Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20190412 : vimarsana.com

MSNBCW Morning Joe April 12, 2019

Shared, and he knows nothing about wikileaks, which he cold a tre called a treasure trove in 2016. Along with joanne willie, we have moork barnic have mike barnicle, we have John Heilemann wikileaks. White house correspondent for pbs Newshour Yamiche slalcido is here with us. Do you have the clips . All the times with wikileaks . Its called a deep tease. The sunday before super tuesday claimed to know nothing about david duke, claimed to know nothing about the klan. In 2000 he said he wouldnt run on any ticket that would run on a ticket with david duke. In the wikileaks comment that ran again and again in 2016. When the president throws around terms like spying, much of the country simply tunes out. When attorney general does it, its a whole different story and now the Justice Department is reportedly concerned about partisan allies of the president using William Barrs phrasing to suggest that something illegal occurred. Oh, are they. An attorney said barr was not trying to provide conservatives with rhetorical red meat. First of all, we just have to stop there. Higheilemann heilemann, thats just such a total lie. Everybody on the planet knew that he said that that he was talking about red meat, even though he backed off. He didnt back off. If who wasnt doing that, what was he doing, given theres no evidence for it whatevsoever. Even though there was no evidence whatsoever of that improper surveillance or spying, whatever they want to call it, theres a lot of countervailing evidence that everything that was done was proper. Four, five federal judges approved the warrant, this were all republicans. You have republicans all around this process that were saying, yeah, this is something we need to look into. Everything was done by the book and there were procedural safeguards, something that donald trump hates, certainly he considering to be a nuisance but there were procedural safeguards all along the way. The surveillance of carter page went through a fisa court. What a lot of conservatives and republicans doesnt like is the way the fisa surveillance was approved, they dont likes the basis for it, the information provided to the court. But thats the fisas courts decision. Youre arguing with fisa but also Rod Rosenstein, who signed off. Dana bente, people who work for bill barr in the Justice Department. Its like people currently republicans working in the Justice Department approved it. And fisa court wasnt just created a year ago. If you watch the clip of bill barr using the word spying, hes a smart guy. He clearly knew exactly what he was saying. His claim through associates in through the press is he doesnt make a distinction between spying and surveillance and who didnt mean to suggest anything improper was done. Except for the fact that who thought that was wrong that you do that in Political Campaigns. Really, seriously . Is he that stupid . I dont think hes that stupid. There are a lot of lawyers in washington, d. C. That are shocked with what hes doing right now that have known him for years, 30 years, democrats and republicans alike are shocked how reckless and irresponsible and roy cohn like hes being. Hes destroying his legacy here. What happens to those people who destroy their legacy . Their troops say thank you for destroying your legacy by showing you have no respect for the rule of law. What happens to those people in the end, meike . Let me answer he gets fired. I talked to somebody who said, first of all, he was stunned at the difference between the bill barr he heard in testimony and the bill barr he knew as a practicing lawyer and a Republican Attorney general. And the second question he raised is epidemic in washington and in certain circles of the media and it is this what scares these people so much about donald trump they they give him incredibly stupid loyalty . What is it that so scares these people . Its something that mika and i have not understood from the very beginning. From the moment and you can go back and look at the tape, from the moment paul ryan endorsed donald trump a couple of days after calling him a racist, we said on this show if you stand up to donald trump, he respects you. If you speak, you know, tough when youre talking ba to him, he will actually negotiate back and forth. Nobody in washington, d. C. Since he has become president has stood up to this guy, maybe kelly once in a while, and matt mattis . Guess what, mattis left with his reputation in tact. Anybody in the next administration would love to have mattis there. I dont understand that question, why they all fold to him. Well, hes a bully and i think that hes bullies are the easiest people to handle actually. The person familiar with the attorney general thinking hooves also u he was using the word spying in a technical sense. By the way, i see people on twitter who know better, people who have been in the news for a very long time just making foos fools of themselves. Its embarrassing. By the way, i respect them so i dont respond but theyre making fools of themselves but it makes me sad. It makes me sad, john. Reporter mr. President i think what he said was absolutely true, there was absolutely spying into my campaign. When the democrats go behind the scenes and they go into a room backstage and they sit and they talk and they laugh because they know its all a big scam, a big hoax. It called politics. This is dirty politics so this is actually treason. Now an attorney general who calls spying for what it is. In plate 2015, recall 2016, spying began on the Trump Campaign. That information leaked that led to what they consider to be legal spying. Then you have the culmination of the ultimate spying where you have the fbi director spying on the president , taking notes, illegally leaking those notes of classified information. Why . So they could appoint a special counsel to spy on an acting president again. Again, i dont know about devin nunez, all right . Skip him. But everybody else knows about him. Like anybody that has ever met people, judges who are on the fisa court know, these are the best and the brightest. Er that also pretty tough men and women. They take their jobs extraordinarily seriously and dumb asses like that that are accusing fisa judges of being part of a conspiracy, a political conspiracy, should be ashamed of themselves. Theyre a disgrace to this country and this once again, and Donald Trumps done it all along, this once again an attack on the federal judiciary. Its that simple. Benjamin wittes has a new piece and writes in part the use of terminology like spying and spying on a Political Campaign is bound to play into ongoing conspiracy theories promoted by the president himself about the origins of the russia investigation. When the attorney general has questions about the conduct of his department, the proper thing to do is not to dangle those questions in a congressional hearing in a fashion bound to stir up conspiracy theories. In the daily beast rick wilson calls bill barr the most dangerous man in america. He writing in part barr won the job by writing a memo before he knew a single fact contained in the mule aeller report. As attorney general barr would protect this president from charges of obstruction. Barr knew then and knows now that he has an audience of one, donald trump. Like barrs job application memo, every word of his testimony this week screamed out obedience to the president. And form are soer senior advises in a new piece for nbc news, it is painically clear that the attorney general cannot and should not be the arbiter of what congress and ultimately the American People can see when it comes to the mueller report. David ignatius, weve talked to people in washington who are depressed by the decline of attorney general barr, way hes performed publicly for Donald Trumps benefit. What insights can you give us on barr as well the washington legal communitys reaction to this performance this week . Joe, barr was supposed to be the professional, the person that had Justice Department experience who could be counted on for at least professional judgment, measured judgment, and i think the reason the people have been so shocked is that in his comments especially about spying on the Trump Campaign, he is feeding a narrative on the right that essentially there was an effort at a coup detat against President Trump that was run by officials of the fbi, officials of the Intelligence Community, and its the most poisonous narrative that you could have. And the idea that the chief Law Enforcement officer of the United States with all these crazy rumors swirling would feed them with these loose comments shock people. Its a sign in part, as you said earlier, how frightened bob must be. Hes clearly not a disciplined speaker. But i note the reaction overseas. Ive been traveling a little built abroad recently and people watch whats happening. One person said to me, a prominent asian, your country is lost. I think thats increasingly the perception. Another said to me were concerned about our ability to continue cooperating with a country thats in this much chaos. So the stakes are high. I hope bar understanr understan. I hope its getting through to him that he made a beneficial mistake. The attorney general took a bad situation, made it much worse not only with domestic implications and hes going to be proven to be a liar, and he knows that. It must have been worth it to him. Hes already going to be outed as sanitizing the mueller report. So now that thats getting hes close to getting, posed the exposed there, he launches a new lie, throws bait out to the most radical antilaw and order people in america and sends a message across the globe that this is a country that is spiraling out of control because of its president. Barrs claim that there was spying is rightly getting the headline but the followup questions that took place in that hearing when someone asked him what evidence do you have of spying . He said, i have no specific evidence and went on to say i have questions and concerns, which makes him more reckless to makes the comments with no evidence. And the he said ill go a step further, ool say it will say i illegal, it was unprecedented spying and it was illegal. Hes going to ride that as long as he can. Attorney general barr could not pro vovide oneson single bar why he said there was spying in the trump cam pan. And the devin nunez comment that james comey because he made notes that there was spying and in the fbi theyre taught taught to make notes and document whats going on. It goes back to this idea that President Trump as the core of who he is is someone who likes to traffic in conspiracy theories. He started his political life by saying president obama might not have been born in this country. Then during the republican nomination process, he was talking about ted cruzs father possibly being involved in the murder of president kennedy. So i think what you have is someone who has seen conspiracy theories work to his political benefit and thats why youre going to see not only the president but the people around him who want to stay in his orbit are going to echo his own behavior. Except now the Conspiracy Theory is echoed with the support of the attorney generals office. He was asked do you have any proof . The attorney general responds, not really, i dont have any pro proof. Thats what roy cohn toll joe mccarthy to throw out charges that would inflame the right g rightwing base when you have no evidence of the charges. The testimony of barr and the clarity they brought of i dont know what has happened to him but what he is now is very clear. I think beyond this discussion, some of the most striking thanksgiving that dthings that day were giveaways. On the striking of the Affordable Care act, well, donald trump wants to have another program. They asked him about the drug problem and opioids. He talked about why we had to build a war, nothing do with opioids. Hes making the kind of arguments that the white house communication director or the White House Press secretary would make. Hes been, to your point, mika, fully trumpified and to the extent that hes operating not as an attorney general a quasi independent head of the Justice Department but is acting as a purely political hack for the president. It was on painful display this week. So what are the operating theories . Why would a man with a good reputation threw t through th years, why would he completely drive his reputation into a ditch . Make no mistake, it is driven into a ditch and when the facts come out, his reputation will be sullied forever. What are the operating theories in washington why he would do this . I think the biggest is that theres been a counternarrative being spun for more than a year now by republicans that this was an improper, unethical, deep state attempt to reverse the election results. Thats what many republicans believe, that devon nunez is the leader of that group but you read that in the conservative press. Theyve got a lot of memos they spin back and forth. But why would barr go there when he knows the process was proper, he understands the role of fisa judges better than anybody else, he knows the surveillance would not have been approved, would not have got i dont know gotten past four or five republicanappointed fisa judges. He knows that. Why would he throw that theory out, sully his reputation when he more than anybody else knows this was a legitimate inquiry . There are two possible answers. One is that when he read the mueller report, which we still have not, he looked at the evidence and decided that there was far less that he expected of wrong doing and that he had questions about how the investigation got started in the first place. I think the more troubling one and likely the more accurate is that his good sense has been broken down by being in Donald Trumps Justice Department as attorney general. He is surrounded by people who believe these conspiracy theories. It takes strong character in a period like this to resist lies. You have to stand up. You have to take risks. And barr, looking at him, i felt looked like a weak attorney general who is not prepared to dig in and tell the country the truth, even though it would risk meaning the president was angry at him. He didnt seem like the man to do that. So lets have a little cleanup operation here. Im going to bring up two names of people when the time came that their country called on them to do the right thing, they did it. Attorney general jeff sessions. He did what was required by law. He did what was required by the ethics of the situation. And, yes, im going to say it, Matthew Whitaker. When the president of the United States pressured Matthew Whitaker to do something that he knew to be um proper, he stood up to the president of the United States. Let that be said. And what happened to both of this many . Theyre both gone. Im just saying reputation in tact, to an, te to an extent. Mabb wiybe william barr like job hes the attorney general of the United States. Hes working for wrong person. So he serves conspiracy theories. What is worth that . Its not that hes had this job for a long time. He kind of begged his way into the job. He campaigned for it. It raises the deeper question. Before he became attorney general, bill barrs reputation was fine. But he got begged to get the job, now has the job and is doing these things. What would make you want to put yourself in a position where your reputation was almost inevitably going to be tarn eshd tarnished in the did the job for donald trump . I was talking to mika about this last night. I saw your father as he was getting older and said maybe it would have been exciting to go back into the administration and he was asked. Your father would have never compromised who he was and his sense of Public Service and theres so many people out there that would do that. Ive heard stories of other officials speaking truth to power. George schultz, when the former epa chief went out and talked to the Hoover Institute and everybody was around and who was the former epa chief . What was his name . House of correctio how quickly we forget. Under reagan . No, no, under trump. Scott pruitt. I thought you were talking about theyre trying to get right by the Trump Administration and everybody sitting around and theyre talking how great, pruitt, thank you for coming. George schultz walks up to him, looks at hum aim and goes, you , you are the single least impressive human being ive met. I think your dad said that to joe. Once. He loved him. Now to some other stories making headlines this morning. A federal grand jury in california has indicted lawyer Michael Avenatti on 36 new charges, including alleged fraud, perjury, and embezzling millions against clients. They come with a possible max sentence of 335 years in prison. Michael avenatti also faces separate charges in new york for attempting to extort 20 million from miknike. He tweeted, im entitled to a full presumption of innocence. And Actor Jussie Smollett is su sued. The entire city of chicago is ang angry, the police chief, the officers, the mayor. Everybody is angry. So who pressured this state attorney to drop those charges . I have no idea, but i think it raises some questions about one of the things that peoples is expect is that there was some defect in the way that even though he there was a case and that somewhere along the line there was something that in the process of putting the case to the, there was putting the case together, there was something done wrong. Thats not right. She recused herself, the state attorney. Something happened from higher up. But i dont know the answer. Whats your gut . Somebody with power stepped in. I think the

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