Deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein says he is prepared to be fired. Nbc news has learned rosenstein, who has control over the mueller russia probe, has been telling confidants that hes prepared to get the axe. With more details on that, Nbc News National Security and justice correspondent Julia Ainsley who broke the story. Matt miller with us as well, a National Security analyst for nbc news. Julia, let me start with you. What more do we know . I would imagine the distinction here is fairly important between rosenstein saying hes prepared to be fired and rosenstein saying hes about to be fired. He thinks that its coming. He thinks its imminent. Correct . This is more of him reading the same things were reading. Its just been a really sharp change in his mental state and his tone in the conversations hes had with people close to him over his tenure. They have said that this week they have heard from a very stoic Rod Rosenstein, that hes been repeating the phrase here i stand, thats a Martin Luther quote. Its also the same one jim comey repeated in george w. Bush during a tenuous time in their relationship, to try to say he believes what hes done is right and he will let the political chips fall where they may. Its also really important to realize that there was a time here where rosenstein was very anxious. These people were getting calls in the middle of the night, he seemed to be very emotional. But now they say hes more resolved with the fact he thinks what he did was right and part of that is he thinks he did the right thing by firing jim comey. He says there are facts that will come out later and that history will prove him right. I am very curious, i think as we all are, to see what exactly those facts might be. But he seems to be at a point now where he believes what he did was right both on that front and in appointing special counsel Robert Mueller, something as you pointed out, hes come under pressure for by President Trump. At this point hes just resolved to let things happen the way they may. Do we know if theres a moment this week or some sort of conversation that acted as an impetus for this, or is he just reading the newspapers and watching cable news . I think some of this news did get to him. I spoke to people who said they spoke to him before the Washington Post broke a story which was wednesday, saying it was definitely being circulated around the white house and also from outside advisers to President Trump who were calling for rosenstein to go. He knew about this a little earlier on in the week. So it seems some of this pressure is coming his way down pennsylvania avenue to the Justice Department. He was already feeling this and said you know, i fought for so long. He was very anxious in may around the time where he had to fire comey, then appoint a special counsel. He was very anxious around late fall, early december, when he was getting just lots of public denunciations from the president on twitter. Now it seems that that has changed, especially this week, as more and more has built, and as more people like steve bannon have said that trump must fire him. Matt, if the deputy a. G. Gets canned, whats the potential fallout . Its a great question. It ultimately depends on what the president s objective is in firing him. If hes just firing Rod Rosenstein out of pique, if he just fires rod and doesnt move further to shut down the investigation, then while it would be i think a deeply dishonorable and unethical act by the president , it wouldnt necessarily have any impact but if hes trying to fire him because hes looking for an official in the department of justice who will fire bob mueller or stop him from moving forward aggressively in this investigation, what you could see is the president asking the next in line, solicitor general, whether hes willing to fire mueller or to stop the investigation, and moving down the line through the doj chain of succession. I think the question for me, this report really raises, if rosenstein is either ready to be fired or thinks he might be fired, what is he doing inside the Justice Department to get ready for that. I dont mean for the rest of his career. Whats he doing with other officials asking them i hope you will stand strong to protect this investigation if the president does try to shut it down. Julia, thank you. Keep us posted, please. Lets get to those startling revelations that detail jim comeys meetings with President Trump, those details pepper the new memoir of the ousted fbi director. The sometimes lewd and graphic details in a higher loyalty. The animosity between comey and President Trump, many of the excerpts made available just days before the books publication focus on what comey describes as mr. Trumps obsession with salacious details of the Christopher Steele dossier. Comey talked about that january 17th meeting at trump tower with abc news this morning. Im about to meet with a person who doesnt know me, has just been elected president of the United States by all accounts and from my watching him during the campaign, could be volatile and im about to talk to him about allegations that he was involved with prostitutes in moscow and that the russians taped it. How weird was that briefing . Really weird. It was almost an outofbody experience for me. I was floating above myself looking down saying youre sitting here briefing the incoming president of the United States about prostitutes in moscow. The president firing back on his medium of choice, twitter. James comey is a proven leaker and liar, virtually everyone in washington thought he should be fired for the terrible job, he is a weak and untruthful slimeball. It was my great honor to fire james comey. Matt miller still with us along with dana milbank, opinion writer for the Washington Post and dave hoppey, former chief of staff to House Speaker paul ryan. Dana, let me start with you. I want to read a section of the comey book that he alluded to in that interview. I added that one of the fbis jobs is to protect the presidency from certain kinds of coercion and whether or not the allegations were true, it was important that he know russians might be saying such things. I stressed that we did not want to keep information from him, especially given that the press was about to report it. He strongly denied the allegations, asking rhetorically i assumed whether he seemed like a guy who needed the services of prostitutes. He then began discussing cases where women had accused him of sexual assault, a subject i had not raised. Your thoughts on the nature of the conversation between the president of the United States and his then fbi director. Well, it sort of defies our ability to describe, as we saw from the clip there of james comey himself. You can imagine why he felt like he was having this outofbody experience. You know, i get that the indication from reading these excerpts that its just quite possible that james comey does not like donald trump, and i think its extraordinarily damning, you know, obviously we have the urological details here but i think the psychological component of what hes saying is far more damning, not just this obsession with the prostitutes but the notion that people around him are essentially operating like a mob family. It definitely seems comey seems to have escalated the battle here into much more of a personal one, and it clearly has gotten under the president s skin. Matt, i want to read another passage here from the book. Again, heres the book. In full disclosure here for viewers and listeners, i have not had the time to read the entire book. I have been reading excerpts throughout the course of the morning. I know that you guys havent been able to read the entire book yet, either. Heres another excerpt. The president is unethical, untethered to the truth and institutional values. His leadership is transactions, ego driven and about personal loyalty. We are fortunate some ethical leaders have chosen to serve and stay at senior levels of government but they cannot prevent all of the damage from the forest fire that is the trump presidency. Their task is to contain it. As a former government official, matt miller, whats your take on comeys sentiment here . You know, i think whats so damning about that portrayal of the president is that its not sometimes you see government officials who leave government and write tellall books, and people on the outside, people look at those books and wonder if the accounts are true. Whats so damning about this portrayal of the president , it lines up with what we on the outside see every day. Having served in government, this is not an issue, i really had to deal with, any of my colleagues had to deal with, where you wondered if the president or even a member of cabinet was someone disconnected with reality, operating at a place where he has no kind of internal foundation of ethics and so you are constantly having to make this decision, do i stay in government to try to constrain him from taking further actions that are harmful to the country, or at some point is there an ethical line that an ethical line that i cannot cross or am being asked to cross by staying here. Its a deeply personal decision for each person. I think you have seen people like Ari Fleischer suggesting jim comey if he really thought this about the president should have resigned. An fbi director doesnt work for a president. Hes there for a tenyear term to be accountable to the american people. The calculation he made is that jim comey, for all of his faults, i think he has many, probably being as independent as he is, there was never more important a time to have that kind of fbi director than with donald trump as president. Matt, there are parts of this book that seem vindictive and small, and hearing an fbi director talk about the president wearing goggles in a tanning booth or the size of his hands, it almost, parts of it read like what a book might sound like if donald trump wrote a book about an fbi director. I dont know if a lot of folks, if this is the james comey that they thought they knew. Is this the james comey that you know . Parts of it feel like a revenge book. Great question. I will tell you, i was surprised to see that language about the president s personal appearance just because it is not the jim comey we have seen before who typically, you know, the reputation of comey and the way he really acts is always kind of a boy scout, more so, even more than that, someone who always thought of himself as a boy scout and as the most ethical man in the room. The risk for him in making those kind of personal descriptions of the president is that it takes away from the more substantive criticism that he made. I think the very compelling substantive criticism. If thats so, i think that will be unfortunate because right now, people are having to make assessments about this book and its one thing to make them kind of just an assessment about the president s character. But at some point, jim comey may be the most important witness in an impeachment inquiry against the president for obstruction of justice and if so, everything that he says is going to be held up to ask whether hes credible versus everything the president has said. Sounds like you think this book may have hurt his credibility. You know, i dont think so. I think people will look at that and may think hes a little vengeful. You have to take the full, i think the full picture and look at the facts that he describes and the troubling behavior that he describes from the president. But again, im not sure that that was the best way to press his case by including those details. Dave, heres another excerpt. This is on how the trump team is said to have reacted when jim comey told them that russia had tried to interfere in our president ial election. They were keen to emphasize that there was no impact on the vote, meaning that the russians hadnt elected trump. There had always been a line. The Intelligence Community does facts, the white house does politics and spin, and does it on its own. In an instant the line between intelligence and politics began to fade. If that is true, what does that say about cynicism in this brand new administration . Craig, i think its pretty clear now that mr. Comey and President Trump dont like each other. On either side. The comey side really hate trump and the trump side really hate comey. I think whats interesting here is it follows a line that i think was set out first in july of 2016, when fbi director comey decided that he had to solve the problem for us all because the attorney general could not do her job. So messiah comey came in and did her job for her and made the decision of whether they would prosecute Hillary Clinton or not. This is a continuation of that. Now with this book, hes going to try and save the country. I understand he has a deep dislike for the president , but there are pieces of this book which are probably valid and valuable and pieces of it which really tear it apart. I think there is a messiah complex here going on. Dana, this is an excerpt of jim comey writing about john kelly, the chief of staff here. He said he was sick about my firing and that he intended to quit in protest. He said he didnt want to work for dishonorable people who would treat someone like me in such a manner. I urged kelly not to do that, arguing that the country needed principled people around this president , especially this president. This was before john kelly had become chief of staff there. But what does this tell you about the relationship between general kelly and the president . Well, it seems to paint james comey himself in a favorable light, that hes saying the man who is now, was a cabinet officer, now the chief of staff to the president , was willing to quit but is only staying because james comey urged him to. Im sure it will further the doubts the president already has about his chief of staff, as well as many others. You know, this has, i think what we have seen from a lot of these excerpts is there are questions about james comeys judgment in saying some of the things that he has done, in publishing the book at this moment, in making money from speeches about the book, in some of the personal aspects of this, but i dont hear or see anything in here at all where people can really say no, james comey is wrong on the facts here. Now, of course, the president can say hes an untruthful slimeball but being called untruthful by this president is like being called ugly by a pig. It does not sound like theres anyplace in here where people can come back and say no, thats not how it happened, no, comey, youre not being consistent, and it just all seems to ring true with Everything Else we have seen. Really quickly, you are a former chief of staff for speaker ryan who announced this week hes not running again. Kevin mccarthy was thought to be the frontrunner, and now theres talk jim jordan of ohio is going to get into the race. Whos got the inside track . Is this mccarthys to lose or does jordan have a shot . I think leader mccarthy is certainly the one whom people will look to first. Two and a half years ago, whatever it is now, in 2015 he was also leading and there were other things happened. Mr. Jordan would be a spoiler, not somebody who would actually get the nomination to be speaker. But he may be involved as a candidate for that, as part of the whole process. But mr. Jordan would not be the one who would get the majority of votes among republicans in the house right now to be their candidate for speaker after the election. David, thank you, dana, thank you. Matt miller, appreciate you. Enjoy the weekend, gentlemen. Some breaking news on this friday. The president s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, fighting back right now after federal prosecutors raided his office. He just asked a judge, just asked that judge to block them from looking at the evidence that they took. Now he waits for the answer. We have our own makeshift law firm here. They will walk us through the Big Development in the raid that had the president fuming. Also, thousands of teachers storming the kentucky state house on this friday. They say funding cuts proposed by the state are personal. We are sinking now. We dont have enough textbooks. We dont have the resources we need to do our job. Now they have gone beyond taking our money. They are taking the students money. David. 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Gigspeed internet. When only certain people can get it. Lets fix that. Lets give this guy gig really . And these kids, and these guys, him, ah. Oh hello. That lady, these houses yes, yes and yes. And dont forget about them. Uh huh, sure. Still yes xfinity delivers gig speed to more homes than anyone. Now you can get it, too. Welcome to the party. Breaking news in the fight to keep the Justice Department from reviewing materials taken when the fbi raided trump lawyer Michael Cohens home and office. There has been no decision on whether the departments search warrant can remain sealed or who will review the materials seized from cohens office. Cohen was requesting a judge to block federal investigators from looking at those materials before he and his lawyer have had a chance to review them. That hearing was adjourned a short time ago until monday. Nbc news has reported that the raids were in relation to cohens alleged hush payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels and a payment made by American Media inc. , also known as ami, to Karen Mcdougal. The developments according to the Washington Post reports today said cohen had a penchant for taping conversations with associates. Those taped files may have been seized by federal investigators during the raid. This morning, Stormy Daniels lawyer responding to the report. If that Washington Post story is accurate that Michael Cohen actually recorded these communications, played them for others and then saved them only to have them ultimately obtained by the fbi, then Michael Cohen is far less intelligent than i thought he was and i never thought he was that intelligent. Michael avenatti there. On top of all of this, nbc news has learned President Trump has also retained new attorneys. Danny cevallos and katie fang joining me here on a friday. Lets start with this temporary restraining order. How significant is this . So what they are trying to do is figure out whos going to get the first bite at the proverbial apple of the evidence that was seized on monday during the raid at cohens hotel room, office and house. So right now, the government wants to be able to use what it calls a taint team. A group of prosecutors that do not actually have a direct involvement in the prosecution of Michael Cohen but the problem is, can you necessarily unsee what you have seen or can you necessarily unhear what you have heard, if there really are tapes that were seized from cohens places. What Michael Cohen wants is his own people to be able to review what has been seized, and right now, the judge is trying to decide can trump now make an argument, does he have a vested interest in how this should go down. Whos got the better case based on what we know about the facts . Probably Michael Cohen will lose in his bid to have his attorneys take that first pass. Normally, courts and Defense Attorneys alike are very critical of these taint teams because as you can imagine, the very thing that we try to keep privileged and away from Law Enforcement, now Law Enforcement is saying well, you can trust this little group of our uninvolved agents and lawyers to look at this and to not disclose any privileged materials. The request by cohen to have his own attorneys look at them first, not likely to happen. Maybe the court will have a magistrate review them or provide for some other way to do a first pass of privileged materials, but its definitely shooting the moon to get your own attorneys to review seized documents. The revelation that cohen apparently was taping conversations, reportedly taping conversations with some associates, how significant is that, what might that mean for Attorney Client privilege . So if the conversations were being recorded and cohen was in new york, its a oneparty consent state and all you need is one party to consent to it. If hes recorded conversations, do they involve donald trump, do they involve jared kushner, who are the people that are part of these conversations, are they clients, are they purely political, do they involve business. From what we understand from trump associates, cohen did this all the time and he explicitly said he used it for leverage. Thats kind of a scary thought if you had a conversation with Michael Cohen its been recorded. We will see whether or not that was actually seized. Stand by, if you can. I want your take on this breaking news right now. The white house just announcing, just announcing it is official, they do in fact plan to pardon Scooter Libby. Kelly odonnell standing by for us on the lawn of the white house. For folks who havent been following this necessarily as closely as all of us, who was Scooter Libby, why is this significant . Reporter Scooter Libby was the chief of staff to Vice President dick cheney in the Bush Administration and he was convicted of a handful of counts related to not telling the truth to investigators and the grand jury related to the leak of the name of an fbi officer, Valerie Plame, who has been now well known over the last several years. Today, the president has issued a full pardon. He says that i dont know mr. Libby, but for years, i have heard that he has been treated unfairly. Hopefully this full pardon will help rectify a very sad portion of his life. At issue, one of the witnesses in the case, judith miller, who had previously worked for the New York Times had given testimony about learning the name of Valerie Plame wilson, she was married to the ambassador at the time who had been critical of the iraq war, that that conversation between source Scooter Libby and the reporter, that she recanted that saying she had given inaccurate information about libby being a source with respect to the leak of a cia officers name. This was a huge crisis during the Bush Administration. It led to the appointment of a special prosecutor, patrick fitzgerald, the person who appointed that prosecutor was none other than james comey, who we have all been living through the drama of his time as fbi director, fired by this president. Conservatives have long felt that libbys crimes happened after the special prosecutor had known that it was a different official, a state department official, who had first disclosed the name to a columnist, but the investigation continued and in the course of that investigation, libby maintained that it was a conflict of memories between himself and other witnesses who contradicted his testimony, and therefore, the argument conservatives have made is that the scope of what the special prosecutor was doing went beyond who identified this classified individual, Valerie Plame, to catching libby in lies. The jury reviewed all that information, they found that libby did, in fact, mislead and lie to the fbi and a grand jury. President bush, not long after the conviction, that was another day i ran to the camera with a piece of paper from the white house, commuted the sentence. So stripping away from libby the 30month conviction prison time that he had. But he kept the conviction in place, saying he didnt want to substitute his own judgment for that of a jury that had reviewed all the evidence. In the years since, at the end of the Bush Administration, Vice President cheney had implored president bush to pardon libby, and it was a real point of contention between the two men as they left office. That did not happen. Conservatives in the years since have raised money on behalf of libby. He lost his law license at the time. It has since been reinstated. But today, President Trump grants a full pardon to Scooter Libby for the crimes he was convicted of in 2007 and go ahead. In terms of timing, what can we make of the timing, why now, and was Scooter Libby lobbying the president for this pardon, because apparently not directly, because according to the statement, President Trump doesnt even know the guy. Reporter there is a process through the department of justice where anyone who is convicted and is seeking a pardon on federal crimes can file paperwork to be reviewed. You often find that in the case of we saw a lot of times when president obama commuted or pardoned those who were convicted of drug crimes. So those were not wellknown individuals. But theres a process by which you can seek an official pardon. Im told that that process had begun for libby. The timing, however, appears much more about a recent influence in the life of this president , joe digenova and Victoria Toensing, two lawyers here in washington, happen to be husband and wife. Toensing is currently Scooter Libbys lawyer. They have had the president s ear and were almost a part of the president s legal team. So one might expect that that case was brought to his attention because of their close proximity to the president. But it is a larger issue that conservatives have been complaining about for years, believing that this was the scope of a special prosecutor going too far. Of course, those who believe the conviction was appropriate say that that is bunk, but today, this president who is living with a different kind of special counsel and a different kind of investigation, that he regularly claims is going too far, you see the similarity, perhaps the sensitivity from President Trump. They cite here in the statement from the white house specific facts related to the libby case that have been known in the Public Domain but it is hard to not see a little selfreflection in the pardon President Trump has signed for Scooter Libby. Scooter libby convicted of one count of obstruction, two counts of perjury and of course, all of this connected to the investigation into the leak of the identity of a cia officer named Valerie Plame, who was on our air here a short time ago. This is just part of what miss plame said about this pardon. Take a listen. I think he is setting this up so that this is a strong signal to those that may be considering cooperating with the special counsel, with muellers investigation. Danny is still with me as well as katie. What do you make of that sentiment from miss plame, that this is clearly a message to those who might get wrapped up in the special counsels investigation this time around . This is trump taking the training wheels off of the president ial pardon. Trump is basically using this as a litmus test to see how outraged will people be. You just heard from the statement, he didnt even know Scooter Libby. Consider the charges you Just Announced that he was convicted of. Obstruction of justice, we have heard a lot about that lately, vis a vis mueller, and lying to the fbi and perjury. The pardon only pardons federal crimes. Trump recently did a pardon when there was no pardon requested joe arpaio. Right. Trump is advancing political and personal interests by way of this pardon. What does this do in terms of precedent, danny . This would seem to be something that should be troubling to folks when you take a step back and look at what this might mean for future administrations. Pardon power is interesting. It is almost unfetterred. It is one of the most limitless powers bestowed on the president by the constitution. Yet there are selfimposed restrictions as we heard talked about. There is a process. There is an office that reviews these requests. So even though the president theoretically can bypass i shouldnt say theoretically. Even though the president can and has bypassed that office, its supposed to go through the process. Yet the power is clear in that the president can just announce a pardon and place any conditions on it that he wants. Its interesting, you mentioned Scooter Libbys law license. One of the things the president cannot do with a federal pardon is affect those collateral consequences like bar licensing, things like that. There are some limits on the pardon power that are beyond federal law. But there are limits. Cant pardon in the cases of impeachment and you cant pardon for future crime. But when it comes to federal crimes already committed, the power is limitless. I think who else is joining us . Kelly odonnell, go ahead. Reporter i just want you to know libbys law license was reinstated by the district of Columbia Court of appeals. So while there are these overwhelming similarities to the current environment, part of the case that they have laid out here is that with the recantation of a witness that there was reasonable evidence presented to the court libby might have been innocent, his law license has been reinstated. Thats the basis they are using for granting this pardon. It is not uncommon for any president , i have covered several of them here, that they dont know who the person they are pardoning in any personal way. Thats not unusual. Going through the normal Justice Department set of parameters where they review the case and they look at all of the mitigating circumstances, that is a process that the president can bypass but again, we are told libby had been seeking that through those normal channels. This is a case where he also performed 400 hours of community service, paid a 250,000 fine and was on probation for two years. Those things have already taken place. The similarities in the circumstances of the modern trump moment and what happened to Scooter Libby years ago are certainly worth talking about, but it is not simply a case of President Trump looking at this file, offering this pardon without at least some factual basis being offered. Of course, others will say a jury reviewed those facts in a long trial and came to a different conclusion. Have we heard from Scooter Libby at all, and can we expect to hear from him . Reporter i have reached out to him and both to the former president , who was involved in the commutation and others in their circle. The guidance i was given is they did not want to say anything until this was official. You can imagine that no one wants to preempt a pardon by saying too much, too soon. That will be the next step of our reporting. Whats he been doing . Reporter well, initially, he was working for the Hudson Institute and he was working in sort of conservative causes, because he now has his law license back. He may be doing legal work. He still to my knowledge lives in the d. C. Area. Hes kept a low profile for a number of years. Kelly odonnell on this breaking news out of the white house on this friday afternoon. The Trump Administration making it official. Scooter libby is going to be pardoned by this administration. His law license was restored a number of years ago. President trump issuing a statement a short time ago saying i dont know mr. Libby personally but for years i have heard he has been treated unfairly. Hopefully this full pardon will help rectify a very sad portion of his life. Libby convicted back in 2007 in a case involving the releasing of the identity of a cia operative at that time, Valerie Plame. Big thanks to kelly o and our attorneys for sticking around with us as well. Another very busy friday afternoon here. The wall street journal has a new report focused on a settlement, another settlement, negotiated by Michael Cohen. This just in from the wall street journal. Im joined on the phone by one of the reporters who broke that story. This is michael rothfeld. Theres the led line. Trump lawyer Michael Colen negotia cohen negotiated 1. 6 million settlement for Top Republican fundraiser. What do we know . This happened late last year. Michael cohen on behalf of Elliott Broidy, deputy finance chair for the Republican National committee along with Michael Cohen. The deal was to pay 1. 6 million to a woman that had claimed she became pregnant from broidy while they were having an exclusive relationship, essentially. She said he was paying her to have an exclusive sexual relationship. She became pregnant and they then reached an agreement which Michael Cohen brokered as mr. Broidys attorney under which she would not disclose any information about this, and the pregnancy was not part of the deal. She was allowed to make her own decision as to what to do about that. But subsequently, did have an abortion allegedly. We got a statement in here from Elliott Broidy and he writes in part to nbc news first, i would like to sincerely apologize to my wife and family for the hurt that i have caused. I acknowledge i had a consensual relationship with a playboy playmate. At the end of our relationship this woman shared with me that she was pregnant. She alone decided that she did not want to continue with the pregnancy and i offered to help her financially during this difficult period. We have not spoken since that time. It is unfortunate that this personal matter between two consenting adults is the subject of National Discussion just because of Michael Cohens involvement. Mr. Cohen reached out to me after being contacted by this womans attorney, keith davidson. Although i had not previously hired mr. Cohen, i retained mr. Cohen after he informed me about his prior relationship with mr. Davidson. I will have no further comment about this matter and i request the media respect my familys privacy. That statement just coming in to nbc news from the man at the center of all of this. This Top Republican fundraiser. Speaking of mr. Davidson here, the attorney involved in this case, is it true, michael, that this is also the same attorney who is involved with the Stormy Daniels case, also represented Stormy Daniels at one point . Thats right. Mr. Davidson represented Stormy Daniels as well as Karen Mcdougal, so he and mr. Cohen knew each other actually through both of those agreements, because Karen Mcdougal was a playmate paid three months before the election by the owner of the national enquirer, 150,000 not to talk about her alleged affair with President Trump, now President Trump, and Stormy Daniels of course, the exporn star who was paid 130,000, mr. Cohen negotiated that directly. Cohen and davidson had worked together and so when mr. Davidson got this client apparently he reached out to mr. Cohen to see if he knew Elliott Broidy because they were both in republican circles and so broidy went to cohen and said okay, can you fix this for me because cohen is trumps fixer, so cohen fixed it. You know, i think we knew Michael Cohen was trumps fixer but now it would seem as if mr. Cohen is a fixer for other Top Republicans. Yes. Hes freelancing his fixing skills, i guess, although now its not really fixed because everyone knows about it which is kind of, we have this pattern of deals that, you know, is to keep quiet alleged sexual escapades that Michael Cohen is involved in and some of which is now under federal investigation. Are there other women out there or do we know . I mean, at this point, of course its possible. Until that comes out, i think that that remains to be seen. Of course, we know the fbi has taken a bunch of files from Michael Cohen. We may very well learn more. Michael rothfeld with the wall street journal on another developing story here. Again, Michael Cohen, the president s personal attorney, its just been revealed he negotiated a more than 1. 5 million settlement for a Top Republican fundraiser who met playboy model and impregnated her. This was essentially part of another nondisclosure agreement. We will take a break, catch our breath and come back with more. How do you win at business . Stay at la quinta. Where were changing with stylish makeovers. Then at your next meeting, set your seat height to its maximum level. Bravo, tall meeting man. Start winning today. Book now at lq. Com back now with more on our breaking news. President trump has pardoned former bush political operative louis Scooter Libby, dick cheneys former chief of staff. He was convicted of perjury, convicted of lying to the fbi and obstruction of justice back in 2007. Although his prison sentence would ultimately be commuted by then president george w. Bush, the charges stemmed from an investigation into the unlawful disclosure of the identity of cia agent Valerie Plame. To make matters more complicated, who was the Deputy Attorney general that assigned the special prosecutor to investigate libby in the first place . You guessed it. Jim comey. Jonathan swan of axios, some new reporting on this. Jonathan, i understand you were on the phone with Victoria Toensing as the news broke. Yes. So people were trying to figure out, you know, behind the scenes what happened here. One thing that no one seems to have picked up on is that Scooter Libbys pardon lawyer is Victoria Toensing, who is the wife of joe digenova and the two of them, the president recently considered adding them to his legal team. Ultimately decided not to. She, i just got off the phone with her and the minute before that, she had been on the phone with President Trump. She told me that President Trump said to her hes followed this for a long time and quote, he got screwed. So slightly different language than they used in the official White House Press release. Then she said hold on, scooters calling. She had to get off the phone to talk to scooter. But she said scooters delighted about this and she submitted the letter last year requesting the pardon. So jonathan, its safe to say Victoria Toensing, we have known for awhile she has the ear of the president. Its safe to say she was personally lobbying President Trump for this pardon. She wont comment on conversations that they had, but that is my understanding, that she has brought this up verbally with the president. Yes. And its also again, according to the statement we got from the white house a short time ago, the president saying in this statement that he does not know mr. Libby personally. Thats also your understanding . I dont have any information whatsoever about his relationship with Scooter Libby. But i believe that, because i can just tell you some of Scooter Libbys friends were trying to figure out, people, maybe friends is too strong, people who worked with him and have known him were trying to figure out what actually happened behind the scenes because it caught some people by surprise, frankly. I will tell you, Victoria Toensing was nervous earlier today when i was talking to her. You know, she thought it was going to happen but she was still on the edge of her seat just hoping that the white house would follow through. Do you get the sense or do you know whether we are going to hear from Scooter Libby at some point in the near future . He just put out a statement, sort of thanking President Trump and i havent even had a chance to read the whole statement yet. I literally just got it in my email. I dont know whether he plans to do a Public Statement or not. All right. We are going to effort that statement as well. Jonathan swan with our friends at axios with more on this breaking news. Thanks as always for your hard work, sir. Again, as we effort that statement, when we get that statement from Scooter Libby we will pass it along to you here. Meanwhile, to the latest in the russia investigation. Nbc news has learned special counsel Robert Muellers office is proceeding with its investigation under the assumption that the president will not be sitting down for an interview. Muellers team had reportedly been in talks with the white house for months to determine the scope of a potential sitdown before negotiations fell apart following mondays raid on trump lawyer Michael Cohen. For more on this, im joined by nbc News National political reporter carol lee in washington. What does this mean for the future of Robert Muellers investigation . Well, what our reporting shows is that it could have an impact on the obstruction of justice piece of the Mueller Investigation in the sense that the president and his legal team had been in these negotiations for months over whether or not he would sit for an interview. They were hashing out final sticking points and this raid against Michael Cohen happens and all of that gets upended. The interview is very much, you know, in question and some say it will never happen, some say its just unlikely to happen. So then you get move over to what happens to the obstruction piece because sources tell us that Robert Mueller is essentially finished with that piece of the investigation, that hes talked to all the witnesses he needs to talk to in terms of that and hes seen the documents and it was essentially just waiting for the decision on whether or not the president was going to sit for an interview because one of the things that you would want in this portion of the case is to know what the president s intent intent was. So if that doesnt happen and the president and mueller chooses not to subpoena the president , then he can move at any time with his obstruction of justice piece of the investigation. Do you get the sense that there is a strong consideration now that Robert Mueller will subpoena this president for a sitdown . I dont think that we know. Theres different theories about whether he will or wont. We do know that the president s legal team was exploring different ideas for how to push back on a subpoena, and one of them being the argument that if the president cant be sitting president cant be indicted, that the sitting president cant be subpoenaed. So they were prepared to make arguments, if it comes to that. I just dont think we know exactly where thats going. But g he does, two certainly drag this out for many months longer than if he didnt and decided to just close the obstruction of justice case, at least, without an interview and without a subpoena. Is the administration concerned at all about the optics of this president not sitting down for an interview with the special counsel after spending the better part of 15 months denying any collusion or any sort of involvement . You know, yes and no. I think that the president seems to go back and forth about this. Sometimes feeling defiant, like i can handle Robert Mueller, why are people saying i cant handle him. And then at other times, and currently, our sources have said that this is his current mood or at least was in recent hours that hes more likely to say why would i participate in this witch hunt. So i think it can kind of go either way. He certainly laid the groundwork in terms of the court of Public Opinion and among his supporters and casting this investigation as a witch hunt, as being politically motivated. So you could envision a scenario in which he says im not going to sit down and engage in Something Like this becauser ins just out to get me. On the other hand he can just say im not going to back down from Robert Mueller, i am not afraid of this and im not going to do it. He seems to go back and forth about that. I think members of his legal team, we do know, have argued to him that he should not sit for an interview. Then others are more open to it. From National Little bit reporter carol lee for us on this friday. As always, thanks. Enjoy your weekend. Reporters in the White House Press briefing surely have a long list of subjects to cover from today. The pardon of Scooter Libby. President firing back at james comey. Strategy for handling syria. The information that we just shared with you regarding the Mueller Investigation and russia. We will be watching that briefing about 35 minutes or so from now. This is msnbc. Dont work your way upfront without it. And dont watch her dance, like nobodys watching without it. Early ticket access. Another way we have your back. The powerful backing of american express. Dont live life without it. Lets team up to get the lady of the house of american express. Back on her feet. And help her feel more strength and energy in just two weeks yaaay the complete balanced nutrition of great tasting ensure with 9 grams of protein and 26 vitamins and minerals. Ensure. Always be you. Your body was made for Better Things than rheumatiod arthritis. Before you and your rheumatologist move to another treatment, ask if xeljanz xr is right for you. Xeljanz xr is a oncedaily pill for adults with moderate to severe ra for whom methotrexate did not work well. It can reduce pain, swelling and further joint damage, even without methotrexate. Xeljanz xr can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. Serious, sometimes fatal infections, lymphoma and other cancers have happened. Dont start xeljanz xr if you have an infection. Tears in the stomach or intestines, low blood cell counts and higher liver tests and cholesterol levels have happened. Your doctor should perform blood tests before you start and while taking xeljanz xr, and monitor certain liver tests. Tell your doctor if you were in a region where fungal infections are common and if you have had tb, hepatitis b or c, or are prone to infections. Xeljanz xr can reduce the symptoms of ra, even without methotrexate. Ask your rheumatologist about xeljanz xr. I we worked with pg eof to save energy because wenie. Wanted to help the school. They would put these signs on the door to let the teacher know you didnt cut off the light. The teachers, they would call us the energy patrol. So they would be like, here they come, turn off your lights those three young ladies were teaching the whole school about energy efficiency. We actually saved 50,000. And thats just one school, two semesters, three girls. Together, were building a better california. Kids are worth it kids are worth it. Thats the rallying cry from thousands of teachers grae eree outside of kentuckys state capital. Teachers demanding higher salaries and more classroom funds. This is how the movement has grown. It all started in west virginia. Thats where teachers all over that state spent nine days on the picket lines. Their efforts won them a 5 pay raise, the states First Teacher pay raise in years p. The movement spread to oklahoma yesterday after lawmakers approved more than 400 million in new education spending. Oklahomas governor also agreed to a 6,100 pay raise. Teachers in arizona are now weighing more action after the governor there gave in to some of their demands last night. Hes proposing to boost teacher salaries in arizona by 20 in 2020. Now as the crowds grow in frankfurt, kentucky, what can we expect there . Thats where we find nbcs ron mott, at the State Capitol in frankfurt. Ron, whats happening on the ground there, sir . Reporter hey there, craig. I dont know if you can hear this crowd of teachers up on the steps of the capitol here. Someone on the loud speaker just told them to walk to the doors and let these lawmakers hear you because lawmakers are now voting, we believe, on a new budget bill and or a new tax reform bill that the governor has previously vetoed. Whats really the big rub for a lot of these teachers is the new pension law the governor signed that goes into effect on july 1st. It will affect new teachers especially who will no longer have a full pension program, what the teachers have enjoyed here in kentucky. Theyve gone to this hiybrid pension 401 k savings program. It is going to be a lot less than teachers already in the system. Teachers are complaining about the threat from Charter Schools and the movement that betsy devos and the Trump Administration are pushing around the nation to bring Charter Schools online. Kentucky just passed Charter School legislation last year. We expect to see those doors open in the 20192020 academic year. Teachers who are working around the state in Public Schools are worried that any funding diverted from Public Schools to go to Charter Schools is going to have a very negative impact on their student population. So while the teachers are fighting for budget increases for better pay, for better benefits, they say it is all for the children that they serve in these communities around the commonwealth. If you can hear them, they are loud and fired up in their red shirts. Weve seen thousands of teachers come and go. Theyll be at it a few hours more. Legislature session ends tomorrow. The state law requires that it is over by the 15th of april. If they dont get this budget deal passed, more than likely the governor will have to call for a special session to get the budget passed before this year. Thank you, ron mott. Well send you off to your weekend with a little smile here. An unforgettable moment at a Philadelphia Phillies game. Joan and her daughters dancing on the feel the with the famous mascot, the philly fanatic. The stadiums announcer interrupted them and said another Family Member wanted to join and this is what happened next. That is air force major robert routen whos been away from his family the last six months, deployed overseas. Based out of joint base mcguire and that is the kind of video that never gets old. Always makes me smile. Hopefully made you smile as well. It makes me cry but i cry at indianapolis commercials. Im insurance commercials. Craig melvin, happy weekend. Now to the news. 11 00 a. M. Out west and 2 00 p. M. At the white house where we are following this breaking news. A president ial pardon for Scooter Libby, the former chief of staff to dick cheney was convicted of lying to the fbi and a grand jury back in 2000. During an investigation into who leaked the identity of a cia
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