Rachel Maddow takes a look at the days top political news stories. And his time working with manafort was laid out by the prosecutors, the next thing was the Plea Agreement with the government and then more discussion later on of the same basic theme. Prosecutors seem to want to get that out on the table very early. Folks may remember the defense brought this up in the opening argument that gates had stolen money from manafort or from manaforts firm. And the prosecution definitely wanted that laid out before we quit court today. They wanted that out on the table and brought it out before they went through chronologically the different crimes that they may or may not have been involved in. They were cleearly trying on inoculate him. I think it is what giuliani called hanging a lantern around your problems. Covering the manafort case for politico, thank you for covering it for us as well. Now lets bring in our legal power panel. Barbara mcquaid, also in court today, and chuck rosenberg, former u. S. Attorney for the Eastern District of virginia and a former senior fbi official. First of all, josh just reported that russia was front and center in some of the testimony from gates today. The Trump Campaign piece, the inaugural piece, everything that happened afterwards. Until the point when he left the side of Paul Manafort. The judge was being a little bit difficult about how much detail he would be allowed to get into. When they were working in ukraine, they were working with the oligarchs. They were making enormous contributions, much more than we
see in this country. They were expected to get huge parts of the country. Someone was going to control the energy sector. So the stakes are very high for people involved in political operations. So thats why Paul Manafort was receiving so much money which he then stored in the bank accounts. So you wonder about the influence. That he may have imported the practice or to what extent theyre seeking the same thing in this country. Pinlds gates is important and significant in the manafort trial. But his deal requires him to cooperate with everything and anything that he is investigating. So what other investigative threads could gates be useful to him . What would you surmise he is being used for . Right. I imagine because of his role in
the campaign, that theyre also asking him lots and lots of questions about contacts with russia and the roles not just of the president but other people. This is a guy who was around the campaign for months and months. He traveled with the president. He was there for conversations. He may have listen in the on phone calls. So youre exactly right. The government could convict him without gates. Gates put some meat on the bone but he will be important in lots of other ways. I found this interesting, subjecting him to revealing what he got the deal for. Having to say in court that he committed crimes. It seemed obvious that he is a part of this. Are they telegraph of course it . They are all at that intersection of potential collusion, potential conspiracy around the Trump Tower Meeting the president tweeted that on sunday. Thats exactly right. First of all, i wanted to talk about what he did on the stand. They have a constitutional obligation to turn over every bad thing mr. Gates had done. So what the government always does when theyre putting on a cooperatator is introduce themselves up front and first all bad things. They draw the sting essentially. To your question, there are people at that intersection of conspiracy or collusion or whatever synonym you want to use. Perhaps other crimes. Financial fraud, bank fraud, tax fraud. And gates had a view of that, a
perch, if you will, to see it in a way that a lot of other people might not have been able to. He was at the center of this for quite a while. Does he know everything . Was he around these people . These actors while they were committing crimes . He was certainly around manafort when he was committing crimes so hes valuable to the government. I dont want to put steve bannon in the same conversation as you but i was struck about his conversations of fury. How you get these guys was to go after Money Laundering. He said the mine for mueller, he talk about how Andrew Wiceman were Money Laundering guys. You go through manafort, Through Kushner and thats how you get trump. Was bannon a canary in the mine to how you can use manafort and use some of the foundations being hated in this crime to get to other people . Is that why you think the
president is acting out . It is hard to know why but i think thats a very valid theory. I think it has been widely reported that President Trump accepted a lot of Money Investment from russian businessmen when he was having a hard time getting loans from other sources. That a lot of his real estate was bought with cash from russians. When you think about all the things Paul Manafort is doing. He is learning how money flows out of russia, when money went from the soviet union and came out of that. There was a lot of money up for grabs that went into the hands of these oligarchs. They needed a place to park it. So the money came into this country. Possibly even to donald trump. So yes, it is an avenue of investigation that rob mueller is likely to pursue. As chuck said, rig gates is someone who likely knows a lot about that. So having him as a cooperator has a lot of value, not just for
this case but in the investigation. You have a lot of value to us. Thank you for your time tonight. Chuck, well make you stick around a little longer. I have a few more questions. Rachel has a mantra. Watch what they do, not what they say unless what they say has legal liability. That story next. The chili pepper sweatout. Not cool. Freezing away fat cells with coolsculpting . Now thats cool coolsculpting safely freezes and removes fat cells with little or no downtime. And no surgery. Results and Patient Experience may vary. Some common side effects include temporary numbness, discomfort,and swelling. Ask your doctor if coolsculpting is right for you and visit coolsculpting. Com today for your chance to win a free treatment. Your Digestive System has billions of bacteria but life can throw them off balance. Realign yourself with align probiotic. And try new align gummies
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meeting with russians to get information on an point has many believing the president has increased his own legal jeopardy by admitting the true purpose of that Trump Tower Meeting. And it stands in stark contrast to the initial meeting that he dictated last year explaining that the meeting had been primarily about adoptions. The president now claims that the meeting was, quote, totally legal. Done all the time in politics which fits into the president s and his allies latest Talking Point that collusion is not a crime. Ive been sitting here looking in the federal code trying to find collusion as a crime. Collusion is not a crime. Collusion is not a crime. I dont even know if it is a crime. Colluding. The hacking is the crime. The question is how would it be illegal . The real question is would a meeting of that nature constitute a violation, the meeting constitutes a violation of the law. What statue or law or rule has
been violated . So of course accepting something of value from a Foreign Government in the context of a campaign is actually illegal and it appears the president is aware of this. His reaction came this morning in the washington post. That trump has expressed a confidantes lingering unease about how some in his orbit are ensnared in the russia probe. He is fearful that trump jr. Inadvertently may have wandered into legal jeopardy. Joining us, washington report we are the washington post. I think this is when he reaches. Based on interviews with 3,900 i think it is 16 or 18 sources, the key they know was
his unease he doesnt believe his son purposely broke the law. He stumbled into collude. Done something bad. Even the most unnotorious violation is that he feels guilty his son is caught up in all of that. He feels probably correctly that his son would not be caught up in it had he not taken the meeting. And there are people he can talk to if he feels guilty about. That but he responded, your reporting got so far under his skin. He responded and retweeted. This is the story. This seems to be, if you step back, the simmer that you describe, the blowing of the lid, how you describe him and other flash points, really started with the thursday morning tweet about sessions
ordering him to stop the mueller probe. Take us through the slow boil. Privately as we reported, he was brooding. He was upset with sessions. Hes been increasing toward the number of false hoods. Hes been naming mueller publicly by name which is something he didnt do before. We even looked back at his tweets and hes been using the phrase witch hundred to describe the russia probe almost twice as much in the past two months. It is getting you said his skin. He is watching and he cannot stand when theyre talking about Paul Manafort, there is another name he hears. That name is trump. Theyre trying to embarrass manafort. Bring all the stuff up to
embarrass him. He thinks it is a white collared crime. It seems to me that it is all of these spears are now pointing in toward the oval office. Theyre trying to get some sort of deal. You have not just that but the gates testimony. Gaigs is a cooperating witness for anything that bob mueller is investigating. It is not just what gates says in the manafort trial that hell see him annoyed by. Trumps bad behavior is often animated by fear. What is the central issue . Thats a great question and some of the people close to him say they dont know what they dont know, what we dont know. The president truly believes that he did nothing wrong. This is getting reinforced by
rudolph giuliani. There were other lawyers previously who were giving him a different set of advice. On the one hand trump believes his biggest risk is not necessarily from mueller but may come from possible impeachment if democrats take the house. So there is an Elementary School where he believes this is a Public Relations battle. That he needs to discredit mueller in case the investigation finds anything but even if it doesnt and lay the ground work. As he likes to say, this is a witch hundred. Collusion is not a crime and he did nothing wrong. We dont know. Now that Michael Cohen has flipped, thats a risk. There was a seed change in the people close to him and im sure you talked to many more. There was a seed ghang the president s potential guilt on the question of collusion. They always thought, he is too incompetent to have colluded with russia. He couldnt even collude between the plane and the headquarters. He could have done something there. But after helsinki, there was a seed change in what people thought he could be hiding on the question of collusion. I think thats true. I think theres a concern after helsinki that again, it is not just may be his family business, but that he may be getting himself in more trouble as he tries to fight this publicly. Remember there is the collusion and the Obstruction Of Justice. And theres definitely a sense that these tweets are not helpful. These moods and public and private utterances are not helpful. Talking about firing your attorney general. Not helpful. Great to have you here in new york. Air force one is surprising in a lot of ways. I spent a lot of time on it and it was a privilege. Kit feed 100 people at a time really great stuff. Kit protect against an election row magnetic attack. Theres something even more
jarring this weekend. That story is next. Of our new unlimited wireless plans. It comes with a ton of entertainment options. Great, can you sign for this . Yeah. Hey, uh. Whats in that one . Thats a shark. New and only with at t, you can get unlimited data, 30 channels of live tv, and your choice of things like hbo or amazon music. More for your thing. Thats our thing. Visit att dot com. But allstate actually helps you drive safely. With drivewise. It lets you know when you go too fast. And brake too hard. With feedback to help you drive safer. Giving you the power to actually lower your cost. Unfortunately, it cant do anything about that. Now that you know the truth. Are you in good hands . Today, lifechanging technology from abbott is helping hunt them down at their source. Because the faster we can identify new viruses, the faster we can get to stopping them. The most personal technology, is technology with the power to change your life. Life. To the fullest. Hope hicks is back in the news. She was the White House Communications director. She has reemerged six months after resigning that post. She was spotted getting on to Air Force One just before it took off in ohio. There she was in the plane with
the president. President trump may want to get some legal advice before he swaps story with hope. About two months before she resigned, she met with robert mueller, reportedly more than once. You will remember she was also on Board Air Force one when President Trump was putting together his Public Statement about the now Infamous Trump tower meeting. Miss hicks was reportedly right by the president s side for that project, texting back and forth. Today a source close to the trump legal effort tells me the president s conduct since the Trump Tower Meeting, his involvement in the crafting a false statement about that meeting and conversations hes had about it point to an increasing likelihood that the president could be vulnerable on charges of Witness Tampering and Obstruction Of Justice. It also points to legal jeopardy facing all the individuals about the crafting of the original crafting of the statement. And any conversations they may
have had with the president. With this in mind, what do we think they talked about . Joining me to help me answer that question. The former Assistant Director for Counter Intelligence during rob muellers ten youre as fbi drektor and back with us again. We can never get enough of this man. We started this conversation at 4 00, shortly after i heard this reporting from someone close to the legal effort, that the president , even if he had nothing to do with the original meeting with the russians, all of his conduct since then. All of his involvement, dictating the false statement to the press. All the conversations reported to the new york time hes with white house aides about their interwakss muellers investigators, that all of those could leave him very vulnerable on charges of Witness Tampering and Obstruction Of Justice. We ten to see this
unexplainable behavior, nicole, between what is right from a legal, strategic standpoint. To not talk or be in the same airplane with hope hicks and then strategy of Public Perception which is to tell the public, look, im thumbing my nose at all of this legal ease. If i want to invite hope hicks on Air Force One, im going to do it. Shes with me. The problem with this dichotomy of what you should do legally and for Public Perception is that hes going down the right path. He subjected himself to more questioning and hes putting hope hicks into a box where she is likely to be reenter viewed, perhaps for hours again, about What Transpird on that plane. It is all a very bad idea. And we know about lies were told, if we could just adopt some of the language that politicians sometimes tea in scandals like this. There was one in the white house where i worked where Scooter Libby was ultimately charged with Obstruction Of Justice and perjury. Thats often what tripped up aides. It is possible somebody involved repeated that lie when they went in to meet with rob mueller. It is possible one of the people who was called in and questioned about that is already in legal jeopardy. No. And frank is right. If youre a defense attorney, the first thing you say is dome talk to anybody who might be a witness in this case. If you need on pass something to another person, another witness, do it through me, your lawyer. We can talk lawyer to lawyer without Obstructing Justice or tampering with witnesses. You cannot talk witness to witness. At the very least it looks bad. More than that, it could be actual Witness Tampering. Imagine the president saying, hey, what is your collection on what happened on Air Force One . How did you describe to it bob mueller . What else did he ask you . To the extent that mr. Trump and his team are concerned that this is taking too long, my advice would be to stop creating more evidence. And we already had some evidence. There was somebody who was part of the p. R. Side of this. He quit over concerns that Obstruction Of Justice was an area that they were all wading into. Do you think theres any chance that hope hicks was someone already on board in quoopgs the Mueller Investigation . I think it is a minimal chance. Im not sure the strategy would be to insert someone into air
force one who would go up against the president of the United States who is represented by coupe. Probably highly unlikely. So we have a woman here with her whole career and life in front of her. She has a choice to make. She can establish a legacy associating with a president who is likely to face serious charges of impeachment or otherwise or she can be her own person and do the right thing and were not seeing that happen. And a corroborating witness includes every one, cooperating witnesses, with special counsel mueller, that does include a pretty wide group of aides. We know that don. There are people cooperating. Where do you put their risk at
this point . We know the president is being brought in under this Witness Tampering law and he continues to be a subject of Obstruction Of Justice questions. Where do you think the interaction ranks or a risk scale for the president . It makes it more risky for the witnesses. It makes it more ricky for the president. Let me draw the distinction. I also agree that hope hicks is a very unlikely wire it up or going in as a government agent. It doesnt mean shes not a truthful witness. The more the president talks to her, the more the government and the mueller team will want to know what em. All these people you just described are very likely truthful witnesses. They dont want to risk their
own fortune, their own liberty, their own freedom to lie on behalf of another person. So as the president reaches out, he is increasing his own risk and as long as those people tell truth when theyre questioned rgt they should be okay. Like mr. Gates and mr. Manafort, if theyve committed underlying problems, they have a separate problem. Judge just like mike flynn. Thats exactly right. Thank you for spending some time with us. Still ahead, democrats are trying on pull off something that hand been done since the 1980s and they may just do it. Stay with us. Well be right back. Ooh, heaven is a place on earth
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republican district. Donald trump won by over 11 points. In normal times it would be a lock for republicans. In normal times we probably wouldnt even be talking about it. For months the democrat in the race has been chipping away at his points steady lead in the polls. Now he has released that lead. He is now beating his republican possibly by 1 point. 1 point is not a slamdunk. It doesnt guarantee a went but it is a heck of a lot closer than democrats ever expected they would get in a district that has not sent a democrat to Congress Since the 80. Now that they have republicans sweating, what can this race tell us about the democrats
chances in the midterms this november and whether they have a shot at taking back the house . Joining us now, robert, it is great to have you with us. There is a tendency in politics when youre on the right side of a poll like that, to overread the national implications. When youre on the down side, to downplay the national implications. You never want to read too much into an august campaign. President trump weigh in the race. So you have this referendum because the republican candidate has embraced the president and you have the democrat running against tt contract everything leadership in washington. Running very much like other candidates across the country this year. Does this race have republicans, i mean, i dont know that it is possible. Im sure that republicans will say anything these days. In the good old days when i was a republican. We used to acknowledge publicly that you could not win the race without winning ohio. Do people acknowledge to have this in a district like this, that this is an ominous sign for the republicans . They feel like they have an impossible choice. Talking to republicans in and outside, they say you cant win with trump because of the way he may anger women voters, those who have densed themselves from donald trump. You cant went without him because he enfuses the republican base. So you see so many trying thread the needle. Talking about the tax cut. Not really talking about immigration in the same way the
build a wall rhetoric. It will be a balancing act. This is a test to see if a normal main stream senator can pull it off. So theyve identified 60 House Districts that are more democratic than the ohio 12. What are the democrats doing right . Are they nationalizing the contest . What are they doing . When you listen to tanny oconner, those like him between amings of 30 and 50, projecting. They as a new generation of the democratic party, theyre not talking about the headlines were writing about at the washington post. The russia investigation. Theyre trying to talk about the economy. Talk about health care. Core democratic issues. They know if they have any shot at a real wave, not just a little bit of a ripple this november. They have to Action 58th Core democratic voters. Theyre finding their own tensions from time to time. The leftward pull of the democratic party. But for the most part, Democratic Candidates are running on health care and the economy. Not so much talking about bob mueller and President Trump. Or even immigration as a major issue. They want to rouse the central democratic issues. And we heard donald trump talking about a red wave. I dont hear any Political Consultants talking about that. Were always grateful to have you. We have a lot more to get to including what were learning about a critical failure of the Trump Administration. That story is next. Stay with us. Is mealtime a struggle . 3 toddlers wont stop him. And neither will lower back pain. Because at a dr. Scholls kiosk he got a recommendation for our custom fit orthotic to relieve his foot, knee, or lower back pain, from being on his feet. Dr. Scholls. Born to move. Children and then lost. On friday the federal judge over seeing the case took the case to task. Only 500 parents have been located. The judge called that unacceptable. There is no plan in place for the government to find the rest of the parents. Many of these parents were removed from the country without their child. All of this is the result of the governments separation and inability and failure to track and reunite. And the reality is that for every parent who is not located, there will be a permanently or f phaned child. Children forcibly taken from their parents and never returned. But it seems so much more real now as the Trump Administration, even under federal court order fails to take the most basic steps towards fixing this. Joining us now is lee, the aclu attorney who has been arguing this case. Thank you for joining us. Help me understand this. They now welcome your help and your expertise, but the federal government hasnt turned over the files or the personal information about all the parents they deported without their parents; is that right . We said, look, it is the governments responsibility. The court made clear of course it is the government responsibility. But they tried to wash their hands and say you do it. Thats not right. They need to take steps to find the parents. But we are more than willing to help and we want to help. How can we help without information . The government is sitting on many, many phone numbers. We could have been calling these parents for the last weeks or months and theyre not turning over the information. And they have the judge basically said what are you doing . Get a plan, turn over information to the aclu so they
can help you. But, you, the government, also need to take steps to find these parents. It was stunning the position the government took. How does it actually work . Im guessing that someone that comes into this country and is fleeing circumstances so dire that they bring their Young Children and young infants to this country, im guessing they dont leave with a Forwarding Address or a working cell phone. What is under the best Case Scenario . How do you find a mom or a dad who left their infant or their young child in basically a Detention Center in america . Right. Thats exactly right. It is a difficult task. But there are pieces of information that we can use. And so, for example, a lot of the parents have been talking to their children from abroad. The government has those phone numbers. We have been begging for those phone numbers. They have not turned over those phone numbers. There may be addresses for some. They say they dont have addresses for all. But even those sometimes say here is the city they might be. Many of the parents are in guatemala and speak an indigenous language. We want to know what language they spoke when they came here. Any piece of information, if they have a phone number for a close relative, we want to know that. Anything to help us. We are organizing groups on the ground in central america. But they cant just simply drive around the country aimlessly. We need pieces of information. And the government should also say what theyre going to do. For example, they could be running psas in these countries, in the print, radio, maybe television saying if you were deported without your kid, call this hotline. The government came forward with no plan and is telling us they will get us the information about parents when they get it to us. Thats not good enough. This isnt just about the cruelty of the Trump Administration policy. There are children that are going days upon days without parents. Are you worried on the impact of these children . You are exactly right about that. The medical community has filed affidavits in our case and come out overwhelmingly to say, look, these children are going to be permanently, permanently traumati traumatized. When i talk to one of the families which has finally been reunited, the mother told me the younger child, the fouryearold just keeps asking her, are they going to come and get me again and take me away . Thats exactly what were doing to these children. You create a sense of vulnerability that may never leave them. Its horrible. Were grateful for the work youre doing. Thank you for spending some time with us tonight. Still ahead, i have something very important to tell regular viewers of this program. It is good news. Stay with us. Tech at safelite autoglass,
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