thanks to you-all. >> thank you. >> before we go, amazing news for all your audio files, there is an "all in with chris hayes" pod cast. listen for free wherever you get your pod cast. that's "all in" for this evening. "the rachel maddow show" starts now. >> more ways to get chris hayes. that's exciting. >> i'll be there on your commute tomorrow morning. >> i once had somebody come up to me on the subway and hold their phone up to me awkwardly where i got scared and it was my avatar there and they were listening to me. >> it's you. >> don't tell me what part you're at. congratulations, man, thank you. thanks to you at home for joining us. nice to have you here. a lot of news has broken tonight. the judge overseeing the case of trump national security advisor mike flynn that plead guilty to lying to the fbi and became a co- co- co-op raytive witness and the judge in the mike flynn case has tonight recused himself from

that case. now the judge in the case with the recruiseusal. there has never been a random lottery, a random drawing from the other judges in that district to figure out who will pick up the case and replace the judge rudolph contreras. instead of him being the judge, the new judge in the flynn case is this man, judge named emit sullivan but this recusal news, it is a surprise and there are two basic things we're waiting to figure out about it now that we got this news. number one is the impact of this decision. number two is the explanation for why it happened. in terms of the impact, the judge in the flynn case thus far as far as we can tell hasn't been handling complex matters, right? flynn was charged with lying to the fbi. he pled guilty to that charge. the judge accepted his plea.

and the sentencing with the -- which the judge would preside over in this case, that sentencing has been delayed for three months while flynn apparently gets his time to cooperate with muller's investigators so the implications of the judge in the flynn case being recused and replaced tonight could be very minor. could be important, we don't yet know. that's one. the implication of this change in the flynn case. in terms of the explanation for why it happened, it's possible that this was just something logistic logistics. it was a scheduling matter with one of the judge's case and possible the judge was discovered to have a previously unknown conflict of interest in the mike flynn case. now, if that's the case, we may or may not get some explanation from the judge about that conflict. in legal terms, these kinds of things happen all the time and they are very rarely seen as the end of the world.

in this particular case, in the mike flynn case, in this particular political climate, i think it's worth recognizing that this is -- this may be treated differently than a normal case. republicans are starting to respond to the threat that the muller investigation poses by increasingly accusing people involved in the investigation, accusing people involved in these multiple prosecutions, republicans are accusing them of having political bias. some sort of political bias that ought to disqualify them all. republicans are increasingly and more aggressively every day accusing the law enforcement people involved in this investigation with having terrible conflicts of interest. that have somehow corrupted the russia investigation. so again, tonight, we have this bare bones news that judge rudolph contreras is recused and will be replaced by emit

sullivan. we don't know why. when the judge discloses some conflict, if this ends up being more than a logistic recusal, it's worth considering this may be another potential flash point for republicans' efforts to problemize the investigation and multiple prosecutions it's led to. that news just breaking. poll lpolitico.com breaking thi. the major news out of congress we expected they would narrowly avert shutting down tomorrow. that's the case. they waited until the last day before the government was due to run out of money and shut down but passed a two-week spending bill to avert the shut down which means we'll have another come to the brink shut down bout right before christmas. which is nice of them. aside from this having been potential shut down eve, the

real drama out of washington today was just this whiplash series of stories on ethics. started midday today when as we expected senator al franken of minnesota made public comments about his future following multiple allegations of groping and attempts at unwanted kisses from senator franken. he announced the resignation. we'll talk about that in more detail in a few moments. the resignation of course follows the resignation of the longest serving member of the house of representatives, 88-year-old john conyers who also stepped down this week in his case after multiple claims of sexual harassment and including some settled financially with members of his staff but it was interesting today we got the resignation from senator al franken today, very dramatic moment, important moment for the democratic party and senate and obviously for senator franken and his family and staff. that resignation had basically been telegraphed with a little

ambiguity and new it was coming but then after the franken succession, the resignation today, tonight in quick secession, we got hit with three big new consequential commitments. you'll remember senator al franken asked for them to investigate the sexual misconduct allegations against him. so hypothetically, counter fa factually, one possible outcome could have been the ethics committee was allowed to go forward. they would have waited for the results and left the senate then. if the ethics committee had come out with some damming report. that didn't happen. senator franken resigned today. that means the investigation will not happen. but now we know there will be an ethics investigation of this man, republican texas congressman blake farenthold to

settle a sexual harassment claim from one of his staffers. it's been interesting this week, on the republican side while democrats have been twisting themselves into knots over those members of congress, there are almost no calls for blake farenthold's resignation or any consequences for him despite the non-decemb non-disputed revolutions that there was a tax settlement in his office and announced they will start an investigation into blake farenthold over that matter. speaker of the house paul ryan referred to the committee an allegation concerning arizona conservative republican congressman trent franks. now, trent franks has been in congress for i think 14 years. he's one of the more visible

members. he's an anti abortion activist, more broadly social conservat e conservative. big supporter of president trump. upon hearing that his case had been referred to the ethics committee by the speaker, congressman franks tonight put out a statement denying he had ever had any sexual contact with any member of his congressional staff but acknowledging that he might have made some of his staffers uncomfortable by speaking to female ss in his office about potentially becoming surrogates to bear a child for him and his wife. this is a bolt from the blue about congressman trent franks. we don't know much about the allegations against him other than the way he is characterizing it in his self-exonerating statement but at the end of the self-exonerating statement, congressman franks announces that he's quitting and resigning from congress effective january 31st. i imagine we'll get more detail what led to the sudden and

dramatic resignation tonight from, again, this long-term highly visible conservative protrump member of congress. if we get that further detail about congressman franks over the course of the hour, i'll stop what i'm doing and give it to you then. but this is tonight a shock resignation from republican congressman trent franks. and then we got further word from the ethics committee about the result of their month's long investigation into devin nunes. he's chairman of the intelligence committee of the house. at the start of their investigation into the russia matter, chairman nunes was the star of his own mellow dramatic cast action movie when he made a big show of marching to the white house to say he was informing the white house about damming documents he had just received, which it turns out were documents that had just coal from the white house to

him. it was weird. there were a couple of immediate consequences of that weird stunt involving devin nunes back in march where he tried to give the white house back things the white house just had just given him. one consequence is he announced he would be stepping back, stepping down from overseeing the russia investigation and house intelligence. republicans promoted mike conway to oversee the russia investigation in devin nunes' place. the other major consequence is the ethics committee started an investigation into whether or not over the course of that weird stunt, congressman nunes might have illegally revealed classified information. they concluded the investigation and cleared him, they have decided he didn't reveal classified information they say they consider the matter closed and so presumably that means that congressman devin nunes will push mike conway aside and put himself back in charge of the russia investigation.

he's been angling to try to do that anyway in advance of the ruling from house ethics. if that happens and congressman nunes takes full control of the russia investigation and house intel, let's get real here for a second, that probably means that the house intel investigation on russia is over. devin nunes was a member of the trump transition. he has made very clear what he thinks the trump russia scandal is, which is something having to do with like, you know, chelsea clinton or i don't know. it's -- i have to say, though, that is just my impression of how this is likely to go. i don't want you to take it from me. we've actually got here tonight in studio a gate reporeat repor covering a ton of work and that investigation including the weirdness of devin nunes that may be back in charge. don't take it from me. i'm looking forward to that conversation coming up this hour. there is new news tonight from cnn that one of the things

congressional investigators turned up is some previously undisclosed follow up communications that involve the trump campaign after the famous june 9th trump meeting where kushner, manafort and donald trump junior met with a bunch of russians that had kremlin connections. once again a currently-serving white house official appears to be implicated in having known about that meeting but not owning up to it. white house social media director dan scuitto received the e-mails. he got e-mails from the intermedia intermediary, the man that promised russian government provided dirt on hillary clinton as part of the russian government's efforts to support trump's election campaign. we know that donald trump junior was questioned extensively about that meeting and about the aftermath of that meeting and

eventual actu eventual public expose. he frustrated a member of democrats on the intelligence committee when he refused to answer questions how he and his father responded once the meeting became publicly known, but this may end up being a serious thing. there remains real questions that we have no answer to at all as to why the trump campaign kept the existence of that trump tower meeting with those russians secret for over a year. until it was finally reported public in the "new york times." now with this new reporting from cnn a current white house official may be on the hook for having been on that meeting and for having not disclosed it. for a year. so all of that stuff has just happened tonight. a lot of unexpected news and weird news. and on the subject of weird news, this is something that i did not talk about last night because i melt a little oogy

about it and honestly, i still hesitate to bring it up now but i'm going to because it has an important news consequence today. despite my -- i'm going to go there. all right. yesterday at the white house when the president announced this very controversial decision that the u.s. will eventually move the embassy in israel to jerusalem, that announcement rattled nerves around the world because of the potentially explosive consequences in the middle east and elsewhere but the president's announcement yet rattled nerves at home because of the way he was speaking at the end of his announcement and i -- i do not like making a bigger deal out of these things than ought to be made of them. i do not take pleasure in showing you this. i do not find this to be hilarious as many people do. i also say this in full c awareness that i flap my hands and make weird faces sometimes.

i don't generally think people should be made fun of or scrutinized because they are fu looking or talk weird or have a strange look on their face. that's it. when the president was making his announcement about jerusalem, depending on how you look at it, he appeared to maybe have his teeth come loose or start slurring words or maybe bit his tongue hard or something. something strange happened at the end of his speech. >> let us rethink old assumptions and open our hearts and minds to possible and possibilities. and finally, i ask the leaders of the region, political and religious israeli and palestinian, jewish and christian and muslim to join us in the noble quest for lasting peace. thank you, god bless you.

god bless israel. god bless the palestinians and god bless the united states. thank you very much. thank you. >> those are the president's remarks yesterday. as you can see, he was speaking strangely. that received enough attention on late-night tv last night and over the course of today that the white house was not just asked about it in the briefing room today. they had a prepared response. the white house has announced that their official explanation for why the president was talking that way yesterday is that he had a dry throat. but then they also announced that the president will get a physical. now this was one of the weirder controversies of the donald trump for president campaign. they made it a central point of their campaign for months they would attack the health and fitness, physical fitness of hillary clinton while trump himself, the oldest person to ever be inaugurated president for a long time refused to submit any information about his own health and eventually turn

in a bizarre statement from his personal doctor, who ended up being a real character and unlike professional medical statements about a person's fitness that we expect, donald trump instead handed in from his unusual doctor what was basically a riming thing that said trump was superman. it was really weird. since he's become president, the white house has been consistently dodging the question of whether or not he will submit to a physical examination by an army doctor at walter reid like most presidents do. they have been dodging that question for months but today, in the wake of the president's strange slurring teeth loose remarks, today they announced that he will be examined by a doctor at walter reid next year and the results will be made public. there has been a lot of idle speculation about this particular president's health. if the white house sticks to its

word, we now know that we'll actually finally get some real information about his health for the first time ever early next year. so like i said, it's been a weird day. but there is one more story that i want to update you on here in the front half of tonight's show and it looks to me like a big story. it is not getting a lot of u.s. attention right now. i think that is mostly because this is a story that just broke in russia. it broke not only in russia. it broke in russian. but we figured it out and that story is next. for the holidays, we get a gift for mom and dad. and every year, we split it equally. except for one of us. i write them a poem instead! and one for each of you too! that's actually yours. that, that one. yeah. regardless, we're stuck with the bill. to many, words are the most valuable currency. last i checked, stores don't take "words." some do. not everyone can be the poetic voice of a generation. i know, right? such a burden. the bank of america mobile banking app.

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the news outlet is called "the bell." it's a relatively recent russian news startup. they publish in russian and you can use google translate to get an english language version of their news stories. but in the case of this story they just broke, we went ahead and sprung for a proper translator to get the story translated more formally to give it a closer read. part of the reason we were willing to open our checkbook and swivel our wrist for that purpose is that we've been really interested in the subject of this news story here on our show in particular. because richard engel helped report out a piece of the story, an angle on the story when he went to russia and talked to people inl valved and it was for us a dramatic thing when richard did that because even though richard is a tough guy and so served in war zones and we've seen him in way too close to fire fights to appear

comfortable, he's been kidnapped on the job, he's experienced and can take care of himself. it was still unnerving when he went to russia to cover part of the story and resulted in him getting basically threatened on camera. he was told from somebody who was sympathetic that the kinds of questions he was asking about this story might be putting him personally in danger in russia. >> we managed to track down one of the lawyers in the case. he says that because of the nature of the charges, treason is not even allowed to tell us which man he's representing. what specifically are they accused of having done. >> it's not a clear accusation. >> is the general accusation that they cooperated with an american intelligence? >> yes -- >> -- group? >> they say american special service. >> was the information related to the investigation into hacking and into the manipulation of the u.s.

election? >> i can't say this because it's breach of my client that i don't disclose this accusation. >> so you think they are being held because they know information. >> they know much. they know much. i can't be completely clear with you and say much about this case because it's quite dangerous. it's quite dangerous for me, as for my client and even for you. >> why would it be dangerous for me? i understand for your client. he's in jail. >> it's a quite sensitive information. >> that was richard engel reporting in russia on a number of arrests, including one-high ranking colonel. we've been reporting on his arrest and keeping an eye and worrying about it a built for most of the course of 2017. the arrest of that fsb colonel and arrest of people associated

with him happened a year ago this week in moscow. russia's biggest spy agency, the inheriter is the fsb, the department within the fsb that focuses on cyber issues is the information security department. you might remember when u.s. intelligence agencies described the russian hack a central part of their sbeer feinterference. there were two hacker groups, one was fancy bear and one was cozy bear. this department at the fsb, information security department was cozy bear at the fsb. and that fsb department, which the u.s. intelligence agency says is responsible for part of the hack against the democratic party last year. the cyber unit of the fsb. they held a regularly scheduled meeting for the high-levelled staff this week last year, december 5th in moscow and there was an unusual interruption of that meeting in the middle of that meeting security officers reportedly rushed in.

they seized the deputy chief of that department. they threw a bag over his head, grabbed him under the arms and dragged him out of the room and he hasn't been seen since. that was a year ago. deputy chief arrested that day. we later learned that his deputy was also arrested. also arrested was a senior guy from kaspersky labs. the fsb colonel was the kaspersky's contact at the fsb. all three of them were taken into custody. "the new york times" later described the arrests as the highest profile arrests for treason in russia since the fall of the ussr in 1991. the russian government never put out a formal statement the arrests were for freetreason bu

allowed news services to publish information about those arrests and by that means, they let it be known they were traesrwere t arrests and that's the ground they were being held. well now, as we're all watching from the united states, the progress of this american investigation into what russia did and whether they had help from the trump campaign, we're watching that investigation here, you know, indict the trump campaign chairman and get a guilty plea from the national security advisor, we're watching the incredibly dramatic investigations, those arrests at that fsb meeting a year ago, those are the closest things we've seen to any kind of action happening on the russian side. right? on the russian side presumably they don't want to investigate the russian attack into the u.s. election but they very well may want to cover it up. so the bell, this russian news source has just published this new report on those arrests and it sheds some new light on one

ve detail. according to the bell, the reason they put a bag over his head when they arrested him, is because quote, he has a black belt in karate and his fsb colleagues feared that he would resist. okay. i know nothing about karate or black bags or fsb traditional arrest techniques so you can take that for what it's worth but apparently, that's why they didn't just drag him out, they put his head in a bag before they did so. as americans, the thing we're most interested in is whether or not those arrests tell us something or prove to us anything about what russia did in our election. in january, "the new york times" reported it was possible russia might have made those arrests to try to stop the flow of information out of russia about what the russian government did to hack the u.s. election. at the time in january, at the time sited two u.s. officials as

saying quote, human sources in russia did play a crucial role in proving to u.s. investigators who was responsible for the dnc hacking. well, now from the russia side the bell is reporting based on conversations with acquaintances of the men arrested that the reason they were arrested is because they were the russian sources who helped u.s. intelligence services get evidence last year that it was russian hackers who had been involved in these attacks in the united states. one person familiar with the investigation quote confirmed that the arrest of sergey and his comrades is connected with the u.s. elections. we're trying to report this out and seek confirmation but if in fact the news reports are correct and putin has locked up his own people who he believes told u.s. investigators what russia did in the election last year, including a colonel at the fsb, one of the top cyber spies,

if this reporting from russia bears out, it would prove one important thing for us and raise an important question for us. it would prove the russian government is full of bull when they deny they had anything to do with the attack on the election. if they hadn't attacked the election, they wouldn't have to lock up people who told u.s. intelligence agencies that russia had attacked our election. you only lock somebody up if they gave out real information, right? so it would prove that. the important question these reports would raise for us, if these reports are true, why is russia letting this information out now? that fsb colonel and those arrested with him have been in jail for a year this week. why would the russian government know the reason they have been in jail helped america figure

out russia hacked our election? why would it be russia's advantage to know this now? more ahead. stay with us. is in full swing. ( ♪ ) you are going to be a big surprise. (whining) aww, i see a big puppy. i see a b-i-i-g pu-u-ppy. hey greg! that's ford, america's best-selling brand. now get exclusive holiday offers, with 0% financing for 72 months across a full line up. for a limited time, get an additional $1,000 cash back on top of 0% financing for 72 months. get these exclusive offers during the ford year end sales event.

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he's stepping down after being confronted. well, it's not clear but we're told congressman franks apparently approached two of his female staffers about him needing a sar gas urrogate to c baby. franks said in part the current cultural and media climate and unable to complete a fair house ethics investigation escorted and sensationalized version would put me and my family through high personalized and sensational trial by media to damage those things i love most, excuse me. this morning i notified them as of january 31st, 2018.

and al franken of stepping down and half a dozen and yesterday more than 30 of the colleagues called for him to step down. pressure to resign including from nancy pelosi. a fresh man congressman, that's why you haven't heard much before this scandal. he's accused for the last year but wait, there is more. we learned that the house ethics committee will start an investigation into the here to fortaxpayer secret of sexual harassment allegations against texas republican congressman blake farenthold. if this keeps up, congress will have a problem and they also might solve the parking problem on capitol hill. when a lawmaker stops being a

lawmaker for whatever reason, you have to replace them. beyond the huge human and political drama of how the seats will be vacant at the same time, what is the smart way to think about how the vacancies will get filled. steve, thanks for being here. >> sure. >> all of these vacancies and potential vacancies in the house and senate have their own contours and stories behind them. we learned today that in minnesota the governor has a plan already for how to replace senator franken's seat. to put somebody in senator franken's seat. can you describe the plan and what the political implications are? >> mark dayton the governor of minnesota a democrat will appoint a caretaker here. dayton will make an appointment, the indications are, not confirming but it will be lieutenant governor. the lieutenant governor will hold the seat basically for the next year and promise not to run for election next year because

the election will be held next august, general next november with every other election in the country next year. she will be appointed. she beat a senator. she wouldn't run and while she holds that job as a caretaker, the normal election process would play out and be a wide open race among democrats and wide open race among republicans and the political risk and why so many are concerned about this plan, if you get a wide open primary, it's expensive, it's bruise bruising and you can have a nominee beaten up with the treasury and not much time for the general election. in a state minnesota as a blue state, hillary clinton won the state by a point and a half last year. >> oh, yeah. >> that movement in the northern part of the country, non-college white voters, minnesota was like heart and soskand soul of that. this is a state barack obama won easily. you have barack obama won that swung to trump by 15 points. that's going on in the ground of minnesota and atmosphere.

not one you can take chances with if you're a democrat. >> in terms of that political wisdom is going to be different in different congressional districts and different in different statements depending on what the prevailing wins are. why would you put a caretaker person in that kind of a job? what's the political advantage today ton in terms of doing that? >> it's hard to see except if you don't feel like choosing and it's a tough choice. you can say i'm not going to offend anybody. i'm going to let everyone in who wants to get in and they can sort it out. that's the logic. dayton is at the end of his career not running for reelection. he's 70 years old. i don't know the long-term future. there is a hold notion of hey, it's best for democracy to have an open primary, maybe that's what is on his mind here as well. also, could enter into this, his lieutenant governor was his chief of staff a couple years ago. her background is more. she was chief of staff. mayor of minneapolis. she was the chef of staff to

mark dayton, somebody behind the scenes recently coming out into more public view. he see as capstone to her public career here, too. sometimes those factor into it. if he does do this, this is very rare. a governor who has an opportunity to make an appointment to serve a year and chooses the open primary, you got to go back to 1992 to find a governor that chose the open primary in tennessee and a democrat and the seat ended up in republican hands. >> there is so much attention on terms of how that will affect the power in the senate and dayton's decision may affect it and he's making that decision under different circumstances. thank you, my friend. >> thank you. >> we'll be right back. stay with us.

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whstuff happens. old shut down cold symptoms fast with maximum strength alka seltzer plus liquid gels. the attacks kicked into high gear. the fbi, its reputation is in tatters, worst in history. by monday the wall street journal editorial board launched their attack on the agency and special counsel robert mueller. quote, mr. muller is too conflicted to investigate the fbi and should step down in favor of someone more credible. it has been all over a certain corner of cable news, as well. they are saying robert mueller is a disgrace to the justice system. yesterday the head of the house freedom caucus in the republican party discussed doubts on

special counsel robert mueller. >> if mueller was doing such a great job on investigating the russian collusion, why could he have not found the conflict of interest within their own agency? >> these attacks on robert mueller and fbi follow a report that a top fbi agent on the team peter struck was removed from the office after found to have exchanged politically charged texts with another former member of muller's team. well, today the director of the fbi testified in the house and in the house he was treated to republican after republican after republican just tearing into the fbi. >> did bob muller recruit people to his probe that had a bias. >> he was a key player in the clinton investigation. the same peter struck who helped -- was a key player in the russia investigation and the same peter struck who was put on muller's team, special counsel bob muller's team.

>> you remember from law school legal doctrine the fruit of the poisonous tree. if that one agent at the center or source is decidedly anti trump and decidedly proclinton, that raises real questions about all of the conclusions that the fbi has reached on any and all of these matters. >> the fruit of the poisonous tree. this is where we're at. republicans decided their strategy is to discredit the entire fbi and specifically to discredit robert mueller's special counsel investigation. that's how they are approaching the investigation. what's the other side? what's the fight back against that? that's next. stay with us. it feels good to be back. ♪ ♪

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qunol helps restore this heart-healthy nutrient with 3x better absorption. qunol has the #1 cardiologist recommended form of coq10 qunol, the better coq10. was supposed to be a wake reup call for our government?sh people all across the country lost their savings, their pensions and their jobs. i'm tom steyer and it turned out that the system that had benefited people like me who are well off, was, in fact, stacked against everyone else. it's why i left my investment firm and resolved to use my savings for the public good. but here we are nine years later and this president and the republican congress are making a bad situation even worse. they won't tell you that their so called "tax reform" plan is really for the wealthy and big corporations, while hurting the middle class. it blows up the deficit and that means fewer investments in education, health care and job creation. it's up to all of us to stand up to this president. not just for impeachable offenses,

but also to demand a country where everyone has a real chance to succeed. join us. your voice matters.

joining us is natasha bertrand for business insider and i have been looking forward to talking to you for a very long time. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me, rachel. >> i think you are one of the best synthesizers of information on the russia investigation and you are good at trying to keep track of -- keep up, not only keep up with everything as it proceeds but when's important and what is red herring. we have learned from the ethics committee in the house that they appear to have closed the investigation that they have been running for months into devin nunez, the chair of the intelligence committee, he was in charge of the committee's russia investigation and then there was a bizarre pageant of

waving stuff around that he did at the white house. the ethics committee investigated whether he disclosed classified information and saying that matter is settled. do we expect he'll be in charge of the russia investigation? >> i've asked that exact question and i have yet to get an answer on it. it would be surprising to me if mike conway steps down at this point in the investigation because he's come so far since nunez recused himself and the committee is divided by partisanship and a mess in terms of the republicans and democrats kind of fighting over who they subpoena, not going to subpoena, who they want to interview and for nunez to come in, a tapted figure in the investigation, that would really bode terribly for an investigation that's already kind of compromised. >> is it your sense that the republicans on the house intelligence committee have been happy with mike conaway since he took over?

>> there's a sense he's more neutral and way easier to work with. the democrats have to go through devin nunez to get things done and not -- he stepped aside from the russia probe and always been a necessary figure and present figure. in fact, i reported the other day that he met with eric prince before eric prince went to go testify with the fbi about the meetings of the russians and he's finding a way to interject in the investigation regardless of the fact that he said that he stepped aside in april. >> okay. so ep though we've all been saying he's recused because it looked like he recused he's splitting hairs on that saying i stepped back, i didn't technically recuse. i can get involved in anything i want and so he has been talking to witnesses. not totally clear he's been present when witnesses have been testifying and all the closed door testimonies. >> he has no, no. >> very interesting.

the other thing going on there, i mean, i don't know that we get anything important out of any committee in congress in terms of getting the bottom of this. i don't. i feel like it's important that we ought to because there's so many things that they can look into they wouldn't be under the per view of prosecutors working for mueller for an investigation of what happened but with the -- with the intelligence committee, one of the things that feels like is happening right now is they're rushing through really important witnesses, really fast. we've seen them -- they had carter page in. they had eric prince, just had donald trump jr. in, about to have felix sadir and list of kind of big deal witnesses they have been doing really fast all in a row. are the -- i sense that the democrats are worried they're not having adequate time to prepare for the people, not getting out of them what they're supposed to. is that your sense of the republican strategy there? >> absolutely. the democrats are very frustrated first 0 of all they

cannot manage to get a subpoena to many of the witnesses. and they've actually decided to come into for voluntary interviews and actually not a good thing for the committee because it mean that is the subject can just kind of get up and leave whenever he or she wants to. jared kushner, for example, left after two or three hours. really at the beginning of when the democrats were just starting to question him. he just decided that he wanted to leave. so, the fact that the republicans have now kind of begun to stonewall or distract from the main subjects of this investigation is really frustrating the democrats and donald trump jr., of course, the other day used the bizarre attorney/client privilege defense that the democrats telling me they're going to make legal arguments to the republicans why that doesn't fly and they're actually planning to call him back but ultimately according to one member of the committee who i spoke to ultimately it is going to be up to the republicans to call donald trump jr. back or any other witness for that matter. >> democrats can't do anything on their own.

fascinating. natasha bertrand, thank you. i really appreciate it. >> thank you, rachel. >> we'll be right back. stay with us. [ coughing ] when you have a cold... stuff happens. [ sneeze ] shut down cold symptoms fast with maximum strength alka seltzer plus liquid gels. ♪ tired of sore throat lozenges that only last a short time? try new alka-seltzer plus sore throat relief. the melts dissolve quickly. plus, the powerful pain reliever provides long-lasting relief for up to six hours.

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yesterday the intelligence committee released a transcript of eric prince's testimony before that committee. before yesterday, that had only happened once before in this investigation with carter page. why do we get transcripts from eric prince and carter page but not from anybody else who's testified? last night adam schiff, top democrat on the intelligence, told us this is by design.

a unilateral zin by the republicans who for whatever reason want page and prince's testimony made public and nobody else's. the only other transcript we have been promised all this time is that of glenn simpson, the co-found ir of fusion gps, the firm that hired christopher steele to put together the famous trump/russia dossier. in august he spent ten hours testifying to the senate judiciary committee and then gps said it stood behind the dossier and happy to see simpson's testimony released to the public and we could get ten hours worth of testimony about whether the dossier is true or not and why glenn simpson says there is. there's a ton of interest on all sides of what he told the committee about the dossier, questioned him about under oath and a ton of interest in that and con sit wents of the committee chairman, iowa senator chuck grassley. >> i would like a transcripts released.

will you do that? >> the answer is, it would take a vote of the committee to do it. we can't release it until we give simpson and his lawyer a copy of it so if there's something that the transcript is wrong give them an opportunity to change it. we'll have to give it to them before the thing you're asking me about can be done. >> will you do that? >> of course we'll put it to a vote of the committee. >> will you personally vote for the release of the transcripts? >> i don't know why i wouldn't. >> chuck grassley telling the iowa con sit wents to put the release of that transcript we're told it runs over 300 pages. he said he'd put it to a vote when the fusion lawyers were finished reviewing it. we can report tonight that fusion gps and their lawyers have finished reviewing that transcript. meaning, it's now back in senator grassley's court and if they want the release it they can. that's number one. number two, we also know based

on new nbc news reporting that during an interview with house intelligence committee last month a fugs gps official not only stood by the dossier's claims and provided additional leads to the committee about russian money flowing to trump real estate projects, particularly those overseas. now, that's according to two sources that were present for the sinterview. we confirmed that today with a source. so, if you're interested in whether or not that dossier was true, whether it's proven out, we may be getting a bunch of new information about that soon. it's in chuck grassley's court if he wants to release it. he told the constituent that is he would. by the way, tomorrow night we have a special show that we have been working on forever! it's just about done and i actually think it's pretty good. it's going to air tomorrow night 9:00 p.m. eastern, a trms special on the dossier. i don't usually say this but i think it's