trump to endorse the blockade of qatar by saudi arabian military. it's an interesting story. >> fascinating. heidi, final thoughts? >> joe, regardless of what happens tomorrow in pennsylvania, it is part of a national trend. we've seen from kansas to south carolina to virginia and alabama, which is the democrats are vastly outperforming their past performance. with money. outraising his opponent. and so are democrats a cross the country. >> in big, big -- in a big, big way, especially in pennsylvania '18. all right, thank you guys so much for being with us. thank you at home for watching. greatly appreciate it. we'll see you tomorrow. for now, stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage. stephanie. >> thanks so much, joe. good morning, everyone. i'm stephanie ruhle with a lot to cover on this monday. starting with armed with a plan. the white house takes its first step towards arming teachers while backing away from previous calls to raise the age on

certain firearms. and education secretary betsy devos, she is leading the charge by tempering expectations. >> everything is on the table. everything is on the table. everything is on the table. there are a number of issues on the table. >> everything's on the table. what does that mean? and keeping it quiet. nbc news has learned qatari officials have evidence of what they claim is illicit influence by one country over jared kushner and other trump associates. but why exactly did they keep this evidence from robert mueller? and how about a stalled storm. reports that the president's lawyers will try and block an interview with stormy daniels from airing. as the focus is changing from the porn star to michael cohen and his payment to keep her quiet. >> either michael cohen did this from his own funds, that's a felony, or he expected to be reimbursed. that's also a felony. >> as i said, a lot to cover

today, beginning with the white house. unveiling its plan to talk about protecting our schools. the proposal to arm teachers, well, that's the big headline. a plan opposed by students, teachers and the public, but guess who supports it? the nra. and i have a great team here to break all of it down this morning. first, i want to explain to you what is happening and just as important what is not happening. what is happening is the trump administration is moving forward with a plan to train and arm teachers. that is the major headline from a new commission that will study ways to secure schools across the country. education secretary betsy devos, she's the one leading the effort. >> schools should have this tool if they choose to use the tool. this is an issue that is best decided by local communities and by states. it is not going to be appropriate in every location but it is going to be appropriate in some places. >> shouldn't be a surprise that this white house is backing this plan because here's what the

president said just a few weeks ago. >> not everybody has an aptitude for a gun. but if they have the aptitude, i think a concealed per fission for having teachers and letting people know there are people in the building with a gun, in my opinion, you won't have these shootings. let people know, you come into our schools, you're going to be dead and it's going to be fast. >> in his opinion and the nras, the white house is also supporting a bill to fix the background check system and a plan to overhaul the mental health system. but one thing that is not part of the plan, raising the minimum age to purchase guns. something the president himself said made a lot of sense. so is it a surprise it's not in there? not really. for all the president's tough talk about opposing the gun lobby, his new plan is straight out of the nra playbook. they oppose the idea of raising the age limit but the nra supports the idea of a stronger background check system and they love the idea, of course, of arming teachers. the national education

association, on the other hand, they absolutely hate it. the president of the nea said last month, quote, bring more guns into our schools does nothing to protect our students and educators from gun violence. our students, they need more books, art and music programs. nurses and school counselors. they do not need more guns in their classrooms. now i want to turn to nbc's kristen welker live at the white house. kristen, why a commission, a commission sounds pretty bureaucratic, a lot of red tape. that does not sound like president trump's jam. >> not only is it bureaucratic, stef, over the weekend, when president trump was in pennsylvania, stumping, he blasted commissions, effectively said that they weren't effective. so it raised a lot of eyebrows when the white house yesterday said a commission is going to be part of this proposal. reporters pressed the white house on why that was the route they're taking. the white house said look, it is important to look at this from a

broad-based perspective. you heard education secretary betsy devos who of course is going to be heading up that commission reiterating that point. today everything's on the table. that's what she keeps saying. she says they're going to be look at some of these controversial issues like increasing the age to buy some weapons from 18 to 21. something that the nra opposes. but of course something that president trump had talked about over and over again, indicating that he would support that plan. that's something that a lot of parents, teachers and democrats wanted to see take effect. now it seems the president may be backing away from that fight with the nra. what the white house is doing is giving support to the legislation, the so-called ficks nics bill. it's a bipartisan piece of legislation by senators cornyn and murphy that would improve the background check system, require and strengthen those agencies that need to report concerns. also includes the stop school

violence act which authorized state-based grants to be used to train teachers and students to carry some weapons. it includes active shooter training. the white house defending it, saying, look, this is a case by case basis. the plan is also getting criticized by some who say this just puts too much burden on states and not enough in the hands of the federal government. so a lot to unpack here. again, this is a first step nearly a month after that tragic shooting in parkland, florida, stef. >> it's a first step or is it. i want to bring my panel in. phillip rutger is the washington bureau chief for "the washington post." matt welcwelch, editor at large reason. and phillip block, princeton university. i know the president really enjoyed that listening tour. sounds like he's only listening to the nra. >> yes, i think that's right, stef. remember in that february 28th

meeting he had with lawmakers, he sort of chastised senate republican senators around the table, saying he would have the courage to stand up to the nra, but it seems he too is beholden to the nra because there's nothing in this plan the nra would not improve. there's nothing in this plan that does anything substantial to the nation's gun laws. he's basically punting those decisions. a lot of gun control advocates feel he's shirking leadership here at the national level. >> the president is sticking to his -- remember, he has said over and over what great guys are in the nra. well, he's showing it with his position here. matt, savannah guthrie earlier today pressed betsy devos, trying to get an answer, how come the age limit 'is not part of this plan, and here's what she said. >> the commission being formed,

along with this issue, is on the table. everything is on the table. this commission will be studying it along with many of the other issues and will be forthcoming with solutions. >> everything is on the table. fortunately not a drinking game because if it was, people would be passed out before 9:00 a.m. but it's not in there. >> it's worth pointing out the table actually belongs to congress and not the president when it comes to gun policy. the only thing trump has really flirted as an idea is signing an executive order to ban bump stocks which i think would be questionable legally but that's the only thing in his purview. con, if it wants to, can pass this and put it on his desk tomorrow. it's up to them. it's not up to him. so in that case, yes, everything is on the table, if congress decides to do that. it is also worth reiterating always, whenever you hear a federal commission, that

commissionings are where ideas and policy in washington go to die. this is not going to produce, i do not think, anything like legislation or anything like action. >> okay, everything. one of the issues with everything being on the table is everything is next door neighbors to nothing. so betsy devos went on to say that arming teachers is something they want to explore. but you already have eight states that have it. so this is what the commission is leading with. what's the point? if states have the power to do it, this is a nothing. >> i was thinking about this and phil's piece in "the washington post" is just really great on this, is that trump lied again. he lied again. the meeting about gun violence and the aftermath of parkland, the parkland shooting, was just simply theater. what do we have as a response to it? more guns. we sought out to control guns. and the answer is just simply nra talking point of more guns. so in addition, i'm thinking

about this, in addition, the age limit not being on the table. it isthe assault, the ban of as weapons, isn't on the table. so here we have 17 babies dead and yet we cannot talk about, right, getting these weapons of mass destruction off the streets and out of the hands of folks. so he lied. it was theater again. just like immigration. it was theater again. and he's just in the pocket of the nra. >> betsy devos, is she the right person to lead this? i realize it's very hard to stand up to the president. it's hard in these interviews when the president is the king of enforced errors to try to talk stormy daniel, his language. but betsy devos sat down with lesley stahl and whether we're talking guns in schools or basic understanding of how the public school system works, even if her own state of michigan, where

that's where she gets a pat on the back for all that she's done, betsy devos struggled to put it nicely. so is she the right person to lead something this life or death important? >> the white house, stef, is trying to narrow the focus of sort of the gun debate to just school safety and i think that's one of the reasons why they selected betsy devos, the education secretary. but there's no doubt she is probably the most polarizing cabinet member right now. people if the education community just hate her. they really do. it's really intense out there. and her interview last night on "60 minutes" was very rough. i mean, she could not get a handle on the sort of basics of the nation's school system, including in her home state of michigan. now she's taking on the gun issue. we'll see if this goes anywhere. i suspect the commission's going to have a lot of meetings and not really do much. >> what do you think about that? exactly to your point. they're going to have this commission and it will result,

to your point, in nothing. can that actually happen? when you have parents of the parkland kids who died? when you have students who aren't going away. they're not getting fatigued. i'm looking at my facebook page and i see people i know day in and day out. saying i'm going to be there. there are parents who are now saying this is my life's work. this commission might exist but if it doesn't do anything, these people aren't going away. and these kids might not all be old enough to vote yet, but they will be next year and the year after and for decades beyond that. >> there's more than 300 million guns in america, one in every three households owns a gun. the second amendment has been recognized twice by the supreme court as an individual right. if you abolish the nra tomorrow, this would still be true. gun control wouldn't ring out across the land. we've been going after the safety of schools since 1990 is the first time the gun free zone act, whatever it's called, was

passed. it's not an easy solution. to pretend that it is is a problem. there are things you can do and address on an individualized basis. i think people tend to throw up their hands and say we have to do it all. in that process, that's easy to counterattack from anybody interested in the second amendment as an individual right. going after individual things that are doable, that's when you can get things done. that's what happened in florida with governor rick scott for example. >> are the kids going to get something done? today in "the new york times" the students, the kids from parkland, now calling on businesses to do more. we have a similar letter a few weeks ago from heads of schools. if you think about corporate america, business, the consumer they care about, the consumer they worry about is argued. >> particularly when we look at the business model, it's not really happening beyond those folks who actually own guns now, right. particularly with regards to

younger people. these folks are not only going to vote, they're going to be active, they're going to continue to push and press for serious gun control. and let's be clear, donald trump just saturday talked about drug policy. he said these commissions do nothing. they do nothing to address. we need to be tough. when it comes to actual gun control, we now find ourselves with the commission, right. talking about punting. >> they can punt but you know what, we're not going to forget it. i assure you, their mothers and fathers aren't. we have to leave it there. please stick around. coming up, officials in qatar say they have got evidence the united arab emirates influenced jared kushner and other trump associates, so why didn't the qatari officials give those details to special counsel robert mueller? a new nbc news report. remember, why did jared do this? he needs money. despite not having any real details yet about a future meeting between president trump

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officials claim to have gathered evidence that the united arab emirates has illicit influence over trump's son-in-law, as well as others. but decided not to share this information with robert mueller. this after "the new york times" reported that mueller's team is looking into the uae's efforts to buy political influence to some very secret meetings. nbc national security and justice reporter julia ainsly joins us. you've got the details. >> that's right, stephanie. what we knew about a week and a half ago is that the qatari officials believed that the trump administration had been influenced in order to go forward an eendorse the blockad against qatar and other gulf course neighbors. what is new is the information. we're learning now the qataris

had information on george nader and elliott brody, these two people connected to the emiratis who had secret meetings with the trump administration, both during the transition and once they were in the white house. and the qataris believe that this, as well as jared kushner's business with the emiratis, could have influenced that decision for the blockade. but this is the really strange world we're living in right now. and this, with the way the officials decided not to go forward to muler with this, this is really illuminating, because they were in this really tough place. they felt that there was undue influence behind this policy, but they didn't want to burn their own bridges. this, when i talk about this strange world, means that when you have these foreign influences coming into the white house, it also impacts how these people can go forward and cooperate. this is in a nutshell what a conflict of interest looks like and why they are being put in this tough position. >> jared kushner who still has a

major stake in his family's business. his family's real estate business that is deeply in debt. specifically they've got debt coming on 666 fifth avenue, a monster building with a monster debt problem. i want to bring in -- first of all, amazing reporting. i want to bring in msnbc national security analyst ned price. former special assistant to president obama and former spokesperson and senior director for national security counsel. what do you make of the qataris opting not to give information on kushner's secret meetings to mueller? >> this story is right up your alley in a way because it's about money, power and politics. the key here is the power. the leverage that the qataris now have over the trump administration in determining it was in their interest, as we just heard julia say, not to turn over info, information, to the mueller probe. we know the qataris have information on emiraty influence

in the trump administration. we know from previous reporting jared kushner, as of april last year, was seeking to get a major loan from the qataris for 666 fifth avenue. that fell apart. just weeks before the trump administration went all in against qatar in announcing and supporting this blockade on the part of saudi arabia and the emirates against qatar. so the question is what do the qataris plan to do with this leverage they now apparently have over the trump administration? it is precisely why the mueller probe was launched in the first place. not in the context of qatar but in the context of russia. of course there are all these claims about what the trump campaign team may have done vis-a-vis russia and what president trump himself, his conduct in russia years before. and that is leverage in another instance. but it's just as dangerous as what the qataris now appear to

have over the trump administration. >> let's remind viewers, if you think qatar coming out of nowhere, who knows them, remember, one of president trump's closest biz advisers who is not part of the administration but ran the inauguration, he has been the investor, the middle man, for the royal family in qatar for years. he knows these people very, very well. last week, "the new york times" reported, quote, mr. mueller's investigators have questioned mr. nader and have pressed witnesses for information about any possible attempts by the emiratis to buy political influence. so, walk me through how the qataris withholding this information effects the investigation. because also, if i'm qatar, i know the investigation is going on, but i also know president trump wants to fire mueller. >> well, exactly. but you also know that there are

a whole range of both business interests and policy interests that you have with the trump administration. and you know that when mueller's report, we're presuming his report, comes out and qatar is named as a coop ra diterative s that would spell an end not only to favorable policy outcomes but of course to the business deali dealings. the business dealings we know jared kushner wants to engage in with qatar and potentially other elements of the trump organization itself. so there's a huge incentive on the part of the qataris not to cooperate here. and of course it's something that the trump administration will welcome. so i think the calculation that the qataris have made, and when you take a step back and think about it, it's not all that unwise, is that they will be better served by staying mum. they will make clear, as they have for this nbc news report, that they decided not to cooperate with the mueller probe. and that in itself will be seen as a huge gift on the part of

kuwa qatar to the trump administration. the issue we have to be watching for is how will the trump administration repay qatar for this? i think we're going to see a quid pro quo in the coming days. it's just not clear yet what it is. >> president trump has said all along no collusion, no collusion. and the trump administration kind of laughs and smiles when you mention conflict of interest. but if we now know that julia ainsley has this reporting and we remember, in june 2017, trump clearly backed the decision to blockade qatar. doesn't that clearly show, man, this guy is mixing business with politics? i don't see country first, i see business first. >> it absolutely does. stephanie, this is nothing new. especially when it comes to jared kushner. one week after the election, he met with officials from china's bank to discuss a loan that

ultimately didn't come through. we know that during the transition, he met with the russian banker and close confidant. interestingly, the russians said the meeting was about private financial interest on the part of the kushner corporation. but others saying policy interest. so clearly jared kushner has consistently mixed business and policy in a way that is not only looks gross but in a way that puts our security at risk. if the trump administration follows through and it gives back to countries like qatar that opt not to throw them under the bus. >> it's a wow. ned, thank you so much. people inside that white house often say why is jared kushner dangerous? because he doesn't know what he doesn't know. while he was a business guy, he's never run a public company, had a board to answer to, shareholders. he learned his business chops from his father who of course, as you know, is a convicted

felon. ned, thank you so much. up next, we are just minutes away from the marketing opening. getting ready to kick off the week. but first, for kids who are home today, you got to see this, they love it. a building in kentucky's capital bites the dust. the controlled demolition included more than 1,500 pounds of explosives to take down the 28-story capital plaza tower. a new building will be built in its place. can't watch those things enough. they just look pretty cool. for

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we want everyone to work safely and come home safely. i live right here in auburn, i absolutely love this community. once i moved here i didn't want to live anywhere else. i love that people in this community are willing to come together to make a difference for other people's lives. together, we're building a better california. welcome back. i'm stephanie ruhle. it is time for your morning primer. we begin in china where lawmakers have now officially voted to remove presidential term limits allowing current president xi jinping to remain indefinitely. only two lawmakers voted against the unprecedented move. and five people were tragically killed when a helicopter crashed into new york's east river last night. the pilot was the only survivor. investigators believe engine failure was the cause of the crash. and president trump has reportedly told israel's prime

minister that the united states would pull out of the iran deal if his demands were not met. trump has reportedly set may 12th as the deadline for france, germany and the uk to fix the agreement. the houston astros will visit the white house later today to celebrate their 2017 world series win. the astros beat the l.a. dodgers last year for the team's first ever championship. and we got to stick with sports because you know what's coming, march madness has officially begun. the 2018 tournament bracket is out with virginia, villanova, kansas and xavier taking the top seeds. the tournament tips off tomorrow. get your brackets ready today. and happening now, the markets just opened two minutes ago and the dow is up slightly. cnbc's dom chu joins me now. i was not here on friday but boom, it was a monster jobs report. what do we expect today? >> so the monster jobs report did really propel the markets on friday like you said.

we're going to wait and see, like you said, if there's a little pause or building on some of that momentum. we're a stone's throw away from record highs in the overall stock market. really gave traders some optimism because it shows we are creating jobs as an american economy but we are doing so without a huge jump in wages. now that may not seem like a great thing but what it does mean is that the economy is moving along but that there's not a lot of fear of pricing pressure to the upside which may end up translating to stuff like milk prices going higher or food prices going higher or gasoline prices going higher. all of that stuff could maybe slow the economy down so right now traders will be keeping a close eye on whether or not we see those measures really pick up again. >> dom, then for your average american and the average american does not own stocks, doesn't that sort of portray this the richer getting richer and the poorer getting poorer? corporate america, stocks are soaring. they're not raising wages.

all those people out there who thought it's going to trickle back to me, it's trickling back to shareholders. >> that's a point of contention. policymakers of course at the federal reserve are going to watch those prices. they're also going to watch them closely because we have key measures of inflation and retail sales out later on this week. whether or not americans actually make more on their wages is going to be a huge point of contention. right now what we're seeing is that companies are not passing along some of those tax savings in the form of huge wage increases. some of them have made one-time bonuses. some people may be upping some minimum wage levels. if companies really do start to see some of that pricing pressure move forward, whether or not that hits americans in the wallet is going to be huge. the one thing i will say is one place americans already are feeling a huge impact on prices is at the gasoline pump. because we're already at a level now that's 25 cents per gallon higher than we were just last year. so as we talk about us having

more pricing power, us having more money in our wallets, we're losing some of that to gasoline prices already. if wages don't go higher, that's going to be a huge issue for middle income americans going forward. >> so people are not getting wage increases but in order to drive to work, it cost them more to do so. thank you so much. my dear friend dom chu of cnbc. we're going to leave it there. coming up, the line between family, business and politics blurred even more. a new report reveals that the kushner family, and we've already covered them, we're going to double down on that. now in private discussions to have president trump's company manage at least one of their new hotels on the jersey shore. guess what, there may be a little federal funding in the mix. money, power politics next. first, march is of course women's history month. and today i want to highlight our #one great woman. jacqueline cochran. this pioneering pilot advocates

for female aviators during world war ii and led the women's air force serving the pilots training program. in 1953, cochran became the first woman to break the sound barrier. let me know who you out there would like to see featured as our one great woman. send us your suggestions. promise and new beginnings, challenges and opportunities. at ameriprise financial, we can't predict what tomorrow will bring. but our comprehensive approach to financial planning can help make sure you're prepared for what's expected and even what's not. and that kind of financial confidence can help you sleep better at night. with the right financial advisor, life can be brilliant.

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♪go your own way once-daily anoro contains two medicines called bronchodilators, that work together to significantly improve lung function all day and all night. anoro is not for asthma . it contains a type of medicine that increases risk of death in people with asthma. the risk is unknown in copd. anoro won't replace rescue inhalers for sudden symptoms and should not be used more than once a day. tell your doctor if you have a heart condition, high blood pressure, glaucoma, prostate, bladder, or urinary problems. these may worsen with anoro. call your doctor if you have worsened breathing, chest pain, mouth or tongue swelling, problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain while taking anoro. ask your doctor about anoro. ♪go your own way get your first prescription free at anoro.com. welcome back. i'm stephanie ruhle. for today's money, power, politics, a new potential conflict of interest.

and i'm not talking about that qatar issue. a new one for the trump white house. "new york times" reporting the trump organization and jared kushner's family company, well, they're now in talks to go into business with one another. according to "the times," the kushners are in private discussions to have president trump's company manage at least one hotel at the center of the jersey shore development known as pier village. the kushner companies and the trump organization have signed an official letter of intent, though no deal is final. so let's focus on it. i want to bring in one of the reporters who broke this stunning story for the nos"the k time times", steve eder. walk us through the details. >> sure. happy to be here. the -- i guess what's happening here is that, you know, you already have the family ties, the white house positions that everyone's already got, right. so what we're looking at are the business ties. this is a whole separate layer of potential financial entanglements. last year, quietly, the trumps

began managing a hotel in livingston, new jersey, that the kushners own. >> it's where they're from. >> true, that's true. and going forward they've been in discussions now, long-running discussions, about running another hotel in long branch new jersey as part of the pier village project. >> isn't this tricky though, because both the trumps and the kushners have lots of outside investors. they don't have a ton of dough themselves. trump could be managing a property that's a kushner property but that has foreign investors. is that not an issue? >> it's one of the questions when he discussed this deal with the ethics and watchdogs. here's the financial side of it and questions about where does the money come from in terms of building a project -- >> and the kushners never want to disclose who their investors are. >> even in a deal like this, you know, there could be some disclosure. but that's one of the questions that does come up in these kinds of deals. >> when you reach out to the kushner organization, the trump organization, how do they characterize this? >> it's a straight-up business deal. >> there's nothing straight

about this. you have the president, his son-in-law and other family businesses. >> the trump hotels, that this is a business they have, they manage hotels and it's, you know, a straight-up business deal no different than the other companies and why shouldn't they be able to compete for this kind of business? >> this isn't your reporting, it's the ap. the ap reports -- and let's not, president trump has said the gateway project, the expansion tunnel project here between new york and new jersey, he said i don't want funding for that, which i thought was a head scratcher. until i read this. the federal government is involved in plans to build a pier, federal government, to build a pier and a ferry service right next to kushner's report on the jersey shore. if the ferry starts up, the value of those condos at pier village would rise as much as 50%. i live on the jersey shore in the summer. it is hard to get to. but there's a federally funded service to get there, boo-ya.

those condos are going to be gold. that's not an issue? please. >> that's one of the issues. they've been trying to get this pier built. they've had federal money that's gone into the planning and design and consideration of it. and a big upcoming question is will they look to the federal government in the years ahead to help build this pier, which would be quite expensive. >> just to wrap that up one more time. trump, no money for the gateway project because you know millions of people go in and out of new york city, to new jersey, every single day. but pier village down on the jersey shore, let's get a ferry for that. we're going to continue to focus on this and continue to ask questions because, again, a letter of intent has been signed but nothing is set in stone. steve, great reporting, stunning. all right, coming up, president trump's legal team reportedly considering new legal action. why? to keep stormy daniels quiet. all of this about an affair that the president's team, they say it never happened. president trump, i believe you,

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you or joints. something for your heart... but do you take something for your brain. with an ingredient originally found in jellyfish, prevagen is the number one selling brain-health supplement in drug stores nationwide. prevagen. the name to remember. did the president approve the payment that his personal

lawyer made to stormy daniels? >> not that i'm aware of, but michael cohen, the attorney in question, has addressed this. the white house has addressed it earlier this week. i have nothing further to add. >> not that i'm aware of. do you know what that wasn't? it wasn't a no. that of course is white house deputy press secretary raj shah avoiding questions surrounding president trump's alleged affair with porn star stormy daniels. behind the scenes, donald trump's legal team is reportedly considering legal action, keeping daniels quiet, not receipti i letting her speak out. citing a personal familiar with the legal preparations, filing a injunction to keep a pretaped "60 minutes" interview from airing. nbc news has learned trump's longtime attorney michael cohn used, ready for this, his trump organization work e-mail to arrange the $130,000 payment in exchange for daniels' silence in

2016. cohn says he used his own money for the payment and neither the trump organization, nor the campaign, reimbursed him. i need a friend like michael cohn. president trump's representatives have repeatedly denied he ever had, quote, an intimate relationship. we have to take a close look at what the definition of intimate is. i want to bring back my panel matt welch, eddie. according to analysts from "the washington post," the use of the trump organization e-mail could, well, almost certainly violated federal election law. trump organization e-mail, are you kidding me? >> they're like the keystone cops or something. it's so -- the incompetent -- >> the key stone cops are very entertaining. >> i am not entertained. >> you know what, you are right. >> the incompetent is mind-blowing. we see violations of campaign finance law. we know there's questions around

excessive contributions. maybe some disclosure violations and the like. but what we see here, again, is donald trump, as the previous block just suggested is not a paradigm of or being a morley up right. here we have at the height of the quality, a question debate about donald trump in an affair with a porn star. >> they're comfortable with being unethical. just like watching steve mnuchin going around president trump going after chuck todd. steven mnuchin, well i'm spending the time with my family and we're going to go over policy. let's go yopd what's moral and what's legal. another potential legal violation, they were paying to silence stormy daniels. if that is acceptable. someone running for office can simply pay people off to shut

them up. >> it may violate the federal elections campaign laws. i'm hastened to point out that almost everybody who violates campaign laws, what this does though, ask yourself this, would donald trump pass a background check? no. this is why, because it's not just, are you willing to pay hush money to a porn actress here right before an election, we know that already. but it's how many other ones are out there like this. you are subject to blackmail? he's so motivated that he's going to loosen six figures out of his wallet for one person with whom he probably had an affair right after his wife gave birth to his most recent child, then is there evidence of this happening. this is a process lue which they do this, right. >> should we be asking the question, what's motivating

stormy daniels? >> well one of thing that's clear is stormy daniels is not dim, she's very smart. she's lev recentlying for a lot of reasons and clearly one is financial gain. she said she wants to get the truth out. that's horrifying. >> let's put that aside. i don't think there's too many people that would say stormy daniels is doing this because she wants to be an american hero. >> no. >> who cares on certain levels. >> what's her motivation if. >> yeah. >> should we not ask the question of why and where stormy daniel's coming from whose paying for her representation if. >> we should ask the question, but it's kind of like it is a strange analogy here. but should we care that some of

this ore ridge fated. yeah, that's interesting but the question is did he know what he was talking about. is this based on evidence that he's believed to believe this corroborated somewhere else. >> she gets paid $130,000, another playboy model gets paid $150,000. we do know that colin was deployed out there to pay off a bunch of folks. >> let's say ko hand was -- and trump says he knewing in about it. could this touch him in. >> no it can't. i shutter to imagine when the mueller investigation moves over to this stormy daniel investigation, i hope this doesn't happen because i want that investigation to be as grounded in stuff that i truly truly care about. if the president of the united states has a track record of

paying hush money to people during campaign season to cover up his own sexual scandals, it's just going to happen. >> are trump lawyers going to be successful in blocking the 60-minute interview? >> i don't think so. >> if that thing's going to air i need to make some sunday night plans. >> i know i'm an egghead, i'm a professor, but to put all this stuff together it doesn't bold well for the country. >> here's the problem, eddy. the country has largely decided, they don't care, that's the upsetting part. we talk day in and out how things are unethical, how it's foul and on scene and the trumps keep on ticking. >> donald trump has the lowest

approval rating of any president since we've been measuring this. >> jimmy kimmell reminded us last week. >> the republican party has done so much worse in off election year. all their polling going into 2018 has been abysmal. this is reason to believe that this is affecting the way that at least some people, edge people have considered donald trump. don't despair just yet stephanie ruhle. >> last point. >> maybe donald trump is a reflection of us and that says a lot. >> it does. stormy daniels remain in the headlines and evangelicals remain with trump. think about that. the white house rolling out its plan to make schools safer, with an about face for the president. is there enough in this plan for congress to get behind and get something done, straight ahead. march 24 for our lives are

coming. we are keeping track of gun violence in this country because parkland is not one off. according to the trace there had been 10,394 incidents of gun violence in the united states in 2018. 369 of them took place just this last weekend. so that's the idea. what do you think? i don't like it. oh. nuh uh. yeah. ahhhhh. mm-mm. oh. yeah. ah.

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before we leave, no matter

what there is always good news somewhere and we think good news rules. today is cycle for survival. a movement that raises money for can senior research. this thing, cyclists spun and spun and spun to benefit memorial cancer research. i'm always rooting for team roar but this year, one family it was a victory lap. shannon brown announced at the event that her young daughter has been declared cancer free. how about that? cycle for survival for that young girl, she won. that wraps us up this hour. i'm stephanie ruhle. i'll see you all day long on twitter and depend at 11:00 a.m. right now i hand you off to my colleague. president trump has his way, american class rooms could look a lot different at that shooting in