schumer reacted to mcconnell s apparent turn-around on election security later on the senate floor. leader mccomfortable kept saying we don t need the money. i made umpteen speeches here at this chair and the republican leader denied the need, but now, thank god he has seen the light. a spokesperson for mcconnell told the washington post that schumer was mischaracterizing the republican leader s position and maintained that the amendment was really a continuation of previous years funding. president trump has filed a lawsuit in his bid to keep officials in new york from gaining access to his tax return, filing the suit against the manhattan district attorney in the southern district yesterday, naming vance and the top preparer as defendants. the suit claims that vance should not get trump s tax returns arguing that a sitting president is not subject to the criminal process while he is in office. vance subpoenaed the president s accounting firm for eight years
whistleblower complaint that the trump administration is trying to keep secret from congress. two people familiar with the matter telling the washington post that it centers on ukraine. nbc news has not confirmed that ukraine is at the center of the issue though. and the white house did not immediately respond to a request for comment. the post citing two former u.s. officials, previously reported that the complaint was made by a u.s. intel official who was alarmed by a promise the president made to a foreign leader in a phone conversation. trump spoke with the new president of ukraine on july 25th, the whistleblower complaint was filed less than three weeks later. ukraine is significant because of reporting that the president was withholding military aid to that country. while at the same time trump s personal lawyer, rudy giuliani, was pushing for the ukrainian government to investigate democratic presidential front-runner joe biden, and his son hunter. the confluence of these tw
again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. day 679 of this trump administration. the day the president was hit with a legal bombshell as robert mueller secures a guilty plea from the man who was once one of trump s most loyal lieutenants. today michael cohen, the president s former personal lawyer, admitted to lying to congress about his boss s involvement in a project to build a moscow version of trump tower as he was securing the republican nomination back in 2016. and perhaps worse than that, cohen admits to being in touch with the kremlin during a presidential campaign. cohen s plea came this morning in federal court in new york as part of a cooperation deal with mueller. in court documents, cohen explained his motivation. quote, i was aware of donald trump s repeated disavowals of commercial and political ties between himself and russia, and that any contact with russian nationals by the trump campaign or the trump organization had all terminated before the iowa caucus
i think this thing is enormous. in the russia investigation so far, the new york times points out today that mueller has, quote, issued more than 100 criminal counts against 33 people and three companies. they include cohen, former trump campaign aides, trump s former campaign chairman, dozens of russians and the president s former national security advisor. so far, there have been seven guilty plea. we should note lobbyist sam paton s charge stemmed from mueller what was brought by prosecutors in washington. we ve asked frank figliuzzi and jeremy bash to remain with us for just a few more minutes to take a few more questions. jeremy, it appears the president will never put pen to paper and sign a bill that protects robert mueller. but do you think mueller has de facto protections of his own now? and are you convinced he already has left an unbreakable and indelible mark on this presidency thus far?
for every day should feel like the night before katrina. they know, brian. robert mueller, whatever the report says, is clearly painting a picture, a pattern of behavior within president trump s inner circle. whether it s roger stone or michael cohen, there is a time line that is being laid out. giuliani told me they are being asked about the time line, asked about the trump tower meeting, they were asked about the president s knowledge of different discussions, different exchanges. robert mueller is trying to build a case. maybe not a legal case that would lead to an indictment of a president, but a case about his behavior, about what he has done. but republicans believe the institutional credibility of the media has been eroded by the president s fake news charges, and that there are people like greg jarrett, other conservatives out there, who will be on the barricades politically for president trump. have you paused for a second today, bob, to consider that during those days e