that is all of the time we have tonight. have a great weekend. >> you too. >> thanks for joining us. happy friday. it's a friday. that means there's lots going on. in missouri tonight, the sitting republican governor of the great state of missouri, he has just been hit with new felony charges. the first felony charges against governor came a couple months ago in conjunction with allegations about an extramarital affair. and then the alleged extortion related to that extramarital affair, and then came can an extraordinary bipartisan report from the missouri legislature containing graphic allegations of violence and sexual abuse in the course of that allege hed affair. the state legislature has been considering whether they may want to start impeachment proceedings. now tonight, the new felony charges against the governor have just been filed. these new felony charges are not related to the alleged affair. these new charges allege he misused a veteran's charity that he ran basically to fund his campaign.

the missouri governor greitens refused to concede anything about any of the charges against him from the very beginning. he has refused calls for his resignation from the leaders of the house and the senate in his state, both of whom are republican leaders. he has been on the edge of the abyss for quite some time now. these new felony charges tonight represent one more hard shove toward him becoming airborne. lots of eyes on the governor of missouri in the wake of these new charges. internationally, the news of the night involves north korea. they have announced they will be freeze their nuclear and long-range missile tests for the time being, and they will plan to close one of their nuclear test sites. this news comes less than a week before kim jong-un is due to meet with the president of south korea next week. it also follows by one day the

installment of a brand-new between the korea's telephone hotline. that was set up for the two leaders yesterday. so they could communicate directly with each other and without notice. today they get the announcement of this freeze. north korea is not announcing it's dismantling the program, only it's hitting the pause button on testing for now. in this case, the pause button is better than the play button, which is where we were before. this next week will be very interesting to see how that evolves ahead of the talks. here at home, "the washington post" has broken news about the fraying edges of the nation's justice department. according to this reporting tonight, quote, attorney general jeff sessions recently told the white house he might have to leave his job if president trump fires his deputy rod rosenstein who oversees the russian interference investigation into the 2016 election. he made his position known to

white house counsel last week and trump's fury at rod rosen steen peaked after the deputy attorney general approved the raid on the president's personal attorney michael cohen. because this is our live -- this is our collective life now, we tonight learned in "the washington post," we learned more about the mean nicknames the president has given the top law enforcement officials in the country. we get more detail on that. people familiar with jeff sessions' thinking say he has said several times he would find it difficult to remain as attorney general if trump for no good reason fired rosenstein. the veteran prosecutor that sessions chose to be his deputy. sessions has had little ability to do anything about it given his own shaky standing with trump for recusing himself from the russia investigation. trump has referred to sessions as mr. magoo and rod rosenstein as mr. peepers. a character from a 1950s sitcom

whereupon, to kocover the news tonight, i have to show you a picture of mr. peepers from the 1950s sitcom. now everybody laughs about the mean nicknames the president is so good at coming up with when he gets into the fun of humiliating people for his own pleasure. the headline here is that the attorney general says he may resign in protest if the president fires deputy attorney general rod rosenstein as a way of killing the russia investigation. that's a capital s scoop for the post tonight. sessions' message to the white house which has not previously been reported underscores the political firestorm trump would invite should he attempt to remove the deputy attorney general. while trump has railed against sessions at time, the protest resignation of the attorney general which would incite other departures within the administration would create a moment of profound crisis for

the white house. so, if rosenstein gets fired, sessions says he is out in protest. the "post" may be right that it would set off a string of resignation, and totally possible. as i said, it's friday. surprise, there's a lot going on in the news. from that post story, while we are on the subject of profound crisis in the white house, today history played a rerun. it turns out it's one of my favorite episodes. on june 17, 1972, at 2:30 in the morning, five men got busted breaking into the headquarters of the democratic national committee in washington. the watergate break-in. there was news coverage about that. it was interesting. five guys all with ties to miami for some reason. what were these five guys doing in washington burglarizing that democratic party office? this was from the first "washington post" story about

that burglary. quote, there was no immediate explanation as to why the five suspects would want to bug the democratic national committee offices or whether or not they were working for any other individuals or organizations. there was news coverage of that. it was of interest that there had been this burglary. it was kind of mild interest. certainly, nobody in the press was immediately jumping to conclusions about this being the first signs of a gigantic political conspiracy that would take down the sitting president, richard nixon. which it did. it's interesting. somewhat lost to history. the democratic party actually did kind of go right there right away when the watergate burglary happened. the press didn't see it that way. the dnc, the democratic party, they went right to the end game immediately. watergate break-in was june 17th. on june 20th, a couple days later, the dnc filed a civil

lawsuit against the re-election campaign for president nixon. saying that that little burglary at the headquarters, that wasn't just a moment of intrigue, it was a trick by the president and the president should have to answer for it. >> lawrence o'brien chairman of the democratic national committee today filed suit for $1 million against the committee for the re-election of the president and against five men arrested early saturday who were charged with breaking into the party's national headquarters at the watergate in washington. carl stern has a report. >> i wish to emphasize as national chairman of this party the deadly seriousness with which we view this matter. i am pleased to note that the fbi is investigating this case. i am shocked to learn that the white house, through its official spokesman, deems unworthy of notice this blatant act of political espionage.

>> famed criminal lawyer william bennett will try to question the five intruders a week from tomorrow and to take depositions inside the committee to re-elect the president to the white house. two of the intruders had a name and phone number of another ex-cia agent who works as a part-time consultant to the white house. o'brien refused to link the committee and white house directly to what happened. he knows more than he is telling he says and he says he feels he is on the right track in suing the committee as a co-conspirator with the five men. carl stern, nbc news, washington. >> right after the watergate burglary happened, right away, the dnc filed a civil lawsuit against the committee to re-elect the president saying that wasn't just some random assemblage of burglars. the lawsuit said, president nixon, you did this. your campaign did this. you have to answer for it. you saw the sober coverage the night the lawsuit was filed

there on "nbc news." and people thought they were a little bit nuts and saying that it was some conspiracy that went all of the way to nixon. to people at the time, it seemed over the top. >> democratic party blames the republicans for sending five men to burglarize or bug its national headquarters. accordingly, it's suing for $1 million. if it works, if they win the suit, it will be a new and quite novel way of raising political money, a device no one has used before. the democrats are $9 million in debt. if they win, if they should squeeze a million dollars out of the republicans, that will be one-ninth of what they need to pay off old campaign debts. it's not clear why if the democrats are intent on suing why they didn't sue for full amount they need, $9 million. trying to force the republicans to bail them out of debt. it is one way of getting even.

>> people tell me all the time, our era is so poisoned by terrible cable news. it has gotten so snarky, and you know, david brinkly had pretty good on-air snark in 1972. the democrats brought this cute little lawsuit. obviously, it's to get them out of debt. they're saying it's about the burglary. david brinkley is saying what everybody was thinking, this is a joke. the democratic party will lay blame for that at the doorstep of the white house? everybody thought it was a joke. they filed this lawsuit. this is the "washington post" coverage the next day. bob woodward, headline, o'brien sues gop campaign, lays blame for bugging on white house. democratic national chairman lawrence o'brien apparently seizing on the break-in and bugging of the party head

quarters a as major campaign issue attempted to lay responsibility at the door of the white house. he said that there is a developing clear line to the white house and cited the potential involvement of the white house counsel. o'brien made his remarks as the dnc filed a million dollar lawsuit against the committee for the re-election of the president whose chief security agent was one of the five men arrested at the break-in at 2:30 a.m. on saturday. president nixon's campaign chair denied any party responsibility and called the lawsuit another example of sheer demagoguery on the part of mr. o'brien. mr. mitchell called o'brien's lawsuit a political stunt. a stunt. sheer demagoguery. that was the line from the president's re-election campaign. nobody in the press took it seriously. but we now know that those wacky over the top democrats were on to it. they were right. i mean, the dnc chair said we think there's potential involvement here by president nixon's special counsel.

well chuck colson ended up serving time in real prison for watergate. the dnc said, we're suing the president's re-election campaign because the chief security agent for the campaign, he was in the middle of it. he also ended up going to prison for watergate. when the democrats filed their lawsuit, the president's campaign chair comes out and calls it a political stunt. sheer demagoguery, and the fo former attorney general of the united states, nixon's campaign chair, yeah, he ends up serving 19 months in federal prison for watergate. all of these guys dismissing it. that's a -- all those guys went to prison. it wasn't that lawsuit that put those guys in prison. that lawsuit by the dnc was the democratic party's way of planting a flag on that break-in and saying, you know what? this is a big deal. it's a political scandal. it's not a burglary. that was their way of putting a flag in it.

saying this is going right to the president, richard nixon and nobody believed them when they started. that lawsuit itself was the way they chose to try to get to the bottom of what was going on. but also to keep it in the public eye. for example, when they found something new in their investigation, into what happened, behind the watergate burglary, one of the tactics was that they would amend their lawsuit. they would amend their complaint in the lawsuit. that would result in a new filing showing up on the docket for the case. that would be publically available. that would give reporters something else to report about this scandal as it slowly, slowly, slowly widened out. >> in politics today, the democratic party was in court strengthening its complaint. the committee to re-elect the president had engaged in espionage. and tomorrow, the secretary of commerce and now finance

chairman for president nixon financed the break-int at the democratic party headquarters. stan says this is a pack of lies. the democrats' complaints will say he used $114,000 in republican campaign funds to establish a political espionage squad. >> a pack of lies. this was the fall of 1972. the democrats had a new filing. they amended their complaint. everybody got access to the amendment. they are signaling they thought they found a closer link between the burglary and president nixon and his campaign. indeed, mr. pack of lies, the finance chair for nixon's campaign, did end up pleading guilty on multiple charges. that was late 1972, that clip we showed you. the public at that point still wasn't all that interested in the watergate scandal. good evidence of that fact is the fact that in november 1972,

nixon was getting re-elected while all the burglars were under indictment. people didn't care about watergate. the democrats using this lawsuit to try to pry out new information in the case. they got sworn depositions that helped them establish the links between the campaign and the burglary. they keep filing amendments to try to get people to cover it as an ongoing and widening scandal. in part that lawsuit was their way of keeping the story alive. they believed it was about the president. by the following year, by the spring of the following year, that story no longer need helping along. no longer need any kindling by the democratic party. by then, the watergate hearings started. john dean flipped as white house counsel and special prosecutor got appointed. the president would have to resign the office and leave in disgrace. back in the slow days, that lawsuit by the dnc, even though everybody thought it seemed hysterical when they first filed

it, not only were they right in the claims, in the end, they actually won that case. they had sued the committee to re-elect the president for monetary damages. on the day that nixon left office in disgrace, the committee to re-elect the president, his re-election committee quietly sent the democratic party a check for three-quarters of a million dollars. the democrats were right. they won that lawsuit. on the day nixon left office, nobody noticed because people had other things on their mind. the democrats getting their check and proved right was not exactly the headline news of that day, and i think that because of that, the fact that the democrats did this during watergate was lost to history for a long while. it was dug up though as a few months ago as the hit slate.com

podcast by nate nafalk. >> after the lawsuit was filed, the democratic national committee chair did something hardly anyone was willing to do at that early stage. he blamed the burglary on the white house. o'brien pointed out the irony of a president who had run as tough on crime, being involved in illegal campaign tactics. he said the country was about to witness the ultimate test of the administration that committed itself to law and order four years ago. o'brien's lawyer thought he should be careful about accusing the president of criminal activity. the chairman of the dnc was not worried. i have studied nixon since the kennedy campaign. i have no doubt the trail will lead to the oval office if we can hang in there long enough. >> that was on the slow burn podcast a couple months ago digging out that artifact from how the democrats fought their side of the fight in watergate. now today, surprise, that artifact from watergate not only proved itself to be dug up, today it reanimated and came

back to life. look. today the dnc, the democratic party today, filed a forgotten watergate-style civil freaking lawsuit against the trump campaign over the russia scandal. it's about the way they were broken into in this scandal like dnc headquarters were broken into in the summer of 1972. today, the dnc contends that although it was russia who did the hacking to break into dnc headquarters, they allege the trump campaign and people associated with the campaign were partners in this crime. the list of defendants is long. the dnc is suing the russian federation, which means russia, gru, russian military intelligence, the specific staff from the gru who posed as the hacker, which was the hacker that took credit for the hacking and robbery of the dnc.

they are bringing the suit against russian business associates of trump behind setting up the trump tower meeting. they brought a suit against joseph missuf who prosecutor say told trump campaign aide george papadopoulos that russia had stole en democratic e-mails. also brought against wikileaks and julian assuage. after them there's a bunch of familiar named. the trump campaign, donald trump junior, paul manafort, jared kushner, george papadopoulos, rick gates. and the last line there, some unnamed john does one through ten. name unknown russian operatives who had been part of the hacking scheme against the dnc. in this lawsuit today, the democrats are seeking monetary daniels just like the democrats did in watergate in '72. they are seeking an admission from the defendants that they participated in this conspiracy. of course, in order to justify

this claim, the dnc has to spell out what happened to them. why they believe they were the wronged party here. we get a long prose, well-written narrative of what they say happened. it starts like this, in the run-up to the election, russian mounted a brazent attack, intelligence services hacked into the dnc commuters and used the information to advance its own interest, destabilizing the u.s. political environment and supporting donald trump. in the trump campaign, russia found a willing and active partner in this effort. it goes on from there. at length and in detail spelling out the allegation. here is the thing.

a lot of people who have been watching robert mueller and the special counsel investigation closely, a lot of people who are close observers believe, have come to expect that at some point mueller will probably bring indictments that relate to the hack of the dnc. i don't say that because i have insider information. i don't. when mueller indicted the russians a couple of months ago, it was not for the break-in of the dnc hack, but the indictment can of all of the russians a couple of months ago was for the social media stuff. that indictment of the russians, that was for social media stuff that russian intelligence did. the dnc hack breaking into the democratic party's computers and phone systems and stealing stuff, that's much more obviously criminal activity under american law. since we are saw that other sort of more abstract indictment of those russians, people have been waiting for the other shoe to drop in terms of an indictment over what happened to the dnc. that hasn't happened. maybe it will never happen.

people have been expecting it. who knows if that had happened already, maybe the democrats wouldn't have gone ahead with this lawsuit spelling out how they were wronged by the attack on their computers and phone systems that stole all that stuff. they have now done that. they have filed this lawsuit. now we get their whole written narrative, their specific time line of how they were attacked and when and what the trump campaign did to make it all work and to help disseminate the fruits of these russian crimes. now that the dnc has filed this lawsuit, there's the possibility if it goes ahead they could end up demanding documents from all these defendants. they could demand sworn testimony from all these defendants. when you look at this list of defendants, that could be a fascinating turn in this case. don junior. before we get there first, the judge in this case will have to decide if this lawsuit goes ahead.

that will be a consequential decision that judge has to make. a decision with very clear echos in history. which makes this almost more than i can stand. this is the bio of the judge. look back when he was a young legal pup. see what it says there, he served as a special assistant special prosecutor, watergate, department of justice from 1973 to 1974. the judge they gave the dnc lawsuit today was a watergate prosecutor. this news today, history isn't just rhyming anymore. it's full on plagiarizing at this point. ng. ♪ you don't like my lasagna? no, it's good. -hmm. -oh. huh. [ both laugh ] here, blow. blow on it.

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democratic party blames the republicans to bug its national headquarters. accordingly, it's suing for $1 million. >> $1 million. june 20, 1972. national democrats sued the richard nixon re-election campaign for the watergate break-in. the media scoffed and leading republicans called the charges scurrilous. the democrats' charges that it was something to do with richard nixon and his campaign was borne out, and they were right. and the democratic party ended up taking $p 50,000 off of nixon's campaign when they settled the suit on the day that nixon left office in disgrace over that scandal. well, today n f, in fed a ral c,

that cockamamy seemingly lawsuit that was borne out and won, and today, that lawsuit had a child. today, the democratic party sued the trump campaign. the government of russia and wikileaks and key figures in trump world for this latest break-in to the democratic party, the hacking of servers and the theft of democratic documents in the 2016 campaign. the new trump campaign manager today responded with words straight out of 1972. he called it sham, bogus, corrupt, desperate, frivolous. this is just day one. we have no idea how this democratic lawsuit will play out. we can look at the consequences from the last time something like this happened. join joining us now is nbc presidential historian michael beschloss, and this is my present to you. >> thank you. >> i got you something for this difficult week. >> wonderful. have any am amazed by this

story, and i would like to ask you which parts of this i screwed up. did get it wrong? >> you got it absolutely right. everything old is new once again. when david brinkley dismissed that in that broadcast, he was sitting about 100 feet from where i am in the nbc bureau in washington. >> when we think about lawsuits in politics, sometimes they are scurrilous. sometimes they are just used as political weapons. substantively some of the things that we won eder about is whether the lawsuits can be used to provide new factual evidence and can you get can deposition, and get discovery and turn up the documents and the communications that you would not otherwise get access to, because of the lawsuit, and was that a factor, and did the democrats end up turning up anything with this lawsuit? was that a factor? >> it was a total factor. as you were saying, this was -- this lawsuit came three days after the break-in. there was no real assurance that

there would be a proper investigation. we know that there was a senate watergate committee and two special prosecutors got in on the act. finally, the house judiciary committee voted impeachment. three days after the break-in h there was no way of knowing that, and this is larry o'brien the chairman and the dnc's way of saying that we want to make sure that this is investigated, because we don't believe that is just a break-in, but it is connected not only to the nixon campaign, but the nixon white house. >> am i right looking back on that era, in remembering or at least thinking about the time -- because i wasn't born yet -- that -- >> i was. >> that george mcgovern running against nixon in '72, that other democratic candidates hadn't figured out a way to talk about the watergate scandal or decided they didn't want to talk about the watergate scandal in a way that resonated with people. it wasn't a major campaign issue that was working for individual democratic politicians. that's part of why the

democratic party bringing on this lawsuit sort of shocked people because it was not in keeping with what people were hearing from democratic electeds? is that ta way it went? >> totally right. i talked to george mcgovern. he said one of the greatest frustrations, he was not able to talk about the offenses of watergate he saw in a way that moved the electorate. sure enough after nixon was elected in that big landslide in '72 that you mentioned, we now know from secret documents and also from the nixon tapes, he was working 110% of the time to try to shut down the investigations that were being discussed both by congress and by doj. >> we also know from documents at the time that nixon was freaked out by the lawsuit as everybody around him was publically dismissing it. i'm guessing because he knew they were on to something. it's fascinating. >> it is absolutely. >> thank you.

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now what? well, after your first reaction, consider your choices. go it alone, against the irs and its massive resources. hire a law firm, where you're not a priority. call your cpa, who can be required to testify against you. or, call the tax law firm of moskowitz, llp. i went from being a cpa to a tax attorney because our clients needed more. call us, and let us put our 30 years of tax experience to work for you. last night, james comey was here for an hour while i asked him questions about things he said he was not allowed to talk about. there were a few he was able to answer. even when he was not able to answer a question, sometimes

that, itself, gave us some news and something new and intriguing to consider. this is one that i wanted to bring your attention to. last night i asked mr. comey about paul manafort who the government has admitted in open court, paul manafort has been under investigation by the fbi as far back as 2014. the fbi knew that when he became chairman of the donald trump presidential campaign in 2016. is there some duty to warn? is there any sort of -- is there some action that the fbi should take? you are not asked to do background checks on people for political campaigns. when you know what you know about these folks, you know about ongoing investigations involving these people in serious matters, should something have been said? >> i don't want to talk about those in particular. in general, it depends what the facts are that started the investigation and what you have learned. the goal is always to disrupt and defeat the adversary's actions. sometimes that means building a criminal case.

and then lock up the person who is working with the foreign power or going to the person who you say, we know you are hooked up with them, and knock that off. sometimes it's a laying in the weeds to develop sources to get close. the goal is to defeat the adversary's actions in an effort to influence the united states. >> did anything like that happen in terms of paul manafort? >> i can't answer that. i could but i can't. >> i could but i can't. it's the story of my life. he said he can't answer that. there's director comey saying in some situations, the fbi has a number of different techniques to try to defeat the adversary nation's actions. what were those, if any, in the case of paul manafort when he became chairman of the trump campaign and the fbi knew what they knew about him? as of yesterday, we now know from justice department

prosecutors speaking in open court that paul manafort was being investigated possibly for being a back channel between the trump campaign and the russian government. what did the fbi do when manafort took over a presidential campaign. james comey left open the possibility they did do something. like wise, when i asked mr. coney about the first national security adviser mike flynn, after the fbi interviewed mike flynn about the contact with the russians, after the justice department warned that he was vulnerable to russian blackmail, i asked comey if after all of that during the weeks that flynn stayed on national security advi adviser whether he or the fbi or the other agencies took any measures to keep information away from flynn to protect

national security since he was somebody who they believed to be compromised? again, mr. comey told me, and i quote directly, i'm not permitted to answer that. that's interesting. the former director of the fbi says he cannot answer whether his agency took any action with the trump campaign, the trump transition or administration given what the fbi knew about paul manafort and mike flynn who were under active investigation by the fbi while they were involved in these roles. that's new and intriguing. if for instance the fbi warned the trump campaign about paul manafort or warned paul manafort about what they were looking at him for, that would add a new dimension to our understanding of what was happening during the election. that is one big thing we learned last night. i have one more, too. that's next.

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as we all remember quite acutely, just 11 days before the presidential election in 2016, fbi director james comey sent a note to congress saying he was reopening the hillary clinton fbi investigation. that letter blew up the presidential race, the hillary clinton campaign believes that was like a comet flying down from the heavens and smashing into their campaign. last night i asked director comey about something right that happened right before he sent that note the congress when rudy giuliani, a top adviser on fox news said that some surprises were coming to turn the race around in trump's favor and this is two days before james comey

announce ed t announced the reopening of the clinton investigation. after comey made that announcement giuliani said that was what he had been hinting at. he had advance notice that the investigation was going to get reopened. did rudy giuliani and therefore the trump campaign have advance notice from inside the fbi from the new york field office that this announcement from you was coming? >> not that i know of. i saw that same publicity. so i commissioned an investigation to see if we could understand whether people were disclosing information out of the new york office or any other place that resulted in rudy's report on fox news and other leaks that we were seeing in the media. i don't know what the result was. i got fired before it was finished. i know i asked it be investigated. >> that answer from james comey here last night has gotten a good bit of attention in the wake of that interview. mr. comey telling us that rudy giuliani's comments during the campaign prompted him, comey, to order an fbi investigation into whether people inside the fbi were feeding the trump campaign

non-public information about the clinton investigation during the campaign. comey confirming to us that he ordered an investigation into that. he said he doesn't know what the result was of that investigation he ordered because, of course, he soon got fired. we're not 100% sure what happened to that investigation. we think that what probably happened to it is that we think it got rolled into a broader investigation by the justice department inspector general. an investigation into the fbi and its activities related to the 2016 election. we think that issue is part of the what the inspector general is due to report on very soon. that inspector general report will be issued next month. which means we may be about to get the results of the investigation james comey talked about so intriguingly about last night include ing ting the party giuliani, right as rudy giuliani

is becoming the president's new lawyer on the russia case. joining us now is congressman eric swallof. it's nice to see you. thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me back. >> the justice department inspector general we believe is still doing an investigation broadly speaking into the fbi's various activities related to the 2016 campaign. we surmise that might involve a look at whether or not fbi agents were leaking non-public information to the trump campaign during the campaign. do you think that the inspector general is a credible investigator? do you think these will be good or determinative results? >> i worry about that. what we have seen as recently as today is now perhaps former director comey is under investigation because of what looks like republicans seeking the memos he wrote, leaks that came out about those memos immediately yesterday and now a report today that he may be under investigation.

of course, we see a president who wants to direct the fbi and the attorney general as to who he believes they should investigate. i do fear the inspector general could be untowardly influenced. i would like to see that report as soon as possible. what it suggested to me is there were a number of people in the trump campaign who had foreknowledge about hacks occurring against hillary clinton, whether it was roger stone and what was being reported out by julian assuage. and rudy giuliani intimating in fox news interviews that there was an investigation to be opened, so it appears that the fix was in throughout many angles of the late fall of that campaign. >> if something like that was going on during the campaign and rudy giuliani was a recipient of that information from inside the fbi and was using it for the trump campaign's benefit, does that pose an issue for him becoming a leading member of the president's legal team? >> certainly. again, he would be another

individual who it looks like was communicating with the trump campaign during -- right before the election and passing along perhaps illicitly obtained information. this is an area that we with tried to explore in our investigation, but unfortunately the republicans on the house intelligence committee showed no interest in being willing to subpoena the documents that communication logs, and the travel logs and the bank records for situations like this that we with believed occurred because of what we saw in the press reporting and other credible individual, and hopefully bob mueller is going to tell u and with the new dnc lawsuit we can find out. bob mueller can only tell us what he can prove beyond a reasonable doubt. this dnc lawsuit will be quite illuminating because they don't have the same standard of proof. it's much lower in a civil lawsuit. what we may learn through a

deposition may tell us a lot more about what was going on at the peak of the campaign. >> congressman, i was -- if you heard at the top of the show, i'm fascinated by that lawsuit as a tactic, also by its historical echos. in terms of the dnc having done that watergate and worked even though people forgot about it at the time. and one of the things that was with reported about the democratic party lawsuits is that democratic party officials and serving members of the congress were blindsided as the republicans and the trump campaign that this is coming, and not something that a lot of people knew that it was in the works when it was sprung on everybody that it was filed. did you have advance notice that this lawsuit was coming? did you work on it in any way? >> no, and i'm okay with that, because it was not something to just drum up political talking point, and the lawyers not asking other politicians to weigh in.

so there should be a separation between what we are doing in congress and what happened to the victim in this case, the democratic national committee. >> congress eric swalwell of california news that i have seen the headline for, but i have not observed it yet. i'm going to make sure i know what i'm talking about before i tell it to you. i will do it right after the commercial. thank you, commercial. but not so much about what market volatility may do to their retirement savings. that's because they have a shield annuity from brighthouse financial, which allows them to take advantage of growth opportunities in up markets, while maintaining a level of protection in down markets. so they can focus on new things like exotic snacks. talk with your advisor about shield annuities from brighthouse financial- established by metlife. fthere's flonase sensimist.tchy and watery near pollen. it relieves all your worst symptoms including nasal congestion, which most pills don't.

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so i mentioned before the break there was breaking news. this has just come out in "the washington post."

one of the dominant stories that we, and i think the white house, has been coping with and trying to understand over the past couple weeks has been the fbi raid on the manhattan office, home and hotel room of the president's personal attorney, michael cohen. since that raid last week, a very dramatic development in the legal saga surrounding the president. there's been a lot of reporting that among the things that fbi agents were looking for when executing the search warrants was information related to payments that were made to women -- payments to pay them basically to not talk about their alleged affairs with donald trump. one of the things that has emerged since we started to realize that might be a central legal concern for the president and his attorney, is that there seems to have been a pattern of collusion, forgive me, between lawyers. and at least two of those instances where women were paid off, michael cohen was involved in the transaction on the side of don't talk about trump.

and the same guy on both instances was involved on the other side of the deal, this guy named keith davidson, it led to suspicion that there was a pattern, some sort of rigged system for these women coming forward where they thought they were getting legal representation but their lawyer was in cahoots with michael cohen to make sure the president got what he needed and the women didn't get much. both stormy daniels and karen mcdougal have sued to get out of these payment deals that were negotiated in part with this attorney, keith davidson, supposedly on their side. here's the story that just broke in "the washington post." keith davidson is cooperating with federal authorities who are investigating trump attorney michael cohen. davidson has been asked by prosecutors in the southern district of new york to provide electronic information according to his spokesman he has done so

and will continue to cooperate to the fullest extent possible under the law. when lawyers have lawyers it's bad. when lawyers have lawyers who have spokesmen, go ahead and set yourself on fire. we'll be right back. insurance that won't replace the full value of your new car? you're better off throwing your money right into the harbor. i'm gonna regret that. with new car replacement, if your brand new car gets totaled, liberty mutual will pay the entire value plus depreciation. liberty stands with you. liberty mutual insurance.

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mass shooting in parkland, florida, killed 17 people in february. unlike what happened with the walkout on the one-month anniversary of the shooting, this time, a lot of schools didn't give their blessings for kids to leave school grounds for their protest. these students staged a sit in outside speaker paul ryan's office. you see them handled by the capitol hill police. back home in paul ryan's district, a handful of kids walked out in janesville, wisconsin. parkland, florida the kids were told yesterday they could face disciplinary action if they walked out, they did it anyway. parkland kids have continued grass roots organizing at home and around the country. some of them went to colorado today, for a day of service and remembrance at columbine high school. today marks 19 years since the columbine massacre, which means some of the kids who protested today have never known a world before having an armed gunman storm the school as an event you really needed to fear. this movement of theirs is still

going. they're still marching, speaking, now sometimes getting arrested for change. they're happy to have help from grown ups. they're not waiting for permission from anyone. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again on monday. now it's time for the last word with ari sitting in. >> can i ask you a question that's not about breaking news, but your interview last night. >> yes. >> you near the end pressed james comey on something that is the issue in our era, which is should the political process or the fbi care about how people will misuse lies. >> mm-hmm. >> i wonder because you were conducting the interview, we didn't hear what you thought of his answer. you were asking about his concern that a lie about loretta lynch would be misused and what he did to preempt that. >> thank you for picking up on that. it's hard to -- it was sort of a hard thing to bring up because it's not something with which everybody is familiar with all the details. but one of the important things