Coverage of national and international news, including breaking stories. Coverage of national and international news, including breaking stories. The cfo knows. Was there Money Laundering . Is there wire fraud or fraud on Karen Mcdougal . What did she think she was signing . Theres a host of questions and possible crimes that could be charged. I think they are running scared from Michael Cohen. I think also theyre running scared from him because of what has come out about what hes saying about the 2016 Trump Tower Meeting with also goes a long way, if true, in helping to put trump in a conspiracy with the russians. Its important to note sort of one of the main take aways. Because Rudy Giuliani did address that. And he suddenly says that trump, it wasnt that he didnt know the Trump Tower Meeting took place. Its that trump wasnt there. We already knew that President Trump was never at that Trump Tower Meeting. The issue always that he absolutely had no knowledge of it. Now Rudy Giuliani is looking at what cohen is saying is changing the president s story. Rudy giuliani is saying there
may be dozens of tape bus they all say call me back, meet me for coffee. Is that what youre hearing . Im hearing the tapes are still in the evidence that the federal investigators and prosecutors, theyre still getting that evidence. Just on friday the government got an additional 950 items of evidence released from the special master. Those were items that Michael Cohen and she says cohen in the filing that Michael Cohen and his team determined to be or they asserted that were Attorney Client privileged. She said of the 1600 items, 952 are going to investigators. I can tell you that when the New York Times story came out it was matched by this News Organization and others there was a tape that occurred that weve been able to listen to. Federal prosecutors had no idea it existed. It was still under consideration by the special master. So its a little bit premature from the Law Enforcement end of things to be able to say okay, yes, the totality of the
conversations are just hey, call me back. Hey because they may not exactly. Theyre still in the process of going through it. But its not immature if youre Rudy Giuliani. No. Mimi as a prosecutor, and Rudy Giuliani if he hadnt gone onto become whatever he has become today might have been remembered not only as an important mayor but a really important prosecutor who made his career as i mentioned to stephanie earlier, on prosecutes mobsters, using the testimony of people who had for a living lied, shaken down people as he says, and taped people. Dirty dogs. How do prosecutors think about this kind of stuff . Well, no prosecutor who is worth their salt as a prosecutor would try to defend Michael Cohen as an upstanding citizen, a truthteller, really standing alone. Theyre not going to just take Michael Cohen at his word. Youre right, and Rudy Giulianiknows this. When prosecutors make cases against criminals, no matter who it is, they need to get someone on the inside. Who is going to be on the inside . Is it going to be a Law Professor . Is it going to be a priest . No. Its going to be another criminal who is doing the same kind of things as the people youre looking at. And thats what Michael Cohen is. If he becomes a cooperating witness, it will not be because the government chose him. It will be because trump chose him to be his lawyer. And he chose him for those reasons. Trump wanted someone who was okay, i think, with doing something of the shady things trump was doing like paying hush money. Most law firms would not be in on that. He called himself, rade donaven. Remember, Paul Manaforts trial, we cannot forget this and the tweet storm that existed out of the president over the weekend and Rudy Giuliani and the nonsense he created this morning, the Paul Manafort trial
begins 24 hours from now. Thats got them concerned. Mimi, thank you. Tom, thank you for your great reporting. Lets read something that i think is kind of interesting. I want to read a little bit from an op ed from 2012. It said he all need to be a little more heroic as the final 100 days to the election nears. We need to finally ask the president to answer the tough questions and support those who support them. The author of that op ed . Michael cohen. Michael cohen. Were 99 days from the midterms. President trump denies he knew in advance about the 2016 meeting. We just talked about it. Between his son and a russian lawyer. What if we did know . What could it mean for the Russia Investigation . Well talk about that next. First, Supreme CourtJustice Ruth Bader ginsburg says shes
not going anywhere any time soon. She plans to remain on the bench for at least five more years. Shes something. She is. The comments come as democrats spar with republicans over the nomination of judge Brett Kavanaugh to replace Anthony Kennedy who is retiring tomorrow. With the new Chase Ink Business unlimited card i get unlimited 1. 5 cash back. Its so simple, i dont even have to think about it. So i think about the details. Fine, i obsess over the details. Introducing Chase Ink Business unlimited with unlimited 1. 5 cash back on every purchase. Are you ready to take your 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. After months of attacking theRussia Investigation, President Trump is now calling out special counsel bob mueller by name. On sunday the president tweeted this. There is no collusion. The Robert Mueller rigged witch hunt headed now by 17 increased from 13 including an Obama White House lawyer Angry Democrats was started by fraudulent dossier paid for by Crooked Hillary and the dnc. Therefore, this witch hunt is an illegal scam. Can we remind our audience, 35. There are 35 plea deals or indictments that have come out of this investigation. Lets remember that. And weve also learned the dossier was not the triggering event. Nbc news reached out to muellers office. Theres no comment at this time. The report after cohen claims donald trump knew about the meeting where donald trump was expected to get dirt about Hillary Clinton from russians. That would be illegal getting
information on a candidate from russians. This morning Rudy Giuliani tried to defend the president while slamming mueller. Collusion is not a crime. The Obstruction Thing is crazy. He had a right to fire comey. He had a right to say to comey give flynn a break. There was no investigation at the time. And he didnt tell him dont investigate him. He asked him to use discretion. Do you respect bob mueller . I guess the judgment is out. You dont know if you respect this man anymore who has all these credentials . I dont respect credentials. I respect performance. According to New York Times in 2017 trump tried to convince aides Robert Mueller had conflicts of interest. Thats why he should be fired. His own white House Counsel conclusion was they disagreed with the president s case. And remember, youve heardPresident Trump saying no collusion, no collusion, no collusion. This is a different story. Today Rudy Giuliani is saying collusion is not a crime. Thats a different thing. Those are different things. So were clear if you found out there was collusion, like, that would sort of bug you as an american citizen and voter. That would be an issue if Somebody Colluded with the russians to influence the election . Up until now the president has said no collusion. Today his lawyer says collusion is not a crime. Joining us now, National Security reporter ken delaney. Okay. Lets go through this. President trump previously denied knowing anything about that Trump Tower Meeting back in 2016. He wrote in this tweet, but if trump did know in what way would it implicate him and how does that matter for mueller . Now for Rudy Giuliani to say trump wasnt in the meeting. We knew that. I want to remark collusion is not a crime. The crime is conspiracy to
defraud the United States. A series of russian Intelligence Officers have already been charged with that. If any americans including members of the Trump Campaign are found to be a part of that conspiracy, they would be guilty of the crime of conspiracy. To answer your question, it depends on facts not in evidence. Take that this russian Trump Tower Meeting was a Nothing Burger but donald trump according to Michael Cohen has been lying about it all this time . That would mean he was lying around something under investigation. That could be obstruction of justice. If it was corruptly designed to impede the investigation to get other people to repieeat a fals story, that could be an element of obstruction. Then the question is why would they want to cover up the meeting . It raises the question that it was actually far more meaningful. Ken, youve been following this since the beginning. The concept of the russians involved in this thing. President trump seems to feel more and more emboldened in his own tweets and through Rudy Giuliani to continue to attack federal prosecutors with these sorts of comments. Theres got to be some danger that this backfires. I have to say ive seen this behavior covering politicians my entire career who are in the cross hairs of the fbi and federal prosecutors. This is how they kraereact, particularly if they have something to side. If you dont have the facts, pound the table. They attack the investigators because they are weak on the actual sub tantive issues. What can donald trump say . The russians interfeernred in t elections. Donald trump has not provided a good explanation. He was warned by the fbi after the Trump Tower Meeting that the russians would interfere. He didnt mention or nobody did on the campaign the other contacts with the fbi. Theres a lot of sort of unfortunate facts for donald trump and hes chosen to attack Robert Mueller who served
honorably in vietnam, volunteered for combat and was wounded . The gdp numbers strong. Jobs are good. The president could have ridden that wave over the weekend. He chose to take to twitter to attack the investigation to call it a witch hunt. At this point we know it is not a witch hunt based on the number of of indictments and the president has not provided full transparency while he says hes the toughest anyone has ever been on russia. Thats laughable if you compare to the likes of a ronald reagan. Even obama, you could say that Vladimir PutinRose To Great Ur Power during the obama administration, but obama era Sanctions Led to the Ruble Crumbling which is why they remain in a financial crisis. And the sanctions put in place by trump, congress made it happen. Friday morning after the gdp numbers, there was a speech. It was also nonsense. Well break that down. Ill go through every piece. It didnt need to be nonsense. Right. He could have had a good speech. The way he sells the economy, hes the best salesman for the u. S. Economy. I just cant understand why his sales pitch includes lies it doesnt need to. 99 days to go until in. The midterms. President trumps ramping up the rhetoric over immigration. Hes now threatening a Government Shutdown if he does not get money for his border wall. But for facts sake, a wall is not an effective way to crack down on undocumented immigration. Across the board, strong Boarder Security is what we need. A big giant wall doesnt seem to solve anything. The fact is, there are over ninetysix hundred roads named park in the u. S. Its americas most popular street name. But Allstate Agents know thats where the similarity stops. If youre on park street in reno, nevada, the high winds of the Washoe Zephyr could damage your siding. And thats very different than living on park ave in sheboygan, wisconsin, where ice dams could cause water damage. But no matter what park you live on, one of 10,000 local Allstate Agents knows yours. Now that you know the truth, are you in good hands . And the whole time i have been in the fire service, pg es been there, too. Whatever we need whenever we need it. I do count on pg e to keep our firefighters safe. Thats why we ask for their help. Welcome back. The president is again calling for a Government Shutdown. Tweeting i would be willing to shut down the government if the democrats do not give us the votes for Border Security which includes the wall. The president wants 5 billion in funding for the wall to finally begin the construction hes continuously claiming is
underway. But so far thats correct. Its not underway. So far House Speaker paul ryan and Mitch Mcconnell havent been willing to bend. Ryan says he hopes the president can be patient. Except for this when he was asked about a shutdown. Is the funding of the border wall going to wait until after the midterm elections . . Probably. And thats something we do have a disagreement on. So Homeland Security wont get funded . Most of the government will be funded. Youre not worried about a Government Shutdown . Thats not going to happen. He wasnt last week. The president says he need a wall at the southern border to stop immigrants he claims pour in and infest our country. For facts sake, lets say what his own department of Homeland Security says about that situation at the border. In government fiscal near 2016 there were just over 563,000 apprehensions at the southern
border by customs and border patrol. According to the agencys own data, it had more than 82 Effectiveness Rate in 2016 be beating its own target of 81 nature thats 82 of people who are at the southern border stopped from illegally entering the country. Meanwhile, dhs data shows there were nearly 630,000 in country visa overstays that same fiscal tho year. Those are people who fly in and dont leave. Thats almost 66,000 more people in the country unauthorized by simply flying in and staying than those crossing the southern border. And that is something a wall absolutely will not stop. And an example that the president and other pro Wall Republicans have pointed out is israels wall along the gaza strip. But that wall was along a border one tenth of the size of our border with mexico, and it was
coupled with policies aimed at making immigration less desirable like prohibiting immigrants from sending money out of the country and forcing employers to deposit 20 of immigrant employees pay into a bank account available when the employee leaves the country. So unless the president wants to adopt similar policies or beefed up the border patrol, any wall would cost billions of dollars and have limited effectiveness. But the concept of stop the over seeing of visas, doesnt have the same ring as build that wall. It doesnt, but you build a wall and someone else is going to build a higher ladder. Joining us now is Senior Editor politics beth. We were talking about this in the break. What does it get the president to continue to carry on about this wall . Hes been fact checked. Hes got all the voters who think they want somebody who is tough on crime, on Border Immigration already. He needs to broa