♪ ♪ (clap, clap) olly.

good evening. in just a couple of days, 800,000 americans will face a friday without a check. millions more who rely on federal agencies and services or just the dollars spent will face the consequences. the stand offthat's driving it over the wall that president trump wants congress to pay for could drag on for another pay cycle, and another. just last night from the oval office, president trump said it didn't have to be this way. >> this situation could be solved in a 45-minute meeting. i have invited congressional leadership to the white house tomorrow to get this done. >> well, today, they have that meeting. and he walked out. >> he asked speaker pelosi, will you agree to my wall? she said, no. and he just got up and said, we

have nothing to discuss and just walked out. >> just left a meeting with chuck and nancy, the president tweeted. a waste of time. i asked, in 30 days, are you going to approve border security, nancy said no. i said bye-bye, nothing else works. actually, according to a congressional aide, before he walked out, there was this exchange with schumer. senator schumer allegedly said you are using people as leverage, why won't you open the government and stop hurting people. president trump then responded because then you won't give me what i want. chuck, as the president calls him, characterized the walkout as a temper tantrum. republicans who also spoke out disagreed with that assessment of it. whatever you want to call it, the president continues to portray his offer of a steel barrier as a concession to democrats, which whatever you may think of his position or

their position is, as a factual matter, it's not a concession. this isn't a debate over building materials. according to another republican lawmaker in the room, he did bring at least one thing to the negotiating table. >> we entered the room, the president again calling all the leaders together to solve this problem. even brought a little candy for everybody. >> candy. according to a source familiar and no, not kidding, it was butterfingers, baby ruths. also, m&ms. after the meeting, his surrogate offered the same lines. painting what's happening on the border as a crisis, in a way that doesn't quite fit the facts, suggesting that a wall would prevent opioids from coming in when according to customs and border patrol, most heroin is smuggled through legal points of entry and the most powerful, fentanyl, usually comes from china through the mail. the spin and the fact twisting you saw after that white house meeting was matched by similar stuff leading up to it including what the president said following his capitol hill meeting today with congressional republicans. >> the republican party i can say and i just left an hour

meeting. we had a great time, actually. there was no discussion about anything other than solidarity. we want national security and border security for our country. >> well, keeping them honest on the solidarity front, lisa murkowski said she spoke out at the meeting about the shutdown's impact. she, susan collins, and cory gardner favor reopening the government without a border deal and at least five house republicans have already voted with democrats on their legislation to reopen the government without wall funding. but the president continues to have considerable support within his own party. he continues to call it a crisis, though the actual numbers of people coming across illegally are significantly down from their high decades ago. if it's not a crisis, is it as the president has also called it, an emergency? he said it was the other day on the white house lawn and said this today. >> mr. president, what's your thinking on the national emergency?

>> because i think we might work a deal and if we don't, i may go that route. i have the right to do national emergency if i want. >> what's your threshold? >> my threshold will be if i can't make a deal with people that are unreasonable. >> webster's defines the word emergency as an unforeseen combination of circumstances or the resulting state that calls for immediate action or an urgent need for assistance or relief. you could argue there are a lot of people waiting in mexico who are in urgent need of assistance or relief. you could also say the same about the americans waiting for paychecks and the shutdown to end. but, keeping them honest. if it really is a true national security emergency, why would the president wait? and if he does wait for days or weeks or months, how would it be an emergency then? more now on where this stands right now, and where the president stands from kaitlyn collins at the white house. so what else are we learning about what happened in this meeting? because there's different points of view on it clearly here. >> there are. we know for sure that meeting was short. only about 14 or 15 minutes we are told by sources. it started out kind of on a lighter note.

the president in a good mood, passing out the candy. telling the lawmakers they had a copy of the latest budget request from the white house in front of them which laid out their immigration priorities, this, that they cobbled together over the weekend during negotiations with democrats, but things went downhill from there as the president and nancy pelosi were going back and forth most of the time. it wasn't all chuck schumer and nancy pelosi and the president. the it was mostly just the president and house speaker arguing about ports of entry, going back and forth. arguing about the democratic proposal, then they negotiate on dhs funding. something the white house has been opposed to because they feel they would lose their leverage if they do that, but it went back and forth and then the president stormed out of the room when democrats said they weren't going to give him any more money for his border wall. white house officials thought maybe privately they would come off it a little bit if the white house offered some concessions as well. that didn't happen, and the meeting ended with the president

telling them bye-bye. no other meetings scheduled right now. >> in terms of the president's address last night, did it accomplish what the president wanted it to? >> white house officials feel it went well because there weren't any mishaps. the president didn't stumble. that was a venue he had been uncomfortable with. he had not wanted to do many addresses from the resolute desk. but other than this, they thought it went fine. the president himself told news anchors according to the "new york times" that he didn't think the message last night was going to change any minds of his critics and it doesn't seem to be that way, which is the agreement that neither did the democratic rebuttal that followed the president. so neither of the measures seemed to move the goal posts here for these negotiations. the president also said he didn't think the trip to the border would really do that either. >> what more do we know about what he's going to do tomorrow at the border? >> here's what's interesting. he's going to a boarder patrol

station in mcallen, texas. he's traveling with the dhs secretary and customs and border protection commissioner, two people you'd expect him to go with, but one person that's unusual is the white house council. and sources have told cnn he's also going to be there, which it's not clear why, but we should note that one thing a white house official did tell me tonight is that declaring this a national emergency is still something on the table and of course that's something the white house counsel would be involved with. >> joining us now is congressman will heard, a republican from texas whose district includes a large stretch of the border. welcome back, congressman. on the shutdown, is there any end in sight to this? how does this get resolved in your opinion? >> i think it gets resolved with some rank and file members who understand this topic, who have trust amongst each other to try to negotiate or suggest an alternative plan. one of the problems that we have right now are that the leaders negotiating this lack trust amongst each other.

some have just met each other that are involved in these negotiations and that's unfortunate. i actually don't believe you should be negotiating on the backs of almost a million workers trying to do the right thing for the country. if this was a crisis, the people that are dealing with this crisis should get paid. so i hope that several of us can talk through some of these issues and suggest an alternative. >> you were on the border. your district is on the border. you know it firsthand. you see it firsthand whenever you're there. is there a national security crisis on the border as the president is saying? >> i will say this. there is 400,000 people that have come through this country illegally last year. there's about $67 billion of illegal drugs that come through our ports of entry and through our mail, as you alluded to in

the opening. this is an issue and a problem that has existed among multiple administrations, so it's a problem that has been here for a while. and because previous administrations and other congresses weren't able to put together a plan to actually get operational control of our border, we're in the situation that we're in right now. and -- >> you don't use the word crisis, though. just in terms of numbers of people being apprehended. it's record lows compared to what it was in the '70s and '80s and up to 2000. >> sure, from 2000 and 2017, there's been an 80% drop in the amount of apprehensions at the border, but is 400,000 still a high number? i think it is and this is something we should address. we should have operational control of our border. and you have thousands of people that are going on this perilous journey to come to our country.

fleeing violence and lack of economic opportunities. and so one of the solutions we should be working on, too, is how we work with our allies in the northern triangle, el salvador, honduras, and guatemala? so, shutting down usaid and not having funding for inl, these programs we're working on with them to address those causes is going to continue to exacerbate the problem that we have. and, you know, i think we've talked about this before, anderson. the only way you solve this problem, only way you make sure you have operational control of the border is to look at all 2,000 miles of the border at the same time. the only way to do that is with technology. the only way you stop the drugs coming in is to make sure the ports of entry have the technology you need. you need additional men and women in border patrol. but there's already 2,000 positions that are unfilled. why are they unfilled? because there's retention problems within border patrol.

so these are all the issues that need to be addressed. >> there's also hiring issues from what i understand with border patrol. it's a, you know, a rigorous standard. you've got to find people willing to live in some cases in remote areas for not a lot of pay. it is just, i can't remember the exact statistic, but the number of people that they actually have to kind of interview and go through the process to actually get one border patrol agent is high. >> it's incredibly high. i think the beginning, the first half of last year, i think it was only a net increase of about 126. that's a pretty low number. but again, you know, i've been involved, my first bill i got signed into law was something addressing border patrol pay. and because of people in the senior leadership in dhs in washington, d.c., they were going to cut the salary of what border patrol was going to make for the same amount of hours. that makes no sense. so we were able to fix that. so there were some internal issues.

that we make sure these men and women are doing things that you know, are being supported for their work. so, i have 820 miles of the border. 29 counties. two time zones. my district is larger than 26 states. roughly the size of georgia. i have 5 of the top 15 ports of entries within my district. and when i talk to, and four sectors. the border is broken up into sectors. when i talk to the men and women of board e patrol, i say okay, if you have $10 million, what would you do? and the first thing they say, put the telephone, the telecommunications infrastructure for my cell phone and push to talk radio to work. that's step one. excuse me. >> seems pretty basic. >> right. there are some basic needs that they have. they should get paid a little bit more. that's another thing. then to have the technology, we're not using the latest and greatest technology along the border, some of the stuff isn't on the border. some of the stuff requires a

phd in computer science to run. you don't have programs, you can do something like the complete the secure fence act. in 2006 and 2008, then-senator barack obama voted for it. hillary clinton voted for it. all the current leadership and the democrats voted for it. >> yeah. that's not even completed. >> exactly. so that's how you put a deal together in order to make sure we get the government back open and actually secure our border. >> congressman, appreciate your expertise on this. thanks very much. i want to get perspective from two individuals who have seen much of it from the west wing. paul begala, david gergen, who has served so many presidents over so many years, deserves a better title than cnn political analyst, but that's what he's

got. all shutdowns are contentious. are all shutdowns this contentious? >> no. no. once again, we're breaking new ground. republicans ought to appoint will heard as our lead negotiator. he makes more sense than almost anybody you hear because it's become such a charade. frankly, it's totally irresponsible for the white house to continue the charade when so many federal workers are about to lose their paychecks. and that sort of thing. i think it's very, very possible that the president set this meeting up today with the leadership of the congress in order to have a pr stunt. to walk out, stalk out. storm out. slamming the table. bye-bye. you know, setting himself up so he could claim the democrats are being completely unreasonable. and now i'm going to invoke the national emergency. >> paul, do you think the president is going to invoke a national emergency? and besides possibly ending up

in court, what do you think of it? >> i'm worried that he will. there is no emergency. i echo what david said. there's problems. issues. there's issues everywhere in america. i do think this was a stunt. this is a guy who in addition to being a real estate developer, was a reality tv star and last night's speech, it was low energy, low impact. didn't move any voters. it was lower ratings than nancy and chuck, who followed him. i think he wanted to have a stunt. the problem is, there's 800,000 people going without pay and then all of the ripple effect of that. and they could do this easily. this is an easy deal to make. just a few months ago the president could have had $25 billion for his border wall. if he would have agreed to the democrats' request to extend the path to citizenship for the dreamers. he agreed and by the time the senators got to the white house, 2.3 miles away from the capitol, he reneged. this is a completely self-generated shutdown by this president and he's just going to have to lose.

that's what is going to have to happen. he has to lose then we can try to get back the regular order. >> david, it's so interesting. you have the president early on in the intentionally televised meeting with chuck schumer and nancy pelosi in which he said he would take on the mantle of the shutdown. clearly, he has backed off that. he's realized that probably wasn't the best thing for him to say. what would you tell, given the fact you advised four presidents. what would you tell the president to do here, at least politically speaking, is declaring a national emergency actually the best option? does it give him an out? >> well, i think the president declaring a national emergency gives him an out with his base. it's terrible for the presidency. it raises all sorts of questions about whether he's grabbing power and whether he's showing his authoritarian tendencies. it's bad for the country. i think paul is right. it's not that hard to figure out

a negotiated settlement. i felt all along that the republicans ought to appoint three negotiators who are in power to speak for the president. and the democrats have three. put them together for a week and i think you'd have an answer. i think there are ways that -- >> isn't the president locked in -- >> the obama administration was locked in. >> isn't the president locked in because he campaigned on this big, beautiful concrete wall paid for by mexico. isn't that really the core issue? it's not so much about the needs on the border. it's more of a political thing, isn't it? from the president's perspective? >> it's mostly about avoiding embarrassment at this point. on his part. because he did paint himself into a corner and nancy pelosi outmaneuvered him in that televised session. he took the bait, put himself in the corner and now he's stuck. but that doesn't justify doing things which are not in the national interest. he's still the president.

not some political hack trying to figure out how the save his skin. there are bigger questions when you're the president. bigger responsibilities and frankly, he doesn't have the team in there that's willing to stand up to him and say, you cannot proceed on this path. let's find a way, put people back to work. for example, if he's saying i'm going to do a national emergency, i'll give it ten days. in the meantime, then he could say let's open the government. he doesn't need the leverage of keeping the government closed if he's got leverage coming out of the national emergency possibility. use that as your leverage and let people go back to work. >> paul? >> where i think this story is going is to mitch mcconnell. sources i talked to today said he didn't utter a word in that meeting. he sat in there while the speaker and president were going at it. he's the leader of the united states senate and he said nothing. he could end this. i'm old enough to remember the 1995 government shutdown which looked like it was newt versus bill. you know who ended it? bob dole.

he took the senate floor and used these three words. enough is enough. he became the adult in the room and put the country back on an even keel. >> that's a good point. it's also true that mitch mcconnell is a master negotiator. he's very, very good at coming up with clever solutions. >> we'll see. paul, david, thanks very much. just ahead, more on the president's clash with the new speaker of the house. or nancy, as he calls her, and what his walkout today says about his negotiating tactics. we'll be joined by michael dantonio, along with dana bash. later, rod rosenstein, his expected departure and where that might lead the justice department and the russia investigation. on the latest we're learning about paul manafort. mine, mine. it's not , and it always will be forever and ever. the rx 350l with 3 rows for up to 7 passengers.

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book things to do, tripadvisor. to severe plaque psoriasis get clearer. and stay clearer. most patients who saw 90% clearer skin at 28 weeks stayed clearer through 48 weeks. tremfya® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections. before treatment, your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis. tell your doctor if you have an infection or have symptoms such as: fever, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough. before starting tremfya® tell your doctor if you plan to or have recently received a vaccine. tremfya®. stay clearer. janssen can help you explore cost support options. the shutdown has brought out the fight in people on both sides. the bare knuckle brawl that president trump says he enjoys. the stakes involve 800,000 men and women. many doing vital jobs, none getting paid, which is more consequential than getting a good deal on concrete for a condo.

whether the president recognizes what's at stake is an open question. there's no question he recognizes a punch in the face when he takes one and this was. >> it is so sad that in a matter of hours, just a few days, many people, federal workers, will not be receiving their paychecks and what that means in their lives is tragic in terms of their credit rating, paying their mortgage, their rent, paying their car payment, their children's tuition, and the rest. the president seems to be insensitive to that. he thinks maybe they can ask their father for more money, but they can't. >> nancy pelosi. the question is, will the president's own tactics serve him well or poorly here. dana bush joins us. also michael dantonio, most recently co-author of "the shadow president." were your officials surprised today or was it expected this was just part of a show and this was what the president wanted to happen.

>> i think it's the latter. there is not much surprise left in the people who have now dealt with the president for the last two years and watched him longer than that. it's really interesting. you can probably speak to this better than i. just in talking to people who have known donald trump for a long time and worked with him in business, this is classic donald trump. to have a dramatic scene, to get up, to walk out. but what that usually ends up happening after that, is a deal. it usually is because they are close to a deal and that's the way you push it towards the end. somebody told me this is actually something that he saw george steinbrenner doing when he was negotiating for the yankees. it's not unusual in business. the difference between that kind of scenario and now is, they're nowhere near a deal and he's not talking to people who have any desire, impetus to give one inch on what he wants, which is the wall.

>> there's a huge difference between the deals that donald trump used to be involved with and deals involving national security and federal employees and hundreds of thousands of people. >> there absolutely is. i think in his past, the president actually lost a billion dollar deal on the upper west side when he made ed koch angry at him. and the mayor wasn't going to go along with this television city project that had real potential. he did this also with the united states football league where all the other owners wound up being really angry. because he pushed something beyond what was constructive. but as i've been watching this, i've been thinking about the fact that this is a man who has been having tantrums for 72 years. you know, and what nancy pelosi is doing is what a good mother does. she doesn't give in to the kid having a tantrum. chuck schumer may not have that

impulse because maybe he wasn't as active a parent as nancy pelosi has been. but the last thing you do is give a kid who's having a tantrum what he wants. i think this is perplexing the president. i think he's met his match in mrs. pelosi. >> is the president right in saying if he gives in to the democrats, he's going to lose republican support in the senate? >> there's mixed opinion on the answer to that. i've talked to people who are close to him today who argue, yes, that he's right. this is one thing he cannot give on. >> for his base. >> for his base. he cannot give on. they actually would abandon him if he gave on this. others say, no. i mean, it's the fifth avenue shooting somebody on fifth avenue theory. they're going stick with him as long as he gives a good argument and reason that they're going to believe what he says.

it's mixed. >> park avenue. >> thank you for that. i think probably any avenue. in midtown would be applicable. it doesn't matter what people are saying to him. it's what he believes and he is firmly confident that this is the right thing to do for him politically. and that's what a republican senator who was in the private meeting with him told me today. it's not that he is necessarily arguing that it's the right thing to do for national security, although he has said that. that he is in a good place politically and that is what is really rankling a lot of people and is also helping to entrench the democrats because they see that he believes this is a political imperative for him. >> by the way, you were right. it is fifth avenue, not park. >> there you go. >> you think actually gender has an issue here, is an issue in terms of his relationship with nancy pelosi. >> it absolutely is.

he's accustomed to pushing people around and he does try to push women around. but i think in this case, this is a very tough woman who has actual power and that's a little bit unnerving. in fact, i can't recall a time when the president as a business man ever actually dealt with a female executive who had her own source of power. her own position. so he's in what is for him uncharted emotional territory. and, you know, we have now been talking for three years, since he declared his candidacy, about the emotions and personality of this man who's now president. and that i think is really the lens through which we must regard him. he is, it's always about emotion and personality. >> michael d'antonio, dana, thank you very much. coming up, the man whose office manages the mueller investigation is on the way out. a source says rod rosenstein is

planning to leave after the new attorney general is confirmed. we'll have more on that, plus the new revelation that one senator calls the closest we've seen to collusion. next. what if my retirement plan is i don't want to retire? then let's not create a retirement plan. let's create a plan for what's next. i like that. get a plan that's right for you. td ameritrade. ♪ ultimate feast time it'sat red lobster.r own pick four of ten favorites to create the ultimate feast you've been dreaming of. like lobster mac & cheese. or tender snow crab. so hurry in before new create your own ultimate feast ends. the question isn't whether he should be impeached any more. he's the most corrupt president in american history. and we all know it. the question now is, how fast can we move past this president so we can build a more just and prosperous future? please, join the more than 6.5 million americans who are demanding action now. because there's nothing more powerful than the unified voice of the american people. together, we will make this happen.

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♪ ♪ (clap, clap) olly. with the president focused on the wall, it's been a while since he's talked about the mueller investigation. it may not be top of the list on his twitter feed, but the investigation continues with big news in the past two days. today, we learned rod rosenstein

is expected to leave the justice department soon after the new nominee is confirmed. a source says that rosenstein is not being forced out. this is on the heels of the other big development in the mueller investigation. the court filings showing that former trump campaign chair shared polling data with a russian-linked operative. tonight, we learned the intended recipients of the data were two ukrainian oligarchs who paid manafort for years and still owed him millions. manu caught up with mark warner today, who put it like this. >> this appears as the closest we've seen yet to real, live, actual collusion. clearly, manafort was trying to collude with russian agents. and the question is, what did the president know? what did trump know about this exchange of information? >> a short time before air, i spoke with senator warner about

what he said. senator, you said this is one of the most significant activities of the whole investigation. do you believe this is collusion? >> i believe that clearly paul manafort, trump's campaign chairman, shared confidential polling information with a known russian agent. and what we don't know is what did the russians do with this information? was this used by the russian services as they used their voter suppression activities over the internet? with the so-called internet research agency? was it directed at some of the efforts to suppress african-american votes? we don't have those answers, but we know that sharing confidential polling data with a russian, known russian spy, and someone connected to the spell jensen agencies, i don't know whether you call that collusion or what, but to me, that is

inappropriate and is one of the most significant items of this whole investigation. >> we've only gotten a peek of this. we don't know what else is in this document, but as of now, there's no evidence that the trump campaign itself or the president or the candidate knew what paul manafort was doing at the time. it's very possible that manafort was doing this for financial reasons, clearly. he's a guy who liked a lot of money. >> that is a legitimate question to ask. what did the president know? when did he know it? we've had this evidence throughout the whole trump campaign where donald trump refused to ever say a bad word about russia, about putin. we've seen now a series of meetings that took place between russian affiliated entities and trump officials, not just the campaign chair, but the president's son, the president's son-in-law. but those are questions that we

need to answer. hopefully mueller's got the answers, we continue to investigate as well. but the question, trump's campaign chairman, paul manafort, sharing confidential information with a russian agent, you know, i'm anxious to hear what trump has to say about this. i'm sure he'll conveniently forget, but only time will tell. with the mueller investigation, and hopefully the ongoing work we'll do as well. >> that's what's significant about that. trump's surrogates and the white house has long been saying all the things that paul manafort is accused of happened long before he had anything to do with the campaign. this occurred, if the reporting is accurate, while he was campaign chairman. >> absolutely and this, the way we got this information, remember, this came because the manafort lawyers made a mistake in not redacting certain informations in their filing last night. so clearly mueller has more information than anyone else. it's one of the reasons why he has to finish his job.

one of the reasons why i have real concerns about bill barr being the attorney general since he seemed to have lobbied for the job by showing he wants to undermine the special prosecutor and that he feels the president is not subject to the laws of the land. >> in speaking of william barr, senator graham said he got an assurance from barr that he would let the mueller investigation finish unimpeded. does that allay any of your concerns about him? >> absolutely not. >> just finally, the news that rod rosenstein intends to leave in the coming weeks, do you read anything into that other than there's likely to be a new attorney general and at some point, he'll want his own deputy? >> i don't know. i'm also hearing stories that rosenstein may continue until the mueller investigation is finished. so i'd like to hear from rod directly. i think it's important. i think he has been -- >> would you like to see him stay? >> i would like to see him stay to make sure that there is

someone who is vested in mueller finishing the job during, doing it independently and making sure the american people get the facts. >> senator, appreciate it. >> thank you. >> now, carl bernstein, john dean, and jeffrey toobin. jeff, on the rosenstein departure, do you read into that that it's a sign the mueller investigation is coming toward an end? >> not really. i think you have a bunch of factors involved. it's been two years. that's a normal course for a deputy attorney general. a new attorney general does pick his own deputy as bill barr will probably be the new attorney general and there is probably a factor that mueller is certainly closer to the end than the beginning. i don't believe the stories that he's just about to be done. but, you know, he could be done in six months. and i think the odds are even the trump administration would be reluctant to fire him at this point. we have the whole separate issue of disclosure of his report

which will be a whole separate controversy, but i think in terms of firing mueller, that risk is probably much diminished. >> the "washington post" tonight is reporting that the white house, the new white house counsel has recently hired 17 additional attorneys. apparently, basically gearing up for a battle over whether the executive privilege and whether some of the president's conversations will be able to be revealed to congress or in the mueller report. >> i think that's to be predicted. this president has tried to obstruct and impede and undermine this investigation at every turn. there may be some legitimate claims of executive privilege as well as i suspect many that are illegitimate. but they are gearing up to fight the mueller report. giuliani has made that very clear. there is no real cooperation by the white house and they want to suppress the findings of what

really has happened here. there's been an obstruction of justice. there's no question about that. no question about the president's involvement in that obstruction. one of the questions that mueller is trying to answer is whether that obstruction itself furthered the interest of the russians. the obstruction is not separate from the collusion question. but did the obstruction further putin's aims as well as what happened during the campaign? >> john, according to the "post," the white house strategy is to, i'm quoting, strongly assert the president's executive privilege to both congress and the special counsel. how firm is the ground on which they can make that argument? >> there's really more allure to executive privilege than law and it's more of a political struggle than an actual legal struggle. it's very remote for these to get their way to a courtroom, so what you have are really two bargaining bodies and they claim it. they may try to justify the claim.

but there's little that congress can do when the president really clamps down other than try to put political pressure on. the subpoena process is slow and cumbersome. so it if goes to that, that's why they may figure they need lawyers. they're going to deny a lot of stuff from the house and they'll be fighting a number of subpoenas. >> ultimately, this is likely to wind up in court. you know, whether, you have two issues. the investigations generally of the white house. and whether witnesses will be allowed to testify and documents will be produced, and then you have the mueller report itself. and giuliani has told me and others that they may assert that some of it may not be made public because of executive privilege. that dispute over whether the mueller report can be public may well wind up in court as well, so, yes, john is right that there's lore here, but it's also law that could wind up before

supreme court. >> this manafort, the lack of redaction which allowed us to learn about these allegations, the white house can say that this had nothing to do with the president. yes, this happened while manafort was campaign chairman. but the president didn't know about it. no one else knew about it. >> that's why we need the mueller report. we need to see how mueller has put these pieces together. we don't know yet what that polling data represented. we don't know as you suggested whether it was manafort trying to save himself from the hundreds of millions of dollars it looks like that he was in debt or whether this was an attempt to do russia's bidding either for his own financing or for the furtherance of the campaign. >> we also don't know what else is in the document. the failed redaction. >> so, as always, what we see is

that mueller has come up with the most enticing bits of information that made clear that donald trump and his campaign were pawns. including that donald trump were pawns, unwitting pawns, half witting pawns. that's going to be part of the mueller story. we know that, i think, from what lawyers dealing with mueller have told us. some things we hear from lawyers dealing with lawyers that are part of the joint defense agreement, with the white house is that these lawyers representing ohs in the case believe that trump has lied every step of the way. through this whole process and investigation. and that, too, goes to the question of obstruction. how does the obstruction fit with being a pawn? >> john, the argument made today by so many trump surrogates on this air and elsewhere, that all

of manafort's transgressions pre-dated the trump campaign. clearly just based on the little we learned yesterday, the mueller team has evidence to the contrary. >> that appears to be the case. not only for manafort, but apparently from gates. this information was turned over around the 16th of july, was it? anyway, they had a hard date on it and it was right in the middle of the campaign after he had emerged as the candidate for the gop. so i don't think that's going to work as a defense. >> having a technical problem. >> i want to add one thing. who was manafort's main client? it was this russian oligarch. what's happening right now is that the treasury department under secretary mnuchin is easing the sanctions on him. so putin has won.

i mean, this is the thing. it's not over. it's not over. it's that, you know, putin's control, or i don't know about control, but his influence in the trump administration continues to this day and you can just draw a line from manafort to the easing of the sanctions today. >> putin has destabilized and continues to destabilize the united states. we keep asking what the hell happened in helsinki. we still don't know. it's all part of the same story and you can't isolate the mueller investigation from what is happening in donald trump's inability to govern effectively and what we see happening in terms of the national emergency that is not the border, but rather is donald trump's conduct in the presidency. >> carl, john, thank you. sorry for the technical problem and mr. toobin. coming up, more on the shutdown's effect on people, and air traffic controllers who keep us safe. be right back.

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senator chuck schumer today accused president trump of using people as leverage in his words in the shutdown. ob speegs one thing is hard to dispute, there is a human cost, a large human cost to the standoff, and it goes beyond the government workers who were directly affected, whether it's families waiting for the fda or waiting for life saving medical supplies or the millions of people who fly every day. we have a look at a husband and wife who both work as air traffic controllers. >> okay, give me a kiss. >> these days, family is the only thing mark schneider can count on. the 48-year-old air traffic controller is working. from indianapolis. he's considered an essential employee but he isn't getting paid because of the government shutdown. >> i'm being paid on an iou. >> an iou he hopes the government will make good on. >> >> when president trump says that many people who aren't

getting paychecks, quote, agree 100% with what he's doing, don't and are fans of what he's doing. don't count mark in. >> i don't know many of those people. i assume that he's getting his data from somewhere. i don't know many of those people that are big fans of not getting paid. >> when asked if he considers a safe border, his safety net as the president has suggested for these unpaid workers? >> i can't spend border security if that's what you're asking me. border security isn't going to pay my mortgage next month. it's not an immediate need for me right now. i would prefer to be able to pay my bills to take care of my family. >> none of this is good for mark's family, and it could be down right dangerous for airline passengers. >> reporter: the system is already stressed. the number of air traffic controllers is at a 30-year low, and many of them are working six days a week and ten-hour shifts. also, about 2,000 of them are eligible for retirement.

if they retire early because of this shutdown, there could be massive delays nationwide. >> delays and distractions. mark is worried about passenger safety and how his fellow air traffic controllers will handle the stress of not getting paid. >> the last thing i want is my air traffic controller worrying about where his next check is coming from. >> at mark's house the shutdown hit twice as hard. his wife isn't getting paid either. >> you and where are wife are both air traffic controllers. how did it feel to lose both of your paychecks like that? >> it was terrifying. i don't have a plan b. i have my savings account, and then after that i have no idea what we're going to do. >> congress is still getting paid, and you're not. is that okay with you? >> why am i different? what's less valuable about my job? what's less valuable about a tsa employee? what's less valuable about a park ranger? where's the difference? why are my bills less important? >> mark was last paid two weeks ago. if he doesn't get a paycheck

this friday due to the shutdown, it will be the first check he's missed as a federal employee. he has some savings, but can't hang on more than a month or so. >> am i upset about it? absolutely. do i think it's right? it's not. it's not. someone should be paid for the work they do. period. that's what our country has always stood behind, a day's wages for a day's work. >> randi kaye, cnn indianapolis. >> let's check in with chris cuomo, and see what he's working on. for cuomo "prime time". >> the president officially owned the shutdown with what he did today and what he said about why he was doing it. not going to end the shutdown because i won't get what i want. he has chosen the wall over the workers like the one you just featured there. so tonight we have a man who was in the room where it happened, we have majority leader steny hoyer. what really happened? what does it really mean? what are the realities going forward, and then we're going to turn and look at the mueller situation and what is the exposure here?

is it really just about manafort and what happened before he worked with this campaign, or does it lead somewhere far more troubling? >> chris, we'll join you in about five minutes from now. see you then. coming up, everybody's talking about the wall, but not everybody wants to hear about it including the army chief of staff. what that's all about next. -omar, look. [ thunder rumbles ] omar, check this out. uh, yeah, i was calling to see if you do laser hair removal. for men. notice that my hips are off the ground. [ engine revving ] and then, i'm gonna pike my hips back into downward dog. [ rhythmic tapping ] hey, the rain stopped. -a bad day on the road still beats a good one off it. -tell me about that dental procedure again! -i can still taste it in my mouth! -progressive helps keep you out there.

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not everyone in washington wants to talk about the wall or to hear about it. the army chief of staff, future chair of the joint chiefs was at senator jim inhofe's office. the senator is the chairman of the armed services committee. when general millie left his office, reporters tried to ask him questions about the wall. here's how that went. >> any opinion about the military building the wall? >> i have no opinion about anything. >> do you know how long it might take? >> sir, do you know how long it might take the military to build a wall at the southern border? >> this comes as there is concern by members of the military that the president is making the military part of his re-election campaign by bringing a political agenda to military audiences or maybe general milley wanted to talk about

sports. i want to hand it over to chris. cuomo "prime time" starts now. thank you, anderson. i am chris cuomo. welcome to prime time. i won't end the shutdown if i don't get what i want. just like that, the president of the united states has chosen his wall over hundreds of thousands of workers. we're going to go one on one with a lawmaker who was at that tense meeting today, house majority leader steny hoyer. so the question becomes was the walkout all for show just like the wall the president promised you in the first place? what's the truth? the truth is he's been moving away from it as the facts have been broken down. the farce. i'm going to show you how. and it is the most proof we've seen yet that mueller has evidence of possible collusion between the trump campaign and russia. does this go beyond paul manafort? what do you say? let's get after it.