hannity.com we'll pick the best on monday. that's all the time we have left a lot of news, thank you for being ♪ good evening and welcome to "tucker carlson tonight." after more than a month of gridlock and fruitless debate, which we have chronicled extensively on this show, the administration has reached an agreement tonight with congressional democrats to end the government shutdown. there's a deal, what exactly is in it? we will tell that you in a minute. but, first, just before dawn this morning the fbi raided the florida home of long time trump advisor roger stone who will be joining news a minute. the cnn producer stood across the street recording it all with a camera as dozens of heavily armed agents piled of vehicles and stormed stone's house some carried rifles with extra magazines heavy military

gear. tactical gloves, one agent carried two separate rifles in addition to his side arm. the man in front of him appeared to have a flash bang grenade on belt. the whole team scrammed bled over stone's lawn and pounded on door. stone appeared he was barefoot and wearing a t-shirt. the agents slapped him in handcuffs. stone told the agents wife was upstairs with their dogs. stone's wife is deaf and didn't understand what was happening. stone was worried that one in the men in tactical gear might shoot her by accident. tragedies like that regularly occur during law enforcement raids and that's why federal agents don't raid the homes of people like roger stone. there is no need. to say stone has no history of violence. he doesn't run international drug cartel. he hasn't been charged with murder or even with spying for vladimir putin. roger stone is accused of lying during the course of the russia investigation. under normal circumstances, during normal times, prosecutors would just call his lawyer and arrange a surrender. stone is 66 years old.

he is so broke from mueller-related legal expenses that he can't afford health insurance. he is hardly a flight risk. but, no. that's not what they did. instead the feds went with automatic weapons and a cameraman from cnn. you don't need to be a roger stone partisan, a fan to see that there is something wrong with what happened this morning. the most powerful person in america is now an unelected prosecutor with no functional oversight over what he does. robert mueller commands in effect his own domestic army. you just saw them. can he use it however he likes and he does. mueller crushes people when it's not even necessary to do it. weak people mostly. and he does it in ways that are clearly designed to send a political message. that is not how democracies are supposed to work. and you would think our media would be bothered by this. reporters are not supposed to side with prosecutors who abuse their power or anyone else who abuses power. they are supposed to hold the powerful to account. that's why they exist.

but not anymore. now they are all in the same team. robert mueller is a hero to our press corps. when his agents raid the home of an elderly man charged with piddly crimes they air the tape and they celebrate. >> roger stone, like donald trump is, a political conman who he is' shoman schtick has finally caught one him. >> if you look up the word scum bag in the dictionary you are going to see roger stone's picture. >> there i'm just so damn happy this guy is indicted and arrested. is he a horrible human being. he is a thug. he is a bully. bye-bye, baby. karma is a bitch. >> how would you like to have her in charge of your life. so damn happy. so barefoot roger stone is taken to jail. if that thrills you, it may be time to take a break, pause, and reassess what's happened to your soul. but no one reassessed today. they rejoiced. one fame mia must neocon summed it up this way given police proclivities maybe

roger stone would enjoy prison. get it? stone may get raped behind bars. how awesome is that? so how should the rest of us people who aren't spending our lives on twitter feel about what happened this morning? is america safer? not if you believed in the russia collusion story we still haven't caught those vale alans two years in still no evidence at all that any american committed an actual crime during the 2016 election. roger stone, for example, stands accused of miss deeds committed long after the votes were counted. his allege crimes arose when investigation into other crimes we have not yet found. the charges against stone include obstruction of proceedings, witness tampering, five counts of lying to congress. the core of it, of the charges, is that stone mischaracterized his conversations with the left wing talk radio host called randy crecko. he served as intermediary with julian assange who runs wikileaks. now, none of what stone or

credico did with assange is illegal. journalists did that kind of thing all the time. if the lying we are told must be punished with you jail time. okay. but, again, we have noted this before. what you are looking at here is a brand new standard of conduct, one that nobody has been paying close attention to this country for the last 20 years would even recognize there san awful lot of lying out there. an awful lot. a lot of not acknowledged as lying. every time an illegal immigrant lies to a federal immigration officer that's a felony. any time a politician lies under note congress that's a potential jail term. both of those happen a lot but nobody is ever charged for any of it. now, this is hardly a defense of lying. lying is bad. it's corrosive and one of the main problems with our political system, actually. everybody lies all the time. but there is, at least, one thing that is worse than lying. even lying under oath. and it's the selective application of federal law. one standard for the

powerful and well-connected, former attorney generals, for example, another standard for barefoot 66-year-old men with unfashionable political views. some people skate, others are destroyed. it all depends on who you know. that's what america is becoming and we ought to fight that roger stone joins us tonight. he has been in the news all day author of new book called the myth of russian collusion. roger stone, thank you for joining us. >> thank you, tucker. i'm a little tired but i'm glad to be here. >> tucker: so, just to get the mechanics of what happened this morning out of the way, we have seen the tapes by cnn remarkably across the street from your house very early this morning. and we saw the very large number of armed federal agents bringing you out of the house. is there something we don't know? do you have an arsenal at home? had you made threats against prosecutors such as violence? is there context we don't have? >> no. first of all, it's disconcerting that cnn was aware that i would be

arrested before my lawyers were informed. that's disturbing. if it was a dangerous situation, which would merit the swat team, well then, cnn's camera men would be in danger. i don't know why they would be allowed to be there. i had no firearm in the house. i don't have a permit for a firearm. i don't own a firearm. only my wife, my two dogs and my three cats were at home. i'm not a flight risk. in fact, i think my passport has expired or it will expire in a few days. i have no record of criminal past. and, frankly, they just could have contacted my attorney and i would have voluntarily turned myself. in the proof of this is that only hours later the judge granted me a $250,000 surety bond, meaning on my signature with no funds put forth because i'm not a flight risk. and as far as the government's contention that they were concerned that i

would destroy evidence, they have been in my email and my text messages and my phone calls for two years. probably longer because the "new york times" reported on january 20th, '17 that i was among three people in the trump campaign under active surveillance. hopefully we will learn something about that in discovery of this case. >> tucker: that gets right to the heart of the charges against you which are primarily for lying to congress. one of the things you are accused of lying to congress about is whether or not there was any evidence you had evidence of communication between you and intermediary in julian assange. did you lie about that? again, given that you knew they had your electronic communications and would know the answer already, wouldn't that be a stupid thing to lie about? what is this charge about? >> yes, indeed. it's really simple. did i forget that i had text

messages from an old cell phone that were entirely exculpatory which proved everything i had said about credico being my source regarding the significance and the october release date of the wikileaks material was accurate. i believe he lied to the grand jury about that. that's been reported. but he appears not to be being prosecuted for perjury. but, i forgot exculpatory information and, therefore, i will. if anybody had bothered to read my website, the stone cold truth, they would know that i basically refuted and documented the reputation of virtually every charge in this indictment. the indictment is thin, indeed. so what is this about? it's about silencing me. there is a war on alternative media. there is a war where they are trying to criminalize political expression. there is a war where they are trying to criminalize free speech. the efforts to shut down my show at info wars, the

efforts to see you lens alex jones who is one of my greatest supporters and proponents are part of this war. so, i intend to plead not guilty. i believe i will be vindicated. it's funny to watch bahara on cnn say this is a slam dunk, calls me a liar. here is a guy who a judge lashed for lying in the william walton case. you are the liar, preet. watching the lawyers jump to conclusions, tucker saying oh, well, the trump campaign official who directed stone to find out about wikileaks was donald trump. no, it was not. there are several things in here in the indictment that are simply not true. >> tucker: who was it if it wasn't the president? >> well, i have to speculate about that. since it never happened, it appears to me that they have composed testimony for someone. perhaps rick gates, perhaps steve bannon. perhaps someone is bearing false witness against me. but, knowing what's in my

email, and my text messages, there is no corroboration whatsoever for this. and as for my email exchange with steve bannon, everything i told him in the exchange was publicly reported information. political report is that after assange announced on october 1st that he had nothing that day but would have releases every week for the next 10 weeks and that all information on the election pertaining to the election would be released in the weeks before the election. that was public information. and it had also been reported that assange had security concerns that day. so the two things i told bannon were public information, not the slightest bit controversial. as for the claim that -- >> tucker: when and how did you learn that wikileaks had these stolen emails? >> when julian assange said it on cnn on july 22nd, 2016, and then repeated it on fox on august 24th this was not a state secret.

randy credico was the source who told me the material was insignificant, dynamite, a bombshell and so on and that it would be released in october. there is also, i think, a reference to dr. corsi in here. dr. jerome corsi no told me in an interview when he was in an interview august 2nd that the wikileaks disclosure would come thereafter and one immediately after that in august that all turned out to be incorrect. so there is no evidence that i received anything whatsoever from wikileaks, that i knew the subject or the content of this material. this is being used to silence me. >> tucker: that allegation is not even in here. the allegation as far as i can tell from reading it is that you lied to this congressional committee. have you spoken to the president about this? >> i have not. but, again, if you watch cnn or msnbc, you wouldn't know that because they act as if -- stone acted as the conduit between the trump campaign and wikileaks or between donald trump and wikileaks. when the president answered the written interrogatories,

he correctly and honestly said roger stone and i never discussed this and we never did. >> tucker: it's clear, i mean it's clear from reading the indictment and you have been saying it for at least a year, that the feds were spying on your texts. >> there is no question about it. i agree. based on the indictment that they released today. so, given that they are reading all of your texts, you text with a huge, i happen to know a huge number of journalists, including me, and some of them work for cnn. even, maybe. all of those texts were being read by a federal prosecutor. what do you think those journalists some of whom are talking about this case right now on tv think of that? >> you know, that's the amazing thing is the press is not coming out and standing up against this war against free expression. this war against the first amendment, which is really a war against the press. look, tucker, i think we both know the game here.

wear stone down financially, make sure he is broke so he has to plead guilty to these charges, even though he didn't commit them. and then try to flip me against the president. i'm facing $2 million now in potential legal fees. people can go to stone defense fund.com to help me. stone defense fund.com. i'm in for the fight of my life. i will not quit. i will not fold. i will not bend. i will not bear false witness against the president. i intend to fight because this indictment is fabricated. this indictment is thin as can be. my attorneys are highly confident that they can win an acquittal. if i can get a fair trial in the district of columbia. >> tucker: what are the potential consequences you face? what are your lawyers telling you they will push for in terms of the sentence? >> it's impossible to say. they have not yet had discussion. the only other thing i do want to say is the fbi

agents this morning were extraordinarily courteous after the initial confrontation in which i was handcuffed but i was then taken to the federal courthouse where i was shackled, hand and foot and went through -- had to sit in the holding cell before the judge. the judge was eminently fair issuing bond i'm restricted in my travel. can i only travel to the district of columbia, new york city and southern florida i'm not a flight risk. i'm 66 years old and i'm essentially broke since the leaks from the special counsel's office over the last two years have dried up my consulting business since the censorship and shadow banning on facebook have substantially dried up my book sales. as you know i had to end my life and health insurance in december because i couldn't meet the premiums anymore. every dollar i scrape up has to go to this fight but,

still i fight o on do you notice a hermine here everyone grind up in this investigation doesn't have the funds to fight back. podesta hasn't been. it's you who can't afford health insurance. papadopoulos who seems broke, carter page. who do you expect the 3r50ur9 will indict next if anyone. >> i have no idea. they seem to be in hot pursuit of dr. jerry corsi. dr. corsi said a number of things about me that are not true but he says he won't testify against the president. i have the emails and text messages and metadata to prove many of the allegations he has made against me are not true. but he clearly has referred to blindly, of course, from this indictment.

take three steps back. who cares? no offense to jerome corsi. he seems like a nice guy. does anyone in america believe that jerome corsi is a threat to america's national security our way of life or democracy. is he? that seems crazy. >> i don't think so nor i do think that political or journalistic inquiry regarding what the topic of the weeks disclosure is should be criminalized. i never received any material around no i never knew that john podesta's emails had been stolen in advance and my tweet is not in reference to that and research memo that jerry corsi wrote me regarding op-ed'podesta's exclusive deal n russia is not part of a coverup because no coverup was required. >> tucker: when you watch the clip that we played i don't know if you had the chance to watch the karageorge of you on television today or see on the internet people cheer

for you to get raped in prison or people celebrating your indictment. what do you make of that? where does that come from? >> well, i must tell you, we're in a very bad place in terms of our politics. i get four or five death threats a week. i can't go out to a public restaurant or airport or travel by myself now because people want to mix it up. they don't want to just yell at you. some of them want to take a swing at you. you know, i don't feel that way about them i disagree with them i'm not for violence. i don't think violence solves anything. >> tucker: i agree. >> now i need security for my family, for myself and that costs money. which is why i have asked the public for help. >> tucker: roger stone, we will be following it thanks for coming on. >> thank you very much. thank you, tucker. >> tucker: andy mccarthy one of the most eloquent writers on law and justice there is andy, thanks very much for coming on assess these

charges if you would as someone who has brought charges within the context of the broader investigation. do these charges bring us closer as americans to understanding how our democracy was hacked in 2016? >> no. i think the take away, tucker, with due respect to mr. stone and this is obviously immense importance to him to the country this set of charges underscores what seems to have been obvious for a year and that is that there never was a conspiracy between the trump campaign and the kremlin to commit espionage. something obvious to investigators for a very long time. and this latest sets of charges indicates that they not only were not in co-hoots with russia, they didn't actually know why

wikileaks had as you pointed out in your interview with stone there is no charge in the indictment that stone, who is facing seven felony charges was in any kind of a criminal conspiracy with weeks. all thiwikileaks. all this is about is the process of investigating the trump-russia conspiracy which it seems to me not only didn't exist but they have long nona it didn't exist. >> tucker: i'm fixated on the cnn tape of this raid on stone's house this morning because, i think like a lot of people i looked at that and i thought this is not at all the country that i grew up in or want to live in. if a prosecutor says we go to the house of a 66-year-old man who we know doesn't have a passport or a gun, who list with his older wife who is deaf and there are dogs and cats and we need 27 armed federal agents, each with a side arm and an ar-15, is there anybody who says you know what? that's just wrong. that's overkill? we don't need to do this? it's actually dangerous?

why wouldn't anyone push back on that idea? >> i don't know, tucker. this is not the first time this has happened in this investigation. when paul manafort, when there was a raid on his home in virginia, it was on the night between two days when he was cooperating with two different congressional committees and it was under circumstances where the special counsel's office knew his very well respected lawyers in washington and could easily have called up the lawyer and said here's a subpoena, these are the -- these are the items we want there was certainly no reason to do it the way they did it this seems to be complete overkill to take somebody who is a best a white collar criminal if is he actually guilty of the charges who has committed process crimes and treat him like was a mafia dawn or usama bin laden seems to me to be crazy.

and the proof is in the pudding. if you really think this guy is either a danger to the agents who were conducting the search or a risk of flight, one thing you don't do is agree to let him out on his signature to $250,000 bail bond. i mean, he either is this evil guy or he is not. >> tucker: kind of reveals the motive, doesn't it? finally there has been a lot of debate today about how a cnn producer with a camera wound up at the scene at 5:00 something in the morning. cnn has an explanation for it i don't know if it's true or not. is it plausible, in your mind, that a prosecutor in this investigation would tip off a news organization? i mean, if you are going to conduct a raid like, this presumably doing it for shock and awe. would it be strange to let a news organization, a sympathetic one know. >> i don't think it would be strange to do that particularly under circumstances where it looks like there was a lot of

orchestrating the media response here. as i understand it the raid began at 6:00. the press release was issued at 6:17 i think catherine herridge said this morning. so, that obviously is suspicious. i'm also aware of investigations where, for example, the media finds out that there is some leak in the investigation. the media finds out there is going to be a raid and the government makes a deal that they can be on the scene as long as they don't leak the fact of the raid so that people get a chance to escape. so, until we know all the facts, i wouldn't jump to conclusions. >> tucker: no, i'm not. i'm not. what you are describing is its own form of collusion i would note if true. andy mccarthy thank you very much. >> collusion is a very loose term there, tucker. >> tucker: loose term and common phenomenon in washington i can tell you. thank you very much. chris hawaiian also from new york. radio host former staff for

chuck schumer joins us tonight. chuck, it's a simple question. why wouldn't the mueller investigation just call up grant smith who is the lawyer for roger stone and say we are going to indict you and meet us downtown and surrender? >> i agree. i have talked to you about this before. i don't like the militarization of our police force and i think wherever possible we should treat people like innocent until proven guilty. i don't like the big show of force. i don't know what those reasons are. i'm not going to second guess law enforcement. i know that roger stone was asking a witness to do a frank, he not only lied to congress he then went and killed himself if you watched the godfather movie. that's a big problem. i don't think that's necessary. >> tucker: wait, it's a problem because theatrical character from a 70's in a movie killed himself. i don't see the connection to the criminal case unfolding before us. >> well, roger stone, he did tell somebody to do that exact thing. so that's part of the reason why he was indicted today.

>> tucker: so we have charges, some of which sound kind of plausible to me. others don't seem plausible. i don't know. they are charges. they haven't been proved. but even if every one of them is true, i'm standing back and thinking yeah, it's bad, i'm against lying. i rail against it every night. what does this have to do with the mueller investigation and russia and protecting american democracy from a foreign threat? what does this have to do with the corruption of the 2006 -- what does that do anything other than hurting a guy who can't fight back, honestly. >> lying and obstructing of justice and witness tampering and there is a clear connection in this indictment to the trump campaign. we have to find out who directly the senior campaign official to direct roger stone to speak with wikileaks to get these emails. >> tucker: wait, wait. hold on. may i ask? because i think you might be breaking news here. would it be a crime for a campaign official to get dirt on my opponent? i don't think it's ever happened in a presidential

campaign but you are saying if it did in this one that's a crime? tell me why that's a crime? what law does that violate? >> wikileaks has been identified by our current secretary osecretary of state aa hostile foreign actor working with the russians during the 2016 election to influence our election here in the united states of america. wittingly or unwittingly working with the russians of our elections is a problem. >> tucker: the views of our current secretary of state and wikileaks immaterial for me, speaking for myself. maybe the russians were involved. >> but they are material. >> tucker: i'm not here to defend, you know, his views. russians may have been involved and maybe not we don't know exactly. no one has proved that. >> we don't. >> tucker: but where is the crime part? where is the part where it's illegal for someone who works for a campaign to ask for dirt i don't know commission a foreign intelligence agency to gather a dossier from. oh wait that's out hillary campaign. that's thought a crime but

no is this. >> if there is no crime why is roger stone talking to his associates like a mob bottom. >> tucker: i just asked him that question. why would you lie about that? that was my question to him. >> i'm wondering why roger would do that. roger's rules, which he tells all of his clients, including donald trump admit nothing, deny everything and do a counter attack. and he just did that on your show a few minutes ago which is his strategy when you are in a scandal. >> tucker: look, here is my mandate to try to strip away all the stuff and get to the core questions that we should really kind of settle. and the core question in this case is, is it a crime for an unnamed or a named or any campaign official to ask someone in his orbit to gather dirt on his opponent? my impression someone who has covered politics for 28 years, that's only not a crime. it is the standard in every campaign. so i'm missing this. >> i hear you. you are not incorrect. you are not incorrect. where i think it becomes a

crime. where i think it becomes a crime is when the person you are asking that for that material on is committing a crime to get that material. and. >> tucker: what was the crime he committed. >> happens to be working for a foreign government. that's a crime. >> tucker: hold on, wait a second. the guy just got indicted seven felony charges today. among them was not any kind of crime related to his dealings with julian assange or the russians or vladimir putin or latvia an bloggers or whatever part of your fever dream you are talking about. i mean, like -- >> -- no. >> tucker: he was charged with lying. what would be the crime i've been asking for two years i have never gotten an answer. >> lying with obstruction of justice and witness tampering. not just lying. let's be clear here. the special counsel is still building a case. are people going to lie to the special counsel to obstruct justice. >> tucker: again, you just accused stone of a crime which he has not accused or

charged by the prosecutors to the extent of the indictment. >> no he was charged with obstruction of justice and witness tampering. i'm going to waited to see what the evidence is. i don't wish anyone ill will. >> we'll be waiting. i will probably be in prison by then. >> scandals in his life. >> tucker: people with scansscandalous pasts are guilt. we know that. he will do anything to win. >> tucker: he is a bad guy. is he immoral. all right. thank you so much. well, the president has cut a deal with democrats to reopen the federal government. what is in that deal, exactly? we have taken a close look and we will tell you what we have found after the break. ♪ ♪ if you have moderate to severe psoriasis or psoriatic arthritis, little things can be a big deal. that's why there's otezla. otezla is not an injection or a cream. it's a pill that treats differently.

for psoriasis, 75% clearer skin is achievable, with reduced redness, thickness, and scaliness of plaques. for psoriatic arthritis, otezla is proven to reduce joint swelling, tenderness, and pain. and the otezla prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. it may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. otezla is associated with an increased risk of depression. tell your doctor if you have a history of depression or suicidal thoughts, or if these feelings develop. some people taking otezla reported weight loss. your doctor should monitor your weight and may stop treatment. upper respiratory tract infection and headache may occur. tell your doctor about your medicines and if you're pregnant or planning to be. otezla. show more of you.

>> after 35 days of shutdown the president made a surprise announcement today, a deal to end the stalemate and refund the government for about three weeks in any case, more details on that

agreement we are joined tonight by trace gallagher. hey, trace. >> hi, tucker, for now things are running smoothly on capitol hill. the senate made a voice vote to reopen the government. the house then agreed to the same measure and it's now waiting for the president's signature on his desk. the continuing resolution as you noted will ensure federal workers get their back pay and keep the government open until february 15th. the president says a bipartisan congressional conference committee will now work to come up with a border security package but, democrats are already claiming victory. watch this. >> separate the funding of government from the discussion on border security and that's what we got. >> the senate minority leader went on to reiterate the democrats are against the wall but president trump says if there is no fair deal in the next three weeks, he has two options. watch. >> the government will either shutdown on february 15th again, or i

will use the powers afforded to me under the laws and the constitution of the united states to address this emergency. >> in other words, he declares the border a national emergency and funds the wall with or without congressional consent. two weeks ago g.o.p. senator lindsey graham proposed exactly what happened today. open the government and debate the wall funding and now graham says that the democrats don't deal in good faith, they will end up hurting any chance of striking a bargain to extend daca. that's the program that allows children brought to the u.s. illegally by their parents to stay here without fear of being deported. tucker? >> tucker: quite a moment. trace gallagher, thank you very much. well, in moments like this we like to bring in one of the smartest people in washington dana perino hosts the daily briefing with dana perino. good to see you tonight. >> great to see. >> tucker: trace just explained that the president alluded to it background

white house is just saying it in three weeks if they don't have funding from the democratic house to build this wall they are going to build it anyway. >> in fact, just to reiterate shawrnz the press sarh huckabee sanders just tweeted this while you were talking to trace gallagher. they are watching the coverage and reaction from their supporters and the supporters seem uncertain what the president is going to do here. she is making it clear something is going to happen. i for one think the president did the right thing today. i think it was a statesman like move to say all right, we are 35 days into this. he was losing ground with the public. not just with the democrats but with the public. you had a situation where the airports were then going to be a mess because you can't have enough air traffic controllers get there claiming financial harm. had people lining up at food banks. had your own fbi director saying i'm mad. we cannot do this. so the president, i think, was right to diffuse the

situation. and then he went in to his talking points and he said look, here's all the things. he paint the picture of why he feels so strongly about border security. the problem, i think, tucker, is that they have been using this same language all of this time. the prime time address, out on the road. wherever he has been every day in twitter. it's not moving public opinion except away from him during the shutdown. so now maybe, perhaps, during this three weeks, he will be able to do that. if not, i think at the end he will declare the national emergency. >> tucker: you know what erodes your popularity with the public is weakness, period. i mean, people's views change based on what they think is succeeding. this is -- right? so if the president said from three weeks and he is telegraphing is he going to say this. it's too important. the democrats are not capable of arguing this in good faith negotiating i'm just building it do you think support for it, it being the wall would rise? >> no, i don't. i think he is going to have to accept that the democrats

are going to come forward with i think they are going to tocome forward. counter. here is $5 billion and we will include some barrier money. but is he not going to call it a wall. i think that at this point we are talking about semantics. we have already established that the democrats are already voted for the very things that the president has put on the table. is he in a position now of being able to say all right. on the shutdown, i will give you that but i'm going to protect this country. i'm the commander-in-chief. my obligation to protect the country. >> tucker: will we ever get to the actual debate which is about what would secure the border? i haven't heard a single conversation about that in the last month. like what would actually work? >> what do you mean? the president has told you that a barrier would work and the drones. >> tucker: i'm aware of that. i mean from the people who oppose him so what would work better? will we get to that point where we debate it? >> i think they will just say that, no.

yes, i think they are going to give him a little bit. they will say look, we will do all of these other technological things that you wanted. we will say there is a barrier. give you money to do it. look, i think that the thing is, the president is not in divided government. he is not going to get everything he wanted. i feel like he was pushed into this fight. that he was not going to be able to win. and you look back, maybe he should have taken the $25 billion from a year ago and the daca that now is on the table and tps. he is in a position now of divided government. he has to do the best he can do. he will go into the re-election effort. being able to say i did all of i could. let me also is i this, tucker, i feel like he has been in the white house too many days in a row. you know what it's like to be in washington that long it will drive you crazy for his own sanity i feel like from a communications aspect as well. get out of d.c. go see america. go visit people. go talk to them. >> tucker: smart advice. >> go out of there to change the dynamic. he doesn't have to be in

washington all the time. >> tucker: totally agree. go golfing. go to maine. >> go hold town halls and visit the people. get out of washington. >> tucker: i'm familiar with that desire. >> i know. >> tucker: dana perino, great to he so you. >> bye. >> tucker: as always. we can debate whether roger stone lied before congress. probably can't debate the proposition that he is a dangerous criminal because he is not. so why did mueller send a swat team with automatic weapons to seize him in the dark of night? it's worth thinking about that because it reveals a lot about where we are going. that's after the break. ♪ ♪

i'm a veteran and the army taught me a lot about commitment. which i apply to my life and my work.

at comcast we're commited to delivering the best experience possible, by being on time everytime. and if we are ever late, we'll give you a automatic twenty dollar credit. my name is antonio and i'm a technician at comcast. we're working to make things simple, easy and awesome.

>> it's disconcerting that cnn would be informed before my lawyers were informed that i would be arrested. if it was a dangerous situation which would merit the swat team then cnn's camera men would be in danger. i don't know why they would be allowed to be there. i had no firearm in the house i don't have a permit for a firearm. i don't own a firearm. only my wife and two dogs and three cats were at home. i'm not a flight risk. in fact, i think my passport

has expired or will expire in a few days. >> tucker: that was roger stone on the show a few minutes ago. there is a lot going on today. he was of course arrested this morning charged with seven felonies. set aside the validity of the charges against stone and validity of the entire russian collusion narrative. we have a lot of time to debate both of those. what does the arrest of stone itself reveal? so a group of heavily armed agents, very heavily armed agents, look at the tape, stormed his house at the crack of dawn today, far from being a safety measure, doing that radically increased the risk that something would go wrong during the arrest and get someone hurt or even killed it's happened a lot. stone said it best, if they wanted to arrest him they could have just asked. >> this morning at the crack of dawn fbi agents arrived at my home with 17 vehicles with their lights flashing when they could have simply

contacted my attorneys and i would have been more than willing to surrender voluntarily. >> tucker: why did federal agents do that a bunch must have been embarrassed that he had had to do it but forced to by superiors. one would be to look impressive in front of the camera. capture the raid. >> exclusive footage you are looking at right now from cnn as the fbi arrives at roger stone's residence in fort lauderdale, florida, taking him into custody. they arrived before dawn there, before 6 -- or just after 6:00 a.m. a dozen officers, we're told. the. [banging on door] >> fbi, open the door. >> tucker: the second this happened people across the country collectively had the same thought. why was cnn there?

was there some kind of well we use the word collusion between that network very strongly pro-mueller network and the mueller investigation? did they know ahead of time? today a cnn producer explained why he was outside roger stone's house in fort lauderdale, florida before 6:00 this morning. >> what's so fascinating is that we have talked to his attorney. the attorney didn't know this was coming. clearly roger stone didn't know this was coming. you were staked out at his house. you didn't know that this was coming. why were you there in position? >> allison, it's reporter's instinct, the whole russia team thought maybe there was something happening there was unusual grand jury activity in washington, d.c. yesterday. the grand jury, robert mueller's grand jury typically meets on friday, yesterday, thursday there was grand jury activity. we also had some other signs that maybe something was going on this angle, the roger stone angle. so, we showed up at his house this morning. we were the only ones there and lo and behold the fbi

agents did come and arrest him. >> tucker: so was that true? it might be true. you know, you want to take people at their word. and another reporter was predicting a friday indictment last night so it's possibly true. it's also possible this is the latest sign of what has become a deeply cooperative relationship between america's two establishments, the washington bureaucracy and the press who have supposed to be covering them. cnn was also the first news organization to know about the mueller's team first indictments against paul manafort and rick gates. maybe that was just a reporter's hunch too. who knows? dan bongino former secret service agent and author of by gate the attempted sabotage of donald j. trump. he joins us tonight. thanks very much for coming on. i want to reiterate. we are not holding anything back. everything we know for sure we have said out loud. maybe you know something i don't know. but it does seem like the press at earlier age was deeply skeptical of what

prosecutors might allege. it's not proven. one side of the story. not so skeptical anymore. >> yeah. that interview you had with chris hahn on was really tucker. you brought up to pint to him and he seemed genuinely confused. you brought up this premise we are establishing the fact now with this case with stone that contact with allegedly unsavory individuals with potentially foreign intelligence ties with a big deal, why the? we can all agree point stipulated. if that is a big deal, then how is it that the clinton team that has already admitted that some of their people went out and dealt with foreign intel people in sworn depositions, how is this not a big deal for them, too in the press and the media seems entirely unskeptical about this at all. they were more concerned this morning about the story how they beat everybody to the punch and made it to stone's house other than the basic facts of this case which don't seem to be applying blind justice to both sides. >> tucker: what i don't understand is how you could look at that tape that cnn aired this morning it's not

their fault what mueller's people did i'm supportive of the law enforcement and fbi of its agents. how could you look at that and say wait a second, maybe that's like awful, actually. it's awful. why wouldn't anyone say that? >> i should have hit on this in the first part. i know that's what you are asking. so much to get to in this. i spent 15 years in law enforcement. predawn raids are not rare. let's be clear. but for a case with this kind of magnitude, with the stipulated characteristics, nonviolent offender, process crime, cooperating, big profile, easily recognizable. almost no flight risk whatsoever. i'm telling you, i get it, liberals, you will gaffe me off. that's fine. i have never seen anything like this. this was clearly, clearly an intimidation tactic. there is no other way around it. this was not a good day for the fbi or bob mueller. this is a really bad look. >> tucker: liberals shouldn't be defending this crap they should be horrified and leading the charge against it.

>> they used to. what happened? civil liberties are out the window now, tucker. >> tucker: whatever gets you power is what he they're for. dan, thank you very much. >> thanks, tucker. >> tucker: it's been an exhausting week of news. how about something happy to end the show or at least weird. something to take your mind off. we found a pennsylvania man with an emotional support alligator. and, to us, that seemed like the most important story in america at least for our last block. we will show it to you when we come back. ♪ ♪ check out the bass pro shops' and cabela's spring fever sale for huge savings. like natural reflections spring fleece jackets for under $20. and new hi-tec wildfire men's waterproof hikers for under $50. your adventure starts here. audible members know listening has the power to change us make us better parents, better leaders, better people. and there's no better place to listen than audible. with audible you get a credit good for any audiobook and exclusive fitness

and wellness programs. and now, you'll also get two audible originals: titles exclusively produced for audible. automatically roll your credits over to the next month if you don't use them, and if you don't like a book just swap it for free. enjoy 100% ad free listening in the car, on your phone or any connected device. and when you switch a device pick up right where you left off. with our commitment free guarantee, there's never been a better time to start listening to audible. the most inspiring minds, the most compelling stories, the best place to listen. to start your free 30-day trial, text listen16 to 500500 today. ♪

>> tucker: bernie sanders is old and some ways traditional like a lot of people like a lot of us he is bewildered by the democratic party's turn into mindless politics. he said so in a recent interview with gq. many of my democratic opponents think that all we need is a candidate who is black or latino or woman or gay regardless of what they stand for that the end result is diversity.

sanders, of course, was attacked for this. because he was telling the truth. and that's not allowed anymore. albee beth stuckey tv and podcast host and she joins us tonight. bernie sanders can be attacked by liberals, huh? >> yes. this is a little bit like a snake eating its tail because bernie sanders is also a perpetrator of this identity politics. >> tucker: he is. >> he is the one in 2016 diversity is our strength only talk about racial diversity as far as his campaign went. he also on monday mlk day was saying that he is going to fight racism through economic inequality, talking to a majority of black audience. so he is also a fan of identity politics when it plays in his favor. he is not, when he is afraid it gist him the votes. >> tucker: i wonder if it makes it impossible, not that he would be the nominee anyway. i wonder if this is a deal killer. kind of thing you are not allowed to say anywhere on

the left. >> that's true. he already has three strikes against him. he is a straight, white, male it might be over for him already. >> tucker: might be. he is right. we should assess people on what they believe on what they are proposing. >> yes, i agree with him on that. >> tucker: alli, great to see you, thank you. >> great to see you, thanks. >> tucker: it was a pretty bumpy week. we will end it with a pretty well kind of amazing story out of pennsylvania. more and more americans are redefining their pets as emotional support animals. joey heene is going even further with his 5-foot long emotional support alligator and he acknowledges the animal could rip his arm off which would not be support he says the reptile is harmless and enjoys being hugged. carley shimkus is fact checking this for us tonight. can an alligator display emotion, bolster your emotion if they seem

emotionless. they have dead eyes how does this work. >> the alligator likes chicken wings as well. cuisine of choice. i have that in common. it's quite incredible. i know you are very familiar with the emotional support animal trend that is seeping into college campuses across the country. that sort of behavior is frowned upon among non-millennials. so what i think is happening is we are dealing with a 65-year-old man who just needed a little extra tlc tucker. so he decided to get the one animal that would actually gain him street cred and respect among his peers living breathing man eater. i get points for creativity and courage. i think there needs to be more men in america like mr. heene. >> tucker: i kind of agree. i'm for the emotional support animal thing. i know it sounds snowflakey or whatever they call it i need my spaniels to get me through the russia investigation. but, a reptile is very different from a dog or a cat. can this end well? i mean, this is going to

end, i don't want to jinx it but this tragedy, won't it. >> i truly hope it doesn't. >> tucker: i do too. >> i see the perks in this story. he said he was dealing with depression. i think it's actually quite smart to have an alligator when you are dealing with something like that because then your normal worries just go out the window because you are constantly in clear and present danger. so, there might be a little bit of reverse psychology that mr. heene is working with here as well. are we getting punked? >> tucker: of course we are getting punked. i don't even care on a day like this, after a week like, this after a two year period like, this i'm so excited that wally is an emotional support alligator i don't want to know the truth. >> he also has another one. i just gout word that he rescue you had a smaller alligator named scrappy. does scrappy like chicken wings as well? we need to know this. >> tucker: will you do me a favor in closing tonight, carley? will you not and i know you are a reporter and it will be hard for you to restrain yourself.

don't check the facts, this is a story too good to check. >> you have the pictures it's on the internet. >> tucker: it must be true. >> absolutely true. >> tucker: as long as you promise not to get to the bottom of it. >> i promise i won't. >> tucker: i feel better already. carley shimkus great to he so you. >> thanks, tucker. >> tucker: that's it for us tonight. we will be back at 8:00 p.m., sorry. prepositions go as the day goes on. we will be back at 8:00 p.m. on monday night. we are, of course, the show that's the enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness, and group think. but more than anything, have a great weekend, turn off the devices and the o . .

snoment nationa[national anthem] ♪ [national anthem] ♪ [national anthem] ♪

[national anthem] ♪ ♪ >> we have reached a deal to end the shutdown and reopen the federal government. >> we asked the president to open up government so we would have time to have a debate on the best way to protect our border. >> i think the president is hell bent on securing our border. to my democratic colleagues, this is the best chance i have seen since 2006. >> the president has agreed to our request to open the government. >> the president put the american public first. >> i think given the way it played out, this is probably the strongest thing president trump can do. >> roger stone will be arraigned in a d.c. federal court next week. >> the indictment is thin indeed. what's this about? it's about