All interlock because each story implicate the question of whether the president has obstructed justice and whether President Trump is still trying to obstruct justice in an ongoing way. First, bob mueller just interviewed Jeff Sessions, the attorney general, we know this because Sessions Team is confirming it to the new york times. Second, bob mueller has completed his interview of jim comey, the former fbi director, we know that because the comey interview then leaked to the same times reporter. Thats not all. The times report that the interview focused on trump and the alleged request to drop the investigation of mike flynn, a key topic because trump went on to fire comey and that flynn went on toer coopera ecooperate bob mueller. Of all the interviews today, tonights news on Jeff Sessions is the first report of a trump cabinet official getting grilled. The interviews important, but none of this means that anyone did anything wrong. Mueller could interview Jeff Sessions and clear him and the administration for any wrong doing. Even after trump fired jim comey, trump kept trying to do a partisan purge and clean house at the fbi that was so extreme, his own appointment mike wray threatened to resign. Heres my colleague, rachel maddow. Jonathan swan has just reported within the last hour, some dramatic news about the fbi, hes reporting that fbi director chris wray is threatening to resign from the fbi or at least has threatened to resign from the fbi because of pressure being put on him by attorney general Jeff Sessions. That is huge, and that news continues to reverberate today, donald trump denying it on the record. No, he didnt at all. He did not even a little bit. Nope. And hes going to do a good job. That denial by the way is directly at odds with something the white house just put out. And i have that break down later in the show, but i have to bring you another russia story at the top of our hour. Late today the Washington Post reporting that bob mueller is looking to question donald trump himself at least about his decisions to oust mike flynn and jim comey. Joining me to break it down, former prosecutor Nick Ackerman and maya wiley. I start with you, nick, four big stories, the one that has the most potential malfeasance would appear to be this highly unusual report of a new fbi director threatening to resign . I think thats right. Again, it shows that trump has no regard for the rule of law, that he thinks he can run the fbi, he thinks there should not be independence between criminal investigations, the department of justice and the president of the United States, which is counter to our entire history of the president dealing with the fbi. Trump still thinks that were living in a pre1776 world where there is a king and not a president and a constitution and laws that constrain the president from doing precisely what hes trying to do. The idea that the fbi director would resign over there, this ranks where in whats happened in the last weeks plus . Its right up there at a 10. Its absolutely outrageous, the fbi is not a political party. The fbi investigates crimes for the department of justice. I worked with hundreds of fbi agents, lots of investigations, we never once talked politics. The fbi is not a political organization. There are a bunch of well trained professionals that do their jobs properly. The notion that is trying to be spread that somehow they are favoring one side or the other for politics is absolute nonsense. And if Christopher Wray didnt stand up to the president , you would have such a demoralized fbi, and i say three cheers for Christopher Wray for sticking up for the brureau donald trump today sticking up for that interview. Take a listen. Thank you all very much, very proud of you. Are you concerned about what the attorney general told the special counsel . No, not at all concerned. The president saying hes not concerned maya, and the report was that he was outraged that he couldnt get Jeff Sessions to stay on the case. He thought his recusal was bad because he wanted Jeff Sessions to be his protector and now his own fbi director Jeff Sessions actually had to be pushed by the career attorneys in the department of justice to recuse himself. When Jeff Sessions actually called for a special prosecutor when the Hillary Clinton email investigation was going on and then u. S. Attorney general had the meeting with bill clinton on the tarmac, so what we really have here, similar to what nick said is that the rules dont apply to them that they have insisted apply to the investigations related to Hillary Clinton. And the president of the United States would insist that the department would protect him as opposed to protecting the country by protecting our laws and ensuring that there is compliance with our laws is absolutely outrageous. I also have former snichbt fbi director, as well as ned price from the National Security counsel, he resigned from the cia when President Trump was coming into office. Ron, your view on the fbi story . Look, i think there are four big pieces, actually i think theres a fifth, in that the missing fbi text messages, hundreds maybe thousands of them between a couple of key players. I think it is troubling when the president , assuming this is true, tries to press the director of the fbi to start replacing staff. That is typically the province of the director himself. He has great latitude in promoting people from within the organization, bringing in some outsiders and you dont see the president of the United States looking to reach inside the fbi, certainly for political purposes which is what we know was the public criticism Donald Trumps own words, that he thought the Deputy Director, which is what this issue boiled down to was somehow against trump, was a comey ally, was a democrat. Listen to Christopher Wray here when he was asked about President Trump which now i think is in a new light. Has President Trump ever asked you for loyalty . I never been asked by the president to take any kind of loyalty oath, my loyalty is to the constitution, the laws of this country and the good men and people of america. Thats what he said then, what were learning now, according to axios 3 sources is that he was threatening to resign over the same ballpark, political loyalty pressures. I think that the workforce, again, if this is true will be very appreciative of the fact that they have a director who is willing to back the words that, you know, of his testimony in his confirmation that if he was asked to do something inappropriate or out of bounds that he would push back or resign and maybe thats come to pass. That is what the fbi needs, that sort of independence, frankly thats what the country needs. Ned price, this all comes amidst Jeff Sessions sitting down with bob mueller. Take a listen to how he was previously addressing the prospect of that interview. Have you been interviewed or been requested to be interviewed by the special counsel either in connection with director comeys firing, the russia investigation or your own contact with russian officials . I would be pleased to answer that. Im not sure i should without clearing that with the special counsel. What do you think . Im just have you been interviewed by them . No. Weird, but moves from a no to a yes now, confirmed by sessions own spokesperson, what do you read into this about where the investigation is going . Well, ari, i think it clearly suggests that bob muellers team is climbing up the totem pole, i think we all knew this was coming, after the sessions interview and the comey interview. What we learned today is not that these two interviews took place, but the fact that Donald Trumps interview will be about Michael Flynn. There is one key question, why did Michael Flynn lie to the fbi . We know from his statement of defense, that he was directed to have those conversations with the russians, which raises the question, was he similarly directed to lie to the fbi on january 24, when he sat down with them for an interview. After Jeff Sessions signed that plea with the mueller team, two sources tell nbc news that two investigators are now investigating that Michael Flynn had been directed by trump to lie to the fbi. Which i think at least raises the possibility that where theres smoke theres fire. Can you put that into context . There are three big issues that are going on, Michael Flynn, the fact that hes testifying and hes revealing all to the mueller team. Thats one piece of this, in terms of the sessions and the trump interviews. Secondly, theres this whole business about sanctions. Because sanctions is really what Michael Flynn lied about. And he lied about sanctions relating to what occurred during the campaign, which leads me to believe that there was some kind of quid pro quo relating to sanction, and the third sort of theme that runs through all of this is the obstruction of justice, if you take these three things and everything thats happened in the news today, they kind of always tie together. Maya, we have basically gone through all of this here and barely talked about a Washington Post report about the interview of the president of the United States with mueller, that he still opposes the interview, that it would be like a death wish or a suicide operation, i think he means legally, to the president. As someone whos been an executive, you cant just duck the interview, but what about this heat that were feeling about the muellertrump faceoff is coming . I think donald trump is creating an excellent job creating the appearance that hes the executive in chief. If you have an executive thats saying hes done nothing wrong and theres been no civil Rights Violations and then you balk at having an interview with the investigator, youre essentially admitting you have something to hide. This is a special night of breaking coverage on the beat, and we have other avenues, trumps attempt to. And is sessions the path to trumps inner circle. I have the latest on these negotiations leaking out to the post. A special edition of the beat im ari melber. Well be right back. Why give it every feature you could want, along with a few you didnt know you needed . Its simple. You can build a car, or you can build a cadillac. Come in now for this exceptional offer on the cadillac ct6. Get this lowmileage lease on this 2018 cadillac ct6 from around 549 per month. Visit your local cadillac dealer. Are you reluctant to eat in public because of your denture . From around 549 per month. 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Tonight this battle with two fbi directors is because of what i was just discussing before the break, axios said that trump kept meddling at the fbi after the comey debacle and kept going so far over the line that comey threatened to resign. Trump sa it got so heated that wray threatened to resign over it and that Trumps White House lawyer said it was not worth losing another fbi director over trumps desire to get mccabe fire. This is an explosive account. It matches Donald Trumps own public attacks on mccabe, a 22year fbi veteran who trump has criticized for illegal activities like being married to a democrat. And while wray denied he threatened to resign, the white house put out the fbi director wray reportedly threatened to resign over pressure from trump, sessions t its nod hard to connect these dots because there are two of them. Jim comey empowered mccabe by giving him the number two job at the fbi in 2016. Trump is saying that link to comey makes mccabe suspect. While the white house here is basically leaning into this report, they are attempting, according to their statement kind of trying to purger the fbi in broad daylight showing the president s not backing off despite this blow back, axios reports, quote, this much meddling with the fbi for this long is not normal. No, its not. Investigators are probing whether its even legal. Im joined by amanda barrett, a law processor, and former u. S. Attorney karen leffler. Having been all over this story and there being several aspects late breaking tonight, your view on the white houses unusual statement about people that comey empowered being political . Yeah, its really an amazing situation because youve got a dynamic where theyre basically denying the notion that they would, you know, engage in something too crass and at the same time, basically confirming that the entire premise of this conflict which is that they want a bunch of people moved out of their jobs at senior positions in the fbi. Its a very tense thing and it shows you frankly how far apart the white house and the fbi and the doj are all from each other, and that in itself is a very unusual circumstance. Jameal, can a president appropriately remove fbi officials because of their political views . The president certainly can remove the fbi director for any reason. Not what i asked you. Yeah. Go ahead and answer. You cant remove someone for their political views, thats not appropriate. This report, which theyre not fully denying, the fbi Deputy Director who is appointed by the fbi director, that is the chain there, and you as a person who cares about the process and the law here, the report on its face seems to be concerning. Its obviously very troubling and the concern here is, the president already fired one fbi director and what we saw was the appointment of a special prosecutor that he doesnt like, so it doesnt make sense to continue down this road. In some ways the president is his own worst enemy when it comes to these issues, getting into these troubles. So the better play here is to let bob mueller do his investigation, its going to be what it is. And the results will come out when they do. Meantime, the president should focus on his agenda, tax cuts, regulatory refwoorm and the lik instead of this back and forth which has thus far not gotten him too far. What about chris wray saying its something hes willing to resign over. Its a statement about what the fbi does stand for, former director comey, mr. Wray, theyre saying we take the oath of loyalty, its to the constitution, its to the country, and i think that if youre the head of an agency and youre asked to do something thats wrong, you have an obligation of saying im going to resign, because this goes over the line of whats ethical and appropriate. And the view of the executive and the president to be, i expect everybody to be part of a cu cultive personality, and we dont do that in this country, i would expect the fbi director to have that type of integrity and stand up for the rule of law. It is interesting hearing widespread support for what is in this account, that he did, as you say, stand up, and thats what he should do. Theres so much here, i want to turn to another aspect of this story with sessions and Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein who oversees mueller. When sessions recused himself, sessions tapped rosenstein to lead the investigation. We were discussing that rosenstein was very likely a witness to the comey firing so he might have to recuse. So, im sorry to interrupt you with my exexclamation of surprise. Youre saying that if mueller is investigating trump for obstruction of justice in his investigation of comey, if rosenstein should be called as a witness for that part of the investigation, he cant oversee the Mueller Investigation at all. That was our point and after that we learned that rosenstein interviewed the special counsel weeks after appointing mueller. The point is there any possible conflict given that rosenstein as you see right there is now on that infamous memo saying they were firing comey over his handling of the clinton email case, donald trump famously eradicated that defense by saying russia was on his mind in his lester holt interview. So, karen, when you look at people like sessions and rosenstein being witnesses to some of this conduct, how do you analyze the work muellers doing now that we learned he just interviewed sessions last week and rosenstein has also provided this information . Well, i mean if youre asking if theres a potential conflict of interest, i mean there could be. I know that if i recall mr. Rod rosenstein, of course i know because we were u. S. Attorneys together, i think he Cold Congress when he was interviewed that if the would follow the ethics rules. For many sessir. Sessions, he w these meetings, and he was required to recuse himself under rules of the department of justice. At the time when they had a strong ethics department, im sure mr. Rosenstein was getting advice on that, i dont know where we are right now, i mean the facts of the case could turn to that, im not sure where we are now. I do recall, if im right, that he testified that mr. Rosenstein said that he would follow those rules. Jameal, listen to jim comeys public assessment, which we now know he has given to mueller, thats new tonight, about why he was fired. Why do you believe you were fired . I guess i dont know for sure. I believe i take the president at his word that i was fired because of the russia investigation. Its my view that i was fired because of the russia investigation. I was fired in some way to change or to endeavor to change the way the russia investigation was conducted. That is a very big deal. Jameal, how does that view, that testimony come up in the way mueller is interviewing comey . If muellers concern that comey was fired because of the russia investigation, thats very problematic, and thats clearly going to be the basis for the Mueller Investigation. And the president has legitimate reason to be upset and concerned with the fbi, these texts between strzok and page are very troubling. The firing of the fbi director led to the appointment of bob mueller. And sort of getting into this middle of this whole wray, mccabe thing, not beneficial, the tweets, that if the president s ees goal is to get agenda moving, he needs to move on. Let them do their jobs. Any idea why so much on this story is breaking right now . I just think that things are heating up and i think things are intensifying, i think an interview of Jeff Sessions shows you that they are really in the inner circle now and theyre really looking hard at senior officials in government. I think its going to get bus r busier. We were talking about theyre talking about a trump interview in a matter of weeks. And i mentioned that huge report at the top of the hour and i have more after the break. Thank you each for your expertise. Ahead, how is the white house prepping for what we just mentioned, a facetoface with mueller which could be under negotiated terms next week. The first leaks about muellers investigation into comey and why does it appear that some sources are talking more this week. And the host of all in chris hayes is here with a busy news night ahead on the beat. Average lasagna . Not in this house. cause thats no average family. Thats your family. Which is why you didnt grab just any cheese. You picked up kraft mozzarella with a touch of philadelphia for lasanyeah kraft. Family greatly. Ethats the height ofs mount everest. Because each day she chooses to take the stairs. At work, at home. Even on the escalator. That can be hard on her lower body, so now she does it with dr. Scholls orthotics. Clinically proven to relieve and prevent foot, knee or lower back pain, by reducing the shock and stress that travel up her body with every step she takes. So keep on climbing, sarah. Youre killing it. Dr. Scholls. Born to move. Breaking news from the Washington Post right now. The white house bracing for donald trump to submit to a facetoface grilling with bob muellers russia probe. Topics include jim comey and mike flynn which are story lines in any potential obstruction case. The lawyers have negotiated terms they have not presented to mueller yet. It could be news to mueller and it could be news to trump himself. He said earlier this month an interview is unlikely. Well see what happens, but when they have no collusion and nobodys found any collusion at any level, it seems unlikely that you would even have an interview. A couple of thoughts, this Washington Post scoop is fascinating. It adds possible clues for why tonight all of a sudden there are leaks about big ticket items in the russia probe, the sessions interview, the comey interview, an fbi director threatening to resign, white house denials. All of this happening. But if you pause on this as a legal and journalistic matter, if this story is a big bone for the press to chew on tonight, it also has some pretty big paw prints on it. Consider the stories based on how trumps attorneys have their own ideas for trumps interview with mueller, ideas that could be presented to mueller, quote, as soon as next week. Could be presented next week. So these ideas, trumps lawyers have not presented them to mueller yet. If that is true, this leak doesnt sound like it comes from doj and the Washington Post doesnt just announce white house legal strategies without a solid confirmation from or near the white house, so today of all days, it looks like maybe the white house wants this story out there. Im joined now by Dorian Warren and Nick Ackerman is back, two friends of the show. Dorian, this does seem to be a curious time for those sources to put this out. Its very curious and it reminds me of this line from all the president s men the movie about watergate. Where deep throat said to bob woodward, the truth is these are not very bright guys and things got out of hand. And if you compare nixons henchmen to trump and his cronies, they know things got out of hand. If youre trumps lawyers trying to prepare him for mueller, youre terrified because you know hes not very detail or yer oriented, he cant stay on script, so maybe its being leaked now so trump can if you want to make a good deal with bob mueller, you usually want to present it to him first, not have him read about it in the paper. And hes presenting a deal thats in the paper that i think is a nonstarter. Theres no way theyre going to allow President Trump to just show up and answer a couple of questions without a Court Stenographer and without a videographer, theyre not going to do that without a normal grand jury process. Bottom line is they can give him a grand jury subpoena and force him to testify. Every court is going to uphold that. If they dont want this, if youre going to make any concession, okay, well do it in the Conference Room in the white house, but theres going to be an insistence of a videographer, this is a guy who says even when its him, he says its not him. He said thats not me. Youre speaking to the part of donald trump that is so unusual for someone in public life, the total willingness to not just lie, but to lie about things that are clearly demonstrably proven, which is sort of insulting to any listener, although some liken it to a cultive personality, tha s es hes not always lying, here he is with lester holt in one of the most famous admissions from the president in the modern era and something that would come up in this interview. Take a look. He made a recommendation, but regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey, knowing there was no good time to do it. When i decided to just do it. I said to myself, i said, you know, this russia thing with trump and russia is a made up story. Dorian, is that the witness that bob mueller could get . That is definitely the witness. Lets put him in context of a witness, most of his career, he has settled with payments, he has rarely had to testify. So i think again, his staff is very worried right now in terms of the preparation for him because of any possibility for perjury. And hes rarely testified in court in open trial, we have had some attorneys that have interviewed him. But sometimes hes very strategic in his own interest and canny, by the way, this is about russia. It you do the rest. Coming up, inside Jeff Sessions interview with the special counsels team, what questions he might have faced last week in his forgetful issues about the russians. And where does this go in here . Chris hayes on the future of the russia probe, thats ahead. Sometimes the confidence to be spontaneous starts with financial stability. Once i heard it i was shocked. I just thought, i have to go get it its our tree see how a personalized Financial Strategy and access to j. P. Morgan investment expertise can help you. Chase. Make more of whats yours. To j. P. Morgan investment expertise can help you. With moderate to severe Rheumatoid Arthritis . 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They always refer to me as master sergeant. They really appreciate the military family, and it really shows. Weve got auto insurance, homeowners insurance. Had an accident with a vehicle, i actually called usaa before we called the police. Usaa was there handson very quick very prompt. I feel like were being handled as people that actually have a genuine need. Were the webber family and we are usaa members for life. Usaa, get your insurance quote today. Breaking news tonight about the most senior trump official to be interviewed in the russia probe. Theres a reason the big fish are getting their interviews now. And recently bob mueller used to run the fbi, so he knows how to run a criminal probe. You dont start at the top. Mueller started with George Popadopoulos and sam clovis, then he moved up to the chief of staff, reince priebus. With the news breaking tonight that he just interviewed sessions, and he had already confirmed that jim comey was concerned about it. He expressed concern about being left alone with the president. I affirmed his concern that we should be following the proper guidelines of the department of justice and basically backed him up in his concerns and that he should not carry on any conversation with the president or anyone else about an investigation in a way that was not proper. That was Jeff Sessions backing up part of comeys story. But there are more questions. What else did he tell comey . Does sessions face any legal liability himself . And of course the question that always comes up when you started from the bottom, where are your real friends at . Im joined by michelle goldberg, columnist for the new york times, and our staff attorney, federal prosecutor for the Northern District of alabama, so she knows a thing or two about Jeff Sessions, joyce, sessions had problems remembering contacts with russians. Thats his exposure. He also as we just saw had a front row seat with this trumpcomey relationship and breakdown. What do you think is key that mueller was questioning him on . Mueller will have three sorts of questions hell want to explore with sessions or that he would have explored with him. And theyll break down sort of along the same lines of the investigation, did the russians interfere with the american election, did the american collude with the russians to affect the election. He didnt do it for no reason, we now know that he did it apparently for good reasons, and there will be questions for Jeff Sessions along those three threads of the investigation. Michelle, your view and the larger part of what you said is Jeff Sessions has been involved in so many different aspects of the russia story, right . I mean Jeff Sessions, although he didnt remember it when he was questioned by congress, was at the meeting where george pop develop li popadopoulos is cooperating with the Mueller Investigation. But the fact that the fbi is now investigating whether any money was channelled through the nra from russia to the Trump Campaign. There was an email with the subject head kremlin connection sent by an nra fundraiser, to the Trump Campaign suggesting that they run this by Jeff Sessions. You know, Jeff Sessions later also said he doesnt remember anything about that email. So he pops up and i feel like my sense is that in an interview with bob mueller, he would not be able to plead forgetfulness in the way that hes been able to do before congress. And, yet, joyce, to be fair to Jeff Sessions, he, and i say this in a sense that it could help him is not always the clearest speaker, is not always super detail oriented, the snl joke that hes sort of the forest gump of all this, speaks to a potential defense of his, doesnt it . We really dont know what Jeff Sessions status is, is he a witness . Is he a subject . Is he a target . These are terms of art for prosecutors that distinguish someone whos merely present and has information to share with investigators and who may well end up being a defendant. And theres some incidents that we have seen along the way with senator sessions that have led people to speculate that perhaps hes a target. This lapse of memory, youre right, it can be difficult to indict someone for perjury when their response is i just dont remember right now, unless you can prove that they in fact did remember and were lying. Those can be difficult charges to bring. So it could be that his carefully worded answers will insulate him. But one thing is true, when youre with bob muellers team, it would be bad to not cooperate with the investigation. We have more on the debate over the firing of jim comey. If as the president said i was fired because of the russia investigation, why was the attorney general involved in that chain . I dont know. I do not believe that it is a sound position to say that if youre recused for a single case involving any one of the great agencies you cant make a decision about the leadership in that agency. In retrospect, do you believe that it would have been better for you to have stayed out of the decision to fire director comey . I think its my responsibility. And i think i had a duty to do so. Joyce, if you were betting, do you think that mueller asked him last week whether he still stands by the discredited claim that they removed comey over the clinton email case . This has to have been one of the core issues that there was questioning on. Obviously there were a lot of people in the Justice Department who believed that jim comey handled the Hillary Clinton announcement that was contrary to department policy. But Jeff Sessions comes into the Attorney Generals Office months after that. We know now from the lester holt interview that that certainly wasnt the president s primary concern, whether it was in fact jeff and Rod Rosenstein, the Deputy Attorney general. Whats the state of mind that the president had when this firing happened. Michelle and joyce, thank you both. Trump has faced many lawyers but none quite like mueller. Chris hayes who has done a few russian interviews of his own, is here to talk about potential crossexamination and whats next in the probe. At social med. She buys stocks in companies that stand for something. You like her. Shes always up on the latest trends. She got in early on the whole goat yoga thing. And her sunsets are always nofilter. You like her. But youd like her better if you made more money than she does. Dont get mad at just marea. Get eatrade. It happens when reality exceeds expectations. Sail with the 1 cruise line in alaska, princess cruises, come back new. gasp singsong budget meeting sweet. 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He has questions about trumps attempts to remove Jeff Sessions as attorney general or pressure him into quitting and determine whether this was a pattern of behavior by the president. For more, chris hayes. Great to be here. Starting with sbk donald trump, one of the many stories tonight. What jumps out to you about it. I think some sort of faceoff between the two was inevitable as always. It is incredibly dangerous territory for the president of the United States for a lot of reasons. I mean, we remember back when bill clinton, they managed to work their way to a deposition for bill clinton, which proved to be essentially the approximate cause, the trigger for what would become Monica Lewinsky even though it was unrelated to the claim by paula jones. If youre a lawyer, kin of donald trump, you do not want him sitting across the table be to fbi investigators. And you want to avoid it as much as possible. We have seen donald trump is very experienced. He may be as experienced as anyone in the country, and i honestly mean that in depositions and answering in sort of narrow ways. Weve seen the deposition footage in which he suddenly leaks all kind of memory holes. I would not underestimate his ability even under the direct scrutiny and those conditionses to acquit himself in a way that manages to give him a sort of enough hedge to not commit any infractions. When you say that mueller meeting trump under oath or in an oathlike setting is inevitable, youre positing this as the plot of heat, and pacino and de niro are circling each other and have to meet up at the end. The two men have to face off. Look, the thing that i always keep coming back to at the core of this is, only donald trump knows what he did. Only donald trump knows what he did or didnt do. When you look at his behavior, when you look at firing comey, the way they handled flynn, theres different ways to make sense of that behavior becaused on what the underlying fact pattern is. What is it him being panicky, or was he covering up a set of crimes he knew he committed. You make a great point. This is where lawyers and journalists look at this pile of aefd and try do it with an open mind. Sometimes theres evidence. Steve bannon reportedly said that he convinced and cajoled and demanded everyone around trump understand that removing comey would be a terrible thing and he said you could do it later or or day one but to do it now in the middle of this is a terrible thing. To a theory youre exploring, if donald trump and all the people around him hear that but he knows something in his head that makes him so concerned, what is that thing. That is why its impossible to make sense of his behavior in the metascandals which is the firing of comey, the way they dealt with flynns departure. All of that ultimately relates to what the facts are in the world about what trump did or did not know, did or did not do with respect to possible collusion with russia, aiding and abetting of federal crimes we know were committed into the breaking of the email servers. Analyzing these big things they did, they lied about flynn and fired him, they fired comey under false pretenses which they later admitted to, you cant make sense how deep an infraction that is without getting to the one person in this entire story who actually knows what he did. En ot other side, the other defense, weve heard of the bad apples defense. Theres the rando apples defense. Rando. Carter page and George Papadopoulos and a bunch of people who republicans say we never heard of these guys and made a bunch of bad decisions and the head of the campaign didnt know. The we were too incompetent to collude with russia is not a ridiculous story for them to tell. It is the case that papadopoulos and carter page were fairly marginal figures. Its more of a problem when you have Paul Manafort under indictment and Michael Flynn who sat in the white house as the National Security adviser to the president of the United States who is also pleading guilty to a federal crime and who also lied systematically about what he was up to with respect to russia. I agree about or i had i its a plausible defense theyve mounted for themselves, but the closer you get to manafort and flynn, the harder it becomes to think it was essentially ancillary. The names you just named are less rando. Yes. Always interesting to compare notes. Well watch all in tonight at 8 00 p. M. Eastern right here on msnbc. And we will be right back. Ancestrydna makes over 10 million new family connections, every day. Thats more ways to discover new relatives. People who share your dna. And maybe a whole lot more. Order your kit at ancestrydna. Com here too comment is Robert Mueller. Hello. How are you . Obviously, i cant discuss particulars of an ongoing investigation. But uh, yeah, we good. We good. Thats Kate Mckinnen revealing her bob mueller impersonation on snl. What did you think of her impression . Let us know on our Facebook Page facebook. Com the beat with ari. Ill see you back here at 6 00 p. M. Eastern. Hardball with Chris Matthews starts now. Tipping point. Lets play hardball. Good evening. Im Chris Matthews in washington. There are several big developments in the trump russia investigation tonight. First, theres brandnew reporting from are the Washington Post that special counsel Robert Mueller is seeking to question President Trump in the coming weeks about his decisions to oust National Security adviser Michael Flynn and fbi director james comey. According to two people familiar with his plans. It suggests muellers investigation is intensifying focus on possible efforts