Secretary of defense, and white house chief of staff under president clinton. Hes back here on prime time. Were going to talk russia and the apparent White House Security breach as omarosa leaks a recording from the situation room. Is that a crime . Well, its monday, but we already have a weeks worth of news. So what do you say . Lets get after it. What does mueller want with roger stone . How does it tie into what he may be looking at with the trump team . Finally we have someone who can help us get answers. Kristin davis. She got the nickname the manhattan madam during the Eliot Spitzer scandal. Shes a close friend of roger stone, worked for the Trump Campaign and has been a focus of the russia probe that has been a focus of the russia probe. Kristin davis, thank you for taking the opportunity. Thanks for having me, chris. So when you got in there, how long were you in there before the grand jury . About an hour. All right. What was the line of questioning like . I think thats whats
Thanks antivaxxers. Welcome to the lead. We begin with the politics lead. Nancy pelosi accused attorney general bill barr today of breaking the law. He lied to congress. He lied to congress. If everybody else did that, it would be considered a crime. Nobody is above the law. Now, the attorney general disputes that and the department of justice said this afternoon that the attack was baseless. Barr also added fuel to the fire today when he refused to testify before the House Judiciary Committee objecting to the format which allowed Committee Lawyers to ask questions as well as lawmakers. Partisan theatrics and fireworks dominated capitol hill and jerry nadler opened the hearing with a prop, an empty chair for the nations top Law Enforcement officer, nadler threatening to hold barr in contempt of congress. Sara murray begins our coverage. Reporter House Speaker nancy pelosi the highest ranking democrat calling the nations top Law Enforcement officer a liar. The attorney general of the Un
Outlining charges against Michael Avenatti. They alleged he embezzled clients money to pay his own expenses and defrauded a bank by using phony tax returns to obtain millions of dollars in loans. Federal prosecutors in new york will announce a different set of charges against avenatti. These related to allegations of extortion of the company nike. Well get into this in a couple of minutes. First, we want to get to the Mueller Report. The New York Times puts it today, the darkest and ominous clouds hanging over trumps presidency was all but lifted on sunday. William barrs summary of the report, the special counsel did not find that donald trump or the campaign conspired with the russian government to influence the 2016 president ial election. The president and his aides have seized muellers findings and characterized them as a victory. It is 100 the way it should s been. I wish it could have gone quicker. We cant let this happen to another president. We can never ever let this happen to
Democrat, no surprise here, says mueller should ignore that guidance. Justice correspondent, Jessica Schneider is with us. This was something that Robert Mueller actually requested and this is somewhat of a stern page and a half letter from the doj. It does lay out for Robert Mueller what he can and cannot testify and it comes after mueller asked for the guidance. The Justice Department warning mueller that his testimony must stay within the boundaries of his report and those were the parameters that mueller was planning to stick with anyway. But theyre also reminding him that he can not testify about any redacted material from the report. That includes grand jury material, information about ongoing investigations. And he also cant talk about the conduct of any uncharged third parties. And that is a crucial directive, because that could really thwart the democrats plan to repeatedly question mueller on this question of if donald trump wasnt president , would he have been charged with o
Attorney general. And he writes that bob mueller in his testimony, quote, must remain within the boundaries of your public report because matters within the scope of your investigation were covered by executive privilege. Well, they are doing this to do Everything Possible to try to make sure mueller doesnt say anything in the hearing because the reality is that the president is worried. And we dont know why, but he is bracing for muellers testimony. Just four days ago he said he wasnt going to bother watching. Today you can watch that evolve within two seconds. Im not going to be watching, probably, maybe ill see a little bit of it. Maybe a little bit of it, maybe all of it. There is no doubt the president will be watching mueller and no doubt the president knows muellers testimony can redefine the presidency. Mueller is coming out. He has a prepared statement he will give at the beginning. And now they are putting the letter out saying you better stay in your lane, buddy. The preside