Rachel Maddow takes a look at the days top political news stories. By the letters, chs. Confidential human source. Now, the trove of documents detail reports of payments to steele, mostly redacted. You can see there, thats a lot of white space. There are two exceptions. The final page is information from a document, from february 2016. Of course, thats long before the russia probe began. It says steele was, quote, verbally admonished by the fbi and that steele acknowledged the admonishment and even signed a document noting it. Now, from this excerpt, which obviously is tantalizing, we dont have the wider context of why. The other item comes from page two of these new documents. It concerns the fbis decision to terminate its relationship with steele. Guess when . Just days before the 2016 election. Now, this document says steele had confirmed his relationship with the fbi to an outside party. And that he was a source for a, quote, online article. In addition to revealing his relationshi
Is as well. And cnn politics reporter to koppen. Former business partner, manafort, rick gates maybe called this week. He is considered a star witness. In exchange for his guilty plea. What is to be expected from him . Yes, thats right, fred. I mean, in many ways, this is sort of what everyone has been waiting for the trial to build up to. He was the man who is sort of on the inside so to speak on all of these different pieces of the puzzle that have been being put together by this testimony from, you know, from accountants, from the various sort of external factors in manaforts world. But this is the man who was, you know, supposedly according to prosecutors side by side with manafort as much as this went down and may be the one to testify, you know, exactly what he was thinking and doing and intending, which is so important when youre building this criminal case. You know, he also is sort of the connection to trump world. That we havent seen as much. And thats what has to be what peo
Rachel Maddow takes a look at the days top political news stories. They are known as the steele dossier. They allege, among other things, that the Trump Campaign had organized collusion with the kremlin. Quote, this is something of huge significance. Way above party politics, that Intelligence Officer told corn, that would be steele. Quote, i think trumps own party should be aware of this stuff, as well. The official confirmation of the fbi investigation into the Trump Campaigns contacts with russia was not confirmed for many more months. Its even easy to forget that, because its the kind of big information thats the center of American Politics, so we all talk about it. People who dont even follow the news know about it. But lets be clear. It was not until march 2017, many months later is, thats after the inauguration, after the election, when fbi director james comey went down to the hill, where he was testifying and said, yes, there was an open probe. By that time, the fbi had also i
Brian Williams examines the days top political stories and current politicalcampaign news. Inaugural address, which my old boss had colorful language to describe. George w. Bush called it some crazy bleep. I was thinking about the line about carnage and i was thinking that the real carnage and it was all in motion when he came that day. The real carnage is the people closest to donald trump. The lives that are being destroyed for crimes theyve committed. I mean, you know, its not a night to feel sympathy for Michael Cohen, but the events that are sending him to jail potentially are events put in motion by the things donald trump demanded of the people close to him. It may end up ensnaring his family. But just this idea of wreckage. A source close to Michael Cohen tonight told me that everything donald trump touches is tainted by his toxic brew of lack of ethics and lack of any adherence to the law. I also thought of something that someone who advises this president said to me earlier i
Brian Williams examines the days top political stories and current politicalcampaign news. Brian Williams examines the days top political stories and current politicalcampaign news. No comment on cohen who was released on 500,000 bail. His sentencing, interestingly, is scheduled for december 12th. The judge noted that cohen could serve up to 65 years in prison, though we should hasten to add the prosecutess recommended sentence is something closer to four or six years. Manafort is expected to be sentenced to seven to nine years when its all said and done. He also faces another trial on related charges next month in washington. Meanwhile, both men now join rick gates, michael flynn, George Papadopoulos on the roster of Trump Associates who faced criminal charges. On that, let us bring in our expanded leadoff panel for a consequential tuesday evening. Nicolle wallace returned to the night shift. The veteran of the Bush White House and host of deadline white house. And here in new york mi