His decision on whether the u. S. Will stay in the iran Nuclear Agreement. And a tease by President Trumps legal team. Reportedly picking the oneYear Anniversary of special counsel Robert Muellers appointment. To announce whether the president will grant investigators an interview. Today voters in a number of states head to the polls in primary elections and its the West Virginia gpa race that has republicans in washington very nervous. Can the very controversial Don Blankenship win the primary . And First Lady Melania Trump launches a new childrens wellbeing initiative called be best. But did she borrow from Michelle Obama again . With us to start things off, we have msnbc contributor Mike Barnicle. Pulitzer prizewinning historian and the soul of america, the author of the soul of the america the battle for our better angels jon meachum and elise jordan. Good to have you all on board. Joe, a lot going on. Kind of all over the map this morning. Yeah, all over the map this morning of course, a lot of the news last night about new yorks democratic attorney general. A story comes out in the new yorker and a couple of hours later, the Democratic Party forces him to resign. Unanimously. It really is what a bizarre world we live in that donald trump is accused of sexually harassing dozens of women and admits he sexually assaults women on tape and yet people like mike pence talk about what a great christian he is and how he loves starting meetings with a prayer. Its strange that the party of mike pence is fine with, with people like donald trump. And you have the party of nancy pelosi and hollywood, all of those godless types according to republicans. Who actually hold a politician accountable. For abusing women. Even listen even the allegations, just the allegations of abusing women while in relationships with them. But very interesting. Im sure that everybody inside the Trump White House will be disciplined enough to actually attack Eric Schneider man, given they work for a man who has abused women throughout his entire life according to my gosh, dozens, dozens of said women. Yeah. And theres obviously an ongoing legal issues pertaining to women at this point as well. Well get to all of that in just a moment. We given with a reported tension inside the white house over Rudy Giulianis numerous media appearances over the past week. Giuliani denies that the appearances have caused alarm in the white house but two sources familiar with the president s thinking tell Nbcs Kristen Welker that the president is finally, ive added that word, beginning to lose patience with some of giulianis recent interviews, in which he has at times contradicted the president and the administration. One source says quote the president still has confidence in rudy, but rudy will need nor discipline to keep the president s confidence. Trump attorney jay sekulow says giuliani continues to provide valuable counsel to the president and the legal team. And press secretary Sarah Sanders had this to say. Is the president pleased with the appearances of Rudy Giuliani over the last few days . I didnt speak with him specifically about his feelings about it. But certainly feels that hes an added member, added value member to his outside special counsel. So you will be hearing, joe, from Sarah Sanders a lot of these words. Which weve heard before. But youre going to be certain to hear them all the time now. I have no knowledge of. Not that ive heard. Ive not heard specifically. Ive not something ive spoke ton the president about. If she says that about everything, what is she standing there for . The job has lost all of its credibility, at least with her in it. Shes been lied to so many times, its actually, actually thats the best thing for her to do at least, because shes vouched for donald trump before and shes always been put in a bad position. Because donald trump is, she knows, is you know, as we all know, he lice all the time. He lives in a posttruth world and unfortunately for those around donald trump, the rest of us do not live in a posttruth world. If you repeat Donald Trumps lies every day, well, we already know that about donald trump. But youre going to have to live with that for the rest of your life. Mike barnicle, its interesting that donald trump went out as he was leaving the white house, a few days ago and said rudy needs to get his story straight. He just came on and he needs to get his story straight. Well rudy got his story straight and he went out and said hey, yeah, there are probably more women, we could expect more women that could happen, yeah. More women may come forward in the future. So now donald trump is upset about that. And reports again, may be the latest version of the mooch. He may be on his way out. The more this continues. The presidency as theater, you have to ask the question are we being played by donald trump and Rudy Giuliani . Because every day giuliani says something that is so odd and so at odds with the law, as we know it, that you wonder, are they just continuing this thing to keep us preoccupied with things that are going on in public, giuliani talking about donald trump mike, i wish they were that smart. Theyre not that smart. Donald trump said during the transition that Rudy Giuliani was losing it. That he was a couple of steps behind. He said a few other things. That he was falling asleep five minutes into meetings. Everybody around donald trump said he was drinking too much. Donald trump suggested as much. That was two years ago. And the fact that donald trump brought this guy in two years later despite his own reservations about him, almost two years ago, thats not any, its not 3d chess. Thats not even checkers, thats a monkey throwing poo against the wall and it doesnt usually turn out well. I did not say winningly, i think theyre just doing this and were going along with it. Look what were not talking about. Were not talking about severe cuts to the chips. Childrens Health Improvement act. Were not talking really, and we will today, about iran and why three allies, britain, great britain, france and germany are not going along with what we are appear to be doing. This is, this is just a classic shell game. That they perhaps unwittingly. As joe mentioned, one of the things that giuliani opened the door for reporters to ask the white house about, was whether this is potentially more unknown payouts to women who claim to have had affairs with the president. You said he, this is a regular arrangement he had with Michael Cohen. Did Michael Cohen make other payments to women for the president . I have no knowledge of that. Think if it was necessary, yes, he made payments for the president , he conducted business for the president. Is that possible, are there other women out there who received money from the president to stay quiet . Im not aware of any other activity. But i would refer to you Rudy Giuliani to respond to any of those questions. Or anybody else on the president s outside counsel. Youve been in his circle for a long time now. You were on the campaign. Is that anything that came across your desk . Im not aware of anything like that, i would refer to you the president s outside counsel. Jon meachum, this may get us, its crazy like mike said. It may distract us from talking about the iran deal for about five minutes or so. But this is actually significant. What Rudy Giuliani has said according to Jonathan Turley and many other legal experts, hes gotten in the middle of their narrative and there are real legal consequences to this Stormy Daniels lawsuit. Michael cohen is now wrapped inside of it. And again, a lot of people a lot smarter than i am, when it comes to these sort of matters are saying that this actually may be an existential threat to the president of the United States. And putting Rudy Giuliani in there, a man who cant keep his story straight, when youre already in that sort of legal jeopardy, why i just, its like putting pat paulson in as your attorney general instead of John Mitchell in 1973, how do you like that reference, meachum . Its very good. We could do a. Mitchell palmer later. We could play attorney general jeopardy. Im not a lawyer, you are. But i have a sense that its never a good day when your lawyer has his Office Raided by special counsel who used to run the fbi. Im just a simple country guy. But i just dont think thats actually a good thing to happen. I think this is what rumsfeld used to call a known unknown. Think all of this is an interesting way is kind of the taking of the Rupert Murdoch culture, to washington, where if, the New York Post kind of volume and if i may leveling of nuance, actually is now running the government. So you know is this goodfellas meets cspan . Is that rudy and trump . It kind of is. Theyre just doing what they do. What do they fall back on . On a roy cohn strategy of fight fight fight. And it reality is doesnt really matter. Because the reality is whats in the paper or whats on the screen. At this particular moment. And it goes back to the report in the New York Times, at the end of last year, that peter and maggie and other folks on the story, who said trump had said to the staff during the transition, lets treat every day as the episode of a tv show in which i vanquish my rivals. If youre busy vanquishing, to go to mikes point, you cant be busy building. What comes with that, elise, with being street fighters and counterpunchers is the truth often evaporates or the truth doesnt matter. In the course of counterpunching and fighting. So you have somebody like on his very first day as attorney, Rudy Giuliani going on hannity. And in the course of trying to squash the idea there were Campaign Finance violation, explaining why it may be a violation to pay off Stormy Daniels. And the scope of what Rudy Giuliani thought his job was expanded. He was up on a stage spitting on a mock iran deal. Pretending he was ripping it up. He wasnt being an attorney, he was being what jon described, a new york guy who will fight whatever the fight of the day is for donald trump. Afounsed the return of kidnapped americans from north korea before the National Security did. He completely is out in front of his skis. I really think that the wild card with all of this is it remains the women. And you see this over the past year, with so many women around the country saying were sick of it, were sick of men in power abusing us. And it happened last night with new York Attorney general Eric Schneiderman. And i think that the drum beat is going to continue. Rudy giuliani has given them an opening. For more women who have potentially been paid off to come forward and its not going to stop. Did Rudy Giuliani go 0 on tv yesterday . He probably wasnt allowed on, right . Do anyone see him . He couldnt help himself. He called up. Its the difference, the behavior here is the difference between jon referenced it, between reacting and acting. They react to a wave of headlines each day. They react to it and the next day, a new wave, new reactions. President trumps legal team has reportedly picked the anniversary of special counsel Robert Muellers appointment to announce whether the president will grant of investigators an interview. Rudy giuliani tells the wall street journal they aim to decide by may 17 whether the president testifies okay. Can i can i just please. This is the vernacular in which we live. This is reality tv. Its a show. Two men on may 17th, well let you know if were going to let the constitution survive. Tune in at 2 00 p. M. To the Iran Nuclear Deal. James madison, youre fired. In an informal fourhour practice session, mr. Trumps lawyers were only able to walk him through two questions. Given the frequent interruptions on National Security matters. Along with mr. Trumps loquaciousness, one person familiar with the matter said yes . Mika, hes very smart. Where did he go . He went to bucknell, i think in. No, fordham, good school. He fordham, a really good school. And this goes back to again, the fact that donald trump again everybody around trump is scared of Robert Mueller. And they think that Robert Mueller is too smart for donald trump. They think that robert ruler will run circles around him. Because mueller is a st. Pauls man and went to printston. They dont think trump can keep up with him. At the end of the day i guarantee you that the Supreme Court of the United States is not going to be announcing their season premiere of subpoena. The Reality Tv Show. Because willie geist, it is, its going to be on netflix, its going to be far more than likely its going to be a very short, about 13second version of Peaky Blinders its going to be violent scene and theyre going to say the president has to actually sit for, the deposition. Then thats the end of their show. Based on the report about them trying to go through a series of questions in a mock interview with Robert Mueller, theres a 100 chance that the president of the United States whl would incriminate himself in an interview with Robert Mueller. Think about the fox friends interview and can you imagine what would happen in that interview . I wouldnt put him in that room for million. He did it with lester holt. He it hurts me, theres nobody on set, so does everybody on set agree with Donald Trumps lawyer . That just because Robert Mueller is smarter than donald trump, or has a better education than donald trump, that Donald Trumps too stupid to sit across the table from him . Because it seems to me, thats what everybody is saying. If i were donald trump, i would make sure i proved to them that i was not that dumb. Rudy is not going to tell him hes that dumb. Rudy will back him. There is no way that donald trump can sit in front of mueller and plead the fifth. I dont think that is politically viable. But willie, you are suggesting what all of Donald Trumps lawyers have suggested all along, that donald trump is just not smart enough to sit in front of Robert Mueller, and not be abused. Well i didnt quite put it that way. But what i do know is that donald trump thinks he can talk himself out of anything. He spent his entire life doing that he think his charm trumps all. If youll forgive the pun and thats not going to work with somebody like bob mueller who is armed with months and perhaps years worth of facts and information about what he thinks donald trump may have done in terms of colluding with russia or obstructing justice after the fact. Who can tell donald trump that . Whos the one who sits and says, i think this is a bad idea. I think this is the one time, mr. Trump, where youre not your own best advocate. Hell never listen to that, he wants to sit across from bob mueller. Joe yeah . Let me ask you when you say that you cant see President Trump taking the fifth amendment. Why would he be unafraid to take the fifth amendment . Look at where he is today and look what hes done. Look what hes been publicly accused of doing. Why would taking the fifth amendment, do you think hurt him among his core constituency . Well first of all, because they heard him say that only the mob takes the fifth amendment. But also for donald trump the secret has always been strength. You have to appear strong. Appear stronger than you are. Going back to what bill clinton told the democrats in the 1990s, better to be strong and wrong than weak and right. So taking the fifth would make donald trump appear to be extraordinarily weak and also a hypocrite in a way that could show again you show the clips from the convention all the clips of him saying you only take the fifth if youre guilty. I think it puts him in a bad place. So at least thats my opinion. All right. By the way, mika, i may have it wrong. Maybe donald trump didnt start it at bucknell or did he start at Sarah Lawrence and then go to penn . No, fordham. Good school. And then he went to penn and he graduated from penn after five deferments on the same day that 40 americans were killed in vietnam. Thats right, okay. Still ahead on morning joe new York Attorney general Eric Schneiderman has resigned in the wake of abuse allegations. Well dig into the implications there. Were counting down to President Trumps announcement about the Iran Nuclear Deal. Admiral james tstavridis