Prosecutors, including that secret recording made of trump just before the 2016 election. As anybody would say, thats the strongest possible evidence. There certainly was evidence of knowledge by the president of a payoff to the playboy playmate. We begin this morning with the president threatening to strip the Security Clearance of half a dozen former officials. Never mind some of them dont even have clearance anymore. That is not stopping the white house from stthe policy of paybk to vocal critics. I want to get to how it breaks down. The president is said to still be considering this move. While none of his people hes targeting are still in the government, current officials are certainly taking notice. Right now, these are the men and women on the list. Former cia director john brennan. Former director of National IntelligenceJames Clapper. Former cia director michael hayden. Monetary gain. No, that wasnt an snl skit. We already know the president has attacked u. S. Intelligence agencies literally. Hundreds of times since launching his 2016 campaign. Repeatedly describing the fbi and Justice Department as corrupt. That includes attacks during political rallies both as a candidate and as president. Just last week, the president suggested hes the victim here. Do you think any intelligence agencies, u. S. Intelligence agencies, are out to get you . Well certainly in the past, its been terrible. You look at brennan. You look at hayden. You look at comey. You look at mccabe. You look at whats happened. Take a look at all of the shenanigans that have gone on. Very hard to have confidence in that group. As for making money, it is true that comey wrote a book and three of the others are network analysts. Although brennans spokesperson says he has not made a penny off his clearance. But what about the president . According to open secrets, nearly 60 million bucks have been paid to Trump Properties since 2016. Nearly all of it coming from trumps own campaign and the rnc. You can draw your own conclusions about whether hes profiting from his public service. So what is trump really upset about . Im going to guess this. President trump made President Trump look unstable, erratic and thin skinned. I dont think hes medically unfit to be president. I think hes morally unfit to be president. The policies this president has pursued globally has served president putins interest in dividing the west. He is giving aid and comfort to the enemy and it needs to stop. Before we go on, lets also remember the records of these people, the president is targeting. Brennan, clapper, hayden and comey. All served under democratic and republican administrations. Hayden, hes a fourstar general who spent 40 years in the air
force. Clapper, served two tours of duty in southeast asia. Despite that, senator rand paul who floated the idea to the president , suggested that this issue is an easy political win. I think theres a great deal of resolve. Because i dont think we should reveal secrets who are calling the commander in chief treasonous. I dont think theres many people in america who are going to disagree with that judgment that we will continue to give secrets to calling the president treasonous. I would probably go further and say that really excia agents once retired should no longer have top secret clearance. While rand paul calls this a nobrainer, democrats like ron wyden say it looks like the president is compiling, quote, an enemy list. As for folks being targeted, theyre staying relatively quiet. Comey and mccabe dont even have Security Clearance. That is whats so important. Sarah sanders gets on the podium, ready to roll, naming people who dont even have
loo about pulling Security Clearance from these people to try to distract us. The humiliation President Trump created for himself in helsinki and other embarrassments. Talk to us about what hes pursuing and how hes dominating the headlines with this. Sarah sanders speaking from behind the podium here, behind me, to deliver the statement to americans just yesterday. It appeared to be a sort of off the cuff idea from the president. Appeared by the senator from kentucky, rand paul. In my conversations with a senior white house official this morning, they insist this is something the president s been thinking about for quite a while. That has been, in their words, on his mind. If its something on his mind for quite a while, why the white house wouldnt have done its Due Diligence to know the fact that two of the six individuals they named no longer had being annive is Security Clearances here, specifically Andrew Mccabe and james comey, as has been identified by their aides. Their clearances were revoked. Comey, when he was fired last year. The bottom line right now, according to the latest report from the director of National Intelligence, more than 4 Million People in this country do have Security Clearances. More than 1 million of them have top secret clearances. One thing thats also striking in this moment is the president obviously focuses on this issue. Is the fact that, youll remember, this is my reporting to my colleagues, when we were trying to focus on the Security Clearances as they related to Jared Kushner and ivanka trump and formerly rob porter who used to serve as the secretary here. The White House Company line, as it was, was we dont talk about Security Clearance. But now in this effort apparently to try to punish some of those who criticize the president openly, the white house is talking very publicly about this matter. Whether its on the president s mind this morning, hard to know. Bottom line, hes had several tweets hes posted. None of them at least for the moment on this topic. Stephanie. Peter, what a silly embarrassment. Has there been any follow up
with Sarah Sanders . She got on that podium, named the people who the president would like to revoke their Security Clearance and two of them, as you just mentioned, dont even have clearance. That is absolute sloppy stupid nonsense. Has anyone been able to follow up with her on that silly mistake . Well, weve reeached out in n effort to follow up with officials at the white house. No specific answer to those questions. But this is part of a pattern obviously. Sometimes when states are made haphazardly, oftentimes in an effort to deliver whats on the president s mind at the moment, mistakes get made. Weve witnessed that. It appears at least on this occasion were seeing it one more time. Repeated sloppiness. All right, peter, thank you. I want to bring my panel in. Its an excellent one. My dear friend and former colleague shannon pettypiece. Elise jordan who worked in the george w. Bush white house. Shannon, what is the point of
all of this . To me, it seems like a distraction. We need to remind our audience, the reason, the core reason these people have clearance, is to help officials who are currently in the white house. And as peter mentioned, 4 Million People out there have clearance. 1 million have top secret. The president is clearly targeting. People have said not such nice things about him. Sarah, when she read that statement yesterday, i think this is some of the reasons some of us in the Briefing Room are a bit taken aback, is there was no National Security reason for this. You know, her statement talked about political remarks that these people had made that, you know,disparaged the president. Do you trust this person to having access to Classified Information . Security clearances are drawn when someone has shown things that would jeopardize National Security. This had nothing to do with the countrys interest or National Security according to her
statement. But i must say, i was not really surprised to hear this because ive been hearing for months now concern among former Justice Department officials that this administration will be taking some action against people who speak out, like comey, mccabe, former intelligence officials who speak out, and one of the follow up questions i asked was, is there anything else theyre going to do . Because this action really doesnt have many repercussions but there has been concern there potentially could be criminal actions taken or pushed by this administration down the road. I think this could be the first of a number of things we see this white house trying to do to attack those who speak out against it. All right, were going to continue to cover it. But, mr. President , were not forgetting about robert mueller, the Michael Cohen tapes and the humiliation in helsinki. Were able to walk and chew gum at the same time. I want to talk about what James Clapper said the potential fallout from this could be. Take a listen. I think this is a real abuse of the Clearance System. Just to use it to attack
political opponents or people who have been critical of the president and, you know, is that now going to become a criteria for obtaining a clearance anywhere in the government, is a pledge of loyalty to President Trump . Ooh, that has to have some sort of chilling affect on current potential future members of this administration and the intelligence community. I think that the way the administration has rolled this out has been incredibly ineffective. But i think were losing the Bigger Picture here. That the Clearance System is just completely out of control. And should we necessarily have former top intelligence officials immediately offering political commentary . Is it in the nations best interest. I do think theres a legitimate point to be made. That when former intelligence official is using their platform politically, that they shouldnt have a clearance. Then that could be universal. But you dont have to say lets
play something that the president said specifically about James Clapper in his interview with cbs. I have no confidence in clapper. You know, clapper wrote me a beautiful letter when i first went to office. It was really nice. All of a sudden, hes gone haywire because they got to him and probably got him to say things that maybe he doesnt even mean. Whos they, they got to him . Is that The Deep State . The deep state, the resistance. Its hard to know what hes referring to. James clapper is all about the resistance. Come on. When you look at these people, James Clapper, brennan, susan rice, comey, mccabe, people who spent their careers in government. Youre talking about two cia directors. Have committed their lives and their careers to this. These are not people who
transitioned into government somehow. These are people who are Career IntelligenceLaw Enforcement professional. Lets get to the broader point that elise was trying to make earlier that maybe we need to revamp the security system. I want to share what rand paul said on fox. I told the president in private what ive been saying in public, i think theres a great danger to having Talking Heads on tv who are excia agents and still have classified clearance. Theres a real danger they might inadvertently reveal Classified Information. If you want to have a cooling off period. If you want to say lets not have these people in the media, thats one thing. The president is selectively choosing people who have called them out for absolute nonsense. When the president said i got this idea from rand paul, he did not get the idea from rand paul. Well, and general hayden made a point that i thought was important and i agree with. Due respect it wont be invited back. Thats not what this is. This is definitely an enemys list. This is a list to retaliate against those who have called out the russian government. He is he made it clear in helsinki. He made it clear in nato who he works for. And that really needs to be all the media, Everybody Needs to be focused on that. Look at all the statements about russia. Even going back to 2016. Look at all the concerns about russia. But clapper, hayden, all of them have said things about putin and russia and their role in Wreaking Havoc and confusion in the United States. So i think we ought to add that to the list of evidence that mueller has that shows he is colluding and he is an agent. Lets remind the president comey and mccabe on your list. They dont have clearance. Thats right. You have new reporting about the mueller investigation. The president liked to call it a rigged witch hunt. There are 35 indictments and plea deals in the mueller probe. 35. What did you learn . One of the big issues out there has been whether mueller is going to be able to interview the president in december. Mueller requested an interview with trump. Trumps legal team has spent months trying to negotiate terms of some sort of agreement over the course of that. His lawyers have changed. This is the process going on. As of last week, giuliani told me the legal team submitted a proposal to mul theyre President Trump would answer questions to collusion and whether the Trump Campaign co colluded with russia. When i asked giuliani why, he said theres a concern other peoples statements around obstruction could contradict
what trump would say, namely comey would contradict what trump said, leaving him open for a perjury charge. Thats like me saying to my husband, you know, you can ask me what time i came home but you cant ask me where i went. So now the president s legal team has submitted this proposal. They have not heard back from mueller as to whether he will accept that. Mueller still has the option to issue a subpoena and say you will have appear before a grand jury and answer under oath. However, trumps legal team said they would fight that. That could set things up for a fight. Mueller and his team have a decision. Do they accept, do they try to negotiate, or do they issue a subpoena . And either trigger a court fight or call the president before a grand jury. Im willing to get distracted with the news of the Security Clearance. You know whos not distracted . Mueller. Coming up, a federal judge grants a request by manaforts attorneys to delay the start of his criminal trial. Were learning the identities of five witnesses who have been granted immunity in the case. Who are we . Weve got the names. First, late nights seth meyers has the scoop on the new issue reportedly bothering trump. Frustrated that his on camera appearances have not had the same Production Value of tv shows he watches. Said an aide, sir, weve been over this, shes a cartoon. On our planet than people. Were putting ai into everything, and everything into the cloud. Its all so. Smart. But how do you work with it . Ask this farmer. Hes using Satellite Data to help increase crop yields. Thats smart for the food we eat. At this port, Supply Chains are becoming more transparent with blockchain. Thats smart for millions of shipments. In this lab, researchers are working with watson to help them find new treatments. Thats smart for medicine. At this bank, the worlds most encrypted mainframe is helping prevent cybercrime. Thats smart for everyone. And in africa, iot sensors and the ibm cloud are protecting endangered animals. Thats smart for rhinos. Yeah. Rhinos. Because smart only really matters, when we put it to work not just for a few of us, but for all of us. Lets put smart to work. Save up to 15 are you ready to take yourearly then you need xfinity xfi. . A more powerful way to stay connected. It gives you super fast speeds for all your devices, provides the most Wifi Coverage for your home, and lets you control your network with the xfi app. Its the ultimate wifi experience. Xfinity xfi, simple, easy, awesome. Welcome back. Im stephanie ruhle. More court action today in the criminal case of the president s former Campaign ChairPaul Manafort. Lawyers are meeting this morning to figure out what jurors can be asked in manaforts trial. This all coming a day after a judge agreed to delay his trial until next week. Now we know the names of five potential witnesses who have been granted immunity in that case. All of them have tied to financial institutions. Nbcs Pete Williams joins me now. All right, pete, you were in the courthouse yesterday. Lay us out what manafort is dealing with now. Right now the question is what can the jurors be written in the written questions which is the sort of modern practice now in federal court. This saves time for the voir dire process of asking the jurors a bunch of questions and then the lawyers decide which jurors can they leave out. This is what you wont be seeing. This is archive tape. Because Paul Manafort is no longer a free man. So this videotape of him walking into the courthouse is something that isnt going to happen anymore. He is now being held in the alexandria jail. He appeared yest