By tweet and cast aside in favor of the president s personal doctor Navy Rear AdmiralRonny Jackson who lacks the sort of Management Experience that would prepare him to lead the federal governments second Largest Department. But who did offer a remarkably rosy assessment of the president s health. Some people have just great genes. You know, i told the president if he had a healthier diet over the last 20 years, he might live to be 200 years. I dont know. He has incredible genes. I just assume. Shulkin alleged today he was fired because he did not want to the privatize va care. In essence because he refused to dismantle the va. He claims he fell victim to a power play by trumps political appointees that saw me as an obstacle to privatization who had to be removed. Im oop convinced its a political issue aimed at rewarding select people and companies for profits even if it innuendo r undermines it people for profits. Despite what you may have heard, the va is popular with the people who need it. 90 of veterans in a poll conducted by the vfw said they would rather improve the system than dismantle it. Independence assessments is found that Va Health Care outperforms comparable private facilities. Thats why the major veterans groups do not want to move the va towards privatization. You know who does . The Koch Brothers and their ally who have been on a mission to demonize the va and led by a group pete hegseth who took his talking points straight to trump tv. The most important aspect is giving veterans a choice to either go to a va facility or a private provider outside of the va if they need to. That creates competition that a hospital like this will need if its going to start treating veterans like customers. You hear that right now, choice, right . Well, trump reportedly considering appointing hegseth to run the va prompting backlash everybody va groups. Just listen carefully to what the president had to say today. But im doing that for the vets. We made changes because we want them taken care of. We want them to have choice so they can run to a private doctor. And joining me is former va secretary david shulkin. Mr. Shulkin, how do you know that you were fired over what you say was your opposition to privatizing the va . Well, i think that the president made a decision who he wants to represent veteran affairs in the cabinet. Thats a decision that the president makes. There was clear evidence though that the political appointees inside va were working against me and my Leadership Team because they felt that we were trying to strengthen the va rather than move it towards privatization. Who though . I mean, im confused how this state of affairs comes about. You havent named names. Youre saying there are individuals you know who they are who were working at cross purposes to essentially sabotage you . Im absolutely saying that. The names have been named. There are documents that have been shared and published. Theyre in the newspapers right now that show the political appointees who have written memos to try to disrupt the operations at va. Operations at va. And weve been focused on trying to make the progress that our veterans need to be able to fulfill the mission that this country owes the responsibility to take care of those hose have served. You just tell me the names of these individuals . Im not going to start naming names right here. But theyre all available. Theyve been published, the New York Times has it and others have it, as well. They are people that have represented the office of public affairs, theyre the white house representatives who are in va. A number of them have already been identified. Does this come utley from the white house . Do you believe the president of the United States was essentially favored this agenda that you say was sort of a fifth column inside your own department . No, i dont have any evidence thats the case. I think that the president wants to improve care for veterans. I there that he is not served well by political appointees who are taking their own personal agendas much further than i think that he intended them to. When is the last time you spoke to him . I spoke to the president yesterday. What was that conversation like . We spoke about the progress that i was making, what i needed to do from a policy perspective to make sure were fixing the issues in va. Very focused. He was very inquisitive about the things we were working on, making sure we were focused on the job at hand. Thats before you were fired . Thats correct. You spoke to him, he made no mention of the fact that he was about to terminate you . Thats correct. And then you found out via tweet . Right before that, the chief of staff kelly gave me a call which i appreciated, gave me a headsup. But that was much after the phone call. Was the president receptive to what you were saying on that phone call as you were updating him on the improvements you say you were making at the va . It was a normal conversation with the president where he asked me what was going on. This is notes a typical. I gave him the updates and told him where we were focused. He had questions about that. It was a very interactive exchange. Does the president understand the nuts and bolts of how the va functions and what you were doing there. Ing. I think this is a very complex organization, and from the outside it seems easy, why arent things fixed faster. The truth is that the va has had systemic problems for decades which spans multiple administrations. And in order to get this fixed, i believe i was on the right track which is working in a bipartisan way with congress, doing what the veterans groups wanted us to do to strengthen the va. At the same time giving additional choice in the private sector and this is a very complex formula to move an organization this big in the type of transformation that it needs to undergo. You were on a phone call with the president. Is it in your understanding in ret pro expect that was a call account president was going to fire you and never got around to it . I take it at face value that he was thinking about veterans that day. Picked up the phone to ask me a series of questions and later on that afternoon, decided that he felt that it was time for a change. So but you know, im not good at the krystal ball game. Im just ive been here to try to focus on veteran issues. I dont do politics very well, obviously. But the important thing is that we have to get this organization working again. I want to pivot back to that. You just said you dont do politics well. I want to ask about the Inspector Generals report. The punitive reason that someone could point to that you were dismissed is there was an Inspector Generals report critical of you and particularly your chief of staff for a trip you took to england with your wife in which there were wimbledon tickets that had been acquired, her airfare and travel paid for by public money, subsequently reimbursed. Do you deny that you did anything wrong in that trip . Yes, listen, heres what happened. This was a trip of the five allies that had been going on for 43 years attended always by the United States. As the major force in the allied forces. We had 40 hours of lectures. I did at least three hours of those lectures myself. A meaningful exchange. The only government money involved was a single coach airfare for my wife. She was invited officially. Va secretaries have always brought wives who were officially invited preapproved by the ethics officials. There were norp surprises. This was done 100 proper in retrospect six months later when the ig looked at the report they found the staff had made a mistake. When that cape out, i wrote a check to the u. S. Government and paid back every penny. There were no other expenses. The wimbledon tickets were no expense to the government. They were a saturday afternoon with our friends. No business involved. There was nothing wrong with that. I want to follow up because the Inspector General report did say your chief of staff essentially changed records in an email to essentially cover up the expenditure. Is that true . Was that wrong . Well, listen, if you change records, of course, thats wrong. But the Inspector General report also said very clearly that i wasnt involved in that. I had no knowledge of that. And so you know, i think that the chief of staff decided to retire rather than go through a full investigation. But look, ig have, you know, i had very strong confidence in her. Your understanding and i think you said this explicitly, the ig report and the stories about the trip were essentially an attempt to get rid of you by people. Theres no question about it. This was politicized. Who . The political appointees within the va that did not like the type of progress that we were making. Did you know that . Were you watching this happen and you were saying the people who work in the building with me who are appointees of the president are actively trying to get me fired right now through this . Yes, that is correct. And who were they reporting to . Who was their to whom did they report this to . Well, the political appointees have dual roles to the administration at the white house and also back into the department. And, of course, you know, you cant run the Department Like this with people pursuing their own agendas. So this was a major concern and this is what ive been dealing with the last couple months which is why i said that it was very difficult to get the type of work done that we needed to get done. There were stories in the newspaper saying had you lost it, that you had become paranoid, that you had an armed guard outside your door. Whats your response to that . Listen, this is all part of the nonsense that they do in washington. There were no changes to my security protocol. Guess what, everybody cabinet secretary has arm guards. Were all in president ial succession. There was no changes in any of my security at all. If this is the situation, you are working in what sounds like a hornets nest. People are trying to undermine you and sabotage you. Appointees of the president of the United States. Youre talking to the president. Did you talk to the president or chief of staff kelly and say i cant work like this. This is bad for the veterans we serve . Yes, i did. What was their response . Their response was that i needed to do what i needed to do to get the organization back on track. And when i tried to do that, there were people that were blocking that. So this was. But i want to be clear here. The president specifically said do what you have to do to get on track but did not intervene to breaking there bizarre standoff you were having inside your department . I wouldnt expect the president to have to do that. The president s always been clear with me that he wanted to make progress and make progress fast at the va, something that i shared. But you know, working in an organization where people have multiple agendas is always tough. I dont think that this is unusual circumstance. But i think that in this circumstance, in the politicized environment we have in washington this became a pretty significant issue and one that i was determined that we were going to get back on track. Unfortunately, the president made the decision he wanted to go a different direction. How did those people, the final question on this and then i want to ask about your successor. How did those people get those jobs . Who represented them and who put their resumes in front of the chief of staff or the folks in the white house to put them an the va. The way this works is after the inauguration, all of the departments get large numbers of political appointees sent to them. Most of them come from the campaign who are moved into the administration. Thats how we got all of our political appointees. Ronny jackson, who is the president s personal physician, was the president s personal physician before this, he has been nominated to your job. He has never as far as i can tell been an administrator. Youre both if im not mistaken both a physician and have been a Hospital Administrator and have familiarity with the difficulties and complications of that. Is your successor qualified for your job . Look, i know dr. Jackson personally. Hes a guy with high integrity. Very honorable man. This is a tough job for anybody to take on, the second Largest Department in the government. Its almost a 200 billion budget with 370,000 people. Dr. Jackson i believe is going to do this with the right intention. Hes going to need a lot of help around him and a team around him to be successful. I certainly believe that i will do everything i can to make sure that that is that he is doing the job he needs to do. But its certainly the case that if what you are saying is true and i dont have an independent wave confirming it, but if what youre saying is true, he cant possibly succeed in the mission of strengthening the va if the same people are there who you say are actively working to subvert that purpose so that the place can be privatized . I think its clear that va needs to rid itself of people that arent there for the sole intention of focusing on improving services and care for veterans and nobody should tolerate this type of politization of an important Department Like va. Former va secretary david shulkin. Thank you very much for making time tonight. Thank you. Joining me now Bernie Sanders of vermont who is a member of the Veterans Affairs committee the former chair of that committee who worked closely on esissues throughout the years. What did you make of that . First of all, let me thank dr. Shulkin for his work and his efforts to strengthen the va. He wrote an oped in the New York Times today and i think it said it all and he said it to you. That is, this is not a personality issue, this is not conspiracy. This is about an effort on the part of the Trump Administration to continue their efforts in support of the Koch Brothers agenda who are now the most power in Political Force in americaing to privatize the va. You heard the doctor tell you the va has a budget of 200 billion. Thats a lot of money. And there are a lot of people in the private sector now looking at the va and saying hey, how can we make huge amounts of money off the va by expanding privatization. Thats what this issue is about. Nobody should be surprised that this is taking place. You got the Koch Brothers who are determined, this is their agenda. Its not a secret. They want to privatize social security, privatize medicare, they want to privatize medicaid. They want to privatize the postal service. You have a secretary of Education Betsy Devos who doesnt believe in public education. So nobody should be shocked that the va, the second Largest Agency in government, would be subject to privatization. That is what the struggle is about. What do you say to people who say the va is broken, these long wait lists. Its not functioning. Give people access to protest care so they have choice and they can get seen immediately. Whats wrong with that . First of all what, does bother me as the former chair of the va, i talk to a lot of veterans. I was just in the Veterans Medical Center here in vermont today. I talk to veterans all of the time. You know what they say . They say, of course, the va has problems. So does every hospital in america. Oh does our entire Health Care System which is basically dysfunctional. But given all of that, you talk to the average veteran, you talk to the American Legion. The American Legion just published a book talking about their strong support of the va and their determination to prevent it from being privatized. Thats what the vfw, the dav, vietnam vets believe. Does the va with 131 separate hospitals and many hundreds of communitybased outreach clinics have problems . Yes it does but so does every other medical system in america. By the way, there was a poll done a couple years ago. They asked the American People, gallup did, they said what are your favorite Health Care Systems in america. In first place was medicare and the veterans administration. They were at the top of the list. So our job and dr. Shulkin referenced this, our job is to do what the veterans want and that is to strengthen the va and make sure they have the doctors and the nurses and the staff that they need not to dismember it or privatize it. Do you believe that dr. Jackson is qualified for this position . Well, i know nothing about dr. Jackson other than the little that ive read. He appears to be a very good family physician and he has done a good job not only for trump but for the Obama Administration. But you just heard dr. Shulkin Say Something that is eminently true. And that is this is the largest integrated Health Care System in america. 350,000 employees. In my view, you would need somebody with a great deal of administrative experience somebody hopefully who knows something about the va. But what i fear very much and this has nothing to do with i know nothing about dr. Jackson. So this is not a criticism. But i think he is going to be the front guy to try to move toward privatization. What i am urging my colleagues on the Senate VeteransFairs Committee to do is to not support dr. Jackson or anybody else who intends to privatize the va. That would be a terrible disservice to millions of veterans in this country who depend upon the va into final question. Has did shulkin do a good job . We keep talking about strengthening the va and know there are problems. Is the trajectory going in the right direction . I think in general it is. Look, he was under a lot of pressure. And at every meeting, there was always that debate between those who wanted to privatize and he was clear. Hes consistent in what he told you this evening. He wants to strengthen the va but wants to give under certain circumstances and the devil is in the details veterans the option to go to private care. If you are living in a very rural state and you have to travel two hours to get to a va, should you be able to go to a community physician, of course you should. If youre in an area where the va is not providing timely care and you have to wait too long, should you be able to get private care, the answer is yes. But that does not mean to say you privatize the va. Thanks for being with me. Thank you. Coming up, the Mueller Probe movesity focus to russian meetings at the 2016 Republican Convention and carter page is here to talk about it. Jeff sessions announces tonight there be no Second Special counsel to investigate the fbi but the plot to stop mueller continues. Ill talk to Steve Schmidt about it in two minutes. Racing isnt the only thing on my mind. And with godaddy, im making my ideas real. When i created my businesses, i needed a way to showcase it. With godaddy you can get a website to sell online. And it will look good. I made my own way. Now its time to make yours. Get started at godaddy. Com everything is working, working just like it should oh hi sweetie, i just want to show you something. Xfinity mobile find my phone. [ phone rings ] look at you. This tech stuff is easy. [ whirring sound ] you want a cookie . Its a drone i know. Find your phone easily with the xfinity voice remote. One more way comcast is working to fit into your life, not the other way around. For months, president trumps allies in the congress and media have been calling for the attorney general to appoint a Second Special counsel to investigate alleged fbi misconduct. Tonight, Jeff Sessions announced hes not going to do it at least not yet. Instead hes asked account u. S. Attorney in utah, jon huber to investigate the fbis actions regarding Hillary Clintons emails and whether the bureau followed proper procedure when they spied on carter page. In a letter today to Republican Leaders sessions wrote i am confident mr. Hubers review will include a full, complete and objective evaluation of these matters and upon the conclusion well receive his recommendations as to whether any matters under investigation require further resources or any merit the appointment of a special counsel. Cecilia munoz with me now and Steve Schmidt, republican strategist and msnbc contributor. Steve, ill begin with you. It seems like Jeff Sessions is under tremendous pressure and basically trying to thread a needle here. Thats my interpretation. Whats yours . He sure is. Look, and the pressures only going to intensify as this Investigation Continues to move closer and closer to the oval office. The one thing i suspect is almost certainly true is that there will be additional indictments that Robert Mueller knows much more about where this investigation is, what its focus is than we do. And that all through the time of Donald Trumps presidency, we have seen revelations denied over and over again by administration officials, those stories fall apart. And what we see are this unusual connection between russians, the campaign, the active measures under way to attack the country, the countrys election process by the russian federation. So this investigation is deadly serious. It poses an existential threat to this president. And for some time, weve seen republican members right wing media attacking the special counsel, attacking the Justice Department, attacking the intelligence communities trying to undermine these institutions. Girding for the political war that they see coming. Because while Robert Mueller knows what hes investigating, on the other side, the president and his team know exactly what it is that they did or didnt do. Cecilia, having served in the Obama Administration by i do think took independence of the doj quite seriously, do you are you confident that independence is being maintained under what looks to me like fairly clear assault . Its very clear that independence isnt being maintained. Were seeing an administration and a president in particular who views the Justice Department as being in service to him as opposed to in service to us is, the people of the United States. Thats a very, very big difference. And the Obama Administration, we had very, very clear lines to make sure that there wasnt political interference with the Law Enforcement decisions made by the Justice Department. And that is essential if youre going to preserve the rule of law. The notion that you have the president s personal attorney for example, discussing pardons with people who are participating in the investigation really is one of many, many signals that we have that this is a guy who thinks the Justice Department works for him as opposed to working for the people. You dont swear an oath to the president of the United States. You swear an oath to the constitution. And those lines are incredibly important for preserving the rule of law. Theyre under assault. Right, okay. So they definitely are from the president. Theres this huge pressure if you watch trump ta and listen to right wing media, appoint a Second Special counsel. There was huge pressure to fire mccabe. They did fire mick cave. Is sessions holding the line sufficiently to your mind . Well, its hard to say without seeing exactly whats happening within the department. Its very clear that official after official after official when they go on television, they know they have an audience of one. They know that the president of the United States is watching and that hes willing to put public pressure on his agencies in order to push them not to be independent. And that particularly in these circumstances should be worrisome to anybody who cares about the institutions of this democracy. Steve, can i ask you about i want to ask about the interview we just did with david shulkin. It seemed to me to be a microcosm of the Personnel Management here in this white house. The president s been trying to get sessions fired essentially publicly forever. We just found out from david shulkin, the president calls him shortly before hes fired, has a whole conversation and doesnt tell him that hes being fired. What did you make of that . I make of it that this white house runs as sham bol likely as the Trump Organization did as crazily as any of the apprentice episodes did. The incompetent, the chaos, the mismanagement, the corruption up and down the cabinet, around the west wing, its unprecedented in the history of the country, unprecedented in the modern presidency. Its not normal. Weve never seen like it before. Its extraordinary to behold. For sure, it shouldnt be a revelation that this Administration Functions at a perpetual level of incompetence that heretofore is unprecedented in the american presidency. Cecilia, what was the way in which the president you served handled these kinds of things from a personnel perspective . Well, with a lot more decency than what were seeing out of this administration. Government is hard. Youve got to fire people sometimes in government. Sometimes you have to fire people. President obama did it when he had to do it from the perspective that honored the people that he served with and recognized their public service. And thats look, theres just an enormous difference between the decency and the sense of teamwork that the Obama Administration worked with compared with the dens of vipers shulkin described. The government functioning well has to be concerned to hear a cabinet secretary say that the white house saw to it that his agency was a den of vipers and that the white house itself is like a den of vipers. When you are at each others throats in that way, you dont have your eye on the ball. You dont have your eye on serving the American People and you cant serve the American People well. That is true in story after story and staffing incident after staffing incident in this administrationing. Cecilia munoz and Steve Schmidt, thanks for joining us. Next, Robert Mueller is reportedly asking questions about a meeting that took place during the rnc between russians and the Trump Campaign and carter page joins me next to talk about it. Thats not right. Maybe if i reboot. Whats with all the popups . 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So the only time you met him was in cleveland . That i may have met him possibly might have been in cleveland. After many denials, former Trump Campaign adviser carter page finally admitted in that interview that yes he met with Sergey Kislyak at the Republican Convention in july of 2016. He was not the i dont know one. Attorney general Jeff Sessions then a senator and one of the Trump Campaigns top advisers spoke with kislyak at the same meeting failing to disclose it in his confirmation process. A source telling reuters muellers team has been asking witnesses about the event attended by kislyak, sessions and carter page who joins me right here in the studio. Youre shaking your head. Let me start with this. I know youve talked to the fbi, right . Absolutely, yes. Which has been disclosed, leaked to the washington post. Thats been out there. So so have they ever asked you about that meeting back in the rnc . I told them a lot of everything you know, i had essentially been doing for quite a long time including obviously you know everything in cleveland. So. So you did talk about that . Yes. Theres a few updates since we last spoke on the first order questions i want to go through. Then i want to talk about your fisa warrant and the fact that youve kind of won a victory. You got the Inspector General looking into it. The schiff memo released in response to the nunes memo says the fbi interviewed you multiple times about your russian intelligence contacts including in march of 2016 which is right around when you come onto the campaign. Is that true . Yes. That is true . Yes. We dont have any way of knowing it. What was that about . Well, you know, lets things will eventually be declassified i believe. Sure. But it relates to you know not long after that interview where we were talking, you know, there was a leak about the whole mael one situation where i was a witness to this spy case. Let me so people know in the Southern District of new york there was a case brought against people that were ultimately convicted of being russian agents and they refer to people they were trying to recruit. One of them is punitively you. They refer to you as male one. Youre saying its in relationship to that case. Lets just yes. I want to be clear because one of the things i think youve contended for a while and your supporters have contended is that it was the steele dossier that essentially is what makes your life terrible, right . This dodgy dossier. Thats what happened before the election, 45 days before the election, theres this is defamatory story that comes out. Thats your perspective on this. I know that. I guess my only point is this march 2016 interview is happening before the dossier. Right as a witness, yes. You talked to the fbi. Other thing about this period of time thats a little confusing i want to clarify, the person puerto rican that you say brought you onto the campaign, new York State Republican Party official named cox, is that correct . Chairman of the Republican Party here. Sam nunberg recently, you know sam . Ive heard of him. I dont think ive ever he said lewandowski brought you onto the campaign. I have no comments about that. You know, the problem is. Wait a second. You told me it was cox. Well, but he floulsed me to people. I stated that to the house intel committee, as well, yep. Point being its not mutually exclusive cox could have introduced to you lewandowski who then makes the ultimate decision. Is that a safe assumption . I dont assume anything. Did it happen. Im just asking you. You know, heres the problem, chris. Weve talked about this previously, right . Where people sort of make stories out of nothing, right . Yeah, im not saying its inkrim natory. Im asking a factual question. Who brought you onto the campaign. It was lewandowski. Ed introduced me to a few people and i had conversations with various people, in terms of campaign, remember im a volunteer. Totally. I was never paid one cent. I never gave anything to anyone in the campaign in terms of money or contributions or anything. So it was a pretty loose its like someone volunteering in any campaign. I want to talk about two memos youre writing back to the campaign. I know how these circles work. Theres volunteer things. Youll hop on calls. Campaigns will have like their telecommunication advisers and have a big call whats our policy on net neutrality. This is sort of what you were doing. Sometimes. So Campaign Adviser carter page presented before gatherings of the new school in moscow including the commencement ceremony, nes board member arkady also spoke before the event in a private event. He expressed strong support for mr. Trump and a desire to Work Together toward devising Better Solutions to the vast range of problems. You wrote that. I think thats a little segment of a long you know relatively longer document. But thats accurate. Did he express strong trump support for trump to you . We had a very brief hello, you know. Its similar to you know, you mentioned attorney general sessions and you know ambassador kislyak in cleveland. Those two, they walked by each other on the way out, you know. Right. Then senator sessions was walking out of that meeting thats cited in the reuters report, and that was it. You know, it was a brief from what i saw, massive. Im talking about you. Its the same thing, right . I had a brief you know hello to him as i was walking out. But i listened to him. He spoke at the same event where i spoke, right . He gave a lot of interesting insights in terms of. The russian perspective, totally. No, no, i mean this about a relationship thats deeply broken in many ways. It was more about ways forward for the russian economy and you know, the World Economy if you will. I guess my question to you is, heres the thing. Heres the thing were having a hard time on the outside of this. I understand how people, you feel like things get manipulated. It does seem like youve got a Deputy Foreign minister telling it you he supports trump. He did not directly use those words. I am interpreting a lot of things that im hearing from him. Then it sort of feels like are you sort of inflating your importance back to the campaign . I think youre not reading the full context of that. I was talking about discussions, you know, it was input had i from a lot of people. Youre cherry picking. No. Youre not reading the full he expressed strong support for mr. Trump. He expressed strong support for policies that i think aligned well with some of the things some of the important steps, some of the important possibilities that were things that then candidate trump was talking about. But you know, it was in the but you know, it was in the macro. The macro you know view of the World Economy and the russian economy. Again, this is a speech. Right. To graduating students at a economists. Right . So this is my interpretation. I will also note, chris, i wrote that memo. Yes. Sitting at jfk airport after taking a tenhour flight and then flying back to london. I wasnt able to get a direct flight. So this is just sitting in the waiting area, you know, right near the gate at jfk airport putting together some thoughts. You know, the fact that i would be talking with you on national television, you know, almost two years later, you know, after having on a day where im traveling ,000 miles and putting out some you know, some basic ideas of my interpretation. Right, i mean, right. It seems from your perspective, from my interpretation of your perspective, theres a very profound sense of how did i end up here, right . Is that fair . Chris, there is a great quote from your book. You say for subjects of authoritarian rule, humiliation is the permanent state of existence. Page 71. Its been a complete. You think we live in an authoritarian role. On your privatization discussion with dr. Shulkin, theres debates what should be privatized and what should not be. Thats a policy discussion. Whats interesting in 2016 is the cia and the fbi, nsa, some of their key functions not to mention doj were for all intents privatized by the dnc with this fake dodgy dossier which is then leading to abusive process in fer courts. This is a really big deal. Your big complaint, and this is essentially the argument of the nunes memo is that the Foreign Surveillance warrant issued against you was wrong. It was improper. It should never have been issued against you and it shouldnt have been subsequently renewed multiple times. Right . Thats your contention. I cant imagine anything which could possibly warrant such a warrant. Do you are you on the same page . My feeling about it is, i want to read the warrant. Absolutely. Just declassify the warrant. Let carter page and chris hayes and everyone else read it and come to a determination whether it was proper or whether it was improper. Which is were completely on the same page. Many people have been working on this. You know, theres a number of nonprofit organizations, yale law school, New York Times have a big case. To try and foia that warrant. Judicial watch. A lot of people. Unfortunately, what quaev had so far is some of the most disclosure has happened in other courts where you know, a billionaire russians or multimillionaire russians who are suing buzzfeed are getting a lot more disclosure than Even House Intelligence Committee was able to get for a long time. So you know, im pretty excited as more details come out, some of the Court Battles will start being handled more fairly. Final question. Have you talked to anyone in the white house in the last year. Not in the last year, no. In the first year . No. Not that i can think of. Are you sure . Not that that i can think of, no. Again, i mentioned because it was forced out of me in the House Intelligence Committee with the, you know, in this eighthour day where im just being grilled nonstop that you know, i had a brief conversation with steve bannon and you know things like that. He told you not to come on my show. It wasnt your show. I dont feel as insulted by steve bannon then. Carter, its good to see you. Great to see you, too. I hope things go well for you. And i hope we end up getting to read your warrant. I think were both on the same page about that. I hope so. Theres some talk about late july even doj is kind of talking about that. Theres been some reporting. You can come back and we can go through it together. Good to see. You great to see you, chris. Ahead, did president trumps lawyers lawyer just make things a whole lot worse for himself and his client . That story ahead. Youve said that the president was not aware of the agreement. Right. He was not aware of the money. Right. When did mr. Cohn tell him about this or did he tell him about it . It the president became aware of it much later on. All right . How much later on . I dont know. You dont know. Michael cohen never told him about it, okay . The president s personal lawyers personal lawyer has been making the rounds on television and appears to be making things worse for himself, his client and his clients client. David swartz says donald trump knew nothing about a hush agreement covering up an alleged affair between trump and Stormy Daniels an affair the white house denies. Its a claim so bizarre it prompted a former prosecutor to tweet whied he admit this on nat television . To help me understand, my guests, former assistant u. S. Torn maya wiley. Why were you so flabbergasted by that admission . Well, the agreement between Stormy Daniels and donald trump has a number of representations that supposedly made by the agreement. Trump is releasing claims against her and making various representations and agreements with her. There is absolutely no way that trump could make any of those agreements or representations if he didnt know about them. So essentially what we witnessed on the air is the lawyer saying trump is not a party to the agreement, which means the whole thing is invalid. Hes under cut his clients position. I dont know why he did that on the national television. Good question. In the agreement is david dennis dennisson. Do you agree . I do. This is a bizarre. I dont know why people go to law school because apparently it doesnt matter. [ laughter ] i dont know what else to say about it. The new normal is so abnormal, what were watching unfold is crazy. Its a nondisclosure agreement. So the two parties are the parties with knowledge of the thing they are not disclosing. Right. You cant have that one of those parties not know about it. No, its an ethics violation. From an ethical perspective. If it is true. If it is true, its bizarre and hard to imagine. If it is true, it means michael chen is in serious trouble with his law license. I dropped out of law school after a year. Did you . I didnt know i did one year. Well start billing you as permanent 1 l. Thats right. Exactly. Even i know that [ laughter ] a party to an agreement if youre not aware [ laughter ] i think what is happening is, they are trying to distance trump from this and cohen is willing to take the fall. Right. Hes not concerned about what it means in terms of ethics and i think look, and ive contended for a while here, this has to do with a lot of money that donald trump may have to pay out, there may be some stipulation to melania in a prenup and look, i have known people who have worked for very, very wealthy people and there are people around them who know i have a job to do. Im going to do it. I dont need to be told to do it because this is what i do. Fixers. Im a fixer. Its possible but it would invalidate the agreement but the idea is they are trying to build a fire wall and trying to conas a rule convalute it. Those who voted for donald trump understood he was a access hollywood grabbing stuff. The idea he is having extra Marital Affairs would be central to his administration. You and i are new yorkers. Hello. Every day of my years i would wait with a tabloid cover covering the affairs of donald trump. Like in a quite literal sense. Thats how i know what donald trump was. If youre actually going to be president , and you are going to surround yourself with people who understand the politics of maintaining your position, these are not the decisions you make. Thats what we are now at the core of this story i dont get. I dont understand their behavior. I genuinely dont understand their behavior. I dont know why the president signed on a counter suit. I dont know why Michael Cohens lawyer is blabbering. I will tell you, chris, there is a real concern in the trump camp right now because as this suit stands right now, there will be discovery. That means his deposition of Michael Cohen, of donald trump, look, bill clinton had problems when the paula jones deposition came around and he had to answer questions under oath. If i was on trumps side i would not want Michael Cohen under oath. They need to settle that quickly. Ms. Clifford, her real name filed for a motion to depose the president in a limited amount of time. That was thrown out today on procedural grounds. Since we have the legal team here, i want to talk about news on the mueller front, cnn reported that basically the exchange that happened when rich gates was approached, this is Paul Manaforts deputy cooperating witness after going back and forth, that what they wanted him to talk about was not to get manafort. They had manafort. It was about the core question of russian collusion and even though that seemed clear to me from the beginning, if that reporting is accurate, it seems significant, maya. Absolutely. What it suggests is there is something that the mueller team has amasked thanks to gates that helps connect them to trump. Thats the big question here, right, sam . Well, i think the issue is what did donald trump know and what did he think was going on . I mean, honestly that gets back to the need to know question. I honestly think and Adam Davidson who is a frequent guest on this program had a tweet threat today, you dont understand, nobody knows what anyone else is doing because nobody is working on this weird wink, wink basis weirdly to do shady stuff. From when he came. There was a lot of very dodging stuff going on. Real estate and casinos. I mean, there was a lot of stuff where i think were going to have certain areas we dont talk about and ignorance and i think that is his entire career. Whether it was like his dad being the guarantee for deals and him pretending like he didnt know that. Right. There is a whole list of things. I dont know trump would know the implications of these things. Yes, it seems to me in the way that he acts, renaldo, the president , about all this, it seems a plausible story that he actually genuinely understand the trouble he might be in. This is unlike any legal trouble the president has been in before. You have to think about the way trump thinks about lawsuits, he thinks about civil lawsuits where people sue for money and there is motions on discovery and people settled. A federal criminal investigation is a different animal. When youre in the sights of a federal prosecutor, youre very much in harms way and you have to make yourself as small of a target as possible, be careful about what you do and say because youre in grave danger and donald trump, i dont think really understands the true parol hes in. I want to play real quickly something from the top of the show because i want to get your quick reaction. This is how he told me he was fired. Take a listen. When is the last time you spoke to him . I spoke to the president yesterday. What was that conversation like . We spoke about the progress i was making, what i needed to do from a policy perspective to make sure were fixing the issues in va. Very focused. He was very inquisitive making sure we were focused on the job at hand. Thats before you were fired . Thats correct. You spoke to him. He made no mention of the fact he was about to terminate you . Thats correct. And then you found out via tweet . Right before that, the chief of staff kelly gave me a call which i appreciated, gave me a heads up. So that was much after the phone call. What the heck . Management by twitter. Management by twitter. Profile encouraged. It seems the call was set up to fire him. Right. Is there any other interp interpretation that happened . Having experience as an actor, that role he takes where youre fired, sometimes thats what you do when you cant really do it in real life. Like this is all play acting and this is the little bit of cause play. Thats what it appears with this guy. Cant say it to somebodys face. The youre fired guy has a hard time but that sounds like someone set up to be like this time youre going to do it in person and he couldnt do it, which i guess is what it is. Renaldo, sam, maya, thanks for joining us tonight. Thank you. If you missed the beginning of the show, we had really big newsmaking interviews including the v. A. Secretary about getting fired by the president and carter page about the Mueller Investigation but dont worry, you can listen to the show as a pod cast. Perfect for nights like tonight. Available wherever you can get your pod cast. Thats it. As russia now expels our diplomats our nbc news reporting reveals what trump is saying and not saying about putin. One is here with us tonight. The latest details on the Mueller Investigation and why he is looking into the Republican Convention. The 11th hour on a thursday night begins now. Good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters. Day 434 of the Trump Administration. The president is at the 137th day of his presidency spent at a trump branded property. He will spend the long easter weekends there levering behind a less than rock solid situation. Today he said goodbye to hope hicks. Jonathan puts it this way. Hicks was more accurate described by white house officials as Trumps White House woman and providing after firm mags and able to provide bad news with few repercussions. John kelly wasnt at president Donald Trumps side for crucial decisions on policy moves. Kelly wasnt on the call. Even as the president appears to be running the white house without kellys input trump has made a point of pun likely