The latest Political Developments of the day and interviews with top newsmakers are featured. Order is, territory now. And i wonder if theyve had a chance to explain to the president what you reported last week, that under this beefed up postenron witness tampering law, he may have more exposure than he understands. They seem to be leaning on a First Amendment defense, which is not going to hold up if your reporting holds up hes being scrutinized for the way these fit together. What Rudy Giuliani said today is this is ridiculous, the clip you played. The Idea Obstruction by tweet. He said it was bizarre and idiotic and there was nothing to it and the president can express his opinions. The thing about the president and obstruction and collusion, you know, interference or whatever you want to call it is the president usually focuses on the russia question. He says, this is a witch hunt. There was no collusion. He repeats that over and over again. The thing is that does the president really understand obstruction . Does he understand the exposure he has there . When muellers investigators sat down with the president s
lawyers in march and said, look, here are the things we want to ask the president about. Twothirds or maybe threefourths of them were about obstruction, they were not about the president s ties to russia or the campaigns ties to russia. A lot of them, we found eight of the questions you reported on earlier this year are about Jeff Sessions. So, while as you said a lot of his allies attacked him, comey, you see them do that publicly, they do it privately, its really the questions around Jeff Sessions. He wanted an interview in december. His guys, roy cohn, he admired eric holder because he saw him as someone who protected obama. How does that kind of thinking about what your own Justice Department officials could or should do look to Robert Muellers investigators . Well, the original sin for the president and he openly says he has an interesting transparency to this he says, look, i never would have made sessions my Attorney General if i knew he was going to recuse himself. He said that out loud in public in an interview with us last july. So that is the thing that is
bothers the president the most, that he does not have someone loyal to him like he thinks obama did, or jfk did running the Justice Department. He wants someone who will do what he wants in the Justice Department. The thing i dont understand, i tried to press the lawyers on, the president could call the Justice Department. He could call Rod Rosenstein, who actually oversees the investigation. Sessions doesnt. Sessions doesnt have the authority to do it because hes recused. Et could call rosenstein and say shut this down, if not, im going to fire you and put someone else in. I dont understand if the president is that concerned this is a witch hunt why he does not do that. And clearly it is not a witch hunt. Bob mueller referred three cases that include and involve democrats to your old stomping grounds, the southern district. Where do you think a prosecutor, an investigator who is not sort of rattling around in this echo chamber, where do they see this conduct . Where does this point them toward . Well, it confirms one of the critical elements of an Obstruction Of Justice investigation, which is the
corrupt intent. And this notion that its laughable or ridiculous that you would have obstruction by tweet is actually laughable and ridiculous. The tweets are just simply statements. And any lawyer worth his salt knows that any statement by a Potential Defendant can be used against him. Mimi rucker said that. If this was a debate there have been many people for months and months and months who have gone on television including me, saying Stop Tweeting because these tweets are going to be used against you. That defense doesnt go anywhere, you pointed out the First Amendment defense doesnt go anywhere. Of course, you cant use the First Amendment as a shield to commit crimes. But this in and of itself is not obstruction. Its remarkable in many ways not the least of which as mike just pointed out, Jeff Sessions is not overseeing this investigation. So if he wants it to end, he should call out Rod Rosenstein to do it. But im not sure that that is
unintentional. In other words, i think he wants to get the message out, but have enough removed so he can have some plausible deniability and say i dont want this to happen. If i wanted to order it to happen, i would. Which of course everybody would know would be a near immediate impeachable offense. So hes walking a fine line. But as we are learning with trump and giuliani, there is more of a method to their madness than it meets the eye. And everything that they say comes from somewhere, and the difficulty for us is to try to figure out what is driving them. What do you think is driving them . Its a little more method than madness. We know where its coming from. Its coming from both of their screaming raging ids, The Fear Center of the president. Some day when i die if i go to heaven, heaven for me is going to be a poker game where donald trump is at the table with a big stack of chips. The guy has the worst poker face in the world. When he is triggered he acts out. Hes been acting out with resecretary to Jeff Sessions the first 18 months. If youre a prosecutor, youre going to look at a piece of evidence that are not in the public record, there arent things weve seen, there arent things like this because there are apparently well talk about this later, im sure. Theres been incredible reporting in the last week about some piece of actual contemporaneous evidence coming out through investigative reporting in new york review and books and other places. You look at what donald trump has done with Jeff Sessions consistently throughout. This is a 35fifth example. The man is desiring to obstruct justice, he wishes justice was obstructed for him. He is screaming his guilt every time he does Something Like this. Of course, the man stands up almost every day and brags about he has tens of millions of twitter followers. I have the biggest megaphone in america. Its not really like a megaphone. Its not really a not an
order. If bill clinton stood up in the White House Press office in 1995 and said, i think janet reno should fire ken starr, we would all, everyone would have had a ka nipgs. It would have been the obvious thing in the world. It is now 2018. This is the equivalent of bill clinton standing up in the White House Press office saying janet reno should fire ken starr when donald trump does it to his twitter followers, tens of millions of them, its the same thing. You know, i figured out all the reporting you and your colleagues have done about all of the white house staffers that have gone into muellers Investigation Offices and testified to all of what john heilman just detailed. Hope hicks has been with muellers investigators. Reince priebus has testified, steve bannon has testified. There are witnesses to everything everyone is talking about. The firing of jim comey, the desire to fire Jeff Sessions, the desire to fire bob mueller. What is the purpose served . Is it simply to sort of play the last card that theyre holding or the last chip to carry over
a lot of republican senators have said that and i think that is something the president actually deep down believes. So when hes lashing out, when hes scratching the itch this morning saying, you should just fire rosenstein, i think hes doing it to make himself feel good and to communicate to the public, you know, even though this does align with the white house narrative, oh, its not an order, it seems like an order to the public and thats a problem. Comey testified that it felt like an order when he asked, can you see to let mike flynn go. The proof of it is now. He can send this tweet today and there are not republican senators on the hill calling for his impeachment. There would be political consequence if he actually summoned Rod Rosenstein to the white house and fired him. What consequence i think a fair number of republicans on capitol hill name them. Do we want to make a list . Lets make a list. What republican would be mad if donald trump fired Rod Rosenstein . Orrin hatch thinks hes the youre asking me to do a memory test of all the republicans im asking you to think of one who has courage. I cant think of any. Im not going to argue with you they have courage eli came up with one. I gave you orrin hatch. Do you want a better one than that . Well find the sound he said donald trump is the bestment ever. He said it would be an issue when trump when he grabs the third rail and he whatever he does, no one ever does anything. There is no doubt that history, that is factual. I want to ask you something about, johns analysis, mikes analysis theyre playing this card because they think they can survive impeachment. The way they got to mike flynn is because his son had Todays Special Value exposure. Im not ascribing onto donald trump the humanity of mike flynn. There is a known unknown. Do you think there is any peril for donald trump, jr. , or his daughters husband jared
kushner or his daughter. Or his daughter, any of that calculation changes, bring it on . Bill clinton had 67 approval the week he was impeached. Thats a poll number played back to me by trumps allies. Hed love the fight. Not so much if one of his children or soninlaw were in legal trouble. I think thats where it becomes more tricky. I dont know what he will do if they go after his son or soninlaw or daughter or his other son eric trump who has openly talked about russian money coming into their businesses. Im looking at two things right now. Not just the public tweets, but also his private conduct because weve talked on the show before about how hes calling around capitol hill and all the agencies, calling the dni and calling in favors to have them in private shutdown the investigation. So i think that if it in public got to the point where theyre going after his family members, we should look at his private conduct as well because as it gets closer to going after ivanka or jared or don junior, is he calling in private while
hes tweeting in public to try to shutdown this investigation another way, or trying to fire Rod Rosenstein another way in private Behind Closed Doors when we dont know about it . Mike, let me ask you a question about the nature, the spirit with which the president s lawyers were in touch with you and your colleagues today because you hear this sort of stonewalling out of the press briefing. The president was just expressing an opinion. If they werent worried, why are they in so much contact with so many reporters today . I think theyre very afraid of the narrative. It comes back to the issue of public opinion. And theyre trying to insulate the president from himself as much as possible. As its long been established, the president s aides and his lawyers have no control over his tweets. They have no ability to stop that. So the only thing that they can do is try and manage the fallout from it and try and say, look, hes just blowing off steam. Hes just expressing his opinions. The problem is that if thats someone sitting on their couch just kind of popping off on twitter thats one thing. When its the president of theUnited States, it comes with a different weight and im not sure that everyone in the white house or outside of it thats close to the president really appreciates that. So, if you could just paint for us the picture of what mike and his colleague maggie reported last week Mueller Stitching together these pieces, how does it fit into an exhibit of Obstruction Of Justice . There are two parallel things going on that intersect, because i think that the smoke that were starting to see including from mike and maggies reporting, but also that we are starting to see from some of these Michael Cohen leaks and critically now that the Manafort Trial is starting and rick gates is a cooperating witness is taking center stage, i dont think its a coincidence that hes lashing out this way in an obstructive nature when we are starting to see in the public a little bit more of the Collusion End of things. And remember, we dont know what rick gates has told bob mueller about any russia collusion. And he was there for a lot of it. And he was very close with
limitations. But my theory on this is that it wasnt lanny davis who reported or leaked that meeting. Lanny davis has not said anything about that meeting in public. So Rudy Giuliani is trying to distract from the original source of the information, which was really him. And the thing that sticks out to me as a prosecutor is you have a cooperating witness who was at that new premeeting. That cooperating witness is required to tell the Special Counsel everything he knows about any criminal conduct. And it is not a coincidence to me that right when Paul Manaforts lawyers get all of those statements from rick gates because thats required before a trial that all of a sudden Rudy Giuliani is doing what he often has done its a pattern now, which is trying tri and get out in front of something and spin it. So i think thats what was really going on here. Mike schmidt, ill give you last word. You and your colleague maggie cover rudy. Do you have any theory or new reporting on what that head
banging was about, what that meeting was about and why it mattered so much to rudy to get out that list . I dont know the words. What was the head banging . I dont know if it works. I think the issue the Trump Legal Team runs into is the president s legal exposure is so complex. There is obstruction. There is collusion. There is a question about whether to do an interview. And these are things that if youre going to go out and speak publicly about them, you really need to be well versed in. You need to know all the facts about them. And i think they run into trouble when they run into subjects that they dont necessarily know as well as others. These are not simple investigations. They have complex legal, you know, questions around them and about the facts. And when the homework is not done, it doesnt come out right. I bang my head, too. Really quick. The Point Mike Is Making is right. They dont know everything. In fact, they dont know a lot. And so theyre learning it probably a little bit ahead of
us, but they dont know, so theyre scrambling and chasing just like we are. Not always ahead of everyone. Mike schmidt and dan goldman, you make me want to bang my head. Thank you for starting us off. Rocket docket speedyest court of the land the raid on manaforts home. New attacks on the media. Audacity of lies. He outpaces his own rate of spreading miss truths. Is he the biggest liar to hold the office of the american presidency . I think so. Youre headed down the highway when the guy in front slams on his brakes out of nowhere. You do, too, but not in time. Hey, no big deal. Youve got a good record and Liberty Mutual wont hold a grudge by raising your rates over one mistake. You hear that, karen . Liberty mutual doesnt hold grudges. How mature of them. For drivers with Accident ForgivenessLiberty Mutual wont raise their rates because of their first accident. Liberty mutual insurance. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty
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. Behind the president s hourslong seven tweet meltdown, Paul Manafort on trial in alexandria, virginia. The trial is moving at break neck speed. The prosecution telling the Presiding Judge just in the last hour that the government will rest its case as early as next week. Thats days ahead of schedule. Nbcs ken dilanian joins us from outside the courthouse to bring us the news from day two of the trial. And joining the table ben rhodes, former Deputy National security advisor to president obama. Lucky for us now an msnbc contributor and author of the book the world as it is. Maybe we should change it to the world ads it was. Ken dilanian, start us off. Day two, what has it brought so far . Well, nicolle, as you mentioned part of the news is the fast pace of this trial. Its going much faster hannah we anticipated. In part the judge is pushing the prosecutors. So much to their annoyance at times, to keep it moving, keep
it moving. Hes preventing them from going into certain areas. To the has been mostly a story about purchases by Paul Manafort of luxury goods, paid for by Wire Transfer from Bank Accounts in cyprus. Theres been a pa