he was a rich person, but there s plenty of rich persons in the united states. he was in the construction business. he organized the beauty pageants, but, no, it would never occur to anyone that he would think of running for president. he never mentioned his political ambitions. it sounds like utter nonsense. let s discuss now with cnn national security analyst steve hall, retired chief of cia russian operation. global affairs analyst, max booth, the author of the road not taken. and a coauthor of russian roulette, the inside story of putin s war on america and the election of donald trump.
for more on the president s relationship with vladimir putin i m joined by julia ioffe, correspondent for gq and michael isikoff with yahoo! news and co-author of russian rule evident: the inside story of putin s war on america and the election of donald trump. julia, what do you make of what we ve been talking about so far? at some point one goes tired of thinking the president s just not listening to his advisers or the president must know better. you ve got to arrive at the conclusion that he knew what he was doing. the whole world told him he wasn t prepared for this meeting and he said he d been preparing all his life for it. he went in there apparently knowing what he was doing. i think that s probably true. i think he went in there knowing that he was meeting with a man who expressed a clear preference for him during the election, after the election. donald trump has seen even more than we ve seen in terms of classified intelligence on what the russians did to help him win.
relationship with vladimir putin i m joined by julia ioffe, correspondent for gq and michael isikoff with yahoo! news and co-author of russian rule evident: the inside story of putin s war on america and the election of donald trump. julia, what do you make of what we ve been talking about so far? at some point one goes tired of thinking the president s just not listening to his advisers or the president must know better. you ve got to arrive at the conclusion that he knew what he was doing. the whole world told him he wasn t prepared for this meeting and he said he d been preparing all his life for it. he went in there apparently knowing what he was doing. i think that s probably true. i think he went in there knowing that he was meeting with a man who expressed a clear preference for him during the election, after the election. donald trump has seen even more than we ve seen in terms of classified intelligence on what the russians did to help him win. so you know, and i think tha
where, you know, in the united states we have this stupidity going on, pure stupidity. but it makes it very hard to do something with russia. in his press conference later on, the deputy attorney general delivered what sounded a lot like an implicit rebuke of the president. we confront foreign interference in american elections, it s important for us to avoid thinking politically as republicans or democrats, instead to think patriotically as americans. the blame belongs to the criminals who committed election interference. we need to work together to hold the perpetrators accountable, and we need to keep moving forward to preserve our values, protect against future interference, and defend america. i m joined by two journalists who have been covering the russia probe more closely than just about anyone. david corn, co-author of russian roulette, the inside story of putin s war on america and the election of donald
best-seller russian roulette: the inside story of putin s war on america and the election of donald trump. he is also an msnbc political analyst. and let s just begin, michael avenatti, the $99,980 you show monthly payments from novartis to michael cohen s llc totalling $399,920. we have a statement tonight from that pharmaceutical company. that s company that of everyone who has been revealed making payments to michael cohen in your report today, this is the company that seems most completely embarrassed by it. their statement is simply any agreements with essential consultants were entered before our current ceo taking office in february of this year and have expired. so that s one company that s not at all proud of what they were