I know nothing about your gout status and i dont think youre that old. I am as of this point goutless, and god bless you. And not in prison. And so thats a happy day, right . Not miserable. Not lonely. Right. And i dont even want to talk about the altarboy thing. Its weird. I was an atlar boy, and it was weird. Completely on the record, completely happy and positive experience. You have to say that now if you say you used to be an alter boy. You just have to. Growing up as a catholic kid in california, i was so mad that i couldnt be an alter boy. It wasnt like a gender justice thing. The alter boys got to handle the wine. I thought i was going to be potential good bartender material. These kids 7 years old and handling the wine. Rachel, given that the statute of limitations has passed, i can tell you, i can confess to you that i saw alter boys mishandle the wine once or twice. It happened. Save that for our weekend show. Okay. When we can swear. Were going to save that one. Thank you, rachel. Governor John Hickenlooper in his first msnbc interview since announcing his candidacy for president on monday. He is going to join us. And we have the experts we need when its an important Michael Cohen day. Joining us in our first panel of guests tonight. And there is so much to report on that. We learned new things. Thats what one member of the House Intelligence Committee said today after Michael Cohens second closed session in a week testifying to that committee. The member of the committee that member of the Committee Also said that Michael Cohen brought new documents to the committee today. The chairman of the Committee Adam Schiff said it was a, quote, enormously productive session. One of the things the house investigative committees are trying to learn is whether pump or his lawyers tried to use the possibility of a president ial pardon to prevent Michael Cohen and others from testifying against donald trump. In a breaking news report tonight the New York Times is reporting that the president s tv lawyer Rudy Giuliani says that lawyers for several people approached him about the possibility of president ial pardons. The times reports mr. Giuliani who has been representing mr. Trump since last spring says he always insisted to defense lawyers that in trump would not consider granting pardons until the investigations were long over. I always gave one answer and they always left disappointed, mr. Giuliani said. The times notes tonight that President Trumps first legal team, headed by washington lawyer john dowd, quote, had discussions with lawyers for Paul Manafort and michael t. Flynn in 2017 about pardons. Abc news is reporting that in the weeks following the raid on Michael Cohens home, office and hotel room last year, Michael Cohen was, quote, contacted by two new york attorneys who claimed to be in close contact with Rudy Giuliani. Sources described the lawyers contact with cohen as an effort to keep him in the tent. Nbc news has confirmed that according to a source familiar with the matter, Michael Cohen provided the Intelligence Committee today with new documents showing edits to the written statement that he delivered to congress in 2017 about a project to build a moscow trump tower. Heres what Michael Cohen said about those edits in last weeks public hearing. Mr. Trumps personal lawyers reviewed and edited my statement to congress about the timing of the moscow tower negotiations before i gave it. So to be clear, mr. Trump knew of and directed the trump moscow negotiations throughout the campaign and lied about it. He lied about it because he never expected to win. He also lied about it because he stood to make hundreds of millions of dollars on the moscow real estate project. And so i lied about it, too. Because mr. Trump had made clear to me through his personal statements to me that we both knew to be false, and through his lies to the country that he wanted me to lie. And he made it clear to me because his personal attorneys reviewed my statement before i gave it to congress. Michael cohen has pleaded guilty to lying to congress. In that written statement that he now says was edited by Donald Trumps lawyers. Trump attorney jay sekulow denied the allegation by Michael Cohen that Trump Lawyers suborned the perjury to congress that Michael Cohen has now confessed to and pleaded guilty to. Heres what Intelligence Committee chairman adam schiff said about Michael Cohens new testimony today. He answered every question that was put to him by members of both parties. He was fully cooperative with the committee. We had requested documents of mr. Cohen. He has provide add adequate documen additional documents to the committee. His cooperation with our committee continues. So i think the members found it an enormously productive session. Some of the additional documents that Michael Cohen submitted to the committee today no doubt include copies of checks to Michael Cohen that were published in the New York Times today. Last weeks hearing, Michael Cohen revealed some checks that he said were part of Donald Trumps reimbursement to him for the 130,000 that Michael Cohen illegally paid to Stormy Daniels during the president ial campaign, a crime that Michael Cohen says he committed at the direction of then president ial candidate donald trump. We now have eight of the checks that were part of that reimbursement scheme. The first two of these checks are from the Donald Trump Trust account, an account that was established when donald trump became president and a trust was established by the Trump Company that was supposed to isolate the trump business from donald trump himself during the presidency. Those first two checks from the trust are signed by the companys chief Financial OfficerAllen Weissleberg and donald trump jr. The next check in the sequence should be an april check, which we have not yet seen, and the check after that is a may 23rd check that is the first one in the sequence that comes from a different Checking Account. It appears to be a personal Checking Account of donald j. Trump and it is signed by donald trump. Why the change in checks . Why the different checks from a different Checking Account suddenly on may 23rd, 2017 . Why did the trump business decide they no longer should be involved in the payments to Michael Cohen . Robert mueller was appointed special prosecutor on may 17th, 2017. And it is the very next check after that, six days later. The may 23rd check that suddenly comes from a different Checking Account and is signed by donald trump personally. And all of the checks reimbursing Michael Cohen for the rest of the year come from that different Checking Account now that donald trump and everyone at the trump business knows that there is a special prosecutor investing investigating donald trump and the trump organization. And all of the rest of those payoff checks to Michael Cohen come from that donald trump Checking Account with only one signature on those checks, only the signature of donald trump. Was Allen Weissleberg no longer willing to sign those checks . Why did Allen Weissleberg stop signing those reimbursement checks to Michael Cohen after Robert Mueller was appointed special prosecutor . Surely someone in the House Intelligence Committee today behind closed doors asked Michael Cohen that question. Heres what Michael Cohen had to say after that closeddoor hearing today. The hearings went very, very well. I believe that all of the members were satisfied with the statements and the responses that i gave to them. I told them that any Additional Information that they would want, they should feel comfortable to reach out to my counsel and i would continue to cooperate to the fullest extent of my capabilities. Joining us now, friend of Michael Cohen, donny deutsch, msnbc contributor. He texted with Michael Cohen before, during and after his congressional testimony today. So he has the latest for us. And tim obrien, executive editor of bloomberg. An msnbc contributor. Hes been reporting on donald trump literally for decades. He wrote a book about donald trump that got him sued by donald trump and tim obrien won that lawsuit. Donny, the checks. Seeing this change where you have you go from the two signatures of Allen Weissleberg and donald trump jr. And suddenly no ones willing to sign these checks anymore after a special prosecutors announced and we see one signature on the checks, donald trump. Yeah. I think you lay it out perfectly. And i think whats interesting is that weissleberg, and we talked last time tim and i were on, about how hes going to be such a key figure. He was the guy doing everything. So its fascinating that all of a sudden trump is signing his own checks. And one other thing about trump and checks. Trump does not like to pay money. People know who work for trump in new york over the years. Yeah. Very hard to collect for anything. Here now all of a sudden donald trump amidst his daily president ial routines is writing retainer checks to a guy who he says barely even when he was working for him was his lawyer. Now he hasnt worked for him technically in months just doing some advice and all of a sudden urgently writing him checks on a very, very timely basis. Very untrump like. And, tim, the there hasnt really been a defense offered for these checks, but what theyve what theyve tried to sort of pump out there through some of the republican members of the committee who are publicly asking questions is that there was a retainer agreement for this lawyer. Michael cohen is indeed a lawyer. But you have all these public statements from donald trump himself saying that, oh, Michael Cohen didnt do anything for me. He was just this guy i let hang around. He didnt really do anything. As usual, on the record, we have trump statements that sort of contradict a trump theory of defense. The other issue is if youre a lawyer in a retainer agreement, those things are written. Ive seen retainer agreements for lawyers. Theyre pretty simple. Yes. Theres got to be a retainer agreement that you produce or there isnt. If Allen Weissleberg cant produce that retainer agreement, i dont know how he justifies signing these checks. Well, then wed be shocked again to discover that members of the trump trio are lying about whats occurred here. You know, its interesting that that Irrevocable Trust is in place here. It was essentially this fig leaf that was established to give the appearance that the trump family was insulating the trump Family Businesses from the white house because the president came into the white house as the most financially conflicted president of the modern era. Every president prior to him had released their tax returns. If they had business holdings, they either put them into an authentically blind trust or sold them. Trump didnt do any of the above. That Irrevocable Trust is run by Allen Weissleberg, the ceo and his two eldest sons. The fact that the checks were cut of the of the trust presumes that allen and the boys knew what the money was being spent on so they are now part of a possible criminal conspiracy involving the payment of hush money and Campaign Finance law violations. I imagine at some point it dawned on them this is actually not a particularly bright group of people. They thought, uhoh, weve been pulled into this and they tell the president it has to come from elsewhere. Trump says, okay, ill use my personal Checking Account. Hes also said that he wasnt really sure where any of these funds were going or what they were being used for. It reminded me in the mid1980s, spy magazine did this great spoof where they mailed checks. 50 people, including donald trump cashed it. Then for 5 bucks, four people and donald trump. 50 cents. Trump was the only one to cash final check. This is a guy who knows where every dollar is going. Donny, one thing Lindsey Graham said in his, you know, defense of donald trump here is, oh, you know, people dont commit crimes with checks. What Lindsey Graham is suggesting in that is that donald trump as president of the United States could somehow get 35,000 over the course of the year, hundreds of thousands of dollars out of a bank somehow in cash and deliver these massive piles of cash to Michael Cohen with all of those cash transactions being illegal. Yeah. All of them. Like, so, you know, Lindsey Grahams defense is, why didnt he commit the crime in an even bulkier way that would create even more problems for him . Were not going to find logic in Lindsey Graham. That would be a fourhour special. I want to go back to weissleberg and draw a line to birdie madoff. Not that trump is running a ponzi scheme. Bernie madoff had a 50 billion fund and one accountant in a strip mall. When you are doing nefarious stuff, you cant have a lot of people involved. Whats going to be sad and tragic as we unpeel this and funny well, sad. The audience will decide. Okay. It will certainly be interesting. Youre going to see everything just went through this little green visor guy where this huge supposedly huge corporation, there is no finance department. There is no controllers. Theres no budget directors. When you are running either a ponzi scheme or a dishonest criminal organization, its got to be very, very isolated. This was very isolated and youre starting to see it here. Let me get you, donny, to the pardons, because you would know more about this than anyone who can talk to us. These stories that were getting tonight saying that people lawyers saying were close to Rudy Giuliani are approaching Michael Cohen shortly after the raid and theyre talking to him about possibilities staying in the tent. This kind of code language. What do we know about that . Well, im not at liberty to talk about that, but i will talk about trump as an autocrat. If youre an autocrat and you also operate above the law, what is the most autocratic tool a president has . Its a pardon. Yeah. You more than anybody understanding donald trump, understanding his constant need to and ability to knock down obstacles, that in some way, shape or form, in may mafio sew way, not a direct way. It wasnt make sense if they werent. Im not at liberty to talk about whether pardons were offered or not offered. I do know, though, that common sense tells you that if youre donald trump and you know that Michael Cohen knows where all the bodies were buried, at some point he would have at least wanted to keep him under the tent until it was no longer an option. One more thing about the testimony behind closed doors by Michael Cohen. Do you know in if the closeddoor testimony Michael Cohen is in effect allowed by the Southern District prosecutors and by Robert Mueller to say more no. Than in the public testimony . No, he is really bound in terms of these things. Look, hes being very careful. Thats why i find it laughable when people were suggesting that he was lying the other day when they were editing this thing. Yes, this guy if he tells the truth gets nothing. If he lies, he gets more jail time. Hes going in the front of the entire world, oh, this is a good one. The lawyers edited my statement. Yeah, i think im just going to say that on my own and its not going to be truthful. Its preposterous to think thats a lie. Michael is being very careful when it comes to any investigation. The Southern District, Robert Mueller, anything going on. Closed doors or open doors, his line is there are