than ten years of service under republicans and democrats. you said you could no longer serve under president trump. give us your reaction to the president's tweet, slamming the leadership of the fbi and the justice department. >> well, that's right, stephanie. in some ways, it is only fitting we're discussing this on groundhog day. we've seen this movie before. history is repeating itself with this president. this is a president who, since even before he took the oath of office, took a bludgeon to the intelligence community, to the fbi, to the department of justice. his rational has changed slightly over time. of course, the dossier has been a constant source of irritation. more recently, it has become the investigation of bob mueller into his own activities and those of his campaign.

but this is a president who has absolutely no respect for the brave men and women who are on the very front lines around the world and here at home who have taken an oath to protect you and men, protect their fellow americans. that's precisely part of the reason why i resigned. we saw it during the transition. we saw it during the campaign. we've continued to see it, especially in recent days, as this memo has become a source of discussion. >> ken, i want to ask you, this is a very good question stephanie had, why is devin nunes not sharing this information with republicans in the senate, the head of the senate intel committee? >> great question. he hasn't explained the answer. all we can do is look at the past though. when devin nunes made an issue of so-called unmasking, you know, the release of names inside -- >> is that the night he ran to the white house? >> exactly. later, richard burr poured cold water on it and said, it is a nunes thing. we're not concerned about it.

a lot of people thought he didn't want to turn it over because richard burr would raise a whistle. >> believing this will be released, the fbi is trying to control the harm done in saying, let's get some things redacted from this. where do we stand on that? >> they are doing that. the office of director of national intelligence is participating in the process. we have a team of reporters asking all over the government, what is the status of this? we can't get a straight answer. a white house official told nbc news yesterday there may not be any redactions. it is up to the president. he can release this on his own with no redactions. he can declassify it with redactions. or he can throw it to the house, in which case, we might not see it until monday. they'd probably want to read it into the congressional record. it'd still be a secret document that the house would be releasing, and it'd be protected from prosecution under a constitutional provision, the speech and debate clause, shielding them from criminal prosecution. >> if paul ryan was joining us

at the table, he said, this is congress doing its job, reviewing whether fisa abuses occurred. what would you say to him? >> paul ryan's talking points don't mesh with what we've heard from the president and his allies, both publicly and what they have reportedly said privately. on the latter, it is reported the president believes this is a great tool -- >> for what? >> a great tool to discredit the mueller investigation. look, this is about the mueller investigation. the first stop to obstruct that investigation is firing rod rosenstein. rod rosenstein, from what we've heard of the memo, is mentioned prominently. clearly, rosenstein is in the sights of president donald trump. even if you look at president trump's tweet this morning, you see he is going at the department of justice and the fbi. if you look at devin nunes, devin nunes is a house lawmaker who has long been one of the biggest cheerleaders and champions of fisa surveillance,

warrantless surveillance and surveillance with a warrant, which means to be the case here. so when devin nunes says this is about fisa abuse, that couldn't be further from the truth. this was the same devin nunes who just was a key voice behind approving the warrantless section of the law a couple weeks ago. >> used to be democrats complaining about fisa abuse. axios reported that the white house is -- there are people in there concerned that this might not have any bombshells in it. >> that's what i don't get. if it doesn't, why would they be pushing it out so hard? i don't get it. >> here's hearing it, too. some people in the white house are afraid it could be a dud. i'm not sure it matters to donald trump. it could be a dud among the mainstream media and a majority of the country, but as long as it reaches the 30%, the people who are -- >> but the 30% is going to love on him no matter what. >> but he needs to lay the groundwork in the house districts where members may someday be forced to decide on

whether to act on impeachment grounds, to discreditnvestigatin say it is unfair. >> thank you very much, ken. intelligence and national security reporter. ned price, former senior cia director. >> i' >> at the center of the memo is a man who goes by the name of carter page. he loves the fisherman hats a. foreign policy, quote, adviser to the trump campaign. up next, could this guy be a double agent? we're going to break down exactly who this man is and why u.s. officials wanted to eavesdrop on him to begin with. and what role he may be playing in this russia investigation. bottom right of your screen, the dow is trending down again. we'll keep an eye on that. first, james comey just weighed in on the fight over the memo with a profound message.

quote, all should appreciate the fbi speaking up. i wish more of our leaders would. take heart, american history shows that in the long run, weasels and liars never hold the field, so long as good people stand up. not a lot of streets or schools named for mccarthy. you're watching "velshi & ruhle" on msnbc. eyboard clacking ] [ keyboard clacking ] [ click, keyboard clacking ] ♪ good questions lead to good answers. our advisors can help you find both. talk to one today and see why we're bullish on the future. yours. let office depot® officemax why take care of you.on the future. this week all dell pcs are up to twenty five percent off! save even more when you purchase a dell monitor. and make sure you protect your investment. office depot® officemax. officedepot.com

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welcome back to "velshi & ruhle." as the white house deliberates on releasing that -- quarter for

me -- memo. >> nickel, nickel. >> sorry. we want to turn to what that memo is allegedly about. >> thank you. >> pretty important. >> yeah. >> the fisa order on trump campaign foreign policy adviser carter page. republicans and page himself claim that the fisa warrant was issued based on information from a dossier compiled by steele. >> as the "wall street journal" points out, vinvestigators had their eye on page long before the dossier or donald trump announced his candidacy. possibly sttwo years before. unlike trump campaign officials who found themselves in the cross hairs of the various russia probes, this guy in the hat, carter page, has not shied away from giving interviews. >> did you meet sergei kislyak

in cleveland? did you talk with him? >> i'm not going to deny i talked to him. i never met him anywhere outside of cleveland. let's just say that much. >> the only time you met him was in cleveland? >> i may have met him, possibly, might have been in cleveland. >> i believe the russians tried to influence the american election. >> hard for me to say because i see a lot of evidence of potential collusion and also influence on the election by false propaganda and false information against attacking me. >> did anybody ever say to you anything about, hey, you know, here in russia, we have some stuff that might help you? >> absolutely not in that sense, no. >> you haven't lawyered up. you don't have a communications consultant. i mean, did you ever consider doing that? and why haven't you? >> it's complete, 100% confidence. >> mm-hmm. >> that this is just a complete joke. >> did he say, absolutely not?

>> not. >> again, the fisherman's hat. it wasn't raining. nobody had an umbrella. i don't know why i'm the only one staying on this, but i find it peculiar. let's look at this man, in the hat, carter page. in 1991, page studied in moscow and became enamored with russia. he worked for merrill lynch in moscow and was assigned to large financial transactions. in 2013, page met a man posing as a russian diplomat to the united nations. in reality, he was a russian intelligence agent. the two traded contact information, and according to court records, page, quote, provided documents to the man about the energy business. two years after that, that man and two others were charged in new york for working as agents of a foreign government. e-mails provided to the court showed their interactions with page and estimations of him, one saying, quote, i think he's an

idiot. back in late 2015, page asked the new york republican party chairman for a recommendation to the trump campaign. he liked the way trump talked about making nice with russia. a few months later, at a "washington post" editorial board meeting, then-candidate trump named his policy team, including carter page, phd and, of course, george papadopoulos, an excellent guy, according to trump. papadopoulos entered a guilty plea last year in a special probe. remember, trump said papadopoulos was the coffee boy. according to testimony before the house intelligence committee, page mentioned to then-senator jeff sessions that he would be spending a few days in moscow. on the trip, he gave a trip at the new economic school, criticizing america's policy toward russia. seeming to praise vladimir

putin, catching the fbi's attention. sessions would later testify that he wasn't aware of any campaign contacts with russians. it was around that time that the fbi was able to secure a fisa warrant on page. the one that is reported to be the subject of the republican compiled memo. wow. by the end of 2016, then-trump attorney, don mcgahn, now white house counsel, told page to cease being a trump adviser. effectively dumping him from the team as they transitioned to the white house. think about this. don mcgahn immediately cease associating yourself. he had to know something to be kicking carter page out with such -- >> thank you for doing that. i really think we have to remind people who carter page is. i don't think -- >> i meant like vim, force. >> enthusiasm. >> vigor. >> it is photo day for us, by

the way. >> school picture day. >> joining us now -- >> doesn't his hair look so good? >> i worked on it. current msnbc contributor and former assistant watergate prosecut prosecater. >> prosecutor. we'll apologize to you, jill. it's friday. >> how important do you think carter page is to this whole thing? some say he is an idiot, but he seems to have an overlap with russians and russian intelligence agents. >> i think his visits to russia are interesting. his involvement in the campaign. i would start by asking what he knows, what meetings he was at. he seems to want to make himself seem larger than life and to build himself up. i don't know, at this point, whether he has any real information about the campaign. he certainly was pushing a meeting with russia. he tried to arrange that for the

campaign. so, there is enough to look at in terms of what the underlying possible collusion with russia is. that's why i would be very interested in him. he certainly is a character who has been described by ma, ny, o, as you said, an idiot. two, not exceptional. he's not good or bad. he is sort of there. it is interesting that donald trump chose him as a foreign policy adviser. what did donald trump want him for? what did he know about him? why did he name him as a policy adviser? >> okay. the president likes to call the russia investigation a hoax. sarah huckabee sanders said the american people are sick and tired of hearing about it. there have been four people either indicted or two pled guilty in this. plus far, none are carter page. what does that tell you about his role? >> it doesn't really inform

anything to me about his role. it does, again, show, when we look at the memo, and i made you another nickel by saying that word, when we look at that, it seems to be based on the warrant that was issued to surveil carter page. he claims that it was based on the steele dossier information and that it is corrupt information. we have to look and say, number one, there's nothing about that. steele was a trusted source for the fbi for many years. they knew him. they know in the past he provided reliable information so he could be relied on. that is the first flaw in the argument because his information was probably valuable and valid. they can't undermine the warrant on that. the second thing is, that was not the basis for looking at carter page. they had been looking at him for

many years before the steele dossi dossier. when they went to the fisa court, they surely had many other sources of information to go and convince the court that there was probable cause to surveil him. when it was renewed, they also had to show that they had gotten some information from the first surveillance in order to get it renewed. it would not have been renewed if it hadn't been productive. so the argument that it is a fraud and a sham and that it ultimately hurts the mueller investigation, which is clearly the attempt of this white house, falls apart very quickly when you look at it. it is a smoke screen to diverse attention from the real issues that congress should be looking at. which is, what did the russians do to our election, and how do we stop them from doing it in this year's election? >> one day maybe, we'll get to that topic. thank you, jill. good to see you.

>> you know -- >> i'm good for photos today, not talking. >> ali and i blamed our inability to read or speak this week on the fact we were in washington, d.c. now we're in new york. >> sorry, folks. it's just us. we await the thing that she gets a nickel for every time it is said. >> memo. >> is this a turning point in american politics or much to do about nothing? bill kristol joins us next. we're watching the markets. dow jones industrial average down 300. this is a big earnings week. there is concern of interest rates going un. the number is noteworthy. stay with us. you're watching "velshi & ruhle." you know where, msnbc. liberty mutual stood with me when this guy got a flat tire in the middle of the night. hold on dad...

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welcome back. you are watching "velshi & ruhle." here is a look at the other top stories we are watching right now. >> this one is serious. >> starting with the cdc. they're reporting 16 more children died of the flu last week, bringing the total number of children who died from this year's epidemic to a total of 53. the cdc says the flu activity last week is now the highest ever recorded.

this is serious. >> defense secretary james mattis said today the u.s. is looking for evidence of ser serin gas use in syria. the united states previous response to the assad regime's chemical weapon use, the last time the united states had credible evidence, cruise missiles were sent to syria. a violent outburst from larry nassar. accused of sexually abusing 265 women and girls. the father of three of the victims charged at nassar after asking the judge if he could say something. here's what happened. a warning, there is some profanity. >> now, we don't want to swear. we don't want to have profanity. i can't imagine the anger and the anxiety and the feeling of wanting retribution.

if you need to say something to help you, i'm more than willing to let you say something, but in a courtroom, we try -- we don't use profanity. >> i would ask you to, as far as the sentencing, to grant me five minutes in a locker room with this demon. >> i have a feeling -- >> would you do that? >> that is not how our -- >> yes or no? >> no, sir. >> give me one minute. >> you know that i can't do that. that's not how our legal system -- >> well, i'm -- is. >> stay down. right now. >> stop fighting. stop fighting. >> i want that son of a -- >> hands behind your back. >> give me one minute. >> there is no word yet on whether the father will face

charges. i'm going to weigh in, i certainly don't he doesn't. we are waiting for the white house to approve the release on a classified memo on the russia investigation. we're going to dig into the politics around the memo. >> nickel. >> i know. give her a nickel every time we say memo. the democrats are keeping pressure on poweaul ryan to rem der der devin nunes as chair of the intel house committee. >> nunes alleges the abuses of the fbi and department of justice. nancy pelosi says, quote, op-ed lays out the actions or inactions in a case of speaker paul ryan. so far, ryan is swiping democratic criticisms aside. >> i think they're blolooking fa political distraction. >> a handful of republican lawmakers are voicing their concerns about the memo. mainly, it could compromise the

fbi's intelligence gathering and further inflame the president's conflicts with his own law enforcement agencies. joining us now is bill kristol, editor at large at the "weekly standard." good to see you. you've articulated that this is a technique. this is just another thing that the president can do to strengthen his base by weakening the integrity, let's say, of the fbi. thereby, deflecting from the seriousness of the investigation into the president. >> and ties to the future where he may say no to an interview with robert mueller and he needs his base to support him. if he's forced, he'll take the fifth. six months ago, the president of the united states would have taken the fifth, we'd say, no, it'll be a firestorm. now, looking at the republicans on the hill, the conservative commentators, they'll say, it is a witchhun hunt. the fifth is an important thing the founders put in there. what do you expect the president

to do? this has been the shock of the last six months. not the president's behavior. he has a cunning, launching the offensive against the people going against him, making it into a partisan fight intstead f law enforcement. the republicans on the hill have gone along with things that, six months ago, i would not have expected them to. >> why? why do you think they are? i mean, the fact that sarah huckabee sanders said in november of 2016, when you're attacking fbi agents because you're under criminal investigation, you are losing. she was speaking about hillary clinton. we expect to hear this kind of talk from sarah huckabee sanders, mark short, kellyanne conway. >> the people around the president. >> but republicans who you have known for decades, why are they doing this? >> you should ask them, obviously. i'm not happy they're doing it. i'm disappointed. there is the rallying to the president if it's your party. some believe the fbi is just a pack of democrats who want to do

in donald trump. >> they don't believe that though. >> some don't. there are two categories. >> paul ryan does not believe that. >> there are dopey republican member s who believe it, watchig only fox news and reading breitbart. it is one thing to have an ideology that, you know, people might not agree with and it is a little dogmatic, this or that, but to go to conspiracy theorizing is a bad sign for a party. >> the breitbart news universe goes after paul ryan, right? >> right. >> robert mercer hates paul ryan. breitbart has ak thatt attacked mcconnell. >> he has to reflect the views of his conference, i guess. i don't know. i think the republicans in the house, honestly, are helpless. the democrats are the way the democrats are. republican senators are the thing i'd focus on. will mainstream republican

senators, six-year terms, under less pressure than the house members, a little more stature, will the john cornyns of the world say, wait a second, this party is now going into fever swamps and we want -- people should step back. i think they're the people to focus on. >> you were asking earlier, why will devin nunes not present richard burr, his counterpart at senate intelligence, with this information, and he hasn't provided a good answer. it may be the house republicans don't think they're going to get the same level of support in the senate that they're getting with house republicans. >> it will be interesting to see. burr is another one. what they'll say the next day or two or three after memo is released and in the follow up, obviously. >> should the senate be working to put provisions in place to try to protect robert mueller in his position? >> i think it would be a prudent thing to do. there are arguments, it's a matter of conscientitutional la. but at least symbolically. whether they should pass legislation or not, come out and

say, this would be totally unacceptable to fire him, to fire rhoden steoad rosenstein, n uncourau encourage the president to work with the investigation. >> lindsey graham said it'd be the end of the presidency. >> graham says a lot of things. the way things are going, it won't be the end of the presidency. he'll retail the support of most republicans and some senate republicans and keep his base. this is where the republicans need to do more than, oh, he won't do that. they need to explain to republican voters out there why it is so damaging that the president is doing what he is doing and is considering doing what he's doing. >> you had -- we were talking about you yesterday because you had tweeted out that the president's strategy now, you compared it to o.j. simpson's defense strategy. it becomes less of a defense and more of a, you guys are corrupt or you guys have got bad information. >> it worked out for o.j. >> yeah, discredit the

investigators. if you don't have a good defense, go on the offensive. raise enough doubt. obviously, the criminal trial, you only need reasonable doubt. in this case, too, it is similar. discredit the investigators enough. you have some people out there who want to be on your side anyway. they can seize on, the glove doesn't fit, whatever. that gives them an excuse to stay on your side. it is very much the case of the attacks on the fbi and the j justice department. it gives republicans who want to be with trump an excuse to say, it's partisan. i'll stick with the president and let him govern. >> great to see you in here. >> great to see the two of you in person. >> never actually all three of us have been in the same place. short time ago, labor department announced job growth beat expectations in january. looks like president trump will have to stop boasting about the unemployment number for african-americans. we'll break down the numbers next. you're watching "velshi & ruhle" live on msnbc. david. what's going on? oh hey!

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public. the president can declassify it and release it himself. he can send it back to congress. congress can then meet to declassify it and put it out there. we were talking to ken who said congress can do it without doing that. we don't know when you'll see the memo, but it seems the president is signing off on it going public. the january jobs report is out this morning, giving us a better picture of where the united states economy stands. 200,000 jobs were created last month, making it the 88th consecutive month of job growth. >> wait a minute, donald trump has been been in office 88 consecutive months. >> important point. the increase in job growth was better than the estimate of 180,000 jobs. the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1%. baby, that is full employment. wage growth is up 0.3% from december. wages are up 2.9% from the same time last year. best performing sectors of the economy were construction with

36,000 jobs added. manufacturing gained 15,000. food and drink 31,000. health care, 21,000. >> health care hasn't lost jobs, even through the recessions. some of these are home health care aides. >> which, by the way, you have a huge amount of immigrant population filling those jobs. >> right. the overall unemployment rate of 4.1% is the lowest it's been since the year 2000. it's always important to look at this context, right? the unemployment rate shot up during the great recession. on the left side of your screen. it started going down since then. look at this number. unemployment amongst african-americans spiked to 7.7% from 6.8% in december. that's actually a big jump. with wages up 2.9% from last year, we're seeing the fastest growth in pages since the recession. that growth is just barely ahead of the inflation rate. none of this is to blame donald trump or give him credit for it.

we like to bring up the point all the time that these things happen in economic cycles. it is not about one president or the other. >> let's bring in dom the break this down. i mentioned this tweet to ali on the commercial. anthony scaramucci writes, you can believe both of these simultaneous high. president obama did a decent job steadying the ship post crisis, and president trump deserves credit for unleashing faster growth with tax reform and deregulation. anthony scaramucci is 100% right. president trump has unleashed this. president trump had a long career of selling sizzle. business confidence, consumer confidence is up. one of the issues that ali and i take is that the president consistently lies about the economy. he talks as though the economy was in dire straits a year ago, and obama left us in obama. obama, in fact, steadied the ship, and it has been a steady

climb that then, credit to president trump, he has supercharged through his policies. anthony scaramucci, you're right on that. president trump, eric, don junior, you're wrong. >> dom? >> yes, all of those things are right. i would like to look at things in trends. you mentioned a lot of numbers in the last couple minutes or so. the trends are generally what you guys have been saying. they're of the same, in that, we have been emerging from the financial crisis ever since the depths of 2009. the trend for employment has been up. the trend for unemployment has been low elower. the overall market, yes, has been doing really well. it is fair to say that president trump has unleashed a lot of business optimism and that has fueled the last leg of the rally. i remember a time in march of 2009, i was still on wall street back then, when the s&p 500 hit 888 on an intraday level. we're now at the 82600 level fo

the s&p. trends are in place and have been for years. the issue for people in the markets is whether or not the trend can stay in tact, given the president's policies. we know for the last year, markets have been optimistic about it. we don't know whether it stays in tact. >> do you make anything of the market activity, we're going to end up with the worst week in the market in two years? job numbers were good. that traditionally used to result in people selling off. >> i mean, is it good news/bad news situation? i would say a lot of traders right now are pinning this market pessimism over the last couple days on rising interest rates. people are saying when people are making more money, if those -- remember, your paychecks are getting bigger because withholdings are doing down a little bit. wage growth, the fastest pace since 2009. there is a fear among those out there we could see a pickup in higher prices inflation, perhaps giving pause to traders in the market. >> you know you're paying more for gas every day.

when prices tick up, it is an issue. you mentioned african-american unemployment. gary cohn earlier today said it is a one-month number. trends are what we follow. to your point, gary, if trends are what you follow, when you speak to the president and advise him -- >> let him know that. >> -- if he speaks about trends, they began long before last year. >> dom, thank you for joining us. dominic chu. the spotlight of the russia investigation is now shining on one of the president's closest aides. white house communications director hope hicks. she's typically stayed out of the headlines, but she popped up in a "new york times" report this week. who is this young woman, and what a former member of trump's legal team is saying about her next. we are watching the white house, expecting to hear the president okayed the release of the controversial memo come pied by intel house chair devin nunes. we'll bring it to you as soon as we have it. ere sitting there and we decided that, you know what? something needed to be done about what was going on in our inner-city. instead of buying a house,

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accompanying letter to both democrats and gop members of the house intel committee. again, we are unclear as to now that it's been declassified, does that mean that can go out to the public immediately? we believe that will be the case, and that most of the world will have the contents of this memo within the next hour or so. >> just a couple points. while it's believed when the memo, it has been edited since devin nunes had it in the house intel committee. >> since they voted on it. >> correct. it has been edited. we don't know how much, we don't know how much of the content changed. but it sounds like what he edited, what was presented to the white house, they are now releasing in full. remember, christopher wray from the fbi, we heard the department of justice saying there were risks, there were concerns that releasing this type of information would be a risk to our national security. some people said this thing won't be necessarily a gift to president trump and his hopes of muddying the waters in the

russia investigation. kellyanne conway said this is about cleaning up, maybe finding there are a few bad apples on top at the justice department, wink wink, nod nod. we know she's talking rod rosenstein. we have heard from those in the intelligence community this should be a gift to foreign adversaries, a gift to vladimir putin, who would love to know more about our process, our methods, because this type of highly confidential information is what is needed, is what is most valuable inside the fbi. >> all right. in addition to being a gift to other people, the worry at the fbi and in the intelligence ranks is that the release of this memo without redactions could let people, would let those who are trying to spy on america or who are being targets of investigations by america know what some of the methodologies are. want to bring in msnbc contributor, former assistant watergate special prosecutor, jill wine-banks back now with us. and julia ainsley, national

security and justice reporter. julia, what do we know right now? >> so at this point, we believe that the white house has declassified this information. we are getting this from other reports. there's a lot we are all kind of scrambling right now. let's just hold on to that. we believe this is going to come out today, it will be declassified, which puts the house in a different position. they no longer would have to, under that scenario, decide whether or not they are going to declassify it because the president has done that for them. that's more than we expected the president to do. we actually thought he would be kicking this back over to congress, saying i don't object, but you have to declassify it. again, that's really fresh reporting. this is what we are hearing from other reporters at this point. >> so at this point, congress has no work to do on this. the president has declassified this and everybody can now see it. it's not classified information, right? at that point that's public information? >> that is correct. but the real danger here is that you are letting the public see one point of view, one slice of

information that we know from reports from the fbi is extremely misleading by its omissions. that would be like having a trial end after the prosecution presents its case, and let the jury decide based on the prosecution evidence. we never do that. we always allow the defendant to come forward. in fact, we tell jurors they cannot discuss the case until both sides have been presented, and that's what we are allowing americans to do now, is to form an opinion based on partial information. that's a very dangerous thing, aside from the release of information that could hurt national security by letting foreign adversaries benefit from knowing how we collect information. >> it could, but julia, at this point, once the white house decides to release it, it is what it is. there's nothing other parts of the government, there's nothing congress can do to stop it. >> or the fbi. or the intelligence community or the justice department. you can't fight fire with fire

because that would be releasing more information that has not been declassified. >> exactly. i have been in touch with a lot of fbi officials this week who feel they are sitting on their hands at this point. that's why director wray tried to get out aled of this, putting out that statement saying they had grave concerns, because they know at this point, after the fact, there is so little they can do. even if there are redactions, they will not be able to correct the record because they say the real problem here is the information that we won't see in this memo. they are going to try to look like there is very flimsy, corrupt evidence for opening and getting this fisa warrant and they won't be able to go correct the record and say actually, we had a lot more because then they would be doing the same thing. they would be releasing classified information. they are in a really powerless position right now. >> oh, heavens. all right. kristen welker joins us now at the white house. you have this memo? >> oh, no, i don't have the memo yet but i do have the breaking news. the deputy press secretary confirming just moments ago that the president has declassified the memo in full, and now

essentially, this gets kicked to the house intelligence committee for next steps, to release the memo. we anticipate that will happen in short order because of course, everyone was anticipating the release of this memo. another key point, he says there are no redactions in the memo so now we have to wait and see what the final text shows but again, based on all of our reporting, the implication is that the memo will show some type of misconduct within the fbi. of course, this potentially could be used to show, by republicans, that the russia probe has in some ways been ineffective or tainted. democrats stress, they say this is a cherry-picked document. they say it is solely for the purpose of brainwashing people to get them over to the president's side in terms of the russia probe but again, very significant news here out of the white house. just moments ago, that that very controversial memo has been

declassified in full by the president and now the potential fallout. we have witnessed this escalating feud between the president and his own justice department. the fbi director warning about grave concerns if this memo were to be released, concerns about national security, perhaps. so they are bracing themselves for fallout here at the white house and i have to tell you, there are some officials here who are concerned about what it might mean. so we are waiting the actual text but again, the memo has been declassified in full with no redaction. >> jill wine-banks, i want to underscore the point that julia was making and you were making, this is like telling half the story. this is like having the prosecution without the defense. but those people who didn't want this released, whether they are democrats or fbi or the justice department, they can't, once you have declassified information and the stuff you would use to defend against that is classified information, they are stuck. >> they are.

they are helpless to stop this from happening. as has been pointed out, the answer to this is that there's much more information that would show that whatever the accusation about wrongdoing is, isn't accurate, that there was much more information available. remember, carter page was under surveillance back in 2013, long before there was a donald trump. so his involvement with the russians goes back a long way. there was good reason to surveil him. he turned over documents to a russian spy. we don't know what that document is or why he did it, but we do have reason to suspect that he was working with the russians, and he should have been surveilled. so whatever the information is that would show other sources and methods, the fbi can't reveal it, the department of justice can't reveal it, the democrats can't reveal it. >> the question will be, what does robert mueller know. jill, thank you so much.

this news continuing to unfold right here. thank you for watching this hour of msnbc live. we appreciate you watching. >> i will be back at 3:00 p.m. today. let's hand it over to andrea mitchell for "andrea mitchell reports." good day. breaking news. i'm andrea mitchell. we are moments away from bringing you the details of that memo, declassified in full by president trump. our investigative team will be poring over the pages, bringing you all of the information as soon as we have them. joining me now, nbc white house correspondent kristen welker, chuck todd, nbc political director, moderator of "meet the press," nbc national security and intelligence reporter, ken dilanian, nbc news justice analyst, matt miller, john mcloughlin, former acting director of the cia and national security analyst, msnbc contributor chuck rosenberg, former federal prosecutor, former chief of staff to james comey. peter alexander at the white us