Two federal charges. He did so as part of employplea. Hes agreed to cooperate with Robert Mueller. He admitted to two counts of conspiracy. All of this coming weeks after manafort was convicted in a different federal trial on agent counts relating to financial fraud. Jury selection for this new trial had been scheduled to begin in three days. His lawyers made this brief statement after proceedings ended today. Tough day for many manafort. Hes accepted responsibility. He wanted to make sure that his family was able to remain safe and live a good life. Hes accepted responsibility and this is for conduct that dates become many years. Everybody should remember that. Thank you, every one. What we dont know at this hour is what manafort is telling Robert Mueller and whether it has anything to do with the president or with the Trump Campaign. Shortly after the news broke the white house issued this statement, quote, this had nothing to do with the president or his victorious 2016 president ial campaign. It is totally unrelated. Joining me now from the courthouse, nbc news intelligence and National Security reporter, kelly o donnell. Chuck rosenberg. Thank you for being with me. Ken, let me start with you on the news. Sort this all out. We had the trial with manafort last month. There were some convictions there. Now a plea deal today. Whats he pleading to . How does it relate to what happened last month and how does it relate to the question of muellers investigation . Paul manafort is pleading to two counts. One of defrauding the yiunited states and another conspiracy obstruct justice. He walked in and admitted to almost all the bad things the government said about him over the last year in virginia and washington, d. C. He admitted to bank fraud, tax fraud. Failing to register as a foreign lobbyist. While the white house says this has nothing to do with the Trump Campaign, the reason they were investigatining Paul Manafort i because of the links to russia. He was evading taxes on money paid to him by ukrainian oli oligarchs. Now hes agreed to cooperate and talk about everything he knows about any illegal conduct. He cant be selective about that. Anything he may know and what is Robert Mueller investigating, hes investigating whether the Trump Campaign son spiconspired the russians. This is why this could be the most important day. You have the special counsel, Robert Mueller, who was put in place to look into this issue of russian involvement. Any potential ties between russians in 2016. Now you have this plea agreement featuring the man who was running for a time the Trump Campaign. Is that something the white house should be alarmed about right now in. Of course they should be. Theres nothing he can testify to that would probably lend weight to imachment because he didnt have close contact with President Trump while president. He did have contact during the campaign. Tough question whether or not alleged crimes committed to get somebody elected president is impeachable offense. We dont know the answer to that. Perhaps they can give information prior about his business dealings. Hes not a credibility witness. Hes pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, lying. What they are looking for is selfcorroborating information that can be used against trump. This validates what judge ellis said on day one. Theyre not interested in manafort for manafort. Obviously hes committed crimes but they are interested in him to see if they can, and this is him talking, if they can make him sing and then theres the possibility of him composing, elaborating on the story. There seems to be some confusion about what he would be cooperating with. Your sense of this is muellers interest would be trump . Fltheres no doubt about tha. Once he agrees to cooperate, he has to cooperate about everything. Theres no such thing as partial cooperation. The question is did he cooperate too late. Would he have been better off cooperating before his first trial. I think he was hoping for a pardon and the question comes up did the president act too late if he was going to pardon. He would have been better off pardoning early. I dont think well see any kind of a pardon at this point. I think well see cooperation and it remains to be seen whether the cooperation will help the special prosecutor, the u. S. Attorney in the southern district. That remains to be seen. Chuck, let me bring you in on that. Is that you are your operatinei assumption here . I think professor is right about this. When prosecutors talk about cooperation, they mean full and complete. They mean truthful. They mean everything about every one. Where i disagree but slightly is i dont think anyone is out to get anyone in particular. I dont believe mueller started this investigation to get a particular person. I think muellers mission from day one and the way he operates and i know this because i worked for him is to get the truth. Cooperators are criminals, typically and they have credibility problems, typically. Theyll have to corroborate what mr. Manafort says. We saw that in his last trial. Gates was the criminal. Gates was the cooperator and they didnt the government didnt just rely on gates at the manafort trial. They relied on gates and tons of documents and bank records and other witnesses to tell the entire story. You wont take manafort at his word. Youll take him carefully, fu y fully. Let me bring kelly o donnell. Folks have been speculating the possibility for the potential for the president to issue a pardon when it comes to Paul Manafort. Are you hearing anything now on that front . Reporter the most recent feedback weve had from the president s legal team is they have convinced him that it would be inappropriate for him to be pardon anyone associated with the russia investigation while the investigation is ongoing. You see the president use his pardon power for others. He seems to like the fact that its something he can do unilaterally and in some instances receive praise and criticism for his exercise of that authority. When it comes to a character like Paul Manafort in this larger drama, what his lawyers are saying to us is they have tried to persuade him and believe any conversations that took place about pardoning figures in this whether it be a Michael Cohen or a Paul Manafort or perhaps any of the others who have been involved would not be politically very damaging. We have seen republicans on capitol hill say that would be a line very dangerous for the president to cross especially while the i venvestigation is ongoing. Were weeks away from the midterms elections. Thats a big factor in terms of how will this will consumed politically. Its been known for a while now that Paul Manafort was found guilty in virginia. Todays events significant but not a big surprise. The cooperating piece is the biggest news of the day and what is it he could say. As a Campaign Chairman during the time he was serving the president s campaign, are there things in which he and the president spoke themselves without others around that he would now testify to. Are there any documents or information that he would bring to this. Not only about the president as the other panelists have talked about but anyone involved in this process. We know that manafort with one of those attendees that involved donald trump junior in 2016 with several russian figures. From the white house they are saying this is not tohing to do with the president even though you can argue unlawful contact was happening. They want to say this is an outside matter. You heard that from manaforts own lawyer. I thought that was cryptic where he was saying in addition to wanting to take care of this, these events were happening a long time ago. There will be no pardon. It will backfire at this point. If hes given a pardon then he cant take the fifth amendment. He would have to testify in i way. He could be called in front of a grand jury. The pardon is off the table. Its too little, too late. If all the elements we have seen, we had Michael Cohen, the manafort convictions a few weeks ago but now this cooperation piece of it. Is this the biggest threat that donald trump has faced in this saga so far . I dont think anybody knows until we know what he knows and what hes willing to share. Potentially, it opens up lots of doors that probably havent been opened before. I think from the point of view of mueller, this is a big win. This is a big gain because he gets access to somebody. For impeachment, he doesnt have access to anybody who is an insider in the white house. He has access to somebody during the campaign or before the campaign. Its still a big get for him. Okay. We are juggling a lot here. This is huge news in terms of the mueller investigation. Were going to have much more on it throughout the hour. Thank you. Im going to send it over to the other huge news in this world today. My colleague craig melvin is in North Carolina following Hurricane Florence. What is the latest . Reporter steve, you are taking a look right now at north myrtle beach. This is where Hurricane Florence is really shifted. The bulk of her fury, if you will. Right off the coast of the carolinas. She continues to linger. She continues to hover. She continues to dump large amounts of rainfall in the carolina coast. Were live here in wilmington, North Carolina. Theres a curfew in effect. More on that after this. More on the National Hurricane center 2 00 p. M. Briefing after this as well. This as well zero Expense Ratio index funds directly to investors. And now we have zero account fees for brokerage accounts. At fidelity, those zeros really add up. Maybe ill win, saved by zero at fidelity, those zeros really add up. This is moving day with the best inhome wifi experience and millions of wifi hotspots to help you stay connected. And this is moving day with Reliable Service appointments in a twohour window so youre up and running in no time. Show me decorating shows. This is staying connected with xfinity to make moving. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and twohour appointment windows. Click, call or visit a store today. Craig melvin up here in North Carolina. Not far from where Hurricane Florence made landfall a few hours ago. This is the scene in jacksonville, North Carolina. This is the scene right now in jacksonville. Massive 400 mile storm. Florence moving very slowly and the hallmark so far o of tf them has been the water. Un unrelenting rain and pretty sizable storm surges as well. The National Weather service calling the flooding c catastroph catastrophic. A look at sunset beach, North Carolina. The suv nearly completely submer submerged. Just about 90 miles north of here, more than 100 residents had to be rescued after the storm surge topped ten feet. Lets turn now to msnbc meteorologist. She has the latest. I understand we got an undate from the National Hurricane center a short time ago th. Did anything change dramatically in. We got this advisory as of 15 minutes ago. Still moving painfully slow. Its moving about as fast as we walk. We walk three four miles per hour. That will continue to cause many issues with the rain over the same areas over and over again. We have been tracking rain from this time yesterday. Some spots are seeing up to 20 inches of rain already. I bet you its a little higher in some spots. Lets take a look at whats happening now. Were looking at a lot of rain. Those are the darker colors. Thats where were seeing the heaviest rain falling. Were seeing this pink line. You want to Pay Attention as you head throughout the afternoon and evening hours. The good news with tornadoes that come out of hurricanes tend to be quick moving. Lets look at winds gusting. Well see winds gusting, maybe even Hurricane Force winds gusting for 24 hours stra s str. Seeing a 45 miles an hour wind gust. Were seeing back to y ining bu. We will continue to watch this day after day. It will be a story for many weeks to come. All right. Michelle with the latest on the storms. Thank you. Gabe is standing by for us. Hes south of where i am. Hes in myrtle beach. Hes on the strip there. How are the conditions now . Reporter hi there, craig. We have been getting hit with some strong winds over the last few hours. The story right now is actually the rain. You can see this intersection, some water accumulation. This much water wouldnt be a big deal. The thing is this is expected to keep raining for the better part of the next day. The concern that local officials have is that how much of this water will continue to accumulate for many of the roadways here in myrtle beach. Im here on ocean boulevard and something that we notice in the last hour or two is the fluctuating power numbers. At one point 10,000 people were without power here many this county. The bulk of them had now been restored. About 250 people without power. As we have been driving around looking for some damage, we have noticed some trees down across the roads. See Police Officers right there going through these different streets looking for damage, looking for any problems. Thankfully no injuries reported here in myrtle beach so far. South carolina hasnt seen the bulk of this storm just yet. These are just the outer bands of Hurricane Florence which is mostly devastated North Carolina as youve been reporting on those water rescues where you are, craig. Were expecting conditions to deteriorate here in South Carolina here in myrtle beach. The hope is that perhaps the forecast might not be right but local officials are expecting more than 20 inches of rain here. That could be devastating. Back to you. My goodness. 20 inches of rain in the 24 hours. Thats as much rain as myrtle beach would see in the span of several months. Thank you. Gabe talked about the Power Outages. All of wilmington, where i am, is without power. More than 200,000 people sitting in darkness. Lets head to oak island, North Carolina. Thats where we find msnbc marianna. Whats the scene like there . Reporter i wanted to move from the ocean over here to the northern part of the island so you can see some of that tree damage that gabe was referencing in myrtle beach. You can see some of the fallen trees in this neighborhood. This is an island filled with oak trees. When i spoke to the mayor this morning, she told me that streets like this and those trees falling on homes, on cars and on people as the storm passes. People think its safe to go out and about. That is up with of the the Major Concerns during this hurricane. I also want to show you the intercoastal waterway over here to my right. You can see just the current that the water is moving and how it could potentially rise and move inland over here where the houses are and where the roads are as well. Im going to ask my producer to start backing up a little bit because as we show you just how vulnerable all of these Barrier Islands here, were seeing more tree damage over here to the left. Its what many residents here are going to start to see in the next couple of hours and into tomorrow as the full extent of what this hurricane did is going to become clear to many people here. This is an island. Its the largest in the state of North Carolina. 8,000 residents. The mayor told me yesterday that at least 500 people had decided to stay. Those people are hunkered down. We have seen no one in the streets compared to other hurricanes ive covered. We have seen police presence, which is a good sign. Both bridges in and out of here totally closed. This island is completely isolated. Well bring you the latest as the hours go by. Craig. The treats being empty is a good sign. Officials telling me thats very much their wish over the next few days. That people dont just go out and try to assess the damage in their community. Thank you. In fact, here in wilmington, theres a cure few in effect. The mayor saying he only wants to see Emergency Personnel and officials on the streets over the next few days. Joining me on the phone by lieutenant russell. Always appreciate the time. Thank you for being with me this afternoon. Lets talk about what these communities in North Carolina right now but also South Carolina. What are these communities over the next few days, what are they going to be facing . The challenge will be the continuous search and rescue. This water thats coming from the rain and from the surge is going to continue to challenge them. You remember everybody explain what the plan was, when the hurricane come well wait till the wind down down and well come and get you. Get what, another call from mike tyson, you have a great plan and a strategy until you get hit in the face. This amount of water is now stretching them and theyre going to have to continue to do search and rescue while the storm is ongoing with these less than 70 miles an hour. Otherwise, theyll have a lot of people in the attic. They will have to work hard to get into the low lying areas. You dont need somebody to tell you where its flooded. Go in there and start knocking on doors and pulling people out before they go sinto the attic. Thats going to be the challenge. Were not going to wait until the storm is over with to get people. We have to get them now and while we have daylight, they need to put every high water truck theyve got on the streets going in there knocking