captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight... >> they came from me. and i tweeted about it. >> woodruff: questions of justice-- a felony conviction and guilty plea from two men onose to president trump raise quess about what these mean akr the man in the oval office. then, we to michael cohen's attorney about what his client knows of the president. and we get reaction from former u.s. attorney general, michael mukasey. plus, facebook and twitter identify disinformation campaigns from iran, one day ed newmicrosoft reve evidence that russia was trying to interfere in the midterm elections. >> when you think about what it takes to successfully defend democracy in the1st century,

this is pa h of it. now e new elections on our doorstep. we need to be prufared. >> woo all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life conversations in a new language, like spanish, french, e rman, italian, and more. babbel's 10-15 minssons are available as an app, or online. more information on babbel.com. >> supporting social entrepreneurs and their solutions to the world's most prsing problems-- skollfoundation.org.

>> the lelson foundation. committed to improving lives through invention, in the u.s. and developing countries. on the web at lemelson.org. >> supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing supporti of these instis: wa >> this programade possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: the fallout from the guilty plea and conviction otwo men close to president trump escalated today, raising the question of whether . trump has broken the law. as yamiche alcindor reports, the

president's supporters remain in his camp. >> alcindor: president trump, under pressure and defia, pushing back about what he knew about hush money his former lawyer michael cohen gave to two women during the 2016 campaign. under oath yesterday, cohen said that mr. trump directed him to make those payments to keep the women from talking publicly about alleged affairs. the president told fox news he did nothing wrong. >> later on i knew.on late but you have to understand, ainsley, what he did, and they weren't taken out of campaign finance. that's a big thing.gg that's a much thing. did they come out of the campaign? they didn't come out of the campaign. they came from me. >> alcindor: on capitol hill, the respse from republican senators ranged from cautious... th all we really know for sure is thae was a plea agreement and he's pled guilty. and everything else isn. speculat >> these are serious charges and they can't be ignored. c i don't think be indicted.

>> alcindor: ...to defensive of the president... >> i don't see any evidence that the president knew they committed these aimes. but th crimes. >> alcindor: some democratic senators raised alarm bells. >> we're ia constitutional maelstrom, literally a crisis that we haven't seen since watergate. i think all the remediesheught to be onable, including indictment. >> alcindor: but most put the brakes on calls for impeachment. >> i think impeachment talk is something we shouldn't be engaging in now. i hope that we don't see, youkn ow, people celebrating. >> alcindor: all this poured in less than 24 hours after two men close to the president and his campaign were declared guilty, each on eight criminal counts. a, a jury found former trump campaign chairman paulfo manart guilty of tax and bank fraud.in nst twoutes later, hundreds of miles away in york, cohen pleaded guilty to charges of tax evasion and campaign finance violations. hours after the news broke, at a

rally in west virginia, the hipresident did not mentio two former confidants. but he continued to attack the overall russia probe. >> fake news and thu russian witc.we ot a whole big combination. where is the collusion? >> alcindor: by early this morning, the president unleashed on twitter, writing: "ooif anyoe isng for a good lawyer, i would strongly suggest that you don't retain the services of michael cohen!" at that rally last night ahead of november's midterm ons, most of mr. trump's supporters remained firmly on his side. >> he had an affair that might have hurhis marriage. any man would be, would be ashamed of that, any man wld not want that to get out, any man who's a man like i believe donald trump is would not want his wife-would regret that. so he's a boss, so he's going to say, pay him off. >> alcin the russia probe altogether. >> i agree with him. i think it's garbage.

we've got better things to worry about in this world. i would be not telling the truth if i said things like that didn't botn'r me because i like anybody that's dishonest,n but agu can't control anybody but yourself. >> alcindor: back on capitol hill today, some democrats, including senate minority leader chuck schumer, took their criticism a step further. they're calling for a delay in next month's confirmation hearings for supreme c nominee brett kavanaugh. >> it is unseemly for the president of the united states to be picking a supreme court justice who could soon be, effectively, a juror in a case involving the president himselfn >> alcr: others, like hawaii's mazie hirono, won't be meeting with the nom at all. >> i will be canceling my j appointment wige kavanaugh because i choose not to extend the courtesy to thisdent, who is an unindicted co- conspirator. l alcindor: as the politi battle conties, so do several

investigations into russia interferen. >> woodruff: and white house correspondent yamiche alcindor joins me now. along with our capitol hill correspondent, lisa desjardins. and larry noble, campaign finance expert and former general counsel for the federal election commission. larry noble, i'm going to turn to you before i turn to my"n shour" colleagues to clarify what is the violation here, if any, of campaign finance laws? we've had one version, we've heard from michael cohen in the courtroom yesterday, his plea, and then the president today saying something different. how do you interpret all this? >> well, iwhat michael cohen has said is true and if the information the u.s. attorney presented is true you have several campaign finance i have a corporate contribution because it looks like the trump organization reimbursed for the payments, you have another corporate contribution from american media, if that's thee company theyferring to, paying for other payments for

karen mcdougall >> woodruff: the "national enquirer." >> national inquiring paying for payments for karen mcdougall. you have excessive contributions by michael cohen because when he first paid out the the money to stormy daniels, then tt was a contribution from him until it was reimbursed, so an illegal contribution, and off failure to report all of this. >> woodruff: so when the president said today the money came from me psonally, there is still a disagreement between the two men about whether the president knew and directed this, the president says he didn't know at the time, aftersa havingd he didn't know at all and now he says he did, but the president is saying te money came from me personally, that it wasn't a campaig contribution so what difference would that make? >> it doesn't make any differce, in fact it wracks it worse. the way this should have been handled, the money should have been come from the campaign and reported as a campaign expenditure. there are obvious reasons they didn't want do this, but saying it didn't come from theea campaign it was illegal contribution because somebody

paid for it when it should have come from the campaign. the important part is michael cohen admitted and said this is for the purpose of influthcing election. once he said that, that turned all these into campaign contributions which should have com from the capaign. unfortunately for mr. trump, once he said it didn't come from the campaign, it adds to the problem. >> woodruff: so with all this roas bacd, yamiche, we heard you in west virginia last night talking to these folstks whoill are supporting the president, very strongly, despite all this news. what is your understanding of why that is? >> well, remarkably, most supporters i spoke to just did not care. they fell into twcategories, the first are people who look at this and says the preside sn't been convicted or indicted of anything. there are all the time around dhim in legal trouble maybe people he shouldn't have trusted but that he actually didn't do anything wrong. at least two supporters said unless the president commits treason or shoots somebody, they're going to continue to support him. >> woodruff: unless he shoots

someone. >> shoots somebody. >> woodruff: okay. the second category of people said essentially mr.ha trump mit problems if he actually did -- if he actually is proven guilty of something, but, as of now, they're still optimistici that tha't going to happen and they said this is between trump and god.pr most suringly a man named sean bailey told me president trump was trying to protect first lady melania trump, it was an act of chivalry by protecting these women and paying tem off because he sees this president as doing what he should as a mauf. >> woo lisa, you have been talking to people on capitol hill trying to gauge it political fallout, among them nominations for supreme courtbr nominet kavanaugh up in the air. >> this is a quandary for both parties. democrats, as they approach brett kavanaugh, one said i'm not meeting with him because of what happened, and we've seen

chuck schumer and others call for a delay in the kavanau hearing scheduled for a week from today. the democrats are arguing many fronts. when you ask them why should what michael cohen said about the president have an effect the nominee for the supreme court, they said we think the president is tainted by this indictment and we also think this is a nominee who has specific feelings about executive power and may protect but then the argument after that becomes more political. they point to the need for documents, they come to other areas. i think what you have isfr democrats unde pressure to try to block this nominee from their base but don't hve the votes to do it on their own. >> woodruff: yamiche, again, given that backdrop of what's going on on the hi, llu have been talking to other people at the white house here in washington. how are they dealing with all this? >> publicly, they are rushing to try to change the. narrati you had the president talking to fox news after this at the white house, trying to def say that he did nothing wrong, and then you had sarah sanders from

e podium putting together a press briefing at the last minute to say again that theid prt did nothing wrong, but behind the scenes, i'm hearing and a lot of other reporters are hearing that white house aid are rattled, worried that the present could leally be held liable. i had a long conversation with lanny daviyou spoke witwith the broadcast, attorney for michael cohen, and said the desident should be indic because he committed crimes but, of course, that's a grey leg area. >> woodruff: lisa, back to you. bringing up pitics, midterm elections coming in november. it's early, speculation, what's your sense of how that could affected? >> there are concern from republicans this may affect things in sos,e distrinot every district. i spoke to john cornyn, senator from texas,a trump ally. he says he does not believe michael cohen, thinks he's lying but, nonetheless, he said in his words these accusations don't help their cause. on the other hand, democrats are also concerned that rising calls for impeachment they see frommo

the progressive members could harm some of the members that have a chance to lip swing districts. i spoke to two new candidates for democrats who h the unseat republicans to their campaigns. they said they aren't going to bring up impeachment. they say that doesn't help themi what theht talk about is corruption from other republican members of congress like ducan hunter who is now indicted or chris collins who is indicted. they don't want to talk about the president and impeachment in swing districts but will talk at corruption more generally. >> woodruff: so many strands to the story but it's important and important to hear all the perspejaives. lisa dins, larry noble, i amiasm, thank you. >> thank y. >> woodruff: now, to the day's other news: thondemocratic na committee says it's uncovered a new attempt to hack its voter database ahead of then midterm elec d.n.c. officials alerted federal law enforcement to the attack, which was unsuccessful. the news came a day after a facebo twitter announced

that they had removed hundreds of account they believe iran and russia created to sow political e scord and misinformation. we'll have m the mounting threat of cyberattacks later in the show.aw president trumded the medal of honor posthumously today to air force sergeant john chapman for his "extraordinary heroism" in afghanistan 16 years ago. chapman died while trying to rescue a navy seal after their helicopter crashed under enemy fire. the military says he continued fight al-qaeda militant and helped save 20 u.s. service meers, despite critical wounds. the president gave the award to ch daughters. and two >> john engaged the enemy and provided covering fire in an attempt to prevent the enemy from shooting down our soldiers, our airmen and that helicopter. in this final act of supreme courage john gave his life for his fellow warrior

e woodruff: chapman is the first member of r force to receive the medal of honor for actions since the vietnam war. new u.s. sctions on russia ok effect today, as russia's ruble slipped to its lowest mark in two years. the new measures snclude a ban e technology exports to russia. they are in response to russia's chemical attack on a former russian spy and his daughter earlier this year in england. speaking in sochi, russia today, president vladimir putin dismsed the sanctions as "misguided." >> ( translated ): as for the sanctions, they are counterproductive and senseless, especially in regards of such country as russia. we hope that our american partners will eventuealize the uselessness of this kind of politics and we will start constructive coopetion. >> woodruff: the president suggested rlier this week that he would be willing to remove sanctions on russia in exchange for cooperation in places like syria and ukraine. house speaker paul ryan stripped

republican congressman duncan er of his house committee posts last night, after hunter was indicted by a federal grand jury.th justice department says the san diego-areaawmaker and his wife misused $250,000 worth of o campaign monexpenses like family vacations and their childr's school tuition. hunter maintains his innocence, and today called the attack "politically motivated." >> this is the new department of justice. this is the democrats arm of law enforcement that's what itppening right now. it's happeningtrump and it's happening with me. we're gonna fight through it and win. >> woodruff: hter is remaining on the ballot in november's midterm elections. meanwhile, republican voters in wyoming and alaska have chosen f their nomine governor. in wyoming's g.o.p. primary yesterday, state treasurer mark gordon came out ahead of president trump's pick, billionaire donor foster friess. in alaska, former state senator mike dunleavy beat a crowded

field for the republican nominati. he'll compete against the independent incumbent governor rd democratic former sena mark begich in the general election. hawaii's big island is bracing for hurricane "lane" to unlendh dangerous and rain over the next several days. the storm weakened from a category five to four today. but 155 mile-per-hour wind gusts and flooding are still expected as it draws closer to land. residents today flocked to supermarkets for supplies. the hurricane could make landfall by tomorrow. u.s. stocks reached a milestonel today: tgest bull market in history. the s&p 500 marked a record stretch of uninterrupted gains since march 2009, but markets closed flat. the dow jones industrial average lost 88 points to close at 25,7. the nasdaq rose 30 points tocl

e at 7,889. and the s&p 500 lost one pointse t clot 2,862. still to come on newshour: michael cohen's lawyer on what's next after the former trump attorney plead guilty to federal crimes. reaction from senators on capitol hill.ss attempts by and now iran to influence policy through social media, and much more. >> woodruff: we turn now to a man at the center of therowing legal storm that could implicate president trump. lanny davis is one of two attorneys representing michael cohen, mr. trump's former personal lawyer.nn davis, welcome to the "newshour". >> thank you. >> woodruff: you probably know aresident trump is saying today that he did knowbout the payments michael cohen made to two women who lege they have

had affairs with president trumr buident trump saying he only knew about it later and he's also saying, as he tweeted a few months o, that this was money that was his own money, it wasn't from the campaign. how does that square with what mr. cohen is saying? >> let's talk about the law and then i'll answer your question about what mr. cohen is saying. the w says it n't matter whether personal or campaign money, you have to report the donation, and it must be by a limit of $2,400 as usual, mr. trump doesn't eith care about thefacts or what the law is, but i'm telling you what the law is. as to what mr. cohen is saying, he is simply saying that, along with the u.s. attorneyor prosec that he decided to plead guilty to these offenses. the rds chosen collaboratively were that mr. trump, without naming him but we know it's mr. trump, directed and coordinated the payment of tat money by mr. cohen, not by

mr. trump because he was hiding, so there's a coverup quality here, paid that money for principle reasons, political purposes, that makes it a lony. it's the purpose of the money, having an effect on the election that markes ate cime, and we now have the spectacle that hasn't happened much in our history where we have, underh, somebody who is a lawyer saying that the client, the president of the united states, committed a grenl, and that's where we are as a country, a president with evidence of felony criminal beufvior. >> woo let's move to several comments you have been making. you'veone several press interviews since michael cohen pleaded guilty yesterday in ich you said he would be willing to testify about the presidt and russian attempts to influence the 2016 election.u how much can say, what can you say about what michael cohen knows? >> so i'm restrained in sayingo

what he k. first of all, i'm an attorney. when a client shares information with me, i can't waive attorney-client privilge. it's my observation, my opinion that what he knows out mr. trump's level of knowledge of the hacking and attempted interference in our democracy bn russian would be of interest to mr. mueller. i don't know whether i'd call in smgun, decisive, it would be up to mr. mueer to decide the weight of that knowledge, but i can tell you it would be of interest. >> woodruff: but based on what you know, is this information that suggests the president cooperated, coordinated or anyone representing the president cooperated, coordinated with the russians? >> i believe that mr. cohen has direct knowledge that would be of interest to mr. mueller that suggests -- i'm not sure itov -- that mr. trump was

aware of russian government agents hacking illegally, committing computer crimes, to the detriment of the candidate who was running against hillary clinton, and as to whether or not that can be decisivein mr. mueller is thinking about whether mr. trump did anything wrong not, i have toleave to mr. mueller. >> woodruff: if mr. cohen hason this informawhy wasn't there some sort of coopetion agreement with the prosecutor why was mr. cohen -- why was he pleading guilty when a lot of people looking at this would say, well, he has information the government would consider of value, they would want to cooperate with him? >> so it's tilt to anwer the question because cooperation agreement is defined by people in so many different ways. i can tell you that he pled guilty because he thought that was the best choice his family and he was willing tore takeponsibility and he's going to go to prison as a result of his decision. however, he's als said and

authorized me to say he will fully, consistently tell the eruth to whoever asks him to appear and tell truth. now, if that isn't cooperation, i don't know what the defined term is, whether there is an agreement or not,ly leave to the prosecution and mr. peclo in new york who rehepresents mr. in the finance arena. >> woodruff: is that process underway? inve they asked him to sit down and share whatevrmation he has? >> are you referring to mr. mueller? >> woodruff: mr. mueller or his representative. >> in this situation at this very sensitive stage, i can tell you that mr. cohen looks forward to sha eringverything with mr. mueller that mr. mueller is interested in andnybody else including congressional committees beuse he made a turn after serving mr. trump and doing a lot of things he's not so proud of, and, on july 2, he

declared his independence first on abc, then hing me, and he's going forward with truth to power as his new life. >> woodruff: lanny davis representing michael cohen, we hope we have ttuhe oppty to speak with him as well. >> thank you, judy.nk >> woodruff: tou very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: fother >> woodruff: for another perspective, we turn now to a former attorney general under president george w. bush, michael mukasey. l mukasey, welcome to th "newshour". you were able to hear what lanny davis attorney for healthcare just said. given the pleas yesterday, what legal jeopardy is president trump in right now? >> legal jeopardy, not much. political jeopardy, that depends, i guess, on how the public receives this, but the question is really what legal jeopardy lanny davis' client was in, and i wou suggest to you that he was in legal jeopardy prinpally from the chges you didn't discuss on that segment and not from the charge that you

did. >> woodruff: what are you referring to? >> well, he was facing a whtman sampler holiday assortment of federal charges including tax fraud, income tax evasion and the like. those charges, i believe he had no defense to. the charge that you were discussing was this harge of making an illegal or undisclosed campaign contribution and that charge i think he clrly had a defense to although nift his interest, i think, to pillead so he could implicate somebody else, ie th president, and disclose the information that would give him leniency ons all cha >> woodruff: focusing on the last point, michael cohen ish sayinge president directed him to make the payment and michael cohen made theayment. the president is saying he didn't know about it at the time, it was only tlatat he reimbursed it out of his own money, and i think the ecti law suggestsette, either way,

there's an election law problem, isn't there? la not really, the electio says that a payment for the purpose of affecting an election has to be reported and is limited for a person other thn the candidate to $2,700 and a little bit. it's theepurpose. if there is a dual purpose including protecting his reputation, then it's not considered a camntpaign bution. if you make a contribution, for example, to pay for yard signs or buttons or you make a contribution to pay for air time, that is a direct contribution to the campaign, but if you make a conattribution erves a dual purpose, then it is nat, i believe, covered by the statute and that statute is read narrowly. >> woodruff: if one acce that explanation about a legal violation, what about the president's shifting personal explanations for what happened that, at one point, he said heou didn't know a payment to these women, he said that in, what, april of this year, then in may heid, yes, he did know, he did reimburse michael

cohen, and now he's saying something along those lines, what are these shifting explanations from the president representing? >> i'm not able to read the president's mind. i can tell you that people often makeshifting representations when they are in a situations that is persolly embarrassing to them, whether unlawful or not. and, certainly, this involving two women, neither of whom was his wife, is a personally embarrassing situation. >> woodruff: the other point we heard michael mukasey froda lanny vis just now that his client michael cohen is prepared to testify before the special ormationthat he had inf about russian efforts to influence the 2016 election. is that something the pre should take seriously? >> i think. it depends obviously ton urce and given the fact the source is somebo with an interest

implicating theprsident inasmuch as possible so prosecutors will think well of benefit he will get th of their good word in connection with all of his sentences including on the other charges, then i think you have to sprinkle a couple of grns of salt on it. look, he would implicate thees ent in the assassination of abraham lincoln if he thought he cold. final, michael mukasey, we heard the president repeatedly cll the robert mueller investigation a witch hunt, he's described the people working on it as democrat thugs. due agree with awe -- due agreeo you agree with all that? >> that's not in my vocabulary. i didn't chothose words, he did. i can understand his frustration with the investigation which was supposed to look into the question of whether there d been inlved by the trump campaign with the russians in influencing our election in

2016. so far, that hasn't been shown, and there's been a lot of other things have been, incngluhe manafort indictment, and so on, but i can understand his frustration with constantly ving to deal with that o a day-to-day basis rather than other issui , but rtainly don't buy into phrases like that, they're not in my vocabulary. >> woodruff: but do you think the investigation is warranted? >> the investigate maybeen warranted at one time. ideaink it would be a good to let it run its course, whatever that course is. that course is not going to involve chaes against the president, at most it will involve a report that may thent be seno the house of representatives and they will make of it what they will, but e question is whether it will include any information that suggests the president commi high crimes and misdemeanors and, so far, i haven't seen it. >> woodruff: michael mukasey, former attornegeneral of the ited states. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: >> woodruff: let's take a closer

look now at the political fallout of michael cohen's accusations against the president and how lawmakers frth both sides oaisle are responding. we begin with the democratic point of view. mark warner of virginia is the senate intelligence committee's vice chairman. prnator warner, welcome back to thgram. >> thank you. >> woodruff: so president trump is repeating today that neither one of se developments yesterday had anything tdo with the mueller russia investigation. what is your read on thety gulea and verdict yesterday? >> well, let's look -- take a step back and look at what we've seen in the last 24 hours. the president's campaign gemana guilty of eight serious nnelies felonies, potentially 80 years in jail, the president's ong-time fixer guilty. comes on the national security advisor pleading guilty, 30 other indictments from the mueller investigation, five

other guiy ples, the president's attorney general self.g to recuse him this president tries to, in a sense, live in an alternative world where the facts don't matter but the real facts are closing in. in thecase of mr. cohen, mr. cohen's guilty plea where he seems to have indicted the president in terms of a campai violation, i'll let other lawyers make the judgment on that, but what i find very interesting for . cohen is his willingness, i understand, to testify before mr. mueller, ande i hearondhand that he may be willing to testify before our committee about thid s that wo of interest to mueller. that, by its nure, might be terms of the ties to the russian investigation, whetherewmr. trup bout the hacking of the e-mails, was willing to coordinate on the release of th de e-mails. know that the intelligence community has assumed that not ly did the russians intervene but intervened to help trump and

hurt clinton. cohenterested in what mr has to say about those activities as well as we have a lot ofquremainingstions about mr. cohen's involvement in a proposed trump twer moscow where candidly our investigation had gotten to a certain point but we still have questions.ui >> woodruff:ly, senator, i want to turn to another part of what michael cohen said and that is having to do with the payments to do women who allege to have hadfairs with president trump, to keep them quiet. is that something -- and he said in court yesterday, mr. cohen did, that the candidate, clearly he's referring to the president, directed lim him to do that is t something congress shlook into? >> i think that would be something that doesn't fall within the mueer investigation or even within our russia collusion investigation, but y hendidate for federal office, fromlowest level to the highest level, knows that you can't direct corporate payments, you can't mae corporate

payments in federal election campaigns, you've got mits, and if with what mr. cohen has said is true, i'll leave it to the auction lawyers but it shower would seem to me that would be a vlation of the law. >> woodruff: finally and quickly, some of your democratis colleagues aying that the brett kavanaugh confirmation hearings should be postponed, given all. this they are refusing to meet with him. where do you stand on that? >> i am still going to meet h mr. kavanaugh. v've got a lot of serious questions about hiws on executive power. think no person is above the law, particularr. trump who is so willing to flout laws and truth at a drop of the hat. so i'm going to just go ahead t and haat meeting with mr. cav pneuand, un-- kavanaugh, and, unfortunately, in terms of the hearings, the jury will set thatime tiebl and have shown no willingness to relax. >> woodruff: senator mark warner, thank you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: with a republicanrs

ctive joined by senator mike rounds of south dakota. senator rounds, thanfor talking with us, again. looking at the events of the last 24, 28 hours, what is your sense of whether the president is any closer to any sort of legal jeopard i on't think he's any closer to legal jeopigardy now. i think this has been an issue that's going to be in the press for an ex the tended period of time -- an extended period of time. the procesin place now haso play out completely. mr. mueller needs to continue to finish out the worthat he started, and, in the meantime, the congressional level, we're going to try to do our work here in d.c. and try to focus on an appropriations bill. we're focusing on moving forward , with the supreme court 'am know and a number of other items including a number of other nominations that have to bed. comple >> woodruff: there are two elements. i hear you, senator. arat the same time, thertwo

elements that came out of the testimony yesterday and beyond that today from michael cohen, t very clothe president for years, his former personal attooey. as you he testified in fedel court that the head the campaign, clearly referring to the president, directed himto ake payments to a woman to be quiet aboutan alleged affair. does this not at least raise questions if your mind? can you just go about your work and completely ignore that? >> we're noignoring it, but we didn't exactly see it as news either because most of us had recognized that the presidentys his attorarlier had indicated that there had been h a direction on their part and had admitted earlier, had senfirmed earlier that tho payments had been made and that the president -- or that they had directed the payments be made. whether or not there's a violation of federal election law and so forth will be determined by the appropriatemo sources, but certainly it is a p iticsue anytime

wmeone is accused of improper activity, and thl be in the news and will be something that we'll continue to talk about, but is it a distraction for us? the answer is yes, it is, but i don't think that it chaes anything in terms of what we had expected to come out, based upon what thea president -- or t his attorneys had already indicated was the case. >> woof:dr the president, as you know, has had several different explanations for what happened. he said earlier this year h didn't know of any payments, then he acknowledged later that did, and now there's aco lict between his version at mr. cohen's version. are you hearing from yourtu consts about this? >> you know, our constituents, for the most part, have simply said they like the policies he's got. they think he is really seriously intent on trying to make things better here in the

country. they can appreciate some of the personal activity he most certainly has been involved with but think he's moving the country forward. but, once again, when you talk to them personally, they disagree with his tweeting and in many cases with what he h been involved with personally. but, once again, they like the policies and so forth, and they continue to support moving forward with the policies thatpr thsident has suggested. >> woodruff: one other thing about mr. cohen. his attorney lanny davis telling tonight and has told other news organizations that mr. cohen is prepared to testified to the robert mueller investigation, even to the congress, that he has no, ma'ams ofknowledghat the president knew about russian attempts to interfere with he election. how much of a factor could that be? >> i'm not sure what mr. cohen would testify to, although he's

indicated he has items of interest that he would like to share andmost certainly, mr. mueller has the opptoortuniy nterview once again and to learn as much as he can. we want that process to contue on. that's the reason why you have the special prosecutor in the first pla. what, at this time, we have not found that there has been y involvement in terms of the trump campaign with the russian governnt any type of collusion, and i think that's what this special prosecutor was all about in e first place. so i think working our way through this process is good for country, working our way through the process, all mr. mueller to complete liz work and make his report with whatever findings he has. that's what we expect him to do in the first place and continue to support at this time. >> woodruff: finally, quickly, senator, if you were able to give t president advice right now, what would it be? >> look, i think the president most certainly has issues here he has to be able to surhare wih

the country. i think he cares deeply about what people think about him and i think he wants to do the right thing for the country. so rather than trying o giv the president advice, i would simply say thopat the out there truly want to see him be successful and want to see him move forward and how he goes about doing that witermine whether or not he will be successful in the near future oo t. >> woodruff: senator mike rounds you very much., thank >> thank you >> woodruff: and we'll be back shortly with the president ofcr oft on the latest efforts by russia to hack the midterm election. but first, take a moment to hear from yr local pbs station. it's a chance to offer your support, which helps kikp programs lours on the air.

>> woodruff: for those stations staying with us, we tu to history, mythology and imagery. a museum exhibition that features these themes opens our eyes to the symbols of native american life and culture in our everyday life. jeffrey brown has this encore report that originally aired earlier this year. >> brown: a 1948 indian brand motorcycle, one of the sleekest machines you're likely to see. clotng with the logo for you local sports team. and perhaps in your refrigerator right now, a box of land o'lakes butter. h >> sheding the butter, right. she's on her knees and she's holding the box that she's on. so it recedes into infinity. so there's something reallypr oundly weird going on. >> brown: even more profound, h ju pervasive native imagery is embedded into theco american subnscious. that's according to paul chaatof smith, a membehe comanche tribe and co-curator of an

exhibition at the f tional museume american indian: x. it's really this parado the country, 330 million people toda one percent of that population is native americ. for most people they don't see or reay think about indians, yet they're surrounded by indian imagery, place names, and have connections with iians on a kind of deep, emotional level. >> brown: wh her we know it or not. >> whether you know it or not. >> brown: to that end the exhibition is titled, simply, "americans," and shows us indians everywhere, in allif aspects of overhead: a prototype of the tomahawk missile, onoan from the nearby air and space museum. on one large wall, clips from films and tv shows. a side room takes us through the strange history of pocahontas, known, but not really known, by all. around the gallery, headdresses everywhere, in signs and

advertising. the image of the native american or indian; the museum uses the >> an indian in a headdress hasi nothing to d baking powder. yet it sometimes works because i think it talks about a kind ofam icanness and quality that people say, "ok, well that bang powder is pretty good because there's an indian in a headdress in it." and note that it is a red, white and blue heahiress. >> brostory of extermination and appropriation of lands, and yet an embrace of american indians as a symbol authentically american. >> there's certainly explicitly racist imagery, but it's a pretty small mority of it. because the whole way that indians have been objectified in thunited states is about a kind of noble indian idea,hich is a different kind of caricature than one that's explicitly vicious and that

we're dirty and backward and unintelligent. but obviously it is, even though it's flattering in some way, it's still another kind of a stereotype. >> brown: it's also, of course, about images and myths, and not about the actual people themselves. smith says this distinction began in the late 19th century after the protracted armed conflict between natives and settlers, and later the u.s. army, had come to an end. >> it was like there was a big meeting of the american collecti unconscious to say, now we're going to freeze indians in the past. actual indians that are on the reservations in th95 or 1910, or actual indians who might living in l.a., living lives like other people in los angeles, they're not going to appear in entertainm >> brown: one area of continuing contention: sports names and logos. st recent years some schools and universities havped using native american nicknames. earlier this year the and

inopans announced they will using the cartoonish chief wahoo logo on their uniforms. but they're keeping the indians na. more controversially, the washington redskins are keeping their name. smith is a fan of his local team, but not its name, though he understands the strong feelings. >> i have great empathy for fans, especially here in d.c. fans don't choose the name of the team, ght. a rich owner chooses it and in the case of these names it usually goes back a century sometimes. i get why people don't, aren't pleased when someone like me comes in and says, "you know, this name is a dictionary- defined slur," as it is in d.c. but if you come in and try to take it away from somebody, i get that that's, you know, you feel attacked. >> brown: no one would name team the redskins anymore, but not long ago victoria secret dressed model karlie klose like

this, only to criticism.ter the muse about the images around them and what they convey.to vi are encouraged to write e of their oeriences.co and for thtry as a whole, paul chaat smith says there's something more at stake. >> there's this challenge to the united states idea of itself to have to acknowledge that the united states national project came about at great cost to native people.ha sodo we think about that? that's what this exhibition is saying. how do we come to terms with that? should americans just feel guilty. i don't think so. it's about all americans inherit this, how do we make sense of it? and a starting point is kind of looking at indians in everyday life.r >> brown: e pbs newshour, i'm jeffrey brown at the national museum of the american indian in washington.

>> woodruff: there is plenty of time to view thibit yourself. it will be at the national museum of the american indian in washington, d.c. until the year 2022. but right now online you can also delve into some works by native american poets compiled in a new agy. read excerpts from that collection at pbs.org/newshour. >> woodruff: the hacking of the 2016 elections by the russians came as something of a surprise to many politicians, voters ands the tech iy itself, which was clearly behind and lacking in its initial response. but now tech giants, ss and political campaigns are soayding the alarm about the foreign actors and governments are spreadg lies and misinformation again.

and as amna nawaz tells us, some t these efforts are aimed esthe midterm elections, ls than three months from now. it's the focus of this week's segment about the leading edge of technology. >> nawaz: there have been a series of findings on this front in just the past 48 hour the very latest: the democratic national committee has reportedly asked the f.b.i. to investigate an attempt to hack its voter databe. let's break all of this down, starting with our own nick schifrin. so, nick, the d.n.c. hack, what do we know? >> the database had tens of millions of people in it. the attempck was by on unknown third matter and unsuccessful. the d.n.c. used the attempted hack to point out it wanted mor security help from the trump administration. that's two points. one the d.n.c. and othe critioized the administr for not providing enough security during the midterm elections and two the hacking intelligence operations, some of which we saw in 2016 havot

stopped. >> and when we the talk about them, we talk about them in relation to russian efforts, buk faceast night shut down hundreds of fake accounts some originating from iran. >> some from iran, some from russia, and the ones from russia are the same actors we saw in 2016 connected to russian military intelligee and they were trying to influence operations in syria and ukraine two countries russia has interfered with militarily. but iran was the big one. 652 pages and accounts posing add news and civil society orgizations that were front for iranian hackers, groups and state media. like in 2,000, the goal was to sow discord and influence opinionso what irn wants them to feel, to people in the u.s., ddle east, u.k. and africa. a few examples, a group calling itself the progressive front posted a fake oto of michelle obama with a sign an immigrant took my jobn apparent

reference to melania trump. ca group allebernie-crats connecting bernie sanders to ghazi, and a notebk showing kim jong un embracing president trump, the sug apparently while president trump was willing to tal about north korean nuclear weapons he pulled out of the iran clear al. what cybersecurity experts said today was bad actors, in this case iran, learn from other bad actors, so these are attempts that mimic the successful attempts russia had in facebook says we're trying our best, improving security. on a call last night thdey sai it's like finding needles in a haystack. mark zuckerberg is improving security every day. >> security is not ing you ever fully solve. our adversaries is re sophisticated and well funding and we have to constantly improving. but the shift from reactive to proactive detection is a big

chge and will make facebook sfer for everyone over time. >> facebook ruggling with us and so is our government. what are we doing as a country not just to stop the behavior but to defend against the attempts to? >> there's some defense. the trump adnistration says it is trying to improve election spcurity but there is also offense, ial when it comes to russia. trump administration imposne ly 500 sanctions on russian people and russian entities. yesterday, there were new sanctions, and in terotal exp say that, look, yes, this is having some effect, but the sanctions aren't strong enough to cripple the russian economy,e and, so, fore, the russian economy will muddle along and so far no disunit around vladimir putin so therefore the sanctions are not changing russian behavior and therefore the russian influence operations will continue. >> nick schifrin, good to talk. thank you. >> nawaz: and speaking of russia, microsoft said yesterday that hackers linked to russian military intelligence tried targeting a pair of conservativt

think tanks u.s. that had advocated for tougher policies against russia. those russian-affiliated groups, known as fancybear, or apt28, or sometimes called strontium, created fake websites for the icdson institute and the international repu institute, designed to lure in users, then steaiotheir inform microsoft says there's no evidence the hackers were successful. russian authorities denied any involvement with those attacks and i spoke with microft president brad smith yesterday. i began by asking him how confident he was of russia's involvement. we are extremely confident and have no doubt in our minds that these web sites were setp by the group that you mentioned, it is a group widely asociated with the russian government, it is the same group that hacked into u.s. political candidates and campaigns and the democratic national party in 2016. it is the same group that we saw hack into thnscampaor at least try to attack the

campaigns of all of the french sidencytes for the pre last year. now this group is doing it ain. it is, in our view, indisputably the same group. >> so why share all the information about the efforts, lbout what you did to counteract them, why share f that publicly now? what do you see about the threat or the tactic tha you too believe there is something new or different you should share with everyone? >> i think we'ret a critical moment in time. we all know far more than we did two years ago about these new threats. we need to take them seriously. when you think about what it takes to successfully defend democracy in the 21st century, this is part of it. nsnow we have new elect on our doorstep. we need to be prpared. we need to get ready. toneed to work -- we need work as we now are with political campaigns across the country to better protect themselves against these kinds of threats. >> let me ask you out the w you were able to respond against

this threat in this stance. you wait for the threat to present itself, detect it, hope you caught it early enough and then you shut it down. seems very reactive to the threats we know exist. but is there a more proactive thing you could be doing, more efforts to stop the threats you don't know about yet? >> i think th's an extremely important point and that's why today we're doing two things. first, we're talking publicly about the work wedid l week to address these web sites, but the other thing, in some ways, is far more sweeping, more proactive, itre's mo systematic, and that's a new initiative we call account guard, part of our defending democracy program.y what we are g is that we will reach out and work we've ricandidate and campaign at the federal, state and local level in the runup to these electionsh we will providm at no extra cost. our mostophisticated threat intelligence, work andda at at, we -- work and data, we

will provide them wi training, we need to get ahead of this or all we will be doing is playing defense. >> what about with your peers? i wonder as you detect new threats andinformation how much detection and coordination is there with other companies like yours? >> i think we've made important progress over the last year ando have mor ahead of us. the tech sector and especially the te leaders haveme together in new ways, we're sharing threat intgeele together. last december facebook and microsoft acted together to disrupt the malware capability of the nine group that launched the worldwide wannacry attack. we're doing new things like th this year. i think we also need to collaborate with people more closely in government. we're interested in that. i think people in washington are interested in that. whenssence, this is a tim we have a lot of differences in the country. there is always lot of differences between competitors. we need to set aside enough of toour differences to worether

to do what it takes to secure our democracy from the kinds of threats. >> president of microsoft bradh, smf you fo thank you for your t. >> thank you. >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. t for all of us pbs newshour, thank you and see you soon. >>ajor funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> consumer cellular believes that wireless plans should reflect the amountd f talk, text ta that you use. we offer a variety of no- contract wireless plans for people who use their phone a little, a lot, or anything in between. to lea more, go to consumercellular.tv >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life conversangons in a new ge. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and dividuals.

>> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by bhedia access group at access.wgbh.org you wouldn't know it by looking at it,

but hidden under this field is an amazing story. this was once the site of a frontier wn called new philadelphia. it was founded in 1836 by a man known as free frank mcworter, who was born into slavery, then bought his own freedom and came here. it's thought to the firsta founded by a black man before the civil war. free frank sold lots in the town to raise money to buy other members av of his family out of y, and new philadelphia became a thriving mu iracial community. time team has been invited to join the research already going on here and to investigate a new area of this once-forgotten town. we e going to look for evidence of the schoolhouse, a building that would've been