Might happen as the 11th hour gets under way on a friday nigh night. Good evening from our nbc news Head Quarters in new york. This was day 687 of the Trump Administration and lets say this at the outset, each and every night on this broadcast where the russia investigation is concerned this may have been the most consequential day so far. Prosecutors from the president s own Justice Department accused him of engaging in a felony. Three new Court Documents fired by Robert Mueller and federal prosecutors in the Southern District of new york detailing trump, Michael Cohen, and Paul Manafort and have shed new lights on the investigation and what could be an existential threat to this administration. Trump tried to get out ahead of it between 6 00 and 10 00 a. M. This morning with tirade on twitter. Individual one is how our president is referred to in Court Documents. Mueller filed a document that indicated cohen met with the special counsel seven times and has, quote, provided relevant and truthful information. Cohen told mueller about his own contacts with russia interests during the campaign and discussions with others making those contacts. He also provided information about attempts by other Russian Nationals to reach the campaign. He said in november, 2015, he received Contact Information and spoke with a Russian National who claimed to be a trusted american the Russian Federation who could offer the Campaign Political synergy and synergy on a government level. This person repeatedly proposed a meeting between individual one our president and the president of russia. Mueller says in the filing cohen provided useful information, quote, concerning certain matter s core to its investigation that he obtained by virtue of his regular contact with Company Executives during the campaign as well as, quote, relevant and useful information concerning his contacts with persons connected to the white house during the 2017 2018 time period. That brings it up to this year. And describe the circumstances of preparing and circulating his response to the congressional inquiries while continuing to accept responsibility for the false statements contained within it. You may recall cohen has admitted to lying to congress about trumps attempt to build a tower in moscow while campaigning for the white house. There was a footnote in todays court filing and we quote again. In a radio interview in september, 2015, the defendant, Michael Cohen, suggested that individual one, trump, meet with the president of russia in new york city during his visit for the u. N. General assembly. The defendant admitted that this account was false and that he had, in fact, conferred with trump about contacting the russian government. Heres Michael Cohen during that radio interview, september 17, of 2015, followed by trump just three days later. Theres a better than likely chance trump may meet with putin when he comes here for the united nations. People want to meet donald trump. Your outside counsel intimated you may have a meeting with the russian president. Do you plan on trying to do that . Well, i had heard that he wanted to meet with me and certainly i am open to it, i would love to do that if he wants to do that. I dont know that it will take place. Im not sure. I know people have been talking but well see what happens but certainly if he wanted to meet. Id like id enjoy doing it. Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of new york also filed their own memo to advise a judge on Michael Cohens sentence. It lays out all of cohens crimes over the course of several years, quote, willful tax evasion, making false statements to a financial institution, Illegal Campaign contributions, and making false statements to congress. Whats key here is about what prosecutors say about trump and the hush money payments to Stormy Daniels and karen mcdougal. Quote, during the campaign, cohen played a central role in two similar schemes to purchase the rights to stories, each from women who claim to have had an affair with individual one, trump, so as to suppress the stories and thereby prevent them from influencing the election. With respect to both payments, cohen acted with the intent to influence the 2016 president ial election. And as cohen himself has now admitted with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and at the direction of donald trump, individual one. That right there amounts to Justice Department prosecutors accusing the president of a felony. Cohen has been cooperating with both mueller and the Southern District of new york prosecutors. Hes scheduled to be sentenced next wednesday. While mueller acknowledges cohens assistance, the team in new york was less than impressed with his information. They argued that he deserve, quote, a substantial prison term which could amount to about four years. In a harsh attack on cohen, prosecutors in new york say he was motivated by greed and he did not deserve much leniency in exchange for cooperating with the government. Mueller also filed documents on extrump Campaign Chairman manafort, who he accuses of lying to prosecutors even as he was cooperating with the government. Mueller says manafort has met with investigators 12 times. He says manafort did not tell the truth about a number of issues, including his contacts with the Trump Administration during this year. With that, lets bring in our front four, peter baker, chief White House Correspondent for the new york times. Former u. S. Attorney joyce vance who spent 25 years as a federal prosecutor. Frank figliuzzi, former fbi assistant director for counterintelligence who in the past has worked for one Robert Mueller. And jeremy bash, former chief of staff at the cia and the pentagon. Joyce, i would like to begin with you. Did we get it about right that this is trumps own doj just alleging that he directed a felony and part two of my question to you is if this were donald trump civilian, would todays papers have included an indictment perhaps . I think that those are the perfect questions to start with. Youre absolutely right. This is not Robert Mueller and 17 angry democrats making these allegations. This comes from the Southern District of new york, a venerable u. S. Attorneys office thats tough but fair and charges people with crimes and has a great track record of convictions. So thats where this charge comes from. By the same token, if President Trump were citizen trump, he would likely be charged in this indictment. The protection he has against indictments stems from dojs policy of being very hesitant, if not forbidding the indictment of a president and then i think in fairness to the president , we have to mention that this violation that hes charged with, the Campaign Finance violation, typically you hear prosecutors or police say ignorance of the law is no excuse. When it comes to the Campaign Finance violation, though, prosecutors have to prove defendants knew that they were violating the law, so thats maybe the one outstanding issue here is whether theres evidence that trump when he engaged in this conduct with cohen knew he was violating Campaign Finance law. But thats pretty slender hope for the president. So, frank, after a life in and around the law as an investigators, what leapt off these pages to you . And i have to say that when you look around the cable news sphere tonight, there are some trying awfully hard to say nothing to see here. Sean hannity said tonight on fox news he read all the documents and was ready to fall asleep. So give us a reality check. Just how bad a day was this for the Trump Administration and donald trump . Well, if sean hannity fell asleep reading this, he should sleep with one eye open because interesting things are about to happen. As youve already said, our own government today has labelled our president a likely criminal, as directing criminal activity. Understand this is not just about silencing women who youve had affairs with. This is about Money Laundering as you pay these payments in a covert fashion to mask where they came from. It could involve other crimes. But what leapt off the pages for me, brian, i saw a couple things. One is that cohen gave mueller information about his preparation and circulation of congressional testimony. We already know that cohen lied during his congressional testimony, but now we have seen something more. That he shared his draft testimony with unknown people. Why is mueller telling us that . Who are these people. Does this reach to the president himself . Who was directing or telling cohen what he could or could not see . Secondly, lets not forget what this investigation of muellers is all about, its about russia, an adversarial government. What did we learn today in this filing . We learned that cohen was cooperating significantly with mueller and providing information as far back as 2015 about overtures from russians to get next to trump and where this would go. And why is mueller telling us that . If its meaningless to him he wouldnt even mention it but he threw in the there because it goes to the core of what his investigation is about. He already knows what the russian involvement is. Cohen likely corroborated that for mueller from his end. Jeremy bash, i know you told one of our producers that what leapt out at you was the money, the huge amounts of money where russia is concerned. December 7, brian, a date which will live in infamy for the Trump Legal Team because i think today the full gamut of trumps legal troubles were laid bare for everybody to see and the thing that i really honed in on when reading the sentencing memo about Michael Cohen was the fact that the moscow trump tower deal was going to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Those are the words on the page. Hundreds of millions of dollars in licensing and licensing fees for the trump organization, for donald trump. So contemplate this for a moment. The government has proven through evidence that while trump was securing the republican nomination for the presidency, Vladimir Putin was authorizing a direct payment to him and his business of hundreds of millions of dollars. If that doesnt establish a very troubling pattern of financial impropriety and potentially outright bribery, im not sure what does. Peter baker, put it that way and it sounds serious. In your early reporting, is there any accounting yet from inside this white house that anyone there views this as the deathly serious moment that it clearly is . Well, it is deathly serious. Its a big moment in this investigation. Were starting to connect the dots. What weve had up until now is a series of desperate factual scenarios that didnt necessarily tell us the whole picture and the one person who does is Robert Mueller. Hes showing his hand one card at a time and it reminds us, one of the things you get out of these documents is how much does he know that hes not telling us . Hes been very good about not leaking. Not producing information before hes ready to do and every time he puts out one of these document wes get a glimpse of some detail that pulls us together. The idea that the russians were connected as early as november, 2015 suggests they were trying from the start to infiltrate the trump circle. The fact that Michael Cohen tells us that he was negotiating to try to construct this hundreds of millions of dollar building all the way up through june of 2016 is the other point on that thing. You draw the line from one to the next and start to see a picture. Frank figliuzzi, we now know we had russians at the Rnc Convention in cleveland. Weve had russians in the oval office. We now know the russians reached out. Put on your counterintelligence hat for a moment. Russians reached out to cohen talking about lets find some political synergies between the two of us. Is that what were supposed to call what we have now . I call it one hand washes the other. Corruption. Prosecutors call it quid pro quo, you do this for me, i do this for you. Thats what was happening here and we saw an all hands on deck effort by the russian government and Intelligence Services to penetrate the campaign in any way they could. I believe they found their vector for the russian invection through manafort. We can talk about that as the show progresses but we saw an effort directed by putin himself get next to this candidate, get him compromised and lets get our man in this oval office. Joyce, something we noticed. Cohen is being called in these documents to account for public statements he made that were false. Why is that an important distinction here . So we dont know for certain from these pleadings but ive got a theory, brian, because this involves cohen going very publicly, releasing a twopage document ahead of his testimony and giving a public rendition of how hes going to accelerate the timeline for the trump moscow project. Instead of continuing through primaries close to the time where candidate trump becomes the nominee, he pushes it much further back so that nothing is happening after january, 2016, or thereabouts. And when he does that publicly hes telling everyone else, its time to line up, this is what our story should look like. He doesnt sit down with folks and arrange explicitly for that to happen, that would be a conspiracy and somebody might flip but he gives this implicit instruction hoping they can get away with doing it like that. I think thats why this is mentioned so carefully in the document wes see today. Jeremy bash, if we fast forward and look at this a certain way and someone comes up to you and says wait a minute, all of this was about hotels and money and hotel rooms that had the trump brand name on them . Will you be confident saying yes it appears that was the motivation . No, id put it differently. I think this was about leverage. It was about Financial Leverage over donald trump to make him indebted to the Russian Federation in the way they lent him money and did business deals with him so when he came into office he would owe them big time their interference in a campaign set up a situation in which they were able to demand that the income Trump Administration do certain things with them and they did exactly what they asked to be done. They helped avert sanctions on russia. They began to denigrate nato and posture the most prorussian Foreign Policy coming out of washington in our history. Peter baker, interesting timing on all of this, of course, the Financial Markets are having a go of it. Theres all kinds of dire predictions about the economy near term. Do you have a favorite bell weather in your reporting in the coming days . Republicans, perhaps, that you will dial around to who will have come around to the realization themselves that things just got real. Thats the real question because, in fact, what youre going to see after this of course are a lot of people who suspected the worst about President Trump, who already believed he was in cahoots with the russians saying ahha, you know, were seeing more evidence of that and the people who dont believe it are saying well, this doesnt prove anything, this is so much smoke and mirrors. So the question is what about those republican lawmakers, particularly republicans in the senate. Does this begin to change that doing . Does it begin to shift their thinking about these things . Im not sure whether it will. I wont see any sign of it yet, still early. But they have digested an awful lot over these 20 months in terms of revelations. They have digested the firing of an fbi director and now the firing of an attorney general. They have digested the news of the trump tower meeting. Theyve digested all these different revelations and pieces of information and basically concluded, well, you know, were still on his side. And as long as thats the case, where this actually will lead us is still an open question because theres not likely to be any kind of an indictment, at least not of the president so where does that leave us . To our viewers, a brief note. We have so much news, so many Court Filings weve had to divide them up into two trenches having just dealt with the cohen set. Were going to take a break, our panel agreed to stay with us. When we come back, well take a deeper dive into the manafort filing and what we could learn between the redacted lines. And later, what Rex Tillerson said that caused the president to call his former secretary of state dumb as a rock and lazy as hell. Thats a first in u. S. History as far as we can tell. Laur ju the 11th hour just Getting Started on this consequential night. Dozen wings. 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In todays court filing, Robert Muellers team says Paul Manafort told multiple discernible lies on a number of topics after signing a plea deal saying he would work for the feds in effect by cooperating with the special counsel. This filing says manafort lied about his interactions with konstantin kilimnik, a russian who has alleged ties to russian intelligence. Also says manafort lied about a separate doj investigation about a Wire Transfer and about contact with Trump Administration officials. According to the feds, manafort has said he had no direct or Indirect Communications with anyone in the Trump Administration. But federal prosecutors write, quote, the evidence demonstrates that manafort had contacts with Administration Officials. For instance, in a Text Exchange from may, 26 of 2018, manafort authorized a person to speak with an Administration Official on manaforts behalf. Separately, according to another manafort colleague, manafort said in february, 2018, that manafort had been in communication with a senior Administration Official up through february, 2018. A review of documents recovered from a search of manaforts electronic documents demonstrates additional contacts with Administration Officials. Back with us, peter baker, joyce vance, Frank Figliuzzi, jeremy bash. Jeremy, on this manafort matter, im trying to focus my thinking on area two of todays Court Documents, what is your takeaway about this relationship between Trump Team Trump and manafort . Well, i think the important player here is konstantin kilimnik. Youd be forgiven on a friday night from your getting confused with your kilimniks, yoand othe names. He was indicted by the special counsel back if june for trying to witness tamper and theres clearly something that manafort is trying to do to minimize his relationships with this individual and this individual was one of the individuals who was trying to set up briefings during the campaign for people like oleg deripaska, whos obviously a close putin ally, and theres something in the kilimnik relationship that loops back to the kremlin that Paul Manafort deems too big of a secret to confess to at this hour. Speaking of secrets, again today, the terror of the black lines of redaction. What do you read into the black lines of redaction in these documents . Yeah. While many folks might be disappointed that we didnt learn more specific details tod today, the reality is those black lines of redaction tell us mueller has reached a level of target and sensitivity that he cannot yet afford to disclose. He doesnt want to fall into what i call the comey trap which is being accused of unnecessarily or prematurely exposing and tainting a public figure. He doesnt need to do that but its also part of a strategy to lock in the facts. Remember, its redacted from us, but its not redacts from the court system or that federal judge. So hes putting this on the record in the event he gets fired or that his report is ultimately put in a shredder. Hes using the court system to tell the story. The fact that we cant see it should not disappoint us but should tell us that hes on to something and its so big and so sensitive that he cant yet disclose it to us. Joyce, on all of this, the sum total of all of this, im not trying to get you in a tussle with a harvard law professor whose back may be sore after the water weight from carrying the water for this president , its been observed of late, but here now well talk about on the other side Alan Dershowitz on his view of the sum total of today. Well, i think were seeing a coming attraction to what the report will be and i think the report will set out a circumstantial case based on all the lying thats taking place. A circumstantial case for arguably political sins. But i dont see any crimes. Joyce, he doesnt see any crimes. Do you . I disagree with him very strongly. I think there are all sorts of crimes here, including a crime that lands at the president s doorstep. And this issue of well, theres only circumstantial evidence is absolutely silly, because prosecutors rely on circumstantial evidence all the time. If you go to sleep at night and theres no snow on the ground and you wake up in the morning and theres know, you can be pretty certain that it snowed overnight. There might be another explanation but its more than likely that it snowed. Prosecutors use circumstantial evidence all the time, you dont have to have a smoking gun in every case. Here where youve got witness after witness lining up and where youve now got evidence that there wasnt just suddenly a trump tower meeting out of the blue with russians in 2016 but rather a course of conduct between folks in the Trump Campaign and the russian government or at least government linked that spanned years, its not so much smoke and mirrors. Its looking like hard evidence. Jeremy, by the way, we must say on this broadcast once a week dont lie to the feds. Rule two is see rule one, dont lie to the feds. Paul manafort, i note, went before the grand jury on october 26 and november 2. Six days later hes called out for lying to the feds. A lot of the big convictions in this case, george papadopoulos, cohen, flynn and Paul Manafort have been about obstructing the investigation, about misleading investigators, both the senate and House Intelligence Committee as well as the fbi and special counsels office. And i think fundamentally what bob mueller is signaling to all of the targets in this investigation, including the person who sits in the o s is i office is that if you try to obama outbound instruct an investigation, were coming after you. We have a betterthanaverage White House Correspondent on this panel. The president responded to todays Court Filings related to his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen by saying, quote, totally clears the president. Thank you. We should take pains to note that no serious person who read these Court Documents tonight came away with that same take away. And earlier tonight we got this summation of what it all means from the governments former lawyer before the supreme court, this is neal katyal and he said this about todays filing from the feds here in new york. This is Southern District prosecutors, his own Justice Department, trumps own appointees saying that you, mr. President , are directly implicated in federal felonies and they have to do with Campaign Finance violations. Thats another thing trump has been gambling on, i can say no collusion with russia and what this document says is theres a whole separate thing going on here. If im the president tonight right now and i can read, which its unclear whether he did read any of this stuff but once he reads it, if he reads it, its devastating. Peter baker, i have one more for you. I have a chunk from the president s wild and woolly news conference. This was february of 2017 and the topic was russia. Russia is a ruse. I have nothing to do with russia. Havent made a phone call to russia in years. Dont speak to people from russia. Not that i wouldnt, i just have nobody to speak to. I spoke to putin twice. He called me on the election, i told you this. And he called me on the inauguration. I have nothing to do with russia. To the best of my knowledge, no person that ill do with does. So peter, that last bit was interesti in interesting. The last part was not true because obviously people he does slow in in fact had something to do with russia including, by the way, his own son, his soninlaw, his Campaign Chairman and his personal attorney. We know that repeatedly. He leaves the impression by using the present tense i have no deals with russia which might or might not have been the case but as recently as a few months before that press conference he was trying to have something to do with russia through his agent, through his fixer Michael Cohen. The idea that were going to build a multi hundreds of millions of dollar tower in moscow at the same time were running for president , the same time as was pointed out here the platform was changed at the republican committee, of course its going to raise alarm bells. I dont know whether its criminal or not, im not a lawyer but its much more theres much more there than the president was acknowledging in february, 2017. Where does it end up . Thats the ultimate question but each kind of piece is being put together and a wall is being built around him and hes feeling penned in. Joyce, you are a lawyer and its kind of hard to believe our president is now referred to as individual 1 in these federal documents. Could it be . Is there any way that for him this is just beginning . Its undoubtedly just beginning. Mueller has, as weve always said, shown us the tip of the iceberg. We dont have good sonar that lets us know whats buried beneath. But increasingly its clear that mueller selectively puts information into Court Pleadings and limits it to whats essential to get it to the next step. We dont know what sells out there regarding the president but it seems very unlikely his troubles end tonight. Frank, what neal katyal said that we just ran is devastating for donald trump. Well, and lets go to the other clip you played where trump was actually saying to the best of my knowledge no one around me is talking to russians. Hes almost hanging his family members out to dry here. We know from cohen and from the filing that he was briefing family members on the moscow tower project and so is our president ready to distance himself from his family members and say i didnt know what they were doing, thats on them. I think were coming close to seeing someone with the last name of trump or kushner in criminal indictments and we need to determine whether the president is going to stand up and say i knew about this or whether he will let them hang out to dry. And jeremy, you know this because youve been around a while. Its a big distinction to journalists first of all but also a lot of washingtonbased lawyers. When something goes into the white house, when something reaches into the white house you hear people say keep it out of the white house. These documents reached into the white house this year, 2018. Yeah, thats right. And the discussions between Administration Officials and Paul Manaforts counsel obviously raises the specter of a pardon for Paul Manafort and one has to wonder at this hour whether thats his ultimate game. In response to my former professor Alan Dershowitz and the sense that this is only political and theres no criminal activity, just imagine had a u. S. Senator taken hundreds of millions of dollars from the Russian Federation during an Election Campaign and then once that person was in Office Actually did every single thing that the Russian Federation asked to include stating they believed the kgbs word over the cia, no one would have doubt there was criminal activity afoot. Again, i say, put it that way, this sounds serious. We have asked a lot of our front four and we are in their debt. Thanks to peter baker, joyce vance, Frank Figliuzzi and jeremy bash for their superb analysis of what we keep saying is such a consequential friday. Another break for us and coming up, the other first in this administration today. My name is jeff sheldon, and im the founder of ugmonk. Before shipstation it was crazy, like. Its great when you see a hundred orders come in, but then you realize ive got a hundred orders i have to ship out. Shipstation streamlined that whole process. The order data, the weights of the items, everything is seamlessly put into shipstation, so when we print the shipping label everythings pretty much done. Its so much easier so now were ready, bring on the orders. Shipstation. The number one choice of online sellers. Go to shipstation. Com tv and get two months free. If your moderate to severeor crohns symptoms are holding you back, and your Current Treatment hasnt worked well enough it may be time for a change. 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It can even warm your feet to help you fall asleep faster. How smart is that . Smarter sleep. To help you shed those sugar cookies, get a running start on the holidays, and take it all in with the patience of a saint. Dont miss the last chance to save up to 500 on select sleep number 360 smart beds. Ends monday. The president would say heres what i want to do and heres how i want to do it and i would have to say to him, well, mr. President , i understand what you want to do but you cant do it that way. It violates the law, it violates a treaty. [ laughter ] he got frustrated and i think he grew tired of me being the guy everyday that told him you cant do that. Nine months after being fired via twitter, former secretary of state Rex Tillerson is finally breaking his silence about donald trump. His administration experience. He had a discussion with journalist and fellow Texan Bob Schieffer in houston. Tillerson talked about the challenges of working for this particular president. Most challenging for me coming from the disciplined, highly processoriented Exxonmobil Corporation to go to work for a man who is pretty undisciplined, doesnt like to read, doesnt read briefing reports, doesnt like to get into the details of a lot of things but rather just kind of says, look this is what i believe. And you can try to convince me otherwise but most of the time youre not going to do that. The response, as predictable as a beautiful sunset in texas hill country, came from donald trump this afternoon and we quote. Rex tillerson didnt have the mental capacity needed. He was dumb as a rock and i couldnt get rid of him fast enough. He was lazy as hell. It was right around this time last year that nbc news first reported tillerson called the president a moron, something tillerson refused to confirm at the time. With us tonight, our own andrea mitchell, nbc news chief Foreign Correspondent and we have prevailed upon the chief White House Correspondent for the new york times, peter baker, to hang out for a little longer. Andrea, you had a front row seat on the tillerson era at the state department. What did you make of this conversation with our mutual friend mr. Schieffer . Well, trust Bob Schieffer to be able to get that out of Rex Tillerson. That was the most honest, direct statement id ever heard from Rex Tillerson. He never fully denied the moron question when we reported it, as you recall, and when we asked him, he said, you know, i never discuss what i say about the president. He never flatly denied it. He didnt lie about it. We all knew he felt it. But for him to say he didnt read, he didnt take briefings, we all know that. But the other people around the president are not willing to quite say that. And this was a man who had been fired fired. He was just back from asia and at 8 30 in the morning he was fired and it was humiliating and a terrible end to a really bad relationship. Peter baker as you know, from achieving the rank of eagle scout to running exxonmobil, Rex Tillerson has generally succeeded at everything in life. And then he gets caught up in the other bit of the trump folks. Exxonmobil is a Big Enough Company to have its own weather forecasters and today he gets called lazy as hell and dumb as a rock by donald trump. This is an administration that even managed to leak out the fact that he was on the john when he got the call from general kelly, he was overseas and was told his services would no longer be needed. Is that this part of that nowfamiliar pattern of diminishing those, everybody the ones high and mighty who serve and spend time around this orbit . Whats striking, of course, is some of the harshest critics you see of President Trump are the people that once were in his circle. People who worked with him, whether it be now his first secretary of state, whether it be liz ghostwriter on his first book, the art of the deal, whether it be the guy who ran his casino in new jersey, whether it be one of his contestants from Celebrity Apprentice or the producer who helped make Celebrity Apprentice in the first place. These are the people out there saying things about the president that describe what they found disturbing and when he pushes back, he elevates their stature in effect. I mean, a lot of people were paying attention to what Rex Tillerson said today but then it leaped on into a further stratosphere when the president took it on himself rather than letting it go by and hoped it wouldnt be as noticed. Other president s hadnt even criticized by disgruntled former aides would have tried to turn the other cheek or leave it to surrogates, not try to push back with something as colorful as dumb as a rock but this is a president who doesnt like to be criticized and when he is criticized; as he said repeatedly, hell hit back ten times as hard. Andrea, the state department, your beat for so many years roaring back into the news because the spokeswoman at state has been nominated to replace nikki haley as our United States ambassador to the u. N. , former fox friends cohost heather nauert. Well, and the irony here is that tillerson really excluded her, never took her on a trip, didnt include her in briefings because he always felt she was forced on him by the white house or a white house spy so she was never in the inner circle but shes risen like a shooting star under mike pompeo and is very close to him, has been a strong adviser and this nomination today is a real vote of confidence in pompeo who is very close to the president over john bolton and the fact with that they are demoting the position, it wont be of cabinet rank. Shes not a diplomat, shes not a Foreign Policy adviser, she is a spokesperson and its another testimony to the way the president really believes in television. He likes tv. He watches it arguably way too much and he believes in that as a virtue, but not in diplomacy. I was with about 35 retired Foreign Service officers and ambassadors today, they asked to come in and talk to me about the state department which, lets face, Rex Tillerson did a great er filling vacancies and not understanding the role, so theres that. And in the middle of all this, the tweet happened and i broke it to them. They were shocked that anyone who had been secretary of state could be treated so abominably on twitter. Believe me, they are no fans of Rex Tillerson for not appointing assistant secretaries. Basically, he never got past the white house personnel block which would not let him put people in and he was stymied in every possible way. Shes going to have some problems, i think, in confirmed because shes not a diplomat. Shes going up against the russian ambassador, a 30year veter veteran. Shes got great skills, shes very transparent, she believes in the media, shes been successful at her job but theres a great argument that you need Daniel Patrick moynihan or bush 41 which he was a great u. N. Ambassador or all of the big diplomatic figures, madeleine albright, thomas pickering, just think, andrew young, think of the people who have been in that position and this is definitely putting someone in who does not have that kind of stature. Good time to take our next break. Again, both of our friends have agreed to stay with us for just a little bit longer. When we come back, the palace intrigue surrounding another key figure in this administration. The newest round of reporting tonight that a big name in the west wing is out yet again. Why didnt you book your Family Vacation on a travel site . At hilton. Com, i get the price match guarantee. And i can choose from their 14 Different Hotel brands, so i get the right hotel for every member of my family. 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Nbc news is reporting President Trumps chief of staff, former general john kelly has been called in and answered several questions from the special counsel. Those questions focused on a reported conversation kelly witnessed in march where President Trump allegedly asked then White House Counsel Don Mcgahn to fire Robert Mueller. The report suggests the special counsel is looking into people whove witnessed possible instances of obstruction of justice. This news came hours after four separate sources told nbc news of kellys departure from the white house being, quote, imminent. Still with us, andrea mitchell, mitchell, peter baker. Andrea, do you believe it this time any more than the other times . I do believe it. The reporting from every one of these sources is that he is on his way out. They had a christmas dinner if r the staff tonight at the white house, and it was possibly his last big event there. We think it is imminent. We know its been long the desire of members of the family and others close people around the president who felt that he was not letting the president run the white house the way he wanted to run it. Now, we know that he clashed with Jared Kushner over the security clearances and he kept a lot of the good friends out of the oval office. Thats the kind of order you would want in the white house, but it created a lot of resentments. Its a pretty logical time coming into a reelection mode and you would want to have someone more political adept than this former general, retired general that was good at many things, but not at hill politics. And if it is the chief of staff to mike pence, who is a 36yearold Strong Political operative and knows the way washington works, very good on the hill, that would be a good time to make that kind of decision in any case. And this is a mans life and livelihood and retirement. He tried to retire once. Hes given every year of his adult life in service to his country. But these rumors have come and gone sporadically. There are going to be recruitment challenges, peter, for this second half of term one white house, and whether 36yearold mr. Ayers is the wartime counsel needed, time will tell, i guess. The circle around the president is shrinking because there have been departures and the number of people he can trust has, to come extent, diminished. John kelly had the future of being up here to the president at least in terms of age and could say things to him that somebody else couldnt. The challenge for nick ayers is as bright as he is is that hes half the age of the president , and that makes for a different dynamic. Thats a different kind of relationship. Will a president who is pretty hard headed himself listen to somebody who is in his 30s when it comes to decision he wants to make that a staff person is supposed to tell a president thats not a good idea. But it is a sign of how things are changing into a more reelection mode. He doesnt have the kind of experience that general kelly does, for instance with military Security Matters or with running a government in that sense. And if you are about to run a reElection Campaign you know is going to be especially heated, especially difficult, you want somebody at your side who has that kind of skill set. Peter, what is your one to two sentence lead about all that we have witnessed this week . Here we are on a friday night talking about these deadly serious federal charge documents that came out today. But remember we all spent most of our week mourning a former occupant of the white house. Well, we did. And what a whip saw kind of week it is, right . From the nostalgia from a different era, a different moment in our history when the parties did manage to come together on important issues at times and it wasnt bean ball back in the bush era, but it seems so much more polarized today, so much more toxic. The investigations are bearing down on the president. His ability to get his agenda through is definitely challenged. Hes facing an opposition house coming in january. This is a very, very, you know, volatile moment and where it heads is, i think, very unclear. We could spend two years in absolute political warheading into that 2020 election. And anyone wishing to be a journalist begin by pulling the work from this week by the superb peter baker and the superb Suzanne Glasser who happens to be married to him and works at the new yorker, especially if you think thoughtful journalism is mutually exclusive terms. Two of our best friends. Approaeciate it. Coming up, for a bench of heavily armed federal employees, they were the nice old couple they got to work with. Coming up. Well describe the last detail. Ofor a limited time,ur holidays even better get a 4course meal starting at 15. 99. Treat yourself to the perfect gift today, because the aussie 4course wont last long and now, get a 10 gift with every 50 in gift cards. Back pain cant win. Now introducing aleve back and muscle pain. Only aleve targets tough pain for up to 12 hours with just one pill. Aleve back muscle. All day strong. All day long. For each job exxonmobil creates, many more are created in the community. Because energy touches so many industries, it supports 10 million u. S. Jobs. Last thing is the service we provide our former president s of the United States because of the service they give us. From the time they leave the white house, our president s and their spouses receive secret Service Protection for life and usually it is a good life. It often means multiple homes in better than average places. As our president s and their spouses age, their secret service slows down with them. They play more of a zone defense than man to man. George bush was known to be very close to members of his secret service detail. How many president s can you name who would shave their kids for the young son of an agent that was undergoing chemo. Well, george h. W. Bush did. There comes a time when there is no one left to protect anywhere, and that moment arrived yesterday. It was chronicled by jim mcgraph who wrote this. Final notification timber wolfs detail concluded at 0600 with no incidents to report at the george bush president ial library, college station, texas. God speed former president george h. W. Bush. You will be missed by all of us. And that is our broadcast on this friday night for this eventful week. Thank you so much for being with us. Have a good weekend and good night from nbc headquarters here in new york. Happy friday. Happy to have you with us. This at least is not one of those fridays where its a big news day as a surprise. This is a friday when we knew we were going to get a bunch of Important Information today on the ongoing russia investigation that has become the defining crisis of this presidency. We knew this was going to be a g