house advisors related to the trump? i was very explicit in my opening staumt as to that not only about my communications regarding the special counsel s office and i said other investigations in the southern district of new york would be included in other investigations. chuck, you re a lawyer and a very good one obviously. he says the white house hasn t provided any promises or commitments, which is pretty a specific language. and those are exact lathe words i have keyed in on, chris. and he arefers congress back to his opening statements that seems to hinge on promises or commitments. it seems like there were conversations between the president and whitaker, not just about recusal but about the scope of the investigation and whether it had gone too far.
passed out of the house. it now comes to the senate. it looks like the yeas, the people who want to vote for the resolution have the votes from republicans. there has been tremendous pressure put on them by the white house. mike pence has been over there. what is your sense of where things stand right now? despite the really overwhelming squeeze exerted by the white house, very transparently so, the votes seem to be holding firm among that handful of republicans who are necessary to overturn this emergency declaration. remember, never before in our history, never has a president clearly usurped congress powers. this measure should be bipartisan. the power to spend and appropriate funds is in the constitution, given only to congress. never before has the president spent money after congress has refused to give him the
authority to do so, not just neglected, but refused. so this kind of vote i think is a challenge to the institution, and my republican colleagues are deeply worried more than may vote the right way tomorrow about the precedent that is set here for the president seizing power from the congress. and eventually, i believe the courts will overturn it, regardless of what the congress does tomorrow. yeah, that seems likely there has been some talk about negotiating some kind of one-time mulligan where this emergency stands, but then they put up some vote, some show vote, which is essentially a show vote to change the emergency act going forward. you seem confident the republican votes are holding. we ll see tomorrow whether that bears out. i m not sure whether i would place my bet. senator blumenthal, thank you so much for taking the time. thank you. all right. we have more details on a very exciting event that s coming up on all in.
in the ongoing saga of whether president trump ever dangled a pardon before michael cohen, prosecutors have requested emails that appear to show a back channel between michael cohen and team trump. cohen has given congress emails and in those emails arex changes between cohen and a lawyer acting as a conduit to team trump. it s costello and he emalled him after speaking to trump lawyer rudy giuliani. he s tlr go between. one emaileneded with a message quote sleep well with tonight. you have friends unhigh places. and costello reportedly wrote rudy was thrilled and said this could not be a better sit waugz for the president or you. thank you for opening the back channel of communication. he claimed a different contact saying cohen raised the possible pardon himself.
important not to lose sight of the main fact which is right after michael cohen s office and home was rodded by the fbi, they were having kanszs about a potential pardon. the president whether directly or through whoever was sngsally telling michael cohen you re on our team, don t cooperate and you have friends in high places. i will fix this for you. that s significant because that could be criminal. that s part of what congress and federal prosecutors, apparently in the southern district of new york are investigating. whether the president can be eindicted is another question. but this raises questions about who else he has potentially dangled pardons for. paul manafort is a good kags study for this. why has his lawyers taken such great risks in his case throughout this entire process if they didn t think the president wasn t going to help him out?