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Coronavirus TRANSCRIPT: 2/24/20, The 11th Hour with Brian Williams

Guests: Steve Schmidt, Errin Haines

  LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: And I want to give a specials last word tonight to Doing that doing that was very, very important to the reporting and to all subsequent reporting and encouraging other women to come forward. Ashley Judd who was in the first "New York Times" articles Harvey Weinstein she went on the record publicly with her name. A big Hollywood start doing that was very, very important to the reporting and to all subsequent reporting and encouraging other women to come forward.

Ashley Judd tweeted today, "For the women who testified in this case, and walked through traumatic hell, you did a public service to girls and women everywhere. Thank you."

That is tonight`s last word. Ashley Judd gets tonight`s LAST WORD. "THE 11TH HOUR" with Brian Williams starts now.

BRIAN WILLIAMS, MSNBC HOST: Tonight with the President in India, the DOW has its biggest drop in two years, and it`s because of the coronavirus, which the President says is under control here while saying he sees opportunity in the stock market.

He`s also saying, don`t believe what the intelligence community is warning about Russians attacking our elections unless it`s to pin it on Bernie Sanders.

Plus the White House National Security adviser goes into campaign attack mode in a startling interview.

And Bernie gets a bounce out of Vegas. Do his rivals make him the target in tomorrow night`s debate, which will be the first with two billionaires on the stage as "The 11th Hour" gets under way on this Monday night.

Well, good evening once again from our NBC News headquarters here in New York. Day 1,131 of the Trump administration, 253 days to go until our 2020 presidential election.

And today while overseas, the President was confronted with a new political risk. To others it`s a financial risk. To still others, it`s a health risk. As U.S. and global markets are taking a hit with sell-offs continuing in Asian markets as they opened there Tuesday morning.

Earlier the Dow closed down more than 1,000 points, largest drop in two years, on fears over the impact of the coronavirus. The number of reported infections continues to grow with tens of thousands of cases now in China that we know of and new signs of rapidly spreading outbreaks in other countries.

About a half hour after U.S. markets closed today, the traveling President posted this, "The coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries, CDC, and World Health have been working very hard and very smart. Stock market starting to look very good to me."

Robert Costa of "The Washington Post" will join us in just a moment. Tonight he reports this, "The Trump administration`s disjointed handling of the outbreak has faced mounting criticism as the President`s allies have scrambled to take preventive steps while seeking to reassure the public, at times struggling to explain their decisions and offer a consistent message."

Tomorrow morning the full Senate is scheduled to get a classified briefing on the virus from Homeland Security, public health officials, state department, the intelligence community and the like.

So it was concerning today to see Ken Cuccinelli, the Acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, ask his Twitter followers if he was doing something wrong, if it was just him, why he couldn`t see the maps of the spread of the virus on the Johns Hopkins website. Mr. Cuccinelli, a fervent and vocal Trump supporter, is on the White House coronavirus task force.

POLITICO reporting that very same White House is going to ask for nearly $2 billion in emergency funding for the coronavirus. The President meanwhile is on day two of his 36-hour trip to India. His Monday started with a campaign-style rally at the world`s largest cricket stadium.

The visit follows reports that intelligence officials had indeed briefed lawmakers about Russian attempts to interfere in our next election and that their efforts are aimed at helping both Trump and Bernie Sanders. As he left the White House yesterday, Trump tried to cast doubt while assigning blame.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you been briefed that Russia is trying to help Bernie Sanders? If so, what`s your message to Putin? Are you comfortable with him intervening?

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Nobody said it. I read where Russia is helping Bernie Sanders. Nobody said it to me at all. Nobody briefed me about it at all.

They leaked it. Adam Schiff and his group, they leaked it to the papers. And as usual, they ought to investigate Adam Schiff for leaking that information.

They don`t want Bernie Sanders to represent him. It sounds like it`s `16 all over again for Bernie Sanders.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: Trump`s national security adviser was also asked about Russian interference. And as you listen to his response again, please remember this is the national security adviser.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARGARET BRENNAN, CBS NEWS HOST: The White House was briefed on February 14th. Were you not in that briefing when the President was informed?

ROBERT O`BRIEN, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Well, there`s no briefing that I`ve received, that the President`s received that says that President Putin is doing anything to try and influence the elections in favor of President Trump. We just haven`t seen that intelligence.

BRENNAN: Are you denying that that is happening?

O`BRIEN: No, no. Look, what I`ve heard from the FBI -- well, what I`ve heard is that Russia would like Bernie Sanders to win the Democratic nomination. They`d probably like him to be president understandably because he wants to spend money on social programs and probably would have to take it out of the military. So that would make sense.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

  WILLIAMS: "The New York Times" puts it this way, "In the fourth year of his presidency and in his fourth national security adviser, Mr. Trump has finally gotten what he wants, a loyalist who enables his ideas."

Axios reporting the effort to rid the government of those considered disloyal to Trump has been going on now for some 18 months quietly and that, "A well-connected network of conservative activists with close ties to Trump and top administration officials is quietly helping develop these never Trump/pro-Trump lists. Members of this network include Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas."

On the 2020 front, we are entering a critical eight-day period now. Tomorrow night Biden, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, Sanders, Warren, Klobuchar, Steyer will all debate in South Carolina. Saturday, the South Carolina primary.

Seventy-two hours later comes Super Tuesday. Another way of putting it, this is the last debate before Super Tuesday. Sanders coming off a big win at the Nevada caucuses, right now leading with the most delegates.

Front-runner status, of course, brings a whole new world of scrutiny. That includes his sit-down interview with "60 minutes" where he seemed to try to distance himself from his own rhetoric.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: A lot of voters are voting for candidates who aren`t calling for Medicare for all, who aren`t calling for a revolution, is everybody really wanting a revolution like that?

BERNIE SANDERS, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, let`s go easy on the word political revolution. You know we`re trying to follow --

COOPER: You`re the one that`s used the word.

SANDERS: Well, I mean, you know, but I don`t want people, you know, to overstate that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: Sanders is also hearing criticism about what he had to say about Fidel Castro.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANDERS: We`re very opposed to the authoritarian nature of Cuba. But, you know, it`s unfair to simply say everything is bad. You know, when Fidel Castro came into office, you know what he did? He had a massive literacy program. Is that a bad thing even though Fidel Castro did it?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: As you can imagine, the reaction of congressional Democrats in South Florida was instant and sharp.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DEBBIE MUCARSEL-POWELL, (D) FLORIDA: I represent thousands of Cuban- American families that have fled the brutal dictatorship under the Castro regime.

Those comments are extremely hurtful to so many people here in my area and very offensive. There is a saying here in South Florida by many Cubans that they say, you know, Castro may have given us health care and education, but he didn`t give us breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: Here for our leadoff discussion on a Monday night as we begin a new week, Ashley Parker, Pulitzer Prize wining White House reporter for "The Washington Post," Robert Costa, National Political Reporter for "The Post" and moderator of "Washington Week" on PBS, and Shannon Pettypiece, a veteran journalist and Senior White House Reporter for us at NBC News digital. Good evening and welcome to you all.

Ashley, I`d like to go back up and start with the Cuccinelli story because that gets us to something wider. He is a vocal loyalist of the President. On his platform when he was affiliated with CNN, whatever side the President was on in an argument, Ken Cuccinelli would take. But how can hiring loyalists and just loyalists cost you when a rigorous response to a real crisis is what`s called for?

ASHLEY PARKER, THE WASHINGTON POST WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: It can cost you a lot, and that`s one of the things the administration is grappling with now, which is that the President has hollowed out a number of these agencies, especially the scientific community, so there`s not necessarily all the people you would want in place to begin with.

And not just only hiring loyalists, but I also want to add the President`s rhetoric. This is a President who often states the truth as he wishes it to be, not as it actually is. And that is gradations of problematic. And it`s one thing to say something from a rally stage that he`s done the biggest tax cut in history or to inflate the size of his crowds. It`s quite another to make statements that there`s nothing to worry about with the coronavirus when, in fact, not everyone agrees with that assessment.

WILLIAMS: Robert Costa, on the coronavirus, what do you think is the level of the President`s real concern, and what`s been the target of most of his concern thus far?

ROBERT COSTA, THE WASHINGTON POST NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: There is significant concern not only in terms of the management and response within this administration privately at the moment, but also about the political consequences of the stock market drop.

On the phone tonight just a few hours ago with Larry Kudlow, the White House Economic adviser, Peter Navarro, the White House Trade adviser and other white house officials and top GOP donors, they`re paying close attention to this because they see the stock market and the Dow Jones industrial average being around 28,000, going all the way up to 29,000 as central to the argument they`re making to suburban voters this fall.

But more important right now for them is making sure they`re getting information from China. But this has not been a coordinated response at every level, and there are many challenges within the administration and with global partners.

WILLIAMS: Shannon Pettypiece, veer us into hard-knuckle politics if you would. The White House reaction, what they make of the current state of the Democratic race.

SHANNON PETTYPIECE, NBC NEWS.COM SR. WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: So, it seems that there`s an increasing acknowledgment that Bernie Sanders could likely be the nominee. I mean I think all of us are sort of seeing that path. And certainly within Trump world, there is assessment where a lot people are starting to game-plan and talk about a scenario where you are facing a Sanders nominee.

And while, you know, there has been a lot of salivating among Republicans and the President`s allies about what that could mean because they see Sanders` policies as so far to the left that they could alienate those moderate suburban voters, female voters, that were so crucial in the last election.

There is definitely a be careful what you wish for tone and vibe that you get when you talk to people about Sanders because for all of his policy flaws they see a lot of personal strength in him. And, you know, that comes with authenticity, ability to build a base. You know, having a clear brand and a clear message where you know where he stands.

And, you know, he got so much criticism for that "60 minutes" interview, but in a way it is him continuing to stand by what he believes and what he has stood for. And if you look at Trump as a model, that is something that voters have shown they appreciate and they value in a candidate is you might not always agree with them, but at least you know what they stand for, and at least they have a core set of ideals that they follow.

So, yes, there is some nervousness and a bit of a wild card here definitely. It`s not going to look like your 2016 race if you have a Bernie Sanders as a Democratic nominee.

WILLIAMS: And back up to you, Robert Costa. Forgetting about the Republicans for one moment, among the Democrats you have on speed dial in your phone, how are they reacting to this dramatic rise of Bernie Sanders?

COSTA: There is a growing realization within the Democratic Party, and we wrote about it with Phil Rucker on today`s front page, that Senator Sanders represents an ascendant left-wing movement that could move in the coming weeks and months toward a takeover of the Democratic Party, a revolt against the centrists, the donors in the party who have long controlled power and have had a big influence over the nominees.

Sanders in the political wilderness for decades going back to his days in Burlington now finds himself at this late stage in his career as a possible standard bearer for a party that has been rapidly changing, moving more toward issues like climate change, health care access, and being OK with phrases like "democratic socialism" instead of being averse.

WILLIAMS: Ashley Parker, back up to what we framed narrowly as the Ken Cuccinelli question earlier in the interview, but more broadly what we keep hearing and reading about. It`s been called, to use the most dramatic term, "this purge" in the Trump administration. Aren`t there instances where forget about the so-called deep state, forget about buried potential never Trumpers deep in the Department of Commerce or Interior. It`s the people with the biggest titles closest to the President who have subverted his will and deflected at times, correct?

PARKER: Absolutely. And that was especially true early on in the administration. And I`ve been making calls about this, to use your word, "the purge" all day. And one thing that people said in defending the President was that some of these changes, they will argue, should have been done very early on in the administration in a transition.

If the Trump transition team and, you know, first 100 days had been like any of his predecessors`, Democratic or Republican, it would have been an organized, non-chaotic effort, in which they generally hired highly competent people who, yes, supported the President and supported his policies. That is not an unreasonable thing to ask for. He did not have that, especially early on and especially, as you said, in some of those top positions.

So this is a correction for that, but the problem for them is both in the timing coming after impeachment, coming with a President who feels emboldened. It has taken on much more of being run by the President`s former 29-year-old buddy man that has taken on much more of the tone of a vindictive purge rather than a natural staffing of an administration, and they`ve seen that backlash in bad P.R. and some frustration internally.

WILLIAMS: Shannon Pettypiece, Ashley reminds us that there`s a new sheriff in town at the White House office of personnel, another to be tossed on the list of firsts for this administration.

Shannon, the four of us have been around a while. Can you remember a White House sounding a little bit like a brokerage house from the President to Larry Kudlow, both of them saying in effect, buy on the lows?

PETTYPIECE: Right. Yes. We talked I think it was on Friday, Larry Kudlow giving a briefing in the White House briefing room, when I asked him about coronavirus and talking about just in general how this was such a great time to invest in the stock market. And you know, of course maybe that`s one thing you can say when you have unemployment or, you know, high or some bad economic indicators, but we`re actually talking about thousands of people dying. And that`s why the stock market is low. So it`s essentially looking to make a profit off of the deaths of thousands of people and the potential deaths of thousands of people more.

But I mean, I think the President, as we saw with his tweet today, saying everything is fine in the U.S. and of course it is at moment, but that is not the problem. The problem is where we`re going from here.

Is this administration struggling to get their hands around a crisis that in one of the rare times in the past three years is not a crisis of their own making? It`s not one of the daily crises that the President creates by his actions. This is something completely out of the hands of this administration. It is in the hands of the global public health community. It is in the hands of the doctors and scientist, and biologists out there working on this in the field. And so they`re going to have to realize and grapple with the fact that they`re not going to be able to control this and there`s only so much spin they`re going to be put on this messaging.

WILLIAMS: Three bylines for our audience to look for, Ashley Parker, Robert Costa, Shannon Pettypiece, along with our thanks for coming on the broadcast with us as we start a new week.

And coming up for us, our next guest says we`re entering into a political season of extremes that we`ve never seen before in our country.

And later, the countdown to South Carolina, the next critical test. Remember, it`s only the second primary but still for the still wide field of Democrats hoping to defeat Donald Trump. "The 11th Hour" just getting under way on a Monday night.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GAYLE KING, CBS HOST: Do you think this Bernie Sanders is the biggest threat to President Trump right now?

SEN. TIM SCOTT, (R) SOUTH CAROLINA: I do think so. I would say that the biggest threat to President Trump is President Trump.

KING: What do you mean by that?

SCOTT: Well, if he`s on his game, as he was at the state of the union, I don`t think there`s a candidate in the country that can beat him. If there is a second choice other than himself, it would be Bernie Sanders. Bernie Sanders brings that outside game in a similar fashion that President Trump did in 2016.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: Interesting moment there with Tim Scott of South Carolina. Senator Bernie Sanders coming off a big win in Nevada. And on Saturday we will come to what is only, let`s remember, the second primary of the political season.

Let`s talk about the state of our politics. With us now, Steve Schmidt, a veteran former Republican strategist who has since left the Republican Party, but he`s here with us tonight. That`s all we care about.

Let`s take them one at a time. Let`s start with the Republicans. Start with Senator Scott`s point. The biggest risk to Donald Trump is Donald Trump because we just had Shannon Pettypiece with a straight face, as a reporter, say it`s another one of these crises -- coronavirus -- that Trump didn`t start himself.

STEVE SCHMIDT, FMR. REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, look, Tim Scott is correct. I mean the person that has always created the most peril for Donald Trump politically is Donald Trump. But since his acquittal by the Senate, as he`s purging the government of anybody he thinks is disloyal, as he is taking his revenge, as he is eviscerating the rule of law in unprecedented fashion, interfering in criminal cases at the Department of Justice, his poll numbers are going up. And so he is consolidating power at an alarming rate and doing so illiterately (ph).

WILLIAMS: Let`s talk about the Democrats and as we do, I want to play the clip. Bernie Sanders` campaign manager came on with Chris Hayes earlier on this network tonight. We`ll look at that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FAIZ SHAKIR, BERNIE SANDERS CAMPAIGN MANAGER: It`s one of the reasons that I love and fight for Bernie Sanders. There`s integrity and honesty that you get with him. And what that means is when you ask him a direct question, he gives you a direct response that comes from his heart and from his soul, tells you exactly what he`s thinking, right? And that means that sometimes you may disagree with his perspective, but you know he`s shooting straight with you. He`s not playing a political game.

So when you ask him about, hey, about Cuba and Castro? Oh, he`s an authoritarian. He`s engaged in human rights abuses. However, there were some good things that happened in Cuba, and so we should acknowledge those too. And that`s an honest answer.

And then other people will play political games and that`s why for instance, Chris, I think over the course of this campaign we`ve benefited from the fact that his straight shooting, his integrity, his honesty rises above other people`s efforts to try to offer political barbs and try to throw cheap shots and the kitchen sink at him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: That was tonight, and at a CNN town hall in the last hour, Pete Buttigieg just said, in effect, here we are. As a party, we`re talking about Fidel Castro.

SCHMIDT: Indeed, and they are. And you look at that travesty of a debate if you`re in the business of wanting to remove Donald Trump from office, the one thing that wasn`t talked at all about in that debate was Trump or Trumpism. And so the campaign manager is talking about Bernie Sanders` integrity.

Is he showing integrity by not releasing his medical records? Is he showing transparency and integrity by not talking about the price tag associated with student loan forgiveness, free pre-k day care for everybody? There`s no price tags on any of this. It`s a dishonest progressivism that`s no different than Donald Trump`s dishonesty talking about the Mexican paid-for wall. It`s all fantasy.

And so when Bernie Sanders goes out there and he starts talking about, well, here`s the good side to Fidel Castro. I think it`s important to understand that there might be a constituency for that in this country, but it`s a really small one, and it`s certainly not enough to get you into an electoral college majority to win the White House. And it certainly dooms your chances in Florida.

WILLIAMS: How do you process the fact that tomorrow night we`re going to have seven people onstage, two of them are billionaires? Two of them look at real double-digit poll numbers knowing that money bought those poll numbers, not some inner need to have them as our next president. How do we process that?

SCHMIDT: Well, I think that they`re two different cases, right? So first off, Mike Bloomberg was the mayor of New York City for 12 years, and by any objective standard, he was one of the most competent, successful leaders of large government anywhere in the world over the last quarter century. He was a profoundly successful mayor.

I think it`s a mistake for Democrats to attack somebody like Mike Bloomberg, who grew up in a middle class circumstance and is a self-made man, is one of the country`s greatest philanthropists.

And I disagree with him on a number of different issues. But if you are invested in progressive causes, it`s hard for me to think of anybody who has done more to advance progressivism, whether it`s on gun issues, whether it`s on climate, than has Mike Bloomberg. So the notion that Mike Bloomberg is on that stage somehow illegitimately is not something that I really understand.

Tom Steyer has been an activist in American politics now for some period of years. He has communicated a message. He`s gotten the requisite poll numbers to be on the stage. The question will be, after the South Carolina primaries, if you have eight moderate Democrats, all of whom might have a greater chance of beating Donald Trump than does Bernie Sanders, will some of those candidates get out of the race to help coalesce support around the strongest moderate candidate?

Part of the issue right now in the Democratic primary is you cannot make an objective judgment and say Bernie Sanders is going to go down to Donald Trump in the swing states on the basis of poll numbers because the poll numbers don`t support that in those states.

But when you look at Bernie Sanders` positions, that we should decriminalize illegal immigration, that we`re going to take health insurance away from 150 million people who have private health insurance, a range of other issues, the type of rhetoric that you saw him use on "60 minutes" talking about Castro, all of these issues come together in a way that I think objectively, what James Carville has said, is disqualifying for somebody running for president and somebody who is likely to lose to Donald Trump. And I think that`s what you`re seeing a lot of panic in the Democratic electorate, in the Democratic officeholder class in these days really focused on.

WILLIAMS: Steve Schmidt, always a pleasure. Thank you for coming by.

SCHMIDT: Thank you, Brian.

WILLIAMS: Coming up, Trump calls the stock market very good after it plunged a thousand points. One of his economic advisers recommending investors buy on the dips. We`ll take a closer look at the potential national security threat the coronavirus presents when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s been described to me like a cold except he fun will kill you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is that about how you`d see it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The problem is with this new virus, it comes with a mortality of around 2 percent to 3 percent, which is extremely high if you consider it as a flu virus.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If it can impact a fifth of the population, we`ll do the math.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It would be a catastrophe, yes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: As coronavirus fears rise around the world, the spread of the virus in nations that are not named China is causing financial markets to plunge. The Dow, as we reported, down over 1,000 today, 3.5 percent drop in total volume, worst in two years.

Italy has become the hardest hit country in Europe now. Health officials there have said 229 individuals have been infected. They are reporting seven deaths.

South Korea, health officials there reporting 80 new cases, bringing the total there to 893. But China still by far the hardest hit country on the planet, over 77,000 cases under management, over 2,500 deaths. Again, that we know of.

Back with us again tonight, Clint Watts, former FBI special agent, author importantly of "Messing with the Enemy: Surviving in a Social Media World of Hackers, Terrorists, Russians, and Fake News" and a distinguished research fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

So, Clint, explain to your audience you`re not with the CBC. You`re formerly with the FBI. How does the threat of a pandemic intersect with your world and your life`s work?

CLINT WATTS, FMR. FBI SPECIAL AGENT: Yes. So what`s fascinating about how this has played out in recent days is you`ve had this spread very, very quickly. You`ve seen the reactions that have come out there. And I think Italy is an interesting case comparing as China. You`re seeing grocery stores cleaned out. You`re seeing water cleaned out.

Think about what our response is and what a coordinated effort is. Anytime you`re in government, in the U.S. government, what we`re known for is having a coordinated effort with competent leaders who know the task at hand and provide a response plan or a coordinated plan.

Would that happen today?  I think in this current era where we`ve seen the White House really go after large budget cuts, in large -- in parts of this in terms of our response, in terms of our pandemic response, when we look at some of the officials that are in charge, that are there maybe because they are more loyal and confident.

Do we trust the information?  That`s really where I think I see this in my work is do you believe the information that`s being put out by your government officials?  We`ve had some inaccuracy problems here in recent months. And then look across the world at the response.

Today, the way we handled it was through a presidential tweet telling everybody that things are fine and maybe they should buy the stock market. I would like some reassurance, I think, about what`s the plan, who are the officials that are in charge and what are we going to do.

Imagine, Brian, if this were spread to a U.S. city the way it has outside Milan. What would be the response be in the United States?

China, for all of its faults in terms of censorship and not getting on this quick enough, was able to quickly quarantine a city the size of New York, was able to build a 1,000 bed hospital in a week. Can the U.S. do something like that?  What would the U.S. economy do?  How would we respond?  What would be resilient in this?

I think our model looks probably a lot more like Italy than it does China and some of these other countries. So really I`m worried about how this goes, how we do everything from rationing masks and equipment and medical responses, and how do we do that triage response because it really only takes one outbreak. We`ve seen how quickly it`s gone both in South Korea, Iran, and Italy in just this last week.

If it hits the United States in this kind of way just a little pin freak where it spread locally, you`ll not just see the market crash. You`re going to see a lot of panic, I think, in the United States.

WILLIAMS: And, Clint, more broadly when you see the national security adviser to the President of the United States say he hasn`t been told about Russia in any briefing about this upcoming election and the guy they really want is Bernie in the White House.

WATTS: Yes.

WILLIAMS: What does that do?

WATTS: Just is a head-scratcher. It`s remarkable for my team. I`ve got a team that works at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. And Brian, you`ve had us on before.

Russia doesn`t hide who they want in the election. There`s lots of overt evidence to show that they do favor Trump overall in the election and that they also will prop up or try and support Sanders, not that the Sanders campaign is working with Russia, but they`re trying to inflate that as a divisive wedge and to set up basically a populist sort of battle between Trump and Sanders.

It`s just face treating because we feel -- at least I feel like we can`t get trusted information oftentimes from the White House or if we do, we always have to ask is this information only coming out because it`s good for the White House?

Sure, Russia always wants to and still long-term chaos, but in any given election, the whole point of active measures is to elevate candidates that are supportive of a Russian foreign policy position or don`t even talk about foreign policy or national security, to positions of power inside the United States.

And so if we`re not even able to talk about it, if we can`t brief our congressional leaders. We have a DNI who can`t actually go have a discussion with the White House, then I don`t know how we can prepare or defend for it. It`s really our political leaders it seems that are the weak point in this entire system at the moment.

WILLIAMS: Clint Watts, always a pleasure. Often scary, however, as it was tonight. We appreciate you coming on the broadcast as always.

Coming up for us, what Bernie Sanders unveiled tonight to tamp down his critics. We`ll talk to our reporter covering his campaign when we continue.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EMMANUEL FERGUSON, SECOND VICE CHAIR, CHARLESTON COUNTY DEMOCRATS: Your plan for free college tuition and Medicare for all seems like a way to excite the Democratic base with no real plan to pay for it.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Here`s what I want to do. First, I`m going to give this to you. I thought that question might come up. All right. Here it is. This is a list which will be on our website tonight of how we pay for every program that we have developed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAMS: So that was a moment during the CNN Town Hall event tonight. Let`s check in on the traveling Sanders campaign and who best to take our questions about one of our NBC news road warriors, Shaquille Brewster, who follows the Sanders campaign for us.

And, Shaq, while we talk, I just want to show our audience something happening pretty darn near on the other side of the world, a ceremony going on live right now. There`s Modi of India, first lady there, it`s behind the President. But this is what people like to refer to as ball game.

This is all of it. This is what the argument is about. This is the job he now occupies, the trappings that come with it. This is the stakes when you run for the presidency.

So with that in mind, what was on that piece of paper tonight, Shaq, that the Sanders campaign was going to put on their website?  How complete was it?

SHAQUILLE BREWSTER, NBC NEWS POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, Brian, I`ll tell you the list is out. It`s on his website already. And going through that list, the thing that struck me is that it`s nothing new. These are numbers that we`ve seen before explaining the cost of ideas that we`ve heard before.

What it`s a sign of vulnerability for Senator Sanders as he goes to these states where he frankly hasn`t spent as much time as those first three initial states. Look, he has these big ideas that we talk about all the time, Medicare for all, college for all, the Green New Deal, the student debt forgiveness, medical debt forgiveness.

At the end of the day and what you`re starting to see from the other candidates is they`re questioning, wait a second. How much is all of this going to cost and what are your ideas to pay for it?

So what he did is he plucked all the pay-fors out of his plan, put them all on one sheet of paper, and handed them to that anchor there. That`s a sign that, again, he knows this is going to come up on that debate stage tomorrow night and what it is, is showing him -- showing voters that he`s thought about this. He`s read it and he knows his plans and it`s presenting it to them in a way that says it`s all there for you to see so he can say that essentially to the candidates when they bring it up to him on the debate stage tomorrow night.

WILLIAMS: He was also asked tonight, Shaq, I noted about this possibility of entering the Democratic convention with the most delegates, though shy, somewhere south of the portal through which you get the nomination.

BREWSTER: 1,999.

WILLIAMS: There you go.

BREWSTER: Ninety-one.

WILLIAMS: It`s tattooed on the inside of all of our eyelids, I know. And this certainly seems like a front where the Bernie forces are willing, ready, and able to throw down.

BREWSTER: That`s right. And we`ve got a hint of this at the last debate there in Vegas where Chuck Todd asked the question of -- he asked the question of all the candidates, if a candidate gets into the convention with a clear plurality of the delegates, not a majority, but the clear advantage, the most delegates out of any candidate, should that person be the nominee?  And you saw all the other candidates onstage say, well, we`ll let the process go out. It was Senator Sanders who said, no, the person -- the candidate who has the plurality should be the nominee.

The fact that we`re having this conversation, first, is a sign of strength for this campaign, and it`s a sign of concern from other candidates. They know that we`re going to -- into this process, especially once we get past South Carolina, we`re going to be hitting California, we`re going to hit Texas, North Carolina.

These bigger, more delegate-rich states where if you look at the current polling, Senator Sanders is leading in these areas, especially after he`s won or at least, you know, if you look at Iowa, you have to count the popular vote where he has done well and competed well in these first three states.

His campaign feels like they have momentum going into Super Tuesday. So they`re looking at this calendar. They`re seeing that they are at the verge of possibly having a delegate lead that`s insurmountable and they feel some confidence there that`s leading to this conversation.

WILLIAMS: By the way, how are you doing?  Are you holding up OK?

BREWSTER: I`m doing well. I`m doing well. Give me some sleep every once in a while.

WILLIAMS: All right. We ask a lot of you guys. It`s a lot of miles, a lot of bad meals, very little sleep. Shaquille Brewster however, is one of our road warriors, so named for a reason. Thank you, Shaq. Appreciate it, as always.

And just ahead for us, what to expect tomorrow night with seven people onstage. There`s a front-runner. There`s a couple of billionaires. There`s some others under big pressure to do well.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WILLIAMS: Let`s look at some numbers. NBC News poll in South Carolina just out tonight shows Bernie closing in on Joe Biden in South Carolina ahead of Saturday`s primary.

Biden leads by 4 percent, but please note that`s within the poll`s margin of error. Tom Steyer is polling third at 15 percent in South Carolina. Buttigieg, Warren, Klobuchar in single digits.

Back with us, Errin Haines, a 10-year veteran of The Associated Press. Now, editor- at-large for The 19th, a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom focused on gender, politics and policy that launches this coming summer.

So Errin, what are South Carolinians saying about what`s going to happen there?  What should happen there on Saturday?

ERRIN HAINES, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, THE 19TH: Well, good evening, Brian. What I`m seeing and hearing from voters in South Carolina is kind of a pattern that has been recurring in Iowa, New Hampshire, and the early states that we`ve seen so far, which is that voters are still largely undecided here going into Saturday. Now, early voting has already begun in South Carolina and so some voters have cast their ballots but they are making a head versus heart decision.

A lot of older black voters, obviously we know that black voters are the majority of the democratic primary electorate here. A lot of them are saying that they are going with Joe Biden. They feel like they know him. He is somebody who has not had to introduce himself to voters down here because of his relationship with the first black president as vice president and because he has long-standing relationships in South Carolina.

But there are other candidates especially that younger black voters seem to be open to certainly Senator Sanders as somebody who has made inroads, who has connections with the many HBCUs in South Carolina.

Senator Warren is somebody that I`m hearing. Some young black women saying that they are open to raising questions of electability but saying she is somebody whose ideas they very much like. Mayor Buttigieg continues to make the case to black voters here, but it`s unclear whether or not he`s going to be able to get traction with them in South Carolina despite all of his efforts.

And then of course you have Tom Steyer and former Mayor Bloomberg, who have spent a lot of money here in the state. I`m seeing ads for Mayor Bloomberg and Tom Steyer quite a bit all over the place, on television, billboards, radio, you name it.

And that does seem to be, you know, at least raising awareness with voters that they are somebody who voters may be open to and thinking they may be viable to go up against President Trump in November, which is the priority of most of the black voters that I`ve talked to in the state.

WILIAMS: And let`s be honest here about two more things. I don`t think we`re going to see any tearful news conferences after the vote on Saturday. People bailing out of the race because I think all efforts are going to be to crawl, if they have to. Three more days into Super Tuesday, that`s point one.

Point two is I know we`re referring to this upcoming debate tomorrow night as the South Carolina debate. It is the last time we will hear from or see these candidates as a group before Super Tuesday, which is a whole different kettle of fish.

HAINES: Oh, that`s absolutely true. This is the last debate before Super Tuesday and to your point probably the last time that we will see them all together. Senator Warren, obviously, it`s probably going to still try to make that, you know, make that display of her being a fighter, something she shows a lot on the campaign trail but something I think a lot of people felt like they were really seeing from her for the first time with some success on the last debate stage.

Senator Sanders, with his current front-runner status, we`ll have to see if, you know, he didn`t draw a lot of fire last time. A lot of the focus was on Mayor Bloomberg. So we`ll have to see if candidates are going after him coming out of his decisive Nevada finish to see how that goes.

I think that you will definitely see former Vice President Biden really trying to make the case once again to black voters not only in South Carolina but to black belt voters in states like Alabama, Virginia, Tennessee, who are on that Super Tuesday ballot and beyond, making that case to black voters that he is still the most electable candidate to defeat Donald Trump.

And, you know, you`ve got those candidates that are polling kind of lower still like Pete Buttigieg, like Amy Klobuchar, like Tom Steyer, who are trying to say that they still have a case to stay in this, you know, past Super Tuesday and beyond.

I will say this perhaps you will see several of these candidates this weekend on Sunday in Selma, Alabama, where the country will be marking the 55th anniversary of bloody Sunday. I`m told that a number of candidates are planning to make their way to Alabama even as they fan out to numerous Super Tuesday states to try to increase their delegate count in those places a week from today.

WILLIAMS: Sometimes you got to do what you got to do.

Errin, we`re thrilled to know --

HAINES: Yes.

WILLIAMS: -- that you`re down there watching it for us and along with us. Errin Haines, always a pleasure. Thank you for coming on.

And coming up, as The New York Times put it today, they asked her for the moon, she gave it to them. A remembrance when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WILLIAMS: Last thing before we go tonight, a few words about John Glenn`s Friendship 7 Mission and one of the special people it took here to get him up there.  Katherine Johnson made that remarkable journey possible, and now her own remarkable journey has come to an end.  NBC News Correspondent Rehema Ellis has our report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REHEMA ELLIS, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Katherine Johnson`s fascination with numbers started early on growing up in West Virginia.

KATHERINE JOHNSON, NASA MATHEMATICIAN: I`ve counted everything.  I`ve counted plates when I washed dishes.  I`ve counted steps from home to church.

ELLIS: Breaking race and gender barriers in the 1960s Jim Crow America, Johnson helped chart the flight path for America`s first space mission with Alan Shepard.  And when John Glenn was chosen to orbit the earth, he insisted Johnson confirm the computer`s calculations.

JOHNSON: He knew that if I had done it, it was right.

ELLIS: Charles Bolden, former head of NASA, said a few years ago Johnson was always given the hardest calculations.

How surprised do you think people were that it was a black whom who was --

CHARLES BOLDEN, FORMER NASA ADMINISTRATOR: Shocked.  Shocked.  You got to remember when she walked in the Control Center, she was the only black in there.  So quite naturally they thought she wad a maid.

ELLIS: For years she was hardly known outside of NASA.  The movie "Hidden Figures" changed that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: NASA, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: NASA?  I had no idea they hired.

ELLIS: She was honored at the Academy Awards and given the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

In an interview a few years ago, Johnson was forever humble.

(on camera): You did your job better than anybody.

JOHNSON: I did the best I could.

ELLIS (voice-over): When she died today at 101, tributes from NASA and Taraji P. Henson, who played Johnson in the movie, wrote because of your hard work, little girls everywhere can dream as big as the moon.  The woman enchanted by numbers now counted as a true American hero.

Rehema Ellis, NBC news.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WILLIAMS: And this final word from us here.  The moment tomorrow night`s South Carolina debate comes to a close, we will come on the air with our live coverage with our entire team from this very studio.  So that is our broadcast for this Monday evening as we start a new week.

Thank you so much for being here with us.  Good night from our NBC news headquarters here in New York.

  THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.                                                                                                     END