Jeff Sessions talks immigration reform and the Mueller probe

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Jeff Sessions talks immigration reform and the Mueller probe

Sessions speaks out about the need to eliminate 'lawlessness' in the immigration system and discusses the Russia investigation on 'Sunday Morning Futures.'

This is a rush transcript from "Sunday Morning Futures," February 18, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST: Good Sunday morning. In just moments my exclusive one on one interview with Attorney General Jeff Sessions coming up. Does he regret his recusal in the Russia probe? Plus Ken Starr breaking down the new indictments laid out by the Justice Department, Ken Starr will join me momentarily. And in another exclusive interview, House Speaker Paul Ryan defends his spending increases to support the military. Good morning everyone! Thanks so much for being here. I'm Maria Bartiromo, welcome to SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES. This morning we will hear from Attorney General Jeff Sessions. I will get his take on everything from the immigration battle, alleged corruption at the top of the FBI and the missed clues in that deadly Florida high school shooting spree. Where did authorities go wrong? Plus a closer look at the new indictments laid out in the Russia probe. Where does the investigation go now? Former independent counsel, Ken Starr, will join me live. Plus an exclusive interview with Speaker Paul Ryan, how does the Speaker of the House respond to the critics of his new spending bill? Does he plan to stick around after the midterm elections? All that coming up right now as we look ahead on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES.

And big developments this past Friday in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation. Mueller indicting 13 Russian nationals on Friday accusing them of interfering in the 2016 presidential election. Coming up in just a moment, we will hear from former Independent Counsel Ken Starr about that. But first my exclusive interview with the Attorney General Jeff Sessions. I spoke with Mr. Sessions just a few hours before the indictments were handed down and I asked him about the Mueller probe including his decision to recuse himself from anything involving Russia. But I began with the immigration battle and the negotiations that simply fell apart on Thursday.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF SESSIONS, ATTORNEY GENERAL, UNITED STATES: Look, this is an opportunity for the American people, maybe our last real opportunity to create an immigration system that's lawful, that ends the lawlessness, the illegality, and serves the national interest. President Trump's plan is strong, the Grassley bill included that pretty effectively. It's the kind of legislation I think could work, that I supported and it didn't pass. But I've got to say, we have got to talk about this as a nation. We need - - President Trump's plans call for ending the legality, having real enforcement with a border wall. It calls for merit-based system instead of the chain migration. It calls for ending the Visa lottery which is a ridiculous policy and always has been. Why we can't get that done baffles me and I think it's -- the American people are there and we cannot stop. We've got to get this done.

BARTIROMO: So is there anything that the administration is willing to give on? I mean, surely you saw that op-ed in the journal on Friday which was titled President Miller's immigration veto and they talk about the fact that this last bill included authorizing 25 billion over 10 years for the wall on the Mexican-U.S. border. That was a victory. It's $2.5 billion in the first year, probably more than the Democrats wanted, so where is the opportunity to come halfway?

SESSIONS: Well, we don't have to go halfway beyond the fundamentals. President Trump's fundamentals are good. Who can oppose ending the visa lottery? Who wants to continue the lawlessness? Who wants to allow create a situation in which you get amnesty a legality for young people that are here and not end up with a legal system that will be enforceable in the future? There's nothing mean-spirited about it. We admit 1 million people a year lawfully into America, hundreds of thousands of workers are here in addition to that every year taking jobs. So we're not talking about ending immigration. The President is in no way talking about being unkind and it's sometime in the future after the illegality has ended, we can begin to talk about people who have been here a long time and who have not violated our laws in other ways.

BARTIROMO: Do you expect to get a deal done on DACA before the March 5th deadline, sir?

SESSIONS: I don't know. The people who say they want to fix that, President Trump has offered them that. He's been very generous in his legislation. I think that is a very generous policy, goes beyond actually what President Obama had in his DACA policy and goes beyond what even some people who favored the DACA expected. So that's been very generous. So we're -- he's already made compromises. So the question really is when we pass this bill, will we once more fool the American people? Will we once more just give legality, legal status to people who enter the country illegally and never follow through in an effective way the promises that have been made to them politically? And I've got to tell you on the enforcement side, there is some big loopholes in this legislation. We -- you cannot lead the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice unable to actually deport people who entered the country illegally.

BARTIROMO: Well I think you make a great point. There's a lot more to come on this so I want to get back to this subject because to address something else. You mentioned lawlessness, there appears to have been a lot of lawlessness going on in government over the last eight or 10 years and I want to ask you about the abuses of the FISA court because any way you look at it, it appears the FBI and the Department of Justice were abusing their power over the election because they simply did not like Donald Trump. We know that in a number of -- in a number or issues. Now people wanted you to start handing down justice. Newt Gingrich joined me on this program last Sunday, here's what he had to say about that. Listen to this Mr. Attorney General.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEWT GINGRICH, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CONTRIBUTOR: He is not in any way recused on this information. He should be appointing an independent counsel. He should be demanding that we get to the bottom of this. I'm totally mystified because he's a great guy. He's a solid conservative. He certainly in his career has been a fighter and this behavior is just totally unlike everything I knew about Jeff Sessions before the last six or eight months.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Are you, sir, investigating the fact that the FBI used the dossier to get a wiretap against Trump associates and they did not tell the FISA court that the Democrats and Hillary Clinton paid for that dossier?

SESSIONS: Let me tell you, every FISA warrant based on facts submitted to that court have to be accurate. That will be investigated and looked at and we are not going to participate at the Department of Justice in providing anything less than the proper disclosure to the court before they issue a FISA warrant. Other than that, I'm not going to talk about the details of it but I'll tell you, we're not -- we're not going to allow that to happen.

BARTIROMO: Do we need another Special Counsel in place to look at what the FBI and the Department of Justice abused its power, how they abuse their power?

SESSIONS: Well the Inspector General has been working very hard on that and he's been relentless and tough. I've seen or heard some of his work that's been produced already. Much of what we know about this has been produced by his work and the Department of Justice. The text messages that have all been made public or disclosed by the Department of Justice. We've made Congress -- we've given Congress records and documents beyond anything ever been produced really, probably in history and we're going to continue to be open with them and be responsive. We have a responsibility to ensure the integrity of this process. I'm going to use my authority as the Attorney General to ensure that but the management of this case from which I'm recused is in the hands of Mr. Mueller and supervised by the Acting Attorney General for this investigation, Rod Rosenstein, a proven professional and Deputy Attorney General.

BARTIROMO: Well there's a lot of conflicts around the special -- the Special Prosecutor's team we know that but that's putting aside because I know you recused yourself. But there are felonies apparently that have already taken place. I mean, we had on this program just last week the Chairman of the Intel Committee Devin Nunes and he said there are felonies that are going -- not looked at it all. They're going by over and over. Listen to what he tells me just last Sunday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DEVIN NUNES (R-CA), CHAIRMAN, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: The big felony in all of this that nobody talks about from the very beginning was the leak of highly classified information when they leaked the phone call of the Russian Ambassador talking to General Mike Flynn right before the inauguration. That was a felony, nothing's ever been done about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Is your office investigating this, sir?

SESSIONS: That is a violation of the law to leak classified documents and it is being investigated. I will say this, there are last two years before I became Attorney General, there were -- each year, there was three open investigations of classified leaks, now we have 27. We're going after this aggressively. I have directed it personally. Some of the matters involve this matter and some of it is a matter that I'm not recused on and we are pursuing aggressively

BARTIROMO: So you feel that there are matters that you can get into? For example, there's a lot of feeling out there that the Hillary Clinton e-mail investigation was a sham. You know, Loretta Lynch told Jim Comey to call it a matter and that's exactly what he did and in fact, it was a criminal investigation. We know that he wrote an exoneration letter, James Comey did before he even did the interview with Hillary Clinton. What have you learned in terms of the opening -- reopening of the Hillary Clinton e-mail investigation? Will there be charges? Will there be accountability here, sir?

SESSIONS: Maria, we're going to do our job in this department properly and correctly and I'm not going to be led in the discussion of all of the details of matters that you might be interested in. We can't do that in the media. We're going to restore the rule of law. We're going to restore pro propriety and how cases are managed and that's all I can promise you.

BARTIROMO: Do you regret recusing yourself from anything related to Russia sir?

SESSIONS: I believe I did the right thing. The only thing I could do. I participated in this campaign and it's such under explicit regulations of the Department of Justice that no one can participate in the investigation of a campaign in which they were an active participant.

BARTIROMO: Let me ask you a broader question here because I know it's really --

SESSIONS: How can you ask --

BARTIROMO: I'm sorry, sir?

SESSIONS: You can't ask other members of the department to follow the law and follow the rules if the Attorney General himself refuses to do so.

BARTIROMO: Yes that's absolutely true. In terms of a broader look at what's happened here, sir. I mean, we know that there was an incredible abuse of power at the top of the FBI and the Department of Justice now. We've seen the text. We know what has gone on. How do you turn this ship around? I mean clearly there have been agencies, government agencies, when did it happen that they became so politicized and can you change this?

SESSIONS: Maria, I'm not going to (INAUDIBLE) and acknowledge the correctness of all of the statements you've made. People will make up their own mind in due time about those things but we are setting a tone of professionalism and responsibility and lawfulness in this department. We expect of every member. We've got a new FBI Director, a new Deputy FBI Director, a new Legal Counsel in the FBI Director's office, and a new press person in the FBI's office. So we made some real changes there. Chris Wray is a man of integrity and decency and brilliant lawyer and experienced Department of Justice employee. We intend and we made other changes within this department that I think will put us on a path to fulfill my responsibility to the American people and that is to conduct 0ur work professionally, honestly and without political bias.

BARTIROMO: And that's all we can ask you to do Mr. Attorney General.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BARTIROMO: Up next, more of my interview with the Attorney General Jeff Sessions including his take on the missed warning signs in that deadly Florida high school shooting spree. That's next. Follow me on Twitter @MariaBartiromo, @SundayFutures. Let us know your thoughts on Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Stay with us as we're looking ahead right now on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BARTIROMO: Welcome back Attorney General Jeff Sessions is ordering an immediate review following the news that the FBI did not act on a recent tip a month before the confessed killer in the Florida high school shooting rampage. Before that news came out, I asked Sessions about the missed signals from the FBI in the case

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SESSIONS: Yes, there clearly were and even the schools refused to let the person come in, or bring a backpack because they were concerned about it. This -- I met with a group of sheriffs yesterday. They all believe that we need to do a better job of receiving these signs and acting on them and following up on them better. That is probably the most valuable thing we can do to stop these kind of cases. We see the recent incidents, Maria, of the grandmother who was concerned about a grandchild and that appears to be -- have been a dangerous situation that her going to the police and them acting on it may have prevented. So absolutely we've got to do better about that. We're going to review Department of Justice policies and we're not perfect either and we're going to make sure we're getting to the highest possible level of responding to appropriate notices of danger like probably was out there in this case.

BARTIROMO: Yes, it's really terrible. Can you explain why the administration reversed an Obama era policy last year that would have forced Social Security officials to report records of some mentally ill people getting benefits? People are saying look, there was a plan in place that you would have known if a mentally I'll person acquired a gun.

SESSIONS: I don't know how that would work, exactly the background on that, but I would just say to you, we have got to be more effective in it. If a person is hearing voices and he's making threats to shoot and kill innocent people, that person is subject to being taken to a legal official and being declared a subject to be having mental health treatment. I think that probably existed in this case. I can't say for certain but we'll see as facts go by. But I have to say, you are correct that we need to do a better job of identifying people who obviously who -- even could possibly present threats to children in the School.

BARTIROMO: All right we will leave it there. Mr. Attorney General, we really appreciate your time this morning. Thanks very much for joining me.

SESSIONS: Thank you.

BARTIROMO: Attorney General Jeff Sessions there. Coming up next, the new developments in the Robert Mueller's Russia probe, 13 Russians indicted for meddling in the 2016 Presidential Election. Where does the investigation go now? Former Independent Counsel Ken Starr joins me live next. We're looking ahead right now on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BARTIROMO: Welcome back. A federal grand jury indicting 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies for their alleged part in a plot to interfere in the 2016 Presidential Election. President Trump is claiming vindication saying that it shows now there was no collusion on the part of his campaign. So where does the investigation go now? I want to bring in the former Independent Counsel, in the Whitewater scandal Ken Starr. Good to see you, sir. Thanks so much for joining us this morning.

KEN STARR, FORMER INDEPENDENT COUNSEL: Oh, my pleasure, Maria.

BARTIROMO: Yes, we have a lot to talk about. You were in the seat of Special Counsel. Your reaction to the 13 Russian nationals and the three companies indicted on Friday?

STARR: Well first, we're now aiming our guns so to speak where they should be aimed. I think we should stop pointing fingers at one another in this country and realize who the real enemy is and I say, enemy. These are spies. They came into our country. They spent millions of dollars. They didn't need to collude with anyone. They had a massive operation based in St. Petersburg, Russia, not Florida, and we now know that the people who were financing this according to the indictment were people extremely close to Vladimir Putin. So the real target here is the Russian government which was seeking to do what? They're seeking to sow discord. The focus has been -- just one more thing -- the focus has been on all this elect President Trump but they were also saying in some of the Facebook ads, vote for Bernie Sanders and then vote for Jill Stein. It was an effort to pit us against one another and Vladimir Putin has succeeded. There's all this finger pointing and the great thing about this indictment by Bob Mueller and his team is that they have refocused if Americans will listen, if they will read that 36-page indictment they will see, my goodness the real enemy is not within it's the enemy without.

BARTIROMO: But do you know what, Ken, I mean, the issue that I have with that is that that's nothing new. I mean, I've got to tell you, I remember going to St. Petersburg when I was working at a different company 10 years ago, and when I went to St. Petersburg in Moscow 10 years ago, I was told, Maria, don't bring your Blackberry, don't bring your -- any of your devices, as soon as you enter Russian air space, they will have access to all of your stuff. It was at that time I had a different Blackberry, I had a different name because I didn't want the Russians to be able to hack into my Rolodex and my calendar and anything else they could. That was 10 years ago, even 12 years ago when I went to Moscow as well. So how does President Trump get mixed up in all of this? We knew that Russia was trying to undermine the U.S. and the west in general, they also tried it in Europe. Why this constant focus on President Trump then?

STARR: Well, I think it does go back to the basis of the investigation itself, the dossier, the Steele dossier which has been exposed as having just rumors and innuendo. There are real issues in terms of the transparency of senior officials of the United States government with the FISA court. You know, the FISA court was developed and created to be a safeguard to protect American liberty against executive branch excess, but there's an assumption there that is that the government is being, the Justice Department or the FBI or whomever is being honest and transparent and there was a real break down there. That we know full transparency to the court and I'm encouraged with what the Attorney General just said which is that the Inspector General -- you know, Maria, there are a lot of calls, let's have a special counsel, I totally disagree with that.

BARTIROMO: Really?

STARR: Let Mueller do his job but the Inspector General was created by the Congress of the United States and signed into law by President Reagan years ago for the very purpose of handling this kind of thing. And that office is an aggressive office and as we just heard again or we were reminded, a lot of the e-mails that have come out that are being so troubling the e- mails from within, the text messages and so forth are the result of the Inspector General's investigation which seems to be going well. We don't know but it seems to be going along professionally.

BARTIROMO: So, I have a lot to ask you about this because I want to ask you about the documents but base on all that and what you just heard in terms of what Jeff Sessions' response to it, do you think up until now this does vindicate President Trump then given the fact that we know who the bad act actors are, the Russian nationals?

STARR: There's not a word in the indictment -- the answer is no. There's not a word in the indictment that suggests collusion. In fact, there's a word that suggests non-collusion. And that's the word unwittingly that appears early on in the indictment.

BARTIROMO: That's right.

STARR: That was in the connection with Florida. It was not in connection with folks at Trump Tower. This is on the ground stuff, millions of dollars being poured into Facebook ads working with local operatives in different states, they targeted certain states and they are -- again, these are Russians who came into our country under fake I.D.'s and they opened up bank accounts and so forth -- all this was funded by oligarchs from what we now know out of Russia who are very close to Vladimir Putin. So at the highest levels of the Russian government, there is an effort to again, sow discord. That's what is so upsetting to me.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

STARR: To sow discord because we're such a pluralistic society, so we have to believe in out of many one that we are united and our love for our country. So let's again start focusing on the real enemy, the real problem is the Russian government and its anti-democratic, its authoritarian regime.

BARTIROMO: And the information warfare that they apparently -- they apparently executed. Let me ask you this. You just heard the conversation with Jeff Sessions. These FISA abuses, the fact that the FBI did not tell the FISA court that the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton campaign paid for that dossier, that they used to wiretap American citizens. Your take on that and you know, I thought it was really incredible that Attorney General Jeff Sessions just said on our air there are 27 instances of classified information being leaked and he is investigating that. These leaks have been -- I mean these are felonies.

STARR: And they have to be investigated. Absolutely right. No, I found that encouraging because the nation has to engage in common sense and to protect its secrets. If we over-classify materials, let's work on that but if it's classified, it shall not be leaked and especially if and this is an if it was being leaked for political purposes so within the executive branch. That is just an unpardonable sin. So again, I'm encouraged for the fact that the Inspector General and his office, it's an able team. I worked with them when I was in the Justice Department as chief of staff to the Attorney General. These are really good and honest people just like Attorney General Sessions said.

BARTIROMO: Well, let me ask you because you were so critical with documents in terms of the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal. The document released here is equally as important. What do you want to see in terms of documents being released and compare what you were going through to what we're watching today?

STARR: Well, the documents that I want to see released are those -- and I know these are judgment calls, so it's easy to paint with a broad brush. But I think especially with respect to the two intelligence committees, the Senate and the House, there needs to be a new paradigm, a paradigm of transparency. We need to get these sets of issues behind us, and we also then get -- need to know the truth in terms of whether there was wrongdoing. There's a presumption of innocence in this country. That is very precious to us. But let's get to the facts, let's get all of the facts and then hold people accountable. That's our system. And let's be fear in that process but let's be thorough and let's also frankly be aggressive. Let's get to the bottom of what happened within the bureau, within the Justice Department, and let's also make sure that the Senate and the House have the opportunity to give us that check and balance that I think the founding fathers envisioned in this country.

BARTIROMO: Yes, I know Michael Horowitz and the Inspector General, they're going to come up with another report in the next couple of weeks and I expect that's why some of these FBI guys have been reassigned because they're part of that report. Do you believe that Robert Mueller - real quick here -- Robert Mueller will look at the FISA abuses and what has gone on at the top of the FBI as part of his Russia probe?

STARR: I don't think so, but again, we're behind veil of ignorance. His mandate is to look at the issue of collusion.

BARTIROMO: Right.

STARR: And I'm not sure how that fits into it. But here is the thing. You know this indictment was announced by Rod Rosenstein and that tells you that this is the Justice Department, President Trump's Justice Department that is looking at these things. Michael Horowitz who you rightly mentioned is a career civil servant reflecting the highest traditions of the Justice Department.

BARTIROMO: Yes, Ken, great to see you. Thanks very much for your insights this morning.

STARR: My pleasure.

BARTIROMO: Ken Starr joining us there. Up next, Congress reaching a bipartisan budget deal but conservatives say it adds too much to the deficit. House Speaker Paul Ryan explains, defends why it is a good compromise in an exclusive interview with me next. We're looking ahead this morning on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES. Stay with us for Paul Ryan.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BARTIROMO: Welcome back. The GOP spending plan has many conservatives complaining about the lack of fiscal restraints and debt management. House Speaker Paul Ryan defended his moves to support the military with me. He discussed the budget exploding entitlement and his future after the November midterm elections in this exclusive interview. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REP. PAUL RYAN, R—WIS , SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: We're really focused on getting the military their budget because they need a budget that they can plan for. We've had the four structures for the last eight years. The discretionary budget that we have now is still lower than the budget that we had put in place in 2011 that we passed. So if you remember, you go back to the BCA, actually it was budget shared then but the discretionary spending we have today is lower than levels we were envisioning back in 2011. And the other point I would simply make is the sequester, no one intended the sequester to kick in, let alone do what it did to the military. So we want to rebuild our military and we did a few things since those days. We've put in about $250 billion of permanent mandatory spending cuts in that course of time. And this bill, we have Medicare means testing we've added to it. We got rid of the independent payment advisory board, a big down payment on health care reform. So we've actually done some things in this bill that are pretty important. But yes, we did have more domestic spending. And that we put in here is pretty much one-time spending disaster aid, infrastructure aid, in exchange for getting the military budget we wanted.

BARTIROMO: Yes, but were there --

RYAN: Here is the question. We got to get entitlements. And so this was a discretionary spending budget. This wasn't a full macro budget, this is a discretionary spending. And for us, save the military, one-time spending for hurricanes, disaster, get some spending cuts that will grow in the out years but we do have to go back and focus on entitlement spending. The House Republicans passed the biggest entitlement reform package ever when we passed our healthcare bill. Unfortunately, somebody did this instead of that in the Senate and it didn't pass. We passed a budget before that cut $7.4 trillion in spending over 10 years in the House, the problem is we have to get our other partners in government to be willing to do the kind of entitlement reform that we're willing to do in the House.

BARTIROMO: Which is why people are surprised at you because you've been this entitlement reform person and deficit hawk for years.

RYAN: I guess that we've been passing bills in the House. Sure, and I'm still am.

BARTIROMO: And you mention running the bucket but you don't look like you are based on this budget last week.

RYAN: Well, I know, because this isn't a full budget, this is discretionary spending.

BARTIROMO: Well you mentioned discretionary, meaning you're also a big boost to (INAUDIBLE) education, 7 billion in community health centers, childcare care grants that was more than just the disaster relief and infrastructure.

RYAN: That's true. So this is a bipartisan budget deal --

BARTIROMO: Did you have to agree to that stuff just to get the military money?

RYAN: Yes, we have -- we have to give to get so we had to do some domestic spending that the Democrats wanted so we could get our defense spending. We got a lot of spending cuts we wanted that they didn't want either, so yes this is a bipartisan compromise. You don't get everything you want. And what I would simply say is look at what the House has already proven our ability to do on entitlements. We have passed every year since we've been in the majority, every term big entitlement savings, the problem we have is we can't get these things through the Senate. Our health care bill, people look at it as the repeal and replace bill. That was an enormous entitlement reform bill for Medicaid, for ObamaCare. We passed it out of the House, we couldn't get it through the Senate.

BARTIROMO: So what's realistic then? I mean, you're obviously not going to make any changes in an election year.

RYAN: Yes, I think --

BARTIROMO: Just think of this. This is in the op-ed in the Journal today. Income transfers like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Food Stamps among other things, that category was 47.7 percent of outlays in '89, today it's 69.2 percent of outlays and that doesn't include the net interest on the debt which is another 7.5 --

RYAN: So these deficits that you saw from Mulvaney's budget, those are stubborn structural deficits we saw before this discretionary agreement. And you know why? Baby boomers are retiring and we're not ready for them. We have a structural deficit increase because of our entitlement spending. That is why the biggest -- the biggest driver is healthcare entitlements. This is why one of the biggest casualties of a narrow Senate of that bill not passing was not getting healthcare entitlement reform. We've got to reform our health care entitlement. That is why we never give up on reforming health care because if you reform health care, then you take care of the structural drivers of our debt like Medicare and Medicaid.

BARTIROMO: And then the Graham-Cassidy ObamaCare repeal bill almost passed the Senate last year. This is one area where the President has said this is maybe should be the focus. Are we going to try this again this year?

RYAN: Well, I think there are a lot of things we can do kind of incrementally. First of all, in this bill that we just passed, we got Medicare means testing, we repealed the (INAUDIBLE) we got rid of ObamaCare funds. So we also repealed the original mandate in the tax bill. So we've been doing and doing incremental gains and healthcare reform when we realize we couldn't get it done in one fell swoop when the House bill didn't pass the Senate.

BARTIROMO: So, what are your expectations for this trillion dollar deficits? I mean, you know, we're talking about $1 trillion deficits for the next 10 years, then after a decade, --

RYAN: No, we're talking about it for as far as the eye can see --

BARTIROMO: Exactly, exactly. And in my opinion, it's going to be $2 trillion after a decade.

RYAN: Right. So that's because of demographics. It's not -- if we can get -- if we can abolish the Pentagon today, we'd still have a deficit. So we don't want to sacrifice our military while we focus on the real drivers of the debt which is entitlements. And that is why and it's really the healthcare entitlements quite frankly. Social Security is a part of a solvency problem. They have a solvency problem but nothing like we do on the healthcare entitlements. So that's why we can never give up on healthcare reform because that is the key driver of our debt in the future which is demographically driven. It's a combination of demographics and healthcare inflation. You fix healthcare, you fix the debt crisis.

BARTIROMO: Just saying, we have to get our arms and not stop on healthcare at our efforts to get cost down is not enough for the markets. The markets may push your hand. We're seeing thousand point declines, we've seen nervousness about these deficits.

RYAN: I'll take whatever -- I'll take whatever it gets to get us to move. Like I said, we pass this bill in the House already. We've done this in the House. We've not been able to get these bills passed in the Senate or over the finish line.

BARTIROMO: So what do you do? What's your realistic solution here?

RYAN: What we tried to do was do it all in the House bill with repeal and replace. Like I said, we passed it. And that bill, one guy in the Senate did this instead of that and that went down. That would have been the biggest entitlement reform bill ever passed by Congress. So what are we doing? We're going back and doing it incrementally, going back at incremental reform and other entitlement reforms so we can chip away at this problem.

BARTIROMO: Do you think you will have an actual entitlement reform package in place this year?

RYAN: I can't answer the question because --

BARTIROMO: It's unlikely because --

RYAN: I thought we would have one last year when we passed --

BARTIROMO: But this is an election year.

RYAN: Yes, but I think there are things we can do. If we can get at the root cause of health inflation, if we can do things that are -- that are good for healthcare reform that bring down the cost of healthcare, that helps the federal budget.

BARTIROMO: Is this going to be enough for you to keep the House come November?

RYAN: I think because we pass this, because we kept our word and people are seeing that what we're doing is actually improving their lives and they're seeing other side is offering nothing but you know, crumbs and resist and all this stuff, yes, I think we'll keep the House.

BARTIROMO: Are you going to stick around in order to see the fruits of your labor because the rumblings are you're going to hopefully keep the House as you just said but then resign and step down after November.

RYAN: I really think we're going to keep the House. Look, my wife and I had that conversation in the spring of every election year. We haven't had that yet. We'll figure it out then.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BARTIROMO: We haven't had the conversation yet. Interesting comments there. My thanks from House Speaker Paul Ryan. President Trump is feeling vindicated after the indictment of 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies. Is he right? Our panel is up next weighing in as we look ahead now on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES.

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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. President Trump is saying he's vindicated after Robert Mueller's probe led to the indictment of 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies. The White House says this backed up what the President has been saying that there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Our -- time for our panel right now. Let's bring in Ed Rollins, he's a former Campaign Manager for the Reagan-Bush ticket in 1984 and former New York Senator Al D'amato is with us. Gentlemen, it's good to see you.

ED ROLLINS, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CONTRIBUTOR: Thank you.

BARTIROMO: Should the President be vindicated at this point?

ROLLINS: I don't think he's totally vindicated yet but I think there was no evidence that there was collusion. I think the Russians set exactly what they've set out to do. They've created chaos. We've talked about the Russians for a year and a half now. There's not a single person who voted for Hillary Clinton that won't be convinced that the Russians basically stole this election.

BARTIROMO: So they did do it?

ROLLINS: They did do it.

BARTIROMO: What do we do about it, Senator?

ROLLINS: I think --

AL D'AMATO, FORMER SENATOR FROM NEW YORK: Well, I think that's the big thing. What are you, Mr. President, and I supported you, what are you going to do now that it is clear that the Russians did everything they could to sow discord at the very least into our electoral process, that they continue to abuse America, that with their cyber-attacks that they have either directly participated in or have people out there doing? Are we just going to continue business as usual or are you going to do something?

BARTIROMO: But what do we do and why did they do it? I don't understand, creating discord. I mean they were even doing things about Bernie Sanders, right? They were pushing Bernie Sanders, so what was the point of this activity from the Russians?

D'AMATO: Because you now have and they've been very successful whether or not they wanted Trump or not in creating discord in this country, conflict that's where we have one group coming out for Trump another group coming to the same place, same site.

BARTIROMO: Basically just all fighting.

D'AMATO: Well they want discord because if you have discord it's very difficult to get the Republicans and Democrats to work together. And you've got a country that's fractured as it relates to foreign policy, as it relates to when do we use military, as it relates to how do we deal with other nations. They've been very successful. And I want our president to stand up.

ROLLINS: They've done this for a very long time. Propaganda has always been their great forefront and I think to a certain extent what we have to guarantee in some way, shape or form that would not do it again, they aren't here in 2018 or they aren't here 2020. I think the president has to get very tough on them. I think he has to slap them with sanctions. There's no longer this great love affair between Putin and Trump. I think he's to really get tough with them and say this is unacceptable. And at the end of the day here, if we find you doing this -- if by any element of this again, we'll going to really make you pay a price.

BARTIROMO: How is he going to do anything in terms of legalities or illegalities when he's got an Attorney General that has recused himself from Russia? Your thoughts on what Jeff Sessions just told me.

D'AMATO: My thoughts on him is that I used to like Jeff Sessions as a Senator. I think he's been a very weak leader here and I think this is a department that needs to be very, very strong leadership. And I think because of his absence, it's just -- it's not functioning well.

BARTIROMO: Well he say -- he just broke news. He said that there were 27 leaks of confidential information.

ROLLINS: But he didn't discover that this morning. Where are the indictments? Where are the indictments.

BARTIROMO: But where are the indictments? I mean, this is a felony to leak confidential information of this sort and he said that there were 27 instances of it.

D'AMATO: It seems to me that the only part of the Justice Department that is really working is the Inspector General.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

D'AMATO: And the fact that if you laidback there and say we have 27, that's not good enough. Really, whose working on it? What are you doing? Where are --

BARTIROMO: Yes, he did say we're going to restore the rule of law and we are going to investigate the FISA abuses but he names Michael Horowitz and he names Rod Rosenstein to do it.

D'AMATO: The only person he's got that the American people can look to at this point is the Inspector General.

BARTIROMO: Right exactly.

D'AMATO: But that's -- I don't know if he's following up on the 27 leaks. I don't think he is.

ROLLINS: But that function is to find out stuff going on inside. Someone has to step forward and start putting indictments. Take these 27 people before a grand jury. Those are felonies and basically start indicting people. Basically that's -- that will make people pay attention.

BARTIROMO: All right, we'll take a break. When we come back we've got more with the panel and we'll talk a little look -- a little at the FBI failings ahead of the Florida shootings. We will look ahead when we come right back on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES. Back in a minute.

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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Back with our panel Ed Rollins and former Senator Al D'amato. The FBI missed the warning signs again of the Florida shooter.

ROLLINS: I think we have to, you know, everybody always rushes to changing the gun laws which isn't going to happen. We need to really think in terms of profiling. When you have a kid like this mentally disturbed, someone has to watch him and there's all kinds of signs that are out there and obviously, they don't watch him. But we have a tendency not to want to do that with privacy issues and the rest of it. But the reality is every single one of these people have been mentally disturbed and we need to watch them and take them out of the system.

BARTIROMO: Let me -- let me ask you before -- did you want to say a comment on that real quick?

D'AMATO: Yes, they really blew it.

BARTIROMO: They blew it. Yes.

D'AMATO: They blew it because they had a clear information given to them number of times, had they contacted the locals in this particular case, the chances are they could have stopped this.

BARTIROMO: Yes. It's a very -- it's very upsetting. I don't know what to say about it. Let me ask you about the Paul Ryan interview. I want to get your take on this because toward the end of that interview, I said to him, will you be around past November to enjoy the fruits of your labor because he's talking about all the great things that the GOP has done like rolling back regulations and cutting taxes, he didn't have an answer Ed. I said will you be, he said every year when I file, I have the discussion with my wife, we haven't had the discussion yet.

ROLLINS: That's great.

BARTIROMO: I said, you haven't decided yet. He said well, I haven't had the discussion yet.

ROLLINS: That was a very bad message to send to his members. He's in a very tight race this year. He's the leader. He has to go out and campaign for one of this country to the other. He has to talk about the Republican agenda in the next two years, four years and he has to be at the helm. I've got the impression that he wasn't going to run and I'm sure every member watching that is going to get the impression he's not going to run.

BARTIROMO: I felt like he's not going to be here after November. That's what I took away from it. What do you think, Senator?

D'AMATO: I've never heard more political nonsense. It was a political story I have to speak with my wife.

BARTIROMO: Well she's the boss, come on.

D'AMATO: I like him but there's not a ring of sincerity and truth behind them.

BARTIROMO: Yes, meanwhile the Republicans are raising a lot of money there. So what would happen?

D'AMATO: Well they're going to need it because --

BARTIROMO: Who becomes the speaker?

D'AMATO: Let me say this to you. That will be difficult and right now, the chances are Nancy Pelosi will be the next speaker. And I say this and Ed will touch on some of the numbers, they're not terrific here in New York. We have several seats at least and in other areas of the country and I'm going to leave it to Ed to touch on it because we've discussed it and I thought you should hear it. We only have a margin of 24. That 24 is basically up for grabs and Nancy Pelosi unless the Republicans can get together maybe their next Speaker.

BARTIROMO: Somebody said to me the other day. Before you go to the November ballots to vote in November, make sure you get your head around Nancy Pelosi being speaker and Maxine Waters running the Finance Committee.

ROLLINS: We always do that but I would argue this. We can't run against Nancy Pelosi. Each and every member has to run on what they're going to do and Paul Ryan has to lead that charge and I think to a certain extent here's the unfinished business, here is how we get it done and make it about those kinds of issues. Nancy Pelosi will hit a boogieman before no one cares.

BARTIROMO: All right. She keeps calling the tax cut plan crumbs. They're going to have explained that when they voted against it. Gentlemen, good to see you both. Ed Rollins, Senator Al D'Amato, it's good to see you. That will do it for us on SUNDAY MORNING FUTURES. Thanks for joining me. I'm Maria Bartiromo. I'll be back on Tuesday on MORNINGS WITH MARIA on the Fox Business Network. Join us 6:00-9:00 a.m. Eastern every morning. Stay with Fox News now here's MEDIA BUZZ after this break.

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