Transcripts For MSNBCW Morning Joe 20180725

Then candidate trump is heard discussing a possible payment to purchase the story rights of a former playboy model Karen Mcdougal about an affair the president had in 2005, of which the president denies. Nbc cannot confirm whether its been edited or altered, heres what was played. A warning. It includes a profanity from then candidate president donald j. Trump. Let me know whats happening. Okay . Oh. Oh maybe because of this it would be better if you didnt go. You know . Maybe because of this. For that one, you know, what you can do to get rid of this, because its so false, what theyre saying. Its such bullshit. Um i think i think this goes away quickly. I think its probably better. To do the charleston thing. Just this time. Yeah. In two weeks its fine. I think right now its better. You sgloe okay, hknow . Okay. Thanks, honey. You take care of yourself. Im proud of you. Whats up, mike . Great poll. Making progress. Big time. And you guys are couldnt believe it. Whats happening . Can we use him anymore . Pastor scott . Mark burns. Talking i dont mean that. Mark burns. Can we use him anymore. No. And just called, a chance, an idea for you. Great. So we. Got served from the New York Times i told you regarding unsealing the divorce papers with ivana. Were fighting it. Going to never be able to get that. Never. Says dont ever be able get me a coke, please. Dont have a legitimate purpose. A woman that doesnt want a correct, yes. And going there for a while. About two, three weeks now. All you have to do, delay it for even after that, not going to ever be opened. Theres no purpose for it. Told you about charleston. I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend david, you know . So that im going to do that right way. Ive actually give it to me. And spoken to Alan Weiselberg how to set the whole thing up with what are we going to do . Funding. Yes. And its all the stuff thinking about that. All the stuff. You never know where that company, where hes going to be. Maybe he gets hit by a truck . Correct. So im all over that. Spoke to alan about it. Comes time for financing listen what financing. Well have to pay. Pay cash . No. No, no, no, no, no. All right. Were goingthrough exactly what you heard. Exclusive rights to mcdougals story, purchased never published by the Parent Company American Media and chairman, ally of the president , may be the man cohen is referring to when he mentions our friend david. Trump and mcdougal met in the playboy mansion 2006, three months after melania gave birth to trumps youngest son and continued to see trump several months after that, according to mcdougal and he allegedly offered her money. Promised regular columns on aging and wellness and prominently feature her on two of the companys magazine covers. When the wall street journal reported the payment four days before the election, Trump Campaign spokeswoman hope hicks said, we have no knowledge of any of this. Lets bring in Senior Reporter of vanity fair and nbc news and msnbc contributor emily jane fox. Good morning. Youve been wired in to Michael Cohens world a very long time. In fact here yesterday talking about a different piece of this story. Just walk us through a little bit of what we heard last night and how the decision was made by lanny davis, the attorney for Michael Cohen, and by Michael Cohen, to make it public . Reporter the most interesting thing about the tape it is very clear that in the height of the election President Trump was clearly plugged in to all that Michael Cohen was doing. So whether that was this payment made, or the talk of the payment made to ami or something about his divorce papers being unsealed, or not being unsealed. What is clear is that the president knew about everything that was going on, and i think that was a very calculated strategy made by Michael Cohen and his attorneys yesterday. Since friday, people in cohen world have been telling me that the narrative that Rudy Giuliani put out about this leaked recording on friday was not accurate. That was not the full story and there was much more to know when the transcript or the recording would actually come out. I dont think anyone believed it would come out so soon, but what we saw over the weekend was a lot of growing frustration from cohen and the people around him. This narrative they believed was not accurate. People were really believing it and cohen believes that there is a calculated strategy in the works from people around the president to discredit him, to make him look like he had nothing to do with the president , that this, the decisions he made were made on his own and the president had no idea. So watching cable news all weekend, watching cable news yesterday, the frustration continued to mount and the president had waived privilege for this recording. I think there was sort of a well what are we waiting for . Why not get the narrative straight. Let the questions we have listening to the recording were posed to the American Public and let them decide what they think. Michael schmidt, listening to the 2 minutes, 51 seconds we just played there, the dispute seems to be between Rudy Giuliani and Michael Cohens team how the payment was discussed what does the term cash mean . Did the president suggest pay cash or saying dont pay cash . End of the day, two men talking two months before the president ial election about a payment, stipulate a payment never made to a former playboy model to keep her quiet . Yes. The dispute is about the payment. When we wrote friday about the existence of this recording, rudy said, look, this shows the president wanted it to be paid by check, to be above board and he did not want it paid by cash. You heard from the audio it is not nearly that clear, but not nearly as clear as cohens lawyering make it out to be, its completely clear that the president wanted it to be paid in cash. We do not hear any of the audio right after the point that its initially discussed. So both sides making contradictory claims about the tape. The tape not being the clearest. We only have a small snippet of what they were talking about. At the end of the day, thats only really an issue thats come up because of the claims giuliani made on friday as he tried to explain why the tape was not bad for the president , but ultimately, as you point out, look, this is something they say the president clearly knew about it. And cohen is trying to reset his life as not being Donald Trumps bullet taker or worse a punching bag for Donald Trumps Defense Strategy where he takes the bullets. This is a turn for him. Its a new resolve to tell the truth no matter what even if it endangers him. The white house declined comment and referred questions to Rudy Giuliani who disputed the cohens team claim on trumps use of the word cash. Major point is that its outrageous that someone would tape his client. Surreptitiously and foolhardy to try and yell and scream and make believe whats on the tape. I agree the tape is a little hard to hear but assure you that we listened to it numerous, numerous times, and the transcript makes it quite clear at the end that President Trump says, dont pay with cash. Jonathan lemire, you smoke to Rudy Giuliani last night. What did he tell you and is it actually clear the president is saying, dont pay with cash . Giuliani told me late last night they have the recording and enhanced it. A tactic he would do as a prosecutor. Go after the mafia, same thing. Muffled recording try to bring the better sound out of it. He says in that recording its clear the president is saying, dont pay with cash and released a transcript that seems to back that up. Of course, they have not released that actual recording. We havent heard that yuet, relying only on the recording Michael Cohen put out. This backs up the president s argument. Their camps argument. He didnt do anything wrong. Trying to do it above board making the point earlier in the conversation, you heard in the tape, discussed a corporation to pay it. Saying, well, giulianis argument is that is showing if donald trump, then candidate trump and Michael Cohen are trying to obscure this, they wouldnt have set up a corporation. Wouldnt be discussing it by check. They believe that this is a, that cohens camp is trying to muddy the waters here and change the argument to try to attack the president and they feel comfortable that thats not the case. Also said they have 12 other tapes theyre going through. They dont believe trump is on them, but rather its cohen talking about trump with third parties. They have said they will, theyre debating whether to release them. John heilemann, in listening to that tape, i dont know what you glean from it other than the fact a lot of names are mentioned. One of the most important probably our friend david and the question why does the tape end so abruptly . Clearly the tape must be in control of Michael Cohen, but i dont know what else you find out in that tape if youre a prosecutor . Neither do i. I think that the largest questions revolve around context. Exactly whats happening before and after . Whos donald trump talking to when he seems to be having a telephone conversation, whos in and out of the room at various times . Whats the reference to the charts schi charlottesville conversation that comes up twice during the conversation. To me, from 30,000 feet what is interesting about this most of us is that for a long time among Donald Trumps adversaries in the legal realm, you had bob mueller, who doesnt speak. Then Michael Avenatti who does. See a lot. Michael cohen did not have a representative who got involved in the gamesmanship and now does. Whatever you think of lanny davis, his motivations why hes doing this, hes back and he, like Michael Avenatti is a skilled practitioner of the dark arts and the garish arts of media lawyering. So the president now, we now are in that place and we had this back in the Clinton Administration, had it at other times. We now have Rudy Giuliani and Michael Avenatti, lanny davis, all engaged in all of it, i dont have a problem with any of it, but all of them have obscure mot va motivations not telling precisely the truth, jesting on their clients behalf and taking us into a new legal carnival kind of element of this story that is going to raise, well see a lot of stories like this that are going to come out in dribs and drabs and the interpretive prisms put on, stark conflict and you wont know what to believe until we get into a court if we ever do. And Rudy Giuliani has obviously been doing that on the president s behalf. To a certain extent, Michael Cohen at a disadvantage. For sure. Betsy woodruff, trying to sort through all of the details of this and the context, et cetera, jonathan talked about exactly who who said that cash and this and that and the other thing. My question is still, why did the president s team want that out there . Perhaps they do believe end of the day whatever they have been able to enhance on this recording is clear enough that it clears the president . Thats right. Giuliani asserted last week there was material on this tape that was going to be exculpatory, listening to the tape a couple times doesnt seem to be quite nearly at clear as giuliani claimed. Part of the reason that the cohen camp was so willing to go out on a limb last night and put this tape out there. Its interesting that both sides are sort of alleging that this tape is somehow going to be a magic bullet that clears their name. That clearly isnt the case. One thing i can tell you, though, is that cohens camp is increasingly aggressive. What were seeing from lanny davis. Additionally from talking to a person close to cohen last week, i can tell you people in cohens circle of increasingly encourage him to affirmatively go to Robert Mueller. Dont know for a fact cohen has anything that could be relevant to the Mueller Probe but hope among critics of the president close to cohen he might have snag could be relevant to that investigation and would like to see him circumvent, perhaps a hopscotch over his negotiations with the Southern District of new york and go directly to the special counsel. A couple interesting elements. Content of tapes, and act of releasing the tapes. Lanny davis out. Saying, Michael Cohen is on a new path. Its a reset button to tell the truth and let the chips fall where they may. All the questions about might mike many cohen turn on donald trump, looks like the beginning of that. Is does. We saw in the press, a couple months ago, quotes from friends. Attributed to, people close to Michael Cohen saying he wants his legal fees paid, willing to talk to mueller. What seemed like an effort to strongarm the president of the United States through the media. A fraught vstrategy but were beginning to see the fruit of that materialize. Back to the 30,000 foot perspective. The cash, no cash thing seems terrain the white house thinks is favorable. Its weeds, difficult to navigate and seems irrelevant. Extending to a broader perspective you see a president who denied through a spokesperson the president says he nerve her a relationship with mcdougal. Thats flat out wrong. Solidifying the fake news narrative your ability to suspend this belief to appeal to negative partisanship, i dont like the media, im going to believe the president over the media. This is really asking you to believe the president over your ears and eyes. And n knowledge of this. Donald trump on that tape two months before the election does not sound like a man who had no knowledge of this. No. They calmed it, again, an old story just more fake news. A quote from an unnamed spokesperson when the story broke in february. This isnt about news anymore. This is about the president speaking on tape, speaking to his attorney. The media is removed from this. And the value of this tape and others we havent heard, obviously, maybe as many as 13 altogether. It, part of this tape we just heard gets to what investigators prosecutors continually try to get to, and in this case, try to get to that the president of the United States, and its state of mind. Whats his state of mind . During the ongoing course of action in this case, trying to figure out what to do about Karen Mcdougal . Is there going to be a payment . How much is the payment going to be . Whats his state of mind jrch . Yes. A number of points made here. A conversational familiarity between the two. This san ongoing conversation, its clear, these two are having about problems the president has. The fact he implicitly acknowledges Karen Mcdougal is a problem, and says all we have to do get through the next couple of weeks, he recognized the political peril and the relationship he denied having were to become public, regardless, paid with cash a check a vehicle or not. Michael schmidt, a question raised a second ago. This is obviously all interesting. It points out ways in which the president lied towards the end of the campaign. Points to potential campaign and finance violations but to raise the question that betsy wood driwooddruf raced, where the story is headed, existence of tapes, is there a place where this story overlaps and crosses over into the realms bob mueller cares about . Mueller took the whole issue of Michael Cohen and his reship with the president and these payments and that was given by the Deputy Attorney general to these prosecutors in new york. Mueller does not own that. I dont see any direct nexus between this tape and that payment and what mueller is doing, but what it is, is that cohen has a general Justice Department problem, and will the Justice Department allow him to deal with them together . Will he be able to go to the Justice Department, say, look, i know i have exposure in new york. I may have this exposure in this russia i may not. What can you give me in exchange for my information. Mueller needs to talk to Michael Cohen. Cohens name is in the dossier. Michael cohen tried to arrange a business deal in russia during the campaign. If mueller is going to complete his investigation he needs to talk to cohen. Does cohen go to prosecutors in new york or go to mueller saying look, ill willing to make a deal, settle this do it all together and make a Global Cooperation deal with the judge is department. Thats the question we have to see. Emily jane fox, as we wrap up here, your sense of what Michael Cohens team wants now. Jonathan lameres reporting that giuliani said theres 12 other tapes that theyre reviewing, trying to decide whether to waive privilege on those tapes. Is that something that team cohen wants out in the open . I think there is going to be a calculated strategy what serves Michael Cohen best Going Forward. Whether that means withholding some things so he has cards to show investigators. If he does decide to cooperate, or if there is going to be more of this kind of drip, drip, drip leaking, then perhaps it serves them best to set the record straight. We have to understand, were having this conversation about less than two minutes of an audio recording. There were almost 4 million documents and files and Electronic Devices seized from Michael Cohens home, hotel room and office in april, and thats not even to say what was not seized and what Michael Cohen knows. Someone close to cohen said to me over the weekend, its not whats on this recording. It is the back story. So this this squirmish were seeing between the two of them is dominating the news cycle for 24 hours. Imagine whats going to happen when all of those documents start getting leaked out in drips and drabs . The fights will just continue and i think were really just at the beginning of this. The tip of the iceberg. Emily jane fox, great reporting, as always. You, too, michael schmidt. Thanks for getting up early for us. Other headlines making news, syria. The death toll is growing after a series of suicide bombings today. According to the associated press, at least 38 people have been killed. State media is blaming Islamic State militants though no group claimed responsibility. Back here in new york, a federal judge ordered the release of an ecuadorian man detained by immigration officials delivering pizza to a military base in new york city. The father of two was living in the United States illegally but has filed to change his immigration status. He spent nearly two months in an immigration detention facility. Also making news, contentious runoff for governor, kemp, selfdescribed politically incorrect conservative endorsed last week by President Trump. His win sets up a heated battle in the fall taking on democrat stacey abrams. Well talk more ar the significance of that race with the New York Times Jeremy Peters. Finally, a georgia lawmaker resigns after appearing on Sacha Baron Cohens new tv show who is america. Seen dropping his pants and yelling racial slurs in the episode that aired this past sunday. A Spokesman Says spencer will step down at the end of the month. Still ahead this morning on morning joe theres an image this morning Many Congress republicans, stay the silent about criticizing the president. Now some are slamming the president to stop the bleeding from its tariff policy. Plus in another 180, President Trump says he is now concerned russia will try to meddle in the Midterm Election, but despite putins own admission he favored President Trump, the president suggests russia is somehow in the can for democrats. Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. Before you can achieve a higher standard of craftsmanship, you need a higher standard of craftsman. See for yourself at the lexus golden opportunity sales event. Lease the 2018 es 350 for 329 a month for 36 months. Experience amazing at your lexus dealer. Dinner date. Meeting his parents dinner date. Why did i want a crest 3d white smile . So i used crest. Crest 3d white removes. 95 of surface stains in just 3 days. For a whiter smile. That will win them over. Crest. Healthy, beautiful smiles for life. If yor crohns symptoms are holding you back, and your Current Treatment hasnt worked well enough, it may be time for a change. Ask your doctor about entyvio, the only biologic developed and approved just for uc and crohns. Entyvio works at the site of inflammation in the gi tract and is clinically proven to help many patients achieve both symptom relief and remission. Infusion and serious allergic reactions can happen during or after treatment. Entyvio may increase risk of infection, which can be serious. Pml, a rare, serious, potentially fatal brain infection caused by a virus may be possible. This condition has not been reported with entyvio. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, experience frequent infections or have flulike symptoms or sores. Liver problems can occur with entyvio. If your uc or crohns treatment isnt working for you, ask your gastroenterologist about entyvio. Entyvio. Relief and remission within reach. This is not a screensaver. Game. This is the destruction of a cancer cell by the bodys own immune system, thanks to medicine that didnt exist until now. And today can save your life. We all want to know you know, the new, new thing. With xfinitys retail stores, you can now see the latest. Want to test drive the latest devices . Be our guest. Want to save on mobile . Just ask. Want to demo the latest innovations and technology . Do it here. Come see how were making things simple, easy and awesome. Plus, come in today and ask about xfinity mobile. A new kind of Wireless Network designed to save you money. Visit your local xfinity store today. President trump now says he is worried russia will attempt to interfere in the Midterm Elections this year. He tweeted yesterday, im very concerned that russia will be fighting very hard to have an impact on the upcoming election. Based on the fact that no president has been tougher on russia than me, he writes. They will be pushing very hard for the democrats. They definitely dont want trump. Well, president putin himself said in helsinki last week he did want trump to win in 2016. President putin, did you want President Trump to win the election and did you direct any of your officials to help him do that . Translator yes, i did. Yes, i did, because he talked about bringing the u. S. Russia relationship back to normal. Thats pretty clear. That question from reuters reporter, did you want President Trump to win the election is missing from the official white house transcript of the News Conference flagged by the atlantic more than a week ago. As of this morning, still has not been corrected. By the way, the white house also now clamping down on what the public knows about the president s contacts with foreign leaders. Cnn and cbs news reporting that the white house will no longer issue public summaries of the president s phone calls with foreign heads of state breaking with tradition of past administrations. According to the reports, nonpublic readouts of the president s calls still will be circulated among government officials and relevant agencies but not made available to the public. John heilemann, put those two pieces together knop more readouts from the phone calls, deletion from the transcript of the question about whether putin favored President Trump in 2016. What does it add up to . Well, theres never seen this. Theres no white house logs either. We dont get to know who comes in and out of the white house. This administrations, the president s absolute desire to try to be as antitransparent as possible has been troubling for a long time. They want to keep things secret. They want to keep us from knowing what the president is doing. They want to keep us from twohour meeting with Vladimir Putin with nobody present. We dont know what happened in that meeting. All of these things consistent with the desire that is to keep the public from knowing what it has a right to know from a president what weve historically known. Whats worse is this issue with the transcript which is not about a question of lack of transparency but a question of trying to alter the basic record of what happened. What happened in the in a public setting. And its not just this transcript. Theyve altered the video that they put out, which we saw last night on television. Hopefully will play it at some point today. Not just take out the question from the written transcript but altered the video put out to make it look as though Vladimir Putin did not say yes to the question whether or not he was in favor of President Trump in 2016. These are faked records. Were in the realm i am like the invocation of hitler, always hess tent to invoke orwell, its too easily invoked, but this is across the board, it all adds up to a genuinely orwellian set of circumstances happening in the white house. This is a White House Press shop that has had moments of sloppiness and made mistakes with transcripts. That would be a lean for the video, too. The lack of a readout, noble noa troubling break for the president , its not good for them. What these phone calls and meetings are like, instead we see time and time again Foreign Government get their readouts first and control the narrative. Russia is particularly good at that. Every interaction, heard the kremlins side of the story first. The would us is missing an opportunity to try to sort of control the narrative around these meetings and since the readouts are circulated among government officials it just means theyre going to leak at some point. And when altering transcripts and video trying to control the narrative in another way they think is a more effective way of doing it. Simply by creating fake documents and fake video about public events. To jonathans point, and noah, perhaps youve picked up on this as well. To jonathans point, though, it gives Foreign Governments the chance to shape the narrative, as russia has done with regard to syria yesterday. Russia accused general votel, our guy, army guy, who runs our operations in the middle east, accused him of not being obedient to his chief executives, the president of United States. Implying in their statement that russia knows more about what happened in that closeddoor meeting between putin and trump than joseph votel or the director of National Intelligence does. Ultimately more work for the Communications Shop. In the past you had to compare readouts from the president an for example the ministry in russia to see what these two things, if they align. Now youre going to have just the account from the other side and the Communications Shop is still going to have to answer questions regarding that readout. You might as well get the readout out first. Makes no sense. Why add more labor to your plate . Counteract what other governments put out there and put out the message yourself. Makes no sense chb. Betsy woodruff, what the president said yesterday and well play in a few minutes, borough the orwellian reference, dont believe your eyes and ears, believe what i tell you. Right. Going back to the president s tweet you cited earlier. One thing thats really baffling about this entire circumstance is that the president is also now claiming that russia wants to interfere in the Midterm Elections to help democrats. Theres no publically Available Evidence that that is the case. We know as putin himself said that the russians wanted trump to win in 2016. If we want to take this tweet at face value, which i dont think we should, but if we want to, that would mean the president himself could be releasing material that intelligence analysts assessed and havent yet released to the public. Either the president is breaching intelligence protocols, putting out material that should not be public at this point according to the Intelligence Community, or the president is just making stuff up to try to troll the public and be funny. Either way, it just goes to the broader credibility crisis that this white house has had ever since he was inaugurated. On a serious point, belief, as much of the Intelligence Community asserted, that russians are trying to interfere in the elections, last week in helsinki the president was given the opportunity on a plate, tell Vladimir Putin knock it off. Who gave him that opportunity . Ah White House Reporter kind of a goodlooking guy from the a. P. Im not sure. Noah . I think this is probably owning the lips. The highest iteration of the base. Troll the public, as betsy said. Provoke a response and an emotional response and appear reasonable and rational by comparison seems to be reaching its limits as an effective strategy but they seem committed to it. Speaker of the house, paul ryan recently said that. This is the president trolling you. Thinking about punishing political adversaries. A ton more to talk about this morning. Still ahead, yesterday msnbc von hillier reported on the pain and uncertainty American Farmers are feeling. Hours later the president announce add bailout and appeared to knock vons reporting. Von hilliard joins us next on morning joe. Looks great, honey. Right . Sometimes you need an expert. I got it. And sometimes those experts need experts. On it. [ crash ] and sometimes the expert the expert needed Needs Insurance expertise. Its all good. Steve, youre covered for general liability. And, paul, we got your back with workers comp. Wow, its like a party in here. Where are the hors doeuvres, right . [ clanking ] tartlets . We cover commercial vehicles, too. I think theres something wrong with your sink. Dont believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. I mean, i saw a piece on nbc today nbc it was heartin robbing. They were interviewing people. Probably go through 20 and pick the one that sounds like the worst. But they went through a group of people. In fact, i wanted to say, i got to do something about this trump. Terrible. And that piece was done by the lobbyists and by the people that they hire. It was a total setup. That was President Trump yesterday in missouri, seemingly referring to a story we aired on morning joe about the economic pressure American Farmers and producers are under because of trumps escalating tariffs. Here again is that report from msnbcs vaughn hillyard. Our whole future is uncertain right now. Reporter American Workers across the country are bearing the brunt of the Trump Administrations growing trade war. A frustration we heard in the lobster waters of maine. Or in iowa, where pork and corn exports are sidelines. Other countries will take up that slack and well lose the markets for the long term, maybe for good. Reporter that dread reached the Cranberry Bogs of massachusetts. We dont want to be punished for just being from america. Reporter the market uncertainty stretches into kentuckys bourbon distilleries and across the potato fields of idaho. The crop is in the ground. Its an emergency. Reporter and back here in nebraska, soybeans. A lot of pain were going through. Reporter Third Generation family farmer doug hopes the president will end the trade war. Every day the tariffs are going on its costing farmers millions of dollars. Reporter producers wait for the exit strategy his chief economic advisers says were in a stalemate with china. Trade negotiations are kind of stalled. Reporter and the president s handpicked fed chair is warning these tactics to stunt economic growth. Countries going into a more protectionist direction has done wart. Reporter we caught up with lawmakers trying to get the administration to pull back. No. The administration doesnt understand. I understand the president s efforts, but we are caught in the cross hairs. Theres no a senator whos been over there that can come back and tell you they have any earthly idea where this is going. I can tell you its catastrophic. Reporter and senators in both parties are pressing for legislation to give Congress Approval power over these tariffs. Im going this to do the country. Reporter President Trump seems set on going it alone, which frustrates this lobster retailer. The president said in his president s speech in 2016 he alone can fix it. Hes trying. Thats the problem. The alone part is the problem. Right . He doesnt have the full picture and is making decisions without really talking to enough people. Joining us from rapid city, the reporter behind that story, political reporter for nbc news, vaughn hillyard. Good morning. Good to see you again this morning. First of all, was your piece a setup by lobbyists . If so how did you rope in all those republican senators to talk on camera . Reporter well, i guess this lobbyist, not much impact on his own bank account, willie, but these are farmers we met out across rural america, quite frankly. A lot of them are people you pick up the phone and give a call to, and they said, come on out. Weve never even seen the press come 0 our front door. They all voted for President Trump and said that today they still have that hope in the president. That he is going to be able to negotiate that better deal. I said, its now four and a half months the trade war has been going on. He said perhaps they were a little too confident with what the president was going to be able to actually pull off, but they said in the meanwhile and in this certain situation, theres a 12 billion Financial Aid plan essentially announced by the administration by the department of agriculture yesterday, which will help a lot of these farmers. Pork, corn producers. Wheat, cotton farmer but a lot of farmers are left out. Individuals like the lobster men you heard from. The fisheries up in the air. What about the bourbon distilleries in kentucky and tennessee . A lot of questions that are Going Forward that are going to have to be answered, and also not account, that program, for future retaliatory tariffs. I talked to a man in iowa, a longtime Third Generation corn and pork producer updecora, iowa. He said the big question mark coming out of this, and i guess the big consequence of this trade standoff is the longterm impact. Talking about export markets. They could, a lot of these farmers, like bob, could withstand the immediate financial impact. Its where our other countries, big import, like the lobster men. 20 of u. S. Lobsters go overseas into asia. The question, are those markets going to begin to turn elsewhere and ultimately people like those lobstermen or like those corn producers relied on export markets before, those export markets will begin to turn to other countries instead of americanmade products. A lot of those producers saying we dont want bailouts we want free trade. Open to those markets. A number of profree trade representatives are criticizing the president s aid package. From wisconsin, becoming more and more like a soviet type economy. Commissars deciding he will be granted waivers. Commissars, figuring how to sprinkle around benefits. Here is senator ben sasse of nebraska. When you choose a war of choice, which is what this trade war is, and then you say afterwards, lets just solve it by buying people goldplated crutches, the farmers and ranchers of america dont want crutches. They want to work. Noah, you had ben sasse speaking again and again on this yesterday and the day before about this idea that the president set up the problem with the tariffs and his correction is a bailout for tariffs and senator sasse says they dont want a bailout. They want free trade. Right. When the bailouts are distributed, its more likely theyll go to big agra business not the really small farmers. Sometimes you see flashes of the republican dna. Conservative dna, for reemerging. Somewhere. Every so often right. One of the things were going to start seeing now is the usda appealing to a depression era Commodity Credit Corporation to start buying up surplus goods that they cant sell on markets. Producing a lot of food no one will be eating, snit a pile a id rot. Incredibly inefficient. The sort of republicans know in their marrow is wrong, bad Economic Policy and is something they have opposed all the way up until january 20th, 2017. But you know, you can only go so far. You cant directly oppose this president because he is still so popular with the base republicans. Even these people, so damaged by these policies still believe in their hearts that this guy has their best interests in mind. All evidence of the contrary notwithstanding. You hear them say that in the interviews. If he only had the information we had he would make a differec. Can i just jump in . Digging into the bureaucratic headaches about administrating some of these tariffs. Looked at steel. 16,000 applications have been made already. 16,000, by american businesses for exemptions. Just think about that paperwork. And so far they only got around looking at 500 of those. Think about what the bureaucrats have to deal with to actually get through all of this stuff. Then think about what its going to mean to try to administer payouts to farmers, and for the uncertainty for american companies, its huge. The steel sector. We talked to a company, down in south carolina. It says its application for specialized wire for wind screen wipers have been accepted. Steel plates for repairing broken bones rejected. Why . Think about the practicalities of that and what the farmers will face in terms of all this. In a rich morning joe tradition, introduce our guests after theyve offered great insights, as you just said. U. S. Managing editor of the Financial Times julian tess. And President Trump tweeted yesterday, countries that treated us unfairly for years are all coming to washington to negotiate. Should have taken place many years ago. As the saying goes, better late than never. What do we expect today . Interesting. The president is doing the same with Vladimir Putin. Meeting with hi other aides for a bit. Having a 15minute facetoface private meeting. Coming from europe, not empowered to offer much but a desperate attempt by the europeans to do a facetoface thing with the president , in think is the only thing that will work because they think hes the only one setting policy now to try to head off the tariffs. Something that the American Voters should know about now is europe already reacted to what the americans are doing right now on the trade side by moving at lightning speed to cut a new trade deal with japan. One of the very interesting things is that the rest of the world is not necessarily going to sit there and wait for this kind of negotiating strategy and dance. They are already trying to find ways to bolster alliances with each other to keep trade going. By the way, critical of President Trump, yonker has been. Interesting meeting between the two personalities. Very much so coming on the heels of the president s rather destabilizing meeting to europe. Rather destabilizing. A lot lost in the aftermath of helsinki. Prior, nato, what he did in the uk, attacking allies left and right. Calling out Angela Merkel for the pipeline deal they made and comes a few weeks after he ripped up the g7, refused to sign the communique. A question for you, vaughn. Talk about these tariffs and such, is there, and the people youve talked to, we see them, they still support this president. Any sense what that breaking point might be . What might be the thing that gets them to finally give up their support for someone that they championed at least to this point and still seem they still believe in . Reporter i think, jonathan, it comes down to the next layers of politics. And its a question of the obligation of governance. Because one man after the next, theres a few that have dropped off of their support of the president , but what i constantly heard was, would you, say the president was up in 2018, despite soybeans dropping 28 would you still support him come this november . At this point in time, every reason they would. What would you need to hear from a democrat . Hear about stability. Hear our markets would be fought or and said we feel like the president to this day continues to fight for us. Hes not getting the results we want, but pe see that hes out there on the world stage fighting or ag and for American Farmers. Still wholeheartedly believe that. That goes to the question, and why thats why i think its also good to talk to a lot of farmers out there who voted for Hillary Clinton, too. Because it comes down to what that obligation of governance is. Once you are in political office, what is it ultimately that you need to do in that position at that point. And, sorry, as i see my light turn out here in the fields of south dakota, theres a question a lot of these farmers are out here at 4 00 a. M. Every morning is the point i want to make. We joined them at 4 and 5 in the morning. These are people, as you said, they have their crops that are coming up. Wheat is being harvested now. Come september and october corn is coming up. They need a place to send it. And they dont want to just go to storage bins. This is more than a business. This is their livelihood and for towns all across america what they rely on to sustain themselves. Vaughn hillyard, powering through the darkness with his great reporting from rapid city, south dakota. Vaughn, great job. We look forward to your next stuff coming up. Thanks so much. Before we go, you mentioned the trade deal that the eu struck with japan. Yeah. What extent is europe turning away theyll never turn away completely from the United States but accepting that the partner they have now in the United States isnt as reliable as its been . Angela merkel said before that they are realizing increasingly in europe that they have to rely on themselves. Now the problem is that europes own political structure is pretty messed up, frankly. So thats not necessarily a good thing. But there is a growing sense that the entire world order is being set. And although america has played a key leadership role in the post world war ii global system, the rest of the world is realizing that thats not going to continue. And a big beneficiary of all of it, Vladimir Putin, russia. Thank you as always. Still ahead this morning, after days of heated rhetoric and allcaps tweeting, President Trump now says hes ready to make a deal with iran. Well ask a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee chris coons for his take on that and more when we come back. Welcome to holiday inn thank you wait, i have something for you every stay is a special stay at holiday inn. Save up to 15 when you book early at hollidayinn. Com save up to 15 the full value oftyou book early wyour new car . Youd be better off throwing your money right into the harbor. Im gonna regret that. With Liberty Mutual new car replacement well replace the full value of your car. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty you run off to your job, what are you looking at today . My colleague spencer and ron and i put a story up last night the way a confederate sympathizing tennessee lawyer connected a reported alleged russian spy master with the then president of the nra. One thing were digging on in is getting as much detail as possible, as much Additional Information as possible as the way that actual american citizens played roles in connecting senior officials with russia and the Political Party and the conservative movement. Thats an on going project and one thing were focussing on today. Still ahead this morning, Michael Cohen used to stand out for his loyalty to donald trump. Now cohen has done everything short of going to tinder to hook up with Robert Mueller. Jonathan turley joins our conversation. He can expand on that. Plus, u. S. Former ambassador to russia Michael Mcfaul will be our guest. Morning joe is coming right back. Surfs up. Earn a 50 gift card when you stay just twice this summer. Or, badda book. Badda boom. Book now at choicehotels. Com moderate to severe Rheumatoid Arthritis was intense. My moms pain from i wondered if she could do the stuff she does for us which is kinda, a lot. And if that pain could mean something worse. Joint pain could mean joint damage. Enbrel helps relieve joint pain, and helps stop further damage enbrel may lower your ability to fight infections. Serious, sometimes fatal events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma other cancers, nervous system and Blood Disorders and allergic reactions have occurred. Tell your doctor if youve been someplace where fungal infections are common. Or if youre prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for Heart Failure or if you have persistent fever, bruising, bleeding or paleness. Dont start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. Since enbrel, my moms back to being my mom. Visit enbrel. Com. And use the joint damage simulator to see how joint damage could progress. Ask about enbrel. Enbrel. Fda approved for over 18 years. With tough food, your dentures may slip and fall. New fixodent ultramax hold gives you the strongest hold ever to lock your dentures. So now you can eat tough food without worry. Fixodent and forget it. So lets promote our Summer Travel deal on choicehotels. Com like this. Surfs up. Earn a 50 gift card when you stay just twice this summer. Or, badda book. Badda boom. Book now at choicehotels. Com welcome back to morning joe. It is a good one, mike barnacle. Its wednesday, july 25th, im willie geist. Joe and mika have the morning off. Still with us, host of kc d. C. , kasie hunt. We do it every time even when we reintroduce you. Its awesome. Its in your contract. Mike barnacle is here. John heilemann. Barnacle in the 70s. Halloween, trick or treat. Watch him sing suffer jet city. Its sick. We have noah rothman and joining the conversation now, associate editor of the Washington Post and msnbc political analyst eugene robertson, Jeremy Peters and law professor at George Washington University Jonathan turley. I want to ask you about your tinder analogy in just a moment, but hold tight. Attorneys for President Trump and Michael Cohen verified a 2016 audio tape recorded by trumps former legal fixer. And while the camps are disputing who said what, they do agree on the subject of the conversation. Then candidate trump is heard discussing a possible payment to purchase the story writes of a former playboy model Karen Mcdougal about an affair she says she had with trump a decade earlier in which the president denies. Cohens lawyer lanny davis released the tape to cnn last night. We cannot confirm whether its been edited or altered, it does include a brief profanity from then candidate donald trump. Let me know whats happening, okay . Oh. Oh. Maybe because of this it would be better if you didnt go, you know . Maybe because of this that one i think to get rid of this because its so false what theyre saying. Its such bullshit. I think this goes away quickly. I think its probably better. Do the charleston thing. Just this time. Yeah. In two weeks its fine. I think right now its better. You know . Okay, honey, you take care of yourself. Thanks, pam. Yep. Im proud of you. So long, bye. Whats up, mike . Great poll, by the way, cnn. Making progress. Big time. Pastor scott . Pastor scott. Whats happening . Oh, no. Can we use him anymore . Oh, yeah. We told him mark burns, can we use him anymore . No. He just called. He had an idea for you. Great. So we got served from the New York Times. I told you this. To unseal the divorce papers with ivana. Were fighting it. Should never be able to get that done. Never. They dont have give me a a woman that doesnt want correct. Youve been handling it. Yes. Its been going on for a while. Two, three weeks now. All you have to do is delay it for even after that its never going to be opened. Theres no purpose for it. Told you about charleston. I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend david so that im going to do that right away. Give it to me. Ive spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with so what are we going to pay . Funding, yes. And its all the stuff, all the stuff. Because you never know where that company, never know what hes going to be. Correct. Im all over that. I spoke to allen about it. When it comes time for the financing, which will be one second. What financing . Well have to pay. No, no, no, no. So lets put that into some context. Jonathan turly, i want to read your latest piece for the hill, titled Michael Cohens trump tape problem. You wrote this before the tape was released last night. Cohen has done everything short of going to tinder to hook up with Robert Mueller. He stripped away any references to trump on social media. Its quite a change from a man among oppressive array of sick offense stood out for his proclamations of love and loyalty. Cohen once said i protect mr. Trump. If theres an issue that relates to mr. Trump, that is of concern to him, its of course of concern to me. And i will use my legal skills to protect mr. Trump to the best of my abilities. It appears now that cohens loyalties are as dubious on his legal skills. However, the one thing that allows is conceivable is that cohen would flip. Professor turly, you wrote that before that tape was released to cnn last night. What more can you add after hearing that tape . First of all, my interest in tinder is purely academic. I want to make that clear. No, he really does follow that Dorothy Parker add age, you scratch a lover, find a foe. This is a very dangerous foe obviously for the president. The fact that he would secretly record his client is deeply troubling for an attorney. I mean, most attorneys are quite shocked. It doesnt make it illegal. The president is wrong about that when he says it might be illegal. In new york it probably is not. Theres been a debate about whether its ethical. That issue is still out there. But it is certainly damaging. In the tape theres clearly a reference to the 150,000. More importantly, theres a discussion of what appears to be david pecker as, quote, our friend. And whats most interesting about this is theres no suggestion that pecker would object to selling the rights of the story that he just recently acquired. The question is why . If he had a journalistic purpose for acquiring that purpose, why is the assumption that it would be easy to purchase it and then cab it within this corporation. Having said that, they didnt go ahead and do that which by the way, would have been terrible. I mean, cohens solution to every problem is self em mulation. The suggestion you could create a corporation and buy the rights to mcdougals story is again one of the worst possible things you could have done at that moment. So just by way of reminder, david pecker runs America Media the company that runs national inquiry. National inquiry bought Karen Mcdougals story for 150,000. They never published it. Kevin mcdougal alleges a long affair with President Trump that President Trump denies. You long said that Karen Mcdougal was more damaging to the president potentially than his Stormy Daniels. Why do you say that . Well, on a number of levels. First of all, the alleged relationship was longer, making her possible story more damaging than Stormy Daniels which may have just been a onenight stand. More importantly, the way that this played out is more damaging, that you have this individual, david pecker, buying the story then burying it. You now have the suggestion that he would then transfer that to a trump, you know, corporation that didnt have any fingerprints, according to cohens account. And that all does reenforce the sort of Campaign Finance violation theory. I dont think that this is as exculpatory as giuliani makes out. I dont believe that it is establishing a crime either, but it does add sort of tiles to this mosaic for a Campaign Finance violation. It shows a concern about keeping things quiet for a few weeks, using these types of mechanisms to bury stories and it makes pecker look really bad in terms of his willingness, according to this tape, hes obviously not saying anything like this, but the perceived willingness to sell this to basically a shield corporation. Michael cohens attorney lanny davis is the one who released the tape to cnn last night. He tells nbc news cohen is trying to reset his life as not being Donald Trumps bullet taker or worse a punching bag for Donald Trumps Defense Strategy where he takes the bullets. This is a turn for him, says davis. Its a new resolve to tell the truth no matter what, even if it endangers him. The white house declined comment and referred questions to Rudy Giuliani who disputed cohens claim on trumps use of the word cash on that tape. Major point is its outrageous that someone would tape his client sur repetitiously. Its also foolhardy for them to try to yell and scream and make believe whats on the tape. I agree with you the tape is a little bit hard to hear, but i assure you that we listened to it numerous, numerous times and the transcript makes it quite clear at the end that President Trump says, quote, dont pay with cash. You know, jeremy, we just heard Rudy Giuliani say that he and his associates listened to the tape numerous, numerous times and we listened to it twice this morning. But i get the feeling, and im wondering whether you get the feeling being out in the country covering elections, campaigns in different states, whether the level of exhaustion is such out in the country that many people are not listening to this stuff . I think thats right. I think theyre not. I think that russia in terms of their list of priorities right now, can i afford to put enough gas in my car, how much money am i bringing in with my paycheck every month . Is it actually getting smaller now. Those are much bigger concerns. However, this all contributes to the sense that this is an administration that frequently does not tell the truth. Tie this back to what President Trump said yesterday, this astonishing remark that what youre seeing and what youre reading is not whats happening. That we are supposed to deny reality. This has been his play book all along. When anything threatens him, when he feels under attack, his impulse is to just say, no. Black is white. Up is down. The sky is not blue. And thats what you have going on to try to muddy the waters around this russia investigation here. But now we have tapes, right . And tapes are very different. Granted, this tape is not incredibly clear. I think as rudy said last night, they had to listen to it three times. Im not really sure if they were listening to it three times because they wanted it to line up with their explanation that they gave to the New York Times on friday saying, oh no, dont worry, this is going to clear trump. Looking for exactly how they could do that with this tape. Or because its just genuinely confusing. I think that the jury is kind of out on that. Well, it is genuinely confusing, i would say. Its difficult to kind of sort through it as we listen to it. They do seem to be focussed on, well, what did the president say about cash which muddies the overall picture, gene. Right. Because who cares. Right. What does it matter. I love that Rudy Giuliani focuses on that one question, well, he said dont pay with cash rather than pay with cash. When the broader point is he knew about this relationship. Exactly, this on going conspiracy, basically, i dont know if in a legal sense but certainly in a real world sense to keep this story under wraps until the election about this affair that he had with this woman for nearly a year and it doesnt matter whether he was going to pay it in cash or with a check. You know, the only thing he says we werent going to do was finance it over time. Fine. We werent going to take out a mortgage. Whatever. Can you finance payments to a playboy model . I dont know how that works. If you go to bank of america and have a discussion with certain people you can finance anything. Good to know. Apparently. Here are two what have you financed in your life, John Heilemann . You get my point. Leave me alone. Two important things about this right, Michael Cohen and donald trump are having a conversation that sounds like its one of a hundred conversations theyve had. This is a familiar tonal the tone of this is familiar. We deal with this, the dirty business we deal all the time. Its almost familial. This is a long conversation that they handled this kind of stuff, take out the garbage. Lanny davis telegraphs this as clearly as possible, Michael Cohen wanted to reset the Public Perception of Michael Cohen, he wants to tell the truth. Michael cohen is going on offense, thats what this is. He is willing now to take the material that he has at his disposal and start to weaponize it and use it against donald trump. How much damage it will do . We dont know. But thats a giant shift from where we were with Michael Cohen two weeks ago, obviously two years ago. But having Michael Cohen with a skilled practitioner of media lawyering and willing to take it to donald trump is just one more problem for the president. Noah rothman, its interesting when you talk to trump voters over the last year or so or two years really, they sort of say they call it the stormy stuff. Thats baked into who he is, but he does all these other things that benefit us, so were willing to overlook that. Is that the case with this . In other words, will that tape we just played have any impact whatsoever . Yeah, i dont think so, as far as broader political impact. As you said, his character issues were baked into the cake in 2016. I dont think thats changed. To the extent that this undermines the fake news narrative, i think thats a benefit for Donald Trumps opponents but perhaps not a significant one. Jeremy is right. The Economic News is the biggest issue. As long as the economy is humming, republican voters, trump voters are willing to overlook this sort of stuff. The biggest question i had moving forward is how democrats will position themselves on tariffs. Clearly tariffs are hurting donald trump voters as much as anybody who is a trump opponent could have hoped. Are they going to abandon working class voters, union voters who they moved away from in the past in order to be a free trade party. Its a difficult thing to imagine the Democratic Party turning away from its past in order to adopt donald trump voters and reembrace donald trump voters as much as it might win them elections. So theyre in a difficult position to try to capitalize on Donald Trumps problems right now. Jonathan turly, we knew the moment Michael Cohen hired lanny davis that he was going on offense and we saw the first round of that official round last night when lanny released those tapes on cnn and went on tv to make his case about them. What does a Michael Cohen on offense mean more broadly to the mueller investigation, to President Trump . Well, first of all, lanny is a friend, but i have to say, its not a good things when your client is a lawyer trying a new approach and that is to tell the truth. You know, one would hope that that had been sort of part of the strategy all along. But, hes obviously a dangerous opponent because he has such intimate knowledge of the president s dealings, not just with regard to the alleged affairs but also some of his business dealings. Theres been a very clever tactical move in dividing this investigation between washington and the Southern District. He could be contacted by either set of prosecutors and offered a deal. Now, how far that deal would go in resolving his problems is a very good question because most of cohens real problems deal with Financial Arrangements that are separate from donald trump. So, it will be very interesting thing how they thread this needle. Lanny is very good at changing the narrative. And he has done that. But hes not an al chemist, he cant turn Michael Cohen into some type of action figure or hero. He has a really quite a tainted record here and hes not going to redeem himself necessarily, but he might help himself if he could get some type of deal. Jonathan turly, thank you. Well audit your tinder 101 class this fall at George Washington university. Swipe left. Good to see you. Thank you very much, professor. Thank you. Jeremy peters, lets talk about what happened in georgia the runoff for the republican nomination in the Gubernatorial Race there. Ryan kemp won by 39 points, smoked his opponent. Explains trumps endorsement a few days ago. President trump came out strongly in support of this candidate. Thats exactly right. And i think what this says is you look a few months ago when trumplike candidates were losing, now theyre starting to be a little bit of a shift where you have trump approved, trump tethered candidates, people who really said i am just like this guy. Im just like the president. Theyre starting to win. In particular, his truck, he ran an ad where he was driving a truck saying i will deport illegal aliens myself if necessary. And pointed a shotgun at a kid who was trying to date his daughter in some type of show of masculinity, i guess, or so he thought. But what this says, i think, willie, to your point, is that while the professional conservative class has really kind of taken over certain aspects of this administration and this president has been a conservative republican president in a lot of ways from appointing gorsuch then kavanaugh and the tax cuts and all these regulatory repeals, culturally the party is very much Donald Trumps. And it will remain so for the foreseeable future. And theres a reason candidates like kemp in georgia are running around saying, im with the president all the way. In fact, last night in his victory speech he said Everyone Needs to remember that tweet, the tweet endorsement from donald trump. Thats why all of these republicans in washington who are culturally against donald trump, paul ryan, jeff flake, bob corker all leaving. Fiscally its a different party. It used to be the party of the deficit scalds. We cant spend. Were running out of money. Were mortgaging the future. Hit a trillion next year. Exactly. Add a trillion to the deficit. Lets throw more money at the farmers. But what a governors race in georgia for the fall between republican and stacy abrams who is a progressive africanamerican democrat. So noah, what can we read into last nights results . Again, 39point spread in that republican runoff. We said it again and again but its worth underlying, President Trump has an 88 Approval Rating among republicans despite all the criticism he receives. Yeah, jeremy hit it on the head that theres an affectation sort of a posture that you have to strike in order to appeal to the trump supporting base of the republican party. And i think this candidate struck it pretty well. Obviously donald trump believed it. And the race in the fall now is set up between a progressive democrat, someone who scolded her fellow democrats for appealing to the middle of the state and a trump supporting republican who promises to deport people by himself and put guns to the heads of people. There is no middle ground. And thats very distressing. Theres a lot of people in the middle of this country who do not appreciate this kind of posturing and are not progressive liberal democrats who think deficit spending isnt a problem in this country. There is no middle anymore. And thats something that i dont think is sustainable. In the long run, there will be a revolt against this kind of polarization. Im not sure it will take on a healthy form, but its coming. If you want to talk about a race that will reflect the nationalized nature of these midterms, this race is going to be incendiary. Its going to be controversial. Its going to be racially charged. This is going to be a race that a lot of people are going to be focussing on. Well all be out running around in the runup to these midterms, but this particular race could get very ugly very fast. Stacy abrams would be the first africanamerican woman to be a governor in the United States of america if she wins this fall. Jeremy peters, thank you very much. Always good to see you. Still ahead on morning joe, when it comes from kim jongun, he calls him smart, talented and a worthy negotiator. On iran, the president threatened to wipe out the country but yesterday took a different tone. Could another summit be coming . Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. Let your perfect drive come together at the lincoln summer invitation sales event. Get 0 apr on select 2018 lincoln models plus 1,000 bonus cash. No matter how much you clean, does your house still smell stuffy . Thats because your home is filled with soft surfaces that trap odors and release them back into the room. So, try febreze fabric refresher. Febreze finds odors trapped in fabrics and cleans them away as it dries. Use febreze every time you tidy up to keep your whole house smelling fresh air clean. Fabric refresher even works for clothes you want to wear another day. Make febreze part of your clean routine for whole home freshness. This is not a screensaver. Game. This is the destruction of a cancer cell by the bodys own immune system, thanks to medicine that didnt exist until now. And today can save your life. You might or joints. Hing for your heart. But do you take something for your brain. With an ingredient originally discovered in jellyfish, prevagen has been shown in Clinical Trials to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. This is moving day with the best inhome wifi experience and millions of wifi hotspots to help you stay connected. And this is moving day with Reliable Service appointments in a twohour window so youre up and running in no time. Show me decorating shows. This is staying connected with xfinity to make moving. Simple. Easy. Awesome. Stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and twohour appointment windows. Click, call or visit a store today. I withdrew the United States from the horrible, onesided iran nuclear deal. [ cheers and applause ]. And iran is not the same country anymore. That i can say. And well see what happens. But were ready to make a real deal, not the deal that was done by the previous administration, which was a disaster. This was President Trump speaking to a Veterans Group at the vfw in kansas city. He seems open to cutting a deal with iran days after the allcap twitter threat to the regime. Joining us now democratic senator chris coons of delaware. Senator, good morning. Its always good to see you. The argument seems to be at this point this morning from the white house that the president was sort of softening the ground with the allcaps tweet to set up a negotiation or a deal. You convinced by that argument . Willie, im not convinced. This seems to be the same play book the president followed over several months with kim jongun of north korea where he threatened and threatened and threatened some sort of aggressive allout nuclear war on twitter and increasely abusive of kim jongun, did a 180 degree turn and did a handshake photo op in singapore. My concern is hell do the same, that he has now very briefly tweeted one all caps threat at president rouhani of the iranian Islamic Republic and will declare himself capable of concocting some better deal. The Iran Nuclear Agreement which took years to put together and relied upon our european allies and china and russia isnt something you can replace with a few tweets and photo op. When you see a tweet like that one from the president threatening iran in all caps, whats your reaction to it . I shake my head. Im concerned. I frankly think were losing credibility internationally. The more times the more ways that our president conducts Something Like diplomacy on twitter in a way that seems unrelated to the actual reality on the ground, i think it undermines our credibility. His statement at the rally in kansas city that iran is now a totally different country is just obviously untrue. Senator, noah rothman from commentary magazine. Turning briefly to domestic politics. You recently criticized the left flank of the Democratic Party saying the democrats are running a relentless race to the left and thats a losing proposition they need to abandon, quite, wild eye proposals. Specifically what proposals constitutes this . The one i was talking about there if i remember that interview correctly was folks who are my friends and colleagues who think we should be reversing President Trumps inhumane and unsuccessful immigration policies and we should be reforming the Agency Responsible for immigration enforcement. But they summarize that position with abolishi. C. E. I think that particular approach is too easily charactertured by President Trump as misrepresenting democrats as welcoming open borders and abandoning any immigration enforcement. Thats not the case. My colleagues with whom ive spoken, they adopted abolishi. C. E. As a short term way of conveying a more substantial position which is we should have strong enforcement but we ought to do in a humane way, the opposite of recent immigration decisions by President Trump and recent Enforcement Actions by i. C. E. Senator coops, kasie hunt, nice to see you. Good morning. I want to turn back not necessarily Foreign Policy but foreign meddling. The president rewriting whats gone on with Vladimir Putin saying that russia is meddling in the Midterm Election but that hes trying to help democrats. Theres been some speculation as to where that information may be coming from or if he just made it up. Im wondering has there been any conversations with you and your colleagues, perhaps those on the Intelligence Committee and i know you serve on foreign services. Is there any truth to this, any evidence that youve seen . Kasie, on the Foreign Relations committee we heard absolutely nothing that suggests russia is making an abrupt change in its preferences as it prepares to attack our elections again in 2018. What weve seen across western europe, central europe, Eastern Europe is that russia is a persistent and aggressive adversary of democracy. It is true that in the United States in the 2016 election russia took some actions to support both the far right and far left in order to further increase division in america, but our Intelligence Community unanimously assessed that in the case of the president ial election of 2016, they ultimately made a decision to support donald trump over Hillary Clinton and to interfere with, to attack our election to achieve that result. Senator, speaking of our Intelligence Community, yesterday you and senator flake, not for the first time, attempted to pass a simple resolution in the United States senate basically saying we believe our guys are doing a great job and we believe our guys are better than the russians. And the senator from georgia, david purdue, used a parliamentary maneuver to block the resolution from coming to the floor of the senate. So my question to you is, whats wrong with your resolution . And if nothing is wrong with your resolution, whats wrong with the United States senate . Theres nothing wrong with our resolution. It was dismissed last thursday as mere symbolism and ill remind you that sometimes symbolism like our flag is an important rallying point for americans. I think it is important. I believe senator flake thinks its important that the senate speak with one voice about backing our Intelligence Community, federal Law Enforcement. But our resolution also called for action. It called for full enforcement of the sanctions that we imposed against russia, excuse me, that we empowered the president to impose against russia in a 9 82 vote last year but hasnt yet been fully imposed. It called for hearings about for the release of notes an records of the meeting in helsinki. So, it was both important symbolism in terms of supporting the Intelligence Community and federal Law Enforcement and our resolution called for action. Whats wrong, i think with the senate particularly with the Senate Caucus in the senate, theres some senators unwilling to do even symbolic measures that would be in any way disfavorable to the white house. That strikes me as concerning. Youve got Senior Administration officials who are openly saying the opposite of what President Trump said in helsinki. U. N. Ambassador nikki haley just said i believe yesterday we will never trust Vladimir Putin. If thats the case, then why is he being invited to the white house . Senator, Gene Robinson. You and i have talked. I know that one of your particular interests on Foreign Relations is the african continent. The only way that i can recall the president has engaged with the african continent referred to it as a bunch of shole countries. Yes. So, do you find others in the administration who are willing to engage with you on africa . Or do you not . Well, to be positive, secretary of commerce ross recently led a trip to four african countries to try to strengthen and broaden our economic ties with countries that have vibrant economies and where theres significant opportunity. And i think that is an important step forward. At the meantime, china is engaged in very active, very aggressive economic diplomacy across the continent. Xi jinping is in Southern Africa and just made a commitment of 14 billion in new investments in just one country in south africa, one of africas most dynamic countries with a very promising economy. My most recent meeting with the minister of trade of south africa was a very somber one. Our tariffs against their steel and aluminum exports is going to have a really negative impact on our relationship with south africa since theyre not really the country were trying to impact with President Trumps tariffs, that should be focussed on the u. S. china trade relationship. This is just another example, eugene of the sort of unintended harm these wildly applied and widely swung tariffs are having. I think we hit four of the seven continents this morning with senator chris coons. Well get to the other three on your next appearance. Thank you very much. Good to see you. Still ahead, former ambassador Michael Mcfaul will join the conversation on the heels of his white house meeting with trumps top adviser on russia just yesterday. Morning joe will be right back. Is this at t innovations . Yeah, wow. This must be for one of our new unlimited wireless plans. It comes with a ton of entertainment options. Great, can you sign for this . Yeah. Hey, uh. Whats in that one . Thats a shark. New and only with at t, you can get unlimited data, 30 channels of live tv, and your choice of things like hbo or amazon music. More for your thing. Thats our thing. Visit att dot com. Stay at la quinta. Where were changing with stylish makeovers. Then at your next meeting, set your seat height to its maximum level. Bravo, tall meeting man. Start winning today. Book now at lq. Com translator options abound and they all can be found in an appropriate, legal framework. Did you want President Trump to win the election . And did you direct any of your officials to help him do that . Translator yes, i did. Yes, i did. Thats a moment from the joint News Conference last week in helsinki between President Trump and Vladimir Putin. When reuters reporter jeff mason asked the russian leader whether he wanted donald trump to win the 2016 president ial election. But that question is missing from the official white house transcript and from the video. The white house has posted its own version of that News Conference on its official Youtube Channel and as was pointed out in the atlantic and last night on msnbc, this white house version differs from what we all just saw. Translator options abound and they all can be found in an appropriate legal framework. And did you direct any of your officials to help him do that . Translator yes, i did. Yes, i did. Thats an odd edit. Joining us now former u. S. Ambassador to russia Michael Mcfaul. Yesterday michael met with President Trumps top russia adviser. Ambassador, good to see you. Its not an odd edit. Its an insidious. I say odd because in some ways it makes it worse because the question was did he help you win did you move to help President Trump win the election and then they have putin saying yes, yes, i did. He was answering when he answered on the real tape, yes, i wanted the president to win. But it makes it entirely unclear the way the edit of the question, did you officials direct officials to do something, to do what . Its cut out its exactly the thing that president that gets President Trump every time on this, the fact that his election might not be legitimate because he could have been helped by president putin and therefore theres Something Else going on. Who would have directed that . Just to be clear, there is no justification under any circumstance for the white house to be putting out a video of an event that happened and altering it in any way whatsoever, whether its to their interest or not to their interest, theres only one version of this reality. Exactly. Question was asked and answer was proffered. That is the only version that our white house should be putting out on its Youtube Channel or through any other official government mechanism or medium that exists. Sit possible that its not legal for them to do that . There are record laws, all emails, tweets everything has to be archived as it is. Though i play a lawyer occasionally on television i dont know the answer. If its not illegal, it should be. Ambassador mcfaul, lets talk about your meeting yesterday. Obviously this comes against the backdrop of the white house saying Sarah Sanders from the lecturn in the White House Briefing room, they were entertaining the idea put forth of president putin making you and others available for interviews in some kind of a sham investigation in russia. What did you learn in your meeting yesterday . Well, first of all, lets be clear what putin was proposing. I think theres been some misunderstanding about it. It wasnt just innocently asking us to be interviewed for some other criminal investigation, it was asking to interview us because they considered us to be potential criminals in an on going investigation. So they were accusing me on the record of being a suspected criminal for doing the work i did while an Obama Administration official. And its so crazy that they even got some of the facts wrong, just so you know, allegedly its what i did in 2009 and 2010 at the state department in moscow. Just to be clear, in 2009 and 2010 i worked at the white house. And it should have been batted down by the president , live tv from helsinki. Maybe he didnt understand what president putin was talking about, so lets let him have a retake. They then did a retake and from the white house they said theyre considering it. And it was only on the third take that they finally said theyre not considering to offering us up for this interrogation. Though again, even in that third take, they called it a sincere suggestion from Vladimir Putin. And lets just be clear, there was no sincerity whatsoever in that gesture either about us or about inter allowing us to interview those gru military intelligence officials who, of course, would lie just as theyre trained to do just like Vladimir Putin did standing next to President Trump. And the president of the United States famously called it a, quote, incredible offer the first time he heard about it from Vladimir Putin. What did you learn in your white house meeting yesterday . Well, so im here in washington to meet not just with white house officials but other members of the government. Im going around to the state department, department of justice. I have many meetings with members of congress, senators. And i have one message, they can tell you what they want about the meeting. Here is my message im glad to share with anybody. Now that this is no longer an offer, thank you that were done with that, but were not done with the possibility that the russian government will indictment and convict me and the other 11 u. S. Government officials of a crime that, of course, we had nothing to do with. It was completely invented. And if that happens, then we all have to worry about when we travel abroad for a red notice to be put out by interpoll asking for us to be arrested and sent to russia. And there are cases of this, most famously bill browder has been living with this for years. Hes not the only one who lives with it. I talked to a senior ukrainian official who reminded me they do this all the time with ukrainian officials. I want my government, i want my president , my commander in chief to tell Vladimir Putin under no circumstances should you go after these American Government officials, former and present, and that will have dangerous consequences for our relationship. I want them to preemptively protect us so that we dont face that kind of harassment. Ambassador Gene Robinson here. Are they going to do that . Are they going to keep you from being effectively a prisoner within the confines of the United States lest you be hauled off to moscow . I dont know. I mean, you know, i want to remain hopeful about my country. This is not a democrat republican thing. This is a National Security issue. By the way, theres a very senior former official from the Bush Administration on that list, too. And i just i honestly cant understand it. Why is it so hard for this Administration Just to say on the record this is absurd. You cannot arrest our government officials for doing their jobs because if they dont say that, it sends a very dangerous message that our diplomats, that our military service officers, that our Intelligence Officers working abroad can somehow be, you know, indicted and prosecuted for crazy crimes that, of course, we didnt do. So its in the National Interest for them to do this. Its not just about me. And not just in russia, right . And not just in russia, correct. Its everybody is looking at this. Can Vladimir Putin silence his critics . Thats what this is about. I am you guys know, ive been on your show, im a pretty vocal critic of what Vladimir Putin does to his people at home and abroad. And this is an intimidation method. We need to push back on it. So ambassador mcfaul, lets back up a bit. Who, by name, did you meet with in the white house . And who, by name, did you express your legitimate grievance to in the white house . And what, by response, did you get . Well, its in the public domain. They reported it, not me. I met with fiona hill, the senior person on russian affair. I want to be clear, i have lots of other meetings. Ill let them read it out. Im not going to report on my own case. I have a message that im bringing to them, and i want the American People to hear the same message so that we have some action. Again, i want to make i want to underscore this one more time, this is not just about me. This is about the other 11 americans on that list and literally tens of thousands of americans who serve our country abroad who could be prosecuted if we dont push back on autocratic dictators who use the law to intimidate us. I know youll stay on this and we will too. Ambassador Michael Mcfaul, we appreciate it. Thanks for having me. There were no indictments from the benghazi investigation or the clinton email probe, that didnt stop attorney general Jeff Sessions from repeating and locking along with the lock her up chant with a group of High School Students. Well talk about that ahead on morning joe. A hotel can make or break a trip. And at expedia, we dont think you should be rushed into booking one. Thats why we created expedias addon advantage. Now after booking your flight, you unlock discounts on select hotels right until the day you leave. Addon advantage. Discounted hotel rates when you add on to your trip. Only when you book with expedia. Overwhelming air fresheners can send you running. So try febreze one. With no aerosols and no heavy perfumes. So you can spray and stay. Febreze one. Its a hightech revolution in sleep. The new sleep number 360 smart bed. It intelligently senses your movement and automatically adjusts on each side to keep you both comfortable. And snoring . How smart is that . Smarter sleep. To help you lose your dad bod, train for that marathon, and wake up with the patience of a saint. The new sleep number 360 smart bed, from 999. Smarter sleep will change your life. Its so hard to believe but its all coming back me. Baby, baby, baby. All you can eat is back, baby. Applebees. During some of the president ease attacks on the press yesterday during an event in kansas city, boos could be heard, in response the vfw tweeted we were disappointed to hear some of the members boo the press. We rely on the media to spread the vfw message, and media on site today with our invited guests. We were happy to have them there. There you go. Classy. Class in indeed. Another moment from yesterday. There were plenty of posts on twitter, linking something prush said with 1984. In the words of the president just remember what youre seeing and what youre reading is not whats happening. Plus a secretly recorded conversation with Michael Cohen and donald trump is out in the public. Were hearing for the first time audio of the two men discussing a payment involving a former playboy model. Morning joe is coming back. Making cars lighter, its a good place to start, advanced oils for those hardworking parts. Fuels that go further so drivers pump less. Improving efficiency is what we do best. Energy lives here. Improving efficiency is what we do best. With tough food, your dentures may slip and fall. New fixodent ultramax hold gives you the strongest hold ever to lock your dentures. So now you can eat tough food without worry. Fixodent and forget it. Just remember, what youre seeing and what you are reading is not what is happening. There you have is, or as George Orwell wrote reject the evidence of your eyes and your ears. The president dominating the air waves this morning, even when they didnt plan to be. Michael cohen has released a secretly recorded audiotape discussion payment of a playboy model. The president attacked reporters as fake news during an event yesterday. And speaking of campaign lines, the United States attorney general egged on High School Students in a chance of lock her up. All this plus a hammers of wow and a government bailout for farmer, the one senator likens to the economic graft of the soviet union. Im willie geist, along liquidity the host of casey d. C. Welcome, guys. Is that hold for you yet . The lightning . Im waiting for the barnicle take. Noaa rath man is here, jon than la mere, political reporter for the daily beast. , and michael schmidt. Joe and mika have the morning ive. A audiotape has verified. While the camps are disputing who said what, they agree on the subject of the conversation. Then candidate trump is heard discussing a possible payment to purchase the story rights of a former playboy model karen mcdual about an affair she had with the president a decade earlier, that trump denies lanny davis released that tape to cnn. While nbc cannot confirm if its been edited. A warning it includes a brief profanity from then candidate donald trump. Let me know whats happening, okay . Oh, oh. Maybe because of this it would be better if you didnt go. You know . Maybe because of this, you know, that one this is to get rid of this, because its so false what theyre saying, its such bullshit. Um i think this goes away quickly. I think its probably better, just this yeah, in two weeks its fine. I think right now its better, you know . Okay, honey, you take care of yourself. Thanks, dan. Im proud of you. So long. Great poll, by the way. Great boll. Big time. And your guy is a good time, who . Pastor scott can we use use him anymore . Yeah, weve told him i dont mean to curb. Im sorry. He just called and said we have a chance here tonight here for you. So we got served from New York Times regarding the unsealed divorce papers with ivana. Were fighting it. Casslick never ever should be done, give me a please. A woman correct. So yes, and its all. Its been going on for a while. All we have to do is delay it four weeks. Even after that it wont be opened. Theres no purpose for it. I told you about charleston. I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regardless our friend david, you know . Im going to do that right away. Give it to me ive spoken to Alan Weiselberg about how to set the whole thing up with funding the yes, and its all the stuff, all the stuff, because you never know that company may he gets hoyt by a truck. Correct. So im all over that. I spoke to alan about it, when it comes to the financing what financing . Well, i have to pay for it oh, no, no, no, i got. So were going to work through exactly what you heard there, but first the exclusive rights to mcduals stores were purchased and never published for 150,000 by American Media, whose chairman, an ally of the president , may be the man cohen is referring to when he mentioned our friend david. Trump and mcdual met in 2006, three months after melania birth gave birth to trumps youngest son. Her 2016 contract with American Media promised her regular columns on aging and wellness and to prominently feature her on two of the companys magazine covers. When the wall street journal reported the payment four days ago before the election, hope hicks said, quote, we have no knowledge of any of this em. Lets bring in Senior Reporter at vanity fair and msnbc news, and contributor emily james fox. Youve been wired into cohens world for a long time. Just walk us through a bit of what we heard how the decision was made to make it public. Well, i think the most interesting thing is it is very clear that in the height of the election President Trump was clearly plugged into all that Michael Cohen was doing. Whether that was this payment made, or the talk of the payment made to ami or something about his divorce tapes being unsealed or not, and what clear is the president knew about everything that was going on. I think that was a very calculated strategy made by Michael Cohen and his attorneys yesterday. Since friday, people in cohen world had been telling me the narrative that Rudy Giuliani put out was not accurate, and it was not the full story and there was much more to know. I dont think anyone believed it would come out so soon, but we saw a lot of growing frustration. The narrative they believed was not accurate. People were really believes it, and cohen believes that there is a calculated strategy in the works from people around the president to discredit him, to make him look like he had nothing to do with the president , that the decisions he made were made on his own and the president had no idea. So watching cable news all weekend, watching cable news yesterday, the frustration continued to mount. The president had waived privilege, so i think there was a sort of a, what are we waiting for in why not let the questions we have listening to the recording be posed to the American Public. So michael, as you listen to the 2 51 seconds that we just played there, the dispute seems to be Rudy Giuliani and Michael Cohen, this question of how the payment was being discussed. What does the term cash mean . But at the end of the day you have two men talking two months before the president ial election about a payment. We should stipulate a payment thatches never made, a played to a former playboy plodle to keep her quiet. The dispute is on this issue of the payment. When we wrote on friday about the existence of this recording rudie says, this shows that the president wanted it to be made in check so it it could followed. He did not want it paid with cash. As you heard from the audio, it is not nearly that clear, but not nearly as clear as cohens lawyers make it out to be, where they say we do not hear any of the audio after the poppye point that its initially discussed. Both sides making contradictory claims about the tape. The tape not being the clearest, we only have a small snip et of what they were talking about. At the end of the day, thats only really an issue thats come up because of the claims that jewelandi made on friday, as he tried to explain why the tape was not bad, but as you point out, it was something that the president clearly knew about. Mike cohens attorney lanny david says cohen is trying to reset his life as not being a bullet taker or punching bag for trumps strategy. This is a turn for him, a new resolve to tell the truth, no matter what, even if it endangers him. The white house deferred questions to Rudy Giuliani. Major point is outrageous that someone would tape his client surreptitiously, also foolhardy for them to try to yell and scream and make believe whats on the tape. I agree with you, the tape is a bit hard to hear, but i assure you we listened to it numerous, numerous times. The transcript makes it quite clear at the end that President Trump says, quote dont pay with cash. Jonathan, you also spoke to Rudy Giuliani, what did he tell you, and is it clear that the president is saying dont pay with cash . What Rudy Giuliani says is they have a recording, and they have enhanced it. He said when i would go after the mafia, we would have the same thing. And then they release a transcript that seems to back it up. They have not released that enhanced recording, so we have not heard that yesterday, but giulianis argument was this still backs up the president s argument that he didnt do anything wrong. He makes the point that earlier in this confession that they discussed maybe set up a corporation to pay it, and then giulianis argument is show if then candidate trump and Michael Cohen are trying to obscure this, they wouldnt have set up a corporation, they wouldnt be discussing it by check. They believe cohens camp is trying to muddy the waters here and change the argument, to try to attack the president , and they feel very comfortable that thats not the case. They also said they have 12 other tapes theyre goingth think. They believe its cohen talking about trump with third parties, theyre debating whether to release them. John heilman, other than listening to the tape, there are a lot of names mentioned. The question is why does the tape end abruptly . I dont know what else you find out in that tape if youre a prosecutor. Neither do i. The largest questions revolve around context, exactly whats happening before and after, who is donald trump talking to when he seems to have a conversation with before the thing start, who is in and out of the room. What is the reference to the charlottesville issue . Theres a lot of questions, and i will say from 30,000 feet, what is interesting about this most of all, is for a long time among donald trump adversaries in the legal realm, you had bob mueller who doesnt speak, michael aftmik Michael Avenatti does. Whatever you think of lanny davis or his motivations, hes back, and he like Michael Avenatti is a skilled practitioner of the garish arts of media lawyering. We had this back in the Clinton Administration and other times where we have Rudy Giuliani, Michael Avenatti and lanny davis all engaged, all of them have obscure motivations, all of them are not telling precisely the truth, theyre ought jousting on behalf of their clients behalf, and takes us into a legal carnival element of this story that is going to raise were going to see a lot of stories like this that will come on the in dribs and padres and the interpretative prisms will be in stark contrast and you wont know exactly what we believe until we get into a court, if we ever do. Still ahead, Vladimir Putin was asked if he wanted President Trump to win. He answer, quote yes, i did, but that exchange is missing from the white house transcript of that press conference. Well talk about that next on morning joe. Youre headed down the highway when the guy in front slams on his brakes out of nowhere. You do, too, but not in time. Hey, no big deal. Youve got a good record and Liberty Mutual wont hold a grudge by raising your rates over one mistake. You hear that, karen . Liberty mutual doesnt hold grudges. How mature of them. For drivers with accident forgiveness Liberty Mutual wont raise their rates because of their first accident. Liberty mutual insurance. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty with tough food, your dentures may slip and fall. New fixodent ultramax hold gives you the strongest hold ever to lock your dentures. So now you can eat tough food without worry. Fixodent and forget it. That russia will interfere. Im very concerned that russia will fight very hard to have an impact. Based on the fact that no president has been tougher on russia than me, he writes. They will definitely be pushing for the democrats. They definitely dont want trump. President putin himself said he did want trump to win in 2016. Reporter did you want President Trump to win the election . And did you direct any of your officials to help him do that . Translator yes, i did. Yes, i did, because he talked about bringing the u. S. russia relationship back to normal. Thats pretty clear. That question is missing from the official white house transcript of the News Conference that. Flagged by the atlantic more than a week ago, and as of this morning still has not been corrected. The white house also clamping down on what the public knows about the president s contact with foreign leaders. It is being reported that the white house will no longer issue summaries of the phone calls with foreign heads of state, breaking with traditions of past administratio administrations, nonpublic readouts will still be circulated among government officials at relevant agencies, but not made available to the public. John heilman, lets put those two pieces together. What does it add up to . Well, theres a number weve already seen this, theres no white house logs, either. We dont get to know who comes in and out of the white house. This administrations absolute desire to try to be as keep th, they want to keep us from knowing what the president is doing. The twohour meeting with Vladimir Putin with nobody present, we dont know what happened in that meeting. All of these meetings are consistent with the desire to keep the public from knowing what it has a right to know from a president what we have historically known, but whats worse is this issue with the transcript, which is not about a question of lack of transparency, but a question of trying to alter the basic record of what happened in a public setting. Its not just this transcript. They have altered the video that they put out, which we saw last night on television. Hopefully well play that at some point. They have not just taken out the question from the written transcript, but altered the video of that in order to make it look like putin did not say yes these are faked records. We are in the realm like the invocation of hitler, im always hesitant to invoke orwell, this is across the board this is genuinely a orwellian moment. This points to the black of readout, its a mistake for them. The readouts are a way to help shape the image of what these meetings are like, what they phone calls are like. Instead we see time and time again the Foreign Governments get their readouts first, russia is particularly good about that. Weve heard the kremlin side of the story first, so the white house is missing an opportunity to try to control the narrative around these meetings, and since these readouts will still le government officials, it means at some point theyll be leaked. Theyre trying to control the narrative in another way that i they think is a more at the effective way, by creating fake documents about public events. To jonathans point, though, it gives Foreign Governments the chance to the narrative, as russia has done with regard to syria yesterday, russia accused general votel, or army guy who runs operations in the middle east, accused him the not being obedient to his chief executive, the president of the units, implying in their statement that russia knows more about what happened in the closeddoor meeting between putin and trump that jo invest votel or the director of National Intelligence. It ultimately will be more more for the Communications Shop. In the past you would have to compare the readouts to see what, you know, if they align. Now youll have just the account from the other side. Coming up on morning joe in the words of President Trump tariffs are the greatest. His republican colleagues have a different set of words for the white house trade policy. Well show their pointed criticism, next on morning joe. Dont believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. I mean, i saw a piece on nbc today, nbc, it is heartthrobbing. They were interviewing people. They probably go through 20, and then they pick the one that sounds like the worst. They went through a group of people. In fact, i wanted for say i got to do something about this trump. Terrible. That piece was done by the lobbyists, the people that they hire, it was a total setup. That was President Trump yesterday in missouri, seemingly referring to a story we aired on morning joe about the economic pressure that American Farmers and producers are under because of the escalating tariffs. Here again is the report from missbcs von hilliard. The whole future is uncertain. Reporter American Workers are bearing the brunt of the trade ward. We later it in the lobster waters in maine. I felt it was like a tick in the symptom yak. Or in iowa. Other cunning will take up the slack and well lose those marks for the long term, maybe good. Reporter the Cranberry Bogs in massachusetts. We dont want to be punished for just being from america. Reporter from kay kay in the bourbon facilities, and the potatoes in idaho, and in nebraska soybeans. Right now its a lot of pain were going through. Reporter doug hopes the president he voted for will end this trade war. Are day they tariffs are going on is costing farmers millions. Reporter his chive economic adviser says were in a stalemate with china. The trade negotiations are kind of stalled. Reporter the president s handpitched trade chair is warning theyre going in a more protectionist direction have done worse. Reporter we caught up with lawmakers from states calling for the administration to pull back. No, the administration doesnt understand what they need. I understand the president s efforts, but we are caught in the cross hairs. Theres not a senator thats been over there that can come back and tell you they have any earthly idea where its going. Senators in both parties are pressing for legislation to give Congress Approval power over these tariffs. Im doing this to do the right thing for our country. Reporter President Trump seems set on going it alone. The president after his Convention Speech back in 2016, that he alone could fix it. Right. Yeah, hes trying. The alone part is the part. He doesnt have the full picture, and is making decisions without really talking to enough people. A number of profree trade republicans are criticizing the aid package. Speaking with politico yesterday, ron johnson of wisconsin said, quote this is becoming more and more like a soviet type of economy, c commissars making the decision. And here is ben sasse of nebraska. When you choose a war of choice, and then you say afterwards lets just solved it by buying goldplated crutches. The farmers of america want to work, they dont want crutches. This idea that the president set up the problem with the tariffs and his correction is a bailout and it was senator sasse who say the farmers want free trade, not a bailout. And when they bailouts are distributed, its more likely theyll go to big agribusiness, not the small farmers. You see flashes of the dna every so often. The usda is appealing to the Commodity Credit Corporation to buy up surplus goods, so well be produces a lot of food that no one will eat and will sit in a pile and rot. Its incredibly inefficient, sort of the thing that republicans know in their marrow is wrong, bad Economic Policy and they have opposed all the way up to january 2017. What is the legal fallout from that recorded conversation . Well have Chuck Rosenberg who served as an aide to Robert Mueller thats straight ahead on morning joe. With tough food, your dentures may slip and fall. New fixodent ultramax hold gives you the strongest hold ever to lock your dentures. So now you can eat tough food without worry. Fixodent and forget it. O. If you could hear the conversation in the break. Ivanka trump is closing her namesake Fashion Company to turn her focus to longterm policymaking he stepped away to avoid ethics problems, but remained to own it in the truth. Despite soaring sales leading up to the 2016 president ial election, the brand became a lightning rod for critics, facing boycotts, deteriorating sales and being dropped from major retailers. Lets bring in msnbcs stephanie rule, whose show is coming up in 26 minutes, what more can you say . To say her business was failing and thats why she shut it down is a bridge too far. You saw companies in metropolitan stores stop carrying her stuff, but you saw a lot of stores in the southeast pick them up. One of the things she faced that was a problem, is they couldnt expand internationally. We could criticize her all day long, or look at it sinically, or at the very least, take it at face value. Every day we hammer ivanka trump, you have a conflict of interest. Shes shutting it down, we should take it and move on. Is it not the case theres a controversy off a connection between her businesses and china and some of the actions that President Trump has taken there i realize without a doubt. There definitely is, and she sat next to xi jinping the same night she got 13 new trademarks. Absolutely, and we it continue to ask, but there are bigger threats to the American People. Now we can say, great, ivanka, youre in the white house full time. Im pretty sure youre focused on advancement of women and kids, so why not take on the reunification. If you talked to other piano who worked on tax reform, they dont back her up, but she likes to say she was involved in tax policy. Shes working on parental leave and chaired the Workforce Development effort. We dont know where the programs are coming from or where theyre getting paid, but she feels like shes getting bipartisan report. My thought is if you thought that ivanka and jared were coming back to new york in november, theyre going to say. Do you think ivanka will step in she has to some extent no, the only thing we heard from her on this. When the president signed the executive order to reverse his own zerotolerance policy, she thanked and congratulated him, said now its congresss turn. Excuse mess, ms. Trump, absolutely not. There are families, there are parents that have now been deported that are not eligible to come back. We have those children here. Even if you said this is not a humanitarian or heartstrings issue, make it a policy, a fiscal issue. Woulder not going to have those adults who would be here contributing to our economy and potentially paying taxes, but instead we now have those children without their families. We have to house them, clothe them, feed them, give them an education. None of it makes sense, and if she says she wants to focus on policy and women and girls, be my guest. We need it. Are you saying that ivanka trump has no conflicts of interest in. No, absolutely not. She is still a key person in the trump organization. Ivanka with us the one who led the project for the hotel in washington, d. C. She and jared have made tens of millions, so so tay shes conflict free is nonsense, but as far as her business, her namesake brand goes, she shut it down. Lets take it. The president has been talking trade this morning, firing off several tweets. He writes i wonder what can they be thinking . He were just going to continue and let our farmers and country get ripped off . No weakness. He continues, when you have people snip at your heels, it would only take longer to make the deal. With unity, negotiations are going really well. Be cool. The end result will be worth it. Be cool. He concluded china is targeting our farmers who they know i love and respect, as a way to get them to continue to take advantage of the u. S. They will be vicious. We were being nice, until now. China made 517 billion on us last year. To that i say, mr. Trump, when say he wonders what are they thinking . Every business person, every political leader, and any economist i speak to says, what are you thinking . We have to remember, during the campaign when Jared Kushner was tasked with finding an economic adviser, he found Peter Navarro, who is considered a wack adoo. And in march, his now hes sitting at the right hand of the president. Hes on cbs this morning, rolling the media that the president needs him to, saying that President Trump didnt cause this problem, he inhearted it. Its right that we have a trade issue. Thats why you engage in treaties like tpp or tppip. What the president is doing is pure nonsense. When he says im going to help the farmers using a depressionera tactic, what will happen when fishermen say its affecting the fishing industry . Today gm said they have lost a billion because Commodity Prices are up. Can i ask two simpler questions when he talks about the 817 billion we lost on trade, i know if i ask you, did we lose 817 billion, you would say its absurd. But put that aside. What does that number even attach to. A trade deficit and budget deficit are two different things. When he blames all of this on the chinese government. On the other side is the u. S. Consumer. The u. S. Consumer made a decision years ago we love cheap stuff, with i want it now. Thats how walmart and amazon became the most powerful companies out there. About you if it meant we are losing the amount of budget definite at this time to ourselves make no sense, but whats that number . Thats not the trade deficit even of last year. I dont know where hes getting that specific number from, but when he throws this at the American People or their base, they start to say were getting ripped off. Not in that regard. Is the president rattled . Is he off his game . I cant say. He has advisers who know that the United States has tariffs of its own that the United States subsidizes some industries in way that is other countries believe it tantamount to a tariff. He knows or they know that those bmws he complains about, the suvs are made in south carolina. Can they not tell him these things . Or does he refuse to believe these things . They can, and those who realize they cannot change the president s mind eventually leave the building. Remember specifically when gary cohn left the administration. It was days after trump surprisingly announced that meeting with steel and aluminum ceos, when wilbur ross and Peter Navarro sfluk their way into the office, thats when gary cohn said i cant do in i good here. 17 minutes before the show, you have to go get ready. Wait, you dont think this is ready . Thats always ready. President trump is releasing to the did, a former model just now suggesting there are more tapes including conversations with reporters. We will talk about that next. But first to be clear, mr. Trump has no Financial Relationships with in russian on theligarchs . Thats what he said. That was Paul Manafort two years ago. The former campaign charles will soon go to trial. Thats only part of the legal web ensnaring the president s team. Well talk about that next. Are you taking the tissue test . Yep, and my teeth are yellow. Time for whitestrips. Crest glamorous White Whitestrips are the only adaaccepted whitening strips proven to be safe and effective. And they whiten 25x better than a leading whitening toothpaste. Crest. Healthy, beautiful smiles for life. Welcome to holiday inn thank you wait, i have something for you every stay is a special stay at holiday inn. Save up to 15 when you book early at hollidayinn. Com save up to 15 when you book early to me, hes, phil micwell, dad. O golfer. So when his joint pain from Psoriatic Arthritis got really bad, it scared me. And what could that pain mean . Joint pain could mean joint damage. Enbrel helps relieve joint pain, helps stop irreversible joint damage, and helps skin get clearer. Enbrel may lower your ability to fight infections. Serious, sometimes fatal events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma, other cancers, nervous system and Blood Disorders, and allergic reactions have occurred. Tell your doctor if youve been someplace where fungal infections are common, or if youre prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for Heart Failure, or if you have persistent fever, bruising, bleeding, or paleness. Dont start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. Since enbrel, dads back to being dad. Visit enbrel. Com and use the joint damage simulator to see how your joint damage could be progressing. Ask about enbrel. Enbrel. Fda approved for over 15 years. You might be missing something. Y healthy. Your eyes. Thats why theres ocuvite. Ocuvite helps replenish nutrients your eyes can lose as you age. It has lutein, zeaxanthin and omega3. Ocuvite. Be good to your eyes. I like this bunch, i gotta tell you. Youre not going to be backing down. Go get em. Go get em. [ chanting ] well, so i heard that a long time over the last campaign. Attorney general Jeff Sessions laughing appeared briefly joining in on the lock her up chant that broke out during his remarks to a High School Students, hosted by a National Conservative group, echos the chants we heard throughout the 2016 campaign, in reference to Hillary Clinton. Of all the things that happened yesterday, and there were many. To me this is the most obscene. This is the attorney general of the United States, the chief Law Enforcement officer of the United States. To do that in front of High School Students, in front of a dinner party, in front of anywhere, it just shows how unserious this administration is and this attorney general is about what i think is a sacred duty. Call me pollyannaish. Youre pollyannaish, but dont you take it seriously . Dont you take seriously the fact that youre supposed to be the top Law Enforcement official of the United States of america . You take it no more seriously than that, justice being blind . Hes supposed to be an example. There are kids in that room. Heres the thing. Its not clear whether he joins in the chant. What is 100 clear is his delight in it. Thats it. Kind of the smiling, giggling, kind of sniggering that he seems to be into this moment, reliving the glorious memory of the times when he was able to stand up on stage and lead the chant, not just giggle along with it. Thats the thing, though. Its become one of the greatest hits. It doesnt mean anything anymore. But you go to an event somewhere across the country, you will hear that chant. The value of this chant and others like it, it annoys the right people. Its transgressive, but it isnt substantive. This is the event thats a provocative conservative group. Jeff sessions was preceded by nikki haley. Who said the opposite. Yourself. And didnt she say specifically this owning the libs idea is what we should throw out. She said get rid of owning the libs, then Jeff Sessions gets up and owns the libs. Im glad you brought that up. Let me read what nikki haley said. She said, i know its fun and it can feel good, but step back and think about what youre accomplishing when you do this, talking about own the libs. Real leadership is about persuasion. Its about movement. Its bringing people around to your point of view, not by shouting them down but by showing them how it is in their best interest to see things the way you do. The thing about owning the libs as a political strategy, is it works as long as youre approaching it from a position of strength. If youre winning elections, it can kind of work. If youre losing elections, it just looks pathetic. Am i reading too much into seeing these moments where nikki haley carves out some space for herself . She doesnt owe anyone a thing. Shes happy where she is. Shes happy to make the points shes making. And shes positioning herself for something, perhaps, but she has been a dutiful soldier and a very effective u. N. Ambassador. She has nothing to prove. Meanwhile, President Trump just weighed in on the Michael Cohen tape weve been talking about all morning. The president tweeting moments ago, what kind of a lawyer would tape a client . So sad. Is this a first, never heard of it before . Why was the tape so abruptly terminated, cut, while i was presumably saying positive things . I hear there are other clients and many reporters that are taped. Can this be so . Too bad. Lets bring in former u. S. Attorney and former aide to Robert Mueller, now an nbc news Law Enforcement analyst Chuck Rosenberg. Weve been playing all morning part of the tape that lanny davis provided to cnn last night. What did you glean from that tape . First, let me answer one of the president s questions. What kind of lawyer would tape his client . Presumably a lawyer that doesnt trust his client. Its unusual. Ive not heard of it. Ive never done it. I dont recommend it. Seems to me thats the kind of lawyer that might tape his client. Not best practices. Not a best practice, but if youre dealing with somebody you cant trust, john, maybe it is. But again, not a way to do business. You didnt learn that in law school. Michael cohen is within his rights. Thats exactly right. New york is a oneparty consent state. In some state, you need both parties to agree to be taped. In new york, you only need one. As you listen to that conversation or what we heard of it between thencandidate donald trump two months before election day in 2016 talking with Michael Cohen, what did you take away from it . Its interesting as a prosecutor. I was one for a long time. I think its relevant. I dont think its inkr incriminatory. This is something that you know, you dont just go into a courtroom and hit play. You need a witness to authenticate the tape, to explain thats my voice, thats your voice. I made the tape on such and such day and in such and such way and its not edited, not missing anything. Why is there a cut at the end . Well, i can explain that. The equipment failed or the conversation stopped or somebody else walked into the room. You need context. As a prosecutor, if this piece of evidence falls into your lap and youre looking at potentially making a case against either one of these people, Michael Cohen or donald trump, what are the questions, the Big Questions you have about context, about other things . What would you want to know as a prosecutor to be able to turn that into a piece of evidence . Great question. The first thing id want to do is corroborate it. Theyre talking about payments, perhaps. Are there payments . In what amounts and to whom . If i have bank records, if i have checks, if i have deposit slips, all that stuff helps corroborate whats on the tape. The tape in and of itself is seldom enough. Its not a smoking gun. Second point, i think there are a lot more tapes. Nobody robs one bank. Nobody makes one tape. These things tend to happen in batches or bunches. I want to hear all the tapes. Then i want a witness to tell me not just what the words are, because sometimes theyre hard to hear, but what they mean. Shannon, you spoke to Rudy Giuliani about this tape. They are, you know, making this very specific argument. Theyre focusing in on the word cash and what the president intended there. What else did you learn in your conversation with the president s lawyer . Does this not just serve to kind of distract from this broader thing we have learned here, which is that the president did seem to know about this realize this and discuss it within the context of the election . I definitely got a sense of the defense that theyre trying to lay out. If this goes into a court of law or just in the court of public opinion, he emphasized that we dont really know whats happening just from this tape. We can make inferences what theyre talking about, but it doesnt signal anything one way or another. But Rudy Giuliani and the rest of trumps legal team know whats on the rest of these tapes. They know whats out there documentwise. Theyve been able to go through and review it as part of this process to flag items that are privileged. They know that there were 12 tapes that involve the president that they flagged, they cited privilege on. This is one of them. Theres 11 others ive been told are a third party and Michael Cohen talking about the president but does not have the president s audio on it. But they, the lawyers, know whats on those tapes as well. They do not have technically the ability to release those, but Michael Cohen could since hes in the position of those. So they definitely know thats another shoe that could come out. But those 12 tapes, those are just the ones the legal team flagged as being privileged, conversations. There could be many, many other tapes, even involving the president or his audio on it that are outside the realms of privilege that they cant make any claim on. So yes, there could be a lot more tapes out here. When the president in his tweet says i hear theres recordings, he could have very easily heard those from his own legal team, which has reviewed many, if not all of the documents that were seized in this cohen raid to look for privileged material. And with lanny davis representing him, mike come hen is on offense. Meanwhile, jurors in Paul Manaforts case are being asked what they know and if they can put that aside to determine a verdict. The group of about 70 possible jurors filled out questionnaires and met with the presiding judge. The judge told the group they will be asked what they have seen, know, and heard, as well as about their Law Enforcement ties. Prosecutors say theyre planning to call witnesses from the irs, fbi, and financial crimes enforcement network. The Washington Post reports manaforts attorneys had hoped to ask jurors whether they voted in the 2016 election and for other signs of their political views, but the judge rejected the questions as political theater. The trial is set to begin on tuesday and is expected to last three weeks. Chuck, this is one of our first real windows into the mueller investigation. What are you expecting from it . Im expecting a fairly dry trial. This is a document case. Were talking about irs agents and tax returns and bank records. Its not going to be sort of a big, sexy case. Its going to be interesting. Theres going to be a lot of details that come out. But its not going to be sexy. Its going to be document after document methodically put into evidence by very, very talented prosecutors. Also, one quick comment on what judge ellis is doing in collecting a jury. All you have to do is find the jury that can be fair. They dont have to be ignorant. They just have to be fair. So who they voted for, whether theyve ever heard of manafort is sort of meaningless. Its whether they can put aside any predispositions they may have and be fair. This is the district in which the 9 11 case was tried. The pentagon was just three miles from the federal courthouse in alexandria. I was the u. S. Attorney at the time. We were able to find a jury that could be fair. We werent looking for people who had never heard of 9 11. That would be crazy. Wouldnt you expect this to be a pretty crisply run trial . The federal court in alexandria is known as the rocket docket. They move right along. They move with some dispatch, eugene. Ive tried cases in front of judge ellis. Its no nonsense, next witness, 30minute lunch. I think folks should expect to see, even though its somewhat dry, that is will move with dispatch. Shannon, whats your sense of the level of concern in the Trump Administration as it keeps an eye on the manafort trial . I dont think the manafort trial is going to be that big of an issue for the president , but stepping back here, the president is in the middle of a legal hurricane. You have the manafort trial. You have the mueller investigation. You have his lawyer, Michael Cohen, now in public warfare with him. Dont forget Stormy Daniels. And a smaller case, summer zervos, who is suing him. A lot of legal battle fronts this president is fighting and still with a relatively small bare bones legal team. Thats going to be a major issue Going Forward. John, final thought this morning as we wrap up. Im thinking that 30minute lunch is talking about are not going to work for you and me. You dont think so . Stretch it out a little bit. I need a court that moves with a little less dispatch. Stretch it out. Youre positioning for some of your legal troubles, arent you . G guys, thank you all for being here this morning. Thatll do it for us. Stephanie ruhle picks up our coverage. Good morning, everyone. Im Stephanie Ruhle with a lot to cover today, starting with a secret recording revealed. For the first time, were hearing audio of thencandidate donald trump and his fixer Michael Cohen apparently discussing a payment involving an explayboy play mate right before the 2016 election. Youre going to hear the whole thing and how the president responded this morning. While republicans are raging against the president , it is all about trade. The president called for the tariffs, and now hes bailing out the farmers that are hurting the most. Lets just solve it by buying people goldplated crutches. The farmers and ranchers of america dont want crutches. They want to work. We want trade, not aid. Reminder, that was ben sass, the republican from nebraska. And going out of business. New details this morning about ivanka trumps decision to shut down her name sake