top of the hour today's top story nbc confirming first charges in the mueller investigation. i'm alex witt. >> good show. thank you, alex. i'm at nbc headquarters here in new york with breaking news that

alex was mentioning. nbc news confirming special counsel robert mueller's office will serve up an indictment on monday in the russia probe. that's according to u.s. official with firsthand knowledge of the process ongoing. part of mueller investigation focuses on whether russia had help meddling in the 2016 election from the trump campaign or anyone tied to the president. nbc kelly o'donnell at the white house with very latest. kelly, what do we know? and what's the white house saying in reaction to the reporting of the confirmation nbc has just had? >> reporter: no reaction from the white house. and none expected at this point. we could always look to the president's twitter feed to see if he has anything to say on this. but what i'm hearing from white house sources is that because specifics are not yet known, there is nothing for them to comment on. for example, we don't know what person or persons is under this indictment or the kind of offense. is it something that relates to white house work or direct work

with the campaign or could it be something completely unrelated but that surfaced through the investigative process? we've heard discussion in the public domain about how paul manafort former chairman of the campaign has been looked at for some of his international lobbying dealings. we know that michael flynn the short time national security adviser appeared to not filled out all of his paperwork pr appropriately. from those kinds of things different offenses can be alleged so we don't know the charges yet sochlt that comes down to the idea that we don't expect to hear anything specific on this just yet from the white house. however, in the briefing room issues related to alleged russian collusion and the broader investigation do come up frequently. and here's an exchange with sarah huckabee sanders that happened on friday. >> i think we are seeing now that if there was any collusion with russia, it was between the dnc and the clintons and certainly not our campaign. if any collusion took place, it

would be between the dnc and the clintons. >> talking about evidence of collusion with hillary clinton, sara, no the president made a charge that hillary clinton -- >> i think i've addressed that pretty thoroughly. mike, go ahead. >> so are you saying? >> i'm saying that i'm calling on your colleague. >> reporter: so that back and forth and the sort of new line from the white house through sarah huckabee sanders the press secretary is about something many of viewers have heard about over these months, the steele dossier, christopher steele, a british operative, a dossier of unflattering opposition research about candidate donald trump. what has now been learned is that a conservative publication in washington that was in the never trump category paid a firm to begin the work on that and later it was the dnc and hillary clinton campaign that paid that firm for this opposition research, which amounts to the dossier that has not been confirmed. that happens on campaigns but it had not been known publicly that

there was a direct clinton dnc connection to that. now that that is in the public space, the white house has grabbed onto that making that point frequently on twitter, from the briefing room lan something more broadly something to look over there for russian collusion and not at the president or his campaign or associates. >> thanks so much. very latest nbc confirming an indictment will come down on monday and the reaction at the white house. thank you so much, kelly, appreciate it. now on the phone with us msnbc partner at the partner of door city and whitney and former assistant water gate prosecutor. nick, great to have you with us here. what do you make of this announcement? i should say the development that we are now confirming which is an indictment will probably come down on monday? >> reporter: it's very hard to tell from the fact that this is going so it be an indictment coming down exactly what it all

means. there is one fact that we do know. and that is that this indictment is under seal at this point. and what's significant about the indictment being under seal is normally the prosecutor doesn't ask for a judge to put an in indictment under seal unless they are concerned about the individual or individuals whom are being indicted fleeing the jurisdiction. so this gives enough time for the agents or the u.s. marshalls to go tout and arrest the person, bring them before a magistrate judge where bail is set. so i thisty that's one thing that is of interest here is that the indictment itself just wanted handed up by a grand jury and filed in the public record. that's unusual only to the extent that it's only normally done when the prosecutor is concerned that the individuals might flee. now, having said that, we do

know that there are a couple of people who could very well be indicted, in fact, one has been told he would be indicted, that's paul manafort. and the other is general flynn. i think both of those people though i can't imagine that there is an issue as to whether either of those individuals are flight risks considering that manafort has already been told he was going to be indicted. and flynn certainly knows that he's in the cross hairs of the prosecutor based on his false statements to the fbi concerning his meeting with the russians. so i think it's going to be extremely interesting to see exactly who is indicted and what the subject of that indictment is. >> nick, the timing here. in the conversations that you've had, and conversations we've had here on msnbc with other watchers and experts like yourself, expectation of timing was not necessarily in the six month time period. folks are saying it could be a year or two or even more.

the timing being six months in, does this mean at the moment mueller's team is hoping show shake the tree, maybe pressure folks to turn, if you will? >> reporter: i think that's a possibility. but i think it's more likely that mueller would be bringing his first indictment in a way that would not only tie in allegations that we know about, like, for example, money laundering allegations that are out there about manafort or false statement allegations out there about flynn, i would think that his first indictment he would want to combine the russian collusion in the allegations of that indictment, just for political reasons, just to show that this is moving forward and that they have real allegations they are looking at. i could be wrong. it's all speculation. >> right. >> reporter: but i guess we'll find out on monday.

>> and keeping on your prosecutor hat here. as you think back to water gate, do you see mueller's team here having five rounds like this? 10 rounds like this? do you see it happening for the next 12 to 4 month24 months? what do you think going forward? >> reporter: it's hard to tell. as you mentioned before this is to bring pressure on certain people and to get them to turn, then it this can go on much more extended period of time. it all depends how they have organized this and how they are planning to bring their indictments. again, there is it really no way to tell. the difference with watergate, was of course at the time archie bald came in people were turning. this started with given 25 year sentence by judge, basically didn't want to spend the rest of his life in jail, so cooperating

from the get go. so this is it a little bit different in the sense that we don't have people out there that are obviously cooperating and pointing finger at anyone with real criminal allegations at this point. >> nick ackerman, great to have you here. thank you so much, sir. >> reporter: thank you. >> bye bye. and, again, as we were speaking with nick ackerman, form terra assistant prosecutor, in note in that particular case, 69 people were indicted at the end all said. let's bring in now former federal prosecutor with the firm of thompson. we have editor of the hill. and a lana congressional reporter at politico. renaldo, you heard what nick said, giving us that perspective, that context of not only watergate but what we might be seeing here. what did you think of what he said? and would you agree with what he said? >> well, here's what i think. i don't really think mueller is

concerned about anyone being a flate risk here. what i do think is that these are early indictments that are being brought down in order to get people to flip. what i mean by flipping is to get people to cooperate with mueller's investigation. every indication we have had is mueller's investigation is ongoing. he recently inter strud a number of people on the white house staff and that would indicate to me he's going to continue his investigation. he's going to keep interviewing people. keep collecting documents. so what i expect he's done here is selected a couple of individuals that he thought were good targets that he had sufficient evidence to convict. and so he is trying to put pressure on those individuals so that potentially they'll cooperate and give him other evidence that he could use to indict other people down the line. >> and that might be the question, right. who might he be trying to get to

flip in this case? as you were bringing up wr. and who might he be targeting at this moment? because whoever they do announce, again we expect this on monday, if it's to try to get him to come up to his case, who might that be, what do you think? >> i think you have to think about paul manafort. his house was raided and told he was going to be indicted. and there haven't been any indication he's cooperating although it's unclear. this was going to be tax reform week for republicans. and it's not going to be now. it's going to be dominate by this news on monday. but i do think mueller has to, as far as timing of this investigation, i think he's going to be cognizant of the election in 2018. and maybe he's moving quicker than we anticipated. but that also remains to be seen. >> did this surprise tu, you on timing? as we've had discussions on this topic. we were talking about a year,

two years potentially or moran we are only six months in. >> well, in keeping with what bob was saying though, if this is really an attempt to get a key figure like paul manafort to flip, it makes sense it would happen this early. of course we won't come to the next milestone for another six months or another six months after that. what is yo what is yo what is yo what what surprises me it's almost like he is answering back? >> what do you mean by that? >> you have republicans starting drum beat uranium and one two punch of mueller coming back with indictment. >> hand we have seen the white house and president get out in fro front of stories or change the story line. the narrative for the day or week or the weekend, as she was talking about, if he were to be doing that, would he have gotten a hat tip based on what mueller

announced on friday? or what we understand heel be doing on friday, excuse me? >> yeah. so, look, what i think the white house is doing is something that people who are under the cross hairs of investigations used to dpo all t do all the time when i was investigating them is try to distract, try to point to other potential issues out there to try to draw attention to what they are doing. tan i think they are also here trying to put pressure and trying to discredit the investigation. i don't think it's going to succeed. i think the new cycle is going to be dominated by the news on monday when people are brought into custody. >> we can't forget it happening, at least in the background here, bob, because the president did bring this up in previous cycles, the pardoning process. >> yeah, that's a big question

constitutionally of how big his powers are on pardoning. it's interesting that a few months ago the before ty cobb came on his team, hey maybe mueller knows comey and can't do that investigation because of that. that has changed hand you have schein him more cooperative and haven't seen him tweeting about mueller in the last months. but will that continue. we shall see. >> tomorrow is sunday. and maybe after a day of digestion, we will see some relax coming from the white house. everyone, we'll talk to you go later. thank you so much for that perspective. great start to the hour. now to this hillary clinton back in the headlines as you heard this after republicans were launching new investigations tied to democrats and the former secretary of state, was it an attempt here to distract the public from what we are talking about, robert mueller investigation and

expected indictment to be released on monday? on with jeff flake and bob corker speaking out against the president, we'll speak with two political scientists who issued warnings about the republican party and they did it years ago. what started as a passion... ...has grown into an enterprise. that's why i switched to the spark cash card from capital one. now, i'm earning unlimited 2% cash back on every purchase i make. everything. what's in your wallet?

going somewhere? whoooo. here's some advice. tripadvisor now searches more... ...than 200 booking sites - to find the hotel you want and save you up to 30%. trust this bird's words. tripadvisor.

when the next generation asks us why didn't you do something, why didn't you speak out, what are we going to say? mr. president, i rise today to say enough. >> hope that he would rise to the occasion as president and inspire to lead our nation instead of dividing it. it's obvious his model as to

divide. >> what's your relationship like with the president? >> almost none. >> that's terrible. republican rebellion, you just heard from three senators all of them slamming president trump. all of them deep divisions within the gop turning into actions. despite the recent feuds, president trump thinks his party has pretty good unity. his words. >> we have a very good relationship. honestly, when you take a look at what's happened with hillary clinton and bernie sanders and the hatred and the division and the animosity, i'll tell you what, honestly, the republicans are very, very well united. >> thomas mann, norm or enstein are not surprised by the gop dysfunction. they talked about the party being fundamentally broken and they did it five years ago. and at the time it angered some republicans that they will would say that.

but now many of them agree with these two scholars. joining me now thomas mann dire, and also wrote the book one nation after trump. great to have scholars like this political scientists that have looked into this. thomas to you first, we play a little bit of the sound from this week as you listen to jeff flake take to the podium there in the senate. and what many have called from both sides of the aisle an eloquent speech. what do you takeaway in terms of what is happening right now with the republican party? just within the last five days? >> jeff flake's speech was historic. it was, as you say, powerful, unusual in that not that he's broken with the president on many of the issues like tax reform or health insurance reform.

but that he's really addressed himself to the president's behavior, to his personal style of leadership, to his failure to speak truth, to be honest, to have any kind of public virtue that would allow politicians to actually come together to seek remedies to problems that they face. so trump now faces three republican senators who have been prepared, perhaps partly because they are not likely to, two are retiring and one suffers from a brain tumor, not likely to be around long, but it suggests some growing problems within the party. >> norm, when you and thomas were putting together your thesis there, that republicans are the problem, that there is a

vacuum that is being created in the republican party. there is too much hoin the part itself. tell me what you were talking about five years ago in the republican party and are all of those characteristics still in play today? >> so, richard, we have been around and we are immersed in both parties for more than 40 years. and we were close to a lot of republicans who represented center right philosophy. a real respect for their own institutions, problem solve ago approac solving approach, and we saw this from change up close to a point it alarmed us so much that we wrote that particular piece in "the washington post" but also a book called "its even worse than it looks." we saw a party becoming trying

to gain short term advantage. disrespect for science and other important values and blowing up norms of governance. and we tried to send out warning signals. most elected republicans were very unhappy with us. some who are not in office were delighted that we were trying to bring their party back to a governing process. and we saw the seeds for a trump like figure emerging. frankly though it's been even worse than we thought it could be. as we see a party now that has no interest in investigating things like the outrageous whitefish contract, the trump administration, even niger, as long as they get tax cuts. it's really become even more dismaying and alarm go to us which is why we wrote with ej, "one nation after trump". >> as you look at why they didn't listen to you five years ago and why republicans may not be listening to the two of you

today. what might make them listen in the coming months? and as we look towards 2018, what might make them listen to your thesis that they need to look internally and fix the issues? >> an absolute shah lacking in the midterm elections, and indicators that the thought is likely to happen. right now republicans are facing an effort by steve bannon and his financer the mercers to challenge republican senators. it's ironic because they'll be challenging senators that voted with their party on most of the major issues. >> right. >> the irony is that there are few disloyal in terms of policy because the policies being debated are largely republican

party policies, like cutting taxes above everything else. >> right. norm, 30 seconds to you on this one. when did the word establishment become a bad word? and why? and is the problem here the parties two party system. >> well, populism has been ingrained figure in our lives that became much more significant after the financial collapse of 2008. bull you had republican establishment figures try to exploit the populous anger of the tea party movement in an a way that turned on them. and they have become the establishment that is now hated almost as much as the rest of the journalistic, academic and political process, including the democrats. >> all right. for those that red the article and "washington post" and book claire v great conversation.

thank you you both. have a good saturday. >> thank you. >> you bet. next, the $300 million deal awarded to a small montana energy company to restore power in puerto rico. what the white house and interior secretary are saying now about this controversial deal. we have that. '06 r-

tais really quite simple.est it comes in the mail, you pull out the tube and you spit in it, which is something southern girls are taught you're not supposed to do. you seal it and send it back and then you wait for your results. it's that simple. we're drowning in information. where, in all of this, is the stuff that matters? the stakes are so high, your finances, your future.

how do you solve this? you don't. you partner with a firm that advises governments and the fortune 500, and, can deliver insight person to person, on what matters to you. morgan stanley. there are more questions than answers as to how a small montana received the largest contract to rebuild puerto rico's power grid. the trump administration denies the president had anything to do with that deal. meanwhile, multiple congressional committees are under way looking into it. nbc gabe has been following this from puerto rico from us. >> reporter: fema is now saying they have significant concerns. and overnight puerto rico says initial audit into the contract suggests will is not sufficient evidence to conclude whether all hiring requirements had been

met. this as this controversy grows, not just here in puerto rico but capitol hill. mounting questions about how it was initially two full-time employees got this deal. >> everything i've seen i think it's an outrage. i think the idea that the government or the appropriate authority did not look for mutual aid, did not call up utility companies in the united states, swi whwhich is what is normally does surprises me. >> reporter: some people including nancy pelosi calling it to be canceled says it does not have the right to audit or review the cost. despite that, white house has 300 contractors on the island simply more faster than larger competitors. >> in the conspiracy theories i get people's questions, they are

very legitimate. the contract speaks for itself. it's the ability to get the work done. >> reporter: u.s. interior secretary ryan zinke who happens to be from montana at the white house friday with prescheduled meeting with prum. >> he did ask secretary zinke just for clarification purposes. and he reiterated once again that we have no role, the federal government and specifically he had no role in that contract. >> reporter: the couldn't erupting as almost three quarters of puerto rico struggles without power. he tells us how this san juan has been in the dark for nearly seven weeks since hurricane irma before maria. >> there is it no hope. we don't know what's going to happen. it's a struggle. >> reporter: the head of puerto rico's bankrupt power authority who approved the contract says he would do it again and that there is nothing illegal here. still, multiple congressional committees are promising full

investigations to find out exactly who was behind the deal. gabe, nbc news, san juan, puerto rico. and indictment is expected on monday with robert mueller investigation. our panel will discuss that what that could mean with the trump administration. numbers by almost half, but despite the great progress that we have achieved, there are still too many veterans who still need a place to live. this project is a comprehensive rehabilitation of the center's facility here in downtown boston to create permanent supportive housing, transitional housing and service spaces, a facility that really delivers on society's commitment to people who have served in the military. citi® was the financial partner because they were able to come with the resources, both the capital resources and also the human resources, the experts in their fields, and without citi's partnership we probably would not be here where we are right now.

the goal for us at this project is to be more effective in the services that we provide so that veterans who have committed to put their lives at risk to protect this country have a home in this country.

it's ok that everybody ignores me when i drive. it's fine, 'cause i get a safe driving bonus check every six months i'm accident-free. and i don't share it with mom. right, mom? right. safe driving bonus checks, only from allstate. switching to allstate is worth it.

welcome back. i'm richard lui at new york city. here's what we are watching, says the threat of nuclear attack is accelerating. pentagon chief is pledging to repel any strike and has called their nuclear program illegal and unnecessary. the situation remains on the forefront of president trump upcoming trip visit to asia. and catalonia parliament is decided to do own independence. spanish is responding by firing political leaders and taking charge of the government.

and over 150 white nationalist rs marching in tennessee as far as white lives matter. chanting foreclosed borders. showed up stating these folks were not welcome. we'll be following this story as it develops. we'll be right back. indictment on u.s. investigation on monday. to most, he's phil mickelson pro golfer.

to me he's, well, dad. so when his joint pain from psoriatic arthritis got really bad, it scared me. and what could that pain mean? joint pain could mean joint damage. enbrel helps relieve joint pain, and helps stop further damage enbrel may lower your ability to fight infections. serious sometimes fatal events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma other cancers, nervous system and blood disorders and allergic reactions have occurred. tell your doctor if you've been someplace where fungal infections are common. or if you're prone to infections, have cuts or sores, have had hepatitis b, have been treated for heart failure or if you have persistent fever, bruising, bleeding or paleness.

don't start enbrel if you have an infection like the flu. since enbrel, dad's back to being dad. visit enbrel.com... and use the joint damage simulator to see how your joint damage could be progressing. ask about enbrel. enbrel. fda approved for over 14 years. backed me up... big time. before movantik, i tried to treat it myself. no go. but i didn't back down. i talked to my doctor. she said: one, movantik was specifically designed for opioid-induced constipation... oic. number two? my movantik savings card can save me big time over the other things i tried. don't take movantik if you have or had a bowel blockage. serious side effects include opioid withdrawal, severe stomach pain, severe diarrhea, and stomach or intestinal tears. tell your doctor about side effects and medicines you take. movantik may interact with them causing side effects. don't back down from oic. talk to your doctor about mo-van-tik.

and how you can have a $0 co-pay. today msnbc nenbc confirms indictment is coming monday. house speaker paul ryan expects the fbi to turn documents next week. but as details flood the headlines donald trump is trying to make the case that the dossier has been discredited because opposition research was funded in part by the hillary clinton campaign. yet even as he tries to distance himself from the investigation,

more information has become clear with trump campaign. back with us, at the hill, "washington post," congressional reporter at politico. alan harks pi alana, pick it up for us here. the big question about the conversation that nbc has been able to confirm is what is robert mueller throat right now? what is his next step? who might be the target of this indictment? >> well, that's not something we can say with any degree of certainty. however, what we do know, is that the two major figures, his team has been sir skeling are paul manafort, the former trump campaign chair, and michael flynn, the former national security adviser. when it comes to manafort refers to money laundering, he is

tipped off he should be expected to be indicted. >> and it could be one person potentially, it can be many people potentially? >> yes, we don't know how many targets there are for this first set of charges. and to be fair there are a lot of potential targets, right. i mean, you have flynn, you have manafort, you also have trump's business attorney who has had some very fishy real estate transactions here in new york, all cash, for way above market prices. you've had who else? i'm thinking carter page. roger stone. so there are just so many people within the trump orbit who could have potentially been sucked into this investigation. and could be, if in fact there is incriminating against them, could potentially be leveraged to point the finger at donald trump, a much bigger fish. >> and it's been a busy week here on the hill in d.c. on this very topic of russia, as you know, as you've been following on the hill. what has stood out to you and been the reaction, if any at all

ta ufd heard of from the trump white house, either from the white house itself or from donald trump's private lawyers? do we know any level what they are doing in reaction to this new story? >> we haven't seen any tweets from the president on this imminent indictment. and obviously some people in the trump orbit are having very anxious weekend. but at the same time, trump and republicans on capitol hill have seized on the whole controversy with hillary clinton and dnc funding the dossier at least in part. so i think you'll find that and other investigations on your nam um one that republicans have launched. they want to go after democrats and muddy the waters and say these are legitimate questions. the congress is run by republicans. and respected republicans, including senator grassley have launched multiple investigations. >> your thought on exactly what was brought up there by bob,

uranium one, loss dossier funded by dnc initially and later on by hillary clinton, either of those two have legs, what we think we'll be focusing on for the next week or so? >> i think what has the most legs is fbi involvement in the dossier. because as they respected very respected republican on both sides of the aisle and he has been concerned for months that the fbi has essentially circulated this dossier throughout its inner ranking so much that it might be focusing on that that in grassley mind may make this dossier seem more reliable than it is. now that the funding revelations have come to light, expect that to have legs. >> so that has legs. then we have to look at the statements being made alongside that.

the word collusion with the clinton campaign and with hillary clinton was used by the president in his tweets, also used by the press secretary. does this constitute collusion what we are talking about here? >> none of what's been reported so far suggests anything approximating that. it seems like a lot of these stories had been covered a couple of years ago, including with your rain with uranium one have been talked about and dredged up against because the white house wants to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. and there is a little bit of this strategy of i know you are, but what am i. or i know who i am but what are you. whatever the expression is. any time there is an accusation against the president, you think we are, no, you are doing collusion, no, hillary clinton has bad character. that's the way they knew

neutralize a lot of these characteristics. it's not about the character the primary players in any of these stories, but also about the techniques. you remember that it was democrats for a long time complaining about fake news on facebook rk facebook, for example. and that term was adopted by the right to slam the press. so any time you get an accusation levied against the president, the strategy seems to be to say, okay, what can we cobble together to make it sound like it's really about his opponent. >> what might be in this, bob, these files that the house intelligence committee is seeking, this information? what would be in it like the dossier, number one. and when you think of this idea of operation research, this is typical in campaigns, whether it be national or local, and all of us being in the news industry, we get folks pitching us from op research firms?

>> that's right. both sides have done it, and they'll continue to do it. the problem here is that it's kind of the more of the cover up where democrats and dnc were saying no they hadn't funded it then now we are seeing debbie saying she was not familiar with it. so the question is this lawyer who was in charge of all this money that was funding it, that's where the questions are going to be. and honestly it should be looked into of who was pulling the strings. >> alana, 15 seconds. >> i think it's important to remember here that the white house may have a sense of the political trouble that it's facing so the uranium one and fbi discussions however legitimate are are also attempt to change the subject for mueller. >> yeah, two more up in the air, thanks very much. fantastic conversation. >> thanks. much more on unfolding

russia investigation after this. s seems a little... strange? na. ever since we switched to fedex ground business has been great. they're affordable and fast... maybe "too affordable and fast." what if... "people" aren't buying these books online, but "they" are buying them to protect their secrets?!?! hi bill. if that is your real name. it's william actually. hmph! affordable, fast fedex ground. but on the inside, i feel chronic, widespread pain.like most people. fibromyalgia may be invisible to others, but my pain is real. fibromyalgia is thought to be caused by overactive nerves. lyrica is believed to calm these nerves. i'm glad my doctor prescribed lyrica. for some, lyrica delivers effective relief for moderate to even severe fibromyalgia pain. and improves function. lyrica may cause serious allergic reactions, suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these,

new or worse depression, unusual changes in mood or behavior, swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling, or blurry vision. common side effects: dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain, swelling of hands, legs and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who've had a drug or alcohol problem may be more likely to misuse lyrica. with less pain, i can do more with my family. talk to your doctor today. see if lyrica can help.

. i think that our position hasn't changed since day one and i think we are seeing now that if there was any collusion with russia, it was between the dnc and the clintons, and certainly not our campaign. white house press secretary sarah huckabee sanders pointing the finger at democrats for russian collusion. but today nbc confirms mueller is handing down indictment on the scandal. and this week devin nunes announcing a new investigation into a uranium deal with russia while hillary clinton was secretary of state. going back to 2010. now republicans say reports that the fbi had been investigating bribes to return nuclear officials tied to the deal is raising some new concerns. clinton was asked about it during her appearance to have her book. take a listen. >> i would say it's the same

baloney they have been peddling for years and no credible evidence and in fact it's been debunked and will continue to be debunked. >> just as mueller investigation ramps up is youranium one investigation part of that. >> noelle, is it ma lonnie? >> you know what, hillary clinton really now be talking too much about that, especially when the dnc. and the clinton campaign have collaborated and colluded. >> how is the collusion, no el? >> i mean, look, even somebody from the new york times, the new york times, maggie came out and said the dnc has lied about the involvement. you have to look at the reason why hillary clinton after she lost the campaign -- >> but you know that, collusion is a different game all together here.

>> well, but i mean, look, there is going to be charges coming out on monday. and deal with the charges that are coming out on monday as far as the trump campaign. but you have to look at one thing, if it is, a lot of people are speculating it's probably going to be manafort, you have to look at what this was with manafort himself. and a lot of people within the trump campaign if it is manafort they didn't know what he was doing. >> so whether this is a redirection or not here, bocomi from yo from uranium one, the optics, this is not good, because now we do know that the dnc, not the hillary clinton campaign, in part along with the freebie con did fund opposition research. something that both of you have been involved with before and you understand. it's just the way political business is done. >> that's right. first of all, i love unplugged hillary and believe this is

baloney. this is something that opposition research is done on both sides n this particular case, remember, it was republicans that had funded this to investigate trump before this went over to the democrats. >> started it, you mean? >> right. she is no longer in charge of the dnc. not really to litigate this that will dpleen any impact any shape or form what we are dealing with the mueller investigation right here and now. it seems debbie are more concerned about sort of circling the wagons around donald trump to protect him for whatever is coming down the pike. >> whatever is it coming down the pike, uranium one i'll go back to you on this. folks that said that have watched this debunked this whole idea yet it is being pushed forward to the next step. and i was mentioning mr. nunes as he looks into this.

>> rife and they are going to look into it. and they have every right to look into it. and other thing about it, a lot of republican legislatures are trying to urge mueller to step down for basically a conflict of interest with his comradery with james comey. that in itself the optics there, that looks lick a violation in itself. >> so that's what -- go ahead. >> but i think this is what's interesting. because there is this effort to sort of discredit mueller. effort to all of a sudden start again talking about hillary clinton at a time when she is off doing her own thing. why all these conversations taking place right now? it seems, i'm not going to say collusion, but coordinated effort to direct this away from the russia investigation and how deep it's going. and for democrats and others watching this, this is important

stuff, because the question will become how is donald trump going to handle this? how is he going to respond? will he come out and start pardoning all the people that get called into this investigation? and thankfully mueller is partnered with the attorney general of new york, eric schneider man so there is some protection against that. but these are things that republicans are going to have to figure out how much are they going to defend the president on? how much are they going to stand behind him as these indictments, particularly if more than just the one we'll find out about, if they start being revealed? >> this is big news, indictment coming down monday, we don't know how many folks, whether it's one, group, we don't know exactly what the charges might be. we do think, we do believe based on our reporting that we will find out on monday now what this all entails. but the flip side is how the president how republicans may be respo responding to this. and maybe getting a two-fer,

because go up against hillary clinton who the president does not like the fact that he lost the popular vote to, right. number two, an establishment figure that is not liked by the right and some in the middle and even some on the left here. so that's why he and others potentially will be bringing up hillary clinton and uranium one and the dossier. >> yes, richard, to be fair, you are right on that. but you also have to look at it from the gop point of view, trump campaign point of view, republican point of view. and the fact that they are very upset that the finger keeps pointing at them with russia, russia, russia, russia, so to speak as kelly and conley likes to say, but you have to look at they have seen where the clinton campaign basically said that the reason that they lost the election, it was very unfair to the democrats, was because of russian conspiracy theories. so now we have just busted them

cold with the fact they have done that that's why the republicans keep going back to the narrative because they are upset how the finger keeps getting pointed at them and not the other say. >> we have to leave it there. thank you, spirited conversations thank you you both. coverage of russian investigation will continue at the top of the hour. stick around from that. we'll have a live report from the white house. plus why didn't the president order the release of all jfk files was it tout of concern for national security or opportunity to spur the conspiracy theories? people who rely on us every day to deliver their dreams they're handing us more than mail they're handing us their business and while we make more e-commerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget... that your business is our business the united states postal service.

priority: you ♪ looking for a hotel that fits... whoooo. ...your budget? tripadvisor now searches over... ...200 sites to find you the... ...hotel you want at the lowest price. grazi, gino! find a price that fits. tripadvisor.

when heartburn hits fight back fast with tums chewy bites. fast relief in every bite. crunchy outside. chewy inside. tum tum tum tum tums chewy bites. here in new york. indictment coming monday. and russia collusion in investigation. part of that investigation is looking into anyone from the trump campaign or with other connection