morning, hallie. good morning, everyone. stephanie rhule is off today. it's friday the 13th of october. let's get started. >> the day to dismantle obama's signature moves. >> trying to reverse former president obama's policies piece by piece. >> announcing he will scrap critical subsidies to insurance companies. helped to pay out of pocket costs for low income people. >> a move that could unravel the markets. >> clearly the president has -- he's deep in thought to say the least, about way ahead in iran. >> today president trump is expected to announce he'll decertify the iran nuclear deal. >> the next steps to congress while not necessarily pulling out entirely. this is a like a theme for him. >> i'll be giving a speech on iran. a terrorist nation like few others and i think you're going to find it very interesting. media is bad. they're really dishonest people. these are very, very dishonest people in many cases.

media has said -- i call it fake media. it's so much fake news. it's frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write. and people should look into it. >> okay. a lot to cover today. we begin with what may be president trump's most serious blow yet to former president obama's signature health care law. ending a crucial component of obamacare. cost sharing reductions. you might hear them as csrs. the headline on axios says it all. trump takes a sledge hammer to the aca, bstcare. president tweets obamacare is a broken mess. piece by piece we will now begin the process of giving america the great health care it deserves. also tweetsing the democrats obamacare is imploding. massive subsidy payments to their pet insurance companies has stopped. demes should call me to fix. pelosi and schumer blasting the

move calling it a spiteful act of vast pointless sabotage leveled at working families and the middle class in every corner of many erk. allows insurance companies to sell cheaper policies that offer less than obamacare currently requires. the president was talking about it just moments ago. >> you saw what we did yesterday to health care. it's step by step by step. and that was a very big step yesterday. another big step was taken the day before yesterday. and one by one it's going to come down and we're going to have great health care in our country. we are going to have great health care in our country. we're taking a little different roud than we had hoped because congress forgot what their pledges were. so we're going a little different route. but you know what? in the end, it's going to be just as effective and maybe

it'll even be better. >> not sure about that. the president said people will pay less for health care. but for fact's sake, our fact figures find the opposite. cost sharing reductions. they're subsidy payments critically made by the federal government to help insurance companies use to help the out of pocket costs that low income americans would otherwise pay if they're part of the insurance -- the public marketplace. this year the payments to insurers were set to be $7 billion. next year they were going to be $10 billion. but take a look at this. in august the congressional budget office issued a report saying that ending these subsidies would increase federal budget deficits over the next decade by $194 billion. okay? they're going to includrease th deficit. some states announced in 2018 that obamacare premiums would all be up.

if we had kept the cost sharing reductions, this is the increase you'd see for 2018. without them, pennsylvania was 9% now it's 20%. michigan, 17%, now 27%. georgia was going to be up 31.5%. now up 54%. maryland was going to be up 33%. they have not speculated what it will be without the csrs. so we don't know what's going to happen there until now. other states almost assumed because the president had hinted that the csrs would not continue. delaware looking at a 25% increase. south carolina, 31%, tennessee 37%. iowa 37%. the big exception is alaska which has the highest health insurance premiums in the nation. they announced an average premium decrease of 26.5% even though they assumed the is csrs would not continue. already the attorneys general of new york and california say they are going to file lawsuits to prevent president trump from

ending the subsidies. the republicans have always insisted that the subsidies are illegal because congress never appropriated the money for them. and in 2016, this is important, a federal judge agreed with congress. john boehner as the speaker at the time filed suit and a federal judge agreed with that. but the judge put her ruling on hold and that is still being appealed 37 we're going to stay on this story. we're going to give you everything you need to know. one thing you do need to know, there are no immediate changes as they relate to the 2018 open enrollment period because these states had already determined what those increase rates would be. they're going to be higher, but they were going to be higher anyway. another big issue, you heard president trump just talk about it. he teased a major announcement later today. >> in a little while i'll be giving a speech on iran. a terrorist nation like few

others. and i think you're going to find it very interesting. >> i'm sure we are. al l hallie jackson is going to be there in a speech. he is expected to say he will not certify the nuclear agreement even though he has certified twice since taking office. but before that, let's have a refresher. the iran deal is known as the jcpoa the joint comprehensive plan of action. it took two years to negotiate and involved domestic risk by everybody who was signing on. key provisions of the jcpoa are restrictions on the amount of nuclear fuel that iran can keep for 15 years. it also cut down on the country's stockpile of low enriched uranium by 98%. and this is important, it was a reduction in the number of centrifuges reduced by two-thirds. all of these are vital to creating nuclear weapons. iran is subject to intrusive

inspections to make sure they're complying. the president says he's not canceled the deal and despite kicking it to congress, he's not asking them to toss it out either. at least not yet. here's what is happening. the administration is asking for so-called trigger points which if violated would allow the united states to re-impose sanctions on iran. those trigger points include ballistic missiles by iran. iran refusing to extend the timeline on its nuclear fuel storage restrictions. or if u.s. intelligence agencies believe that iran could actually finish a nuclear weapon in less than a year. all right. what all of this does not take into account? there are other countries involved in the deal. there were five others who were responsible for negotiating it along with iran and the united states. there's the uk, france, russia, china, and germany. remember, this was a huge,

multilateral agreement. it is not something that the u.s. can easily just rip up. there are consequences for violating the deal assuming as we have been that iran is actually sticking to its side of it. if the majority of an eight-member panel finds that iran is in violation, sanctions will snap back into place. you heard that term used a lot. all countries involved and the european union sit on that very panel. if the administration thinks putting sanctions back is going to fix everything, remember that north korea developed nuclear weapons despite more severe sanctions. some food for thought. before the president tries to discard what was a very hard plan. there are a lot of sides to this thing. i want to go to iran for one of them. laura, let me start with you. because this is really

important. the agency is the one that reports on whether or not iran is living up to its side of the agreement. as it relates to its nuclear pra m. and they have continuously said iran is living up to it. >> that's right. time after time when the agreement -- when the iea has been asked to give its ruling which is quarterly, they have identified that they have found no violations of the nuclear agreement with iran. >> ali, the issue here of course that the trump administration is bringing up is not that iran is violating the letter of the deal that was signed, but there was a preamble to that deal and an understanding iran would be a better global citizen and good neighbor. and they're saying they are not doing that. it is meddling. they are involved in propping up the regime in syria.

it is involved in hezbollah. it's not being a good neighbor. >> well, ali, that was the hope of the obama administration. to improve iran's behavior. but that was not the latter of the nuclear deal. the only thing the deal was supposed to do was curtail iran's ambitions of creating a nuclear weapon. so far it has done that. iaea said iran has been in talks with a deal eight times so far. now, there are flaws with the deal. there's no doubt about that. there are things that could have been negotiated better. but that's not part of the deal. the deal was the nuclear program. and iran is adhering to the letter of that deal. so it boggles the mind why you would want to prevent your country against nuclear weapons. iran for that part sees there is a benefit to adhere to this deal.

they wanted to call to prop up again. they wanted to sell oil on the open market fop reinvigorate their economy. the only way to do that was to moth ball their nuclear program and they've done that for now. because they want better relationships with the international community. that's something president rouhani has said over and over again. but none of that is happening. so iran is now edging away from this. they're saying if you're looking at different aspects of this, if you want to revolutionize -- it makes the deal essentially null and void. so we're going down a very dangerous road here. you have a country that has been contained right now. and now you're opening the doors for it to break away from the nuclear agreement that's working. and nobody seems to agree with president trump on this.

all of america's allies are saying the deal is working. even the israelis is saying this is working. but they're saying we should adhere to the deal. so i'm not sure what the strategy is going forward once you take this deal apart or you start tinkering with different aspects of it that's going to make the iranians say we're out of this. this is not working for us. you're not -- we're entering some very uncertain times, ali. i'm not sure what will happen if this deal falls apart. but i can tell you for sure the moderates in this country will be silenced. >> very important point nap there are hard-liners in iran who side with this idea. they thought it was a bad deal too. ambassador holgate, spell this out for us. those who said this was a good deal or most of the people in america thought it was a bad deal. the truth was it was a hard deal

to arrive at for purposes of the aea. it was hard won. what are the chances of getting control of iran's nuclear program if they let this deal go? >> well, the chances are very minimal that that can happen. the iranians are complying with a very detailed set of investigations and measures under so-called additional protocol which is a standard document that many countries have. and under wish no country has ever successfully pursued a nuclear weapons program. but the iranians are only applying that provisionally. they have not yet ratified that until later in the process of the deal. and so it would be very easy for iran to step back from those intrusive conditions embedded in the additional protocol as well as other provisions on parts of their program of their nuclear

program. and if the u.s. is violating the deal, there's no reason to expect they would not step back from their provisions as well. >> all right. we're going to follow this closely. thanks for the analysis from both of you. all right. stan stand by, everyone. donald trump once again attacking the free press. i'm going to speak with a longtime champion -- newton minnow. why he's asked all the former president who is are alive to come together and fight this. here's our political cartoon of the day. a row of red buttons on his desk. they're labeled with some of this favorite targets. north korea, iran, cnn, "new york times," nbc, and the nfl. stay with us. you're watching "velshi & rhule" on msnbc. (cheering)

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it's frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write. and people should look into it. >> that was president trump in his latest assault on the press. but there's one outlet he seems to like listens to. check this out. since taking office he's done 16 interviews with fox news. that's more than all the other outlets combined. let's listen to just a few of those interviews over the past nine months. >> these people over at nbc news doing everything they can to take you down. >> what i have here is a copy of donald trump's tax returns.

we have his federal tax return for one year, for 2005. >> i thought you leaked those returns yourself. it made you look good. you had made $135 million and paid a lot of dough to uncle sam. >> you know, they're bad people. there's something wrong with them. they leaked them. it's illegal to do what they did i think. >> are you going after these leakers hard? >> thinking about it. we're looking at it. but it's terrible what going on in washington. we have a certain establishment out there that's leaking. >> will you be able to work with schumer after all of the horrible things he said? >> it's tough. i'm surprised because i've known him for a long time. >> big news today. you said you didn't take james comey. why did you want him to believe you possibly did that? >> well, i didn't tape him. but when he found out that i -- you know, that there may be tapes out there, whether it's governmental tapes or anything else and who knows, i think his story may have changed. i mean, you'll have to take a look at that. >> it was a smart way to make

sure he stayed honest in those hearings. >> well, it wasn't very stupid. i can tell you that. >> so now you get a flavor of how fox news interviews the president, you can understand why he doesn't really like nbc. joining me now is newton minnow. he was a sergeant in the u.s. army during world war ii. he served as chairman of the federal communications commission under president kennedy. he's one of the last remaining members of the kennedy administration alive. and that's just among a litany of other offices he has held in his long, notable career. just last year -- and you have to sit far second while i let people know. he was awarded, there it is, the presidential medal of freedom during president obama's last ceremony awarding the honor. ironically it was jfk who started that award and he was never around to award a single one of them. he recently penned two op-eds, newton did. one with an experience in the kennedy administration which is relative to this situation and

another appealing to all other former presidents. thank you for joining us. i want to start with this conversation that you wrote in an op-ed about a year ago when you got the medal of freedom. you remembered a time when president kennedy phoned you because he was mad about something that nbc had reported. >> thanks, al. what happened was that the ceremony for the medal of freedom was on november 22nd which was the anniversary of the president kennedy. i thought about president kennedy during that ceremony many years later. every president at some point gets irritated with the media. in the case i wrote about, president kennedy was in a

controversy with the steel industry. which had just raised prices despite what president kennedy thought had been a commitment not to do that. and i was at home one evening when president kennedy called me and he said, did you see the nbc news tonight? i said yes, mr. president, i did. he said you see what these guys said about me. i said yes i did, mr. president. he said i want you to do something. do something about it. and he hung up. of course, i thought about it and i didn't do anything. and in the morning, i call the president and i got the president's assistant. and he said i know why you're calling because i was with the president when he called last night. i said either tell the president yourself or i'll be glad to talk to him myself. but tell him he's lucky he's got

a friend at the fcc who knows enough not to pay attention to the president when the president is angry. >> because presidents get angry. and they legitimately do and they're not supposed to be in love with the media that covers them. >> right. but the difference today is that i think our current president doesn't auns that. it's the job of the press to be a critic and to -- and that's the role of the press. that's why the first amendment protects the press because that is exactly what the media should be doing. and the current president's judgment, everything he doesn't like that the press reports is fake news. and that's just a misunderstanding of our government. >> just so our viewers have a proper roll of what the fcc plays, wla should it be?

i guess you're looking for certain standards to be held up for decency, for mall las. what are the things you could have gotten involved in as the chair of the fcc? >> well, the fundamental point of the law creating the fcc is that broadcasters should serve the public interest. the public interest. not the private interest. and the public interest means that journalists should cover the news, critique things as they wish. but try to be as fair as possible. that's the fundamental point. but if the public interest is taken by the bait and criticism and nurture and change. that's the american system. >> newt, you have an ask. you're not letting it go. you've asked all living presidents to take action about the stuff that president trump

is doing with respect to the media. what is it you're asking them to do? >> i'm very alarmed when the head of our national intelligence and the chairman -- republican chairman of the foreign relations committee tell us that the president is unstable and our system where one man has his hands on the nuclear weapons, i'm asking the five president who is have 32 years in the oval office with their hands on the nuclear weapon, very steady hands for all 32 years. i'm asking them to alert the country to the seriousness of our current situation. >> good to talk to you. >> al, we miss you in chicago. >> bill there on tuesday, actually. bill there next week. good to see you. maybe i'll see you there. >> thanks. >> newton minow, former head of the fcc. stand by, everybody.

the harvey weinstein scandal is getting worse. dozens have come forward with allegations against the movie mogul. what's next for him and hollywood? you're watching "velshi & rhule" live on msnbc. the morning walk was so peaceful.

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new fallout this morning from the scandal surrounding harvey weinstein. the number of women accusing him of sexual misconduct continues to grow. scotland yard is reportedly investigating weinstein. received a report wednesday about an alleged sexual assault in the united kingdom from the 1980s. also developing, another board member of the weinstein company is out. a source in a position to know tells nbc news richard koenigsberg is the latest to step down. he's among four other member who have resigned since the scandal surfaced. variety reports some board members are pushing for the company to be sold while others say they want to stay and try to weather the storm despite business partners bailing and debt piling up. i want to bring in msnbc legal analyst danny cevallos.

good to see you. this is kind of tricky from a legal perspective. you are part of a major corporation. many of them do very little and they get paid a lot of money. they're often the owner's friends and other rich people. bailing when things get bad is actually -- can be legally perilous. because if they knew what harvey weinstein was up to or had an inkling about it, they had a legal responsibility to get on top of that thing. you can't just leave and wash your hands of the stuff. >> no. they're in a tricky position. you're absolutely right. as a member of the board, you have the fiduciary and legal o obligations. this could be evidence of what they knew. in terms of finding out what they actually knew, this is going to be discoverable. there's going to be e-mails. there's going to be memos. there's going to be some sort of records of who knew what and when. it's important to know that in states like california and new

york but particularly california, there is automatic, strict liability for a company when a supervisor like harvey weinstein harasses an employee, sexually harasses an employee. >> we'll put up a screen of those on the board. harvey weinstein and his brother ran successful companies that created great films. that won a lot of awards. and in theory, that's the kind of thing that makes money. now with weinstein out, there are people who are saying maybe this company can't even survive reputationally it can't make films. it can't attract the capital it needs. people won't want to touch it. yet there's some creativity possibly and value in some parts of that company. >> they have a difficult decision to make. they may want to consider chapter 11, reorganization. it means they reorganize. they negotiate their outstanding debts and try to get people to accept a little less on the

dollar than what they're owed. they have to look carefully at the assets and the business as what's called a goirng concern. what is its viability in the future and is it worth the trouble of reorganization. >> that's a tough question in a company with this sort of reputational damage. can they live off of their laurels in the past to say we can still attract good money and movies or is that too damaged. now we have another unrelated but interesting story. amazon has suspended one of its hollywood executives kaccused o sexual harassment. roy price was accused of making graphic and unwarranted sexual remarks back in twvtz to isa hackett. first reported the accusations back in august. the site reports there was an investigation but no information about any results. yesterday amazon announced it was suspending price after

hackett went public with details in an interview. in a statement, it was said row price is on leave of absence effective immediately. joining me is editor and chief of the information. thank you for being with us. first of all, what's the connection between roy price and amazon and then b weinstein company? or are they just putting them into the same press release? >> so there's two connections. the first is that yesterday rose mcgowan also accused roy price of basically covering up or not taking action on her allegations against harvey weinstein. amazon has projects with the wine steen company. there's a conflict there as well. they're also entangled in

incidents because isa hackett said she was willing to share more about the event because she's boldened on what to give out. >> do you know if there was action taken after the investigation in 2015? do you think the suspension that they announced yesterday is because of the harvey weinstein stuff that amazon was trying to get in front of this? >> we don't know. we know that isa said she told amazon about this incident back then. that it was investigated. amazon told us that the information, the same thing earlier this summer. i think yesterday she had a lot more detail about the nature of his remarks, some very explicit and graphic details. i believe that made this tougher to ignore. >> you learned that amazon brought in the same investigator who looked into isa's claims two years ago to talk with employees in the spring. tell me about this. because what we hear about in

other companies where sexual harassment or assault is uncovered. companies bringing people to talk to other employees. is that to protect them? to try and figure out whether this is more widespread? do you know anything about that? >> i think, you know, it's really to try and get to the bottom of what's going on. i mean, obviously the investigator was trying to do her job. i think the question is what does the company then do once presented we the information? we know that a lot of people spoke to that investigator including hackett. >> jessica, thanks very much for joining us. founder and editor in chief of the information which broke that story on the amazon situation. stand by, everybody. we're digging back into trump's tax plan. there's some really good reasons it hasn't happened since 19 e6. we'll explain why reagan's reform passed and why trump's a harder sell. and here's stephen colbert are

trump's promise to cut taxes to the lowest level in decades. >> yes, bottom line. he's taking our tax plan more than 80 years to the 1930s, the era that will forever be known as the great happiness. just look -- sure. i mean, need proof? just look at this mother's radiant smile. you wish to know how to protect your sterling credit score. my credit is off to a good start, but i worry my information was hacked, which kinda freaks me out. well, unfreak yourself out and download the free creditwise app from capital one. creditwise gives you a credit score, and alerts you to changes. even if i'm not a capital one customer? nooooo! yeah, and it's free for everyone. thank you. gravity, is a fickle mistress. what's in your wallet?

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welcome back to "velshi & rhule." here are some of the top stories we're following right now. breaking news in california. right now more than 20 wildfires are burning in the state. 31 people have died. hundreds are missing. unfortunately the conditions are getting worse. there's an elevated threat through much of northern california all weekend. strong winds are expected tonight and tomorrow. 20 to 60 miles an hour in some areas. and here's an indication of the challenges that firefighters are facing. the fires are barely contained. all right. earlier today a western family freed from the taliban left pakistan for great britain. caitlin coleman and joshua boyle seen here in this taliban-released video were taken hostage by the taliban while hiking in afghanistan in 2012. they had their three children while being held by the taliban. president trump is touting

his tax plan as recently as this morning. >> we hope congress will pass massive tax cuts for the american people. >> so it's a cut now rather than tax reform. and does it help you? the answer keeps getting clearer as the president compares the proposal to president reagan's tax cuts in 1986. but analysis and, well, plain old history shows the plan is missing, well, kind of everything that made the reagan plan so beloved by a generation of conservatives. i want to bring in cnbc editor at large john harwood to talk to about this. john, good to see you. >> hey, ali. >> first of all, people sort of forget that as much as folks like reagan's tax cuts, much of it was undone through the course of, you know, some of it was undone through the course of his presidency. it's not he just had this big cut and that was left for all of posterity. >> that's right. he had an initial cut taking the top rate down from 70% to 50% when he came into office.

then tax reform took it down to 50% to 28%. but then of course it crept back up in the years since although some of the base broadening provisions remained. you highlighted the key point at the beginning. president trump said we're going to have a massive tax cut. that's not what reagan did in 1986. this was a tax reform that involved raising the same amount of money for the government, but shifting how you raised it to make the economy more efficient. that's one of the things that allows you to pull the two parties together. that allowed you to get bill bradley and jack kemp together on the page. because economists agreed at that time lower rates, broader base, is a better way to go. >> jack kemp, republican, that was part of the secret sauce back in 1986 in the early '80s. there was bipartisan support. there are tax cuts to individuals with an equivalent tax high to cooperations. and there were, you know, laborers were taxed lower than

shareholders were. there was at least some semblance that regular folks were getting -- >> much easier to sell to the american people than the current plan. and that's even discounting the idea that ronald reagan was in 60s in approval. donald trump is down in the 40s. in this case, you've got a tax plan that according to the tax policy center raises taxes on individuals overall although wealthy people get a big tax cut. that is difficult to defend -- well, economists don't buy the administration's argument so far. in fact, there's a bush administration economist who runs the penn wharton model who says this will shrink growth in the long run. what about the impact on deficits? steve mnuchin says it will raise so much money from economic activity that it'll bring

deficits down. most economists don't believe that. that even supply ciders think that in the mean that tax cuts can only pay for maybe half of themselves on the corporate side. >> part of it, john, is you can't draw a straight line between tax cuts and a boom in gdp growth. it could contribute to an increase in gdp growth, but we are in a much more global economy than we were in 1986. so the line is less direct. there are things that can cause the economy to boom. and there are things that can cause the economy to crater that may have nothing to do with any kind of fiscal policy to put in place. >> absolutely right. bill clinton raised taxes and the economy boomed after that happened. the economy continued to approve. jobs grew. after barack obama raised taxes in that fiscal cliff deal. you've also got a big dispute over the questions about what's going to happen with that money that comes back to the united states. the administration says, oh,

that money's going to be invested and go to workers in higher wages. but when they had a repatriation holiday when they brought cash back, american multinational corporations did in 2004, where did that money go? it went to shareholders, not to workers. >> right. and i'm not -- i don't want to paint this the wrong way. companies can do what they want. but gary cohn had said -- because president trump kept talking how this was going to increase household income by $4,000. gary cohn finally explained this on tv yesterday saying companies, that will be the average per worker benefit that companies get. obviously they're going to give that to workers. again, i'm not faulting companies for not doing it, but that's not what companies generally do when they show up with extra money they got from not paying taxes. if it goes anywhere, it's goes to shareholders. >> exactly right. gary cohn was asked about that at a white house briefing and was asked, well, if the money goes back to shareholders and buybacks and that sort of thing and dividends, is that okay with you? and he said, yeah, that's fine

because those people will then put the money back into the economy. that is a trickle down argument. >> doesn't always work. >> some people believe that, but that's not exactly what history shows us. the track record for that is not great. >> john, good to see you as always. thanks for the discussion. cnbc's john harwood. stand by, everybody. president trump's ethics chief says he is, quote, deeply concerned about the government's leaders. we're going to break that down for you next. you're watching "velshi & rhule" on msnbc. when a fire is going on,

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welcome back tovell ruhle " ruhle." they come in on and the officer said he is, quote, deeply concerned that the actions in some in government leadership have harmed perceptions about the importance of ethics and what conduct is and is not permissible, end quote. joining me now, bloomberg's ben

brody who reports on government ethics. ben, thank you for joining me. what does the government accountability office say? >> the accountability office says what the government did do during the transition, and it says the state department was able to help the president on only a couple of phone calls. if you cast your mind back to november, there were a ton of phone calls coming in, and we don't really know, you know, how many of those were secured, how many of those need to be secured. that was one thing. the other thing that the gao report was talking about was the fact that the president did not really consult with the office of government ethics about how to dispose of his businesses, and he was really breaking with the president of some of his forebearers in that. >> wasn't the point of the other guy, walter schaub leaving that job, about the fact that everybody's expectations were this government ethics office was not going to be particularly vigilant about this administration. i mean, the white house doesn't

really seem to take that offer seriously, anyway. >> this appears to be correct. there appear to be a lot of sort of records that the white house hasn't necessarily provided. the president sort of took his exemption from some of the ethics laws and just didn't do anything with them, didn't take this advice that was pretty freely given despite the fact he is exempted from those ethics laws. he says, i'm exempt and i don't want to listen to it, which i think listening to walter schaub who left the government organization after a couple months, i think that is part of the big reason he exited. >> we know there are at least five cabinet officials under investigation right now, scott pruitt, david which i wichilkin zinke. much of this is about airplane

usage. is that an ethics question that's raised? >> that is annett ethics quest and they mentioned this is normal for high-ranking officials to take this travel. in the gao report they are able to say this is within the law for government transitions. they don't say how many people are doing it, how much it cost, necessarily, or what the point of it was, but they made clear this jet travel charter habit sort of started back then. >> ben, good to talk to you. thanks for joining us. we'll have special live coverage of president trump's announcement on the iran deal. stay with us. one more thing i want to do, we got monumental americans. here on "velshi & ruhle," we've been introducing you to monumental people. today i want to introduce you to civil rights activist mary

mccloud bethune. they are considering putting a statue of her to replace a confederate general. she was born to parents who had been slaves. she started a school for african-americans in daytona beach. she became an action figure as a member of franklin roosevelt's so-called black cabinet. she was the only founder of the adviser to five american presidents. she died in florida and was known as "the first lady of the struggle."

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welcome back to "velshi & ruhle." here are the top stories in the last hour. just now president trump spoke at the religious conservative group. he said he was committed to values and he spoke about many issues on his agenda. he was the first sitting president to address the event. a group of lawmakers are in puerto rico today. the group will tour the remains from irma and maria. three weeks after maria made landfall, electricity is scarce. many on the island are still without clean drinking water. that brings it to an end for me. thank you for watching this hour

of "velshi & ruhle." i'll be back at 3:00 p.m. eastern. my colleague stephanie ruhle will join me. time to hand it over to andrea mitchell for "andrea mitchell reports." dismantling the deal. this hour president trump will announce he will no longer certify the iran deal, leaving a crucial decision about whether to reimpose sanctions and officially leave the decision up to congress. >> in a little while i'll be giving a speech on iran, a terrorist nation like few others, and i think you're going to find it very interesting. health care sabotage? donald trump going after the signature initiative of his predecessor, clipping key subsidies for low-cost health insurance plans, potentially sending premium costs climbing. >> one by one, it's going to come down and we're going to have great health care in our country.