Nixon, if you want to learn about watergate, learn about what the country was like and what was going on in the country. And the way to start understanding that is to understand 68. Oh, and theres a little bit of collusion in the victory in the end that is worth its actually Richard Nixon used collusion with the foreign government, the south vietnamese in order to win in the end. And for the rest of the story, playing with fire is now available in bookstores and online. If you can bear the sound of my voice for hours on end, the audiobook is available too. Thats tonights last word. The 11th hour with broian will jams is next. 15 million for flynn to have a turkish president s rival sent back to turkey. Also two republican senators tonight withdrawing their support for roy moore as the alabama candidate calls the Sexual Misconduct claims against him completely false. Were live in vietnam as President Trump is half a world away from the problems back home in washington. The 11th hour on a friday night begins now. And good evening, once again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. Day 295 of the Trump Administration, and tonight it is now clear that the attention of Robert Mueller is for the time being, at least, bearing down on mike flynn, the retired u. S. Army general who was one of the stall warts of the Trump Campaign effort and who served as National Security adviser for 24 days in the west wing. Nbc news reports today mueller is investigating a possible deal between senior turkish officials and flynn during the president ial transition. This report says, in part, quote, four people familiar with the Investigation Say Mueller is looking into whether flynn discussed orchestrating the return to turkey of a chief rival of turkish president erdogan who lives in the u. S. Flynn was offered upwards of 15 million to be paid directly or indirectly if he could complete the deal according to two sources familiar with the meeting. Flynns lawyers released a statement about the story saying, quote, we have intentionally avoided responding to every rumor or allegation raised in the media. Todays news cycle as brought allegations about General Flynn ranging from kidnapping to bribery that are so outrageous and prejudicial we are making an exception to our usual rule. They are false. Flynn, youll recall, among trumps earliest campaign supporters, he served on the Transition Team before following the new president to the white house. Sormer acting attorney general Sally Yates Over at justice had testified six days after trump took the Oath Of Office she warned the white house flynn was compromised with the russians. She also testified that Vice President mike pence had unknowingly made false statements about flynns conversations with the russians. And Administration Official has
said pence was relaying what flynn told him. 18 days after yates warning, trump fired flynn. Heres how he explained why he did it. Did you fire mike flynn . Mike flynns a fine person. And i asked for his resignation. He respectfully gave it. He is a man who there was a certain amount of information given to Vice President pence whos with us today. And i was not happy with the way that information was given. Did you direct mike flynn to discuss sanctions with the Russian Ambassador . No, i didnt. Prior to your inauguration . No, i didnt. Would you have fired him if the information hadnt leaked out. No, i fired him because of what he said to mike pence, very simple. Mike was doing his job. We ultimately fired, but we fired for a different reason. Youre talking about General Flynn . General flynn, yes. Because of lying to the Vice President . Yeah. But everything plays in, everything plays into it. But we fired him because he said something to the Vice President that was not so. Lets bring in our starting panel on a friday night, shall we. Nbc News National political reporter julia ainsley, more on that in a moment. Political White House ReporterMatthew Nussbaum is back with us, and jennifer rodgers, former assistant u. S. Attorney for the Southern District of new york. Good evening and welcome to you all. Julia you get to go first because, of the panelists, you made the news today. Tell us this story as best you can for a lay audience, including how In The Name Of God it also includes the poconos and pennsylvania . That is a good question. I will break that down for you as simply as i can. Basically we know that Robert Mueller is looking into whether or not Michael Flynn and his associates met in a december
2016 meeting at the 21 club in new york. That is an upscale restaurant just blocks away from the trump tower where flynn was serving on the president ial Transition Team. We understand from sources who are familiar with this meeting that they allegedly talked about a 15 million bribe that they would try to give flynn once he was National Security adviser if he could see that fi tul la len. In order to remove him, that could have been through a kidnapping operation, or through extradition. We also know that the fbi had reupped their investigation, they were asked to reup their investigation into gulen at the beginning of the Trump Administration when flynn served as National Security adviser. This was after they had already dismissed the investigation under obama. Were looking at a number of pieces. What mueller is trying to drill
extradition request to come from the white house. Its supposed to come through diplomatic channels in the Justice Department. So counselor, this comes down to you. Someone said on social media today that if there could be anything funny taken out of this, this could be the plot from a Cohen Brothers movie with General Flynn driving around the poconos looking for this old guy to send out of the country. As a former prosecutor, what alarm bells go off in your head . Well, its not good for flynn, no matter how you slice it. If hes talking about taking money to try to orchestrate a return of gulen to turkey through official channels, then youre talking about serious bribery offenses, youre not allowed to take money to do things for your government job, except your salary. If youre talking about him trying to orchestrate some illegal operation, its obviously a federal crime to orchestrate kidnapping that crosses international lines. Either way you look at it hes talking about committing a very serious crime if these allegations are proven to be
true. Matthew, how does this continue to haunt the administration that, after all, continues even though the traveling white house right now is on the other side of the world . In some ways its convenient that theyre over there in asia for now while this news drops. Sarah sanders and the rest will have to confront this when they get back. It would be hard to overstate how serious this is. Obviously the Manafort Indictment was serious for which white house. That was someone who left the campaign in august mike flynn was with the campaign through the end, prominent in the transition and served in the white house over the warnings of the president obama who told President Trump not to hire him. And you have to remember it was Michael Flynn who donald trump was defending to james comey and said cant we find a way to let this go . He went on to later Fire James Comey which led to bob mueller getting here in the first place. This flynn case is very, very serious for the white house, more serious than the manafort case. Matthew, lets go deeper on 1 million in three years on Business Suits out of a place in cypress, these guys are not going to do 25 years in jail. Thats why bob muellers going about this the way that he is. He knows these guys are not seasoned criminals and he knows theyre going to roll over on each other. Mark my words, it will start becoming a race to the special counsels office. I also heard someone today refer to mueller as an back y preci theyve gone about the case so far. Thats clear. Thats the point behind the substance and heft of the Manafort Gates indictment to get them to cooperate. Similarly, here, they have charges they could bring on flynn already. The registration, the Foreign Agents Registration Act defense and false statement offense is not enough to get him to flip. You bring potentially, if they can, these charges which are significantly more serious, and flynn already, unlike manafort, has indicated an interest in getting immunity and perhaps
cooperating. I think they think if they can get a serious enough offense against flynn hes definitely flipping. Do you concur with what seems to be the present attitude we know between 1 and 10 going on between all reporting, mueller runs a tight ship. Thats right. Thats the way it should be honestly. These are confidential investigations going on. Until they bring actions that are meant to be public then i agree they should stay confidential despite the great work of the news media. We have a lot of work to do still. Well find out in time. Matt, lets delve briefly into the trump agenda. While all this is going on, were hearing a lot about tax cuts and tax reform and soon the Traveling Circus is going to come back to town and were going to be all about capitol hill once again. Thats right. I mean, we know this administration has a hard time driving one message. Weve seen that this week when
tax reform and the asia trip were supposed to the big thing. Obviously roy moore made short work of that. Between this controversy down in alabama and the white house having to answer for that, and muellers investigation expanding, and these new questions about flynn, you couple that with the fact that this tax bill looks like it actually raises taxes on a fair amount of middle class families, thats a lot of issues for the white house to be coming back to, this is not an environment thats friendly to complex and politically difficult as tax reform. Our thanks to the leadoff panel for leading off coverage on friday night. Julia apes l julia apes lee, Matthew Nussbaum, jennifer rogers. Coming up, supporters announced no longer supporting roy moore. Live to vietnam, the most controversial item on the president s agenda prior to wheels up and heading home, the
11th hour just Getting Started on a friday night. I dont want to sound paranoid, but dya think our recent online sales success seems a little. Strange . Na. Ever since we switched to fedex ground business has been great. Theyre affordable and fast. Maybe too affordable and fast. What if. People arent buying these books online, but they are buying them to protect their secrets . . hi bill. If that is your real name. Its william actually. Hmph affordable, fast fedex ground. Liberty mutual insurance. Or a little Internet Machine . It makes you wonder shouldnt we get our phones and internet from the same company . Thats why Xfinity Mobile comes with your internet. You get up to 5 lines of talk and text at no extra cost. So all you pay for is data. See how much you can save. Choose by the gig or unlimited. Xfinity mobile. A new kind of network designed to save you money. Call, visit, or go to xfinitymobile. Com. With a 14yearold girl back in 1979. Moore was then a 32yearold assistant da at the time. The post also interviewed three other women who said moore took them on dates when they were teenagers. Nbc news has not verified the allegations. The reporting is based on over 30 sbeinterviews of people who w moore during that time. The women have not filed Police Reports or civil suits. More than a dozen republicans have called on moore to step aside if the allegations prove to be true. Just three senators, john mccain, mike lee and steve daines have fully denounced moore as a candidate. And former gop mitt romney wrote on twitter today, innocent until Proven Guilty is for criminal convictions, not elections. I believe lee corfman, the woman in the article, her account is too serious to ignore. Moore is unfit for office and should step aside. President trump continues his
asia trip this week, hasnt addressed these allegations directly. Today, however, during a Press Briefing on Board Air Force one, press secretary Sarah Huckabee sanders chose her words carefully here. Like most americans, the president believes we cannot allow a mere allegation, in this case one from many years ago, to destroy a persons life. However, the president also believes that if these allegations are true, judge moore will do the right thing and step aside. Well, lets talk about all of this. Stuart stevens is with us tonight. Hes a campaign and political veteran. He served as mitt romneys Chef Strategist for the 2012 campaign. And indira is back with us. Thank you for being with us. Stuart whats going on here, a days full of News Coverage today, various people coming on television and radio, normalizing an adult and a teenage girl. Listen, its really not
complicated. Roy moore in this interview with sean hannity did what all the bad guys do in law and order when they dont have a lawyer, he basically indicted himself. He said it was in his 30s, assistant district attorney, did go out with girls young enough he had to ask their moms for permission. I guess he thought that was a defense. But, i mean, look, if youre in your 30s and youre going to take girls young enough you feel like you have to ask their mother, that should have been the first clue that something was off. And so hes saying these girls are 16, 17 and he was attracted to them in his 30s, which is weird. But he wasnt doesnt have any cant imagine him doing anything with someone a couple years younger. I mean, look, he should step aside. Its clear. Its a disgrace. Where is your party, stuart, and where are the profiles in the u. S. Senate for starters . This is a situation where the
president could be very helpful. Hes wildly popular with republicans in alabama. I think that they would listen to him and i think the president should look at this and ask roy moore to step aside. There are various mechanisms that could still guarantee republicans have a shot at this election. Otherwise, to condone this, to accept it is to condone it. If you dont call it out, in my view youre cone doning it. Indira, your view of what is were witnessing here . Ill give you another curve ball, the bannon effect on all of this. Right, well, of course, steve bannon, the guy who backed roy moore and pushed for him against Luther Strange who would have been the more mainstream candidate. What i have to say about this, theres so many disturbing elements. One is, as stuart said, that during this interview with sean hannity that roy moore essentially said, well i did know two of these four women. Not only did he say well, i never asked any teenager out without getting her moms permission which, again, sort of stunning and shocking that he was doing it if the first place. Then he said the girl who he supposedly plied with alcohol when she was underage, oh, im sure i didnt do and that she didnt drink underage, i remember her as being a good girl. Immediately putting the blame on the young woman herself. The other thing thats so disturbing is how the alabama gop has reacted. I mean, pretty much across the board, Alabama Republicans have stood by him saying that even if these allegations are true, that they still would vote for him over the democrat and one of them, the Auditor General of the state compared this to mar yan joseph and said mary was a teenager and joseph was an adult carpenter, and they were parents of jesus. And i thought, oh, my goodness, the bible says that mary was a virgin. And that god was the father of jesus and how in the world can you use this to justify dating
teenage girls . Its appalling. And, you know, the senators in the u. S. Senate who are coming out against him keep saying if true, if true he should step down. How are we supposed to prove this . What do these four women have to gain putting their names out there, their entire life histories. The Washington Post sought them out, and really did bullet proof reporting on this i find very hard for anyone to say thats not true. That required some courage from the women they encountered and interviewed. Also, indira ive heard it said this week that, if true, has become, as phraseology goes, if true, has become the thoughts and prayers of last week. Exactly. So stuart, on the bannon angle, we have this immovable object who is going to be a part of our politics whether republicans or democrats like it or not. I want to play for you jeremy
peters of the New York Times