Chris Hayes discusses the days top news. Chris Hayes discusses the days top news. Of the house judiciary committee. Congressman, let me start with you. Do you think Michael Cohen is credible . I do. And if Michael Cohen is telling the truth, it means theres at least three felonies in what hes about to say. First, donald trump conspired with a foreign power to influence the election. Second, donald trump went ahead and lied about the meeting, which could be potential obstruction of justice. And third, trump junior lied to congress when he said his father did not know about this meeting. Were way beyond not normalizing what shouldnt be normalized. These are potential criminal felonies. Thats why the Robert Mueller investigation needs to proceed without any more political interference. You know, there was always a striking thing that happened on the house side, the House Intelligence Committee in your investigation into these matters, which it sort of said, well, we wrapped up and found no collusion, which is they never got their hands on the Phone Records and never subpoenaed the Phone Records of the phone call don junior places to an unknown number amidst him confirming and
why would he do that . My view is he is doing that to tell the americans a story that it is illegal to influence american elections. And if an american, whether it was trump junior or donald trump himself conspired with the russians to do that, they would also be guilty of conspiracy to include these elections. Its absolutely a crime. So thats interesting. As a former prosecutor, youre saying these indictments against russians, particularly the gru agents who will never be rendered to the u. S. , its unlikely to say the least, you say you view that as setting the predicate for an existing criminal conspiracy that might also involve others . That is correct. So conspiracy means that you didnt necessarily complete the act, you just helped complete the act. And so if trump or trump junior helped in any way with what the russians were doing, they will be guilty of conspiracy. Congressman ted lieu, thank you for your time tonight. From rob gold stone talking about the Government Support for the trump campaign. Three days later you have donald trump giving a speech saying he was going to talk about Hillary Clinton. It made it very obvious because he never gave the speech of the and june 8th right before the day of the Trump Tower Meeting you have d. C. Leaks, which was the Russian Governmentowned website that was going to release all of the hacked dnc emails that was created. June 9th was the actual Trump Tower Meeting. Its an amazing detail thats emerged from this. June 8th, the russian gru agents create d. C. Leaks, which is a website to disseminate hacked information about Hillary Clinton. Yes. The next day is the Trump Tower Meeting. Yes, correct. And that exactly that kind of timeline and all of this evidence put together is what prosecutors are going to be looking at. Theyre going to say these were probably separate events, but were they separate events in a
larger conspiracy and theyre going to try to string them together. There was a lot of circumstantial evidence that make it look really bad for the president. Paul, what do you make of that . First a caution. Michael cohen is a shady character who wants to snitch in order to keep himself out of prison, so everything he says has to be taken with skepticism. That said, President Trumps version of events is even harder to believe. All of these coincidences. Youd have to believe that, again, manafort, trump junior, Jared Kushner didnt tell him about this meeting. Why is he lying about it after the fact . He gens up this false narrative. You dont try to cover up things that are on the upandup. So mueller has probably already done the most important corroboration, which is of the Phone Records. Thats right. So the Congressional Republicans may not have gotten it. We can be certain that mueller has it. If trump junior was lying about
that, hes getting charged with perjury and then mueller uses that to squeeze the president of the United States. Thats very interesting. There are 20 times that trump and his allies denied that the president knew. This is him, don junior, everyone has denied this, right, consistently. Over and over theyre on the record. Jay sekulow, all of them. So if thats a lie, they lied in a lot of circumstances, including to congress. And, matt, theres a key point here, right, which is about the credibility. This is a very strange thing that were watching unfold that i cant quite make sense of, because if you were trying to get a cooperating deal with robert silent. Were watching this whole thing play Out In Public. What do you make of that . It makes no sense strategically. If you want to get a deal with mueller or the Southern District of new york, the best card you have is your information and you want to offer it quietly. Theres no need to broadcast it publicly and in fact it hurts you. The explanation that maybe the
trump team leaked this. I dont know how the trump team would know that he was ready to testify to this unless i mean the only thing i can think of and its somewhat suspect circumstance is if cohen had gone to trump or the people around him and said, look, im ready to testify to this to bob mueller and his team unless youre ready to help me out. Thats the only circumstance, which would raise a lot of other questions. The one thing i can think of and its not a strategic reason they would be doing this but its something that happens to people in these circumstances. Ive represented people in legal trouble. They feel battered down. If they see their reputations being dragged through the mud, they want to fight back publicly. And i would guess that usually what happens is the attorney in that case is telling them, no, be quiet, take your time. Youll have your time to talk to the prosecutors and well tell our story eventually. The only thing i can guess here is that not his lawyer or his lawyer spokesman is telling him Something Else or maybe Michael Cohen is doing this on his own. Theres another aspect to this too, which is Michael Cohendoes show up in the dossier. The infamous dossier, as the person who essentially takes overrunning the russian collusion portfolio. Yes. After the heat theres too much heat on Paul Manafort and actually flies to prague. Michael cohen Stren Juously Dend this and showed people his passport. There was clarity mcclatchy reporting. No one else has reported this so i have no idea whether this is true or not. Two sources familiar with the matter said that he did in fact do this, right . He secretly made a late summer trip to prague during the president ial campaign. If thats true, then were at the center of the whole thing if in fact cohen were to talk to mueller. Right. So this is a huge, huge aspect of it. If cohen has suddenly decided that hes willing to talk to bob mueller about issues at the center of the russia investigation which again theres also reporting saying someone close saying hes ready to talk about
the things that go to the core of the mueller inquiry. And thats whether or not trump colluded with russia. So if that is the case and Michael Cohen was pretty much central to this dossier, he was dispatched to prague to clean up the mess. Allegedly. He denies this. Yeah. And he was allegedly dispatched to pay off the russian hackers, et cetera, et cetera. That would be consistent with his Lifetime Role as trumps fixer. That is consistent with that. So if he were to Start Talking about things that he witnessed during the campaign or, you know, try to lessen his sentence perhaps to get to the heart of what bob mueller is investigating and, therefore, be extremely valuable to that investigation, then that would just open pandoras box. I also think, paul, the most implausible thing about the Trump Tower Meeting to me that im obsessed with is the cover story of all participants in it, including the russians who were present who have spoken, is theres this huge buildup in which the senior members of the campaign set up a meeting in Campaign Headquarters where they are promised dirt from the Russian Government on Hillary Clinton and the meeting takes a
weird turn and they dont really get the dirt and they talk about adoption and no one ever says anything about it again. Again, and what prosecutors say to juries is use your common sense. Exactly. And so the day before President Trump promises at this campaign rally, youre going to hear some really good stuff about hillary next week. Then they have the meeting, the dirt doesnt come out and that speech that the president promised, it never happens. And so again, when jurors use their common sense, theres not going to be a criminal trial of the president yet. Maybe after he leaves office. Again, thats the rule that Justice Department rule that mueller is following. But in terms of impeachment and in terms of evidence of crimi l criminality, thats kind of a smoking gun. And the other part of that to me, again, youve got this meeting, we know the meeting
happened. Its possible the president knew and its possible Michael Cohen knew that he knew. No one, just based on what we already know, no one says word one as they watch the russians interfere over and over in the election, having been told in an email the Russian Government wants your dad to win. Yeah, thats right. You know, natasha talked about looking at not just one event but the entire mosaic. I think to understand this meeting, you have to pull back the lens and look at a few more tiles. You have to pull back and remember they were told, George Papadopoulos was told in april two months before this meeting that the russians had obtained Hillary Clintons emails. So i suspect when don junior gets that email and probably calls his father and maybe has a meeting with his father, they go into that meeting suspecting theyre going to get Hillary Clintons emails. They dont get it in their meeting but still think its coming. Which is why a month later in july you see donald trump standing at the podium publicly asking the russians to do what they didnt deliver in that meeting they had privately. Thank you, that was great. Who to believe, the president or his fixer or neither. Sorting through the lies, lies and more lies, next. A hotel can make or break a trip. And at expedia, we dont think you should be rushed into booking one. Thats why we created expedias addon advantage. Now after booking your flight, you unlock discounts on select hotels right until the day you leave. Addon advantage. Discounted hotel rates when you add on to your trip. Only when you book with expedia. Alright guys lets go lets do this directions to the Greek Theater beep can i get a connection . Can i get can i get a connection . Can i get a connection . Are you ready to take your then you need xfinity xfi. . A more powerful way to stay connected. It gives you super fast speeds for all your devices, provides the most Wifi Coverage for your home, and lets you control your network with the xfi app. Its the ultimate wifi experience. Xfinity xfi, simple, easy, awesome. First we heard a secret recording of donald trump and Michael Cohen talking about a hush money payment. Then we learned Michael Cohen is willing to testify that donald trump was in on russian collusion at trump tower. And now according to a source in the daily beast the two men are, quote, dead to each other. In other words, theres an ongoing public possibly to the Career Death Feud between the president of the United States and his former personal lawyer, both of who have, lets say, substantial credibility issues, which not only prompts the question of whose story were supposed to believe, but also why this information is coming to light publicly as cohen is presumably pursuing some kind of cooperation agreement. Thats something usually done in quiet. Joining me now, betsy woodruff, coauthor of that great piece and david caye johnson, author
of its even worse than you think, what the Trump Administration is doing to america. Betsy, we are seeing this play Out In Public because these two men are caught in an existential death match and what you see is what you get as they play this Out In Public. Thats a good way of putting it. What we have seen unfold over the last few months and sort of reach a Breaking Point in the last 48 hours is the final irreparable, Unfixable Rift between Michael Cohen and his former boss, president donald trump. And its important to take a step back and sort of put this in context. Michael cohen spent most of his career presenting himself as the watchdog of trump. As somebody who would go to the mat for him. As someone who as recently as a few months ago said he would jump out of a building for trump. Rapidly, weve seen that shift. Weve seen a sea change. Now according to numerous sources that my colleagues and i spoke with, the break is
unfixable. Michael cohen has resolved himself, has made peace with the fact or is making peace with the fact that hes never going to have a relationship with trump again. That he cant go back, that this is done. At the same time, the president has Semd Aaccepted and is very ready for this project that his outside allies are going to undertake of trying to nuke Michael Cohens credibility. Any ounce of credibility Michael Cohen has is a liability for trump, so were going to see the president s outside allies do everything in their power to undermine him. We saw yesterday obviously Rudy Giuliani talking about Michael Cohen has been a liar his whole life, which is hilarious because Rudy Giuliani himself called Michael Cohen honest just a few months ago in the role that Michael Cohen once had. We also saw the Drudge Report call him a rat. David, youve reported on trump for years. What do you make of it . Well, Michael Cohen clearly has done, as betsy put it, a complete break here and hes a terrible threat to donald
because donald tears up his documents. Weve had stories that they have to piece together things in the white house. Whereas this guy kept records. Well, Audio Recordings and memos to the file, what the lawyers call memorializing, those are powerful information to juries. And the fact that youve lied about something, all of us have lied. I bet you youve told your children that, yes, there is an easter bunny or santa claus or whatever. We put people well, im not Michael Cohen, though, david. Okay. I mean its i just want to be clear here about the credibility issues of this individual, who im just not prepared to take at face value. But theyre no less substantial, chris, than sammy the bold all sorts of criminals who Rudy Giuliani used to convict other criminals. The idea that because Michael Cohen has been lying and hiding things for trump that that is going to reduce his credibility, maybe in the court of public opinion, but it wont in a
courtroom. Betsy, can i give you a very paranoid feeling i keep having and you can talk me out of it. I keep feeling like theres some setup, that this is, to use the professional wrestling term, when fake animus is created between two wrestling characters. Somehow what were watching is a weird public setup and theres something happening behind the scenes im not seeing. Is that happening . I think youre probably giving too much credit to the president s legal team here. I think the idea that Rudy Giuliani is puppetmastering some sophisticated effort to secretly reverse engineer Michael Cohens credibility, although the year is 2018 and i dont want to put anything outside the realm of possibility, maybe ill eat my words, but i dont think thats whats happening. I think rather whats happening is we are seeing this bareknuckled brawl between two lawyers, Rudy Giuliani and lanny davis, both of whom have a deep
affection for the spotlight, both of them have deep affection for media attention, and are also deeply loyal to their clients and are embroiled in a legal battle and a P