And later, my conversation with senator Kiersten Gillibrand. But first we are following a wave of breaking news. Rudy giuliani tells the New York Times and nbc news Robert Mueller will seek to conclude his investigation into collusion with russia by September 1st. So far we have not heard anything from the Special Counsel ourselves. Robert costa from the Washington Post reports an important asterisk. That deadline might hold true if the president sits for an interview. At the same time, President Trump ordering the Justice Department to investigate an if in Fib Informant who was used in the early stages of the russia probe. The president tweeting, quote, i here by demand and will do so officially tomorrow that the department of justice look into whether or not the fbi doj infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for political purposes. As for the president using the power of his office to intervene in an ongoing Justice Departmentinvestigation, maybe we shouldnt be too surprised. You look at the corruption at the top of the fbi, its a disgrace. And our Justice Department, which i try and stay away from, but at some point i wont. Looks like some point was today. We are also hearing tonight from the Justice Department as well to talk about all of this, im going to bring in my panel with me on set. Senior writer for politico and coauthor of the politico play book jake sherman. Chief washington reporter and msnbc contributor kimberly atkins. Former special Assistant To The President and former spokesman for vicepresident mark lauder. Nbc news intelligence and National Security reporter ken dilanian. And joining us by phone is the New York Times reporter Michael Schmidt who broke that story on the Mueller Probe time line. Michael, you are with us, of course, by phone. I want to start with you. Can you walk us through your conversation with rudy giuliani, what you learned about the time line Going Forward . We know that the Trump Administration had been saying
they think its time for this to be wrapped up. Giuliani has had a series of meetings with mueller. In one of them two weeks ago, muellers team volunteered this. They brought up this, and what giuliani said that date is an end marker. If the investigation goes beyond that point, if there were findings that come out after that, that is too close to the election. He calls that, quoteunquote, comey territory, referring to what happened during the 2016 election where comey had to make public statements before the votes were taken. And he giuliani very concerned about that and about the impact that could have on the president. Hes trying to put a marker down about that September 1st date. Did you get the sense that if, in fact, this, the investigation didnt conclude by the september 1 date, that mueller would simply put the investigation on hold or would he be making a commitment to not release any findings before the
election in that intervening time, or is this a pledge that, no, all of our investigative activities have going to be finished by this day . Well, its a great question. Who knows what could happen between now and then. Other things that mueller may have to look at and what could delay this. But what folks say is regardless of what mueller does, its a political decision. If he were to release something before the election, it certainly would have a political consequence. If he didnt, it would have a political consequence on the other end. It is such an important thing, such a big decision that no matter what he does, there will be an impact. What will mueller do . Will he if he feels the president wont sit down, will he feel comfortable subpoenaing the president in the months before the election or would that be interfering too much with that . I dont know. Michael, before i let you go, very quickly, i want to get you to weigh in on a story we are about to talk to the rest of the panel about, which is all of the news that broke about the doj and the fbi and the informant. Does the department of justice feel right now as though they are under real serious pressure that could leave them in some real trouble . Or do they view this as simply the president distracting with tweets . Well, this seems to be the latest sort of fascinating dance that Rod Rosenstein has had to do in regards to balancing what the president wants and sort of following the rule of law. And in many of these cases, they have referred things to the Inspector General as a way of showing that theyre doing something, but not going so far as to open a criminal investigation. And this to me looks like rosenstein, once again trying to keep the president at bay, trying to keep House Republicans that have been breathing down his neck off of him, by saying, look, we are going to do something. At the end of the day, the Inspector Generals investigation is a serious thing, but it is not nearly as serious as a criminal investigation so it is not the
full mounting. Michael submit, thank you for your time tonight. Well be following your reporting. As michael was just talking about and we had started to delve into this conversation about the department of justice and they have now asked the Inspector General to expand their current review in the wake of the president s tweet request. Deputy Attorney GeneralRod Rosenstein releasing this statement saying, quote, if anyone did infiltrate or surveil participants in a president ial campaign for inappropriate purposes, we need to know about it and take appropriate action. It is worth remembering this tough talk rosenstein had a few weeks ago about some republicans impeachment threats against him. I can tell you there were people who have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite sometime. And i think they should understand by now, the department of justice is not going to be stoextorted. Were going to do the rule of law. Any threats anybody makes is not going to affect the way we do
our job. So, ken dilanian, you have been spending probably far too much of your Weekend Reporting on this story, but we very much appreciate it. Im hoping that you can kind of cut through what has been i think a very confusing thing for people to try to sort through here. The department of justice clearly coming under incredible pressure now from the sitting president. What do you make of the statement, the fact that the department of justice and rosenstein himself came out, felt that they had to respond to it, and in what context would you put the degree of significance . I think this is a very shrewd move by Rod Rosenstein because who can argue with is that statement . Of course they should take a look and see whether anything was inappropriate about this placement of an informant. Its a huge deal. Lets not kid ourselves. The idea that first, trump said there was a spy in the campaign. Thats not what happened. Clearly there was an informant who went to talk to americans who worked for a president ial campaign sent by the fbi, potentially other intelligence agencies. That is a major deal. It is perfectly important for the Inspector General to scrutinize that. Can you imagine the levels of approval that would have taken, the Attorney General of the United States to make that happen . Theyre critical about the steps they take. The reason is they were deeply concerned about potential Russian Infiltration over members of the Trump Campaign. Thats what this investigation is about and thats what well find at the end of the day a. Were they looking for or did they feel they had evidence of criminal wrongdoing on the parts of these people in the campaign . We dont know the answer to that but lets remember this began as a Counter Intelligence investigation, not a criminal investigation. Really what they were trying to figure out is were the russians exercising improper influence over any of these people . Were these agents agents of a foreign power which has its own definition of law and allows for its own kind of surveillance. One of the techniques they do is they send informants to talk to people and potentially record their conversations and see if theyre going to incriminate themselves. And have we, to our current public historical knowledge, have we ever seen anything like this before in history sfla no, i dont think we have. There is no precedent we know of for this happening, and it speaks to the level of significance of this investigation. But what i also find amazing is the fbi let voters go to the polls in this election without disclosing that they had suspicions that some members of the trump team were agents of a foreign power. Thats a decision that will go down in history and will be debated for years to come. Yeah, of course in the context of them talking more than they normally do about the Hillary Clinton investigation. Mark lauder, i want to talk to jake sherman about how some of this came out visavis the house and their pressure, but from the administrations perspective, i realize youre not there day to day any more, but in your conversations with people that you worked with, what is the sense behind the scenes in the white house of how significance this is . Obviously were dealing with a new cycle where the president tweets and we rocket from one thing to the next to the next. This strikes me as something that potentially has a bigger,
more lasting as ken pointed out historical significance. How angry are the white house and aides about this . The president is frustrated about it rightfully so. From an anger standpoint, i think theyre sharing the just the sheer shock of the matter like many of the American People that the fbi used a foreign someone who is connected to the intelligence community, both the american and British Intelligence communities sent them in to spy on the Trump Campaign and that is something we have never seen before. And its at a historic level and something concerning. Jake sherman, lets talk about how some of this has come about because of mark meadows has, and company, have gone to war with Rod Rosenstein and have been pressuring the department of justice on a whole host of things. And to our knowledge the speaker, paul ryan, seems to be going along with it. There had been some pull back when it seemed as though the white house was willing to try and protect sources and methods. But that clearly has blown up now. Yeah, its really fascinating you kind of have a trio of republicans, devin nunes, mark meadows and jim jordan who have been beating the drum very loudly on capitol hill. Even when it seems like the white house wants to play it cautiously and wants to play it carefully and the president is definitely receiving counsel that he ought to play it carefully, you have these three guys that have the president s ear, especially meadows and jordan and nunes who is close to the speaker of the house paul ryan who has been his friend almost two decades. So, it helps in the sense that he has this back up. He has this kind of echo chamber that will go on tv, these three guys who will go on tv and say what he wants them to say and kind of i think helps spur them along a little bit. Kimberly atkins, youve been reporting on this all day. What are you learning from your sources behind the scenes at the white house . Its unclear. We dont know what the president means by this tweet. We dont know if hes going to ask for some sort of formal
criminal probe or whether this i. G. Report that Deputy Director rosenstein said he would undergo would be enough. We dont know if this is just because its sunday and he was home and had a lot of executive time and he was angry about this, or if this could lead to some sort of constitutional crisis tomorrow if he asks Deputy Attorney general rosenstein to do something that he doesnt want to do, and perhaps it leads to the sort of a new saturday night massacre, monday morning massacre, if you will. So people are waiting to see exactly what this means. There is still a lot of unknowns, but there is a lot of concern that this could be a big deal. Ken dilanian, the president seemed to have some of his facts not totally right on friday when he was tweeting about this. At least thats what i talked to several white house officials over the weekend who essentially said that, wow, okay, parts of the tweets that were not 100 on point, that the president clearly understood the overall implication of this. Do we have any indication how the president learned about
this . Was it just news reports . Was it some other way . Weve also been doing some reporting on our team about rand paul talking about the cia and all of this. I mean, where do the facts stop and we tip over into thats a good question. We dont have clarity. We know devin nunes has been trying to get some of this information from the Justice Department. Hes in a fight with them. He wants the name of the informant. The Justice Department has been resisting that. At the same time you have News Reporting going on including by me. I published a story on friday about a professor who fits the profile of the person the times and the post later, hours later named as the informant. Our story says we arent saying this guy is the informant, we havent confirmed hes the informant. There are people talking around this investigation about various people who met with George Papadopoulos and carter page and who those people thought were suspicious encounters. So, its not clear how donald trump knew, but its not surprising that this is coming out. We are just Getting Started tonight. Still to come, inside another
meeting that donald trump, jr. Had at trump tower and that is also raising eyebrows. Plus, well talk about stalled efforts to improve School Safety and gun safety when former secretary of education arne duncan joins me exclusively. Plus the house passed major Sexual Misconduct legislation. Why is the senate dragging its feet in bringing those sweeping changes . My conversation with senator Kiersten Gillibrand. Kasie d. C. Back right after this. Uhp. I didnt believe it. Again. Ooh, baby, do you know what thats worth . I want to believe it. [ claps hands ] ooh im not hearing the confidence. Okay, hold the name your price tool. Power of options based on your budget and well make heaven a place on earth yeah oh, my angels ooh, heaven is a place on earth [ sobs quietly ] ooh, heaven is a place on earth brbut how will his dentured to thicope with. A steak. Luckily for brad, this isnt a worry because hes discovered super poligrip. It holds his denture tight and helps give him 65 more chewing power. Leaving brad to dig in and enjoy the tastiest of tbones. Super poligrip, helping you enjoy the foods you love. That skills like teamwork, attention to detail, and Customer Service are critical to business success. Like the ones we teach here, every day. Now to a story it seems like weve heard before. Donald trump, jr. Meeting with a person linked to a Foreign Government who is interested in helping his father win the president ial election. The New York Times writing in August Of 2016, the president s eldest son attended a meeting that included an emissary with a crown prince of two gulf nations. George nader, former advisor to the uae who is now cooperating with Robert Mueller, nader reportedly told trump junior that the crown princes were eager to help his father win the election. The times also reports the Israeli Social media specialist had drawn up a multimillion Dollar Proposal for a plan that involved using thousands of fake social media accounts to promote trumps candidacy. On platforms like facebook. The president responded on twitter. Surprise, surprise. Writing in part, quote, the
worlds most expensive witch hunt has found nothing on russia and me so they are looking at the rest of the world. Heres what the ranking democrat on the Senate IntelligenceCommittee Mark warner had to say about that times report this morning. If the times story is true, we now have at least a second and maybe a third nation that was trying to lean into this campaign. And i dont understand what the president doesnt get about the law that says, if you have a foreign nation interfere in an american election, thats illegal. All of the people involved in that meeting say nothing came from it. And, ken dilanian, at the defense here has sort of been i dont know if you want to call it the naivete defense, we took these meetings because they wanted a meeting so we said, okay, fine.