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tv   Anderson Cooper 360  CNN  August 24, 2018 5:00pm-6:00pm PDT

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going to be the problem this hurricane brings to the hawaiian islands. in fact, the mayor of honolulu he said earlier, listen, if we get even half the rain the big island got, that's going to be some major, major problems. >> ac 360 starts right now. it could be a big flipping deal for the president. john berman here in for anderson. the man who for decades kept donald trump's books, ran his charity, even signed his tax returns is now cooperating with michael cohen. there may be no human being on earth who knows more about the president's finances and he's been talking to the feds. let that sink in buzz you know president trump has. even as we're reporting our thoughts are with senator mccain and his family. today they announced he has decided to discontinue medical
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treatment for brain cancer. when he made this speech we're going to show you from last october, senator mccain was already well into a battle that he knew almost no one ever wins. >> i'm the luckiest guy on earth. i have served america's cause, the cause of our security and the security of our friends, the cause of freedom and equal justice all my adult life. i haven't always served it well. i haven't even always appreciated what i was serving, but among the few comp sayings of old age is the acuity of hindsight. i see now i was part of something important that drew me along in its wake even when i was diverted by other interests. i was knowing or not along for the ride as america made the future better than the past. >> we owe him our thanks for that.
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we'll have more on the senator's condition a bit later in the program. first, though, the commander in chief he has so often been at odds with. and we should note the president made no mention of senator mccain at an event in ohio. not a single mention or nod to the family. maybe it's a lack of compassion or maybe the president has something else on his mind or likely someone, donald trump's chairee and the president's own finances, he's the inside man of all inside men, and he's worked for the president and the president's father sense the original godfather was practically its in first run. keeping them honest, such people used to be called cooperators because that's exactly what they do to help make cases. the president, though, sees it differently. >> i know all about flipping.
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for 30, 40 years, i've been watching flippers. everything is wonderful and then they get ten years in jail and then they flip on whoever their next highest one is or as high as you can go. it almost ought to be outlawed. >> the president on fox news he was talking about michael cohen who implicated him on tuesday in a pay off to stormy daniels. yesterday it was revealed the tabloid publisher who was involved in both arrangements is also cooperating with authorities. and today we learned the trump organization chief financial officer allen weisselberg was also given immunity and has cooperated in the cohen case. the reaction of so many who have followed trump for years was, wow. >> i need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend david
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so that -- i'm going to do that right away. i've spoken to allen weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with funding -- yes. and it's all the stuff. all the stuff. was you never know with that company, whether he's going to be -- correct. so i'm all over that. so i've spoken to allen about it, when it comes time to the financing. >> listen, what financing? >> no, no, no. >> so that's the man who implicated the president in two felonies talking about a deal with one cooperator publisher david pecker who he says he's already run by another cooperator, allen weisselberg. and if you're keeping score mr. weisselberg makes it six who have been cooperating one way or another with the feds or michael cohen who has turned against the
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president. rick gets, cohen, george papadopoulos, david pecker and now allen weisselberg. joining us with more now is shim shimon procupez. >> he's named as an executive in the court documents. they don't name him by name, but in the charging documents that michael cohen, that the court filed in regards to michael cohen, he's in there. he's referred to as executive one, and it essentially says he reimbursed michael cohen for some of the hush money payment. it's understandable why the government would want to seek him at the very least as a witness. what's interesting is you have between weisselberg and pecker who apparently who also has been cooperating and given immunity, you have all these people who were around the president who either have been facing charges
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or perhaps could have faced charges in this deal. they have all had to worry about this. really one person and the ultimate person who would have had to benefits in all this, the president, goes unscathed. clearly investigators felt that the information he had was important enough where they would not charge him and instead give him immunity, john. >> is the immunity, and this is the big question, shipone. is the immunity specific to information related to michael cohen or does it go beyond that? what are you learning? >> basically all we know is weisselberg has not been called back by the u.s. attorney's office, by investigators since he received immunity regarding the michael cohen investigation. however, we also know as "the new york times" has been reporting the manhattan da's office is now doing its own investigation. so perhaps he could be given
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immunity in that investigation. and keep in mind federal investigators believe they want to pursue other things in this, they could always bring him back, offer him more immunity or perhaps make him a full-fledged cooperator if they think it would help them in their investigation. and this now also frees weisselberg from any prosecution so that he could appear before members of congress should he be subpoenaed. he can't claim, well i may have to plead the fifth because i could face charges in this case. so i think that is another element which i think important for people to keep in mind. >> his role in this not nearly over. in a moment a lawyer in questioning weisselberg and also barbara rez and colleague of allen weisselberg. first, though, more on the man himself from 360's randy kaye. >> reporter: allen weisselberg knows where all the financial bodies are buried according to a
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former trump employee who spoke with cnn. weisselberg is the chief financial officer for the trump organization, the top book keeper who likely has knowledge of everything from donald trump's tax returns to the hush money paid to silence two women claiming they had an affair with trump before he became president, something trump denies. if trump reimbursed cohen for the payment to porn star stormy daniels, then perhaps weisselberg could corroborate that for federal prosecutors. he put himself and weisselberg in charge of the family business. >> he relinguishes the family business to his sons and long time executive allen weisselberg. >> reporter: he prepares the president's tax returns and was the treasurer for trump's charity.
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weisselberg has also been privy to trump's real estate transactions both here at home and overseas including where all the funding was coming from. there's no doubt about how vast weisselberg's knowledge is. he has a long history with the trump family going back decades. in the 1970s he was an accountant for president trump's father, fred trump. he then moved over to the trump organization. "the wall street journal" reported that weisselberg oversaw many of trump's transactions including household expenses and purchases of planes and boats. he says weisselberg is the single most indispensable person in the trump administration. in that case, he says weisselberg knew where every dollar in the trump organization came from and controlled where every dollar went. over the years weisselberg has kept a pretty low profile. one former colleague telling "the wall street journal" that
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weisselberg, quote, fits in with the wallpaper. suddenly, though, he seems pea a household name. randy kaye, cnn, new york. >> and we have a household name of our own cnn legal analyst and nixon council john dean who perhaps became the most famous white house cooperator in history when he blew the whistle on watergate, and barbara rez, former long time trump executive and author of "all alone on the 68th floor, how one woman changed the face of construction." you worked within the trump organization. is there any person who's got a better understanding, perhaps outside the family how that organization works and allen weisselberg, and i'm talking down to the nickels and dimes here. >> you know, i've been asked that question many times and i've heard the experts speak to what he knows and what he doesn't know and what he controls, and i'm a little
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surprised to be honest with you. when i worked there many years ago allen was working in brooklyn and he was in charge of the apartment buildings. but when he moved to new york, and i can't pinpoint the date, he was the chief accountant. he was a person that paid the bills, that made sure the payroll was right, that sent out the invoices and things like that. he was an executive vice president, a title, but he was not part of the inner circle by any stretch of the imagination. so this is news to me. perhaps over time things developed with allen. he was certainly a low-key guy. he was the kind of guy i'm not sure may have called donald, may have called him mr. trump. he was a quiet guy and he was unassuming. >> the money goes through him, which is so key here. and the big question, does the immunity extend beyond the cohen case and is weisselberg providing information to
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prosecutors on the president's business dealings? the president's business dealings and finances beyond cohen? jason? >> so there's no way of knowing exactly how far the immunity extends but i do think, john, the key here is the timing of it. this is either great news for the president or terrible news for the president. and this is what it appears to be the case, if mr. weisselberg was already immunized and has already testified and then mr. cohen pled guilty, it would seem that the investigators have already gotten all of the testimony from him that they wanted and they haven't charged or attempted to charge mr. trump. in which case that would be great news for him. if on the other hand this amunity is recent development and they're continuing to investigate these same transactions, that's terrible news for the president. >> well, we do know that the
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justice department, the southern district and the mueller investigation separately are operating under the assumption that you can't indict a sitting president. so that might limit them how far they go in terms of chasing down the president's role in this. john dean, to you. prosecutors don't just hand out immunity for nothing. they reel give it if someone has something of value to offer, correct? >> that's true. generally there's something called equitable immunity just to assure the person won't be prosecuted. there's also statutory immunity, and it can be transactional, which covers everything or use immunity, which can be limited. you don't necessarily have to be a cooperator to get immunity. if you take and invoke your fifth amendment privilege and refuse to testify the prosecutor can force you to testify by
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immunizing you. and that could be happening in several of these cases, that they've not volunteered but rather been forced to testify. >> that's interesting, so they use immunity to push to get the information they want. we've heard how much the president says he values loyalty. weisselberg testifying with immunity, david pecker testifying with immunity. how does he react to what he perceives as disloyalty? >> he gets very angry. he's vaery volatile, and he mus be be seething. because his perception of loyalty is it different from the rest of us. he sees it as doing exactly what you're told regardless of what that is regardless if it's legal or not legal and keeping your mouth shut. so that kind of loyalty, i don't know how far it'll go.
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i don't think it goes to a jail cell for anyone, not for anyone. >> so jason, to that point you've actually had the chance to depose allen weisselberg when you were prosecuting the trump university lawsuit. what was he like during that deposition, how far did his loyalty to the president extend, and we also have some hints in other recent cases as well, don't we? >> we do, john. and the reality was he was a fairly cooperative witness. he is definitely loyal to mr. trump. he is one of the few people who refer to him as donald. he's been with the family for a better part of a half century, and as a witness he was somewhat reluctant, but i would not say that he was -- that he was dishonest in anyway. i think he did provide testimony that could be interpreted as potentially damaging to mr. trump. he mentioned the frequency of which those two interact. they're on the same floor, and there was certainly information that mr. weisselberg learned
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that could be impugnative to president trump -- now president trump through mr. weisselberg. and given the nature of the relationship as he described it, it could have been damaging to mr. trump. >> it didn't seem he'd protect the president at his own expense to you? >> to go so far as to be dishonest, no, i don't think so. i do think he is very loyal to the president but i don't think he'd go so far as to lie. >> knowing the facts of the cohen plea, do you think prosecutors would have need today grant the weisselberg immunity to security cohen's guilty plea? does it make sense he need today be use in an expanded role beyond just the cohen investigation? >> there may have been a quiet race to the white house after that raid on cohen's hotel or
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office, what have you, and pecker might have been been in there before cohen got in and given him enough information to solve their issues they're looking at. it's not clear who needed what to be immunized or prosecuted. it was a result, of course, when cohen decided himself he would plead. >> john, just to ask you your experience here, and you've got unique experience in this. when you start to see people testifying with immunity. when you start to see in the case of michael cohen flipping overtly, what does that signify in an investigation? >> well, it's a standard procedure in investigations. both in high level white collar as well as mafia cases where they go to the lower levels and grant immunity and figure out step by step what they need and how to get it and who to get it
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from. and that's what we're watching. i'd say we're about midway through all this right now. >> maid way, a long way to go. and barbara you told politico this week you thought the president was quote, unraveling. what exactly have you seen that you came to that conclusion? >> i think i really meant that the story of trump, the tone of trump was unraveling, the lie, if you'll have it. that he was falling apart in the sense that we were now seeing all the different elements of what he had put together as this one persona. and i think that's what's coming apart, that people are realizing now he's doing different things and lying about different things and losing certain support and stuff like that. and i do think it's falling apart. i think that the myth -- it's what i call it -- the myth of trump is now going away. >> and jason, finally to you,
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what do you think? what does your gut tell you about where these immunity deals fit into the larger investigation? do you think that the prosecutors of the southern district would have given immunity to david pecker and weisselberg just to get their guilty plea on one part of cohen? do you think? >> my gut tells me that is it visa vi the president. there may be other individuals within the trump organization, but i don't think they're planning on doing anything more significant visa vi the president and here's why. it seems they had enough information that they could have at least charged michael cohen with a conspiracy. and it could have been a conspiracy with individual three, and that individual three could have been president trump. cohen said enough at his guilty plea hearing and even the assistant u.s. attorney said enough at that plea hearing. and yet they didn't include a
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conspiracy charge, even if they're not actually charging the president. and that to me indicates they're not planning on moving higher up the chain. >> very interesting perspective. next the president's latest attacks on his attorney general, and sessions' life expectancy on the job. also one of the 11 jurors who voted to convict paul manafort on all 18 counts, and she's a trump supporter. anderson asked her what convinced her, ahead on "360." you wouldn't accept an incomplete job
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attorney general jeff sessions and the airing of grievances is coming right from the top. you'll remember this week we saw the president slam him on fox and the attorney general hit
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back saying the office will not by imprurmly influenced by political considerations. and today the president mockingly, the department of justice will not be improperly influenced by political considerations, jeff, this is great, what everyone wants. so look into all hof the corruption on the other side. this entire list that the president likes to go on and on and on with. come on, jeff, the president says, you can do it. the country is waiting. that long to-do list is kind of the president's greatest list. they're all scandals as he sees it, but it's hard to know what the president makes of it because he crammed it all in. but what those two tweets represent is a sitting president
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lobbying his attorney general to go after his enemies. and they don't spend so much-time trash talking their attorney's general or letting them twist so long in the wind. lindsey graham has signaled it would be okay for the president to let sessions go but only after the mid-terms. however, another republican is sending the opposite message. >> bizarrely there are people in this body now talking like the attorney general should be fired. i'm not sure how to interpret the comments in the last couple of hours, but i guess i would like to say as member of the judiciary committee and as a member of this body i find it really difficult to envision any circumstance where i would vote to confirm the successor to jeff sessions if he is fired because he's executing his job rather than choosing to act as a partisan hack. >> as you might imagine plenty
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to talk about. joining us david alexrod and neal. so the president going as far in the second day to call attorney general jeff sessions jeff, goading him to investigate, quote, the corruption on the other side. within 24 hours of jeff sessions warning he won't make political use of the justice department. what do you make of it all? >> well, if this goes to the core of the president's campaign here which is to say nothing's on the legit, that the justice department is infested with democrats who won't go after their own and are going after him for political reasons. and it is grossly unfair and unjust and wrong and destructive. but i think he is trying to lay
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the predicate for the time when he will remove the attorney general to try and get ahold of all these investigations. i think that time is coming and i think that's what this is all about. >> and it really does seem as if the president is specifically trying to press the buttons of the attorney general. the attorney general put out this statement and says i will not make decisions based on politics here, and it seems like the president is trying to order him to do so. >> yes, and i don't think this is just about the attorney general jeff sessions. i think this is about donald trump and his views on law enforcement. i mean put simply donald j. trump does not believe in law enforcement. he doesn't believe in the law part of it. you know he tramples on the constitution willy-nilly and doesn't believe in the enforcement part of it either. you saw that this week when he said, you know, he attacked process of flipping which is something prosecutors do every day in this country day in, day out in exchange for information. that is what bread and butter of
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what prosecutors do all the time. and trump condemned that practice. you know, if that were the law, you know, thousands of criminals would be on the streets today. it can't possibly be the law. it's so dangerous, and that's why we've never had a president say anything like this mishmash of horrible stuff coming out of this person's twitter feed. >> let me ask you because i spoke to attorney general gonzalez to today, and he had something to say along those lines. >> what i have to say that the constant attacks against the attorney general i think weakens the attorney general, i think damages morale within the department of justice. >> and he went onto tell "the washington post," if we ever got to a place where it would be routine for the president to question the judgment of the attorney general that would not be a good place. aren't we already there on all those fronts? >> i really applaud attorney
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general gonzalez for saying this. those already know the things president trump has said about our prosecutors and our attorney general, how much that corrodes confidence in our rule of law and what prosecutors have to do every day, so i'm really glad he said it. >> and david, there's an irony here, which is that the attorney general maybe more than any other cabinet member is actually implementing the policies of the president of the united states. >> that's true in almost every other way. and he is following through on the trump platform whether it's immigration or law enforcement or, you know, the whole range of things that trump campaigned on. i disagree with many of tem, but he's been faithful to the president in that regard. but let's be clear what this is all about. donald trump does not feel like he should be accountable. he doesn't want to be accountable to the law. he doesn't want to be accountable to the news media, and he's trying to destroy and
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create, you know, profound cynicism and doubt about -- about these institutions that our founding fathers created or empowered for this express purpose, to hold people in office accountable. you know, i always -- when people say this is fundamentally american, but this is really un-american. this goes really right to the core of our constitution. up next inside the paul manafort trial, a juror tells anderson even though she is a trump supporter she does not want him to pardon manafort. and later we'll take you to hawaii where hurricane lane is already causing flooding and land slides as it approaches. school... grade... done.
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tonight we have an inside look at the paul manafort trial from someone who was right in the thick of it. as you know earlier this week the president's former campaign chair, paul manafort, was convicted on eight felony counts. paula duncan was on that jury. earlier today she told anderson what prevented pmanafort on beig convicted on all 18 counts, and shy eshe doesn't think the president should pardon him. take a look. >> thanks for joining us. you probably know it better than anybody else out there. i know you said you would have
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convicted planfort on all counts. can you explain why that wasn't the outcome? >> we had one juror who held out her boat. we had two, one that could flip-flop from one day to the next. would say she was pressured and change her vote. we had some of that, but in the end it was one person who even though we could put the paperwork in front of them again and again they said they had reasonable doubt, and therefore that's their right as a juror. we tried very hard to make sure we weren't a hung jury, 11 of us. ten for sure were positive from almost day two. and the rest of us, the other two, were not sure. and we spent a lot of time deliberating and doing due diligence like we were supposed to as a jury. and in the end even though we could tell her that the defendant met the criteria to charge him as guilty, she would
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in the end say she had reasonable doubt. >> i read that you said i wanted paul manafort to be innocent, but he wasn't. i know you're a supporter of president trump and you're skeptical of the special counsel investigation as a whole. to those who may hear that and wonder, well, why did you vote to convict, what would you say? >> because your civic duty as a juror, as judge ellis said, was to -- the defendant has the presumption of innocence, and you accept the witnesses, you accept the evidence and you make your judgment based on those things. and there are are those that said i shouldn't have been a juror because they say i was biased, according to social media. at least that's what my daughters are telling me. and that's not true. if i were biased i would have said i would have been the hold out and i was not the hold out vote. >> well, number one i would recommend your daughters not read social media because i can tell you from personal experience no good come of that.
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but i've got to tell you, you give me faith in the system, the fact you're the kind of juror somebody would want, that you can put aside whatever your political beliefs might be and just look at the evidence and make a decision based on that. >> i think coming out the trump hat thing, wasn't going boo be part of what i had to say until the last bit. but i thought, you know what, if it shows people that can we can have differences of opinions and still work together to get justice done, i thought it was an inspiring thing to hear about. >> the trump hat thing for people to know, you have the make america great again hat but you kept it in your car. >> i did. and it's actually my husband's hat, just for clarification. we don't need two. but i mean we're both trump supporters and we feel that president trump deserves a chance to try to do the job without all the other stuff going on around him. unless, of course, it's illegal.
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the law is the law, and my job as a juror and the rest of my fellow jurors was to make sure that the law was upheld. and i feel we did. i wish we could have convicted him on all 18 counts. i feel there was enough information to do that. i thought america needed to know it was 11-1. >> i know you said that you believed the mueller investigation is a witch hunt. if the mueller investigation hadn't happened, there's no guarantee that paul manafort wouldn't have ever been brought to justice for these financial crimes. does that justify the mueller investigation at all to you? >> no, he should be punished for his crimes. it just shouldn't have come about in the way that it did, in my opinion. >> do you think the president should pardon paul manafort, or how would you feel if the president pardoned paul
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manafort? >> i feel it would be a grave mistake for president trump to pardon paul manafort. >> why? >> justice was done. the evidence was there, and that's where it should stop. >> one of the things that the president campaigned on was draining the swamp, and that's obviously something people on many sides, all sides of the political aisle, you know, don't like the way washington works. to you, is paul manafort part of the swamp? is he sort of the epitome of the swamp? >> well, there's the irony, maybe he is. i think my favorite thing trump said, of course, was make america great again. and i've gotten a lot of flack over this, and i've had people calling worried about my safety. and i like to think that i am braver than that. when peaceful americans' views
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are silenced from fear, then america is certainly not a great country. so maybe what we need are caps that say make america kind again. >> do you think that's a hat the president would wear, make america kind again? >> i challenge president trump to wear a hat that says make america kind again. because i think once we're kind, then we will be great. tolerance is important. i want people to get out and vote. no matter who you vote for, get out and vote. that's your duty. voting and serving on a jury, that's so important to who we are. so many people have fought for that right, and i don't care what side you're on, just vote. >> paula duncan, thank you. >> thanks. >> what an interesting discussion. sad news tonight about senator john mccain. he has discontinued his
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treatment for brain cancer. as tributes to his service and heroism pour in from washington, we'll get the very latest next. let your perfect drive come together during the final days of the lincoln summer invitation event get 0% apr on select 2018 lincoln models plus one thousand dollars bonus cash. at at&t innovations, we give you more for your thing. here we're adding tv and movies from our unlimited plan to the powerful new samsung galaxy note9. the perfect device for entertainment & productivity. so, it's essentially the ed helms of devices? how so? well he's both very entertaining and very productive. you think? yeah, i do. and that's my completely unbiased opinion. buy a galaxy note9 and get one free.
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tributes are pouring in for senator john mccain after it was announced today he is stopping treatment for brain cancer. a statement from the mccain family reads in part, quote, john husband surpassed expectations for his survival, but the progress of the disease and the inexorable advance of age render their verdict. with his usual strength of will, he has now chosen to discontinue medical treatment. a war hero, a long time senator, and as he and his family face this difficult time partisan lines are falling away as his colleagues in congress send their thoughts. i want to play you more now from his speech last year when he accepted the liberty medal. >> i've had the good fortiune t spend 60 years in service to this land. i there are times the country would have benefitted from a
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little less of my help, but i tried to deserve the privilege as best i can. and i've been repaid a thousand times over with good adventures, good company and the satisfaction of serving something more important than myself, of being a big player in the extraordinary story of america. and i am so grateful. >> wonderful in so many ways to hear those words tonight. joining me now chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta and chief political analyst dana bash. what are you hearing from your sources about the senator? >> well, as you mentioned his family has said that he is no longer going to have medical treatment. that is under way, and has been at least all day. and what that means is they're trying to make him as comfortable as possible. look, it is no secret, and dr. gupta can tell you this and has since we broke the news on this very program a year ago july
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that senator mccain has this horrible, horrible brain cancer, that this would be the thing that finally catches up to him, finally reminds us all that john mccain who survived 5 1/2 years being tortured in isolation in a north vietnamese prison is a mere mortal. and it's hard for even those close to him to grapple with that. i talked to some of his colleagues today who like all of us who have known this day is coming, are finding it kind of shocking that the end appears to be near. >> list took his words from last fall you're reminded john mccain doesn't feel cheated. he feels so appreciative for the days he's had. what are the factors a patient takes into account when choosing to forego additional treatment?
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>> as dana mentioned, the conversations start, here are the treatment options, here are the likelihood of having some benefit from these treatment options and here's the toll those treatments are going to take on your body. and john, it's a constant balance after that. the decision at this point really comes down to are these treatments working, are they continuing to affect the tumor and actually shrink the tumor, and what is the toll that it's taking on my body? does the risk benefit still play out the are the benefits greater than the risks, and i think it's a discussion of probably some 13 months, but this is an inflection point where they say that's no longer the case. the benefits are no longer greater than the risks. >> some colleagues who have served with him for a very, very long time, what have you heard? >> yeah, what is remarkable about senator mccain is that he's a throwback to an era which
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seems like many, many moons ago but actually wasn't that long ago where there is is was genuine respect across the aisle. he is somebody who still, you know, up until the last year has taken under his democrats, taken them on world travels to places far flung to talk about america's place in the world, to teach them about how important it is to be a senator, to have checks and balances. so all of those relationships that he forged, particularly on those foreign trips, are still very real, very strong. and you mentioned the fact that he, you know, he always said, particularly in the past six months to a year, that people shouldn't feel sorry for him. boy does he mean it. he has lived every single day to its fullest. he fought hard. he loved hard, and still is
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doing all those things. and it is one of the things that makes john mccain somebody so unique in our time. and ultimately in american history. >> sanjay, without the treatment, how fast will the cancer progress? >> it's tough to say that. i started my neurosurgery training 25 years ago, john. the last quarter of a century following this. we haven't made a lot of progress in terms of survival with this particular tumor. glioblastoma, a tumor that originates in the brain. it depends how fast it grows. if it's not treated, it's certainly going to grow and eventually start to push on other areas of his brain. >> so, dan, i don't want to spend too much time talking about that because i'd much rather talk about the tributes that are pouring in. what have we heard from the
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white house? zip, nothing. >> nothing. and, look, i think this kind of speaks volumes about where we are in our times and, of course, in this relationship or lack thereof between the president and john mccain. and the upside, he didn't trash john mccain in his speech as he has done in recent campaign speeches talking about his health care vote. instead, maybe, i'll just talk about what john mccain wrote in his last book, whether we think each other right or wrong, we owe each other our respect as long as our character merits respect. >> i know the mccain family knows the entire nation is with them tonight. dana bash, sanjay gupta, thanks for being with us. check in with chris cuomo, see what he's working on for "cuomo prime time" in a few minutes, chris? >> who would have thought that the end of such a dramatic week, we would get the biggest piece of new information. the man at the center of the
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money for donald trump, the cfo of the trump organization, weisselberg, why was he given immunity? what does it mean? we have as our first guest tonight, john, an ethics lawyer who fought with the white house about disclosures who says he knew this day was coming. we'll take you through it. >> some said it would never happen. weisselberg would never talk. he's talking, chris cuomo, looking forward to that, appreciate it. hurricane lane is pounding hawaii's big island with you been relenting rain as the storm still churns the pacific. the latest on its projected path and the damage it's done so far. . with expedia's add-on advantage, booking a flight unlocks discounts on select hotels until the day you leave for your trip. add-on advantage. only when you book with expedia. add-on advantage. now t-mobile has unlimited for the rest of us. unlimited for you. for them. for all. get unlimited for as low at 30 bucks per line for four lines at t-mobile.
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hurricane lane is dumping just a ton of rain on parts of hawaii's big island, nearly three feet has fallen in one spot, causing serious flooding, landslides, road closures, it is now a category 1 storm. it is south of honolulu, heading
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north slowly. nick watt is on oahu joining me with the latest. how are things looking? >> reporter: well, john, here in oahu, the rain is just starting within the past five or ten minutes. we're expecting the storm to get here within a next few hours and dump a lot of rain. as you mentioned big island got hit hard, got hit first, catastrophic flooding down there, up to 40 inches of rain in places. that's 4-0 inches. now the ground is just saturated. anymore rain that falls is just a flash flood. now, some tourists down there had to be rescued from a rental home. further north in maui, the airport's still open but no flights going in or out. and wildfires in maui, we don't know how they started but we know for sure the winds generated by this hurricane have been pushing those flames. one of the fires jumped a highway, more than 100 homes were evacuated. we are now just waiting for this storm to really hit oahu.
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it's category 1, moving slower, which is a good thing, but it's also a bad thing. it's going to linger over places, dump a lot of water. if it dumps half as much here as it did on the big island, the mayor says major problems. >> you don't want it moving slowly. how unusual is it, nick, before hawaii to be dealing with hurricane threats? >> reporter: very unusual. i mean, the last direct hit hay had was in 1992, more than 25 years ago. so it is rare because normally these hurricanes, yeah, there are a lot of hurricanes in the pacific, but they track south of the hawaiian islands. the other thing is, you know, it's a big ocean and the hawaiian islands are a little speck. they don't often get hit. but this one, there was a fear that there was going to be a direct hit. but now they really think that within the next 12 hours or so the storm moving north is going to weaken and is going to get pushed out to the west. so we're not going to get a landfall of that center of the hurricane. but we are going to get wind. we are going to get rain.
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and here in honolulu, they're standing by, waiting to see just how bad it gets before the storm moves out to sea and away from the islands. john? >> hopefully it moves off before it hits. nick watt, thank you very much. don't forget, full circle, daily interactive on facebook, see it weeknights. the news continues. i'll hand it over to chris cuomo. i am chris cuomo, welcome to prime time. we have new information and a key player in the trump legal saga. after a week of legal pounding for the president, arguably the biggest news broke today. the man at the center of the trump organization's finances was granted immunity to work with the government. but what beans did he spill? we're joined by a man who predicted a week like this might come. the ethics watchdog who took on his