Transcripts For MSNBCW The Rachel Maddow Show 20180227

Were dropped against rick gates in exchange for his guilty plea on the two new charges, muellers prosecutors basically took off the shelf the earlier indictments in which rick gates and Paul Manafort had been charged together and they rewrote them so now all the charges are just against Paul Manafort. We now have new indictments against manafort alone. They incorporate all the charges he and gates used to be facing together plus a few new ones. We are expecting Paul Manafort to be arraigned in federal court in washington, d. C. , on wednesday of this week, the day after tomorrow, and then were expecting him to be arraigned again in a different federal court in virginia on friday because he is facing dozens of felony charges in both jurisdictions. The dozens of felony charges that are now pending against the Trump Campaign chair Paul Manafort obviously represent a significant legal challenge for him, himself. The way the charges are laid out they may indicate potential problems for other people as well. There was, for example, a bunch of reporting over the weekend quoting former european heads of state all denying that they knew the source of the funds they had been paid from when manafort spent 2 Million Euros to lobby for his clients in ukraine. The indictment mentioned coconspirators at banks and lending institutions. People who worked with rick gates and Paul Manafort on Money Laundering and bank fraud schemes. Somewhere out there theres a person who recognizes this email. Who knows he or she once sent an email to gates and manafort when they allegedly cooked up the fake documents to get a multimillion dollar loan. Somebody somewhere knows this was their email. Quote, looks doctored. Cant someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me . Somebody recognizes that as their own work. Whoever that person is knows Robert Muellers prosecutors consider him or her to be a conspirator and Robert Mueller has that exact email. So we know the trouble that rick gates is in and how that is changing now that hes pled guilty. We know the trouble Paul Manafort is in with these pending felonies against him. There are other people, other conspirators clearly known to mueller and his investigators whose identities at this point are known to the prosecutors but they have not been made known to the public. And that brings us to the issue of the federal savings bank which is called lender d in the pending indictment against Paul Manafort. Right before manafort and gates joined the Trump Campaign in march 2016 when they were scrambling for some reason to get their hands on millions dollars in cash including resorting to doctored documents and other illegal means to get these loans. There was a bank in chicago that started talking about doing loans with Paul Manafort and coughed up an enormous amount of money to Paul Manafort. 16 million. Despite the fact they were a small bank that kate tornacater veterans and other lenders were turning down Paul Manafort because his paperwork and his financials werent passing the smell test. Nbc news and the wall street journal have reported the cash loans to Paul Manafort, the 16 million from federal savings bank, was about a quarter of the total assets that bank had available to loan. Which makes it unusual in the first place. Nbc news and the wall street journal are both reporting Robert Mueller and his prosecutors are investigating those loans in particular to see if they might have been a quid pro quo. The founder, the chairman, the chief executive officer of the bank reportedly was under the impression that donald trump was about to name him secretary of the army. He went so far as to reportedly contact the pentagon multiple times to try to arrange briefings for himself for this job which he assumed he was about to get. Muellers prosecutors reportedly looking into whether those 16 million in loans might have been basically payment for that job offer. The loans to manafort were questioned by other officials at that bank and, quote, at least one of the Bank Employees who felt pressured into approving the deals is now cooperating with investigators. Ever since that reporting came out and then the federal savings bank loans ended up in his indictment weve been trying to figure out how tight that case is, not just if there are employees cooperating with muellers investigators. Weve been trying to figure out if the head of the bank, the alleged hopeful recipient of this job offer in exchange for the loans, weve been trying to figure out if he might be cooperating, too, or if theres anything else we can find out about his personal role in approving this money going out the door of his bank to Paul Manafort. Weve been trying to figure that out. Turns out, so is his wife. It is reported these jumbo multimillion dollar loans to Paul Manafort have a starring role in the Divorce Proceedings ongoing in cook county, illinois, between the head of that bank and his soontobe exwife. During their Divorce Proceedings this past year Court Records show that the estranged wife of steve calk, his wife demanded as part of their Divorce Proceedings that she be allowed to see the entire loan file for any and all loans made to Paul Manafort. Now im not sure why that would be material to this couples Divorce Proceedings. It feels like none of our business, right . But it is part of the legal strategy that steve calks estranged wife is raising questions about the lending practices of this bank under her husbands leadership with a particular focus from that money he gave to Paul Manafort. So steve calks wife subpoenaed the loan documents. Steve calks divorce lawyers tried to quash that. A cook county judge is overseeing these proceedings. Were not sure if the documentation did get handed over as part of the divorce, but now the donald trump for president Campaign Chair theres the possibility these key records from these loans in question, those records may eventually become public through divorce court. Which is nuts. Adam schiff, the top democrat on the Intelligence Committee told us here friday night he believes Paul Manaforts legal strategy right now in part at least is to basically all but openly beg President Trump for a pardon in this case. That may be true but given all the different jurisdictions looking at manafort it may be too late for a president ial pardon to keep him out of serious trouble. There are reports now of nonfederal criminal investigation noose manafort and his various financial dealings in multiple nonfederal jurisdictions. Separate and apart from the fact some of these details may come out in a divorce proceeding in chicago. Regardless, though, a president ial pardon can only help you with federal matters. It cant help you with any other legal proceeding and, in fact, it might hurt your prospect of prevailing against charges that are brought, say, in state court. Were going to have more on that ahead tonight. Well talk about the unexpectedly detailed declassified memo from House Democrats about the fbis counterintelligence investigation into the Trump Campaign. A lot more information in that document than anybody expected to see. Before we get to all that tonight, before we get to that story, i want to go back to something scary that happened just a couple weeks before the president ial election in the fall of 2016. It happened in late october in new york city at laguardia airport. And nbc reporter ended up in the middle of this scary incident and it was an amazing night. He came right to our studio from the airport after it happened. Here was some of our breaking news footage from that night. As chris and i were just talking about there in the last hour a plane carrying republican Vice President ial candidate mike pence, in fact, skidded off the runway at new Yorks Laguardia airport. The important bottom line not only governor pence himself but everyone else on the plane is safe. This is what the plane did to the tarmac at laguardia as it slid off the runway. I didnt know that happened when you slid off the runway. All the air traffic was suspended for over an hour in the wake of this incident. Joining us now is a man onboard that plane, he was on the plane when it slid off the runway tonight. Let me shake your hand. Im glad youre okay. Thank you. Were you scared . The crazy part this isnt the first time well, the first time weve gone off the runway but a lot of shaky things. We had the hard impact and then we went for about two, three seconds, and thats when we started to swerve off to the right and all of a sudden came to a hard, crashing start. You could see that the road was oddly close to where the plane was at the road with cars on it. The road with cars, the circle k across the street. Thats when it became real. When you say you were trying to get tape, you were filming as you were landing, is that because you were expecting a hard landing because youve had so many . Its a joke. Its a joke how long are we going to last . Youre saying its become a joke how long were going to last, that the hard landings on the Pence Campaign planes are so frequent and so notable that its a point of discussion among the press corps . Yes. Have you only had bad landings in heavy weather nope. We landed in ft. Dodge, iowa, we hit and it felt like we came back up in the air where everybody held their breath for a second. You could see the blue sky again. We didnt go off the runway at that point. That was the night that it happened. That was actually an hour after it happened. Vaughn hillyard from nbc was on the plane as a member of the press corps. That plane went off the runway, skidded almost onto a highway. They closed down the airport after this landing. Vaughn was able to get out of there, get in a cab and come straight to the studio to tell us what happened. We are all relieved he and everyone else was fine. As soon as i asked him if he was okay, he instantly said, yeah, it was scary but this happens all the time. Hed been traveling on the Pence Campaign plane for our coverage of the election, and he said weve been having tons of hard landings. Its been scary all along. That was the night that it happened. By the following day nbc nightly news was able to put together a good portrait of what actually went wrong in that crash landing. Reporter on the tarmac today ntsb investigators were examining the mud covered landing gear of the charter plane that carried governor mike pence. It was just before 8 00 p. M. On a raney, windy night when the flight came in for a landing. Suddenly, trouble. Stop, stop. Reporter the plane was too far down the runway. We have an emergency in the airport. Reporter onboard with pence nbc News Campaign embed Vaughn Hillyard. We started to go and slide off and thats when we came to a complete halt. Reporter the plane stopped just 300 feet from the highway thanks to the crushable concrete arrester beds like this at the end of the runway. Okay. So that whole thing happened october 27th. Its right before the president ial election. A couple things about this incident. First of all, the ntsb did a full investigation and came to a very clear and damning conclusion what went wrong. Their determination it was clearly pilot error. The copilot was at the controls as they were bringing the plane in for a landing. The errors started early. They flared the plane, they brought the nose of the plane up to slow it down. They started that maneuver too early. They started at an altitude almost twice as high as recommended for that plane. First officer then touched the plane down way too far down the runway. Way too close to the end of the runway. This is a 7,000foot runway. The officer didnt put it down until they passed the 4,000foot mark, way past the point the pilot should have abandoned the landing, pulled back up, circled and come back in. They didnt do that. Once the landing started to go wrong and they didnt try to take back off and land again there were further errors as they tried to bring the plane to a halt. The captain then tried to take control from the first officer but the captain didnt announce thats what he or she was doing and that resulted in the pilot and first officer both simultaneously trying to control the plane during this fouled up landing and were apparently giving opposite instructions to the plane while it was skidding off the end of the runway and off towards the side and towards that active highway. They deployed the speed brakes too slow. It was bad. The ntsb said this was pilot failure. Pilot error. The Charter Company for that flight later announced they developed some new flight crew training to address the issues that were identified during that ntsb investigation. So thats one part of this. The other part of it Vaughn Hillyard said that night when he came into the studio right after getting off that plane, he said, yeah, i was scared but this happens all the time. It was a running joke, dark humor among the press corps, that none of them would survive covering mike pence because the landings were so terrible. They had so many hard landings and bouncing off the runways. It didnt feel safe to anybody who was on that plane. It was a consistently unsafe feeling environment according to reporters who were embedded with Vice President ial candidate mike pence. Well, it turns out that all happened at the end of october. The month before, the month before that crash landing at laguardia, that same Charter Company running the mike pence flights for the Trump Campaign, they had another trip through the headlines. In september 2016 the Guardian Newspaper reported the previous pilot theyd had flying the mike pence plane, he was wanted on violent felony charges. This was a guy who had been who was the chairman of a protrump Law Enforcement coalition in florida. I dont know if thats why they decided to give him the plum job of flying mike pence around the country but something about the vetting process didnt turn up the fact this particular guy was currently facing violent felony charges for aggravated ba ed ba with a deadly weapon, allegedly running over a coworker with his car three times putting the guy in the hospital and seriously injuring him. The mike pence pilot pled not guilty to those charges, but it turned out there was another similar case pending against him from 2014 in which, again, he was accused of deliberately driving into another person, this time on a motorcycle. Those incidents apparently including the pending felony charges, those apparently werent a problem. Just didnt pop in the vetting process when they were deciding who should fly mike pence and a whole bunch of beloved reporters around the country. And that was the month before they found out about that because of the press. They had to fire that guy the month before they ended up with a crew that overshot the runway, chewed up the asphalt, shut down laguardia airport. Man, i mean, whoever was running the trump president ial campaign air fleet, that guy has a lot to answer for. Turns out he has landed on his feet. Axios to report they are likely to be nominated to run the federal Aviation Administration in the actual u. S. Government. For all of us. Presumably only because the guy who ran over the other guy three times in his car isnt available. Maybe he will be secretary of transportation. And this is kind of a theme in the trump republican era. And there are a lot of scandals in this presidency and it is sometimes hard to focus on all the themes, but Donald Trumps golf caddie is the white house director of social media now. His longtime bodyguard is the director of oval office operations. There he is with the pope. Eric trumps wedding planner was put in charm of hud for the northeastern United States. A member of the trump household staff at trump tower her husband ran a Home Contracting Company Called steves tools in motion before he somehow ended up getting a job at epa region 2 headquarters in new york. This is the same president who named his bankruptcy lawyer ambassador to israel. A friend of his wife got a 26 million payout from the inaugural committee. Thats just slightly more than the inaugural committee spent on the actual contractor who actually runs the inauguration and has done so for decades. What did Melania Trumps friend do on top of that and for more money . We dont know. So many scandals. Who has time to chase Something Like that down . There was a lady from the apprentice who went on to the office of public liaison in the white house. While she worked there she worked alongside andrew giuliani. I wonder how he got that job. So now, you know, why not why not apply the same principle to all of american aviation . After the white house staff secretary was found to have served in that incredibly sensitive job more than a year despite serious Domestic Violence allegations against him from his exwives which prevented him from getting a full security clearance, today was the First Business day they were to operate under john kellys new security clearance policy, the First Business day, the first day at work in the Trump White House where interim security clearances would be canceled. All access to sensitive materials cut off for anybody whose security clearance has been pending since before last june without that person being able to get a permanent clearance. This describes the president s daughter and soninlaw. But apparently they are keeping their jobs are or without security clearance, regardless of whatever supposed policy is in effect, regardless of the white house chief of staff, and regardless of any rules we know of that apply to this type of sensitive material. I mean, president ial daughter is not a job from which you can be fired. If thats what you get hired to be if white house daughter is senior white house official, how do you so whats going to happen here . I mean, one thing we can be proud of in this moment in American History we have built something here for future generations. In the future the textbook explanation, the textbook case studies about nepotism, about a friends and family approach to governance. In the future when there are after School Specials about the uzbekistanization of the American Government and whats wrong with that and why it doesnt work and what could possibly go wrong, those stories will be crystal clear. No ambiguity because of what were living through now and thereby maybe future generations will figure out how to avoid this particular kind of mess. See thats funny, i thought you traded options. Im not really a wall street guy. Whats the hesitation . Eh, it just feels too complicated, you know . You know, at Td Ameritrade, we can walk you through your options trades step by step until youre comfortable. I could be up for that. Stepbystep options trading support from Td Ameritrade want us to do about what woulthis president . Fathers im tom steyer, and when those patriots wrote the constitution here in philadelphia, they created the commander in chief to protect us from enemy attack the Justice Department just indicted 13 russians for an electronic attack on america. So what did this president do . Nothing. Hes failed his most important responsibility to protect our country. The question is why is he still president . You wouldnt accept from any one else. Why accept it from your allergy pills . Flonase relieves your worst symptoms including nasal congestion, which most pills dont. Flonase helps block 6 key inflammatory substances. Most pills only block one. Flonase. 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. Some breaking news just posted by the New York Times. I just referenced this in the a block, i swear i did not when i made the reference this news was about to break. Melania trump parts ways amid backlash over inaugural contract. This has just been posted by the New York Times. Read you their lead. Melania trump has parted ways with an adviser after news about the advisers firm reaping 26 million in payments to help plan the trump inauguration. Stephanie winston has been friends for years, working as a Senior Adviser to the office of the first lady. Mrs. Trumps spokeswoman says now that the office of the first lady has severed its contract, according to two people with direct knowledge of the situation the move was prompted by displeasure from the trumps over the news that a firm created was paid nearly 26 million for Event Planning for mr. Trumps inauguration. Mr. Trump was also enraged to learn that she brought on a close friend, david monn. Mr. Monns firm was paid 3. 7 million. She is complaining about News Coverage of her role in the inauguration calling News Coverage completely unfair but according to these reporters from the times she did not specify any errors. Do we have ken on the line . Have we been able to get him . Joining us now by phone on unbelievably short notice is New York Times reporter ken vogel. Thank you very much for joining us at the drop of a hat. Appreciate it. I was just mentioning the unusual nature of this large payment and this contract of the committee for this person who is a longstanding friend of Melania Trump, Stephanie Winston. The large size of the financial contract she was paid 26 million. Do you have any clarity as to what exactly she was paid for . We can only go by sources who are familiar with what went on by the inaugural committee. The inaugural committee is registered as a 501c3 nonprofit and only has to file very vague information about its finances and even that is a significant lag time from when the spending and fundraising occurred. So we only had this document showing how it spent its money in the loosest of ways, in the most cursory sort of detail last week even though its more than a year and a half after the inauguration. Or more than a year after the inauguration, and theres no detail about what was thiss e 2 Million Contract went for. Stephanie Wilson Wolkoff did a lot of subcontracting to various other vendors. Were told her firm handled everything from paying for venues, rental venues to table settings to arranging instagram filters and even paying for satellite feeds for broadcasts for networks to carry the proceedings from the inauguration. She says, Stephanie Winston wolkoff says, her firm only got to keep 1. 62 million only 1. 62 million and even that was divided up amongst her 15 or so employees. I think even if you do the math you would conclude thats probably not too bad for just a couple months of work. And theres some unusual details about this. The firm set up by ms. Winston wolkoff that was eventually paid this money, even if most of it was just passed through, a firm set up only one month before the inauguration, set up in december of 2016. Then theres the fact that back to i think maybe even back to truman the major contractor that runs inaugural events has been the same major contracting firm, and they get the same gig every year through democrats and republicans first and second inaugurations. They were also contracted by the trump inauguration. They ended up getting paid about as much money as Melania Trumps friend but we know what they did because they always do the inauguration and its not exactly a nobid contract but the sole source contractor for these things for the United States for decades. Thats right. This is a firm that has been paid to do previous inaugurations, like you said, a firm that sort of specializeness producing trade shows. Theyre more of a known entity and this firm is not a known entity but didnt even exist more than i think it was six weeks before the inauguration. So it was clearly set up. We did report that, in fact, Melania Trump did introduce this woman, Stephanie Winston wolkoff to the longtime friend of donald trump who was the chair of the inaugural committee, but people say people close to the inauguration say that it was actually mr. Barretts decision and not mrs. Trumps decision to ultimately hire Stephanie Winston wolkoff. That said, other sources saying stephanie Wilson Wolkoff did throw around Melania Trumps name with transition officials and later when she went into the east wing as a special government employee, as a Senior Adviser to Melania Trump. She continued to behave in this way in what her colleagues and associates saw as an effort to get her way. She was sho she would flaunt her connection to Melania Trump. They concluded for whatever reason this relationship was problematic for them whether it was because of the bad press from the inaugural to the 26 Million Contract on the inaugural committee or something else. She is no longer working even as a volunteer for the east wing and for the office of the first lady. Ken vogel reporting for the New York Times, thank you for joining us so quickly tonight with this breaking news story. Congratulations on the scoop. Yeah, thank you. It was a pleasure as always. Again, that breaking news from the New York Times just posted. The first lady has parted ways, the first ladys office has severed its relationship with Stephanie Winston wolkoff, a figure who first surfaced in National News when it emerged that a company she had just set up weeks before was paid 26 million, a quarter of the money that was raised and spent on behalf of the trump inauguration. If you spit blood when you brush or floss you may have gum problems, and could be on the journey to much worse. Try parodontax toothpaste. Its clinically proven to remove plaque, the main cause of bleeding gums. For healthy gums and strong teeth. Leave bleeding gums behind with parodontax toothpaste. We had previously known carter page had been approached by the fbi in 2013 because they wanted to talk to him about a russian spy ring operating in new york city. It was a spy ring that had tried to recruit carter page as an intelligence agent. We knew that from the case the Justice Department brought against the russian spies in the case. We knew that before. This weekend we learned something new. This weekend we learned carter page was approached again by the fbi. Again about his links to russian intelligence but this time it happened a few years later. It happened in march 2016, which is the exact time he joined up as a Foreign Policy adviser to the donald trump for president campaign. The fbi was meeting with carter page that month to talk to him once again about his ties to russian intelligence. Really . Thats new. We learned that new information this weekend in this memo, declassified, released by democrats on the house Intelligence Committee. This is the byproduct of a lot of fighting and diversionary stuff that has happened on the Intelligence Committee as its chairman, republican congressman devin nunes has tried to turn it into an indictment of the fbi and the Justice Department. In the end, though, regardless of what the origin story was for this memo, what we got when we got this democratic memo is just a whole bunch of straight up new information we didnt have before. We learned about that fbi meeting with carter page, the same month that he signed up with the Trump Campaign. We learned the exact date of the start of the fbis counterintelligence investigation into the Trump Campaign. It started on july 31st, 2016. Good to know. We learned that for all the republican efforts to make the Christopher Steele dossier some kind of scandal at the heart of the russia investigation, the Justice Department presented to a court in its surveillance warrant investigation for carter page, quote, Additional Information through multiple independent sources that corroborated steeles reporting. You want to know what that corroboration was . In the memo it looks like this. Bullet point, redacted, redacted, footnote 12, redacted, redacted. Two fully redacted paragraphs followed by a third which reads, quote, pages, blank, in moscow with blank, senior russian officials, blank, as well as meetings with russian officials, blank, blank, blank, blank. Footnote 13. So theres a lot mere thats absolutely new information for us trying to figure out whats going on in our country, but theres also, interestingly, an explicit allegation this trump Foreign Policy adviser, carter page, theres an explicit allegation that he lied under oath to the house Intelligence Committee when he testified there in november. What exactly did he lie about . And if he did lie about it and the committee knows it for sure, what happens to that information . What happens next . The answer to that is here next. Directv gives you more for your thing. Your toprated thing. That five stars, two thumbs up, 12outof10, would recommend thing. Because if you only want the best thing, you get the 1 thing. Directv is rated 1 in Customer Satisfaction over cable. Switch now and get a 200 reward card. More for your thing. Thats our thing. Call 1. 800. Directv but prevagen helps your brain with an ingredient originally discovered. In jellyfish. In clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. The name to remember. If you have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis, Little Things can be a big deal. Thats why theres otezla. Otezla is not an injection or a cream. Its a pill that treats psoriasis differently. With otezla, 75 clearer skin is achievable after just 4 months,. With reduced redness, thickness, and scaliness of plaques. And the otezla prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. Dont use if youre allergic to otezla. Otezla may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. Tell your doctor if these occur. Otezla is associated with an increased risk of depression. Tell your doctor if you have a history of depression or suicidal thoughts, or if these feelings develop. Some people taking otezla reported weight loss. Your doctor should monitor your weight and may stop treatment. Other side effects include upper respiratory tract infection and headache. Tell your doctor about all the medicines you take and if youre pregnant or planning to be. Otezla. Show more of you. Democrats on the house Intelligence Committee this weekend were finally able to get declassified and release aased the russia scandal. Joining us now is congressman jim himes. Thank you for being here. I know it was a pain and a long process and a big fight to get this memo declassified after the earlier republican memo had been declassified. Are you happy that this is out . Are you satisfied in terms of what was redacted and released to the public . I am. I sort of chuckled because of course the process to get the republican memo out was all of 2 72 hours over the objections of the fbi. We wanted to be a little bit more careful, give the fbi and doj, the department of justice, an opportunity to make sure we werent disclosing additional classified information and, you know, lo and behold it got released on saturday night. Not your most intense news hours. I know whats behind the redactions, and the good news is the information we needed to get out there and tell the story that the nunes memorandum was misleading at best, you can read our memorandum and its pretty esoteric, pretty technical. You can read our memorandum and see the nunes memorandum was an attempt to slime the federal bureau of investigation, the department of Justice Without any real basis. Theres a lot of information specifically about Foreign Policy adviser to the Trump Campaign, carter page, because the whole basis of the nunes memo was the application to a court for a surveillance warrant against him. In explaining the further context you put into that warrant and the application for that surveillance theres a couple of very blunt statements. Theres a couple places in this memo where information that is redacted, which is about what carter page did in moscow, is then followed up with a blunt Statement Like this. Quote, this information contradicts carter pages testimony to the committee on november 2nd, 2017. And theres a whole bunch more redactions. This also contradicts his sworn testimony to our committee. A lot of this we cant see the exact details because it is redacted, but theres a clear statement here that carter page lied under oath. Is that the way that we should be reading that . Is that what this means here . Eye chu i chuckle because i was in the interview of carter page and in the history of congressional interviews of witnesses this one was unique, and im not disclosing anything i shouldnt disclose because the carter page testimony pursuant to an agreement with him is available to the public. Look, in the testimony that he gave to us, he contradicted himself in that testimony. We were asking and, again, you can look this up, about these trips to russia and did he actually meet with anybody important. No, no, no. Except for those people in the most senior levels of the russian government. The point here, rachel, the premise of the nunes memorandum, the republican memorandum, there was an abuse of the legal system by the fbi because theyre biased against donald trump. Now you remember what happened in the leadup to the election in terms of what jim comey was talking about in terms of investigation. You start out with that being crazy but then carter page if hes going to be your victim, hes going to be your victim that was sort of innocently doing and going about his business when the fbi look, this is a guy who as you pointed out the fbi had interest in for years, a guy who describes himself, describes himself as an adviser to the kremlin. I would argue, i guess, devin nunes did not maybe pick the most lilly white of people who say the fbi took an inappropriate interest in. If the Intelligence Committee is aware of information that mr. Page did lie under oath, does the committee pursue that . Does the department of justice pursue that . Its a crime to lie to congress. This is a little bit of a hard one because it was in his own testimony to us he contradicted his own testimony to us. Ive never got aten a bead on carter page. You wonder whether hes actually you know, what hes actually doing. We have bigger issues to go after. I wont try to prejudge what the Ranking Member might try to do. As you know steve bannon came before the committee and had this incredibly expansive claim of executive privilege, couldnt even ask him about the transition when the president wasnt president. We have some pretty big issues to deal with. Im not sure his contradictions are at the top of the list. Congressman jim himes, thank you, sir. I appreciate it. I will tell you the house Intelligence Committee tomorrow will hear from a very important, very powerful official. Tomorrow hope hicks. Yes, it will be behind closed doors. Well still try to figure out what happens. Well be right back. 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That would be great. That would be great. That okay with you, jake . Get a portfolio that works for you now and as your needs change from Td Ameritrade investment management. You know whats not awesome . 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. , quote, so ive been receiving a jillion calls from the press. Am i at liberty to help them understand it . To explain what the provisions mean . This comes from the end of a Court Transcript that happened on friday where rick gates pled guilty to a couple felonies in the special counsel investigation and agreed to cooperate with the special counsel. At the end of the hearing, the lawyer for rick gates said he has one final question he wants to ask the judge. He wants to know if he, the lawyer, can explain his clients new plea deal to the reporters who have been calling him about it. He asked the question to the judge. The judge responds by saying to the prosecutor, what do you think . The prosecutor then says this, he says, no objection so long as you do not talk about Paul Manafort. And then the judge says basically, quote, i clearly dont want you talking about the substance of mr. Manaforts case. At which point rick gatess lawyer says to the court, no, no, no. So no talking about Trump Campaign chair Paul Manafort. If youre the lawyer for rick gates you can talk about the plea deal and explain how it goes but when it comes to Paul Manafort, ixnay on the talking. Joining us now is benjamin w wittes. Its good to see you. Thank you. He has been his path has d diverged from rick gates, a lot of people see that as something that greatly increases the pressure on Paul Manafort that may change the course of how his legal case proceeds. How do you see it . Well, look, most people who are indicted by federal prosecutors, particularly good federal prosecutors, and the mueller team is extremely strong, are guilty. And most people who are indicted and rather than face charges plead to them eventually. And Paul Manafort is facing very serious charges. He is, as you point out, facing them alone, and that and defending yourself against such charges is an extremely expensive and extremely risky proposition. And so the pressure on him is undoubtedly intense. Mr. Manafort put out a statement in response to rick gatess guilty plea that was an aggressive statement saying the reasons for rick gates doing this would eventually come out, hes expressing his disappointment, criticizing rick gates for having made the decision. That was reviewed by congressman adam schiff from the Intelligence Committee, he said that as mr. Manafort making a public plea to the president for a pardon. Im getting the sense for what mr. Manafort is facing legally that a president ial pardon wouldnt get him out of the woods hed face continued problems with nonfederal jurisdictions things a pardon couldnt help him. If hes relying on the president ial pardon right now, thats a pretty desperate situation, because a president ial pardon, among other things, would be extraordinarily politically difficult for President Trump to do in this instance. So even if youre even if youre wrong and the only charges facing manafort are these federal charges and he has no exposure on anything at any state level, i still think it would be an extremely risky proposition to bank heavily on a pardon from President Trump. Do you think the memo released this weekend is significant in advancing our understanding of the state of the counterintelligence investigation and the strength of the special counsels case. I think its a pretty significant document, and its a quite devastating document, actually. Look, the whole issue around the nunes memo is a big distraction in the sense that, you know, the premises of the nunes memo was that the steele dossier was the carter page fisa warrant. The significance of that claim is that a lot of people seem to believe falsely that the carter page fisa is the orgin of the russia investigation. And what is shown clearly, and not contradicted by anybody, is that, in fact, there was a lot more information about carter page than came from the steel dossier there was a lot of reason for the fbi to be interested in carter page, as you pointed out, including recent interactions with the fbi over his contacts with russian government officials. And, in any event, the carter page fisa had very r little to do with the origins of the russia investigation, which predate it by several months. So i think its a very significant corrective to a very upsetting incident in which the chairman of the Intelligence Committee essentially used the oversight process to lie about the fbi. Benjamin wittes editor in chief of law fair. Thank you for being with us. Thank you. Well be right back. Stay with us. We the people. Are defined by the things we share. And the ones we love. Who never stop wondering what well do or where well go next. We the people who are Better Together than we are alone. Are unstoppable. Welcome to the entirely new expedition. This beneful grain free is so healthy. Oh farmraised chicken thats good chicken hm . Here come the accents. Blueberries and pumpkin. Wow. And spinach that was my favorite bite so far. avo beneful grain free. Out with the grain, in with the farmraised chicken. Healthful. Flavorful. Beneful. The smoother the skin, the more comfortable you are in it. And now theres a new way to smooth. Introducing new venus platinum. A premium metal handle boosts control. To reveal up to 100 smooth skin. Venus when this guy got a flat tire in the middle of the night, so he got home safe. Yeah, my dad says our insurance doesnt have that. What . you can leave worry behind when liberty stands with you™. Liberty mutual insurance. Just want to reup the strange breaking news we got this hour from the New York Times. The office of first lady Melania Trump has announced tonight it has severed its relationship with the first lady from a company that received 26 million from the inaugural fund. They were displeased by how much Stephanie Wilson has been paid. Thats it for us, now its time for last word with lawrence odonnell. I bring greetings from dublin ireland, you have a lot of fans there. I grew