been allowed to be in court, judge t.s. elliott told the jury, quote, it appears i may well have been wrong. he went on to say, this robe doesn t make me anything other than human. i sometimes make mistakes. paul manafort, a reminder, facing bank tax fraud charges, charges he denies. this is his first trial as a result of the investigation by mueller s office. with us tonight to talk about it, we re so pleased to have chuck rosenberg back, former u.s. attorney for the eastern district of attorney, who has spent his fair share of time in that very courtroom where the trial is being held. he also happens to be a former senior official with the fbi. and eric tuck certificate back with us, justice department reporter for the associated press.
too. i told a story earlier today where i accidentally, and it wasn t a crime against humanity, came back from lunch with a piece of chewing gum in my mouth and a federal judge in the eastern district of virginia asked me to come to the bench, handed me a tissue and politely and discreetly we took care of the problem. he wasn t happy with me, but like i said it wasn t a crime against humanity. he didn t do it in front of the jury. these judges have to be so careful. the government has no appeal. for the defendant, it s a matter of liberty or even life. the notion that you would put a finger on the scale, even accidently is a big one. i m so glad we finally have something on you. it s really unfair that the judge goes by t.s., but it s ellis, not elliott. that one is on me, i apologize. what do you make of the room, of the dynamic, and the reporters
it was a good day. an attorney for president trump s former campaign chairman paul manafort sounding confident. day eight of the manafort trial. today s testimony focused on charges that manafort lied and committed bank fraud to qualify for bank loans. the more notable moment may have come before any witnesses even took the stand this morning. it was in the form of a rare mea culpa from this judge, who has clashed frequently with the special counsel s team, the government prosecutors. referring to a tense exchange the day before over whether an irs witness should have been allowed to testify after having been allowed to be in court, judge t.s. elliott told the jury, quote, it appears i may well have been wrong. he went on to say, this robe doesn t make me anything other than human. i sometimes make mistakes.
something on you. it s really unfair that the judge goes by t.s., but it s ellis, not elliott. that one is on me, i apologize. what do you make of the room, of the dynamic, and the reporters who have been saying today that he s unmistakably tough on the prosecution, do they have it about right? no question, brian, it was an extraordinary moment for everyone coming into the courtroom this morning for the judge to basically tell the jury to put out of their minds something that he in fact had said yesterday and to offer a semi apology. the one thing that i think we should definitely not lose sight of, though, is what precipitated this, which is actually a government request last night and early this morning where they said to the judge,
areas, but also in other places of the world, you think of yemen, al qaeda in the arabian peninsula, he s been pretty successful. so we have got other threats all going all at the same time. in the past, you suggested that the administration was guilty of conducting lawfare instead of warfare, you needed general patton, not elliott nest to go after the bad guys. are you persuaded that this president knows how to be general patton? well, today really is the day to talk about our differences. this is a day to celebrate all of the intelligence services, this information started four years ago under the bush administration, carried through through the obama administration and slowly but surely our intelligence services pieced this puzzle together to finally find this compound and take action on it. there are still lots of room for discussions about interrogation and the value of it and i argue that this clearly demonstrates