As the former fbi director spares no salacious details in his take downof the president. I dont know whether the current president of the United States was with prostitutes. And the the president fires back plus a legal battle at home. The President Trumps personal attorney the focus of a probe as President Trump defends his socalled fixer. Good man. It a disgraceful situation. Might the president s personal attorney be indicted . Stormy daniels lawyer is here. Ahead. Hello jake tap ner washington with the state of our union, its at war. Abroad and at home. President trump this morning waging rhetorical battle against former fbi director james comey tweeting quote unbelieve mri james comey states that polls where crooked hillary was a leading was a factor in the handling nord making decisions on the fact he thought she was going to win and he wanted a job, sliem ball. Unquote. This is an apparent reference to a passage in the comey book where the former fbi director wrote its entirely possible that because i was making decisions in an environment where Hillary Clinton was shoe shub to be the president my concern about her making an illegitimate president by concealing the restarted investigation bore greater weight than if the election appeared closer or if trump were ahead in all polls. But i dont know, unquote. Just another distraction for the president who is also fuming over an fbi raid of his personal attorney Michael Cohens office and in the same week authorized more military strikes in syria. Coalition missiles lighting up the skies late friday night. New video showing the destruction. Miller leaders in the United States say precision strikes hit the heart of the Bashar Al Assad emg uncle Weapon Program pl. After the attack President Trump declared Mission Accomplished. Its appearing many in the ari fliecher cringed when they saw the banner that hung prematurely more than a decade before the war ended. This morning President Trump defended the use of Mission Accomplished, tweeting the the syrian raid was perfectly carried out with precision. The only way the Fake News Media could demean wasabi my use of term Mission Accomplished. I felt it should be brought back use often unquote. Joining me . Independent senator angus king. A member of the Armed Services committee. Thanks for joipg us. The president says its Mission Accomplished in syria. Do you agree . Is it Mission Accomplished in syria and what is the mission . Well, that was the second question sort of answered the first question. I think its very difficult to say Mission Accomplished if the mission is to deter the use of the chemical weapons. We hope thats the case but we did a strike a year ago for the same purpose, and it was deemed a success. But the chemical weapons continue to be used. Its impossible to say at this point that the mission has been accomplished. They had it was a more significant strike than a year ago. Hitting three sites instead of one. More missiles. It was accomplished apparently with the precision that our military is capable of. But saying that its been a success, we wont know until we see whether the regime continues to use chemical weapons. The strikes were launched because american authorities and others say they have information proving that assad law firm a chemical weapon attack against his own people. Youre on the intelligence committee. Did the Trump Administration present any evidence to you to support this claim . They did notify the leadership of the congress on friday before the strike. But im unaware that they presented definitive evidence of what the use of the chemical,ens was. We got updated briefings over the weekend from the Defense Department about the strike. And they indicated they had confidence that the chemical weapons had been used but didnt supply the evidence. Now there are going to be some classified briefings this week. Im sure well have more information. But certainly they believe that they had the evidence that these chemical weapons had been used. I think its important, jake, to distinguish between a chemical weapons attack and a general incursion into syria. The former, chemical weapons have been essentially illegal worldwide for over 100 years, since world war i. Theyve been used occasionally. Thats a red line for most of the world. So going in to take out the chemical weapons capacity which was what the strike was about, is arguably its within our National Interest and justified. What this strike was not and its fortunate that was the case was a strike against the assad regime itself and attempt to intervene in the civil war. It was a narrow strike. But as you say to go back to the initial question, whether the mission was accomplished we with wont know for months. You have said in terms of the back and forth about whether or not congress should be should vote before the United States launches military action, youve said youre okay with the limited strikes as you just delineated. So though in general you say youre not comfortable with dwres not playing its role with the use of force. President s for decades have used military force without congressional approval. You might remember in 2013 the senate pulled become a vote on syrian strikes after president obama asked for approval. Isnt really the unspoken fact here that congress doesnt really want to vote yes or no on war, that they want to see this authority to the president so they dont have to go on the record . Its not unspoken by me, jake. I think thats absolutely correct. It isnt a case of president s over the years taking this power to themselves. Congress abdomicated the power. They havent declared war since 1942. I understood late last week that the foreign releases committee was taking up an authorization in the case of syria. Well see whether it happens. I think youre right generally congress did what they are really good at i have to say what we are really good at is standing on the sidelines making avoiding the making the decisions. Le courageous of you to acknowledge that. The president said this friday night. In 2013 president putin and his government promised the world that they would guarantee the elimination of syrias chemical weapons. Assads recent attack and todays response are the direct result of russias failure to keep that promise. The president is exactly right on that. How do you account for the fact gnat Obama Administration seemingly trusted russia to supervise the syrians getting rid of the chemical weapons . Were they naive. Perhaps somewhat naive. But also going back to that period. And i remember living through it. The russians did in fact there was a great deal of physical on the ground activity of getting rid of chemical weapons. They were shipping them to a destruction site. I mean it was monitored. It wasnt like pure promises. There was in fact activity involved in destroying and cutting back on the capacity. Now, whether assad rebuilt that capacity on his own its hard to belief he would do anything without the russians knowing about it. So i think in essence the president was right, that the the russians essentially guaranteed that this wasnt going to happen again. And the evidence is at this point i havent seen it definitively. But the weight of the evidence now seems to be they are using chemical weapons. By the way, jake, theyre killing their people daily. This morning they are bombing again without chemical weapons and still killing their own citizens. So, yes, getting involved in terms of chemical weapons is an important National Interest. But lets not kid ourselves that somehow if we stop the chemical weapons from being used the the horror of whats going on over there is somehow going to stop as well. Very briefly i want to ask you a quick question. The New York Times is reporting that allies of President Trump believe the criminal investigation into the president s lawyer Michael Cohen out of the u. S. Attorneys office in the Southern District of new york, that that is more threatening to the president than special counsel Robert Muellers investigation into possible russian collusion. You know more about the evidence or lack there of of any possible russian collusion than i do. What do you think . Does the cohen probe bear more of a threat . Well, i think its really important to realize that whats going on in the district of new york is not under the counsel mueller. This is a separate investigation by a United StatesAttorneys Office in the Southern District of new york. So its a separate deal. Whatever happens to mueller and i hope nothing happens it wont affect that prosecution. Its a serious matter, no question. Because mr. Cohens name coming up in connection with all of these things, whether its the Stormy Daniels or the russians. He seems to have some involvement in all of those things. All right. Senator angus king, independent of maine, good to see you, sir. Thanks for jing us. Thank you. President trump cant seem to help himself this morning in a flurry of tweets taking on james comey hours before the former fbi director First Television interview and change about the raid on the lawyerss office. Preet bharara is here to bach that next. Stay with us. Your society was led by a woman, who governed thousands. Commanded armies. Yielded to no one. When i found you in my dna, i learned where my strength comes from. My name is courtney mckinney, and this is my ancestrydna story. Now with 5 times more detail than other dna tests. Order your kit at ancestrydna. 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Saying slippery james comey, a man loo always ends up badly will go down as the worst fbi director by far. As comey continues to sell his back. Including an oneonone interview with me on the lead. This thursday. Joining me to discuss this Preet Bharara. Thanks for joining us. Thanks. President trump up and at them this morning. Tweeting looking at what he tweeted as we came on. Attorney client privilege now a thing of the past. I have too many lawyers. And they are probably wondering when their offices and homes will be raided wfrg. Including phones and computers taken. All lawyers are deflated and concerned, unquote. Whats your reaction . It obvious obviously is an incredibly bold move for the u. S. Attorneys office for the Southern District of new york, an office you used to hold, for them to raid Michael Cohens office. Yes, when he said all lawyers are deflated, im not deflated. Injury you have to trust that that office is doing things by the book and crossing every t and dotting every i. I dont think donald trump has a teent understanding of Attorney Client privilege how it can be pierced. The people doing the investigation in the southern new york i know well. I know the person in charge of the investigation. The u. S. Attorney himself recused himself. He is a professional. Worked with him a number of years. A person who knows how to do a prosecution. He was a career prosecutor in the office a number of years. The three assistant u. S. Attorneys names appearing on the brief opposing the tro that Michael Cohens lawyers sought are professional, know what theyre doing, do it by the book, all three of whom i hired over the last number of years. I have great confidence in their ability to do things right and make sense. In addition, the decision to do the raids, the severance on Michael Cohen, the home, hotel and office were approved also by an office a Career Office in the department of justice called oeo, the office of enforcement operations. In addition to Rod Rosenstein who is a republican who oversees the Mueller Investigation, there are career professionals in washington and new york alongside a judge who approved it to see if the severance were okay. By the way if you read the brief that my former colleagues filed in the Southern District of new york in front of judge wood, a fine well respected judge the Southern District of new york. Theyre meticulous in explaining the reasons why they had to engage in this process, among other things Michael Cohen from everything you see in the brief is barely a lawyer. Right he is a fixer is the argument made by the government. While the president wages war on that front he also wages war on the comey front. Listen to what comey said this week about the unconfirmed allegations from the steele dossier. I honestly never thought the words would come out of my mouth. But i dont know whether the current president of the United States was with prostitutes peeing on each other in moscow in 2013. Its possible. But i dont know. Its possible but i dont know. Now, comey is criticized by people saying its possible but i dont know is the same thing as saying i have no evidence to confirm its true. Isnt comey the critics say putting himself out there for criticism by phrase going that way. I suppose look. There are strong feelings about jim comey on both sides of the aisle. Certain occasions people like him because he is engaging in a practice hurting a political opponent. But but on the other side people think the opposite depending whats going on at the time. My view of jim comey separate and apart from his book which i havent read yet or what you think about the things he did with respect to the Hillary Clinton investigation, which reasonable people can have an objection to and not be happy about. But one thingible about jim comey is he isnt a laroue liar. He doesnt make stuff up. He mass a keen understanding how the law, and what investigations are supposed to be about. Whether or not he spoke about them in a way that yet beyond what a reasonable person should have done when he says the president asked for personal loyalty, another thing the president wetted about this morning, i believe that. I credit that. What do you make of President Trump having another tweet storm and attacking jim comey this morning . I mean, i suppose im sure he has advisers around him all youre doing is make it another best seller and give it more oxygen. Have oshows like this talk more about jim comey because youre talking about it. Having interacted with President Trump what do you think. I interacted one time in person and then on the phone. And then i refused to take his phone calls. Which is something im proud of given how he talks about interactions other Law Enforcement and people in politic haves. I find it hard to get inside the president s head. Clearly jim comey experience got under his skin. He doesnt like air time for someone critical of him. He deals with it by lashing out on twitter my guess is his lawyers dont want him going about it that way. There is lots of evidence not necessarily in this tweet storm but others that will bad for him if bob mueller brings around a case together relating to obstruction. Every time the president makes clear that he doesnt like investigation of him or his associates and wants that investigation is to stop that adds to the nar tha