Analysis and discussion of the days top stories and compelling issues from Lawrence ODonnell. Joining us now intelligence and National Security reporter for nbc news, politics editor at theroot. Com and former Chief Adviser or al gore and a former senior aid to president obama. When a trump tweet ends with National Disgrace, a tweet that includes a misspelling by the president , it reminds me of the days when misspelling was a National Disgrace when done by the Vice President of the United States, dan quayle on the word potato, days that no one can really remember at this point. Here is the president and the only reason i read the tweet is to note the level of hysteria, which increases in direct proportion, it appears, to just how disturbed the president is by the news hes reading or being read to him in the New York Times. Lawrence, you can almost say he was unhinged. You could, yes. By the way he seems to be
responding to these things. I have to say i have been avoiding that word since it became a book title. Yeah. But its a hard word to avoid. The dancing around has been very difficult given the president s actual behavior, yes. And this is a reflection of multiple things. One, again, 20something years ago the president spelling something wrong in public and correcting a child was a week long news story. Now we have a new controversy. If a scandal is happening, it might be a day that ends in y with this administration. You have a president who is constantly screaming and attacking an investigation as to whether or not he tries to stop people from investigating him. Thats part of the issue. He is confirming everything that theyre trying to find out about him. I will say this very quickly about don mcgovernments exhibit ahn. He has a long exextensive history. This guy knows how to stay out of trouble. And so hes definitely going to reveal whatever it is he needs to reveal to mueller because he has a career he wants to extend beyond what this presidency may be able to handle. The most important phrase that i have read in all of this reporting about the mcgahn interviews is the New York Times describing that don mcgahn has given them the president s mindset, the mindset on the firing of james comey. Yeah. And so that can change what Rudy Giuliani and the president are trying to set up as a he said he said conflict, meaning james comey says the president said something to him about flynn and the president denies he ever said that about flynn. Well, what if, what if there is someone else in the white house who can actually confirm that the president did Say Something like what jim comey says the president said . Yeah, lawrence. Youre absolutely right. This is a key thing. The hardest part of proving the
case is proving what the president did was with an intent to obstruct justice, to impede the investigation. And don mcgahn had a Ring Side Seat for that intent and was involved in these various acts that trump did firing comey, demanding that mueller be fired and actions taken against rosenstein. If you take a step back, you have got a white House Counsel now talking to prosecutors. You have got someone running around that taped the west wing. You have a president with an enemys list. We are a few away from a remake of the 1970s. This looks like the Nixon White House all over again. I want to go to something the president said in an interview with routers today. And the president arranged this interview. I think it is fair for us to consider that it might have been arranged in direct response to the New York Times reporting
this weekend about don mcgahns cooperation. The president is echoing something that Rudy Giuliani keeps saying relentlessly. This is about what they call the possible perjury trap. He says so if i Say Something that he, comey, and he, comey, says something and it is my word against his and hes best friends with mueller, so mueller might say, well, i believe comey. And even if im telling the truth, that makes me a liar, thats no good. Now, ken, The Don Mcgahn reporting, as i say, interests me most when it comes to the possibility that don mcgahn might be able to change the comey versus trump story from comeys word versus trumps word to trumps word versus comeys word plus possibly something from don mcgahn. 100 . But first a word about that tweet. It is inconsistent with the facts and inconsistent with american values. Thats not a partisan statement. Robert mueller volunteered for vietnam, was wounded in combat, led the fbi after 9 11. There are Prosecutor Ons that team with sterling records. Got so far into their skin they threatened to kill him. He had 24 7 security for a year. These are Public Servants who have given over their careers to serving the American Public and bringing people to justice. Donald trump may not like what they are doing, but he is sounding like every politician i have ever reported on who has been under criminal investigation by the fbi. You are absolutely right. Don mcgahn can be a crucial witness. And this story in the Washington Post where sources are suggesting he Didnt Incriminate the president , i read that as this is the Giuliani Philosophy that the president cant obstruct justice because he can fire whoever he wants for any reason. I dont think that Robert Mueller believes that or legal
experts believe that. If he fired comey for corrupt reasons, if he asked Comey To Go Easy On Flynn For Corrupt Seasons and if mcgahn can help mueller establish that, thats obstruction of justice. You cant charge a sitting president , but i think we are moving towards a comprehensive report that will go to congress that may be more damning that we can imagine sitting here right now. Im glad to you went back to the president s tweet. Which is just the most disgraceful thing that this president could possibly say about bob mueller as a person. If he wants to criticize his prosecutorial work, that is one thing. But im so glad you went back to that. Also, ken, this point that the president is the white house is putting out tonight, clearly coming from the white house to the Washington Post that don mcgahns lawyer told us he did not incriminate the president , that could mean anything. That could mean don mcgahn did not say i saw the president commit a crime. I saw the president commit obstruction of justice. But don mcgahn could have told them exactly what he saw the president do and the prosecutors could decide what they just heard is a crime. Yeah, absolutely. The New York Times seems to have a pipeline into don mcgahn and his version of e pents already reported on these episodes, that trump insisted mcgahn help him fire mueller. That trump was pressuring people around him to get rid of Jeff Sessions or was moving forward with a plan to fire Jeff Sessions. All of that i i have is deeply relevant. The bizarre thing about this, lawrence, is, you know, the white house could have asserted executive privilege, and they could have at least tried to prevent some of this interview. They may have lost, but they
could have strung it out. They didnt do that. And that went to the earlier legal strategy of Donald Trumps former lawyers to fully cooperate with the Mueller Investigation and and also according to the new york sometimes mcgahn deciding he felt that trump was setting him up to take the fall. He was going to go in there with his lawyer and tell mueller everything. And do 30 hours of interviews. We heard Steve Schmidt today who said i know don mcgahn very well. I have an office next to him. He is not going to go to jail and be disbarred for donald trump. That seems to be the consensus from people that know don mcgahn. When we come back, Michael Cohen is reportedly being investigated for bank fraud, 20 million of bank fraud. So does that make Michael Cohen 20 million more eager to cooperate with federal prosecutors and tell them everything he knows about donald trump . Later in the hour, the woman married to the biggest cyber bully in the world, david little speaks today about Cyber Bullying prevention while her husband was cyber bullied. I dont want to ruin the suspension by telling you who those two people are, so you are just going to have to stick around to find out. [upbeat music]Michael Cohen woke up today to a front page story in his hometown newspaper, the New York Times outlining the charges federal prosecutors are considering in their investigation of Michael Cohen. The New York Times reports that Michael Cohen could face charges of bank fraud and obtaining 20 million in loans from two new york banks that most new yorkers have never heard of. The bank loan is under scrutiny, the total of which has not been reporting came from two Financial Institutions that catered to the taxi industry, Sterling National bank and melrose credit union. People of knowledge with the matter, including a banker, who reviewed the transactions include that mr. Cohen used 32 Taxi Medallions as collateral. They were valued at 1 million each and generated 1 million a year in income. Michael cohens partner in the Taxi Business is already cooperating with federal
prosecutors and an accountant who worked for both has testified before the grand jury in the cohen case. The New York Times reports if Michael Cohen becomes a cop wop rating witness, it would likely include a provision that mr. Cohen also provide information to the special counsel, robert s. Mueller, iii. Joining us now Michael Daley and ron is back with us. The Taxi Business has been a Cash Business for a very long time. The one thing that can be much dirtier than commercial real estate in new york, the Taxi Business. So its starting to feel like Michael Cohen has a 20 million more reasons now to cooperate with Special Prosecutors. I thought it was good news for him. They talked about many crimes. I mean, this narrows it down to a few multimillion dollar crimes. If you start looking at the taxi, the first guy who he is Business Partners with, he had a problem because he was charging fake late fees. The only winner in the Whole Trump Russian Saga so far is freidman. It looks like he was going to go to state prison. All of a sudden, hey, i can give up Michael Cohen. Luckily for him there is something more interesting because of the trump investigation. Ron, the president of the United States could be in very big trouble because of the Taxi Business in new york and his buddy Michael Cohen drowning in legal problems because of it. Yeah. I mean, Michael Cohen turns out to be a crook. Who could have seen that coming, huh . I think it is true, lawrence, that he could be in trouble. But i think even truer is he may already be in a lot of trouble. We are focussed on whether or not Michael Cohen will offer additional evidence to special counsel. We need to remember that the most important evidence Michael Cohen probably has is those millions of pages of records that bob mueller already has. And a Special Master looked at and set a few aside as being looked at by attorneyclient privilege. Theyre not going to have all the different ways it could be impeached. So i do think it is an interesting issue how much farther Michael Cohen does go, does he flip . But mueller may already have in his pocket most of what he wants from him. More of those guys cracked than you can remember. Joe macina, toughest guy that ever lived, never be a rat. Him, him, him, him. Here is donald trump today tweeting about who is going to be a rat in his world. The thing thats interesting, the president of the United States is supposed to stand for justice. And, you know, rats are people that are leading you towards justice. Hes calling you a rat. But how can a guy be a rat if hes not giving up something . You can stop someone in the street and say, are you going to flip on trump . There is nothing to give. But all of a sudden, there is this kind of implicit thing that there is something to give up. Yeah. And, ron, what about that . It is not youre saying it is not clear to you that Michael Cohen has enough of value for Robert Mueller. As i said, i think the files are the big thing. I think the records are the big thing. Theyre reliable. Theyre provable. He may well have for. We talked about his role in the payoffs to women who like Stormy Daniels who allegedly had a relationship with donald trump and there is a lot of things there. Were there federal Campaign Finance violations involved in that and the way that helped the Trump Campaign . What i think you see is we have the white House Counsel offering evidence against trump. You have now his personal lawyer offering evidence against trump. And these people, they wouldnt have anything to say if there werent criminal activity. If there wasnt something they were trying to protect themselves from because of what went wrong and what was wrongly done here. And i think thats the big picture. People coming to testify against trump, they only have something to testify if trump did something wrong. Thank you both for joining us tonight. Really appreciate it. When we come back, President Trump actually thinks he can replace Robert Mueller with himself. I wish you werent so worried about moving. Im hoping these Nature Sounds will help me relax a bit. At least we dont have to worry about Homeowners Insurance. Just call geico. Geico helps with Homeowners Insurance . Good to know. Feeling better . I love you, pookie bear. [parrot 1] i love you, pookie bear. [parrot 2] i love you, pookie bear [parrots] i love you, pookie bear get to know geico and see how easy homeowners and renters insurance can be. Publically urged to quit and privately attempted to fire. In one tweet, the president referred to Jeff SessionsJustice Department with the word justice in quotes. In his interiew today, the president did not rule out tripping Robert Mueller of his Security Clearance. The president said, i havent given it a lot of thought when asked about muellers Security Clearance. Today more than 175 former Government Officials signed a statement in support of former cia director john brennan after the president stripped his Security Clearance last week. Yesterday john brennan repeated what he told Rachel Maddow friday night. Well, i have been contacted by a number of lawyers, and they have already given me their thoughts about the basis for a complaint, an injunction, to try to prevent him from doing this in the future. If my clearances and my reputation as i am being pulled through the mud now, if that is the price we are going to pay to
prevent donald trump from doing this against other people, to me it is a small price to pay. I will do whatever i can to try to prevent these abuses in the future. If it means going to court, i will do that. And in a footnote to Meet The Press yesterday, just when you thought Rudy Giuliani was beyond parody, he found a way to parody himself. Look, im not going to be rushed into having him testify so that he gets trapped into perjury. When you tell me that, you know, he should testify because hes going to tell the truth, that he shouldnt worry, thats so silly because its somebodys v