Transcripts For MSNBCW All In With Chris Hayes 20191206

Judiciary committee to draft impeachment articles for what she called President Trumps serious violations of the constitution. Our democracy is at stake. The president leaves us no choice but to act because he is trying to corrupt once again the election for his own benefit. The president has engaged in abuse of power undermining our National Security and jeopardizing the integrity of our elections. His actions are in defiance of the vision of our founders and the oath of office that he takes to preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the United States. Sadly but with confidence and humility, with allegiance to our founders and a heart full of love for America Today i am asking our chairman to proceed with articles of impeachment. The speaker also had some words for sinclair reporter even walking back to the podium to get her point across. Do you hate the president madam speaker because i dont hate anybody. We dont hate anything, not anybody in the world. Dont accuse me of i did not accuse you. You did. I asked a question. Representative collins yesterday suggested the democrats are doing this simply because they dont like the guy. Let me just say this. I think the president is a cowered when it comes to helping our kids who are afraid of gun violence. I think he is cruel when he doesnt deal with helping our dreamers. I think hes in denial about the climate crisis. However, thats about the election. This is about take it up in the election. This is about the constitution of the United States and the facts that leads to the president s violation of his oath of office. I still pray for the president. I pray for the president all the time. So dont mess with me when it comes to words like that. Just as Speaker Pelosi began her press conference the Judiciary Committee announced it will hold a hearing on monday. To receive presentations from the counsels related to the impeachment of trump. Republicans have been trying amidst this process a sort of weird Jedi Mind Trick suggest ing impeachment is backfiring and modern democrats are scared. That tactic is not working because its just clearly not true. And its actually unclear whether republicans deluded themselves into thinking democrats were starting to get skittish. Reporter David Drucker whos well sourced and House Republicans twieting many republicans seem legit convinced democrats no, this is going to happen. As we saw from nancy pelosi, democrats are committed 100 to impeaching the president of the United States. And it took many of them a long time to get there. There was a moment yesterday that was very interesting in the hearings when harvard law professor noah feldman was read his own quote from months before by one of the House Republicans in which he was opposing impeachment. And feldman agreed, yeah, i was against impeachment. I was an impeachment skeptic until the whistleblower complaint and trumps phone call with the ukraine president. And that is generally trul of the majority of the democratic caucus. I saw it day after day interviewing them right here on this show. Speaker pelosi and the democratic leeldership held the reins on this for months. A number of democrats supporting impeachment ticked up. But what pushed them over the top was seeing in black and white clear evidence of the president of the United States attempting to rig the next election. It was when they found out he would said the ukrainian president , quote, i would like you to do us a favor, though. Thats when things changed. And once they decided to move forward completely, they have moved quickly. Its only been 35 days since the investigation formally began. The investigations into nixon and clinton took 170 and 64 days respectively. Every situation is different. Articles have only been drafted three times before so its hard to get an apples to apples comparison, but its notable the calendars of the trump and clinton impeachments are sort of uncannily sinking up. The house voted to impeach president the 21st anniversary of his impeachment is exactly two weeks from today. And as for the pacing here theres a somewhat strange situation we find ourselves in which both nancy pelosi and donald trump seem to believe that a fast impeachment is to their respective advantage. Democrats are full speed ahead, forging ahead today. Late last night trump was tweeting, quote, if youre going to impeach me do it now fast so we can have a fair trial in the senate and our country can get to business. Because trump thinks he can control the game in a senate trial, and it seems like Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats are going to call the president s bluff. Joining me now is barbara mcquade, former attorney for the Eastern District of michigan, and the former spokesperson for Senate Majority leader harry reid and also press secretary back when president clinton was being impeached. Barbara, let be start with you. I thought it was interesting the wording nancy pelosi used around what she viewed as violations, abuse of power and National Security. Meddling in elections and i wondered how you see that language relating to what the categories of articles of impeachment might be. Yeah, i thought those were interesting choices of words, and i think it suggests a strategy that is probably advisable in terms of looking at impeachment not as violations of technical statutory language like bribery or extortion or using terms like quid pro quo, but talking more broadly as we heard the professors testify about yesterday, the essence of impeachment is about abuse of power and the things that the framers of the constitution feared the most were foreign influence in elections and undermining our National Security and putting a president s selfinterests above the national interests. Those are the things she seemed to hit, and it suggests to me perhaps when drafting the articles of impeachmented, the drafters of those articles will keep those bigger things in mind. You had many years working on the other side of capitol hill in the senate. And i wonder what you think when you watched the strategy here which is in the words of the house leadership and also the critic Jonathan Turley yesterday narrow and focused. Keep it on ukraine, move fairly quickly, get it over the senate. As a sort of veterinarian parliamentarian watching it develop, what do you think of that strategy . I think its the right way to go. I have seen an awful lot of poorly run hearings over the years, so to the extent these have gone well so far, you know, i think its great. But to go to your deeper point what the speaker has done is fantastic. She checked the different corners of the caucus, made sure everyones onboard and like a good leader she made the decision to pull the trigger and decide to move forward. I think she is concerned and i am as well that if this continue tuesday stay out there people are going to lose interest and or, you know, theyre going to find some other reason to go after biden, for instance. Let me follow up on that because i think one of the concerns now about the senate where you really know how that body works is essentially a Senate Republican majority that can muster 51 votes for rulings in a trial essentially turning this into a kind of circus and investigate the investigators enterprise that donald trump has dreamed of and Lindsey Graham has said he wants. A couple of different things. First of all, you and have talked about this before, but the fact of the matter is based on everything i can tell you so far theres not a snowballs chance in hell that joe biden, his son or anyone else like that is going to be testifying in the well or on the senate floor in part why because i think theres a whole bunch of republicans that dont want to go down that path. There were a couple of quotes today from john cornyn and john thune both of whom said basically they want to avoid a circuslike atmosphere. You throw in susan collins, Lisa Murkowski and others, mit romney for instance and i dont think the votes interest there. Remember to a significant degree everything is going to be done on a majority vote. And if mcconnell overplays his hand or the hard liners overplay their hand, theyre going to lose. There seems to be quite a disconnect between what the white house wants and what i think is going to happen on the floor of the senate. That is the most you have put your finger on the most fascinating dynamic if and when we get a trial, precisely that. Because we know what donald trump wants. Mcconnell is happy to tell the president to go walk off a pier when he doesnt have the votes. Itll be interesting to see if that happens. As were speaking here, barbara, the speaker today talked about the election. I mean right now Rudy Giuliani, the president s lawyer is in ukraine doing the thing that the president is being impeached over. He is tweeting today about how ukraine wont get full u. S. Cooperation until they deal with the biden situation. Hes meeting with shady exofficials people notoriously with axes to grind and agendas and it is remarkable to watch him continue to do this. Yeah, i thought one of the things chairman jerry nadler said yesterday during the hearing was particularly compelling speaking about the need for urgency. Theres been some complaint and professor turley yesterday during the testimony said he thinks things are moving too quickly. But the Counter Point to that as chairman nadler said is this president continues to seek interference in the election. He must be stopped. We cant just wait until the next election, because if hes rigging the election, then we cant count on that as an effective way to remove him from office. And so the fact that Rudy Giuliani is still out there seeking election interference and the fact that President Trump began this effort with president zelensky the day after Robert Mueller testified about his last effort to interfere with the elections suggests hes a recidivist, encourageable and we need impeachment and need it quickly. Thank you both for sharing your expertise tonight. Joining me now one of the members of congress who was on that house Judiciary Committee responsible for drafting and voting on articles of impeachment against the president , democratic congressman joe nagoose of colorado. This is maybe a wonky processing question what royou in a room together, literally how are you going to draft these articles . Its good to see you, chris. Enterms of the notices the Judiciary Committee will have an opportunity to receive the evidence and presentation of evidence from the Intelligence Committee and Judiciary Committee counsels. So obviously that will be a very important hearing as we kind of compile and react to that evidence and compare that evidence and apply it against the legal standards expounded upon yesterday. I imagine theres going to be robust conversations about what articles should be sent to the full house for consideration and to the extent we were to proceed along that paths, they would be marked up the same way youd have a markup for a resolution or legislative bill. Theres lots of steps left in this process, but were going to treat it with the respect it deserves and take it with a methodical approach Speaker Pelosi so eloquently described today during her press conference. You talked about the president tweeting about witnesses, intimidating them, conceivably tampering i think in your mind and in the minds of many. Do you worry that the president is not getting the message about restraining his behavior in this domain particularly with the president s personal attorney making in public tonight the same claims that are getting the president impeached . I think its very clear that this president is not getting the message. And as you said what the president s personal campaign attorney is apparently doing right now in ukraine based on the reports weve seen thus far is testament to that very fact, and it underscores the circumstances we find ourselves in. So as we talk about the need for the house to move forward and to treat this with a sense of urgency, to move expeditiously through the process, it is precisely because the president s conduct poses a real threat to the National Security of our country in terms of the corruption and m. D. Mining of our elections. And that is happening in realtime, and it is ongoing. So that is precisely why the house has taken this so seriously and why i think youve seen us move in such an expeditious fashion. Are you watching the polls . Im not. Well, youre in a fairly safe seat. When i say you i mean collectively the caucus. I would just tell you this, chris. I think every member is certainly spending time back home with their constituents. This freshman class of democrats held more town halls combined than any of our predecessors. And were certainly taking their views into consideration as we move forward in terms of honoring our constitutional oath. But at the end of the day as the speaker said it is not about the polls. It is about our constitution and defending our constitutional republic. That fundamentally is the work before us as a committee, as a congress, frankly as an american people. And so in my view thats the way were taking this sort of the approach were taking and the lens by which were reviewing the work before congress, not through the polls. All right, thank you very much. Thank you, chris. Still to come the house intel member who says hes just basically so fed up with the behavior of his republican colleagues hes leaving his job. Congressman denny heck joins me in his first interview since announcing his retirement. clients voice remember that degree you got in taxation . danny of course you dont because you didnt your job isnt doing hard work. Its making them do hard work. And getting paid for it. vo snap and sort your expenses to save over 4,600 at tax time. Quickbooks. Backing you. Here, it all starts withello hi . How can i help . A data plan for everyone. Everyone . Everyone. Lets send to everyone wifi up there . Uhh. Sure, why not . Howd he get out . a camera might figure it out. That was easy glad i could help. At xfinity, were here to make life simple. Easy. Awesome. So come ask, shop, discover at your local xfinity store today. Im very angry about how it is the most powerful person on the face of the earth would remove you from office after your Stellar Service and somehow feel compelled to characterize you as bad news and then to ominously threaten that youre going to go through some things, so i am angry, but im not surprised. That was congressman denny heck, member of the house Intelligence Committee last month during the testimony of ousted u. S. Ambassador to ukraine. Yovanovitch. He seemed to be clear at his wits end during the impeachment hearings frustrated with the behavior of the president and his republican colleagues. That seems somewhat surprising since congressman heck does not have a reputation on capitol hill as a fire breather or bomb thrower. And then yesterday lee announced hes retiring. He will not be running for reelection next year basically because, well, he kind of cant take it anymore. In a statement congressman heck said the impeachment inquiry had, quote, rendered my soul weary. I will never said how some of my colleagues could ignore or deny the president s unrelenting attack on a free press, his vicious character assassination of anyone who disagreed with him and his relationship with the truth. Here to talk about this with me is congressman denny heck of washington. Take me through when you made this decision and why. Probably over thanksgiving holidays. Oh, that recently. Yeah. I think it probably had been coming for a while, but you ask when the decision was made and i got a chance to get some rest and do some heavyduty reflection and came to that conclusion. But, again, its probably been coming for a while. I mean, after all week after week, month after month weve been sitting there subjected to some of the behaviors that you describe from or quoted from my letter, chris, its an awful lot of abrasion to the spirit and soul. To observe is daily. Its very saddening. Expound on that. I always wonder about the human aspect of being in that room. Because we all have workplaces, coworkers relationships, sometimes theres fraught, conflict and sometimes those jobs require conflict and youre a grownup and a certain amount of that is expected but what i read in that letter is there was Something Else happening. So you have to compartmentalize and we live in a highly pluralistic society. And we have to figure out to way to Work Together on occasion. And when i observe my colleagues across the aisle, many of whom i consider good friends i come to the conclusion theyre incredible selfdenial or in abject fear of what the president will do to them or he has a demonstrated record of viciously attacking people when do not support him fully. Theyre completely cynical. If its any one or a combination of those when you look at the numbers both this cycle and last cycle the number of republicans who have retired not running for office its a multiple number of democrats. And the other conclusion ive come to is ill not saying it out loud or in public i dont think many more of them can take it either. Youve got some retirements that looks like folks who are looking at their polling and are going to have a tough race. But some you had representative graves today in georgia whos the sort of upandcoming star in the party. Its a safe seat. Theres been a bunch like that as well. I mean, you think what you call soul weary is actually something, theres ironically some bipartisan soul weariness to we serving in this office at this time by this president. Inarguably, chris, theres no doubt about it. I think there have been a handful of people and while they were not able to or willing to speak up about it is what they felt in their heart. Take a contributor carlos car bellow from florida who was defeated and hes pretty explicit in his criticism now hes been eliminated from the prospects of electoral punishment by a vindictive president. And i think he says what a lot of republicans who have departed voluntarily are thinking and feeling. How many terms have you served in the United States house of representatives . This is my fourth, but lets put in it context, chris. I was first elect today the statehouse of representatives in 1976, 43 years ago. And ive been out of Public Service more than in it. But i have been in and out of it my entire adult life. So this is actually the end of a very long journey of the privilege to engage in Public Service. Congressman, its really refreshing to hear someone speak this honestly about it. The sometimes seems like were watching something very hard to watch go on with the country and politics and political culture. And its strangely gratifying to hear that the people closest to it maybe feel that way as well. I dont want to be melodramatic chris but one of the expressions ive heard an awful lot, in fact ive heard it too much when some of these behaviors have manifested is were better than this. Im going to be a little ominous. Whether or not were better than this remains to be seen. Its up to us to decide whether were better than this. Change does not as dr. Martin luther king suggested roll in on the wheels of inevitably. If we want to be better than this it is time to step up. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Coming up, president ial Bernie Sanders on the state of the race and how he thinks hed cast his Impeachment Vote based on where things stand now. That interview next. Your current plan with thousands of options nationwide from National Insurance companies. Dont miss the deadline. There are only days remaining in open enrollment. Funny thing about Health Insurance, you dont think about how much you need it until you need it. Hes not going to be okay. 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Healthmarkets can find you the right health plan and make sure you get all the subsidies you deserve without all the hassle. They even have new alternative options most dont even know about that can save you thousands. They work to help you and do it all for free. Dont assume that your plan is still the right fit. The Healthmarkets Fitscore makes it easy to find the right plan for you. Having helped enroll people in millions of policies with an a Customer Satisfaction rating, you can trust healthmarkets. For this free service, go to healthmarkets. Com or call right now. Your Insurance Market place, healthmarkets. Call healthmarkets before the december 15th enrollment deadline to see if you qualify for 0 premiums. Call the number on your screen now. We are now in the 60 day run up to the iowa caucuses. The Democrat Field has already winnowed substantially. And what seems pretty clear right now there are in early states and National Polling four people at the top of the democratic list. One of those candidates is senator Bernie Sanders who some people had many written off a month ago who has jumped ahead of Elizabeth Warren and joe biden in a new poll of california primary voters which for super tuesday would be quite a bit. Joining me now is Bernie Sanders. Senator, i want to start on an interesting debate happening right now in the democratic primary specifically about College Tuition but more prodly i think about universal programs versus means tested ones. Theres a difference in the way you and is that right warn approached the issue. I want to play you the explanation mayor buttigieg gives for his plan which would subsidize tuition but with means testing so people at the top of the income scale do not receive that subsidy. Im going to play that response. I think rich people should pay their own tuition. I have nothing against them. Is it if youre in a position than you should. Im also concerned about a narrative emerging that ignores the fact not everybody goes to college. Now i want everybody who wants to go to college to have the chance. I want to make sure cost is never a barrier. Where i come from 3 out of 4 people dont have a College Degree. And if the message were ending to them you need a College Degree in order to get by in life and prosper and succeed, were leaving most americans out. What do you say to that argument, theres no reason to pay for people well, i say buttigieg is wrong on both counts. Number one of costs. We talk about making a higher education, public colleges and universities tuitionfree, we mean not only college but we mean trade schools as well. There are millions of good jobs out there in construction in all kinds of areas where people are good at working with their hands. They dont want to go to college. And of course we are going to make it tuitionfree for those people. So what hes saying is not accurate. Second of all there is the issue of universality. Im glad hes im worried mr. Buttigieg thinks im too easy and im going to allow and right now trumps kids can go to any public school, elementary school, high school in the country tuition free. But the point is i happen to believe when you talk about programs like social security, like health care, like higher education, they should be universal. The way you pay for them and the way i do it not the way buttigieg does it i do demand that the very rich will start paying their fair share of taxes as will corporate america. You pay for it by raising revenue for the very rich but then you say in a simple way that any person who wants a higher education, college, trade school should be able to do it. Right now thats what we do with social security. It is a popular program, it is a universal program. Theres a global meeting around climate and the report issued in anticipation that shows really, really disturbing numbers. Basically that were missing all the targets even if were going to stay at a pretty dangerous 1. 5 degree celsius and crucially countries are not living up to their own promises. I guess my question to you is theres a world in which this essentially bolsters arguments for inaction you see from some republicans which is basically, look, everyones going to cheat. Chinas going to cheat, indias going to cheat. Why should we be the sucker and take the lead in cutting emissions . Thats a great idea. The entire planet should go down in flames. Look, it is a real tragedy that we have a president whose ignorance on this issue is not only impacting our country but the entire world. The United States should be leading the world telling china, telling india, telling brazil, pakistan that in fact what the scientists have told us is they under estimated the severity of the crisis. Chris, we are fighting for the future of this planet. We are looking now at unprecedented levels of rising sea levels, looking at a drought, extreme weather disturbances, Food Production is going to be threatened in the next several decades. Were talking about major cities in the United States and around the world going under water. We have a global crisis. And we need leadership in the white house which i would provide. Which tells the entire world maybe instead of spending 1. 8 trillion a year on weapons of destruction, which is what were doing, maybe we pool those resources and fight our common enemy, which is Climate Change. But what the scientists are telling us, and this is really scary, they have underestimated the degree and severity that Climate Change is ravaging this planet. We have a global crisis. We have got to act boldly. And the Sun Rise Movement has snood that our plan is the strongest plan out there. Is it fair to interpret if i talking to someone about Bernie Sanders that climate as an issue is your number one priority, you see that as your number one priority as president of the United States . No, i dont chris, thats oldfashioned politics. My number one priority is standing up for families of this country. We can do more than walk and chew bubblegum. Climate change is a huge threat to the entire planet. How could it not be a major priority . So is health care and creating decent paying jobs. My job as president of the United States if im elected will be to take on the fossil fuel industry, take on the insurance companies, take on the Drug Companies and create a government and economy that works for everybody not just the 1 . Final question for you. Theres an Exchange Vice President Joe Biden had with a voter today at a Campaign Stop about his son hunter biden, his position on the board in ukraine. And i guess my question to you is do you think the attacks that come from the president and other republicans on the Vice President s son are fair, or are they off limes . I think what they are doing is very clearly trying to deflect attention from the fact that the Trump Administration is the most corrupt administration in the modern history of this country and that trump will be impeached for those reasons among others. So i think its a deflection of the attention away from what the Trump Administration has been about. Have you made up your mind how youre going to vote if and when a trial comes to you . Look, all i can say is as a senator i will be there listening to the evidence. And just because trump has been a disaster, that is not necessarily impeachable. So im going to listen to all the evidence. But this is what i will tell you, based on what i have seen right now if i were a member of the house i would certainly vote for impeachment. And unless i can hear some very good explanations, i intend to be voting for his impeachment in the senate. But i do want to hear all of the evidence. But thats where i am at this moment. All right, senator Bernie Sanders on the campaign trail in iowa tonight. Thank you for making some time. Thank you, chris. Ahead multiple investigations into the president s favorite Conspiracy Theory reportedly come come up empty. Plus tonights thing 1, thing 2 starts next. Thing 1 tonight, weve heard a lot about Donald Trumps antics on the golf course. And really what more do you need to know once youve seen him drive a golf cart on the green . But theres an entire book by rick riley filled of trumps cheating. And now we have a new story about trump and one of his fatherinlaws in law, melanias dad. The antidote comes from two former house keepers at the president s bedminster club. Theyre undumed immigrants who have come forward to tell their story what their life was like working for trump. Trump would regularly give his used cast off clothings to victor, thats trump and melanias father. You can wear the same clothes. As the former employees told the post one day he went out to play golf wearing one of his trumps discarded baseball caps which is apparently a nono. Because when he spotted him on the fairway he blew up and in front of other golfers ordered him to get off the course. And remove the hat. He threw the hat on the ground and cursed trump. Those sound like totally normal family dynamics. Wait until you hear the one about the orange makeup. Thats thing 2 in 60 seconds. Two undocumented immigrants that worked as house keepers at Donald Trumps Bedminster New Jersey Golf Club shared some interesting details about his particularities and about the strange details about how he likes his boxers ironed and how he would throw things on the floor when he wanted them to be discarded is his strange 2 1 2 rule. He wanted his bedroom bureau with two full containers of white tic tacs and one container half full. The former employees go onto describe how the rule also applied to the face makeup trump apparently slathered on daily, two full containers, one half container even if it meant they had to bring new shirts because of the rust colored stains on the krolers. Since this broke the company that produces the makeup called bronx colors strangely based out of switzerland has taken full advantage of the free pr, offering a social promotion on trumps exact product, their boosting hydrating concealer,. The shade is orange bhc 06. I hope they now go and take a look at the oranges of the investigation, the beginnings of that investigation. Somebody picked an orange out of a refrigerator, jow dont like it so lets go and impeach him. The bulb were being forced to use number one to me most importantly the lights no good. I always look orange. Nationwide from nati onal insurance companies. Dont miss the deadline. There are only days remaining in open enrollment. Funny thing about Health Insurance, you dont think about how much you need it until you need it. Hes not going to be okay. With so many changes to Health Insurance plans, are you still sure you have the right fit . Having the wrong fit can cost you thousands. New plans are available that can save you money. Thats why i love healthmarkets, your Insurance Marketplace. They guarantee you wont find a lower price anywhere for the plans they offer. Their new fitscore instantly compares thousands of plans, both on the Government Exchange and off, to find the one that best fits your insurance need. Call or visit healthmarkets to find your fitscore today. In minutes, you can find out if your current plan is the right fit or if theres another one that can get you extra coverage or help save you money. Best of all, their service is completely free. Their new fitscore makes it easy to compare your plan to new ones that could lower your costs and save you money. Try the new fitscore today. You may even qualify for free Health Insurance with no monthly premium. Dont get stuck using the Government Exchange either. Healthmarkets can find you the right health plan and make sure you get all the subsidies you deserve without all the hassle. They even have new alternative options most dont even know about that can save you thousands. They work to help you and do it all for free. Dont assume that your plan is still the right fit. The Healthmarkets Fitscore makes it easy to find the right plan for you. Having helped enroll people in millions of policies with an a Customer Satisfaction rating, you can trust healthmarkets. For this free service, go to healthmarkets. Com or call right now. Your Insurance Market place, healthmarkets. Call healthmarkets before the december 15th enrollment deadline to see if you qualify for 0 premiums. Call the number on your screen now. Right now theres a sitting member of congress, republican congressman Duncan Hunter of california who pled guilty to a very serious crime this week and yet as i speak to you hes still a sitting member of congress and has made no move to resign from office. On tuesday congressman hunter withdrew a not guilty plea and admitted to one count of a conspiracy to misuse Campaign Funds. Prosecutors had charged him and his wife with stealing more than a quarter of a Million Dollars of Campaign Funds for their own personal use. And he had previously claimed the 60 charges filed against him were politically motivated and even tried to throw his wife under the bus for the wrongdoing but then she pled guilty herself and was expected to testify against him. I guess things changed. Now, the evidence against congressman hunter is really quite overwhelming and the details in the charges are just remarkable. I mean he allegedly used Campaign Funds to pay for trips to italy, to hawaii, tequila, oral surgery. 1,500 for video games and more than 500 in Campaign Funds to fly his pet rabbit across the country. And also used the Campaign Money to finance extra Marital Affairs with both lobbyists and congressional aides. Congressman hunter could go to prison sentenced in march but also get away with only having to do Community Service because not only did he plea but he got a deal extremely lenient. The government agreed to a prompting one legal expert to proclaim, that is huge departure, ive never seen one like it. In a letter tonight the House Ethics Committee warned hunter that given his guilty plea in a District Court he should refrain from voting on the house floor, which seems like a good rule. Well see if he listens. Either way right now Duncan Hunter is still a member of congress. But you know whos not another california resident, california democrat katey hill. She chose to resign after a story about a Campaign Staffer surfaced and images perpublished clearly designed to shame her and chase her out of the public spotlight. Katey hill is out while Duncan Hunter is still there. She has a lot to say about that double standard. Dont miss it. In the Mueller Report you can read all about what exactly led it fbi to open an investigation into the Trump Campaigns possible contacts with russia and russian intelligence. And it started with this guy. Former Trump Campaign advisor convicted felon George Papadopoulos who was sentenced to prison for lying to the fbi about contacts with russian intermediaries during the campaign. And the story goes like this. A mysterious professor, kind of interesting man of mystery went to papadopoulos and they had a conversation and he told him, he told papadopoulos that the russians had dnc emails. And then papadopoulos turns around and shares that information with an australian diplomat. And then the diplomat was pretty freaked out as you might imagine particularly when after having this conversation with papadopoulos the dnc hack becomes public in 2017. And so the australian diplomat basically passes the information to the fbi. Thats the version of events in the Mueller Report. Thats why the investigation started. Theres a counter narrative pushed by papadopoulos himself and the right wing media and the president. And he claims the whole thing was a trap, it was a false flag. That the guy who told papadopoulos about the emails was actually an american deep state intelligence asset whose job was to try to entrap the Trump Campaign. And so despite all the evidence the trumprussia investigation was actually one big hoax orchestrated by an evil deep state out to get the president. Under William Barrs Justice Department there are believe it or not currently two separate investigations attempting to prove this theory out to run it down because trump and william barr really want it to be true. But yesterday the Washington Post reported that the man he hand picked has indicated he could not offer evidence to support the suspicions by somecurves the case was a setup by some intelligence. And the man leading has reportedly indicated he cant prove it either. And despite all the pressure from the attorney general himself it looks like no one can come up with the essentially evidence to prove the Conspiracy Theory push by trump and the right wing media. Im joined now. Flank, ive heard you talk a little bit about this. I want to sort of step back from details of the Conspiracy Theory and the integrity of the department of justice. Here and youve got these two investigations now where there clearly is pressure from the very top to justify this story that has been in the right wing media. What do you expect to see happen. How important is the result of this . Well, it when the attorney general decided he wasnt equipped enough to handle this inquiry he had to create his own special inquiry and run that micromanage this investigation. Thats a clue he probably knew this wasnt going to come out well for him. He needed his own answers. And now we see what almost looks like a strategic leak to get out in front of this where someone at doj, someone perhaps even at the i. G. Office is telling reporters, hey were not finding anything. And not only that we asked the u. S. Attorney of connecticut if he found anything and he said no, he had nothing. And then the attorney general we have a leak where he says im going to disagree with that. Whats wrong with the attorney general disagreeing with his own department . Whats wrong with it is hes consistently choosing, deliberately choosing to ignore the facts and the truth. And when your attorney general is doing that, thats a disgrace. Theres a similarity here between whats happening which is the president putting pressure on different investigative entities to bear out these conspiracy theories that he appears to believe are being filled in his head and using his power as president to do it. Its a really interesting parallel. And within doj, bill barrs communications and just these reports which many attorneys at doj dont know if theyre correct or not, but just the reports that have come out have caused a lot of concern. I was in touch with a current doj prosecutor earlier about this topic. And what the person said to me was that the notion bill barr would believe there may not have been proper predication which is usually use said for a good enough reason to start the russia investigation is something really disturbing to Justice Departments prosecutors because they make decisions everydy about what they need to know in order to get a criminal investigation started. And its obvious to basically all of them that the fbis intercepts of russian spies reaching out to carter page who had advised the Trump Campaign was the properest predication you could possibly get. Another thing the prosecutor said is and within doj youd be really surprised to hear the extent to which theres a yeerning for the era of jeff sessions. He said its remarkable how much people feel the level of political interference has been ratcheted up under barr than even it was under the prior attorney general. This gets to the question which is so dangerous because it seems to be very important that there there are mistakes that could be made. It is important we investigate. If you had the fbi wrongly spying on american citizens, if you had them wrongly abusing their power in pursuit of something, that would be a big deal. Its important we be able to investigate and be some repository of trust that be ferreted out if it exists. And not being sent on domestic political errands. Youve raised a great point which is we want a healthy questioning of authority. We want departments and agencies like the fbi theres oversights. And the job there is the Inspector Generals job. And if the attorney general now has all of us scratching our heads questioning whether the Inspector General is neutral finder of fact we dont even know if theres proper oversight of our agencies. Hes very divisive, very destructive. And the only person happy about the attorney generals divisiveness tat the doj then trump himself would be someone like Vladimir Putin laughing and smiling and saying i got doj at odds with itself, im splitting people up at the department of justice. Theres betsey, theres a real palpable nerves around this report being released on monday, what it will mean particularly because republicans have been beating the drums this is going to be bad for the president s enemies. And most folks at the doj dont know whats in the report and dont necessarily have 100 visibility into the way decisions about a cross fire hurricane this investigation came about. So the possibility that the Inspector General whos had a huge amount of time and a huge amount of access to review those decisions would find things Many Americans would potentially see as troubling or inappropriate, thats not a 0 possibility. But one thing people have to remember when it comes to i. G. Reports the Inspector General had an amazing luxury that the people he is studying or investigating dont have. And that is the luxury of time. All the fbi and doj officials who were making these decisions about the inception of this case or acting under an intense time pressure and incredible levels of concern about what exactly the kremlin was doing. Its likely to be something hell consider but also something people reading the report should keep in mind. Thank you both for your time tonight. The the 11th hour with Brian Williams starts right now. Tonight the speaker has spoken nancy pelosi instructs her Committee Chairman to move forward on articles of impeachment and knocks down the question about motives. If youre going to do this lets get on with it. President vents his anger today at an iowa voter. All of it as the 11th hour gets underway tonight. Well, good evening once again. Day 1,050 of the Trump Administration. This was the day the speaker of the house made the call and alerted her Committee Chairs to