Thank you. Thinking of your wife. Bring flowers. Msnbc political analyst and former chairman of the Republican National committee Michael Steele. Remember, michael . Working on it. Oh, boy. His chorion and author of the soul of america and rogers professor of Vanderbilt University jon meacham joins us, nbc news and msnbc news contributor just ran out the door to get some flowers and former u. S. Attorney now nbc news Law Enforcement analyst Chuck Rosenberg, who i know remembered and former Justice Department spokesman now an msnbc justice and security analyst matt miller is with us. Joes away with his kids for this president s day weekend and willie taking a welldeserved morning off. Worked three weeks straight and im here on valentines day. Okay. We begin with what appears to be another instance of quid pro quo by President Trump. Theres a lot to get to, so were just diving in. The same issue that got him impeachedthe first place. Before a meeting with andrew cuomo President Trump put out 0 link that put out a freeze with demand the state drop a myriad of lawsuits against him and his administration. Just doing it in plain sight. Why not. Right . He wrote this im seeing Governor Cuomo today at the white house and he must understand that National Security far exceeds politics. New york must stop all of its unnecessary lawsuits and harassment, start cleaning itself up and lowering taxes. Yeah. New yorks attorney general Letitia James issued a subpoena for trumps financial records and has filed a number of lawsuits against the Trump Administration and the trump organization. She responded to the president s tweet writing, when you stop violating the rights and liberties of all new yorkers we will stand down. Until then we have a duty and responsibility to defend the constitution and the rule of law. By the way, i filed ethe lawsui. Not the governor. Wondering. Weird what we see happening. Wonder if anyone saw this coming . Cue house representative from just two weeks ago. What we have alleged in this case is in a the president solicited a personal political benefit in exchange for an official act. Solicited dirt on a political opponent in exchange for the release of 391 million in military aid solicited dirt in exchange for a white house meeting. And if this senate were to say thats acceptable, then precisely as was outlined in that question could take place all across america in the context of the next election and any election. Grant allocated to cities or towns or municipalities across the country, but the president could say, youre not going to get that money, mr. Mayor, mrs. County executive, mrs. Town supervisor, unless you endorse me for reelection. The president could say that to any governor of our 50 states. Thats unacceptable. That cannot be allowed to happen in our democratic republic. Chuck rosenberg, seemed so ludicrous when Hakeem Jeffries made that example of what potentially could happen and yet as of yesterday, it has. Whats the recourse . Whats your take moving forward . First of all, you know, its not that hard to predict that the president will be a logical and petulant, mika and by the way, i dont know if you can put his tweet back up. Uhhuh. But there is a rank inconsistency within it. First says National Security is much more important than politics. And in the very next sentence, theres the rank politics. Right . The very next sentence after talking about the primacy of National Security there comes the threat. If he doesnt get what he wants, a cessation to the lawsuits that have been filed against him and his organizations by new york state, then hes going to exact revenge. Mr. Jeffries was spoton. I give him credit for that, but this has been a pattern weve seen over and over and over again and i think its deeply disturbing. So jonathan lemire, so much has happened. We started with this. There are many other things that happened yesterday that we could have started with. Given the attorney generals comments later in the day, which well get to, but weve got a situation now where the president s appears to be issues quid pro quos in realtime on twitter. What are you hearing from the white house and from your sources in washington . Yeah. Doing so in plain sight. Theres little attempt to cover this. We know the president has had sort of a contentious relationship with Governor Cuomo and most new york officials because most of democrat and a series of investigations the state has run in addition to whats going on in the house of representatives. That is something the president has been irritated about for a while. Recall, of course, even renounced citizenship on the state of new york. Is now a citizen of florida. In part because of how upset he was with how things were going on with those officials. Now, what is happening here is exactly what representative jeffries implied. Seems to be a quid pro quo offer right in front. Took away this program, Global Program a few weeks ago. Suggesting hes trying to put it back on the table if these investigations stop and gets a cheap shot at the governors brother while hes at it. No deal struck yesterday that weve heard. Letitia james spoke out forcefully against it, the attorney general. This is window how the president is feeling postimpeachment. Completely emboldened, unchecked. We saw what happened in the few days after the verdict. Lieutenant cornlonel vindman walked out of the white house in front of cameras. The tip of the iceberg. Told people around him weve written this week he feels not only did he survive impeachment but come out stronger than ever, because no one in the Republican Party except for mitt romney dared stand up to him. Weve seen a pattern here and Michael Steele, its the president cant take a win. He cant take a win when hes gotten his way. When hes gotten through something. He cant take a win. Actually doubles down and gets worse. Which leads me to Susan Collins, i believe, saying, well, i believe the president has learned a lesson . Well no. Hes doing it again. In plain sight. The republicans own this, but do they care . No. They dont. And you know, in large measure, because, you know, theyve saddled up with the president in terms of, you know, the way all of these things play out. You know, on the first part of this, you know, you get on the other side of impeachment, and what you see is the president now wanting to exact his revenge. He wants to settle the score. This is not over until he says its over. Until he feels that hes made his point after those who, you know, perceive has come after him and done so. So you have that. Republicans still sit there stymied by the whole thing where you have a Susan Collins telling us, oh, well, you know, hes going to learn from this. The president doesnt learn anything from these exercises, as he sees them. He sets his own course. So, you know, as ive said before, the important thing, mika, what do we learn from it . Yeah. What do we get away from this . Because thats the important part of this. We know trump is not going to learn anything, because he doesnt want to. He set his course, his mind in a certain direction. What are we taking away from this and what will be our next move as government, as citizens, as the state of new york . And how do we now adapt on this playing field, if you will, to what the president is doing with the, you know, the perp walks of career soldiers from service, et cetera. All right. Keep moving through this incredible set of events in the past 24 hours. President trump has now attacked the lead juror in the case that ended with his friend roger stones conviction. Trump tweeted now it looks like the fore person in the jury in the roger stone case had significant bias. Add that to Everything Else and this is not looking good for the Justice Department. Puts that in quotes. The attack came the day after former Memphis School board president ta mika hart identified herself as lead juror in the facebook post. Hart said shes didnt silent since the november 2019 conviction out of concern for her safety but decided to speak out in defense of the four prosecutors who quit the case after the department of justice overrode their recommendation. Hart also defended her own work posting to facebook this as foreperson i made sure we went through every element of every charge matching the evidence presented in the case that led us to return a conviction of guilty on all seven counts. Since identifying hers, the president s allies and the media dredged up old social media posts claiming to show bias. Hart did run for congress as a democrat in 2012, but stones defense knew that when they cleared her to serve on the jury. Meanwhile, the chief justice of the Federal District court in washington issued a rare public response to trumps attacks. The judges of this court base their sentencing decisions on careful consideration of the actual record in the case before them. The applicable sentencing guidelines and statutory factors and submissions of the parties, Probation Office and victims and their own judgment and experience public criticism or pressure is not a factor. Lets stop right here. Chuck rosenberg i want it hear your thoughts. Well, first of all, judge howell is spoton. Exactly right. I am not concerned, mika, in this particular case the outcome of the sentencing will be unfair. In fact, judge jackson is a wellrespected jurist. Shes smart and tough. It will be a fair outcome. What worries me is that the perception of the outcome will be fair. The department of justice has to be two things. Objectively fair and perceived as fair. When the president weighs in on a case about a friend of his and asks the Justice Department to do a particular thing, which is then does, that goes to the perception of fairness. And judge howell and judge jackson, by the way, we heard this from chief Justice Roberts, have spoken out about the, the men and women who comprise the federal judges across the country and how they dont succumb to pressure and how this thing doesnt work, but the public doesnt necessarily know that. So the president put the judge in a terrible situation. Because it either looks like shes capitulating to the president , if she sentencing mr. Stone lower than guidelines call for or rebuffing if does not. When in fact all shes going to do her job. Be just and fair. The outcome will be fair. I worry about the perception. All of this brings us to the socalled barr fight. Love t. The attorney general saying in a new interview with abc news that the president s comments and tweets make it impossible for him to do his job. William barr insists he was not asked by the president or anyone from the white house to intervene in the stone case. Barr says he spoke to the u. S. Attorney before the sentencing memo was turned in and advised him not to recommend a seven to nineyear prison sentence. But instead to defer to the judge. Heres what the attorney general says happened after claiming the u. S. Attorney defied him. On monday night, when i first saw the news reports i said, gee, the news is spinning this. This is not what we were going to do. You were surprised . Very surprised, and once i confirmed that thats actually what we filed i said that night to my staff that we had to get ready, because we had to do something in the morning to amend that and clarify what our position was. I had made a decision that i thought was fair and reasonable in this particular case, and once the tweet occurred the question is, well, now what do i do . And do you go forward with what you think is the right decision or do you pull back because of the tweet . And that sort of illustrates how disruptive these tweets can be. So youre saying you have a problem with the tweets . Yes well, i have a problem with some of the tweets. Im happy to say that, in fact, the president has never asked me to do anything in a criminal case. However, to have public statements and tweets made about the department, about people in the department or men and women here, about cases pending in the department and about judges before whom we have cases make it impossible for me to do my job. The White House Press secretary released the following statement in response. The president wasnt bothered by the comments at all. And he has the right just like any american citizen to publicly offer his opinions. President trump uses social media very effectively to fight for the American People against injustices in our country. Including the fake news. The president has full faith and confidence in attorney general barr to do his job and uphold the law. Okay. Matt miller, you know, im really thinking about these comments, which, know, seem to really push back against the president at first, at physicfi whoa, whats going on . Stepping away a little bit . Is he a little bruised by all the criticism hes gotten . Because the Legal Community in washington is so tight . But seems to me that what hes saying is that these tweets make it harder for bill barr to help him be corrupt. Whats your gut . I think you have it exactly right, mika. Look, bill barr often has a way of saying all the words you want to hear out of an attorney general. If you go back in time and put the words said yesterday in Jeff Sessions mouth what we always wanted to hear from Jeff Sessions. See him pushing back against the president s attacks on the Justice Department. Problem with barr is his words about independence and the fact he cant be bullied, going to do whats right in the traditions of that department are never backed up by his actions. So when i see him yesterday, what i hear is when he says youre making it impossible for me to do my job. He means, youre not giving me the political space to operate to do all the things you want me to do, donald trump. You know, i think barr has made it very clear his interests and the president s interests are aligned. He will squash investigations into the president when he can, when its too late to squash as in the case of mike flynn and roger stone even the Mueller Report, he will steer them in the president s direction, launch investigations into the president s enemies as hes done with jim comey and seems to be doing against john brennan with his investigation to the origins of the original election interference. He will do all of these things for the president , but he needs the particular ed to shut up and stop messing it up talking about it publicly. What happens, he starts a revolt inside the Justice Department. I suspect barr was trying to quell that incertainly revolt we saw start this week when four prosecutors removed their names. Telling the president , just be quiet, i will give you what you want. Exactly. You have to give me the spas spas space i need. Lemire . And one voice, close to the president , insisting hes not upset by these comments. Might be if indeed this is the play just described. Also we know the president doesnt react well to negative Media Coverage and more we see barrs comments played over and over, we may hear from him. In the white house statement said the president like any american has the right to voice his opinion. Fact check this for me, jon people uch meacham, is he, this president , like any american and if so, why is this so consequential. That part of the phrase jumped oubt at me. Which editor in the white house added including the fake news. I wonder if it was put in in sharpie. That has feel. Doesnt it . The remarkable thing about the president is his capacity to in its epic, even in president ial terms, hi encyclopedic grasp of grudges and his ability to hold them and weaponize them going forward. Mrs. John kelly this week. Right . Remembering a conversation, congresswoman dingell, he allegation had a phone call about chairman dingells funeral. Remarkable internal taping system that spews out everything that the world as he wants to see it, and hes not just like every other citizen, to go straight to the your point. John adams in 1790 wrote that the president , the first character was going to be the object of all eyes, the object of all attention. That creates an enormous amount of responsibility. But at this point, were so far into this, we know that the presidency is not going to change him. For us, seems to me to go to michaels point, its now on us in a large measure, and on republicans in most significant measure to decide whether hes changed the presidency itself. And whether hes changed our public culture forever. Ive been basically optimistic for almost four years now that i would take James Madison over twitter. Im less so now, as things go on. There were a number of republicans i thought would stand up at the last possible moment and say, enough, and as you played the congressman jeffries statement, you have this remarkable moment where the train is blowing past, rapidly. And what folks are going to have to decide at a certain point is, do you want a president picking on judges, trying to change cases . The two things, my two check boxes that were going to be break the glass kind of emergencies were going to be, try to remove a judge . Ever try to overturn a verdict unilaterally and try to postpone an election . The two things to watch out for. And hes getting awfully close on the first. Well, i mean, at this point, i think we can safely safe, if theres a question that begins with would he ever do, a. , b. Or c. , the answers, yes. So its up for republicans to decide how much exactly can you live with . Coming up on morning joe, a lot more to get to here. We reported the news that john kelly made, top of our show yesterday, soon as it crossed, but a lot