>> he wouldn't have agreed to do this knowing him. >> the idea that -- is it a done deal that this will answer everybody's questions? to the point that our panelists were making it could end with mueller determines there's no actual law that was broken. democrats could still say, what about there are -- seems like there's acts of collusion. whether they are illegal or not, it's a question of are they appropriate. >> i think the only appropriate answer to that is i don't know at this point. i i'm not sure that answer is knowable at this point. mueller is in addition to being an accomplished prosecutor, he is expressed in washington and in the world. he understands the importance of the larger questions here, independent of the criminal culpability of any individual. he will be aware of the need for some sort of public disclosure. whether he files a report, how he makes a public disclosure, i

don't know what the answer is. i don't know if he knows at this point. certainly -- allan was saying we will never know. he will either indict or fold up shop. i don't know that's the case. >> i can tell you the fear in the white house is that there will be answers to questions we didn't know we had. that's the fear of a special prosecutor. the other thing that i want to add to the idea of him lawyering up, that my understanding is that the advice that he is going to get is he should do that immediately, not just for his own personal legal reasons but also to protect the white house staff in a way they haven't been protected. your friend was taking all the incoming during the clinton administration, at least the white house staff could deflect to him in a way this white house staff has not been able to do. >> when the white house put out statements, three sentences. no collusion. i look forward to being resolved quickly. i will never start fighting for

what matters. the sentence not in there, i and my staff and i will cooperate fully. he is going to have to. he is making a huge mistake by not by not volunteering he will cooperate fully. there's evidence that will be subpoenaed. you don't have an option. witnesses that will be called. he should pledge full cooperation. the fact that he has not tells me something. >> he will fully cooperate. >> why do you say so? >> let me tell you the individuals who should be scared. it can go any which way. the folks who should be frightened are the leakers who have committed felonies, who have endangered national security. not the trump administration. there's no evidence of russian collusion. people point to carter page who never met president trump. there's zero evidence. this is not going to -- >> when you say he is going to cooperate, you don't know what the white house response is going to be. >> they are going to cooperate. that statement indicates we know that president trump when he is

not going to cooperate with something, he says it. >> he has said, his attitude toward the investigations has been if they want to investigate, they can investigate. he has nerve given a full throated we are going to give them all the information he wants. >> he said, wasn't there to be fully vetted. i wrant ant it to wrap up kwuqu >> remember in washington, people change dance partners frequently. rarely do they change dances. what's happening now, everybody is saying, mueller is this great guy and we all like him. i have a feeling two months from now people are going to be saying, what's he doing going after tony podesta. everybody will have paul's reaction. >> try not to -- >> i can't tell if that's a joke or -- >> how did monica lewinsky end up being one of the victims of a

real estate investigation called whitewater? we never really know which direction they're go going in. they have broad latitude. >> that's really an important point, actually. i used to visit in the west wing. you don't know where this is going to go. once you have someone with subpoena power -- ken star's investigation began with a land deal in arkansas. it wound up with monica lewinsky. >> since you lived through that to the congressman's point what does it do to a white house? you talked about president clinton's buiability to com compartmentalize? >> there are good people in that building who will become collateral damage. this president will throw them under the bus. they need to do what president

clinton did, which is compartmentalize. it was a well run shot at that poi point. there were very few people -- i was one of them -- assigned to impeachment. everybody else had to do their job. if you talked about it in a meeting, you were punished. people stayed in their lines. we call it the parallel universe. if you were not part of the parallel universe -- >> theredoesn't seem there's a f lanes. we have to take a break. we are continuing -- we're going to continue to bring all the latest tonight. let's go to pamela brown for the latest on this story. pamela? >> the latest is that rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general wanted to make sure he didn't give a warning to the white house and to the attorney general jeff sessions about this decision to appoint bob mueller as special counsel. in fact, the white house was basically blind sided by this, only finding out half an hour

before the announcement and after bob mueller had signed the order that he would take over the russia probe. it's clear that ron wanted to do this by the book. that's a big reason why he didn't give that advance worning. we're told that this decision to do this had been in the works for several days, at least since shortly after the firing of the former fbi director james comey. in fact, we know bob mueller was at the justice department the day after meeting with rosenstein. as of late friday, he was telling people that he didn't feel a need to appoint a special counsel. he felt like unless the fbi investigation was imperiled, there was no need. the president allegedly told james comey that he wanted him to stop the flynn probe in february. it raises the question if that

was a tipping point for this or sort of how that factored into all of this. >> making this decision today, he had stated he didn't think a special counsel was needed. >> that's exactly right. he had been telling those people that around him that i don't think it's needed despite the growing pressure from capitol hill, despite the democrats in particular were saying that he needed to do so or resign, he wasn't letting the pressure get to him according ing ting to s. he said he was resisting calls for a special counsel. it does make you believe that the latest revelation about james comey's memos did play a role in this decision to in fact bring bob mueller on board as special counsel and remove the justice department from the investigation. >> to be clear, there's a possibility the president of the united states would have to testify? >> he could be deposed, depending on what bob mueller sees fit in the investigation.

he will have all the authority to convene a grand jury, he can issue subpoenaed, he can certainly have the president interviewed as part of this investigation. whatever he thinks is necessary. >> as part of this investigation, would he be looking into the idea of obstruction of justice? >> he very well could. what could be telling here is if the comey memos are released. if they're not, if he doesn't want them released that could be an indication that he is looking at whether the president tried to interfere in the investigation and obstruct justice. so he would want to keep the memos close hold because they would be a key part of the investigation. we're not sure if that is the direction he wants to go in. that's something to look out for. >> thanks. for new reaction, let's go to jim acosta. what is the white house saying tonight? >> i just talked to a white house official who describes staffers as exhausted. because of the last 72 hours of bombshell announcements.

the russia news came down monday when it was revealed that the president talked about classified information with r h russian officials. last night about the comey memo in which the retired -- former fbi director said that the president tried to shut down the flynn investigation. then, of course, the news that is coming down tonight that bob mueller, the special counsel, in the russia investigation. i think one other very interesting point to point out -- i just got this from administration official, that the attorney general jeff sessions was here at the white house whether the mueller news came down. the president and his attorney general jeff sessions were very much in the dark whether this n when this news came down from the justice department that a special counsel had been named. at the same time, we should point out the response from the white house, the official response from the white house coming from the president is very restrained, very toned down. let's put this statement up, if we can, to show you how

restrained this is. no shots taken at anybody here. here is the president saying, as have i stated many times, a thorough investigation will confirm what we know. there was no collusion between my campaign and any foreign entity. he goes on to say, like forward to this matter concluding quickly. will never stop fighting for the people and the issues that matter to the future of our country. president trump is going to be waking up to a different world tomorrow. that is because he cannot as he did with the former fbi director call him over here for a meeting for a dinner and try to apply pressure on him. he cannot do that obviously with bob mueller, the special prosecutor. over last several hours since this came down, his credentials, his reputation is beyond any question. >> jim acosta, appreciate the update. not everyone is surprised by the way president trump has been behaving. tony schwartz spent a year with

donald trump writing the art of the deal. in a new op-ed he says president trump is doing what citizen trump did, reacting impulsively and blaming others and inventing stories y ies that don't depict facts. knowing the president like you did -- you spent a lot of time over the course that was year. how do you think he is handling and has handled all of this information, but also the news of a special counsel being appointed? >> i they he is in a pretty significant meltdown, anderson. i think that the sense of siege that he feels because his sense of self-worth is so, so vulnerable that the series of things that have happened have been overwhelming to him. i think he is reacting from, as i say in the piece, i think he's reacting from a survival place. i think he is being run by the part of his brain that is

reactive and impulsive, not capable ref flexion. i think he is in pure defensive mode. >> i want to go deeper on that. one of the things you write about -- this is based on your experiences with him over so long a period of time and getting into his head -- is that he basically -- you wrote that he kind of lives his life in survival mode. every interaction with him, it's about winning it or losing it. it's a binary choice. you either win or lose. this goes back his entire life. >> yeah. it goes to his very early childhood with a very brutal, difficult father with whom by his own definition he had a business relationship. guess what? from the perspective of attachment, you can't grow up in a healthy way if you lack love from a parent. the only parent he valued was his father. his father overpowered his mother as well. >> the only photograph he has

behind his desk in the oval officer or did for a long time. >> yeah. i mean, i think there's a kind of family kind of loyalty. it's been fascinating to me to watch and evidence of his meltdown is the fact he started to scream as jared kushner. i think his kids are next. his boys he doesn't need to blame because they're not part of it right now. i can honestly easily see him going after ivanka if she says the wrong thing right now. one of the things i say in the piece is that i remember very vividly when i was working with him how terrified people would be of going up against him in any way when he was feeling -- when you could sense he was feeling the way i guarantee you he is feeling right now. >> you boipoint to the fact tha the hundreds of phone calls you listened in on, in all the meetings you went to with him, you never remember anyone ever disagreeing with him to his

face. does he want anyone to disagree with him? that's one of the questions, does he have people around him who can say, you shouldn't get on the twitter machine right now or you should not say this. >> this is the most important thing. we have normalized a person who is not in any way normal. i recognize that there are plenty of critics now out there. but this is not a person operating according to ordinary human expectations. >> i would push back on that. is anyone who reaches the level of president operating -- to do what it takes to get to that level, it's an extraordinary level of achievement. >> no question. what he lacks as i say because he was so involved in defending himself and still is, is he lacks the qualities that you ordinarily see in someone as they mature, as they grow more secure. he lacks empathy, the ability to really connect with other people, self-awareness and above

all a conscience. a clear distinction between right and wrong. there is no right and wrong. there is winning and losing. that's very different than right and wrong. right now, he is in pure terror that he is going to lose. by the way, he is going to lose. i surely believe that at some point over next period of time, he is going to have to figure out a way to resign. the reason he is going to do that as opposed to go through what could be an impeachment process or a continuing humiliation is that he wants to figure out a way as he has done all his career to turn a loss into a victory. so he will declare victory when he leaves. >> you wrote that beneath his exterior, you sense a hurt, incredibly vulnerable little boy who wanted to be loved. a lot of people might be surprised to hear that.

my interviews with him and other people i have talked to who have spent time with him, there's a need of him -- i have never met somebody at his level who does kind of look for approval in some way from -- you -- if you give hmmim a compliment, you ca see it wash over him. >> no question. he lives in deficit. i describe him in this piece as a black hole. you pour adulation and achievement and conquest into him and it just pours out the other end. it doesn't stick. all i think he wants is for people to love him. that's really dangerous. he wants people to love him and to adore him so much that he would like not to have any dissent. he would like not to have a free press because they criticize him. he would like not to be involved in being president in a democracy because that allows

people to disagree with him. those authoritarian instincts are psychological and emotional, not ideological. >> i remember something you tweeted out, it might have been a year ago. it stuck in my mind. i have always thought about this when i read the president's tweets or things he says. the criticisms he makes of others, the attacks he launched on our people, the adjectives -- i don't want to paraphrase you too much. t is what he thinks of himself. when he calls comey a grandstander, it's what he thinks of himself. when he says somebody is weak, that's what he worries about himself. am i characterizing what you said correctly? >> very accurately. it's projecting on to others what he sees in himself and cannot own or must disown. that is if you look at his tweets, it would be wonderful for somebody to do a ph.d. thesis on this. if you look at his tweets, any ones that relate to other

people, can fine d a pattern ana very accurate self-portrait. i would love to see somebody do that. the attacks are exactly -- they would have called this the shadow. they are the aspects of himself that he finds most intolerable. >> i am never going to have a ghostwriter. you know everything about your subject. i don't want anybody to know me this well. >> i'm never going to do it again. don't worry. >> you seem affected by it as well. i appreciate you being with us. that's a washington post op-ed. it's interesting. it's fascinating to hear from tony. >> can i say, my colleague at the new yorker did a piece with tony before the campaign. it was when tony sort of first -- his insights into trump's character are so amazing.

i think that interview -- it whetted people's appetite. this guy really knows trump better than almost anybody who has written about him. >> we shouldn't overstate some of the psychological things. i think it goes too far to say that every insult he throws really is looking at himself in the mirror. we have to be very careful in kind of psychology -- >> there's a pattern to the insults he gives to other people. it does make you wonder why are these -- why is winning such a big -- >> if you listen to him, you would think this guy would have ended up in bankruptcy court somewhere. >> no. i think -- >> not being a very great success. >> i think the opposite. i think most people who attain a great level of success are unhappy. it comes from a deep place of longing and need. i speak from someone who is relatively successful. >> would you like to go off the

couch? >> you are speaking about us, too. >> you know. go ahead. >> there's one other interesting thing that, of course, tony wrote about in the book the art of the deal, because he had to come up with a way, he says -- he has written about this and talked to us about it. to describe the president's, let's call it, special relationship with the truth. he called it truthful hyperbole, which is his way as he says of figuring out how to say donald trump was lying which he did quite frequently without saying that he was lying. when he presented it to donald trump and said, look, this is the way i'm going to talk about you and i'm going to say you engage in truthful hyperbole, trump thought this was a great idea. this was the best thing that he had ever heard. he kind of gave him a rational for not telling the truth for which i think tony feels forever regretful. >> we should say -- the

president is charming one on one. i enjoy talking to him as many people who do interview him do enjoy talking to him. in terms of what's happening now, political transgressions are not necessarily legal transportations. robert mueller's job is not to parse president trump's qualities as a leader. you can expect members of congress are going to continue to do that. >> right. i think this is a really important point to remember. telling the truth is actually really important when you are under investigation and you are put under oath. if you look back to what got president clinton ultimately in trouble, it was pure jerierjuri him. i think that the fact that he often -- president trump often does i think what tony said, invention of stories. i would say he maybe doesn't always remember things exactly the way they happened. we could think of inauguration day where he kept insisting that the crowds were a certain size

when they weren't. when you are put under oath and you start having problems telling the truth, i think you can get into a lot of trouble. you also have a white house that i don't think anyone would accuse of being run like a well oiled machine. that's not even -- i'm not trying to be critical. it's a new white house. who are going to be thrust into an investigation where you have to have all your dukz cks in a . you have to answer honestly and clearly. you wonder what kind of problems could come out of this from them not answering those questions accurately. >> if president trump had not fired james comey, do you think he would face this special counsel investigation tonight? >> i don't think he would. if you look at joeames comey's integrity. people question his judgement, some of the comments he made about hillary clinton after he closed the case. nobody questioned the guy's integrity or his drive. i don't think, especially after president trump humiliated the law enforcement and intelligence community, investigators and analysts, would ever let this bone go.

i think if comey were there -- somebody said the firing of james comey got the white house in a worse position. i agree. he would have proceeded with this. the white house can't get ten feet way from this. robert mueller, who i know personally, won't let him within ten feet. >> you have reporting about how this transpired for rosenstein. sglt fa . >> we reported this real time last week, which i know seems like two years ago. it was when he was basically thrown under the bus from his perspective about the comey firing. he blamed. they put out a memo say it was him. that's when he started to get angry with the white house. it continued. i talked to a republican source in touch with him who said he was to the point where he was going to pack his bags. he was done. that continued to escalate to the point where he was very reluctant to go to congress. he is going to go to congress. i don't have any indication that that's been canceled tomorrow.

he is meeting behind closed doors with the senate. he wanted to distance himself with this white house and to be the point person on this white -- on this investigation of this white house. that was a big reason. the question now is whether or not james comey is now going to testify publically as this time yesterday, we were all talking about that that was the next big thing. republicans in congress said they wanted him to come and really explain himself before the public about what he said in those memos that the president asked him to do that was clearly inappropriate. just to finish, i think that the thing that we need to remember though is to connect the dots to the truth, to my reporting tonight, and to the big bombshell news tonight is that this whole question of collusion that james comey testified about that got the president angry in march, all of that could be small potatoes at the end of the day.

i'm getting tweets, questions about whether or not james -- robert mueller will be able to get the president's tax returns. he said, if he thinks it's relevant, sure. this could expand and mushroom to a place the president couldn't even have dreamed when he fired -- >> we talked about this before. you were giving advice to the president, you would say get a lawyer? >> i would say not only get a lawyer but i think he has to understand that he has to be told that a grand jury investigation is not a search for truth. a trial is not a search for truth. if it were, we wouldn't say this. we wouldn't keep evidence out that is truthful but obtained unlawfully. a grand jury proceeding is a search for admissible evidence on one side. it is the most fundamental denial of civil liberties. civil liberties is the first casualty of partisan politics.

nobody is here speaking up on behalf of civil liberties. even if you are opposed to trump, i don't like the precedence by going after people in an unfair way. they are after trump. somebody has to speak up on behalf of the civil libber 'tis liberties of all americans. they take secret testimony. they don't have a lawyer. you can't rebut the evidence. they don't consider the evidence in your favor. let's not glorify grand jury proceedings. >> allen doesn't like grand juries. there are lots of responsible prosecutors out there. bob mueller is a responsible prosecutor. he is looking for admissible evidence in a possible trial. he is trying to figure out what happened. i think that is an honorable thing. he is an honorable person. >> i agree. >> to go back to the question you asked which is what advice

would you give donald trump. the advice you would give, whether he would follow is, is don't talk about this subject. st say it's under investigation. >> which is what he could have said. >> all along. what he should have said. >> if you have a lawyer, don't necessarily announce it. it doesn't have to be a lawyer who is well-known. just somebody who is experienced and you can go to confidentially and discreetly and get advice. i suspect he may have such a person. he is not tweeting and talking as much. >> do you think congressional republicans tonight are just breathing a big sigh of relief? >> well, it depends. if you think he is innocent, then you should be breathing a sigh of relief. i think that if ultimately this investigation is seen all the way through, this is a result that would be accepted by most people. maybe not bipartisan democrats. you have nancy pelosi who wants an independent commission. as compared to the investigations that are going on on the hill, which most people

see as partisan. most people say this say respected person and whatever he finds would be accepted. if he is not innocent, there's a lot to be concerned about. this is somebody with very broad authority that is going -- and has a good reputation. >> we have to -- we have more ahead including late reaction from capitol hill where lawmakers have been grappling with the investigation. more on why the choice of rwhy robert mueller is drawing bipartisan praise. to those who know that the essence of integrity is a promise kept. ♪ if you've got the time welcome to the high life. ♪ we've got the beer ♪ miller beer

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and that's a commercial made the johnsonville way. the naming of a special counsel came as republican lawmakers began signaling acc t acceptan acceptance. the congressional probes do continue. in a moment we will speak with one of the congress members part of it. first, wider reaction on the capitol hill. what have you been hearing on the hill? >> positive reaction up here on capitol hill. really that has already gone a long way in lowering the temperature up here. we heard from democrats and republicans really praising this choice saying that bob mueller is someone who is very well respected. has a long history of integrity, someone who basically is a known commodity to a lot of the lawmakers up here. we heard earlier this evening from the chair of the senate intelligence committee richard burr and the ranking member mark warner who are leading their own

investigation senate side praising this pick. they said in a statement, quote, the appointment of director robert mueller as special investigator is a positive development and will provide some certainty for the american people that the investigation will proceed fairly and free of political influence. the senate select committee on intelligence will continue its own investigation and the extent any decon fliks iflicconflictio. they expect to have engagement as going forward with director mueller. >> the senate intelligence committee will work with mueller during investigation. there are other investigations into russia's meddling. do we know what happens to those? >> there are multiple play erla.

those will continue to go on. that work doesn't stop. it works in tandem with what mueller will be working on. starting to be working on. i think there's a real sense and a feeling up here on capitol hill that what that does is it takes a little pressure off those who are working up here on capitol hill. as you know, there's been a daily drip of news and lawmakers have had to respond to every little movement of this story. this might give them a sense of some room to work as they work on their own vfrt gainvestigati. we heard from one who said he believes the move would help diffusion the rehetoric on capitol hill that everything has become part soy son. >> more now from capitol hill. shortly before air time, i spoke with eric swalwell.

first i want to get your reaction to the naming of a special counsel. >> it's welcome news. this investigation was disrupted last week when president trump fired the chief investigator, director comey. i hope this say way to get that investigation back on track and that the american people can learn whether anyone in the united states worked with russia during its interference campaign. >> called for an independent commission to investigate russian interference. is that no longer necessary? >> more necessary than ever. that's the other part of the solution here. an independent commission looks forward and we know from the intelligence community that russia intends to attack us again. so this would be a commission that would be charged with understanding how we were so vulnerable, whether any u.s. persons were involved but most importantly what reforms are necessary so that future elections are secure. right now, i don't think that can happen anywhere other than in an ind pent commissioner. >> you are saying a special counsel is just investigating

the legality of what may have occurred in the past and the independent commission would look forward, although, would you want independent commission to also look at russian interference or potential collusion? >> an independent commission would look at of course whether any u.s. persons were involved. the 9/11 commission is the best example. it looked at how we were so vulnerable, what the response was and what rer foforms were t. the department of justice is charged with looking backward at a crime that may have occurred. they should still do that. people are concerned that we're going to find ourselves in a mess like this again. either because of russia will attack us or other countries with similar capabilities will come at it. we owe it to the american people to make sure we're never in a mess like this. >> does the naming of a special counsel remove any concerns? >> certainly on the criminal

prosecution side. bob mueller is an individual with the highest integrity. i am more at ease today about the criminal side. the duty to protect the ballot box and fair elections, that's on us. that's on congress. we should not shirk that responsibility. >> you have heard about this appointme appointment? >> i have not. two republicans have supported our legislation for an independent commission. today we have forced a vote on it. we have started the process to force a vote. the speaker of the hour wise wi not bring it forward. we are hoping we have signatures. >> i want to ask you about "the washington post" reported they have a reporting of kevin mccarthy last june saying, quote, there's two people i think putin pays rohrabacher and trump. what's your reaction sksreactio? >> it's a concerning comment.

i ask first, is he speaking with personal knowledge? if so, did he pass this along to anyone? i was concerned that the speaker is accused of saying let's keep this in the family and not let this outside of this circle of people. to me, we're all very concerned about the allegations of ties between donald trump to russia. we have not seen any action from house or senate republicans to get to the bottom of what happened and what we can do to make sure we're never in a position like this position. it's not a joke to me. that's the defense. this is serious stuff. the american people expect a serious response. >> appreciate your time. >> my pleasure. more perspective from david gergen. carl bernstein and jason miller. david, you said on this program last night, i think we're in impeachment territory for the first time. how does naming robert mueller affect your thinking on that? >> i think it's the same

conclusion. i do think it's very good news for the country. this is the first time the administration has moved in such a way as to give us reassurance the investigations will be carried out fairly, carefully and with -- letting the facts go where they might. at the same time, i do think this is so -- it's obvious we're seeing a pattern that this investigation is broadening from what it was which was about is there possible collusion to did the white house or did the president personally try to impede or influence the outcome of the investigation that was then under way? if so, did he break any laws? what we know in robert mueller in in addition to being so respected, he will have enormous authority here. if he decides -- the justice department has given up to mueller the right to decide who should be prosecuted and who shouldn't.

those are big decisions for a prosecutor. also mueller is going to be the one to decide now whether the president has broken any law and if so what should be done. for white house, that is not good news. special prosecutors have a way of digging in and finding things they didn't know were there to start with. the investigations can sway off into a different direction. as you will recall, the bill clinton years, when -- i thought dreadful investigation started into his -- into whitewater. it eventually led us to ken star and to monica lewinsky. that's not where it started. that's what -- the trump white house has lost control over the outcome of the investigation. >> do you worry about that? >> i think there is a responsibility both from democrats and from the media first and foremost to not treat this as a solution in search of a problem. for everyone who has been clamoring for a special counsel, we have to let it run its

course. there's a bigger, broader point for the administration here. too much good news has been getting drowned out. we talk about immigration being down 70%. we talk about unemployment being at a ten-year low. all the great things are happening aren't getting picked up. clear, this is really engulfed everything in the administration because of the media barrage. this is an opportunity to reset the narrative. now it's in the hands of a special counsel. >> that does require the president not to continue to comment on and not to continue -- it requires discipline from the president. >> look, i think both the president and the administration is smart enough to realize there's some aspect of this that will try to leak information and trying to get him. this is why i went back to the point where it's so important for the special counsel, democrats, even members of the media -- we can't let this become a solution in search of a problem. the administration now has to get back to the core messages to

help the president win this past fall, taxes, trade, immigration, defeating isis. when he is talking about these issues, in particular before the big international trip -- if this news had broke while he was on that trip or immediately coming back, that would have wiped out all the good coverage i think there will be from seeing president trump on the world stage. tlef they have to be very focused. >> apologize for coughing. >> what ron did here is he threw a monkey wrench into a coverup at white house. we have never known what the coverup was about. what it is that the president or those around him in his campaign have been trying to keep us from knowing. and why comey was fired for trying to find out what that was about. we are going to find out, because there now is a real investigation that the president of the united states can no longer control.

it's a great moment in which the country can finally say, we're pulling back from this terribly dangerous moment in which the rule of law was being flouted. it looked like there was very little possibility that the rule of law would prevail. now there's a real chance that it will prevail. also, the press -- what the press has done here by seeking the best obtainable version of the truth through four months of the trump president is direcy i responsible for getting a neck nix in pla mechanism in place in which the rule of law can prevail. the press and news organizations have done nothing heroic. they have simply done their job. the result is that we now have broken a coverup and we have a chance to find out what has

happened. >> i have to jump in and make one point. if you go back and look at deputy director -- the deputy ag, his comment tonight. he made very clear in announcing the special counsel that there had not been -- this was not an indication that something illegal or improper had happened. it was the fact that they're going to continue going through this and make sure they do a thorough job. it's important to point that out. the core fundamental criticism here, attack or whatever you want to call it, is that there was some type of coordination between the campaign and a foreign entity. so far, there hasn't been one shred of evidence that been put forward saying that he ining t. we have a special counsel that will go through. we have an obligation to not rush to and jump to conclusions now that it's in the hands of a special true. >> that's true. there's no need to jump to conclusions. the conclusion that we had very solid evidence of was that the white house was trying to prevent the truth from being

known both to the public and to investigators. that's what the firing of comey was about. we have now jumped a big fence, jason. we now have a mechanism in place in which the rule of law has a real chance of succeeding. that's all i'm saying. without prejudging. >> i want you to have the final word, david. >> i must agree with carl. i do want to add one note. the center of gravity in this investigation and what we know seems to be more serious, there may not be collusion or it may be vague or whatever it is. but the evidence is piling up that the president was particularly anxious to protect general flynn. we have learned tonight from the "new york times" that flynn told people on the trump team weeks before yates came over that he was under federal investigation are his lobbying on behalf of turkey. >> cnn has not confirmed that

yet. >> nonetheless, there's growing evidence that trump -- he fired comey after -- he asked comey to drop the investigation against flynn. he has been very solicitous about flynn. flynn seems at the center of this. what is trump's relationship with flynn? why are we looking at what we're looking at? >> david, carl, jason, thanks very much. what we know about the man who has chosen to lead the russia investigation. a closer look at former fbi director robert mueller next. finding time to get things done isn't easy.

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it may have come as a surprise to the white house and the country that a special counsel had been nape e named. lawmakers say robert mueller is a good choice. he is well respected. gary tuchman has more. >> reporter: in the summer of 2001, president george w. bush declared -- >> it's my honor to nominate robert s. mueller of california to become the director of the federal bureau of investigation. >> reporter: it was exactly one week before the terrorist attacks of september 11th, 2001 that robert mueller began his tenure as director of the fbi. mueller, a princeton grad with a master's degree from nyu. following his military service he wept to law school and became a litigator and a federal prosecutor.

the day after the 9/11 attacks he said this. >> my first objective is to determine, identify the hijackers on each of the planes. having identified the hijackers on each of the planes, we then have sought to identify any of their soassociates in the unite states. >> reporter: the nation was in chaos. weeks after the attacks, congress passed and president bush signed the patriot act which enhanced law enforcement investigative tools, including domestic surveillance and increased the opportunity to punish terrorist acts. three years later the passage let to a showdown voluming mueller. he received a call from james comey late at night. alberto gonzalez was on his way to persuade john ashcraft to reauthorize a key part of the act. the justice department had determined it was against the

law. comey, with mueller's brlessing raced to the hospital to stop gonzales. >> >> i thought i had just witnessed a very sick man who did not have the powers of the attorney general because they had been transferred to me. >> both mueller and comey threatened to resign but were convinced to stay. bob mueller served for two terms. >> i want to thank robert mueller, not just for the introduction but because bob has led the bureau during incredibly challenging times. >> mueller has most recently been a visiting professor at stanford. he'll leave those positions to take on this new and important

responsibility. gary tuchman, cnn, atlanta. >> lisa monica worked with robert mueller from 2005 to 2009. is he the right person for the job? >> absolutely. there's no one better suited in this country for this role at this time. >> why do you say that? >> because if you look at the authority that the deputy attorney general required here, the person has to be from outside the department of justice and be guided by only doj policy. that's the department of justice policy and the law in exercising his authority. that is the person. bob mueller is the personification of those characteristics. >> in terms of not being partisan, he's down the middle? >> absolutely.

he is guided by no party, by no political ideology. he's guided by the facts and the law and will apply those without fear or favor. >> what does this mean -- i mean how does this investigation under mueller work? how does he work with the fbi? obviously there will be an fbi director who heads the fbi investigation. so what are his responsibilities? >> it's interesting. bob mueller is perfect, in essence, for this role, because he's occupied every one of these jobs. he's been a prosecutor, u.s. attorney heading a team of prosecutors. he's been the deputy attorney general just before he was named fbi director and of course he has been the fbi director. so he understands what the relationships are and ought to be under the appropriate institutional norms of both the department of justice and the fbi. i imagine what he'll do is he will get on the job, he will make sure he's got a team that he's comfortable with, that he's got the resources he needs to do

a thorough and competent job, and he is going to be the chief prosecutor. that's what the special counsel role is. he's responsible for identifying if there have been violations of the law and making prosocutive judgments about that. the fbi is to gather the facts and present those to the prosecutor and bob mueller and his team. >> at the end of the investigation, there's been discussion from jeff toobin in the last two others over whether mueller if he decides to prosecute, then there will be evidence and that will be made public. if he decides not to, does he just say there's nothing to -- there's nothing here to prosecute? or do you think he would make some sort of description of what he found given the public's interest in this? >> one thing i'm very confident of, however it ends up, whatever

determinations he makes, he'll be guided by what the law requires and what the department of justice policy allows. in other words, he will not stray out of what those requirements are. so he could potentially decide, i imagine, to make a report if there is no investigative judgment rendered. but that will be within the norms of the justice department. >> fascinating. lisa monaco, thank you. "the new york times" reporting that michael flynn told the trump transition team that he was under federal investigation for secretly working as a paid lobbyist for turkey during the campaign. he said this yet he still got the national security adviser job. the transition team knew this and he was asked to still serve. you have been doing great reporting about the mood of the white house over the past few days.

jim acosta, do you have a better sense of what is going on because they offered kellyanne conway and then canceled her appearance. >> i think they are reluctant to go on fox news on primetime, that's an indication of where they are right now. they are in the bunker. the president's top advisers are in the white house. the white house has released its schedule for tomorrow. he's expected to hold a news conference with the president of colombia, a joint news conference. he'll take a couple of questions from the press and presumably he could get asked about this don't although we've seen in the past and it hasn't been the case at every news conference, he'll call on friendly news media outlets to avoid certain questions. that will be a telling thing to look for at the white house if it happens as scheduled. at the same time, i can tell you from talking to staffers here, they are feeling exhausted as one staffer put it to me earlier, it's been 72 hours of a bombshell dropping at 5:45 in

the evening and the question is how much more are they going to take of this. and keep in mind, this is all heading into the president's first foreign trip where he's going to be heading overseas, not going to places where the questions are going to be easy. they are going to be tough. he's going to be meeting with the saudis, nato, an alliance that he's called obsolete in the past and the g-7 as well. the road does not get easier for this president. >> year yeah, in the coming hours and days, it will be interesting whether he blames anyone else for this. >> he never blames himself for anything. you know, if you talk to people who have known him well for decades and people who work with him now and people who talk to him regularly, they all say to a person that he doesn't ever blame himself and as for this particular situation, i've been talking to people who say that the president is blaming everybody right now.

he doesn't seem to have faith in anybody inside the white house. the word said to me to describe the white house staffers are disconsulate. they don't know what the legal ramifications are for them, who don't know whether the president will be able to push his agenda, who don't know from day to day whether the president is going to be up against a wall and continue to lash out at people inside the white house or -- and blame them for his own problems, which he created, by the way. i mean, these are his own self-destructive impulses that they are trying to deal with. >> what's the latest you're hearing from your sources about how white house staffers are reacting to the announcement of a special prosecutor, their strategy on this and how they are doing. >> our understanding is that they presented a pretty united front when they brought this news to president trump and the word we're getting is that this has helped to sort of bring people together which sounds

like something of the message the white house is trying to push and we saw the statement they put out. it was mesasured. it was clean. it didn't include the comey letter. like jim was saying, you can't understate -- rather, overstate what a difficult week this has been for the white house. the communications team has been embattled. this was supposed to be a quiet week preparing for this big international trip and instead they are dealing with crisis after crisis after crisis with that flynn story you mentioned just adding more fuel to the fire. i think they have to be wondering what comes next. >> jim, what's your take on "the new york times" reporting that trump told the transition team that he was under investigation. sally yates said in her meeting with the legal counsel, i talked to her last night, that was the first time the white house counsel learned that michael flynn had actually been interviewed by the fbi.

>> well, i think it's another indication as to why president obama warned president trump -- president-elect trump at the time not to hire michael flynn. he was known to the obama administration as being bad news, as being trouble. donald trump liked having michael flynn out on the campaign trail because he hated obama and hated the obama administration and their policies just as much as he did and was willing to go out there as a retired general and chant "lock her up" and dish out the same red meat that candidate trump at the time wanted to dish out on the campaign trail. president trump was very loyal to michael flynn throughout this entire process and it's astonishing that this "new york times" story is true, and i have no reason to think it isn't true, that these things would be made aware or made known to the transition team during that time and nothing was done about it. but, you know, it is another example, as gloria was saying,

where the president has the capability to be very self-destructive. >> thank everybody for watching. i apologize for my cold tonight. time to hand things over to don lemon and "cnn tonight." anderson, thank you very much. much more on our blockbuster breaking news. this is cnn tonight. i'm don lemon. robert mueller taking over the investigation into possible collusion between russia and president trump's campaign. remember, it was just eight days ago when president trump abruptly fired comey sending shock waves around washington and across the country. and tonight those shock waves have triggered a political tsunami, a tsunami of the president's own making, one that he can't blame anyone else but himself. so we have all of the cnn top