Transcripts For CNNW CNN Tonight With Don Lemon 20170518

Thats right, the big question in the wake of Rod Rosenstein Deputy Attorney general announcing special council, were told that former director comey didnt share his memos with top doj officials including Rod Rosenstein and as of last night he had not seen those memos. Its unclear how much of the revelation of the memos in the times and else where factored into his decision to announce bob mueller would take the reigns of the russian probe. As of last friday he was telling people close to him he didnt think it was necessary to appoint a special council unless the fbi investigation was in peril and then there was this investigation yesterday that raised the question how much it factored into his decision. So he never read comeys memo before deciding special council. As of last night he did not read those memos. Comey did not share those with him. Its unclear if the people who had it shareed it with Rod Rosenstein but as of last night he did not see them and director comey only had shared with his close circle of associates and senior fbi officials. Part of the press release said Deputy Attorney general announced appointment of Robert S Mueller the third to oversee the previously investigation of russian efforts to influence the 2016 president ial election and related matters. Certainly, that is a key element in all of this, looking into possible coordination between Trump Campaign associates and russians and with bob mueller now special council he can take this investigation where he wanted and look at matters relating to that. You never know where the facts will take you. That certainly indicates it will be a focus under bob mueller as well. I want to bring in Senior National security analysis wt. You broke the news that Michael Flynn told the Trump Transition Team weeks before the inauguration that he was under federal investigation what else can you tell us. So what we understand is that general flynn is notified in late november, early december that the Justice Department is looking into the work he had done as a lobbyist for the turkish government and that point wasnt known publicly that developed into an investigation. On january 4th he called the trump transition and said this is going on, you need to know this, his lawyer followed up with a phone call. That was 16 days before the inauguration, and the Trump Administration knew there was an investigation and still went a had ed and decided he would remain in his job. In any other administration he would take the new job as National Security advisor in any other administration this would have been a automatic disqualification, the job as National Security advisor has access to almost every american secret and has a huge role in shaping american policy but the trump transition seemed unconcerned with it. Was the president aware of this or the president elect aware of this . You know that is a tougher one. If this were an ordinary standard transition i would say i cant imagine he wouldnt be. In this case i dont know. We had a white official suggest that was the case. But its really hard to tell. Theres been such chaos. Who knew . The transition lawyer who is now the white house council, other lawyers there did, presumably they told the rest of Trump Transition Team and now the white house staff. The head of the team was mike pence then . Was mike pence at the time, yes. So what does that mean h . It means they knowingly brought in someone with access to almost every american secret and new was under federal investigation and knew secretly without telling them worked with an agent of a Foreign Government in this case turkey, for the final months of the campaign. Lets talk about what we learned from mcclancy who is reporting, it says National Security advisor that says before the inauguration flynn made a decision on behalf of the flynn team that benefited turkey and turkey paid upwards of half Million Dollars as a lobbyist. Im just seeing that, its both astounding and goes straight to the problem of bringing in people who would throughout the Campaign Lobby on behalf of the Foreign Government and they are now going to make decisions to benefit people in this case two many tos before that decision was made his client was paying him half Million Dollars for 90 days of work to represent their interest in this case lobbying against an opposition leader. Can i ask a question, this is yet another terrific story, its all about why what was it about Michael Flynn that everyone in the trump orbit wanted so desperately to have him in the administration. All of the stuff that would be disqualified. Why did they keep him . You know, thats a good, i wish i knew the answer it to that. I mean, i dont mean to put you on the spot. Maybe you dont know. But it does raise that question. Right. Its a great question. Look for trump he was loyal. One of the first people to sign up with trump and stuck with trump through the whole campaign. Theres a weird connection between those two. They are both outsiders who made it and established in their respected fields, never really accepted. They were going to shake up washington together and he would get up and lead chants lock her up during the campaign and trump wanted to reward that and say this is my guy. Trump is not known for extending himself for other people, not only is your story but the whole story from yesterday, Michael Schmidt story about how trump tried to get comey to shut down the investigation for Michael Flynn. This is perhaps the most damaging story about trump and its for the benefit of Michael Flynn. Hang on before you answer that before putting matthew on the spot bring in our senior analysts, legal analysts and reporter, to get more on this reporti reporting. Matthew as i understand in the course of your reporting you reviewed subpoenas that werish autoed in the flynn investigation. What can you tell us. Grand jury issuing subpoenas anyone who did company with flynn, or flynn intelligence group, they are asking for all the records they have done with these guys. Theres something important if this was a mere violation of his registration as a lobbyist they tend to be handed out of washington by a sleepy part ofod which which s odoj. This issor. We dont know if theres there are other grand juries out there but they do seem to be active. You to Michael Flynn how he responding to how he the. Our understanding is he sees this as part of continual effort immediately of the election to of the. He had been fired by president obama, flynn ran the Intelligence Agency and was out of the sprez. Obama warned President Trump about flynn and didnt pursued trump. And then the w450i9ds White White White white why this president take up for Michael Flynn and put his job in jeopardy owe trying to get him out of trouble reportedly with comey saying can you back off this investigation thats the milliondollar question. It certainly is. I dont pretend to have the answer. Theres certainly some possibilities. The fact he was an outsider, the way trump was. The fact he was so reckless and angry in his denuns iation of Hillary Clinton famously leading the chant of lock her up at the Republican National convention. He also had russian connections, turkey obviously we know he was getting a great deal of money from turkey. He had that meeting, he went to russia, he was paid by russia today the news outlet where he sat next to president putin. I dont know. Whats interesting is that theres so much exposure to the white house and you have this new reporting by matthew and then he notified the transition team, right. And the Vice President mike pence in charge of the transition team. And steve bannon on that transition team. Donald trumps three oldest kids on that transition team. The team of course in charge of trying get the government up and running so the president z be ready on day one so he could be surn surrounded by people whats going in all the hots the country the fact that the warning didnt get up to donald trump or he didnt heed the warning. Fact his children were on that Transition Committee wand steve bann bannons z we talk about him being loyal to Michael Flynn he has said before why he didnt fire him over 18 day period some of his answers have been well hes a general. We know donald trump idolizes the generals in his administration so i think thats part of it too theres something in Donald Trumps view that seems to be inherently good and worth defending to label general. But this particular general was a birther, so many things that were just below what even a civilian should say or a behavior from a civilian rather than a general. It makes one wonder why this president had so much respect or loyalty for him. Totally agree. Can we get one factual question settles. This grand jury that is subpoenaed Michael Flynns records is in Northern Virginia does that grand jury now fall under mueller and is mueller the overall person in charge or is that something separate . Well, i think the answer will be mueller will have to make that choice. He will undoubtedly learn what that grand jury is doing and decide whether he wants to take that over. Matthew would you say thats right. That seems right. We dont know for sure. Obviously got appointed. But somebody else in the Justice Department has to make a decision to prosecute or whatever to do with flynn out of Northern Virginia. Let me weigh in, if i could. Interestingly enough the one overseeing is the one who replaced sally yates who was fired for refusing to implement or try to enforce and defend the travel ban so thats an interesting link right there. But remember as special council and special prosecutor Robert Mueller has the advantage to decide when and who he would like to tell at the doj about his findings and investigation. He has the prerogative to withhold information or be forthcoming this happening with flynn would fall under the scope of the investigation as marching orders are dictated by Rod Rosenstein so it will be all encompassi encompassing. He could, since hes under the direction of rosenstein, rosenstein can overrule his statements or decisions but he has to go to congress let them know that. He has a big advantage. So you, david, you ask because . I think it will be interesting to see how the pieces are tied together. Mueller i would assume he won the take this unless he had control of all pt pieces. I wouldnt think he would want flynn piece to be a side show because the information could be very relevant to what hes collecting. I just dont believe that the trump team sat there from the time they were first told he was under investigation until he was forced out of the white house i think it was about 40 days. That is a long time. Wouldnt be forced out if not for the news store that broke. So they kept him a long time. I dont think donald trump would keep someone because he liked him or they shared views on steve bannon. You have to believe theres something more serious and the question becomes was there a flow of money of some sort that flynn was involved with and it is very much in Donald Trumps interest. It may not hit him personally but may be somewhere in his organization that he is concerned about what will happen with the money is this a bigger thing hes trying to protect. Because i think you can safely believe that when he called comey in and had that conversation oneonone and said why dont you drop this, he knew what he was doing, he knew what the stakes were. But it was worth it. You seen the subpoenas, they say theyre looking for bank records, correct. Yes and any other records of financial transactions. All right. Heres a question. Matthews reporting in new york times. Have you heard the reporting about what was happening as this came down saying it takes a lot of the politics away. Theres a sensatione of unity b takes a lot of the politics away. If you look at the reporting thats happened it takes none of the politics out of this. No and it certainly doesnt take the spotlight off this. Initially you mentioned thats what donald trump wanted to do. He felt if he could get comey out of the picture that somehow he would be in a better position and of course the white house finding out tonight the hard way that they are probably in a worst off position than they were when comey was head of the fbi with this special council now in place. So this idea now that the white house and those white aides who are over worked and in many ways thrown under the bus by their boss they have no choice but to hold it together because they might be impolitic ated in some of this. If you have a special council that can subpoena anything and can figure out what these aides knew and when they knew it, if theres Text Messages or emails they might have to lawyer up in a way the president at some point might have to lawyer up. This moment tonight spreed a core once the questions start coming at them i imagine theyre going to feel very differently. She makes a very real point here. You know, youre talking about, like, real human beings, whether you like the Trump Administration or not. And many of them are not very wealthy. And if you have to hire a White Collar Crime lawyer because youre subpoenaed to the grand jury even though youre not a suspect, havent done anything wrong, youre probably talking about 20,000 just to show up with you at the grand jury. Thats a lot of money. The president is a billionaire. He can afford it. Im sure he can help them out. We dont know we havent seen his tax return. If i could. Let me just add, you know, mia, youre actually right, the president is in exponentially worse state. Even in the letter that comey sent to the staff said the president could fire me for any reason or no reason at all well there are protections in place for Robert Mueller if he were to be fireed it would have to be a personal action from attorney general Rod Rosenstein who could be fired by President Trump but it has to be a good cause, theres protections in place to say you dont have that atwill status. And there could be hearings to determine whether or not the firing of those individuals would be a good cause, this is a battle he put in a immeasurably worst state. I have a question, how do the clinton staffers pay for their legal fees. That occurred to me just now. Very good question. Trump staff are going to be facing tens of thousands of dollars at least. George step analous wrote about it in his book how to be human some of them borrowed money from their parents, i mean, they scrape d money together isnt that the famous quote from Hillary Clinton when she said we were dead broke when we left the white house. It was because of legal fees. Correct for them it wasnt 50,000 it was 5 million they owed to their lawyer. I came to the administration and had to hire a lawyer because i had to justify things that happened before i came to the administration. It was quite incredible. Life has changed so much that i saw young person after young person in clinton years that i thought the system was very unfair who had to lawyer up. I think the trump team will find a number of young people are going to be put into terrible situations, they were just there, they were witnesses to whatever and will have to hire lawyers and will be a very expensive proposition. Matthew, what else is breaking, youve been here 20 minutes you have anything. I do have a thought in all of this, is that you got the special council now but theres still a ton of, i dont want to call it investigations but intelligence going on. Remember the investigation involved things on the other side of the world. And those agencies are still controlled by the white house. By trump appointees. So i think there is the white house last i understand they do sf still have a lot of authority in this country and this is hardly something theyre powerless over. Weve seen no evidence of anyone in the cia saying dont collect on russia, dont look at this, we dont know that to be the case entirely and certainly will be something well be looking out for. Thank you all when you want the to be president of the United States careful what you ask for. When we come back what will happen with the Russian Investigation now that Robert Mueller is taking the reigns. When did you see the sign . When i needed to create a better visitor experience. Improve our workflow. Attract new customers. Thats when fastsigns recommended fleet graphics. Yeah now business is rolling in. Get started at fastsigns. Com. Yeah now business is rolling in. Fotheres a seriousy boomers virus out there thats been almost forgotten. Its hepatitis c. One in 30 boomers has hep c, yet most dont even know it. Because it can hide in your body for years without symptoms, and its not tested for in routine blood work. The cdc recommends all baby boomers get tested. If you have hep c, it can be cured. For us its time to get tested. Ask your Healthcare Provider for the simple blood test. Its the only way to know for sure. Investigation, the Justice Department appointing Robert Mueller as special council to oversee the probe. Bringing in now assistants during watergate reporters. You heard the other breaking news we heard tonight. Whats your response . I mean, its just amazing. I mean, ive never seen anything like that since wataergaergatew. Its one revelation after another and good thing that mueller is appointed, we need someone who is independent who can investigate the matter. So dig deeper what do you think the move means. I think there will be subpoenas issued, people will be called into grand juries and have to give evidence and testify and theres going to be a real independent investigation and digging in. I think the whole thing sends a message. Having a special council in place shows the seriousness of the matter. Not like we have various senate and house committees muddling along we have someone who will dig into the facts, that will get subpoenas out there, that will work with the fbi regardless if comey is there. They will be directed u there going to be supervised, and i think were going to see action. Just your overall what do you think of this. I think the appointment is a brilliant idea, exactly what we needed. There has to be an independent investigation. I hope the scope of the appointment is broad enough to encompass all of the potential crimes and even the possible endangerment of National Security by leaking code name information to our adversaries. Does this investigation now trump, no pun intended, all other investigations going . How does it impact. It should be unrelated to the congressional investigation. Theyre looking forward to what laws they can change to prevent there being a reoccurrence of this behavior. Where as the criminal investigation of the special prosecutor is looking at whether theres actual violations of existing law that people should be held accountable for that could include the president. The question then would be whether the president would be indicted or impeached. Based on watergate i would say impeachment is the proper procedure once a crime is uncouldvu uncovered. The president said he looks forward it to this matter being uncovered quickly but our analysts say it could take months possibly years like watergate took years from start to finish, what impact do you think it will have on the administration on the country and on trump supporters. First of all i want to point out the watergate prosecutor was appointed may 1973, the president redesisigned in 74 an less than 18 months we went through the entire investigation, theres a 18 minute gap in the tapes and 18 day in firing flynn. We went to the Supreme Court to get the right to listen to the tapes and we sent a road map to congress for impeachment and had trial and convictions that was all in a year and half. That compares favorably to ken stars investigation. I would hope mueller would be close toer our time line. 18 months would be august 2018. Dont forget watergate was june 1972 so there was a year before cox was appointed. So this doesnt happen in a short time it will take some time. It is interesting when i hear young people say this is crazy, i cant believe it had is happening, and i remember when i was a kid our president having to leave the white house on a helicopter. That is crazy. Do you think looking at the evidence that we have now is that, is that a possibility . Oh, absolutely a possibility. I mean, you got a primea facia case of obstruction of justice. Case of obstruction of justice. Its the fact flynn was kept in a long time before he was finally fired. The next day trump goes and talks to comey and gets rid of the attorney general and everybody else and has a private meeting where he says to him, can you do something, stop this investigation with flynn. Its an intent crime. Its a question of what was his intent in what he was doing. Did he have a corrupt purpose to try and basically get rid of this investigation. I must say on national tv with the interview that was done last week he pretty much admitted that he had the Russian Investigation on his mind when he got rid of comey. That almost does it right there. But all of the circumstances certainly lead to a conclusion that there is, at minimum probable cause of obstruction of just zblice jill, do you agree with that . I agree complete. I believe it is a impeachment event. The question is whether congress has the will to do it. That may depend on public reaction. In watergate the massacre forced him to hire new prosecutor and release the tapes. So im hoping for the public to Pay Attention and get behind the special prosecutor and get the information and facts out. I think that will happen when comey testifies in public. All right, you guys say that, but if you sit and you watch the news most people want to have news that reenforces their own beliefs thats what they watch. If you watch conservative media this is not a big story or they are not even covering it. I watched couple main networks last night there was one person doing something on a chipmunk or something. Everyone else is covering breaking news. Whatever 30 of the country who voted donald trump if they are not getting the news whats it matter to them, it does not exist. Yeah but i still think its building, that people are being educated. How could you be educated if you are not paying attention to it. I dont think theres a choice to Pay Attention for the most part, especially when comey testifies, thats going to be like the john dean moment of this matter. When he goes through the memos, the description what he had to do in speaking to trump what trump said to him on those three occasions when he asked him am i under investigation. I guarantee you once that comes out thats going to be absolutely riveting and change a lot of peoples minds how will it make a difference if you are not being served by the socalled News Organization you may be watching or reading or the commander in chief is telling you its all fake news yet people are being fired, special prosecutors are being appointed around you, people are being dismissed, yet its fake news, how can that happen . Well let me point out that Richard Nixon actually won in a land slide unless President Trump who did not carry the popular vote, president nixon did, and despite that and despite very strong support for a very long time, the facts reached all those people who supported him. The facts reached congress to the point where senators goldwater and rose said you lost the support of the voters if you do not resigned you will be impeached. And i Hope Congress people despite the results of a terrible gerrymander situation where nobody has to compromise, youre right, nowadays theres far more Media Outlets so you have people who cant agree the table is square. You can debate what a table means if you agree on the facts of the table. Youre right. Thats a serious problem. I ultimately have great faith in the American People to really find out. Even if it is only because theyve now lost their health care or they are hurt because of the new tax proposals. Eventually the people who supported him and its not the majority of the country will turn against him as will the congress. And we have a dow jones crash today and that may reach republicans in ways that Donald Trumps activities dont. Hopefully the truth will come out. Follow the money. Thank you both i appreciate it. When we come back much more on breaking news Robert Mueller named special council in the Russian Investigation. Why he is being called incorruptible. But weve got the get tdigital tools to help. Now with xfinitys my account, you can figure things out easily, so you wont even have to call us. Change your wifi password to something you can actually remember, instantly. Add that premium channel, and watch the show everyones talking about, tonight. And the bill you need to pay . Do it in seconds. Because we should fit into your life, not the other way around. Go to xfinity. Com myaccount i want you to take a look at this. Bright bart news making it look like President Trump appointed the special teacouncil is sayine President Trump confirms no collusion between my campaign and special Council Appoints council to lead the investigation he didnt appoint the special council to lead the investigation my point exactly. Lets go to our analyst. If you are no the being informed by your News Organization, thats all youre reading, how will you know the truth when it comes to your president. Well, the interesting thing with the appointment of former director Robert Mueller, the twist here, he is a very lowprofile guy. Not a guy going to be out giving up updates or sitting in front of the media. In fact his reputation was always low key guy. No entraje and took a different approach than director comey. Very different leader. In fact if you recall he moved into headquarters week before september 11th and had a scramble and immediately brought the country together. So you think it will ultim e ultimately serve the American People. Exactly, hes not going to be someone to sit in front of the tv cameras. He will do a very thorough and complete investigation and when he thinks hes got it right hes then going to report to congress. Jeff you want to the weigh in. I got to agree that director mueller is a great choice, hes got stellar reputation and he will drive to get the truth. Both democratic and republicans are applauding rosensteins decision in appointing Robert Mueller. How will this investigation start, will he have to start from scratch . I think he will have to take it where the investigation is now. He will of course review the investigation see whats been done and either put it in a new direction or move in direction theyve been going. Do you think the administration now is seeing it as a big mistake for the president to have fired james comey . I mean, no question about it. I think if you had to choose director comey versus former director mueller i think the president now has to be somewhat concerned. Direct direct direct director mueller will get to the bottom of it. The truth will come out and he will report based on the evidence he develops and the American People should be and should have the confidence that when he speaks, that is the complete truth and we can be satisfied we got to the bottom of it. Theres lots of talks about memos and tapes of interactions do you think the special council will get his hands on white tapes if they exist. I would hope so. If they do exist than the white house will have to respond. I want to talk about the fbi rank and file, so much is made of them and how theyre dealing with this and will their own investigation continue alongside this one or not. Will it stewart . Keep in mind Robert Mueller is at the helm here so he has complete autonomy to decide who he will utilize. My guess is he is going to sit with the agents that conduct the investigation. Hes going to be brought uptodate very, very quickly and my guess is he will rely on continuing to utilize those individuals to continue forward. I would not be surprised as early as this evening as he already met with the fbi agents conducting the investigation and been brought up to speed and given them directions what they should do next. A g. O. P. Source said rosenstein had thrown President Trump over board by appointing the special council. Do you agree stewart . To some extent. Thats a difficult question to really respond. Im going to pass on that one. Jeff you want the to take it on . I think he anybody in the department of justice or the fbi their loyalty is to the constitution and rule of law. Thats a tough question but thats where the loyalty should be. The president met with four candidates in the fbi director position. Joe leeberman. Andrew mccabe. Richard mcfeely. What do you make of the accountant candidates. I dont know much about them. I served with mccabe and he knows whats going on in the fbi and where to get support from, i think its tough to month within the bureau up to that top spot. Does mccabe have a relationship with mueller. I would think so hes been in washington long enough. Stewart do you know these potential candidates. Not those. There were other individuals that were on the short list that i had the privilege, one of the candidates who has been reported Mike Anderson the sac in chicago i had the pleasure of going through the fbi candidate with who my understanding was on the short list and very dear and close friend who is very qualified is assistant director paula bate. I do know those two individuals and ray kelly former new York City Police commissioner, his name has been thrown in. I think though that the fbi would be better served at this point to have someone from the outside come in and do some House Keeping and really renew the confidence not only for the American Public but also within the fbi. I think there needs to be new blood brought in. I agree with that. Thank you very much. When we come back more n the special council who will now oversee the Russian Investigation after a week of bomb shell reports. How will russia react . Ual realiy of business communications. No, its reality. 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Movantik may interact with them causing side effects. Why hold it in . Have your movantik moment. Talk to your doctor about opioidinduced constipation. If you cant afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. Back now discussing breaking news, Robert Mueller has been named as special council on the Russian Investigation. So good to have both of you on. Max im going to get your take on the breaking news on Robert Mueller. Obviously this is not good news for donald trump. I mean Robert Mueller is a straight ahead investigator and has a case that should not be that hard to crack. Remember up until about eight days ago there was a hard case to make against trump which you had to prove he was colorado you had to prove he was in collusion with russian to meddle with the election. Is it would be hard to prove trump was in charge of that. But in trying to stop that investigation donald trump has created a world of hurt for himself because he fired james comey and now were seeing all of the evidence comey is going to bring forward in his memos of obstruction of justice. This is entirely trumps doing his effort to block this investigation and hes basically proving the old adage that the cover up is worst than the crime. Was it right move for rosen steen. I think its the only thing rosenstein could have done, he either had to appoint a special council or step down, he appointed a special council and you know, i would say the bottom line here is that the odds of donald trump serving out all four years of his presidency have now markedly diminished. Jonathan . I watch russia more than american politics but i see the news gods giving you great amount of things. Whats interesting is the russian newspapers today one of them called a witch hunt going on in the huts. On in the United States. Other gloated saying a meeting with our ambassador in washington and Sergey Lavrov has kicked off this intense debate about whether theyre giving secrets to us, and mr. Putin said it was political schizophrenia that had americans blaming the president of the United States for giving secrets, secrets to the russians. Well we dont know what the russians got but we do know Pouliot Putin is having a good time. Saying if you want well give you notes if you want. Like hmm you want pictures of the meeting, well give you pictures. Are you saying they are laughing at us . They are getting a good, i wouldnt say theyre having a chuckle because the people who are serious in russia like stability, like predictability. Had is very unpredictable. Also going with the rule of law which theyre not entirely used to. Are they taking joy out of our grief what they did with the photograph are gamesmanship 101. Are they playing President Trump . No, i dont think theyre playing President Trump. I think their dislike for the clintons is so very strong and was so very grounded in some real political controversy, that theyve been hoping that trump would break through the consensus, maybe the only consensus that exists in washington, d. C. , that being hostile to russians is a good thing, and a second cold war is something we all embrace. Max, you write something, an opinion piece. You said about President Trumps sharing of classified intelligence to the russian diplomats, Donald Trumps blunder is horrifying. Tell us about that. This is unprecedented to have a president sharing code word secrets. And by doing that, conceivably blowing up a source of information that we rely upon to tell us about isis plots. But to step back, this is part of the horrendous, nogood, terrible seven days that donald trump had from last tuesday, in fact, eight days from last tuesday to this wednesday. That was only one of the blockbuster stories that emerged this that time period, along with the fact that he fired comey, that he asked comey for a loyalty test, that he asked comey to end the investigation of mike flynn. Now the final bit of bad news, that a special counsel is being appointed. If you step back, the entire picture i would say of the Trump Presidency has changed completely within the course of a week. Remember, at the beginning of may, we were talking about the 100 day mark. A lot of people were saying hes normalizing, hes becoming more of a main stream president , that hes not as crazy as he used to be. Now people are seriously talking about impeachment thats become a real possibility. This is a completely different presidency. Its been utterly transformed. Donald trump has been tremendously weakened. He is exposed to obstruction of justice charges, which a veteran prosecutor will be able to prove. Robert mueller knows what hes doing. Jonathan, your thoughts on this . Do you think that the russians have shared maybe with iran or someone else the information that they gleaned from the oval office, from the president of the United States, sharing classified information with them . You know, mr. Putin comes out of the spy racket, compartmentalization is very important to them. Im going to tell you, don, my take is a little different. First of all, maybe its just selfish. I fly russian airlines. I want to be safer. Some of the leaders of isis are people who have come from the former soviet union. Theyve got more to fear in moscow with isis and its success and the cadres that are getting trained in isis that could come back to haunt the russian motherland than we have. And you know, the last big story i covered for cbs news was the School Crisis where they killed 188 children. They know what terrorists can do and they want to protect their people. And we have good reasons to try, no matter whats going on in this country, to beat down, in little ways, the walls of the cold war that are growing up, that keep us from cooperating with the russians. None of that is a justification for donald trump taking code word secrets that were given to us by our Israeli Intelligence partners and willynilly sharing them with the russians. Remember, the russians are also very close to the iranians and the Bashar Al Assad regime. That places at risk the sources and methods that the israelis have developed and at risk the United States, because hes compromising American Security by doing that. The russians yes, its true that we do have some overlap of interest in some areas with the russians. But they are not our friends. They are the people who interfered with our election and undermined our democracy and are committing war crimes in syria. Thank you, gentlemen. I appreciate it. Now i want to bring in the National Security correspondent for the Washington Post and cnn political commentator alice stewart. Thank you both for joining us. You broke the news in the Washington Post today. Tell us what you learned. Well, what we learned was that there was a meeting in june 2016 of the republican leaders. It was a meeting that took place after the ukrainian Prime Minister had met with these same leaders that described russias interference in ukrainian politics. And that led kevin mccarthy, the majority leader on the house side, to basically make a comment, an extraordinary comment, which was basically that he thinks that putin pays two people here. Dana rorbacker, a congressman from california, and trump. And then when there was laughter from some members in the room, mccarthy adds swear to god. Lets listen to it. He begins by saying, ill guarantee you, thats what it is, the russians hacked the dnc and got the research that they had on trump. And then mccarthy laughing. Mcccarthy adds, theres two people that putin plays, rorbacker and trump. Theres laughter and then he adds, swear to god. Ryan then interjects and says, this is off the record, no leaks, right . Ryan then adds, this is how we know were a real family here. That was a concise way of getting that in. What happened afterwards, did you attempt to get a response from anyone that was there about this conversation, and if so, what did they say . Yeah. We went to ryans office. We went to mccarthys office, and we basically said we were going to report this dialogue. They came back to us and said that it never happened. That there was no such conversation. They said it was fiction. We went back to them a second time and we said, were going to report that the actual were going to print the actual transcript which you had me read from, to which they said it was a madeup transcript and false. Then we went to them one last time and said, were going to be saying that we listened to the audio of this, and verified it. To which they basically said, yes, this conversation happened. We take back the earlier denials. And that mccarthy was it was a bad joke on his part. So again, thats what put this tweet up, that said this was an attempt at humor gone wrong. No surprise, the Washington Post tried to contort this into breaking news. But you heard the actual conversation. Do you think that he was joking . Well, frankly, certainly the conversation is very serious until that point. Im not sure exactly where mccarthy decides to say what he says. But when he says it, he says it very seriously. Theres the laughter, then he says swear to god. Do i think mccarthy believes that trump is getting paid . I dont think he believes that. Is his point that he thinks theres this very strange affinity between trump and putin . I think thats probably what he meant, and he turned it into kind of this strange comment. Okay. So rye yns comment is the most interesting, why does he choose to shut it down . Why did the spokes people lie when there is a recording of the conversation . Look, i think were in a different era, a different time where so many things are being recorded and a lot of folks arent aware that theyre being recorded. But more than anything, it was a good scoop. They said the conversation never happened. Right. I think more than anything, what ryan and mccarthy wants to do is not pretend as though it didnt happen. They want to move past that and get past that and ryan made a good point about that today is we need to get focused on the issues that the American People are concerned with and not these types of conversations. Were going see ryan and the gop focus on issues that the American People want to focus on and let the special counsel now do its investigation. As ryan said today, the gop can walk and chew gum at the same time. They would be best, and the white house would be best served youre not condoning a lie there, are you . Absolutely not, no, don, im not doing that whatsoever. I think right now what the gop is trying to do and focused on is not get sidetracked by these stories that once again i say it was a good scoop on adams part. They want to be tight lipped and not have conversations and not further a news story about these types of conversations and focus instead on what the American People want, and that is tax reform and health care reform. [ overlapping speakers ] if theres going to be credibility i really have 20 seconds left here, credibility on both sides of pennsylvania avenue . The main thing is, any time youre in a situation like this and you have a reporter like adam coming on a story like this, you dont want to continue to feed that story. So youre not going to discuss it, not going to give Additional Information on it, and hopefully the story dies down. Ive got to go. Thank you. Its the end of the broadcast. Thank you both. I appreciate it. Thats it for us tonight. Thank you for watching. See you back here tomorrow night, everyone. And good evening, and what must they be thinking right now at the white house . Barely eight day office since the firing of jim comey, and just days after the barely hours after Financial Markets took a nervous dive and republican lawmakers began cautiously demanding answers a development that could change everything, the naming of a special counsel to lead the investigation. His name is Robert Mueller, he will have sweeping powers and a broad mandate. If he wants to investigate jim comey, he can do that. If he wants to interview the presiden