Trying to live your life. And you have no certainty whatsoever. Its insane. Thank you, lawrence. Ill be watching the way youre covering it tomorrow, joy. Thank you. Thank you. Have a good night. Thank you. Well, it turns out to the worlds surprise that Donald Trumps golf weekends are not all golf and Binge Watching the queen on netflix to learn how to be president ial. Sometimes instead of golf, the president stews. According to tonights breaking news in the New York Times, the long bedminster weekend began late thursday, may 4th, when mr. Trump arrived by helicopter joined by a trio of advisers, his daughter ivanka, his soninlaw, jared kushner, and Steven Miller. It rained during part of the weekend, forcing mr. Trump to cancel golf with greg norman, the australian golfer. Iran stead, mr. Trump stewed indoors, worrying about mr. Comey and the russia investigation. Mr. Miller and mr. Kushner both told the president that weekend they were in favor of firing mr. Comey. Mr. Trump ordered mr. Miller to draft a letter and dictated his unfettered thoughts. Several people who saw mr. Millers multipage draft described it as a screed. The New York Times is reporting tonight that special prosecutor Robert Mueller has obtained a copy of that screed. According to the New York Times sources, White House Counsel Don Mcgahn managed to prevent the president from sending the screed to fbi director james comey. Mcgahn believed that the trump and miller coauthored letter was problematic. Mr. Mcgahn and others on the white house staff were alarmed that the president made the decision on the unprecedented action of firing the fbi director after consulting only his daughter, his soninlaw, and the 31yearold Steven Miller, who has no Legal Training and, like the president s daughter and soninlaw, has absolutely no experience that would earn him a senior position in any white house other than the most out of control, most incompetent white house in history. Mr. Mcgahn identified several passages in the trump miller letter that he wanted deleted. Mr. Mcgahn then arranged for the president to meet with attorney general Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein to discuss firing james comey. During that meeting with the president , mr. Rosenstein was given a copy of the trump miller screed. Mr. Rosenstein agreed to write his own memo about why comey should be fired. That memo was released by the white house when comey was actually fired. There are several ways that the special prosecutor could have obtained the trump miller screed, but you dont have to think about it very long to realize that the most likely way and the easiest way is the Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein simply gave mueller his copy of it, knowing that it is relevant to the special prosecutors investigation. Joining us now, david frum, Senior Editor for the atlantic. Also with us, jed sugarman, professor of law atford ham university, and neera tanden. David frum, here is the confirmation that when the president made what is probably so far for him, anyway and his own future, the worst decision of his presidency, firing james comey. It was on the advice of the junior most people in the white house in terms of experience, who have the senior most positions apparently his daughter, his soninlaw, and Steven Miller. So the president has been given the lie twice today on this matter. The first is with this report, hes been given the lie that the story that the firing did not originate as wad said at the time with the Deputy Attorney general general, who doesnt seem to have played a very heroic role here. The second lie the president gave himself when he tweeted earlier today how angry he was that james comey had been too soft on hillary clinton. Remember, ostensibly the reason for the firing was to punish james comey for having been too tough on hillary clinton, nothing at all to do with trump or russia. The story has collapsed, and not that anybody is terribly surprised by that, but it is in ruins, and one of the things that when you look at an obstruction case you wonder about is not only did the person lie, but if there is a lie, what is behind the lie because obviously you lie to protect something you dont want people to know. If you had something krtabcredi to say, you wouldnt lie to conceal it. Professor sugarman, we discovered the president had meetings with a wider circle once he had made that decision, and it wasnt just white House Counsel who saw the screed. Others saw this. What happens to those people in the wider circle who were consulted about this, even those who were advising against the president doing it . Thats the biggest question to address, and i think its the biggest news of the night. There are lots of people we suspected before of participating in obstruction of justice. The biggest name tonight is Vice President pence. So let me explain why this timeline puts him in legal jeopardy. So we know that this letter was drafted on one day, and then after Steven Miller came back with that draft, it was read in a room of people, including Vice President pence. And when that letter was read, it had, quote, the New York Times talks about a screed, and it identified all of these other connections to the russian probe for why trump had decided to fire jim comey. Then after this letter is edited, mike pence then tells the media that the comey firing was not connected to the russian probe, and he said it was due to Rod Rosensteins recommendation. Those are untrue. Those statements are untrue, and it implicates mike pence now in a combination of conspiracy to commit obstruction of justice, aiding and abetting obstruction of justice, and also a relatively less known felony call call called misprigs of a felony. When one has knowledge of a felony and if one conceals and does not make it known to the legal authorities, one can be guilty of misprision of a felony. Lets keep in mind that the nixon articles of impeachment included a provision blaming nixon for misleading or false statements to the public. Now, thats not a felony, but it was grounds for impeaching president nixon. It may be grounds for an impeachment of Vice President pence. And tonights new word for me because i didnt go to law school is misprision. Neera tanden, the trip wires for everyone involved in this case, theres just more of them than they realize. I imagine mike pence might be hearing his possible jeopardy for the first time if hes listening to the professor tonight. But all of these people now, all of these people who are named in these meetings about this, are all witnesses for the special prosecutor, including white House Counsel because white House Counsel does not have an Attorney Client privilege with the president. The president is not his client. Absolutely. You know, i mean i think if we really step back here and look at this, obviously there are lots of people in the white house who knew what was really going on, and they all basically lied to the public. But lets just say whats happened here. We have evidence that the president fired director comey because of the russia investigation. Everybody knew it was because of the russia investigation, and then a lot of people basically conspired to come up with another reason, which was the rosenstein memo. They all knew that wasnt the real reason. They had heard directly from the president the real reason was because of what he was doing with the russia investigation. The president wanted to stop that. That investigation of himself. And then they came up with an excuse for the public and an excuse for the media. And the fact that the white House Counsel and other people around the president were perfectly comfortable with a lie to the public for the rationale of this firing says to me that they all pretty much knew that there was illegality here. This is how you act when theres something wrong. You come up with a cover. And this whole episode is a bunch of people coming up with a cover. In the nixon white house, we had john dean among others crack and tell the truth about what he experienced in the nixon coverup. Lets listen to the first person in the Trump White House who cracked and apparently told the truth about why james comey was fired. He actually told that truth to lester holt on video in the white house. Lets listen to this witness. He made a recommendation, but regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey, knowing there was no good time to do it. And in fact, when i decided to just do it, i said to myself, i said, you know, this russia thing with trump and russia is a made up story. Its an excuse by the democrats for having lost an election that they should have won. David frum, that will surely be an exhibit or being certainly maintained as an exhibit at this point in the files of the special prosecutor. Whether its ever used in court is another matter. But theres donald trump basically turning in donald trump. Well, to lift this out of the legalities into the politics a little bit, that incident that is so beautifully quoted there illustrates i think a problem that all of us have in responding to all of this appropriately, which is because donald trump lies all the time, because hes lost so much credibility, when his white house tells lies, people are not actually fooled. No one actually ever believed for even 30 seconds that this all happened because of Rod Rosenstein. No one ever believed that story. So weve lost the capacity to be offended and shocked if the story turns out not to be true. We dont feel like we were deceived and we dont have the anger against the lie that we should. The lie, however, remains a lie, and it remains hugely improper for a president to do even if the president had already by then so trashed his reputation that no one was ever fooled for a moment. Can i just say go ahead, neera. Sorry. I mean the issue here is, of course none of us trust i mean i dont trust President Trump in the things he says. But the issue here is that they all came up with an alternative story. They were at least for a period trying to explain this and to offer, you know, another explanation that wasnt illegal, that wouldnt have bought an obstruction of justice charge. The fact that don mcgahn recognized that the screed basically condemned the president tells us that his screed was an issue, that the special prosecutor should be obviously examining as obstruction of justice. Professor sugarman, what are the prosecutors looking for in that screed that they now possess and may have possessed for quite a while . Well, let me just note that for all of trumps lies, he has already confessed, as you just showed with lester holt, to the basic i mean he told the truth to lester holt, that he fired jim comey because of the russia investigation. I mean that could be the nixon articles of impeachment right there. So well pause there and just note that and also keep in mind that he also said in his letter explaining the firing of jim comey, he says, while i appreciate you telling me on three separate times that i wasnt under investigation, i nevertheless am firing you, thats an amazing none sec witter confession. The first part this is what youre asking lawrence. What mueller is looking at is the rest of the screed there, which is President Trump wanted jim comey to tell the public that trump was not under investigation and really what trump wanted was to stay not under investigation. Thats why he fired jim comey. So thats pretty thats amazingly significant. I do also want to be clear theres another news event today or yesterday that President Trumps lawyers had met with Robert Mueller and tried to make the argument that because a president has the power to fire an fbi director, this cant be obstruction of justice. That basic argument is so wrong that it shows why theres so little that the Trump Lawyers have to argue. A president has the power to order a military strike. But if the president is ordering that military strike with the intent of, lets say, killing someone who slept with his wife, thats still murder. A president can pardon someone, but if the president pardons someone because he received a Million Dollar bribe, thats still a felony of bribery. Just because the president has the power to do something, it doesnt mean that it excuses any exercise of that power because intent matters. Professor jed sugarman and neera tanden, thank you for joining us tonight. David, please stick around. Coming up, as we reported last night, special prosecutor Robert Mueller is using irs agents from the criminal Investigation Division of the irs. These are the irs super agents, the ateam. You dont want them on your case. There is probably nothing about Robert Muellers investigation that scares donald trump more than having these irs agents on the case. A former director of the irs criminal Investigations Division will join us next. Oh, you brought butch. Yeah butch growls at man hes looking at me right now, isnt he . 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As one of those workers, im proud to bring you gillette quality for less, because nobody can beat the men and women of gillette. Gillette the best a man can get. Gloria always went big. So we helped her plan a Memorial Service that no one would soon forget. This ones for you, gloria. Only a dignity memorial professional can celebrate a life like no other. Find out how at sanfranciscodignity. Com. 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. Im not really saying tax returns because as you know, theyre under audit. You learn very little from a tax return. What you should do is go down to federal elections and take a look at the numbers. The irs best agents are on the case as Betsy Woodruff of the daily beast reported to us here last night. Special prosecutor Robert Mueller has now added special agents from the irs criminal Investigation Division to his Team InvestigatingPresident Trump and his campaign associates, including his family. Measured strictly in terms of money, irs auditors are the most valuable players in government. Senior auditors working on the biggest cases are paid close to 150,000 per year, and on average, they each find and collect for the government 19 million per year in tax revenue that the government was never going to see if those irs auditors didnt find it. Of course hating the irs is an article of faith in republican politics and cutting the irs is a republican favorite and no republican is going to want to cut the irs budget more than donald trump now that the irs super agents from the criminal Investigation Division are working with special prosecutor Robert Mueller. Joining us now, martin scheel, former branch chief of the irs criminal Investigation Division. He spent 30 years at the irs. Mr. Scheel, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Tell me what this means to the investigation that Robert Mueller has your old team on the case. Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me here, lawrence. Its a great compliment, and i appreciate the offer to be here. What it means in a nutshell is that the finest Financial Investigators in the world are now focusing on members of the Trump Organization and possibly trump himself. You know, theres now a change of the focus of the original counterintelligence investigation. Its now morphed into a financial investigation. And, you know, certainly fbi has some tremendous people involved in doing their financial investigations, but irs criminal investigators focus only on doing financial investigations. They dont do much of anything else. You know, they do some things like, you know, Identity Fraud and Computer Forensics and things like this. But there are 2,200 agent