good evening. the day began with the president of the united states declaring a national emernl si. the real emergency, sadly where we begin tonight, a mass casualty shooting at a factory outside chicago. it's the horrible things we have learned to expect. right now, five people we know have been killed as has the suspected gunman. sara sidner is on the screen. she joins us now. what's the latest, sara? >> reporter: we have been hearing about how this all went down around 1:24 here local time. they talk about the fact that a couple of officers got here quickly.

they engaged. they went into the area. they were shot. a few more showed up. in the end, five officers were hit with gunfire. what they noticed when they got into the building, into the manufacturing area, is that there were people who had been hit by gunfire. in the end, five victims have been killed in this particular mass shooting. we should mention the person who police say is responsible for it, as you mentioned, the shooter, killed. we have heard from police that they believe that he did work inside of the building, that he ended up doing the shooting spree. we have heard from a witness who was inside as well who said that he was using a gun, it seemed to have some dort of green laser on that particular weapon and that he was firing at everybody. there was terror. there was panic as this was going on inside of this manufacturing business. i want to give you a sense of where we are in the neighborhood. this is a hard-working blue collar neighborhood.

lots of families live around here. this isn't just an area for manufacturing. you have homes all around the perimeter as well. they were all in their homes. they saw and heard all of the emergency vehicles that showed up here. we did notice a chaplain walking around here. as you might imagine, police on edge. police terrified where they hear their fellow officers are being gunned down. a very, very active scene still happening now. we know that there will be more emergency vehicles. we have not yet seen what has happened to those or know any of the identity of those who were killed. we do know from police that there are numerous civilians who were also hit with gunfire who have been injured as well. >> do we know about the victims who are in the hospital? >> reporter: we know that at least four of them -- there are at least four. four are in an area hospital at this moment.

we have not been given more detail than that. just that there are numerous victims that have been shot, that did survive this at this point. all in all, in this area, a lot of surprise, a lot of people trying to figure out what went wrong. certainly, police engaged quickly. they took the brunt of what ended up happening. five of the officers injured. those who were killed inside of this building, many of them likely worked inside this building, according to one of the witnesses. and he said he did believe he could identify the shooter in all of this as well. >> sara sidner, appreciate it. we will monitor developments. news is still breaking. a filing from the russia special counsel signalled fresh trouble for roger stone. it has to do with stone's alleged contact with wikileaks. which published hacked e-mails

from the russians of the democrats. however, now for the first time, robert mueller is signaling he has evidence. shimon prokupecz joins us. what does this filing say? >> we are learning a different story from what roger stone has led us to believe and others have tried to say that there was no direct communication between roger stone and wikileaks. for the first time, the special counsel's office in a filing today said that they have evidence that roger stone was directly communicating -- they have communications with roger stone and wikileaks. obviously, this is the first time we're seeing this in the indictment they filed this. this is the first time in this case that we are hearing that they have actually been investigating this and have been looking at these direct communications. >> do we know what form those took?

and also, we should be clear. stone hasn't been charged with collusion or conspiracy. >> no, we don't know what form. what's interesting is that the special counsel's office says that they obtained this information -- they used search warrants against the case involving the russians who hacked into the dnc, the russians who hacked into the clinton e-mails. they did that investigation. as part of that indictment, they did all sorts of search warrants. they say they are common to the search warrants in the roger stone case. perhaps leaving clues that roger stone was part of the investigation into the russian hackers. he hasn't been charged with collusion. he is only charged -- or conspiracy under the law. he has been charged with lying to investigators about this investigation. it would assume at the least that this investigation of the hacked e-mails and whether there was collusion between the campaign and roger stone, it's

something that the special counsel's office undertook. it's an investigation that perhaps may still be ongoing. >> shimon, thanks. we also learned that sarah sanders has spoken with the special counsel's team. pamela brown joins us now. what do you know about this? >> this is a significant development that we didn't know about, even though sarah sanders was interviewed by robert mueller's team late last year. the white house had been keeping this under wraps. we learned from sarah sanders herself, in a statement exclusive to cnn, that she voluntarily sat down with robert mueller, and she says she did so at the urging of president trump. sarah sanders, of course, has been a key person in the white house from the very beginning. now she's press secretary. while we don't know the substance of what the interview was all about, it would make

sense that investigators want to know more about the crafting of the statements that she would make from the podium defending the president and the russia investigation. we have previously reported mueller's team is looking at the president and the obstruction of justice probe and whether he may have influenced anyone else to make false statements publically in an effort to inhibit the probe. of course, we know mueller's team has been interested in the air force one statement, the statement about the don junior trump tower meeting where sarah sanders said from the podium that the president merely weighed in. as any father would do. then we found out from the lawyers that, no, he directed the misleading statement. that's potentially one area of focus investigators wanted to ask her about. >> do we know why the white house didn't allow her to be interviewed immediately? >> that's one of the questions. i'm told by a source familiar with the matter that there was a lot of back and forth with the

white house special counsel emmitt flood, that the white house initially rejected the request, similar in the way they handled the john kelly -- the former chief of staff interview. this was a change from before. as you may recall, before, white house staffers were voluntarily being interviewed by robert mueller's staff. the white house wasn't standing in the way. in this case, there was a change. of course, there was concern about executive privilege and those conversations sarah sanders had with the president, whether they should be protected. we don't know if there were limitations. i can tell you in talking to sources, sarah sanders, before she would go up on the podium, she would talk to president trump. he was involved in what she said at that podium. then he would watch and they would talk about how she did at the podium. it would make sense that the investigators would want to interview her. the question is, were there guidelines, parameters, given the executive privilege concerns? >> interesting, pamela brown, appreciate it. with me now is preet bharara. who served as u.s. district

attorney for the new york until president trump fired him. what do you make on the roger stone news? over and over he denied direct contact with wikileaks. >> it's a significant development. we have seen roger stone make a statement, it turns out not to be true. he made the mistake of telling untrue statements to congress which has him in trouble. he has charged. what i think is interesting is that we're learning this bit of information about potentially direct contact between roger stone and wikileaks not from a criminal complaint, not from a criminal indictment, not from the guilty plea allocation of somebody who accepted responsibility. we hear it in a procedural filing in which the government is deciding to say to the court that, for interests of judicial efficiency, we think the russian hacker case is related sufficiently to the roger stone case that the same judge should preside over both. it's an odd way in which we find out this information. i think it brings us closer to the question of whether or not there was coordination, conspiracy between the campaign

and people who are operating at the russian government behest. >> this is beyond just lying to federal authorities. there's potential other kinds of legal exposure. right? >> yeah. precisely. the roger stone indictment is very serious, the one on the books. some people call it process crimes. i don't. i think they're serious crimes. if you are thinking about what the underlying issue is, of whether there was interference on the part of the russians and whether there was activity on the part of the trump campaign and knowledge on the part of the trump campaign that there was going to be coordination with respect to how this damaging information would be leaked out to inflict maximum damage on the clinton campaign and you have roger stone communicating not through intermediaries, but directly with wikileaks, that's a serious matter. >> it's also interesting looking at what we learned from the indictment three weeks ago, certainly it doesn't seem like that's everything there is to know.

there's still stuff out there. >> the one lesson we learned is notwithstanding people saying it's wrapping up, people forget every time you go and do something, like, you arrest somebody, they may flip. that will lead you down other paths. as we have seen, when you arrest someone and then you engage in searches, we have seen as this document makes clear the searches they did in connection with the russian officials led them to these communications that showed the government that roger stone was communicating directly with wikileaks. and what just happened a few weeks ago? roger stone was put under arrest. at the same time, a number of search warrants were executed on his properties and his devices. so, i imagine there's a massive exploitation going on now of those devices. you don't know what that will lead to. if you believe roger stone, which is a tall order, on some things he may tell the truth, but he says he never deleted anything.

there may be a treasure trove of information that may lead to more charges against roger stone, corroboration of evidence they have that they haven't thought was sufficient to bring against roger stone or other people. >> the news sarah sanders talked to mueller, what i find interesting is, she's in the room having discussions with the president about how to craft various messages. we know she has said things which are not true from the podium that the president probably -- the president has probably lied to her about or that she has been concocting lies with the president. >> all of that could be important. depending on what they're looking at. we don't know. depending on what interactions with the president they asked about and depending whether she thought she could assert executive privilege. it could be very informative. the fact that a principal like a president decides to lie to the press person or to say, will you lie for me, or decides to keep something from the press person, i have seen those happen in connection with cases we have brought against politicians in new york when i was u.s.

attorney. the fact that the spokesperson was either let in on a secret about telling a nontruth, or was not told information, that tells you something about the state of the mind of the principal. i imagine that's sort of the kind of thing they were looking at. the person who was in the ear of the president and whose ear the president is in on a regular basis, one of those people is the spokesperson. >> particularly on the crafting of the message on air force one, about don junior's involvement, the trump tower meeting, that -- people have raised that as a possible obstruction if he was intentionally trying to mislead. if she's in on the crafting of that, that could be significant. >> or, she was cut out of it. or she has some information about why it was true that the president decided to draft it on his own and why that was not the first message given out to the public and why there was dissembling about it. all of those things are relevant. i think it's only natural for prosecutors to talk to her. >> thanks very much.

just ahead, another stunning development from the special counsel. his sentencing recommendation for paul manafort. it's truly a page-turner, not in a good way for the president's former campaign chairman. 24.5, years they say he deserves. breaking news in the wake of the president's emergency border declaration today. the first legal attack on it. that, and a closer look at the remarkable way he unveiled it and pulled the rug out from under it in a sentence or two. td she's watching too, saying [indistinct conversation] [friend] i've never seen that before. ♪ ♪ i have... ♪ i have... ♪

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before prohibition took it all away. i promised our family i'd find your lost recipe. by tracing our history on ancestry, i found the one person who still had it. now, i'm brewing our legacy back to life. i'm david thieme, and this is my ancestry story. now with 100 million family trees, find your story. get started for free at ancestry.com. this next item was the top story until tonight's breaking news. it remains the only story that could leave a legacy for decades to come. this morning in a rambling and a surreal press event, the

president declared a national emergency to get billions more dollars for a border wall than congress approved in their bill to head off another government shutdown. many of the figures he cited were questionable or just bogus. beyond that, some of his words, not to mention the timing and staging of this undermine his case that this problem, which is truly a problem, is also a crisis demanding immediate, drastic and extra constitutional moves. because time is of the essence, he got right to it. >> we have a large team of very talented people in china. we have had a negotiation going on for about two days. >> so he didn't get right, right to it. a national emergency was the next thing he mentioned. >> the uk and the u.s., as you probably have been seeing and hearing, we're agreeing to go forward and preserve our trade agreement. >> all right. that wasn't it, either. he is going to get to it.

although, there was this. >> we have a lot of great announcements having to do with syria and our success with the eradication of the caliphate. >> remember, this is to announce a national emergency. keeping him honest, it took five minutes to even mention it. it doesn't scream urgency. nor do his remarks a short time later in which he literally described this emergency as a non-emergency, as something he decided to do for reasons of impatience, not necessity. that's what he said. >> everything else we have so much, as i said, i don't know what to do with it. we have so much money. on the wall, they skimped. so, i was successful in that sense. but i want to do it faster. i could do the wall over a longer period of time. i didn't need to do this. but i would rather do it much

faster. >> i didn't need to do this, he said. i would rather do it faster. keep in mind, is a little odd given how slowly he has done this. this urgency has now been two years, one 35-day shutdown, endless threats, five minutes of boasting this morning in the making. it happened despite facts from his own government departments that fail to show the human invasion from the south the president so often invokes in support of the wall. something the president was questioned at length about today by a number of reporters, including jim acosta. >> i wonder if you could comment on this disconnect that we seem to have in the country where you are presenting information about what's happening at the border, calling it an invasion, talking about women with duct tape over their mouths, and yet there's a lot of reporting out there, there's a lot of crime data out there, there's a lot of department of homeland security

data out there that shows border crossings at a near record low. >> that's because of us. >> undocumented immigrants committing crimes at lower levels. what do you say -- >> you don't really believe that. do you? do you believe that stat? >> your government stats are wrong? >> no, no, i use many stats. >> could you share those with us? >> you have stats that are worse than the ones i use. i use many stats. i also use homeland security. next question. >> many stats, better than the ones that reporter uses, bigger, harder to climb than mt. everest. which he said earlier this week. the president would not be pinned down. so much so that a legal website filed a freedom of information request regarding data used to justify the president's decision. there's that. we will see what comes. the president, not making a full

and factual case for his actions. there's a statement which could undermine the case. there's the tone of the whole thing. listen to this moment the president acknowledging the legal obstacles ahead. >> the order is signed. i will sign the final papers as soon as i get into the oval office. and we will have a national emergency. we will then be sued. they will sue us in the ninth circuit. even though it shouldn't be there. we will possibly get a bad ruling. then we will get another bad ruling. then we will end up in the supreme court. hopefully, we will get a fair shake and we will win in the supreme court just like the band. they sued us in the ninth circuit and we lost and we lost in the appellate division. we went to the supreme court and we won. >> kind of sing-songy. jim acosta tried to pin the president down on the facts. he joins us now. jim, the president certainly did not like being pressed by the facts today.

>> no. it was a truth emergency out there on the rose garden south lawn where the president was trying to make this case for a wall once again. you saw him trying to really present his own set of alternative facts. he was going against what the data has shown us for some time now. we have been presenting it over and over again on cnn. he can watch us and see it for himself. that border crossings are on a downward trend, undocumented immigrants commit crimes at a lower level than native-born americans. most illegal drugs go through legal ports of entry. those are all things that -- those are data points that he skews and warps and twists to try to get this point across that he thinks a wall needs to be built on the southern border. when you press him on that, you saw what happened, he went after us, called us names again.

my experience covering this president is that when he is calling us names, coming after us, that's when he knows the facts are not on his side and his back is against the wall. >> he is aware of the court challenges he could face. he sang about that or sing-songed about it. does the white house have a plan for that? >> they do have a plan for that. they say they have their attorneys on standby to deal with this and that they understand this onslaught is coming. there was one announced tonight by public citizen, the government watchdog. one of the things that is mentioned in the press release announcing this lawsuit -- it's on behalf of landowners on the border who object to the president using this national security. one of the things that's mentioned in this is the president saying, i didn't have to do it right now. this notion that he said earlier today that perhaps the only motivation that he has for declaring this national emergency is, he wants to speed things up. these lawsuits that we will see

coming out, the first one from public citizen, we will see more, are going to be using the president's own words against him. one can just imagine the face palms going on inside the offices of the justice department, the white house counsel's office today as they heard the president talk about this. clearly, he was not -- he was not on a teleprompter today. he was off-script, off the prompter. not dealing with reality. my guess is that there are plenty of officials in the administration who are wondering if they could have kept him on script, they might have had a better fighting chance. but, anderson, these lawsuits are coming. it's not going to be a pretty picture for the administration. >> amazingly, he is undercutting his own message. jim, thanks very much. we will talk to one of the landowners who filed suit. first, on capitol hill, reactions coming quickly. republicans, many who had been on record warning against emergency declaration, got on

board in favor of the president's decision. house democrats fired off a letter to the president demanding that the white house counsel and justice department officials answer questions in the coming days. joining us is california congressman ted lieu. thanks for being with us. what questions do you, does your committee, want answered, exactly? >> thank you. let me say, my heart goes out to first responders and victims of the mass shooting in illinois today. regarding your question, the judicial committee will do an investigation. the framers of the constitution are rolling in their graves right now. because they specifically gave the power of the pourse to the house of represents. there's no way they would allow the president to override that by declaring this fake national emergency. we will interview witnesses. we want to know what basis they have for the national emergency. what communications they have, we want to request documents. we believe the president and his staff are acting in violation of the constitution.

>> in terms of the president's comments that he, quote, didn't need do this, as you are well aware, the president frequently speaks off the cuff. how much weight can a comment like that hold in any kind of an investigation? >> one of the things that makes america great is that our courts as well as congress deals with facts and statements from the president are things they will consider. there's also a host of data that jim acosta alluded to that shows there's no national emergency. based on the trump administration's own data, they have said that border apprehensions have decreased 75% from 2000 to 2018. based on the fbi's data, violent crime and property crime are down. >> as of tonight, has the committee gotten any kind of response from the white house? >> not to my knowledge. the letter only went out today because he declared the national emergency today. i want to make an additional point. even if donald trump gets through the obstacle of the

courts, he still has to raid pots of money from certain accounts. the biggest is military construction that helps military families. i don't remember during the campaign that he said that the wall was going to be paid for by military families. it was going to be paid for by mexico. he has a big political problem. >> that's where some of the money would come from, military construction that's meant to help military families. >> that's correct. based on the republican reporting, there's military construction funds that are raided as well as funds that are for counter narcotics, which is really quite stupid. when you look at the data, according to department of homeland security, 80% to 90% of illegal drugs come through our legal ports of entry. the counter narcotics operations do the rest. so, to really take money from that is really not a wise thing when you are trying to build a wall. that will not help solve this problem. >> some republicans have said, just last night, that other presidents have declared

national emergencies for things that -- somebody used the example of a situation president obama declared a national emergency for in burundi. so, other presidents have done this. why is this any different? >> two reasons. one is, all the national emergencies, many of them dealt with a foreign issue. none of it was to construct a large construction project. second, congress just handed him a bill where we specifically rejected billions of dollars more for building the wall. i don't see how the courts are going to say that somehow congress intended through a national emergency statute to let him do this end-around the constitution. that's why i think it will fail. let's say he wins in court. at the most, what this is going do is give him a one-time shot of $6 billion to $7 billion. and then that's it. from now on, every single appropriations bill that congress writes, we will

prohibit him from using the money for the wall. he is never going to be able to build his $50 billion to $60 billion wall by doing it through this method. which is why he never declared a national emergency two years ago. >> it's interesting. so many republicans who went after president obama in the past for declaring a national emergency or doing something by executive order, they have reversed themselves and are allowing this president to do that. it's the same thing with the budget. they were very concerned about deficit spending. now there's record deficits. >> you have seen republicans engage in this pattern where they will say all sorts of things, telling the president not to do "x." then when the president takes action "x," they come around and support him. this is particularly when they know in their heart of hearts this is completely unconstitutional. it's weakening the power of congress. it's giving the president even more executive power. by the way, in two years, there's another election. we could get a democratic president.

if they want a democratic president to have all this power, then they will look at this day and rue their words. >> congress, thank you. we will return to breaking news. we will talk to one of the landowners who is part of the first lawsuit filed against the president's action. (woman) candace, two minutes. too late for lunch. starkist saves the day. sweet and spicy tuna in a pouch! smart choice, charlie. (charlie) no drain, no pain. just tear, eat... and go! try all of my tuna, salmon and chicken pouches.

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this didn't take long. the consumer advocacy group public citizen has filed a lawsuit against the president. it's filed on behalf of a environmental group in texas and three landowners who were told it would seek to build a border wall on their property this year. one landowner joins me on the phone. when were you approached? how did you learn they wanted to build the wall on your property? >> well, sometime in november, i got the first letter saying that they wanted to come into my property so they can do a survey and take some soil samples. i did not respond to that. sometime, i would say -- it was thanksgiving week, they came in and after they came in september, then they came in november. and said, well, you know, we want to come in and take -- do a survey and so forth.

i said, what's this for? they said, border wall infrastructure. they want to build the wall. i remember telling the lady, well, you know, a wall doesn't fit in the back of my home. these people basically at the end said, we're going to squeeze it in there. i said, i don't like the words on your contract. it was so broad. i was going to give them a signature to anything that was out there. >> right now, is there a barrier there at all? >> there is no barrier. >> the president says this is a national emergency. there's people streaming across the border. i assume if they want to put a wall up in your location, do you see people crossing from mexico through your property all the time? >> no. if i would see people crossing all over the place, i would not even let my grandkids out and play in the yard. >> have you ever seen people --

>> i have never seen anybody. >> how long have you lived there? >> 40-some years. >> you have lived 40-some years on this property on the border and where you are, you are never seen somebody cross your land illegally? >> i see border patrol walking back and forth. i have caught him in my surveillance cameras and stuff. have i ever caught illegals? not at all. >> you've never even seen them on security cameras? >> i got border patrol jumping my fences. but illegal immigrants? no. >> what's your message to president trump? >> my message is, i see no emergency. the only emergency that is out there is the man-made emergency created by someone at the white house because he wants to build the wall. he has instilled fear in the

people. he has based this fear on fake news and lies. they are overexaggerated lies. you can go -- come down the border and in our county, there's only one person that wants a wall here. he wants a free fence in the backyard, in back of his land. where i'm at, i'm going to lose my home. it will be built five feet from my home, and you need a 25-foot maintenance road in front of that. i might not have a home after this. >> if they were to build a wall it would be within five feet of your home? >> yes, sir. based on the maps they showed me. you think i was going to sign over something when i'm thinking, what am i going to do knowing that they haven't compensated people from ten years ago whose properties were taken over by the law.

>> i think a lot of people hearing this, again -- i want to reiterate. how far are you from the actual border? the border is five feet away from your house? >> i'm 200 feet from the river. >> and, honestly, in the 40-plus years you have lived there, you either with your own eyes or on your security cameras have not seen people crossing illegal in that area? >> i have not seen anything. if i would, i will tell you. i have a brother who works in law enforcement. i have a father had a just retired a couple of years ago. i could call very easily and say, hey, there's somebody trespassing. i have not done that. >> i'm sorry you are in the situation you are. we will follow it with you. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> by saying he didn't need do this when he declared a national emergency, trump may have given his critics ammunition.

joining me now, shan wu and kirsten powers and michael caputo. michael, what do you make -- you hear this woman who has lived there 40-some years may lose her home and hasn't seen the emergency that the president is talking about. >> i understand. all my life, we heard stories about highways being built and people losing their homes. eminent domain, it's something that bothers me. in areas where she is, perhaps there's not a problem at the border. in other areas, there's a large problem. that problem reaches up to where i live when the opioids are killing people, eight or nine over a weekend. i believe there's a crisis at the border. but in fact the president has broad powers under this state of emergency act where when congress passed it, they didn't force the president who invokes it to prove there's a state of emergency.

i think this is going to be a very interesting and probably necessary legal challenge. >> it's interesting. this woman lives there. she says she sees no crisis. she's lived there 40 years. the opioid epidemic, according to homeland security, the vast majority of opioids and heroin and fentanyl and other things comes through legal points of entry. >> her testimony seems devastating to me. if i was a lawyer on the other side, i would be talking settlement after listening to what she said. the problem for the president here, from a legal strategy point of view, michael is right. he can invoke the act. then the question turns to what does he need to do to prove he properly has invoked the act? there's no definition for national emergency. some of that might be common sense, because most people can agree when there's an emergency. perhaps the lawyers will be digging through legislative

history to look at what kind of debate went on to define that. the act does allow for congress to say, no, we disagree with the joint resolution. the president would probably veto that. now everything is teed up for the court battle. if i were the president's lawyers, i want it to be legal. i don't want any facts. i want to speed through on legal grounds. get to the d.c. circuit. get to the supreme court. on the other side, you want those facts. you think the president has no facts and, of course, facts will delay things. litigation takes time. it could take years if they go to trial. that's some of the strategy on both sides. >> how damaging do you think it was for the president to say that he didn't have to do this while making an announcement about a national emergency, which would seem to be the definition of something you have to do? >> yeah. that would undermine the idea it was a national emergency.

i don't know in terms of how that will affect him in the courts. jeffrey toobin was saying earlier today that he feels like he could possibly be successful. i think this is another example of donald trump just having no regard for the norms of society. yes, it's true that it hasn't been defined. partly because i think we operate on the assumption that people are really going to behave in good faith. the presidents we elect are going to follow basic norms. one would be not creating a manufactured crisis and declaring a national emergency. i think this is something that is really out of bounds, that today when he was pressed on where he gets his facts, he doesn't feel any need to provide that information. he invoked el paso as an example. and said, i asked people there what they thought if the wall helped. they said it did. all the statistics show the opposite. the republican mayor of el paso has said he needs to stop saying the things he is saying about el paso.

yet he continues with this. nobody is disputing the president of the united states has the authority to declare a national emergency. what people are disputing is that you can just make up a problem, have a policy disagreement, and not get the funding from congress and then declare a national emergency. whether it's legal or not, it's highly problematic. >> michael, if the next president comes around whenever and if that president is a democrat and declares climate change a national emergency and therefore wants to allocate military spending and spending from all sorts of regions, can you make argument they don't have the power to do that? >> i think we're going to test this in the courts. we have had almost 60 of these things since the act was passed and signed in 1976. i bet nobody among us and none of the viewers could think of

any of the other 55 of them. >> i can name a few of them. certainly, you can name some of them. iran/contra. >> we know george w. bush and barack obama have deployed the military to the border. we had governors who declared states of emergency on the border before. this has been done before. in the end, i guess it was robert jackson who talked about how the president draws his authority from where their agreement waxes and wanes from disjunction and conjunction with congress. they are at their maximum authority when they are in agreement. right now, the president is up against congress. at these weak points in a presidency when arguments in the courts -- we will find out what a state of emergency means. that will mean something in the future. >> do you think he can -- he would win down at the supreme court?

>> i think that is in doubt. if we're analyzing the supreme court from the point of view of their potential conservative politics, this is not a conservative issue. in my mind, his power. unlike some of the cultural issues that go on. i think there's going to be a lot of legal clues as to which way the different courts will go. there's a lot that will lead up to this. for example, right away someone could seek to have a preliminary injunction against it. that standard is a likelihood of success. potential likelihood of success. which way a court rules will give hints about which way this is going to go. there will be a lot of tests. this is going to be a firestorm to the white house adding to the legal troubles they have to defend against. this is not ending soon. there are multiple ways to attack his action legally. >> even if it doesn't pass the courts, there is political advantagein the move. he can say to his supporters, i went to the wall for this. i tried my hardest and the

courts stopped me. i did my best. >> yeah. i think that's something that frankly both the -- the bases of both parties want to see that. right from the leaders. they feel like they come -- they get elected and they start following the system and they don't fight for the things they say they're going to fight for. that will resonate with the base. the same way it would resonate with the democratic base when you're really fighting. the problem is, he doesn't have the facts on his side. >> thank you very much. right now, want to check on chris. >> i heard what you did there. tell his base i went to the wall on this. >> i'm glad you picked up on it. >> strong. i'm a student of your game. i'm a student of your game. we have jerry nadler here tonight. he is going to be leading the charge for the democrats against this emergency declaration.

i have to tell you, i'm not sure that the legal case is going to be that strong. here is why. yes, his six words today, he basically said, i didn't need do this. it's therefore not an emergency. it's never been tested. they never had one of these be tested. the way the law is written, it's all about allowing the president to do something and then give it right back to congress and let them deal with it. it's supposed to be a temporary thing. i think a court would construe this and see there's no permanent damage. i could be wrong. especially from what he said today. but it will be a great test for kavanaugh. this is a man who made his name with jurisprudence about separation of powers. boy, would he have a hard time not seeing this through that lens. we will take it to nadler, see what the strategy is. >> chris, a lot to look for 11 minutes from now. next, robert mueller's office making a recommendation

for how many prison time paul manafort deserves. it's in the double digits. the latest on that. also, the state department orders all non-emergency u.s. personnel to leave haiti after more than a week of violence. i spoke with an american living there. what he says about the situation on the ground coming up. each day justin chooses to walk. at work... and after work. he does it all with dr. scholl's. only dr. scholl's has massaging gel insoles that provide all-day comfort. to keep him feeling more energized. dr. scholl's. born to move. dad! hiding when i was supposed to be quitting. i thought, i should try something that works. i should try nicorette. nicorette mini relieves sudden cravings fast.

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we have more breaking news. special counsel robert mueller's office weighed in with a recommendation for how much time paul manafort should spend in prison for his conviction for financial crimes. the recommendation, 19 1/2 to 24 1/2 years. nearly a quarter century. evan perez joins us with the latest. did the special counsel make any additional sentencing recommendations beyond that? >> they did not. they said that the judge should follow what the recommendations are from the probation offices, is what the guidelines are for this type of crime. if you remember, a jury in virginia found paul manafort guilty of financial crimes. bank fraud, tax fraud. what the prosecutors said that in the end, manafort acted for more than a decade as if he were above the law and deprived the federal government of millions of dollars. they say these are serious crimes that paul manafort had a choice.

this is all obviously -- these are crimes that happened years ago. they continued into the time that he was leading the trump campaign. they said he had a choice to follow the law and he chose not to. >> manafort is 69 years old. was his age taken into account. >> they said you should not take into account that. for a man who is about to be 70 years old, this could be a life sentence. the last time we seen him in court the last couple of times, he did not look good. he has wheeled in. this is somebody who at the beginning of the case was coming in in suits. he does not look good. they say that there is a risk of recidivism if you take into account his age. >> the judge in the d.c. case, what did she say in terms of the importance of communications between manafort and the russian? kilimnick. >> here is the -- this is a separate case. it's in the district of columbia where paul manafort pleaded guilty. he was supposed to be cooperating with prosecutors.

the judge has found that paul manafort lied at least in three instances that the special counsel called him out for and blew up the plea deal. one of the things that -- there's time spent in the transcript of the hearing from a few days ago. there's a lot of discussion of of konstantin kilimnick. someone that paul manafort was in business with in ukraine. special counsel says that he is a russian spy. the defense says, well, you know, he provided information to the u.s. government through diplomats in kiev. they're trying to make him out to be as if he is a double agent. the judge says it doesn't matter. this goes to the heart of the investigation of the special counsel. she says that essentially, the importance is that he ties the russian government to the trump campaign. this is why lying about him is so key to this investigation. >> evan perez, appreciate it. back with shan wu. special counsel made it clear how important the interactions between manafort and the russian

is. it's a lot of time. >> it's a lot of time. they had two ways out of this after that conviction. the money here automatically ratchets up the high amounts following the recommendation. will be a life sentence for him. the age factor, as evan was pointing out, they think that doesn't matter. i agree with that. unlike with violent crime, age does not diminish the chances of recidivism. worse, he sounds like a recidivist. he continued to do improper things during the pendency of the case. they have only one option left. >> i talked with jeff toobin. he talked about how tough these five months have been on manafort. he looks like a man who will die behind bars. that's not taken into consideration? >> it's not. the judge here is free to consider his age. unlike with violent crime, the age won't necessarily -- the

statistics are violent crime as you get older, your chances of recidivism go down. the legal team doesn't have much to work with. they will make the sympathy arguments. i think the real fascinating question will be, what does manafort say to the judge? he will address the judge. will he try to signal something to the president to get that pardon? >> it's playing out in front of the backdrop of a possible pardon for manafort. that could come -- the president could do that at any time. >> yes. this president has shown he does not respect the normal process of vetting. it could come at any time. in some senses, if i was manafort's attorneys, going for that hail mary shot, i want the worst sentence possible. i want it to look terribly burdensome on him. and make him look as sympathetic as possible. >> thanks very much. before we go, a word on the deadly anti-government protests in haiti. for more than a week, protesters opposed to the president have set cars on fire, clashed with

police amid reports of looting. the united states issued a do not travel advisory. the state department ordered all non-essential personnel to leave. american citizen living in high haiti described what it's like there on the ground. >> what's been going on is that usually in the morning, you are able to get out, grocery stores will open for a couple of hours. folks have been able to go to grocery stores. the problem is here, water, gas, fuel, all those things are delivered by truck. there's been no deliveries of those things. in terms of physical safety of individuals, if you just stay at home and you don't go around and try to drive through roadblocks or participate in demonstrations, that's less of a concern. it's just people protesting out in the streets and kind of trying to block the streets to put pressure on the government

not to go after individuals. there's no one or two major leaders. people are putting pressure to see can something be done with the currency or subsidizing food prices. there's no one leader. >> in the capital, the pentagon sent ten marines to provide security at the american embassy. the news continues tonight. hand it over to chris. for cuomo "prime time". >> thank you. i am chris cuomo. welcome to "prime time." mueller drops another bomb on our watch. actually, two. how long manafort should go away and the proof they have to put stone away. we have the man leading the charge against the president's emergency declaration tonight. the chairman of the house judiciary committee is here. he is giving president trump one week to give him answers justifying the move. will he get them? did the president deliver a death blow to his own case for a border emergency? the six words that may come back to haunt.