clovis who is the completely unqualified trump nominee to be the department of agriculture's undersecretary for research, education, and economics. that job is commonly referred to as chief scientist of the agriculture department. congress has specifically expressed the preference that the job be filled by a scientist which it usually has been, and which sam clovis most definitely is not. what sam clovis is, especially in relation to donald trump is untrustworthy. sam clovis abandoned the rick perry campaign to join the trump campaign. you could say betrayed rick perry to join donald trump. and after he did that, leaked e-mails showed sam clovis attacking donald trump in iowa when he was working for rick perry before he joined the donald trump campaign. clovis said in those e-mails that trump's comments reveal no foundation in christ, which is a big deal. in another e-mail, clovis objected angrily to donald trump's insulting john mccain for having been captured during the vietnam war. mr. clovis wrote mr. trump's comments were insulting to me as a veteran as i missed birthday

clovis. he lost that senate primary in 2014. in 2015 he started to run rick perry's iowa campaign. that ended up being a short job. in 2016 he ended up joining the donald trump for president campaign. sam clovis became the national co-chair of the trump for president campaign, became the top policy official and weird russia stuff kept following him around. when the wall street journal reported earlier this year about a republican political operative named peter smith who mounted a campaign to get hackers' imma e-mails. he was supportive to find russian hackers to obtain documents from the democrats. peter smith also bragged he was in contact with sam clovis from the trump campaign on that operation. now, as far as i know, sam clovis has never had to answer any questions as to his alleged role in peter smith's project to try to work with the russians to help trump and hurt clinton during the campaign, but, like i say, weird russia stuff follows sam clovis around. sam clovis is also credited, if that's the right word, with bringing on to the trump campaign, carter page, who traveled to mo

radio talk show host, and his name is sam clovis, and he lost that primary in 2014. in 2015, he started to run rick perry's iowa campaign and that ended up to be a short job. and then in 2016, he ended up joining the donald trump for president campaign. sam clovis was the co-chair for the trump campaign, and top policy official, and weird are russia stuff kept following him around. when "the wall street journal" reported earlier in the year about a republican operative peter smith with the effort to contact foreign hackers and specifically russian hackers to try to get hillary clinton's e-mail, he claimed that he was working with retired general mike flynn from the campaign and he described mike flynn as not only aware of, but supportive of trying to find the russian hackers to obtain stolen docume documents from the democrats. but in contact with the contact with flynn, he was also in contact with sam clovis from the trump campaign on that operation are. now, as far as i know, sam clovis has never had to answer any questions as to his alleged role in peter smith's project to tr

nominees, and we know clovis has been talking to the special counsel. this is a development just into cnn. joe johns has more for us. what are you learn? >> reporter: well, he is a former campaign official for trump. now he is a nominee to be the top scientists at usda, the department of agriculture. a white house source familiar with the situation tells several of my colleagues at cnn that he is in danger, his nomination is in danger, that either he may have to with draw and if he doesn't with draw he may be forced out. the problem with clovis is his connection to george papadopoulos. this is the former trump campaign foreign policy adviser who has pleaded guilty to making false statements to the fbi and the russia investigation. apparently mr. clovis is one of the individuals referred to in court documents as exchanging e-mails with papadopoulos, and this, obviously about sending trump staff overseas to talk with russians, a lawyer, a very important to see a lawyer for clovis has said mr. clovis was adamant about telling papadopoulos that, no, there should be no trump staff foreign

reporting that papadopoulos' superior former trump campaign co-chair sam clovis testified before a federal grand jury last week. now clovis' attorney appears to deny a key part of what papadopoulos revealed to investigators, that our client encouraged a trip to russia on behalf of the campaign. dr. clovis vigorously opposed a trip. adding that if someone proposed foreign travel in a personal capacity dr. clovis could not prohibit such travel. that's lawyer talk. documents unsealed after clovis testified appeared to show he did encourage such a meeting telling plows i would encourage you to make the trip if it is feasible. mueller is creeping closer to the white house itself. "politico" reports his investigators are scheduled to interview trump's close aide hope hicks, later this month as well as three or four other current white house officials as early as this week. by now there is no question that they are aware of the consequences of making false statements to investigators. i am joined by nicolle wallace, joy reid, kari ca dera from the office of director of national intelligence and s

between campaign officials and leadership. it was clovis who responded great work. one of the people sort of rengiren ringing the alarm bells of this as loud as anyone else. first, your reaction having sat on the other side of this campaign, having watched all this development, having thought about the degree of russian involvement, your reaction to the facts we learned yesterday. >> well, the first thing i thought about was how far we've come, chris. the trump campaign and trump himself initially denied there was any interaction with any russians at any time. that fell by the wayside. ask enthen interactions they had with the ugz russians had nothing to do with the campaign in anyway. that fell by the wayside. now they're saying this is with some low level volunteer. but we see from mueller's investigation it actually reaches furg reaches further up into the trump campaign. the bottom line is what we have suspected for months is now clear, that the russian government offered help to the trump campaign to help him win and hurt hillary clinton, and the trump campaign was eager and wil

played a role sam clovis sam clovis was another person in the campaign that's who it is appears that george papadopoulos was talking to as well as paul man of fort sam clovis has a confirmation hearing coming up to be the chief scientist for the u.s.d.a. the agriculture department even though he has no science background so i think we'll see the media digging in a little there again to cover a couple of wood responses from each of you melanie is donald trump any closer to impeachment or not i think there's definitely a step closer to him impeachment if not and if not that indictment so i think the walls are closing in on mr trump and he's going to be panicking and it'll be interesting to see what he does as we all know he can be fairly erratic ross. there is no chance of impeachment as of today based on these indictments and with the current makeup of the congress then your thoughts thomas. indictment is a legal act impeachment is political and legal we have to see whether in fact there are enough legal facts to carry it there the question of politics is extremely important i think u

. sources tell nbc news sam clovis now president trump's pick to be the agriculture chief scientist met with mueller's team and testified before the vecking going last week. his lawyer would neither confirm or deny his interactions with the mueller team. court documents describe e-mails between george papadopoulos arrested in july after admitting to lying to the fbi in its investigation and in an unnamed camp supervisors t. supervisors responded great work after papadopoulos discussed his interactions with russian, who wanted to arrange a meeting with trump and russian leaders. clovis' lawyer confirmed he was the supervisors but added that clovis never encouraged papadopoulos to pursue improved relations between the united states and russia. yesterday the white house addressed where clovis stands, given this new information. >> is the president still comfortable with him saying clovis serving the administration. >> i'm not aware any change would be necessary at this time. >> clovis who is not a scientist is serving as an unpaid white house adviser to the agriculture department. he awaits a c

know -- we know mueller's people have been questioning the people in that room. sam clovis, who was papadopoulos' campaign supervisor, was before the grand jury a week ago and had to resign -- pull back from his nomination to be at usda this week as a result of these disclosures. but mueller has some answers about what trump's response is, and i think that's very critical. >> i would just say i think that the march 31st meeting is extremely important, but i think the key to all of this is looking at it from what happened after papadopoulos was informed by this russia-linked professor that the russians had these thousands and thousands of e-mails that they said came from hillary clinton's campaign. when he essentially learned that the russians had dirt and they wanted to give it to the trump campaign. after that you saw a consistent effort by papadopoulos to reach out to high-level members of the trump campaign, apparently not j.d. gordon and jeff sessions because they shot him down but to paul manafort, corey lewandowski, to pitch this trump/russia meeting. why did he want the presi

for the top agriculture post is withdrawing. sam clovis was the supervisor for the former adviser who wanted to set up campaign meetings with russians and now cooperating with the special counsel. the president has big economic news on two fronts. the job announcement that the white house moments from now and later today his choice to lead the federal reserve. we begin with a policy and political fight over what you pay uncle sam. house republicans unveiling their tax cut plan. now they have the daunting task of selling. >> we are getting rid of loopholes and leveling the playing field. are we going to let them see our country down this downward spiral or are we going to realize the promise of our country and revitalize the american idea? this is our chance to make sure that generations to come don't just get by. they get ahead this this country. >> the plan cuts taxes on corporations and offers relief to middle class families and promises to roll back deductions for mortgage and medical expenses. it will help working families, they say, and create millions of jobs. democrats call

surrogates and the russian government is totally false. >> reporter: sam clovis, trump's pick for the agricultural department, has withdrawn his name from consideration. the unsealed court documents show papadopoulos contacted a campaign supervisor who was clovis and he encouraged papadopoulos to take the meeting. clovis said he didn't want to be a negative distraction writing, "the political climate inside washington has made it impossible for me to receive balance and fair consideration for this position. the relentless assaults on you and your team seem to be a blood sport that only increases in intensity each day." the clovis pick was already controversial since he has a history of homophobic comments, wolf. >> brianna keilar reporting for us, thank you. let's talk more about the breaking news in the russia investigation. joining us now, ted yoho, a member of the foreign affairs committee. congressman, thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me on, wolf. >> let's talk about the special counsel for a moment. he's asking about jared kushner's role in the firing of the fbi direct

administration. sam clovis was the president's pick for chief scientist, but he withdrew after court documents revealed e-mails between papadopoulos and a campaign supervisor whom the "washington post" identified as clovis. the court papers show papadopoulos contacted clovis, who was then the campaign co-chair, about a potential trip to russia to meet with russian officials. clovis wrote, i would encourage you to make the trip if feasible. clovis said he was withdrawing from the usda post because he didn't want to be a distraction. and we've learned tonight that the trial in the paul manafort and rick gates case, it won't happen until may of 2018 at the earliest. that's because of the judge's schedule. prosecutors say it will take at least three weeks for them to lay out their case. that will push the case into the summer, keeping russia in the spotlight as the midterm congressional races heat up. wolf? >> all right, jessica, thank you. jessica schneider reporting. joining us now, a key member of the house intelligence committee. democratic congressman eric swalwell of california. th

. sam clovis allegedly encouraged george papadopoulos to continue communicating with the russians. the president was already, though, under fire for naming clovis who is a controversial figure. he was going to be named as chief scientist but many say he lacks credentials on science. >>> this all comes as our new poll shows 49% of americans believe trump likely broke the law during the presidential campaign. more than half approve of how robert mueller is handling the investigation. >>> on the other side of the aisle the former head of the democratic national committee claims hillary clinton staged a, quote, secret takeover of the dnc to rig the primary against bern si sanders. in her new book donna brazile says the dnc was rigged in clinton's favor because clinton's campaign was largely financing the party early in the primary season. president trump is calling for a criminal investigation and he spoke to fox news last night. >> it's a major story. now, i don't know if the mainstream fake media, because they are fake and phony but i just don't know if they'll pick it up. that is a big

usda chief scientist sam clovis withdrew his nomination amidst news that during the campaign he was aware that campaign adviser george papadopoulos, i got it write, was talking to russians. i recently spoke to michael lewis. michael, sam clovis was always an odd choice for not the least of which reasons, he wasn't a scientist. >> well you know, as i've wandered around the trump administration, they're like two categories of appointees. they're the people like rick perry at the department of energy and sam clovis, who when they were offered the job, should have said no. because i'm not qualified for it. and the idea that you're putting in charge of a $3 billion a year science budget, that is trying to figure out you know, how to direct money so we can grow things in a changing climate, 50 years from now, a guy who has absolutely no science background at all. his chief, his chief job qualification was he was a right-wing radio talk show host in iowa who helped trump. you put that guy in charge of that office, is insane. and you just look at, the thing i've written, profiles the person

today is that sam clovis, who was the nominee for a top science position which he was arguably not qualified not being a scientist in the ag department, is not going to be up for a hearing. that nomination withdrawn. he's been under quite a shadow because we've reported, kim delanian of our team, reported he is the unnamed supervisor with george papadopoulos. the question would be, what did you know about russian contacts? what did papadopoulos tell you as the supervisor? >> reporter: that's right, andrea, and that is a big part of the reason why this, of course, has been derailed, although i will also say there was a story in the "washington post" this morning, the paper obtaining a letter in which clovis admitted in questions from some of the senators that he didn't have nyack dem i can or scientific credentials at all, and that, of course, this position was as the top scientist at the usda. so a conflue nernce of factors there. we have reported that clovis has spoken to special counsel mueller about all of this russian meddling investigation, and that he is potentially involved.

clovis will not be the department of agriculture's chief scientist after withdrawing his name in a letter to the president this morning. questions had also been raised about his qualifications. i want to bring in the washington correspondent for "the new york times" and an msnbc contributor. mccabe koppens is a staff writer at the atlanta. you've written about george papadopoulos who pleaded guilty in the russia probe. now you have sam clovis withdrawing. although he says he's going to keep his job right, in the government. help us put this development with clovi into context. >> you may recall when special counsel mueller put out the charges against manafort and his partner and also revealed that george papadopoulos had pled guilty to lying to him about his conversations with russians as a trump foreign policy adviser, in the information filed with -- in court about papadopoulos there were all these references to senior campaign officials, campaign supervisors, to whom he was returning and saying, hey, i've been talking to this professor who seems to have ties to russia. we've bee

job at the department of agriculture sam clovis announced he's withdrawing his name. he confirmed he has no -- not just limited -- no background in hard science or agriculture. the white house said in a statement they respect clovis' decision. a source tells nbc news robert muell mueller's team interviewed him last week. >> and clovis is one of the people whose names have something to do with george papadopoulos. there's that relationship. reporter ken delaney has been doing work on this. what are you hearing about this withdrawal and what does it have to do with? >> does it have to do with free press? >> it was already a controversial nomination. but this is clearly related to the revelation that he figures keenly in the mueller investigation. and this stems from his conversation and his e-mails with george papadopoulos. you know, he was not named in the papadopoulos plea agreement, but quickly his lawyer confirmed that he was the campaign supervisor who said great work to papadopoulos when he was e-mailing him about his contacts with russian officials and a possible meeting between

to a top department of agriculture posts sam clovis this morning withdraw his nomination amid questions on his role of the russian probe. he was one of the campaign officials revealed to a correspondent with papadopoulos according to to the washington post. our team of cnn reporters is back with me. i want to go to capitol hill and manu raju, what are prosecutors telling you? >> some republicans are raising questions as well. you'll recall over three hearings this year, including his confirmation earlier this year. there were questions about what he knew about any communications, contacts with russian officials, time after time, attorney general sessions said that he didn't know. he didn't recall some key details and sometimes he denied that there were such contacts that particularly democrats are raising questions about. in the aftermath of the relations of these court documents being unsealed and showing that george papadopoulos did in fact pose a meeting with vladimir putin and candidate trump in a meeting that sessions was president at and sessions rejected. democrats are

special counsel. communication between papadopoulos and sam clovis, trump campaign national co-chairman. the plea agreement citing eflt-mails said the campaign superviser told papadopoulos i would encourage you and foreign policy adviser to the campaign to make the trip to russia if it is feasible. but sanders tried to contradict that account today. my understanding is there wasn't encouragement. >> clovis nominated to top scientific post at department of agriculture, despite questions raised by top senate democrat on the agriculture committee, the white house see no reason to withdraw his nomination. >> major garrett again at the white house. thank you. social media executives told a subcommittee that russian linked accounts began trying to interfere with the election in 2015. and they kept at it long after the voting had ended. here is nancy cordes. >> we take what happened on facebook very seriously. >> reporter: executives from facebook, twitter and google told senators today that russian trolls were more prolific than they initially believed. posting 80,000 pieces of conte

adviser sam clovis who was nominated for a senior position at the department of agriculture who has today announced he is withdrawing his name. saying this. the political climate inside wash made it impossible for me to receive balance and fair consideration for this position. the relentless assaults on you and your team seem to be a blood sport that increases in intensity each day. >> he was one of the people that papadopoulos was communicating with. he was apparently encouraging papadopoulos to try and set up these meetings. what jeff sessions said is he was not aware of anyone who had communications with russians and so i think there is a disconnect here. it's a problem for clovis. i think sessions probably ought to amend his testimony, but -- >> it's a bigger problem for clovis than the attorney general. >> that's why clovis is going to be working at the department of agricultu agriculture. a former trump campaign adviser carter page is grilled on the u.s. presidential election. this is president trump insisting he is not under investigation himself. we are standing by for the p

going to be when the white house revealed the clovis nomination was withdrawn. >> yeah. >> i will still be here tomorrow night. >> good. >> i will definitely be here tomorrow night. so viewers of the hour of television of course knew this on tuesday. america found out today that, of course, sam clovis will not be having a confirmation hearing to answer questions about the dealings with the special prosecutor. >> the sam clovis story, something about the fact he is a talk radio show host from iowa and makes you think that like maybe this is kind of low level story. he's still a current administration official. he spoke to the grand jury without notifying the white house. s he started to speak with mueller's investigators without telling the white house. we have no idea of an immunity agreement with the discussions and brought carter page and george papadopoulos on the trump campaign and oversaw this national security group that involved them that's now posing such difficulty for the attorney general. i mean, sam clovis is listed in the reports of contacting russian hackers to get h

there's more fallout involving papadopoulos and russia. another former campaign aide sam clovis withdrawing his name to be top scientist at the agriculture department after revelations he also had conversations about russians with papadopoulos. clovis saying his decision to withdraw was prompted by the political climate inside washington. >>> and on thursday, paul manafort who was indicted for charges ranging from conspiracy to money laundering was back in court along with his former deputy rick gates. a federal judge saying both are a flight risk and have to remain in home confinement and continue to wear their monitoring devices. philip? >> kristen, thank you. and new insight this morning into just how americans view the russia abc news washington post pole saying they approve of the way special counsel robert mueller is handling the investigation. and nearly a majority 49% saying it is likely that trump himself committed a crime. another a 51% believe the president is not cooperating with the investigation and just 37% believe he is. >> it was with great fanfare that congress

hands full with that investigation. >> and there's been some political fallout. sam clovis who will been knowledge fluctuated by the president to -- nominated to be chief scientist but was an aide on the campaign and in these documents was seen to be encouraging papadopoulos to continue communicating with the russians. he withdrew his nomination this week. >> he did. he was scheduled for a hearing for his nomination i believe next week and that would have been turned into a whole russia hearing so he wanted to get out of it. more importantly, he didn't have scientific credentials to do the job. he was nominated to be the chief scientist with no scientific background. he will be staying in the administration as a senior white house advisor at the agriculture department. >> what message was the white house sending when they nominated with no scientific experience to be the chief scientist? >> he is a guy from iowa so maybe they figured he knows farm issues and agriculture. but more importantly he was a loyal advisor on the campaign and this is a government and administration that cares a l

to the special counsel's office, which included communication between papadopoulos and sam clovis, the trump campaign national code chairman. the plea agreement citing those emails says that the campaign supervisor, now known to be clovis, told papadopoulos "i would advise and you other members of the campaign to make the trip to russia if it is feasible." but sanders tried to contradict that account today. >> my understanding is there wasn't encouragement. he made multiple attempts. >> reporter: clovis has been nominated to a top scientific post in the department of agriculture, and despite questions raised by the top senate democrat on the agriculture committee, the white house said it sees no reason to withdraw clovis' nomination. >> mason: social media executives total a senate subcommittee today that russian- linked accounts began trying to interfere with the election in 2015, and they kept at it long after the voting had ended. here's nancy cordes. >> we take what happened on facebook very seriously. >> reporter: executives from facebook, twitter, and google told senators to

national campaign co-chairman and colonel sanders getting "high on his own supply," sam clovis. ( laughter ) now, when papadopoulos wrote to ask clovis about going to russia to collude, clovis replied. "i would encourage you... to make the trip, if it is feasible." well, that's nice. betray your country, but only if it's no bother-- you know, like, "on your way home, could you pick up some bread, some eggs, and half a gallon of treason?" now, this email from clovis sounds damning, but clovis' lawyer explains that his client is a "polite gentleman from iowa" who "would always have been courteous to a person offering to help the campaign." "why, shucks, you've gone to all this trouble. it would be rude not to engage in an international conspiracy to undermine our democracy." go on. so things are looking bad for the white house, and they can't wriggle their way out of this one. it's as if-- it's as if all of their lies have suddenly come back to entangle the white house in some sticky mesh of interwoven threads. what's the metaphor i'm looking for? yeah, yeah, that's right, that's right. yeah

man is making news. sam clovis, formerly a white house adviser is withdrawing his name for consideration for department of agriculture. it was clovis who allegedly encouraged papadopoulos to continue talking with the russians, writing in an e-mail "great work." >> our thanks to pierre thomas there in washington. and clovis climate makes it impossible for him to do the job. he's already under fire for being named chief scientist. he's not actually a scientist. >>> a new poll reveals what might be some alarming results about the investigation. 58% approve of robert mueller's handling of the russian investigation and 68% approve of the charges being filed against paul manafort and his associate. the abc news/"washington post" poll finds 39% of americans think it's likely president trump broke the law in terms with russian attempts to influence the election. >> and the former leader of the democratic national committee is addressing the controversy surnding hillary clinton. in her new book, donna brazile says the primary was rigged in clinton's favor. because her campaign was l

grand jury. sam clovis is an important actor. earlier when he said he was going to leave behind as he heads for this 12-day, master trip to asia. his top economic adviser gary kohn, he joked and said if taxes don't get done while i'm away, and he wants the house bill to be passed by thanksgiving and he wants these tax cuts to be on his desk by christmas. so the president obviously very focused on taxes right now as he has these private briefings preparing for the asia trip where the focus will be obviously heavy on trade and on north korea, more broadly. white house officials say they do hope this provides him an opportunities to focus on agenda items, on issues where they think he appears strong and where he's most confident on taxes and north korea. ittal lo allows them to ignore on twitter. >> we expect in less than a minute to have that tape of his comments. thank you for sharing that with us, peter. the president likely not able to go forward with that agriculture nominee who is so caught up in this investigation. >> they're adding all kinds of trouble with their nominees across

meeting between putin and the president. then when you combine that with the fact that clovis, who was the senior policy person, is encouraging him to go down this route, you certainly have people at the higher levels of the campaign who knew what was going on. and remember, all of this preceded by quite a bit of time before we even knew that there were hacked e-mails, when papadopoulos is saying, yeah, i knew there were thousands of e-mails that they were potentially in the possession of. so their effort to distance themselves both from papadopoulos and also from all of these representations that they made about no one knows anything about russia, trump didn't know anything about russia, he was sitting in that meeting too, so he knew they were trying to make connections with russia. you know, the level of lying here is pretty stunning. and if you don't think clovis and others are going to testify to more of this sort of thing, i think people are deluding themselves. >> well, to that point, we should say the paper that you write for, "the washington post," just breaking this, that papa

contact with russians during the election campaign has already tainted paul manafort and sam clovis. now it appears that attorney general jeff sessions who attended a meeting with papadopoulos and the president. there's the picture in march 2016 was at least aware that papadopoulos wanted the campaign to make an overture to russia. according to a source close to sessions, quote, attorney general jeff sessions rejected a proposal by a junior campaign aide who offered to use his russian contacts to set up a meet between donald trump and v lead mir putin himself. he was not aware of anyone on the campaign who had communicated with russia. here's what he told al franken in his confirmation hearing in january. >> if there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the trump campaign communicated with the russian government in the course of this campaign what will you do? >> senator franken, i'm not aware of any of those activities. more recently we saw sessions was careful to avoid a direct answer to this question posed by senator lindsay graham just last month. >> did you ever overhear

and russia. another former campaign aide, sam clovis, withdrawing his name to be top scientist at the agriculture department after revelations he also had conversations about russians with papadopoulos. clovis saying his decision to withdraw was prompted by the political climate inside washington. and today paul manafort, who was indicted for charges ranging from conspiracy to money laundering, was back in court along with his former deputy rick gates. a federal judge saying both are a flight risk and have to remain in home confinement and continue to wear their monitoring devices. lester. >> kristen welker, thank you. >>> also in washington today, president trump made it official nominating federal reserve board member jerome powell as the next chair of the u.s. central bank. if he's confirmed by the senate, he'll succeed janet yellen when her term ends in february. it's the first time in decades a new president has not renominated a sitting fed chair for another term. >>> in colorado tonight, a search for answers after a gunman went on a rampage inside a walmart opening fire seeming

mentioned sessions in passing, but he also told sam clovis, who was then a national campaign chairman of the trump campaign, and clovis himself made him sign a nondisclosure agreement as part of this campaign. now, when he was on this trip, anderson, one thing we have now learned is that page many met with a deputy prime minister of russia, one of the senior officials in the kremlin. this is significant because page for long publicly said very that he did not meet with anyone on this trip. he downplays this meeting. at the same time, he said this trip to moscow was not campaign related, but he e-mailed the campaign afterwards saying pretty clearly that he would be willing to brief them on it and also ask the campaign ahead of time was there anything they suggested him to say during his speech to help with the message of the trump campaign, so that's raising questions from lawmakers after that testimony, anderson. >> talk about how carter page's story has changed over time about this trip he took to moscow. when i interviewed him, he said he was just meeting with professors and that's rea

named sam clovis, who was national co-chair of the trump campaign, chief policy adviser to the trump campaign, sam clovis last week met with robert mueller's investigators. and nbc news reports tonight that sam clovis has also testified to the grand jury in this investigation. so if the trump white house decides they want to keep distancing themselves from people who have turned up in the russia investigation, distancing themselves from sam clovis is going to be particularly difficult, given not only that he was a national co-chair of the campaign but also that they have nominated him to a senior position at the u.s. department of agriculture for which sam clovis is supposed to face senate confirmation next week, which is probably going to be very, very awkward now. joining us is joyce vance, former state attorney for the state of alabama, thanks for being here. >> thanks for having me, rachel. >> so reading this document tonight that was unsealed by the court, this is a representation -- first there's the warrant, then there's the terms of confinement under which gates and manafort

seeing, with manafort, isn'tpoulos, clovis, who a guy who has a lot of expertise a sideign policy, is effect of the trump campaign and he could not get the best people, the top-shelf foreign policy people. he got carter page, a guy who claimed to be an oil executive, papadopoulos. this was not a heavy hitter and he is one of the five people that the campaign put on a form policy committee and he was empowered to work on behalf of the campaign to set foreign-policy. how we will find out is much other officials knew about his interactions and conversations with russia. host: it also shines a light that jeff sessions "mi sremembered" again. >> he is towing a line on conversations with russian ambassadors and we are seeing a changing of the story and it will the interesting to see what the paper trail is. on whatll depend sessions can credibly say about what he knew about the conversation and what kinds of permissions papadopoulos had and what he was carrying back-and-forth, in terms of information, offers, and ideas. most people did not know about george papadopoulos. he was and we k

manafort and corey lewandowski as well as sam clovis now nominated for a high level position at the department of agriculture. his views about clovis but the white house is distancing itself from papadopoulos. >> i think that papadopoulos is an example of actually somebody doing the wrong thing while the president's campaign did the right thing. what papadopoulos did was lie and that's on him. not on the campaign and we can't speak for that. >> in fact, the white house and president trump yesterday belittled him calling him, quote, a low-level volunteer who has already proven to be a liar. >>> time now for a look at your weather on this wednesday morning. millions of trick-or-treaters made their way through halloween snow. the heaviest part of that was in michigan, it got up to 8 inches in some areas. snow also fell in the plains and in new york state near the great lakes. temperatures will be in the 40s in that area today. it'll be pleasantly warm across the south. 80 in miami, 79 in dallas, 72 degrees is unseasonably warm for denver. it'll also los angeles. 50s can be expected in

the president's nominee for department of agriculture sam clovis withdrew his name from consideration after those same court filings revealed it was clovis who was the supervisor who encouraged papadopolous him to make contact. "the washington post" reported clovis, nominated for a job called chief scientist, admitted he has no actual scientific credentials. so that was sort of a tough one too. clove advice isn't the only trump official for whom unsealed filings are causing trouble. members of congress on both sides of the aisle are depending an explanation from the attorney general of the united states. jeff sessions. they're demanding it about the discrepancies between his sworn congressional testimony and the actual events recounted in those filings. sessions appeared before both the senate intelligence and judiciary committees in recent months where he categorically denied any knowledge of contacts between the campaign and russian nationals. >> i have no knowledge of any such conversations by anyone connected to the trump campaign. >> you don't believe that surrogate