The gun safety battles including heat on mitch mcconnell. Neal katyal is here later. But our top story tonight is this new intensity in congressional opposition to trump, including developments in a probe that some democrats say could actually change the future of the trump presidency. Democrats in congress are now preparing for what will be their last major legislative session before all eyes turn, of course, to the 2020 race next year. And now i can tell you theyre outlining a new way they want to check President Trump. Now, the context here is something you know about, its something you know from your calendar. Summer is over. When democrats left for this summer recess, the members in their caucus calling for impeachment were in the minority. And now, they are the majority of the democratic caucus, which may explain why Congressional Democrats are pushing these newly aggressive probes into some admittedly familiar topics. Investigative hearings on hush money payments that donald trump made in 2016. Now, lets break it down as we try to do around here, really clearly. The knowledge of those payments, thats not new. The knowledge they were illegal, that isnt new either. Michael cohen famously went to jail for that months ago. Whats new is democrats saying they could actually reach an indictable crime by the president treating trump as a coconspirator. So what is new about that . Well, basically, the aggressiveness, by at least some House Democrats to zero in on what they call their criminal and what is in their view, impeachable acts, which can be publicly pinned on donald trump. Now, how do you pin something on trump when he has been obviously stonewalling so many of these probes . The news tonight here is democrats saying some of these crimes are effective lip different for any impeachmentstyle probe, because they involve evidence from before donald trump became president. That means no executive privilege claims can hide the underlying evidence or testimony to again, as im saying, pin this on the president. Democrats say these new hearings could come as soon as october. House judiciary chair nadler already saying theyve started formal impeachment proceedings. And this is the framework that Speaker Pelosi will have to address, will have to basically contend with as she returns to washington. With some constituents who have been demanding she and her party go further. I need you to lead for my Community Support an impeachment inquiry, one that is already going on. Its happening. Reporter with the Lifetime AchievementAward Ceremony is quickly interrupted with People Holding impeach now signs. Impeach now impeach now and i think we owe it to every american to find out what happened and make a judgment at the time. But it is an extremely high bar. It is now 134 democrats, as i mentioned, the majority of the caucus, that are onboard and want to get back to the impeachment business when Congress Comes back into session. Im joined now by joyce vance and dunkin lavin, and nancy erica smith, a leading civil rights lawyer, who represented a fox News Reporter who wanted to be released from an nda to report on this same story regarding the hush payments by donald trump to Stormy Daniels. Joyce, do you see anything new coming here in this strategy . I dont think it will be new, ari, but i think it might be fresh. The real question is who will hold this president who has been notoriously tough, accountable. It may be too little, too late. Thats what a lot of people think about this strategy. But by circumventing the white houses constant fullcourt press against subpoenas, by going back to preelection activity, where they can subpoena witnesses and acquire documents, the democrats may come up with a narrative that the American People will finally get to see in full and may find compelling. And duncan, sas you know, ths is a legalistic thing, but its not strictly legal, because were talking about Congress Acting in its capacity under the constitution to do what amounts to the indictment of a president when they decide to impeach, if they ever do. And this is something Speaker Pelosi has obviously, as i have mentioned, she is the key Decision Maker on that piece of it. For context, this is how she sounded before this week, before things hit the majority caucus, as were calling it. Take a look. Reporte if a majority of a caucus wants to go forward wan impeachment inquiry, would you go for it . Its not even close in our caucus. But eventually you know what, why are we speculating on hypotheticals . Duncan, hypothetical season is over. She does have this whether its wind at her back or pressure coming at her depending on how you put it, how does that affect, in your view, the balancing of whatever evidence democrats have if they want to go forward . Well, look, in addition to the political aspects of it, there are some legal aspects of it. And there is one new thing coming out of this, which is something that we wouldnt really know if the Associated Press and other press outlets wouldnt have gone ahead and get the unredistracted search warrants from the Michael Cohen search warrant. What we know now, what the cause of the Associated Press did is the Southern District of new york is not going to go forward with an investigation into anymore Campaign Finance violations. And the reason that thats significant is that we know other people were involved. Michael cohen did not act alone. In fact, the indictment itself charges a conspiracy. We know if we can put that together with Michael Cohens congressional testimony, that individual one, who is named in the indictment, is the president paymentsited states. That were routed through the Trump Organization were recharacterized as legal payments when in fact there was no retainer, there were no legal services. We know that these things happened and we know that other people were involved. And yet the Southern District of new york just dropped the inquiry in the middle of the night, in the dark. In fact, wasnt going to say a word to anybody until the Associated Press moved forward with its lawsuit for the search warrant. And so as a result of that, this has come to light. And frankly, the department of justice does not owe any answers to us about why they want to not charge somebody. But in cases where, of great significance, the department of justice has actually explained its decisions and why it doesnt want to charge people. Obviously, most famously, jim comey announcing why they werent going to charge Hillary Clinton with the email scandal, but in addition to that, more recently, the u. S. Attorney in Brooklyn Made an announcement about not charging daniel pantaleo, whos the officer who put eric garner in a choke hold. June kim, who was the acting District Attorney in the Southern District of new york, making an announcement in 2017 about not charging bill de blasio for Campaign Finance violations. So we know that in certain cases the department of justice will actually make an announcement about why they dont charge people. There hardly could be a case of more National Significance than this case, so there are honestly, i think a lot of people who are following the case closely are just left scratching their heads. And then theres a question about whether other people can fill that void. So the manhattan district let me bring in nancy whos shaking her head. Go ahead. I just think that its really important to fill in the void. Did the attorney, whos obviously very enamored with trump interfere with that investigation. And do the American People have a right to know the whole story . We know some of the evidence they have, because my client was subpoenaed and we turned over a lot of evidence about what trump knew, what about paying off a porn star, days before the election, in order to affect the election and i think its important that some of the people who had been subpoenaed to this hearing in front of congress are pecker, dylan howard, people who know about what they knew and what they were willing to pay off. Is this an Illegal Campaign contribution . The entire Fox News Organization is an illegal Trump Campaign contribution, in my view. But they chose to kill the story, days before the election. Thats going to come out in these hearings, and the American People should know that. Fox viewers should know that. Its really important right now for the truth to finally be told. Trump has lied about this so many times, and so frequently, that we cant just say, oh, well, he lies about everything, why should we talk about this, we should talk about it all. Every aspect of it needs to be brought to the American Public. Nancy, i will say in all seriousness, in fairness to fox news, they have a lot of opinion that may look like endorsing trump, but they have every right under the First Amendment to go forward and share that. I dont think that legally is a campaign contribution. I think youre speaking, though, to the narrower point of whether there were deals made that were explicitly benefitting the campaign, which is different. To give you a chance to follow up on that, any response you have to that, and then also were curious, will we hear from your client through this hearing, as well . Well, my client has briefed the committee. So i dont know whether shes going to be asked to appear yet or not. If an Organization Presents itself as a News Organization and then makes a decision not to run clearly Important News days before the election about the president , not only paying off a porn star to keep her quiet, but lying about it to the American People through the press, that to me is an Illegal Campaign contribution. Killing that story days before an election in order to mislead the American Public in favor of a candidate and my client will testify what was said to her about murdochs preferences when she was told that her story was being killed. And to this day, fox is telling us that she didnt have the story. Hopefully now the American Public will see what she had. Well, and thats very interesting. Joyce, i want to double this back to congress. A lot of people at home are watching saying, okay, weve heard about some of these problems. Why is this what congress and the democrats are coming back to here when they come back from recess, as the impeachment caucus grows . And part of it is the strange saga of Michael Cohen. And i really wonder what you think, now that weve taken it all in, it would be hard for people to understand at the beginning of this or if you saw this as a movie, how much ended up landing on mr. Cohens shoulders, including one of the longer sentences affiliated with the mueller probe. Of course, it was handed off to new york. When he basically, apparently, did a lot of what was asked of him, first to help trump, some of which he later confessed to illegally, and what was asked of him by the congress. For context, we put together for your analysis, joyce, what donald trump said. He basically said, to use a common phrase, you better ask somebody, you better ask Michael Cohen, and ultimately the congress did. Here was that condensed story. Did you know about the 130,000 payments to Stormy Daniels . No. Then why did Michael Cohen make it if there was no truth to the allegations. You would have to ask Michael Cohen. He asked me to pay off an adult film star with whom he had had an affair. He was concerned with the effect that it had had on the campaign. He knew about everything. Joyce, what would you say to critics of this tragedy on the democratic side that after everything thats happened and many, many months after Michael Cohen did give his inperson testimony, theyre circling back to this stuff . Well, to be fair, Michael Cohen is a convicted felon. Convicted in part because of untruthful conduct. So no prosecutor and no Congressional Committee would rely solely on his testimony, to move forward. But that said, ari, its important to remember that federal prosecutors stood up in the courthouse in manhattan and essentially charged the president of the United States with being an unnamed, an unindicted coconspirator in Michael Cohens conduct. And we have still not heard that full story. What was the evidence that was based on, in fullness, what were they thinking about, and who else was involved . We know that there were members of the Trump Organization, at least one, who became cooperators for the government. We dont know the extent of that cooperation of what resulted from it. So i think for critics, who are talking about what is a political argument, that this comes to, or maybe a substance argument that its all been gone over in the past, there is still, as i started out by saying, Fresh Information that can be obtained here. The real question is whether congress will be able to obtain it when trump has successfully thrown up road blocks in so many areas. If they succeed, this could be compelling evidence of the president s criminality and the real question will be does the American Public care or is it all baked in at this point. Right. Is it overly baked in . And you lay it out there as you often do so clearly for us. A reminder that while donald trump has certainly been caught lying about and doing many, many obviously suspicious things, this is the one case, in one part of the country where the feds actually said, heres the evidence hes connected to a crime. That does make this case different than others. Well be watching. Joyce vance, duncan eleven, and nancy erica smith, thanks to each of you. We have a lot more in tonights show. Mike pence taking a foreign trip to trumps gulf club at your expense. And walmart taking a stance on gun violence. And how donald trump got fact checked on Hurricane Dorian by his own administration while he was golfing. And later, an update from bill karins with more about where this storm is headed. 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