Welcome to the lead, im Briana Keilar in for jake tapper. We begin with the politics lead. It may be mustsee tv, but President Trump says hes not sure hell watch special counsel Robert Muellers testimony before congress wednesday. The president going after muellers credibility today, tweeting, quote, highly conflicted Robert Mueller should not be given another bite at the apple. In the end, it will be bad for him and the phony democrats in congress. As abby phillip reports, the president also stepped up his attacks on four democratic congresswomen of color. Reporter as washington and the white house prepare for special counsel Robert Muellers big day on capitol hill this week, President Donald Trump tamping down expectations. Im not going to be watching mueller because you cant take all those bites out of the apple. Reporter the president winding up familiar attacks against mueller and his credibility. Robert mueller, i know hes conflicted. He had a theres a lot of conflicts that hes got including the fact that his best friend is comey. But hes got conflicts with me, too. Hes got big conflicts with me. As you know, he wanted the job of the fbi director. He didnt get it. Reporter but mueller never sought the fbi director job under trump, and former fbi director james comey has denied that he and mueller are personal friends. On twitter, trump adding his prediction. In the end, it will be bad for him and the phony democrats in congress who have done nothing but waste time on this ridiculous witch hunt. And, days after claiming he wont watch mueller, trump now admitting he might. Im not going to be watching probably, maybe ill see a little bit of it. Regime mueller wasnt the only thing on the president s mind. He took aim at one of his favorite targets, the socalled squad made up of four democratic female congresswomen of color. Very bad for our country. Reporter on his way to pay respects to former Supreme CourtJustice John Paul stevens, trump turning the accusations of racism on the four minority lawmakers tweeting, the squad is a very racist group of troublemakers who are young, inexperienced, and not very smart. They are pulling the once Great Democratic Party far left. And pointing to the economy as proof that he doesnt have a problem with race. Theres no racial tension. Its because of the economy and what ive done for the africanamericans. Reporter one of the president s lawyers insisted that there is no organized effort to rebut muellers testimony this week despite the president s tweets. Jay sekulow said there is no war room planned at the moment. But at the same time, sekulow said he expects democrats to ask mueller to literally read from the Mueller Report in order to get sound bites that they believe can be used against the president over and over again. All right. Abby phillip at the white house. Thank you so much. Lets open up this conversation. So david urban, we should note you are a 2020 Trump Campaign adviser. If the president truly believes this report as he says exonerates him on the issue of obstruction, why doesnt he welcome mueller testimony . Listen, heres what i think at the end of the day, this is just some more theater, right. This is a political question. Impeachment is always a political question. And thats the only way to remove the president. So the members of congress, the house particularly, the democrats here particularly, going to make a decision, theyre either going to impeach the president or move on. And theyve heard from the constituents, theyve heard from people at town hall meetings, from across america, time to move on. This isnt about the law. This isnt about no no, it isnt fabricated yes, it is listen, the majority leader, very smart woman i might add, right the speaker speaker, excuse me. The speaker, the steepeaker youre getting ahead of yourself. That will be in two years. The speaker, right, very smart. Shes wisely decided to put it behind herself. Steny hoyer, you go down the list, clyburn, all the folks who are smart, seasoned politicians, yet not off the table, though. Not off the table well reelect the president again, there are wait. Say that again. I said it but more importantly, there are a number of other investigations, some that have to do, frankly, with National Security that arent werent under the pursue of what mueller was investigating where there relevant questions and things being investigated. There are real questions that folks want to ask mueller. Like was it your intention to have congress decide on obstruction of justice when you listed 11 different incidents. So point being, what pelosi has said is lets let the facts take us where they will. Right. Lets keep doing our job and doing our work in the meantime, but lets let the facts take us where they will. If were not afraid of im not afraid of what the facts are, lets have a say im not afraid at all. The thing david said about how all the democratic constituents want this gone, thats not all. If that were the case they it would not have given democrats control of congress in 2018. Lets remember that part of what temperatur democrats ran on was to hold the president accountable because republicans were completely looking the other way. They were lemings, they are lemmings frankly. They have become the party of cowardice and complicit. It is part of congress job to go through the process of holding this president accountable. Having mueller testify about all of the damning things that were in this report, i think is going to be a critical part of the process that nancy pelosi has put forward in terms of getting the country to a place where are we going to impeach the president . Maybe. She hasnt taken it off the table. But lets see i think its where it follows theres a Division Within the Democratic Caucus that this is a problem for the democrats. If they were unified, if they all believed in impeachment, that would be one thing. Nancy pelosis got a difficult task. Shes going to figure out how to manage the different parts of her caucus. Some see the hearings as an opportunity to advance the cause for impeachment of the president. Others rightly argue, look, we use this to gather information, to gather things that could be harmful in the campaign but those two things arent mutually exclusive, its part of the process i agree, but theres only enough air for one of those. And there are 40 democrats who just got elect wanted. A lot of modern democrats, connor lamm, a lot of modern democrats who are going to be hiding, i promise you the president again, he talked today about these four congresswomen of color. If we can turn it back to this. Its been a week, but it continues on. He was asked he was asked why hes attacking them. Lets listen. And theyre pulling the democrats way left. Nobody knows how to handle them. I feel theyre easy to handle. To me, theyre easy to handle because theyre just out there. Hes such a liar. Its so so insulting that he even talks about these four young women of color as people who need to be handled. They are elected members of congress. They deserve respect. What i think really drives this president crazy is that they are young, and they are women of color, and that they are doing things that really take him off of his message. And they are also exposing what many of us have already known that he is a racist, that he has taken a playbook out of the handbook of White Supremacists telling them to send her back. And then then using that at his rallies and saying he doesnt agree with it. Come on what do you think, david, about the word choice look, listen the handling of the women . I have said many times, i dont necessarily agree i advise the president to tweet on substance. Look, why he attacks these people personally, lets attack their ideas. Their ideas stink. We can win on ideas. Lets keep winning on ideas. When you take it ad homonym, you get last in the bushes, nobody pays attention to their ideas. Because everybody who doesnt agree with your idea is not a racist, okay, just not but david you cant you cant the problem is, the problem is everybody who the initial attack was racist. Listen, again, i would advise bad tweet, okay. Come out he doesnt listen to you. Argue ideas. I think its particularly ripe that, you know, talk about racism, 400 years, jamestown coming up shortly. And the democratic governor is still sitting in virginia. Why are we hoisting him whenwhe wheres he . The reason why the president comes back is he feels theres an advantage. He wouldnt do it the advantage to davids point is to the extent that you highlight these people as the Democratic Party and as spokespeople for the Democratic Party, i think its a problem for the democrats. Were talking about the four people, not the 22 running for president. I think thats the issue. To be clear, donald trump doesnt get to decide who speaks for the party. Thats right. I would argue that it would be a nancy pelosi, it would be a john lewis, the media has also i think hes got a lot more say than you might like it admit. The media has been obsessed with talking about these as the spokespeople for the party. They are for of the people in the party. The president doesnt want to talk about substance. He wants to keep us divided. While were divided and fighting each other, were not paying attention to the great employment numbers . No, we are going to talk about substance ahead in a moment. Democrats and republicans are preparing to question Robert Mueller. 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So ditch the old way of selling your car, and say hello to the new way at carvana. Welcome back. A tale two of approaches, democrats and republicans gearing up for special counsel Robert Muellers testimony on capitol hill wednesday. Republicans are expected to question the exfbi director about the origins of his investigation and the makeup of his staff. Democrats are hoping muellers testimony will bring the president s controversial, what some consider obstructive actions to life. Cnn has more from downhill. How is each side getting ready for these questions . Reporter yeah, the potential magnitude of this moment not lost on anyone up here on capitol hill. Certainly both sides have been busy preparing for this moment. Democrats are hoping to really have a gamechanging moment at wednesdays hearing. They have been, many of them, rereading the entire copy of the Mueller Report, staging mock hearings, practicing their line of questioning for the former special prosecutor. Democrats say that they know many americans, of course, have not read the entire Mueller Report themselves. So they do want to breathe life into the report by hearing from him up here on wednesday. And they will certainly focus in on the areas of the report they say that they believe the president obstructed justice. Heres a chairman of the house Judiciary Committee, jerry nadler. The report presents very substantial evidence that the president is guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. And we have to present or let mueller present the facts to the American People and see where we go from there. And republicans up here on the hill, too, will similarly be looking for their own moment when theyre questioning Robert Mueller. They will be trying to essentially undercut his credibility, questioning the origins, the start of the investigation, and certainly how it was conducted over the nearly twoyearlong investigation. Two hearings on wednesday lasting potentially about five hours long. Certainly a potential for very dramatic moments. Are you hearing anything about Robert Muellers testimony . Reporter yeah, new detail just coming out from my colleague, jessica schneider. She spoke to Robert Muellers spokesman who says that, yes, indeed, mueller has prepared an Opening Statement to deliver up here on the hill on wednesday. And that Opening Statement has not been seen yet by the department of justice, nor did it need to be cleared ahead of time. Mueller has been preparing with a small group of his colleagues who helped over the course of his investigation. This spokesman saying that muellers testimony will be in line with that statement he delivered in late may and expected to really stick to whats actually in the report. But importantly, this spokesman also emphasizing that mueller is someone who comes to the table fully prepared. He will be ready on wednesday. All right, sun lathank you fe hill. Muellers made it clear his testimony is the report. He has no intention of going beyond it. Sunlands reinforcing that with the reporting and jessicas reporting. Listen as hes coming before congress, let to what Sheila Jackson lee, a democrat, said to our dahna bash about what she hopes he does. To tell an indicting story that can be projected by the voice and the words of director mueller. The picture that will be gleaned from the testimony, both in front of the Judiciary Committee and in front of the Intelligence Committee will be stark and real. Maria, do democrats run the risk of looking foolish if Robert Mueller resists their attempts at theater . I do think that that is certainly a challenge. But i think what the congresswoman was getting at is that the report in and of itself is damning. That if we can get mueller to actually just read what is in the report, those 11 instances when he clearly delineated when this president obstructed justice, that that will be damning enough and can be followed up by questions and commentary by the democrats to really spell out the picture to americans who have not yet read the report, that this report engaged or may never. Or may never. Exactly. I think thats why its hugely important for us to hear from mueller. And even if he does just describe like he said exactly what is in the report and then followup questions, and even if the followup questions just get him to report whats in the report, another key question is whether he decided not to indict the president simply because there is that department of justice guidance. If that guidance wasnt there, would he have gone further . These are key questions that i think will paint a very damning picture. Heres the other thing to remember. From the beginning, barr is the one, the administration, they are the ones who set the narrative in the frame from the very beginning. What did we first get . A fourpage sort of summary, not actually muellers summary, but a summary written by the attorney general. So it was his version of events that we know mueller didnt agree with. I was going to say that. We know mueller actually didnt necessarily agree with. That would be a question i would want to ask. Or he felt was incomplete. Either way, a great question to ask. Point being, from the beginning and democrats recognize, ive talked to folks, they recognize its playing kind of catchup a little on the narrative about this. Again, remember when barr did the press conference, right, before leasing the redacted report when no reporters actually had a copy. So again, theyve been able to shape the narrative around this from the beginning into like maria said, just reading the actual facts can be damning. The president has a beef with mueller, he has these conflicts that are ridiculous. Theyre not real. Even his own advisers have said these are not real. So republicans are going to question the origins of this report. The president clearly would like for them to question Robert Mueller himself. Right. How tricky is that for republicans going after someone whos who his background is unimpeachable. Both sides this is tricky. The issue for republicans is, you know, Robert Mueller does have an extremely credible record of service. And to try and somehow impeach the credibility of Robert Mueller i think would be a mistake. I think the question is can they begin to raise questions about the motivation for what the department of justice did. Can they raise questions that then they can follow up on in the future . I think that should be the goal fo