He was not a person who was involved with the daytoday operations of the campaign or a person i recall interacting with on a regular basis at all. This was a campaign volunteer. He wasnt somebody who was a Senior Adviser as many of you want to bill him to be. He was swb thomebody that playe minimal role if any at all and part of a voluntary Advisory Board. I never heard of papadopoulos. He never showed up at trump tower. He was the coffee boy. The bigger question that should be looming over the president , who in his circle knew what papadopoulos was up to. We know that papadopoulos revealed to muellers investigators he had long planned to arrange a meeting in russia between members of the Trump Campaign and russian officials. Nbc news is reporting that papadopoulos superior former Trump Campaign cochair sam clovis testified before a federal grand jury last week. Now clovis attorney appears to deny a key part of what papadopoulos revealed to investigators, that our client encouraged a trip to russia on behalf of the campaign. Dr. Clovis vigorously opposed a trip. Adding that if someone proposed foreign travel in a personal capacity dr. Clovis could not prohibit such travel. Thats lawyer talk. Documents unsealed after clovis testified appeared to show he did encourage such a meeting telling plows i would encourage you to make the trip if it is feasible. Mueller is creeping closer to the white house itself. Politico reports his investigators are scheduled to interview trumps close aide hope hicks, later this month as well as three or four other Current White House officials as early as this week. By now there is no question that they are aware of the consequences of making false statements to investigators. I am joined by nicolle wallace, joy reid, kari ca dera from the office of director of National Intelligence and senator Richard Blumenthal who sits on the Senate Judiciary committee. Are they threatening senator with a perjury charge . They got him on saying something that wasnt quite accurate. Now they pled bargained the guy down from zero time to six months. It doesnt seem like throwing the book at the guy. It looks like they scared him into a deal. Your thoughts. Theyve reduced multiple counts of false statements, each punishable by five years in prison, to a single count of a maximum exposure of less than six months. And obviously the potential of probation if he continues to cooperate but only if he is truthful. And only if he really gives them results. And thats why clearly what theyre doing is climbing the ladder of culpability in that campaign from papadopoulos to the Campaign Second periupervis. There are multiple contacts in that document with the Campaign Supervisor and with the campaign Senior Adviser. If you look at that table where donald trump is at the one end and Jeff Sessions is at the other, you know that Campaign Supervisor could well reach high into the campaign apparatus. Theyre all denying this. Lets go to sam clovis, apparently the next rung up on the ladder from papadopoulos. He is denying a lot of this. In particular his lawyer is denying that he had anything to do with encouraging papadopoulos to go to russia by saying, well, if he wanted to go on his own i couldnt stop him. That is lawyer talk. Nobody said you couldnt stop him. Who is going to go to russia on their own dime on Campaign Business . It seemed to me a very clever way of avoiding, yes, he did encourage him to go. Your answers, senator. That statement of offense, the plea document, is a remarkable tableau. A chilling story of the collusion that russia was seeking to arrange and the multiple contacts that took place in march and april of 2016. To say it would have been a private, unauthorized trip simply fails to pass the smell test. And whats really happening here is the special counsel is saying to all of the potential witnesses, the train is leaving, this plea occurred on october 5th. It was unsealed only recently. There is more to come. Now is the time to follow papadopoulos and cooperate, not manafort and confront us and face this multiplecount indictment with very heavy potential imprisonment. I would predict well see more action soon, more indictments, and possible plea agreements. Kari let me ask you about this violation of the law. Maybe its not always enforced but the logan act. You get the word on a campaign, these russians want to meet to give us dirt, to work out something in terms of u. S. Foreign policy, i assume. They want somebody from the campaign to come over to russia. They want to meet and discuss this whole aspect of you might be the next president , therefore, weve got to talk about this. We have to talk about helping you get that job as president. It seems to be creepily illegal. Is it . What were hearing here . You know whats amazing to me as someone who served on another campaigns Advisory Committee on Foreign Policy and National Security is that nobody who was receiving these different emails from papadopoulos seemed to understand russia as a threat as its understood by the rest of the Intelligence Community and National Security community. Russia the director of National Intelligence put out threat reports that indicate that russia is a military, economic, cybersecurity, economic threat to the United States. Whats in the papadopoulos plea is just one snapshot of one persons explanation of the various emails and communications that were trying to be set up with representatives of the russian government. But there is more to what papadopoulos knows that is probably not in that plea agreement that the special counsels office knows and the special counsels office is now going to look at what all the other individuals in the campaign knew about these potential meetings and coordinations that took place. As senator blumenthal just mentioned we learned this week that in a meeting with donald trump and Jeff Sessions in march of 2016 papadopoulos said he had connections that could help arrange a meeting between thencandidate trump and president putin himself which papadopoulos later tried to arrange. Today Sarah Huckabee sanders told reporters she doesnt believe the president well, this is an interesting statement she doesnt believe, she doesnt believe. Whatever she believes is what the president tells her, that the president remembers. How does she know. Thats what he tells her he wants to say he believes. Does the president recall at the march 31st, 2016, meeting of his National SecurityAdvisory Board mr. Papadopoulos suggesting the meeting between thencandidate trump and Vladimir Putin . Does he recall that. No, i dont believe he does. We are looking at a picture of what looks to be almost a roosevelt room meeting. Obviously a campaign room. The young fella, papadopoulos, sitting to the left between sessions at one end of the table and the candidate for president at the other end. He has been denied his very existence being denied now. We are hearing from sessions now for months there was no meeting about russia ever, there was no connection with russia, blah, blah, blah. Heard all that. From trump through Sarah Huckabee sanders he doesnt according to her, she believes, she believes what she is told to believe, of course, she has to represent the president. She believes that the president believes or says he believes that he forgot that this guy ever exists. They are going into operation separation. Its like custers last stand. Divide the column and somehow well survive. That seems to be their strategy. Scatter. Its one weve seen before. He branded Jeb Bush Low Energy jeb. Branded marco rubio little marco. They decided to brand George Papadopoulos once they learned he pled guilty and have been cooperating with bob muellers investigator since at least july. Lowlevel george. Theyre not involved in a Political Campaign anymore. This is definitely not a branding exercise. Bob mueller is impervious and indifferent to Donald Trumps smears for his aides. Theyve just entered a faphase where they may successfully convince the 32 of the country that will be with donald trump that George Papadopoulos was a lowlevel aide and doesnt matter. That may have been their goal. I dont know. What they say about George Papadopoulos will have no bearing on what bob mueller already learned from him, what he may continue to learn from him as bob mueller now questions other aides that may have been around the campaign, that may have come into contact with others since donald trump was sworn in. So theyre entering a phase, as you pointed out at the beginning, where everyone who goes in and answers questions from the fbi, from bob muellers investigators, must tell the truth or they could face perjury charges. You are inside politically, i was there too, maybe not as high as you were, nicolle. You were pretty high. I want to go back to something so ethnic it sounds awful but ill stick to it. I never met a russian in politics in 50 years. Me either they werent floating in and out of the office. At the convention. Talking about the ukraine plank, the manafort working for the russians. Carter page working for the russians. Flynn having dinner with Vladimir Putin. Give me a break. The russofhiles. They werent going to beat hillary, last may or june. She has it made, of course. Then they hear somebody in russia has tinker toy information that might turn the tide against hillary. Wouldnt you know about it if it came up at the table . Wouldnt you never forget it if it came up at the table you are sitting at . We saw him sitting there with the candidate. He brings up russia, he goes, thats something i wont forget. They got her emails or whatever. All they want is somebody to come over and pick up the junk. Come get it. Thats all they want. You wouldnt remember that conversation . Well, of course you would remember it of course you would pass it on. If we know one thing about Donald Trumps campaign, i mean, it was good enough that they figured out how to win, but it was small enough that they certainly all knew each other. So this idea that he was some lowlevel coffee boy is not only insulting and rude and, frankly, stupid he is now cooperating with federal investigators, talking about everything he saw and heard on the campaign, so calling him lowlevel, calling him a coffee boy, is not going to help them now. And the idea you know, they never forget meetings with anyone from any other country. They have had so many contacts with so Many Russians they all either lie about it, forget about it or, you know, have to turn states evidence to talk about it. President trump talked to the New York Times tonight by phone late today. And he said, i am not under investigation, as you know. And when it comes to the Manafort Indictment the president said, even if you look at that there is not even a mention of trump in there. It has nothing to do with us. Joy, what do you think of the flakry thats going on here . All the way down from the president. Bagdad bob approach. There was no russian involvement, there was no flirtation from our side with them. There were no meetings. Jeff sessions got the memo there were no meetings. We never met with anybody. The outer line of defense, the outer redoubt, the perimeter, is so far out there they look like theyre lying from day one because its never proven to be correct. Theyve had relations. The russians are out to change the election. Its all in the paper. Its news now. Its not an argument. What are they up to with the allout stone walling . If there was collusion, it was Hillary Clinton that was col udi colluding with the russians. Youre doing their handiwork. You have to think about where donald trump was in march of 2016 when George Papadopoulos gets brought on to the campaign. When sam clovis, who is now in the spotlight as well, assembles Donald TrumpsForeign PolicyAdvisory Committee. Why did he do that . I have worked on campaigns. Every Single Person on the committee, no is not going to be interacting with corey lewandowski, the campaign manager. What the committees job is is to put together a Foreign Policy platform that then the speech writers and policy people and Campaign People can take out to show that this is a serious candidate for president. In march of 2016 nobody thought donald trump was a serious potential president. He was seen as somebody with obviously no political experience, no Foreign Policy experience, just a guy from the apprentice who was a joke even to republicans. The idea that he could be a serious person on Foreign Policy bothered donald trump. So he was proactively trying to demonstrate he would have a policy platform. What did the platform involve . Better relationships with russia, changing our attitude toward russia versus the ukraine. What were all of these people who were advisers sitting on sam clovis committee, which included Jeff Sessions. He was sort of the big man on the committee. Sam clovis put it together. Theyre trying to show their worth. Who are they working for . Russians or trump . Theyre working to try to show they can bring donald trump and Vladimir Putin together, create a trump putin axis. People trying to demonstrate that they can get trump and putin in the same room and people trying to show they can find the 33,000 emails. And that russia has them, i am going to go get them and show my worth. Thats trumps problem. All the people ensnared in russiagate were trying to do one of two things. The way to get ahead in the campaign was to get the two people together. Now the way to get together in the Legal Community is to spend your efforts proving they had nothing to do with each other. Exactly. Nicolle, did you Say Something . I agree with joy. The idea that donald trump was a blank slate on National Security and Foreign Policy is true with the exception of russia. Right. He had really strong instincts. He had really strong feelings about the way putin ran his own country, about the things he liked and about his desire. And he was he had fights with our colleague Joe Scarborough and mika brzezinski. He defended Vladimir Putin when they said he is a killer. He kills journalists. He says we kill people too. For a blank slate who didnt know much about Foreign Policy he knew he liked Vladimir Putin. I remember a president who said they could see into putins soul, all the way in there. I forget who that was. But the policies did not look anything like this president. Fair enough. Nicolle wallace, joy reid, c Carrie Cordero and senator Richard Blumenthal. President trump began the morning after the terror attack with a tweet storm. Did he bring the country together . Not exactly. He went after Chuck Schumer and the democrats and blamed everybody for everything. The instant politicization. With the election for Virginia Governor one week out now, white house chief of staff john kelly dives into the culture war. Is that where he wanted to go . Resurrecting the debate over the confederate monuments and arguing that a lack of compromise was that what it was led to the civil war. Werent there a lot of compromises before that war . The toll the Mueller Investigation is taking inside the white house. Aides fearing it poses an existential threat to the trump presidency. They really do. Some are urging trump to step up attacks on the man bearing the bad news, the special prosecutor himself. Let me finish with whats called in politics a comparison ad. This is hardball, where the action is. D needing others. Then we are told its braver to go it alone. That independence is the way to accomplish. But there is another way to live. A way that sees the only path to fulfillment is through others. That our time here can be deep beyond measure. No one who chose interdependence ever found despair. Because what the world taught as weakness, is in fact our greatest virtue. Former First Lady Michelle Obama today criticized President Donald Trump though not by name. Speaking at an event in chicago, she argued people shouldnt share their every thought on social media. Lets listen. This whole tell it like it is business, thats nonsense. You dont just say whats on your mind, you dont tweet every