Now democrats are demanding answers. Plus Robert Muellers response to the Supreme Court. New details linked to the mystery case on the russia probe. Well have the new candidates topping the democrats list. We begin with the president closing the border. The shutdown is in its eight days with roughly 8,000 workers affected. Trump is demanding 5 billion for the wall. The Vice President pence said the president will accept 2. 5 billion instead, but Senate Majority leader moo i north leader Chuck Schumer rew e jekted that. Meanwhile as the democrats proo e pair to take control of the house next thursday, more americans are blaming President Trump than they are Congressional Democrats for your the shutdown. Lets start this morning by bringing in our white house kroblt Kelly Odonnell as well as Congressional Correspondent mike viqueira. Kelly, lets start with you. The president went so far as to say he would consider turning it into a profitmaking operation. Kelly, what did he mean by that .
welcome back and thanks so much for joining us. i m morgan radford. robert mueller is accelerating the pace of his russia investigation as the year comes to an end. the special counsel s office responded nearly three days early to a subpoena fight at the supreme court. earlier this week, chief justice john roberts putting a temporary hold on a contempt order against an unidentified foreign-owned company. now, that company is fighting a grand jury subpoena in a mystery case that s believed to be linked to the special counsel s investigation. joining me now, doug byrnes, a former federal prosecutor, as well as jill wine-banks, msnbc contributor and former assistant watergate special prosecutor, and betsy woodruff, politics reporter for the daily beast and an msnbc contributor. doug, why is this filing shrouded in mystery and what s the significance of coming in three days early? it s probably shrouded in mystery because it s part of the investigation.
should be public hearings, because there s a very big difference between what congress does and what mueller as a prosecutor does. he prosecutes existing legal violations, violations of laws that are on the books now. congress needs to look at what laws are needed to prevent this kind of thing happening again. but the other thing they need to do is the educate the public about what the facts are. we won t know the facts from mueller until there are indictments and trials. and the way that people will be able to know how to vote or how to be influenced in terms of whether they continue to support the president is through the education. that s what happened in watergate. and that s what actually led to the resignation. it s because the facts came out and people lost faith in the president. so we need the facts to be public. that s what i think is important. facts and faith. thank you so much to doug, jill,
guliani himself approved the release of the recording writing mr. guliani seems to be confused. he expressly waived attorney client privilege last week and talked about talked about the recording for hitting all confidentiality. the government has 183 of cohen s recordings according to guliani who says a dozen directly involve the president and all of them will exonerate president trump. trish: okay. lots of recording. he does. trish: thanks, rick. how will it play out? i m just by doug byrnes, former federal prosecutor. where to start. all right. first of all, this whole idea, the tapes themselves, it s all a question of what is on it. but last time i checked, although it s kind of seedy and none of us like it, it wasn t illegal to pay off a woman that
good in the first place. he s not a bigot or a racist. he was trying to get illegals swarming into his county and there s no sin in that. does he deserve a pardon? attorney doug byrnes on that. what do you think? this is a highly political case. politics and criminal law don t miss. the case comes out of the whole dust-up and hot button rhetoric and sanctuary city versus sheriff arpaio s approach. on the case itself before i really answer should you get a pardon, does he deserve it, the reality real quick so everybody understands the case, you guys pointed out as is critical that it s a misdemeanor, number 1. but there s two other points. he had requested a jury trial. there s a big issue pending on appeal now about that. okay? and there was another issue about whether or not he had relied on the advice of lawyers. reliance on advice of counsel is