Chris Hayes discusses the days top news. Fraudulent Accounting Tricks that they use to convince banks to give them more money and Paul Manafort was cced on these emails. There is something here as i read testimony of the case and paged through some of the bits of evidence the government has entered, julia, that there is a desperation that is almost cinematic. You can feel wafting off the emails. That these are people that are scrounging and starved for cash. Desperation is the word, im glad you used that. That is the one word that the prosecution wants to have sticking in the jurors mind when they deliberate. This was a man desperate enough when he works with these shady characters. He would have put his whole family and business at risk because he was so desperate. He got to a point where he might not have been able to pay Health Care Premiums but still wanted to fund the lifestyles and keep the house in the hamptons. A man that was desperate, and wanted to keep up his image. Desperate to hold on to this kind of pseudopower that he had amassed around him and i think they are going to want to spell that out as we move into the Mueller Probe that he was desperate. Why did he work for the Trump Campaign for free . What about the defense . They dont have much to work with factually. What was their approach today . As you said, they dont have a lot to work with. Spent a lot of time asking vendors, the Tax Preparers, did you work with rick gates, Wasnt He Handling all of this. Wasnt he always telling you to talk to rick gates. The Tax Preparers and the bookkeepers saying Paul Manafort, we talked to him too. And he was ccd on this emails. Thank you. That was great. Mounting legal consequences manafort this week. Joined by barbra mcquade. You have been following this trial closely. Im an amateur and i am just watching this and reading the coverage and talking to people who are there. It did not look good for him. Not a great week for him the evidence is coming in. And it seems to be persuasive. They seem to be very engaged and taking notes and listening. I think they provided very substantial evidence that Paul Manafort was using these offshore accounts to fund his lavish lifestyle and failed to put them on his taxes. As we have discussed before, paper cases are a lot safer. You dont have to worry about a witness going south. Will he testify remains a question because the evidence is coming in so well for the prosecution. I totally agree. That the defense that the defense put on in their opening is just falling apart. They are not able to
substantiate this is all gates fault. They are both ccd on everything. And both in conference calls. There was an email in evidence today in which the tax preparer says hey, do you have any Foreign Bank Accounts and he writes back no. That is pretty clear. You cant get any clearer than this. Whatever Defense Theory they had is going down the toilet today. He is gone in this case. And i agree with barbara. They have got the conspiring on emails, and phone calls with the accountants. There was a sidebar, because it reminded me of a defense Rudy Giuliani talking about the
president. He says, it cant be obstruction, he is doing it in broad daylight. The lawyer says only a fool can give that kind of information to an accountant if he is trying to conceal the fashion. There is a trail and these documents could lead to the truth in that. And someone who intended to violate the law would not have done that. Inconsistent with someone who would want to violate the law. The person sitting next to me said, wow, if thats the best argument he has, he is in trouble. The fact that Paul Manafort had to disclose to his accountant, he told them they were clients not his own entities. So about three steps removed
that he is disclosing this. If that is the best argument that they have, i agree with this spectator, they are in trouble. This is a mueller prosecution. We have that lurking in the background. It doesnt have to do with the Trump Campaign, or the collusion. You cant but look at it and say this guy was so desperate. So desperate there is an email in there where he is trying to basically squeeze his daughter over furniture purchases. He writes a stern email. That same dude during this period goes and works for free on the Trump Campaign. Nothing is for free. Lets start with that premise. What he was doing was also trying to ingratiate himself with various oligarchs. Offering to provide them updates
on the campaign. That was one of the people that was providing him with all of that money during that time period. Remember, the email when he gets a job, he turns around and goes to kilimnick who is his deputy in ukraine, how do we use to get whole. Has he seen. The exact same thing. There was a motive to his madness here. Barbara, what is your sense of this trial. Moved through the witnesses quickly. What do you see for next week . Well, maybe we will or maybe we wont see rick gates. They are teeing up a summary witness. For many witnesses who have testified, a chart that has not been published to the jury. And have been asked have you verified the numbers in the chart. To sort of make it Crystal Clear to the jury what these numbers mean. What the numbers were going in and what were going out. We are likely to see that coming out next week. Someone to tabulate it all. Here is the evidence, and here is what we are able to make out of it. They heard the raw evidence and it could be difficult to keep up. Long days, and tedious. Line 17, line 22. I can imagine having a summary witness in the form of an fbi or
irs agent who pulls together the relevant numbers they have heard about. I am wrapped. I am on it. Thank you both. Next, why a woman known as Manhattan Madam spoke with Robert Muellers special counsel team. That in two minutes. Wednesday august 8th,
thomas rhett and Kelsea Ballerini host. Lets get this started cma fest Wednesday August 8th 8 7 central on abc. Xfinity gives you more of the cma fest with an encore performance from old dominion right after the show. Only with xfinity on demand. And watch it live on abc Wednesday August 8th. Once upon a time in the new york city in the tabloids no bigger story than the Manhattan Madam scandal. The madam was Kristin Davis. Ran a high profile sex service. Wednesday, Kristin Davis met with the team of Robert Mueller. She is a good friend of roger stone. The key difference between
the mta and my former Escort Agency was that i ran one set of books. Roger stone has been making super super weird Instagram Post about davis with her child. Why do fbi agents dispatched by Robert Mueller keep asking my friends if i am the father of this baby. In a Statement Today stone said Kristin Davis is a long time friend of associate of mine. I am the god father to her 2yearold son. Joining me to help understand what is going on is michael issi koff. What is going on . I can attest that Kristin Davis was very close to roger stone at the crucial period that mueller is looking at. I remember interviewing roger stone at the office of yahoo and Kristin Davis showed up with him and they left together. So you know, clearly what is interesting here to me is that mueller obviously stone obviously remains clearly a subject of muellers investigation. Mueller has farmed out other aspects that he has come across such as Michael Cohens taxi stuff and the illegal election money to the Southern District in new york. He hasnt done that with roger stone. When that indictment came out a couple of weeks ago about the hacking of the dnc, there was explicit reference to stone. Somebody who was in regular touch with donald trump during the 2016 campaign and was in communication with guccifer 2. 0. Most likely this relates to information that she may have about who stone was in communication with and how he was communicating during that crucial time in september and october. Yeah, that part of it to me, the only way to make sense that her talking to mueller is her talking about stone. And stone having to do something about Stones Communications in 2016 in the closing months of the campaign. Which is part of andrew miller, constitutionality of the entire mueller operation. It seems to me that you know, we dont know what is going to happen, but to your point about he farmed other stuff out, stone seems like he is sitting right there in the tractor beam of the mueller investigation. All of the signs are that mueller is closing in on stone and if we are going to see a case, it is extremely likely we will see it in a few weeks. He doesnt want to be accused of bringing cases in the course of the election. So you know, this may drag out until post election, but i would think given the pace of activity that it is reasonable to think that we could be seeing something soon. One other thing worth mentioning, yes, we have been focused on communications that tone appeared to have or
advanced knowledge appeared to have about what wikileaks was going to be releasing, theed to desa time in the barrel. Stone also running this operation, called stop the steal which was an Election Poll watching event that was designed to intimidate voters or suppress African American participation in the election. May be questions about the funding of that that mueller is interested in and that Kristin Davis could provide answers for. The closeness of them. It makes a bit more sense in the context of that. Though what Doesnt Make Sense is the bizarre Instagram Post. Maybe they are asking about the child but those are weird. A lot of things that he is doing as of late is weird. Somewhat unhinged. So you know, i think stone is clearly feeling the heat. Thank you so much for being here. Any time. Next, remarkable new report of the Washington Post that shows the president s New York Hotel reaping Windfall Profits from the saudi family. I will talk to the reporter who broke the story after this. Hypothetically, just spit balling here, if you wanted to bribe the current president of the United States, the simplest way to do so is to throw money at his businesses. Thank about that for a second. A story today from the Washington Post, it looked lake the hotel was set to take a loss and then came a last minute visit to new york by none other than the crown prince of saudi arabia. This cams from a letter obtained by the post. The crown prince didnt seen stay at the hotel. According to the General Manager, he wrote in his letter we were able to accommodate many of his foreign travelers. He doesnt stay in. Such transactions have fuelled criticisms accusing the president of reaping revenue from foreign governments in
violation of the practice. To talk more about what we know about what is going on, joined by jonathan oconnor. We know the saudi prince came to new york in a publicized visit. And we know that stay was lucrative enough for the trump hotel that their revenue went up 13 instead of dropping as it has done in the previous years. They dont have shareholders, my understanding is the letter is kind of like the Earnings Call that you would do if you
did have shareholders. He is saying when you want to look at what quarter we had, we had this big boost. The hotel is managed and branded by president trumps company. The units in the hotel are mostly owned by independent investors. Every so often they get a report from the General Manager about how leasing is going and how the hotel is performing. So this was that letter to them. Is this constitutional . No. It is blatantly on constitutional. On its face the constitution prohibits of taking emoluments, profits. The constitution even mentions princes that federal officers cannot take something of value from a prince or a foreign state and the reason for this is
really obvious. We cant have federal officers and especially the president of the United States who is getting cash in his pocket from foreign governments while we are making critical Foreign Policy decisions about trade and diplomacy. And War And Peace in the middle east on whether we are going to let the saudis invade qatar for instance. Would we know if someone is doing it. They said was the profits from the Major Business at their hotel company. We dont know anything more than that. We dont know who the people
spending that money are other than a few published reports about major stays at mostly the trump d. C. Hotel. We dont know how much each of them spent or who exactly stayed there. So quite a bit we dont know. And we may learn more about the business because of this lawsuit that was already filed. What do you think of the lawsuit . It was an incredible lawsuit. New york should be in the lawsuit so we can learn about what is happening in new york with new york businesses, the other stories from the Trump International hotel that we dont know. The other stories about foreign moneys going through trumps businesses that we dont know. And actually a week after donald trump was elected before he took office, i sounded the alarm and said look, it looks like donald
trump is set to violate this essential clause of the constitution. And three days after Donald Trump Took Office we filed the first emolument lawsuit. We know there is unconstitutional behavior but only from public reports. We dont have the tax returns and we dont know the financial flows. This is somewhat uncharted constitutional territory. Absolutely. And for a lot of reasons, we havent had a person like this be president of the United States before, but the federal judge said yeah, you have standing and this is a real case that could go forward. Right. And the particularly tough news for the Trump Organization out of that court case is the judge seemed to define emoluments very broadly compared to the way the Department Of Justice defined it. For a service they are paying, market rate for, could be defined under emolument. And the judge has been clear if you look at what he said about the case so far, a competitive in new york, another state may have stand figure there is a hotel or business in their jurisdiction or area that is conducting this business. Zephyr, you are nodding your head. They had a bizarre definition of emolument. Saying it is only an emolument if it is a bribe. The judge set a ruling to define emolument that i and others have been pushing. This prohibition is against money coming in from foreign governments and you dont have to prove this is some pro quo. Why a judge today federal judge slammed the Trump Administration by suggesting that somebody else take over the work of reuniting families. And next, what is Great Britain anyway, that is thing one, thing two after this. International geography lesson. I am sure you are familiar with the region. It can get confusing. This is Great Britain. Made up of three countries, england, scotland and wales. This is the united kingdom. United kingdom of Great Britain and ireland. And finally, you have the British Isles encompassing everything in this blue circle. The republic of ireland. And the aisle of man and many islands. Any of us is not the president of the United States. People call it britain, they call it Great Britain, they used to call it england. But the uk, Great Respect. And that is thing two in 60 seconds. Donald trump owns a golf course if scotland you think he would have a decent understanding. Weirdly, trump has had a really, really tough time with uk geography, he once told, you dont hear the word britain anymore. You have different names, you can say england, you can say uk, you can say united kingdom. I always say which one do you prefer. Last months nato trip, he told the sun, he prefers england. It is so true. You dont hear england anymore. Last night trump was in pennsylvania and he brought up
uk once again. I have Great Respect for the uk, united kingdom. People call it britain, they call it Great Britain, they used to call it england, different parts. But the uk, Great Respect. Nobody elected this man to get the names of places right. I am greatly