reports that federal investigators wiretapped the phone lines of president trump's personal attorney michael cohen. it's not clear when the surveillance began, but we have learned it was in place in the weeks prior to the raids on cohen's offices, hotel room and home in early april. we have also learned that at least one phone call between cohen's phone line and the white house was intercepted. we don't know for sure at this time if that call came from the president, but we do know that trump placed a call to cohen days after the raid. trump's attorney rudy giuliani says he's infuriated by the report, telling "the daily beast," quote, we think it's going to turn out to be untrue because it would be totally illegal. you can't wiretap a lawyer, you certainly can't wiretap his client who is not involved in the investigation. no one has suggested that trump was involved in that investigation, so they're going to wiretap the lawyer, his client, and his client the president of the united states? i don't think so. not if they want to stay out of

jail. and suggesting to the hill that attorney general jeff sessions should intervene, saying, quote, i'm waiting for the attorney general to step in in his role as defender of justice and put these people under investigation. we haven't yet heard a reaction from the president himself, but the raid of cohen's offices prompted one of the most memorable meltdowns from the president to date and his most pointed threats against robert mueller, the special counsel in the russia investigation, and rod rosenstein who over sees it. >> it's a disgrace. it's frankly a real disgrace. it's an attack on our country in a true sense. >> and of course news of that wiretap follows a dramatic admission by giuliani last night and confirmed by donald trump this morning that donald trump fernl personally reimbursed cohen for the payment to stormy daniels. let's get to julia ainsley, a

reporter who broke the story also from the washington post white house reporter ashley parker, joyce vance former u.s. attorney and harry litman also former u.s. attorney and former deputy assistant attorney general. julia, take us through your remarkable reporting which is already sending shock waves through the president's legal team. >> i'd love to, nicolle. i'd also push back on some of the things giuliani was saying to the daily beast. so, what we have is that weeks prior to the raid, the fbi in new york started or the prosecutors of new york got a warrant to wiretap michael cohen. they were able to get text, e-mails and wiretaps on his many phone lines. leading up to the raid and continuing. and in order to do that you have to show a judge that there is ongoing criminal activity and that you cannot get that information in other ways. there's no way of subpoenaing documents or getting cooperation, that it has come to this point and you have to then do a wiretap. and we also understand now that there was a conversation between

a line at the white house and lines connected to michael cohen that was picked up as a result of this wiretap. this comes against even advice that had been given to trump not to talk to michael cohen. although it's not really clear this had come from trump. it's just a white house line. so, right now giuliani is saying that the president was wiretapped, and that's not what we're saying. we understand that cohen was wiretapped because he was under investigation and it was his criminal activity that they were looking into. anything that falls outside of that scope, because the bar for domestic surveillance of an american citizen is so high, particularly a lawyer, anything outside of that scope cannot be recorded. it is not even that it has to be gathered and then set aside. it's not even gathered. the investigators would turn off the recording devices when it comes to a phone call they may be hearing that does not pertain to their investigation. and so we're not saying that prosecutors are wiretapping the president's phone calls. they are simply wiretapping his lawyer, which is still a very

significant revelation on its own. >> joyce, how much concern do prosecutors and investigators need to have about someone to get a wiretap authorized of their phone line, particularly if that person is an attorney? >> getting a wiretap is very difficult. to get the authorization, you actually have to have very credible evidence that links the phone that you're getting the wiretap authorization for to ongoing current criminal activity. so, sometimes you'll have a consensually monitored phone call that will prove that that phone is being used. other times it will be an under cover or an informant who can say, in this case michael cohen is using this specific phone line to conduct criminal activity. that permission to even ask a court for the warrant is vetted through the criminal division

and main justice before the u.s. attorney can reach out to a federal judge to authorize the wiretap. and federal judges maintain pretty rigorous scrutiny on wiretaps. for one thing, the original order is typically only good for 30 days or less, and prosecutors have to go back to the judge every 30 days or so and prove that the wiretap is being productive, that there is continuing evidence of criminality coming off of the wiretap. so, it's a pretty stringent set of conditions before the government can do this. >> joyce, let me ask you to dumb it down a little bit. a former prosecutor said to me that -- when i asked him about the bar that had to be reached around the original raid of cohen's offices, i said, how suspicious did they have to be of the severity of the crimes? and he said they basically had to prove that there was evidence of either destruction of evidence or ongoing criminality. is there a parallel between the standard that has to be met for a raid like the one of

mr. cohen's homes and a wiretap, or is it relative -- is it higher for a wiretap? is that the kind of behavior that we need to be at least suspected? >> the process -- they're both high standards, nicolle. the process for getting a wiretap is really much more involved because there's guidance that tells us that you shouldn't use a wiretap if you can get the evidence from any other means. so, you have to have tried other means and failed. and the most difficult thing for prosecutors is proving not just that a target is involved in criminal conduct, but that the target is using the specific telephone. so, that linked up evidence is what makes this a pretty high burden for prosecutors. >> harry litman, you worked in main d.o.j. the process that joyce just described certainly suggested that prosecutors in the southern district had to go back to the justice department through the criminal division. how high up might this have gone? because when i hear rudy giuliani asking jeff sessions to intervene, it certainly seems

possible that this could have been something that went pretty high up the chain of command at the justice department. and those ranks are pretty lean to begin with, right? >> that's right. i think it almost certainly here went to the tippy top. as joyce says, sometimes the head of the criminal division could do it. given what they were dealing with, it went to the rosenstein level. everything joyce says is accurate. there is one thing i would add. giuliani is making a reckless misstatement of law. you can certainly wiretap an attorney just as you can search an attorney. it requires extra process. so, the people who were listening in on the wiretap were themselves already a taint team. they were listening for any possibly privileged communications and it was only after they would determine that the communications were not privileged that they could hoist the information over the wall, so to speak, to the normal

prosecutors. so, those extra measures were in place. and as far as their happening to pickup communications from the president of the united states, that's no different from picking it up from anyone at all. so, it's really brazenly wrong for giuliani to suggest there is anything illegal here. >> so, julie ainsley, let me ask you to pick that up and marry up your reporting which no one is disputing the facts of it. it seems like the push back is that rudy giuliani saying -- debating the justice of it. that no one has a right to listen to the president's phone line. but that's not the fact of your report. the fact of your report is that michael cohen is a target in a criminal investigation. they met the very high standards joyce and harry have described. they were granted permission by a fed ra judge. it may have reached the highest levels of the justice department run by donald trump's appointees so they monitored his conversations and the president may or may not have called him in this interim. am i missing something? >> no, you laid it all out. thank you for doing that because

i've been reading this reporting in the daily beast and seeing the push back from giuliani. i don't think that giuliani would be the source here to dispute our reporting. why would the president's attorney know whether or not michael cohen was under a wiretap? prosecutors do not work that way. they don't want anyone under a wiretap surveillance to know they are being listened to. that would be pretty counterproductive. i think what he is picking up on here is the fact that he's thinking that his client is being wiretapped. he may even know that's not what we're saying. i'm sure he's an astute reader. i think he's trying to stretch it to show perhaps the justice department is out of bounds and they should go to jail for anything like this. he's pushing back on the veracity of the reporting from a position that he really isn't in, quite frankly, and that he's also trying to cast a light that we've seen before from the president's legal team and from the white house where they want to show prosecutors out of bounds. they do the same thing with robert mueller, saying they're out of their scope and they're going too far.

it's the same argument michael cohen argued in court saying a lot of these things seized in the raids are under attorney/client privilege. but the same logic holds true. they had to get a warrant for those raids just like they had to get a warrant for the wiretap. there will be materials that will not be admissible. they will be protected under attorney/client privilege. in this case protected because they might fall outside of the scope of the investigation. so, thank you for laying all that out because i think that these waters are getting very muddy. >> any time you need any of your great reporting dumbed down for people like me, come to me. i'm your gal. ashley, let me ask you to widen the lens on just how triggered this president is by the investigation into michael cohen. it seems to be the punch line of every bizarre statement coming out of rudy giuliani and donald trump over the last four to six weeks. let me read you some, from the nbc report. it is unclear what incriminating information cohen could give prosecutors on trump if he chose to cooperate. he represented trump and the trump organization in its

business dealings for nearly two decades before trump became president. special counsel robert mueller is interested in any information that federal investigators in new york may pick up that would be relevant to his investigation into possible collusion between the trump campaign and russia. the office, it is also true, as i understand, that bob mueller may have already kicked over to the southern district anything outside of those categories, and it seems to me -- and you knew better from me being in and around that building all the time -- that the president is just as anxious and the concerns just as grave around the things that michael cohen may be able to testify to should he choose to cooperate at some point, should he be given that opportunity that are unrelated to potential collusion or obstruction. >> yeah, i think if you're looking for sort of a cosmic or a psychic turning point in all of this, one of them is the raid on michael cohen's home office and hotel room. that is when we go back and trace changes to the president's

legal team, changes in his posture from cooperative to more aggressive, changes from his willingness and almost eagerness to sit down with mueller and his investigators to now a much more hard line approach. it all comes down to that raid. and there was a sense from the president that mueller's investigators had basically, in kicking it to the southern district of new york and in raiding the home and the office and the hotel of his personal attorney, had just sort of like overstepped their bounds, were not operating in good faith. and when you go back to the other stuff you just laid out, there is real concern from the president, but especially people in the president's orbit and those outside advisors who are always in his ear and quite influential. that they don't know what they don't know. but what they do know is this. cohen was sort of the fixer. cohen got his hands dirty in the stuff no one else wanted to deal with with the president's business, with the president's family, with the president's personal life. and as rudy giuliani said, i believe in one of his many

interviews, i think with the post, but he said, look, the reason the president paid michael cohen was to fix things, was to sort of deal with things and get them off his plate. so, michael cohen getting embroiled in all of this is very problematic for the president and the people in the president's world. >> and let me follow-up with you, ashley, about the idea of other people in the president's orbit being of concern to the presiden president. the "wall street journal" reported cohen worked as a fixer for don junior. in 2016 killing a story u.s. weekly was preparing about an affair don junior who had been a judge on celebrity apprentice, and aubrey o'day, singer of dumb blonde to people familiar with the matter. if there are any raw nerves for the president, it's his children. >> that is sort of what is at issue here. among the cast of characters that mueller is looking into

that we are currently aware of -- and i have a feeling new characters and new plot twists may emerge. but among those existing cast of characters that we know right now, looking into michael cohen comes the closest to crossing the red line that the president laid out, which is what he said. if anything got into his businesses or his family, and that is exactly that sort of murky gray area where michael cohen lives. so, again, we don't know everything that were seized in those raids. we don't know what was on the recordings that we know michael cohen made of conversations. but we do know or we have good reason to believe and certainly this is what people in trump's world are worried about is that it could be stuff with his family and it could be stuff with his business. those are all the red lines that are likely, if anything is likely, to make the president make a rash decision about a possible shake up at d.o.j. >> harry, let me ask you to speak more broadly. that's i think one of the best

articulations of sort of the president's emotional reactions and really the best justification for what are incredibly unpresidential statements he makes on a near daily basis. let me hear the other side of it. the justice department is blind to the emotional concerns the president has. they are simply following the facts wherever they lead them. wouldn't that be the case no matter who they were scrutinizing? >> you sure hope so, right? i mean, we have 9 the famous statue of lady justice wearing the blind fold. it would be against their duty to try to push it one way or another. and by the way, i think julia's point is well taken. it's reinforced by some of the questions that mueller has forwarded to team trump. donald trump, jr., and jared kushner seem not to have spoken to the special prosecutor -- the special counsel. and the most likely conclusion is that they have indicated that

they are planning to take the 5th amendment. so, things have been very quiet with them of late, but i think they are in real precarious shape and in the near future. i don't know if trump appreciates that, but clearly that's part of why he tried to draw this red line, which, of course, a citizen can't draw. well, you can look at anything you want, but don't go into the living room, you know, is normally an indication to investigators to go into the living room. >> all right. julie ainsley, harry litman, thank you so much for joining us. when we come back, inside rudy giuliani's shocking admission that donald trump paid back his personal attorney and fixer the $130,000 he paid porn star stormy daniels. unraveling months of alternative facts, spewed by the president and his press secretary about the payment to daniels. also ahead, inside mueller's investigation room, what a witness said when he came out that may hard ebb the president's position about that wide ranging interview the

special counsel is said to be seeking to determine donald trump's involvement in possible collusion with russia and potential obstruction of justice. and disposable men. that's the latest label to be slapped onto jared kushner by the president's new attorney. does rudy know something about jared's legal fate? storms by an insurance company that knows the weather down to the square block. this is a diamond tracked on a blockchain - protected against fraud, theft and trafficking. this is a financial transaction secure from hacks and threats others can't see. this is a patient's medical history made secure - while still available to their doctor at their fingertips. this is an asteroid live-streamed to millions of viewers from 220 miles above earth. this is ai trained by experts in 20 industries. your industry. hello. this is not the cloud you know. this is the ibm cloud.

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rudy giuliani with a complete reversal of the story that the president has been telling for months about his role in the stormy daniels scandal. giuliani breaking the news last night that the president reimbursed his long-time

personal attorney and fixer michael cohen for the hush money paid to the porn star. >> sorry, i'm giving you a fact now that you don't know. it's not campaign money. no campaign finance violation. >> they funneled it through a law firm. >> funneled through a law firm and the president repaid it. >> oh, i didn't know he did. >> i might have to hear that again. trump previously denied any knowledge of the $130,000 payment to cohen, but trump doubled down on the new version of events as debuted by rudy on hannity in a tweet this morning writing in suspicious untrumpian language. mr. cohen, an attorney, thanks for that, received a monthly retainer. lots of punctuation here. not from the campaign, and having nothing to do with the campaign, comma, from which he entered into, come a through reimbursement, comma, a private contract between two parties, comma. we are going to check, these are the most commas ever, ever seen

in a trump tweet. as a nondisclosure agreement or nda. these agreements are very common among celebrities and people of wealth. that sounds like it might have been him. the rudy trump statements were described to me by two sources familiar with the president and giuliani's thinking as a quote strategic play carried out last night and this morning, not a gaff or a stumble. the goal according to one of these sources, make clear to cohen that trump still has his back ask try to prevent him from flipping and cooperating with federal prosecutors. the sources adding, rudy and the president believe they, quote, know some of what was taken out of cohen's office and if you know what they have, you start putting it out there yourself to control the narrative. end quote. joining me at the table jim mussina, former white house deputy chief of staffer for president obama, also his former campaign manager in 2012, eugene robinson, washington post columnist, jennifer rubin also an opinion writer with the post, and rick&!

>> i mean, it was remarkable to see it in the words of rudy giuliani last night. what's striking about it is that -- well, a couple things are striking. first of all, it seems like just mr. giuliani and the president knew about this plan.

all of the other people in the other white house you would want to be read in who want a heads up. it seems like they were following along like we were, like the rest of america, sort of in real-time glued to their tvs or their twitter streams. so, that's the first thing. the second thing is what giuliani seemed to be trying to do here is thread a very fine needle and basically try to get rid of the biggest headache right now for michael cohen and the president, which is possible campaign finance violations by saying that the president paid this money, he paid him back. so, it wasn't a campaign finance violation on the part of michael cohen. the money didn't come from the campaign, it didn't come from the trump organization. it came from the president himself. in doing that, of course, what's notable is that he basically all but contradicted previous public statements both the president and the white house press secretary have made on this topic. and the issue is normally that

would be a huge deal and a number of people argued that it is, that the president had lied essentially to the american people about something. but so far at least the president in many ways has been impervious to those sorts of norms that would sink -- not quite sink the presidency, but would be very, very politically problematic for any other politician or any other president. so, in trying to clean up one problem, he basically said that the president has all but lied. the press secretary has all but lied. you saw her trying to field those questions today all day in the briefing. >> ashley, i heard from someone late last night after i appeared on our friend brian williams' program. there was no way there was strategery on this. the mayor said it was absolutely strategic. really, tell me. they said the ultimate goal, the ultimate prize is to provide

some cover politically, legally, psychically, cosmically, emotionally for michael cohen. that their chief concern is what cohen might do if he becomes afraid enough, if his family becomes concerned enough, that he's facing criminal prosecution. they are, they are sufficiently afraid of that scenario that they would do just about anything, including proving once and for all that they've turned sarah sanders into a taxpayer funded liar. >> you're exactly right. there's a couple of camps. there are a number of people who actually do believe there is no strategicery behind this. there are other people who believe it is exactly what you said, trying to give michael cohen some cover, some reassurance because we know one of the concerns, of course, is that he might flip and he might provide more information than they currently have from him. and then ape third camp says it's a different type of strategy which is that all along the president has sort of

created someone out there, being aggressive in defending him. it's sort of the emotional strategy and the emotional response that the president desires. and it may not be great politically, and it may create a lot of headaches for his staff, but it's nice to have someone finally out there defending him and it's sort of scratches that itch that he has and he often exhibits on twitter. so, giuliani is doing it, maybe his tweets as we saw this morning were for him somewhat restrained, complete with hon honorifics. >> your birthday. >> this is nuts. >> thank you very much. [ laughter ] >> do not exonerate his client. he confessed, in fact, to possibly two campaign finance violations. one is an illegal loan by mr. cohen to the campaign in excess of the amounts never

reported. and secondly, that donald trump in paying him back made a disbursement on behalf of the campaign, also didn't report that, and signed under penalty of perjury that the campaign finance records were correct. so, they need to get a better lawyer -- they made it worse. >> joyce, i listened to the part where rudy said, can you imagine if it came out right around the time of the debate? >> unbelievable. >> yeah. what are they doing? >> you know, cohen's problems are already baked in, for better, for worse, whatever conduct they found in the wire search and the tap, the government already has that. what we are watching is a cover up in progress. everyone knows that old saw prosecutors say it's the always the cover up. you find lots of criminality when people try to hid conduct. i fear that's what we're seeing now. jennifer is absolutely right.

there was disclosure of campaign finance problems by m mr. giuliani. the only question in my mind is are they regulatory fec violations, the sort of slow-moving regulatory violation which sometimes results in fines after a long period of time, or will there be enough here that it crosses over into the criminal which would require that trump, giuliani, whoever, knew that there was an absolute obligation under federal law to make disclosures, to file reports, and that they intn intentionally failed to do that. those sorts of campaign violations are awfully hard to prove. not prosecuted a whole lot, but you do see them happen. >> one thing i heard from these sources defending the brilliant strategic play was that there could be a whole lot of stormy danielss and michael cohen could have run around in the final days of the campaign and cleaned up a whole bunch of stuff. >> exactly, yeah, he could have.

so, i'm still trying to get my mind around how this gives michael cohen the message, how does this help him. how is he better off today than he was yesterday? and i can't answer that question. in fact, we don't know why the southern district of new york is all over michael cohen like white on rice. it could be something unrelated, it could be some of this, it could be however many stormy daniels there are. who knows what it is. i don't see how this helps him understand that they have his back. and also i think there are a lot of questions about how this money, this repayment was handled. was it structured -- and i know that's potentially criminal term, but was it structured in a way. >> that's at the heart of this. let's listen to giuliani explaining just that.

i don't think we have it, but he says, first of all, we have to defend this as not being campaign contribution. i think we can do that. it was for personal reasons. i think he went into protecting the president's marriage. this was hurt personally, not politically, personally so much. and the first lady about some false allegations. one more false allegations, six years old. he was trying to help the family. for that the man is being treated like some kind of villain. he went on to defend michael, i like him a lot. the man is being treated like some kind of villain. i think he was a good lawyer and a good man. cohen didn't ask, make it go away. they are holding him up as a crooked system. >> let's talk about political strategy. if that was a strategy, the strategy sucked. [ laughter ] >> you sound like me now.

>> you and i worked in two different white houses. if you're going to do this, go out and say the president of the united states lied to everyone, you are going to script it more careful than everything. you're going to have all your people ready. the white house is actually going to know it's coming. the hill is going to know it's coming. they just put him out here and had him do it because he and the president whipped this up together. >> it's crazy. they don't script anything. they are completely unbuttoned up. it is kind of crazy that he went out this morning and he actually made it worse by saying the thing about what if it happened during the debate. by the way, he also remembered this morning mention martha stewart. remember why martha stewart went to jail? not for insider trading but forelying under oath of the cover up. michael cohen is going up the river. there is no doubt about it. [ laughter ] >> so, this is the motion that the u.s. attorney filed to quash the motion that cohen filed. the searches are the result of months-long investigation into cohen and seeking evidence of

crimes many of which have nothing to do with his work as an attorney, but rather relate to cohen's own business dealings. now, by the way, if you're from new york like i am and you read the story the other day he owned 14 different taxi medallion licenses. >> right. >> these are the businesses that people who do criminal things are in. he was down there at the courthouse signing up people torching their cars to get insurance payment. his list is this long. >> ashley, let me give you the last word with one more delicious nug elget from your reporting. basically rudy went, he was at dinner with his long-time business partner and former political aide tony carbonetti. he said he was dining with the former new york mayor in manhattan's upper east side before he went on fox. we thought it was a quick hit and he was coming right back. giuliani returned to the dinner table at 10:15, seemed pleased. he warned those lampooning giuliani are mistaken. if you'd been around rudy there

is always a rides for it. if you knew a narrative was coming out he'd want to get ahead of it. sometimes we under estimate these folks. maybe there is something worse and rudy was trying to distract. i had the sense after i was on tv last night maybe we're chasing the wrong shiny object. >> well, that is what his defenders say and he does have some, to be fair, not just his close friends, but people in the president's orbit. it also gives you a sense of how this white house works. if you're doing something like that, sort of a deliberate strategy, a deliberate p.r. 101 to drop something to distract from something else, to get ahead of the story, you would imagine you would be in murder boards before him. some serious interview -- >> we put them to death. >> and then him coming back and thinking it went well is another example that often what the president thinks is a good idea or good strategy, what the people close to him is not what say his communications team or his chief of staff would have scripted. so you have really divergent

opinions. >> perfectly and diplomatically put. ashley parker and joyce vance thank you so much for spending time with us. after the break we will take you inside special counsel bob mueller's investigation room from the perspective of a witness in the investigation into possible collusion and obstruction of justice. this witness under the belief that bob mueller already knows everything.

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giving them pride in where they live, will make this a thriving community once again. ♪ what are the possibilities the president will sit down with him for two, three hours tops? >> that's the amount of time we would allow only because that's what clinton got. he got only 2 1/2 hours. >> other trump allies maintain any amount of time spent with bob mueller's investigators could spell trouble for the free wheeling president with a tenuous relationship with the truth. here's why. listen to how former trump campaign aide michael caputo described the three hours he spent in the special counsel's office yesterday. >> they know more about the trump campaign than anybody that

worked there and they know more about what i did in 2016 than i do myself. the mueller team is spear fishing. i think they believe they know where they're going. they're not asking a wide range of questions that seem to be, you know, unrelated. they know exactly what they're looking for and they have e-mails backing it up and i don't think that they ask any questions they don't already know the answer to. >> wow. we knew this hour we learned special counsel mueller's team just filed a request for 70 blank subpoenas in alexandria, virginia. a former federal prosecutor, someone fluent in all this material. let me ask you first to respond to rudy giuliani's tour de force and the idea this was a strategic play to, i guess, give michael cohen some breathing room, to take some culpability, some heat off of him around the

campaign violations, and say we've still got your back. >> nicolle, this is the play you make when you learn the fbi has been recording conversations of your client and you figure, we might as well get it out there anyway. i don't think there is any forthcoming rewards that they should be reaping here. it's time to just come clean, sit down with bob mueller's team. and, nicolle, it's so bar czar to me the continued obsession with the clinton family. that bill clinton only had to interview for 2 to 3 hours. hillary clinton was told about the investigation. this is a different order of magnitude. we're talking about potential money laundering, conspiracy with the russians, obstruction of justice, and he's been given the answers. he's essentially been given the answers by the mueller team. they have provided him where they're going and he's still unwilling to sit down. if he does not sit down for an interview, i think with he should assume what he assumes and anyone who would assert the 5th amendment which is he has

something to hide. >> let me ask you about something folks have covered the mueller investigation, in particular the obstruction of justice sort of buckets in the mueller investigation say may have been the most significant revelation in that rudy interview and that is the additional, i think be it may be the 5th explanation or articulation for donald trump's state of mind when he fired jim comey. let me show you how those explanations have evolved from different spokespeople and we'll talk about it on the other side. >> what was the first time the president even knew this review was underway is this >> my understanding is the president was presented with the recommendations of the deputy attorney general who was a career prosecutor served as the u.s. attorney for maryland under president obama who over sees the fbi. he made that recommendation to the attorney general. the attorney general forwarded it to the president today. the president concurred. >> i was going to fire comey knowing there was no good time to do it. and, in fact, when i decided to just do it, i said to myself, i said, you know, this russia thing with trump and russia is a

made up story, it's an excuse by the democrats for having lost an election. that they should have won. >> he fired comey because comey would not, among other things, say that he wasn't a target of the investigation. he's entitled to that. hillary clinton got that. and he couldn't get that. so he fired him and he said, i'm free of this guy. >> so, we've got, we've got the old rod rosenstein defense which fell by the wayside the minute donald trump sat down with our own lester holt. i was going to fire him anyway. i didn't like the way the russia investigation was going. rudy said he fired him because comey refused to tell the president he wasn't a target of the investigation. >> there's a lot of stories here that we're hearing, nicolle. there is only one version of the truth. i think the one that is most likely is the one that is closest in time to when comey was fired. it's the story that he told lester holt and it's a story

also that he told his friends the russians when he invited them into the oval office and kicked everyone else out and only allowed russian media in. so, again, innocent people don't obstruct. innocent people cooperate. they want to get investigations over with as soon as possible. they don't drag it out. he is acting like somebody who has something to hide and somebody who is trying to game the investigation and trying to turn as many people do, many defendants do, who is trying to turn the investigation against the government and to put them on trial. that usually doesn't work. it may last a little bit longer because he's the president of the united states, but the rule of law is still going to win out in this country. >> hope springs eternal. congressman eric swalwell, thank you for spending time with us. >> my pleasure. >> eugene, are you this optimistic? >> i hope, i hope that's true. one thing i'm not as optimistic about as the congressman is donald trump ever sitting down with robert mueller for an interview, for an actual interview. and, and frankly, everybody in this country deserves a lawyer.

even donald trump. he doesn't believe that, but i believe it. >> he gets one a week. >> so, i think he does deserve a lawyer. if i were his lawyer -- i'm not an attorney -- but i don't see how i could let him do that. you saw what happened when he called in to fox and friends last week. if he sits down with mueller, before the first bathroom break, he will confess to three felonies that mueller doesn't even know about. he'll just go on and on and on. >> right. >> the problem is he doesn't have a choice. he will be subpoenaed. if we think that bob mueller is going to pass up the opportunity to put donald trump under oath, who has information not only about his own liability, but about other people's liability including paul manafort who is going on trial, where all smoking something. he's going to put him under oath. he's going to send out a subpoena, perhaps they're going to horse around in federal court for, you know, a identifew week

few months. the order u.s. v. nixon. u.s. v. jones. >> that could take years. >> does anybody around the table think that he's not going to fire mueller? >> i don't know any more. >> i don't know. >> i'm sorry, i can tell you how the play is going to end. this is the way this guy operates. he's been -- what did he say about comey? there never was a good time to do this. i always knew i was going to do it. he's always known he's going to do this. he just hasn't figured out the mek iz many i'm sor-- mechanism to say. >> the back ups come and the replacements come. it is so bizarre. what is motivating him isn't even true. he's not going to get what he wants even if he object instructs justice in plain view. >> let me ask you about this idea that the two sources told

me this week. the reason sarah huckabee sanders -- i watched the briefing today. it was a tragedy. it wasn't a comedy any more. it wasn't funny. she took to the briefing and that room, you can tell when you've lost the room. she lost the room today. today the room wanted to know why she comes out there and spews b.s. every day. why does she lie to them every day. and i don't know what their recourse is, but i think they're done reporting on what comes out of that podium because she's now been a proven liar, proven by her boss. one of her explanations when she goes to the president and asks about stormy daniels, he has three versions of the truth about stormy daniels in his own mind. it's a buffet. whatever he serves out is what she gives in the briefing room. that's not how it works. i don't know if he's oblivious or compartmentalized. everyone is a potential witness in the mueller probe.

>> we know this about the president. it's whoever talked to him last. he had three different stories on immigration, several stories here. they decide to trot out his lawyer to call him a liar yesterday. sarah sanders is done in that room. no one is going to take anything she says seriously. >> she can arrange press -- she does not speak with any credibility. >> who in the white house does currently? no one thinks of the chief of staff as a chief of staff any more. who exactly do we think is being honest except for maybe kelly, when kelly called the president an idiot. >> i know we are. i know we are. >> i do think it's hard for her when you have a president who says that every moment what he thinks is the best version of reality to say right there. and on the press secretary -- >> there is the truth and a lie. >> but he doesn't even have the truth. whatever he thinks is the best --

>> you quit because if you're being sent out to lie every day, then you quit. we're all acting like oh, these people are poor prisoners. he took an oath like everybody in the white house. >> donald trump to the country. >> and to the country. giving her a pass on all this, oh, poor sarah, she's being sent out to lie again. no, she is violating her oath and she is lying to the american people and there should be consequence for her and everybody doing the same. >> well said. more reaction on rudy giuliani's media ballistic from michael avenatti. that's next. mom? dad? hi!

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mother...nature! sure smells amazing... even in accounts receivable. gain botanicals laundry detergent. bring the smell of nature wherever you are. now that you don't know. it's not campaign money. no campaign finance violation. >> they funneled it through the law firm. >> funneled flew a law firm, and the president repaid it. >> oh. i didn't know that he did. >> an admission so stunning it was worth hearing again.

stormy daniels attorney michael avenatti insisted donald trump was behind that hush money to his client. stormy daniels attorney joins us now. it's been a long 20 hours since that stunninged a miss from raudy giuliani. as we have been reporting all hour, while it wasn't exactly a rogue move the president was in on it. i'm guessing that's a good fact for you. >> a lot of good facts have come to light over the last 18 to 20 hours. i want to focus on a couple of thing that i think are important. first of all, this whole idea that there was nothing untoward relating to the reimbursement of the $130,000, there is nothing illegal about it, it was all above board, which is what mr. giuliani is expecting everyone to believe based on his statements. >> and what mr. trump said in his tweets this morning. >> correct. i mean, that's a bunch of non-sense. you only need look at the following facts. if it was all above board and

there was nothing untoward about it why did they have to structure it across many months in response to invoices, bogus law firm invoices? why wouldn't donald trump simply have written a check or send a $130,000. >> to stormy daniels. >> or to. >> or to michael cohen. >> to michael cohen, to reimburse him. why go through all of this hoopla. >> the "new york times" reports the amount trump paid cohen sometime the campaign was over they set up a payment of $35,000 a month out of his personal account mr. giuliani said. he said michael cohen was paid 160 or $170,000 from mr. trump for those payments which also included money for incidental expenses he had incurred on mr. trump's behalf. are there other women besides stormy daniels? numbers don't add up. >> it appears that mr. trump

overpaid by $300,000. not a good deal. look, this was not all above board. if it was above board they would have simply written a $130,000 check and it would have been no big deal. and by the way, i don't understand why an llc would have had to have been set up and the facts go on and on relating to this. it doesn't pass the smell test. the second thing i wanted to raise. i don't know if you have the statement relating to this statement, relating to shortly after the "wall street journal" article -- i recall it was around february of this year, january or february of this year -- michael cohen gave a statement relating to this $130,000. >> do you want me to read it? in a private transaction in 2016 i used my personal funds to facilitate a payment of $130,000 to stephanie deliver. neither the trump organization nor the trump campaign was a party for this payment for miss

cloifrd or reimbursed me. the payment was lawful and was not campaign constrict or expenditure? >> here's why i think this statement is important. mr. giuliani -- i don't know what he is claiming as of this moment, because it changes. >> it does. >> earlier today he suggested that donald trump first learned of the fact that he had reimbursed the money after the air force one statement of april 5 or 6. so he first learned about it within the last 30 days or thereabouts. this statement was given as i said i believe in january or february. now there are a interesting things. first of all the use of the word facility taded, as opposed to it does not say i paid this. suggested that when this statement was made mr. cohen already knew he was being reimburlsed through some mechanism he had not just paid

it. the agreement was already in place by the time this statement was issued. that's a. the second point i want to make is it only calls out the campaign and the trump organization. it specifically seems to exclude donald trump individually. >> personally. >> personally. so if you are to believe mr. giuliani that the president only first became aware of this, you must also conclude that it's just one hell of a coincidence that this statement allows for the carveout of those two very important points. i don't believe it. there is no question when this statement was made, was issued, that the president knew about the agreement, that the reimbursement had either occurred or was in the process of occurring. >> as these mothly payments. >> right. this whole thing continues to fall apart with each passing hour. i think it's important that people look at when the statement was issued. >> take me through what you gained last night by rudy jewel jail's parn on fox news for your

client? >> i think we gained a number of i think this. we have yet another version of events relating to the $130,000 now we have michael cohen's states, the statements of michael cohen's attorney, david schwartz. we have the press briefing statements. we have the president's statements an air force one and now we have the fifth version which is mr. giuliani's statements related to what happened. i think all of that, the inconsistency across that's various statements adds fuel to the fire in our ability to get a deposition of mr. cohen and a deposition of mr. trump. that's first of all. second of all, if donald trump actually knew about the agreement, knew about the arrangement, still didn't sign it, inthat also benefits us. there is also reasons that we don't believe that the nda will ultimately hold up. make in mistake about it, inthe more that mr. july jewel -- rudy, if you are listening, if we can send a car for you to go

to fox and friend. >> we invited him. >> if you want us to send a car for you to appear on those shows we will do it every day, because every time you speak our case gets better. >> the same thing with the president. >> same thing. i hope they go on fox and friends every morning. i hope they continue to go on the network because our case gets better and better. >> what do you think happens next? you have expressed concern for mr. cohen's legal exposure. the picture is not getting better. but obviously he appears to have leverage based on giuliani's comments last night there appears to be grave concern around what may have been seized by the fbi in the raid we have talked about on multiple occasions now what's your think today about mr. cohen. >> i don't think he has much leverage. i think the only thing he has to trade douches. >> over the president? >> that's true but i don't know what he expects to get in response because i don't think that a presidential pardon is going -- i made this point before -- is going the save him from new york state charges. and i also believe that the

california ag could also potentially play a role in this because of the transmission of the $10,000 and how it occurred. >> have you had those conversations in california, in your state? >> have i spoke with him? >> i mean, have you dealt with your says cases to an state level or are they all in a federal --? >> no, i have dealt with them on a state level. ultimately the pardon or a promise of a pardon is a hollow promise because it's not going the alleviate michael cohen's concerns related to criminal liable. as it relates to what michael cohen has. he really has only one guy farther up the ladder to trade up on. that's the president. >> michael, what is the criminal case, the worst case criminal case with the payment of $10,000 -- of $130,000 to your client. >> i will speak in terms of

hypotheticals. campaign finance conspiracies not to report the payment or have it routed or paid in a certain way so it stays to of the books to avoid detection or disclosure. those could be a couple of felonies. bank fraud, money laundering, a whole host of thing. >> and raudy giuliani certainly added to those suspicions with his comment. imagine if this happened before the third debate. >> and his use of the word funnel. >> you never want to have your attorney -- funnel it from me to you. >> i only watch "law and order" and i knew that was a bad word. that does it for our hour. i'm nicolle wallace, "mtp daily" starts right now. i will give chuck todd these 24 seconds back some day. >> some day, nicole. meantime, you have got to ask when does chris christie wind up joining giuliani on this legal tour? that's the only thing missing. >>