this is what the end result is. >> and ending and the beginning of retribution. >> where did it come from, the inspector general? what is his name? >> it came from the inspector general report. >> firing government watchdogs. >> the president doesn't really want to hear the truth. >> another friday night firing oaf one of the most important

u.s. attorneys in america. >> turning on opponents. >> i have absolutely no doubt that obama and biden were involved. >> with an attorney general willing to do his bidding. >> attorney general barr misrepresented the work of the special council. >> he believes that the president ought to be all powerful. tonight, a cnn special report. trump and the law, after impeachment. two recent bombshells have confirmed the attitude that trump has with the law. first, john bolton alleged in his new book that trump had a pattern of on just of justice as a way of life, and was willing to give personal favors to dictators he liked. >> the president wants to do

favors for turkey, the president of turkey. >> and then, just days after that revolution, trump and attorney general bill barr pull the trigger. >> president trump forcing out -- >> trump fired the well respected and u.s. attorney, the man leading the investigation in a turkish bank. that trump promise he would stop. the state-run bank pleaded not guilty to charges that helped iran evade u.s. sanctions. they have investigated a number of trump associates, michael cohen, and rudy giuliani. giuliani says he didn't know he was under investigation. >> the president doesn't like oversight. the president doesn't like the

southern district of new york. he runs rough shot of government because he doesn't trust it. unless it's his personal ininterests. >> this is bombshell after bombshell. >> the shocking memoir, the "the room where it happened," and a look at the boss, erratic and stunningly uninformed. and china and other matters and shoved aside law and national security in exchange for anything that might him politically. bolton said this. >> i don't think he is fit for office. i don't think he has the competence to finish the job. >> reporter: trump fired back on twitter saying the book is made up of lies and fake stories. the trump administration sue him to block the release. all of this after the senate acquitted senate trump and the

impeachment. >> this is what the end result is. >> bolton told martha raddatz -- >> he didn't learn lessons from it, other than he can get away from it. >> after the senate impeachment trial, the president declared -- >> i am actually the chief law enforcement officer of the country. >> reporter: not acting as if he is above the law as democrats asserted in the trial, but that he is the law. >> this is president trump totally unleashed after he got out of the impeachment trial. it tells us that he thinks he is king. that he can call all the shots at the justice department. >> reporter: and the chief law enforcement official of the land, attorney general bill

barr. >> he believes the president ought to be all powerful. >> under president george bush. >> bill barr believes the checks and balanced that have affected and limited other presidents shouldn't apply to his president donald trump. he is working hand in hand with donald trump to realize that goal. >> and those who had high hopes for barr said he is more focused on helps trump than justice. >> there is no collusion. no collusion. there's no collusion. >> as he said from the beginning, there was in fact no collusion. >> it started with the mueller report, led by former fbi director robert mueller. the special council indicted 34 people, including trump associates in the 22-month probe with alleged ties with the trump campaign and the russian government. before the report was released

to the public, barr misrepresented mueller's findings in a four-part summary. >> barr said as the president oven said, no obstruction, no collusion. what mueller said, i can't prove collusion and there was plenty of evidence of obstruction of justice. >> months passed before the public could read the report. >> that gave the president a report, weeks on of a false public unssing there was no obstruction and no collusion. >> reporter: the report concluded while the mueller team could not find prosecutable ever ens of conspiracy, there were evidence of ten instances of obstruction of justice. decidedly not the no collusion, no obstruction spin that barr

gave the public. >> attorney general barr is over the course of the president's term trying to undo major activities that the special council engaged in. >> reporter: a senior justice department national security lawyer under presidents george w. bush and barack obama. >> he has unwound substantial parts of that investigation, and it certainly seems his intent is try to unravel as much of that investigation as he can. >> a year later, a federal judge said that barr's handling of the report caused the court to seriously question whether attorney general barr made a calculated attempt to public discourse about the mueller port in favor of president trump. but even though that was not enough for trump. he sought to hit back harder, claiming the investigation

itself was politically motivated. >> i call it the witch hunt. it's all a big hoax. this is an attempted coup, a take a president. >> while the fbi made mistakes in the russia probe, it was legally justifies. >> that debunks one of the key conspiracies, there was a deep plot against him. >> but barr intervened again, rejecting key findings in the horowitz report saying the fbi launched an investigation on the thinnest of suspiciouses and barr had his own criminal inquiry. >> bill barr did not want to be stuck with the results of the ig investigation. so he created his own

investigation. >> around the time trump tweeted investigate the investigators. >> and that is one of the problems with the president's tweets. it looks like the attorney general is following the president's instructions. >> in april, barr said this on fox. >> there is something far for troubling here and we're going to get to the bottom of it. and if people broke the law, we can establish the evidence, they will be prosecuted. >> while we wait for the results, the fbi counterintelligence investigation, and the mueller probe did turn up massive russian interference in the u.s. election, and filed dozens of criminal charges. >> one of the great easteironie after complaining it was overshadowing his presidency, they keep talking about it. they expect bill barr will be able to deliver a report from

john durham some time before the election, and they believe this is one thing they can use to his advantage. >> barr did not respond to our request for an interview. coming up, barr intervened in the case of a trump ally, and ignited a firestorm. >> whams next is a revolt by the prosecutors. is mealtime a struggle?

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with progressive, not this luscious mane of mine. [ laughs ] jamie, do you know what a beard is?

emboldened after the senate acquitted president trump of abusive power and with a renewed sense of invincibility, president trump launched an attack to help an old friend. roger stone. >> roger stone, long time trump associate and adviser was taken into custody by the fbi. >> fbi! open the door!

>> stone had been arrested in connection with robert mueller's probe and to whether anyone with the trump campaign conspired with the russians who attempted to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. the special counsel alleged that stone was a conduit between the trump campaign and wikileaks which released russian hacked emails from the democratic national committee, involving hillary clinton. in june of this year, through the freedom of information act, cnn obtained a less redacted version of the report noting that former trump campaign chair paul manafort, former deputy chair rick gates, and former trump attorney michael cohen, all told investigators that in july 2016, roger stone told donald trump and others that wikileaks founder julian assange told him that the website would soon begin publishing damaging documents. >> that was a long time trump

ally faces criminal charges, prosecutors accuse roger stone of lying to protect the president. >> roger stone and donald trump have been friends or sometimes frenemies for essentially 40 years. roger stone was long an advocate of donald trump running for president. he briefly worked on trump's 2016 presidential bid before he was either fired or quit, depending on which of these men you ask. so they had a very up and down relationship. they've always reconciled. >> stone was convicted by a federal jury on witness tampering, obstruction and lying to coming. the jury found stone guilty of lying during his testimony to the house intelligence committee in 2017. to conceal his role in the trump campaign's efforts to learn about those hacked dnc emails. on february 10th of this year, federal prosecutors submitted their sentencing recommendation of seven to nine years in prison

for roger stone in line with federal sentencing guidelines. >> i remember being at roger stone sentencing, and being outside the courthouse and just waiting for the moment when the president was going to weigh in in real-time. it just felt inevitable. and then of course, the president weighed in on twitter. specifically on judge amy berman jackson, and calling into question her fairness, calling into question her credibility. essentially suggesting that she was out to get roger stone. >> an unprecedented action on the part of the executive who traditionally would keep his hands off. >> criticizing a federal judge in the midst of the sentencing of roger stone. a blatant attempt to interfere in the carriage of justice. a president just doesn't do that. >> one of the most damaging things the president has done has been to disparage and really

verbally attack individual judges. it undermines the rule of law because judges need to be independent. >> hours later, attorney general barr ignited a firestorm when justice officials intervene and overruled their own prosecutors. asking for a lighter sentence for stone. >> what happens next is a revolt by the prosecutors handling the roger stone case. they resign from the case. one of them resigns from the justice department entirely. >> barr's action prompted more than 2,000 former justice department officials to call for his resignation, including stewart gerson who served as an assistant attorney general under president george h.w. bush. >> the point was less to have the attorney general resign. that isn't going to happen. than it is to call attention to the breaches of normal procedure, the affront to the rule of law. >> it looked and felt to

everyone watching from the outside like this was the president's attorney general weighing in to help the president's friend. >> isn't your tweet political interference? >> no. not at all. he was treated very badly. i want to thank the justice department for seeing this horrible thing. i didn't speak to him, by the way. just so you understand. >> the justice department is saying there was no communication between the president, between the white house, and the justice department over this. >> under intense criticism, attorney general barr broke with the president slightly. >> you have public statements and tweets made about the department, about people in the department, our men and women here. about cases pend go in the department and about judges before whom we have cases, make it impossible for me to do my job. >> bill barr wants at least the public to think that he is doing

things based strictly on the law. in this case, it was clear that the president and the attorney general were on the same page here. they were on the same page about getting a lenient sentence for roger stone. >> swatting aside the request that the president stop tweeting about the matter, president trump claims he has the legal right to ask the justice department to intervene in a criminal case. and either way, barr was doing what the president wanted. helping his friend. one who could potentially damage the president himself. >> the attorney general is a man with incredible integrity. just so you understand. i chose not to be involved. i'm allowed to be totally involved. >> the president has said that article 2, the part of the constitution that conveys and describes executive power, gives him the ability to do, in his

own words, whatever he wants. the fact is this president has overreached. he has a very limited, if any, respect for the constitutional separation of powers. >> it is very damaging. i think as a people, we all have the idea that the president is not above the law. that no person is above the law but he is also echoing something the current attorney general bill barr has told him. and bill barr told him that first in a memo he wrote in june of 2018 before he was attorney general. and he specifically there talked about how the president is the executive branch. he necessarily has control over everything that goes on in the justice department, and he specifically said that the president has the power to effectively negate an investigation of anybody, or a case against anybody, even if it is involving himself. >> barr has politicized the department of justice in a way

that certainly without precedent since the nixon years and perhaps even before that. >> we don't cut them a break -- >> in congressional testimony on june 24th of this year, aaron zelinsky, a prosecutor in this case, described significant political pressure in the justice department. >> the department of justice treated roger stone differently from everyone else. i was repeatedly told the department actions were not based on the law or the facts but rather on political affiliations, mr. stone's political relationships and that the acting u.s. attorney was afraid of the president. >> in response the justice department stated, quote, he did not have any discussion with the attorney general, the u.s. attorney, or any other member of political leadership. mr. zelinsky's allegations are based on his own interpretation of events and hearsay. >> i want to address today's sentencing of a man, roger stone.

i want to see it play out to its fullest. roger has a very good chance of exoneration, in my opinion. >> even after stone's sentencing, the president did not relent and he targeted for criticism a private citizen who had served as a forewoman of the jury. >> it is my strong opinion the forewoman of the jury, the woman who was in charge of the jury, is totally tainted. when you take a look, how can you have a person like this? she was an anti-trump activist. >> the president, roger stone's allies, have again done an extraordinary thing which is to take aim at a specific member of the jury, the forewoman, to say she was tainted. this was an unfair process to suggest that somehow she was out to get president trump from the beginning. >> at a hearing in february, stone's attorneys argued for a new trial on the basis of social media posts by the jury forewoman. saying it showed that she was biased against stone.

stone's defenders went after her record of running for office as a democrat. a fact not challenged during jury questioning. as that hearing was proceeding, president trump lashed out again. >> he uses his twitter platform as a bludgeon against his political opponents, but then more concerning against individuals, and it is hard to see how that doesn't provide an intimidation to those individuals trying to carry out their lawful functions. >> in response, judge jackson issued a warning. any attempts to invade the privacy of the jurors or to harass and intimidate them is completely antithetical to our entire system of justice. >> the core of the problem lies with who is the president right now and what little regard that president has shown for the rule of law. >> the president by his actions is knocking the knees out from under these institutions that

have held up for hundreds of years. >> a president getting involved in a federal prosecution of a friend of his. unprecedented. attacking a jury foreperson. unprecedented. setting new standards that republicans would rightly criticize a democratic president. and yet silence from most republicans on capitol hill. coming up, president trump again testing the rule of law. this time over a case involving his former national security adviser, general flynn. >> the flynn case is a perfect example of barr's abuse of power. should i be getting excited? depends. are you gonna want faster speeds? i will. more reliability? oh, also yes. better response times? definitely. are you gonna be making sourdough bread? oh, is that 5g related? no, just like why is everyone making sourdough now...

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transfer your service online in a few easy steps. now that's simple, easy, awesome. transfer your service in minutes, making moving with xfinity a breeze. visit xfinity.com/moving today. general flynn was under enormous pressure. what they did to general flynn was a disgrace. >> it was an unusual case. >> they tormented him. they destroyed him. >> this is a case where the administration is quite frankly

attempting to substitute its own facts or nonfacts. >> a case that following the president's impeachment acquittal, critics say exposed the administration's renewed zeal to undermine the rule of law. intervene on behalf of friends and attack perceived enemies. >> the common thread is abuse of power. >> the president talking over and over again over for months about how illegitimate the prosecution and the investigation of michael flynn was. then we have the barr justice department moving to withdraw the case even though they already had a guilty plea. these were extraordinary moves by themselves. >> earlier this year in a stunning reversal, the darrel of justice you understand barr's leadership requested to drop its own prosecution case against michael flynn. flynn's legal troubles date back to phone calls he had with then

russia ambassador to the u.s., sergei kislyak. flynn asked kislyak to reciprocate moderately against sanctions imposed by the obama administration in response to russia's interference in the 2016 election. when fbi agents questioned flynn in early 2017, flynn lied, denying he discussed sanctions. trump fired flynn in february 2017 before fbi charges were filed for also lying to vice president pence and others in the white house about the cause. in december 2017, flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the fbi. in a statement at the time, flynn acknowledged that his actions were, quote, wrong. through my faith in god i am working to set things right. he said, quote, my guilty plea, an agreement to cooperate with the special counsel's office, reflect a decision i made in the best interests of my family and

of our country. i accept full responsibility for my actions. but the case took a turn in january of this year after flynn, facing possible jail time, told the court that he wanted to walk back his guilty plea. he now says he's innocent and alleges government, quote, vindictiveness and breach of the plea agreement. in february of this year, justice department prosecutors doubled down, and asked federal judge emmett sullivan to deny flynn's plea change request. they appeared to waiver on seeking a prison sentence. >> i really do believe -- >> come march, trump floated the idea of a presidential pardon saying, i am strongly considering a full pardon. in april, the president went after the fbi investigators. >> these were dirty filthy cops at the top of the fbi and they were dishonest people. >> then in may a bombshell that reverberated through the halls of justice and the white house.

the justice department is dropping its criminal case -- >> he was targeted by the obama administration and he was targeted in order to try to take down a president. >> michael flynn pled guilty not once but twice to the charges against him. i have never, ever seen a prosecutor intervene to dismiss a case after a defendant had pled guilty. i think it is very clear that attorney general barr is acting as an attorney who represents trump and not the interests of the american public. >> speaking to cbs news, barr said he followed the recommendations of outside federal prosecutor jeff jensen. in february, in another unusual step, barr had appointed jensen to review the department's case against flynn. >> he found some additional material and made a

recommendation that we dismiss the case, which i fully agreed with, as did the u.s. attorney in d.c. >> the government's motion to dismiss following jensen's recommendation, asserted the fbi had flynn and kislyak's fall transcripts so there was no need to interview flynn other than to elisse at this time very false statements, and there by criminalize him. the motion concludes that he quote pleaded guilty to making false statements that were not material to any investigation. minutes before jensen's findings became public, brandon van grak with drew from the case. in that same cbs interview, barr argued that filppula's statements to the fbi were not part of a, quote, legitimate investigation feeding trump's attempts to the russia mueller investigation. barr responded to criticism that

he is doing the president's bidding. >> i'm doing the law's bidding. i'm doing my duty you understand the law as i see it. >> some legal experts have questioned whether or not flynn should have been prosecuted for lying to the fbi to begin with. in 2017, the former fbi director james comey said in a closed door testimony, quote, i think there's an argument to be made that he lied. it is a close one. so it's not as if barr's take on this is out of the realm of debate but it is highly unusual, and indicative to why it is a problem for looking out for president's interests and not that of justice. we reached out to barr, the white house counsel, and private attorneys who have represented the president. all either declined to be interviewed or did not respond to our requests. >> at the very moment that flynn lied, it became material.

no one told him to lie. >> the question from there is did bill barr do this because of what the president wanted him to do or is this because of his pre-existing views of how these were handled. >> judge sullivan called on former judge john gleason to serve on a friends of the court and take an independent look at the justice department's dismissing its own case against flynn. he called it a gross abuse of prosecutorial power. in his analysis, gleason said, quote, they reveal an unconvincing effort to disguise as legitimate a decision to dismiss based solely on the fact that flynn is a political ally of president trump. gleason argued that he should be sentenced for lying, including for perjuring himself in court by admitting his crimes and then disavowing they will. just days later, flynn appealed to a higher court. >> breaking developments authorizing in the big back and

forth legal fight. >> in a surprise 2-1 decision, the appeals court panel ordered to drop the case against flynn. written by naomi rowe, a trump appointee, concluded they have the right to dismiss its open case even if the defendant pleaded guilty. >> what happened to general flynn should never happen again in our country. he was persecuted. >> the most depressing thing about this opinion is it continues the perception of the judiciary being politicized. if that is the message buried here, pass deeply unfortunate message. >> if under challenged, it is a maiming victory for flynn and puts it into a key stone chapter. when we return -- >> did i hear the word inspector general? really? where did he come from? what's his name? (vo) parents have a way of imagining the worst... ...especially when your easily distracted teenager has the car.

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is >> hello. i'm the inspector general.

ig is the only job truly independent and removed from politics. no one can stop us from doing the audits and investigations we think are necessary. >> two years after that video, steve and other inspectors general were fired or removed from their posts in a mass expulsion of administration watch dogs willing to criticize the president and his administration. >> acquitted of the charges in said articles. >> again, this all happened following the senate acquitting the president in those impeachment proceedings. >> we went through hell unfairly. did nothing wrong. >> a move that seemed to unleash the president even further. >> we are right now in the midst of one of the greatest purges of inspectors general in four decades. >> inspectors general or i.g.s are supposed to be nonpartisan watch dogs of their departments. but president trump seems to see them as either friend or foe. >> trump's dismissal of the intelligence community's

inspector general michael atkinson comes after he made very clear he was unhappy with how atkinson handled a whistleblower complaint. it dealt with ukraine and it eventually led to the president's impeachment. >> i thought did he a terrible job. he took this terrible, inaccurate whistleblower report, right? and he brought it to congress. >> in point of fact, atkinson had been following the law. notifying congress as he was required to do, and testifying honestly, which in this case meant unflatteringly about complaints about the president's behavior. >> i think this president, he doesn't like bad news. he doesn't like to be embarrassed. he doesn't really want to hear the truth, and we have seen that repeatedly. >> the coronavirus, which is you know, very well under control in our country. >> like in the case of the

acting inspector general at the health and human services department who issued a report, and her report said that we in fact were not properly stockpiled with protective equipment for health care workers. >> that report followed the same standards as a similar one about preparation for the ebola epidemic during the obama years. but when it was about trump era mistakes, it prompted a very different reaction. >> did i hear the word inspector general, really? it's wrong. and they'll talk to you about it. it's wrong. >> this is your own government. >> well, where did he come from? the inspector general? what's his name? >> independence -- >> not he but she. kristy grim was demoted out of her oversight position after publishing that coronavirus report. glenn fine was removed before he could even get to work overseeing $2 trillion in pandemic response funding. >> how does the american public

have confidence -- >> we have a lot of igs. when we have reports of bias and when we have different things coming in, i don't know fine. i don't think i ever met fine. i heard the name. i heard the name. i don't know where he is. maybe he was from clinton, okay? check that out. >> fine worked for clinton, bush, obama. >> our report made five recommendations -- >> and trump as an ig in multiple agencies. he was removed from his role as acting inspector general of the department of defense. the single largest u.s. government agency and replaced by a policy adviser from customs and border protection. >> the president has decided that had he will fire inspectors general and he has the ability to do so. but he has done so in a way where it really looks like he's

firing inspectors general who are investigating things the president doesn't like, the issue with firing the inspector general at the state department who had been looking into mike pompeo, a close ally of president trump for quite some time, certainly raised a number of red nags. >> oversight of the secretary of state might sound like business as usual, based on inspector general's job. >> preventing, detecting, waste, fraud and abuse and gross mismanagement. >> he told congress he had opened multiple investigations into pompeo. one involving his bypass in congress to sell arms to saudi arabia. another regarding reports that pompeo used a political appointee to run personal errands for his family. >> second pompeo was the i.g. -- >> when he was asked on fox if he was fired for investigating him, pompeo said this. >> it was investigating policies he didn't like. that's not the role of an inspector general. i recommended to the president that he terminate him. >> he is now the fifth, yes, the

fifth inspector general to be fired by president trump. from his or her post in the last few months. >> presidents reagan and george h.w. bush also stirred controversy when they tried to replace every inspector general at the start of their terms. president obama caught congressional ire when he removed an i.g. during an investigation of sacramento mayor kevin johnson, a vocal supporter of obama. >> an agency head or even a president who wants to fire an i.g. first has to explain why. >> but trump in some cases did not need to cite a reason for his actions. because many of his inspectors general were not presented to congress for constitutionally mandated vetting. they were, like so many trump

appointees, even those in important national and homeland security positions, acting officials. >> i like acting. because i can move so quickly. it gives me more flexibility. >> he recognized early on that he could control these acting officials more precisely, more deliberately, and with more political pressure, and that they would be more accountable to him and not accountable to congress. >> critics say more ig removals call into question one of his campaign promises. >> drain the swamp! >> the only people since this president took office in 2017, who are draining the swamp are the inspectors general. this president is not draining the swamp. >> a former inspector general told me simply, trump is, quote, sending a message to inspectors general, do your job at your peril. next -- >> we are in uncharted territory. >> the entire trump presidency has been an exercise in shredding the norms of how presidents behave. >> tech: every customer has their own safelite story.

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profound and everlasting gratitude to president trump. >> it was only two weeks after president trump had been acquitted of impeachment that he granted clemency to ex-illinois democratic governor and former celebrity apprentice contestant

rod lagoyavich and others. >> yes, i do have an absolute right to pardon myself but i'll never have to do it because i didn't do anything wrong. >> trump's action set off alarm bells, for using his presidential power, to his political advantage. and for bypassing traditional processes. >> he eliminated the role of the justice department office, that normally conducts a thorough review of whether or not a pardon is appropriate. >> what we've seen is, repeatedly, in a number of cases, that pardons are given because of your connection to the president. >> paul was convicted of federal tax fraud. but trump pardoned him after the pogue family donated at least $250,000 to trump 2020 political action committees and the republican national committee. his son ben, can be seen here socializing with donald trump jr. in august 2019. the same day polk made $40,000

in donations to various trump campaign groups, according to the federal election commission. in a statement to cnn, ben polk said the pardoned granted to his father was, quote, in recognition of his 30-year record of providing significant humanitarian aid to countries around the world. >> the controversies involving pardons in recent decades have all involved cases that have skirted the justice department. when george herbert walker bush pardoned the iran contra figures. when bill clinton pardoned his half brother in the fugitive mark rich. >> even conservatives say he has repeatedly pushed the limits of executive power and the constitution. >> we're living in a time of constitutional corruption. >> we have a chief executive, who denigrates the institutions he's supposed to lead. who fights every legal decision that doesn't go his way.

>> a chief executive, who is historically used the courts to fight his personal battles. to punish or intimidate perceived foes, who published facts and opinions, that he did not like. >> the story in "the new york times" is a total fake. it's a fake newspaper. and they write fake stories. >> trump has recently ramped up his attacks against news outlets from rhetoric to lawsuits. lawsuits that legal experts say have no merit. he sued "the new york times" and the "washington post" claiming op-eds they published were false and defamatory. ignoring that such pieces are protected by the first amendment of the constitution. and if your polling doesn't please him. >> brand new cnn poll. it shows a huge drop in the president's approval rating. >> you can expect a factually and legally baseless letter from the trump campaign. threatening another lawsuit. it's a case no reasonable attorney thinks they could win. but for trump, it seems it's as much about bullying as it is

about winning. often, trump goes so far as to falsely accuse others of criminality, where there is no evidence of it. whether falsely saying an msnbc host committed murder. or suggesting ted cruz's father played a role in the jfk assassination. and i should disclose here, that president trump has accused me, specifically, laughably, of illegally smearing him. no specifics, of course. just a general objection to coverage he does not like. and in an apparent attempt to win re-election this november, trump has made this vague allegation against his predecessor. >> you know what the crime is. the crime is very obvious, to everybody. >> the crime, according to trump, is an old, baseless, and vague conspiracy theory he has given new life with a new name. >> obama gate is -- it's essentially the president's belief that, even before he took office, obama administration officials were conspiring to try to undermine his presidency.

>> an inconvenient fact in all of this? the fbi did not even comment on the existence of the investigation in 2016. while, at the same time, it was openly discussing the investigation into hillary clinton. it, unquestionably, helped candidate trump and hurt her. undermining, significantly, any theory that obama was trying to prevent trump from becoming president. >> when it comes to his adversaries, the president almost always talks about the justice department not being hard enough. obama gate is the most recent example of this. the -- the conspiracy theory that joe biden and barack obama, somehow, oversaw a corrupt beginning of the russia investigation. >> it's treason. look. look. when i came out a long time ago, i said they've been spying on my campaign. >> there are serious questions about the justice department and fbi's investigation, including its use of warrants and its disclosure of information in the prosecution of michael flynn.

but as the president did in the ukraine scandal, he is now attempting to muddy the waters and cast this all as a grand conspiracy by barack obama and joe biden. >> it is unusual for the united states to have a -- a leader, who is constantly threatening to lock up his political opponents. >> so, crooked hillary -- crooked -- you should lock her up. >> that's more likely to be found in the venezuelas of this world. in -- in truly authoritarian governments. it's very disturbing. >> the entire trump presidency has been an exercise in shredding the norms of how presidents behave. >> now, the president, reading polls suggesting he will be defeated is claiming, with no evidence, that millions of ballots will be illegally cast. experts say this is false and unhinged. the attorney general is backing the president up. >> there's so many occasions for fraud there, that cannot be

policed. >> what might this mean for november? >> when he campaigned for president in 2016, trump said it is time to drain the swamp in washington, d.c. to make our government honest, once again. and he, constantly, tweets in all caps, law and order. and yet, the facts are the swamp is not drained. the government is even less honest. and president trump shows, not just disinterest but, sometimes, downright hostility towards structures of law and order. accountability, transparency, and perditions intended to curve abuse of his office. previous presidents have crossed lines. but the degree to which this president has attempted to weaponize the justice department. in the words of john bolton, quote, obstruction of justice, as a way of life, is shocking. founding father john adams, declared the united states a nation of laws, not of men.

long after trump has departed the white house, the precedent to invert adams' declaration will have been set. good evening, thanks for joining us. out of the 50 united states, tonight, coronavirus infections are dropping in just four of them. think about that for a minute. four months into the outbreak in this country. more than 126,000 lives lost. and there are only four states in the entire nation, the ones in green, where the infection rate is actually going down. in 31, the ones in orange and red, cases are rising and have now been rising for several weeks. 15 other states, the numbers are holding steady. the surge is happening in small states and large, red states and blue. though, mostly now in the south and west. it's not, as the president likes to say, because we're just so gosh darn good at testing. we represent so