Happening to him. Hes a hate news monger. Hes being challenged in court for things hes done. I do think this is another example of how these companies are struggling to figure out how to handle content on their platforms. Its harder than having an algorithm decide what to do. And what is the policy moving forward. Unclear. Appreciate it. Thank you all for being with me. Im poppy p py harlow in new yo. Next hour starts now. Hello, everyone, here is a question for do you believe an admitted liar or an accused one . That is exactly what jurors are face floodinging today in a Vid Courtroom as the star witness is back on the stand in the trial against Paul Manafort. So far Rick Gates Has been telling the court a riveting tail of betrayal, theft, and years of financial fraud. And while there is nothing here about what either man did for
the trump campaign, this is the first trial to come out of the Special Counsels russia investigation, and theyre back at it now. Joe johns is outside the courthouse in alexandria, virginia. Hes joining me right now. Joe, what has been happening in the courtroom . Testimony continuing, what are you hearing . Reporter its really fass nating. The way rick gates lays out how they did it, how he and Paul Manafort moved millions of dollars that they got paid from ukraine through Bank Accounts in cypress so that manafort could have access to the money, and theyre laying it out by presenting the witness, rick gates, star witness, by the way, with emails and other documents including some that are damaging, presumably, to manafort, one in particular which clearly indicates that what this gates would do is get
Kate Bolduan gives a fresh take on todays top stories. Thats where we are. Back to you. And more to come. Joe, thank you very much. Court continues. Joining me, Crime And Justice reporter shimon porcupez, and cnn legal analysts and former federal prosecutors. Thanks all for being here. Renata, first to you, how is the gates testimony going so far . Like how would you how would you grade this . Its going very well for the prosecution. I think at this point if were grading on a curve, wed give him an a. They have obviously gates has problems, you alluded to that earlier in the show. Whenever you have a flipper, cooperator, theyre going to have problems. Theyre somebody whos committed a crime. Here gates is you know, admitted to lying under oath. He admitted to lying to the fbi. So that is something that jurors are going to have to consider. But the that has been fronted by the prosecutors. In other words, they have put that out there there for the jury so it takes the sting out
of the crossexamination. And what they have done as was pointed out a moment ago is walk through in detail how rick gates committed crimes along with Paul Manafort. And that is the power of a witness like him, a cooperator. He can say, i committed crimes along with that man, and here is how he did it. Jennifer, the Washington Post who put it this way first, which is the jury has to now decide who theyre going to believe, as i said it top. An admitted liar, an accused one. How is the jury supposed to decide that . There are a few ways that the prosecution will ask the jurors to decide that rick gates is telling the truth here. One is just the structure of his cooperation agreement. He has to tell the truth. Thats in the agreement. If he doesnt, he doesnt get the benefit of cooperation, he doesnt get his guilty plea back either. Hell be facing time. The judge wont be able to give him leniency. The most important way is that hes corroborated by all the other evidence in the case. Thats what was being discussed earlier. Not just his own oral testimony about what happened, but emails, other documents, im sure there are Wire Transfer records, as well. So in addition to what he says, the jury will also be relying on the other evidence in the case. Thats what prosecutors will use to say yes, he lied to us when he first came in, yes, he was stealing from Paul Manafort, yes, he lied to the irs. But hes telling you the truth here today, and heres how you know. This evidence backs him up that, of course, he couldnt have anything to do with fabricating. Shimon, put this in perspective for folks. Who is rick gates in The Grand Scheme of the investigation . When you listen to the testimony and what youre hearing is a guy who is directly involved in almost every part the Paul Manaforts business. Thats clearment in this clear. In this testimony, hes
revealing emails, messages sent to him, to Paul Manafort, to ukrainians. It is going to be hard for the defense in this case to refute the documents. You can go after witnesses all you want. It seems like the prosecution at least to this points has a lot of other evidence, documents certainly that are going to bolster their case. You know, in The Grand Scheme of things, also when you think about rick gates and what he was to the president ial campaign, right, he was involved in that. So he knows almost every aspect probably of Paul Manaforts professional life, his political life. And again, you know, what was revealed yesterday was that he has met with prosecutors some 20 times. So we really dont know exactly everything that Rick Gates Has told him about Paul Manaforts life. We know that investigators, the fbi, the Special Counsel, has been very interested in Paul Manafort outside of this case and what he knew about communications with russians and perhaps others during the campaign. We really have only a little bit of of look inside of what
rick gates knows concerning Paul Manafort. And with all of this kind of setting up as we have, i really wonder what is crossexamination going to look like . It is going to be brutal, kate. The defense absolutely has to take down rick gates if they want any chance of victory. Even if they do take down gates, theres a lot of other evidence, they still might lose. If they dont take down gates, its all over. Gates essentially lays out the prosecutionss case, goes through the evidence. He is telling the jury, i worked with that man, we were criminals, we worked together. Heres how we did it. So you can expect a lot of fireworks today. This is going to be the most dramatic part of the trial. In the defense opening, they said, the opening statement, that that rick gates is the real bad guy, hes the real wrongdoer. And you can expect that a lot of fireworks here, particularly focusing on the fact that he
embezzled money from manafort. The defense will argue that he fooled manafort then, and it goes to show that he fooled manafort as to this other stuff. Part of what one of the big things thats come out, jennifer, is that rick gates says that admitted that he basically stole money from Paul Manafort over the years, like in the process of all of this nefarious stuff that rick gates is admitting to. Why did he admit that . He had to admit that. You have to tell the truth about everything that youve done. I mean, even if he stole car parts when he was a kid, hes going to admit that. This especially because keep in mind the prosecutors have all of this documentary evidence. They have all of the financial accounts and probably could see even if rick gates didnt tell them, that money was going out that couldnt be accounted for through the salaries. He had to come clean. He did come clean. Renatos right, thats going to be a tough part of the cross. Jennifer, does this testimony make it less likely that manafort takes the stand . You know, its hard to tell about a defendant testifying. In my experience defendants only take the stand when theyre desperate, when it looks really bad for them and they think they have no chance of winning. I think thats probably the case here. But keep in mind that his testimony then opens him up to cross on a whole variety of topics including things that he doesnt testify about on direct. As long as they go to his credibility. He may not be willing to open that pandoras box given what the government knows about him. So it will be interesting to see. I still am guessing that he doesnt testify, though, given the risks. Okay. Shimon, this case as weve mentioned is not about the president s campaign or possible collusion with russia. These are very clearly financial crimes that happened that hes accused of and charged with, that happened before manafort joined the trump campaign, years before in some cases. How important is really today for the Mueller Investigation when you talk about this star witness, this testimony, this crossexamination, that will be coming . This moment . So heres what i think, its important because rick gates is a cooperator. If the defense or anyone, say, in this case brings him down, whatever else he may be cooperating on could be in jeopardy. If they break his credibility here, certainly if this jury finds that hes not believable, you can be assured that the prosecution, that these investigators are going to look at this as an issue. Its not necessarily going to affect the plea deal that Rick Gates Has worked out and the cooperation agreement. They would be devastated. It would hurt their chances of using him in any other criminal trial. They can continue to use him in their investigation and gather information and get information from him. But to put him out there publicly would certainly if
his credibility is found to be bad in jeopardy, putting him out there in public again would probably limit it. Guys, great to see you. Thank you very much. Lets see what happens today. Ahead for us, the final test for President Trump before the midterm elections. Can republicans hang on to a very longheld, very strongly held, reliably red seat in ohio . Or Will Democrats Be Making History Tonight . And one of the greatest athletes of all time, tennis star Serena Williams, opening up again about a personal struggle. What she is saying today that has so many people talking. [stomach gurgles] when you have nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea. Girl, pepto Ultra Coating will treat your stomach right. Nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea. Try new pepto with Ultra Coating. When we switched our auto and home insurance. With liberty, we could afford a real babysitter instead of your brother. Hey oh, thats my robe. Is it . When you switch to liberty mutual, you could save 782 on auto and home insurance. And still get great coverage for you and your family. Call for a free quote today. You could save 782. Liberty mutual insurance. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Ohio, ohio, ohio has long been the bellwether of president ial politics. Once again, all eyes are on ohio. Its not a president ial race, of course, but the president is a factor for sure. Voters in ohios 12th Congressional District are heading to the polls in a critical special election. The seat has been held by republicans for more than 30 years. Trump won the district by 11 points. So why then is the race a virtual tie between Republican Troy Balderson and Democrat Danny Oconnor . Why, oh why . It seems everyone has their own answer, and the thinks he is the solution. Campaigning there over the weekend, but not surprisingly, the candidates disagree on what impact he will have. Has brought so much enthusiasm out, to have both the Vice President of the United States and the president of the United States here within six days of each other is just huge. The most important thing we can do is have oneonone conversations with our
volunteers, with me, with my family, knocking on doors. Because thats more valuable than when people come in from washington, d. C. , they spend a couple of hours here, and leave. Theyre not invested in the Community Like i am. Cnns ryan nobles is in ohio for us. What are you seeing there . Youre at the Polling Place where the voters are. What are they telling you . Reporter yeah, its been a steady stream of voters here in wef westerville. Theres no doubt that President Trump looms large in this race. National politics certainly a part of the focus here. We were reminded last night that this is still very much a local race. Thats because of something the republican candidate Troy Balderson said last night. Take a listen. My opponent is from Franklin County. Franklin county has been challenging. We dont want someone from Franklin County representing us. Reporter if you caught that, balderson said we dont want someone from Franklin Countyrepresenting us. We happen to be in Franklin County now. This makes up onethird of this important Congressional District, and it is where danny oconnor, the democrat, hails from. Oconnor responded saying our district represents someone whos going to represent all of us. Troy balderson made it Crystal Clear thats not him. And democrats are really trying to seize on these comments, targeted facebook ads that are going out to voters here in Frederick County to try and drive them to the polls. Certainly this would be the more moderate end of the district that includes parts of columbus, as you get further away from columbus. The district gets more red. Kate, for all the talk about Donald Trumps influence in this race, it could come down especially something, a race that is so close at this point to a very big gaffe at the 11th hour that could decide who wins or loses tonight. Well have to see what happens. Great to have you there. Thank you very much. For more on the race and what the results could mean, who else am i going to go to . Difficult, or disastrous . This is the only election. Not like theres more inning in terms of ohio. More coming in terms of ohio. This is what folks are voting on if theyre turning out in ohio. What does it change in terms of the map and the path if the democrat wins . Reporter if republicans cannot hold this seat, Ronald Reagan was president the last time a democrat won this seat. If the republicans cannot hold it tonight, it is a betterthansafe bet the democrats will take back the house. Better than a safe bet. If they cannot hold a seat like this, you cannot expect them to hold the more competitive races that would give the democrats the 32 23 or 24 they need. If its close, republicans will try to turn the lessons in the battlegrounds states. This matters. Its not just a special election because were inside 100 days, were close to november. Republicans are nervous about the message out of this district tonight. Yeah. The momentum is real on this one. Trump came out with a new
endorsement yesterday. I want to ask about another race. There are other people voting. Reporter right. Tonight. A controversial polarizing, if you will, kansas secretary of state, chris coback, he is running for governor. In the primary fight with the current republican governor. What does it mean for republicans chances of keeping the Governors Mansion there if were talking about chris coback and an endorsement that by all accounts that im seeing folks didnt want donald trump to weigh in on this. Reporter no, they did not. They wanted him to stay silent. Think about what you said the sitting republican president just opposed a sitting republican governor. Donald trump loves his sway in the Republican Party. He thinks he can turn out the voters. He loves being the leader of the Republican Party in that way, rally trump, if you will. Base trump, if you will. He doesnt understand, many republicans will tell you, his responsibility as the leader of the party, they think by endorsing chris coback who, like the president , says that millions of people came out of the woodwork and voted illegally in the president ally election, among other president ial
14,000 firefighters across california are battling 16 major fires. The largest is the mendocino complex fire. Its two fires combined into one. Now its doubled in size over the last three days. And now its the largest fire in californias history. Its burned more than 290,000 acres, an area about the size of los angeles, if you can believe it. So far, there are no reports of deaths or injuries related to that fire. We know from other fires there have been fatalities. Joining me now, live from lakeport, california, correspondent dan simon with more. Dan, it really seems like these fires, you take all 16, they will not quit. What are you seeing there . Reporter hi, kate. Yeah, the California Wildfires keep getting bigger and bigger. This one is massive. Were not seeing any abatement. This is one of the hometown thats been one of the homes thats been destroyed. 75 homes in total. And you have about 34 containment, and thousands of people who have been evacuated. At this point about 11,000 homes still being talented. We have some of the structures like i said, destroyed. For the most part, you see what the fire has done. It has charred a tremendous amount of landscape. Were talking about fire that is in a steep area, very rugged terrain. So that is the place where the helicopters really need to focus their efforts