Rachel Maddow takes a look at the days top political news stories. Magazine which typically showcases male celebrities. The males chief ref new officer and Content Officer have told some employees that they unsuccessfully appealed to david pecker, the ceo of america magazine, who reportedly ordered the cover. They asked him to consider replacing her on the cover. The executives said they argued that would it hurt the reputation making it tougher to attract top talent for future covers and potentially alienating hardwon advertisers. Nevertheless, there she is. Get her workout. Guys. It says it right there in the fine print. Four days before the president ial election in 2016 the Wall Street Journal published the first report that this company, American Media, most famous for owning the national enquirer, reported
did the president have this affair . She said yes. He says no. You say stop talking about this matter. I dont want to know. I understand. But federal prosecutors are looking into whether that was an effort to influence the outcome of the election. An effort that was potentially illegally coordinated with candidate donald trump and his campaign. That is a matter of federal criminal investigation. An audio tape apparently made surreptitiously has since been released which has trump with cohen on tape discussing it. And specifically they discuss trumps intention to pay American Media back that 150,000 that they paid to Karen Mcdougal to make that story go away. So now there are two new things. Number one is this. American media really has taken this somewhat hilarious step. Where is my ben affleck is wheres My Duane The Rock Johnson . Content for a piece about her fitness routine. So thats the first new thing. American media and David Peck Er putting together this magazine cover, scratching it together. All of a sudden to make it look like that 150,000 deal with Karen Mcdougal to cover up the president s alleged affair, trying the make it look like wasnt that at all. They were really after her for her mastery of the cable pulley. Or whatever. According to the reporting on this, according to their own employees, to take advertiser hit, to take Editorial Hit to the magazine which this entailed, we know they were warned that that by their own senior employees. American media to think this was worth it. They had to be scared enough by the legal jeopardy they thought they might be in when it comes to that contract. This woman and what they did with her for trump during the campaign. They thought it was worth it and they really did go ahead and publish it. Thats one new thing. The other new thing that has happened is this. Federal prosecutors considering a criminal case against the president s lawyer, Michael Cohen, are now officially in possession of all the evidence they are going to review to decide whether to try to bring federal criminal charges against mr. Cohen. Now, the Court Appointed official, the Special Master who had been appointed to review all the evidence to see if any of it had to be covered by prosecutors, that process has now come to a conclusion. Weve heard that from the Special Master herself and had it confirmed by sdny. At the conclusion, only a tiny fraction. Of nearly 4 million files federal agents seized when they raided mr. Cohens office, apartment and hotel room were protected by attorneyclient privilege. So only a tiny fraction were held back. The rest have been given to sdny. And those prosecutors, we believe they have convened a grand jury to consider the Michael Cohen matter. That is considering the Michael Cohen matter. Those prosecutors are now in the possession of all the evidence that they need to make their own decision on whether or not to ask that federal grand jury and sdny to bring charges against cohen. In addition to bank fraud and Tax Fraud Charges that are a little bit like what Campaign ChairmanPaul Manafort has been facing, one of the charges under consideration by prosecutors is Michael Cohens involvement in that alleged payment to cover up that alleged affair. I mean, to compensate Karen Mcdougal for how much mens journal needed and wanted to put her on the cover instead of ben affleck again. Why would the president be talking about reimbursing American Media for their contract to Karen Mcdougal . If the contract was really just to put her on Fitness Magazines . Why would the president be talking on his lawyer about paying that money back . So its tick tock at the u. S. Attorneys office in the Southern District of new york. For what its worth, that is the same federal Prosecutors Office that brought multiple charges against chris collins. Chris collins was the first member of congress who endorsed trump for president. He served as a Senior Member of the trump transition. He has been arrested and indicted. The same federal prosecutors. It is tick tock at sdny. Southern district of new york for the president s lawyer. And apparently it is also tick tock in virginia at the criminal child of the president s Campaign Chairman. And boy, did this not go the way we thought would it today. This was humbling. We really thought, i really thought with Confidence Heading into today that we knew what was
going to happen. The judge has been keeping such a tight rein on the way this trial has been going, it seemed quite clear the way this would unfold right through the end. We thought for sure the prosecution would rest their case by the end of today. Then defense would have to decide whether or not they would call any witnesses on Paul Manaforts behalf. Then there would be closing statements and the whole thing would be done. It didnt unfold that way today. The prosecution has not rested its case. And the reason that happened is because almost the whole day in court was taken up today in a mysterious series of conferences at the judges bench between the judge and the lawyers on both sides. Also, meetings apparently in the judges chambers where nobody could see them. At one point the judge himself left the courtroom and appeared to walk off. Not in the direction of his chambers but in the direction of where the jury usually comes from when they enter the court. We have no idea what happened for most of the day today at the Paul Manafort trial. We know that the prosecutors did file another motion asking the manafort judge to correct something to the jury that the Prosecutor Says he messed up. You might remember this happened earlier as well. Earlier this week they file a motion informing the judge that he had improperly scolded the prosecutors in front of the jury for something the prosecutors say they didnt do wrong. They asked him to tell the jury that he had been in the wrong. That prosecutors hadnt done anything wrong and he should correct that for the jury. The judge acquiesced tp that. Last week, the prosecutors asked again. They asked him to clear up something as well as the jury. During proceedings yesterday the judge interjected, as he is want to do. The judge interjected to tell prosecutors basically that they were barking up the wrong tree. They shouldnt be trying to prove something with this
witness that wouldnt end up being legally relevant to the charges manafort was facing. As a matter of law, it looks like prosecutors were right and the judge was wrong. And so prosecutors asked the judge late last night to clear up that point with the jury as well. Now, we have no idea if the judge did or did not clear that up with the jury as prosecutors requested. If did it happen, it wasnt in the courtroom in front of spectators and reporters today who had little idea of what was going on as any of the rest of us. So an unexpected day in the case of Paul Manafort. Prosecutors at the end of the afternoon, they finally did. They brought the jury back in and finally did start bringing on witnesses that we had expected today about this allegation that Paul Manafort had offered a Trump Administration job to a bank ceo who had arranged for manafort to get millions of dollars in loans between the election and the inauguration. We had previously seen evidence in the trial that the guy from the bank thought he would end up being secretary of the army for his troubles. Today, an employee of the bank fetched the bank ceo said he thought he would be secretary of the treasury or secretary of housing and urban development. And thats apparently, those apparently were dangled. In addition to whatever else was, including a potential job with the army. So those details between Paul Manafort and so whether or not there was some quid pro quo with the bank ceo thought he would get something from the Trump Administration, in exchange for green lighting those loans. We thought that would be the finale today. That tale has started to be told. They didnt start until late in the afternoon. Honestly, The Big Question now, the big mystery now is, what happened during those hours long delays . What happened in the sealed discussions out of earshot all day long. We know it is late at the end of the case. There will be more witnesses on monday for the prosecution. Were told that closing arguments will take place only as early as tuesday. Particularly if the defense doesnt call its open witnesses, own witnesses, which they might not. Given this strange turn, is this the kind of thing that is a normal occurrence . Not too strange an occurrence . In a trial that has been running as fast as this one in this kind of a court where it seems to be run on such a tight schedule . Can we tell if it had something to do with the jury . Do we think Hit Something to do with the fact prosecutors keep trying on correct the judge . For him in their words, screwing
stuff up . And when do we find out . This was the note we got today. We tried to get the formal record of what happened in this courtroom today. Quote, the transcript is under seal and will not be available to the public. Some day that may change. Until that happens, we have to ask people who were there what happened. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Was it frustrating or fascinating or both when things sort of took off out of earshot . If some cases, out of sight . It was surprising the way things screeched to a halt. As you were talking about, weve been moving at a Break Neck Pace for prosecutors to keep it short, keep it short, and cut all the witnesses down, sometimes spending half as much time as they intended. To then see the judge consume about five hours today with procedures either being held at side bar or in secret in the judges chambers was a pretty startling development. I would say interesting but at the same time, frustrating because we couldnt get a good idea why the trial had been put into some kind of suspended animation. One thing happened was this request from prosecutors for a second time they wanted the judge to correct something that they thought that he got wrong before the jury. We saw the judge did correct himself. He agreed that they had blamed prosecutors for doing something wrong that they didnt get wrong. They asked him to correct something that was more of a matter of law in front of the jury. We know thats something, there was a motion about from the prosecution. It wasnt something they were fighting about orally and in person. Is there any way to know if that might have been part of why things went so differently today . Why the jury wasnt called in until so late . Why the first thing happened when the doors opened was Bench Conferences where the lawyers were talking out of earshot of everybody else in the room . I think that could be part of it. I think it is highly up likely that that motion accounts for all the delay that we saw. There was enough other weird action going on with the judge moving back and forth to the jurys chamber at the side of the courtroom. I dont think what the judge said wrong yesterday, while significant, he said that attempted bank fraud isnt very important and is maybe something the prosecution should be trifling with. No one would expect an attempted bank robbery wouldnt be prosecuted as a crime so it is hard to see why it would be dismissed. That was the issue the prosecution got upset about and filed a motion overnight. It is surprising and unusual there was no public ruling on that motion and no instruction to the jury. Maybe the judge denied it. If he did, the judge didnt give any explanation on the record. There was some speculation morning maybe the defense or the prosecution was seeking a mistrial on that account and it might be difficult for the judge to fix his mistake without saying that manafort was guilty on that charge, and there could have been an argument of that sort. I guess well find out when we find out with all of these things. I know it has been long hours all week. Thank you for being our eyes and ears there. Thank you. Joining us, Chuck Rosenberg and Senior Justice Department and fbi official. Thank you for being with us tonight. Appreciate you being here on a
friday night. My pleasure. Thank you for having me. As an experienced prosecutor and someone very, very experienced in the Eastern District of virginia, a lot of us who are nonlawyers and who are not frequent observers of federal trials were totally flummoxed. Whats happening, how weird is this . Is it going off the rails . Everybody was trying to read the Paul ManafortBody Language to suggest if this meant the trial was blowing up in some way. As someone who has been there and knows what this means, how weird was today . Have you seen stuff like the happen before . Especially right toward the end of a trial . Ive seen things like this happen before. I dont think it is going off the rails or blowing up. Maybe i can explain. Sometimes a judge has to take three or four hours to straighten out an issue. It is frequent but it is frequent enough that we can make an educated guess. It usually involves a jury issue. It may be something as benign as a juror has something at home. That doesnt seem to be the case here. Ive seen it happen in my own trials once or twice over many years, a juror accidentally sees something or hears something. Maybe overhears hears a conversation, a bathroom or a hallway or cafeteria. Maybe Saw Something at home at night after a court recess for the day. Overheard a conversation and more likely than not, reports that to the judge. Why does it take hours to straighten it out . The judge has to essentially call a timeout and question the jury. And the juror. What did you see or hear . What you saw, what you heard, did that challenge your opinion of this trial . Can you put it aside . So the judge probably has to make some sort of inquiry. Some sort of factual finding. Thats likely. When you see a trial shut down, it is usually along these lines. In terms of when this will become clear, i showed the note from the Court Reporter in terms of this being a sealed transcript. Is this the kind of thing we should expect to eventually become public . Whatever happened today, will the discussions remain sealed indefinitely . I would imagine it will eventually become public. The courts really want to make all their proceedings public. Unless theres a compelling reason not to. For instance grand juries are sealed. But this is an open public trial. I imagine someday, perhaps soon well know precisely what happened. My guess is it is a juror issue. One where the judge had to inquire and had to satisfy that this juror, whatever he or she
saw or heard can put that aside and consider the case fairly and even handedly. There is Something Else that happened today. I want to ask you. Can you stick around . Yes. Chuck rosenberg is back with us after this. Stay with us. I dont keep track of regrets. And i dont add up the years. But what i do count on is boost®. Delicious boost® high protein nuritional drink now has 33 more protein, along with 26 Essential Vitamins and minerals boost® high protein. Be up for life. Get ready to switch. Protected by flo. Should say, protected by alan and jamie. Right . Should it . When you bundle home and auto. Run, alan . You get more than just savings. You get roundtheclock protection. You get more than just savings. Thanks, janet. Its welcomemy happy place. Store. You can learn how to switch to xfinity mobile, a new Wireless Network that saves you cash. And you can get 5 lines of talk and text included with your internet. And over here im having my birthday party. Dj fluffernutter, hit it dj fluffernutter
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