People have made to congress to buttress the russian side of the collusion investigation. Thank you for that. We thank you for watching this hour of msnbc live throughout, i mean, from the very beginning craig melvin whos about to pick up our coverage from the day that Robert Mueller was appointed thrappoin appointed, this story has never been far from the headlines. Among these many days, this is huge. This is an infection pointing deep. Were going to continue our coverage. Good morning, craig melvin, msnbc headquarters here in new york city. That Breaking News on the Mueller Investigation is where we start. Shortly before President Trump left for his meeting with World Leaders in argentina, last hour just a few moments ago he called his onetime attorney and fixer Michael Cohen a quote, weak person, who is lying. Cohen made a surprise appearance in a Federal Courtroom in manhattan this morning. He named the president. He named President Trump in a shocking new plea deal involving Trum
in sync. finally, what a summit. the focus is going to be the meeting with the chinese president. there are now two foreign leaders who are land mines for him, not only vladimir putin who he s not going to see, but then you have mohammed bin salman, the crown prince of saudi arabia. michael, thank you. i want to turn back to tom winter here in the studio, of course, nbc investigative unit tom winter who was there at the courthouse this morning, legal analyst danny cevallos. we also have chuck rosenberg, an msnbc contributor, a former u.s. attorney, and kim way lee, a law professor at the university of baltimore. tom, i will start with you. you managed to sift through these documents you were there in the courtroom this morning. talk to me about the top lines here. it would seem to me that the biggest nugget of news is that michael cohen is clearly cooperating with the special counsel s office? that s exactly correct, craig. according to the court filings, we know that michael coh
cohen continues to respond and provide truthful information regarding any and all manners as to which this office deems relevant. what does that mean, ken? it means, craig, and i m grateful to tom for buttoning that up for us. it means that michael cohen is now working for robert mueller. we said this about paul manafort, right, and that turned out not to be the case in the end, but tom reports that inside the courtroom michael cohen seemed absolutely serene, at peace, understanding what was happening. in contrast to his previous appearance where he pleaded guilty to those campaign finance and fraud charges where he seemed very rattled. this is a man and in his public appearances and interviews in the months since that time, he has seemed to be at peace with his decision to tell the truth, to cooperate with the mueller inquiry, and go where that takes him, even if it s hostile to the interests of the man he once said he would take a bullet for.
putin and has been ever since then is because he has been pursuing this deal, something that he has been pursuing since the 80s. another point i wanted to make was that the russians never seemed to take donald trump s overtures very seriously. he has been pursuing deals in russia for decades, but it never actually panned out. i wonder if the russians were dangling a real estate deal before the president in order to invent vise him to undermine the hillary clinton candidacy. we just got this note in from your colleague and mine, tom winter from the investigative un unit, and according to tom, according to michael cohen s plea agreement he is cooperating with the special counsel s office. in the document it says that the government will agree to bring to the court s attention at sentencing the lying to congress case and the earlier case about campaign contributions, quote, the nature and extent of the defendant s cooperation with this office, mueller s office on the condition that you