or any other investigation. of course, our reporting wasn t that he made any promises. our reporting is that the president was venting at him and frustrated about what was going on in new york and at the justice department. the justice department has just put out a statement backing what whitaker s testimony had been there, reiterating that he didn t make any promises or commitments concerning the special counsel s investigation or any other investigation and saying he stands by his testimony. brooke. laura jarrett, thank you so much. we will analyze what you all laid out there. a former u.s. assistant attorney is the southern district of new york is with us as is paul rosen swieg, former counsel to ken starr. gentleman, ali, start withing with you, out of the gate, this is obstruction? what other reason could the president have for calling matt whitaker as the cohen investigation was growing, threatening him.
here, out of the gate, do you believe that there is evidence that there are enough suspicious ballots in question that could actually clang the outcome of this election? the short answer is yes. we knew there was sufficient evidence before the investigation began. what investigators unveiled in shocking testimony and today and perhaps into tomorrow, i believe it further underscores there must be a new election. this election was tainted in the 9th congressional district. is it enough to close that thousand-vote gap? well, i believe it is, but in north carolina the law says it s not just showing that there is enough to close the goop. if there was sufficient activity of illegal behavior and here it s not just a question of alleged election fraud, it s actual election fraud that has been found and admitted to by others. if the election has been tainted
obstructing, where is the law on that? so an attempt. we re talking about really two separate things. one is, in doing this, did he break the law? did he violent the u.s. code in some form or fashion? i m not going to sit here and, again, on the basis of an article that i haven t even read yet say that i could come to that legal conclusion. but when richard nixon was when articles of impeachment were drafted in connection with nixon s activities, the abuse of process articles of impeachment were not so much about his violating the u.s. code, they were about his manipulation of the officers of the government. for example, trying to get the central intelligence agency to shut down an investigation being conducted by the fbi. that sort of thing, i believe,
district of new york investigation. now, recall thaelt s the investigation going on in manhattan that is investigating the trump organization and the role that the president played in hush money payments to women before the 2016 election. and what trump did was he asked whether the u.s. attorney, who had to recuse himself in that investigation, could be put in charge. the real implication being he needed an ally put in charge of this investigation because it was, from the president s point of view, spiraling out of control. so this is important because mark whitaker just testified before congress, and he said he had not been pressured by the president when it came to various investigations. that s right. a lot of his questioning was about conversations he had with the president about the different investigations going on. one of them being the mueller investigation and, of course, there is the southern district
interest could be put in charge. trump thought that this individual, jeffrey berman, might actually be more of an ally and clearly it indicates that the president saw this investigation up in new york as being problematic and potentially spiraling out of control. so that was the request he put in to matt whitaker. and whitaker ultimately said what? whitaker was unable to do anything about it. it appears that he didn t take too many steps to try to follow through on the president another request, knowing full well that actually trying to get someone put back in charge unrecuse is someone he did not did not have the power to do in the justice delaware we reported trump sours on whitaker. he is angry whitaker is not able to carry out some of the tasks the president had hoped he might be able to do. so it was one kind of window into the president s attitude