Page 21 - Bombshell Reporting News Today

Your sources -- >> since publication. >> okay. and theres -- your sources are not backing off what theyve -- >> not at all. >> -- told your reporters. are you confident that these sources are in a position to know what they tell you they know? >> yes, we are. >> okay. ben, obviously one of the black boxes here is the justice department structure around the special counsels office, and theres been movement there. weve had the -- jeff sessions be recused. weve had him leave. weve got an acting att...

Again, that the president directed him to lie to congress to cover up at least some aspect of the trump tower moscow project. thats what the week has been like. now tonight just as we were getting on the air, after a day in which multiple members of congress described the "buzzfeed" report as if true, the most serious allegations against trump yet, if true definitely the grounds for impeachment. if true, an inflection point in the entire scandal surrounding this presidency from the outset. that ...

Guilty to lying to congress, related to his previous testimony about trump tower moscow. i mean, all of these things are moving parts, but these have proven to be well-sourced reporters who have been ahead of everybody else and whose previous reporting has been borne out in court by things said by the special counsel. so theres reporting questions here. theres very interesting questions about why the special counsels office is speaking up on this story when they almost speak on nothing. and ther...

The buzzfeed story. but i think in the main what you can glean from their december 7th sentencing memorandum is that the core of the buzzfeed story is accurate. >> in terms of that -- the way they are pushing back, i mean, we heard from ben smith, who is the editor at buzzfeed very early on in the show tonight plainly frustrated with trying to parse the special counsels statement. >> uh-huh. >> trying to understand what exactly was in dispute. i mean, what the statement says is that whats not ac...

If the news keeps going on at this rate and this jagged, of course, were all going to need neck braces to keep up with it. as the special counsels office tonight pushes back on buzzfeeds bombshell reporting that the president ordered his longtime personal lawyer to lie to congress. lying to congress is a felony to which his longtime personal lawyer has already pled guilty. as we are making our way through the impact of that statement and that reporting tonight, one of americas legendary investig...

After that report, we got a very -- at that point i think unprecedented statement from the spokesman for the special counsel. not directly disputing the mcclatchy story but giving a sort of general warning to the press that there had been lots of inaccuracies out there and every journalist should be very careful about their sourcing. "many stories about our investigation have been inaccurate. be very cautious about any source that claims to have knowledge about our investigation and dig deep int...

Trump had never made any claims like that at all. trump had claimed as a candidate that he had no deals in russia, no pending deals, no investment, nothing going on whatsoever. trump had never given anything so finely nuanced as to explain the exact kind of lie that cohen would have made about the timing of that deal. thats part of this that i never understood about why cohen needed to lie in that way. >> well, there was some reporting about this at some point. and, you know, i have to say, as -...

Indictment. >> uh-huh. >> so this isnt coming out of a blue sky. this is a line of reporting that has been repeatedly vindicated. >> ben smith, "buzzfeeds" editor-in-chief at a very kinetic moment in "buzzfeed" right now. ben, thank you very much for being with us. appreciate it. >> thank you, rachel. >> all right, so this has been a rollicking day on this story. this bombshell pushback from the special counsels office on "buzzfeeds" bombshell reporting has created a bunch of questions. i mean, ...

Characterization of documents and testimony obtained by the office. tonight buzzfeed says they stand by their reporting and they say they are urging the special counsel to make clear exactly what his office is disputing here. joining us now is chuck rosenberg, former u.s. attorney in the eastern district of virginia, former senior fbi and justice department official. mr. rosenberg, it is great to have you with us tonight. thank you for making time. >> my pleasure. thank you for having me. >> i w...

Dead wrong in every respect. they didnt do that. and i think the emphasis you put on those words, the specific descriptions, the characterizations, sort of is a window into the thinking of the mueller team. there are parts of the reporting that trouble them. i have no idea, rachel, by the way, why they decided on this occasion to push back on a story. im sure there are other stories that got other things wrong. but, again in the main, i come back to this point, it seems to me that the core of th...