The latest Political Developments of the day and interviews with top newsmakers are featured. We played that clip of donald trump call thing an attack on the nation. Cohen, interestingly in interviews with George Stephanopoulos and others, said the fbi was very courteous and respectful. He did not describe the raids on his home and offices as an attack on the nation. Does that seem to be more that he softened on his stance against the fbi . He seems to. I recall him saying he would take a bullet for the president. Maybe thats going into court and Pleading Guilty. But the pardon itself is a political calculation. Im not very good at that. I dont know whether hes a candidate or not. But at this point, with what he has in front of him, what he did and what he knows, he seems like hes taking the smart path, the one where he admits his guilt, sort of takes his medicine, and hopes the court will give him some consideration for that. Joyce, when you look at what lanny davis, Michael Cohens attorney and spokesman held out,
cohen will have to be truthful will prosecutors, not just on his own terms. Hell have to tell the truth about everything. Hell have to disclose all of his crimes, and other crimes committed by other people that hes familiar with as part of a Plea Agreement. So theres always a dance that has to be done, and it may be at the end of the day, cohen cant fulfill all of the obligations he would have to fulfill to conclude the agreement. Barbara, joyce did a good job listing off the things that Michael Cohen can speak to. We put together a list ourselves. Payments to women, like Stormy Daniels and karen mcdougal. Everything that went on in the trump organization. I think theres some tape well play in a minute where he implicates the cfo. You can follow the money for investigators. He, as we said, can talk about his allegation that donald trump had prior knowledge of the trump tower meeting. And all the potential Business Enter actions with russians
and the judge tells him what rights hes sacrificing by virtue of Pleading Guilty. But to your first question, when does this process of cooperating begin, does it begin today . My guess is its already begun. Both parties have to be satisfied and they have probably begun talks on that. That would be typical. That can happen later, often it happens simultaneously with the plea, but it can happen later. But its probably already begun. Joyce, nbc news learned that Michael Cohen is facing perhaps three to six years of jail time. Take us inside how that number is arrived at, is that because of the nature of the crimes hes Pleading Guilty to, the one Campaign Finance violation, the bank fraud, does that sound reasonable, does that seem to leave enough leverage for federal prosecutors to incentivize some cooperation if
they want it or need it . Hard to know whether thats correct or not. Federal sentencing is a little bit of a confusing peek inside of some statutory confusion at the moment. There are both statutory law, which sets a map. It might say, for instance, a crime has a 20 or 30year maximum. What really controls sentencing is the federal sentencing guidelines, and they base their assessment of the range of time a defendant can serve in custody based on both his prior criminal history and the product thats involved in the crime that hes being convicted of at the moment. So for cohen, what will drive any sentence he looks at is likely the Dollar Amount of conduct hes charged with. If hes looking at bank fraud or tax counts. Potentially the Election Finance Counts could have some additional time. Three to six years might be a good baseline guidelines
hannitys face when he said the president repaid it. When did this start to look like it would reach the conclusion that it has reached today, that Michael Cohen might made guilty, might be facing three to six years of jailtime, and may ultimately become a cooperating witness in one or more of the investigations. I think when we learned about the search, the stakes were clear that it was high for Michael Cohen. A search cant be conducted unless a judge found theres probable cause a crime has been committed. I would think that when the stakes are this high, when theyre looking at an Attorneys Office that has to be approved by the highest levels of the Justice Department rn, especial when its a lawyer for the president , i would go as high as the Deputy Attorney general. So we knew that Michael Cohen was facing serious legal jeopar
jeopardy. Its been a wait until then. I think the thing that delayed any of this is the review by the Master General of the materials for attorneyclient privilege. Now thats complete, theyre ready to move on and sit down and discuss cooperation. And so i think that was the moment when we all knew something was up. They often say the hardest part for a defendant is the waiting, not knowing the uncertainty, what is my fate . So i imagine since that search occurred in april, these have been some excruciating months for Michael Cohen. While today is probably a difficult day for him, it also provides a sense of relief that hes moving on to the next stage. The other camp that is largely in the dark today from my understanding is the president and the white house. I understand them to be on the phone with outside advisers and others trying to figure out what they know about whats going to happen in this hour with Michael Cohen. And you could grasp if lthe lun
of the president s tweets where he described this as an attack on the nation, to the tweets this morning, where he is unraveling. Take us through the reaction today, the mood in the white house behind you. Well, thats a sense of anxiety thats been building the last couple of days, particularly the last few hours when news broke about cohen and this plea deal. Publicly, its been ssilent. The president has not yet tweeted. We have not seen the president yet today since this news started to break. He had a meeting earlier today here in the white house. There was some talk of letting the press pool in to get a look. We heard later that cohen did not come up in that meeting. Also, the president of course, is going to a rally tonight in west virginia. Earlier in washington, there
were thunderstorms. Now it is rain. But theyre still taking the motorcade, which means reporters do not have a chance to shout questions, which you see time and time again. We can all expect the president will weigh in tonight. But here in the building, people just what you said, theyre trying to figure this out. They are waiting for his appearance in court as much as we are. They dont know what is in these court documents. Certainly the Campaign Finance violations are of a worry to the president and the people around him. They want to see if the president s name is going to be in these documents. Theyre waiting like we are. But there have been people close to the president who said, even more than mueller, it was what cohen could provide that worried them. Today begins that process. And the intersection between mueller and cohen is known. The questions that Robert Mueller has for the president , that he laid out for the
president s lawyers include, what communication did you, mr. President , have with Michael Cohen and others, including foreign nationals, about russian Real Estate Developments during the campaign. The anxiety is rooted in knowledge of lawyers that special counsel Robert Mueller wants to ask the president what he knew about what Michael Cohen was doing on his behalf with russians. Thats right. The anxiety is on two fronts. The mueller front as well as the Southern District of new york with these payments to the women, which is going to be Stormy Daniels and others, part of what we see today. The president has he was clearly unnerved by that raid on cohens hotel room and office back in april. It began a series of tweets that sort of eradicated every time Rudy Giuliani goes on air to give an interview, his attacks on cohen seem to get sharper and sharper, at one point saying he was an honest lawyer to now
calling him a pathological liar, and we should expect this to continue. Theyre going to continue to undermine his credibility to win the court of Public Opinion. But what matters now is the courtroom in Lower Manhattan. Let me bring the panel into the conversation, eugene robinson, and rick spangle. And former Senior Advisor to the dnc. Weve had a lot of conversations about what Michael Cohen knows about donald trump. I talked to a source close to the president who said he knows the stuff that really makes him blow up, the embarrassing stuff, the gross stuff, the stuff he tried to hide from his wife. Exactly. That may be one reason the president is so crazy about this, because of he knows about the women. He knows about he paid them off. Right. Rudy giuliani told Us Donald Trump repaid all the money. Exactly. So the existence of this plea deal has got to be very good news for President Trump. Lets see the documents. I just cant wait to see the documents. [ Overlapping Speakers ] let me ask you too, rick, to weigh in on the president s anxiety. The fact that cohen Pleading Guilty stands in contrast to what the president sees in manafort as someone standing strong. I was told that manafort, at this hour, everything is reality tv for this president , manafort is winning the pardon contest. Listen, this is the guy were all trying to cover. If its a contest between cohen and manafort, manafort is winning. Michael cohen has gone from being willing to take a bullet for the president to firing a bullet directly at him. Remember, hes the fixer. Hes not really a lawyer. Hes the guy that donald trump called when i need to pay off this woman. Or when we need to figure out this deal with these people whose money is not really great or people who want to buy a house for cash. So its not like hes a real lawyer, he would make the deal. So i think that is why trump is more concerned about Michael Cohen than anybody, because Michael Cohen knows where every body is buried. Lets listen to Michael Cohen and donald trump doing some of their business together. Ive spoken to allen about how to set the whole thing up with funding and its all the stuff. Because here you dont correct. So im all over that. And i spoke to allen about it. When it comes time for the financing, well have to pay
no, no, no. You couldnt make this up. I use My Cousin Vinnie too often. No, no, no. You could not make that up as evidence of incompetence and unethical lawyering. I would just be petrified today, wondering what exactly Michael Cohen is going to charge in what is going to be charged against him. We know Campaign Finance violations and tax fraud, we know bank fraud. This is not going to settle well with President Trump. You look at how Michael Cohen wasnt just brought into the fold of the republican party, he was made Deputy Finance Chair in april of 2017, and only in june had to step down from that role. So this has been active, even after what he did on the campaign, which we dont know but im hoping well find out more soon. And the president called him
the friday after the search of his office. We have brand new sound in from the chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Intel Committee on the this. We recently reengaged mr. Cohen and his Team FollowingPress Reports that suggested he had advance knowledge of a june 16th meeting between Campaign Officials and russian and a russian lawyer at the trump tower. Mr. Cohen testified before the committee that he was not aware of any meeting prior to this disclosure in the press last summer. As such, the committee enquired of mr. Cohens legal team as to whether mr. Cohen stood by his testimony. They responded that he did stand by his testimony. We hope that todays developments and mr. Cohens Plea Agreement will not preclude him for an appearance before our
committee as needed. Thank you very much. Doug, this does not feel a very good day to be Michael Cohen. No. These huge news. And its not a good day for the Trump Administration when you put this combined with flynn delaying his sentencing, and then manafort i mean, these are the very senior level advisers to the president , and it calls into question the best and the brightest claim that this president made that he was going to be bringing in the best and the brightest to the administration. He also ran as a Law And Order president. [ Overlapping Speakers ] hes bringing in criminals and Corrupt Agency Heads into these positions. Lock her up has a new meaning. Theyre locking up the entire former leadership of the trump orbit from the campaign years. Yeah. Were going to need a little more jail space at some point. One other point here, and it goes to your question, we keep talking about Michael Cohens cooperation with respect to the president. But the Southern District of new york prosecutors, any prosecutors, are going to ask questions that are much broader than that. Tell us about everyone you know who did anything wrong. So it might be that he has something on the president , maybe he doesnt. But it could be that hes useful against the Jared Kushner or roger stone. If youre somebody who did something wrong and you confided that in Michael Cohen, i imagine youre going to spend tonight staring at the ceiling and not sleeping very well. Chuck shs let me press you a little bit. Its a great point, and theres been rumblings over the last 12 months about all the people you named, especially people in the president s family. There are lots of questions about whether don junior is in trouble, whether don junior may have not conducted himself before congress or perhaps in
front of muellers investigators. And cohen, having worked for the family, if you take comeys analysis that the family had a special moblike meaning, could be someone who really does seal the fate of people in the family. He was the lawyer for the family. Youre exactly right. And so i think that theres probably lots of stuff that Michael Cohen knows that the Southern District of new york wants. And now its a question of whether or not cohen is willing to give it all and give it truthfully. Again, if he is, a lot of folks are going to have a restless night. Dont go anywhere. We have Breaking News in The Manafort Trial we want to bring you. Well bring in nbcs intelligence reporter ken delaney. What do you know . Reporter im being told the jury has reached a verdict in eight of the 18 counts. Thats about all i know. We just found out that the jury
submitted a note to the judge. The jury was called into the courtroom. We have producers in the program right now. And the word came out that the jury has reached a verdict in 8 of the 18 counts. So recall earlier today they sent a note wondering what they should do if they were deadlocked on particular counts and how they should fill out the verdict form. So this suggests they may be deadlocked on 10 counts and reached a verdict on 8. And its not clear to me whether were going to find out the outcome, or whether he will send the jury back to deliberate further. Joyce vance, is this a common sort of point to reach for a jury looking at such complicated issues and financial crimes that largely rely on documents and a judge that rushed through some of that in the trial, what does that development sound like to you from ken . Juries go through a lot of stages in reaching their verdict, and its not unusual in a complicated case for them to
initially decide that theres some counts where they can readily reach a verdict, while others take more work. I think youre right, the biggest problem here that this jury faced, and it was a real challenge, was the fact that they didnt have the opportunity to see the governments evidence in real time in the courtroom. The judge didnt permit the government to publish it to the jury as they presented it. So now theyre having to go through pretty much a mountain of documents, figuring out which documents apply to which counts, and putting that together for themselve