Page 11 - Cannot Obstruct News Today

Scovino. hes taking responsibility for the tweet and then the new talking point, the new defense you talked about, hallie. john dowd telling nbc news this morning the president cannot be accused of obstruction because hes the chief law enforcement officer and allowed to discuss these things. >> thank you, kristen welker. i want to bring in former assistant attorney general for presidents nixon, ford, carter as well. and michael allen who was a former adviser to george w. bush. let me pick up the...

Comments about, quote, the greatest witch hunt in u.s. political history. >> you cannot charge a president with obstruction of justice for exercising his constitutional power to fire comey and his constitutional authority to tell the justice department who to investigate, who not to investigate. thats what thomas jefferson did, lincoln did, roosevelt did. we had presidents that clearly established that. >> the presidents personal lawyer, john dowd, also insisted this morning, the president can...

President in? have we had clarity from the white house this morning? >> reporter: we have not had much clarity on this topic. you played the clips of the president earlier as he defended himself and michael flynn and the way hes been treated has been unfair. broadly speaking, we have also heard over the course of this day significant from john dowd, basically laying out the new defense strategy as noted there, dowd telling nbc news that the president cannot obstruct justice, which is raising que...

Flynn. just fake news. the president fired comey in may. the top democrat said the panel is investigating possible obstruction of justice by the president. heres what senator dianne feinstein of california said on "meet the press". >> i see it most importantly in what happened with the firing of director comey. it is my belief that that is directly because he did not agree to lift the cloud of the russia investigation. thats obstruction of justice. >> shepard: that was yesterday. a lawyer for pr...

But i think theres an effort here by john dowd and the white house staff to distance the president from those words. there are a couple complicated factors, however, if john dowd wrote the tweet and drafted it, does he then become a witness in the mueller investigation? and if that happens, does he have to recuse himself from somehow representing the president and his personal attorney? i dont know. i can tell you within trumps orbit theres a lot of c consternation about the whey the white house...

Tweet on saturday, i sure as heck hope the president is getting better legal advice from these guys than hes getting pr advice. to me that was a horrific two days coming out of the presidents legal team that did not help this situation at all. >> paul, as i mentioned, the presidents lawyer john dowd telling axios, quote, the president cannot obstruct justice because hes the chief law enforcement officer under the constitutions article ii and has his rightly to express his view of any case. presi...

That they appear to be willing to cede these facts that he did take actions to shut down the investigation, even if so, that is not obstruction of justice is a dangerous argument for this instance and because if the president cannot obstruct justice in blocking this investigation, it means he can fire bob mueller. theres nothing that be done about it. its a troubling thing for them to argue. >> i can see them arguing whats happened so far doesnt amount to obstruction of justice. they have every ...

Sally yates was clear. she didnt tell the white house that flynn lied to the fbi. she refused that answer that question. for the president to know at that time that flynn lied to the fbi, it wasnt because the fbi had told him or the justice department. he only could know because mike flynn told him, and that gets you into an entire conspiracy to impede and obstruct this investigation, and i think a pretty damning moment for the president. >> john dow, he was baffle heg said he wrote that tweet. ...

President did not obstruct justice. now it has turned into the president cannot obstruct justice which there does seem to be consensus among legal experts that the president can, indeed, obstruct justice. what does this argument mean coming from the presidents legal team? >>. >> thanks for having me back. >> of course. >> what it means is -- what it means is they are grasping at straws. after the flynn plea and the -- letting it slip this weekend in a tweet that the president knew, and whether i...

Spotlight for tweetgate thing claimed that quote, the president cannot obstruct justice because hes the chief law enforcement officer of the united states. not a defense saying trump didnt obstruct justice, would be a blank check saying he can obstruct is anytime he wants because the president cant commit that crime. that argument has a terrible track record, most famously advanced by only president forced from office whose impeachment articles included obstruction. >> what in a sense youre sayi...