Extraordinary attack on james comey. Hes unleashed bliterring criticism of the president and in a shocking new book and interview. And all options , all options ae on the table following the deadly chemical attack in syria but while the president vowed a Quick Response and the evidence is mounting, the u. S. Is still weighing how to retaliate. Im wolf blitzer and youre in the situation room. Announcer this is cnn breaking news. Breaking news, as an allout war of words between President Trump and james comey over the former fbi chief eyepopping revelations. There are stunning new developments. The Justice Department says the president s personal lawyer Michael Cohen is under criminal investigation as cohen goes to court to suppress evidence seized in fbi raids. And President Trump pardons former Bush Administration aide Scooter Libby. Convicted of lying in a cia leak case. Many see this as aing is nall by the president to his former aides caught in the special counsel web that he has the power to protect them. And John Garamendi and our specialists are standing by with full coverage. But lets begin with the president s personal lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen. Now revealed in Court Documents to be under criminal investigation. Cohen has gone to court today to suppress evidence seized in fbi raids against him. Possibly including recorded phone conversations. Our justice correspondents are here and we are at the federal courthouse in new york. Marathon session there and with surprises. What is the latest . Reporter that is right. It was a session that started at 10 30 and kept getting adjourned and finally ended a short time ago with no answers. But what we have learned, what we have learned is there are several developments in the investigation. As you said, Michael Cohen, the Justice Department, the u. S. Attorney here confirming that hes under criminal investigation. In court papers that they filed, they say this has been a months long investigation and also a grand jury has been impanelled and that all of that is ongoing. This while they are trying to get their hands the government is trying to begin to review the materials that they seized from his home, from his office, from his safety deputy boxes and from his phones where there may, as weve been reporting, be theseowd these audio records and they said they need access to for their investigation but that is being delayed because Michael Cohens attorneys are arguing it is privileged material and also today we learned all of a sudden, and sort of a last minute effort sh the president has hired attorneys and hired them on wednesday and they, too, have now asked the court to consider that some of the information that the government has now is privileged because it belongs to the president. It is the president S Communications and because Michael Cohen was his attorney at the time, these materials are privileged and only he only the president would be able to waive privilege. Now as sort of a side note here, wolf, michael avenatti, Stormy Danielss attorney, he was here in court, he was going to speak this afternoon but decided not to speak before the judge and weve also been told by him that hes likely he may have his client appear here on monday when Michael Cohen has now been ordered to appear before this judge because shes looking for answers on who Michael Cohens clients are. There is an all day battle here between the Defense Attorneys and prosecutors, because they want to know who Michael Cohen is claiming has privilege to this information and reasons for why they should not have access to it. But so far kmak so far whiek attorneys have not been able to provide that to the court. And tphone conversations wit people that he had, routinely record phone conversations, did that come up in the Court Hearing today. Reporter no, that did not come up in the Court Hearings. The only mention of Electronics Devices was mentioned in court papers, but the prosecutors did not specify what they were referring to. There has been no mention of that and really government never discussed any of their evidence in court. Everything weve learned was filed in the Court Documents and really it is an extra order nary and unprecedented thing for the government, for the department of justice, for the u. S. Attorneys office to go ahead and publicly admit that someone is under criminal investigation. But it really appears that what Michael Cohen here by filing this lastminute effort to try to get the government from not seeing any of this socalled privileged information may have backfired on him and that we now have a better sort of inside look into what the government has, what the case is about and the government in their core papers saying this has to do with his business dealings, and not so much as his activity as an attorney. But about his business dealings. I want to bring evan in. How much trouble is Michael Cohen in . If you read the testimony the first sentence was a federal judge found probable cause to believe the premises and devices searched contained evidence and fruit and instructionality of conduct for which cohen is under criminal investigation. The answer is whole lot of trouble. And as shimmon alluded to, some of the trouble that hes in is because of things that he has said and that the president has they are making their own case worse off for themselves. And in the court papers that were filed today, government mentioned this video from the president essentially telling reporters that he had no no information from Michael Cohen and there is nothing about this 130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, that essentially he was not consulted about this. And so what the importance of that is that it is not core not covered by Attorney Client privilege and that means Michael Cohen and his lawyers could not protect that information from the governments eyes. So i think theyll end up losing in court today and it is going to be clear that not only is he in a lot of trouble but made the case worse for himself in order to try to keep the government from seeing some of this important evidence that he said the government has now. And shimmon, and there is a word that President Trump spoke to Michael Cohen today on the phone. Does that further complicate this case . Reporter it certainly can. We dont know if those communications and Michael Cohen is under a wiretap of some kind. He is under investigation. There is a grand jury impanelled here in the Southern District in new york, in manhattan investigating Michael Cohen. Certainly hiS Communications could still fall under the surveillance under surveillance because what the government revealed today is they have had Michael Cohen under surveillance and what they call covert methods to obtain emails. We dont know if theyve obtained or recorded his conversations or if they wiretapped him. We have no indication of that in the court filing. But certainly the president talking to someone that is under criminal investigation, that a grand jury is now listening to evidence about, it is a problem and should concern everyone, the government here is still fighting to get access to this information and as evan said, i think that Michael Cohen is going to lose because the judge has certainly given a lot of indications today that she was extremely frustrated with his attorneys, she kept asking them all day, really for information about who his other possible clients were and gave them an opportunity to at 4 00 to come back from 2 00 to 4 00 and to provide this information, they did not provide that information. And now shes giving them really until monday to tell her who his clients are so the government could then determine perhaps who is affected by this privilege in some of the documents and the information that theyve obtained. And amidst all of this, evan, there is a report and cnn confirmed this report, that Michael Cohen was actually involved in working out a 1. 6 million hush money agreement with another playmate on behalf of a major republican fundraiser. Were talking about elliott broidy, a deputy finance chair for the Republican National committee and now acknowledges that Michael Cohen helped arrange a 1. 6 million payment to a playboy playmate that as a result of the relationship, she got pregnant and she she ended the pregnancy. We know the rnc said that he has resigned from the rnc. But broidy and coen together he helped get cohen a position on the rnc in the past year. So hes a very big donor for the republicans. He actually just in the past month helped host a fundraiser for the president in california. So hes somebody who is very important and very close to a lot of people in the trump world. And just to just to add to what shimmon just talked about just now, Michael Cohen, the video were showing, is is him smoking a cigar with a group of men on a bench outside of his Manhattan Hotel while his lawyers were essentially trying to argue to protect him, while the judge seems to be very frustrated that he is not there to provide answers as to who exactly are his clients and according to government, he only has one client and that is President Trump. So that video shows what Michael Cohen was busy doing while his lawyers were in court trying to protect him essentially from this investigation. Friends were smoking cigars. Was he spoking a cigar as well. He was smoking a cigar, 80 degrees day and chatting with photographers and looked good and wanted to get photos they were taking of him is so he could provide them to his mother and not a care in the world. Very interesting. I know you guys are working sources and back to both of you. And President Trump echoed by a spokesperson has unleashed a torrent of insults at james comey at the same time trying to divert attention from his revelations with an extraordinary show of president ial power. Lets go to our chief White House Correspondent jim acostaer for the latest. If the white house is escalating attacks in response to the allegations of the new book, but the president is facing plenty of new questions of his own after he pardoned a key official from the Bush Administration. And an action that democrats believe is a signal to witnesses cooperating in the russia probe. At the white house, a steady series of insults for former fbi director james comey. The American People see right through the blatant lies of a self admitted leaker, this is nothing more than a poorly executed p. R. Stunt by comey to desperately rehabilitate his tattered reputation and enrich his own bank account by peddling a book that belongs in the bargain bin section instead of a dedicated servant in the pursuit of justice like so many other colleagues at the fbi, comey will be for every known as a disgraced partisan hack that broke his sacred trust with the president of the United States sara sanders channeled a furious President Trump who is said to be outraged over the flow of damaging anecdotes in comeys new book. I never thought the words would come out of my mouth, but i dont know whether the president of the United States was with prostituted peeing on each other in mosque yow, it is possible but i dont know. The president saying james comey is a leaker and liar and everybody thought he should be fired for the terrible job he did until he was in fact fired. He is a weak and and you posted this before the election in 2016 when you are attacking fbi agents because youre under criminal investigation and youre losing. What do you make of that now . The rank and file fbi are some of the greatest people in this country. Weve repeated that time and time again. And certainly have the full support of this administration. I think that weve been very clear, though, how we feel about some of the leadership at the fbi. Particularly james comey. The president is making other waves auns nothing a full pardon for Scooter Libby, the former chief of staff to dick cheney. He was convicted of perjury into the outing of former fbi agent whose husband joe wilson tried to fault the case used by the Bush Administration about weapons of mass destruction. And i dont think my contempt for donald trump go ko go lower but he surprised me every day. And it is surprising given his past comments about the Bush Administration during the campaign. You call it whatever you want. I want to tell you. They lied. They said there were weapons of mass destruction and there were not and they knew there are none. There were no weapons of mass destruction. And victory and her husband recently considered joining the legal team in the russia investigation. Degeneva is a fierce critic of Robert Muellers investigation. Slamming Comey James Comey is a dirty cop. Hes a completely dirty cop and Rod Rosenstein who oversees the russia probe. Rod rosenstein is so incompetent, compromised and conflicted that he can no longer serve as the Deputy Attorney general and Jeff Sessions now has an obligation to the president of the United States to fire Rod Rosenstein. Democrats are accusing the president of using the libby pardon to send a signal to those cooperating in the mueller probe. I think it does telegraph what hell do with flynn and manafort and using his pardon power like with arpaio, he doesnt use it in the most discrete way but for political purposes and he wants to cover his people. The white house insisted there is no connection. One thing has nothing to do with the other the president tore into top fbi Deputy Director andrew mccabe, pointing to a new Inspector General report that said he was not candid with investigators who were looking into comments that he made to a reporter about a probe into the clintons and mccabes lawyer said he is a victim of a rush to judgment but in a tweet the president compared mccabe to comey and that is compared and people raising questions but if you look at that tweet, it is another sign all in capital letters and the exclamation points, uses by the president there this investigation is getting under his skin. Hes starting to feel very under siege by the fbi and the top officials at the Justice Department. Jim, thank you. Jim acosta at the white house. Now joining us John Garamendi of california. Congressman, thank you for coming in. And let me get your Quick Reaction to the breaking news, the president s longterm personal attorney and friend Michael Cohen, federal prosecutors confirm in the Court Document he is under criminal investigation. Should the president be concerned . Absolutely. We should all be concerned. Wolf, just stand back for a second. Consider what has happened to america. Consider where we are after just what, 14 months of this presidency. This nation is in deep, deep trouble because the leadership in this nation is in trouble. And causing trouble. The whole history of trump, all tv coming out. If only this had happened during the course of the campaign so the American Public would have been aware of what was coming down on us. You look across the world, were National International on this show. The world is looking at this and going, oh, my god what has happened to america. This president has so debased the office of the presidency. And in the process, debased america. As you know, you just heard us report that president actually spoke on the phone with his attorney Michael Cohen today, depending on what they discussed, could that place the president in some sort of legal jeopardy . Well he is in legal jep arpdy to begin with. He is not the target, he is the subject. Whatever difference that might mean. But one more thing, stepping up what he should or could have known that his personal attorney was under i guess criminal investigation. To speak to him where does all of this go . Well it is clear that it is becoming closer and closer to trump. Capital letters on every tweet and tweets not just