before starting, tell your doctor about all planned medical or dental procedures and any kidney or liver problems. learn all you can... to help protect yourself from another dvt or pe. talk to your doctor about xarelto®. chris: i'm chris wallace, midway through his term in the wake of dramatic election results, president trump at a turning point. ♪ ♪ chris: this hour we will bring you exclusive interview with the president inside the white house as he shakes up his team for the next two years in his run for reelection. if you can't carry michigan, wisconsin and pennsylvania, you're not going to get reelected. facing the end game and the special counsel's russia probe. if whitaker decides in any way to limit or curtail the mueller investigation, you're okay with that? who is behind the murder of jamal khashoggi? did mbs lie to you, sir?

the president responds to criticism for not going to arlington cemetery. barack obama went every year he was in dc. we will get reaction from the sunday panel. >> nothing like it in the world. chris: described how he makes his toughest decisions all right now on fox news sunday. ♪ ♪ chris: and hello again from fox news in washington. as president trump starts the final two years of his term, he faces new challenges. for the first time he must deal with a divided congress after democrats regain control of the house. robert mueller's russia probe appears to be reaching its conclusion and there are new challenges overseas from allies like saudi arabia and adversaries like north korea. we sat down with mr. trump friday in the roosevelt room just across from the oval office

hoping to explore a presidency at a turning point. mr. president, thank you for talking with us. >> thank you, chris, very much. chris: let's start with the state of donald trump. there are a number of stories out there that you're angry about the midterms, about your treatment in the media, about the way you were treated when you were in paris, one story even said that you were in a, quote, cacoon of bitterness and resentment. we will get into details later. how dark is your mood? >> it's very light, it's fake news. it's disgusting fake news. i read a front page in washington post, they never called me, nobody calls me. i don't even think they have sources. i think they make it up like it's fiction and i will tell you i'm extremely upbeat, the white house is running like a well-oiled machine, it's doing really well, i have great people, i will make some changes but not very many.

i'm very happy with my cabinet other than, you know, a couple of exceptions and either way i'm not unhappy and i will tell you that it's so wrong, the reporting about me is so wrong, i'm loving what i'm doing. i did well in france. i did have a problem where i wasn't able to go to a cemetery because the secret service will not let me do it. i'm telling you, the secret service would not let me do it and made it a big deal. chris: you said a lot of things, let's try to unpack them. there's a lot of talks about staff changes, deputy national security adviser was moved out after your wife did something i've never heard of a first lady doing before publicly calling for her removal. are you comfortable with the way that went down where it kind of looked like your wife was firing one of your advisers? >> i didn't know the adviser, really, my job did great job in africa and she was not treated

properly by the press. she worked so hard. they came to me and wanted to go public because that's the way they felt and i thought it was fine. i met with mira2 days ago. she was with me for a long time. she's somebody i don't know very well but we will move her around because she has certain talents. frankly, she is not -- she'll never be put in the united nations let me put it that way. chris: meaning she's not to diplomatic. >> but she's talented. chris: are you happy with kirstjen nielsen at dhs? >> i like her a lot, i respect her a lot, she's very smart, i want her to get much tougher and we will see what happens. chris: what are chances that she will be dhs secretary? >> that's what happened in government, you leave, you go, the people that have left have done very well, the people that have left have done very well from my white house.

i like like her very much, i respect her very much, i'd like her to be much tougher on the border, much tougher, period. chris: back in july you said that chief of staff john kelly will be here through 2020. can we still say that? >> i wouldn't -- look, we get along well. there are certain things i love what he does and there are certain things that i don't like that he does that aren't his strength. it's not that he -- he works so hard. he's doing an excellent job in many ways, a couple of things where it's just not his strength, it's not his fault, it's not his strength. chris: such as? >> i haven't thought about john in terms of this, but john at some point is going to want to move on, john will move on. chris: so 2020 is no longer written in stone? >> it could be, let's see what happens. i have not -- look, i have 3 or 4 or 5 positions that i'm thinking about. of that, maybe it's going to end

up being 2. i need flexibility. chris: you have already made at least one big change naming mat whitaker as acting attorney general. he has a long record of speaking out against the special counsel and his probe. >> i could see a scenario where jeff sessions is replaced and that attorney general doesn't fire bob mueller but reduces the budget so low that his investigation grinds to absolute halt. >> the truth is there was no collusion with the russians and the trump campaign. chris: did you know before you appointed him that he had that record and critical of robert mueller? >> i did not know that he took views as such. chris: when you found that out? >> i don't think it had any effect. i don't think -- chris: he says there's no collusion. he says you can starve the investigation. >> what do you do when a person

is right? he said it. if he said there's collusion i'm supposed to be taking somebody that says there is because then i wouldn't take them for two reasons but the number one reason is the fact that he would have been wrong. if he said that there's no collusion, he is right. chris: he would have to make a lot of big calls in the mueller investigation, if mueller decides that he wants to subpoena you the attorney general whitaker can block that, if mueller has final report, he decides how much goes to congress or doesn't go to congress. you tweeted this week about, quote, bob mueller and his gang of democrat thugs. >> right. chris: if whitaker decides in any way to limit or curtail the mueller investigation, are you okay with that? >> look, it's going to be up to him. i think he's very well aware politically. i think he's a astute politically, he's a very smart person, respected person, he will do what's right. i really believe he will do what's right.

chris: you won't overrule him if he decides to curtail. >> i would not get involved. all the people that say that i would end the investigation, how long has the witch hunt gone on? chris: since may -- >> you know how long i've been looked at? i was looked at as candidate with nothing, no proof with phoney people like mccabe, strzok and lover, lisa page and his lover. they wanted an insurance policy in case i won and hillary lost and that was the insurance policy. it's a scam. there was no collusion whatsoever and the whole thing is a scam. chris: your team is preparing written answers to questions about -- >> no, no, my team. i'm preparing written answers. i'm the one that does the answer, yes, are they writing them out, yeah, they are writing what i tell them to write. chris: are they going to be submitted? >> i completed them. chris: you are -- >> wasn't a big deal.

by the way, wasn't a big deal. the questions were asked and answered, wasn't a big deal. they make it like i had meetings for many, many hours. i got the questions, i responded, we wrote them out, i read them once, i read them a second time, we made changes, that's it. very simple. you know why, i did nothing wrong. chris: here is my question, though, you are submitting written answers to the special counsel about the issue of collusion but not on obstruction of justice? >> well, there was no obstruction -- chris: if i may, sir? >> i think they probably agree with you. chris: your final position that there's going to be no sit-down interview and nothing written or in person on obstruction? >> i would say probably, probably. i can change my mind but probably. i think we've wasted enough time on this witch hunt and the answer is probably. we are finished. chris: what are the odds 1 and

10? >> i don't do odds. chris: you ran casinos, sir. >> very successfully actually. we gave very, very complete answers to a lot of questions that i shouldn't have even been asked and i think that should solve the problem, i hope it solves the problem, if it doesn't, i would be told and this is probably the end. chris: tushish president erdogan has shared a tape with the u.s. and other countries that is of the killing of jamal khashoggi inside the caudy -- saudi consulate in istanbul, have you heard the tape or been briefed on it and if so to your mind what is the shot? >> we have the tape, i don't want to hear the tape. no reason to hear the tape. chris: why don't you want to hear it, sir? >> it's a suffering tape, i've

been fully briefed on it. there's no reason to hear it. i said should i, they said you shouldn't. chris: what happened? >> it was violent and vicious and terrible. chris: a month ago you said you had spoken with saudi crown prince mohamed bin salman and told you directly he had no knowledge of this. >> that's right. still does. chris: some of the people closest to him, closest advisers were part of this, did mbs lied to you, sir? >> i don't know, who can really know. i can say this he has many people now that say he had no knowledge. chris: what if the crown prince the president of the united states directly lied to you? >> he told me he had nothing to do with it, maybe 5 times at different points. chris: what if he's lying? you live with him because you

need him? >> would anybody really know? he did have certainly people that were reasonably close to him and close to him that were probably involved. you saw we put heavy sanctions on a large group of people from saudi arabia, but at the same time we do have an ally and i want to stick with an ally that in many ways has been very good. chris: if congress were to move to either try to cut off any u.s. involvement in the war in yemen or to block arm's sale you won't go along with it? >> i want to see yemen in so it takes two to tango iran has to end it also and iran is a different country than when i took over, it's weakened, one of the great rip-offs of all time. i want iran to stop also. chris: when democrats flipped the house back in 2006 and picked up 30 seats, president bush 43 had conference the next

day and said we had a thumping. last week in this election the house picked up so far 36 seats, maybe on the way to 40 seats and your reaction was that it was almost a complete victory. >> i won the senate, you don't mention it. i won the senate. chris: i understand that. historically big defeat in the house, you lost 36, maybe 40 seats, some would argue that it was a thumping and i want to talk about some of the ways in which you lost, you lost traditionally republican suburban not only philadelphia and dc but red state big cities like houston and oklahoma city, you lost among suburban women, you lost among independents and in 3 key states that i think you remember pretty well, wisconsin, pennsylvania, michigan, you lost both governor seats and the

senate seats. >> are you ready? i won the senate and that's historic too because if you look at presidents in the white house it's almost never happened that you won a seat. we have 53 as opposed to 51 and we have 53 great senators in the u.s. senate. we won, that's a tremendous victory, nobody talks about that. that's far greater victory than it is for the other side. number two, i wasn't on the ballot. chris: wait, you kept saying -- >> i said look at me -- i have people and you see the polls how good they are, i have people that won't vote unless i'm on the ballot, okay, i wasn't on the ballot and almost everybody that i won, 10 out of 11, i won against president obama, oprah winfrey and michelle obama in a great state called georgia for the governor and it was all stacked against brian and i was the one that went for brian and

brian won. look at florida, i went down to florida, rick scott won, and he won by a lot, i don't know what happened to all those votes at the very end, if i didn't put a spotlight on the election before it got down to 12,500 votes he would have lost that election, okay, in my opinion, he would have lost, they would have taken election from him. rick scott won florida, excuse me, a man name ron desantis is now your governor, new governor of florida. a wonderful fan named dewaine is governor of great state of ohio, remember what they used to say before my election? you cannot win unless you win ohio, i won ohio. we had a tremendous set of victories, you look at the victories -- chris: but if you can't carry and you certainly didn't carry it two weeks ago michigan, wisconsin and pennsylvania, you're not going to get reelected?

>> i didn't run. i wasn't running, my name wasn't on the ballot. there are many people that think i don't like congress that like me a lot. i get it all of the time. sir, we will never vote unless you're on the ballot. i get it all of the time. sir, i will never vote unless you're on the ballot. i say no, no, go and vote, what do you mean? as much as they try and convince people to go vote, i'm not on the ballot. chris: up next much more from our exclusive interview with president trump. we have a spirited exchange about his calling fake news the enemy of the american people and mr. trump makes a rare admission he'd like a do

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♪ ♪ ♪ chris: we are back now with more from our exclusive interview with president trump. about an hour before we sat down with the president there was breaking news, a ruling on the cnn lawsuit against the white house for pulling a reporter's press pass. cnn argued the trump administration violated its first amendment rights. administration lawyers said mr. trump can exclude any reporter he wants from the white house grounds. and that's where we started in the second part of our interview with the president. a federal judge who you appointed has just ruled that you must give cnn reporter jim acosta his press pass back, your reaction to the ruling? >> it's fine. it's not a big deal. what they said, though, is that we have create rules and regulation, et cetera, et cetera, we are doing that, we will write them up right now.

if they misbehave we will throw them out or stop news conference. chris: what are your rules going to be? this is over the line and you -- >> they are doing them now. we will have rules of decorum. we had a lot of reporters in that room. many reporters and they were unable to ask questions because this guy gets up and starts doing what he's supposed to be doing for him and for cnn and, you know, just shouting out questions but i will say this, look, nobody believes in the first amendment more than i do and if i think somebody is acting out of sorts, i will leave, i will say thank you very much, everybody, i appreciate you coming and i will leave. and those reporters will not be too friendly to whoever it is that's acting out. chris: why didn't you call out on acosta on the first place, there seems to be a simple solution, uncall him? >> i would like to do him but in many cases i don't, he stands up and unbelievably rude to sarah

huckabee, unbelievably rude and i see her, why do you call on the people that are so nasty and one of the things is maybe turn the camera off that faces them so that they don't have air time although i will be sued for that and maybe win or lose it, who knows, with this stuff you never know what's going to happen. chris: let's get to bigger issue in 2017, last year, you tweeted this, i want to quote, fake news media is not my enemy but the enemy of the american people. >> it's true, 100%. not the media, i'm glad you're calling it correctly. chris: that's what you said. >> the fake news -- so people that are supporting me in particular, they are very smart people, they are hard working, brilliant, great people. they know when news is fake. and they get angry when they see all of the fake news at frankly -- chris: people who have been critical of other presidents, no

president has liked his press coverage. john kennedy in your oval office canceled subscription to new york tribune, nobody called it the enemy of the american people. >> chris, i'm calling fake news, it's fake, it's phoney. chris: a lot of times it's news you don't like. >> no, i don't mind getting bad news if i'm wrong. if i do something wrong like, for instance, the cemetery i was not allowed to go because of the secret service because they expected to take a helicopter, they had zero visibility, they said, sir, we are totally unequipped for you to go, in addition to that, the cemetery was far too far away from air force one which is sort of like a controlled center where you had to be near. not one paper that i saw wrote it that way. they said i stayed out of it because of the rain and yet the following day i made a speech at the american cemetery, it was pouring, it wasn't even really raining the first day but the

fog was tremendous, okay. chris: sir, leaders in authoritarian countries like russia, china, venezuela now repress the media using your words. >> i can't talk for other people. ci only talk for me. i will tell you -- chris: you are seen as beacon of oppression. >> i'm not talking about you, but the news about me is largely phoney, it's false. even sometimes they'll say sources say, there is no source, in many cases there is. chris: i don't understand you like your coverage. >> 94%. chris: can i bring the bigger issue up? >> yeah. chris: million mcraven, retired admiral, navy seal, former -- >> hillary clinton fan. chris: special operations. >> hillary clinton fan.

chris: took down saddam hussein says the greatest sentiment is biggest threat. >> he's hillary backer and obama backer. chris: he's a navy seal. >> wouldn't have it been to have gotten osama bin laden a lot sooner than that. they considered a nice mansion, i don't know, i've seen nicer, but living in pakistan right next to the military academy, everybody in pakistan knew he was there and we get pakistan $1.3 billion a year and they don't tell him -- chris: you're not going to give him credit for taking down bin laden? >> they took him down, there's news right there. he lived in pakistan, we are supporting pakistan, we are giving $1.3 billion which we don't give them anymore, by the way, i ended up because they don't do anything for us, they don't do a damn thing for us. i'm totally in favor of the media and free press.

chris: the president gets to decide what's fair and what's not? >> when you do something very good and they write it badly and it's consistently, when you -- as an example rarely do -- chris: barack obama whined about fox news all of the time but never said we were the enemy of the people. >> no, he didn't talk about the news. he didn't talk about anything. i'm only saying it very differently than anyone has ever said it before. i'm saying fake news, false reporting, dishonest reporting of which there's a lot and i know it, see, i know it because i'm a subject of it. a lot of people don't know it but when i explain it to them they understand it and because you know better than, you don't have to act perfectly wonderful innocent angel, i know you too well, i knew your father too well. it's not your gene. >> look, i think some of the coverage of you said, and i've said it on the record is bias but i don't think that they are

-- >> most of it is bias. chris: i don't know, the idea that you call us the enemy of the people -- >> i'm not calling you that. chris: we are altogether. >> you don't understand it. i'm not calling you. chris: doesn't matter. when you call cnn and new york times, we are in solidarity, sir. >> i'm calling fake news, fake reporting is what's tearing this country apart because people know, people like things that are happening and they're not hearing about it. chris: where do you rank yourself in the pantheon of great presidents, lincoln, washington, fdr and reagan, do you make the top 10? >> i think i'm doing a good job. we would have been in world with north korea if the administration continued forward. i would give myself -- look, i hate to do it but i will do it. i will give myself an a plus, is that enough?

can i go higher than that? chris: can you envision a situation, you talk about 6 more years, can you envision a situation well into your second term where you think that you're so good for the country and so essential for the progress of the country that you would try to amend the constitution so you could serve a third term? >> no. chris: why not? >> it won't happen. i think -- i think the 8-year limit is a good thing not a bad thing. chris: you've talked a lot already about the cemetery and the fact that you didn't go because it was security concern and you did go the next day, here is the thing -- >> excuse me. not security concern, they wouldn't allow me to go. chris: i understand. >> sir, secret service said, sir, you cannot go, we are not prepared. it was supposed to be helicopter but the helicopter counterfly. they -- couldn't fly.

chris: barack obama went every year he was here in dc. >> i should have done that, i was extremely busy on calls for the country. we did a lot of calling as you know. chris: this is veterans day. >> i probably -- you know, in retrospect i could have and i did last year and i will virtually every year but we had come in very late at night and i had just left literally the american cemetery in paris and i assumed that was fine and i was extremely busy because of affairs of state doing other things. chris: why -- >> i would have done it. chris: why haven't you visited our troops serving in war zones in iraq and afghanistan in the two years you've been in office as commander in chief? >> well w i think you will see that happen, there are things that are being planned, we don't want to talk about it because of -- obviously because of security

reasons and everything else. there are things that are planned. as you know, i was very much opposed to the war in iraq, i think it was a tremendous mistake. i don't think anybody has been more with the military than i have as president in terms of funding, in terms of all of the things i've been able to get them, including the vets, i don't think anybody has done more than me, unbelievable busy schedule and i will be doing it, on top of which you have the phoney witch hunts on top of which -- i mean, we have been very busy but i will be doing that. chris: before midterms you said your biggest regret is perhaps you should have had a softer tone in your 2 years as president. but since then, some could argue you've been on a tear at the press conference the day after the election, you mocked some of the republican congressmen who lost, not embracing you.

>> mia love gave me no love and she lost. too bad, sorry about that mia. >> you went after two african american reporters and basically said that they were dumb. >> the same thing with april ryan, i watched her get up, i mean, you talk about somebody that's a loser, she doesn't know what the hell she's doing. >> do you want to rein robert mueller? >> what a stupid question that is. you ask a lot of stupid questions. chris: i was in st. jones in missouri, they love what you have done to the economy and put isis out of business, the one thing they say is why do you have to be divisive, why don't you do more to bring the country together? >> i think that if i was very different i wouldn't have gotten what we had to get, we got the biggest tax cuts in history, we

have approved and got rid of individual mandate which was the most unpopular thing that you can imagine, health care. i got rid of it, everybody said it would be impossible to get rid of it. the regulations. i think if it was a more modified or moderate in that sense, i don't think i would have done half of the things that i was able to get completed. with that being said, other than you have to have a certain ability to fight back and as you know people have, you know, they take strong stands on me both ways, you know, love and hate, i would like to see it maybe more right down the middle, but tone is something that's important to me, but a lot of times you can't practice tone because you have people coming at you so hard that if you don't fight back in a somewhat vigorous way you're not going to win and we have to win. this country has to win. we have a lot of victories coming and i think if i -- if i go too low key we will not have

victories. chris: mr. president, thank you. appreciate it, sir. one point of clarification admiral mcraven never endorsed candidate for president in 2016 but in e-mail clinton campaign john podesta discussed mcraven as possible running mate. after the interview president trump took us into the oval office to talk about how he makes those tough decision that is come across his desk every day. that's next. rewarded. going new places. anytime. rewarded! learn more at the explorer card dot com. all the tools you need for every step of the way. make it, squarespace

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with the place so far? >> i have, i feel very comfortable. took me a little while. it's incredible, you say you're the president of the united states and i say, well, and takes a little while to get over. chris: i was going to ask you the first time that you're in the oval office by yourself, everybody is gone, you are looking around the room, iconic room, the most famous -- >> here we go. i've had people come into this, the biggest people in the world, presidents, prime ministers, heads of biggest companies in the world and they always stop and they say this is the oval office, this is the oval office. nothing like it in the world. this is the desk, very famous, john kennedy was right here, a little door that opens up. chris: right. >> famous picture, i could show you the picture, in fact, i will give it to you, this is a very important desk, fdr, john kennedy, we have 7 desks and as president you can choose any one

of the desks, this is to me i think the most beautiful in terms of its carving. i also think in many respects it's, you know, some people that i respect. chris: when you're sitting tat desk, how do you make decisions? i mean, do you agonize over them, do you second-guess yourself, how does -- >> i don't think i don't think about it. i don't think about how i make them. i make what i consider to be the right decision, i have great people work target white house, they don't get enough credit. i have tremendously talented people and i will talk to them and sometimes i'll have them go at each other, i do like that, they are competitive people and at the end i make a decision. and certainly on the economy, a lot of things -- we have made a lot of good decisions and i want to keep it that way. chris: do you ever second guess yourself? >> all of the time. i have done things where i wish i had gone different route, you

change course and bring it back and stabilize. chris: toughest decision you've had to make as president? >> well, i think north korea has been very tough because we were very close. when i took that over president obama right on those two chairs we sat and talked that's by far the biggest problem that the country has and i think we had a real decision as to which way to go in north korea and certainly at least so far i'm very happy with the way we went. i have a very good -- chris: even though there's talk that they are putting new sites? >> maybe they are, maybe they're not, i don't believe that, could be. if that's the way it goes, that's the way it goes. you know, i go with the way we have to go. but so far it's been good, we have a very good relationship, we made i think some great decisions for the people of this country and i do, you know, i put america first and other countries should put themselves first. it's not like we should put everybody else should be second, no, other countries are proud of their countries and their

leadership put their countries first but we were putting our country in many cases last, we were more worried about the world than we were worried about the united states. that's not going to happen with me. chris: we want to get some reaction now to our interview with president trump from our sunday group, former republican congressman jason chaffetz, jonathan swan who covers the white house for axios, former democratic congressman edwards. jonathan, i was struck by a lot that the president said, first, he really seems to be closing the door to any interview with robert mueller, he said probably it's finished and he seemed to be opening the door to possible oversight of mueller by the new acting attorney general mat whitaker? >> this is the first time i've ever heard him acknowledge on the record what has seem to all of us to be reality which is that there was no intention of him sitting down. we heard for months that he

wanted to, trump said publicly that he wanted but his team really didn't want to, that's the first time i ever heard him basically shut the door to that and with whitaker it's interesting, i don't know that it's credible when he told you that he wasn't aware of the statements that whitaker had made about robert mueller but it seems that trump is very happy with him in his job and i think it was notable that he sort of let it open that he could, you know, constrain budget or other things, he didn't shut that off. chris: his decision, i will leave it there him, then, jerry, the president's refusal to acknowledge any defeat in the midterms and when it came to the losses that republicans did sustain he absolutely flipped the script from the campaign and the rallies at the end to say, i wasn't on the ballot. >> yeah, no, it was a -- the election is about me, the election wasn't about me turn which is probably what you would expect, he does seem fairly sensitive about the outcome.

i thought the fascinating part of the conversation, the fascinating part of the midterms which you try to draw him out it's the details, it's where the defeats happened for republicans, suburbs that they really need to win and in three states you correctly pointed out that are crucial to trump coalition. this wasn't just a defeat, it was a defeat in some places that are very sensitive politically. i will say, though, it's right we held the senate and we added a couple of seats, that adds firewall. chris: he said i'm not going to say which house is more important but he made it clear that the appointments i want to make to the bench and cabinet, whatever i can get through the senate, i don't have to deal with the house. >> by the way both republican caucus in the senate and the republican caucus in the house will be more protrump now than the election, the trump enemies and critics and moderate -- chris: what struck you about the president's reaction to the

midterms and do you see in what you heard from him any basis to believe that there's going to be any serious deal-making, compromising, governing with the house democratic majority? >> well, i mean, i heard the president acknowledge his mistake on veterans day but he wouldn't acknowledge his mistake when it comes to the elections, i mean, we had bush who described it as thumping, obama as slacking and the president victory is mine. and so you know i look at this and said that what the president underscored is the ability of the house of representatives now to embark on investigations that they want and measured kind of way, but also possibly doing something on prescription drugs, on infrastructure, on immigration even if the president is willing to negotiate with the house, but i think we will have to see and right now the house of representatives is, i think, not in a mood to negotiate at least the base of the democratic party

but we will come to a time where that's going to be true. chris: congressman chaffetz, the president had interesting things to say about the murder of journalist jamal khashoggi, he said he won't even listen to the tape, advised it's too violent and suffering tape he said, he left open the possibility that the crown prince may have been involved but he made it really clear that he's not going to do anything to rejerd piz relations with saudi arabia. >> well, the president is in a very difficult spot because there's so much on the line. i thought it was interesting what he said about yemen focusing back on iran. he wants to get rid of what's going on in yemen. you need saudi arabia. i think that was fascinating. it was fascinating what he said about pakistan. i thought that was news worthy about the foreign aid, that does not look good for pakistan which has nuclear capability and it'll be interesting to see where that goes. chris: and then, jonathan, the

president's decision not to go to cemetery in paris -- i should say the order he got from the secret service on saturday and, you know, he brought that up several times on his own. i wasn't asking him about it and a rare admission of mistake by this president in not going to arlington this last monday. >> this is the second time i've seen the president acknowledge a mistake on camera, the only other time i can recall was after access hollywood when he did what look today many of us hostage video and after he apologized, brought back the clinton accusers to the debate. so it is like -- it's unheard of for him to acknowledge a mistake. these are the matters that really he fixates upon, the optics of the presidency, ceremony of the presidency, the visuals to have presidency and the symbolism of the presidency and this was such an obvious

mistake that it's clearly gotten under his skin. chris: jerry. >> there was that but also the fascinating play with him about tone in which you tried to get him to talk a little bit why doesn't he moderate tone even though he's hinted at it a few times, he said essentially this is the way i succeed and i thought that was fascinating, he admitted the mistake but he's not going to change the style and don't expect that at all and that's formula for success for me. chris: all right, panel, we will have to take a break here, when we come back, there's other news, race for house speaker meets with potential challenger plus election drama in florida, who would have thought? the senate race between rick scott and bill nelson goes to hand recount. you need

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>> come on in, the water is warm. >> if the vote was taken today she might not have the vote. chris: house democratic nancy pelosi and potential challenger marsha fudge engaging in trash talk on who will be speaker in democratic house. congresswoman edwards, 17 house democrats have signed a letter saying that they oppose the election of nancy pelosi as speaker and marsha fudge who we just heard there is one of them. you have an article today in the washington post with this provocative headline, don't blow it democrats, there's only one choice to be the next speaker and you say that choice is nancy pelosi. why? >> coming out of 2018 where you

win the most historic victory that democrats have had since watergate led by nancy pelosi staying on message, raising health care as issue around the country and democrats need to come back and get to work on health care, on infrastructure, on immigration, on government accountability and instead they are having a fight about the speaker, well, the rest of the country doesn't really share that at least among democrats and it's time for democrats to, you know, to get together and i'm convinced that nancy pelosi will be the next speaker of the house. i think she will come out with overwhelming majority in the caucus and that is going to follow her to the floor and it should, she's a strategists, she's held democrats together and now, look, she raised more than half of the money that democrats took in to get the house majority. chris: jerry, as we say, a number of house candidates, democrats campaign pledging, it was an issue in the campaign and certainly in campaign ads, they

would not support nancy pelosi for speaker. do you think she's in any real trouble getting elected? >> she had some trouble but not real trouble, i think. look, it's hard in politics to beat something with nothing and there's no viable alternative, nobody has built ground work or layed predicate, no one person has and i think in the end the new members who said they won't support her can vote against her when democrats decide who their choice but there's no alternative and that gives them a way out. again, if you don't have something you can't beat something. chris: marsha fudge is toying with the idea -- >> but not there yet. chris: would she be serious contender? >> again, no ground work has been layed for serious opposition. >> if they vote as caucus she's going to win and she goes to the floor, they have a choice, are they not going to vote for her, sit silent, are they going to vote for kevin mccarthy, a clarifying choice.

chris: let's turn to the recount, the continuing recount in the florida senate race where there are continuing claims of fraud from both sides, take a look. >> he can't stand the fact that he's not going to be elected for the first time in decades and he won't -- he's here to steal the election. >> he's been using his power as governor to try to undermine the voting process. chris: congressman chaffetz, there are growing signs as the votes start to come in from the manual recount that rick scott is going to be able to hold on to the lead which is about 12,500 votes, is this over, is he going to take the senate seat and replace bill nelson and why, not that you're on expert in florida, but to a certain degree all of us are, why are florida elections so often a mess? >> i don't know, it's embarrassing in florida. we are having the same problem in utah where there are still thousands of votes that have not

been counted for the first time. so the margin is so great for, i think, we are looking at senator scott because 12,000 votes is insurmountable, historically the hand recounts maybe sway 100, 200 votes but not the 12,000 that would be necessary. chris: do you have any insight as to why florida? >> ron desantis has big job in task. i don't understand why counties are going their own direction when somebody in documented way who is leading elections has the types of problems that she had, she should have been pushed out of office a long time ago. chris: you know who could have done it, governor rick scott? >> i think there's a lesson for governors out there to pay more attention, not going to election of 2020 but also the census which is on our heels. chris: jonathan, let's look at election 2020, it's not just congressional election, that's the presidential election, it is

interesting that the blue wave and it's become more of a blue wave as we see the final victories a restaurantishing, i read today that the entire congressional delegation from orange county in california is going to be democrat, reagan country, goldwater country, all going to be democrats. but the blue wave did not hit in florida which is we always think of as the key swing state, what does that tell you about 2020 that it looks like they will elect maybe small margins republican senator and republican governor? >> well, it tell tells you one thing, one thing trump is right about he does have impact in florida, ron desantis would not be governor without donald trump. he wouldn't have gotten through primary, most republicans consider him as horrible candidate. trump's numbers aren't terrible in florida, the problem is that there's path for democrats to take the white house which is upper midwest and you identified those three states and, yes, donald trump wasn't on the ballot but he didn't even go to

3 states for the reason that numbers have fallen so much. there is this sort of democratic fantasy about arizona, texas but they don't need to do that, they can go through midwest. chris: but we talked about the speaker's race, you have to beat somebody with somebody, we don't know who the democratic candidate is going to be so, yes, warning signs in suburbs, upper rust belt but it's donald trump against the unknown at this point. >> who rides the wave, somebody who speaks to those voters in those three industrial state that is you spoke of or somebody who speaks to coastal enclaves where the strength is, by the way, is texas a swing state, ohio doesn't look like swing state anymore, ohio looks republican, texas is a great question mark, nevada looks more blue but arizona looks like a swing state, it is going to be slightly different if not significantly different presidential map in 2020 than the one we've been used to seeing. chris: i'm glad that we waited a

week and a half to start talking about 2020. [laughter] chris: thank you panel, see you next sunday, up next, we will be back with a final note. the mercedes-benz winter event is back and you won't want to stop for anything else. [ barks ] ho! lease the c 300 sport sedan for $399 a month at your local mercedes-benz dealer. mercedes-benz. the best or nothing. ♪ ♪ the united states postal service

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♪ arthel: this is fox news alert, senator bill nelson set to make a statement after calling republican governor rick scott to concede victory in the florida senate race. eric: correspondent phil keaton where nelson's concession is expected at any moment, marks end of 46 years in public office and marks the first time, republican senators at the same time, phil. >> hi, eric, yes, it is all over after 12 hard-fought days over recounting and lawsuits and florida election 2018 is finally do