the legal team may try to paint mike flynn as not trustworthy. if he accuses the president of behaving badly. msnbc s garrett haake is here in west palm. garrett, fill us in on what s happening here. i know you ve been reporting this out this morning as well. reporter: sure. the washington post has been if michael flynn were to roll over on the president or other senior administration officials, the washington post sources say the response would be to try to discredit him, paint michael flynn as a liar, an untrustworthy person. the white house attorney, john dowd, has been pushing back at this report calling it complete nonsense and more fake news. on the one hand, it would make sense. you ve got michael flynn who admitted to the fbi as part of his deal with the special prosecutor s office. on the other hand, you ve got
mr. president, i rise today to say, enough. and fighting each other. there s a special place in hell for republicans who should know better. he looked like a disheveled drunk that wandered in off the street. racial tensions. this car plowed into a crowd of people killing at least one person. you will not be president trump taking heat for not taking sides. i think there s blame on both sides. i have no doubt about it and you don t have any doubt about it either. number 6. west wing exits. michael flynn has resigned. priebus becomes the shortest serving white house chief of staff ever. a high-profile white house departures. i m grateful for the work on the administration. anthony scaramucci kissing his job goodbye after ten days. erasing the obama legacy. at number 5. i have been very active in
by the way, yet. he doesn t want to talk about it yet. this could complicate things for any potential flynn pardon even as michael flynn s brother is tweeting to the president, hey, let him off the hook. right, hallie. all of this is unfolding pretty quickly. if you see the white house lawyers, they were saying before christmas, we want to go in and meet with bob mueller s team. they re telling the president we expect you to be exonerated, this to end quickly. that may not be the case. i think you re seeing different strategies unfold as this investigation has developed. at first it was a cooperate, cooperate, cooperate. and now in 2018, there could be a new chapter in this. i think it s going to get dicier. tom, as we talk about the special counsel investigation, there s new reporting out from michael isikoff, from yahoo, he says that robert mueller s team has started questioning rnc staffers. specifically about the digital operation that worked with the trump campaign to target v
it remains within the scope. i did not collude with russia, nor do i know of anyone else within the campaign who did so. michael flynn has just pleaded guilty to a charge of lying to the fbi. the president fuming as the special counsel zeros in on his last win. no russia did not help me, okay. russia. i call it the russian hoax. reporter: nbc s peter alexander reporting on the top-ten political moments of 2017. we ll be right back with today s big picture from sunny west palm.
that s largely based on the testimony of michael flynn, i think it would be a classic defense response to go after flynn himself. how could you not? if so much of mueller s case hinges on the truthfulness of flynn. i think that the administration will have a reasonable argument to say this is a guy who admitted to lying to federal agents. at the same time, i think you ll have to be careful in navigating around the past statements of the president endorsing michael flynn s character, saying that this is a stand-up guy makes it more difficult to launch that line of attack. josh, tom s point that he s making, not surprising, but maybe a little risky. what is the risk in labeling it guy potentially a liar. somebody who was the national security adviser inside the west wing. the highest levels of clearance here and somebody who the president has, as garrett pointed out, the president spoken highly you haof in the p discrediting him as a liar, he was the top national security