Demand. We can go through them, washington, adams, jefferson . Lincoln . No, not lincoln. Anybody . Roosevelt . No. I hereby demand. Stunning. Erdogan and putin say that. This is maggie trump who is being investigated by a department of justice appointed special counsel consulted with his attorney on his order to the doj to investigate the investigation into himself. Why do you go to your personal attorney, why do you go to your white House Counsel . Thats why theyre there. This deals with the constitution this isnt a porn star payoff. This has to do with the constitution of the United States and upholding checks and balances that madison gave us 1787. Hes not interested in the checks and balances that madison gave us. And the second part is this is a political strategy. This isnt about the constitution. This is about trying to get him out of trouble and create a diversion from what bob mueller is looking into. Welcome to morning joe as we back into everything this morning. Its tuesday, may 22nd. With us we have msnbc contributor mike barnicle. Fellow in global and comparative politics mike, not to keep interrupting. Mike backed into a garbage truck the other day. Theyre going to take his license away. Mike no. Kids are trying to take away your license, arent they in. Sort of, yeah. All right. Fellow and dploebl in comparative politics at the London School of economics, brian closs. How are the twins doing . Not good. Whats happening with the twins right now. They had a good start to the season and fell apart. Whats happening . They won yesterday, in the eighth, they came from behind. Overall, its a disappointing season for the Minnesota Twins fan. Brians book, how to rig an election well get to that this morning and in washington, nbc news capitol hill correspondent and host of kasie d. C. On msnbc, kasie hunt. You wanted to start the show differently. Willie and i you know what we do before the show. We go down the newsletter and the orphanage and we do that work at least. But on the way up from the orphanage, i just i saw i think it was guy vincent had tweeted out, hey, im all for investigating what we need to investigate. Theres one thing that keeps bothering me. That is, if the deep state was really conspiring so elect donald trump, i just cant sort through this. Why, why did they keep the investigation of donald trump private before the election, but of course comey sent out the letter ten days before i got to say if that in fact was the deep state trying to play puppet master, they are really bad at what they do. And the New York Times, one of the few times well say this the New York TimesEditorial Board, they write this about trump v. The department of justice. Write quote there was a sophisticated multiyear conspiracy by russian government officials and agents, working underdirect orders from president Vladimir Putin to interfere in the 2016 president ial election of donald trump. Full stop. Donald trumps intel chiefs that he put in place all agree with that fact. Let me continue. The american Law Enforcement and intelligence communities warned of the Trump Campaign during 2016 about this multiyear effort by Vladimir Putin to rig americas elections, which all of Donald Trumps intel chiefs said, they in fact did. And they asked both campaigns to report anything suspicious. Now kids, you may have heard the department of Homeland Security after 9 11 say, if you see something, say something. Thats what the intel communities did here. They told the Clinton Campaign and the Trump Campaign hey, theres a multiyear effort by the russians to interfere with americas 2016 election. If he see anything, anything at all thats suspicious, this is obviously very dangerous. One of our sworn enemies trixting to influence the outcome of the president ial election. Let us know. Get what the Trump Campaign did the campaign did nothing. To the contrary, writes the New York Times, at least seven Trump Campaign officials met with russians or people linked to russia. And several seem ed eager to accept the russians help. As the fbi became aware of these contacts, it began to investigate. And yet the bureau went to Great Lengths to shield this investigation from becoming public even before the election. Even as james comey, then the fbi director, spoke openly about the investigation into Hillary Clintons private email server. These facts, write the New York Times and im sure guy vincent and trumps own appointed intel chiefs are not in dispute. So the question has to be, brian closs how does devin nunes with a straight face, how does mark meadows with a straight face, how does Rudy Giuliani, with a straight face say the sort of things that donald trump wants him to say, when it is beyond debate that everything the guy benson, that the New York Times that all of us have been saying for some time, that all of these things happened. The russians were trying to interfere, the fbi was warning both campaigns. The Trump Campaign we havent seen anything. Even mike pence, lying through his teeth, after the trumps were sworn in, lying through his teeth saying we never spoke to russians. Well, because theyre orchestrating a Political Campaign to politicize the rule of law in america and theyre trying to do it to save the president s skin. Even if it means hurting American National security. Even if it means eroding democratic principles and institutions. Even if it means sacrificing their own personal integrity that they tried to build for their careers. I think the strongest parallels 2014 in turkey when president erdogan facing a corruption investigation. He called it a witch hunt. He fired prosecutors and he purged the equivalent of the department of justice. This sounds really familiar, right. And they chipped away at it slowly, day after day and i think thats what were in the midst of, democratic decay, we accept new normals, that were previously unacceptable by republicans and democrats and are now just daily life. And wheres paul ryan . Wheres mitch mcconnell. Something you said yesterday, thats the most disappointing because they should know better. Paul ryan, mike pence, they have all the angles, all the experience, they absolutely positively know better. And have chose ton do the wrong thing. Instead, willie, theyre lumping olump i lurching out on something, the controversial version of the new coke. This doesnt end well. This guy trump, he goes away, he leaves a stain on the legacy of mike pence and leaves a stain on the legacy of paul ryan and leaves a stain on the legacy of devin nunes and leaves a stain on megcy of mark meadows and leaves a stain on of mitch mcconnell. He leaves a stain on the legacy of of every republican that will not raise their voice, at a critical crossroads of this Constitutional Republic, where the president of the United States is interfering with an investigation into the president s operation and willie, by the way, this is after the president s campaign manager. Has been indicted. This is after. The president s head of National Security has been indicted in and it cooperating. This is after the man that the president said was one of his top Foreign Policy advisers has been indicted and is cooperating. This is after one of the guys that ran Trumps Campaign, helped in the Inauguration Committee, and even was working the white house at the beginning was indicted and is now cooperating and how Many Russians . 13 russian nationals, three Russian Companies all indicted. And yet trump is trying to interfere with actually one of the most brutally efficient investigations in modern u. S. History. And republicans are saying nothing. And clearly, the president is worried about what bob mule certificate working on because he doesnt know what bob mueller has. Mueller appears to be three, four, five months ahead of what we all know publicly. When you see the allegations about the middle eastern contacts during the campaign. All of these things that seep out from behind the scenes, these are things we didnt know were happening. Thats got to worry trump and thats why you see diversions and why you see meetings like the ones youll see today. The white house will gather lawmakers and intelligence officials for a meeting on a secret fbi source, the Washington Post described it as either a concession from the Justice Department or maneuver to buy time and shield actual documents, yesterday President Trump met for an hour at the white house with deputy a. G. Rod ros rosenstein as well as fbi director Christopher Wray and National Intelligence director dan coats after trump posted on twitter, i hereby demand and will do so officially that the department of justice look into the whether or not the fbi doj infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign. In a statement after the meeting. White house reaffirmed a doj Inspector General review and added it was also agreed that white house chief of staff kelly will immediately set up a meeting with the fbi doj and dni together with congressional leaders to review highly classified and other information they have requested. The decision means Congressional Republicans like nunes can access information on what if any use the fbi made of a secret source during the russia investigation. Something he has been demanding. Yesterday morning at c. I. A. Headquarters, President Trump praised nunes. A very courageous man, hes courageous. Congressman devin nunes. Thank you very much, devin for being here. Thats the president praising devin nunes whole will get a look at the classified information from the russian investigation. So much has been coming at us, is this the same devin nunes that held a press conference at the capital. He went scurrying to the white house. Said i have information i must pass along to the white house that will it had to do with i have Important Information that i let me be perfectly clear, i am taking to the white house and i am not a crook. And then he comes out, and to the white house, and hes been given information inside the white house. Who does that . After lying to reporters, saying i must go hes nothing but a floor fied courier. I believe they call it the midnight run. Didnt charles grodin. He was great in that movie. Grodin. One of the greats. Heaven can wait with warren beatty, was grodin not great . And stay focused. Willie, i got you. So this is a quote from the president of the United States. Remember the interview in december with Michael Schmidt on the terrace at maralago. He told Michael Schmidt of the New York Times, i have the absolute right to do what i want to do with the Justice Department. Thats the way he thinks. He hereby demands. Thats the way he thinks and thats what hes doing today with that. Lets go to kasie hunt. Is the doj capitulating or buying time . One of my questions is whether or not democrats are going to be able to see this information as well. Typically you would offer classified intelligence to a very select but Bipartisan Group of people and the details on this are so fuzzy. I think we can anticipate that today. I want to go back to paul ryan for a second. We touched on that, but lets, lets not underestimate the degree to which he is enabling and has enabled devin nunes in all of this and how many times hes appeared to be caught flatfooted by, in his understanding or apparent lack thereof of how its going to play out politically. He said we have to know where there are fights of abuses fisa abuses, it has nothing to do with Robert Mueller. That construction is fundamentally not what is going on here with the Freedom Caucus. So is paul ryan mr. Good guy act. Oh, gee, i just care about policy. I dont know this politics stuff. Had is the that tishtick this rn doing for years now. Paul is not dumb enough to actually think the two are separated. Nobody believes paul is dumb. Hes a very smart man, right. Is this just shtick. Just gee whiz, oh gosh, go pac, yeah. Devin, go ahead and go ahead and undermine the constitution. I mean whats going on with paul ryan he has to know. Hes got to be able to link these two things together, right . I honestly think based on my conversations around this as they have unfolded over the last couple of months, i honestly think he got caught flatfooted in how quickly this moved. Who kasie, who are his advisers . I was not allowed to like go to the bathroom at the wrong time in congress. If it didnt look right. Hey well of course, you want to go to the mens bathroom. Exactly. I was like mr. Mcgoo. But if i was going to drop a bill as one of 435 like backbenchers, my staff would look through the building, no, this doesnt look right. Paul ryan is the speaker of the house, while constitutional norms are being ripped to shreds. Have we to believe that paul ryan and his staff member does not know what is going on here . That this is what erdogan did in 2014. Not what americans have done since James Madison and hamilton sketched together the United States constitution . Is he really that out in the dark . Are his advisers really that out in the dark . I think you have to remember the political reality that paul ryan has been living with for the past years. What made him speaker of the house and that was, the mandate to manage this group of people on his right, the Freedom Caucus broadly defined and to not let them tear the republican conference apart and he has continued to try to governor that way on this particular issue and there at a higher cost. A at what point, because this guy is leaving. And now hes a lame duck. Im just curious, i dont know, paul, ive known paul since hes 23. Ive always tone people i loved paul. I was so thrilled when mitt romney picked him to be his Vice President. But at what point does paul ryan stop worrying about the Republican Party and start worrying about the republic . Were at that point now, is there a realization, kasie, on the hill that we are at that point . Weve been talked so much about this. People sound so different when the cameras arent on behind the scenes. Everybody, i feel like most people that i talk to in both parties, obviously the degree of outrage and concern varies there are some republicans who will say all right everybody just needs to take the temperature down. For the most part people are in fact you know, they have their jaws on the floor. They use swear words that we cant use on tv when they talk about this presidency. They wont say it in public. You can use those words on this show, we have a sevensecond delay. You can, i wont. You got to be one when youre leading. I dont understand it, mike. I actually heard, i always hear thing about bill clintonin, the would go on tv and scream in his defense. I understand this goes and works for both parties. But mike not to cover old ground, but, god, it was very goldwater, firebrand, conservative, the really the founder of a modern conservative movement, that drove to the white house and told nixon its over. And were not even asking paul ryan to do that. Were just asking paul ryan to pick up the phone and go, hey, devin, listen, youre my buddy, youve been loyal to me, i understand. But youve stepped over the line. Mark meadows, youve stepped over the line. You want to make me on, you want to divide the party before i leave . You can do that, but youre going to lose. Youll have the votes in the short run, but youre going to destroy the Republican Party. Ive been sitting here and listening to this for 10 or 12 minutes. I have to tell you the truth, it is so sad and so depressing. Were talking about the United States of america unaptly named Freedom Caucus. The disassembling has worked. It has worked. You go out to the country and ask you people what do you think about this . They say what is going on. The Freedom Caucus. You want to take the Freedom Caucus . The root of this the root of this occurred nearly two and a half years ago when every american intelligence service, the c. I. A. , the fbi, the nsa, realized that the russians were attacking the foundations of our democracy, our electoral system. We dont talk about that. People dont know about that. The Freedom Caucus never mark meadows and jim jordan never mentioned the fact that we were victims of an act of war. We have a commanderinchief who is not defending the republic. Whose intel chiefs, that he appointed. Let me