russia investigation or you re talking about the payments to the two women, donald trump s story keeps changing about it. at any trial that would occur in the house or somewhere else or in the senate or somewhere else, you explain to the people who are the deciders of fact, if there was nothing to hide here and you weren t involved, why do you keep lying about it? this is as swampy as it gets. thanks very much. jeff is going to stay with us because i want to explore more of the political angles preet was talking about. joining us is jen psaki, and former senator rick santorum. senator santorum, is there any scenario where this isn t a big problem for the president, whether it s political or, you know, well political, let s say? no, you focused, i think rightfully so, on the cohen plea bargain. i don t think the manafort guilty plea guilty conviction is problematic for the president. but michael cohen s admission or pleading guilty to, quote, cooperating with the president
lies, but they were always on big issues and never on day to day small issues. and, david, it s one thing for the washington post to be tallying it, but a lot of people discount that. to have your former attorney say, you know what? i m a crook. i m pleading guilty. by the way, the guy i ve been working for is one as well. this is a whole different league. we ve moved into a whole different stage in this still fantastic story. i don t understand how we ever got here. yeah. i wish it was fantastical. yeah, fantastical is a better way to put it. david gergen, thank you. john dean as well. it s been a rough day for the president s men. late today we learned that the second of candidate trump s original two congressional supporters has now been indicted. congressman duncan hunter of california. he and his wife are charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, campaign finance violations and conspiracy. they allegedly misused a quarter million dollars in campaign money. a spoke
so i was ready to go and did. and david, of course, was in the white house at that time. john, how significant do you think it is, what michael cohen had to say today? i think it was interesting that he said it during his allocution, which was under oath, where he said to the judge that he was doing it at the direction of the head of the campaign, referring to trump. making that clear point in court. when you do plead, you have to explain to the court what you ve done and why you have done it. and they want to make sure you re of sound mind and thinking clearly at the moment. and so i have been through that drill. and it s not the sort of time you give a false statement to a judge. so i think that was probably as awesome and serious of circumstances he could have made that presentation. david, how do you see what happened today in terms of michael cohen? it brought back memories of another day in history. back in the watergate investigations.
white house at that time. john, how significant do you think it is, what michael cohen had to say today? i think it was interesting that he said it during his allocution, which was under oath, where he said to the judge that he was doing it at the direction of the head of the campaign, referring to trump. making that clear point in court. when you do plead, you have to explain to the court what you ve done and why you have done it. and they want to make sure you re of sound mind and thinking clearly at the moment. and so i have been through that drill. and it s not the sort of time you give a false statement to a judge. so i think that was probably as awesome and serious of circumstances he could have made that presentation. david, how do you see what happened today in terms of michael cohen? it brought back memories of another day in history. back in the watergate investigations. when john dean went to nixon and said, there s a cancer on your
the big problem with president trump s story is it s not been a consistent story. and that s problematic for him. but we re still, you know, look, this is a serious problem. this is a game changer in many regards. but looking at who this is coming from and the circumstances around it, i just think it doesn t weigh as heavily as some other charge might. but you know, jeff toobin, isn t it hard to, on the one hand argue, well, this is coming from skuzy people, when donald trump particularly chose these skuzy people to be around him. i mean, if you re bathing in filth and then some of that filth gets on you, it s a little hard to say, well, i can t believe these people are dirty when in fact i m the one who has employed these people and the very reason i probably employed them is because they re willing to do just about anything for me. at least in michael cohen s case. that s part of it.