power. and on the other side, former trump campaign manager cory lewandowski has a new book and he's out to settle some scores and i'll be asking him the tough questions. that does it for me. "hardball" with chris mathews is up next. /s >> devastating, let's play "hardball." ♪ ♪ good evening, i'm chris mathews from washington. we have some breaking news tonight. according to a court filing, special counsel robert mueller's office says former trump campaign chairman manafort lied to the fbi and to the special counsel in a breach of his plea agreement. and that's according to a filing intended to update the court on manafort's cooperation. meanwhile, harvard law professor alan dershowitz who has been an ally of president trump predicts the impact of mueller's report will be, quote, devastating to

the president. and now fresh off his thanksgiving vacation, trump has resumed his attacks on the special counsel's investigation. today, as he and the country away robert mueller's next move, trump appears to be defending himself from the damaging information that mueller may soon reveal. quote, when mueller does his final report, will he be covering all of his conflicts of interest in a preamble? will he be recommending action on all the crimes of many kinds from those on the other side? and will he be putting in statements from hundreds of people closely involved with my campaign who never met, saw or spoke to a russian during this period? there was no collusion and mueller knows it. well, the tweets from trump appear to signal that trump is preparing for something truly big. it comes a day after alan dershowitz made that ominous prediction about what trump should expect from mueller's investigation. >> i think the report is going to be devastating to the

president, and i know that the president seems already working on a response to the report. >> it also seems increasingly likely theorist jerome corsi will be the next to fall in the probe. corsi widely credited with inventing, if that's the word for it, the birther lie about former president obama, is suspected of having advance knowledge that wikileaks would release russian-hacked e-mails belonging to clinton's campaign manager. special counsel robert mueller offered him a plea deal on one count of perjury related to statements about his contact with wikileaks founder julian assange. however, after negotiating with prosecutors, corsi says he plans to reject the deal. i'm joined now by david corn, washington chief with mother jones. michael steele. peter baker, white house chief correspondent for "the new york

times." let me go to barbara. what do we make of this development with regard to what went wrong with the manafort plea deal that seems to be broken all over? >> yeah, i haven't seen the report that robert mueller's team filed, but it could be devastating for a lot of people. if he lied, he loses his values a cooperator and the deal is off. what it means for paul manafort, what happens is the plea is accepted. the guilty plea stands, but the plea agreement can be voided if he has lied. by failing to comply with the terms the deal is off. instead of getting a motion for reduced sentence in exchange for cooperation, he now faces the guidelines which i think are 17 to 20 years in prison. so we go back to where they would have been if he had pleaded guilty without cooperation. it's also of negative consequence i think to mueller and his team who are probably hoping to get information that they could use against others in the organization based on manafort's testimony. if he has lied to them, he's lost his value as a cooperator.

>> well, according to the court filing, the court filing, after signing the plea agreement, manafort committed federal crimes by lying to the federal bureau of investigation and the special counsel's office on a variety of subject matters which constitutes breaches of the agreement. peter baker, let me ask you two questions at once. what do you make of the manafort fall apart here where he's going away for a long time because of lying even in this late stages of deal-making, but also what's going on with dershowitz saying, my god, it's devastating what's coming to trump? >> yeah, that's a great question. we don't know what alan dershowitz knows that might make him feel that way other than what we all know publicly. what we know publicly, of course, is robert mueller has pulled together a lot of disparate threads of this story and we don't know how they all add up. but parts of them already known publicly are pretty damning in their own way. what the manafort thing means is an open question. as george said, presumably the

special prosecutor for manafort was about other people, particularly the campaign, what he might be able to tell them. if he is now deemed to be a liar even after the plea agreement, he does seem to lose some value. you can certainly imagine president trump and his advocates saying once a report comes out, why should anything that comes from paul manafort be trusted given that he has apparently a pattern of preverification that will make him, you know, suspect in terms of any damning information he might provide the prosecutors. >> i'm joined right now, peter, by nbc national security reporter ken dilanian. ken, what do we make of this? manafort was a star witness. now he's going to get no credit for his witnessing. >> reporter: that's right, chris. i'm not sure he would have been a star witness because of the credibility problems you were talking about. prosecutors did hope to get new information from him about what happened during the campaign. and they are saying flat out that he has lied to them in

these discussions that they've been having with him since the plea agreement. it's remarkable because in the document, prosecutors say that manafort disagrees and doesn't believe he lied. but if, in fact, mueller is going to go to court and say that manafort lied, he must have some proof of this. he must have documentary corroborating evidence that shows the things manafort said in these discussions flatly aren't true. so it's really hard to know exactly what to make of this until we see the details, and the details are not in this document. mueller is, in fact, saying he's going to file a document later explaining the ways in which manafort lied. but it's just an incredible development. if it's true, it just shows -- it's another level of recklessness from manafort who, after all, allegedly tampered with witnesses while he was under indictment which led him to be thrown in jail. >> let me go to david corn on this. it seems to me the president senses something big is coming. the waterfall, the titanic hitting the iceberg, whatever you want to call it, the president is out there dumping

all over the prosecution saying we have to go after democrats, we have to do the opposite of what they're doing. it sounds like dershowitz has figured out something. he spoke yesterday. the president tweets today. it sounds like the president is either afraid of what dershowitz said or something has him mad on this. >> well, dershowitz said that there will be a devastating report. we still don't know at the end of the day whether there will be any final report. mueller does not have an obligation to file a report -- >> why are you saying this now, hoe? >> i've been saying this a long time, but people keep thinking, i think wrongly, there is a report -- >> what else can he do with the president except report? >> he doesn't have to file a report. >> you mean, he's going to indict all these people that work for the president, put them away for a long time, we're now hearing about manafort going away 15, 20 years and not say a thing about the king of the whole operation? >> it's up to mueller to decide whether to file a report on the president. he has no obligation to do so. he might do so. and on everything else, he only

has to file a prosecutorial memo at the end explaining -- >> jaworski, the precedent is indict everybody you can. if you can't indict the president, you put out an impeachment exercise. >> it's possible, it's not obligatory. we know the president does go through these moments when he feels -- he looks like he's more scared about what's happening. he gets out there, says no collusion, no collusion. we get more evidence there was collusion in the trump tower meeting. >> michael, you're the politician here. what is trump up to? why this crazy fog machine he's putting out there? >> i think it's a little bit of fear and fog. i think the fear is basically what his lawyers are telling them -- telling him about their discussions with mueller and the idea that, you know, people have already gone and made testimony. the fog is continuing to perpetuate the narrative that this whole thing is a witch-hunt and that there is no up side.

there's no good. the president tomorrow, if not tonight, will spin the latest revelations to say, see, there's no there there. maybe there is more but the fog is what matters for trump. >> let me go back to peter baker of the times. what do we know about the president's written answers that came to the government last week? do we know what's in there? has anybody gotten a peek the what he at what he said in answers to mueller's team? >> not that i know of at this point. obviously that's going to be key to what mueller decides to do. vis-a-vis what david was saying in terms of a report or not, this is what he's been waiting for all year. he's been trying to get answers out of the president. it took basically almost 11 months into the year to finally get some. whether they satisfy the prosecutors or not, we don't know. but you have to imagine that this is the final piece for the -- at least one of the final pieces before any report might be written if one is written because he has to compare the president's answers to all the voluminous evidence he's been collecting more than 18 months.

>> let me find out with jerome corsi, barbara mcquade, does corsi -- apparently doesn't want to admit to perjury. he just refused. i admit i may have got my facts wrong, but it's just faulty memory. >> prosecutors don't charge people based on faulty memory. to establish a perjury count, you have to show that the person then and there knew that what they were saying was false, and that it was about a material matter. that is something that was very important. and so faulty memory does not ring true. if he doesn't want to plead guilty to a perjury charge, then i think he'll put him to their proofs. i think there could be a little more time that goes before robert mueller is done, because if there is to be a charge against jerome corsi, i think the ultimate goal there is to get to roger stone, and the goal there is to see whether you can flip him and find out what happened with conversations with wikileaks. i think it could take some weeks for that to play out. >> does anybody in this panel right now have a sense of how this accumulation of things is going to work? we're looking now at paul

manafort, the chairman of the campaign, the chairman of the convention of the whole campaign. we're looking at people like jerome corsi, lesser players like papadopoulos. we're looking at roger stone, probably on the list for the guillotine here. all these people going to prison for a significant amount of years looking ahead. and then the president of the united states sits there. is this a rico situation, barbara? if the mastermind walks, as david thinks anything is possible here, if the mastermind walks where 20 people go away to prison for hard time, i think history will have a hard time figuring this baby out. >> you know, in terms of putting together a rico, you'd have to show there is an association for the purpose of engaging in criminal activity, pattern of racketeering activity. i don't know they're at that point. we have a number of different individuals who pleaded guilty to crimes. until we put it together we don't know what we have. but there are sometimes political offices used for the purpose of engauging in criminal activity. it's not just here and there,

but a pattern and that's the purpose of the organization. i'm not sure that robert mueller would be able to get there or that he would try. the last thing he wants to be accuses of is overreach. there are plenty of charges to go around if the evidence can support those charges. >> michael, you're shaking your head yes. i'm looking at this emoluments clause again. i'm looking for people to search for trump defending the saudi prince against what his own agency said was murder. why defend a guy on murder? i don't like the guy, he's a bad customer, but we need their gas, we need their oil. he's not saying that. could this be the fact the saudis love to write checks for trump, they love it? >> the way i look at all the facts we know so far, the russian pipeline, financial pipeline has been cut off. there's no doubt about that. his own sons were bragging about the russians financing a lot of their golf courses, things like that. a new relationship has been established with the saudis. i took note of the president's

tweet when this story first broke that he said he did not have financial interest in saudi arabia. the key thing is do you have financial relationships with saudi arabia. >> he claimed he does because they all stay -- >> that's the juxtaposition -- exactly. that's the juxtaposition. that's why the is where he is. >> i'm joined by congressman eric swalwell, intel committee. thank you for this breaking story here. what do we make of this manafort thing falling apart? i did think he was going to be a major witness. he may have credibility problems up to kazoo. just as they're dotting the i's on this thing, he's lying to the fbi, lying to mueller's people. i don't know why a guy would lie at this point. who is he covering for? >> well, chris, it also is suspicious that this is happening the same day that jerome corsi is getting cold feet. you have to wonder, are pardons being dangled in front of these guys as they are in cooperation agreements? and that's something, i'm sure the mueller team will be looking at, and now something a new

congress will be able to look at. >> what do you think, david? hold on, congressman. >> i think that's key. you talked about where that's going to end. i think for us citizens to know the full story, we have to know more beyond these prosecutions. that's where house democrats and anybody in the senate when the investigation is ongoing has to get on the case and start investigating things and tell us what the republicans wouldn't about the whole scandal. this is wide, it's wide ranging. and we're not going to get all the answers from robert mueller. we never were. that's not his job. and so i think to understand fully what's going on, whether it's with emoluments, with russian financing, the saudis, anything coming up with the trump/russia scandal, we'll have to have more digging -- >> let's go to the congressman. schiff is talking about going after him on the emoluments. do you think trump has been running a criminal enterprise since he's been president, this is something he can bank the

money? >> i think the president has put transactions above u.s. values. and that's not just with russia. that's with the khashoggi case. someone said to me yesterday on an airplane, he said i hope you guys keep looking at the russia stuff. this khashoggi deal with the saudis is happening right now in plain sight. and i think he's right. what he means is that the president's prior or existing -- and we're going to find out if it it's existing because we're going to get his tax returns. his financial interests are driving u.s. foreign policy. in about 39 days there's going to be a lot more light on what those interests are. >> when you have the subpoena? >> yes, when we have his tax returns and when we start to be able to interview whether it's not whitaker, whether there is an agreement there to be protected by this new acting attorney general, or whether it's with pardon offers that he's been making to witnesses who are starting to back out of cooperation agreements. >> a lot of reckoning coming on here with the mueller report. i think there will be a report. we'll see how mueller goes ahead and finishes this. i do think he has to come through with an overall statement. something like rico, if not

judicially like rico, somebody is running this operation and i don't know anybody else except the president who could have done t. thank you, david corn, michael steel, barbara mcquade, peter baker, ken dilanian and u.s. congressman eric swalwell. we're going to have more on the late breaking news from special counsel robert mueller later in the program. coming up, the trump administration closed off the busiest port of entry along the u.s./mexico border yesterday for hours. and fired teargas at central american men, women and children who tried to cross the border. today trump threatened to close the border permanently. what's that mean? plus just when you thought the midterms were over, one final senate battle is now still being raged down in mississippi. cindy hyde-smith is hoping one last visit from the president will get her over the line. and after all of trump's promises that manufacturing jobs were coming back to the good old usa, gm announced today it will be cutting nearly 15,000 jobs,

including 1600 in ohio. senator sharon brown will join us and talk about what's good for gm is good for america. finally let me finish with the most effective social democratic leader of her time. this is "hardball" where the action is. you should meet our newest team member, tecky. i'm tecky. i can do it all. go ahead, ask it a question. tecky, can you offer low costs and award-winning wealth management with a satisfaction guarantee, like schwab? sorry. tecky can't do that. schwabbb! calling schwab. we don't have a satisfaction guarantee, but we do have tecky! i'm tecky. i ca... are you getting low costs and award-winning wealth management? if not, talk to schwab.

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leave no room behind with xfi pods. simple. easy. awesome. click or visit a retail store today. mr. president, are you comfortable with -- >> as you know, they're not -- they had to use because they were being rushed by some very tough people, and they used teargas. here's the bottom line. nobody is coming into our country unless they come in legally. >> well, welcome back to "hardball." that was trump, of course, defending the u.s. border patrol agent's use of teargas on central american migrants at the southern border this weekend. tensions boiled over on sunday when migrants in mexico, here's the pictures, protested the u.s. asylum process, tried to get around a blockade and crossed the border near san diego.

the ensuing chaos led to border patrol agents firing teargas and also pepper sprayed hundreds of migrants, including women and children. border patrol said the move was necessary after some in the crowd tossed rocks and bottles at the agents. we saw those pictures. anyway, the situation caused border protection to shutdown all vehicle and foot traffic at the san ysidro border crossing, one of the busiest ports of entry along the southern border. i've been there a few times, more than six hours. in a tweet this morning trump said, motorcycles co-should move the flag waiving migrants, many of whom are stone cold criminals back to their countries. he added, we will close the border permanently if need be. congress, fund the wall. that's always the end of all speeches. i'm joined now by president for center of american progress, and adolfo, surrogate to the great john mccain. how do we deal with this? you start. look at the pictures. the american people are grabbed by pictures.

they don't like the pictures. whatever your politics, nobody likes the pictures. >> i'll put the politics aside for a moment although i'll say quickly from my perspective, this is an i told you so moment for president trump who was warning that this type of thing would happen. it happened on the mexican border. how we deal with it, to answer your question, first and foremost, the thing the president needs to so is do what he's doing. execute the laws of the united states, which is to secure or border. that has been the first tenet of any comprehensive reform legislation or proposal, has always been border security. this is an example of why it's necessary. i mean, there are two choices here. it's very clear. i'm curious what -- >> i want to ask you the final question. >> let people into the country -- >> a lot of poverty south of our border. two-thirds of a billion people living down there, a lot of them are poor, desperately poor. living in countries where there's no freedom at all, and danger. how do we regulate honestly in

an american way acceptance of asylum seekers? how do we develop a profound comprehensive immigration policy that we are proud of as americans to enforce? because at some point there is going to have to be enforcement. when is that going to come, that day? >> i hope that day comes soon and i really do believe, and i've said this before -- >> do you believe in asylum? >> i believe in asylum. i don't believe in economic refugees who rush the border. i do a lot of spanish television and i see these interviews and they're heart breaking. there are people looking for jobs. that's not a basis to seek political asylum. >> that's the law. your turn. what should we do? >> i think the truth is that we have laws and we have a president who unfortunately wants to inflame a crisis instead of solve for it. >> what would you do? >> i think we should enforce our asylum laws. if we need more resources at the border to make adjudications faster, we should do that. we have had asylum laws for decades. we had higher levels of migration across the border in the past. we've had caravans come in the

past. the truth is that our laws should be enforced. what donald trump wants to do is change the asylum laws so we don't actually allow anybody to come in. he said that himself. and you know that. when we've talked about comprehensive immigration reform, his whole focus is actually not to solve this problem. it's to democrat going tagogue . a lot of people didn't like it because he wanted to actually change the immigration laws. >> let them in, give them asylum processing -- >> no. what i'm saying -- no, no, what i'm saying is we have a process. if people are adjudicated to be proper asylum seekers they get in. if they don't, if they're rejected, our laws are such that they should be deported out. that is the law today. why he can't actually follow the law is -- >> a couple things. i have worked these issues for two decades. i headed up -- >> you should know what the law is. >> let me finish. it's what it is. i do know what the law is and obviously with all due respect,

you don't. i'm a lawyer and i'll tell you why, with all due respect. these individuals do not qualify. you said it correctly, chris. the vast majority of these cases are economic -- let me finish. >> you're not a judge. let the judge decide. >> you know what? they're adjudicating 100 cases a day right now in san ysidro. the problem is this. the vast majority of these individuals have been sold a bill of goods that they're going to get into the united states and find jobs for the reasons you said earlier, chris, about work and so forth. that's just not the case. what's going on here -- >> if the comprehensive bill is -- several years ago there wouldn't have been ill legal jobs waiting for them. that's the problem. >> this isn't political persecution. these are not asylum seekers. >> you want comprehensive immigration reform, the whole thing? >> absolutely. i think there is bipartisan support -- >> tell the president. tell the president. >> it's everybody's version of it and not open borders. >> what nancy pelosi has to do is bring up the bill that was

beaten. >> i would support it. >> up next, mississippi's republican senator cindy hyde-smith is hoping a visit from trump tonight and this afternoon will divert accusations against her of racism and voter suppression piling up on tomorrow's runoff election. she did say these things. she's in trouble because of what she said. this is "hardball" where the action is. with fidelity wealth management you get straightforward advice, tailored recommendations, tax-efficient investing strategies,

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i'm here to ask the people of mississippi to send cindy hyde-smith back to the united states senate so we can make america great again. we can make it great for all americans. cindy's far left opponent, he's far left, oh, he's out there. how does he fit into mississippi? i could go over this, but how does he fit in? >> oh, anyway, we're back to "hardball." that was president trump this afternoon campaigning in -- oh, that's a tough one for him -- mississippi for embattled senator cindy hyde-smith facing mike espy in a runoff election tomorrow. election ending down there. she's had controversy the last several weeks including joking attending a public hanging. that's a hoot. and saying voter suppression it a good idea. getting caught on tape with that baby. she's facing questions about posing with confederate

artifacts like the hat over the weekend. the jackson free press reported she attended a seg academy back in the '70s. segregation academies. they were set up so white parents could avoid sending their kids to school with black students. vaughn hillyard asked tore had clarify and got this response. >> we are going to an event. thank you, guys. >> senator, can i ask you a question about race? it's an issue on voter -- why not speak about the issue of race? there's a lot of people we've talked to across the state that are concerned about your remarks and what you are apologizing for. senator, why not speak to this issue? your comments offended a great number of people, senator. no, you vanity. i'm wondering -- what is it that you're apologizing for? >> let's bring in tonight's "hardball" round table. anita kumar, white house correspondent for mcclatchy susan page, washington bureau

chief, managing editor of the beat. that sounds interesting these days, the beat. thank you. she's made these comments about hanging as being a hot ticket for going to see the lakers players or something, going to a hanging is -- i don't know what she's talking about. segregation academies and this other stuff about it was a real joke, voter suppression, really fun. your thoughts? >> and yet she's still up in the polls. we're calling it a tight race. >> what's the right/black proportion -- >> a third are black -- >> 38%. >> in other words, mike espy is beating the spread, if you will. >> my cousin has a story about african-american republicans sticking by her, not having a problem with it. >> why are they doing this? >> i don't think people are sticking by her. i don't think she's a strong gop candidate so we can talk about the race relations. clearly african americans are not going to stick with her. >> you said you have news here. anita says -- >> my colleague has talked to -- >> maybe i'm hearing the

opposite. black republicans and white republicans are not sticking with her. she was somebody who was picked by the d.c. gop establishment. so when the govern there hand picked her, he usurped three or four other republicans who felt this was rightfully their senate seat. people are highly embarrassed and irritated she is costing the state business so they are not confident -- >> who is going to win? >> i think espy, the victory is certainly in espy's spot. i don't typically go by polls. we've seen that betray us time and again. i think victory is within her reach. >> in her reach? >> i'm sorry, in espy's reach. >> really, you would be profoundly surprised if she won by ten points? >> i would be surprised, chris. trump is coming down there -- >> we'll check this tomorrow night. >> she did a rally last night. there were less than 50 people there. she does not turnout the crowds that trump does. mike espy -- >> let me tell you something. i'm generally optimistic about race relations in this country. i thought mike espy was taking a real danger shot, it's going to

be a risky shot to go statewide in mississippi. your thoughts? >> i would take that bet. mike espy needs to get 30% of the white vote to win. that is very aspirational for an african-american democratic candidate to get in mississippi. this is a state that still has a confederate flag on its state flag. so i think you've got -- the fact that trump is going there to gin up republican support, maybe that indicates this race is closer than it ought to be, closer than republicans think it ought to be. he won that state by 18 percentage points in 2016. it's going to be a reach -- >> has anything changed since the days of george wallace? what changed? politically what's changed? >> politically what's changed is you have a more educated electorate and people have seen this before. >> where is that shown in elections? >> i think we saw what happened in alabama. i'm a daughter of the south. we've seen the south change and we've seen what happened in

alabama. >> good point. >> you've seen what happened in georgia and what happened in florida. the african-american -- >> i do think to your point there is a danger in that. kemp won after saying racist things. >> optimism, half full, half empty. the there is a bombshell of the special counsel. according to court filing late tonight, trump's former campaign manager paul manafort is in violation of the terms of his plea agreement which he made in september. quote, after signing the plea agreement, manafort committed federal crimes by lying to the fbi and the special counsel's office on a variety of subject matters. that's in a statement. manafort, however, says that he's provided only truthful information to prosecutors. what do you make of this? it seems to me, susan, we've been following this a lot. you, too, a knit a. i have to tell you, the more this gets further, more people are going to get hurt by the trump operation. it does look like a rico operation. everybody is going to jail. papadopoulos, this guy jerome corsi, one after another.

he said there's nothing but a witch-hunt. they caught a lot of witches. >> papadopoulos went to prison for 14 days. paul manafort looks like he's going to prison for the rest of his life with this plea deal being off. the sentencing will be without consideration for his cooperation. this is not, though, good news for the special counsel, though, because i think robert mueller had hoped to get the kind of inside look at what happened in the trump operation that you could get from paul manafort. he's not going to have that. so while this is bad news for manafort, i think it's also -- >> you think he still needs star witnesses, anita? >> it's still bad news for trump. every time something happens with paul manafort, he tries to distance himself yet we know he was his campaign chairman. you can't distance yourself when you have that kind of close relationship. every time he's a liar. we know he's a liar. >> why would he lie? he had a deal to protect him from long-term prison? why would he lie and screw it up at the end? >> he's getting instructions from a higher power. >> we don't know what he's lying about. >> why would you at that point lie? you're obviously getting

instructions from a foreign agent or the person who occupies the white house. i'm not convinced this is some innocent -- >> we don't know that. it's logical but we don't know that. >> what is scarier than going to prison? that's a question you have to ask yourself. because by lying to mueller, he has ensured that he's going to spend more time in prison. >> that's a great way of putting it. a good argument. what's worse than going to prison for the rest of your life? well, we're staying with us. up next the round table is going to stick with us. what about this devastating report on climate change? my theory is if he can deny the sun, he can deny mueller. that's how wild trump has gotten these days. north pole is falling apart and he's laughing at it. why did the trump administration try to bury this report? and what does it mean for america and what a lot of people have been thinking about nothing but this climate report this last week. it is the only planet we got. you're watching "hardball." excuse me a minute... hi dad. no. don't try to get up.

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welcome back to "hardball." last friday trump administration scientist -- did you hear that, trump administration scientists and 13 agencies released a report that confirmed, quote, the earth's climate is now changing faster than at any point in the history of modern civilization. and the damage from climate change could cost hundreds of billions of dollars by the end of this century if more preventive measures aren't taking now. instead of taking action president trump did what you would expect. he said he doesn't believe the report. the trump administration purposely released on black friday to minimize its impact. let's watch. >> i've seen it. i've read some of it and it's fine. >> they say economic impact will be devastating. >> i don't believe it. >> you don't believe it? >> no, i don't believe it. here's the other thing. you're going to have to have china and japan and all of asia and all of these other

countries -- you know, it addresses our country. right now we're at the cleanest we've ever been, and it's very important to me. but if we're clean but every other place on earth is dirty, that's not so good. >> well, last week the president retweeted that brutal and extended cold blast could shatter all records. whatever happened to global warming? cold weather can exist with hot weather -- you learn when you're 5 years old there's a difference between weather and climate. we're back with "hardball" round table, anita, susan and tiffany. i think we have to be remind ed we only have one planet and we live here. it's getting hotter and everybody knows it, and the ocean is rising. these are objective facts. you can argue about the degree to which mankind contributes. makes sense since we're here affecting it. >> you said it was the trump administration that released this report. >> on black friday. >> on black friday this was

released because congressman dates this report so it has to come out. the president often does not believe the things that his administration comes out with. these aren't his political appointees. these are career folks in the agencies, much like the fbi that he often doesn't believe. so this is, this is pretty normal for him to say this report came out, i don't believe it. these are people i don't believe. but yes, it did come out then because they wanted to minimize the impact. but i still think it got a ton of attention. >> somebody said, susan, half the country is reading the climate report and half are worried about the caravan. we live in a society where people have different worries. >> and everyone else is christmas shopping, they put it out on black friday. you can believe or not believe this report, but we live in this report. and i think the report found the region of the country most affected by global warming is going to be the middle west. farmers in the middle west. that's where i'm from, from kansas. farmers are pretty pragmatic people. if they see the climate changing in ways that really are going

to -- >> how does it affect agriculture? >> it raises the average temperature. so you can't raise soybeans where you raise soybeans. it makes pests flourish where they hadn't before. i think people from my hometown will look at this and be living in this climate and will not be dissuaded by any politician who says it's not true. >> or if you care about the economy, it's going to cost the u.s. hundreds of billions of dollars. everybody focuses on president trump when he tweets out something assenine. particularly at the department of interior they felt their work was being impeded by political appointees. she asked the general counsel to look into it, the investigator -- investigative counsel. she asked him to look into it because people were complaining that their work was being impeded to draw and sound the alarm on what's happening with climate change. so i think when we get caught up in what's happening with the national big headline from

donald trump, we have to look across the agencies how they are every day impeded progress. >> the reason western civilization has done pretty well in recent centuries is belief in science, we put a man on the moon, we're already at mars. all this is because of science. these straight-hour guys, men and women work their butt off to get the facts right. and the president doesn't buy it. >> strategy clearly here was not to impede it but bury it. >> most cultures would love to have our science. thank you, anita kumar, tiff knee page and anita. remember what's good for gm? they're slashing 15,000 jobs and shuttering three factories in north america right in the industrial part of the country that voted for trump. among them a plan to employ 1600 workers in lords town, ohio. we'll talk about the reaction. you're watching "hardball." ping. ping. business loans for eligible card members

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those big once incredible job-producing factories. and my wife, melania, said, what happened? i said, those jobs have left ohio. we're going to get those jobs coming back and we're going to fill up those factories or rip them down and build brand-new ones. but we will never again sacrifice ohio jobs or jobs from any state in our union to enrich other countries. >> well, today in a devastating blow, america's largest automaker general motors announced it will cut nearly 15,000 factory and white collar jobs in north america. gm will close plants in ohio, michigan, maryland and canada. the closures come as auto sales for certain cars have slowed and production costs have increased due to tariffs on steel. president trump told reporters he was not happy with the decision by gm. for more we're joined by senior senator brown. i don't get happiness out of bad news, but this certainly runs against trump's promises.

>> well, trump came to the honing valley, ohio all over. one of the reasons he won the state by almost double digits, he promised the valley these plants that have been shutdown or abandoned where where there had been layoffs, he'd get companies to come back from overseas. he's done none of that. i called on him -- i talked to him on the phone three months ago. it was late june this summer, asking him to weigh in with gm because they had already laid off 1500 at this plant. they were looking to layoff another 1500. today they announced they're closing the plant. fundamentally what the president actually did was gave a 50%-off coupon in the tax bill he jambed through congress for these companies to move. companies in large -- producing in large town, ohio get a 21% daks rate. you go to mexico, you get a 50% off in your taxes. you pay 10.5%. that's the president's tax plan.

it is now law. that's a big reason these companies are moving overseas. the president, first of all, needs to fix his tax bill instead of giving money to companies that move overseas. >> let me ask you about the rip off effect. when you lose 15,000 jobs, what happens? >> i was in a steel worker plant that's a stamping plant near lords town a year ago. whenever lords town gets a cold, they get pneumonia. when they layoff people in the big assembly plant in youngstown, they stamp parts in lords town, youngstown. you see this happen in mahoney valley. 1500 jobs lost in lords town, coupled with 3,000 earlier, coupled with the supply chain is what's so devastating to literally thousands of workers in mahoney valley and western

pennsylvania. >> let me ask you about the trump voter. you know them. i went home to my family this weekend. we're very divided politically, even in my family, very divided. what strikes me is the true trumpy or trump-ite, they don't care what you say. they're with him. is that true in your experience? do trump voters are sticking no matter what happens like this knowledge of 15,000 jobs gone? >> well, it's partly true, but his base is eroding. i mean, it's pretty clear to me these workers, they heard trump promise in the campaign that he would bring jobs back from mexico. then they heard him say it again last year, examine then they heard him say it again this year. and then they see this plant cloiz close the same day 1500 were laid off, the second plant in lords down, the same day they announce they're making the chevy blazer plant in new mexico. they could have retooled that yungs town plant. i asked president trump this

summer to intervene, talk to the ceo of lords -- of gm, and ask her to retool this plant instead of building the new plant in mexico. the president was silent. he didn't want to stand up to her. so, i think voters are pretty immaterial. i want work preserved. i want gm to put something else in there and redo another vehicle. i think more and more trump voters are on to him. >> we'll see if he gets a challenge from main in ohio. as goes ohio so goes the nation. when we return let me finish with the most effective social democratic leader of her time. you're watching "hardball." (burke) parking splat. and we covered it.

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let me finish tonight with a word about who should be speaker of the house. for six years i held the statutory position of administrative assistant to the speaker. i worked under thomas p. tip o'neal in the most challenging job of my life. he was a good hearted but very strong leader who broke failure when it could not possibly be avoided. he was tough. working for him from morning to close of business the half dozen years was the best political education anyone could get. i say that out of loyalty, but also a store i had fact.

it's the rare american politician who earns the honor of being called legendary. he was and is. i've watched former and i hope future speaker nancy pelosi from greater distance but with equal interest. let me say without exception. when it comes to lead being her caucus in the chamber on those moments when all else rides, she is the best. she has the machiavellian strength of being feared, but not hated. the washington post observer quotes a pelosi ally when watching her go after votes on the house floor saying he could hear the theme music from jaws. i don't know another leader who could have done what she did with the affordable care act. every democratic president, and actually a few republican ones, teddy roosevelt, richard nixon tried to win approval for national health care system. nancy pelosi did it. for that she deserves the renowned effective leader of her time.

she's the one to ensure she gets done right. she most certainly deserves the speakership from her caucus this wednesday. that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. ""all in with chris hayes" starts right now. >> good evening from new york, i'm chris hayes. there is breaking news in the russia investigation. paul manafort, donald trump's former campaign chairman, is ending his cooperation with the mueller probe in what sure looks like a last-minute ploy to get pardon. lawyers on robert mueller's special counsel team say that paul manafort violated the terms of his plea agreement by repeatedly lying to the fbi and special counsel's office in a joint status report, the special counsel and the lawyers for manafort have requested the court schedule sentencing for manafort. manafort's lawyers say he, quote, believes he has provided truthful information and does not agree with the government's characterization. joining m w