question is what you re saying to this case, that we ve never seen a pardon dangled in this way that could potentially affect the outcome of a case detrimental to the president? absolutely, that s precisely right. when else in our history has a president sought preemptively to pardon people so that they wouldn t testify against him in a massive national security investigation of his own conduct? michael, you make particular note of current and former administration officials, say they recounted conversations they either took part in or overheard, about pardons. so tell me, michael in your role as analyst of your own work, where s the mueller interest in a line like that? well, the question really here is, was there an intent to actually obstruct the investigation? did the president simply, you know was the president going to dowd? we don t know if that s true but was the motivation here, look,
and to our great veterans. and while shulkin s rumored possible replacements ran the gamut from a fox news host to a three-stor army general, the president s choice was a genuine surprise. he chose his doctor, the physician to the president, to run the second largest agency in all of our government. ten times bigger than the fbi. you may remember the doctor from his memorable on-camera briefing after examining his patient, the president. u.s. navy rear admiral ronny jackson was selected as white house physician back in 06. he previously treated president obama. and just last week he was promoted and received his second star. here is a bit from that memorable briefing a few months back. he has absolutely no, you know, cognitive or, um, mental issues whatsoever, that he is very sharp. he has incredibly good genes. it s just the way god made him. his heart is very healthy. he s very sharp. and you know, he s very articulate when he speaks to me. more stamina and more energy
phase, looking the president down on this investigation, will the president sit with mueller, will mueller have a chance to understand from the president why he did the things he did, why did he fire jim comey, why did he ask comey to end the flynn investigation? that will allow mueller to assess what were truly the president s intentions? michael, you and i have had this conversation before. when we learn that mueller s on to something, isn t the usual rule of thumb that he s been on it for weeks or months before we have learned about it? yeah, we don t know if this is a part of the obstruction inquiry that mueller s looking at. but if you talk to legal analysts and you kind of watch this investigation and read between the lines, it s hard to believe that mueller would not look at this question. you have to remember, mueller wants to overturn every rock here, to make sure that when he closes up shop, he can say that he looked at all these issues and he s not faced with a disclosur
our nbc news headquarters here in new york. day 433 of the trump administration. another great day for all those involved in the newspaper war that this administration has sparked. not a great day to be the now-former va secretary, and in a moment we ll talk about the latest departure from the trump cabinet and how the president plans to fill this particular job. but first, as they say, two reports today with major possible implications on the obstruction angle of the mueller investigation. the new york times first on the board, washington post quickly followed, to report president trump s former lead counsel in the russia case, john dowd, spoke last year with lawyers for former national security adviser michael flynn and one-time trump campaign manager paul manafort about possible presidential pardons. a five-person reporting team for the times writes this. the discussions came as the special counsel was building cases against both men and they raised questions about whether
attorney and former staffer for the house intelligence and armed services committee. mark, talk to us about how significant is this filing. we ve got people watching who probably read a headline on their devices and who have just gotten home from work, especially if they rely on the new york city subway system, they re just getting home from work. update them on what they need to know on this story. i think the significance is that you have a senior trump campaign adviser in the final weeks of the campaign who s having these communications with an associate who is, as mueller has said today, an active member of russian intelligence service, has active ties to the service, and who gates himself said he knew was a former gru officer. if you step back and you say, what s the cosmic significance? it just shows once again that the trump campaign was having these contacts with not only the