we saw the cabinet meeting where he went around to each cabinet member and each one had to genuflect to a president, which is a sorry sight to see in a democracy. thank you, senator. "a.c. 360" starts right now. good evening. where to begin. the president says a decision on is coming in his words fairly soon. appeared he said it could be very big about the raids on michael cohen. new reporting that the president's allies are worried the feds may have seized tape recordings made by mr. cohen, and although trump hush payment, this time to a former doorman who told a story about an affair that, and allegations that he fathered a child with a housekeeper. and white house preparations to undermine rod rosenstein, and the republican party has the

launched a major war against james comb yes. 4r5i9 today, details from that book began emerging, some revealing, some outright salacious, remarkal scenes with president obama and later president trump, at some of the most critical moments in recent history, including a russian attack on american democracy. randi kaye joins us with the latest. >> according to "the washington post" in his new book james comey set he brought up the dossier, that dossier alleged that russians had a so-called pee tape of prostitutes that trump had paid to urinate on each other and his bed in a hotel suite. comey writes that he wanted him, reportedly writesh adding that it bothered him if there was even a 1% chance his with wife melania thiol it was true the in

an apparent play for my sympathy, trump said he has a beautiful wife appeared the whole thing has been very painful for her. he asked what we could do to lift the cloud. 9 former fbi director reportedly writing that president trump said -- i'm a germ aphobe. >> there's other personal revelations. >> comey does not mince words, writing when he met the trump, the 6'3" president-elect looked shorter, his face appeared slightly orange, with bright white half-moons under hi eyes, where i assumed he played small tanning goggles, and impress liver coffeed bright blond hair, which on close inspection looked to be all his. he also observed hi hands, writing, i made a mental note to

check its size. it was smaller than mine, but did not seem unusually so. >> what does comey say about how president trump runs the white house. >> "the washington post" says that comey describes it like this, writing that the president built a cocoon of alternative reality, that he was busily wrapping around all of us. the post says comey describes trump as a conjet tal liar, and driven by person ego. according to the paper, comey likens his interactions with the president to flashbacks to my earlier career as a prosecutor against the mob. the silent circle of assent. the boss in complete control. the loyal oaths, the us versus them world view. the lying about all things large and small. the result, the post says, comey writes is the forest fire that is the trump presidency. >> just getting back to the dossier, what does comey say about how he was chosen to tell

the president about it initially? >> well, comey and james clapper reportingly briefed president obama about it first, then according to the book obama asks, well, who plans to tell donald trump? clapper reportedly said that comey would. according to the paper, comey writes in the book that obama turned his left to his left and looked directly at me, he raised and lowered both of his eyebrows with emphasis and then looked away. coy wrote reportedly that grouch i don't marks eyebrow raise was subtle humor and expression of concern, almost as if he was saying, good luck with that. anderson, this is a 304-page tell-all, so this is really just scratching the surface. >> late word from pam brown and jeff zeleny, white house officials say there are no plans to respond to anything from the book tonight. people familiar with the matter say the white house and the rnc not plan to respond toach allegation, largely because they

know less about these incidents in many cases that we do. phil mudd, frank rooney, and alison. in fact he seems to be poking the president, talking about his hand size and the white circles until hi eyes from tanning. >> yeah, i think revenge is best served cold. i think that that is partly what it is. i mean, don't forget, this is a president who fired him. comey was fired in a way that no one would want to be fired. he didn't know about it. he was halfway across the country. i think he has some scores to settle here, but moreover, i think it gives us an important hint about what he has been saying to the special counsel the what his testimony would be about this question of obstruction. here he says, you know, i'm not going to tell you whether i believe this is obstruction or there isn't obstruction, but he does give you chapter and verse

about what the president was concerned about, in certain areas, largely also, by the way, it seems that the president regard the fbi as his own sort of personal feifdom and he could use somebody like james comey as his personal investigator to help him out particularly on the issue of the tapes and the request whether melania would be upset, et cetera, et cetera. it gives you a picture of a president who really doesn't understand the appropriate relationship between his office and an independent branch of government. >> phil, given your experience with the fbi, it he kind of de3450urd and it would not look good for the president if they found out he was asked to look into this. is that appropriate for a president to ask the fbi to do?

>> it is not. look, the indication to me is you have outsiders, the trump team coming in thinking that the fbi is somehow going to investigate something for the president, because the first lady is concerned. the fbi is the chief federal investigative agency for the united states government. they investigate based on problem cause, violations of federal law. if the first lady of the united states is concerned about allegations in the press about what her husband has done, it's not clear to me why the fbi director should go down that path. the indication, anderson, from that story to me is not just about the fbi, it's about a president who comes into washington, d.c. and whether he's dealing with the defense department, the state department, the fbi or the cia saying i should ask you a personal favor. he does not understand hi responsibility as commander in chief. >> alice, at another point, comey notes that the president said that it bothered him if there was even a 1% chance that

melania thought it was true, means the allegations in the tape about the hotel in russia. he said to what kind of man does a spouse conclude there's only 99% chance that her husband didn't do that. that is really harsh. >> sure. the problem is this is the kind of marriage that the president has. to phil's point it's not the fbi's responsibility to lift the cloud with regard to these allegations, and to gloria's point, this book in large part is about him getting revenge. more than anything about him getting revenge against the president for firing him. while talk about the prostitutes and the hotel room and the dossier is going to make headlines and sell books and what people will talk about, the big picture, what this book is about is not about those details. in my view -- we haven't read the book, but this is more about comey's view about the toxic consequences of lying, and about the problems with loyalty to one person over the truth.

and in his view, as the fbi director, having a president to try to get him to drop an investigation with michael flynn, which he had a huge problem with. that is the overall takeaway. while the other part is salacious and what we will be discussing, i view that as the takeaway. >> the fbi director is essentially comparing the president to a mob boss ermts as was said in the introduction, there's no minced words here. we haven't read it in its entirety, it's an extremely shrewdly done book. comey talks about the fact he worked in three administrations, makes a point of criticizing people from each of the prior administrations, and it's clear he's doing that so when he tells you that donald trump is violating all the norms of the presidency, that donald trump is a danger to the country, that it's a real threat to democracy, he wants you to see someone who will willing to criticize a wide group of people who comes at it with great depth of experience, and i think he does this to

bolster he kribel. phil, you were shaking your head? yeah, i don't agree. there's a buy at the core of decision-making by a flawed president, that decision making involved him trying to intercede in conversation about investigations that his state of and maybe he him solar, and comments on the president's hand a whether his hand was small and whether he had a tan and moons under his eyes. look, if you want to inform the america people, stick with the facts and be care 68 about being seen as partisan. it's two books. i'm afraid the second book, the salacious stories will divert from the first book. how was this president as a national security leader. >> it does provide ammunition to obviously people in the gop and elsewhere who want to come after comey heart. to phil's point, it's not sort of straight down the middle. even the idea of writing a book

like this, revealing behind the scenes details, you know, rubs some people the wrong way. >> i agree with phil i think you walk a fine line. i think comey may apt more partisan, because these are very serious issues about separation of power, about the toxicity that he believes emanates from this white house throughout the government, stemming directly from the president, and those are serious charges and serious issues, and then when you talk about, well i was looking to see what size his hand was, it's just not funny. it's kind of like either you're serious or you're not serious about this. i think that comey is trying to raise a lot of ethical issues here. not only in the way he was treated, but in the way people

have to pay feelity if they work for him. and those are really, really important issues. the question i have is -- and again we haven't read the whole book, we need to do that -- why would you diminish the very serious points with other things. >> i think that's part of what sells books, clearly the details about the hands and the suntan those are going to be the things that people pick up on, but what i'm hearing in the overall context, the loyalty, the obedience to someone who has a loose association with the truth, but this is comey's way of making a stand for the fbi, which for a president that he viewed constantly undermined the law enforcement arm of the fbi, and many of our law enforcement agencies. this is his way of setting the record straight about a

president he views as attacking the fbi. we've seen -- >> that stuff is sent out. >> we've seen journalists tease out the stuff that's the most salacious. that could be a very minor porpgs of the real state of this book. >> "the washington post" quotes comey writing -- they lose the ability to distinguish between what's true and what's not. they surround themselves with other liars. perks and access are given to those tolerating the lies. pretty stunning stuff. >> i think he thinking it's a toxic administration, and he wants to sort of get that across. what we also know, and we have to read in this book, is comey's defense of himself and what he did during the election to hurt hillary clinton's chances for reelection by releasing also

investigations into her e-mail. i haven't read that yet, because i'm curious about what he says about hi solemn, because he's been criticized extremely. >> there's a self-serving dimension, we know he recounts obama turning to him, basically saying i know you tried your best. so for sure some of this book will be read as extremely self-regarding, but i think from what we have seen it's existential sigh of concern about what he sees happening in the white house. >> we have to take a quick break. more on this including director com comey's account of a critical conversation with john kelly, and why comey counseled kellie to stay on the job. later a cnn exclusive, what we're learning about new

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higher loyalty truth excerpts have been released. there's also the picture he paints of here's more of john

kelly, comey writing -- he said he was sick about my firing, and he said he didn't want to work for dishonorable people who would treat someone like me. and i argued for him not to do that. back now with the panel. you know, frank, it's going to be interesting to see what the response of the president. the rnc are the ones officially going to be launching -- but what is the white house and what is the president himself going to be saying? >> there is no chance in the world that over the next days the president doesn't tweet something about this. just monday in that meltous at the white house about the mueller investigation, he made a point about digressing about what a horrible person comey is. over the last week, over the last month, federal officials, all of it has poked ever deeper into recesses of his life he never expected to be invaded.

now this book is coming owl telling tales and i think it's got to make hem feel very defensive. >> he'll have some breathing room given -- he's get a lot of support from the members of the republican party. a lot of members of congress have the president's back. they say comey has a history of contradictory statements, and acted in voolgs of doj protocols, and many democrats asked for comey to resign when he brought up the hillary clinton investigation. so the republicans will push back for trump. i would like to think he can show restraint, because he's going to have a lot of cover. >> phil, what do you think is the objective -- again, we have not read the entire thing. but what do you think the objective for comey is in this book?

i think this is a second objective i'm still struggling to united states. that's when james comey spoke about hirk hibbard, and i think there was an element of this hearing about huma abedin, many months after she's been cleared about the relationship with her husband, he came across not as just a chief federal investigators, chief federal law enforcement officers in the united states, but as sort of the school principal for america. i have views on hillary clinton, we decided not to charge her. here are my views on how she treated national security information. we're seeing the same thing again. he's got views on the president, some of which relate appropriately, some of which relate to his personal views about whether he thinking the president was moral or amoral.

i'm not sure i agree with that, but i think we'll see james comey, school principal, in part of this book. >> comey says that he never saw president trump laugh, a sony according to comey of deep insecurity, his inable tore vulnerable and risk himself, which on reflection is sad in a leader and scary in a president. >> look, a lot of us have not seen a lot of self-deprecating humor from this president. this is a personal memoir, so he's free to make whatever remarks he wants. that honestly is less interesting to me than the questions about what the president said to him when about general flynn, and others. and his meeting with jeff sessions, which he also writes about, because he clearly told jeff sessions, you need to get between me and the president. you cannot leave me alone with

the president. let me make it -- you know, just one more comment about the context in to which this book is not appearing. it's not in a vacuum. we have stories now about his -- the president's personal lawyer's office being raided, which has enraged the president. we have stories coming out in publications about the president's extra marital relationships. stormy, karen macdougal, going on and on. we have the president asking james comey to disprove this story about women in russia. you put all of this together and then the comey book coming out, which the president will hear a lot about if he doesn't read it, will hear a lot about. and this is going to create this incredible storm inside the white house and inside the president's head about how to

react, and how to lash out. at the same time we are clearly considering some sort of action in syria form the president has a meeting with north korea coming up. is he going to testify in his own defense before the special counsel. i think when you put all of this together, it's kind of a stunning maelstrom. >> it certainly is. >> but there's a bit about there's so much, as gloria says, it's become white noise to people in middle america. i speak to gop groups an cross the country. it's white noise. they look at it as yet another incident that we knew about the president before he was elected. they are concerned about what he's doing to create jobs, and middle americans are not super-focused. as long as they're creating jobs and keeping america safe. >> i appreciate it. gloria just called it a storm.

it feels like it tonight. the president's personal attorney making tapes on behalf of -- his conversations on the phone. does the fbi now have them? we have new reporting on that. also a cnn exclusive, how the white house is preparing to r undermine rob rosenstein. hold up. hold up. we got a laggy video call here. you need verizon, the best network for streaming. here. trade ya. okay, people, that's a reset. you want us to surprise her again? yeah, but like in a fun way. like this. all my favorite friends are here. there's tony and diane. like something like that. (avo) get up to 50% off our best phones, like the samsung galaxy s9 and the google pixel 2. because unlimited is only as good as the network it's on.

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in advance of the comey book in released what everyone thought was in advance of it, the republicans committee released a -- requests lyin' comey" is the name of it. cnn has learned that the white house is gearing up for war

against deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. what have you learned? >> anderson sources say at least there was a preliminary plan that the white house was developing to try to discredit rod rosenstein. this comes as a time when president trump has been weighing whether or not he wants to fire hi deputy attorney general in the wake of these raids against michael cohen. they've cup up with a cup 8 lines of attack form the broad idea is he's too conflicted to oversee the russia investigation. they point to the noise that rosenstein was behind this memo that president trump you willy used, but somewhat illogically they also point to another reason the white house made the case that rosenstein and james comey are actually good friends, so the reason rosenstein has approved this ever-expanding probe against president trump is try to get retribution for the fact that his good friend was

fired, a source who is familiar with their relationship between rosenstein and comey says, yes, they were colleagues, but not exactly besties, not exactly close friends. when a spoke to a white house spokes penn, they said they is not a coordinated effort, and say this is not the same as what you're seeing when it comes to james comey, which was a coordinated effort. >> if that's not true, and coordinated messaging, sending out talking points, it does just sound like they're trying to lay the ground work for firing rosenstein. >> i think there's a number of aides who remember what it was like the day the president decided to fire james comey, where they came up with the reasoning after the fact to explain it. i think they've had a number of surrogates outside of the white house who we have seen publicly making the case that the president should fire rod rosenstein. people want to be prepared if the president ultimately decided

to go that route, and how it's justified and how do they explain it. these are the inklings of maybe that reasoning. >> the question is will the president read the memos. when the white house came out to explain why comey had been fired, basically the next day the president completely contradicted what he said. sa sara, thank you very much. "the washington post's" head lijs, trump allies are worried that they may have seized recordings business his attorney, mike at cohen whose office, hotel room and home were raided this week. what are you learning about the possibility recordings? >> what we are learning is that michael cohen, the president's longtime personal lawyer worked for the trump organization, often recorded his conversations, at times he would even play back recordings of conversations with folks to other people. he would even play them to

president trump. what his allies are concerned about is when they came into his office, his hotel room, his home this week, they took all of his computers, phones, electronics devices. in those devices were actually the recordings he's made of different phone calls he's had over the years. that's a concerning idea to a lot of people around the president. you know, you have these reportings, what is better evident for the special counsel's office that is actual people talking to each other on tape. >> if he made recordings and played them for associates and also for the president or then citizen donald trump, was it known that he recorded conversations? it must have been at least among some people. >> among some folks we obviously suppose to who we talked to about this story, knew he had recordings. i don't know that most people -- new york is a one-party consent

state on recordings. both sides do not have to agree to the conversation being recorded. that said, the recordings could actually prove to back fire here if they show activity that's deleterious. he often did business transactions to have leverage. he would say, i remember what you said last time. i actually have you on tape. in political conversations he would play recordings to president trump. he would talk to different people about the president, and then he would show the recordings, and let the president here. so whether the people on the other end knew they were being recorded or now, it's unclear. it's unlikely. >> so these are both conversations about politics that he might have though he didn't have an official role in the campaign, but also about business in legal matters? >> well, michael cohen was

intricately involved in the campaign and the president's business relationships. i think that's the influence he's had. and we know with the stormy daniels -- but the other matters, he's given him advise. he's helped him close business deals. we talk about trump projects over there. it's every facet of the president's line. michael cohen was there, from politics to personal to business. he's himself been quoted as the president's ultimate loyalist, the personal who would do anything for the president. you know, the southern district of new york was investigating, it could give them ammunition. >> do you know, did he record conversations with president trump, or with his then citizen donald trump? >> those one of the answers we don't know. we have between no reason to

believe hi did orb did not. we do not have in our reporting firsthand knowledge. >> josh dawsey, appreciate it. thank you. up next alan dershowitz and jeff toobin, give their opinions on what a white house appears to be planning action. i'm just worried about the house and taking care of the boys.

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more now on our breaking news, "the washington post" reporting that allies of president trump are worried that recordings having seized from michael cohen, and that the white house is working on talking points. alan deferenrshowitz, and also us jeffrey toobin. thanks both for joining us on this very calm, not very busy day. >> a typical day. >> jeff, in terms of the rosenstein talking points, can there be any juchx other than to fire rosenstein. >> here is the deputy attorney general, who is being investigated by the white house, by the people who employ him,

solely because he is doing the job he's supposed to do. rod rosenstein is supervising the mueller investigation in an honorable way reflecting his integri integrity, and that's not good enough. >> but you say he's a witness. >> of course he's a witness, the primary witness. any decent lawyer kaye rosenstein as the first witness and says, did you write the memo at the time? at the time you wrote the memo, did you think you were obstructing justice? did you think there was justification? did you ask the president if he had any corrupt motives? you can't be a witness and at the same time supervise prosecution, but do you really believe that's the intent of the president in terms of getting rod rosenstein. >> i don't know the mind of the president. all i'm saying is there's a legitimate argument to be made to, a. recuse himself, and if he doesn't do that, to go to court and seek a recusal. firing is an act by the

president. i would be very much opposed to that. it would be a terrible mistakes. >> you would be guess hint feig rosenstein. >> absolutely, or mueller or anybody. that's a big difference between that and his lawyers taking a legitimate step that many lawyers would take of seeking recusal. >> rod rosenstein, it's been known he was involved in writing this her, is since the day comey was appointed -- since mueller was appointed. where have they been with their complaints about the conflicts of interest? >> that's a fair point. >> it's a completely bog gus pretext to try to get rid of rod rosenstein. it has nothing to do with his integrity, has nothing to do with any purported conflict of interest. this is about getting rod rosenstein, because he is pursuing this investigation and allowing mueller to pursue it in an appropriate way. >> i'm not sure it even has an

advantage for the president. if rosenstein is recused, somebody else will take over, especially now there's a case in new york, there's a case here from the special counsel. so i think from a tactical point of view, it just doesn't make any sense to try to interfere with the current personnel conducting the investigation. if i was trump's lawyers, i would be focusing on defense, focusing on trying to make a deal with the prosecution to have a minimally intrusive series of questions. that's what i would be focusing on. >> it seems if you've done nothing wrong, isn't the fastest way to get yourself cleared is toffee them complete the investigation. >> but you know the orlando argue, what do you care if somebody searches user premises or interrogation you. innocent people also have tactical advantages sometimes in taking legal actions, but a lawyer has to think hard about the balance. when you move to recuse somebody, it can have unintended

consequences. >> this idea that -- about michael cohen, having perhaps recorded the things -- how serious would that be if there were actually recordings with the president, recordings with other attorneys or ami, or "the national enquirer" or whoeverever? >> it's a gold mine. there is nothing you want more than contemporaneous records, you know, actual records of what was said by people who are suspects and witnesses in a criminal investigation. >> so long as it's not privileged. >> right. obviously they are not -- they're not allowed to have access to it if it's privileged, but you know, when you are an investigator and you go in to search someone, the more the merrier. more e-mails, more financial records and tapes. >> which gets to your point about the taint team. just explain that. >> they go in, the more the

merrier, they pick up everything. they pick up things that are clearly in the end will be lawyer-client privilege, and then they give it to a tarcht team, who is that team? they get to listen to the tapes. they get to read them. >> that team is separate from the investigative team. >> they only turn over the nonprivileged material, but government agents have listened to your confession to your priest, to your statement to your doctor, to your intimate conversations with your wife and your statements to your lawyer. i propose legislation, i'm doing a column today and i will be speaking to legislators about it tomorrow, to change the taint rules when it comes to lawyer-client privileged communications, are irthat a judge, a judicial officer, a magistrate, be present during the search of any lawyer's office. before anything can be seized a preliminary determination has to be made by a judicial officer. only that officer will listen and watch. if he determineds in is

privileged, no government agent gets tout it. that way no agent does get to see it, there's no leak. judges don't leak. if it does leak, we know who did it. what's wrong with that? >> lawyers, doctors, priests are not above the law. >> i want to make it the law. let me finish. they are not above the law. that are offices can be searched just like anyone else's. there are plenty of reasons to search offices of doctors, priests and physicians. and, you know, to crazy an additional barrier to these searches i think is inappropriate. the system is not broken, the taint teams work. yes, it is true that privileges should be honored, but just because you have a privilege doesn't mean you should be exempt. >> i'm not exempting the lawyer or the judge and the priest. i'm talking about the client, the pen i tent and the patient. it's their rights that are being

violated. there's no reason why any government agent should be able to see that kind of material. there's a way of eliminating it. >> it's a violation if a judge sees it -- >> but much less. >> you trust judges more inch a, judges are more trust worthy. they don't leak. we know the justice department and the fbi is like a sieve. >> members of the taint team can communicate effectively. that's how the oliver north case was lost. we should not be trusting. the aclu to its everlasting shame, came out and justified the defended the search without going into any of these issues. if this had been hillary clinton's lawyer, can you manuals the aclu coming out and defending this search? >> i don't know what the a counter. lu did today. i'm not familiar with that. >> i can tell you. >> i think this was an orderly fair laws enforcement investigation, multiply reviewed by levels of the justice

department. let's see what they get. let's see if there's a case to be made. >> you're missing the point. it's too late to undo you that fbi agents -- >> professor, jeff toobin, thank you. coming up, another effort by the parent company of "the national enquirer" to buy and bury a story. this time it involved a rumored affair the president had with a housekeeper, allegedly producing a child. i'll speak with ronan farrow, next. re-pubescent squire! thy armor was forged by a feeble-fingered peasant woman... your mom! as long as hecklers love to heckle, you can count on geico saving folks money. boring! fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.

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company of the "national enquirer" paying someone to keep a potentially damaging from the story about getth out. this time a doorman and a house keerp who are had a rumored affair with donald trump. today the doorman said in a statement i can confirm worng at world tower i was instructed not

to criticize the house skeerp dug to prior relationship she had with president trump who which produced child. he joins me now, you're not able to confirm the doorman's story. for you the focus is this is another example of ami catching and then killing a story. >> exactly. as colorful as the underlying claim is, really the crux of this for many sources stepping forward was reporting was halted. they allege, on direct orders from david pecker, the head of the company. >> ami reporters quote unquote had gone out. >> right. >> and investigated the claims made by the doorman. >> the parent company of the national inquirer spent weeks investigating this. there was a positive polygraph result saying it seems in their eyes he had been told. >> ami polygraph. >> ami administer add polygrf that's in the relevantable in the eyes of the experts. but in the eyes of the reporter

that would abpoint they would double down. instead in transaction happened, a $30,000 payment and subsequently in what these sources described as very unusual, anderson, a million dollar damages clause. >> damages clause saying that what that if the doorman spoke. >> he signed an amendment saying that if he ever spoke about this he would have to pay $1 million. >> that's according to the former ami people you talked to. >> according to documentation, emails and texts we saw. yes according to many other sources not a standard operating procedure. there was an elevated level of scrutiny on this particular story and this transaction. >> ami, have they said whether or not they -- have they said they don't believe him but they paid the money. >> they have. >> so obviously $30,000 i mean it's less than paid to karen mcdougal which is the other story you broke, $150,000 was paid to her. this came -- do you know that this came directly from david

pecker >> that's what we report as a claim from several of the sources involved. you know, they say he was calling regularly about this. now ami we should point out has flatly doid that. a source close to the white house referred us back to am. they're referring to each other. i think with the raids happening and the probes happening that fbi raid this week focusing specifically on finding these kinds of transactions and communications related to them with michael cohen more may come to light about how involved he was. >> did you talk -- i believe you talked to some ami employees believing that michael cohen may have been in communication with ami during this time. >> that's exactly what they have said. and, again, ami denies that. but the sources we talk to on the inside did say that was happening. >> which again points to -- if there are audio recordings taken from michael cohen offense and there were communications between michael cohen monitoring that they were working in tandem to protect donald trump, that's extraordinary. >> during an election cycle, which election law experts

pointed out is seeing esuggestive -- not sufficient to establish, but suggestive intent to influence election. >> the bigger question is a is sort of a pattern emerging of how michael cohen allegedly dealt with allegations like this, rumors like this, stories like this. we have seen three -- three examples really thanks to your reporting. and also, the dwrd that the big firkt idea is that if there are more stories out there that ami and the "national enquirer" bought and killed they have files of. that's leverage they have over the president of the united states. >> throughout the reporting of all stories sources said over and over ben, including sources close to ami we are concerned about the national security implications because we have seen how this company uses dirt it has on other celebrities to influence them. and that now may be playing out in their eyes with the president. >> they used dirt -- they allegedly used dirt on other celebrities to get the celebrities to tell stories

about other people? >> in that case it would be to tell stories about other people, to participate in exclusives and photo shoots. banal stuff but obviously the stakes it different with a of the of the united states. >> it was reported that david pecker visited the white house with a friend of his who has connections to saudi arabia who has business dealings. >> i'll stick very carefully to what we report and others reported so far without any speculation. but certainly that has been reported. and a string of close interactions have been reported. and you know the sources that we talked to did say we think this was a transactional relationship that got deeper and deeper as the election went on, potentially with mutual benefit. >> it's a fascinating story. ronan farrow from the north americaer thanks. >> thanks. >> james comey says the trump presidency it's not normal, not fake news, not okay that's a line from the upcoming book and judging by the what's coming out there are bombshells to back it up. that's next.

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a president who is unethical and untethered to truth. the words of fbi director james comey by way of "new york times" tonight. on the table his new book leak leaking out and he has much to say about the presidency. and nuts about robert mueller. what could be the last word. breaking news about the stormy daniels case way the president's attorney is seeking a delay. michael avenatti joins us with that. we begin with the comey memoir and the window into what makes the president tick and what keeps him up at night. jim sciutto has been going over the excerpts joins with us more. what does he say about how the president runs the white house.

>> he says he runs it like a mob