Actions during the transition were lawful. There was nothing to hide. The president s personal attorney john dowd now says he was the one that actually wrote that tweet, but with the new detail that the president knew in january about flynn this raises new concerns about the president s conversation with thenfbi director jim comey the day after flynn was terminated because according to comeys testimony to congress the president said to him that he hoped comey would let the Flynn Investigation go. Joining me now is cnns kara skinnell and she broke the story on what the president knew. Give us the details about what President Trump knew and when he knew it because this is key. Right. It is very critical in this time line here. What we understand is that don mcgahn, the white House Counsel had informed the president after meeting with acting attorney general sally yates in january that in sum and substance what Michael Flynn had told the fbi was essentially what he told mike pence, the Vice President. And the fbi investigation of which sally yates was not providing any greater details, but what they did know was that flynn had in don mcgahns mind, he believed that flynn had misled the fbi and had lied to Vice President pence. Why is there it seems to be lack of clarity when it comes to whether mcgahn would have advised the president over whether this was breaking the law. I would expect, but perhaps this is illconceived that don mcgahn would say to the president this may be a violation of law. He could be in big trouble, but we dont know that that happened. We dont. What we do know is at the time of that first conversation they did not have any information other than what they had learned from sally yates and what he had perceived or interpreted of what she had said. They later learned a week later they had a transcript of the conversation that mcgahn had rut led him to believe that the statements were inconsistent, but mcgahn never told the president as far as our sourcing that flynn had broken the law. And flynn misled the fbi, but they really could only compare the transcript to what flynn had told pence because they knew exactly what flynn had told pence, right . Right. They did not know the questions or the answers between fbi and flynn so it was hard for them to make did determination, our sourcing tells us, about whether a crime had been committed kara skinamerica ell, great reporting. Thank you so much for that. Now for the white house prespons tpr response. Shimon prokupecz, the personal attorney, and this is not white House Counsel, this is the president s attorney, part of his separate legal team is reacting to the concerns about the president obstructing justice. We are talking about john dowd here who is the president s personal attorney. In one tweet over the weekend where he said that he helped draft a tweet where the president knew that flynn lied and today telling axios that the president cant be investigated for obstruction of justice. Let me read to you exactly what he said because this has caused a lot of noise today and certainly raising a lot of eyebrows on this strategy, and he said, quote, the president kv cannot obstruct justice because hes the chief Law Enforcement officer under the constitution, article 2 and has every right to express his view of any case. This comes from john dowd, the president , and this has certainly raised eyebrows within the Legal Community and people are asking questions about whether this even makes sense. Lets just say we have not heard from john dowd again today. There are a lot of questions now about whether he can proceed, even, as the president s attorney, a sort of illadvised statement from him, and an illadvised tweet over the weekend causing a lot of unnecessary noise and raising all sorts of eyebrows while the special counsel is still continuing to look at this investigation. Are your sources, shimon, buying that john dowd is the one behind this tweet . For Law Enforcement, i dont think that that is a big concern because if there is any obstruction and part of the case that theyre making out has really to do with the conversation that the president had with james comey about Michael Flynn, thats really the center of the obstruction investigation, and what was the president s state of mind at that time . What exactly did the president know, and in his statements in his conversation according to james comey, it appears that the president had some idea that the fbi was investigating Michael Flynn and thats why he asked him to let it go, perhaps to go light on Michael Flynn. So that is an important aspect of this investigation. A tweet over the weekend, certainly could probably that investigation, to that charge, if the special counsel decide to bring it. Look, this just creates a lot of noise, unnecessary noise and probably just keeps this going and keeps this conversation going concerning obstruction. All right, shimon. Thank you so much for that report. I want to take a deep dive and joining me is we have mike geragos, hes a criminal defense attorney and mike rash who used to prosecute cyber crimes at the Justice Department. Mike rash to you and this is a panel who i will be using both of your last names, obviously. How significant is it that the president knew in january that flynn misled the fbi . In order to obstruct justice there has to be some valid investigation that youre obstructing. So the fact that the president knew that flynn had committed some kind of a crime, that tells him what investigation that he would be obstructing, an investigation of false statements to the fbi. Mark geragos, what do you think . Well, look, an obstruction of justice, unlike some other of the crimes that could be investigated here requires a mental state and the mental state of the president , obviously, is going to be important. What he knew, when he knew it and what actions he took. Thats the gravamen of the obstruction of justice. Part of the problem here is is that, you know, there is sally yates in the time line telling him at some point in late january, telling the president that in fact, they had presumably intercepteded a conversation and that he was not being, that general flynn was not being straight up, and so based on that, he would have known that something was up. He knows that in realtime that general flynn had apparently misled the Vice President , firing comey or asking comey to let it go and those kinds of things, i dont know that at the end of the day thats going to be the exactly where the focus of this investigation is going to end up. Mark rash, when you see the argument from the president s legal team which was before that he did not obstruct justice and now their defense seems to be that the president cannot obstruct justice when we hear from so many legal experts that actually the president can obstruct justice. What do you think about that change in argument that were hearing . Well, sure. First of all, i think the change in argument means that the president s personal lawyer is now focusing on the facts saying even if the facts can be used to demonstrate an obstruction of justice case for an ordinary person, the president cant obstruct justice. Well, thats simply not true. While the president has the right to hire and fire people and the president has the right even to fire jim comey for particular reasons, if the president does so with corrupt intent to impede or obstruct the due administration of justice, thats a crime. Ultimately, for the president the question of whether or not there was an obstruction of justice may end up being a political question rather than a legal one, though. Mark rash, the state of mind that you mention and that geragos mentions, thats clearly so important here, but it seems like it must be so difficult to prove. Its funny because in the law there are all these different states of mind. Theres knowingly or recklessly or intentionally and the obstruction of justice keicarria unique state of mind, not just that you did something bad, but that you did it with an evil intent and the intent to obstruct an administration of justice and its a fairly high standard. Mark geragos, check out the tweet from john dowd. The president s lawyer. He said that he and not President Trump wrote this tweet. He said i had to fire him. At the time we understood it and now were learning from our sources that the president did actually know that flynn misled the fbi or had been informed of that by white House Counsel, but we did not know that until today. Weve had that news broken here on cnn today. Do you believe that john dowd really wrote that or is he just covering for the president in a tweet that could get him in trouble . Think the whole thing has been kind of almost silly from an evidentiary standpoint. Whether dowd authored it, whether the president authored it, theyve taken the position repeatedly that the tweets are offici official statements of the white house and theres been litigation having to do with the travel ban thats been admissible evidence. Even if john dowd wrote it and the president put it out there, its still, under the law, called an adoptive admission. You can imput that to trump whether he wrote it or not. So at a certain point it becomes much ado about nothing because it is going come in on an evidentiary basis, if that, in fact, is what theyre trying to do or what theyre focused on, and i think my counterpart mark is right. Ultimately, this is a political question. I dont think you will see a situation where the special counsel will be the one who will indict the president. I think if theres ever anything in the argument about whether the president can be obstruct cs down to whether or not that is a high crime or misdemeanor and then it would be thrown over to congress to deal with that a la what happened with president clinton, what happened previously with president nixon, both of which had in their bills of impeachment reference to be on strukobstruction. We really appreciate youren sights. Coming up, President Trump m makes it clear. He supports roy moore. He called him from air force one to express his support. So will this turn things around for moore who has been slipping in recent polls . And special Counsel Robert Mueller removes a member of his team after discovering messages that could be interpreted as antitrump. Could this pose a problem for his investigation . You might take something for your heart. Or joints. But do you take something for your brain. With an ingredient originally found in jellyfish, prevagen is the number one selling brainhealth supplement in drug stores nationwide. Prevagen. The name to remember. Paim open to that. Medicare . Lower premiums . Extra benefits . Its open enrollment. Time to open the laptop. And compare Medicare Health plans. Why . Because plans change, so can your health needs. So, be openminded. Look at everythinglike Prescription Drug plans. And Medicare Advantage plans from private insurers. Use the tools at medicare. Gov. Or call 1800medicare. Open to Something Better . Start today. President trump is going all in with his endorsement of Alabama Senate candidate roy moore. The president wrapped up an air force one phone call to the accused child molester with a message to him saying go get em, roy, and moore released a statement which reads in part, i am honored to receive the support and endorsement of president donald trump. President trump knows that the future of his conservative agenda hinges on this election. That a lines with the president s twitter endorsement today, quote, democrats refusal to give one vote for massive tax cuts is why we need republican roy moores vote to, stop crime, illegal i imgrapgz, border wall, military prolife, judges, Second Amendment and more. The president gave this endorsement low key last month, but this is fullthroated support for roy moore. Youve been talking to voters. Does this change anything, do you think . Reporter yeah, brianna, now President Trump throwing his influence behind roy moore. Its hard to say what impact this will have among voters in alabama, because so many of the voters ive talked to theyve made up their mind as to whom theyre voting for or if they plan to vote in this special election. Now with President Trumps firm endorsement coming eight days out, i dont think that there are that many votes left for him to sway. President trump won the state of alabama by 28 points and the same people who voted for him are the people who have been standing by roy moore against or amidst these explosive allegations. So now when you hear that president bu President Trump is endorsing him in this way, you dont know if hes had an effect on how he supported roy moore. He believed his denials of the allegations and railed against jones, those words of the president have been used in moores ads across this state and if he was going to get any pop from him you would think that that pop would have already come. Now with trump visiting pensacola a florida, about 20 miles from the state line and we just learned that the president will be on the other side of the state in jackson, mississippi, on saturday, maybe the turnout, that is always a challenge in special elections could could be, affected by President Trump energizing some of those who otherwise didnt plan to vote in the special election. And this is i mean, this is coming up soon, right . This is a week from tomorrow, this special election. How is the race shaping up right now, kailey . Right now, the polls, brianna, no matter which one you look to. The margin is so slim between these two candidates and the latest poll from the Washington Post has Democrat Doug Jones with a threepoint lead over roy moore and thats within the margin of error of that poll. These two candidates neck and neck. So whats also interesting, though, to learn from that Washington Post poll, the fact that 28 of those polled still say they dont believe theal ga allegations of roy moore. When you think of the senate race in a state that hasnt elected a democrat in a quarter of a century, to see those numbers that tight you know those allegations have had an effect on those sagging numbers here. Will it play out . Youll see in about a week, kayleigh hartang. Despite the president s daughter ivanka trump saying there is a special place in hell for someone like roy moore when she responded to these accusations that he was engaged in Sexual Misconduct and Sexual Assault with girls as young as 14 years old. I want to get more from chris. Specifically Mitch Mcconnell, Top Republican senator. At first, we were hearing from republican senators that they could basically kick roy moore out. Yep, and would. Thats right, that they would and he completely changed his tune over the weekend and its more like the voters of alabama are going to decide and then well sort of see where we are after that. Yeah. So i think what youre seeing here with trump and mcconnell is something very similar which is political pragmatism on m pragmatism on mcconnells part because i think he thinks roy moore is probably coming to the senate. I know kailey mentioned the moore and the they had doug jones up three. It feels to me and theres a lot of other data out there that would suggest that roy moore is trending back from a clear dip he took after the allegations and mcconnell, they tried to get him out of the race. The race, as you point out, is in a week, basically. So theres not a whole heck of a lot else that you can do. For trump, trump wanted to be with roy moore from the start. He took mcconnells advice a he wound up endorsing luther the republican senator who was more beat and when he was in asia, all of these allegations came out with moore. He held off and he held off, but then he said roy moore might win and he views roy moore as a similar figure to donald trump which s you know, he believes hes denied all these allegations which is what donald trump did. He denied. Hes run against the establishment and hes brash. He wants to be for him and now because he thinks hes going to win its easier for him to be for him. But what does this do, if anything, to the republican brand . You have the party that is supposed to be family values and you have a guy who is accused and in pretty convincing terms by several young people people who were young women. 14 to 19. When roy moore was in his 30s, to be clear. Does this hurt republicans . The republican brand is not in great shape. Good point. Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose. Theyre in pretty bad shape, but, look, Mitch Mcconnell has said i believe the women and this person is not fit to serve and well let the people of alabama decide. I have a feeling the people of alabama are going to choose roy moore, and candidly, all of this talk that we heard in a week or two ago, that if they seat him, republicans will move to expel him. The last senator expelled from the senate was in 1862 for support of the confederacy. So its been a while. And this idea that while alabama elected roy moore, and the people of alabama know what theyre getting now with roy moore. Its not as though roy moore has painted himself as anything other than what he currently is and he denies these allegations, and i think it would be hard to overturn that and the most likely outcome eight days out is senator roy moore for the foreseeable future, which, yes, to answer your question in a roundabout way which is problematic even for a Republican Party that is not in a good place right now brand wise. An fbi agent reassigned from the russia investigation. He was booted from Robert Muellers team by the special <