Can he Donny Deutsche. Best dressed is never me when donny is here. Author of the book a world in disarray richard haas, and columnist for Time Magazine eddie glod. Senior columnist at usa today heidi, Michael Schmidt with a bunch of whoppers out this week. He is the coauthor of one of those pieces we referenced this morning about the white house looking for leverage on muellers investigation. President trump eights Approval Rating is at 36 . The president is said to be laying the ground work to undermine special counsel tasked to investigate any links between the russian government and the Trump Campaign and any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation and any crimes committed in response to the investigation. According to the Washington Post, President Trump has told aides that he was essentially especially disturbed after learning that special counsel bob mueller would be able to access several years of his tax returns. His lawyers are sending a message with jay saying the scope is going to have to stay within muellers mandate. If theres drifting, were going to object. He cited a report in bloomberg based on a Single Source that says mueller is examining Financial Transactions between trump, his associates, and russia going back to at least 2004. The Washington Post reports that trump has asked his advisors about his power to pardon aides, family members, and even himself in connection with the probe according to one source. Another said trumps lawyers have been discussing the president s pardoning powers amongst themselves. An advisor said the president has simply expressed curiosity in understanding. You can could google that, mr. President , of his pardoning authority and the limits of muellers investigation. This is not in the context of i cant wait to pardon myself, a close advisor said. The New York Times is Digging Deeper that President Trumps lawyers and aides are looking to discredit or even fire special counsel bob mueller and his prosecutors. The effort includes scrutinizing donations to democratic candidates, investigators past clients, and muellers relationship with james comey, whose firing as fbi director is part of the special counsels investigation. The president had considered mueller to replace comey as fbi director, and even met with mueller shortly before he was appointed special counsel. In trumps interview with the New York Times on wednesday, he said, talk about conflicts. Mueller was interviewing for the job. There were many other conflicts that i havent said, but i will at some point. Not clear what that is. White house advisors told the Washington Post that another potential conflict is an allegation that mueller and Trump National golf club in Northern Virginia had a disbutte over membership fees when mueller resigned as a member in 12011. A spokesperson for mueller said there, in fact, was no dispute. According to the Times Justice Department rules say they cant participate in an investigation if they have a personal relationship with the sunl of the case. However, Something Like a Campaign Donation is not included on the list of things that would create a political relationship. And Deputy AttorneyGenerals Office the Deputy Attorney generals order appointing mueller a special counsel allows for a broad mandate out of the russia probe into any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation. On wednesday the Deputy Attorney general was asked to address some of these issues. Some of the attorneys that he has hired that several of them have made donations to Hillary Clinton, to the clinton campaign. Does that bother you . Does it make you believe that those people have any reason to be questioned in terms of their impartiality in this investigation . At the department of justice we judge by results, and so my view about that is well see if they do the right thing. Obviously before we have the power hitting third baseman of the philadelphia phillies, mike schmidt, here with us. One of the authors of one of these incredible blockbuster pieces. I want to ask you, theres a lot in this piece, but obviously the flashing red light here is the notion that the president is talking about to what extent he has to pardon, his aides, his family members, and potentially himself. Tell us more about what your reporting shows about what his attitude is towards that question. He is asking the question with what kind of disposition . I think the president clearly understands the seriousness of mueller, and he clearly gets the problem here, which is that an investigation which starts with russia is just going to go in a lot of different directions. What he what the white house is trying to do is try and find ways to stop mueller from going beyond that and what can they do . Theyre researching the lawyers that mueller has hired. Theyre looking at their backgrounds. Theyre looking at the cases that they dealt with. Theyre looking at whether they ever got, you know, rebuked by courts or anything. Just trying to come up with any type of information that they could use to put these to either disqualify some of these lawyers Going Forward or to put them on the defensive and to create problems for mueller. They are certainly taking an aggressive posture here. When ken star was apointed, there were folks in the clinton world that started demonizing him for political reasons. This seems to feel along those lines and be if not more severe. I think the president wants to be aggressive here. They are going to fight this. Instead of saying, look, you know, oh, well do everything to cooperate and well just kind of leave you alone to do what you are doing, i think the president is really going to go after them. The president s lawyers, i think, certainly some of them, dont want him to do this. What impact are any of the lawyers that he has surrounded himself with having on the president in this regard . Well, its our sense that they dont want him to be out there. At least, you know, some of them dont want him to be out there being so aggressive on this issue. They think that it antagonizes mueller. It raises questions about the independence of mueller, and its a distraction, and its not helpful. At the same time this is a president that believes he is his best spokesman and has shown the willingness to attack these folks, even his own attorney general. He sees that as his best offense here. At the same time it sort of raises questions about it is process. He is really undermining mueller in ways, certainly in the publics eyes and putting the political lens on it that may not really be there. All right. Speaking of raurz and shakeups. This morning there are shakeups to the external trump legal team. Mark jackson reports that Mark Kasowitz is no longer leading the counsel. Politico and the ap says that he is seen as a michiganing presence in the operation. Mark, the spokesman for the outside legal team, tells Peter Alexander, he has resigned. He started just two months ago, and according to politico, had grown frustrated with the operation and warring factions and lawyers. He was also reportedly concerned about whether he was being told the truth about various matters. One of those people said. Heidi here. Heidi, what do you hear about how hope always springs eternal that someone someday will be different . It seems like this is how every story about tangoing with trump ends. Well, its also in the context of what is happening at this time. I take you back to the beginning of this campaign that all of us have been pushing to get that disclosure, and somehow, you know, the president promised during the course of the campaign that after the audit was over, he would give us those tax returns. Of course, he never did. Not only did he not give us the tax returns that werent under audit, we never saw any tax returns that are no longer under audit. This seems to be the trigger point for the president. Even those closest advisors around him are starting to feel like i would like to know what was it that made him suspicious that maybe even he isnt being told the truth . Nicole, i want to jump back to where you started the show. A great interview with corker where he said it was implausible that President Trump would ever fire mueller. Trump tells us what he is going to do. He shows his hand. He has said there is a red line if you go into my businesses. Of course, theyre going into his businesses. I want to refer anybody to a spectacular article by greg unger in the new republic called trumps laundromat where it lays out the dirty russia money coming in. Trump knows he cannot let it go that far. He cannot. He will be destroyed. He will end up possibly in jail. He will fire mueller at some point. You can see. He is teeing it up. Thats where this is going. Make no mistake about it. Donald trump is not going to regardless of what the law is or repercussions are and let this investigation go on its own terms in its current way. Yeah. And i just want to jump in here because, one, i think only Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein can fire mueller, and its mueller isnt the only one who enrages him. In your interview from earlier this week, i made a list of everyone dised in 50 minutes. Sessions, mccain, rosenstein, mueller and comey. Theyre not all the same, obviously. These are distinct men with different profiles, but anyone arguably thats going to run the Justice Department or be the dag is going to have some commitment to the rule of law, which is going to allow mueller to conduct an investigation. Theres nothing outside the scope of the investigation. That seems central to it. Yeah. I mean, you can clearly see as they do this research and they sort of look into the lawyers, theyre also looking not only to put hurdles in muellers way, but if they have to make the argument to get rid of mueller, how would they do that . Would this give them ammunition to do that . Theyve raised these questions about hmuellers relationship with comey. There really isnt much of a relationship there. Theyve said, oh, mueller cant do this because him and comey are best friends and comey did this to get him appointed. Well, indeed they have worked together in the past. Mueller and comey did. They arent really that close. They arent really buddy buddy. There are folks that comey has been very close with over the years that he worked with as a prosecutor or that he took with him to the fbi, but there really isnt a relationship there. Theyve searsed ized on that as of undermining mueller. Theres probably few people in washington as wellrespected by both parties as mueller. Theyre taking on someone who a lot of people like and who a lot of people have respect for, and someone who is really credited with keeping the country safe after 9 11 as the fbi director and is basically keeping the fbi intact as it moves forward and changed its Mission Towards counterterrorism. I want to get to some of the other noncandy striper voices around the table. Nicole just made this point, richard, about the list of people that trump took on in the legal judicial Law Enforcement establishment. It seems to me he is at war with all the establishment. These institutions that have quasiindependent status. They are political appointments, but they operate independently. Last time donald trump went to war with a washington establishment, it was the intelligence establishment. It defendants exhibit woid not for him. As you look at where we are right now, as these battle lines are being drawn, where do you see this going . Its not clear to me. I think it has an internal limit. Why do we assume it does . At the end of the day donald trump, like any president , is going to think about selfpreservation. I think because he comes outside the political culture i dont think his initial instinct, i dont think what his default position is the preservation of the system. I think its the preservation of his presidency. The president preservation of himself, the preservation of his family. I think we have to understand at some point that theres probably going to be a structural tension between what is legal and what is legitimate. Right. And i think its too narrow a conversation to have around this table and other tables to simply say is what he is doing legal . I think theres going to be a larger conversation about his view of his presidency and what he can do. The wall street Journal Editorial Board writes about sessions. The white house said thursday that President Trump still has confidence in attorney general Jeff Sessions, but after the past two days the better question is whether mr. Sessions still has confidence in the president. Mr. Trump needs the ag at this point more than the reverse. Working for a president who can be as willful and rash as mr. Trump cant be easy, and somed aviesors may find it impossible over time. Mr. Trump needs people who can protect him and the country from his worst instincts. If mr. Sessions quits, mr. Trump might not find anyone else who will take the job. We began the show in talking about all of this over the past week or so. We began the show with bob corker talking with nicole. They might have to go to the white house to say, mr. President , you sht just playing with fire. You are on fire. You have to stay away from bob mueller. We would hope that would be the case. I think that would be the case, in fact. Watching President Trump throw Jeff Sessions under the bus, it makes one wonder why anyone on the hill would align themselves with this guy. In some ways it remunds me of an evil character in one of my sons favorite shows. Valdemort. Only i must live at the end of the day, and thats the way he seems to function. It seems to if you align yourself with this guy, you might end up, shall we say, not surviving. All right. Still ahead on morning joe an nbsz news exclusive. Kier simmons just interviewed foreign russian it was invited inside the oval office by President Trump last may. Kier will join us live with that exclusive interview just ahead. Plus, member of the Foreign Relations committee senator chris coons, kathleen sabilias. First, heres bill karins with a check of the forecast. The fire in california exploded again yesterday. It went from 40,000 up to 70,000 acres. Unfortunately, now reports of up to 50 structures have been burned. Theyre still trying to get containment on that braise. How about the fire that was in new jersey yesterday . Wharton state forest. This is near washington township, new jersey. Doesnt look like new jersey, does it . Thats 1,000 acre blaze. They have that about fully contained at this time. The heat is the problem. If we get these fires, they do form and they do rapidly spread. 78 Million People under heat advisories or excessive heat warnings. Just as hot today in the Central Plains as it was yesterday, and even hotter for the midatlantic region, the carolinas, all the way up to new york city. Also, on top of this, we have a Severe Weather threat. 27 Million People at risk. This is from fargo from north dakota all the way down through minneapolis, rochester, right into the heart of wisconsin. Even chicago once again could get hit late tonight. This area has been hit a couple of times this week, so the chance of flash flooding is now in a moderate risk here. The southern portions of wisconsin. Along with the wind damage threat, you have to watch out for the high water. Todays forecast as we mentioned, as hot as it gets. 103 in st. Louis. The midatlantic, it looks like d. C. Is going to be the hottest on saturday. Then final on to sunday we cooled off with thunderstorms in areas of the midatlantic, but were still very hot throughout much of the country. Washington d. C. , step outside this morning. It feels like 91 degrees. Thats gross. Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. Choicehotels. Com. Badda book. Thats it . He means book direct at choicehotels. Com for the lowest price on our rooms guaranteed. 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