Political analyst Gregg Jarrett offers his thoughts on the Mueller Report and the investigation of russian interference in the 2016 election. He is interviewed by matt schlapp, chair of the american conservative union. After words is the program that interviews top nonfiction authors about their latest work. My great honor to be here with Gregg Jarrett, my friend and someone who has made me smarter. Your most recent bestseller, witch hunt the story of the greatest mass delusion in american political history, a fascinating read that tells us all the tale that we have been going through since 2016, this is a followon to your bestseller the russia hoax which was the New York Times number one bestseller and im sure this will be as well. I am already at number 3, great to be with you. When i heard the president use the term witchhunt like he used the term fake news, the fact that the election could be rigged. All of these things, i spent my adult life in washington dc you recoil because they are bold phrases. Now you have borrowed this phrase for your book. Why . Guest it is very telling. What people forget about witchhunts is there are no real witches but this overwhelming irrational desire to believe that witches exist is what propels a witchhunt and that is what happened here, an astonishing array of smart people convince themselves and tens of millions of others the president had committed the most noxious crime there is in the criminal codes, treason. Treason is conspiracy with Vladimir Putin hatched in the bowels of the kremlin to steal the 2016 election and it was based on not a shred of credible evidence and the book explains how now we know through testimony of those involved they never had any plausible evidence to launch the original fbi investigation in 2016 and 9 months later when the special counsel was appointed they still had no evidence and the appointment itself violated the regulations authorizing the appointment and i explain how in the book and one of the things that struck me as truly amazing is that the appointment was made by Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein, wasnt based on evidence or the law but was based on vengeance. He named a special counsel because rosenstein had become angry with the president , he was emotional and in an act of retaliation he appointed Robert Mueller so think about this, a 22 month Long National nightmare because one guy got angry and he knew what he had done was wrong the day of the appointment, after it was announced he is confronted in his office about what he had done. s abuse of power, violation of the regulations and he hours behind his desk and bloggers am i going to get fired. It tells you he knew what he had done was wrong. If he had gotten fired earlier we might have avoided so much of this drama. Go back to this whole idea of donald trump prebeing elected to presidency his relationship with russia. I have flashbacks to all the interviews in the runup to the republican nomination in the general election of 2016, there was always this intrigue that donald trump was made by russia or bailed out by russia. There were scant facts or even details but where did this come from . It began with Hillary Clinton in early 2016 she began to pepper her speeches with references to trump and clinton, the trump might be a kremlin marionette. Do you think she believed that her was dealing with politics. One of the Unanswered Questions as she did it from cia director john brennan who was already beginning to investigate trump and any potential ties with russia. Is described in my book is the instigator of the witchhunt, he put together an Interagency Task force that grew to be the foundation of the russia hoax and the investigation, used by the fbi and in particular peter stzrok who was head of counterintelligence for the fbi, point person in the witchhunt. So we dont know whether it was something that came from the rich imagination of Hillary Clinton or john brennan or both. James clapper was involved, he turns out to be the prodigiously current i explain his leaks in the book but it all came to a head when Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National committee paid for russian disinformation that was composed by and ask british spy, Christopher Steele, and the amazing part, i explain this in witch hunt the story of the greatest mass delusion in american political history, he puts together his antitrump dossier within the course of 10 to 14 days. That is impossible. Read the first memo of his dossier, thats the kind of information that would take months if not years of working information on the ground, he hadnt been in russia in more than 10 years. It is almost as if he picked up the telephone, called the kremlin and said give me something, anything, true or not, about donald trump. I think in the end he was simply said russian disinformation with little tidbits of truth which is classic russian information. The truth is Public Information that anybody could find on the internet. Did Christopher Steele or brennan and the obama appointee did they use allies like the brits and others to try to handle some of this, to wash their hands of the fact this information was being dredged up . The cia than under john brennan, the director are not allowed under us law to spy on american citizens. It seems that they are able to. They outsourced to foreign governments and people in Foreign Countries and they were able to lure some key people in the Trump Campaign but they were minor figures. Overseas so that they could feed them information that could be used to justify their investigation and they used confidential informants like longterm cia asset named stefan how burn how burn. The fbi and cia sends in an fbi analyst under a fake name by the name of as russia turk who is described as a sexy bottles blonde to seduce george papadopoulos. My peripheral volunteer junior advisor on the Trump Campaign, what they end of getting is not incriminating information because there was no incriminating. What they got was exculpatory information which was then said jealously hidden. Host in order to understand this kind of rotten stench, i dont like saying it, that comes from a lot of high up officials in our government you kind of have to wind the tape all the way back, and always back to the clinton scandals because that is a long tape but the Hillary Clinton, the benghazi tragedy, her decision to keep silvers in the bathroom of their home, her decision to have an outside the normal government process to collect emails and data, all of that which obviously becomes quite a scandal as mueller, the fbi director, comey is the fbi director, has to figure out how do i handle all of this scandal, you have to go back there. And reading your book again i felt like i lived every moment of that but reading it again, it is quite extraordinary. The result of all that. Tell me the story. Guest chapter 1 is entitled a tale of two cases and it compares the clinton investigation to the trump investigation and demonstrates the disparity of treatment, the unequal prosecution and justice that is dispensed not based on the law but based on politics and partisanship. Host she is never sworn in . Guest now. The bottom line is Hillary Clinton committed multiple acts that constitute felonies. It is abundantly clear. She had a private server, violation of the espionage act, classified information is stored in her home and for people who say james comey said there is no similar case of someone prosecuted for that. I name these individuals who have been prosecuted for exactly what Hillary Clinton did so and comey said no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case that is just not true. Reasonable prosecutors have brought innumerable cases. Comey knew what clinton did was a crime, multiple crimes, 110 crimes representing 110 classified documents stored in her home and he actually wrote a statement two months before she is interviewed in 17 other key people are even interviewed and in it he uses the language of the espionage act, grossly negligent, but then he presents that statement to his staff and says but i still want to clear her. The steps as you cant clear her if you found her guilty of a crime under the espionage act so a pivotal date occurs in which peter stzrok sits down at the computer with his lover lisa page standing over his shoulder and eliminates the incriminating words grossly negligent and substitute something that is under the law identical and synonymous but sounds different it is not in the criminal code, extremely careless, which had been borrowed from barack obama and based on that he cleared Hillary Clinton, twisted the fact and contorted the law. Host doesnt he later say he was ordered to do that . Guest yes. Host by the permit of justice headed up by Loretta Lynch who just before comey clears clinton meets on a tarmac in a plane with bill clinton but they are just talking about grandkids and golf. She owed much of her success and career to her own abilities but also to being a close ally to bill clinton. He elevated her and she eventually became the attorney general but he advanced her career. She then pretends to recuse herself from the case but she doesnt actually recuse herself from the case. Host there are people who dont like the clintons, didnt vote for Hillary Clinton who really get into the whole dynamic of the story. We have a lot of people watching the show who are clinton supporters who think may be a story with the title like witch hunt the story of the greatest mass delusion in american political history might just want to bring out the worst of what Hillary Clinton did. Theres a lot to write about in terms of that but why does it matter . She breaks the espionage act, she says she does it for a matter of convenience. We can understand that. We have our devices, nice when it is more convenient. Why was it a problem to keep her emails vulnerable . It jeopardize National Security. As i explained in the book, document subsequent to her being cleared demonstrated Foreign Countries obtain her emails. And classified documents as well. That jeopardizes our National Security. That is the purpose of the espionage act. When donald trump before he was president said maybe china, the point was she said she deleted the emails, there is no record of these emails but the fact that our enemies read the emails they probably have copies of the emails, ironic and tragic but maybe truthful. Guest he was referring to russia, if you have her missing emails, let us know. It was obviously said in just but turns out it was likely true, some of the hacked emails ended up in russian hands because they were hacked through a russian server. Host the other piece of this is hard for people who support the clintons and voted for Hillary Clinton is so what . This was about hot yoga and wedding plans and where we are going to meet for dinner. With all the research you did, this is quite an Extensive Research project, there are indications the emails were destroyed because there were Sensitive Conversations about things like benghazi and things she is a candidate for the highest office in the land wouldve been publicly damaging had people known. Guest she wasnt entirely successful in destroying the emails. That by itself would be obstruction of justice because Congress Asked her to preserve it. When you define congress with a subpoena attached to it, that is obstruction of justice. Host you said the other week they werent under subpoena, she reprimanded the president , did she destroy these emails after congress made clear they wanted to see them . Congress had sent in writing a request to preserve evidence so that is official whether there is a subpoena or not but that is obstruction of justice. It turns out some of the emails she destroyed turned up elsewhere and some of them contained very sensitive government information so it wasnt yoga and wedding plans. Host are they are public . Guest not all. So her explanation is simply untrue. And yet in addition to violating the espionage act of the evidence is overwhelming that she did. Congress had demanded when you receive preservation letter you have got to abide by it. Host i am a former government official. My wife recently left government service, her second go around. You have an obligation to retain records, on your first day on the job. You dont need a letter from congress or anyone to notify you that you should keep records. You are told immediately you have to keep those records. When you work for an administration, the secretary of state, the taxpayer has a right, everybody gets to see that information. Guest foundation of democracy is transparency and accountability. Everything you do as a public official is not your property, the government and american peoples property on Hillary Clintons state Department Email account, empty, 0. Everything she did in the course and scope of her employment was kept in her home on a private server. You are jeopardizing National Security, and signed a document on her first take to understand these rules, received a tutorial on, the law you must follow it, she signed two separate documents, and i will abide by it but she already knew that from her service in the United States senate, the same instructions, how to preserve documents and cannot jeopardize National Security by leaking them. You will knew the rules, but she ignored them with impunity because she felt she was above the law and that the rules dont apply to her. Host what is your legal background . Guest a defense attorney for many years, a lot of people out there. Most of my clients were still behind bars. My point is if you look at this black letter law use sign the document, Hillary Clinton, Ivy League Educated lawyer, you have been through several senior government jobs, you understand the concept of records, on the river there and the whole museum that houses them. Hillary with a different surname has no legal penalties. Guest inevitable federal indictment issued by a grand jury. It is a slamdunk case. Loretta lynch knows this. And you believe it stopped at Loretta Lynch to the fbi, we are not going to prosecute this. Former top officials at the fbi all of this unfolded testified behind closed doors, the testimony has since been released, very few journalists have done it. Lisa page at the fbi did it under oath, the part of justice that no charges were brought against comey stood in front of cameras and said the department of justice doesnt know what im about to do, they were directing. Host a lot of people believed nothing like this could have happened without the president , Vice President be aware of that, your research couldnt find proof of that. People have to just surmise how high up the food chain this went. Guest i lay out the facts in the book witch hunt the story of the greatest mass delusion in american political history. When the exoneration statement was made to clear the first host he seems pretty upset about that. Strange wording, and being sort of aggressive with his language. Guest it came to an interview barack obama had done on fox news. A sort of public instruction, i dont want Hillary Clinton to start one. That is the language comey eventually adopted. A violation of the law, gross negligence. Host you dont believe the fbi director listened to the words of the president. Guest he did. He told the Inspector General when he was interviewed that he paid close attention to what barack obama said. It was just careless and didnt jeopardize National Security. That is what comey said. He was adopting not just the language of president obama but he essentially a public order. Do you think barack obama sent every signal he could, giving a pass on their legality. Guest the method was quite theres no paper trail. I am going to go on television and tell everybody what to do and they will hear it. Host then the story takes the turf, the clinton inc. Allies, all the various aspects of the clinton world are on defense. She has committed crimes, she has to get herself out of this. There is a terrible tragedy in benghazi, there is testimony up on the hill where it is not about the victims but about her. Congress with a republican majority in the house goes the various iterations of investigations of benghazi. The last investigation which democrats were howling over, how many investigations can you have, how many investigations do they have . Five . Guest there were multiple dueling investigations, trey gowdys investigation was the foremost but had it not been for the deceptions by Hillary Clinton and the state department involving benghazi we would never have discovered this private server, hundreds of thousands of emails and classified documents stored in her home. Host the dastardly turn seems to be the folks you chronicle in the book, the fbi predominately but Mister Brennan invokes in the Intelligence Community, switched to go on offense and decide that to quote peter stzrok we are going to stop him, meaning trump. They took extraordinary measures to try to dig up dirt overseas especially with russia to push you towards the Clinton Campaign to make the idea to vote for donald trump repugnant for voters. How did that happen . Guest there were two parts to the plan. Part number one is to exploit the dossier penned by Christopher Steele. The fbi was unable to verify. They tried mightily but you cant verify something that doesnt exist, that is simply a lie but part a of the plan was to leak it to the media and they assumed the media would run crazy with this story, it would damage trump politically and ensure Hillary Clintons election in november of 2016 and while it is true that many members of the media did pick up on the story it didnt quite gain traction and resonate with American Voters and trump was elected but the insurance policy was plan b. The insurance policy famous from the peter stzrok lisa page text message we have an insurance policy, the insurance policy was the fbis investigation donald trump won we would kick it into overdrive and really go after him and make our investigation of him, potential or alleged russian asset public. And they did. In fact they did it in january of 2017 before he was even sworn into office. Comey, clapper, brennan, concocted a plan to ambush trump at trump tower, selectively give him information about the dossier, gauge his reaction and use that meeting as a pretext to leak it to the media and that is how the dossier was published and once it was published the media was off to the races with the russia hoax. Host it seemed to me the troubling part of that is anybody who works for a president has to make Sensitive Information, hard to do with the leader of the free world but seemed in this case they are using leverage and blackmail. They had a lot of information. Dont think we dont know it and that seems to be we really thought those days were over. To the fbi and the consequences on that piece of the story, in all the dossiers we have read about and read and washed all of the in depth reporting on it, all of this work that Hillary Clinton campaigns, the deep state, all these things we have come to know. It is there any truth to any of these things, the donald trump had any legal action with russia . Were there any truth in the dossier about things that are embarrassing . Guest all of the collusion allegations in the dossier turned out to be untrue and you can read it in volume one of the Mueller Report. The fbi created a spreadsheet of all the collusion allegations and it all turned out empty, they couldnt corroborate or prove anything. Christopher steele, the author of the dossier said the information is unverifiable because it came from multiple anonymous hearsay. Hearsay is generally not allowed in a court of law, double hearsay is never allowed because it is a farce and this was triple and quadruple hearsay. We learned in subsequent testimony with emails in such that were passed along with the fbi that steel himself by these characters in the Obama Administration was viewed as an unsavory character. He got fired by the fbi for lying. He was on the payroll guest that seems to be a trend. He was on the payroll not just of the Hillary Clinton campaign, the Democratic National to me, he was in the payroll of the fbi and had been since early 2016, the year of the election. He lied to the fbi about talking to the media and feeding this information to the media and too many people in the fbi found out about it, they had to fire him, they still use him. He goes to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to get a warrant application to spy on the Trump Campaign and he vouches for steel as credible knowing he wasnt, he was a liar. Host internal communications at the time proved he felt guilty, he knew he was unsavory and that he lied. Guest the state department, and officer at the state department met at one point before the fisa applications to spy with Christopher Steele and she sizes him up in the course of an hour and realized he was a phony and she checked out at least one major part of his dossier, some consulate in florida that didnt even exist so she notified the fbi and the department of justice, this guy is a fraud. They ignored that warning and went ahead to the judges with the fisa court and concealed evidence and it wasnt just the state department that warned the fbi, and the conduit, giving it to the fbi, warned them be careful of this information, it is totally unverified. The fbi, didnt care. Has verified information yet they relied on the dossier which was unverified. Last time i checked lying to a judge, a witchhunt, was also five other potential felonies. The Inspector General report comes out, i expect it to be a damning indictment of the actions of these people with the deceptions of the fisa court. Host i worked for president george w. Bush. I was involved in selecting bob mueller to be fbi director. In the rose garden, my mother, one of her wonderful friends from wichita, had photos from the location. I remember the meeting, nothing anything inappropriate, the one thing you heard over and over about bob mueller, the quintessentially the fbi director. Was it true then . If it was or wasnt true, when did the fbi get on the most dangerous of rogue have . Did it start before mueller . Was a comey obama problem . What happened . Guest it started before mueller. It escalated using any power they could because they are the good guys, they are the g men, they have the white hat, they could do these things, they are the truly elite that can break the rules and the interests of the country. Guest the reason it began before mueller was after mueller was appointed fbi director at the time of 9 11, he gets halt in front of the fisa court, and they confronted with evidence the fbi had for years been presenting lies to the fisa court in warrant applications to spy and mueller promised he would fix it, rules and procedures and the woods procedures and the fbi continued to violate the woods procedures in this particular case in the investigation of donald trump and the surveillance of spying on carter page. It predates mueller but continued under his leadership and really escalated under james comey. Host with my experience in the Bush Administration that is the first time james comey was considered a real candidate, we did a little checking on jim comey, not a name i am familiar with. He was politically a chameleon. He would tell us he loved president bush and loved his policies but talk to liberals and they would say james comey secretly one of us was pretty liberal and everything, a photo of president bushs, the hodgepodge story, one person who knew him will summarized it, the best thing to know about james comey. I saw it early on in the 1990s. Some case he had launched. My camera man walked out to the van and have you ever seen a guy who loves himself that much. I always remember that because i saw vividly in my research. James comey, this sanctimonious and selfrighteous individual who only cares about james comey. Host that was our experience and if you think back, he always turned on the person, turned on president bush, the end of the administration on Sensitive Information about renewal, patriot act, 9 11 era legislation. This whole Hillary Clinton saying back and forth, reopening the investigation before the election date, completely infuriating the Obama Clinton folks, what is he doing . To this day, now he really has the social Media Presence of an almost a oc acolyte. Guest he is a warrior in the communist revolution. Amazing metamorphosis. It is rather nauseous when he tweets outstanding by the sea in some philosophical phrase he uses or fanning among the tall trees. It is pretty comical. Host you didnt say standing behind the curtain. James comey lied to the president repeatedly saying you are not being investigated. The truth was the document shows that testimony shows he was lying to the president , one of the reasons, the Hillary Clinton case trump fired him because comey was lying to him all the time. And he has been lying to me. The final straw and fire james comey. Comey told the president i dont do sneaky things deals government documents, not his property, Government Property and leaks them to a friend for the purpose of leaking them to the media to trigger the appointment of a special counsel that happens to be longtime friend and colleague and mentor bob mueller. That is how devious james comey is and when he gets caught in a lot of things he feigns memory loss as he did in his testimony, as he said 149 times. In interviews when confronted, he pretends that he doesnt know things, the dossier, im not sure i know what that is. Mister steele, i know i heard that name before. Those kinds of answers really makes you doubt the credibility of comey. Host if jim comey really brings racket to the reputation of the fbi you have a question about the policies, the power to stop trump, to push this russia hoax, who hires andy mccabe, how does the cast of characters around james comey come together . Is that an internal process that was inevitable . Having people with leftwing politics and animus towards the duly elected president how do they get into the upper russia line . That cant happen by anything other than guest comey surrounded himself with sycophants, didnt matter the qualifications. I talked to several former top fbi officials who said mccabe was not qualified to be deputy fbi director and on the firing of comey, i have a spouse that is involved in politics, a lot of people in 21stcentury america that have that. He even the question of having a spouse that is politically active in the commonwealth of virginia, the optics of that arent great. Host and he shouldve recused himself it was too late. It was the very end. Guest i open chapter 4, the entitled coup, by observing Rod Rosenstein and Andrew Mccabe are living proof of the peter principle. People in hierarchy tend to rise to the level of their own incompetence and that is true of Rod Rosenstein and Andrew Mccabe. The people that comey surrounded himself with work, as i say sycophants, they are all on the same page. Not that they are terribly qualified to do what they are doing but these are people who believed in james comey and were willing to do anything even undermine the rule of law and subvert the democratic process which is what they did. Host donald trump is struggling to get the idea of collusion with russia behind him, to keep having this come forward in all these stories. Tell the story of the reemergence of bob mueller. From my understanding of having conversations with people who would know, some would say to be Donald Trumps director of the fbi after james comey is let go. Host i read a column recently that posed the question did mueller lie to congress . He denied that he was interviewing to be fbi director, with donald trump in the oval office the very day before he becomes special counsel. Documents show that rosenstein and mueller were secretly communicating that mueller was already on board to be special counsel so what was he doing then in the oval office the day before he takes the job . He denied he was interviewing for fbi directorship but i interviewed the director of the oval office, that is why he was there. I interviewed his personal assistant who set up the meeting and was privy to the conversations, an interview with the fbi director, multiple administration witnesses and documents demonstrate mueller was either terribly mistaken or not telling the truth when he denied all of that but it invites the question what is he doing there . If he already decided to take the job a special counsel wise in the oval office . Was that a conversation under false pretenses so that mueller could gather information from trump in the oval office to be used against him in special counsel investigation and the key question is did the president explained to mueller, his reasons for firing comey and if the answer to that question is yes then mueller could not have served as special counsel because that makes them both prosecutor and witness in the same case which is strictly prohibited. I put the question to the president when i interviewed him a couple months ago in the book, did you tell mueller your reasons for firing james comey and the president paused and thought about it and smiled and said no comment. He says i could tell you the answer because i know the answer and vividly remember the conversation and as i write in the book it was clear to me sitting across from the president judging his reaction to my question in his demeanor that the answer was yes. It is inconceivable that they wouldnt have talked about the firing of james comey just days before because trump was talking to everybody about it so again, mueller should never have been special counsel. He was a fax witness. He wasnt honest with the president. He didnt say to the president by the way, mister president , i agreed to be a special counsel to investigate you. He wasnt forthright, wasnt honest and truthful to the president which to me was unconscionable. Host the mueller comey, rosenstein, brings back mueller, if you look through this, the fbi had quite a black eye which i dont think either one of us or any american likes saying. The fbis an important instrument of our government and muchneeded agency in our government. Are they on the path to recovering . Guest now, comeys twin brother is the fbi director. Host Christopher Ray. I dont think judging the actions of chris race and he has been fbi director demonstrates that he doesnt care about transparency and unsporting the truth to the american people. He cares about covering up to protect the fbi. How do i know that . Because he has defied lawful subpoenas issued by congress. He has fought the declassification of critical documents that would expose the truth behind the witchhunt so it is a shame that Christopher Ray cant be more honest and forthcoming and transparent to the american people. They need to know the truth, they deserve the truth. Accountability in a democracy is fundamental. Jim clapper, john brennan, two names that appear throughout the book. We had to read and watch their roles in all of this. Can they be prosecuted . Is that a live wire . Should they be cute you guest it is possible and that is white is very significant and important that william barr several months ago launched an official department of justice investigation and appointed us attorney from connecticut john durham who is wellversed in corruption at the fbi and cia, prosecuted and put behind bars people who have engaged in lawless acts in those agencies. As i write in the book, inventing ally is easy, spreading ally is easier, uncovering the truth is hard because the truth has its end and it will take time to unravel all of the lawlessness and corrupt acts involved in the witchhunt. But i have confidence in william barr and john durham. The Inspector Generals report will be very important but they are not waiting for the ig report. They are moving full steam ahead and we recently learned that durham has expanded his investigation, added additional personnel which suggests to me that he likely has already found evidence of potential crimes. Guest what is amazing when you read the book, you recollect the amazing path our country has been on. It seems during the obama years nothing leaked from this group, the deep state, the people in the Intelligence Community who no real dirt on us and our enemies overseas, they have real information and nothing on the Hillary Clinton emails, nothing on trying to stop him, nothing leaked but with donald trump there is a delicious leak including conversations with foreign leaders and others on a regular basis. Why is that asymmetry guest for the eight years of the barack Obama Administration the Intelligence Community, the fbi were all empowered. Small group of unelected but powerful officials you call the deep state, i call a malignant force, they saw donald trump coming and he was a threat to perpetuation of their power. Hillary clinton would have been a third term of barack obama, their power would continue, donald trump vowed to drain the swamp. They are the swamp, a malignant force, they didnt want to be drained. Power in washington is like crack cocaine. Once you get on it and have it you will do anything to stop someone who is going to take power away. That is how the russia hoax began, that is how it began the witchhunt, these people saw donald trump has a threat to themselves and what they loved, power, the end justified the means, even lawless means. Host this whole tragedy since 2016, you have to end your book. The whole idea is keep going. The journal every day got to be taking good notes. Guest im not inclined to write another book. The only cure for a lie is the truth and the only remedy for lawlessness is justice. I end with that and say a reckoning awaits and so we wait. I follow it very carefully. I continue to write columns on the subject matter. We will wait and see. I am as curious as the American Public is, whether people will be held accountable. Nobody is below the law either and trump was treated as if he is below the law. He was accused of obstruction of justice constantly because he dared to speak out that the investigation against him was wrong and he havent done anything wrong. He wasnt obstructing justice. He was protesting in justice. And yet the mueller team thought that criticizing them and their investigation was obstruction of justice. As one of the lawyers said, they acted like crybabies that no one, not even the president could exercise, what youre doing is wrong, i didnt do anything wrong, it is a witchhunt. It was a witchhunt and now we know. Host tell us a little more about your career, your path to chronicle these Amazing Stories that are truthful in your two books. How did you get to this point . Guest i was a lawyer, defense attorney, local news guest how do you follow . Guest a buddy of mine was auditioning for a morning tv job and i tagged along and i ended up auditioning, he is still my friend. He had a wonderful career doing other things. I did both for many years and did too much and i was young and single and didnt have a mortgage. And after a couple years, you are still on the letter head. Is this sabbatical ever going to end. I was at msnbc, started writing columns and the column sort of took off so i asked fox to give up the conflict of interest. The column led to two books. I met my wife in wichita, incurred the she wasnt born and raised in wichita, and i was living there. I had a great time there and the people are so nice and i fondly regard wichita and been back several times. My mother was just here from wichita, brothers and sisters come out. And obviously with these different media jobs you had. Does that give you a perspective . When you live with the people of kansas and north carolina, people in maryland, i anchor the news there as well. You get a feel for the honesty of america and what people care about. One of the great things about being a correspondent for several years, i went to every state, but you get to know people. It keeps you grounded and honest because they are honest. It is an important part of being a reporter, to understand who your readers are and who your viewers are. Host Gregg Jarrett, a good man, the book is witch hunt the story of the greatest mass delusion in american political history, appreciate you being our guests here. This program is available as a podcast, all after words programs can be viewed on our website at booktv. Org. Cspan coverage continues at 1 45 p. M. Eastern. Joe biden in iowa and at 7 00 tom stier in waterloo, iowa. Watch live on cspan, online, cspan. Org or listen live on the free cspan radio apps. Host starting now, booktv on cspan2, every weekend, 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books and this weekend former New York Times labor reporter stephen greenehouse is our guest on afterwords. He talked to andy leavitt about the challenges facing American Workers and we are live with Sebastian Gorka on our monthly call in program in depth, Deputy Assistant to donald trump joins us to talk about his books on us to mystic and foreign policy