jim baker ends his analysis of this moment in history by noting that article ii of the impeachment proceedings against richard nixon stated that nixon, quote, knowingly misused the executive power by interfering with agency of the executive branch, including the criminal division of the department of justice in disregard of the rule of law and in violation of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. in other words, hey, presidents get impeached for reaching into the justice department to talk to officials there about what s going on in an investigation of a president and his white house. that s the history. that s the precedent. as of today, senator chuck schumer, the top democrat in the senate, has written to the inspector general at the justice department asking if there might be something analogous right now with the mueller investigation.
this is an in-depth historical piece about president richard nixon and the trouble he made for himself when he leaned on officials in his own justice department both to try to influence the course of the watergate investigation, but also specifically to get them to feed him information on the ongoing case. james baker, ex-fbi general counsel now providing an impressive history lesson on how one of the articles of impeachment against nixon was in part about him opening up a back channel of communication with a senior justice department official that was designed to inform him about the inner works of the watergate case. joining us now for the interview is james baker, former general counsel of the fbi and co-author with sarah grant of this fascinating spotlight on this part of history. mr. baker, it s really nice to have you here. i know you don t do things like this often if at all. so it s a real honor to have you on the program. thanks, rachel. first time ever. i promise it will
because all of the sudden his guy at the justice department matthew whitaker is giving him access to the inner works of the mueller investigation. we don t know if this white house has been able to spy on or attempt to improperly influence the ongoing investigation into this president and his white house and his campaign. but we do know our history and we do know that history in this case is clear. history tells us that when presidents do that, they get found out. and we have some very strong parallel history to go on here, and we have someone in a very interesting position to be pointing us to this particular part of the historical record tonight, and that is former fbi general counsel jim baker, and he joins us next.
nixon and the trouble he made for himself when he leaned on officials in his own justice department both to try to influence the course of the watergate investigation, but also specifically to get them to feed him information on the ongoing case. james baker, ex-fbi general counsel now providing an impressive history lesson on how one of the articles of impeachment against nixon was in part about him opening up a back channel of communication with a senior justice department official that was designed to inform him about the inner works of the watergate case. joining us now for the interview is james baker, former general counsel of the fbi and co-author with sarah grant of this fascinating spotlight on this part of history. mr. baker, it s really nice to have you here. i know you don t do things like this often if at all. so it s a real honor to have you on the program. thanks, rachel. first time ever. i promise it will not be too painful. okay. we ll see, we ll see. i want to
president engaged in those discussions, the president broke the law. jim baker ends his analysis of this moment in history by noting that article ii of the impeachment proceedings against richard nixon stated that nixon, quote, knowingly misused the executive power by interfering with agency of the executive branch, including the criminal division of the department of justice in disregard of the rule of law and in violation of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed. in other words, hey, presidents get impeached for reaching into the justice department to talk to officials there about what s going on in an investigation of a president and his white house. that s the history. that s the precedent. as of today, senator chuck schumer, the top democrat in the