president convicted after being, who the president pardoned. the same joe arpaio who was accused of abuse of power as the maricopa county sheriff. so i'll return to my original comment and probably something in corey gardner's thought bubble. seriously? that's all for tonight. thank you so much to the folks right here in mobile, alabama. we'll be back on monday with "mtp daily." if it's sunday, it's "meet the press" he on msnbc. and i'll have my tour right here in alabama. and ari, i know i'll late but nicole was late too. so make matthews pay for it. >> my only question, how are the oysters? >> i'll tell you in a few minutes. >> we'll check back with you. have a great weekend. what we have is a lot to

chew on. two stories breek this friday night. who bob mueller interviewed today and the briefing room and russian contacts. i'll bet you know that many big stories do break on friday nights. tonight no exception. but this comes late in the day from "the new york times." an important school regardless of where one may stand on the russia probe. this is a story that can cut both ways. it reinforces how persistent russian forces were even after the election which obviously looks bad. but it also suggests the russians may not have had the best access, which trump allies are using to argue there was no high level conspiracy. now whichever direction you take this story, it is significant for the workings of our government and for this russia threat. whether the president acknowledges it or not. here's what i'll tell you. here is the big news.

"the new york times" reporting that bob mueller's team spent today and yesterday interviewing top trump aide hope hicks. and two, that russian operatives were trying to contact her well after the election, a pattern that was so acute that the fbi warned her about repeated attempts by russian operatives to make contact with her during the presidential transition. even after trump won, even after tense agencies had correctly labeled the kremlin, russian spies were still trying to get into the trump transition team. to get into the government in waiting heading into the white house. another point that's important. the "times" reporting this is about russians going after hope hicks. trying to reach her. no indication that she was encouraging that or that she did anything wrong in this story. the fbi agents met with hicks twice after trump took office,

reportedly giving her the exact names of the russians who kaktd her and they were not who they claimed to be. and they urged miss hicks to be cautious. that's advice she could certainly use tonight after sitting with bob mueller's team all day. she's been at trump's side from the start. in fact she is one of the first white house aides who got her start working for donald trump in business. >> hope hicks. the legendary hope. come on up here. she's shy. >> a great person. she's done an amazing job. i have a great staff. one of whom is hope hicks. this is hope. this is hope. this is hope. nobody takes more phone calls in a day than hopeful so thank you, hope. >> nobody takes more phone calls. i'm joined by the former federal prosecutor. he knows a thing or two about corruption cases.

and howard fineman for the "huffington post." how good a journalist is howard fineman? he is the only nonlawyer we allowed to report and join us on this legal story. i start with our former prosecutor, jennifer rodgers. big deal that the fbi had this in a red level. this is after the election. as we are careful to do no, allegation of wrongdoing. how is this important? how would mueller touch on this in the interviews he did today? >> certainly another sign of the brazenness with which the russians were trying to get to trump and his inner circle for sure. as for what mueller and his team want from her, surely they want to talk to her, who she talked to about them. i read that he she told the white house counsel about they

will. what happened from there, i don't know if they inquired about other topics. it goes on the top of the information the president knew about when he was telling everyone, there was no russian interference, he didn't believe it, he didn't believe the russian intelligence. just another piece of evidence in that pile too, that he reportedly denied. >> it could make the president look bad if it ups the exposure to not have the credible denials he's made. at a certain point if the fbi is telling your top person in the situation rule, how do you keep saying there is no russian interference of any kind. >> i think you just said it and summarized it beautifully. that's one of the most important elements of the story. there's no doubt in my mind that hope hicks reported to the

president in the same way that she did to don mcgann. as jennifer said, one more piece of evidence the president knew that the russians were interfering, that they were engaged in the election. they were trying to reach his administration. and yet to this day he says he believes putin. he said he didn't do anything. who does the president think sent those agents to try to contact hope snihicks? it is time for the president to admit it and admire our tense services instead of demeaning them and admit that the russians have interfered and attempted to undermine our democracy. >> all of this comes a day when there are more reports about the way the wikileaks material spilled out into the public view. donald trump, we checked this. talked about wikileaks 141 times in just the final month before the election. so while it is not always clear,

exactly what moved where he, when, there is this growing chorus about the fact the white house seemed to be, at the time the campaign seemed to be definitely on notice about the links to russia. >> yes, the russians were brazen seeking to cultivate hope hicks who sits now outside the oval office. that's where her desk is. why were they so brazen? why did they feel a level of comfort about knocking on hope hicks' door and presumably he other door? why the almost fraternal approach? and i think that's what the bob mueller is going after here. he is going after the connective tissue between putin and his circle and trump and his circle.

what contacts there were and what was attempted some and he is looking the fill it in as he looks for the question of motive and possible collusion. and i covered hope hicks during the campaign. i dealt with her. she is not only very smart. it is impossible to overstate how plugged in with donald trump's world she is. there's no doubt if the fbi came and took her to the situation room, and briefed her on these approaches by the russians, there is no doubt that she immediately went and told the boss because she talked to the boss all day long. he probably wondered where she was for the hour she was in the situation room. so that's an fbi warning to trump as well. >> you make such an important point. we can all tell our campaign war stories. i didn't hear from hope all the time as a journalist but did i

file a couple stories about whether or not trump would actually pay for the original loans that he structured when he was self-financing and he perceived it as a comment that he couldn't afford it. she called me with him very much near to the phone and they ultimately provided a quote from him. unlike the other stories that had personally hit him because he was very offended by it. ultimately they did forgive the loans. it all comes forward and backward. >> the trump defense here which is voiced in the times reporting as well. they say it could undermine, if they had, they might have found a better entree. so how might a prosecutor rebut that? that's a situational defense. >> first of all, i think hope

hicks has been shown to be one of the closest connections to donald trump. so i don't think that i can accept the premise that they were reaching out to somebody who they were desperate to make connection. he talked to her all the time as you've noted. so i think the answer was she was an extremely good connection. and we know she's been involved in the drafting of the phoney report in the june meeting in trump tower with don junior. so she is involved in the investigation. and i think there's no reason to suggest that wasn't a good outreach. th to answer the question about why would they do it so brazenly, they've entree he to everybody they've tried. why wouldn't they keep on trying? they ask and they get. >> and it is not isolated because there are so many people, some high, some as we

reported, very close to donald trump. but others may be more peripheral. and then you have a debate about how peripheral they are. to that end, i want to ask but, not my material. i'm careful as a reporter. the proverbial, quote, coffee boy, george, who has pled guilty to false statements. his fiance speaking out in a somewhat unusual way. she is not they know trump folks because she is not buying the coffee boy defense. >> it was not a coffee boy. >> was he in touch with the chief strategist steve bannon? >> as far as i know, yes. i know steve bannon, michael flynn. >> he was in touch with general flynn? >> as far as i know, absolutely, yes. >> how important is that? and don't rule out the campaign that maybe he was in tough with flynn just to take the order and not talk about anything else. >> well, the key here is that he

was named to the original foreign policy advisory committee. and it didn't say next to his name, coffee boy. he was one of supposedly distinguished panel of people that donald trump was going to turn to for advice during the campaign. why was he on that list to begin with? what were his contacts with the other people? what was he supposed to be doing? you can laugh about it except trump was accused of not knowing anything about foreign policy. and someone put together a list of people and i think mike flynn was involved yp. why would he not have put papadopoulos on the list? >> this is a, you don't know me like that defense. somebody over there did something. i don't know him and he doesn't

know me. how do prosecutors chip away if that? they're talking foreign policy, he was more than a barrista. >> well, we've already seen he donald trump suggesting, he is a great guy. where was he in the meetings? he is right at the table with trump. those ties, those communications, the witnesses to discuss it. you're just trying to show that they're closer than the defendant might say. >> it is like the old song, more than a barista to me. thank you very much. i have more on the law. there's reporting on how trump's favorite bank might be in a panic. trump hits the road with an endorsement of roy moore.

and new, and fat joe is here on the beat tonight to talk hip hop activism and news on puerto rico. more people shop online for the holidays than ever before. (clapping) and the united states postal service delivers more of those purchases to homes than anyone else in the country. ( ♪ ) because we know, even the smallest things are sometimes the biggest. even the smallest things anyone ever have occasional y! constipation,diarrhea, gas or bloating? she does. she does. help defend against those digestive issues. take phillips' colon health probiotic caps daily with three types of good bacteria. 400 likes? wow! try phillips' colon health.

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how much evidence has bob mueller actually gotten for his indictments so far? tonight we know. court rules require bob mueller's team to detail what he has on former trump aides paul manafort and rick gates. it is considered only fair to them as defendants. according to a new file obtained tonight, bob mueller has almost half a million documents on these defendants. e-mails, corporate records. and that shows mueller knows far more about his targets than the white house knows about mueller. that came as they spent the day grilling hope hicks. it was exactly one week bag

mueller brought mike flynn into court to plead guilty. so those are the important developments happening in this case. consider that the signal and contrast it to the noise emanating from donald trump's defenders. as mueller bears down on targets and witnesses, the noise is getting louder. when investigators, the noise can get really loud. consider that the context for this noise. >> two conflicts of interest that could get mueller fired. the first one is, mueller interviewed with the president for comey's job. he is being dishonest and deceptive. >> mueller's credibility is in the gutter tonight. his conflicts of interest, his clear bias, his corruption are on display.

he has put the country on the brink of becoming a banana republic. >> sort of weird in that graphic, there was no actual information. if you broaden out to the past week, the number of trump white house aides that bob mueller prosecuted went from zero to one. that's a binary change. and it is being met, we can see, with a shift in the attempted signal to rois ratio. the attacks not only on bob mueller. now on the entire fbi itself. some casting it as russian secret police. >> mueller has been using the fbi as a political weapon. and the fbi has become america's secret police. >> the fbi doesn't see it that way, of course. from their perspective you have a right to shut up and do what you're told and by the way, you'll stop asking so many questions if you know what's good for you. this is exactly how the secret police started. >> the secret police.

so let's keep in mind as we process that, there is the signal and there's the noise. if you know anything with bob mueller, he will probably tell his investigators, forget that noise. back me, jennifer rodgers. currently a senior. i begin with you. do you think this is a noise distraction? and what do you think substantively of the attempt by some of the most prominent conservatives in the country, who i just showed, tucker carlson and sean hannity and others, to liken the fact finding to the secret police? >> i think your analysis is right. this is a response that bob mueller is building inroads and building a case. and therefore the trump wing is

panicking. the way they're trying to smear a man like bob mueller is disgusting and disgraceful. there are so many disgusting and disgraceful things going on in the world including many of them are willing to do that. you have someone like bob mueller, a lifelong prosecutor who was, who up until he became the special counsel, was universally revered in washington. known as a man of unshakeable integrity. appointed to run the fbi by george w. bush. reappointed by oprah. now people who were trying on praise him are trying to tear him down. they see him as a threat. trump himself was leading the way in a way that it violates

the law. he is actively trying to obstruct justice at this moment. >> i couldn't agree important. it's one thing to attack press. they do it sometimes. but another thing is to attack your own justice department and to declare the fbi . this notion of attacking the people are your people is really, i think, unprecedented and really disheartening for those of us in law enforcement. >> and i know you say that as someone who worked the fbi on a daily basis from law enforcement. i want to point to the importance of language here. because going on to a year into the trump presidency, there's clearly a larger pattern of using distraction attack and extreme language to kind of exhaust everyone. to kind of clear it all out. and i want to play for you rush

him because. i showed tucker carlson referring to secret police. and we don't make it a practice to just look at what other tv channels are doing as a daily habit but i'm looking at this because it seems important. the same with rush limbaugh. he refers tow a coup. >> mueller has always been an investigation leading to impeachment. not crime. i think there's and has been ever since trump was elected, a silent coup to get him out of office, ultimately. >> this whole investigation stinks worse than cabbage cooking in a small unventilated kitchen with sardines on the side. there needs to be an investigation of the investigation. >> that there is a former governor and the father of the current white house press secretary. your view as a conservative about how people should meet this sort of extremist rhetoric which relates to potential

action. >> i think it is shocking to which these supported conservatives are willing to bend the rule of law. why did they put some importance on appointing justices to the supreme court. those judges are supposed to uphold the rule of law. and yet clearly, this trump chorus is seeking to undermine the rule of law and another thing jumps out at me, that trump and his supporters spent so much time attacking people on the left, including and especially those nfl players who needle during the national anthem for questioning the actions of the police and they like to upheld to virtues of the men and women. the justice department, mueller, nib if. they don't mine undermining law

enforcement. just reprehensible and making it worse because all these people are basically colluding with trump to obstruct justice. >> i think you nailed it. what is the fbi? federal cops. they do state law. they are by the way people risk their lives for it. thank you for being here as always. one of the few reports. roy moore, as i mentioned, days out from the election. drurn personally campaigning. coaching means making tough choices.

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he spent four years reporting from moscow for the guardian. his new book, collusion. he grilled paul manafort. and he got a meeting that most members of congress could not. he interviewed the now famous christopher steele who wrote the dossier. and he reported extensively on donald trump's relationship with a bank that recently got subpoenas from bob mueller. he is in london. what are your sources saying about how deutsche bank is handling the demand for financial records about trump? >> well, my sources are telling me that deutsche bank is completely terrified. they're having a meeting next week the discuss it. the back story is exceptionally tricky. donald trump, famously defaulted on a loan, $45 million to deutsche bank in 2008 after financial crisis, he sued the bank.

but then the bank lent him another $300 million. and i talked to people inside the warning about this new york. and i say is this normal? they say, are you kidding me? it's not normal. and i think this partly explains why bob mueller has subpoenaed the bank to get to the truth. >> right. they said are you if'ing kidding me. your view of the theory that mueller wants to know whether anyone linked to the kremlin could have bought part of that trump debt. >> well, that's right. trump has a history of bankruptcy. he gave a personal guarantee. the bank took that. what we have to remember is that while deutsche bank new york was busy lending to the future president, deutsche bank in moscow was carrying out a massive money laundering scheme for vip cemetery religion

connected involving $10 million. going from moscow to the western financial system and deutsche bank was great profits off this. the question is whether these twoe strands, the russian money laundering and the lending to the president was connected. and the department of justice is investigating deutsche bank. and who does department report to? the president. so there's a clear he conflict of interest. >> i've heard about that one. >> do you think from your reporting that donald trump will ever be critical of it? >> that's the question in my book, collusion. we've had almost a 84 of upheaval and daily chaos and news that you follow. the one constant, like the sun rise go in the morning, the dossier of christopher steele, whom i met, says that putin has

leverage over trump. and i see nothing in recent weeks or months to suggest that's not the case. >> how much of the dossier is true? >> well, steele's own assessment, according to friends i've talked to, is between 70 and 90%. it is not perfect. the reason he sent it to the fbi, he felt it was such a great conspiracy in his view, that it needed to be properly investigated. and i think having talked to his friends, that his morale is pretty good. he's been slimed by republicans on capitol hill bust we've had four indictments, michael flynn last week, and i'll sure there are further indictments to come in the next few weeks. >> i have to go bust why do you think there are more indictments in the coming weeks? >> i think we're not done with paul manafort. i think there are further question marks about carter

paige. many others we don't know yet about. and i think the heat has been turned up on jared kushner as well. >> wow! you have a book a lot of people are talking about. it is called collusion, secret meetings, dirty money and how russia helped donald trump win. programming note, my colleague rachel maddow is reporting on the trump-russia dossier tonight. straight ahead, barack obama makes a very interesting comparison about how the u.s. could lose its democracy. and trump on the road, down south with a very simple message in all caps. vote roy moore. it's easy to thl money managers are pretty much the same. but while some push high commission investment products, fisher investments avoids them. some advisers have hidden and layered fees. fisher investments never does. and while some advisers are happy to earn commissions

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carbon emissions at power plants. this is the potential. reducing co2 emissions by up to 90%... while also producing more power. this could be big. energy lives here. donald trump is all in for roy moore. this is right by the border of alabama. political professionals talk about earned media, and trump sure got lots of that in the election. this event in a major alabama media market. that means it is designed to reach the alabama voters who will hear about it, read the paper, along with trump's tweet today that said in all caps, vote roy moore. back with me, laura, it has

gotten worse, if you think this is a questionable choice. donald trump went from literally campaigning for roy moore's primary point to now embracing him, if anything, increasingly, despite the rising number of allegations, evidence and reporting that this is an individual who was a serial predator of women who were even below, women and teenage girls below the age of consent. >> that i think the allegations against roy moore have actually helped him. i think this late in the game, it seems like they're helping him. it seems to have insensed people who don't believe the accusers and think the "washington post" story is fake news and read their news from breitbart and they believe the women are lying and they feel like there is a big liberal conspiracy to take down roy moore. if anything, it seems to be a boone for him. >> do you think in some way,

whether or not it is an understandable development, some of the valid rage against donald trump's positions has spilled out in other directions? >> yes. there's obviously a lot of rage going on against the republican establishment at large. i think when mitch mcconnell came out and said roy moore should drop out of race, that helped him. all they need to say is establishment republicans don't like me and that seems to be really rallying his base. >> so there's ethics and then the politics. your reporting is that the politics of that helped roy moore because they don't like mitch mcconnell. >> i read a poll the other day where republican voters tend on believe women less than democratic voters. i think with republican races, i think the ethics matter less than the politics. >> let me talk to you, mafl, about homelessness.

this is a rot afflicting the party. the former republicans waking up every day and saying i'm homeless. politically homeless. >> that's certainly a realization i came to the day after the election when i reregistered after a lifetime as a republican and reregistered as an independent. i could not be part of this political party that has sold its soul to donald trump. and what we've seen in the years since, is that it doesn't end with donald trump. once you throw out all standards, once you judge that victory is worth supporting anybody, including a guy who is creditably accused of sexual assault by 16 different women. then you have no way to avoid even further moral compromises. so now in the case of alabama, the republican party is supporting a guy who is very creditably accused of molesting a 14-year-old girl, among other victims. and beyond that, everything he says and does is simply

appalling. this is a guy who has actually said that the last time america was great was under slavery. this is a guy who said he agrees with putin that america is the focus of evil in the modern world. this is guy who said that homosexuality should be outlawed. he is a caricature of a back woods bigot. it tells you everything you need to know about the complete moral and intellectual collapse of the republican party, that they are supporting this guy. >> as they say, happy holidays. >> i mean, it is a game of whackamole. trent franks, people in the democratic party, too, across industry. i mean, you can take one guy out. you can tar and feather each individual guy. and until you tackle the structural problems from.

are allowing for them to exist, nothing will ever change. >> thank you very much for being here. thank you for your analysis on both those stories. i want to show you something else. this is a new video emerging of a pretty serious warning about how democracy can get lost. this comes from former president barack obama. she was speaking at the chicago economic club but he invoked the lessons of nazi germany to warn how societies lose democracy. >> we've seen societies where that happens. now presumably, there was a ballro ballroom in vienna in the late 1920s or '30s that looked pretty sophisticated. and seemed as if with the music and the art and the literature and the science that was

emerging, it would continue in perpetuity. and then 60 million people died. >> very severe warning there from the former president. he is basically saying the complacency is the worst enemy he and the enabler of these problems. he did as barack obama does so go on to talk about other ideas and other ways to fix that in that address. he said you have to safeguard democracy with democracy and with a free and active press. we wanted to show that you it came from a facebook attendee. now coming up on the show, we have a lot more. not just fallback friday but fat joe is joining us and has news about puerto rico. each day justin chooses to walk.

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he was very famous before he ran for office. had he finished the race as the less popular candidate.

he is one of only five to assume office despite getting fewer votes than his point. trump went from being a harmless candidate in the culture dropping by shows like the fresh prince or giving directions in hole alone 2 -- >> excuse me. where is the lobby? >> down the hall and to the left. >> harmless. so it would seem. trump went from that role as a famous gag to something very different now. cultural leaders, treating him as a serious joke. and once nonpolitical figures like m & m taking him on. naturally, bill kristol. >> i want to say hi to fat joe. they've been active in this for a long time. >> you're not shouting out bill kristol? >> i've seen him on tv. >> hey, bill, we don't know you

like that. >> i'm speechless. what can i say? >> i'm honored to even be mentioned. >> that day, fat joe was on the phone but he did promise to come back to talk politics and the hurricane in puerto rico. tonight i can tell you the "new york times" saying the death toll is far higher than the local government claimed of the reporting that over 1,000 hurricane-related deaths had occurred. and now, this grammy nominated musician is back. joining me now is rapper and activist fat joe. thanks for being here. i'm good. i want to start with trump and then get to some other things. when you look at trump now, how does he compare to the donald trump you knew as someone in new york? >> man, he's totally different. i didn't think he was like that. i would see him walking that new york, going to big games and stuff like that. i always say, i was actually excited. i've been a democrat my whole

life. i was excited when trump announced that he was going for president. i was like, new yorker trump. >> you liked it. >> i liked it. and then when he went down the escalator and called the mexicans rapists and drug dealers, what's going on, man? i thought he made a big mistake. who would have known that would have got him to the white house? >> yeah. and why do you think coming out of new york, which has so much diversity. >> that was so weird, man. new york is so diverse. it is probably one of the only cities you can see jewish people and muslim people working side by side in unity. and it is so much diversity in new york city. it's weird to see the views that he shares. you know what i mean? it's crazy. >> let me play for you what jay-z was saying about this. he did this big interview with the editor-in-chief of the "new york times." >> the great thing about donald trump being president is now

we're forced to have the dialogue. now we're having the conversation on the large scale. and he's like provided the platform for us to have the conversation. back to our president. like you would think, man, mann stood at that podium, the dignity he brought to that place, that this couldn't exist, but it does. >> he revealed the silent majority. some people who feel like him walking amongst us who don't necessarily tell us in our face, but that's just the truth. and jay-z hit it head on. this is a time where people have to stand together, black, white, latino, asian, whatever. we all need to stand together, and if we stand for love over hate, then that's what's going to win. >> puerto rico is a cause you have been behind for a long time. but specifically the hurricane. you were telling me you raised $3.7 with other artists at this title benefit. here's what we know right now. you have a million applications

for assistance from fema but only about a quarter have been approved. a third of this island still without power. where do we go from here? >> man, i don't know, man. i don't know. we just -- i'm talking to my cousins. i'm talking to my family. and they say it's getting better, but slower than they want it to. just a little bit at a time. black friday, the number one seller was suitcases, so everybody is just leaving the island. and we're going to have resorts and it's going to be not the puerto rico that we know and love. >> mm-hmm. when you look at this moment that we're talking about, with all of this debate over donald trump, i mean, and you look at russia and you look at where we go from here. do you think that artists are playing the right role? you know, last time you were on, we were talking about eminem. do you think artists need to speak up more? >> you have fat joe. you have fat joe with ari. we're doing -- you know, fat joe from the bronx. we're doing as much as we can. we're being vocal about it. people just waiting for the democrats to take over, man. that's what -- i think that's

the game. that's the game plan. that's the play. you know, i don't think donald trump lasts four years as president. >> you don't. why not? >> because he's not supposed to be president. so that's -- i mean, it's sad whenever you have -- i remember the day he was elected, man. people were just so furious. people were so upset. i have never seen that in the united states. we are going through a time in my lifetime, we used to read about it in school. you know, now, this is such a weird time that's going on in america, where everybody doesn't know what's going on. you know, every day is a breaking news. have you noticed that? every single day -- >> i notice that sometimes. >> must-see tv. >> fat joe, terror squad. it's about us, it's about trust. it's what i remember. thank you for being here. i really appreciate it. >> thank you so much, ari. >> appreciate it. for my constipation,

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been a long week, perhaps, but it's friday on "the beat" and you know what that mean. it's time to fallback. i'm joined by christian, a stand-up comic and original on vh1's best week ever. chuck nice, also a comedian, rumored to be funnier. we'll find out, and francesca chambers. a frequent beat guest, but this is your debut on fallback. >> so excited to be in new york. >> there you go. who needs to fall back? >> this one, it's hard for me because i'm a huge fan. he's one of my heroes, but i'm going to have to say it's an annual thing for me, sir paul mccartney needs to fall back.

>> wow. >> yeah. if i had a time machine, i of course, would go back and kill hitler, but i would make a stop on the way to november 16th, 1979, to stop him from releasing the song "wonderful christmastime," which ruins my year. >> you're tired of it. >> the worst, a terrible song. i suppose it's a nice song if you want to feel magically transported to a tj maxx. >> is this a song you have been singing in the green room? >> theman the minute you hear the keyboard sounds from like a junior high sex ed film, the minute you hear it, it's going to be stuck in your head all day. >> but now you're plaguing me with it. he's been singing it in the green room. >> don't sing it. from the little you told me, i don't think we want to hear you sing it. it sounds like a repetition thing. as the grateful dead say, maybe you had too much too fast. >> that is true. i feel like it's constantly trying to set me off like a

manchurian candidate thing. i have this urge to kill. >> chuck, you don't look like you're feeling this. >> i love paul mccartney. i wish he was my lover. >> who needs to fall back? >> i'm going to go with jeff sessions who has been quietly waging a war since marijuana since he has been in office, and quite frankly, there's something called the rohrbaabacherohraba / rohrabacher/blumenauer amendment to the budget that stops the federal government from prosecuting anyone for medical marijuana. if that goes away, anyone who uses medical marijuana or sells it will be in peril. let me say this. i do not smoke marijuana regularly, or like snoop. but, i do believe that i have a family history of glaucoma that could hit me at any time in the next couple hours. and as a result, i just think that this is something that should be addressed. >> okay. >> that's all i'm saying.

okay. >> francesca chambers, who needs to fall back? >> i was stuck this week, but i went with lavar ball. he tweeted this gif of the president, and he's dunking over the president. and the president is getting very mad and looking at his phone and, like, the phone is of lavar ball dunking him and it still goes in the same gif. he had this feud with the president after his son had been accused of shoplifting in china, and the president and him shared some tweets. then we all moved on. but now he's still hitting the president. and it's the holiday season, ari. you know. >> lighten up. too much. >> let's move on. >> my fall back is simple. people on their phones all the time, everyone is glued to their phones and missing out on life. now there's a new phone, signature edition from lg for $1,800. it's being sold as an exclusive. and i just think they are dialing up our addiction and always making us use the phone. >> it looks like i'm going to have to return that phone now that you have called me out. awkward.

>> i hate to do this. but i will. i think this time i think chuck was funnier. >> oh, come on. stop it. stop that. >> i never had a chance. >> and you know what. and you were great, too. i don't know. i should never take sides. >> and you were great, too. an old girlfriend said that to me once. >> christian, chuck, francesca, thanks for lightening up our friday. "hardball" starts right now. trump touting more. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. even as some in his party warn of disaster if roy moore wins next tuesday, president donald trump is going all out with the alabama republican. and just over an hour from now, trump will hold a campaign rally in pensacola, florida. just 20 miles from the alabama border. it's a city that shares a media market w