About its scope. The fbi has spoken to six individuals in connection with the investigation, mark judge, Brett Kavanaughs friend who dr. Ford identified as being in the room when she was allegedly assaulted. Leland keyser and Patrick Smith who ford identified as being present at the assault allegedly occurred. Deborah ramirez who alleged kavanaugh exposed himself to her when they were at yale and two of kavanaughs high school friends, tim gaudette and chris garrett. However, more than 40 potential corroborators or character witnesses havent been contacted including more than 20 individuals who know either Brett Kavanaugh or debbie ramirez. And nearly 20 people with potential information about dr. Fords allegation, none of them being interviewed. The fbi hasnt interviewed judge kavanaugh himself nor has the fbi interviewed dr. Ford hers f herself. After weeks of restraint, President Trump dismissed dr. Fords allegations in mississippi. It may be one of the worst things hes done recently. Lets watch. 36 years ago this happened. I had one beer. I had one beer. Well you think nope, one beer. Oh, good, how did you get home . I dont remember. How did you get there . I dont remember. Where is the place . I dont remember, how many years ago was it . I dont know. I dont know. [ cheers and applause ] i dont know. I dont know. What neighborhood was it in . I dont know. Wheres the house . I dont know. Upstairs, down stairs, where was it . I dont know. But i had one beer, thats all i remember. Are all the women there cheering . I dont think so based on that picture. Today Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell again reiterated he expects to have a vote on kavanaughs nomination this week, that would mean by saturday but President Trumps comments may have complicated matters with three republican senators who could decide kavanaughs fate. Jeff flake, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski who slammed the president s comments. Theres no time for comments like that. To say this at a political rally is just not right. Its appalling. The president s comments were just played wrong. I am taking everything into account. The president s comments yesterday mocking dr. Ford were wholly inappropriate. Sarah sanders defended the president today. The president was stating the facts, the testimony by dr. Ford was compelling but you cant make this decision based on emotion. It has to be based on fact. Thats one of the reasons they begged for the fbi and delayed a hearing vote so they could get more facts on this case it seemed he was stating facts that dr. Ford herself laid out. Ridiculous. Im joined by Richard Blumenthal, mimi rocah, former assistant u. S. Attorney and eddie glaude the a professor at princeton. Senator, your reaction to the president s performance. Appalling is the right word. Mocking and ridicule ago survival of Sexual Assault. It recalled me about dr. Christine blasey ford talking about the alleged laughter of mark judge and judge kavanaugh when they assaulted her so it was demeaning and dismiss i have not only to her but also the entire community of survivors. It describes why so few people come forward because they face this public shaming and ridiculing. Its the worst kind of reaction to claims of Sexual Assault. Youre a former prosecutor for a long time, i knew you as the attorney general of connecticut. Women who have been assaulted and certainly more serious if they were raped, both horrendous crimes. The hard thing is to have them put up with the ridicule or questioning or skepticism and here the president , what did he do to that crowd out there . It was a shameful and disgraceful message to all surviv survivors that they are not entitled to be believed. That they will be ridiculed and mocked. By the president of the United States. By the commanderinchief, the chief Law Enforcement officer of the United States and its just gut wrenching, stomach turning to see the president of the United States after dr. Christine blasey ford knowing the nightmare she would have to endure came forward, spoke her truth to the powers of the United States senate and then has continued to endure the threats and so forth. Professor glaude, it seems to me this is insult and injury together. Not only has the president insulted her again, mocking her for the gaps in more memory. Not for her memory but the gaps so that therefore she should havent brought the case forward but in the instructions hes giving to the fbi, dont interview her. We dont need to investigate. Dont believe her but dont ask her any more questions because you might learn more. There seems to be a real contradiction here. A conflict in what he wants. It sounds like he doesnt want to hear from her because shes afraid she has more. Your thoughts . I think it reveals not only a contradiction but bad faith that part of what victims of Sexual Assault and rape want is for folks to take the claim seriously. We heard early on republicans saying very clearly that we should hear dr. Christine blasey fords story. We should be open to our minds being changed. Even donald trump said that in the press conference but what what last night revealed in mississippi is that donald trump was never open to changing his mind. That he engaged in this process in bad faith and in some ways called the fbi information and constrainting it also suggests a crisis of legitimacy around the process more broadly. So at the heart of this to my mind, chris is bad faith that suggests the process was broken. The Republican Leaders said the report would only be made available to senators but Tennessee Republican bob corker argued for making some of the findings public. I know whats going to happen to this. The two sides are going to leak out the part that benefit their side of the argument and if there was some way for us to present this to the public, i think it would be helpful. It would help the American People know there was a background check that took place and what came out of it. Mimi, the president has argued hes the chief Law Enforcement official that is he is above the attorney general and then he mocks a witness, a victim who comes forward and says i have been been assaulted and i want to talk about it to the United States senate because they are deciding that who the next member of the Supreme Court will be which to me is citizen duty and he mocks her for meeting her duty as the Top Executive of the government. Hes saying here i am on behalf of the United States government tell me. You are a fool to tell us what was done to you because well laugh at you. Hes done it before. You have the new president of the United States say nothing one should come forward with their story of Sexual Assault unless they can prove it themselves as opposed to the way it works or some official body. They tell what happened and then Law Enforcement investigates and figures it out. Everyone is assuming its dr. Fords burden to prove every piece of this. This isnt a trial. Second thats not how it works. Victims had things happen to th them. She remembers key details. He wasnt even accurate in what he was shocking her about. She did describe the location, she has a specific time frame. It happened in her teens. She knows that she has given leads to give the date more specifically. You have to get to this point. He kept saying she kept saying she only had one beer. Is he implying she was drunk . That she was somehow cooperative in this horror . Shes saying i only had one beer except to mock that claim. Why would he pick on that one detail . Look, i think to some extent to suggest that because she had a beer she was complicit because thats what he does but remember at the end of the hearing, at the end of her testimony, everybody trump, even fox news was saying a Sexual Assault happened to this woman. They were still saying well maybe she was wrong about who it was or shes misremembering but there is no question that people believed including trump, fox news, and many republicans that she was the victim of a Sexual Assault. That hasnt changed. He is mocking somebody who he admitted is a victim of Sexual Assault and now hes facing to find ways to blur the lines because the facts dont look good for Brett Kavanaugh when you look just at the facts. Well, shes inconvenient her testimony is inconvenient to his plan to pack the court. Anyway, democrats are disputing the account of background probes on twitter. A pair of tweets from the committee account controlled by the republican majority reverences kavanaughs background checks say nothing where was there a whiff of any issue related to inappropriate sexual behavior or alcohol abuse. Committee democrats responded with a letter to the chairman writing while we are limited in what we can say about this Background Investigation there is information in the second post that is not accurate. What did we find about the six fbi background checks of judge kavanaugh . Whats most important is what the six prior reports lack. And i am constrained by what i can say. As a general matter, fbi background checks will not go back prior to 18 years old. They focus on coworkers. Why not the freshman class at yale . These people are all over the place hitting the tip box with all kinds of stuff. Nay still have failed to interview not probably as a result of selfimposed constraints but rather straight jacketing from the white house. And they need to talk to, for example, one of the witnesses that i put in touch with them who can tell them about possibly improper outreaches to key witnesses in the ramirez incident who were known to judge kavanaugh and potentially indicate that he knew about that new yorker story. Is that illegal to go around new york talking about your misbehavior, your misconduct. Is it illegal . Is it witness tampering . Under some circumstances it can be if there is anticipation of testimony under oath by those individuals in connection with some Law Enforcement proceeding but put aside whether its witness tampering those contacts indicate judge kavanaugh knew about ramirez before the new yorker article. Professor, last word to you, im curious what i think everybody says implicitly where he stands on a life choice and that hot issue of roe v. Wade but theres a concern about who will have the temperament to be a member of the Supreme Court. We look up to that even after what happened in 2000. Let me ask you what can you tell about a guy who is in his mid50s based upon his behavior even if it was outrageous in college . What we saw during the hearing was a person who trades in conspiracy theories. It would make it difficult for me to imagine that he could be objective when it came to a question before the court too that looked at something that seemed democratic in his orientation. I want to be clear we have witnessed the diminishment of the office of the presidency. In my view the congress is broken and now we see the debasement of the Supreme Court. Senate mcconnell is going to plow this through. He doesnt give a dam about dr. Christine blasey ford, he doesnt care about deborah ramirez, he doesnt care about swetnick. They only want this appointment. Its a Faustian Bargain and democracy be dammed. This is an acrimonious person seeking to potentially threaten revenge against the democrats is a profoundly important picture. Thank you, senator Richard Blumenthal of connecticut, mimi rocah and eddie glaude. Coming up, President Trump hits back against the New York Times after an investigation into his finances on the front page. Trump seems most upset at how the article punctures the picture hes painted of himself as a selfmade billionaire. Plus, hows the kavanaugh effect motivating voters coming into the midterm elections and is the drawn out confirmation battle shifting some of the Key Senate Races . Well see that in a few minutes. And President Trump went after dr. Ford last night. It wasnt the first time he attacked the female accuser of prominent men, obviously. Finally we finish tonight with trump watch. This is hardball where the action is. This ihs ardball where the action is. burke thats what we call a huge drag. Seriously, thats what we call it. Officially. And we covered it. Talk to farmers. We know a thing or two because weve seen a thing or two. We are farmers. Bumpadum, bumbumbumbum new family connections, every day. Llion thats more ways to discover new relatives. People who share your dna. And maybe a whole lot more. Order your kit at ancestrydna. Com today at 2 18 p. M. Eastern time every american with a cell phone received a text message from fema that looked like this. It was a test, part of the National President ial alert system which is a new nationwide emergency warning system. This does not mean President Trump or his administration can use this at any time to contact all americans. There are protocols in place to assure that its only used for national emergencies. Some critics dislike the fact that at this point you cannot opt out. You have to take it. Well be right back. Reporter can you explain what is inaccurate about that story . If theres anything thats actually inknaaccurate about it . Im not going to sit and go through every line of a boring 14,000 word story. The only thing i will say one thing the article did get right was that it showed the president s father had a great deal of confidence in him. In fact, the president brought his father into a lot of deals and made a lot of money together. So much so his father went on to say that everything he touched turned to gold. That was Sarah Huckabee turning any story to gold trying to refute the New York Times investigative report on the source of trumps wealth. The story which took up a staggering eight pages in todays newspaper took over a year of research to get it done. Trump attacked the report and the times on twitter calling it a hit piece. But according to the times, the reporting makes clear that in every era of mr. Trumps life, his finances were deeply intertwined with and dependent on dads money. By their account, trump received the equivalent of up to 413 million from his fathers real estate empire, thats 400 million over his lifetime. Trumps long reliance on his familys fortune raises new questions about the image he has cultivated of himself. That of a successful Real Estate Developer who made billions from a loan of a Million Dollars. Here he goes. I borrowed very little money from my father. My father gave me a small loan of a Million Dollars. My father gave me a very small loan in 1975. I built a company thats worth more than 10 billion with a Million Dollar loan. As for that loan, the times reports fred trump lent him 60 million or 140 million in todays dollars. With the lead editorial in todays New York Times, that puts it more bluntly calling trumps origin story a sham saying its version of reality so elaborately embellished it qualifies as fan fiction more than biography. Yet weve seen trump goes to Great Lengths to maintain the illusion of selfmade billionaire. Heres what trump said about those who question the value of his assets in 1995. The only critics that would say that are losers. And people that know better or they dont know it all or theyre jealous or have problems. And heres how trump reacted in 2016 when marco rubio challenged him on the source of his money. This is what were going to have as president . Heres a guy that inherited 200 million. You know where he would be right now . Selling watches in manhattan. [ cheers and applause ] that is so wrong. Well work on that. I took 1 million and i turned it into 10 billion. I borrowed 1 million. Then release the tax returns so we can see how much money he makes. I borrowed 1 million and turned it into 10 billion. He doesnt make that much money. This is like groundhog day. Here you have marco rubio that got blown away in the race saying i just want to see his tax returns. Joining us is david corn and glenda blare is author of trumps three generations of builders. Glenda, you start. What do you make of the story that blew away the front page of the times. The amount of detail and documentation, of paperwork and financial records. It points out the president didnt do what he claimed it did which is make himself into a tyco tycoon. He didnt do it. No. He didnt. The model, the m. O. , the way of doing it, not so much. His father perfected the idea of figuring out the way around every rule, every law, every regulation and figuring out how to find a tiny corner that he could week around. He did in the his own career and he would turn to make to doing that for his son and the rest of his children, not a surprise. We hear the term born on third base and claimed he hit a homer but this guy looks like he was born sliding into home. How do you not make it when daddy gives you 400 big ones . 400 million. Thats not that long a way to a billion. Well, a silver spoon, no, it was like a platinum sp