say, testifying to the senate intelligence committee behind closed doors. that's tonight's last word. the 11th hour with brian williams starts now. the breaking news tonight, new bombshell reporting on the mueller investigation, the raid apaul manafort's house and the indictment warning from prosecutors to the form trump campaign chair. plus a late-breaking, urgent and fast exploding storm, hurricane maria suddenly a 5 and there's a state of emergency in puerto rico. we'll get a live update. and after trashing the u.n. for years, down to its day core, donald trump addresses the general assembly just hours from now. as they say, welcome to our world as the 11th hour gets under way. on a monday evening as we start a new week, good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york of

the day 242 of the trump administration. this is suddenly a busy night, mostly because we have new reporting on the mueller investigation. "the new york times" tonight reporting mueller is using shock and awe tactics to intimidate witnesses and potential targets. the times tell the hyped the scenes story of that forcible entry raid on paul manafort's house a few months ago. the raid and the warrant to allow it were just the first prong, it turns out. then came a warning for the former trump campaign chairman. the times reports it this way tonight of the special counsel robert mueller followed the house search with a warning. his prosecutors told mr. manafort they planned to indict him, said two people close to the investigation. it adds this about the search warrant allowing the raid. to get the warrant mr. mueller's team had to show probable cause that mr. manafort's home contained ed of a crime. to be allowed to pick the lock and enter the home unannounced, prosecutors had to persuade a federal judge that mr. manafort

was likely to destroy evidence. lawyers and a spokesman for manafort declined to comment for the story and it's not the only illuminating report from the times on mueller's investigation or the effect it is having. here is another headline. trump lawyers clash over how much to cooperate with russia inquiry. this story dropped during the emmy awards last night. the lawyers reportedly at odds are special counsel to the president ty cobb there on the left who was brought in to manage the response to the russia investigation and white house counsel don mcgahn on the right. we know this because ty cobb was talking about the russia investigation and talking about mcgahn, apparently, out loud at lunch with another of the president's lawyers in a washington steakhouse where he apparently didn't realize he was sitting next to a reporter from "the new york times." the times writes about the tension between the two men, quote, at the heart of the clash

is an issue that has challenged multiple presidents during high-stakes washington investigations, how to handle the demands of investigators without surrendering the institutional prerogatives of the office of the presidency. now, it goes on to say the uncertainty has grown to the point that white house officials privately express fear that colleagues may be wearing a wire to surreptitiously record conversations for mr. mueller. all of this unfolds as a current and a former trump ally gear up for the role they will play in this investigation. long-time lawyer for both trump and his business, michael cone, will testify before the senate intelligence committee tomorrow. he told vanity fair earlier this month he was taking his lawyer's advice and had not spoken to trump or his family in a few weeks. but he made his loyalty clear, telling the reporter, quote, i'm the guy who would take a but for the president. and there's a new legal defense fund for former nsa director michael flynn, who "the daily

beast" reports is preparing for a million dollar or so legal tab. let's turn on our lead-off panel on a monday night. carolyn ryan is with us, assistant editor for "the new york times." sam stien, long-time political journalist, politics he had for for "the daily beast." and ron a dough measure ratty, a former federal prosecutor who wrote this piece for politico that got our attention today, titled how to read bob mueller's hand. he says currently a lawyer in private practice, we should add. good evening and welcome to you all. sam stien. >> yes. >> if manafort gets indicted, that will leave a mark. that will get our attention. >> that definitely will leave a mark. of course, he's not the big fish, right. he is a fish. he's a big fib, but he's not the big fish. and what this is all leading up to or so it seems is to build enough pressure points on paul manafort so that he will

ultimately turn on donald trump. incredible assessment of what they think about paul manafort's trustworthiness. they're moving in fast and moving in a way where he feels like his only avenue to get himself out from under all of this is to turn on the guy who hired him to chair the campaign. >> carolyn, what aspects of your newspaper's reporting do you believe are most important and it's most important for us not to ignore? >> it's all great stuff, but what really makes an impression on me having seen a bunch of federal prosecutors deal with a white house, given the wide tentacles of this investigation, just how aggressive they are being, what kind of signals they're sending to potential witnesses, to potential targets. and, you know, mueller has been around and i think he does not want to get caught in one of those extended investigations that gets over taken by congressional investigative committees, gets over taken by news. and you can sort of sense the

urnl i and the intensety of this right now as they apply pressure to the man 40s and the flins. >> so explain that because a lot of civilians may not understand there's a foot race. while it's all a big investigation, is mueller first and for most among equals? is mueller trying to race the hill to get to his evidence and witnesses. >> i think that's how he sees it. there are a few concerns, one is that information would come out through the investigative pros either be leaked or otherwise come out. the other is if the information becomes public, witness that he might be pursuing get a chance to line their stories up. so there's a way that they can be ahead of him kwhld be injurious to his ultimate aim which would be what happened here. >> we happen to have a lawyer on board for this discussion. i read enough about you, university of chicago undergrad, yale law school, a career in both public and private law to

know that you know your way around this case. so tell us what you make of the tea leaves, the crumbs being dropped by robert mueller. >> wow. well, there have been a lot of crumbs lately. look, today's news from "the new york times" was certainly shocking and striking, but it also was in line with what we have seen. i mean, whenever the fbi comes to your door and picks the lock and enters, you know that you are in trouble. and that means that they got a search warrant and a no knock warrant as "the new york times" confirmed, something that i had talked about on twitter sometime ago. look, i agree with the other panelist that mr. mueller is trying to get paul manafort to flip i would say not just on trump but potentially others. when i was a federal prosecutor i used the tactic of sending what we call a target letter and

having an fbi agent saying we are going to indict you as a way of trying to get someone's attention, to flip them and, you know, flipping people is largely about convincing them that you have overwhelming evidence that will prove their guilt and will send them to prison for quite sometime. the other tactics that mueller and his team are engaged in, to me, strike me as aggressive tax ticks to use when people are not being cooperative or you think they're going to destroy evidence, for example. and, you know, frankly, that is a bit shocking and disturbing that or every obviously the former chair of the president's campaign was doing that. you know, and there's obviously there as well that we've learned today. >> sam, while robert mueller does not scare easily and is a combat veteran of the vietnam war he also airs on the general tilt of the law. he's not the kind of prosecutor you would see in a light night law and order episode.

are you surprised at this tactic or being used so publicly? >> well, you noticed to distinguish the tactic he's using against paul manafort and paul manafort's aides and even his own lawyer which is highy aggressive and seems strictly defined to try to get enough pressure points on paul manafort that he flips and the tactic that's being used for the white house aides which what we're hearing is much more at a distance, much more what you would describe as by the books. trying to build relationships of trust perhaps, but not trying to push the investigation into an adversarial investigation and i think that's done by design. part of it is he feels like there's more vulnerabilities outside the white house. part of is a process that you use when you're a white collar defense lawyer. he's smart about this. he's also as we've reported at the daily beast compartmentalized his staff. there are people who are looking strictly at manafort. there are people who are looking

at other facets within the trump orbit, some designed to look strict lg at the social media. he's not did you mean. he's not new at this. this is something he's quite expert at and we're beginning to see all the wheels turning now. >> so ken vogue yell of the new york times goes out to lunch with a source and imagine his good luck to look over and see not one but two lawyers for the president. many of us, this is the picture he took with his cell phone. that's ty cobb on the right. the one with the handlebar mustache. many of us engaged in some skeptical speculation that maybe these attorneys were mouthing off for ken vogue yell's consumption, having recognized him. it is a question nicolle wallace put to ken during the 4:00 p.m. hour. we'll watch this and dment afterwards. >> did you ever have a sense that they wanted to be heard? >> well, that last part first, i

don't get the sense that they wanted to be heard. i've seen a little bit of speculation on that point on twitter and elsewhere. and, you know, typically with folks in trump's orbit if there's a spectrum between like incredibly devious sort of manipulative puppet maisry and just clumsy incompetent it's always going to be closer to that clumsy incompetent. i think that's what happened here is they were just very indiscrete. >> so that's part of his defense that the people around trump are not buttoned down, carolyn. >> it reminds you of the mar-a-lago scene when they started having conversation about -- >> illuminated by cell phone flashlight apps. >> remember the geography, the times bureau is here and the steakhouse is here. that place is always crawling with reporters, certainly times

reporters. >> ty cobb as great a career as he's had has fallen for an e-mail prapgster very recently with the e-mail address at e-mail prankster.com. i don't know that he's really that savvy to notice ken vogue yell. but my other question is this do new york times get to expense lunches at blt because that seems to be a great gig. >> we knew that was coming. so you're going to get our last legal word. and the question is this, when you hear people speculating that their colleagues within the white house are wearing a wire, i know that gets your attention. does that scare you? i heard john dean say tonight he was asked to wear a wire in the nixon white house before the presence of a taping system became publicly known and he refused. >> well, i will tell you what really strikes me from that is

the complete distrust and disunity within the trump white house. i mean, that's what it tell us me. if you are concerned that your colleagues are wiring a wire. if you are hiding documents from others of people on your team with a locked safe, what it tells me is you don't trugs any of the people you're working with and that is exactly what a prosecutor wants. federal prosecutors want to divide and conquer. they want to pit people against each other so they're pointing the people against each other. it's in the interest of the defense to keep and stay up fied. and so this tells me that mueller has the trump team right now where he wants them. >> as effective a last word as we've had around these parts for quite sometime. our great thanks to carolyn, ryan, sam stien and reign add dough from chicago tonight. thanks to you all. coming up, all the world's a stage. at least it feels that way in new york during this same week every year. the question is how will donald

trump perform on that world stage? the 11th hour just getting started on a busy monday night.

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i mean, what do we ever get out of the united nation? do you ever hear that the united nations sofld a problem? it's become a political hornest's nest. we spent a fortune on it. >> the united nations is not a friend of democracy. it's not a friend to freedom. it's not a friend even to the united states of america where as you know, it has its home.

>> where do you ever see the united nations -- i love the united nations in new york. they're wonderful. do they ever settle anything? it's just like a political gang. >> i have long felt the united nations is an underperformer. which brings me to my next point. the utter weakness and incompetent of the united nation. >> welcome back. greeted, no doubt with open arms president donald trump attending the first annual meeting of -- on his first day today trump met with israel prrm net ana hugh. we'll deliver his main address tomorrow but trump today echoed his prior sentiments in a toep that was noticeably less disdainful. >> in recent years the yund nations has not reached its full potential because of bureaucracy and miss management. we seek a united nations that

regains the trust of the people around the world. in order to achieve this, the united nations must hold every level of management accountable, protect whistle blowers and focus on results rather than on process. to honor the people of our nations, we must ensure that no one and no member state shoulders a disproportionate share of the burden. >> president trump has apparently been preparing for his u.n. debut. one report by the "associated press" goes into detail about a crash course in national security he received at the urging of secretary of state rex tillerson and defense secretary james mattis. quote, the officials said the purpose was to answer one of trump's most persistent questions of his national security aides, why does the u.s. government need so many people abroad? to be successful, mattis and tillerson decided they should use talking points and

commentary with which they believe trump would be most familiar. the role that the military, intelligence officers and diplomats play in making the world safe for american businesses like the trump organization to operate and expand abroad. with us tonight, the coauthor of that article, january anthony la mere, white house reporter for the "associated press." michael kroully is with us as well. gentlemen, welcome to you both. jonathan, was this just short of using emow jazz, this briefing? >> so was this was in july and the stated purpose was to discuss strategy in afghanistan and iraq. the president went to the pentagon went to a windowless room in the pentagon name the tank. they went through a 90 minute proposal that was described to us, the "associated press,"

educating the president sort of america's role in the world. going through why it was important to project american influence and power globally. to suggest this is why we have embassies here, this is why we have this military base here. the president, of course, remember, ran on the campaign of america first. he's suggested many times that he wanted to reduce the american footprint across the world, suggesting that it was a waist of american resources, american money, perhaps american lives. and those in the pentagon suggested there are significant strategic reasons why we have to have all of this -- why we have to have so many people. and the president came out of that meeting he said publicly, it was a very good meeting, that it was very ill lum naturing. and we have seen since we have seen some of the nationalist forces in his white house like steve bannon be ejected. we have seen him commit to an afghanistan strategy that includes a gradual but some troop increase.

the and they have seen him not at least not yet pull back from the world. so i think there are people around, other world leaders, people around the globe who have been very nervously watching what this president would do internationally, how he would treat the u.n. and now have some degree of assurance that elstay the course. we'll find out tomorrow. >> so michael, what's his greeting going to be like tomorrow? let's talk tone, ten or ask adherence to teleprompter. >> you can never know for sure. >> that are. >> donald trump can be handed a speech and you don't know if he's going to read the script. and i keep thinking back to the appearance he made at nato headquarters in brussels i think in may and it was very important to a number of his key advisers, including the national security adviser h.r. mcmaster and defense secretary jim mattis that trump reaffirm his commit tomt article 5 of the treaty and

nato allies were very upset about the fact that he had seemed to question this as a candidate of the and when handed a speech with this language and by the aides had celebrated the day before in the new york city times and other outlets going to say this and trump got to that part of the speech and he did not read it. >> he talked about the construction cost of the new headquarters. >> that said, the smoke signals come from the white house tonight suggest we will get a relatively conventional speech. it's not going to be so we are getting the sense a tirade. it's not going to be a blistering denunciation of the u.n. like we saw in those wonderful flash points to the campaign that were so colorful. he's going to talk about the threat from north korea, which would be very expected. he is going to talk about iran, which is very much on the radar as there is a key deadline coming up on the iran nuclear

deal. elcriticize the u.n., talk about the need for reform. at this point we're not expecting a stem wiernd. again, you never know. >> jonathan, i have to show this. he could not help himself today talking about the trump name and construction, in this case right across the street from the u.n. >> well, thank you very much. thank you. i actually saw great potential right across the street, to be honest with you, and it was only for the reason that the united nations was here that that turned out to be such a successful project. >> so to string that out, he saw the prestige of the u.n. address and realized that across the street would be a good place for a building. what's the chance we see or hear such bravado, provincial or not tomorrow. >> he's always donald trump. and the trump name, the trump brand, the trump personality is always going to come first. let the record show his first ever words at the united nations as the president of the united states was about the apartment

building on first avenue across from the u.n. >> yeah. >> one would think tomorrow in a more formal setting he would stick closer to the teleprompter than today, which was a smaller speech. he only spoke for about four minutes. and as discussed, he did sort of chied the u.n. a little bit about, you know, bloated bureaucracy and perhaps having an unfill filled mission across the globe and its soaring costs. but he did so not nearly with the scold it has voiced like he did in may in brussels. >> 30 seconds you get the last word. do you think the weight of the north korean situation will be evident in him tomorrow? >> yeah, absolutely. i think that he seems to feel this. i mean, i think a lot of these foreign policy issues like afghanistan for instance you get a feeling he's not that interested. you don't get the sense he's that invested. in this one, north korea, he does seem invested and maybe because it's kind i a mono amono

thing and donald trump seems to reality to those kind of show downs and you can interpret that as being a good thing or a bad thing. i think for that reason he feels it and i do think we're going to see some vigorous rhetoric on that subject. >> it's personal. >> it's personal. well said. >> thank you both. two of our very best. our thanks for tonight. coming up, another category 5 storm just made landfall in the caribbean and could threaten parts of the u.s. before it's over. the latest from mike seidel. he joins us next. acks to take c. ...of our jeans. it got weird. ahhh! i'm just airing them out! luckily we discovered tide pods plus downy. so our jeans stay in great shape. and they actually get clean. what? we can wash 'em. tide pods plus downy. super concentrated to clean, condition and keep your favorites looking great. it's got to be tide.

welcome back to the 11th hour. we're going to return to our political coverage in just a moment. our coverage of health care, north korea, the trump administration, but we have a very serious situation to report to you tonight. first and most immediately, the east coast of the u.s. is feel the effects of hurricane jose. churning up the coast, roig surf. it's going to hammer the new jersey beaches along the way and then it's going to come down hard on long island, new york, massachusetts, the cape and islands. but the more urgent situation tonight is this. hurricane hunter air crews tonight reported back that hurricane maria in the caribbean has exploded into a category 5 and it's already running up and over islands that were mostly spared by irma.

sadly, it might be aiming at puerto rico. the great intrepid weather channel meteorologist mike seidel joins us with an update on both. from the eastern most tip of new york in montauk, long island. so take us through both -- obviously what's behind you there, but as i said, first and for most, this sudden explosion into a category 5 and the real chance that puerto rico is going to have a category 5 landfall. >> reporter: yes, indeed. maria just blue up. it went from a cat one to a kwat five in 27 hours. it made landfall in dominica about two hours ago and the winds were 160 miles an hour. now, the only saving grace is it's a very small, tightly wound hurricane so the hurricane force winds only extend out 25 miles. but it made a buzz saw across the island and now it's tracking west northwest through the

northeast caribbean. and it's hard to imagine it not missing the u. and british virgin islands and puerto rico on wednesday. this could be the first cat 4 to hit puerto rico in 85 years. it could be catastrophic with landslides. not to say that the u.s. and british virgin islands won't get hard. the island that got hit by irma, they're going to be too far north. getting everything rushed to completion in puerto rico and the british virgin islands tonight and tomorrow. >> mining, about what's behind on you every you, how much of a wallop are portions of the east coast going to get tomorrow. >> we're being looing at jose as like a nor'easter. maybe some of the winds gust to 50 miles an hour. here at montauk we may get rusz 40 to 45.

the real impact, battering waves, rip currents and beach ereegs. we're going to be dealing with this for a couple more days. now the forecast models indicate it will go out and come back. it may come back towards the east coast later this weekend or next week. and what that could do and we're hoping is that it steers maria out to sea. so maria is coming to come towards the southeast as jose comes back towards the west and they're going to do this what we call dance. they're going to go into orbit and jose hopefully will pin wheel maria out spew the atlantic and spare the east coast a direct landfall. that's not etched in stone. that's the likely scenario but as you know tropical forecasting five, six days in advance is shakey at best. in the meantime, puerto rico, the virgin islands are going to take a direct hit if not a cat

five very likely a cat four on wednesday. >> our good friends at the weather channel have been way too busy for all the wrong reasons of late. our great thanks, mike. another break for us. and coming up, how a great but under celebrated british here cysts named bernie top pin played a role in foreign affairs unwittingly this weekend and what on et can the white house say next about the greatest threat on et, that would be north korea when the 11th hour continues.

welcome back to the 11th. as north korea hangs over this u.n. gathering here in new york, the u.s. military conducted a show of force over the korean peninsula. two american bombers, four f 35 fighters, notably all stelt aircraft joined south korean and japanese aircraft in exercises that included releasing live weapons at a south korean firing range and hoping these pictures

would be beamed around the world. shortly thereafter defense secretary james mattis told pentagon reporters the u.s. military has military options in north korea that would not put seoul, south korea at risk, but he declined to provide details. this all comes one day after the president channeled the great british song writing duo of bernie top pin and elton john and wrote on twitter about his ongoing diplomatic process, quote, i spoke with president moon of south korea last night, asked him how rocket man is doing. long gas lines forge in north korea. too bad. joining us now among the great experts in the field, two of them, gordon chang, daily beast columnist, author of nuclear show down, north korea takes on the world, and sue my terry, former north korea analyst at the cia. gordon, i'm not joking when i

ask you how will something like rocket man translate or don't we care? >> i think we don't care or at least trump doesn't care. what he really should have said was missile man because the north koreans have been firing missiles. the last rocket that they fired was i think february 2016. and the security council permits rocket firings. they don't permit ballistic missile launches. and i think that, you know, kim jong-un must like the attention, but nonetheless, you know, trump has got to back that up, especially tomorrow. and he's got to say something specific because the world is waiting for him to say something different than what he said in the past. >> why in your view do we keep talking about military options that we have against north korea that don't result in basically a sea of fire in south korea? why is that happening? >> well, i guess we want to continue to president the kim jong-un regime and make sure -- i don't understand secretary mattis' statement that there's a military option that does not

put seoul at risk. okay, there's a naval block aid. maybe there are things we can do in terms of -- but any military option will cause retaliation by north korea and it would cause a massive escalation. so i'm not sure there is an option that would lead to seoul not being at risk. >> remind us just low tech weapons, artillery tubes are formed -- >> 14,000 within 60 seconds of seoul with obviously even millions of people living in seoul, 2 hundred,000 american expats living in seoul. >> gordon, how good a chance do you give diplomacy right now? this is u.n. general assembly at all. >> aim very concerned because over the weekend we heard the time for diplomacy was over. mcmaster on one of the talk shows said time actually had run out.

nikki haley basically said the same thing, maybe in a little bit softer language. but it's fairly stark talking how we've fwot to go to much more coercive options. i think that keys in to what mattis was saying. everyone says well, we're not going to do anything because of seoul but mattis is saying, no, we are going to do thing. i think what he's going to do is basically start inspecting north korean ships on the high seas. and i think that the administration is going to start to look at that and actually interdict these shipments. >> what's our threshold on a launch? if a missile comes out of there next week that is a few more degrees closer to guam or a few more degrees closer to the center of japan, is are we calling these on the fly like the flip of a coin before an nfl game? >> i don't think so. and i don't think north korea is ever going to attack guam or any part of u.s. territory. they're just going to continue

doing tests. i do think that trump administration knows that north korea is not going to actually attack us. >> do either of you think we have a threshold in mind? do we have a number in mind for miles outside of guam? >> well, i'm sure we do because it was launched at guam, whether it's at that band of water 30 to 40 kilometers or the island itself we're not going to know at fist exactly where that is going and at that time we're going to make a decision -- >> he's not going to be stupid enough to actually go anywhere near where it's going to cause or provoke a u.s. military action. >> let's hope at least parts of what both of you said here tonight remain correct. thank you very much. we'd like to have you both back. sadly, we'll have reason to as this story goes on. coming up, what's the chance the senate really can vote to change health care in the coming weeks. and right after the break bill

kristol is here with us in our studio to react to the latest on the russia investigation and much more as we continue right after this.

welcome back to the 11th. as the political attention shifts briefly this week from d.c. here to new york as the president addresses the u.n., robert mueller's investigation continues. tonight as we've reported the times is saying prosecutor's on mueller's team told his former campaign chairman, paul manafort they plan to indict him. then there's the fake video the president retweeted over the weekend. so much to talk about. bill kristol is with us here tonight. a veteran of the reagan and bush administrations, editor at large of the weekly standard and one of the true thought leaders of the republican government in exile in washington, d.c. always a pleasure. thank you forth coming on. if paul manafort gets indicted,

what? >> well, does paul manafort think donald trump will pardon him if he hangs tough. there's a cnn story reporting on a fisa wiretapping which those things usually do not leak. i was thinking what will donald trump's reaction to the story will be, he's a pretty slud fighter in certain ways. he will attack these leaks, he'll say they're coming from mueller. i don't think they are, but the fisa leak came from somewhere. if he wants to go on the foepssive and at least rally his base to preemptively not believe what mueller says and to begin discounting mueller and laying the groundwork for firing him, for pardons, this is not a bad excuse for trump to begin doing that, i think. >> you agree with the position that the sheriff joe pardon was an exercise to get people used to the exertion of the pardon lever? >> yes. and to signal to maybe others that he shouldn't be talking with now like manafort, one of

the stories that says trump and manafort kept talking for a while and lawyers told trump you have to stop talking. >> ken vogue elof the new york times is one of the print journalists we have on this broadcast quite often. his defense when asked were you unwittingly used as a plant, were these two lawyers who knew exactly what they were doing, they knew you were within earshot, i'll paraphrase his defense and he said no, i know the crowd around trump. they're not like that. these guys aren't that kale. do you -- >> i don't know cobb at all. my friends who are lawyers if they're in public and they'll talking about their cliept they'll say nothing opener his innocent. if you're interested in white house intrigue and lawyers not getting along and staff not getting along it's a story that

hurts the trump white house in a certain way. what's the headline, trump's lawyer for russia says trump is innocent, totally confident of that and we want to share everything with the prosecutor. you know we have these people in the white house that are concerned about these esoteric legal doctrines. it is kind of exculpatory. it's not really -- the headline it sort of helps trump. >> among the president's actions this weekend, they were all if not most on social media. he retweeted and you're very active and a must read on twitter, so you know the medium better than i do as merely a follower. he tweeted out this give or jif if you pronounce it the way the inventor of the medium did showing a fake -- donald trump's actual golf swing and then hillary clinton who tripped on her way into the aircraft as if she was hit in the back by the golf ball. this is the president of the

united states. >> unbelievable. he's retweeting soum disrepresentable character. others have looked at his previous work so to speak. it's really unbelievable. he does seem to do -- attacking hillary clinton is sort of his default, i'd say when eptsds to rally his base. i wonder if the white house had been contacted about a couple of these stories that have been broken tonight and asked for comment and trump thought maybe, you know, i want to get -- let's get people talking about hillary clinton again instead of about my problems. >> and you talked about this before and you're a good reminder to all journalists. civilians forget that this dynamic is out there. lawmakers often do get a long lead heads up that something is coming. an aide will tell them, a reporter will let it be known, and so it's useful to look at his motivation in advance of something that may be bad coming out. >> i mean, i'm not a believer that donald trump is playing five-dimensional chess and he's super clever and the tweeting is helping him. i think that's mostly ridiculous, but he has certain kind of cunning and he certainly

is a fighter in his way. and so, yeah, i take this as a sign. you're going to the u.n. you're going to give a speech that's well written and all that. this isn't the time to be picking a fight with hillary clinton. the fact that he did it so abruptly on monday morning. we tend to focus on the story. we want the truth. trump gets to fight his fight too here and as i say, i think he'll really go nuts about the leak. i'm sure he'll order sessions to look into this. it's an outrage that a fisa warrant has been leaked. >> bill, thank you very much for coming by. bill kristol. twitter and thoughtful commentary are not on which words that are used together, but he has managed it. >> coming up, are senate republicans really getting ready to try yet again to repeal and replace obamacare. what are the chances of that? more on that when the 11th hour

continues.

the last thing before we go here tonight, senate republicans are taking a final stab at repealing and replacing obamacare because of complicated senate rules, they only have until the end of the month to pass a bill with just 51 votes. that means they once again can't afford to lose more than two of their own. you'll recall john mccain was the third and final no vote for the gop during the last round. but the legislation has new life

in the form of a bill backed by senators lindsey graham and bill cassidy. politico puts it this way tonight. mcconnell and his team are engaged and serious about the vote and working with the conference to build support for graham cassidy, a source familiar with the bill's prospects said sunday. the white house is also operating with all hands on deck. democrats opposed to the republican plan spoke late into the evening tonight, adjourning just before we came on to the air tonight. here with us, jeremy peters, new york times political reporter, our own pro from doer on this subject. a man who knows the hill and this issue well. jeremy, what is the chance that democrats emerge from an ikea like fever dream where they're putting the pieces of their party back together in two or three weeks and say, my goodness, this is real, this is a real effort to repeal and replace in the senate? >> i think it is indeed very real, brian.

and lindsey graham and bill cassidy are two very well respected senators who have reputations for reaching consensus with their colleagues. i wouldn't, though, under estimate just how difficult it will be to get to that 50th vote because you can have mike pence cast the tie-breaking vote. crucially john mccain hasn't said how he'll cast a vote. >> he says arizona's governor seems to be behind it, and that would really influence him. >> absolutely. no. you're 100% right, brian. and that's going to be a big factor as well as his close relationship with lindsey graham. but you have not heard lisa murkowski or susan collins say how they're going to vote. and you have rand paul from the other side, from the right saying he's opposed to that. so getting to that 50 votes i think is still difficult at this point. >> and jeremy, remind the good folks watching tonight how many workdays this senate has left in

2017. where is the band width going to come from for health care? you might mention a few of the other topics they'd like to tackle. >> they've got an awful lot to do, none of which are small. you have tax reform, which is the white house's priority and the republican conference's priority both in the senate and the house. you have a budget that they need to get through, that they are going to have to pass before december 15th. and thanks to donald trump, you have immigration reform and an act to deal with the d.r.e.a.m.ers that he has suddenly dumped in republicans' lap. so amid all of that now, brian, they are going to go and handle the issue that has bedeviled them more than any other this year so far, repealing obamacare. i just -- i remain very skeptical. never say never, but i just don't at in point see how that's going to happen. >> and in our waning seconds, again, as a viewer's guide,

let's say it's 51-49 in the senate. they cobble together this majority, repeal and replace passes. what happens to it then? >> well, i think if this passes the senate, the chances of it getting through the house are probably pretty good. the senate has always been the tougher road. i think i would think about this, though, it's most helpful to think about this, brian, in sterms of the political importance for republicans. when they failed to repeal obamacare both in the house and in the senate, the air really went out of the balloon for them. the dismay that you heard from the voices of republican voters, especially in crucial races that happened early onin in georgia sixth, i mean, it was just palpable. they need to demonstrate competence and if they can't get this done it is going to really hurt them in 2018. >> our man on the hill, our pro from dover on so much

as always for making time for us, especially on this monday night. that is our broadcast for this evening. and our thanks to you for being with us as we start off a new week around here. goot night for all >> breaking news tonight on special counsel robert mueller's case against paul manafort, the president's one time campaign shareman. according to the "new york times" when federal agents executed a search warrant on his virginia home, two months ago, the special counsel followed up with a warning. prosecutors told manafort they plan to indict him, said two people close to the investigation. that's one of the tactics employed by mueller. which reported they picked the locks on his front door, took binders, even photographed the