he wrote while in the united states about the saudi government. one tweet went so far as to suggest that a street be named after the journalist gentleman ma'am cha showing by whose murder was approved by the saudi crown prince according to u.s. intelligence and that ended up with a 16-year prison sentence. i spoke to his son when he was in prison and told him about the conditions there. >> they wake them up in the middle of the night and prevent him from sleeping. they torture him until he convicted himself by saying he sent tweets to destabilize the kingdom. >> saad remains in saudi arabia. he's now under a 16-year travel ban and his son tells us he is not free until he is in the united states. thanks so much for joining us. "ac360" begins now.

today the nypd said they have police ready to respond to protests should former president trump become the first former president to be criminally indicted. it's a question of when and also if. i'm john berman in for anderson. remember, according to the former president's own social media post this weekend, the indictment was supposed to happen today. but he had no proof of that and so here we are. yet, all indications are something is in the pipeline but among the litany of things we still don't know about this indictment apart from if it will actually happen is how we will find out about it. will trump be arrested? will there be a mug shot? will he appear in court? what will the actual charges be? will it be a misdemeanor about trying to keep an affair with an adult film star secret and falsifying business records or does the manhattan d.a.'s office believe it has the evidence to sustain a felony conviction about this alleged payoff being part of a much broader charge about trying to influence the

election so that is what we don't know. we do know that many top republicans are aghast that anyone would be investigated over a little simple hush money. alleged simple hush money. >> this was personal money. seven years ago. statute of limitations. >> that was kevin mccarthy on the third and final day of a republican retreat trying to do his best, nothing to see here, leslie nielsen impersonation. according to the reporting in "the wall street journal" this money that the former president's then lawyer michael cohen paid to stormy daniels, it wasn't done directly. he used an llc, and the names he used to refer to trump and daniels were david dennison and peggy peterson so kinds of sounds like somebody was trying to hide something. if speaker mccarthy was being sly in his defense of the former president senator rand paul was not. he went full bore at his attack over the manhattan district attorney tweeting, quote, a trump indictment would be a

disgusting abuse of power. the d.a. should be put in jail. jail, really? he must have some serious evidence to say something like that. right? wrong. here's was his response, i think we'll stick with just what we tweeted out if you want to report that. no evidence. alabama senator tommy tuberville weighed in too on alvin bragg. >> i think he should be accountable what he's doing. nobody's ever done this. this is unprecedented going after a former president of the united states that is running for president. >> what if he broke the law. >> if you break the law, you got to pay the price, but, i mean, i haven't looked into it enough. >> got it. this is unprecedented, but i haven't looked into it enough. that about sums it up. hammer the talking point, fact be damned or distant. we don't know what's coming down the pipeline or even if anything

is coming down the pipeline but we do know enough to be able to wait and see what happens before suggesting people go to jail. let's start with democratic congressman dan goldman, former federal prosecutor who was the democratic counsel to the house intelligence committee during president trump's first impeachment inquiry. congressman, thanks so much for being with us. look, many of your republican colleague, you just heard speaker mccarthy there, are disparaging district attorney alvin bragg and the probe downplaying the investigation before it's concluded. what do you say to their argument an indictment would be partisan and politically motivated? >> well, they certainly weren't saying that when alvin bragg, a year ago, decided to go against the recommendation of his very experienced prosecutors and not indict donald trump, but what they're trying to basically do is pick and choose they view as political and what they view as reasonable and following the law and that basically comes down to, whatever the outcome is as it relates to donald trump. it's very clear they're doing the bidding of donald trump and

trying to undermine this investigation even to the point of potentially obstructing it. >> obstructing. now, hang on here, because you actually use that word in a statement you put out before. you said from day one and this has to do with house judiciary chair jim jordan and others trying to get alvin bragg before the committee, you said from day one i said the so-called weaponnization sub.com was the committee to obstruct justice and as if on cue house republicans are now using the official power of the congress to try to obstruct a state prosecution of donald trump. that's a pretty strong word. what exactly do you mean by obstruction? >> well, when you look at the threats, when you look at the accusations and when you look at the inflammatory language in that letter in particular, it is very clear that they are trying to influence, put it that way, alvin bragg in some way, and

influencing a prosecutorial decision or witness testimony or otherwise can be obstruction of justice. now, i don't -- i'm not saying that they have committed a crime here, but i think what is very clear is that they are trying to interfere and influence this investigation without knowing the facts and without knowing the evidence and essentially they're trying to put donald trump above the law and that is antithetical to our fundamental rule of law, which is that our government is one of laws, not men. >> so, some legal experts, and we're not talking about trump apologists here have said this is not the strongest case on its merits. as a former federal prosecutor and lead counsel in the first trump impeachment, do you think it is? >> well, look, i think if you look at the actual facts and you went through some of that in your opening, donald trump used a home equity loan by taken out

by michael cohen to pay $130,000 to a porn star three weeks before the election to silence a decade old affair. he was then reimbursed by falsifying the rationale through the trump organization. it was clear that donald trump was trying to avoid having this become public and a political liability before his election. for a variety of reasons, the southern district of new york, the federal prosecutor did not charge this case and so now it's really up to mr. bragg to determine whether or not he thinks that it should be, though that fact pattern should be charged in state court where the law is not as clear on campaign finance fraud as it is federally. >> so of all the investigations that the former president faces, which do you think is the most legally perilous because you would be hard-pressed to find anyone who does think it is this case that could be brought by the manhattan d.a. >> i would agree with that.

i think the fact thadold trump conspired with a number of others to overturn the 2020 election is far more serious than the conduct here. that doesn't mean that because it's more serious that this conduct is not serious, but that is a fundamental effort to overturn our democracy and the peaceful transfer of power and that investigation by the special counsel is the most serious and most concerning from, you know, any american citizen that's viewing this. >> so the manhattan d.a. is not as serious as the others, but you still think potentially it would be worth pursuing? >> that's really up to mr. bragg. i don't know the evidence here. i know that there is a process that donald trump can use to challenge this charge legally or factually that there are 12 jurors that need to be unanimous to find his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and i wish that

my republican colleagues would focus on the process that is laid out and has been existence for 250 years to let a defendant like donald trump make his defense if he wants to rather than make these accusations and allegations and try to undermine this investigation. >> we could wait and see what happens, in other words, congressman dan goldman, great to see you. thanks so much. >> thank you, john. federal authorities including those at the fbi and homeland security have detected an increase in violent rhetoric online including calls for civil war since the former president this weekend asked followers to, quote, protest his possible impending arrest. we should note this is just online chatter but something authorities are taking seriously nonetheless. i'm joined by cnn's senior political commentator adam kinzinger and cnn national security analyze julia kayyem.

what does it say to you that some of your republican colleagues are using their government power to try to keep the former president's legal threats at bay or at least run what dan goldman said is interference for them? >> it's pretty chilling. i think, look, see what this is. it's like they've already made up their mind. they know all the evidence and have come to a conclusion. that's not how justice works. there is a phenomenon. i'll try to do it in 15 seconds that exists when you're a congressman that is kind of a bit not all in with donald trump and your base keeps telling you how come you're not defending trump more and something like this comes along and you basically emote all of that intensity and defend donald trump the best you can so you can go back to your dinners and say, see, i'm defending donald trump. i saw the impeachment votes. you see that holding people in contempt for ignoring subpoenas and i think you're seeing some of that here where people can convince themselves that this is

egregious. they're going to be extremely loud about it and it allows them to go back to their base to say they're defending donald trump. >> on this front, cnn is reporting federal officials including those at the fbi and department of homeland security, they are monitoring what they say has been an uptick in violent rhetoric online including calls for civil war. what's your take on this? what are you seeing? >> absolutely, and one would anticipate given donald trump's language this weekend seeking a protest but also talking about bringing america, you know, taking america back, it's the language that we heard on january 6th, but times are very different. it's very easy for people to go online and talk about civil war but in terms of the radicalization, i want to focus on the violent radicalization that showed itself on january 6th, the environment is very different now. i mean it's not only because of what the former congressman and his colleagues did in terms of sort of turning the gop narrative against trump, trying

to give an off-ramp to republicans in terms of you don't have to be with this guy to the arrest of a couple hundred people which takes away your troops to the fact that donald trump is essentially deplatformed. he cannot give people a get out of jail free card and also that he cannot fill the protests. i mean we've already seen him try to and there is a big yawn. all of those together over the two years means that he may be a lot of smoke and a lot of fire and a lot of anger, but he cannot deliver on the kind of incitement that we worried about, the sort of existential incitement, the kind that could really harm america that he could be for and that is going to take a lot of, i think, hopefully the gas out of whatever becomes of trump in this movement in the future after the arrest. >> what if he has a few more day, congressman? i ask that because cnn is

reporting if trump is indicted they don't expect his arrest or initial appearance to happen before next week. so we could find out about an indictment and then have four or five days before he were to show up in new york city for the actual processing. now, i get that could be so they can get the security preparations under way but couldn't he use that time if he wanted to to drum up protests or some kind of activity? >> absolutely, i mean, look, you know, and one way it's a blessing obviously that we don't see what he says. most of the time he's yelling in a dark room to a few people on truth social but if you look at what he is saying, i mean, we cannot grow numb to this. we can't grow numb to the fact that he is basically said americans are the enemy, not russia. you know, we have to stop justice from occurring in essence. i don't put anything past him. there's always times where i sit back, i don't think donald trump would come out and do x, y and z. i no longer believer there's any restraint on him so i think it's quite possible that in that

intervening time between the dime and possessing, i'm not sure why there would be a big distance but i'll leave this to the experts but in that time he certainly could gin up enough to show up and try to block the way or create problems. look, i agree that there's not a ton of belief that it's going to be like another january 6th necessarily, but there are a number of people on twitter right now saying things like civil war is coming. civil war is happening and if just one or 2% 6 americans believe that, that's, like, what, 6 million american. >> juliet,te, do you think it'sa smart idea, the couple days -- >> obviously they have to have an indictment before they can act, right? you cannot sort of just say this could happen because trump said it happened so they have to then get the facility ready. they have to hope that they can negotiate a very voluntary, very

quiet, i say hope, i wasn't born yesterday movement to essentially bring this body from florida to new york and back. the secret service and department of homeland security do not owe donald trump anything anymore. they are -- he is someone that they protect. he is a protectee, but he no longer controls what they can do so can make it relatively easy for the united states. there's a lot of activity going on around the person and then, of course, the facility. time is not good in the sense that he can agitate more people. on the other hand, time does give some opportunity to lower the temperature and also to show that he cannot get people out there. i mean, that's the one thing that's been amazing the last couple of days. he got like four people in front of trump and like five in front of mar-a-lago.

that's much better than the alternative at this stage. >> juliette and adam, thanks very much. the back story about how we got from a former playboy model and adult film actress to possible indictment of a former president. ronan farrow has written on this and will join us. will rupert murdoch's son be forced to testify in the defamation attack. the latest ahead. if you still have symptoms of moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis or active psoriatic arthritis after tnf blocker like humira or enbrel, rinvoq is different and may hp. stand up to your symptoms wi rinvoq. rinvoq is a once-daily pill that tackles pain, stiffness, swelling. for some, rinvoq significantly reduces ra and psa fatigue.

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it is important to remember any criminal charge of the former president out of the manhattan grand jury investigation if it happens would be the culmination of a tale that began before the 2016 election and included a playboy model and the head of the owner of "the national enquirer." the author of "catch and kill," lies, spies and a conspiracy to protect predators joined by reasonen farrow also a contributor writer to "the new yorker." so, stormy daniels and this gets to a lot of your reporting, she had approached "the national enquirer" with her story and tried to get them to buy it from her. is it clear why they passed? >> my reporting was on a string of interactions that trump and people around him including michael cohen had with ami, the parent company at the time of "the national enquirer" and

proved out i believe pretty thoroughly that there was an ongoing arrangement to pay hush money to catch and kill, this is the journalistic term that was used in the tabloid world, unflattering stories about trump. >> so the catch and kill system which you brought up orchestrated or involving david pecker who was the former publisher of ami, how did it work? >> the concept is very basic. "the enquirer" forged an alliance with donald trump. david pecker and his consigliere dylan howard were both heavily involved in this arrangement by which they would go out and seek unflattering and usually tawdry stories about donald trump and they would pay money for the rights to those stories, which entailed essentially muzzling the people in possession of those stories and instead of running the results of that transaction in "the enquirer"

they would sit on it and i at one point of my reporting got access to a master list of many, many stories that over the years "the enquirer" had done this with with respect to trump. >> so anderson spoke with karen mcdougal in 2018, the "playboy" model who said she had an affair with trump and was paid for her silence. i'm going to play part of that where she explains her experience with this catch and kill process. >> what's your understanding of a catch and kill. >> from what i'm learning a catch and kill is somebody for, like, for yourself taking a story about somebody you like or care about or have a friendship about and they squash a story so it doesn't hurt you. or hurt them. >> so did you know that that's what was going -- that's the allegation of what was going on here. did you realize that at the time? >> i knew the story wasn't going to be printed. yeah. >> why do you think they squashed the story?

>> back then or now? >> now. >> they didn't want to hurt him. >> you think it's because a personal relationship with the guy who runs ami is friends with donald trump? >> correct. >> so to that point, why was david pecker protecting trump like this? what did "the enquirer" get out of it all? >> well, there's now a lot of literature on this and david pecker appeared to really enjoy the friendship with trump and the largesse trump could afford and i think david pecker and dylan howard, this is according to many, many dozens of hours of its views with people in the rooms with them around these decisions, they all wanted to ride on trump's political coa coattails, as well and then there was a dawning realization of dylan howard and others that what they were doing was going to look very bad, i mean, that

was said in some of those internal text messages pretty directly, almost word for word and now we're seeing the consequences. >> so david pecker did meet with prosecutors in this case that were dealing with this week and reportedly testified to the grand jury. what kind of information do you think he might be able to provide? >> well, it's interesting, when i was reporting on these hush payments through ami including karen mcdougal's story, "the enquirer" folks were lying to us and giving statements to us that it never happened and have you it all wrong and subsequently have had to admit to what was alleged in that reporting in sum and substance in their agreement with federal prosecutors. now when these individuals are talking to additional prosecutors after that admission, i think there's going to be a lot more information. what's remarkable about this, john, it is not new information. these facts are out there. you know, they were in my reporting, "the wall street

journal" did really potent reporting on this. the record is kind of established and people like peeker can speak to it and reinforce it. the question is, how is it going to resonate with a jury, especially with this novel legal theory at the foundation of the case? and how is it going to resonate politically? i, you know, heard from a prosecutor that in their words this is a billion dollar gift to donald trump referring in other words to the amount that he'll be able to fund raise off the back of this. >> it has been a long road. we will see where it winds next. ronan farrow, great to see you. >> thanks so much, always great to see you. up next, attorneys for fox news and dominion voting systems battle it out in court today in that $1.6 billion defamation case. we have the latest developments ahead. create something new? our dell technhnologies advisors can provide you with the tools and expertise you neneed to bring out the innovator in you.

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voting equipment company dominion spent about six hours in court today wrangling over the $1.6 billion defamation case against the right wing network and they willable back at it again tomorrow. a dominion lawyer told a judge, quote, the fix was in arguing that fox hosts knew they were promoting false claims about dominion rigging the 2020 election and kept booking guests who prompted the lies. fox argues it is protected by the first amendment and claims it can't be held liable for reporting newsworthy allegations from figures. if it does go to trial dominion wants fox chair rupert murdoch and his ceo son lachlan to testify. cnn's senior media reporter

oliver darcy joins us with much more. oliver, what more was revealed today about what was going on behind the scenes? >> a lot of what you saw, john, was dominion trying to bring to life the legal filings they have made in this case over the past several months and so one instance you saw them reading a text message they obtained during discovery from tucker carlson, that message was to sean hannity and laura ingraham in which he said our viewers are good people and they believe it referring to these election conspiracy theories and pushing it on fox news even though they knew it was false. a key thing to keep in mind as you watch it play out in court, how the judge can reacting to some of fox's arguments and saw him today exceedingly skeptical at times about the defense that fox was putting forth in the courtroom and i think that's going to be very important as these both sides, as you said, asked the judge to rule in their favor. >> how was it dominion was trying to make the case that the fix was in? >> well, you saw in one case that they pointed to mike

lindell who is obviously an election conspiracy theorist and they talked about how they knew that he was an election conspiracy theorist but still put him on air arguing that it was a business relationship they wanted to preserve, i'll read what one of the dominion lawyers actually said in open court. he said, they were putting lindell on air for business purposes, they knew lindell was crazy but they also knew he was their highest advertiser and they were just trying to massage hi -- assuage him. you can see it and say a lot of the coverage was not based on what was true and false but based on business decisions, keeping advertisers happy, keeping ratings up, not losing ground to competitors like newsmax. >> oliver, thank you so much. perspective from lee lavine who has represented both fox news and cnn in cases. lee, thanks for being with us. the tucker carlson messages have been previously mentioned but to

have it highlighted in open court how damaging do you think that is to fox? >> well, the judge is obviously seen all of this stuff in the hundreds of pages of briefing that's been filed so it's really just the point of emphasis for the judge. it's an opportunity for dominion to show the judge what they think is the most significant evidence and likewise fo