Get them out of prison to restore their Voting Rights but some people are irredeemable back to that debate in an hour and the president s peek and a new take from the white house that you might call like father, like soninlaw. Jared kushner about an hour ago saying the Russia Special counsel investigation was, get this, more damaging to the country than the actual kremlinled interference in the 2016 election. Quite frankly, the whole thing is just a big distraction for the country. You look what russia did, buying some facebook ads to try to sow dissent and do it and its a terrible thing but i think the investigations and all of the speculation thats happened for the last two years has had a much harsher impact on democracy than a couple of facebook ads. If you look at what they did and the magnitude of what they accomplished the ensuing investigations have been way more harmful. We didnt know what russia was doing what they were doing, a notion what have they were doing didnt even register to us as being impactful. And the president just moments ago, you see it right there, leaving absolutely no doubt he approves of his soninlaws take. Russia, of course, did a lot more than buy a couple of facebook ads but facts are not easy to come by in the white house effort to attack the Mueller Report and its damning findings about the president s conduct and about his character. Fight is the white house mantra of the moment. The media, morning show personalities, tariffs, twitter, democrats, the obama administration, all subjects of president ial twitter scorn in the last 24 house, but the propane propelling hissage, read the tweets, is the Mueller Report. Words like harassment, coup, twisted and witch hunt litter the president s twitter feed. The president now wants you to think mueller found nothing so that he can make his next argument, that the democrats are now trying to recycle nothing. Democrats see it differently, of course, and are now pressing through a subpoena for testimony from the former white House Counsel don mcgahn, the witness most cited by the Russia Special counsel in his report. With me in studio to share the reporting and their insights, julie herb felled davis, jeff zeleny and richard share and just a couple of facebook ads. Set aside collusion, obstruction, all of that, if you read the Mueller Report, no matter what you, are its a tamning detail of the sustained russian interference and every american should be outraged by it and the president s soninlaw said just a couple of facebook ads. Of all the many things up for dispute, was there obstruction, the the russian involvement is not disputed by intelligence agencies so for Jared Kushner to say this and clearly his audience was of one and clearly that person the president responded in kind, but its just another exampleofsort of living in this alternate universe but all of it is geared towards framing then tire thing for the Reelection Campaign, and the president has done a very good job of it. But the question is why cant he sort of follow one track here and move on to Something Else . He is consumed by this more than anyone else, so that is the unknown question here. How much will it consume him, envelope him, or is it just sort of a split screen here, still trying to define this as House Democrats are sort of launching their own inquiries. Right. This is an attempt to sort of downplay the findings, not just the findings that are sort of indisputably supporting the notion that russia interfered, in a very elaborate way, rather than just a few facebook ad, but in a very fulsome play, how to plan and how to interfere with american democracy. He does not seem bothered by that like is reflected in many parts of the report. He seems to see it as sort of a question of trumps legitimacy to even look at that question, and feels that, you know, thats a worse thing for democracy as you heard than, you know, the underlying crime itself of a foreign country trying to have its way in a president ial election. His fatherinlaw his fatherinlaws ego and insecurity are more important to him than sanctuary of american democracy. Forget the names involved. What the russian disease was heinous. Look, the political spin and the motivations behind what kushner and trump are saying is important, as jeff and julie said. What the is also important is the substantive implications of what hasnt been done as a result of them taking that viewpoint, right . When you say its just a couple of facebook ads. That means you dont aggressive confront what happened in the past or what is likely to be happening in the future, and there is deep frustration in the bureaucracy, in the Intelligence Community bourque circumstances the cyber bureaucracy, that this administration, because of the president s grievances, is unwilling to do whats necessary to prevent this from happening again, and were coming up to an election fast. And it fits into this idea that at first the president said he was totally vindicated, totally exonerated, the Mueller Report was great and now the Mueller Report was wicked, its part of a coup and most of what the president says in attacking it has no relation to the facts. This is one of his tweets last night. Isnt it amazing that the people who were closest to me by far and knew the campaign better than anyone were never called to testify before mueller in the reason is that 18 angry democrats knew they would all say no collusion but only very good things so lets define close to the president of the United States. As we do so, Jared Kushner who you just heard, just a couple of facebook ads. The president s soninlaw, defined as close. He testified to the Russian Special counsel. Hope hicks worked for the Trump Organization and came out a key spokesman and went on to become the White House Communications lawyer, she spoke to the special counsel. Michael cohen, longtime lawyer and fixer, he spoke to the special counsel. Corey lewandowski, didnt the president say close to the campaign, don mcgahn, Jeff Sessions the attorney general at the president s side through you a lot of the campaign, michael flynn, the National Security adviser by the president s side, paul manafort, the campaign chairman, Reince Priebus the National Republican committee and steve bannon, rob porter the president s aide, Chris Christie around a lot during the campaign. Who are we missing . The alternative narrative that the president is trying to create is not rooted in fact as you saw from the extensive graphic there, and also remember that the Trump Legal Team from the start encouraged this method of cooperating with the spoum, and thats something that immediately after the redacted report was release, that a lot of his surrogates did emphasize. Kellyanne conway told us in the white house driveway that look at all these witnesses that, you know, that mueller talked to. We had a strategy of full cooperation and yet this is the result and trump does seem to be kind of undermining that a little bit here by insisting falsely that people in his inner circle werent talked to. Who wasnt on her . Ivanka and melania and baron trump are really the only three people who did not talk to the special counsel. Its interesting. We seat president do this all the time. Its because, forgive me for interrupting, its because what have they said. Read the report. Even if youre on the president s side, read the report. These people incredibly close to the president and corey lewandowski, says they were told to meddle in the investigation, do things to stop the investigation, and they refused to do so. Right. But you see this time and time again with President Trump. Youre close to him until you Say Something that he finds unflattering about him and or rerealizes he cant control you or what you say, and in the case of don mcgahn and a lot of other people who spoke to the special counsel. They told the truth and told the narrative the way they saw it so now they are no longer close. Think about the people that are out there that might turn to their neighbor and say did you know that the special counsel didnt interview anybody who was close to the president s campaign . Thats why its our job to call out the facts, number one and i would urge anybody out there, fine, it read it yourself. Dont believe anybody else. The words quoted by the people who were pretty close to the president. What part you made the point, the president s political argumenting is to try to convince everybody theres nothing here so that when the democrats issue a subpoena as they did yesterday for don mcgahn he can say this is overreach. This is over. Why are you trying to recycle this . Nancy pelosi has a problem on her hands because they read the reports quite differently. They see Robert Mueller lay out ten counts of obstruction that are pretty compelling. You have to prove them and take it further and last night she calmed down the impeachment argument. Whether its the articles of impeachment or the investigation, its the same set of facts, the presentation of facts, so shes trying to calm the liberal fervor for let impeach immediately, saying no lets care they out a while longer but lets be aggressive. If youre looking at the public sentiment, obtaining that evidence and the full sorority something that is broadly supported by the public and clearly nancy pelosi and the democratic leader are looking at that which is why they issued the subpoena for the report last week and are continuing to pursue that evidence, but just look at the polling numbers for impeachment alone. I mean, you have maybe about six in ten democrats according to a recent Washington Post poll saying democrats support impeachment but if you look at the broader voting public its only about 41 and thats the divide that the Democratic Leaders are looking at right now and try to very carefully navigate. A poll is a snapchat in town so well have to watch that to see if that changes. With the Mueller Report out thereto we know so much more information. It could very well change because theres a conversation obviously in the 2020 campaign as well and Speaker Pelosi has been very successful so far in sort of calming and guiding and allowing things to fester privately. Maxine waters, one of the first people to call for impeachment. Is she out there now . No, she is not. She is following her speaker. I wouldnt rule out Speaker Pelosi leading the way but its complicated. So far pelosi is getting her way. Well see if it continues. A riveting day at the Supreme Court. The Trump Administration wants to ask on the 2020 census is that person a citizen of the United States. Several states and cities object. Riveting arguments just ahead. Goin down the only road ive ever known like a drifter i was born to walk alone keep goin man you got it if you ride, you get it. Here i go again geico motorcycle. 15 minutes could save you 15 or more. Im workin to make each day a little sweeter. To give every idea the perfect soundtrack. To fill your world with fun. To share my culture with my community. To make each journey more elegant. Im working for all the adventure two wheels can bring. At adp were designing a better way to work, so you can achieve what youre working for. Heres the question of the day. Is this person a citizen of the United States . The Supreme Court today hearing oral arguments. The Trump Administration argues asking that citizen question is a common sense addition to the census so the government gets the best count of the population but several judges have ruled that cannot be asked and the Supreme Court decided to fast track the case. The stakes are enormous. The 2020 census will be used not only to allocate congressional seat and Electoral College votes but funding allocations for billions in federal aid programs are based on the census count. Just back from the court is our Supreme Court and legal analyst. You loved it. Youre excited. Why . The best 80 minutes ill have all week. Okay. They had an unusual amount of time. 80 minutes, heard from four different lawyers, three on the side of the challengers and then Noel Francisco representing the government. He got most of the attention from the conservative dominated court. He explained that commerce secretary wilbur ross had reasonable grounds to add this census question. You know, the challengers are saying this is going lower the count. This is going to make it harder for hispanics and noncitizens to be counted in the 2020 census which will mean so much for money and for political power, but s. G. Francisco said he had reasonable grounds to do it. It wasnt arbitrary the way the Lower Court Judges ruled and the question from chief Justice Roberts and other conservative judges suggested they were willing to find in the evidence that the government was putting forward reasonable grounds. They also talked about the history. Even though this question has not been asked since the 1950 census, it was asked prior to that and newest Justice Brett kavanaugh mentioned that. So did neal gorsuch. They talked about, you know, not just the history and the practice and the idea that maybe this is important for Voting Rights information which is the governments asserted reason and just as elana kagan on the left said this sounds like post hoc rationalization. Wasnt in the original record but what youve come to deliver now. One of the plaintiffs the new York State Attorney general, again to joans point, new york saying, look, federal aid programs, a lot of money here. This would be a huge undercount is their argument. States all across this country will lose resources, federal recourses as a result of an undercount. In addition to that, we will lose representation here in washington, d. C. And it appears that the issue of determining ones citizenship took priority over a constitutional obligation to get this count correct, and its really critically important that we not do anything, add any question that will undermine that count. Its a giant legal question at the moment but when you hear the arguments play out, we were just talking about in the context of the Mueller Report, but you hear the president s Reelection Campaign playing out as well saying the democrats want to count people who are illegally here to get them benefits. Right. So it has two things that are in common. It is part of the administrations political strategy that hes used throughout, from his 2016 campaign and mid terms and then now to demonize immigrants as a way of riling up his base. Its also fundamentally like the substantive question is to this point about, well, it was done the question was asked before 1950. You know, 1950 is an interesting place where the immigration system in this country changed pretty dramatically, and the large bulk of hispanic immigration to this country happened after, that and the question of does a question like this put on the census, you know, essentially drive a lot of hispanic immigrants into the shadows because they are afraid of the kind of deportation, aggressive deportations that the Trump Administration is doing. Thats a substantive question that makes it different. Is the substance the issue before the court, or is it at least one of the challenges, was it not, that they didnt follow the normal process to add the question, therefore the court would throw it out on a technical grounds and not answer the is this right or wrong question . Its interesting. So many evidentiary questions today. You usually dont have that at the Supreme Court but reason we did is because the administration was able to leapfrog over the Appeals Court level, so the justices themselves were asking about what evidence is in the record that might have led secretary wilbur ross to make this decision, and what evidence is in the record that led the Census Bureau officials to say do not ask this question because it will drive people away from filling out forms, and the house of representatives was was represented before the justice and douglas letter and argued saying all the demographic issues on the citizenship questions and other questions about money, household issues, those are all secondary to what the census is trying to achieve, an accurate count, and if you do anything that diminishes the chance to get an accurate count youre undermining the Constitution Constitutional responsibility of this census every ten years. And theres an interesting analysis being promoted by some of the immigrant rights groups, and they look at data from the nonpartisan migration policy institute, and they showed that of the top ten states with the largest population increases in