Thats the center of jack smiths case. Donald trump is not being prosecuted for lying. Hes being prosecuted for the deliberate and criminal steps he took alongside his six coconspirators to stay in the white house and the quote, unlawful means they pursued to subvert the results in several key states. After the election, in michigan, the indictment noting this, in a private oval office meeting, with the States Senate majority leader, donald trump raised a false claim of an illegitimate vote dump in detroit. The Senate Majority leader told trump that he, quote, had lost michigan, not because of fraud, but because the defendant had underperformed with certain voter populations. Prosecutors then say trump brought his false vote dumping claim to his ag, who told the former president what happened in michigan was, quote, the normal vote Counting Process and that there was no indication of fraud in detroit. The very next day donald trump say this, made a knowingly false statement that in michigan a vote dump came in unexpectedly saying, quote, this, nobody knows anything about it. It is corrupt. Detroit is corrupt. On december 7th, the indictment says, despite still having established no fraud in michigan, coconspirator one, who we know is Rudy Giuliani, sent a text intended for the michigan Senate Majority leader saying so i need you to pass a Joint Resolution for Michigan Legislature that states that the election is in dispute. Ultimately that michigan Senate Majority leader declined. It is one piece of a large and messy puzzle. Well get into the coconspirators jack smith says helped him along the way and the former president s strongest defense now. We want to begin with the reporting and then what happens next. Joining me now, ryan reilly, from outside the courthouse in washington, d. C. Donald trump set to appear there about 24 hours from now, tomorrow, from what we know. What do we know about that appearance . Reporter luckily the line hasnt started yet, but there is i lot of anticipation here. Someone dressed up as donald trump in an Orange Prison Jumpsuit was in the location behind me a little while ago doing interviews with reporters there. Some of the fanfare has become. We expect barricades to be set up around this courthouse. We expect that means one entrance will be open. The Secret Service has to work closely with the u. S. Marshals service, the park police. Were in an area that is, you know, within sight of the crime scene, which is sort of remarkable here. We can see the u. S. Capitol from where i am standing now, a few blocks away. So youre going to have a lot of Law Enforcement agencies that need to coordinate for this security situation, to make sure everything is kept safe in this unprecedented event. We havent seen indications thus far on social media from what ive seen and some of the experts have been looking at anything overt. But it is sort of a stand by, i think, scenario for a lot of donald Trump Supporters. We have seen violent reactions to charges before. After the raid in maralago, an individual was physically here on january 6th and was on the grounds of the u. S. Capitol and ended up going to an fbi headquarters location there. I think it is something that Law Enforcement has to be ready for, potentially, a reaction to this incredible and sort of historic and unprecedented indictment of a former president and it is the largest one of the many investigations that he is facing right now. Ryan reilly, ill be down there beside you tomorrow as we await the former president s arraignment. For now, thank you. Want to bring in former u. S. Attorneys joyce vance, Barbara Mcquaid, both msnbc legal analysts. Joyce, let me start with you on this one. As i mentioned, as we came into this hour, lies are not enough for jack smith and he stated that pretty clearly in this 45page indictment. This is about much more laid out in paragraph four of this indictment where he notes about the unlawful means of discounting legitimate votes and subverting the election results. Joyce . Thats right, yasmin. The line that smith sets up in this indictment is there is a certain amount of conduct that is awful conduct, but we have to tolerate it. Because we are a democracy. And the allegation is that trump ultimately crosses over the line between awful and unlawful and once hes done just talking, just pushing the lie, even taking legitimate actions like challenging results in court, and he moves on to doing things like entering into conspiracies designed to subvert the Justice Department, to push the fraud line even further, that hes in criminal territory. So thats the construct that smith has set up for this prosecution. Barbara, i want to dig into count four. Both you and joyce are interested in count four this conspiracy to interfere with voting rights. Why is this specific language this specific count so stunning to you as laid out in this indictment . Well, i think this count is so important, yasmin, because i think when we think about count one, conspiracy to defraud the United States, we think of it as a crime against our government. When we think of obstruction of a official proceeding, we think of it as a crime against the members of congress in the joint session that day to certify the vote, but this one, this deprivation of rights, this one is targeted against us, the voters. The citizens of the United States who cast their ballots for joe biden have been deliberately interfered with. That is the one that really hits home as the attack on democracy and why it is so poignant that that charge is included in this indictment. Can you kind of draw on that a little bit as were talking about count four here, specifically, essentially the victims here are the american people. How do you see the former president s attorneys defending these actions . Well, im sure well hear all sorts of arguments ranging from the inevitable legal argument that the constitution nowhere specifies a right to vote. Thats true. The language you have a right to vote does not appear in the constitution. But, of course, it is implicit from the surrounding context. And courts should make short shrift of that sort of argument. Well hear the more detailed arguments that trump perhaps never formally entered into a conspiracy, where the object was to interfere with the vote, because he believed that he had won. He in fact believed what he was doing was effectuating the wishes of the voter, and so much of this will come down to jury issues, it will be a question of who the jury believes after they hear the evidence. I think im reading through, this 45page indictment. All the states in which these fake elector schemes were drawn up, arizona, georgia, michigan, nevada, new mexico, pennsylvania, wisconsin, and all these states it was clearly laid out in this indictment and yet we know there is a potential indictment coming down by Fulton County d. A. Fani willis. Im wondering if youre thinking the same thing as to where there arent more in depth investigations happening within some of these states and could that be in the potential pipeline considering what has been laid out here by the Special Counsel . It could be but it is a lot to bite off and chew if youre a County Prosecutor or state attorney general. I give a lot of credit to fani willis for taking this on. It is enormous and immense. In michigan, there has been a charge filed against the 16 fake electors. But within each state there is a little conspiracy. And it is not so little. It is just one of seven. I think one of the reasons fani willis acted so quickly is because she had that really powerful evidence of the recording of donald trump, pressuring Brad Raffensperger to find him 11,780 votes. I dont know if we have such open and obvious recorded evidence in the other states, and it is probably convenient to just sort of stand down and let jack smith do his thing. In theory, all seven states could bring charges, separate sovereigns and they have the right to do that because the crimes that have been at least allegedly committed against their citizens are different from the federal crimes that have been committed. The smoking gun in the phone call referenced also in this indictment as well, in which the former president asked then georgia Secretary Of State to find the 11,000 plus one votes. Joyce, draw for me on this idea that jack smith chose to move forward with just one defendant, that of the former president of the United States, donald j. Trump, but not charging for now the six coconspirators, five of which we know the identity of. Right, so this is, i think, something that we should acknowledge. We just dont understand precisely why smith made this strategic decision. It is possible that we will see a follow on indictment, the original indictment could be superseded. There could be additional indictments charging these people. The one thing we cant see in my mind is a failure to hold some of these people accountable. For instance, coconspirator number four is, i think, undoubtedly jeffrey clark. He was the head of the environment and Natural Resources division at the Justice Department. And he interacted directly with trump at these pivotal moments and he agreed that he was willing to pervert the purpose of the Justice Department. That he was willing to reach out to states and lie about the existence of fraud in order to throw the certainty, the conclusion of the election into doubt in the publics eye. You know, doj federal prosecutors like barb and myself were instructed to indict the most serious readily provable charges that we have based upon the evidence. Here the government has put forward a lot of evidence in this indictment that suggests that these six or at least some of them can be charged. This sort of conduct is far too serious to commit the people to just walk away from. So i think we will ultimately see some form of charges brought here. Barb, and while there is not this is not prosecuting the lies the former president told, it is about his efforts to subvert the results of this election. This is about building a case of intent. What he knew and when he knew it. And i want to speak briefly about mike pences role in all this, the former Vice President of the United States, who offered a statement a little bit earlier today as well. Mentioned this document a hundred times in the 45 pages and within this indictment saying this, on january 1st, the defendant called the Vice President and berated him because he had learned the Vice President had opposed a lawsuit teak Sikhing A Judicial Decision that at the certification the Vice President had the authority to reject or return votes to the states under the constitution. The Vice President responded that he thought there was no constitutional basis for such authority and that it was improper. In response, the defendant told the Vice President you are too honest. Does this in fact prove the intent that the former president knew what he was doing was wrong but he did it anyway . Yeah, when you tell somebody theyre too honest when they object to your plan what does it say about you . An admission im dishonest . I think thats the way i read that. No one piece of evidence is dispositive of any issue because a jury has to be convinced Beyond A Reasonable Doubt. But if you look at all the allegations in the indictment, it just piles up. There is william barr telling him theres no fraud, there is chris krebs, the cyberczar, telling him theres no fraud. His own director of national intelligence, members of his campaign team, again and again and again hes told there is no fraud in this election and yet as soon as hes told that, he goes right back out and persists in his false claims. He may say i had no idea, i still believe i won to this day, but the jury will be instructed on something known as willful blindness, a person cannot deliberately ignore a high probability that a fact is true, just by being blind to it, just by pretending it doesnt exist. I liken it to a toddler who puts his hands over his ears and says i cant hear you. At some point a jury is allowed to draw a reasonable inference that he knew. My kids do that and they always know what im saying. Thank you, both. Appreciate it. Breaking news we have been following in washington as well. Capitol Police Locked down and evacuated the Russell SenateOffice Building after receiving reports of a possible active shooter. This according to two Law Enforcement officials who spoke to nbc news. Joining me with more on this is senior Congressional Correspondent garrett haake. What do you know . Reporter a short time ago, Capitol Police officers began evacuating the Russell SenateOffice Building over my shoulder here, just across the street from the capitol itself. Staff members in other Office Buildings were told to shelter in place, lock down, close their doors, keep their electronics on silent while officers investigated reports of what they believed to be an active shooter call. I should make the point there has been no indication of any shots fired. No one has found anyone with a weapon. Capitol police are taking this very seriously now. I talked to several staffers who are rushed out of the russell building at gunpoint, officers with guns drawn, moving people through the hallways, getting them out. I did just speak to the Capitol Police spokesperson who said theyre continuing to search all the Senate Office buildings, the three buildings on the far side of the street from the u. S. Capitol, looking for something, anything to match up with what may have been a 911 call that came in. So far, they are finding nothing. Theyre taking this very seriously. Congress is out, theyre on recess, most staffers are working remotely if theyre working at all this week. Folks here describing very frightened by this, being rushed out of the building at a pace they never experienced before. Clearly not a drill. Clearly something theyre taking seriously. We expect to get a proper briefing on this from Capitol Police as soon as they have more information to share. Right now theyre still searching, not clear on exactly what theyre looking for. But no specific reports shots fired, but this partial evacuation, partial lockdown under way of the Senate Office buildings. Let us know when you get updates on that, thank you. Appreciate you. Coming up, so how do you defend donald trump . Im ask one of his former attorneys after the break. Plus, why this indictment is as much about the future of the Republican Party as it is about donald trump. And who is the judge assigned to this case . What can we expect to hear from her . Ill speak to someone who knows her pretty well. Were back in 60 seconds. O know her pretty well. Were back in 60 seconds astepro allergy, steroid free allergy relief that starts working in 30 minutes, while other Allergy Sprays take hours. With astepros unbeatably fast allergy relief you can astepro and go im mark and i live in vero beach, florida. My wife and i have three children. Ruthann and i like to hike. We eat healthy. We exercise. I noticed i wasnt as sharp as i used to be. My wife introduced me to prevagen and so i said yeah, ill try it out. I noticed that i felt sharper, i felt like i was able to respond to things quicker. And i thought, yeah, it works for me. Prevagen. At stores everywhere without a prescription. Joining me now, jim parlatore, served as Donald Trumps attorney until his resignation in may because of infighting with boris epstein. He represents former nypd commissioner bernie kerik who turned over thousands of pages of documents to jack smiths office as part of the investigation into trumps efforts to overturn the election. Tim, thank you for joining us on this, i appreciate it. I want to play for you some sound, the former president s attorney who appeared on the today show, john lauro, kind of staging some of the defense, it seems like were going to be hearing in the coming months and have you react on the other side. Lets listen. This indictment is criminalizing conduct, not speech. It is criminalizing speech for this reason. What the president saw in the 2020 election was all these irregularities going on. He had every right to comment on that, and act politically. In a criminal case, what they would have to show is all that speech is not entitled to First Amendment protection. Hell never be able to do it. Tim what is your reaction to that . You know, hes kind of hitting the point that all of these counts do require Corrupt Intent. They require him to know that these claims of fraud were false and be pushing them anyway. The First Amendment aspect of it is not something that i really see as applicable he