Norman, bad news. I never graduated from med school. What . But the good news is. Xfinity mobile just got even better now, you can automatically connect to wifi speeds up to a gig on the go. Plus, buy one unlimited line and get one free for a year. I gotta get this deal. I know. Faster wifi and savings . I dont want to miss that. Thats amazing doc. Mobile savings are calling. Visit xfinitymobile. Com to learn more. Doc . The Calendar Pages are turning and the clock is ticking. By this time next week we could no the fate of the former president and whether he will face jail time. In this hour traditions of what will happen. A good day to all of you. Welcome to alec witt reports. Rescue crews are rushing to reach the site of a crash of a helicopter carrying president Ebrahim Raisi. State tv is reporting the helicopter was traveling in rough weather when it suffered a hard landing. It happened near a city on the border near azerbaijan. He was inaugurating a earlier in the day. Dozens of rescue teams have been deployed but they are hampered by very bad foggy weather. Lets go to josh lederman. What more have you been able to find out . Reporter as of this moment the status of president Ebrahim Raisi and his entourage is unknown. We do not know if they are alive or badly injured or if they are fine after what has been as described by state media as a hard landing. Other sources have referred to it as a crash. We dont know what happened to the helicopter other than it was traveling through a dense fog and bad Weather Conditions. He was making his way back from inaugurating a dam. According to state media theyve been unable to reach the site of this landing. The Weather Conditions are making it difficult at this moment, even though some 40 teams have been deployed. According to the Health Minister of iran, theyve deployed every possible resource including medics and surgeons and all kinds of Search And Rescue resources to the area so they are prepared to respond just as soon as they are able to locate and potentially evacuate the president and the Foreign Minister and others. We have seen people praying for his wellbeing on his instagram account. Theyve released a Message Calling for people to pray for his safety. There is a lot to get to. Keep us abreast of anything you find out. Joining me now we have general barry mccaffrey. Thank you for being here. First of all, lets talk about the helicopter that the president of iran may have been flying on and why risk it during heavy fog. This talk about military operations in that regard. You make an excellent point. With these helicopters flying it low altitude and bad weather are at peril. They get above the highest mountain and go on autopilot. But they are landing and taking off with vips, it is somewhat surprising that they will take this kind of a risk. But a larger implication is to lose a president and Foreign Minister. Will this kickoff a power struggle. And the president was a harsh architect of oppression and brutality and to include the morale the angle that they continue to subjugate. Iranian women who were taken to the streets and and have been courageous. This is a potential lawsuit has tremendous implications. Iran as part of almost everything negative going on in the middle east. Through their circuits and militias and certainly hezbollah on the north of israel is totally funded, and to some extent, commanded by the iranians. This is a very important point to see who replaces him if, indeed hes been lost. Before we get to further speculation, the order of command in the wake of his passing, where that to happen, we have no confirmation. I would get back to the helicopters. Its my understanding that with sanctions a lot of the helicopters in the fleet are very old and some predate to 1979. And that its difficult to get military parts and the like. Can you speak to the kind of helicopter that might be up in the air and its viability flying through bad weather . Are most modern helicopters still require enormous amounts of maintenance. Much more than fixed wing aircraft. And the parts have been difficult for soviet era aircraft and other european craft. I think the technology is at risk, and i think in addition we have to recognize that is how well organized and commanded are these helicopter aviation units. We dont know, but it has been a shoddy operation for a long time now. Lets make the point theres a difference between the president and the supreme leader, the ayatollah. The ayatollah is in command of the country. That this is an aging man. Hes in his mid80s at least. At the end of the day this is a theological dictatorship and this vibrant healthy country has been suppressed for decades by basically a corrupt dictatorship hiding behind the guise of religious morality. All of this is at risk. Can they continue to be held to this regime are not . So far they have managed it by unconstrained brutality. People take to the streets and they get killed. They just hung seven people, i believe, yesterday and another one today. This is a terrible, autocratic and repressive government. Thank you very much for illuminating what might happen and what we know has happened and get us through the particulars. Thank you. We will stay on top of this. But we will go to political headlines for u. S. President biden has wrapped up the Commencement Address at Morehouse College. Is most direct engagement with College Students since the israelhamas war. And donald trump has no Public Events today but will be back in criminal Court Tomorrow as the Hush Money Trial nears the end. We will have more on that ahead. Our reporters are on the ground covering all the latest developments. We go to Aaron Gilchrist at Morehouse College in atlanta. Welcome. Talk about the president s message to the graduate class and what issues he touched on. He touched on several issues. Some conventional. He talked about his faith and the faith that he hopes these young men have. And the 400 men who graduated today. He talked about leadership and talked about democracy and what it means. And i think we can help but notice that he talked about the elephant in the room and thats the conflict in gaza. The war between israel and hamas. We should note there were several graduates in the crowd today who had silent protest, if you will. Some of them turned their chairs around. They turned their backs to the president and sat quietly as he spoke. We saw one young man with a palestinian flag over his shoulders. There were other symbols of support as well. The president said those protests are something he supports. He believes students to express themselves and hes listening to them. He said hes calling for an immediate ceasefire in gaza. There were also points where the president touched on topics it seemed to be in line with what you hear at a Campaign Speech. There were hints of his Campaign Speech here. He talked about extremism in particular and referenced the former president. I want you to hear what he had to say about extremism. Insurrectionists stormed the capitol with confederate flags and are called patriots by some. Not in my house. Black police officers, black veterans protecting the capital were called another word as you will recall. They also say out loud, immigrants poison our country. Like the Grand Wizards Of Sin the past. But you know and i know that we all bleed same color. Reporter the president said he will continue to work and his administration will work to root out racism in this country. He said that they dont see you in the future of this country but they are wrong. The president is going to detroit and should be landing there shortly. He will attend the naacp dinner and join a fundraiser there. Thank you so much for that. Lets go to jake trailer in dallas, where donald trump spoke last night at the nra convention. How did the former president try to appeal to gunowners . Reporter last night the former president spoke right behind me at the annual convention and receive their endorsement despite the fact that he cannot legally purchase a firearm in the u. S. Because hes facing multiple felony indictments. He was quick to bring that up and talked about the fact that his legal woes were come here to to gunowners having the rights stripped away. And he said the radical left are stripping away the rights. This is something common from him to take the courtroom and bring it on the Campaign Trail and compare his legal complications with the issues that voters face every day. I want to point to one assertion he made last night about gun owners saying they are not active in the political process and they dont take part in voting despite research that debunks that claim. But gunowners dont vote. I would think that they would vote more than any other group of people and it is just the opposite. They have to get out and vote. Reporter that right there could be the last time we hear from him on the Campaign Trail before we hear of a verdict reached in the criminal trial on monday. We will see crossexamination continue with Michael Cohen and we could hear Closing Arguments on tuesday and we could have a verdict this coming week. Thank you so much for that. In fact, history will play out in a manhattan courtroom this week. But how . We will be back. Now too weak of History In The Making as donald trump get the step closer to The Moment Of Truth and the Hush Money Trial. Tomorrow lawyers will resume crossexamination of Michael Cohen and Closing Arguments could begin tuesday, but only if trump decides not to testify. The jury could be deliberating by the end of this week. Anna bauer is joining me. And David Henderson a civil rights attorney. I welcome you both. Youve been in the courtroom every day. What impressions do you have of the jury . We know there are two lawyers on the panel. Have you been keeping an eye on them . And how they reacted . There are two lawyers on the panel. Overall, this jury has been very attentive and very engaged. Some people describe it like spectators watching a tennis match as they move their heads from side to side to keep up with the crossexamination as witnesses answer questions. Overall people have been very engaged and at least one of the attorneys has been taking extensive notes. Theres this big question of how having two lawyers could potentially impact these deliberations. You have to wonder if these lawyers will be people who will be the Leaders Within the jury. Other things ive noticed with this jury is the first time i noticed that they disengaged and became what appeared to me board was during an extended section of todd blanche is crossexamination of Michael Cohen. Todd blanche is Donald Trumps attorney. He continued to go over and over several points he already covered in a previous section and it was at a time when he was trying to attack Michael Cohens credibility and trying to portray him as someone who cannot be trusted and it seemed that the jury at that point got bored and more disengaged. There were other times, however , during his testimony that i saw smiles and it seemed that when there were occasions that Michael Cohen made said something that was unintentionally funny there were smiles. Its hard to say what that means. I dont want to give you my own ideas. We are always trying to read the tea leaves. But the New York Times saying that the case is the prosecutions to lose. As a former prosecutor, what is your assessment . Have they established a clear link between trump and the crimes . Its hard for me to say, but if you asked me sitting here right now if i think trump did it, i would say yes. Do i think the state has proven it Beyond A Reasonable Doubt . No. They rely too heavily on Michael Cohens testimony. We always suffer from the curse of knowledge. And it gets hard to draw line between what we know because he heard outside of court versus what we know because we heard it inside. The books got cooked and they hid these payments. But you still have to believe Michael Cohen to believe that. And the crossexamination to been so terrible that there are million Different Reasons why should not believe Michael Cohen. And one of the critical pieces of evidence they put in and thats this note from west aberg is let your case ride on someone whos serving five months in rikers. But can i ask you on a personal note, what is like to be an attorney. What is it like to think in your heart and with everything that you know, even outside the courtroom that someone might be guilty but because of Courtroom Proceedings may not be found guilty . How do you go to bed at night with that . I ask myself the question every night. Is an ongoing problem. And thats why have the hangups that i do in this case. Im nervous because at times when i was supposed to be convinced to believe Michael Cohen, i found reasons to doubt him. He makes a secret recording of the former president. And he says he made this recording to be used for the secret purpose but reassuring david pecker loyal. The argument is trump micromanaged everything. Here is an example of you telling me you did something that he was unaware of. Wise it impossible to believe you did same thing with stormy daniels. The defense is not putting this out of crossexamination. You hear him saying that you said mean things about me. So it goes both ways for me in that case. Can you counter what david is saying with regard to when you had the lead attorney yelling and raising his voice at Michael Cohen and his demeanor throughout the trial has been pretty steady. A typical of what you would expect from him. Did that we can the defense . Would there be sympathy for Michael Cohen being in this position at all . Yes. I think there potentially is sympathy for him. As someone who was watching it happen in the courtroom, it was not a moment in which todd blanche came off very well and that was a moment at the very beginning of his cross examination, for example, when he asked Michael Cohen to start things off, he hissed at him and said, did you call me something on tiktok. And thats when the moments that i cite your smile and laugh a little bit. So i dont want to impute my own impressions, but it seems to me that they are more endeared to Michael Cohen and it couldve been that some of these more fiery exchanges backfire. But even if the jury is queasy about Michael Cohens character , when you look at the documents. The first statement with Allen Weisselbergs notes on a plan to reimburse hundred 30,000. Should the documents carry more weight than the personality . Yes and no. I agree with anna. The defense is making Michael Cohen seem more likable to the jury because of how theyre handling crossexamination and not and are not pointing out that documents should control apart from the testimony that the people in the room doing the writing. But i will give you reasons. Document youre looking at involves handwritten notes from allen weisselberg. If i see handwritten notes from someone and that person didnt testify, i wonder why im not hearing straight from the horses mouth. And theres a reason why you dont want me to hear directly from allen weisselberg. We talk about how juries come up with reasonable doubt. No one can tell you what that is. For people to start wondering if its enough to turn the tide during jury deliberations. Lets listen to this. Ive heard people say what did he even do wrong . No one understands the crime. Theres a falsification of Business Records within 10 to defraud by concealing another crime. And the other crime is Campaign Finance violations. The contribution by Michael Cohen exceeds the 2000 limit. And has the manhattan da met this burden . Its a loaded question. Keep in mind what i said about reasonable doubt. First its a question of you presented any evidence to substantiate the prosecution. The answer is yes. The question about whether you been persuasive is different. As a lawyer i cannot get past some of the parts of Michael Cohens testimony and things i know about allen weisselberg. Its impossible to guess what the jury is feeling. But can we anticipate the verdict . And that is harder. The defense has made such a mess out of this case. If they asked me from the beginning i would say you have to admit you had with stormy daniels. Theres no doubt that you had with her and theres no doubt that cohen was paid hundred and 30,000. The question is is when the books were cooked we in on it. And you couldve made the argument that these things went down without my knowledge. That thats not the way they presented this case and thats why its a tossup trying to anticipate how people might feel. Anna, do you have any