At one point, he says its gods orders, kate. All right. So much more to learn. Scott, thank you so much for being on the ground. Really appreciate it. Thank you all so much for joining me today. Inside politics with john king starts right now. Thank you, kate. And welcome to inside politics. Im john king. Thank you for sharing your day with us. The president s new response to the Special Counsel is more political threat than legal strategy. Shut things down, team trump tells Robert Mueller, or become a Midterm Election issue. Plus, how alexandria ocasiocortez turns a stunning primary upset. And look to the stars. Is that the battlefield of tomorrow . The Trump Administration moves ahead with its plans for a new space force. The latenight comics say thank you. The United States space force. Were not entirely sure what we do. Do we fight aliens or . I have no clue. Just shut up until we get the spaceship. Spaceship . We begin with the russia investigation. A Team Trump Legal strategy thats in truth a team trump political strategy. The president s lawyers are now waiting on Robert Mueller after sending the Special Counsel a response they know is a nonstarter. The president , they say, is willing to answer some mueller questions, but nothing about the possibility of obstructing justice. The reality is he doesnt need to ask a single question on obstruction. He has all the answers. Theyre not going to change. The president s not going to change his testimony. So stop the nonsense. You are trying to trap him into perjury because you dont have a
answer questions, i should say. Thats not new. But they still have a client, the president , who is arguing that he wants to answer questions. The flip side is they have a Special Counsel who really wants the president to answer questions. So theyve been going through this dance for months now. Proposal, counterproposal, the mueller team wants to ask a broad range of questions, the trump team keeps wanting to narrow it in. So they dont have a choice, really, but to answer the questions or excuse me, but to negotiate about answering questions. So while theyre doing that, they have to try to find bright sides. It has been true, and i know youre hearing this from republicans as i am, that politically speaking, theyve been surprised at the fact that the russia investigation isnt as much of a drag with regard to the base, and maybe even some independents, as they thought. Maybe it could be a help. So hes trying to look on the bright side. It definitely is and was a moment of candor from giuliani,
but the ball is not in their court. Hes very open about that. They have to wait to see what Robert Mueller does. Its really unclear. Subpoena or anything else that could run the gamut. So theyre going to play the cards theyre dealt right now. Play the cards theyre dealt and try to benefit politically as they wait for the Special Counsel. You are right. Thats his response this next response, i guess, might tell us something. Dana bash, appreciate the reporting. I get they keep saying were trying to work this out, but i keep reading this as theyre saying no. Theyre saying no, and theyre trying to make mueller decide, are you going to take the momentous step of issuing a subpoena for the president of the United States . Is there another way to read it . And forgive me, i know everyone keeps saying the president keeps saying he wants to testify. Hes the president of the united
states. He could tell his lawyers bring him in, lets do it, and he hasnt. Im skeptical the president actually really wants to answer questions. Like, let me at him type of thing. Dont hold me back. Yes, i think thats a good point. But again, it does seem like theyre really trying to bait Robert Mueller. There is a Lot We Dont Know. We dont know what mueller is doing. A lot of it is kind of an iceberg investigation. Theres a lot happening below the surface. We dont know what he will do. That would if the president is subpoenaed before the election, that would energize the president s base. You heard devin nunes basically selling that during a fundraiser on that recording just yesterday. Saying that were the last line of defense for the president. So that is already kind of there in the ether among republicans. Theyre talking about this sort of thing probably more than the democrats are. To that point, since you brought it up, theres a school of thought, forget your political party. A Special Counsel is investigating Election Meddling by a foreign power that does not have the interest of the United States in mind, and there are some questions about communications between people who work for the president of the United States and russians. Why wouldnt the president of the United States want to clear all this up and answer the questions . Thats the silly apolitical way to look at it. Si silly because it doesnt work that way. You mentioned devin nunes. Here you have the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee who knows a Lot We Dont Know about this because he has access to classified information, speaking at a fundraiser. Listen to him here. Is he saying we need to clear up all these questions . And i understand from a republican perspective, lets get this over with, especially if the president did nothing wrong. But thats not what he says. He says lets keep the republicans in charge of congress because we need to protect the president. It will certainly matter whether one or in theory both chambers of congress are whether democrats take over. Then all these questions that right now are totally different, the Impeachment Question is totally different when theres nothing on the table. Itll obviously be a very risky political move for democrats to do if they were in charge. If things change next year, it wont matter whos in control of the house as well as the senate. Meanwhile, the court of Public Opinion does matter because if mr. Mueller puts out a report that doesnt have an actual kind of Charging Hammer with it but includes details that come out in the public at some point t will also matter whos in charge of each chamber of congress. The president and his legal team are playing the only game they have right now, which is the political game. And not hearing from mueller is interesting. Obviously it looks to me like hes got three options. Keep up these negotiations, decide to wrap things up without talking to the president , thought experiment, bob mueller says im not going to talk to the president , i dont need to talk to the president. What do you think republicans say . Are they satisfied with that
answer, or do they say, aha, hes already reached a conclusion . So either keep up these negotiations, go nuclear with a subpoena, or decide he doesnt need to talk to the president. We dont know what his intent is in any of these things. We know he wants to talk to him, but would he settle for not . And theres definitely some irony in Rudy Giuliani sort of daring publicly, Daring Mueller to go past the September 1st Deadline because, you know, the lawyers have been in negotiations for really a better part of this year now about this interview, how it will be conducted, what questions need to be off limits, and a big reason for that is because theres tension between trumps lawyers and the president himself. Hes out there saying i welcome this interview, i want to be interviewed because im convinced i can get in front of mueller and his team and show them that im innocent, whereas his lawyers dont really buy that. They know he struggles with, you know, being loose with his words, being loose with his sort of version of the truth. They, i think, are sort of frightened and worried about the prospect of him having this interview and committing perjury. Its the theory in the Justice Department that you get close to an election, youre supposed to back off. James comey is exhibit a in recent history. We all assume bob mueller is going to play this as a company man and is not going to be doing things in the last week of october that will be judged as political. This is an ig report that got into this 60day rule, per se. It talks about ray hustler, who was the chief of the Public Integrity system. Hustler said that while working on the Election Year sensitivities memorandum, they considered codifying the substance of the 60day rule, but they rejected that approach as unworkable. Hustler told the Inspector General that a prosecutor should look to the needs of the case
and significant investigative steps should be taken, quote, when the case is ready, not earlier or later. In other words theres no 60 days. Theres no hard rule, but dont be a jerk. Use common sense. If the Case Blossoms and, bang, you have to choice, but otherwise, dont be doing things to poke close to an election. To that point, its relevant to look back at former attorney general holder, who released identical versions of a memo saying you shouldnt take public steps with the purpose of affecting the outcome of an election. And to your point about muellers options, one is to just simply pause. Go ahead with cases like the manafort trial, other things that are in the system, hit the pause button on everything else, come back after the election. Rudy giuliani and the president use it as an issue during the election. If democrats are in charge after the election, then mueller hits the restart button, we live in a very different world. But well watch this play out over the next few weeks. Up next, hes facing criminal charges, but
welcome back. Congressman Chris Collins looking at the possibility of 150 years in prison. Thats a big number. But he says it wont keep him off the ballot this november. The new york republican vowing now to fight Insider Trading charges. Prosecutors allege he shared inside information about a failed drug product prompting his son and the father of his sons girlfriend to dump a pharmaceutical stock just before it tanked. I will mount a vigorous defense in court to clear my name. I look forward to being fully vindicated and exonerated. Rest assured, i will continue to work hard for the people and
constituents of the 27th Congressional District of new york, and i will remain on the Ballot Running for reelection this november. The news, of course, not surprisingly dominating the republican lawmakers home state headlines. Look right here. Friends and Family Discount . Just won word from the rochester chronicle, indicted. Its not good news for the congressman. Not good news for the Republican Party. If you listen to the Press Conference yesterday, the prosecutors laid out this case in pretty stunning detail. If you look at the documents they released as well, it is even more meticulous in how it is built. Yet, the congressman says hes going to mount a vigorous defense and importantly says hes not going to get off the ballot. This really is what people
imagine as being corruption at its worst in washington, when people think about why Congress Approval ratings are so low, they think about this kind of scenario you see in tv shows and movies. A member of congress having special access and then trying to help himself then the people around him have personal profit off of this kind of information and this kind of access. I think in terms of the district that he is in and the fact that hes going to continue running for reelection and by the way, its kind of very difficult to take his name off the ballot a this point, just because of how things work in that district. Unless he were to die or run for another office, which i dont think hes going to do at this point in time, i think a lot of this is going to come down to how democrats decide to capitalize on this and seize on this moment. Yes, it is very, very difficult in this district for a democrat to flip this seat. However, this is how unusual things happen in politics. Something, some kind of external circumstance thats unexpected happens, and then the other side capitalizes on it. A lot will come down to can democrats seize on this moment . Although, i can see a scenario. Hes a huge defender of the president. He was an early supporter of the president. Its not impossible that trump could decide to back him. Yes, that indictment was extremely damning and even had flowcharts. That said, i wouldnt be nothing really surprises me anymore, but i wouldnt be surprised if the president decided to say this is a witch hunt, hes my supporter, i back him. It could be as easy as that for him to win reelection in a district like this. And the democrat running against him had raised about 80,000 up until yesterday. Well see what happens. This is a strong trump seat, strong republican seat. But you have exceptions to the rule when you have Something Like this. The Weekly Standard writing about this today. The 68yearold former businessman could lose what was previously seen as a safe seat from the Republican Party fighting to hold on to the house of representatives. His opponent, 43yearold town supervisor from grand island, relative youth and impressive
educational background could make him an attractive candidate in a district thats not elected a democrat since the last round of redistricting in 2013. You see this from time to time. If it flipped, the other party gets elected to a solid seat, then maybe the next election they change it. But its to throw the perceived bum out. And jackie is right, anything could happen, but we didnt see President Trump jump on this yesterday when he was doing his five hefor five lap or talking about the Special Election in ohio. I think anything that touches on those Swamp Boundaries is a problem for him messaging wise. Anything that touches on the criminal Justice System also is. Hes been pretty well disciplined, or he was, for about a 24hour period. He did just tweet about the socalled witch hunt. Hes tweeting about other things. He has the phone in hand, obviously. Well see if he gets to it. If he doesnt, that tells you something. One of the risks is the democrats think they can seize on this, not just with
congressman Chris Collins. They think they can say, hey, look at scott pruitt, look at tom price, look at david shulkin, look at other people in the Trump Administration who have had swampy questions about personal finances or the way theyve conducted affairs in their department. Thats exactly fair. They have this broader narrative. Thats potentially very effective. Im skeptical that this is going to be particularly painful politically for congressman collins, if only because we have another example of a member of congress who assaulted a reporter, broke his glasses, and lied about it who is a duly sworn member of congress. Its not really clear to me that voters on that side are particularly swamp intolerant. And by the way, the swampy visuals here could not possibly be worse. The fact that we have footage of collins taking these phone calls while he was at the white house attending the congressional picnic surrounded by other people in washington, some of his colleagues. The visuals are so, so terrible. And lets remember the last time culture of corruption
worked. It was very house centric, which flipped it before. Now, with the president and all of his cabinet members, maybe that sinks in. But House Democrats in particular had quite a case to make the last time this worked. If nothing else, it is another problem for a Republican Party that has a long list of issues in a very difficult med term Election Year. Up next, the Trump Administration makes its case at the pentagon and on twitter for a Brand New Branch of the military. Take a look. About people and while we make more ecommerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget. That your business is our business the United States postal service. Priority you
sleonly remfresh usesep one in threeionpowered melatonin to deliver up to 7 hours of sleep support. Number one sleep doctor recommended remfresh your nightly sleep companion. Welcome back. The Trump Administration today making a public push for a new military frontier, a space force. This is Vice President pence at the pentagon last hour. Now the time has come to write the next great chapter in the history of our armed forces. To prepare for the next battlefield where Americas Best and bravest will be called to deter and defeat a new generation of threats to our people, to our nation. The time has come to establish the United States space force. That pence visit comes as the pentagon gets ready to release a report on spacere