We have this list. I got to make sure i get it. I get it completely. Made perfect sense. Rachel, we have mannapuzo joining us tonight with a Big Development in the obstruction of justice case. One of the witnesses quoting hope hicks to the special prosecutor, her words saying the emails that set up the meeting at trump tower will never get out. And the question is, was she intending to obstruct justice by participating in a scheme to make sure the emails would never get out and if she was, she was doing it with the president of the United States who was on the phone with her. And what is particularly important i think in an ongoing way for this story is once again youve got this strong statement from hope hickss lawyer saying no this didnt happen, but mark corallos side of this comes bolstered. The way the New York Times got this story and reported it out is that mark corallo told three people contemporaneously at the time it happened what happened. Theyve now given their reports to the New York Times, mr. Corallo is not disputing the reports. And now we have, after he said it alarmed him, we know he quit. We didnt have an explanation at the time why he was quitting, this now gives us the explanation. So we have the reporting, the witnesses coming forward and going on the record and hes attesting to the truth of what theyre saying, thats a lot of weight. Thats not he said, she said, thats he said and these folks can back it up. Its a gigantic development in the obstruction of justice investigation. I try to find an adjective that will get this to land because we get so many bombshells and explosive developments this one is more of an Important Development of what we already knew about the president being on the phone trying to come up with lies to tell the New York Times because as everyone pointed out, that was just lying to the New York Times. That wasnt lying in any legal procedure. And its left a sort of mystery of why is the special prosecutor so interested in hope hicks and these air force one phone calls and if it was a discussion about more than lying to the New York Times, if there was a discussion about getting rid of the emails knowing the prosecutor investigating it, that is a crime. That last point you made there is super important. Its not something that randomly happened during the campaign and theyre lying and who cares theyre lying. This happened well into the administration after when he knew there was an ongoing investigation. This happened in june when this was First Responders repoported. So if the content of their discussion about occluding from view the public or blocking from the prosecutor the existence of this evidence, thats a legal concern. Thats not just youre a bad person for lying. That is youre potentially liable for having tried to impede that investigation by keeping that information away from them. A super important story. Another great example of what the special prosecutor knows we dont know until we discovery it long after the special prosecutor has. We can get the feeling through Michael Wolffs book that we have a minute by minute understanding of some of these days, some of these scenes, we dont. A lot can happen in a minute and the special prosecutor is trying to find out about each one of those minutes. We should have learned that lesson on indictment day when George Papadopoulos is pleading guilty. Who had him in their story line. Theyre in the Robert Mueller terms, they dont leak. And the fbi and Justice Department now is going to get hotter tomorrow. But they proceed at pace. Thank you, rachel. Lauthank you, lawrence. Were going to get to the New York Times. But remember before the New York Times report its been a day of breaking news including a report that President Trump in what is his now customary gansster style asked Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein if he was, quote, on my team. That was a report earlier today. We also got an fbi Statement Today saying that the memo written by the republican staff of the House Intelligence Committee that might be released as early as tomorrow is filled with misinformation and falsehoods. Well get to all of that later in this hour. But first, we will begin with the late breaking news from the New York Times on the obstruction of justice investigation of the president of the United States and his staff, including the 29yearold White House Communications director hope hicks, who reportedly said something on air force one that could indicate that she and the president were conspireing to obstruct justice. Well be joined by one of the reporters who broke the story for the New York Times tonight. The times is reporting what mark corallo is planning to tell the special prosecutor when hes interviewed. He was special counsel for the trump team before he resigned in july, shortly before the incident thats described in the New York Times tonight. Mr. Corallo intends to tell the special prosecutor about a Conference Call that has not previously been reported. Weve known about a Conference Call from air force one involving the president and hope hicks in which the president was directing the false answers that should be given to the New York Times for what became the first report of the meeting at trump tower in the middle of the president ial campaign with a group of russians, that meeting was attended by donald trump jr. , paul manafort, and jared kushner. Tonight New York Times is reporting on another Conference Call about the evidence that could reveal that the trump tower meeting was really about getting dirt on Hillary Clinton. The New York Times obtained the emails that set up that meeting. They indicated that the russians were promising dirt on Hillary Clinton, to which donald trump jr. Replied, i love it thats all in the emails. The emails are very important in this case. Tonight the times is reporting, quote, mr. Corallo is planning to tell mr. Mueller about a previously undisclosed Conference Call with mr. Trump and hope hicks, the White House Communications director, according to three people. Mr. Corallo plans to tell investigators that ms. Hicks said during the call that emails written by donald trump jr. Before the trump tower meeting in which the younger mr. Trump said he was eager to receive political dirt about mrs. Clinton from the russians, quote, will never get out. That left mr. Corallo with concerns that ms. Hicks could be contemplating obstructing justice the people said. Joining us now by phone is the Investigative Reporter for the New York Times, one of the coauthors of this report. Matt, the significance of mark corallo interpreting in as possible obstruction of justice what did he see in this that he thought could be obstruction of justice. What he told people in real time was that either hope hicks was being naive in washington everything ultimately sees the light of day. Or that she was indicating some sort of effort to keep those emails from seeing the light of day. Now, we should say that the actual practicality of that was very low. At that point we know the lawyers had already gotten those emails, stamped those emails, prepared them to be given to congress and to bob mueller. But if youre on that Conference Call, our understanding of what coral l corallo is going to tell bob mueller, is that i believe that was some sort of indication to keep those emails out. Remember i was the one dealing with the white house on this in real time at the moment. We were dealing with dualing statement. We got a statement that was misleading that said, the purpose of this was mostly we talked about russian adoption and then our story comes out and an hour later theres another story that suggests not only did they not talk about dirt on Hillary Clinton but maybe this was all a democratic setup. So we were getting kind of like duelling statements to make sense of this. Neither of which addressed the truth. So the Conference Call you just mentioned is mark corallo and hope hicks on the line on whos dealing with this better. This Conference Call youre reporting tonight, did that occur on air force one prior to or after the other Conference Call. No. My understanding that would have been the day after the initial our initial story came out. This would have been postair force one trip as the administration tried to deal with the fallout of this. And hope hicks is saying mark corallo, how could you give this rival statement. That was really dumb. And mark corallo turns around and says hope hicks are you kidding me . Your statement was misleading. And they kind of go at it and the implication that corralo left with was she was trying to cover something up. I think its worth mentioning not only does hope hickss lawyer, who typically does not talk to reporters and not give statements to reporters vehemently denying the conversation happened that way. But we have contemporaneous reporting that says hope hicks is advocating trying to get ahead of the story by putting the emails out. So again this is a theme of these these fights inside the administration of, you know, whos right and whos wrong, whos on the side of good and whos not. And this is the kind of thing that bob mueller is going to have to sort out. Any indication of what mark corallo is going to say about what the president said about those emails never getting out . So our understanding was that the president , for the most part, was in listening mode there. Its not even clear to us to what degree the president knew exactly what was in the emails. Obviously he had direct involvement in helping craft that statement to us that was misleading, but to the its not clear to us what extent he knew was in the emails. So our knowledge of what mark corallo will say is, mr. President , this is not a smart decision and we shouldnt be talking about this, you know, without lawyers present. This is no longer a privileged conversation because this is not a conversation between you and your lawyers. And mark corallos not a lawyer. He was a spokesperson, a pr person, handling the reporters who wanted to talk to the legal team. So theres no attorneyclient privilege in this discussion that the president is participating in with hope hicks talks about those emails will never get out and mark corallo being apparently horrified by what hes hearing. And he apparently knows enough about Legal Process and has dealt with lawyers enough certainly on the team he was representing that he knew this was edging into, if not stepping straight into, obstruction of justice territory. It was a concern that he shared with people in real time. And then, when we spoke to him today, we said, look, this is what were going to report. He said, i dont dispute any of that, but i dont have anything to add. Obviously hes going to talk to mueller, so theres constraint there is of what he wants to say ahead of that interview. Again, i think the circular firing squad analogy is apt here. People from the white house have gone in and spoken to mueller under the penalty of, obviously, not giving false statements and have said that this is not the way this went down. And that is an awfully strong denial from this is not a nondeni nondenial, denial from hope hicks lawyer. So you have a differing statement than what was given to the New York Times back in july. Let me stay on mark corallo for a moment. Characterize him for us because he wasnt working on the white house staff. He was not a government employee. He was privately employed by the outside privately hired lawyers who are running the criminal defense for the president in this investigation. This has nothing to do with white house counsel, nothing to do with white house personnel. Right. And he was i mean, mark corallo is a former john ashkroft spokesperson at the department of justice. He is a Political Communications consultant. He runs his own communication shop in northern virginia. Hes certainly well known in d. C. Circles. And his departure from the legal team has only been a little nebulous, right . Some people said he quit. Some people said, no, he was fired. And nobody has come out and put a fine point on exactly why he left. And his departure was shortly before the president removed Marc Kasowitz from his legal team, his longtime lawyer, and decided to stick with a different legal team, john dowd, who is leading the discussions right now about what the president is going to you know, may or may not tell bob mueller. And i think its very important that this the air force one statement that was given to us back in july is something that mueller has told the president that he the president s lawyers that he wants to talk about in the interview. And that is very much front and center in the debate over, the negotiations over whether the president is going to sit down and talk to mueller because there are some people who say the president doesnt need to talk about to bob mueller ant whether he was totally forthcoming with the New York Times because lying to the New York Times isnt a crime or being misleading to the New York Times isnt a crime. So if you dont have an under y underlying crime to investigate, the president doesnt need to answer your question. So thats a fascinating question. But it goes to show this is front and center, very much of interest to bob mueller. That is obviously why mark corallos input here changes what was going on on air force one from being a story lying to the New York Times to something 34u67 more important that goes right to the center of the investigation. Please stay with us if you can because there might be questions from our other guests. John hileman, Barbara Mcquad an msnbc legal contributor, and frank mon toy ya, jr. Hes a retired fbi executive. John, i want to get in one more word buy graphically here about mark corallo. Heres a former spokesperson for the attorney general. A Republican Attorney general. He knows his way around this arena. And he develops concerns of the people hes dealing with and what he hears in this Conference Call that hope hicks could be leading the president into obstruction of justice or herself into obstruction of justice and it sounds like this is the kind of thing that made him get out of there. Mark corallo is a familiar figure if you covered washington scandals and politics for a long time. He made his name working for dan burrtons committee back when that committee was investigating bill clinton. He did work for john ashkroft in the Justice Department and then left and worked for valerie rose. So this is a guy who has a lot of time at the nexus not a lawyer but someone who knows a lot about the law for a nonlawyer and knows about the political implications and political jeopardy and the trouble you can get yourself into if you tell lies or try to cover things up. This is a sharp guy. Its clear now the New York Timess very detailed report tonight. Sources left right and center, some contemporaneous, some now. And then you have the Michael Wolff report. So you take those together the suggestion that mark corallo saw the issues here, saw the trouble the president was wading into, be immediately radar went off. Knows the law, knows what mueller might want to look out. Knows what it means the lies that tumble out of other lies. And also knows when hope hicks said this thing that he said she said, and told people contemporaneous that she said it, was either naive, which is possible. Not a stupid person but thaugtd this is a small number of people on the email chain it might not get out. Not realizing that these emails have been dragged into the investigation, they were on their way to capitol hill. But in either case, he sees that jeopardy and there is a strong suggestion that as he looked back on this quickly thereafter, hes like, im out of here and left the white house. Barb mcquad, as a former prosecutor, your reaction to this . I think Robert Mueller will be interested in the comment by hope hicks about no one seeing the emails. Her intent is going to matter, we talked about obstruction of justice, a corrupt intent matters. So asking questions about the context and trying to understand her meaning will be very important. But i think that mark corallo did a smart thing, youre right he has a lot of experience in the Justice Department, very savvy, by immediately reporting what he observed and heard to three people, it wont be a battle of what did she say and he say, but these three other witnesses could testify later and it would be an exception of the hearsay rule if theyre called to rebut an allegation of a fabricat