Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski interview newsmakers, politicians and pundits about the issues of the day. Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski interview newsmakers, politicians and pundits about the issues of the day. Days before according to the leak, he says there was a meeting with donald junior, with Jared Kushner, with Paul Manafort, with yates and possibly two others in which they, out of the presence of the president discussed the meeting with the russians. We checked with their lawyers. The ones we could check with which was four of the six. That meeting never, ever took place. It didnt happen. Theres no second meeting here . Its highly unlikely. I always have to leave the option open as a lawyer. In case they come across something that startles us or feels some of the things we feel are important. Whats he saying . Whats he saying . Run that clip again. I actually, the words. Try and listen to exactly what he is saying. And whats he saying here . Well hear it. Lets look at it again. Maybe it will make sense. Theres no second meeting here . Its highly unlikely. I always have to leave the option open as a lawyer, in case they come across with something that really startles us or feels some of the things we feel are important. Another round . Yeah. I think willie can translate wlarch. What a journey. My drinks are free. Rudy giuliani is debating himself. He is debating himself. So in the morning on cnn he raised the idea of the second meeting. That came Out Of The Blue to a lot of people. What second meeting . He put that on the table. He says to preempt the New York Times story we havent seen yet and Maggie Haberman says she doesnt know what hes talking about. 12 hours later on fox news, hes shooting down the idea that he raised earlier that morning on cnn. Its a debate all in his own head. The best part, he did it to kill a story he singlehandedly brought to life. Right. None of us were talking about that story. He is talking about the story. Again what he says, well, we
shoot it down just in case we dont know about something that they they know wevhether the did it or not, mike. Like donald trump lying on Air Force One to cover up the real meeting of The Don Junior Meeting Which don junior said his father didnt know about. A little Perjury Issue if we find out that donald trump all of these no big deal, if donald trump knew about the meeting. Its a big deal for don junior because he committed perjury, if thats the case. Its just like trump lying about that meeting means that something went on in that meeting that they wanted to hide. And now youve got rudy saying, well, but you know, were not going to say it didnt happen, because we dont know if it did or not. Yeah, they do know whether it did or not. Its incredibly taxing and tedious to have this put on us,
this early in the day . Begins one segment talking about meeting that took place in the very same segment, same 30second clip goes from there was a meeting a meeting that occurred we wanted to get out to get ahead of the news and 10 seconds later called it along alleged meeting. As if the meeting he referred to didnt take place. What time of night was he interviewed for that . Thats my question. I dont know. I will say, we have theres that question. A good one. Some of the worst v. O. Of Rudy Giuliani ive seen, i think. We need come on. Look at that. Get some good shots of the guy. Whats he doing with that ring . World series ring . Pulling it or something . Heidi, do we need to play it again . Do you have any idea what he was saying, and what would your followup have been if you were interviewing him . Play even more. Not only did he confirm a meeting none of us were talking about but actually flashed out some of the details in those meetings. That apparently Michael Cohen
may have been in Donald Trumps office when don junior came and said, hey, were about to meet with the russians. So he seemed to corroborate that. Thats not good. Is it . He also put gates potentially in the preplanning meeting, which would be huge, if true, since as we all know, gates, rick gates, Paul Manafort business partner, has been cooperating with the Special Counsel for several months, which means we dont have to rely just on Michael Cohen for this information, that rick gates may have confirmed it and mu mueller known about it a long time. Bottom line, the number of conspiratorial meetings around the russians is increasing and so is the circle of Trump Officials, Trump Campaign officials, who participated in these conspiratorial meetings. At least he has Paul Manaforts innocence. Well, theres that. The first trial in the Special Counsel probe kicks off today
with Jury Selection for Paul Manafort. The president s former Campaign Chair is accused of hiding at least 30 million that he made before his days with trump as an unregistered foreign lobbyist for ukraine, and its former prorussian president. Told the Prosecution Plans to call 35 witnesses including agents from the fbi, Treasury Department and irs to show how he stashed his wealth in overseas banks to avoid paying u. S. Taxes. Last week a member of Robert Muellers team said he does not anticipate a government witness will utter the word russia during the trial. But if manafort is convicted, they could use it as leverage for him to talk about anything he knows pertaining to the Trump Campaign and russia. The trial is expected to last about three weeks. Manafort face as similar trial in washington in september. Richard a long haul for him. Yeah. And the question everybody has is, why has he not pled yet . Absolutely no defense. Have him dead to center. After he goes through this in virginia, hell go through it in d. C. Short answer, i have no idea. But theres so much apparent evidence against him that you either hes going to spend the rest of his life in prison or hes going to have to do some sort of a deal and i dont know im not a lawyer. Like you, i am not a lawyer. What the sequence has to be here. Clearly they have a lot on mr. Manafort. Clearly they do. Its interesting. When everything seems to collide with donald trump and things start going really bad. He deflects. He decides hes going to take a meeting with a group of tirendtir tyrants. Its a playbook. It is. And at a particular time, stormy
daniels was about to hit the front pages he went there. Now hes open to meetings with the iranians. After this, when he gets in trouble, hell talk about meeting with the martians. Lets take a quick look at the president of the United States doing what he likes to do most. Deflect. Ill meet with anybody. I believe in meeting. I would certainly meet with iran if theyre ready to meet. I dont know if theyre ready yet. Theyre having a hard time. I ended the iran deal. It was a ridiculous deal. I do believe they will probably end up wanting to meet, and im ready to meet anytime they want to, and i dont do that from strength or weakness. I think its an appropriate thing to do. If we could work something out thats meaningful, not the waste of paper that the other deal was, i would certainly be willing to meet. Do you have Preconditions Noor Meeting . No preconditions. No. They want to meet, ill meet. Anytime they want. Anytime they want. Good for the country. Good for them. Good for us, and good for the world. No preconditions. If they want to meet, ill meet. So the reason why we needed, the world needed to have someone at the meeting with Vladimir Putin and donald trump is because in the past week or so, since helsinkhelsinki, donald t has, one, sent a signal he wants to lift sanctions on an oligarch whos close to Vladimir Putin, that we just put on a couple months ago, and, two, now hes talking again from a position of weakness. Wanting to meet with iran. Its a its a complete 180 turn. Theres very little, actually, to explain that, richard, but there is a playbook for donald trump. Threatened to bomb a Terrorist State. Say you want to meet with the Terrorist State and then capitulate to the Terrorist State. Are we going to see what happened in north korea happen with iran now . Almost certainly not. If the administration were serious about meeting with iran, they would have done it before they unilaterally got out of the nuclear deal, that by the way iran was what if foot eputin asked hi reach out to iran . Another reason the iranians want no part of it. The secretary gave a big Speech Calling for regime change. The administration is ratcheting up sanctions. Got out of the nuclear deal after the president said hes meet without preconditions. The Secretary Of State started listening to preconditions on nuclear issues, iran regional behavior, how theyre treating their own people. Look what weve been saying about north korea all along and you have donald trump declaring victory in north korea, when the north koreans now, we keep finding out, in more ways, that theyre cheating and, in fact, their Nuclear Program is more dangerous today, u. S. Intelligence officials tell us, than it was when donald trump first started negotiating with the north koreans. A Front Page Story in the Washington Post today, after last weeks story about their Nuclear Program, we learn now their Missile Program, Intercontinental Ballistic Missile program is continuing. The only word i take exception with cheating. We dont know if north korea is cheating because we dont know what north korea and the u. S. Agreed top its like a piece of swiss cheese. The holes were bigger than the cheese. We know this. Donald trump said americans can sleep at night. That Nuclear Weapons were no longer a problem with north korea. We know thats a lie. We know thats a lie, and nothing like that was accomplished. What were seeing is a pattern of summits where the promise is great. We dont really know what was agreed on wrong at both ends. Theres no preparation and theres no followthrough. No engine, no caboose. All of these summits essentially leave us worse out than where we were before them. Think about it, willie. The north Korean Leader leaves far stronger than when he first met with trump. Putin, much stronger than made donald trump look like, you know, his patsy on the world stage. Hes much stronger than he was before, and now trump is saying, we dont negotiate from a position of weakness or strength. No. If youre the United States of america, im sorry. You always negotiate from a position of strength. As richard points out, the president is supposed to come in end of the process. Dot handshake, sign the declaration. Not come in at the beginning making promising and declaring victory at the end of a Press Conference where nothing was actually achieved. One of the patterns of the Trump Administration, the president make as grand public declaration, the rest of the administration comes in to reshape it or clean it up. Yesterday mike pompeo talked about all the preconditions he would need to see before a meeting with iran. If iranians present a commitment to change how they treat their people, that its worthwhile to enter into a Nuclear Agreement that actually prevention proliferation, the president is prepared to sit down and have a conversation with him. One of the things they tried to get in at the senate hearing. Who should the american people, the United States Senate Listen to. You have President Trump saying one thing on the big stage and then people like pompeo, bolton and others coming in after the fact, saying something completely contradictory . The answer is clear. Listen to the president of the United States. Thats what the rest of the world is figuring out. As much as they may respect the secretary of defense or the Secretary Of State, end of the day, if they dont speak for the United States and it doesnt appear they do, how can you listen to them. The two summits we had, there was no staff in the room. They werent in the room. The president of the United States has become the chief different mat of the United States. We have to learn, thats reality. So the Secretary Of State and others can come in before or afterwards and try to clean it up, but we he is look, i like mike pompeo. Dont get me wrong. I think the president is putting him in an extraordinary difficult almost untenable position like with rex tillerson. If youre not in the room and dont know what transacted, how can you authoritively say this is the policy of the United States . And talking Republicans Trust donald trump more than their family, more than they trust the media. So at what point do republicans visit at what point do republicans, the question we continue to ask, at what point do republicans say, wait a second. We were antiputin and antirussian. Didnt like him shooting down commercial aircrafts or invading other countries. Poisoning people, assassinating but now donald trump says hes okay. So hes okay. And rewriting 70 years of policy that republicans champion and then makes nice with north korea. And now he sounds so weak. Basically begging the iranians for a summit. At what point does somebody like nikki haley go, im out. Im running against this guy in 2020 before he ends up, like, turning u. S. Foreign policy over to all of our enemies. I was if he hasnt already. If you remember, i was critical and every other conservative was critical of barack obama being so focused on dealing with iran and cuba. That was childs play. Donald trump is north korea,
russia, now iran. There is not a tyrant, not a terror state that this Guy Doesnt Want To Cozy Up to. I think the answer is, at least all the evidence weve seen to date is never. Never. Thats what i cant stress enough, theres no evidence whatsoever that his base supporter or any member of congress is actually turning on him in a public way. Id say the opposite is true. Hes growing more powerful. His sway is growing more powerful. Because conservatives now like iran and now like north korea and conservatives like russia . I dont think people pay that close attention to it. I think people look at him and say, hes doing it different. The old way didnt work. I dont believe any of you guys on the set. They dont trust us. They trust him. Heidi, they could go on the Google Machine 30 seconds. You dont have to trust me. Go to your neighbors Google Machine and type stuff in. The truth is out there, but this
isnt the x files. Russia was the perfect example. Right . It never happened. Cant sit alone with putin for two hours, meet with him. Treat him like the pope when standing next to him. Surely republicans will turn on him. Nobody turned on him. Even the couple of congressman, kel, concerned about that. Within 24 hours, all ran for the hills. Why . Because they fear the base. Its painful. The base loves trump. Somebody needs to tell the base the truth and could that, go to town Hall Meetings and actually tell the base the truth, heidi. They ought to try it sometime. You have, again, with donald trump, you have him capitulating to terror states, and then you have Steve Scalise actually joining in. Somebody in the republican majority joining in, signing on to impeach Rod Rosenstein, because theyre trying to get to the bottom of Vladimir Putin and
his attempts to undermine american democracy. Well, that is a republican leader. Not abencher. That is a republican leader who is actually working hard to subvert and investigation already indicted several dozen russians, and we have the the u. S. Military, the u. S. Intel community, has the goods on the russians. They tried to subvert american democracy in 2016, and Steve Scalise is signing on with Freedom Caucus back benchers to try to actually subvert and investigation over someone actually trying to undermine american democracy . Joe, i saw your tweet yesterday about how this election in 2018 is going to be the most important of our lifetimes for a lot of people, and i think that is your answer. Whether you want to go down whether its Foreign Policy or
its guns or its the tax cuts. Theres going to be another proposed round of tax cuts for the wealthy now. At the same time that President Trumps base is closing ranks around him, look into the poll numbers, and see whats happening with the intensity of the disapproval on the other side of the ledger, and thats why this election is so important, but thats also why its so hard to tell exactly Whats Going On has to match those numbers up, because what we could see here is a repeat of what happened with barack obama, which is that when barack obama was not on the ballot in the midterms, his people didnt come out but an intensity on the other side of the ledger that swept democrats, and you could see the same thing happening here, just because those numbers are becoming stronger with each one of these examples that you cite. The intensity of the disapproval on the other side is strengthening. Manifold, twofold, threefold. One more point about iran before we go to break. Yes. Often ask, what if obama had done this . We dont have to ask. He did it during the debate almost to the week in 2007, 11 years would meet with ahmadinejad, savaged by republicans and Hillary Clinton and democrats as well. Still ahead on morning joe, President Trump heads to florida to stump for a candidate whos stumping for trump . Well explain. Plus, two weeks ago republican senator rand paul announced he was concerned about President Trumps choice of Brett Kavanaugh for the supreme court, but yesterday paul wrote on twitter, i have decided to support his nomination. Who could have saw that coming . And when we look at the senators who may or may not support kavanaugh, jim vandehei, lets not even put rand paul on this list. He does this every time. Im going to vote against that. Im going to vote against that, and he always ends up lining behind the president , supports donald trump blindly. Hes going to vote for kavanaugh. Its a joke for him to even any reporter that thinks hes not should really seriously look into another profession. Hes going to vote for kavanaugh. 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. But prevagen helps your brain with an ingredient originally discovered. In jellyfish. In clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. 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. 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
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the party is not conservative anymore. But we are so far beyond that. They are they are theyve adopted Vladimir Putins Foreign Policy. Donald trump has adopted Vladimir Putins Foreign Policy. You have people on Russian Television every night saying, the soviets. We could never do this when we were the soviet union. Donald trump is doing it for us. Thats what Russian Television commentators are saying. Then you look at our domestic policy, our foreign oepolicy. Stalin wishes he had the ability to impose tariffs and then pay farmers 12 billion that a lot of farmers are saying, we dont even need. As ron johnson said it is a sovietstyletype economy when you start when donald trump starts talking about picking winners and losers. I dont know if its soviets
sell, it is socialism, though, and that used to be, at least where im from, that used to be something that conservative voters were against. Maybe its a Selling Point now. I dont know. So lets talk about your former political party, which changed drastically, i submit, since you were last a registered member of the Republican Party. Right. And jimmy pointed this out earlier. This poll who would you trust for Accurate Information . Among Trump Supporters the result, trump, 91 . Friends and family, 63 . Mainstream media, no surprise, 11 . So if youre running for governor of florida, if you are ron desantis you clearly seek his fave perp understandable. You want a favorable tweet from the president of the United States. Rockets him ahead in the primary, but among the base we continually talk about, how deep and lasting is the fear, the clear fear that many of elected republicans have about the president of the United States . I mean, i think its i just the fear is there. What i dont understand is, when leaders of my party did something i disagreed with, i went after them. Went home and explained to my constituents why i went after them. Theyre spending too much money. Newts talking about theyre spending more now. Just saying. I could go home, voted against the bill because theyre spending too much money. I voted against the bill because newts talking about getting rid of the tax cuts. Jim, thats what i i dont understand is, id hold 100 town Hall Meetings a year. You can explain to your constituents and i can tell you my constituents way back then always understood. Yeah, okay. Dont go along with the party, then. If the partys going the wrong way, go your own way and found it strengthened me, not only among independents but among
party members who trust immediate more because they didnt blindly follow party dictates. But fear is an exceptionally powerful motivator. Step back one second. Georgia, basically a swing state. Florida, basically a swing state. The president of the United States weighs in on both of those races, and takes trump candidates who were way behind in the polls and instantly makes them such favorites that people are telling putnam to get out of the race. Its insane. Instant, overnight. Thats power. Adam putnam, one of the most able leaders in the state of florida. Republican or democrat. Florida voters would be a fool to not vote for adam putnam. But they dont agree with you by a 12point margin and think the establishment is foolish to back putnam. Thats the pow are he has and why it outlast its the thing trump proved all the things we thought the Republican Party stood for, didnt necessarily is what the base of the party stood
for. Turns out they get more jazzed about immigration, about the changes face of america this is exactly i remember driving over with with my former Chief Of Staff, driving over after katrina hit, and we were dealing with, richard, just extraordinary incompetence, not only at the federal level but the state and local level. Now, my Chief Of Staff said, you know what . This is what happens when you go down ideological check boxes. By the way, hes a very conservative republican. In fact, hes hes hes an elected official. He said, we check off, are they prolife . Are they progun . Are they prothis . Prothat . And we get the candidates we want, and then a katrina comes. And ideologically theyre lined up but dont know anything about leading. Here you have ron desantis, dressing his baby in make America Great outfits and reading bedtime stories, its
cute, clever. Hes playing the trump card. Whats going to happen when a category 5 storm goes across the i4 corridor . Will desantis be able to deal with that as well as putnam . No. Nobody would begin to think that. Its lunacy. Not just talking about this race, but this is how people ask, how do we get the katrinas, the poor leadership we get . And it is the stupid, dumbingdown ideologically on the democratic side and on the republican side. Are they prochoice . Are they antigun . Whatever on the democratic side . And same thing on the republican side. And nobodys looking for, are they a leader that can get my family evacuated when a category 5 hurricane comes in tampa bay . Just to say were going to have that problem, and didnt we already have that problem for two reasons . One, the risk of sounding wonky, severe weather, cost of climb
change is the norm, no longer the exception. Look whats happening around this country. And our infrastructure combined with that means we cant cope. So this is governings hard but we are making it harder because were not serious. Not serious about Climate Change or infrastructure. This country face as crisis economically, socially in human terms and are simply letting it happen. By the way, not serious about elected serious leaders. Best leader ive ever seen and wasnt warm and fuzzy, jeb bush. Never seen anybody lead on a state level as effectively as jeb bush. Not a close second of all the people ive seen over the past 20, 25 years and Jeb Wasnt Warm and cuddly. You know . He just did his damn job. Anyway still ahead, President Trump is awake. Good morning, don. And tweeting this morning. Hes taking a shot at the coke brothers. Oh, my god. Taking a shot at the coke brothers. Yeah, a smart move. Youre so powerful. Hey, keep attacking the coke brothers. Attack them every day. Year so powerful and strong. By the way, also senator enough to sit down with bob mueller. E really should not listen to all of those people because you went to princeton and you fordham youre not smart enough to sit down with him. Im not sure where you went to high school but smart enough to sit down with him and keep attacking the Koch Brothers after the network announced it wouldnt support some republican candidates this november. Willie it is a veritable war of words out there. Yes, it is, and the Koch Brothers are happy to have it. As am i. Well be right back. Lets fly, lets fly away just say the words and well beat the birds down to acapulco bay its perfect for a flying honeymoon they say
Come Fly With Me Lets fly, lets fly away Come Fly With Me Lets fly, lets fly away youll make my morning, buty the price ruin my day. Ou . Complicated relationship with milk . Pour on the lactaid, 100 real milk, just without that annoying lactose. Mmm, thats good. But allstate helps you. With drivewise. Feedback that helps you drive safer. And that can lower your cost now that you know the truth. Are you in good hands . Olay regenerist wipes out the competition; hydrating better than 100, 200 even 400 creams. With our b3 complex, Beautiful Skin doesnt have to cost a fortune. Olay. Officials overseeing billionaire charles koch will not be supporting republican congressman kevin cramer against incumbent democrat Heidi Hide Kamp in north dakota. Supporting those outside the Republican Party seeking to distance itself from President Trump over disagreements on trade and immigration. The decision deals a big hit to cramer, whos already being outfund razed by heitkamp. On the heels of that the president is tweeting this morning saying the globalist Koch Brothers who have become a total joke in real republican circles are against strong borders and powerful trade. I never sought their support because i dont need their money or bad ideas. They love my tax and regulations cuts, judicial picks and more. I made them richer. Their network is highly overrated. I have beaten them at every turn. They want to protect their companies outside the u. S. From being taxed. Im for America First, and the american worker. A puppet for no one. My god. Ooh. Except for vlad. Two nice guysideas. Make America Great again. God. I dont know where to start. Theres a lot there. Jim, first of all, theres no reason why charles koch a classical liberal, no reason why Charles Koch Would Support donald trump, would support the protectionism. They obsess over government spending, they want not balanced budgets but rational budgeting and you got the biggest Spending Bills ever, trump going on the Biggest Trade War weve been at since Herbert Hoover was president. You can go down the list. Economically theres really no reason for charles koch or any libertarian or in his case
classical liberal to support donald trump, is there . No. I think you outlined perfectly what the Koch Brothers stand for and its more traditional Republican Party topics on recognizes, taxation, even immigration is a different place than the president. Charles koch probably likes this tweet because one of the things that the koch network is trying to do is rebrand themselves. They know how radioactive they are in politics. David koch has stepped back from political operations. Charles koch is the leader of that organization, probably happy to have this. But, again, i think hes definitely speaking for a distinct minority inside the Republican Party. But speaks for what we thought republicans stood for pretrump. Heidi, they always have been very uncomfortable with some of the more hard core republicans views on immigration. Theyve been concerned about exploding military budgets. Theyve also been concerned by protectionism. This was before trump. And dont know they have much of a choice but to do what they have done here if they want to stay true by the way, donald trump cant make the kochs any more money than they already have. They never liked trump. They didnt support him in 2016. They held out for quite a while. And, yes, the issues range the gamut from the Deficit Spending to the muslim ban. Charles koch was on the record likening that to nazistyle racism. But heres the thing. Mark short is tightly aligned with the koch network and he was right there in the white house as a legislative director and they took away the crown jewel of their agenda which was the tax cuts. So surprise, surprise, now mark short is leaving. Hes gone after the tax cuts have been enacted and i know personally from speak with the kochs and the representatives that as early as january they started to become very uncomfortable, they started to pick up whiffs of the protectionism that was about to come with the tariffs and the trade wars and were very concerned about this, so theyve been kind of in this position for several months. Not surprising they would come out at this point, that they are comparing this to depressionera tariffs and trade protectionism. But i do think this is significant because, joe, so many times weve sat in this chair and talked about what is it going to take the republicans to stand up to trump. Well all along its been who behind them. Its been the donors threatening them on the tax cuts, for instance. The donors have outsize influence over a lot of these
republican representatives. So i do think that this is an important moment, and a potential change, and strategy that could, could show some fractures in the party because donors are so powerful in this party. Its a great point to make. By the way, i know the koch network is still working with the white house when it comes to criminal justice reform, but willy the president launching this war against the kochs this morning, you wonder where paul singer is going to be, where other republican donors will be. Because heidi is right, the only thing that these republican candidates would fear more than Donald Trumps wrath are a lot of traditionally republican donors saying youre just not conservative any more, im cutting off the spicket. Donald trump doesnt consider any of that when he sends out a tweet like that. As heidi points out they did not
support donald trump financially. They sat out the 2016 election. He never forgot that. They came out the Koch Brothers and criticized him about the muslim ban. Steve bannon talked about the Koch Brothers quote shut up and get with the program. Steve bannon to the Koch Brothers. But this is at the end of the day for the Koch Brothers about trade. This is what pushed them over the top, the idea that trade somehow bad which is the message that President Trump put out there. They see these tariffs, the bail out of the farmers as fundamentally contradictory to everything they stand for. So they say of course well back republicans as we always have but we also might back a democrat who stands up to things like this. Thats great. Free trade, immigration, they have been drivers of American Economic success. So trump is all about cultural republicanism. These guys are much more about
classic economic republicanism, a small state and openness which again has been the real engines of americas success. Great to see people standing up to this. Thank you all for being on this morning. Coming up all right you two. Let the past be the past. Exactly what ive been trying to say for 2000. Donald trumps new Defense Strategy in the Mueller Probe is not new. But it continues. Utter confusion. Well have the dizzying new comments from the president s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, plus from fire and fury to a meeting with no preconditions the president sets the stage for a north korea style shift with iran. Well talk about that ahead on morning joe. And packages. And its also a story about people. People who rely on us every day to deliver their dreams theyre handing us more than mail theyre handing us their business and while we make more ecommerce deliveries
to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget. That your business is our business the United States postal service. Priority you
that ted cruzs father was part of the assassination plot along with lee harvey oswald. Hes just citing a report what people say. I know you worked for ted cruz so im not going to have you answer this question, but im just saying, just its true. An announcement okay, good. An announcement to anybody out there, if you accuse my father of assassinating the president and then make fun of my wife and say shes ugly, all i can say is duck. Not only duck today, duck tomorrow and duck every day for the rest of your life because im going to be coming after you every day and either youre going to be finished politically or ill be finished politically and chances are good ill have a lot more hate in me
oh, my lord, no hate in your heart. Youre reduced to dust. That said thats shocking im looking past a guy that worked for him. Im looking at you walter. How shock that ted cruz is to donald trump after donald trump accused his father of being a part of the assassination of jfk and suggested that ted cruzs wife was ugly. The obsequitous of Republican Leaders to donald trump is something history will be baffled about. You go up and down the line. As you said earlier in the show there were times as a republican you had to stand up to a republican president , whatever. The fact that nobody will stand up to him shows that they care more about their primary than they do the example you bring up with ted cruz, its taken to the lowest level. He wrote the piece in time
magazine for donald trump. For time 100. I would write the piece too but i would Say Something else. Its just your father. Whats the big deal . Go down the list of republicans, only those retiring, like corker and flake are standing up. Heres the problem, though, howard decent ive noticed some people who are retiring, to borrow a term ive already borrowed a term from Walter Isaacson and others are borrowing regularly, even those retiring are going to be lobbyists. They wont say anything negative about donald trump even when it has to do with u. S. Foreign policy that has tied this country together with our allies for 70 years. The political system is broken. Im going to blame the republicans but im sure the democrats have some skin in this
program. You see a total lack of statesmanship. We see goldwater and nixon and you can even get the republicans to vote against trump. Susan collins has no business for voting for Brett Kavanaugh and shes going to do it. Its ridiculous. No willingness to stand up for your constituents. Its all about being reelected. Its only about being reelected not about exercising the mandate that the voters gave them to do something. Which you would think is an Incredible Opportunity for the democrats. Well get to that. Were not so much better. I need to ask, willy, if somebody attacked your father and your wife and im dead serious at nbc news, the way that donald trump attacked ted cruzs father and wife, would you ever work with him . Would you ever write a time 100 piece about saying how great
they are. I would not go out of my way. I understand on the one hand hes a republican senator who wants to get things done and may require the support of the United States, but on a personal level i wouldnt do all these other things and lavish him with praise in the way ted cruz has. To the governors point. Remember we had mark sanford the day after he lost his primary. What did he say when i asked him what was your advice to republicans running this fall . He said simply pledge allegiance to donald trump. So whpeople are scared for thei jobs. Fear and quivering. They are quivering. As opposed to some back bone, some spine and some belief that you put country ahead. Really quickly as a Public Service announcement, i mean this for kids who are running, who we think they want to get into politics at some point, im dead serious. Nothing sells. Nothing sells with voters like
being yourself. For standing up against something that everybody thinks you need to fall behind. Voters love independents. I know youve seen it before. Its conviction politics. Its what they like. Conviction politics. Im telling you, when gingrich was man of the year, and he was supposedly the most powerful go after him every time. And constituents would say why are you doing it . I would explain it one, two, three at a town hall meeting. Okay. Got it. You can do it. Thats why we love stories like profiles in courage, the kennedy book. Also with us for the conversation, we have staff writer for the atlantic, an nbc news and msnbc contributor. Good to have you on board. The intros are not happening today, joe, just not happening. But i will get to the news. We do know each other. President trumps lawyer Rudy Giuliani is not ruling out the possibility of a second 2016 meeting about russians peddling dirt to traufump campaign. Something he raised then denied in Television Appearances yesterday. Giuliani said he was heading off a story from the New York Times quoting from the report he said journalists included Maggie Haberman. Giuliani said he and trump attorney spent a great deal of time on sunday trying to run the story down. Giuliani said he believes he managed to shut it down and how to kill the story but yet speculated youre using your outside voice again. The journalists found other reasons not run the item. Maggie haberman said i lost the thread of what the former mayor is talking about. [ laughter ] not the only one. In his third and final fox interview, if you call it an interview, giuliani backed off his flat out denials senior trump aides discussed the russians offer in an earlier meeting. There wasn another meeting that hasnt been made public. Three days before. According to cohen or according to the leak he says there was a meeting with donald jr. , with Jared Kushner, with Paul Manafort, with gates and possibly two others in which they out of the presence of the president discussed the meeting with the russians. We checked with their lawyers, the ones we could check with, the four of the six. That meeting never ever took place. It didnt happen. Theres no second meeting here . Its highly unlikely. I have to leave the opening open as a lawyer in case they come across with something that startles us or we feel is important. Natasha, giuliani introduced this meeting in the morning on cnn and over the course of the dave he says there was another meeting three days before and then at night he said im telling you that meeting did not take place, it never happened. Again having a debate with himself. The most salient line of all his interviews, quote, nobody can be sure of anything. Do you know anything about this other meeting hes talking about . It certainly makes sense. I want to step back. I think this is really now it shows its very obvious the trump Team Strategy is to get ahead of stories because if its true that the New York Times was planning to release a story about this june 7th meeting that occurred two days before the Trump Tower Meeting then thats obviously what giuliani was trying to get ahead of and thats what he told the daily beast last night. We dont know if this meeting
took place yet but that seems that would make complete sense given up to everything we know the days leading up to the trump tower, the famous speech that donald trump gave about Hillary Clinton, the dirt that hes previewing about Hillary Clinton and her ties to russia and her work at the State Department was that night, paul Unanimous Fortfort manafort and Jared Kushner were with him when he gave that speech at that rally that night. Its very obvious what happened here and donald trump learned about it on june 7th the meeting and probably approved it and gave the go ahead and i couldnt resist bragging about it that night. Im not a real lawyer but i played one in law firms for about five or six years. And the thing that was most fascinating is when you would be around somebody that was a great trial lawyer, and you did discovery and everybody started pulling pieces together, there
was always, always the most exciting thing to see would be a great timeline coming together. And i got to say, of all the cases that a lot of prosecutors i talked to have ever seen, the timeline that is coming together in this case against donald trump, against don jr. , against all of them, whether youre talking about the proactive statement on Air Force One, go back to the campaign where donald trump on the very day said russians if youre listening go after these 33,000 emails, the russians start working on it that day. The timeline from beginning to end is pretty extraordinary, and its going to look very stark inside a courtroom. So, i think that Rudy Giuliani has the same crisis communication correspond School Online that carter page did. Youre absolutely right. Because the public communication on how this is going, i mean giuliani is incoherent. I dont know from one day Whats Going On. You were Communication Director whats he doing. Nothing we learn. You would say normally, okay, this is wrong, go out and clean this up. Then you go out and clean it up. Reporters report it and the story dies. They dont do that. They go out and confuse it more and confuse it top of that. Giuliani talks about what you would not normally talk about. All lawyers would like to preserve a defending for future use. Thats what they do. Except he talks about it. I told sean hannity, well i dont want to say i have to keep that open as an option in case his client lied or it is revealed as weve seen all along which was pointed out this morning. It keeps advancing. No we met with no russians. We might have met with russians. We did meet with the russians. There was no collusion. There might have been collusion. Theres no crime. It is a crime. Collusion and conspiracy are interchangeable words. Incredible. Devaluing the truth. Look what Rudy Giuliani is doing and mumbling words and doing a great disservice for his client. Look what his client is doing. Hes just babbling. Michael cohen is hurting to get a plea deal by having Lanny Davis Go Out and put it all out there in the immortal words of the fantastic mr. Forks its amateur night in dixie. Its bad. Michael cohen has stopped looking for Smoke Signals from the white house. I want to pick up on your point about the timeline. While all this is going on, this is noise they are creating, mueller is putting together a timeline and it has real dates and real witnesses and real logs and real evidence about what
actually occurred. So by the way donald trump may not care about what the facts are. He may be in the white house that talks about an alternate version of facts. 91 of republicans may be the same way. Bob mueller cares about facts and so do the judges deciding these cases. Meanwhile, walter, you have rudy who is not just clearly is going rogue on the White House Press office and just calling up his mega phone to make an announcement on fox news, not to be grilled in anyway or given a tough question in anyway, allowed to make announcements and then change those announcements and then devalue the truth, transform the truth, change the facts, bring in more alternative facts what ever you want to do, whatever he chooses. Whats the point of the Press Briefing at this point . The White House Press briefing where reporters wait every day to try to understand whats
happening in this white house, to try to understand whats happening in this world, to try and get closer to the facts . Youre right. Giuliani is totally unhinged. He has been for a while. What hes doing, as rick said, is undermining the case so badly that i dont know why they are allowing it. Theres no control at the white house. Its not just the Press Briefing, the Chief Of Staff, general kelly, these are probably people who would like to reassert control but cant. On the final point ill make is we really have to give respect to bob mueller at the moment. Robert mueller, despite all these incoming missiles and attacks so methodically, carefully kept his eye on the ball and laying things out, doing it in a way that makes it clear this is no witchhunt, not leaking, you know giuliani is leaking the possibility of a meeting that he says might leak. But mueller is a man of deep and true integrity and the attacks on him are appalling. You know, willy, while the reason why Robert Mueller doesnt care what Rudy Giuliani or the Freedom Caucus or donald trump say is donald trump is playing ping pong in queens with his phone spurs, mueller was running through the jungles of vietnam and saving men there, and came back highly decorated guy. Could have cashed in and made Tons Of Money but he dedicated his life to Public Service. Hes the antithesis of donald trump in every way. Robert mueller is not listening to this noise. Hes not watching Rudy Giuliani On Fox Three Times contradicting himself. When you hear Rudy Giuliani the other day say Robert Mueller doesnt have a damn thing. Rudy giuliani doesnt have a damn idea what Robert Mueller has and neither of us eritrea. It didnoesnt appear the presid of the United States objects to the way Rudy Giuliani defends him. Remember during the Stormy Daniels payment story of a couple months ago giuliani told a couple different versions of that story. Hes the kind of guy, new york guy that creates this fog machine that donald trump likes. Right, exactly. Its unclear whether theres any coordination going on outside of donald trump and giuliani. I think giuliani mentioned he had discussed this potential Story Leaking with jay sekulow who was a tv lawyer going out and being the pr person for the president last year, anyway. This is i want to go back to the timeline for a continue that rick talked about because i think thats really, really important to judge whether or not this meeting is likely to have occurred. I think that this knowing a preplanning meeting happened, knowing the Trump Campaign was very eager to get this dirt on Hillary Clinton has to be looked at from the perspective of,
okay, well the campaign actually already knew or at least one member of the Campaign Already knew rurchs had Dirt On Clinton in the form of thousands of emails. Remember George Papadopoulos had been told by russia linked Foreign National that the russians did have this Dirt On Clinton. So if you use common sense and if you say its very likely that papadopoulos told the campaign about these emails beforehand and you look at their eagerness and willingness to accept this meeting with the russians on promise to obtain dirt on Hillary Clinton and don jr. Didnt seem surprised at all, that it makes total sense they would be very, very eager to take this meeting and that donald trump himself would be in on it. The wall street Journal Editorial Board south with a new oped entitled trumps lose the house strategy. It reads in part mr. Trump might
not welcome the Democratic House but he also might not fear it as long as republicans keep the senate. Even more than most politicians mr. Trump always needs a foil and Speaker Nancy Pelosi would be from central political casting. Mr. Trump could cut deals with democrats on paid family leave, public work spending and trade protectionism. House democrats could start up the Impeachment Machinery and once under way the momentum would be hard to stop. But as long as hes safe from conviction by the senate mr. Trump might figure he can benefit from a backlash against impeachment the way bill clinton did. The president may think a Democratic House may improve his chance for reelection as
independents conclude hes the only barrier to a left wing Government Led by elizabeth warren. Thats pretty insightful. I do not read Wall Street Journal oped. Havent read it for 30 years. Thats very interesting thinking. So on point. I mean, this is exactly what could happen. I dont think trumps support is not there. The interesting thing is what it captures is trumps amorality. Trump has no loyalty to anybody but himself. But how do you feel about that, thats a reality that could play out, whether hes moral or not. But youre right. The fact that hes so amoral the thing about the Republican Party hes a democrat. Please. A democrat please. You mortally wound me. Gave money to the dnc when you were there . I dont think so. If he did that wasnt a fair question. He always gave money to the dnc. I never called him, thats for sure. A lot of democrats did. I actually dont think i think trump may be thinking thats what i thought was insightful. This is a mirror into the thinking of a csociopath. Theres a little we hate nancy pelosi in there. But nancy pelosi would make a good, a good counter point. You can say anything a lot. You can say anything about nancy pelosi but one thing shes not stupid. Shes a smart political operative and smart enough to know whatever her numbers may be, unlike many people in washington, shes not driven by ego that needs to put her in front of the Television Cameras every day. If she thought that was a possibility she would be much lower profile. My only problem with that
editorial is that its 7 21 on july 31st, you know what donald trump is thinking about . 7 22. Its true. That could happen by default. Second of all, mika, i dont think democrats will impeach trump unless theres a real reason to do it. Hating donald trump is not a reason to impeach him. I think manafort, i mean the Manafort Trial will be an enormous problem for donald trump. And that is a piece of the puzzle that is, in fact, connected to the collusion. Really clear were all acquainted with trumps m. O. In new york. Theres no chance that donald trump, his total top down Command Control is the way he runs. No chance he didnt know about the meeting. Good chance He Sat In On One of the meetings with the russians. The guy knew everything. Thats how he ran the campaign. It was a mom and pop operation without a mom. He knew absolutely everything that was going on. But, if you just look at the history of it, it is true, walter, that we can go back to 2010, tea party comes in, in essence reelects by overreaching reelects barack obama in 2012, we all got elected in 94, overreached, Got Bill Clinton reelected in 1996. This happens all the time. And there is no doubt for Donald Trumps reelection, nancy pelosi, Speaker Of The House is much better than a republican because right now hes blaming the democrats for not being able to build the wall. Republicans are in charge. You know, he would swing this is why he goes and meets with north koreans. Begs the iranians to meet with
him. He would certainly sort of play with the House Democrats and i think that, you know, he would change his stripes as hes often done. The weird thing about it, though, i think natasha had a wonderful line which is tv lawyers. I mean people who Arent Real Lawyers but the giulianis and lanny davis thats out there for tv. This is what happens when youre not sort of having a strategy for the long run, and youre just dancing for the 7 22 00 a. M. , 7 23 a. M. Tweets youre going to do. Howard decent thank you very much. Still ahead on morning joe its clear that the russians used social media to attack the american election. But it doesnt stop there. Natasha has new reporting On How Moscow has now weaponized the American Court system against the kremlins enemies. Shell take us through her new reporting on that. An update on the start of Paul Manaforts criminal trial. Youre watching morning joe. Well be right back. Fact is, every Insurance Company hopes you drive safely. But allstate actually helps you drive safely. With drivewise. It lets you know when you go too fast. And brake too hard. With feedback to help you drive safer. Giving you the power to actually lower your cost. Unfortunately, it cant do anything about that. Now that you know the truth. Are you in good hands . Youll make my morning, buty the price ruin my day. Ou . Complicated relationship with milk . Pour on the lactaid, 100 real milk, just without that annoying lactose. Mmm, thats good. The first trial in the Special Counsel probe kicks off with Paul Manafort. Hes accused of hiding 30 million he made before his days with trump as an unregistered foreign lobbyist for ukraine and its former pro russian president. The Prosecution Plans to call 35 witnesses including agents from the fbi, Treasury Department and irs to show how manafort allegedly stashed his wealth in overseas banks to avoid paying u. S. Taxes. Joining us now, Washington Bureau chief susan page and former assistant u. S. Attorney in the Southern District of new york. Good morning. What should we be looking for . Give us a preview of the
Manafort Trial. This will be a classic fraud trial in many ways but for the fact that manafort is a highprofile defendant and a lot of attention on it for ext extraneous reasons. He made a lot of money, spent lavishly. The trial will be very dry and burglary. When gates was the that will be the most compelling interesting part to the rest of the world. But, you know, its a strong case. I think theres a very good chance that hes going to get convicted. Always hard to make those predictions. Opening arguments, which will be after Jury Selection which can take a couple of days in a trial like this, the Opening Arguments will be to lay out both the governments case in a nutshell, and what some of the defenses might be which are hard to see right now what those might be. Manafort is interesting because he was obviously Donald Trumps Campaign Chairman. This trial has to do with before he had that relationship with donald trump. Do you see a nexus here at all of the Russian Investigation and what this trial is about . I think the New York Times headline was perfect, actually how its not explicitly part of the trial but looming over it. The prosecutors have promised the judges, this is a No Nonsense Judge and he wants to keep the Russian Investigation out of this. Manafort has asked to barney mention of the fact that he was even Trumps Campaign manager. That was granted with the exception there was one bank loan where the person who loaned him the money was basically offered a job on the campaign in exchange. I believe its going to come in through that. But, no. I dont theres not going to be explicit talk about it. The real issue is in the jurors. And this was manafort asked for the trial to be moved to another location. That was denied. As i think it should have been
because its a very tricky thing to try and find jurors who can be completely impartial in any case. Everybody brings their own biases to any trial. Maybe they dont like the police. Maybe they were a victim of a crime and think any defendant who was charged must be guilty. So prosecutors and judges and Defense Attorneys are always trying to weed out biases like that. Here thats going to be even harder, because were in such a politically charged divisive time, and so even if the campaign, the fact that he worked for trump is not explicitly part of the trial it may be in the back of jurors head. You do run the risk, if i were a prosecutor i would be worried about jury Nullificationullific Decid deciding the case other than on the facts of the case. I wonder how important the outcome of this or even the revelations along the way are to the Mueller Probe . You know, i think this is an important test for Robert Mueller as well as something of really consequential problems for Paul Manafort and thats because this is the first trial from charges he brought as Special Counsel. If he has a trial that seems very authoritative and feels like a strong case and Paul Manafort is convicted it makes it harder for critics of Robert Mueller to say hes on a witchhunt. This is one more example of the consequences of the meticulous investigation that hes done. Of course, weve been waiting to see if its possible Paul Manafort might be pressured to cooperate in the probe that does have something to do about russia, about collusion and Obstruction Of Justice and thats something that could be an outcome of this trial even if its never mentioned in courtroom. You and usa today have been checking in with your trump
panel to see how they feel about the state of affairs in washington. Does russia register with them, more or less now than it used to and more broadly how are they feeling about President Trump . Its interesting because some of the trump voters that weve been talking to think russia did meddle. Some think they didnt. They believe that the assertions that President Trump has made in opposition to the conclusions of his intelligence agencies, we found some trump voters do view russia as an enemy not as a competitor. Some of them were a little uncomfortable with that Press Conference with Vladimir Putin. But this has not shaken their support in donald trump or their faith in him. They are ias though the attacks against donald trump just make him stronger with them. They see him as standing up for the things he said he was going to do in the campaign on things like that, even building the wall and shutting down the government as a threat to do it, something that shows hes doing
what they said hell do. Hes pursuing the issues that prompted them to vote for him. Your latest piece for the atlantic how russias punish dicy dent using u. S. Courts. How russia has weaponized red notices and the u. S. Judicial system against its enemies. Tell us more about that. Yeah. Over the course of my reporting i found ice as been detaining Asylum Seekers on the basis of these red notices which is not an Arrest Warrant but the closest thing to an International Arrest warrant that exists today. Russia is the top abuser of interpol in terms of issuing these red notices which are politically motivated. What i. C. E. Is doing is cracking down on Visa Overstays and using that as jumping off point as an
excuse to detain these individuals who are then denied Bond Hearings because of these red notices that have been issued by russia against primarily dissidents and kremlin rivals. The red notices are being given a lot of weight by the department of Homeland Security even though they have no independent value of their own. Sign court filings, for example, the dhs has argued that Arrest Warrants issued by russia are valid because of the red notice that has been put out by interpol which, of course, only require that russia fills out the right form. Interpol and red notices have no independent value of their own. What were seeing these people are detained and are kept in detention and ultimately they are facilitating these back door extraditions because the u. S. Does not have an extradition
treaty with russia. Lawyers have been appealing that decision because their argument is that these individuals would essentially be sent to their doom if they were sent back to russia, but it is it is kind of a way to facilitate these back door extraditions which is a disconnect that we dont have an Extradition Treaty with russia because we dont trust their system of justice. Natasha, thank you very much. Still ahead on morning joe i will have mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words. Mexico will pay for the wall. Believe me. And whose going to pay for the wall . Mexico. 100 . We heard that throughout the 2016 campaign but now trump is threatening to shut down
congress if Congress Doesnt Fund the wall. The government democratic senator will join us next for that. Well be right back with much more morning joe. En . 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
security, after many, many years of talk within the United States, i would have no problem doing a shutdown. Its time we had proper Border Security. Were the laughingstock of the world. We have the worst Immigration Laws anywhere in the world. I would be certainly willing to consider a shutdown if we dont get proper Border Security. Is the funding of the Border Wall Wait until after the Midterm Elections . Probably. Thats something we do have a disagreement on. Youre not worried about a government shut down . No thats not going to happen. I twhohink it would be bad politics for the Republican Party. We would get blamed. Theres a way to get wall funding and deal with the daca population. If the president wants to shut down the government, thats his prerogative. I think it would be a mistake and i dont think it would be necessary. President trump and republicans on capitol hill at odds over whether a shut down over immigration Border Wall Funding should be on the table. Joining us now a member of the Judiciary Committee, senator hirono. Theres a hearing on Child Separations at the border this morning. Senator, thanks for being with us. I want to get your view on this idea of a government shutdown, the president who for years has promised mexico would pay for it. Now says hell shut down the government if democrats and republicans in the senate dont agree to pay for it. Whats your reaction . The president could have gotten his Border Wall Funding months ago when he was presented with a bipartisan bill to protect the 800,000 daca participants and he kept saying he would sign such a bill and he did not. So the president says a lot of things. He changes his mind. He governs by chaos, which he
mainly creates himself. Senator, is there something you would offer, put on the table in a larger package for Border Security . I think we should have impressive comprehensive immigration reform. I dont hear him talking about daca that he created a huge vulnerability for. The president goes from issue to issue. Its always about himself all time every time. He throws red meat to his base every time he feels threatened or insecure. Thats something we can couldnt on from him. He came back and said lets take care of the daca kids if you give me Border Wall Funding what would you say . I remember the meeting i participated in where he said send me a bipartisan bill ill sign it. By the time we got back to our offices that was off the table. So how can we even couldnt on this president to maintain his position on anything . As i said the one thing we can
couldnt on is when he feels threatened hell go on attack and continue to throw red meat. One of the red meat is always to attack immigrants. I want to get to the hearing we advertised the Judiciary Committee on which you sit will have a hearing on family he new if i if i occasion efforts. Incredible outrage, well founded outrage and confusion, frankly about why these families have not been reunited. What do you hope to find out today well find out why some 7 eleven children have been deemed ineligible to be reunited with their parents. What happened to the 400 children whose parents are already deported. What about some 40 children they dont even know where the parents or who the parents are. So this is total chaos. We need to find out specifically what do you have in mind, how do you plan to reunite these people. I find it incredible in the
hearing before the judge, thank goodness this judge in san diego is keeping the administrations feet to the fire, is to, for them to say well we did it, we accomplished what we needed to do in your time frame and yet there are 7 eleven or so of these children who are deemed ineligible to be reunited. Really what constitutes ineligibility to reuniting these traumatized children with their parents. Walter . I want to raise this to a larger issue because when you said trump was willing to accept a bipartisan bill and maybe calm down the immigration thing, and he reverses himself, he does so because hes so infected the Republican Party with an antiimmigrant sentiment that he got backlash from republicans. Do you see any way that you and the senate which is supposed to be the deliberative body could be working with republicans and maybe could spill over to the house to sort of say we can
actually do a bipartisan thing without the rightwing of the Republican Party rebelling against that . Theres always hope. As i said the senate actually had a bill. This was about the fourth iteration of a bipartisan bill that we thought the president would be willing to go along with because thats what he said he would do. You know, i look at it is the senate is the one body and while it would being a great for the house to wake up to their responsibilities, i think that we should do what we need to do in the senate to pass a bipartisan bill, which we came up with. So, im hopeful that we can do that again. But at the same time if we wait around for the president to make up his mind what he deems acceptable, we should live so long. Thats my attitude. Senator hirono of hawaii. Report back to us after that meeting. So lets bring in susan page right now. Saw san, lets talk about the politics of this. Hearing today, obviously a lot of fireworks, Got Democrats that to abolish i. C. E. And you also have a lot of people wondering where these remaining children are and why the Trump Administration lost them. This is one of those issues that divides the American Public along the lines that have become pretty familiar since the election of donald trump as president. This is something that is moving suburban, better educated suburban voters towards the Democratic Party and as it solidified trumps support among his core supporter. Weve been talking this morning about President Trump, now rules a new Republican Party. Thats not only because of the issues hes presented, its because hes changing some of the demographic nature of the Republican Party and i thought David Wasserman made a smart
point yesterday when he said one of the things going for democrats in the Midterm Election better educated voters are more likely to vote. That has been a good thing for republicans in midterms. This time its going to be a good thing for democrats because these are the kind of voters that have been in the past predominantly republican but disturbed and moved away from the gop because of issues like these family separation policies. I want to ask you something, the reality of separating children. Seems to me that the Administration May have run afoul of current law. Talk about the aspects of separating immigrants from children, is there a criminality there . I think extreme view of it that some people have taken is that its akin to kidnapping. I think that is pretty extreme. I dont think anyone would
actually pursue that theory of criminal liability. It talks to the point of this is unheard of before. The way in which childrenbeing, ripped from their parents hands and the real the issue about the laws is whether children will be held in some kind of custody. You know, thats what the Trump Administration tried to challenges and undo, was that children until recent under the law now cannot be held in jail basically for any extended period of time. So that was that, combined with this unprecedented policy of prosecuting every immigrant that came over the border regardless of the circumstances, you know, which had never been done or their legal status, if they were seeking asylum. Exactly. Is there more that judges can do . I know some judges are being tough, but it seems to me that the only help for these children
are these judges who can Start Holding the administration in contempt if they dont start moving faster. Right. And you see this over and over, both in the Immigration Front and, frankly just to circle it back for a second, in the with the, quote, witchhunt. You see judges over and overlooking at the facts, looking at the law and holding this Administration Accountable in a way nobody else either seems willing or able to do. So, yes, i think the judges in the Immigration World right now are sort of the Unsung Heroes because they are trying to enforce deadlines that theyve set that the Trump Administration, you know, there are very low consequences if they ignore them. You know, i think well see more of that going forward. Mimi, great to have you at the table. Thanks so much. Coming up on morning joe, the latest by the push by some republicans to impeach the Deputy Attorney general, the effort that has the support of the third ranking house republican, Majority Whip steve
scalise. Morning joe is coming right back. When my hot water heater failed, she was pregnant, inlaws were coming, a little bit of water, it really it rocked our world. I had no idea the amount of damage that water could do. We called usaa. And they greeted me as they always do. Sergeant baker, how are you . They were on it. It was unbelievable. Having insurance is something everyone needs, but having usaa now thats a privilege. Were the bakers and were usaa members for life. Usaa. Get your insurance quote today. New laptop with 24 7 tech support. Yep, thanks guys. I think he might need some support. Yes start them off right. With the School Supplies they need at low prices all summer long. Save 200 on this dell laptop at office depot officemax. Its a hightech sleep revolution. The sleep number 360 smart bed intelligently senses your movement and automatically adjusts. So you wake up ready to run the world. The new sleep number 360 smart bed, from 999. To visibly reduce wrinkles. Neutrogena®. Are you ready to take your then you need xfinity xfi. . A more powerful way to stay connected. It gives you super fast speeds for all your devices, provides the most wifi coverage for your home, and lets you control your network with the xfi app. Its the ultimate wifi experience. Xfinity xfi, simple, easy, awesome. Walter, kwifrg quislings, it will be used moving forward. What are your final thoughts . I was watching that congressman i know well from the new orleans area, Steve Scalise, talking about disappointing to me. Republicans used to be very much about the rule of law, about law. Here you have a Deputy Attorney general who is a republican appointed by a republican with a special prosecutor who has served this nation who is a republican. And theyre methodically laying out a case. When you talk about quislings,
thats where you really, really cross the line, is when you are no longer in favor of the rule of law. My question is what do people in louisiana the good people in louisiana, the good people in northwest florida, the good people in this country, what do they think when their representative is trying to stop, derail an investigation that actually benefits Vladimir Putin, the stopping of that investigation and his interference in american democracy . It is that simple. We have the evidence. You know, i have been down living in new orleans now. It is surprising how things are beginning to turn among conservative republican business leaders. Yes. And thats where you are getting a bit of a divide between the sort of hardcore Trump Supporters that have nailed russia. I dont get it. By the way, look at the polls. They have announced theyve become pro russia, pro putin compared to where they were a
couple of years ago. Used to be for the rule of law, used to be for standing up to russia, used to be for free trade, used to be for balanced budget. Used to be. Walter isaacson, thank you so much. Still ahead, Rudy Guilliani muddies the water again in the special council probe, revealing the possibility of a second meeting it Trump Campaign officials regarding russians offering dirt on Hillary Clinton. We will go through his latest cable news rambling session straight ahead. Morning joe coming right back. D agerelated macular degeneration, amd, i wanted to fight back. My doctor and i came up with a plan. It includes preservision. Only Preservision Areds 2 has the exact nutrient formula recommended by the National Eye Institute to help reduce the risk of progression of moderate to advanced amd. Thats why i fight. Because its my vision. Preservision. Also, in a greattasting chewable. The president s made it clear through his tweet and there was nothing as far as we know that would lead anyone to believe that there was anything except for discussion about adoption. Looking back on it. I think donald trump jr. Would tell you it wasnt the right thing to do but it wasnt a big deal because nothing came of the meeting sfw meeting. If hes proven to have not told the truth that campaigns look for dirt. There are some things in politics you take for granted. I have been looking at the federal code trying to find collusion as a crime. It is not. Collusion is not a crime. Theres so much going on there. I mean theres the lie, theres the lie that the president of the United States actually concocted on Air Force One when his lawyers werent around, where he said it was about adoption. So they were all trotted out and they lied about that. So, you know, it was all about adoption. And then, of course, we find out that the president did lie about that. Correct. And that he was the one that actually drafted the lie. But then you actually go on and ive got to say and i see my good friend jim who was such a sucker, he would regularly taken negative stories written about me and put them on the front page of roll call. Oh, no. It is so great to see you back. It is ridiculous. My life is like one rolling deja vu. I dont remember it though. You know you let these little resentments pileup. No, i dont. Very nixonian. My middle name is millhouse. Anyway, so darrell issa, ive heard darrell issa say it now. Who is the other republican said it . Oh, dana rorhbach. Of course, he said it in russian so it took me a couple of hours to get the exact translation. Right. But both of those guys said
everybody would take dirt from a foreign power who is an enemy. I can tell you, if somebody from the republic of iran said we have dirt on your opponent, again, i have said it before, you knew like stafford, you know. You knew rachel, all of my chief of starts, bart, they would have immediately picked up the phone and called the fbi. Right. Immediately. Theres no question you see somebody run over, youre going over to vote at the capital, by a car, you would immediately call the police, call 911. It is the moving of which has been first, for Trump Supporters answer me that question. Right. Would anybody other than donald trump do this . Have you ever heard of anybody in all of your years on capitol hill taking dirt from foreign enemies . Well, no. Not only wouldnt they, i think everyone would respond exactly democrat or republican the way you are talking about. I think it is always the moving of the goalpost, right. It is always saying first, we never had any contact with the russians. Okay, maybe we did. We never had any collusion with the russians. Okay, maybe there was some collusion. Even if there was collusion, it is not a crime. The next one will be, if it is a crime everyone does it. I will say you see it is contagious. Not just trump does it but Trump Supporters to it in congress, and then the trump true believers who are the voters do it. Thats why he has this mesmerizing power over the party. Right. Where people look to him for truth. They see his truth superior to their familys truth. Yeah. Well talk about that in a minute. But, mika, thats it, where they lie about the meeting, then they lie and say everybody would do it, and now weve gotten to the point of even if he did lie. Uhhuh. Big deal, it is not a crime. And then guilliani said, he finishes it by saying, well, my client didnt commit a crime, but if my client committed a crime it wasnt a crime. Well, this is them reacting to what seems to be just coming out like a waterfall day by day by day and deflecting. Usually trying to, like, transform world events to deflect against whatever is going on. Heidi przybyla is with us as well. You see richard and along with willie, joe and me. We will get to our top story, which is that, President Trumps lawyer, Rudy Guilliani is not ruling out the possibility of a second meeting in 2016 about russians peddling dirt to the Trump Campaign. Come on, come on. Honestly, his family should step in. Throw grandpa from the train, all right. He needs to go home. That was a good movie, by the way. The family needs to step in. Someone needs to step in. You know what, just let it ride. Remember when ferris buehler,
save ferris. Somebody close to rudy needs to take him home. If you are interviewing rudy, you really need to be embarrassed if you dont have a followup that makes sense. I watched a couple of the interviews, and it has been painful. Im sorry. Its pathetic. I dont know at some point you need to get your selfrespect back. I thought one was actually good. Really . Thats all they had. Do you like purple . I love the laughing nervously, wondering how they can let him get away with it because it is so obviously painful. Anyhow, thats a fiveminute wind up for us to give you the news. I did fourandahalf. Lets go. Numerous Television Appearances yesterday by Rudy Guilliani. He told the daily beast last night he was heading off a story from the New York Times. Quoting from the report, guilliani said that journalists included Maggie Haberman who reached out to the alleged premeeting meeting. Guilliani said he and trump
attorney jay sekulow spent a great deal of time on sunday trying to run the story down. He says he believes they managed to, quote, shut it down and helped kill the story, yet speculated the journalists found other reasons not to run the item. For her part, Maggie Haberman said we dont talk about source but i have lost the thread of what the mayor is talking about. Yet in his third and final interview yesterday. It was like a trilogy. Guilliani rambled on and out without much followup at all. He backed off his flatout denials that senior trump aides discussed the russians offer in an earlier meeting. There was another meeting that has been leaked but hasnt been public yet. Okay. That was a meeting, an alleged meeting three days before according to cohen or according to the leak. He says it was a meeting with
donald jr. , with Jared Kushner, with Paul Manafort, with gates and possibly two others in which they out of the presence of the president discussed meeting with the russians. We checked with their lawyers, the ones we could check with, which was four of the six. That meeting never, ever took place. It didnt happen. Theres no theres no second meeting here . It is highly unlikely. I always have to leave the option open as a lawyer in case they come across something that really startles us or fills some of the things that we feel are important. Whats he saying . Whats he saying . Run that clip again. Actually, listen to the words. Try and listen to exactly what he is saying. I was trying. What is he saying here . Well, well hear it. Lets look at it again. Maybe it will make sense. Here we go. Theres no second meeting here . It is highly unlikely. I always have to leave the
option open as a lawyer in case they come across with something that really startles us or feels some of the things we feel are important. Another round. I think willie can translate. What a journey. A friend of mine, my drinks are free. Rudy guilliani is debating himself. Yeah, he is debating himself. So in the morning on cnn, he raised the idea of the second meeting. That came Out Of The Blue to a lot of people. They said, what second meeting . He put that on the table, he says to preempt a New York Times story we havent seen yet and Maggie Haberman says, i dont know what hes talking about. Then 12 hours later on fox news hes shooting town the idea he raised earlier on cnn. It is all in his he was killing a story he singlehandedly brought to life. None of us were talking about the story. Hes talking about the story. He says, again, we shoot it down just in case we dont know about
something they know whether they the it or not, mike. It is just like donald trump lying about adoption, getting everybody together on Air Force One to cover up the real meaning of the don jr. Meeting, which don jr. Said his father didnt know about. Got a little Perjury Issue there if, in fact, we find out that donald trump all of these people say it is no big deal if donald trump knew about the meeting, it is a big deal for don jr. Because he committed perjury if thats the case. But, you know, it is just like trump lying about that meeting means that something went on in that meeting that they wanted to hide, and now youve got rudy saying, well, but, you know, were not going to say it didnt happen because we dont know if it did or not. Well, yeah, they do know whether it happened or not. This is both incredibly taxing and incredibly tedious to have this put upon us this early in the day. I mean he begins one of those segments by talking about a meeting that took place, and in
the very same segment, in the very same 30second clip we played he goes from there was a meeting that occurred that we wanted to get out to get ahead of the news on, and ten seconds later he is calling it an alleged meeting as if the meeting he just referred to didnt take place. I mean what time of night was he interviewed for that, thats my question . I dont know. Theres that question. It is a good one. Some of the worst of Rudy Guilliani i think i have ever seen. We need some glamour. Come on, lets get some good shots of the guy. By the way, what is he doing with his ring. I have seen it for a couple of weeks. He is pulling at it or something. Heidi, do we need to play it again . Do you have any idea what he was saying and what would you followup have been had you interviewed him. I think we can play even more, because not only did he confirm a meeting none of us were talking about but he actually fleshed out some of the details in those meetings, which was that apparently Michael Cohen may have been in Donald Trumps office when don jr. Came and said, hey, were about to
meet with the russians, so he seemed to corroborate that. Thats not good, is it . He also put gates potentially in the preplanning meeting, which would be huge if true, since as we all know gates rick gates, who is Paul Manaforts business partner, has been cooperating with the Special Counsel for several months, which means we dont have to rely just on Michael Cohen for this information, that rick gates may have confirmed it and mueller may have known about it for a long time. But the bottom line is that what were seeing here is that the number of conspiratorial meetings around the russians is increasing and so are the Trump Officials who participated in these meetings. Coming up, when Stormy Daniels hit the headlines President Trump was all about north korea. With Michael Cohen on the front pages, suddenly a meeting with iran sounds good to the president. We are going to talk about the
real impact of the vague proposals or deflections straight ahead. First, bill karins with a vague check on the forecast. Bill. Vague deflection, an excellent weather person. Today is the last day in july and the peak of the Hurricane Season is august, september and october. So far, so good. Knock on wood somewhere around here. I will show you the fire videos. This continues to be the story of the week, maybe the story of the summer out in california. Still coming in from the carr fire, over 100,000 acres burned, there have been eight fatalities in california, two of them firefighters, and we have also seen hundreds of structures burned. That fire, by the way, is like 25 contained so they still have a lot of work to do. Here is a look at the map that shows the fires. Here is the big one, the Ferguson Fire in california, the mendocino and the carr fire near redding. This is all smoke, just horrible air quality. The temperatures, still continuing the soar. Near carr fire, imagine being on the fire line putting out the fires, 103, 101 to 100 over the
next three days. In the east, the opposite. Flash flood watches from winstonsalem to atlanta. We will pick up significant rain in the next couple of days, through friday as much as two, three, four inches. Aisles lated areas on have five inches. For flooding, most concerned with the north georgia area. Minneapolis looks great. Dallas, well take 90. Thats 100 times better than the 110 you had only a couple of days ago. New york city one much the spots, youve been dodging the rain tropes so far. I think wednesday after will be the first shot of thunderstorms. Youre watching morning joe. We will be right back. The fact is, there are over ninetysix hundred roads named park in the u. S. Its americas most popular street name. But allstate agents know thats where the similarity stops. If youre on park street in reno, nevada, the high winds of the Washoe Zephyr could damage your siding. And thats very different than living on park ave in sheboygan, wisconsin, where ice dams could cause water damage. But no matter what park you live on, one of 10,000 local allstate agents knows yours. Now that you know the truth, are you in good hands . Booking a flight doesnt have to be expensive. Just go to priceline. Its the best place to book a flight a few days before my trip and still save up to 40 . Just tap and go. For the best savings on flights, go to priceline. Chair is accused of hiding at least 30 million that he made before his days with trump as an unregistered foreign lobbyist for ukraine and its former prorussian president many we are told the Prosecution Plans to call 35 witnesses including agents from the fbi, Treasury Department and irs to show how manafort allegedly stashed his wealth in overseas banks to avoid paying u. S. Taxes. Last week a member of Robert Muellers team said he does not anticipate a government witness will, quote, utter the word russia touring the trial. But if manafort is convicted the Special Counsel could use it as leverage for him to talk about anything he knows pertaining to the Trump Campaign and russia. The trial is expected to last about three weeks. Manafort also faces a separate trial on similar charges in washington in september. You know, it is interesting. When everything seems to collide with donald trump and things start going really bad
he deflects. He decides hes going the take a meeting with a group of tyrants. He did north korea. It is a playbook. It is a playbook. People made fun of us for saying it. With north korea at a particular time when Stormy Daniels was about to hit the front pages, he went there. Now he is open to meetings with the iranians. I guess after this when he gets in trouble, i gesell talk ab guess hell talk about meeting with the martians. Lets take a look at the president. I would certainly meet with iran if they wanted to meet. I dont know if theyre ready yet. Theyre having a hard time right now. But i ended the iran deal. It was a ridiculous deal. I to believe they will probably end up wanting to meet, and im ready to meet any time they want to. And i dont do that from strength or from weakness. I think it is an appropriate thing to do. If we could work something out thats meaningful, not the waste
of paper that the other deal was, i would certainly be willing to meet. Do you have preconditions for that meeting . No preconditions, no. If they want to meet, ill meet, any time they want. Any time they want. It is good for the country, good for them, good for us, and good for the world. No preconditions. If they want to meet, ill meet. So the reason why we needed, the world needed to have someone at the meeting with Vladimir Putin and donald trump is because in the past week or so since helsinki donald trump has, one, sent a signal that he wants to lift sanctions on an oligarch whos close to close to Vladimir Putin that we just put on a couple of months ago. And, two, now he is talking ben from a position of weakness, wanting to meet with iran. It is a complete 180 turn. Theres very little actually to explain that, richard, but there
is a playbook for donald trump. Threaten to bomb a terror state, say you want to meet with a Terrorist State, and state. Are we going to see what happened in north korea happen with iran now . Almost certainly not. If the administration were serious about meeting with iran, they would have done it before they unilaterally got out of the nuclear deal that, by the way, iran was complying with. What if putin asked him to reach out to iran . The other reason, the iranians want no part of it. Theyre not going to sit down with somebody the Secretary Of State the other day gave a big speech essentially calming for regime change. The administration is ratcheting up sanctions. Again, they got out of the nuclear deal, after the president said he would meet without preconditions, the National Security council under the Secretary Of State started issuing the preconditions on nuclear issues, on how theyre
treating their own people. You can look at what were saying about north korea all along and you have donald trump declaring victory with north korea, when we find out now more ways theyre cheating and, in fact, their Nuclear Program is more dangerous today, u. S. Intelligence officials tell us, than it was when donald trump first started negotiating with the north koreans. Theres a Front Page Story in the Washington Post that says after last weeks story about the Nuclear Program, now we learn their intercontinental Missile Program is continuing. The only word i take exception with is cheating. We dont know if north korea is cheating . Why . Because we dont know what the United States and north korea agreed to. If you look at the commune caiq that came out of the singapore summit, it was like a swiss cheese but we have had two summits. Donald trump said americans could sleep at night, Nuclear Weapons were no longer a problem with noerpt. We know thats a lie. We know thats a lie and nothing like that was
accomplished. Again, we are seeing this pattern of summits where the promise is great. We dont really know what was agreed on, and then theres no it is wrong at both ends. Theres no preparation and theres no followthrough, no engine, no caboose. Coming up on morning joe, the president s firing off tweets this morning aimed at a Political Network thats been closely aligned with republicans, at least before donald trump was around. What a brewing feud with the Koch Brothers could mean for the up coming mid terms. Morning joe is coming right back. We have got a problem. A few problems actually. Weve got aging roadways, aging power grids,. Aging everything. We also have the ageold problem of bias in the workplace. Really. Never heard of it. The question is. Whos going to fix all of this . An actor . Probably not. But you know who can solve it . Business. Because solving big problems is what business does best. So lets take on the wage gap, the opportunity gap, the achievement gap. Whatever the problem, business can help. And i know who can help them do it. 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
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significant because, joe, so many sometimes weve sat in this chair and talked about what is. That it is going to take for the republicans to kind of stand up to trump. Well, all along it has been who behind them. It has been the donors threatening thm on the tax cuts for instance. The donors have outsize influence over a lot of the republican representatives, so i do think it is an important moment and a potential change in strategy that could, could show some fractures in the party just because the donors are so powerful in this party. Still ahead, well talk about a new column that caught our eye. Stephanie grace explains how throughout history only 19 officials have been impeached, yet somehow a group of republicans in congress think Rod Rosenstein deserves to be the 20th. Steve scalise is now signing on to the idea. Thats just ahead on morning joe. Oh oh ozempic® vo people with type 2 diabetes are excited about the potential of onceweekly ozempic®. In a study with ozempic®, a majority of adults lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than seven and maintained it. Oh under seven . vo and you may lose weight. In the same oneyear study, adults lost on average up to 12 pounds. Oh up to 12 pounds . vo a twoyear study showed that ozempic® does not increase the risk of major cardiovascular events like heart attack, stroke, or death. Oh no increased risk . Ozempic® ozempic® should not be the first medicine for treating diabetes, or for people with type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis. Do not share needles or pens. Dont reuse needles. Do not take ozempic® if you have a personal or Family History of medullary thyroid cancer, multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, or if you are allergic to ozempic®. Stop taking ozempic® and get medical help right away if you get a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, itching, rash, or trouble breathing. Serious side effects may happen, including pancreatitis. Tell your doctor if you have Diabetic Retinopathy or vision changes. Taking ozempic® with a sulfonylurea or insulin may increase the risk for low blood sugar. Common side effects are nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, stomach pain, and constipation. Some side effects can lead to dehydration, which may worsen kidney problems. I discovered the potential with ozempic®. Oh oh oh ozempic® vo ask your Healthcare Provider if ozempic® is right for you. If you look at what mark meadows and jim jordan and devin nunes have been doing, theyve been fighting to get more information from the Justice Department and, frankly, it is mind boggling that justice wont comply. They ought to want to work with us to root out the bad apples, and if putting impeachment on the table is one more tool to get them to comply with the subpoenas from congress, we need to make sure they do their job and comply. If this came up for a vote, you would support them . You would vote yes . I would. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise speaking last week on fox news. Political columnist for the new orleans advocate stephanie grace writes about scalise on a new piece entitled, on rosenstein impeachment, Steve Scalise crosses the line. Stephanie joins us now. With us, professor of Political Science and director of International Studies at stanford university, former u. S. Ambassador to russia, michael
mcfaul. Hes also an nbc news analyst. Senior writer at the Weekly Standard John Mccormick is with us as well. Stephanie, why is this the line . First of all, i guess i would start you off there. How would you be able to explain in terms of someone like Steve Scalise would understand that this is incredibly dangerous . Well, i mean the first thing that hit me on seeing that is the line that i was a little surprised to see him cross. Ive known steve ska lien for many years. He is very conservative. He is very much in line with the Republican Party. He is very much on the trump train, no question about that. But this is different. This is really, you know, for one thing breaking with the leadership, breaking with paul ryan who said, you know, really this is dangerous territory and really calling into question whether congress is going to where is the line . You know, how far will congress go, the republican congress, to kind of help donald trump out in this situation . And it is interesting. I have been hearing from a lot of people who know Steve Scalise, like him, and they were they were disappointed. You know, the word that comes up sometimes is i thought he had more integrity than that. Right. And it is a question that, you know, i might ask from my point of view, one might say, well, she shes on a Different Team so shes trying to fight for her side. But for republicans, for the party, why is this potentially i mean is there any scenario, stephanie, where this ends well . I mean it is hard to see where it ends at all. You know, when you look at impeachment, and you mentioned in the intro i looked back at how many people have been impeached in this country. Obviously become. You know, the most recent one was a local judge from here in
the new orleans area, a federal judge who had a real trial before the senate. It was, you know, it was bribery, it was graft, it was sordid stuff but criminal behavior. Thats what this is supposed to be. Thats what impeachment is, and the trial you know, one thing i learned watching it is there are a bunch of senators who are former prosecutors because it was a trial, very much like what you would see in court. I cover louisiana politics so i have been in court a lot. I have watched a lot of trials of politicians. This is something totally different. Rod rosenstein has not been accused of anything criminal certainly. It is a question of a difference between congress and the executive branch. To hear Steve Scalise basically say impeachment is a tool, it is how you get leverage, that just to me really defines it down to inappropriate level. Not a lot of people have been impeached in history. John mccormick, so he would be number 20 if it were to actually
happen. The trump train, is this what it is . It is barrelling out of control or just going so fast that those who are on it are hunkering down, hanging on for dear life . Yeah, you know, jack gold smith had a good piece in the Weekly Standard saying it is muddying the waters. There are even factual errors. They hold him accountable for not vetting the steele dossier when he didnt become doj until later. He said on tv, why would he impeach rosenstein, for what crimes . Rosenstein is an executive branch employee. If he has done anything impeachable or even just not living up to his job, donald trump could fire him tomorrow. Do you believe in the sincerity of the arguments from people like Steve Scalise, jim jordan, mark meadows of the Freedom Caucus that theyre concerned that documents are
being withheld or is it an operation to protect the president . You know, i havent talked to them directly to be honest. I think a lot is to protect the president. I think if you go point by point you could find some legitimacy to some of what theyre saying, but a lot is just smoke. A lot is just muddying the water. Ambassador mcfaul,tive top d topic. The president proposing in a joint News Conference with the head of italy, meeting without preconditions with the head of iran. This is something that, as you know very well, barack obama was vilified for 11 years ago when he talked about it in a debate. What is your reaction to the president , who seems to say and actually says it out loud, it is a good thing to get along with people. It is better than the alternative, which is war . Well, two things. First of all, yet it is another data point about how disconnected the president of the United States, the commander in chief, President Trump is
from his entire Trump Administration that works on National Security. This happens time and time again where theres one policy by the administration and he seems to be kind of ad libbing, said something different. Secretary pompeo said there were all kinds of preconditions, and he pops off and says, ill meet with anybody. The second thing though is another part of his philosophy that i think is fundamentally flawed when it comes to diplomacy. He thinks that having meetings is the goal of diplomacy, whether it is kim jongun and the singapore summit, Vladimir Putin and the helsinki summit and now maybe mr. Rouhani and the dubai summit. I dont know where theyre going to meet and theyre not going to meet because the iranians do not want to meet. But he confuses that as the goal. Instead, normally democrats and republican president s alike as well as other leaders look at summits as the means to achieve american National Security
objectives. And in this instance i have no idea what american National Security objective hes seeking to achieve by saying that. We know from that helsinki summit in my opinion, the actual summit was bad for American National skur National Security interests. We dont know everything that was talked about, but what we do know about including me, by the way, we do know that was talked about. I think it was bad for america. So time to get everybody on the same team and understand the purposes of summits. So, john and rick, youve got singapore. Youve got helsinki. You now have the potential of the president going to tehran, two guys in a room in three different spots in the world. You have Steve Scalise coming out favoring impeachment in order to curry favor with the president. What does this say to us about the level of fire among the base of Republican Party politicians,
specifically in the house . Are they so afraid of crossing this man or saying anything adverse to this mans policies that we hear relatively nothing from them . I dont know if it is fear or true loyalty for some of them, but i mean theyre all in. Theyre all on board. If you look at any of the reecet examples you gave about helsinki or kim jongun, the republicans would have been screaming bloody murder if barack obama said kim jongun loves his people or if he gave legitimacy to Vladimir Putin. If you look at the polls, 90 of the Republican Party is on board with donald trump and these things havent dented that support. Most members of congress are not we call them leaders but theyre not leaders, theyre followers, and joe as well. If you can articulate why you oppose certain policies to your constituency, they will listen
to you but they wont do it. Theyre afraid that all of these trump voters are just going to turn against them so they wont take it on. Sometimes you got to say, look, im going to say what is right and if i lose my seat, i lose my seat. That should be the conservative position anyway. Mr. Ambassador, it has gotten ridiculous. You have a leader in the Republican Party, in the Republican House who is actively working to help hide you know, cover Vladimir Putins footprints in the 2016 election. When Steve Scalise signs on to impeach Rod Rosenstein, he is no longer just helping donald trump. If you look at the indictments that came down a few fridays ago, he is helping cover up Vladimir Putins interference in american democracy, isnt he . It is incredible. I got to say it is incredible. We have been talking about this for two years. The russians violated our sovereignty, right . Arent they supposed to be about America First . Arent they supposed to be protecting our borders . Well, our cyber borders were violated. We now have overwhelming evidence. We have indictments on gru military officers and yet for some reason our America First patriots wont stand up and defend america. I dont understand it. This is not democrats and republicans, folks. This is america sovereignty being violated. It is hard i mean i work on National Security. I dont work on domestic politic goes. This is a National Security issue. Never in history has it happened and yet people dont want to stand up and defend our sovereignty. Youre talking about republicans, members of the Republican Party, and there is we began this segment talking about Steve Scalise and this position of potentially impeaching rosenstein. It is incredible. I think that when you hear someone like ambassador michael
mcfaul talking about this, given the way he has served our country and the experience he has, we should be frightened at this point. I dont understand why more people arent stepping up. I dont get it. Well, it is not that theyre just not stepping up people in the white house. Theyre actively, actively signing on to bills to cover up Vladimir Putins attempt to undermine american democracy. Thats not hyperbole. How Many Russians have been indicted now . 25. 25. You have 25 russians indicted. You have the United States military and the United States Intel Services saying, this is a member of the gru that was at this building, these are the key strokes they made at this exact time. This is how they infiltrated the dnc. This is the russian agent that did it. I mean the evidence i mean Vladimir Putins dna is all over this. By the way as i always say, you could go into any court and get judicial notice of that. When Steve Scalice signs on to actually try to stop this investigation, by firing the guy and impeaching the guy that actually is allowing it to move forward, youve got a guy, Steve Scalice, and by extension, anyone who does not condemn him, who is doing the work of an exkgb agent who is trying to undermine american democracy. Am i overselling this . No, you are right. Whos connected together. Trump is saying this is a win hunt. Steve scalice agrees by signing on to, frankly, embarrassing impeachment document, hes saying these 25 indictments against russians. Against russians, that thats the witch hunt. Hes defending the gru. Hes defending the gru
against the United States military. The professionals at ft. Meade. The professional also in the intel community. So let me connect something else. If the president is willing to pay off important stars, playboy models to keep quiet, what do you think else he would be willing to be compromised on . Ambassador michael mcfaul, thank you. Thank you both very much for your reporting as well. President trump weighs in on the next dangerous chapter in americas gun debate. Thats next on morning joe. Its what this country is made of. But right now, our bond is fraying. How do we get back to us . The y fills the gaps. And bridges our divides. Donate to your local y today. Because where theres a y, theres an us. Another antiwrinkle cream in no hurry to make anything happen. Neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair works in just one week. With the fastest retinol formula to visibly reduce wrinkles. Neutrogena®. President trump tweeted this morning, quote, im looking into 3d plastic guns being sold to the public. Already spoke to nra, doesnt seem to make much sense. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer responded saying, quote, your administration approved this. What kind of incompetence and dangerous governing is this . And to check with the nra . Holy moly. Attorneys from eight states and the district of columbia have sued the Trump Administration to stop the company, the texas company, from publishing the blueprints. Senator nelson of florida says he plans to file legislation today to block the blueprints from being released. And thats another example of the president playing with the truth by tweeting out something thats very misleading. Or he clearly doesnt it could be that he just doesnt know because he doesnt think. His Administration Approves the plan. I think theres more. Yes. I think at this point we need to look at his behavior as strateg
strategic. Now to the ongoing crisis of Migrant Children and families separated at the border. The Washington Post has highlighted the dire conditions those children faced in one illinois shelter, including reports of children forced to scrub toilets with their bare hands and of a 10yearold being denied medical attention after breaking his arm. Joining us now, immigration attorney jeff goldman who successfully advocated for the reunion of of two boys ages 9 and 10 from that shelter with their parents after a federal judge ordered the government to release them. They are the first known reunions by judges order in the country. Thank you so much for being on. So the status of the remaining children, how many are there . What are the continued conditions that they live in . What do you know . Mika, theres still hundreds that have not been reunified with their families. We know about 460 of them may never find their families because the parents have been already removed and deported to
their home country. Leaving the children here. I think at the end of the day, most of them will be reunified with the parents. I think theyll have to do dna tests. This is going to cost the federal government millions of dollars to try to reunify all of these children. I think the taxpayers are paying and paying for nothing. This never needed to happen. So who pays to transport these children to various parts of the country . Who pays to maintain these children on a daily basis in those various parts of the country . For the the two boys i helped get release from the facility in chicago, the federal government was ordered to pay for the reunification, for the flights, but we decided not to wait. We had some donors who were offering private money to fly the boys immediately to be reunified and we choose that route instead. Theres been word the federal government is going to have to reimburse people who paid for these flights. We dont know. We dont really care. We just wanted to get the kids back with the mother. You have rare inside information of the process. How you identified these two boys and how you got them back to their parents. I think a lot of people would like to see what you were able to do for hundreds of other kids. We were contacted by one of the mothers. She called my law firm directly and said she was given our phone number by someone who said we could help. Once we understood this is a parent whose child had been taken out of her arms at the border, we were able to sit down, focus, and went into action. Shed an that point did know where her child was. Its actually remarkable. The government released her after ten days in jail, left her without any knowledge of where her child was but another woman who she met in prison was able to find her child and she called and said i think youre client is in chicago because my friend has met a friend called joco. We got in touch with the highest level of people in chicago. The federal government farms out these key tensidetention center private contractors. We called, they said were not releasing him. We said, the mothers right here, shes able to take the child back. No, were not releasing him. Why not . The federal government could not let these contractors release the children. The federal government, after a very wellplanned chaos, that they created, decided to lets call these 2,000 children orphans. Therefore, parents would have to go through extensive back ground security checks not just of the parents but of anyone the parent knows or lives with. Which is ridiculous when the parent is standing at the governments door asking for the child. What did they tell you about their time when they were being held . Just routine. They did attend classes. They had time to play. One of my clients was left in solitary confinement for two weeks, unable to touch or
communicate or talk to anyone because he broke out with a rash which the doctor at the facility said was chicken pox. It wasnt chicken pox. This child already had chicken pox. And they ended up injecting him with something to hopefully help this rash, without a parents permission, of course the child didnt know what was happening. My two clients absolutely were forced to scrub toilets without gloves on, sweep the floors. These were 9 year old boys. I cant imagine the legal ramifications and potential out of all these stories. Child abuse. I dont even know what thats incredible. Many of the children were told if you dont do this, youre not going to see your parents. Thats child abuse. Absolutely. What would we say of if this is how if they forced 8 year olds, 9 year olds to scrub toilets, oh, my god, it would be an international scandal. Joe, just a month ago, our country spent i dont know how
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