Explanation for this meeting was adoption policy under u. S. Sanctions. One american investors who worked on that policy told Business Insider this when he found out who was also in the room. And we quote. In the world of russian intelligence there is no such thing as a former Intelligence Officer. So in my opinion you had a member of putins secret police directly meeting with the son of the future next president of the United States asking to change u. S. Sanctions policy, crucial to putin. And in light of todays headlines it is worth remembering that the president and his aides this week applauded donald trump jr. For his transparency. And on tuesday after release his emails about this meeting don jr. Said, not once but twice, this is everything. I have a quick statement that ill read from the president. My son is a high quality person. And i applaud his transparency. More than happy to cooperate with everyone. I just want the truth out there thats part of why i released the all stuff today. But this isnt. Theyre trying to drag out the story they want to drip a little bit today a little bit then im more than happy to be transparent and more than happy to cooperate with everyone. As far as you know as far as this incident is concerned this is all of it. This is everything. This is everything. Can you explain to us why there is this playing of amnesia that affects all these People Associated with the campaign and one country and one country only . Every single day we do our very best to give you the most Accurate Information that we have. And we continue to do that every single day and have oh offered to be as transparent as possible with all committees and anyone looking into this matter. How refreshing to have somebody take responsibility, be transparent and earnest, admit that maybe he would have done things different. Most people would have taken that meeting. Its called Opposition Research or Even Research into your opponent. Zero happened from the meeting. I think the press made a big deal over something that really a lot of people would do. Well lets bring in tonights starting panel ken delaney is with us or nbc National Intelligence and National Security reporter who broke that exclusive report this morning. Indira boston globe columnist and the chair of journalism ethics at pointer. Rick stengel. Former Public Affairs department and former managing eder to of Time Magazine gp ill start with you mr. Delaney maybe Nothing Happened of consequence of the meeting but the drip, drip, drip nature of it sure looks like its not nothing. Thats absolutely right, brian. Thats really an interesting point. Even if you take the innocent explanation that it really was a nothing burger, the kind of things this lawyer and lobbyist were talking to the Trump Campaign about were of no consequence, the way the trump folks handled it is just so deeply suspicious, the story changed like three times and then even when don jr. Went on fox news said eye ive told you everything today we learn he didnt tell us everything. And the person that whose presence was not disclosed happens to be a kind of a political fixer who has represented russian interests in some way as suspicious character maybe not as quote i dont think he is a agent of putins secret police. But he is certainly a guy kind of operating in the shadows in washington, has represented causes that are near and deer to the putin government and somebody whose presence at the meeting is going to interest bob plural and house and senate investigators. To not disclose that you have to wonder as a political matter what the trump folks are thinking. And ken, this may not be answerable, may not be known. You may know and be unable to say just nod your head. Is there going to be anymore from this one meeting . Of course there were others. Well, brian, at the end of the today we sort of concluded here at nbc news we still dont fully under how many people were in the meeting. There is talk of a translateser being there whose name has been out we havent confirmed. There is potentially another person in the meeting. There are things to be learned about this meeting still which is incredible, brian. Because you know theres been so many chances for the Trump Administration to set the record straight and disclose everything. Indira, while i ask for your forgiveness for the new fewer than 15 pronunciations ive used tor your is your flame you have been a journalist all your life. I have to ask this about the trade. We dont know what we know because of Government Agencies being transparent and coming forward. It was another good week, a amid daily barbs of fake news it was a good week for a free and robust press. Absolutely. When donald trump says, oh i applaud my son for his transparency. Lets be honest there is no way at a donald trump jr. Would have released the emails had the New York Times not been on the phone with him saying weve got your emails and were about to release them. Thats the only reason he put them out there in order to try to get ahead of the story which was going to be out there anyway. In answer to the question token which is is there more come . Absolutely there is more coming. Everyone talks about is there another shoe to drop. There are more shoes in than in immelda markos closet. Were talking about how many people in the meeting the latest reporting showing six, might have been seven, each person suffering from all the russo amnesia wit a second no there was one else np no there was someone else. There was at translator this person. I means it incredible to me that donald trump jr. Things the worst thing about that meeting was that nothing came out of it. Its not that actually accepted the meeting i understand instead of calling up the fbi and saying somebody said that the russian government is trying to win the election. Help im here to report a crime. Instead of saying that he said i love it and went ahead with the meeting what he thinks is bad is that nothing good came out of according to him really we have to ask ourselves the question. And indira you are so right. That line nothing came of it has been the response from the president all through the surrogates. And we have no proof of that yet. We dont know that to be true or false. My old friend rick stengel, you are a master of optics, back when you ran Time Magazine, the cover that means so much to donald trump, you knew the power of a single optic every woke and then you went to work for the state department where the job was optics for in country. Having said that, the optics in week dont look good. The optics look just god awful. And in fact they have violated every rule of Crisis Communications that you can possibly have. Rule one is get it all out as soon as possible. And what theyre doing which is aiding the people in the media is having it come out in tiny little droplets. And what that does is perpetuate the story. Its a very unprofessional operation process. The fact we talk about not even knowing how many people in the meeting do you have a meeting here at nbc where nobody doesnt have a record . Its kind of astonishing. I mean i dont he know how they ran the trump observation they cant run the white house like this for much longer. Ken, weve got in russian lawyer who is so russian there has to be a translator to understand her for the americans in the meeting. We have the former intel guy, at least former that we know of. Let us not forget the two sergeys in the oval office. Let us not forget the possible invite for putin to come to the white house having already come to our the president ial election. When people ask you, what is it with russia, knowing that were still halfway down the road, whats your answer thus far . Well, donald trump was the most pro russian president ial candidate to run in modern history. Republican or democrat. That was before all this stuff. Now this meeting to me brian was a bit of a game changer. Because for months republicans and trump allies have been saying where is let evidence of collusion there is a lot of smoke you say but where is the actual evidence . Now we have of an email from Rob Goldstone on behalf of agalarovs whose father is a direct tie to putin. Offering direct help to the Trump Campaign and donald trump accepts and takes the meeting. Thats not proof but thats evidence of crucial and it seems like it has changed the game a little bit in terms of where in investigation is headed because it raises the question of what other meetings were accepted . What other communications happened along these lines. Indira, a twoparter for you. Can it be said this white house is a single issue white house, consumed by all things russia and secondly, was this particularly bad for credibility this week because you had the president tweeting about his sons transparency. You had the president giving definitive statements about what a nothing the meeting had been . Well, i mean again back to the whole question of the trump team calling to this call this a nothing burger. To the rest of america we would consider in a double whopper given the country indigestion and Heart Failure with a lot of hidden additives we dont know everything that was in there the secret sauce. What troubles me about the meeting is the quality were hearing every person in the meeting seems to have a different version of what happened or didnt happen were they talking about adoption, were they talking about sanctions . Did anything happen . Were documents passed . Was there stuff about the dnc . What happened in this meeting . And you know the latest former soviet intel officers in the meeting he says Something Different than the russian lawyer. Everyone has a different take. To the first question about whether this has become a single issue white house, i would say so for anybody concerned about ethics and laws and democratic norms in this country, yes, of course the white house says differently they say everything is mooting sailing, everything is going along as always. And the protective placements base is happy with them as they always have been. But i thought it was very interesting kenneth cruz tweeted out today an article from news day that ran i think it was eight days before president nixon resigned a front page story saying president fixen a base is still with him love him eight days later he had to resign having your base love you doesnt necessarily guarantee that you know youre going to always be in power if youve broken the law or youve broken the democratic norms of our country. Ill speak for the two guy was gray hair in new york we remember the days and there was a lot of that going around. Ken i have my spectacles on to read from you a Washington Post oped. I wanted to see if in sounds familiar a former cia Intelligence Officer writing today everything we know about the meeting from whom it involved to how it was set up, how it unfolded is in line with what intelligence analysts would expect an overture in a russian influence operation to look like. It bears all the hallmarks of a professionally planned carefully orchestrated intelligence soft pitch and thats a an interesting term of arten the Trump Campaigns willingness to take the meeting and more important failure to report the episode to u. S. Authorities may have been exactly the green light russia was looking for to launch a more aggressive phase of intervention in the u. S. Election. I hear another former Intelligence Officer today talk about that soft pitch. They want to make sure you dont report it and untroubled by the meeting. That green lights to them youre kind of a willing target. Youre someone they can do business with in the future. Youve got it perfectly, brian. Its so interesting, nearly every current and former Intelligence Officer you toek l speak to about in seems to have the same view. Its the one you just articulated. And what they say is it doesnt matter with whether this lawyer and lobbyist were dupes, were willing participants had a different story or you know the point is that the overture came in an offer of help from the russian government pan came through the agalarovs who had a business relationship with the trump family they were build being trump tower in moscow they were together on the Miss University pageant in moscow. The overture came in through a known person. And the Trump Organization showed it was willing to take the meeting. What happened after that the Intelligence Officers say is irrelevant because the signal was sent if in fantastic this was a dangle by russian intelligence, the signal was sent that the Trump Campaign was willing to play. And so then the question becomes well what else happened . What other overtures were made. Rick stengel david gearingen who served four president s said tonight its the most incompetent coverup he has ever seen. To your earlier point about malpractice in at least media management, does this now mean they will always be reactive . There is no there is no getting the upper hand . They dont look institutionally willing or able to get the upper hand. So im going to come back to that, brian. Because at the state department i dealt with russian disinformation and russian active measures they call it. I want to add one thing to what the Intelligence Officer said. Is that sometimes the russians do a the the faint. Maybe they wanted us to think theyre tampering in this election. They have a term of art in the Russian Military called the gray zone. The gray zone is about the fact that nothing seems clear at all. That is what they look like. They like grows frozen conflicts they like things unclear np thats what theyre doing now. To get to the first question, yes theyre completely on the back foot and will be probably forever. While the investigation is going on until that is consummated i mean theyre going to be asking question about this and you have a president by all accounts is absolutely obsessed with this. And may be watching right now about it. Our great thanks to our starting panel. Last day of the week but our first segment on a friday night token, indira, rick. Coming up after the first break, the legal team that keeps growing to deal with the russia response, when our broadcast response, when our broadcast continues. If youve got a life, you gotta swiffer intrzero alcohol™. Ine® it delivers a whole mouth clean with a less intense taste. So it has the bad breath germkilling power of this. With the lighter feel. Of this. Try listerine® zero alcohol™. What should i watch . Show me sports. Its so fluffy look at that fluffy unicorn hes so fluffy im gonna die your voice is awesome. The x1 voice remote. Xfinity. The future of awesome. Did you ever meet with any other person from russia that you know . I dont even know ive probably met with people from russia not the context of actual formalized meeting or anything like. Why would i . That was donald trump jr. Earlier this week. Now we know he did in fact meet with additional people from russia as did white house Senior Adviser and soninlaw to the president Jared Kushner and former Trump Campaign chairman paul manafort. So what are the legal ramifications of this changing story . And thats where the list of questions starts. With us tonight carrie cord row former senior associate general counsel for the dni be the director of National Intelligence. These days professor at georgetown. Brian weiss with us a criminal defense attorney who helped overturn the Campaign Finance convictions of former House Majority leader tom delay. Welcome to you both counselor. Im start with the president s new hire went out and got another lawyer under the category of you cant make this up, sports fans will recognize the name. Ty cobb a modern day distant relative of the baseball star. Ty cobb hired to oversee the white house and media response to the investigations. Tom energies officials want someone to enforce discipline . The white house regarding russia matters. That includes the president who frequently events frustrations about the investigations upon twitter. Two people familiar with the plan said. So carrie, in real life, the old ty cob was known for sliding into base and drawing blood. Dont make my search for a metaphor here. But is this kind of discipline, the discipline people have been how willing for is the roll of a personal lawyer. Certainly when there is outside investigations at this point were up to four investigations if you count the three congressional investigations and the special counsel former fbi director bob mueller investigations. Clearly there is jeopardy for the president and for many individuals in the white house. And there has been a complete lack of discipline with respect to lawyers all over town wondering you know how come the president s lawyers cant control his various tweeting and public statements that are the confusing and are related to the ongoing investigation. So certainly it makes sense to those in the Legal Community why there would be another attempt to bring in a lawyer who can bring some order and discipline to whatever is their legal and media strategy. Brian we know about the feds, that they hate being lied to. In fact its a crime. But you just never lie to the feds. How do they feel about a slow drip . Look you got to understand that it doesnt do anybody any good, whether its the president or don jr. , to hire a lawyer if youre not going to listen to them. And brian i think the only way that ty cob can do Team Donald Trump any