Prelude to the president of the United States actually calling on Rod Rosenstein to end this investigation . I can tell you for sure this is what john dowd wants to happen. Good morning and welcome to am joy. On saturday during this very show Donald Trumps personal attorney, john dowd, urged Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein, the man overseeing the russia investigation, to end the probe. Now dowd first claimed to be speaking as Donald Trumps legal counsel. But then he backtracked. The one thing i can tell you, that i can break on air is ive been emailing back and forth with john dowd this morning. He emailed me to say that he hopes i will share with you all that he was speaking in his personal capacity and not speaking on behalf of the president. When he initially emailed me this morning, i asked him are you giving me this quote on behalf of the president. He replied, yes, speaking at his counsel. I put that in the story. Now hes emailing me to walk that back to say actually he wants people to view this as him speaking in his personal capacity and not on behalf of the president. Thats another email ive gotten from dowd this morning. In a statement later distributed to multiple news organizations, dowd said he prays, quote, acting attorney general rosen stein will follow the brilliant and courageous example of attorney general Jeff Sessions and brings an end to the alleged russia collusion investigation, manufactured, he said, by mccabes boss, james comey based on a fraudulent and corrupt dossier, unquote. He also threw in a quote from cat on a hot tin roof which is probably fitting because by many accounts, the tensions over at 1600 pennsylvania avenue are turning into a 21st century Tennessee Williams drama. Dowds gambit could be the latest distraction from the real plot line, the white house drowning in allegations of collusion, infidelity, hush money, payoffs and general chaos, or it could be a shift in trumps legal stra gee as the heat from bob muellers probe moves closer and closer to the oval office. It would take a hell of a playwright to dream this up. Joining me by phone is congressman luis gutierrez. Good morning. Good to be with you. Good to be with you, too. We know you are among more than one member of congress including representative mark pokan who have offered mr. Mccabe a job essentially sailing if Andrew Mccabe would like to come and either work for mark pokan or yourself, and i believe there might be other democratic congressmen coming forward, he could come to work for you and have enough time an tenure to get his full pension. Why are you and other democrats doing that, sir . Well, first of all, because we think its patently unfair and political that he was fired at 10 00 at night on a friday night, and it was political. That should not have happened. They should have let the natural course of events play out. But, of course, mr. Mccabes wife, as the president have told us on repeated occasions, is a democrat. What the hell does your wife being a democrat have to do with your Public Service . I like how would i say this to you . I like balance, i like balance in life. I think it would be balance that mr. Mccabe, after nearly 22 years of service, who was 26 hours away from pension, and if i can help make that happen and bring some balance to this situation, then i think mr. Mccabe should come down. Here is how i understand it, and im not expert on these rules. You need to have 20 years of service and you need to reach the age of 50. So he had more than 20 years, 26 hours short of being 50 years old. That should not be a reason. Listen, youre going to tell me that Jeff Sessions, the attorney general of the United States who lied to congress when he went to get confirmed and said, oh, no, i never spoke to the russians, who is part and parcel of this chaotic administration that we have, and donald trump, mr. I tell the truth all the time, are not going to pass judgment on Andrew Mccabe 26 hours before his birthday . This was mean, vin sickive, a little balance. Thats all im doing. Have you heard back from mr. Mccabe . No, havent heard back from him. But i hope he comes by and look, im being very clear, very transparent. If this resolves the issue on the other hand, quite honestly, if he wants to stay and work in the office through july 2nd of 2019 which is my last day in congress, hes welcome to come and work. You know im on the Judiciary Committee. Im one of the proponents of the articles of impeachment of this president and wed love and we are sure that he could be of great value and Great Service to us on the Judiciary Committee. Very quickly, i want to read you the chairman of the House Judiciary CommitteeBob Goodlatte had to say. He said i applaud attorney general Jeff Sessions for firing Andrew Mccabe prior to his scheduled retirement. Mr. Mccabes actions have tarnished the reputation of the fbi. What do you make of republicans, including the chairman of your committee, attacking Andrew Mccabe and applauding him being fired such that he could not get his pension . Think about it a moment. The Judiciary Committee which im a member, the chairman who issued the statement, has done nothing although we have jurisdiction over the Justice Department. We have done absolutely nothing. This is a donothing committee where Everybody Knows bills go to die and which has done effectively nothing to safeguard the constitution. Being on the Judiciary Committee is to safeguard the constitution and the greatest values of our democracy. Yet it is the committee that has been completely silent. Look. This is an administration that we know, and kbroi dont think funny that we have a porn star attacking the president. I think its really sad that we have a porn star, but you know what, let me be very, very, very clear, the president of the United States lied to us. He said, oh, i dont even know that woman. We have nothing to do with her, but now hes involved in a gag order to keep her quiet and silent. What is it that the president is so afraid of . Joy, it always surprises me because hes quit to twitter on anybody that he perceives as being a threat or criticizing him. But he doesnt criticize the porn star nor the attorney representing the porn star. I wonder whats there. If the president had to pay 130,000 to a porn star in the United States of america, are there any porn stars in russia he doesnt want us to find out about . Good questions. Like you said, i wish we had a House Judiciary Committee that would ask some of them. We cant. Wont, wont, wont, wont do it. But you know what . Thats why were up this morning to ask those questions. Thank you. Thank you congressman luis gutierrez, appreciate you. Have a great sunday. Joining me nah tash tra bertrand from the atlantic, Matthew Miller, betsy woot roof and garrick guster. Betsy, you were the star of the show with all the information. Give us the updates you have on the onagain, offagain person, john dowd, is his Statement Given to you and other outlets operative as a statement on behalf of the president that he wants this probe ended . Without a doubt. His statement is operative. Its not operative on behalf of the president. The most recent thing he told me is he decided after i published my story that he was speaking in his personal capacity, not in his capacity as the president s lawyer. However, President Trump essentially all but tweed tweeted what dowd said, that it never should have started, it was a witch hunt and created based on false pretenses. It seems like everything dowd said overlaps perfectly with what the president said. It just goes a little farther. Another thing we know is the president sometimes i dont know if this is the case now, but the president has people in his orbit make statements that go farther than he would like them to to see what response they get. I dont have reporting if the president directed dowd. At the same time were seeing a huge amount of push back. After my story, a hoet of senate democrats, mike warner, the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence committee tweeted he was very concerned about the development and that he believes that Congress Needs to take steps to try to protect the mueller probe. Its very much a live story and at this point were certainly keeping a close eye on mr. Dowd. Yes indeed. Natasha here with me at the table. The term contemporaneous notes became a very important phrase when james comey was fired and announced he had kept notes. Those are now in the hands of bob mueller. So, too, are the notes that Andrew Mccabe kept. The handful of memos he took, he took notes about his interactions with donald trump. Axios reporting last night hes already given an interview to bob mueller and hes handed over his notes to bob mueller. Donald trump waking up at 8 22, after a dose of fox friends and tweeted, spent very little time with mccabe, but he never took notes with me. Probably at a later date. Same with lying james comey. Trying to push back on the contemporaneous notes. They dont take notes in front of you, donald trump. They take notes as soon as they leave the room. Exactly. Thats what james comey did. As soon as he left these meetings with drum where he asked comey to drop the investigation into Michael Flynn and to announce publicly he was not under investigation, comey went into his car and drafted the memos contemporaneously. This is not something he would be in a meeting with trump taking down notes on what he said. The same thing happened with andy mccabe. Its not clear whether those includes notes about mccabes conversations with comey in which comey would likely describe to mccabe the conversations he had with the president. Not only does mccabe have firsthand experience with the president , but he also is a witness to this investigation because he was communicating with comey. These are two people very important to muellers probe in terms of whether or not the president obstructed justice. We already know Matthew Miller from the testimony that weve already heard from Andrew Mccabe that in his interactions with donald trump he was asked who he voted for which seems completely inappropriate. He was chided about his wife and subjected to putdowns about her having lost the race she ran in west virginia. We now have in addition to that, donald trump in his morning tweet storm at 8 35 a. M. This morning, matthew, tweeting why does mueller team have 13 hardened democrats, big crooked hillary supporters and zero republicans. Another dem added, there is no collusion. Donald trump apparently thinks only republicans are allowed to work in government unless theyre Andrew Mccabe and theyre married to a democratic. Thats right. You can smell the fear coming through in the president s tweets this morning. He seems to be very nervous all of a sudden about this probe. If you look at the developments over the last few weeks, i think theyd give you some clue why. We found out that bob mueller has subpoenaed his personal business for records. We found out from the New York Times they submitted questions that will give them some idea what theyre looking at. He found out yesterday that Andrew Mccabe kept memos of their interactions and if theyre like comeys, theyll have inappropriate requests of Law Enforcement by the president , going back to the first days of this administration. I think were at one of the most dangerous times for the mueller probe. You have not just the president s anger, nervousness, fear, but you also have these reports in the last few weeks that the president is increasingly comfortable that he knows how to do this job and he doesnt want people telling him no. He shouldnt take rash actions. When you combine those two trends, it puts us on a perilous path and potentially a a dangerous set of actions from the president in the next few weeks. There is a sense, eric, that donald trump is sort of unburdening himself from anyone with any common sense in the white house in trying to only get down to people who will do what he says and let him do what he wants. Hes also doing some things that are strange for somebody who is under investigation. Hes already fired jim comey which is what triggered the mueller investigation. Now back to 8 02, wow, watch comey lie under oath to senator g. When asked have you ever been an anonymous source or known anyone else to be an anonymous source. His favorite source of news, shown on fox friends. Donald trump seems to be walking into slander against james comey, mccabe, attacking his wife. None of this seems to be intelligent politics or from a legal standpoint. Its a minefield for him. We call this consciousness of guilt, joy. When people are being investigated, they act out and they tweet, they send letters, make phone calls asking people to stop the investigation, asking people to lie for them, asking people to pure jer themselves for their benefit. That is consciousness of guilt. When a jury trial occurs, if one occurs for donald trump, these things will be in evidence. Everything about this campaign, everything about this organization is a train wreck that we are watching happen and donald trump is the conductor. Hes used to being at the top of the food chain in his organizations. Hes used to not listening to everyo everyone. Hes used to people kissing up to him. Thats why he doesnt listen to people who have common sense. Those around him are surely telling him, man, chill out, stop doing this. But hes going to do it anyway. He watches fox friends, tweets their quotes, tweets their segments because that is his source of news and they are pandering to him and to their audience for him. Meanwhile comey is talk, too. He said mr. President , the American People hear my story soon. They can judge for themselves. He has a book coming out. Betsy, whether or not donald trump is winding up to firing or forcing the firing of mueller . It seems like where hes at in terms of just his view as of the last 24 hours on mueller, he likely feels emboldened by the firing of mccabe and is almost certainly speculating about it. Its something hes interested . What happens if that happens . What happens inside the Justice Department if that happens . Do you think rosenstein will do it . I dont think so. I think the president would have to fire his way down the line to find someone who did. I think the president is testing the waters, seeing if republicans push back on him. If he doesnt hear that kind of push back, youll see him move. Eric guster, what happens from a legal standpoint . Is that an additional obstruction of justice . Its obstruction of justice. But hes going to play poker. If he knows an indictment is going to happen, hell get rid of him. Last but not least, natasha, will republicans push back if donald trump accomplishes the firing of mueller . Lindsey graham said this morning it would be catastrophic, the end of his presidency if he tried to fire mueller. That being said, there has been no effort by the republicans to advance this longstalled legislation to protect the special counsel. We have the house judiciary chairman praising the sacking of Andrew Mccabe without a pension. Well be back. Thank you all very much. Up next, its march madness at the white house. Stay with us. I just got my cashback match, is this for real . Yep. We match all the cash back new cardmembers earn at the end of their first year, automatically. Whoo i got my money hard to contain yourself, isnt it . Uh huh let it go whoo get a dollarfordollar match at the end of your first year. Only from discover. 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Welcome to the party. As far as Rex Tillerson is concerned, i appreciate his commitment and service and i wish him well. Hes a good man. Mr. President , what did you say to Rex Tillerson . Rex and i have been talking about this for a long time. We got along actually quite well, but we disagreed on things. The great Rachel Maddow pointed out this week, the white house sputing out a different timeline of Rex Tillersons firing from what tillerson and the state department say happened. Chief of staff john kelly says he called tillerson to give him a heads up