donald trump. couldn t his defense argue or he argue that he did not know it was a campaign finance violation? he just thought it was hush money from his own pocket? frank, take that one. you can certainly try that, andrea, and we re seeing an evolution of the defense strategy which has gone from, i didn t do it to i might have done it but it s not illegal to the next step being, i did it and it might be illegal, but i m the sitting president and you can t touch me. the problem with evidence that you directed a felony is that you re involved in other crimes. people who say, this is just about giving money to women to be quiet don t understand the the gravity of directing money through money laundering, through bank fraud, through wire fraud and then campaign finance violations and possibly using the trump organization as a slush fund to support the campaign. at some point, he can no longer
(dad) nooooooo. (dog) yessssss.. (vo) quick, the quicker picker upper! bounty picks up messes quicker and is two times more absorbent than the leading ordinary brand. (boy) hey look, i got it. bounty, the quicker picker upper. you know how i love to end this show. no matter what, there s always good news somewhere and we think good news rules. it comes from california. the scene of so much devastation after last month s wildfires. one woman, her heart broke. andrea gaylord had to leave behind her two dogs. she was afraid they were gone for good. fast forward a month, she was let back onto her property and
the past saying no collusion and calling this all a witch hunt. over the weekend, kelly o donnell asked the president if he directed michael cohen to make these two payments and the president said, no, no, no. multiple times. i spoke with the president s attorney, rudy giuliani, over the weekend, who really echoed what we heard from the president who said, look, there s nothing to see here but bottom line, this clearly isn t going away and it s giving a lot of ammunition to democrats who are increasingly talking about impeachment but more significantly, talking about the political peril the president could face, if and when he does leave office, andrea. the prosecutors effectively are accusing donald trump of defrauding the voters. on friday, the sentencing memo from michael cohen, what they say he did was trying to subvert the election. by making these hush payments,
andrea gaylord of paradise, california, was forced to leave everything behind including her beloved dogs but she found a miracle. her dog madison standing watch. a month later outside their burned out home and then miguel was found by volunteers and reunited. how about that for good dogs? that does it for us. and here s ali velshi and stephanie ruhle for velshi & ruhle. have a good afternoon. i m ali velshi. i m stephanie ruhle. it s monday, december 10th. let s get smarter. john kelly will be leaving at the end of the year. among the names getting buzz now, congressman mark meadows, chair of the house freedom caucus. mick mulvaney, the white house budget director, and matthew whitaker, you might recognize his name, the acting attorney general. part of the problem is that there isn t a long list of people knocking down the door of
fallout of the allegations he ordered the killing. yeah, that s right, andrea. in the period of time after khashoggi was killed on october 2nd, we learned there were repeated conversations between jared kushner and mohamed bin salman or mbs as he s commonly known. in some of the conversations, kushner was actually offering him some advice about how to get through this storm of controversy and scrutiny that came after the killing of khashoggi. so it s a long pattern that really dates back to even the months before the administration, before the president came into office, but it has continued up until the present time and that s, i think, what made it particularly interesting for us. part of your reporting is also, mark, that jared kushner was involved in the very early stages of the white house, even during transition with this