Trump Retweets Anti-Muslim Videos; Duke Praises Trump's Retweet.
KING: Welcome back. We turn now to one of the most astonishing, many would say troubling, aspects of this president's behavior. Something on display for the whole world to see and for the whole world to try to interpret. With all that's happening globally, all the unchecked items here on the year-end agenda for the president, he took time on Twitter this morning to retweet three anti-Muslim messages put out by a well-known far right extremist in Great Britain. They're accompanied by video clips that may or may not reflect actual events. But, either way, the captions make the inflammatory point, Islamist mob pushes teenage boy off roof and beats him to death. Muslim destroys a statue of Virgin Mary. And, Muslim migrant beats up Dutch boy on crutches. Again, President Trump, from the White House, retweeted all three of these clips, which originally appeared on the Twitter page of a British ultranationalist. Her name is Jayda Fransen. She's well-known to U.K. authorities. She's also relishing this attention she's getting from the president of the United States. Let's start with CNN's Phil Black. He's in London with more on just who she is. Phil.</s>PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John, She is Jayda Fransen, the deputy leader of Britain First, an organization whose members will tell you they are British patriots, Christians, people who are defending the British people and its traditional values from being overrun by immigrants, and in particular Muslims. They campaign on this. They take part in political elections. They've never won. But also they go on to the streets and confront Muslims, often in a very aggressive, provocative way. They take part in so-called mosque invasions. One of the people who have done this is in fact the deputy leader, Jayda Fransen, whose tweets have today been retweeted by the American president. She's responded to this, well, with something close to glee. This appeared on her Twitter feed a short time later. It says this, the president of the United States, Donald Trump, has retweeted three of deputy leader Jayda Fransen's Twitter videos. Donald Trump himself has retweeted these videos and has around 44 million followers. God bless you, Trump. God bless America. So a lot of happiness from this very controversial organization. But across the British political spectrum, there has been a great deal of condemnation towards the American president for giving this group publicity. There has also been criticism. Just a short time ago, from the British Prime Minister Theresa May, who says that Donald Trump was wrong to forward these videos to his followers. And she makes the point that Britain overwhelmingly rejects the politics of the far right because it stands against all the values that this country holds so dear. John.</s>KING: Phil Black for us in London. Phil, appreciate the reporting. Simply stunning. You can -- the White House will say the president's trying to make a point about safety. He's trying to make a point about immigration. He's trying to make a point about tough borders or the travel ban or whatever. You can make those points by making that point. Make your case. You don't have to make your case by retweeting hate.</s>BENDER: Yes, that's right. And their -- the White House responding there and acknowledging that Trump is ignoring this other piece of it. I talked to a White House official today who said that Trump was scrawling through, didn't click through to see who the source was and just hit the retweet button. And that was his way to sort of explain away what happened. But it also acknowledges that he's not giving any thought to the other piece of this. You know, our -- I do think that this raises some pressure on John Kelly. He talked to a few reporters out in Vietnam. I was on that trip with them. And we had -- that was right when Trump tweeted about the short and fat Kim Jong-un. And we asked him about those tweets and he said, well, I -- believe it or not, I don't pay attention to the tweets. I tell our staff, you know, that our policy is not going to be influenced by the tweets. But now we see --</s>MARTIN: Which is extraordinary.</s>HENDERSON: Yes.</s>BENDER: It is extraordinary. And just sort of ignores the facts here, right? I mean the transgender ban was a policy created on Twitter days before Kelly starred. You know, it's influencing the policy debate. Schumer and Pelosi skipped a White House meeting ahead of the potential government shutdown yesterday because of a Trump tweet. And now --</s>KING: Right. And in this case, again, you know, people say you're normalizing Trump. It just happens to be a fact. He's the president of the United States. He lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. He is viewed by many as the leader of the free world. And he is tweeting, retweeting racist, hateful -- just, uh, I can't find the word for it.</s>HENDERSON: Yes.</s>KING: Let's listen. This is a -- and, again, this is your tax dollars now. His staff then has to go out, as Michael was just noting, and try to clean it up. Try to explain it away. This is your tax dollars that pay Sarah Huckabee Sanders who says pay no attention.</s>SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Whether it's a real video, the threat is real. And that is what the president is talking about. That's what the president is focused on is dealing with those real threats. And those are real no matter how you look at it. Look, I'm not talking about the nature of the video. I think you're focusing on the wrong thing. The threat is real. And that's what the president is talking about.</s>MARTIN: Well, she has no answer, obviously, here, John, because it's indefensible type of situation where if you're a staffer you're trying to explain away something that you can't. I am perplexed by this approach that John Kelly, and also others, have employed that somehow the tweets don't matter. This is like saying about FDR, I don't listen to the radio broadcasts.</s>BASH: Right.</s>MARTIN: Well, guess what, that is the medium that he used.</s>BASH: Exactly.</s>MARTIN: And this is this president's primary method of communication. This is how he gets out his message unfiltered. The one last thought, real fast. You always hear this from Trump supporters. They will sing his praises to the heavens, but they'll add, I don't like the tweets. I wish he would tweet less. And today reminds me of those comments that I hear all the time. I'm sure you guys do, too. What they're actually saying is, just act more presidential. That's what they're actually saying. It's a euphemism, right? And I think his conduct today sort of gets at why even the people who like him, who are sympathetic to him, they just don't understand why he does this.</s>KING: And I'm not even going to read the entire tweet. And please jump into the conversation. I just want to show it. Makes you really proud as an American, right, when David Duke is praising your president as a truth teller. I'm not even going to read it, but there it is, and that's what's happening. The British prime minister says he's wrong. Just about every anti-discrimination civil rights group in the United States has issued a statement saying, dear God, Mr. President, get a grip. And David Duke says great.</s>BASH: The only people who are supporting what the president did are racists and fascists and bigots. And that is so hard to swallow. I mean it actually physically gives you a stomach ache to think about it. I mean the -- it's both in terms of the content of the videos, and the source of the videos. It matters. It is not OK to just say, as they are saying at the White House, well, he was just scrolling on and he hit retweet and he didn't look. You've got to look. You're the president. And this --</s>KING: Yes. Yes. Maybe the 300 pound guy in the basement that he likes to often refer to --</s>BASH: Yes.</s>KING: Can get away -- can get away with that.</s>BASH: Exactly. Not the guy in the Oval Office.</s>KING: Not with the guy who -- not the guy who lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.</s>BASH: Exactly. And this woman who initiated the videos was convicted for assaulting a woman, a Muslim woman, was just kind of, you know, walking down the street with her four kids.</s>BENDER: Yes, she's</s>HENDERSON: That -- I mean it's -- yes, I mean it is sad and scary</s>BASH: Just imagine -- and can I just say one thing, just replace Muslim with Christian or Jewish.</s>HENDERSON: Or Jews or black people or --</s>BASH: Imagine.</s>HENDERSON: Yes.</s>BASH: Imagine.</s>HENDERSON: Yes. And we really almost don't have to imagine. I mean we've seen the way that inciting fear of the other leads to people dying and leads to problems and leads to attacks, leads to entire black towns being burned down because someone told a lie about a black man.</s>BASH: Exactly.</s>KING: And leads to people -- we're talking about the human behavior, which is just reprehensible. I'm sorry, there's not another word for it. It is reprehensible. And he's the president of the United States. We also work in a town that is consumed by politics and he is the Republican president of the United States. And Trump supporters out there will say, well, he was already a critic. But listen to Senator Jeff Flake here who happens to have Republican next to his name too. And with this president, doesn't like it.</s>SEN. JEFF FLAKE (R), ARIZONA: Flummoxed. Why? It gets very inappropriate. I mean, why? I don't know what that gets us.</s>MARTIN: Yes. I spoke to Senator Flake last night about a story that we have in the paper today about this president's I guess obsession is the word that you can use with conspiracy theories, whether it's President Obama not being born in America, or the claim now that he is reviving that the "Access Hollywood" tape does not actually have his voice on it. And Senator Flake, in sort of a similar pained type response that he gave Manu there --</s>BASH: Is that Senator Flake?</s>MARTIN: It's not him. It's not Senator Flake. But he -- he said that he is going to start giving a series of speeches on the floor of the Senate to address this issue of what he said is his central concern. And that is the lack of shared facts in this country and the threat that that poses to American democracy.</s>KING: All right, we're going to come back to that conversation and that story in the newspaper a little bit later. Up next, this show down --</s>KING: That's OK. It's OK. The art of the segue. Up next, the showdown looms here in Washington over tax reform. But, before we go to break, what just happened at our table? The phone rang, right? Another great showdown moment in the Senate. A confirmation hearing. This is President Trump's pick for Health and Human Services secretary is having his confirmation hearing and Pat Roberts has a little problem with his cell phone.</s>BASH: Again.</s>SEN. PAT ROBERT (R), KANSAS: Services, as well as the confidence in you shown by the Senate. Sometimes we have to do a multi task here. I apologize for that.