Finding religion in the Stormy Daniels affair. You get a mulligan you. Get a do over here. When all in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Breaking news from the Washington Post about the fbi Deputy DirectorAndrew Mccabe and the president. Its literally just been published. We learned today before that the sitting attorney general of the United States, the top Law Enforcement officer in the nation was questioned by the special counsels team in a criminal investigation of the president of the United States, his campaign and associates for possible obstruction of justice and collusion with a foreign adversary. Take that in for a moment. The Justice Department confirming today Jeff Sessions did sit for hours last week with Robert Muellers investigators, accompanied by his personal attorney. They also learned today that james comey, the former fbi director whom the president fired last may, was also interviewed by muellers team late last year. On deck according to the Washington Post none other than the president of the United States himself. Mueller reportedly wants to question the president in the coming weeks about the departures of comey and former National Security adviser michael flynn. As far as we know, muellers investigation is proceeding on at least two separate tract abc Jeff Sessions is implicated in both of them. First theres the question of russian collusion with the campaign. Sessions was a key member of that campaign. During the election he met at least twice with the Russian Ambassador encounters he failed to disclose under oath to former colleagues. We know that carter page told sessions ahead of time about his own trip to moscow in the summer of 2016 where he met russian officials and we know sessions chaired a meeting attended by George Papadopoulos in march 2016 as you can see there on the screen. Papadopoulos spoke about his efforts through russian kaks to set up a meeting between donald trump and vladimir putin. Sessions later claimed under oath he couldnt remember much about that meeting except, except his own response. I pushed back. Ill just say it that way. Did anyone else at that meeting including then candidate trump react in any way to what about papadopoulos had presented . I dont recall. Okay. So your testimony is that neither donald trump nor anyone else at the meeting expressed any interest in meeting the russian president or had any concerns about communications between the campaign and the russians . I dont recall it. I remember the pushback. Then theres the second track of muellers investigation, the question whether the president or aides committed obstruction of justice which is a flown under felony law by pressuring comey to end the investigation and firing hip when he refused to comply. The attorney general is elbow deep in the firing of comey, one of the officials asked to leave the oval office before the president asked comey to let the flynn matter go. Comey testified he employered sessions to keep the president from communicating with him directly. Later after comey testified twice on capitol hill, the attorney general wanted one negative article a day in the news media about mr. Comey according to the New York Times. The Justice Department denied that account but the times stands by its story. When the president eventually made up his mind to get rid of comey for good, he reported brought sessions into oval office to discuss it. Ultimately it was sessions who wrote the memo recommending comey be fired used by the president as a shortlived pretext. Sxwroefr all sessions has been both a target and a tool of efforts bri the president to rein in the russia probe and bented Justice Department to the white houses will. Last year sessions demanded control of the investigation dispatching white House Counsel the attorney general not to recuse himself. The president threatened to fire sessions and kept on attacking him months later. Sessions should have never recused himself. And if he was going to recuse himself, he should have told me before he took the job and i would have picked somebody else. Jeff sessions takes the job, gets into the job, recuses himself, i then have which frankly, i there is very up fair to the president. Sessions appears to be doing the president s bidding in other ways. Last night we learned the current fbi director threatened to resign, a fairly extraordinary step if you know anyone who las a job like this after sessions taking a cue from the president s own tweets pressured him to fire his deputy who has been the target of political attacks. Just moments ago, this report from the Washington Post. Andrew mccabe, that individual who is the acting director targeted by president , tag the by trump tv and the president s allies recounting that trump asked him in a get to know you meet whom he voted for during account oval office who he voted for during the election. Mccabe declined to answer. Senator Richard Blumenthal is a member of the Senate Judiciary committee conducting its own investigation into potential russian collusion and obstruction of justice. Andrew mccabe was Deputy Director and then acting director after comeys firing. He has come under tremendous criticism from the president and his allies. New reporting tonight suggesting the president in their first meeting asked him squarely who he voted for. What do you make of that . It is explosive because what it shows is even more powerful evidence of obstruction of justice and interference with the fbi and an attack on the fbi itself through Christopher Wray and trying to fire mccabe after asking Andrew Mccabe a longstanding career professional in the fbi whether he had political involvement in the sense that who he voted for. And i think it adds context also to the continuing work of the Judiciary Committee. We should be looking into whether or not this kind of interview involving president of the United States and a career professional of the fbi represents an attack on this institution. It is one of the premier Law Enforcement institutions in the world. And it is now under attack by republicans a relentless allout assault on our Law Enforcement institutions. Do you see a pattern here insofar as james comey testified the president cleared everyone out of the room or had him over for a oneonone meeting, asked had i am for loyalty. When he did not offer loyalty, he asked him to see his way to letting flynn go, thats the first person. Then Andrew Mccabe, brought in for a get to know you and asked essentially out of loyalty who did you vote for, lo and behold the president calls for him to be fired. We now have reporting he pressured wray to fire him and mccabe ultimately retires. It is definitely part of a pattern. Thats absolutely right. And i saw your very excellent insights earlier on ari melbers show the beat where you said only one person knows what donald trump did. Well, there is evidence here of what he did. And what he thought at the time in that pattern, also in his tweets about his contempt for the fbi, the investigation by mueller being a hoax or a witch hunt and, of course, his firing comey which is central to all of what he did after he demanded loyalty in that kind of pattern and wanted him to go light on flynn. So it is all part of a pattern. And the most recent report adds very strong powerful evidence to the obstruction case. Jeff sessions, who has given has given an interview to muellers investigations, attorney general of the United States sitting for an interview into a criminal investigation into the white house, do you have confidence that he has safeguarded the independence of the department of justice or have you lost that confidence . I had no confidence from the very start of his tenure. I voted against him. I was one of the first Judiciary Committee members to say that i would oppose his nominations and then raised the issue of his untruthful testimony before the Judiciary Committee and his need to come back and explain that testimony about his meetings with the Russian Ambassador. He is linked in so many ways to this case, his contacts with the Russian Ambassador, while he was involved in a campaign. Then as a senator. Now as attorney general. His potential involvement in this coverup and all of these threads, these lines of liability, lead to the oval office. Thats the significance of the other Washington Post report that the special counsel now wants to interview the president , no question that that was predictable. But the timing may be a little bit different. May not come right away. Youre absolutely right to raise that question. Senator Richard Blumenthal, thank you for your time tonight. Thank you. More on the russia investigation. Im joined by se ri hurwitz who covers the Justice Department for the Washington Post and paul butler, msnbc legal analyst. Se ri, let me start with you. How unusual is Something Like that to bring the new acting director in and just say, who did you vote for in the first meeting . Well, its obviously highly unusual. He talked to mccabe, what we are reporting tonight is that the president asked the number two person in the fbi, andy mccabe, who he voted for but he also brought up contributions to his wifes campaign in virginia. You know, andy mccabe has been under pressure, so has the fbi director, chris wray, from the white house, from sessions. Chris wray, weve written this story also, the fbi director has been under pressure to get rid of andy mccabe and to put other people who are not connected to former director comey. We have a story today that he is bringing in a new chief for his office, a chief of staff. A new general counsel, and of course, we know that andy mccabe is leaving. Youre going to be seeing a lot of new faces at the fbi and this is directly because of pressure from the Justice Department and from the white house. Paul, you shook your head vigorously no when i asked about how appropriate or inappropriate how nush it is to come out and ask the fbis second in command that question. Why . You know, chris, ive never seen anything like this. All of todays developments are breathtaking. We have the attorney general and former director of the fbi as witnesses in a criminal investigation against the president of the United States. And we know that President Trump has this pattern of making inappropriate overtures to people who are overseeing investigations of him. Its not just today, Deputy Director mccabe. It was former fbi director comey. It was the National Intelligence chiefs and it was attorney general sessions. The main question for mueller now is that its clear that the president has tried to impede the investigation. The issue is whether hes country or whether hes clueless. Sari, what is your reporting saying about what the department of justice is like right now. The times reports after comey testified youve got sessions asking for a negative story every day. And then two, the fact that he is he was putting pressure on wray directly to get rid of mccabe which again, makes it look like the attorney general is acting as a very squirly as a kind of defacto tool of the white house here. Right. We dont know a lot of whats going on behind the scenes with the attorney general. But you know, its highly unusual. He is the only cabinet member that has been interviewed by special counsel mueller. It went on for several hours. As you said earlier, is he so key because there are sort of two prongs of the mueller investigation. One is the possible coordination between Trump Campaign officials and the russians. And the other, of course, is the question of obstruction. He n. O. W. Im sure was questioned about both issues. He was very involved in the firing of director comey who at that point was overseeing the russia investigation. He met with him beforehand, he and rod rosenstein, met with the president before he fired him. He sent over a memo along with the Deputy Attorney generals long moorm to trump. So you know, there are a lot of around the whole obstruction of justice issue and that is something that special counsel mueller wanted to talk to him about. Paul, the facts that we already know that have sort of been established and in some cases not even disputed in any real way, show the president is doing a lot of things over the department of justice with this investigation. Hes nudging it, hes pushing it, hes pressuring it publicly for all the world to see on twitter. I guess your point about corrupt intent, at what the point does violating these norms of independence cross noose something more nefarious or more sinister . When go on and on as they seem to do with President Trump. With sessions, mueller has questions about him about collusion, the original subject of this investigation. Sessions ran the Trump Campaigns foreign policy. He conveniently forgot o forgot about his meetings with the russians which is why he had to recuse himself even though George Papadopoulos puts him at meetings at which russians and the specter of trump meeting with putin came up. Obstruction is the key with sessions. As sari said is, obstruction with regard to why he fired comey, why the president fired comey but also important questions about trump trying to get rid of sessions. First trying to not have him recuse himself and when sessions does appropriately recuse himself from the russian investigation, then trump wants to fire him. Thats all part of this pattern which i think again, leads rational investigators to start thinking less about cluelessness and more about a corrupt intent. Sari, is your reporting suggesting that theres any kind of legal restraint being offered on the president right now . I mean, its remarkable to me as your paper is reporting, that he would even say this to Andrew Mccabe, given the amount of scrutiny hesed you, given the legal liability hes exposed to in terms of james comey . Its astounding action to take to do that in a way you have to know will get out. Thats an interesting question. We are reporting tonight that trumps lawyers are negotiating, discussing with the special counsels team the idea of having an interview in the coming weeks. And whether that will be done facetoface or whether part of it will be written. And there are some people who are close to the president including roger stone but there are other who are advising him not to do this interview. Theres a lot of concern that he could cause more problems for himself legally because of things he may say. Liablous things he may say. Theres a lot of concern maybe he shouldnt sit down and do this interview. Thats being worked out right now. Paul, final question for you. You worked, if im not mistaken in Public Integrity when you were a prosecutor. Yes. You worked in Corruption Cases which meant public officials, Office Holders folks like that. Given that background, what is your thinking about what the approach is if and when the mueller team or mueller himself interviews the president of the United States . So you know, the president doesnt have a lot of Bargaining Power with how the interview goes. Mueller could always subpoena him and then he has to come and testify. His only way of getting out of it would be to claim the fifth amendment which politically would be untenable i think or he could continue these bogus claims of executive privilege. Thats just not going to fly. I think the terms of the bargain will be how long the length of the interview, bill clinton got ken starr to agree to only four hours. The subject. So i think mueller will insys on collusion questions and obstruction questions but probably not agree not to ask any questions about money laundering. The courthouse or white house venue. It looks like it might be the white house. If you lie under oath or not under oath talking to the fbi, its still a crime. Michael flynn found that out the hard way. Great to have you both. I want to bring in legal analyst ben wittes, the editorinchief of law fair. Daily in gran shoe lar fashion, youre someone who has written a lot about what you see as sort of attacks on the integrity of Law Enforcement of the fbi. Of comey and folks around him. I want to first start just your reaction to the president of the United States asking Andrew Mccabe who did you vote for and asking him about his wifes campaign contribution. After i pulle