Would have. I was so stunned by the conversation that i just took it in. Lordy, i hope there are tapes. I remember saying, i agree hes a good guy as saying im not agreeing with what you just asked me to do. That, of course, former fbi director james comey in the d dramatic testimony on capitol hill this morning. Welcome in this morning. Im in for kel ly evans. The dow hit a record intraoday but now we are down 22 points on the trading session. Well look at whats behind the reversal. Looking ahead as well to the u. K. Elections, polls there close in just under two hours, and the house back here is set to vote on its plan to roll back parts of the doddfrank financial reform law. That vote is expected sometime this afternoon, probably within the next couple hours. Well go live to capitol hill as soon as it begins, so, yes, still a very busy day here. Absolutely. Plus, a high profile departure over a jpmorgan. The man often seen as the heir parent to Ceo Jamie Dimon is leaving. We have the details. I dont know how well fit it all in. I dont either. Starting with eamon on the testimony and reaction from the white house, and elsewhere, eamon . Reporter thats right, bill. A lot of astonishing moments in todays testimony as you played some of them. One of the most astonishingfuls comeys essentially unprompted admission that he had leaked a version of his memo he made about his conversation with the president through a professor at Colombia University to the New York Times in order not to leave his prints on it. This is that whole interaction. President tweeted on friday after i got fired that i better hope theres not tapes. I woke up in the middle of the night monday night because it did not dawn on me originally, there might be corroboration for the conversation, a tape, my judgment was, i needed to get that out into the public scare. I asked a friend of mine to share the content of the memo with a reporter. I did not do it myself for a variety reasons, but asked to because i thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel. Comey not only admitting he leaked the memo he previously described as unclassified, but that he did it hoping it would lead to the appointment of a special counsel as ultimately it did, but mark, the president s private attorney, took bridge at the fact that the fbi admitted to being a leaker. This is what he said. Mr. Comey admitted he is one of the these leakers. Today, mr. Comey admitted that he unilaterally and smade disclosures to the press about communications with the president. Notice what he did there in the remarks at the press club, calling it privileged communications. Remember, comey said his memo was unclassified. He deliberately made it nonclassified when he wrote it because he said it might have he might later have a need to get it out there. The attorney, though, calls it privileged communications. Is was this is privileged communication at the time it was made and at the time that comey leaked it to the New York Times . All that still to come. Theres a lot of wrestling over the details. Well see more over the next coming days. We will. Thank you so much. Reporter you bet. A lot of reaction to the testimony, ylan is in the actual hearing room where the comey testimony took place. She has reaction from the members of congress for us. Ylan . Reporter thats right. This is where that open hearing took place, comey was sitting right here testifying before lawmakers, and then he headed over into a room next door for the closed door portion of the testimony. I watched him as he left that portion of the meeting. He stared straight ahead the entire time. He did not answer any questions, but the Committee Chairman did talk to reporters briefly. He said that he hoped that this testimony helped clear up some of the facts surrounding the Russian Investigation in comeys role in it. He also said that he hoped that the committee could continue to conduct a bipartisan investigation. Now, some of the defense that youre starting to hear from gop lawmakers is that, perhaps, the president simply was unfamiliar with the protocols of his office. Senator marco rubio addressed that question to the reporters. Is this a concerted orchestrated effort to impede justice or nonconventional politician who never worked in government who doesnt understand or not interested in convention and how it could protect him from hearings like today . Reporter meanwhile, here is a reaction from one democratic lawmaker, harris, member of the committee, saying she was stunned by the allegations that comey said he was worried that the president might lie about his conversations and thats why he kept such meticulous records of the conversations. Moe mentous day here clearly on capitol hill. Thank you very much. Theres what happened. Lets try to make sense of it. Lets bring in nick from dorsey and whitney, assistant special prosecutor in the watergate scandal going back in the day, and joining us along is robert ray of thompson and knight, independent counsel for the white water investigation. You guys both have experience in these things, and, as a matter of fact, both of you at various times were assistant u. S. Attorneys here in the Southern District of lower manhattan, but you both come to opposite conclusions about whether the president , President Trump in this case, attempted to obstruct justice. Nick, you think he did. Bob, you dont think he did. Nick, make your case. Yeah. Theres no question trump was involved in an obstruction of justice. The comey testimony today makes that crystal clear. He told trump, basically, to back off of flynn, to get out of the investigation, and trump admitted that to lester holt saying he had the russian thing in the back of the mind firing comey. He admitted to the Russian Ambassador. Thats what he did. You got two other National Security people that didnt testify yesterday, but when they wheth will, its pretty obvious they were going to say they were called by the president who asked them to try to stop this criminal investigation that was being conducted by the fbi. Okay. But what everybody is missing here is the motive behind what trump is doing. The idea that hes a naive wake who doesnt understand how washington works or the criminal system is absurd. He was dealing okay. He was dealing with general flynn, who was dealing with a Russian Ambassador about sanctions on russia relating to ukraine and the interference in the election. I dont believe for we have to i dont believe for a minute he did that on his own without trump knowing it, and bottom line is, the president is worried that mike flynn is going to turn into the next james mccord, the watergate burglar who wound up getting a heavy sentence and then fingering the people in the white house. Okay. Thats concerning. Bob, theres a lot in that statement. Lets have you parse it a little from your opinion. You do not think that the president obstructed justice, but what do you make of the kme comments of senator rubio and House Speaker paul ryan saying it was an unconventional president who doesnt do things the regular way and naive how government works. You dont have to go there. Whatever the president s hopes and intimations were, he didnt issue a directive or an order to the fbi director investigation, and furthermore, the fact anybody argues replacing the fbi director amounts to obstruction of justice does not give the president credit which his office is due which is, how can you make a personnel decision in obstruction of justice . Thats a ridiculous notion. No prosecutor would ever bring such a case, ever. Rob, im curious, then, your thoughts on what you think the president s intent was when he said to jim comey in there, one of the meetings, he hoped hed back away from the flynn, from michael flynn. What was the intent in saying that . I think he was testing the directors loyalty. I think by his own admission, thats in some in substance what he was trying to do. Again, while you think and others conclude and everyone has the right to conclude whether or not this was stunning or inappropriate or a whole bunch of other adjectives, the thoughts it was obstruction of justice is farfetched. Its not just me saying that, but legal scholars talk about the president s prerogative with regard to decisions about what to do with personnel. Even if its true that the president stepped in and actually ordered the fbi director to halt an investigation, thats not obstruction of justice. The president is entitled to do that. You may not like it. The Congress Might decide that thats grounds for impeachable offense, but it is not obstruction of justice. All right. Nick, one of the most stunning things that was said in the testimony by mr. Comey today was the fact that he decided he had to write down the notes of the particular meeting because he was worried at some point that if the president talked about it, he was worried the president was going to lie. That, i think, was one of the most stunning things to hear mr. Comey say today. Whats reactions to that . Well, i think that was totally appropriate. I mean, i think it was his own feeling in talking to the president at the time that this person was asking him to do something that was illegal, that was obstruction of the fbi investigation, i mean, he had a better sense of what the president s intent was than anybody. Obstruction of justice 12 an intent crime. If his intent was to impede, interfere, or obstruct investigation, thats obstruction. You can do innocent things like a lawyer was convicted in the Southern District of new york for advising a client to assert the 5th amendment privilege, a legal thing, like the fbi director can be fired by the president , but if the intent is to end that investigation and you put into that the motive to keep flynn quiet, to keep him from cooperating and being convicted, so he doesnt finger the president , all adds up to one big obstruction of justice. Okay. All right. Good luck trying to prove that corrupted intent. I have no problem being the prosecutor in that case. No. We got to welcome the opportunity. We have prosecutors here with two different opinions. See you in court. Thank you, both. Nick akerman, bob ray, thank you for joining us. Thank you. Thank you. Fascinating to see how it goes. A news alert from a high profile departure at jpmorgan. We have the story, though, this is your beat. Tell us about it, will . Reporter it is, indeed, bill. Yes, indeed, so matt, the coo of Jp Morgan Chase and favorite to take over from jamie dimon in the long term, groomed for the role, has left the firm. Spoken to a couple sources, one put it like this, it is as good a separation as can possibly be imagined. Thats the tone coming from both statements. I also learned from sources that the next role present has not been decided yet, though, theres many, many officers. Hes looking to run his own shop, likely to move to a smaller outfit which also suggests he wont be moving excuse me to a rival large bank. Interesting in the next couple days to see Financial Filings towards options if hes keeping all of the options, then we can be pretty sure he wont be ending up at a rival, which clearly jpmorgan would not allow in separation terms. Now, i want to give color on terms of how important he was to jp. He earned jamies respect after the london wale issue stepping forward and put the hat in the ring to do the multiyear administrative tedious complicated roles of sorting out operations. After that, he was a favorite of dimon he was not just coo. He reason treasury business, and very much groom as a long term successor, not, perhaps, if something changed tomorrow, and with that, i say this is a very, very big surprise, this departure, nods to release it on a news day like today. One senior hedge fund mechanic described it as a huge, huge loss to the company, and with that, you raise the question, particularly, as well with the recent changes at goldman sachs, whether a tenyear plus tenure for a ceo leads to the likelihood that the next best level of talent stops to leave. Stock is not reacting significantly. Guys . I wish we could talk about the new heir, but we cant. See you later, will. Thank you. Dow down 19 points right now. Major averages, though, hitting record highs. Well look at how the u. K. Elections impact the market coming up next. Also ahead, getting the trump agenda back on track with the comey agenda done. Bringing tax reform ideas for us among other things. Well get to that coming up. Youre watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. The power of a low volatility investing approach. The power of smart beta. Power your clients portfolio with powershares. Before investing, consider the Funds Investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses. Call 8009830903 for the prospectus containing this information. Read it carefully. Distributed by Invesco Distributors Inc. Parts a and b and want more coverage, guess what . You could apply for a Medicare SupplementInsurance Plan whenever you want. No enrollment window. No waiting to apply. That means now may be a great time to shop for an aarp Medicare SupplementInsurance Plan, insured by Unitedhealthcare Insurance Company. Medicare doesnt cover everything. And like all standardized Medicare SupplementInsurance Plans, these help cover some of what medicare doesnt pay. So dont wait. Call now to request your free decision guide. It could help you find the aarp Medicare Supplement plan that works for you. These types of plans have no networks, so you get to choose any doctor who accepts medicare patients. Rates are competitive, and theyre the only plans of their kind endorsed by aarp. Remember these plans let you apply all year round. So call today. Because nows the perfect time to learn more. Go long. As james comey took to capitol hill today, investors took note of two other events with global implications. We mentioned them. The European Central bank left Interest Rates unchanged, and in the u. K. With polls open for a little bit less than two more hours, voters there are determining who will rule parliament. Joining our exchange today to talk about what this means for the market, we have mark, chief investment strategist at downy montgomery scott, fred, the president and ceo of atlantic cou counsel, and steve and rick. Welcome, all, lots to talk about. You know, steve, im going to start with you. You just said you got to love the market, picks itself up. Dusts itself off again. Deals with whatever is right in front of it and seems becoming calloused to whatever you throw at it. Weve seen north korea headlines, impeachment headlines. That was the only one i thought had a lasting effect, and then the market just spit it out once they saw how long the process would take and unlikely it would be with the republicanrun congress for that to even take bite or take hold, but i think today, you looked at the market. It wanted to absorb. We got the release testimony yesterday, and there was nobody that really cross examined mr. Comey and unearth anything we didnt very see yesterday. Markets shrugged it off again. Fred, we have the u. K. Election. I mean, do you see the market i mean, im thinking back to brexit, convinced they were not going to be voting in favor of that, and then, of course, we know what happened. Were convinced of how this result is going to come out today. What if it doesnt . What do you think happens here . Well, the nightmare scenario for the markets would be a labour election, and more and more the polls are showing thats a long shot, really very unlikely, what is a little bit more likely is theresa may could win her gamble. If she increases margin in the parliament, she, then, could next week there would be a relief rally, so markets go up, the pound strengthens but you could have an offer in next week to the e. U. Of a big and generous offer on e. U. Citizen rights. That means residency, that means work, that Means Health Care for the 2. 9 Million European Union citizens who live in the u. K. If that happens, you could then have, you know, brexit would be costly, but may negotiates this in the single market, and so this could be a very good week and good period of time for europe following the macron election in france, and may here. Again, we got two more hours to find that out. Looks like thats where things are going now. Fred, apologies, i mispronounced your last anytime. I owe you one. Leading off on europe, and draghi left Interest Rates unchanged. Whats next . You know, with mario draghi or janet yellen, i dont think anybody really knows whats next. With regards to rates or the negative rate in europe, no real new information. We dont know if theyre ever we know in some point in the year they purchase less, but we dont know for how long and if they ramp up from that level, should they not like the reception the market gives them when they taper, although nobody li likes that word. Nothings decided. Markets are smarter than us. Whether its the hearing today, the stock market popped a little bit, its not mattering the level. It popped in a certain point in time. The same is said for what happened with regard to europe, seeing the euro, they acted as though it was a dovish statement. I agree with fred, by the way, i think the whole issue with this election is the time line to brexit. Brexit is the glue that holds everything together right now in my mind in the voters minds in the u. K. , and whether they think may is Margaret Thatcher or not, they know that if her majority increases, most likely, it makes brexit a little bit more timely, and it certainly seems as though thats the big threat for 201617, getting brexit on the move. Okay, mark, ill ask you the High Altitude question, then. This seems to have been the market is a teflon market. Nothing bothers it right now. Are we misreading it . Anybody Holding Breath abo