Page 2 - Disputing Buzzfeed News Today

Gave the nixon white house and their detractors ammunition to go after them. what we dont know yet is whether buzzfeed got it right, but somehow screwed -- you know, screwed up the attribution or there was some miscommunication here. but what do know, to get to elizabeths point, that the big picture remains that donald trump himself lied to the american public. he said he had nothing to do with russia while he was campaigning. yet there he was pursuing a deal that would have enriched him to the ...

Accurate. buzzfeed issued a statement standing by its reporting, and then issued a second statement, asking the special prosecutor to specify what is not accurate in their reporting. buzzfeeds report last night was attributed to two unnamed, quote, federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of this matter, end quote. now, that certainly sounds like a description of two people working on robert muellers team. that would be one way to describe people working on robert muellers ...

Federal officials quoted in this are from the southern district of new york as opposed to muellers team. does that -- when you read the buzzfeed article, does that read as possible to you? >> no. i mean, first of all, let me be clear about something. people are using this term, the southern district of new york. that to me and to almost any prosecutor, defense lawyer, anyone working in the system, means the u.s. attorneys office. okay? i can sit here right now and tell you that there is a less t...

Investigation. of course, they dont want to ruin or, you know, harm the investigation. but there is no -- theres no logical reason why hearings couldnt be held. and under the constitution, that is what impeachment is. it isnt throwing donald trump out of office. its allowing hearings where the public can start to understand the narrative of what was done, potentially to our election, to elect donald trump and what he did while in office. >> yeah, and as were going to discuss later in the show, t...

Didnt matter all that much. >> david corn, your reaction to the buzzfeed story tonight, and its parallels to that woodward and bernstein mixup, mistake, back in their big days of covering richard nixon. >> well, now we know that what they reported, carl and bob, you know, ended up being true. though, as they note, they got the attribution wrong, and it gave the nixon white house and their detractors ammunition to go after them. what we dont know yet is whether buzzfeed got it right, but somehow ...

For a clarification on the special prosecutors statement tonight. any chance of that happening? >> no. i dont think so. and look, i feel for buzzfeed. i think robert muellers strategy of saying nothing about anything ever, even off the record, is very frustrating. i mean, even the central intelligence agency will give reporters a steer at times if they think theyre about to get something horribly wrong. and if mueller had done that in this case, perhaps buzzfeed would have been more cautious and...

He said, i cant speak to buzzfeeds sourcing, but for what its worth, i declined to run with parts of the narrative they conveyed, based on a source central to the story, repeatedly disputing the idea that trump directly issued orders of that kind. note that the general thrust of cohen lying to congress in accordance with or to support an advance trumps agenda, per cohens legal memo, is not in dispute. the source disputed the further, more specific idea that trump issued and memorialized repeated...

With. but it doesnt exonerate trump. it doesnt mean something didnt happen. >> right. >> its just not as clear what it was. and i think what mueller is saying is, whoa. you know, lets not rush to impeachment. hes putting the brakes on, as you say. and lets see -- let the facts come out the way i, mueller, am going to describe them. and so back to your original question. it seems to me that something got lost in translation here. i dont necessarily think this is someone who made up facts, meaning...

>> david corn, your reaction to the buzzfeed story tonight, and its parallels to that woodward and bernstein mixup, mistake, back in their big days of covering richard nixon. >> well, now we know that what they reported, carl and bob, you know, ended up being true. though, as they note, they got the attribution wrong, and it gave the nixon white house and their detractors ammunition to go after them. what we dont know yet is whether buzzfeed got it right, but somehow screwed -- you know, screwed...

Mueller team. the mueller team is very tight-lipped. they do not leak. and, you know, one could assume that maybe what theyre also trying to project and telegraph is, do not write a story in which youre projecting that we have now -- members of the mueller team have leaked information to buzzfeed, right? i mean, when michael cohen pleaded guilty in the southern district of new york, he said himself, as he stood up and spoke to the judge, that he lied specifically about this moscow trump tower pr...