try to get more evidence for the investigation, but you heard it, the president is standing by the royal prince and his family for now. and now, joining us is jonathan la mere, and one of the associated press white house reporters who spoke with the president tuesday and ashley parker who is a reporter at the washington post, and also msnbc reporter josh letterman, and let s go to you, peter, what we heard and the president is doing today and this is one of the times that we will hear from him, but he said when he was asked are you giving cover to the saudis, and he said, no, but we did not hear anything about the criticisms that we are hearing from congress, and serious concerns raised from people like lindsey graham and what can you tell us? yes, that is right, chris. and jonathan who was in the room yesterday can elaborate on this as the president made the
in violation of the law. now, when jonathan la mere of the associated press asked trump about this said he accused cohen of lying under oath, calling his claim false. and a p.r. person who did small legal work. the president s comments coming after one day of a new report in vanity fair about what michael cohen has been up to since his guilty plea in august. despite having no formal cooperation agreement with the government he has willingly assisted with ongoing investigations in a string of meetings exceeding more than 50 hours in sum. 50 seems like a lot. seems to have gotten under the skin of president trump. that s an unnerving number of hours. especially, look, the president may have said that michael cohen was a p.r. person who did a small number of spam small amount of legal work, whatever
so far are those not running for re-election. i mean, that is what we have seen. we have seen the politics of personal survival inside a republican party that is fluid and right now controlled by donald trump and his assumed base of voters. that is what is above perhaps speaking out, talking about the separation of powers, the basic tenets of american democracy. there is no concern for history. the fact that this is all playing out in public, in plain view, and that this will be written and people will be judged and their legacies may be tarnished by this, there s no concern for that, it s short-term political gain, go into 2018 and sell tax cuts. and the ability of republicans on the hill to sort of not see some of these things, to look the other way or squint and see things in a way where they don t really see a problem with these things, for paul ryan yesterday to say the mueller probe shouldn t be messed with and yet to green light devin nunes sending this memo to the white house f
written and people will be judged and their legacies may be tarnished by this, there s no concern for that, it s short-term political gain, go into 2018 and sell tax cuts. and the ability of republicans on the hill to sort of not see some of these things, to look the other way or squint and see things in a way where they don t really see a problem with these things, for paul ryan yesterday to say the mueller probe shouldn t be messed with and yet to green light devin nunes sending this memo to the white house for release, knowing like any logical observer of this knows that this is all pretext to mess with that investigation, it s stunning. it s stunning to see playing out in plain sight. a lot of people never thought they d see this from a lot of republicans, including paul ryan. hardly a pleasurable conversation. always a pleasure to have you gentlemen on. thanks very much. much obliged to jonathan la mere and eli stoke ankles. the continuing insistence by the white house that am
house counsel refused and said he would not do it, that he would quit first. welcome back to morning joe. it s a very busy friday, january 26. willie who do we have? we have a busy morning ahead. we have the president s speech from davos in just an hour, donny deutsch fresh off a bar fight on the upper east side, it s vicious up there along with the former chairman of the republican national committee michael steele and joining us conversation, columnist for the wall street journal, political contributor for nbc news and msnbc, the great peggy noonan. msnbc chief legal correspondent, host of the beat ari melber, white house reporter for the associated press jonathan la mere and former u.s. attorney for the northern district of alabama, joyce vance. mika is back on monday. so if you re just waking up, here s the news. a source with firsthand knowledge confirms to nbc news that president trump ordered the special counsel robert mueller be fired last june. the new york times was