Terms of what didnt get leaked and what we didnt know about, the day after the fbi raid. That guy was arrested at dulles. Nobody knew. Criminally charged, nobody knew. He was pleading guilty. Nobody knew. He was cooperating with the Mueller Investigation. Nobody knew. All of these things about the papadopoulos side of this out of the news completely. In a way that, you know, makes me feel like people complaining about leaks all this time missing the point. But that was a total blindside story today. Lets just think about how difficult it is to get arrested in and around washington without anyone noticing. Right. I mean, just lets start there. Everyone has a camera in the pockets. It is stunning, the all the procedure that is the papadopoulos case has gone through in this case in utter secrecy. Arrested in a public place and then kind of unarrested. And arrest kept secret while being criminally charged, while actively, proactively cooperating with the investigation for months, multiple fbi interviews, represented in person himself at the District Court to enter his guilty plea. I mean, all of this stuff happened without anybody peeping about it. Its just i mean, not only does it show that the mueller side of things isnt leaking and not enough reporters on this story. And, you know, just courthouse elevators are wonderful sources of gossip in this world. Just the ability to move him in and out of that federal Court Without anyone seeing, without anyone picking up a hint that this is going on. So the leaking of the Mueller Investigation so far is zero. There are plenty of ways that it could have been leaked outside of the mueller team of what was going to happen today on these manafort indictments. That leak did occur but theres plenty of ways other than the mueller team that could have come from. Even with the endimt, we knew theres an indictment as of friday night. We know now that manafort and gates both had to hand over the passports yesterday and even after they handed over the passports, nobody knew that the indictment was them until they were in motion this morning so i just feel like our conception that everything will come to be known before its publicly announced has been absolutely rocked by this news today in a way that makes me feel like we need to reset the expectations about how leaky this investigation is, the most important stuff theyre not leaking at all. You have been your guide through all of this and i think so many including me in your audience were up to speed on this thanks to your just relentless, concentrated guiding, no matter what else was going on in the news. Never losing sight of this following the money as you have said and as you said in the opening of your show tonight and its led to where we are today which feels like a beginning. Well, thats nice of you to say. Some people would call it fixation but i call it focus. Fixation on the truth. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, dear. Guilty. That is the most important word in this day of historical developments in the special prosecutors investigation. Guilty. In the very first case that special prosecutor Robert Mueller brought in his investigation of collusion between the Trump Campaign and russia Robert Mueller got a guilty and that happened weeks ago. But we learned about it today on the same day that Robert Mueller indictmented manafort and his associate rick gates on 12 counts including conspiracy against the United States. Today the president of the United States tried to pretend that Paul Manaforts conspiracy against the United States was something that happened long before donald trump hired Paul Manafort to run his president ial campaign. And that is just another trump lie. Paul manaforts alleged crimes against the United States occurred before he joined the Trump Campaign and continued while he was on the Trump Campaign and after he left the Trump Campaign and continued right into this year, right into 2017. Paul manafort was charged with crimes today that he committed this year. As well as years past. Paul manafort and rick gates pleaded not guilty today which is what everyone was anticipating would be the big news of the day until Robert Mueller revealed this morning that he already had a guilty in a secret federal Court Arraignment on october 5th. 30yearold Trump CampaignForeign Policy adviser George Papadopoulos was charged with lying to the fbi and he was asked how do you wish to plead and he said immediately, i plead guilty. And with those three words George Papadopoulos stepped into history, the very First Defendant charged by Robert Mueller and he is the first to plead guilty. The question tonight rattling the Trump White House and no doubt making Donald Trumps insomnia all the more acute tonight is has George Papadopoulos just become the e. Howard hunt of this investigation. E. Howard hunt the first to plead guilty in the watergate investigation that brought down the nixon presidency. After hunt pled guilty, 55 people were found guilty or pled guilty in that special prosecutors investigation of watergate which culminating in president nixon being forced to resign the presidency. George papadopoulos pled guilty to lying to the fbi in answer to several questions about multiple contacts that he had with russians and people he believed to be agents of the russian government and one person he believed to be Vladimir Putins niece. In other words, he lied to the fbi about collusion with russians. And his own attempted collusion with the russian government continued attempted collusion. The guilty that Robert Mueller got on october 5th and was revealed today was a guilty about collusion. George papadopoulos admitted in the guilty plea a russian source, quote, told him about the russians possessing dirt on then candidate Hillary Clinton and the form of thousands of emails. Papadopoulos lied multiple times about that. And lied multiple times about when he learned that information. Lied to the fbi about that. Special prosecutor discovered that papadopoulos tried to arrange a meeting between candidate trump and vladimir putin. In a brief outlining papadopouloss offenses submitted to the judge at the arraignment in writing, the special prosecutor detailed many of papadopouloss written communications and avoided identifying who he was communicating with. At one point the person identified only at Campaign Supervisor. Says this. About papadopouloss collusion with russians. Great work. George papadopoulos had a choice when he submitted to a voluntary interview with the fbi. Admit to his collusion with russians which he knew was the very heart of the matter that the fbi was investigating, admit to all that, give it all up, or lie. It wasnt like papadopoulos is a sad sacks who got tripped up by the fbi and lied about some minor thing for which he now has to plead guilty. George papadopoulos was lying about collusion with russians, he was lying about the very essence of the special prosecutors investigation is all about. In that secret arrangement, the judge asked George Papadopoulos lawyer, do you concur that the government would be able to prove each of the necessary elements of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt . Yes, your honor, said the defense lawyer. The george then asked, papadopoulos, if he read the special prosecutors statement of offense, detailing all of the lies that George Papadopoulos told the fbi. The judge said, did you read the document carefully . Papadopoulos said, yes, i did, your honor. The judge said, is everything in that document true . Yes, it is, your honor. The bad news for President Trump is that George Papadopoulos secretly pled guilty three weeks ago and the even worse news for donald trump is that George Papadopoulos is cooperating with the special prosecutor, telling the special prosecutor everything he knows and George Papadopoulos knows that his future depends on him telling the truth. His sentence depends on him telling the truth. He pled guilty three weeks ago to a federal felony that carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum fine of 250,000. And at his special arrangement the judge told George Papadopoulos that if he continued to fully cooperate with the special prosecutor his prison sentence could be, quote, between zero to six months. And that his fine could be, quote, between 500 and 9,500. The judge then told George Papadopoulos that it was completely within the judges discretion to impose a sentence that is either higher or lower than those guidelines that he just explained to him. And so, even though George Papadopoulos had already said that he wanted to plead guilty, the judge following standard procedure in an arraignment like this took all the time necessary to explain to the defendant all of his rights and then said, so, mr. Papadopoulos, are you ready to make an about whether you want to enter a plea of guilty or whether you wish to go to trial in this case . Yes, your honor, said pop develop louse. What is your decision . Id like to plead guilty, your honor. And are you entering this plea of guilty voluntarily and of your own free will because you are guilty and for no other reason . Yes, your honor. Joining us now, david frum, Senior Editor of the atlantic and joyce vance for Northern District of alabama and professor at university of alabama law school. She announced on the evening before President Trumps inauguration that she was retiring from the Justice Department after 25 years. Joyce vance, i wanted to go to the particulars of the papadopoulos case. It seems to me this is the dead center of the investigation. This is someone whos been charged with lying to the fbi about the essence of what the special prosecutors investigating. He has been. The lie hes told, in fact, relates to the russians interest in him stemming from his involvement in the campaign. And that i think attests to muellers genius in leading with this charge because not only does it signify that he wont tolerate being lied to in the course of this investigation, it puts everyone whos involved in this circle of events, i think in a state of high fear because we dont know who else has been arrested, who else is cooperating like papadopoulos so each of them has to be concerned about conversation that is they may have had with papadopoulos since his arrest in late july. And the day that papadopoulos lied to the fbi was before there was even a special prosecutor named. It was back at the end of the first week of the Trump Presidency on january 27th. And that friday, january 27th, turns out to be the very same day that fbi director james comey invited by the president surprisingly and suddenly to the white house for a one on one dinner and heres how james comey described what happened at that dinner. Let me move to the january 27th dinner where you said, quote, the president began by asking me whether i wanted to stay on as fbi director. He also indicated that lots of people, again, your words, wanted the job. What was your impression and what did you mean by this notion of a patronage rape ro ip . My impression, again, its my impression. I could be wrong but my common sense told me what was going on was either he concluded or someone had told him that you didnt youve already asked comey to stay and you didnt get anything for it. And that the dinner was an effort to build a relationship, in fact, he asked specifically of loyalty in the context of asking me to stay. David, i have the feeling when the history of this is written there will be many days like this, many days on january 27th where one dramatic scene is happening in the white house and dining room with the president and james comey and another fateful scene is happening where someone like George Papadopoulos decides on that day to lie to the fbi. You are not the only one who has that impression. To my mind, one of the most interesting things about tonight following today is something thats not happening. If you have been watching fox, i assume you have and other networks, too, i think one its striking there are no republican lawmakers on tv. And at the atlantic, i assume many other organizations, we spent time trying to get them on the phone and they seemed to have lost knowledge of how to make that instrument work either. This is a moment where a president rallies or tries rally his friends and theres gingrich and hannity and theres laura ingram and others not facing electors but what is not what were not seeing tonight, not taking the courageous route an saying dont fire Robert Mueller and not either accounted for the president. Thises a moment when a lot of people wavering as to what their future looks like. Joyce vance, a lot of expectations surrounding mike flynn today because he seems to be one of the most easily charged people in this story. And leading up to all of this. What do you suppose is happening on the flynn side of this case . Right. You have to wonder after todays events whether or not flynn is already cooperating with mueller. Many people thought that he would be the subject of todays announced indictments. I thought manafort was more likely because we knew that the fbi had been investigating him prior to the establishment of the special counsel but the fact that flynn was not included in the indictments today leads you to believe that either that will be coming in the near future or that perhaps its unnecessary because hes already cooperating. And, of course, the white house tried to suggest that Dan Papadopoulos was not a serious player in the trump Foreign Policy team in the campaign. Lets listen to how donald trump himself described Dan Papadopoulos to the Washington Post. We heard you might be announcing your Foreign PolicyAdvisory Team soon. If you want i could give you some of the names. I wouldnt mind. Id be delighted. George papadopoulos. Hes an oil and energy consultant, excellent guy. I want to apologize to Dan Papadopoulos, a friend of mine when i should have said George Papadopoulos. David frum, theres the president when hes running saying George Papadopoulos is one of the people he relies on. Thats when the president had very few few its striking how many had an improper relationship with russia. Thats the giant, magnetic force. All of this theres a second track which we have to keep in mind following this story. This is the same time trump and Trump Organization are frying to get a hotel deal in russia. Thats happening concurrently with the hunting for hillary, access to Hillary Clintons emails moscow is exercising this Magnetic Attraction on different parts of the trump brain. I want to dumb down the political opponents brain. I want to make money in moscow brain. I want to stress the point of the interview with the fbi. This is happening very, very early in this investigation. Before people knew that the kind of massive power and pressure of a special prosecutor was going to be on them, and so, it seems to be that papadopoulos made the guess that he might that this might be a low voltage investigation, that he could just talk his way through at this point. Well, i think a lot of people around trump just made bad calculations. One of the whatever you think about donald trump personally, that he seems not to attract super masterminds in secondary positions. And so, a lot of people are doing wrong things but because theyre so much especially in Foreign Policy the c and d and e team they dont take things that you would think of as basic precautions if you had an awareness of how risky and improper your actions were. Joyce vance, quickly, does it before we go, does it repeatedly shock you that people think they can get away with lying to the fbi like this because it stuns me they sit there and make that calculation and decide to lie . Its absolutely incredible. And of course, nothing, angers agents more than being lied to. It makes them double down on their investigation. We saw that here today and it certainly gives new vitality to james comeys namt, lordy, i hope theres tapes. I think the fbi was angry enough to be lied to that theres more tapes now. Thank you for joining us. Really appreciate it. Coming up, donald trump spent the day fuming according to tonights reports, fuming about the charges today. One insider told