cnnheroes.com. thank you so much for being with me. i'll seal ye you in an hour. next is "smerconish." ♪ i am michael smerconish in philadelphia. we welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world. when donald trump suddenly fired fbi director james comey this week, did he harm the credibility of his presidency or firm up his base? maybe both. and firing someone who's investigating his administration and then hinting he recorded their conversations. >> what about the idea that, in a tweet that you said there might be tape recordings. >> that i can't talk about. i won't talk about that. >> that sounds like something from president nixon's play book. i'll ask former nixon adviser

pat buchanan what he thinking. meanwhile, the democrats are rallies the drumbeat to it is a special prosecutor on russian ties to the trump campaign. several senators are on board. i will talk to one of them, gary peters. and i have been summoned for jury duty. how would you answer this question? would you be more likely to believe the testimony of a police officer because of his or her job? tell me right now on facebook and via twitter. first, this was a terrible week for president trump, right? after all, his stated reason for firing fbi director james comey was contradicted by his staff. and ultimately abandoned by the president himself. you would think a political disaster. well, not so fast. let's review. the president told comey in a letter he was terminating him after accepting the recommendation of the attorney general who in turn was relying on a memo from the deputy attorney general. there was just one problem and that was the timing.

the president's letter, the correspondence from the attorney general and each is dated may the memo from a the deputy attorney general have something in common. each ways dated may 9, 2017. the president asking us to believe on may 9, rod rosenstein, deputy attorney general, provided attorney general jeff sessions with a three-page memo, which included, quote, having refused to admit his errors. the director cannot be expected to implement the necessary conservative actions. and on the same day, this memo was delivered to sessions, sessions immediately accepted the outcome, turned around and sent his own letter to the president saying, quote, for the reasons expressed by the deputy attorney general in the attached memorandum, i have concluded a fresh start is needed at the leadership of the fbi. and then still on that day, may 9, the president gets sessions' letter, turns around and writes to the director telling him, quote, you are hereby terminated.

it never made sense that such a momentous decision, such as firing the head of the fbi would be made by each of these three parties on a single day, particularly where there was no new information contained in the deputy ag's memo. it was premised on facts known since last july. that this was really about the russian probe was made clear by the president's letter to comey, specifically where he wrote these words. quote, while i greatly appreciate you informing me on three separate occasions that i am not under investigation, i nevertheless concur with the judgment of the department of justice that you are not able to effectively lead the bureau. that was a non sequitur. the deputy ag memo said nothing about the russian probe. creating a paper trail, that's not the issue. what was problematic is that it was a fake excuse, something made clear when the president was interviewed by lester holt. >> i was going to fire comey. there's no good time to do it, by the way. >> in the letter you say i

accepted their recommendation, so you already accepted the recommendation. >> i was already going to fire regardless of recommendation. >> my hunch is the firing will have unintended consequence, redoubling of efforts by the fbi to piece together the russian investigation, plus the scrutiny of whoever is nominated to be comey's successor should ensure he or she will not be a patsy for the president. but will it harm the president with those who put him in office? i have doubts. most of the callers to my sirius/xm program this week overwhelmingly disapproving of the firing, but not all. listen to these three from yesterday. >> the credibility of the news organizations is just mind boggling. i mean, the eye rolls, the ice cream banner on the bottom. it is really getting out of hand. and i can't see how everybody doesn't see that. >> there's a huge disconnect between the d.c. bubble and main street.

i live in main street, america. i'll tell you what we're saying. >> tell me. >> this is a snow job about russia, all fake news. being told trust us, trust us. there's something here. there's no trust between us and d.c. no trust between us and the media. >> i am a trump voter. my husband is military. i think our mindset is he supported the military, voted for that, voted for him getting things done. he is not able to get things done because there's so much smoke and mirrors through the media and it makes it difficult for the regular people in the working world just to get one foot in front of the other. >> polling suggests mark, john, beth my callers are not alone. the president might be incapable of destroying himself where his supporters are unwilling to change their mind about him, even as he embarrasses, contradicts, undermines himself and his administration and the nation.

you remember that abc news/"the washington post" policy last month that showed 96% of voters would vote for him again? now a brand new gallup survey shows 78% of democrats disapprove of trump's removal of comey. that made sense. firing somebody investigating you seems indicative of guilt. but 79% of republicans approve. when the president said he could shoot somebody on fifth avenue and get away with it, we could never have foreseen that the victim figuratively would be jim comey. to discuss this and more, joining me, reporters from "the wall street journal," "the washington post," and "new york "all of who have broke stories during the tumultuous week. del quinton, and also with us kara demeritsian, and also joining us is math though rosenberg, covers intelligence and national security for "new

york times." truly an a list. dell, let me begin with you. you reported rosenstein pushed white house counsel don mcgrahn to correct the perception comey was fired because of his memo. how hot, how angry was rosenstein, and is resignation a possibility? >> you know, our reporting showed that rod rosenstein, deputy attorney general, was upset when they rolled this out, the white house made it sound like this was all on the deputy attorney general's recommendation. he recommended we get rid of comey so we did it. remember, that was the narrative on tuesday and wednesday. rosenstein did not appreciate this, that's not the truth. he was in a meeting with the president on monday. on monday the president said give me a memo justifying why i should get rid of comey, what is wrong with comey is more likely what the president ask him and ros rosenstein did that. when he saw the narrative, it was all sparked by his words, he was upset.

call don mcgahn, said you have to correct the record. i can't work in an environment where we're not being within the lines of what the truth is and what really happened. >> is there a possibility that rosenstein is so hot about this he might resign his position? >> i don't think so. from the people i've talked to, he really likes this job as deputy attorney general, believes that he's the right guy to lead the department, day-to-day operations and overseeing the probe of russia and russia's meddling in the u.s. election, and this was just his way to push back at the white house. others have reported he threatened to resign. we didn't get that far in our reporting. we found he basically said let's set the record straight. you know what happened, the white house did, right after that started talking about how this was at the president's

instigation, he long wanted to fire comey and as you played earlier in his interview, didn't care what the recommendation was going to be, he was going to fire him anyway. >> right. i think the date as i suggested in my commentary belies the assertion. the senate intel subpoenaed documents from flynn. today you are reporting that there's new pressure not to slow things down. there are a number of investigations taking place, the senate intel, fbi, maybe the house intel committee, perhaps the nsa and cia as well. which of these investigations might bear the most fruit? which is to be most aggressive? >> well, a week action, or not quite a week ago i would probably say the fbi investigation, that one has been going on the longest. certainly seems to be the one that all of the congressional investigators are focusing on most acutely as they look for information and pull people back for testimony. as you've seen, the removal of comey has thrown a little monkey wrench into that. certainly it is not a purge of the fbi. as you said, there may be redoubled efforts, because there's a lot of support

for comey among employees to push ahead with the investigation, and may not be much disruption. but the senate intelligence committee investigation is the only one at this point that hasn't been plagued or affected by some politically rocked scandal in the last few weeks or months. as you mention, the house intelligence committee had that whole episode where devin nunes made allegations of unmasking of names. they're regrouping, they had a change of leadership for the russia probe they're doing. the senate intelligence committee is going on even keel. you have cooperation and literally leaders of the committee putting arms around each other to endorse each other's dedication to pursuing this. while they're dependent on the intelligence community for a lot of the information they have to pore through, and getting those documents and witnesses to interview, they have this kind of renewed sense of purpose now because they know that their investigation hasn't been marred by these sorts of discussions we're having now. what does this mean about comey's firing we had a few

weeks ago, what did it mean about nunes' leadership because these other things distract from the purpose of that probe. >> matthew, in the times you report that days before the firing comey asked for more resources for the russian probe. do you think the net of all this will be redoubling of efforts by the fbi in pursuit of this investigation? >> you know, it is hard to say what's going to happen. in the short term, absolutely they're pressing ahead. depends what the leadership ends up looking like. not going to know that for awhile. they're interviewing interim candies right now, but the long-term candidates are uncertain. we updated the story, comey had gone and asked for more prosecutors. that speaks to maturity of the investigation. doesn't mean they were looking to bring charges immediately, when in fact they needed people to vet evidence, go through things, to organize the case. this is all up in the air right now. a lot of the decisions that will

be made, and then the white house who will run the s organization will have an impact. the fbi is filled with law enforcement guys. they're going to keep going. it's what they do. anybody that's been subject of an investigation knows they don't really stop. but how resources are directed within the agency, what the message is from the top does have an impact. >> dell, the cnn reporting on this issue is that rosenstein doesn't see a need for special prosecutor. how do you see that issue in the future? >> you know, things can change. more political pressure that gets applied. jerry side, one of the columnists at "the wall street journal" wrote that you'll notice things will change when more republicans get on the side of asking for a special prosecutor and begin to push for that. we haven't quite seen that. that's on the political realm. in terms of rosenstein, he is not a fan of special prosecutors. they can run amok. he has been a u.s. attorney a long time, top federal

prosecutor in maryland and resisted calls for special prosecutor as recently in an interview with us, before he took office and during his confirmation hearing. i don't see him buckling to that unless more shoes drop. >> a question for all three of you, but i'll start with karin, is there a list of usual suspects circulated as to who might be the comey replacement, i don't mean on an interim basis. i mean who might president trump put in that position? >> we've heard a variety of names of people interviewing for that position now, including potentially the majority whip of the senate, john cornyn. it is not clear who he is going to choose or what criteria he would base that decision on. he could go with somebody s partisan. don't need more than 50 or the president's tie-breaking vote in the senate to get one of the nominees through, or go with somebody traditional. mccabe is there, probably wants the job, serving now as acting

director of the fbi, that would be sticking with the script of who's around and making it more -- it will be more of a gesture to say this was just about comey and not about trying to rout out the entire hierarchy dealing with the russia probe or clinton investigation frankly. he has a variety of options which way he could go and who he chooses will show us something potentially about what the reasoning was behind getting rid of comey. like i said, there's a pretty open road in the senate as long as he can keep the republicans happy, vast bulk of republicans happy. they can afford to lose two and get a nominee through. as dell said, a lot of this depends on what the republicans want. haven't seen republicans coming out like democrats, calling for for a special prosecutor or independence commission as democrats have. they criticized the action by trump with comey, but hasn't gotten to the point they're willing to throw in the towel,

and say we need new leadership and take this out of the command of doj. >> matthew, limited for time, is there a name on your tongue? >> there have been wild rumors like trey dowdy, an incredibly partisan congressman. he led the benghazi investigation in the house. you hear all kinds of things. some of the better angels of the white house are saying go for somebody nonpar san, law enforcement background, and some saying go to somebody that protects your interest and will be loyal. >> dell. one name. give it to me. >> john cornyn. alice fisher is interviewing today as well as michael garcia, andy mccabe are interviewing at the justice department down the street from the studio. who knows. that's just the list put out. never know how this stuff will go. >> keep up the great work. del quirchlten wilbur, karin, and eric, we really appreciate you being here. thank you.

>> thank you. >> what are your thoughts at home. tweet me at smerconish or go to my facebook page. i'll read some during the course of this program. hit me, katherine, what have you got? how long will it take until we see actual proof on trump colluding with the russians to affect the election? nicholas, a long, long time if some get their wishes and shut this whole thing down. that's my short answer. one more if you can quickly. smerconish, comey tapes are a ruse to deflect from the real story. potus does not want to be president and is looking for an out daily. i don't know, nicholas. i have wondered this question aloud. i get the impression all of this tum mutt tumult is something he thrives on. end of the day sees himself as having a productive week. with the fbi director ousted, some are calling for a special prosecutor on the russia question, including michigan's gary peters who is here. and matt drudge warned president trump this week, leaks

on hour, every hour, will destroy presidency. there's a trojan horse plotting within the inner circle. with all of the talk of nixon's watergate, does trump have more than one deep throat in his ranks? i'm about to ask former senior nixon adviser, pat buchanan. if you have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis, isn't it time to let the real you shine through? introducing otezla, apremilast. otezla is not an injection or a cream. it's a pill that treats plaque psoriasis differently. some people who took otezla saw 75% clearer skin after 4 months. and otezla's prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't take otezla if you are allergic to any of its ingredients. otezla may increase the risk of depression.

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it reminded some of the saturday night massacre, october of 1973, when he ordered dismissal of special prosecutor archibald cox, which led to resignations from others, and now a tweet from president donald trump has some wondering if he may have taped his conversations, another famous nixon move. sean spicer dodged the subject yesterday, and then president trump had very little to say when judge jeanine pirro asked him. >> did president trump record his conversations with former director comey? i assume you're referring to the tweet. i talked to the president. the president has nothing further to add on that. >> what about the idea in a tweet you said there might be tape recordings? >> that i can't talk about, i won't talk about that. all i want us for comey to be honest and i hope he will be, i am sure he will be, i hope. >> i have somebody that knows a thing or two about white house

tapes, the man that told nixon to burn his. fat rick a-- patrick buchanan, former senior adviser to president nixon, syndicated columnist with a brand new book out, called nixon's white house wars, the battles that made and broke a president and divided america forever. patrick, i want to put back on the screen the tweet from president trump because i had a different interpretation than most. james comey better hope there are no tapes of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press. was that a threat or was that an admission? because it came after revelations from the comey side and made me wonder, was the president saying hey, comey, you better not have been taping or as most are interpreting this, was it donald trump saying be careful, i might have you on tape? >> the second i believe, michael. i cannot believe the fbi director would walk in the oval office and tape the president of the united states whereas jack kennedy and lyndon johnson and richard nixon had taping

devices. my guess is no taping device exists or did not exist at the time of that meeting, and that there's sort of a warning, tell the truth, mr. comey. >> well, you say you can't imagine the fbi director would walk in the oval office and tape the president. i can't imagine the president would allow the fbi director to come in and tape him. what is the up side for president trump in not saying in that fox interview, or having sean spicer make very clear, of course he's not taping anybody? >> because quite frankly that the president of the united states needs a taping device in the oval office, if you have, for example, mr. lavrov was in there with the russians, and what did they say about syria and iran and afghanistan? i mean, you want evidence of what they said and they would expect you would be taping them just as i'm sure mr. kisilak was sure he was

being taped by the nsa when he had the various meetings. >> right. i guess i would -- yeah, i would see a point of differentiation between tapping kislyak on a phone outside the white house versus recording him in the inner sanctum. let me get to the bigger issue. you don't see the bigger parallels between this and watergate? and if so, why not? >> i see a parallel in that he fired someone heading an investigation. look, during watergate when i was in the oval office with the president when he had to fire elliott rich ar sonde, we were in the middle of the yom kippur wart, vice president resigned, just been rye playsed, the yom kippur war, the president said i cannot have the attorney general defying me when i'm telling brezhnev what i am doing in the middle east if he doesn't do certain things. i will reveal something to you. no doubt about it. nixon was thinking about firing

cox for a long, long time and this was the triggering event. he told me in that oval office, and i quote, we can't have that viper sleeping in the bed with us. cox was moving far beyond his original mandate. he was investigating bb ra bozo, nixon's good friend. the watergate prosecution was all over the lot. i understand why nixon did it, it was costly and expensive. >> i read that part of your book. i didn't know you would bring it up, i intended to. you say nixon was intending to send a message to breznef. could trump be trying to prove strength to russia or china in the way he's handling this? >> no, nixon was forced by what richardson told us. i was in the white house, he told haig and others, he was on board. cox had to accept the compromise on the tapes and he would make sure it happened. then comes thursday or friday and elliott switches, gets cold feet, comes down on the side of

archibald cox, and the president is there now with cox having a press conference, saying i'm going after more tapes and he had to act. this was forced on president nixon by the situation he was in. with regard to comey, whether mr. trump did it january 21st or a week from now made no difference because it is not that big a deal. excuse me. here is where i disagree with folks, michael. that was a huge deal at a time of -- the arabs just imposed an oil embargo on the united states. it was a very dramatic october. the watergate burglary was liddy and company trying to go into larry o'brien's office at the dnc, which happened to be at the watergate hotel. this is an enemy state meddling in a u.s. election. to me, apples and oranges. because this is the far more serious of the two. >> look, michael, you're a little off on timing. the break-in was in june of '72.

the fire of cox was in october of '73. >> i am talking about watergate versus the russian probe. >> the initial event in watergate was a third rate burglary, if you will. right now the russians clearly have hacked, according to all our intelligence agencies, but donald trump, the president has a valid point. there's a cloud been sitting over his head that he could conspired with putin or russian agents to hack the dnc and to hack podesta, and then work with wikileaks and all of this to win the election, and then he succeeded in a series of felonies, alleged series of felonies. as far as i know, there's no justification for that cloud. we've had mr. clapper say we found no collusion. mike mo rely, former head of the cia, we found no collusion. i understand the president's rage that comey or someone won't stand up and say look, not going to tell you where we're

investigating, but we can tell you this, we have found no collusion between the president of the united states or his closest aides in the russians in hacking and disseminating that material. why can't they tell us that? >> if investigations were concluded and had come to that point -- >> >> michael, this is the problem. why cannot the fbi in ten months cannot make a decision as to whether or not somebody in trump's operation wired, phoned, e-mailed, went to moscow, you're doing a great job, and here is where you ought to put these out? excuse me, comey's why are we ten months in? ten months into watergate people are in prison. what is going on that they can't find any evidence that mr. trump colewded with anybody to do that? >> after you famously told nixon

to burn the tapes, he didn't take your advisor maybe history would have taken us a different direction. to the extent this president has recordings of comey, would you tell him to burn them? >> no. if he's made them, no, i wouldn't tell him to burn them. there's nothing illegal about what nixon did. it was foolish that he with a taping machine that started as soon as he started talking. jack kennedy and others during the missile crisis, you talk with dubrennan. he is sending signals whether he is removing missiles. don't you want a tape recording and record of that you can look over and say what exactly did they commit to and what didn't they commit to? >> yeah, but not between the fbi director and the president. patrick, appreciate you being here. >> delighted. >> see what you're tweeting @smerconish and via facebook. what do we have? smerconish, trump is nixon updated for 21st century. target still dnc, but burglary now contracted to russia instead

of wiretaps sy, i just said to pat, and he's not buying into it, but when it's an enemy state trying to meddle in our election, it is different, more serious, more outrageous than republicans and democrats doing battle and one of them going way over the line. i am not excusing watergate. i am saying as i said last week, used to be that partisanship ended at our borders and we need to get back to that point in time. president trump mentioned the fbi's investigation into russian meddling when explaining why he fired director comey. and assistant ag rosenstein who wrote the letter criticizing comey, says there's no need for an outside special prosecutor. many democratic lawmakers disagree. i'm about to talk to one. senator gary peters of the great state of michigan. all eyes are on olay ultimate eye cream. allure best of beauty and marie claire's most wanted. eyes show emotion, not your age. olay eyes. ageless.

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deputy attorney general rosenstein doesn't see a need at this point for a special prosecutor in the probe into the meddling in the 2016 election. they pushed for the move since the firing of fbi director james comey. critics of the trump administration's handling of the situation have long held the view that special prosecutor is needed. my next guest has wanted an independent prosecutor since march. michigan senator gary peters led a letter, calling on doj inspector general to investigate any political influence with the fbi investigation and joins me now. senator, answer the question just raised by pat buchanan in my last segment. he said the fbi had ten months and have nothing to show for it. move on already. >> well, i don't know if they have nothing to show for it. we know they're in the midst of

an investigation. they aren't going to make that kind of information public until they wrap up that investigation, make sure the evidence that they're seeing, if they are seeing anything, is actually substantiated. we know mr. comey was going to get additional resources, that's what he was asking for. and shortly thereafter was fired which is why this is so troubling. we have an investigation that's ongoing, and that appears was actually ramping up, probably to look deeper into whatever they're finding, and the president wanted it seems to cut that short and fire the fbi director. >> you were one of i think the number is 96 members of the senate who voted to confirm mr. rosenstein in position of deputy ag. are you regretting that vote now? >> well, i'm not pleased with the actions that we have seen. there's no question about that. i think he still has time to come forward. going to get more information on

what was in his thought process this week. he agreed to come before the senate, all 100 of us. we will be there. we have a number of questions. i have certainly some specific questioning about that timeline, what was going on in that firing decision. and i hope that he realizes the importance of having a special prosecutor, that we have to clear the air. we have some very, very important business that we have to do in the senate and congress to deal with challenges in this country. this is such a cloud over the administration. the fact that the trump administration folks may have been involved in collusion during the campaign, this smoke has to clear. my view is very clear. let's have a special prosecutor that's independent, not subject to any kind of political interference. you'll have transparency. find out where the facts go. people should not be afraid of the facts. if the president believes there's nothing there, shouldn't be afraid of the facts coming out. let's get the investigation going, let's get it over with. let's have 100% credibility with

a special prosecutor, make sure it is done with integrity and done in a nonpartisan way. >> unfortunately like so many other things dealt with by the house and senate, this is viewed entirely through partisan lenses. "new york times" has maintained a tally. i'll put on the screen. those in the house and senate who called for a special prosecutor or similar, one republican by the way representative tom mcclintock from california. 139 democrats or independents. those who have called for independent investigation which is the next tally. the latest number on that. only six republicans, 85 democrats. i offered at the outset of the program, senator, some recent polling data from gallup that shows that democrats and republicans beyond the house and senate are seeing this largely through partisan lenses. so what does the future hold if the rs are on one side and ds on

the other with regard to this investigation? >> well, it doesn't look good now, but we have to move beyond that. this is to me about russia, about a foreign government that we know was engaged in unprecedented way in our election. that should be troubling to every american, goes to our core values and the most fundamental aspect of the american democracy, which is our election process. this is not about partisanship. this is the time for folks to stand up and say we are going to put country ahead of party. i hope some of my republican colleagues in the senate will do that. certainly i have been encouraged by a number of them that made comments, how disappointed and concerned they are about the firing of the fbi director. that hasn't risen to the point they're asking for a special prosecutor, but i know that there are concerns there. we have to keep pushing forward and saying we have to clear the air here, we have to do this in a way that restores trust. we have a confidence of trust in this country right now, and to me this festering cloud over congress and the country only

continues to further erode trust and democracy can't function without trust. we have to get to the bottom of this. >> final quick question. so apparently president trump wouldn'ted a loyalty oath, a pinky swear or something from director swear or something from director comey and couldn't get it when they had dinner together. might a positive net effect be increased scrutiny on the process of confirming the successor, such that he or she is not a patsy for the president? >> i think that's absolutely right. we have to set a very high bar. one of the fundamental institutions that helps maintain trust in our society is an independent fbi. that we know the fbi will completely, be completely independent, will be fair, will let facts drive any conclusions that they have as they bring these cases forward. that is fundamental. that means the next director of the fbi has to clear a very high bar. they have to have a track record of being independent, nonpartisan.

a record of exhibiting integrity in everything they do and true professional. i don't think the american people should expect anything else. they should not receive anything else. as congress, we should demand those are the types of nominees that will be put forward. >> senator gary peters, thank you so much for being here. >> thank you. >> keep the tweets and facebook comments coming. here's another before we break. just one. smerconish, sorry, it is not a russian investigation but a bunch of sore losers looking for a crime. brad, do you want to know the answer? i do. do you want the answer to whether the russians meddled in our election and if so, whether there was collusion. that's not a republican issue or democratic issue, that's an american issue. still ahead. i got a summons for jury duty. i had to answer this question. would you be more likely to believe the testimony of a police officer or any other law enforcement officer because of their job? my answer is next.

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question. would you be more likely to believe the testimony of a police officer because of his or her job? that's a question asked of prospective jurors across the country every day. when i was recently summoned for jury duty, i realized i may have a new answer to that question. in the past, my answer has always been a reflexive yes, but a lot happened since the last time i was summoned. in a word, video. in several high profile incidents, videotape contradicted police accounts of killings of civilians. still, its worth noting so far widespread use of video hasn't increased conviction of cops in cases of alleged manslaughter or murder. in fact, videotape often exonerated police officers and in some high profile cases where video played a role, charges were still never brought. then two weeks ago and for the

first time since ferguson raised awareness, a police officer pled guilty based largely on what was captured on video. south carolina former policeman michael slager pled guilty to civil rights charges for shooting walter scott five times in the back after scott ran from having been pulled over for a to be clear, all of these video-driven stories have not made me think less of police. they just made me think more deeply about whether my prior position of giving them an edge in testimony was proper. by the way, the video age did not delay my response to the follow-up question whether i would be less likely to believe the word of a cop. on that, i remain an emphatic no. charles ramsey co-chaired president obama's commission on policing. part of the bias is based in his belief that cops see things a

normal person doesn't see. but even he acknowledged instances where police have not been honest on the stand, statistics imply that jurors feel the same way, the associate professor of criminal justice at the university tracks what he calls the police crime. his most recent data shows that annually a thousand people are shot and killed by officers, since the beginning of 2005 there have been only 80 police officers across the country charged with murder or manslaughter resulting from an on-duty shooting. of those, 29 were convicted, 31 not convicted, 20 still pending. st stison concluded that jurors were unlikely to make the decision regarding police officers who used deadly force in volt street encounters.

i will be at the courthouse, and committed to treating everybody as equals. still to come, the worst tweets, what do we have? anyone who puts the life on the line daily for little or no pay gets the benefit of the dot. dottie that is the way i used to answer the question. i'm treating everyone equally this go-around, i certainly treat everybody as equals. yeah! first, let's check out the aluminum bed of this truck. wooooow!! holy moly. full on crack here. now let's check out the steel bed of the silverado. i'd expect more dents. no holes. current qualified lessees can get this silverado all star edition for around $249 a month. plus, find your tag and get an additional $1,500 lease cash on select silverado pickups in stock. find new roads at your local chevy dealer. then you're a couple. think of all you'll share...

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thank you so much for watching and following me on twitter and facebook. here is some of what has come in just during the course of the program. smerconish, don't you think tapes just to tweak the media? >> it had only occurred to me because we're all chasing our tail on that statement, right, in the aftermath of what he said? but what is the upside, why

would he want comey and the police believe that he is rolling tape that has not been done since the nixon era, i can't understand it. what is next? smerconish, my 11-year-old son thinks the firing is fishy, too bad the trump voters are not as smart as a sixth grader. hey, there was legitimate reason to fire jim comey. it's the timing, there was legitimate reason to fire him professiona previously, but to your son's choice, it was fishy to fire him on may 9th. that is bogus. all about russia, in my view. but comey, you can certainly have a legitimate debate and conclude that his handling of the election issues should render him unfit for that job. but that is a different issue. one more. can i quickly? haha, not even close to nixon,

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. this is cnn breaking news. it is 7:00 eastern time, i am ana cabrera, we're live in the cnn news room, thank you for joining us. the pentagon is trying to learn more about another missile launch from north korea, launched early sunday local time from a site close to the country's west coast. a u.s. defense official now tells us it has traveled about 430 miles. this comes, this latest launch comes just after two weeks ago when there was a missile test that officials say was a failure. alexander field is joining us now, alexander, do we have an indication about the type of