Him. Cnn providing even more detail, reporting that, quote, u. S. Investigators wiretapped former Trump Campaign manager Paul Manafort under secret court orders before and after the election, an extraordinary step video offing a high ranking official now at the center of the russian meddling probe. There was a period in which mr. Manafort was known to talk to President Donald Trump. To hear what this means for the investigation, ashley parker, reporter with Washington Post and political analyst. Former federal prosecutor paul butler, also an msnbc analyst, jeremy bash is a former National Security analyst and the former chief justice of the department of justice also an msnbc analyst. Jeremy, let me start off with you, because you and i have talked on so many occasions about what incremental bits of news about this investigation could portend, what they might mean, this seems like a big one. Explain how and why one goes about obtaining permission to wiretap someone . They skr have to go to a special court, and as i understand it, its called a fisa court, can you walk us through all of this . Sure. The government needs to show that there was probable cause to believe that Paul Manafort was not only committing crimes, but that he was an agent of a foreign power. And the investigator in this case has to go to a judge and submit an application for the judge to issue an order that would allow for the surveillance of manafort and that surveillance could be eavesdropping, could be reading hi his emails and also allowing a physical search and to actually go into his home. On top of that, in addition the government the investigating him for criminal activity, for probable cause to believe that crimes have been committed. Just to put this all in perspective. The idea that the Campaign Chairman of the Trump Campaign was working with russians, possibly an agent of the russians and committing crimes while doing so and its an open question whether he was at the same time talking to the president or the president ial candidate at the time, president elect. This is the most significant evidence that we have seen that bob muellers investigation is zeroing in on the trump inner circle for violating crimes and violating National Security. Paul mnanunanimou manafort w be the donald trump family. And he was recruited into the president s inner circle, into the president s personal space if you will by ivana trump and Jared Kushner, if Paul Manafort at this time being investigated for these types of crimes, what kind of exposure could there be for the president and his family . It all depends on whats on these wiretaps and we know there were probably conversations between donald trump and candidate donald trump that the fbi was listening to. Theres two things here, one is National Security. Thats what fisa is focused, did Paul Manafort register as a Foreign Agent when he did all these shady dealings with the ukrainian government, if he didnt register, thats a federal crime. Theres one fisa rule for that, they stopped because there wasnt enough evidence. He was a lobbyist who worked for that side of that conflict so that was the work he was doing, and it would have been a crime if he had not done the proper notifications to the government about the lobbying work he was doing, right. When work as Foreign Agents, thats not against the law unless you dont report it. And there are people who trump has employed have not reported working for foreign governments. Thats allegation number one. But apparently there wasnt enough evidence of that, so they stopped that eavesdropping, but then collusion, there were all these concerns based on other evidence that the bureau was gathering that the Trump Campaign was working with russians or having these weird conversations with russians and so thats they went back to the judge, that process that jeremy described, they went back and obtained a new warrant . Now to investigate collusion, whether manafort himself was talking to russians, which they knew he was, what was the substance of those conversations, now mueller has all of that evidence. These approvals take place at the highest levels of the Justice Department. Is it possible that President Trump knew that fisa had approved the surveillance of Paul Manafort . He should have. They continued into this year when Jeff Sessions became the attorney general and Rod Rosenstein became the Deputy Attorney general, they would have been briefed on those investigations and briefed on those warrants. When we came into the administration, the senior most officials were briefed on the largest cases and what steps the Justice Department was taking in those cases. But that said, it would be a grave breach of the separation, the independence of the Justice Department if they briefed the president on those wiretaps and on the fact that someone in his inner circle was being investigated. Lt while the president has never been named as a target of the investigation, a subject of the investigation, its his campaign from last year that was under investigation, its his campaign, his associates that ultimately, mike flynn and Paul Manafort that now are the targets of this investigation. So to brief him on the contents of what the Justice Department was doing and to tip him off would have been a great breach. And it sounds like he didnt have, because he continued to talk to Paul Manafort, months after it was Public Knowledge that manafort was under doj scrutiny and th. He didnt stop talking to Paul Manafort until his lawyers instructed him to do so. So it seems like the president in some ways was playing with five in legal terms . Yeah, i will say, his lawyers have come under some scrutiny recently but that was actually quite sounded advice they gave him. And thats one of the challenges this entire time is that hes hired a legal team who are advising him and theres a breakdown in communicating a message to the president , getting him to understand it and getting him to act on it in a responsible way. I feel like we could put up a count down clock to see when President Trump is going to say, see, president Obama Wiretapped me, which is not the case at all . I dont think that would be an accurate tweet. That never stopped him. Or plausible tweet. And this is something that people will look at if and when we see that tweet as a referendum or an indictment of his new chief of staff. But the one thing i have to say is that general kelly is controlling the information flow to the president. Hes controlling the people who get in to see him. But what he cant control is the president himself and what the president watches on tv and what the president tweets sometimes when hes alone. So what you raise is actually a possibility. Some of the intelligence collected includes communications that sparked concerns among investigators that manafort encouraged collusion with the campaign. So while not conclusive, youve got three sources that say that manafort encouraged the russians to help with the campaign. What does that say to you . First of all, even if there was mere knowledge by Paul Manafort that the russians were interfering, then he would probably be violating federal laws against collusion, against computer hacking and federal laws for bidding interference in our elections by other states. If he encouraged them, i think thats conspiracy to commit those crimes and hes in hot water. Let me tell you what the New York Times reports a characterization of the Mueller Probe and ask if you agree with it. He says theyre setting a tone, its important early on to strike terror in the hearts of people in washington or else you will be rolled. Is mueller doing what every good prosecutor does . Hes doing what ever good prosecutor does, mueller is going in in a public corruption investigation in a way that i have never seen before, especially this close to the white house, so hes sending and thats your specialty. You just blew my mind with that. Youre seei ining mueller, and investigation into Trumps Campaign is something that looks to you as a mafia kick pin probe . If i had gone to my boss and said i want to do a search warrant. Tell us what that mean the Fourth Amendment requires that even if its a search warrant you knock and announce. Theres an exception if you think the folks are going to destroy the evidence, and you almost can never get those in public corruption cases, so mueller is sending a strong signal to manafort that hes going down, its just a question of how far and for what . Matt miller, its been long rumored that manafort has done the kind of business, the kind of private practice work that some others in washington wouldnt touch. Talk about the intersection of sort of that body of work, with a job at the highest levels of a president ial campaign. Youre absolutely right, Paul Manaforts business goes all the way back to the 80s when he represented a number of foreign dictators, and his belehavior h gone to the outer limits of those involved in politics and he worked for a ukrainian dictator to is a russian backed despot. So you look at Paul Manafort in the summer of 2016 when he joined the Trump Campaign, he had a number of skeletons in his close set. Mo most people would not take on a position in american politics that would bring them under scrutiny. Which is what happened, he became subject to a new federal investigation that led him to leave the campaign and ultimately going to lead him to be indicted. You ask him why he did that . He faced a cash crunch and i think he thought working for donald trump would bring in new business overseas, potentially if he won, but even if he lost. Bring us back to the time when Paul Manafort entered donald Trumps Campaign and life. This is a campaign that describes itself as sort of fly by the seat of their pants, and its often their defense in a political context, but were not talking about a legal context, were talking about a shock and awe investigation by bob mueller that paul here just described as an investigation into a mafia family. Talk about what the trump family, the kushner family, what they have stepped by getting in bed with paul mana fort . As you mentioned, sort of in that question, the campaign and the white houses defense has always been the backhanded, we were too stupid to collude, basically. And when Paul Manafort was brought in, this was a period where the president was basically facing what he believed to be a floor fight at the convention and potentially he thought having the nomination that was stolen away from him. And there was a seat of the pants aspect and this was a period where even then the call Pain Campaign couldnt attract top talent, initially because it was going to other campaigns and then people saw that it was kind an unorganized campaign. Especially frankly, that late in the president ial cycle. Ashley just gave the perfect political analysis as to what the Donald Trump Team faced when, but they us to the status of the investigation that the president and his inner circle are now facing with these two developments . Its possible that russia actually sent and dispatched Paul Manafort to the Trump Campaign, or at least that once Paul Manafort attached himself to the Trump Campaign, the russians said, okay, now our agent is inside. And they tried to manay ed tiede campaign, through agents of influence. Do you think its possible if theyre going to want to find out if manafort was a russian plant . Is that one of the questions they want to answer . Theyre going to want to know if there were ties between Paul Manafort and russia, whether they were financial or otherwise, that caused him to in effect do russias bidding. And whether wittingly or unwittingly doing work on behalf of the russians. And did trump know about it, did he know what manafort was doing, and did he know what flynn was doing and when he found out about the investigation why did he try to its always this sort of incomp tense defense. Is that a legal defense, we didnt know that manafort was getting paid by the russians or is that simply a story you tell . Ignorance of the law is never a defense, and you never want to say at the highest levels of the government, that you were too stupid to follow the laws in the highest office of the land. And the president comes out swinging, threatening to totally destroy north korea and its rocket man and calling the iran deal an embarrassment. 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Legal help is here. Bob mueller is running his investigation the way bob mueller does everything, but two central questions, potential collusion with russia and potential obstruction of justice, were joined on the phone by House Intel Committee member congressman eric swallwell. Let me ask you, so jeremy bash whos here with us, and paul butler who is here with us, jeremy says that one of the things the investigation is going to have to answer in light of this manafort news, that two fisa warrants were obtained to surveil him is whether or not russia placed him in the donald Trump Campaign. Is that of interest to you . Its certainly of interest of whether the Trump Campaign, people who had prior relationships with ukrainian or pro ukrainian groups continued those relationships when they started working on the campaign. So thats something that our committee is also seeking to understand. That was one of his clients, the pro russia side of what would amount to a domestic debate in this country. But in ukraine, Paul Manafort was on the pro russia side. So your committee is seeking information about that body of work and whether it continue ed during the Trump Campaign . Were seeking to interview Paul Manafort, not speaking for the others, but i want to understand just what was the degree of those relationships and did they continue when he worked for the president and his campaign and whether he was in contact with russians throughout the campaign. We know that he sat in on that june 9 meeting with don jr. And Jared Kushner. We know that he allowed carter page to go over to moscow during the pcampaign and we know that e decided on the platform change during the convention and ambassador kislayak was present and attending the convention. So he was a central figure with prior relationships with russians and pro russian ukrainians, and it seems like that may have continued while he was working on the campaign. Theres certainly a lot of pro russia connections there. The New York Times detailing, i dont know the Technical Work for it. But when they just barge in. I guess a noknock, whats it called, paul butler . A noknock warrant, when you barges in and you pick up all the evidence you can because theres some fear that it might not be there if you go through always the polite niceties, what does that tell you about bob muellers probe . Of course we cant confirm anything we have heard on the committee one way or the other. But as a former prosecutor, that tactic would be used if you wanted the element of surprise, if you wanted to maximize the amount of evidence you could seize and prevent from being destroyed and at least at the state level, its something that a judge has to, its an extra box that the judge has to check, which is Night Service authorized, or noknock authorized because it is an elevated means of going in. And also, ill just say, with respect to electronic surveillance, the threshold for obtaining an electronic surveillance warrant is purposefu