klondike could not have picked a worse time to announce the end of an ice cream treat. choco taco is no more. klondike did say they're working hard to bring it back to ice cream trucks in the coming years. the news continues. let's turn it over to laura. >> is there a burrito coming at some point? if the push pop goes, i'm out of here. thanks, anderson. everyone, i'm laura coates.

the committee may be flexing its oversight power to illuminate what happened on january 6th. but the d.o.j. is apparently investigating the president himself. key aides to mike pence and his lead counsel have already testified in front of a federal grand jury. pretty high up. they asked hours and hours of detailed questions about meetings that trump himself led, one that was described to the january 6th committee. remember this? >> mr. eastman came in.

he said i'm here to request that you reject the electorate. i said we would lose 9-0 in the supreme court, wouldn't we? he started, well, i think you would only lose 7-2 and after further discussion acknowledged, yeah, you're right, we would lose 9-0. >> 6-2, 6-1, half dozen of another. as for jacob's credibility, keep in mind his version of events was already shown in front of a federal judge and that judge's conclusions, it is, quote, more likely than not that president trump corruptly attempted to obstruct the joint session of congress on january 6, 2021. the post reporting seems to indicate this goes beyond witness testimony, that the dodge back in april, i might add, received phone records of

key trump officials, including former chief of staff mark meadows. and cnn's own reporting is that the department has subpoenaed documents from state lawmakers in arizona and georgia involving a plan to submit fake pro-trump electors. in the words of a pro-trump lawyer, quote, we would just be sending in fake electoral votes that someone in congress can make an objection when they start counting votes and start arguing that the fake votes should be counted. now, a follow-up e-mail suggests alternative votes sound better than saying fake votes. now, where have we heard that alternative sounds better than fake before? i'm racking my brain to remember when that might have been. hmm. the timing of all this reporting comes as we see merrick garland doing what he doesn't often do as attorney general, sitting down with a network television

journalist on camera. >> we pursue justice without fear or favor. we intend to hold everyone, anyone who is criminally responsible for events surrounding january 6, for any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another accountable. that's what we do. we don't pay any attention to other issues with respect to that. >> reporter: so if donald trump were to become a candidate for president again, that would not change your schedule or how you move forward or don't move forward? i'll say again that we will hold accountable anyone who is criminally responsible for attempting to interfere with the transfer -- legitimate, lawful transfer of power from one administration to the next. >> he'll get tired of saying just that. those questions are going to keep coming to him. my guests tonight know the

players and they certainly know the stakes. i'm glad to have you all here today. merrick garland's probably going to get tired of having to answer that very question. basically he was like i said what i said, i'll say it louder again. it's weird for him to have that tone but it displays he keeps getting the same question. do you intend to hold trump accountable? these questions are coming. what goes through your mind? is it too singular and myopic a focus? will it harm politically speaking other aspects? what are your thoughts? >> i think he has to decide if he wants to say something more specific or say nothing at all. the usual reasons for giving nothing about the investigation don't really apply here. everybody knows what the issues are. he's not tipping off anybody. he certainly doesn't have to say

we're going to indict him but he could certainly have said what we just learned today, of course we're looking at trump's behavior and asking questions about him. today's reporting was the first time we heard even questions being asked about him. >> as much as the attorney is trying to be general about what he's saying, he has tipped his hand. just before that interview he said "this is the moegs important investigation in justice department history." it's not the most important investigation if you're looking at peter navarro or a low-level aide. it it's the most important one if -- we may not know the sphinx's answers but we know the questions he's asking and we are within feet of the ex-president of the united states, the people who sat feet away from imhad, the phones that were feet away from him, they are zeroing in on

the ex-president. >> what is the analogy? i want to go into great detail. i'm visual. i'm thinking why is he a sphinx in washington, d.c.? >> everyone is trying to guess what merrick garland is doing. there's something very fascinating about this to me. before he ran for president, he was basically under investigation given what was happening with russia. once he became president he was investigated over russia and the ukraine call. after his election he was investigated for january 6th and is now. this is a man who is per pechually under investigation but this one looks like it's getting close to the ex-president than any of those ever did. >> yet he's teflon don, right? all those things happened before and he got millions and millions and millions of votes. you have to wonder, does any of

this get through? you know this very well. is any of this you think resonating with people in way in a i guess the committee maybe hopes it will? >> i think it is. i think the hearings have have been very effective and very methodical and they're hearing from republicans themselves. these are people who were there until the very end in the trump administration, who were loyalists and did their jobs diligently. i think that is resonating when they come forward and say this is what donald trump did this day, these are the facts, what we lived and it's firsthand testimony. i don't think you can skirt around that. trump went out of his way to politicize the department of justice, the fbi, intelligence community. i've got to give some credit to garland here where he does have to be very careful with this investigation and methodcall that we traditionally always wanted to expect from the

department of justice. especially in the united states. >> i want to play for you what he had to say about the reason things are being closer to the vest. i mean, the committee is very public and the court of public opinion wants everything on the table every why. here he is. >> we've been moving urgently since the very beginning. we have a huge number of prosecutors working in these cases. it is inevitable there will be speculation about what we are doing, who we are investigating, what our theories are. the reason there is this speculation and uncertainty is a fundamental tenet of what we does as prosecutors and investigators is to do is outside of the public eye. >> of course that's true. olivia, you know short and jacobs. tell me what they're testifying to in that grand jury.

>> what the president was trying to do, what eastman was trying to do, what greg jacob and i worked very closely together, he is man of integrity and he believes very much so in the rule of law and this country. so i have no doubt that they talked about the amount of pressure placed on the pence team and on mike pence himself. >> why haven't we heard, though, from mike pence? i know all the people who are sort of in the line. help people understand. why not the proverbial? why not that person? >> i think there are two issues. politically, which i'm not the expert on, he probably does not want to go on record. >> no witness wants to go on record. we don't care about that in d.o.j. >> well, d.o.j. is going to be slightly concerned with what is his status at this point. he would be tremendously valuable but they are getting all that information from the people near to him. as a prosecutor, i think he'd have to make decisions about

pence first, and if i was his lawyer, i would be looking to make sure i had guarantees that you weren't looking at him as a target or a subject. so that may cause some delays in terms of getting him in front of the grand jury. >> i'm going to give a harsher assessment. it ultimately comes down to a lack of courage. this was the one issue following through on the law was the one place we've given pence any credit for showing back bone in this administration. otherwise, it means in the oval office he would stand there and smile and nod, even when the president wanted to do illegal things. he was there when trump would say things like i want to get rid of the judges. and that was the same mike pence who would stan and nod his head. i'm not expecting pence to stand up any further than he has. i do think he did the right thing that day. i don't think that makes him a super hero. >> we'll see what he'll do. we don't know what has been

asked of him on that day. but i am like you. i seem to hold my designation of h heroism much closer to the vest. consistency over time has a big part in it. the january 6th committee might not have any more hearings planned until september but that does not stop them from releasing more eye-opening testimony. this time donald trump's acting defense chief testifies just how many troops he was told to have ready on january 6th. and could trump's hold oaf the gop be slipping? a new cnn poll suggests more republicans think it's time to maybe find someone else.

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the january 6 select committee put out brand new video, showing trump's active defense secretary denying they were ordered to have troops ready to protect the capitol. >> i just want to make clear here that since then in february 2021, mark meadows said on fox news that, quote, even in january that was a given, as many as 10,000 national guard troops were told to be on the ready by the secretary of defense. is there any accuracy to that statement? >> not from my perspective. i was never given any direction or order for any plans of that nation. >> never given any direction or order. that's testimony given under oath, as opposed to this moment. >> i definitely gave the number of 10,000 national guardsmen. i think up should have 10,000 of

the national guard ready. they took that number from what i understand, they gave it to the people of capitol, which is controlled by pelosi and i heard they rejected it they didn't think it would look good. >> hmm, gave that number to the people at the capitol. i may need more specifics there. i'm concerned by alex burns from the "new york times." i'm glad to have you all here. first of all, we were told no more hearings until september. you're all waiting and cannot wait, i understand. for every statement that might come out, i'm just going to leave this right here for you at the table. what do you make of this decision to do that? was it trying to undercut the perspective notion that trump could have a leg to stand on in the public eye? what's this about? >> the committee has been very deliberate all the way through

putting out information and denying donald trump a clear lane to make his own case at any point ever. this is not necessarily the thinking of the committee but i think it sure works out pfor thm politically that as donald trump is coming out with speeches of america first agenda, there is another drop of evidence. >> you don't necessarily know what's out there. if you're, or others, there are others that might have little tidbits, bread crumbs spread out among whatever trail they want to have. if the end game is accountability, the big umbrella of accountability, i so often have people say, you know, if you prosecute a former president, it's going to really divide the nation. let's just move on and beyond even knowing the truth. i wonder, do you really think

that prosecuting or holding accountable in some way, shape or form somebody who might be engaged in this behavior, is that going to divide our nation irrevocably or is the absence of doing that the problem? >> i'm going to say two things on that and i hope alex and olivia hit me on both sides. i think it would be both cathartic and potentially violence. americans want to know no one is above the law. the committee i think has already shown that laws were broken here. they've made a damn good case and they're not even the prosecutors. they're not the justice department. they're a congressional committee that doesn't have the ability to do this prosecution. but i think they've made a really compelling case here that laws were broken, especially that key law, disrupting a proceeding of congress. so it cathartic to the american people to not that not even a president is above the law. at the same time i highlight violence very warily because one

trump if he's prosecuted and convicted or exonerated, people in the law enforcement community have told me those situations could both end violently, that trump supporters if convicted could be out there conducting acts of violence and if he's exonerated, i think you could see riots in this country. it's definitely a dangerous situation but not a reason to not go forward with a law. >> to my own point, i've had these conversations in national security circles where there is concern that would a prosecution or holding them accountable in that way, would it lead to violence, would it lead to more the civil war direction that we're heading in that everyone is concerned about in the country. my argument on that isn't aren't we already on the brink of that? we're kind of already there. if you decide we're going to be nation that's not going to uphold the rule of law, also, what are we saying internationally to the world, and to international partners, that the rule of law no longer matters, that wealth and power

can undermine the rule of law. is that the precedent we want to set based on the fact that we fear violence. we already have violence right now. we're already experiencing that. there's great concern about political violence in upcoming elections because of how divided we are and a lot of it because of donald trump's rhetoric and the emboldening he's done with these extreme groups. >> it's such a bizarre american perspective that you can't prosecute somebody who used to run your government or the country will fall apart. happens in other places in thele world all the time. they've indicted former presidents and prime ministers of countries like france, brazil. i'm not saying it would be easy for them but it is the legacy of watergate and the pardon of richard nixon. the on way you turn the page is not hold the person in charge accountable. i think it's a really change, counteramerica exceptionalism. >> speaking of turning the page,

vice president mike pence was speaking today and wanted to turn the page. he had an interesting statement on how he and trump are not so different on the policy front, just on the focus. >> i don't know that the president and i differ on issues. but we may differ on focus. i truly do believe that elections are about the future and it is absolutely essential a the a time when so many americans are hurting, so many families are struggling that we don't give way to the temptation to look back. >> what a very nice way of saying please stop talking about what happened in the past. that's what he's going at, right? not saying as many words but am i just giving him too much credit? alex is like no. >> they do disagree on the hanging mike pence issue. that's a place where they do not have the same agenda. >> they are not in agreement that should happen, you are correct.

that's right. >> but one of the main challenges here for mike pence is the question of how do you parse threw a relationship with donald trump and the old trump administration. but mike pence is saying don't talk about the past, you talk about the future. mike pence's past as vice president is the only reason he's seen as a serious candidate for president in 2024. he's not an ideological visionary for the party, not seen as one of the big ideas people, electrifying, charismatic, new guard laeeader of the republican party. he's a stalwart member of the party in good standing for a very long time. if you can't tell a story about that phase in your career and then spinning it forward with a set of new ideas, i think it's awfully hard to compete. a lot of people i talk to in republican politics think it's awfully hard for him to compete with other ron desantises of the world who do represent a next generation and don't need to

untangle what they were doing in the oval office on any given date or time. >> a new poll back at the end of the july where you have republican leaning voters whether they want the nominee to be trump or somebody else? not a total runaway but that's pretty significant. >> these numbers were flipped a year ago. in fact, they were worse than that. it was 75% wanted to see donald trump. so that's very significant. a lot of damage has been done to trump here politically throughout all of this. more and more people want to see a new face. i also would caution you cannot overstate the stranglehold that trump's maga movement has on the levers that determine who the nominee is, all the way down to the precinct captain level, the maga team has been exceptional at infiltrating the republican party and taking it over.

that does give donald trump a built-in advantage. as far as whether pence can be competitive, if you want to know what the mike pence vice presidency was like, mike pence is a guy with an erect posture and flas it conscience. he stood up tall but he did not stand up to donald trump. we just saw it in that clip. he stood up tall in the speech but he still after people trying to assassinate him could not stand up to donald trump and said we don't disagree on the issues. that tells you everything you need to know about mike pence. >> i'm not mature enough to respond to what you just said. i really do appreciate it. thank you so much. and still to come, the fight behind the scenes to preserve a landmark case. we have new cnn reporting on just how hard chief justice john roberts tried to save roe v. wade. what might have doomed the effort in the long run. (grandmother) make it three. (young woman) three?

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right now a cnn exclusive on what happened behind the scenes of the supreme court, looking at the landmark decision to overturn roe v. wade. a deal with one of the justices ultimately collapsed.

the question is why. the chief justice has been successful in the past trying to cajole and persuade behind the scenes. with that leaked draft opinion, things seemed to have changed. that was the moment there was that inflexion point? >> bottom line, i wonder if he was ever going to be successful. but once it was leaked, then it really eliminated the chance almost to about zero. you're exactly right that the chief has been successful in the past. the chief himself has switched his vote at the 11th hour, as we know most memorably in the 2012 obamacare case. votes switch sometimes. they don't always stay the way as this one did, in december they voted five conservatives saying we totally want to reverse roe. chief justice job roberts wanted to uphold that mississippi ban on abortion and the liberals saying please leave abortion rights the way they are now. but your question about his

private negotiations where he's seeking, you know, concessions and offering concessions, that all goes on with one or two justices he's dealing with. it's not his most successful moments are dealing in small ways with his colleagues. >> so who here was he trying -- >> his best prospect was brett kavanaugh. but he did not rule out amy coney barrett either. both were not as locked in as clarence thomas and n, you know what, in the end he always going with the hard line of the

anti-abortion move. once everything became public on may 2nd when political published that leaked first draft -- >> with his name signing on to the majority. >> it wasn't explicit but everyone knew sam alito thought he had a majority. then the world knows that brett kavanaugh has voted a particular way and it's very hard to go back on that. the hard right conservatives were very anxious about what the chief was doing and they wanted to get the opinion out sooner because they did not want anything to thwart their majority. >> not the plot thickens as to why there was a leaked opinion in the first place. >> exactly. >> it sounds very, very strategic. >> when you back up, it looks completely strategic. i don't know if i believe that for sure, though. of course the supreme court is still involved in its investigation and we're about to hit the three-month mark and they have not found the culprit

or culprits. so i also wonder if maybe it changed hands a couple of times. remember that draft was dated february 10th and they published it in may. but, you know, the new reporting just shows how vigorously they tried to investigate this but with no luck. >> just the idea that it dropped, having it out there makes people think you can't change your mind. there's an opportunity to negotiate and wheel and deal behind the scenes and make concessions because now i had to know i'm changing your mind and it's not the behind-the-scenes private motions. >> right. because the times when the chief himself had switched votes, we didn't know that initially. in this case everybody would have known if brett kavanaugh suddenly was in the middle as the chief was to uphold the mississippi law but not roe. when they first took this case,

they didn't -- they said they were only going to hear it on the question of whether a 15-week ban was unconstitutional and they went much further and this is what we have now. >> the plot thickens as to who exactly leaked it and now the why. as always, thank you for your reporting great to have you here. up next, we're going to hear from a texas woman who experienced firsthand what can happen when strict new abortion laws take effect. we heard pregnancy suddenly became complicated. that's when her nightmare began.

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the overturning of roe doesn't just affect women looking to end unwanted pregnancies. i'm about to introduce you to a woman who had to endure days of medical horror and bureaucracy. elizabeth was an excited mother to, but her water broke way too early at just 18 weeks. that means the chance of survival for the fetus plummeted, while her hachance o potential deadly infection went way up been at first her and her husband james were given two options, continue with the presidency and hope to get the baby to 22 weeks and hope for the slight chance of survival or

end the pregnancy. they chose the latter but the procedure was blocked. why? because the wellers live in texas where abortions are illegal if there is a fetal heartbeat. so to get one, elizabeth had to wait until the fetal heartbeat stopped or until she got so sick that the doctors had to terminate the pregnancy as a medical emergency. the wellers, they join me now. thank you for being here today, elizabeth and james. i'm so sorry to be meeting you under these occasions and i'm just heart broken at the choice that you had to make, let alone the treatment that you received. could you just walk me through, elizabeth, a little bit about what that was like, to know that you had to endure for days waiting until you were either sick enough or until the heartbeat stopped. >> yes. so the mental anguish that

followed having to leave the hospital with something that i would never wish on anyone, the following day after having to grapple with the fact that my daughter, who i wanted so badly was going to die was just a hell on earth. it was torture having to wake up every day in a home knowing what i wanted to fill that house with baby girl and the future that we created in our heads of what this house was going to look like, how it was going to feel and then to be in my home in the sense of doom and broken promises that were created all around me because we had just started to work on her nursery and now having to grapple with the fact that she was going to leave -- that she was not going to make it. walking through our home was kind of like walking through a tomb. >> it's just devastating for me

to hear that. i'm so sorry that that is what you've had to experience. and just the phrase of broken promises and the hopes and what you've gone through, you and your husband, james. can you talk to me a little bit, james, you're in texas. most people think about the overturning of roe v. wade and the dobbs decision as being somebody else's problem, those who have an unwanted pregnancy. as you and your wife are sitting here today, you wanted your daughter and yet the choices that you had to make, the ones d dictated often times by the doctors, fearful with having to dond contend with that very decision, what was that like for you as the father? >> we wanted nothing more than to fill that house with children. and there were points during our ordeal where we were looking at flights to denver or to albuquerque so that we could stop her from having her life

put in jeopardy. and now i feel like although i was born and raised here in texas, i don't know if i want to start a family in texas. i feel like sometimes my only real option for our family is to sell our house and move to a state where it something were to happen to my wife during pregnancy, her life doesn't have to be put on the line for it. >> it's amazing to hear that statement. and i want people to understand, elizabeth, you endured a great deal. you had days of having to wait until you were considered sick enough -- that in and of itself in my mind just sounds sick to even contemplate, that someone would make you go through that. what was your pain like? what did you have to go through? i want people to understand that this was something that really was horrific for you. >> so there are two levels to that pain. the first one is mental and the second one is physical. physically my body was reacting

to the cramps and the continued exit of amniotic fluid from my body. i was starting to experience nausea just from the amount of stress and pressure that i was going through, having to grapple with the fact that, one, i'm losing my baby and, two, i can't do anything to minimize the suffering that she's enduring inside of me because for a lot of people, you have to realize that this is a baby without amniotic fluid. she is being encased in her own sack and the pressure of my body is on her. so i have to endure the physical pain of, one, my body now starting the process of contractions and starting to what is in a sense rejecting a failed birth inside of me. and then on top of that having to grapple with the mental

anguish of it all. there was a point in time on friday the day that i was going to get induced before we even knew we were going to be able to get an induction happen and that morning through the pressure and through the mental anguish of it all, i heard a sound of gas in my abdomen. and for me to have heard that sound, it was very high pitched. and to me in my moment of anguish, i thought that that sound of gas was actually my baby screaming because she was about to die. and even though that's completely irrational and with, you know, not within the realm of reality, that was where my mental health was at. and that is the consequences of what these laws that are in action in texas are doing. it's not just the fact that you're grappling with the pain

of having to lose a baby girl that you wanted so badly, but now having to deal with the anguish of knowing that you need a medically necessary procedure and the state of texas to tell you no. >> elizabeth, i'm just so sorry to hear even for a moment to think what that would have been like and what it continues to be. i want to thank both of you for sharing your story. i know that it's difficult to do. i think it is so brave and it speaks to your humanity to really talk about and explain what is so deeply personal. because the world needs to hear what you went through. thank you to both of you, and i'm very, very sorry for your loss. >> thank you. >> thank you. justice, while it might have been delayed, but it wasn't denied. a teen convicted after a

notorious central park attack that happened back in 1989 is now exonerated in the year 2022. what's it like to finally, truly be free? one of his co-defendants knows and he'll join us next.

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the central park five, or really as they want to be called, the exonerated five. but you may not know there was a sixth teen who's convicted in that case as well. steven lopez was his name, and he was only 16 when he was told to take a plea deal in the 1989 beating and sexual assault and a female jogger in new york. he served nearly four years in prison as a result of that plea agreement. but while his other five codefendants were exonerated back in 2002, thanks to dna evidence, lopez would not be exonerated until yesterday. he is now 48 years old. my next guest is raymond santana, he is one of the exonerated five. raymond, it's good to see you

again. and thank you for joining me here tonight. you know, you have been very vocal about your experience has been and it has really been so riveting and helpful to the entire world to hear all of your stories. but many people did not know about a six. why do you think it's taken so long for stevens case to end up like yours did, exonerated? >> well first off, thank you for having, me such an honor to be here tonight. i think with the case of stephen lopez, you know, he was charged and he was set to go to trial like the rest of us. and, you know, i think because he might have taken a plea agreement for our robbery case, he wound up serving four years in prison. i think, you know, because of that issue right there, because of him not going to trial, that he kind of got lost in the sauce when it came to the story of the central park jogger. he became the lost offended that nobody really knows about. and then also, you know, when we get to 2002 and we are exonerated, and we filed a civil suit against the city,

steven lopez is in a place that, like he's trying, to get his life together, and you try to put it together. he's doing okay and i think that for him, it was better if he just stayed into the black, because he was trying to start a family, he is trying to move on with his life. and we're so just deep in the middle of things, you know, we have an 11-year battle with the city in a civil suit. and i think for him it was just too much. so, he did not want to participate in the beginning. he was just trying to put the pieces together. he was trying to move on with his life. i think that is the reason why people really need to know about stephen lopez. >> just looking at his images on the screen right now, we are seeing his eyes, watching how he is reacting, so emotional in that courtroom. and what strikes me particularly, as you talk about wanting to move on, wanting to sort of move me on it, you think about that plea offer, you think that plea agreement, you think about the choices that a young child, and i'm going to call a teenager a child, what they are grappling with in those moments, thinking

about the sort of cost benefit analysis when their freedom is on the line. and you know full well about in the way in which one could put their thumb on the scale, and change the course of one's life. when you look at the story, it is really reflected in that as well. >> yes, well, definitely. here it is, he is a 15 year old kid at the time. he is put in the newspaper as a so-called ringleader. and so, you know, he sees two trials, whether both trials were convicted. and he is the third trial that's up next. and so he's afraid. and often with a plea agreement, he's offered a plea agreement, and he takes it. it's understandable, because we know that as a issue within our criminal justice system now, that the plea agreement, where, you know, you can sit up and lay up in a prison or a detention center for years, you know, before your case is finally heard and you get your day in court. so, for him, it was a process of dragging. and when they offer you a plea agreement, he looks at it like a lifeline. and he says if i go to trial and i lose, i am getting 5 to

10 years. but this plea agreement for a robbery case of the one and a half to four and a half. so, he chose the latter of the two evils. but, i mean, his name is in those 400 articles within the first two weeks of his cases. -- kids who are 14 15 16 at the time, he was put in there was a wolf pack well the urban terrorist. yet to deal with this ordeal just the same way we had to. >> so, i'm really glad that you expressed and talked about the way in which, and what other trials he was in, because you really understand the fear that was culminating and building up. and you know what, raymond, you and i have talked about this in the past as well, stuck with me, there may be the exonerate five, not exonerated six. but you are illustrative of thousands of people, if not more, who found themselves in similar circumstances. thank you for sharing your story as always. we will be right back.

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well, that's it for us tonight. don lemon tonight starts right now. hate online.

>> hey, how are you. >> i got my shoulder pads working. today >> you do, i feel like it's dynasty night, again, is blake carrington coming over with krystal, or joan collins? >> they wish they wish they had this. i was a dallas fan. not very south fork, not very miss elliott, but i don't know, maybe it's linda gray. >> no, it's dominick deborah, all the way. thank you. thanks laura. i've got to get to the news, i will see you later. this is don lemon tonight. there is a mountain of brand new revelations from the january 6th investigation that i have to tell you about. and pretty soon we are going to have our chief legal analyst on here and i think he thinks this is a pretty big deal, okay, so, stay tuned, right? >> totally. >> that was a precursor. that is jeffrey toobin. new tonight, the justice department reportedly investigating the actions of the then president himself as part of its criminal investigation of efforts to