11:00 eastern with stephanie ruhle, again 3:00 p.m. eastern. now it's time for "deadline white house" with my friend nicolle wallace. >> hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york. we start with breaking news from the department of justice. a report just out from the department's inspector general on the bureau's handling of the investigation into hillary clinton's use of a private e-mail server during the 2016 campaign finds that the conclusions reached by prosecutors were not affected by any bias and that they were based on, quote, the prosecutor's assessment of the facts, the law, and past department practice. the inspector general was less generous to former director james comey writing that he, quote, chose to deviate from the fbi's and department's established procedures and norms and instead engaged in his own subjective ad hoc decision making. and that these decisions usurped the authority of the attorney general. former fbi director comey responding in an op-ed in "new

york times," minutes after the report became public writing, quote, i do not agree with all of the inspector general's conclusions, but i respect the work of his office and salute its professionalism. the inspector general's team went through the fbi's work with a microscope and found no evidence that bias or improper motivation affected the investigation which i know was done competently, honestly and independently. the report also resoundingly demonstrates that there was no prosecutable case against mrs. clinton as we had concluded. although that probably will not stop some from continuing to claim the opposite is true. the report also reveals new text messages from two of the fbi agents involved in the investigation. those messages raising new questions about the bureau's timing of the reopening of the hillary clinton investigation just 11 days before the election. but the report stresses, quote, our review did not find evidence to connect the political views expressed in these messages to the specific investigative

decisions we received. one trump ally said to me today that the president is likely to overplay his hand with this report as he often does by trying to paint the mueller investigation with the same brush as the i.g. report. this source saying, quote, bob did the right thing by firing the agents in question and chris wray looks good now for replacing the senior fbi leadership. this source's point, most of the individuals criticized in today's report are long gone. let's get into it with the reporters covering it and some of the our favorite experts and guests from the washington post. develin barrett, frank figliuzzi former fbi assistant director to counter intelligence is back. former u.s. attorney joyce vance is here at the table with us. matt miller, former chief spokesman for the justice department and rick steng l, former secretary of state for public diplomacy and former managing editor for time magazine. frank, since you're the only former fbi person, senior former member of senior leadership with the fbi, let me start with you. your reaction to the report and the analysis by a close trump

ally the president very likely to overplay his hand with today's findings. >> so, a couple of reactions. first, i'm relieved. i'm relieved that the i.g. has determined after going through all the legal decisions that indeed the final outcomes are not something that needed to be changed and so, therefore, we don't have a fruit of the poisonous tree. we're not in a place right now that we shouldn't be. that's a relief for me. i am disturbed, nicolle, to hear about the texts and the e-mails and this new additional text that's come to light where pete strzok said to lisa page, we'll stop trump. i don't know the context of that. it could be that a counter intelligence professional was deeply disturbed that someone with trump's connections to a foreign government was possibly going to be the president of the united states. but the bottom line is my question, are we where we should be? would anything be different if anything was played out differently? and the answer appears to be no.

>> joyce, let me get you to weigh in on the same question. your reaction to the report, and to the analysis that, for all the problems that are revealed in this report that frank just went through, it doesn't exactly confirm the president's harshest or even least harsh attacks on the fbi as being in cahoots with hillary clinton. in fact, most of the conduct as described here ended up helping trump. >> i think that's exactly right. it's important to keep in mind that at the end of the day, to the extent that the i.g. finds that there was any misconduct or people made bad decisions, that that all annured to president trump, perhaps would have been elected anyway. but it is a little bit difficult to be sympathetic if he wants to cry foul given how much he benefited here. the topic of the actual content of this report i think is deeply painful for anyone who

has worked in d.o.j. and who loves the institution because it's clear that there were people who engaged in conduct that was unprofessional. the text messages between the agents are particularly difficult. but at the same time, the i.g. reaffirms that people set aside their politics when it came to making decisions about the investigation, and that there was no political taint in those decisions. that the clinton case was properly closed, that those decisions, even though the sausage-making process was really incredibly messy and distasteful in some ways here, the outcome was an outcome they can support legally. >> you both reference the text from fbi agent pete strzok. let's put that up since we both talked about it. here it is. so, this was lisa page and fbi lawyer wrote, trump is not ever going to become president, right? pete strzok fbi agent wrote

back, no, no, he won't. we'll stop it. matt miller, your response. >> that is an appalling thing for an fbi agent to say, to think. it would be worse if he acted on it. there is no evidence that he did. and the i.g. found that there was no evidence and that he didn't take any steps to -- based on animus, based on bias. when you look at this report in total, i think the top conclusion is that it explodes the lie the president has been telling about the department of justice for over a year now. yes, the department of justice made mistakes. they made mistakes that helped him in the election. >> right. >> not that hurt him. when i look at this report, joyce used the word painful. that's how i feel about it. >> yeah. >> we've known about the mistakes jim comey made for a long time. i read through this report and i see the actions of people at the department of justice who all of us on the outside were watching and saying, why didn't you tell him not to do it? why didn't you stop him? why didn't you order him ton do it? i read this report and i have that same question for loretta lynch. why did you tell him not to hold

that press conference, why didn't you tell him not to send that her? i don't think they have a good answer. >> devin, you write a good story. you and your colleagues, i assume you read the whole thing and had this first draft of history of today apartments 's the i.g. report. the conclusion is jim comey basically acted -- was in subordination to loretta lynch. there is an answer this this report, right? >> right. that is a pretty serious charge. i think one of the things the report really exposes and under lines is how bad a relationship there was between jim comey and loretta lynch when she was the attorney general. i do think it's a little -- i think it's a little strange to say that the report just shows that the president is wrong because hopefully the fbi is held to a higher standard than a bunch of conspiracy theories. i do think it's a fairly damning report for the fbi. i think the d.o.j., justice department comes off fairly much better by comparison. but i think this is going to be

something that sticks with the fbi and they're going to spend years digging themselves out of the hole thooecey've dug for themselves here. >> another theory, it serves the purpose for both sides because it calls into question comey as a character witness, as a character witness to his own firing, his conversations about flynn. have you picked up anything in your conversations with sources today there is something in here for everyone? that's how it was described to me by -- >> absolutely, look, this is 500 pages. everyone is going to find something they can season and say, see, our side was right about this. and no more so frankly than when it comes to comey who is already basically trump's favorite target for a lot of these arguments. so it definitely calls into question his judgment. there is a difference, though, between judgment and honesty. and i think what comey's defenders will say is you can attack his judgment all you want, but he is basically an honest person. and i think that's how that fight will play out.

look, i do think this ultimately is a hard report for the director jim comey and others, but i do think that at the end of the day the question about whether he is credible is going to be fought along other topics and other incidents. >> would you agree that would be a political debate? comey has found ironically defenders in the democratic party which believes that comey helped throw the election in trump's direction, but they viewed comey as a key witness to what could have been obstruction of justice on the president's part. >> right. i do think that's a political question. and i think when it comes to judging the president -- i mean, we know how the constitution is written. the potential jury for the president is ultimately congress. so, all of this is in that sense very political and comey will fall into that. >> i want to get into -- we've talked around this, but let's look at the lies the president has been telling. let's take a report that he's likely to start tweeting about in 3, 2 -- i'm kidding, we don't

have any tweets yet but we expect them soon. but they do -- i think it's farah analysis to say there is something in here for everyone. but his attacks on the justice department are debunked largely by this report. so, one of them is that fbi leadership politicized the investigation. horowitz finds and writes at the beginning of the report that there was no bias. this is one of the president's oft repeated tweets. investigators in the fbi and justice department politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of democrats and against republicans. something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. rank and file are great people. that is blown up by this report which makes clear that despite finding text messages between two agents, there was no bias in the conduct -- >> for better or for worse, what it comes up with is that comey was trying to protect his institution and trying to protect his own reputation. i mean, to a fault in an

insubordinate way. he was thinking of how the fbi would be perceived and how he would be perceived. if you look at the two agents, i think this proportionality issue, they're like two soldiers on the beach on d-day. >> let me put up a list of all of the people that the two agents in question attacked because i think this is often taken -- and this is -- i'm going to let frank and joyce jump in if they disagree with me. fbi agents i know and unlike sarah huckabee sanders, i don't know hundreds. i know a few. i found them to be skeptical of political leaders. but these are all the people that the agents in question criticized. eric holder, senator bernie sanders, martino mali, chelsea clean, edward snowden, all of congress, jeff sessions, ted cruz, paul ryan and donald trump. so, they were bipartisan skeptics of politicians. >> the other thing is i use literal literary references. the two minors of hamlett, they

are two actors that had no outcome of the result. >> frank, do you want to get in on this? >> nicolle, you hit it right on the head. generally, especially for agents who have worked public corruption and spent time in washington, the philosophy is, look, they're all corrupt. we've seen it all. look, it's like an oncologist who sees nothing but cancer all day. imagine working nothing but corruption for much of your career. you become extremely jaded and you hold at arms length the notion that there are straight-up politicians. so you can see this in all of their texting. everyone is fair game. no one is pure and pristine in their minds. and that's what we're seeing here. but nonetheless, nicolle, i have to say for a senior executive like pete strzok to come out and in a text or e-mail and say, we'll stop trump, completely inappropriate. and i doubt he's going to survive this. i don't see how he survives it. >> let's talk about that, frank. so, lisa page is no longer at the fbi. pete strzok, who everything i understand his reputation as an

agent, very effective agent, would you predict that he would be let go, fired, discharged, do you think there is enough in here for him to meet the same fate as andy mccabe? >> i spent some really ugly days in my career running internal investigations and inspections and i've got to tell you i think we have at a minimum a demotion from the senior executive service and at a maximum a loss of effectiveness where he might have to, he might have to be dismissed. >> i want to say to you, joyce, we're spending time talking about these agents because it is already the piece of the story and i agree with rick steng l's analysis these are minor characters and what was a very broad inspector general investigation into the entire bureau's conduct during the hillary clinton e-mail scandal. but there is a fuller picture to be painted before this first draft is sort of set in stone. and it includes this. "the new york times" reported peter strzok's role in the counter intelligence

investigation and wrote, fearful of leaks, the agents kept details from political appointees across the street at the justice department. peter strzok, a senior fbi algt, explained in a text justice department officials would find it too tasty to resist sharing. i'm not worried about our side, he wrote. ostensibly about leaking. so, it is a more complex picture than is likely to be depicted on a competing network on primetime this evening. >> it's a very complex picture. for me the take away is that nothing that anyone in this cast of characters did was adjudged to be undue political influence exerted on a case. in fact, they just frankly set aside their personal politics, you know, the agents hated everyone. other people had their biases. everybody put those aside and just looked at the evidence. but the real problem here -- you know, this wasn't too agents out on the street. these were people in the senior executive service, and their personal conduct, their text

messages shouldn't have taken place on their d.o.j. equipment. i think that they would be the first to acknowledge that. and the real problem that we see is how easily the credibility of an agency can come down to everyone who works for it. this is a cautionary tale for the future and d.o.j. and the bureau will have to take the i.g.'s advice seriously, take the recommendations seriously, and work hard to reestablish credibility. >> i want to bring it back to comey as a witness in the mueller investigation with you and delve a little deeper into whether i agree with the assessment. i think it's develin's assessment that it's his conduct scrutinized in these 500 pages, not his honesty, not his character, not his capacity to recollect any contemporaneous memos, the ongoings of the interaction in the oval office. how do you think it will weapon eyes the i.g. report to discredit comey as a mueller

witness? >> the first thing you'll hear from them is the president was justified in firing him. look, this is why he fired him. this is what the rod rosenstein memo said. we know of course that's absurd. i think it kind of goes back to the sort of dichotomy in this memo -- in this report of the decisions the fbi including jim comey and people that worked for him and the justice department, properties cuteers, a -- prosecutors, all the way to the a.g., in every step they made the appropriate decision. they weren't acting because of bias, and how they handled the public announcement of those cases, the public steps. by the way, that's true with respect to the russia investigation, too. there is an accounting in the report of why comey wouldn't sign a letter about the russia investigation because it was too close to the election. we've heard it before. there are legitimate questions raised in the investigation about the way jim comey handles himself publicly. he's a little bit of a showboat, we've seen that -- >> the antimueller. >> the antimueller. we've seen it for a long time. there is still not a serious

question about his ethics, his honesty in this report. and so when you take what he said about the president, you have to take it through that filter and also the fact that in every instance a he said, she said. jim comey says one thing, donald trump says another. when you take the credibility of both those men i don't think there is any contest about who is more likely to be telling the truth. >> develin, let me bring it back to you. i want to ask you about something i picked up from a senior justice department official around the time andy mccabe was pulled out of this investigative process and dealt with ahead of the fuller report. there wasn't a suspicion -- that's too strong of a word, but there were questions about whether the process had been affected by the atmosphere, by the calls for the impeachment of senior d.o.j. officials, by the president's constant tweeting. and in recent weeks and since the flash point over the informant and the demand that the fbi and d.o.j. reveal his name and brief democrats and

republicans on the identity of an informant, there's been this sense that the justice department is increasingly folding to political pressures. i wonder if you picked up today in your reporting on the report any unease about anything about how this was put together, and any sort of i don't want to say questions, but any concerns that this, too, will become politicized, quickly. >> look, i think it's politicized from the start and i think it will end politicized. part of i think what you see, i think one of the sad bits of this whole report and this whole time line in american history is that you started with a political -- an overly politicized investigation and it only became more radioactive and more damaging as it went on. it was corrosive to everyone who touched it including the fbi, including the justice department. i personally think that will continue. i think this will provide fuel to both sides to basically

continue challenging the credibility and integrity of each other. and, you know, there's going to be stuff in here that's going to be pulled out and used for purely partisan reasons. i don't think there is any avoiding that. you know, the notion that the average american is going to read 500 pages of this i think is a little farfetched so it's going to be another political weapon as we go forward. >> develin, we're glad you read all 500 pages and gave us this first draft on history. thank you so much for your reporting today and spending time with us. >> thank you. >> when we come back, a trump ally describes the president's attacks on mueller's probe as demonstrably false, but cautions with today's i.g. report as we've been discussing he has fresh ammunition. also ahead the new york attorney jenna cueses the president and his three kids of persistent illegal conduct. we'll tell you about that new lawsuit. stay with us. just another day on the farm. or is it? this farmer's morning starts in outer space. where satellites feed infrared images of his land into a system built with ai. he uses watson to analyze his data

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it took guts for director comey to make the move that he made in light of the kind of opposition he had where they're trying to protect her from criminal prosecution. you know that. i respect the fact that director comey was able to come back after what he did. i respect that very much. >> what he did, he brought back his reputation. he brought it back. he's got to hang tough because there's a lot of, lot of people want him to do the wrong thing. oh, and there's -- he's become more famous than me. [ laughter ] >> director comey. [ applause ]

>> he was for him before he was against him, matt miller. >> one of the things you see in those clips -- i know it's probably traumatic for you. one of the things you see in those clips that is true about everyone in the republican party in 2016 is they had this really twisted view that hillary clinton really had broken the law and they really believed she was going to be prosecuted. and something that investigators, prosecutors looked at this case would tell you from the beginning, it was a dog. there was no way she was ever going to be prosecuted for this. there was no way you would ever show intent. you had the republican party clinging to this idea. they were really -- they were obviously using it for political benefit when jim comey made this recommendation not to prosecute her. they believed it. they had the president coming out later to say, well, he did the wrong thing by not prosecuting her despite the fact there was no case. but now he did the right thing but throwing this hand degree nad into t -- grenade in the middle of the

election. it undermines everything he said about the reason he fired jim comey. everything he said, his administration said about jim comey because of the investigation. >> the problem even going further back is the case itself was nothing. it was written on water. i mean, i keep coming back -- this is my hobby horse. people don't understand that there were two -- >> can i get you a new hobby -- >> two systems at the state department, classified high side and there is an unclassified low side. you cannot send a classified e-mail on the low side and you cannot send a nonclassified e-mail on the high side. so, there was no intentionality about hiding anything. the original sin was her private server which made everything else seem like there was a conspiracy. but, in fact, there was no violation of the law at all. i mean, there was carelessness and even a bit of negligence, but there was no crime and no intentionality. >> frank, i want to get you in on that to respond. but i also want you to take us beyond relitigating e-mails and

talk about whether it was jim comey's decision to -- when i said in the last block he's the anti-mueller, i mean i think the way he announced his dee silcis not to bring charges against hillary clinton is exhibit a. instead of letting it present itself, he chided her. he seems to have created his own, whatever you call it, hornet's nest here politically speaking. >> indeed. so, first to address the first issue, this should be the headline coming out of this and i'm certain it won't be discussed on another network whose name we shall not mention, which is that the hillary case was properly decided on the law. >> right. >> and that's the head lineup, number one. number two, no evidence political biases existed or if they existed they impacted decision making in a negative way. let's talk about what this report says about jim comey now. it's no surprise that we're learning that literally, and there is strong language in here, that the i.g. finds that

he had serious errors in judgment. literally words to the effect that he felt he was the only one in the room, or the only one in washington who could make this decision with moral integrity and standing. and we know that and it's a tragic flaw of his. and unfortunately the irony, the huge irony here is that a man who was trying to make decisions based on agonizingly tough moral issues and integrity issues and wanting to be as transparent as possible with congress and the public ultimately caused the public to perceive the fbi as lacking transparency and lacking integrity. so, it back fired on him and it's not a surprise to see this. >> joyce, i want to get your thoughts on the same questions. >> you know, jim comey in the op-ed he has in "the new york times" today called this situation a 500-year flood. i think it's a lot more like a 10,000 year flood, nicolle. nobody could have imagined all of these sort of crazy situations from the meeting on

the tarmac to the whole russian involvement. so, really good people, people who had spent their entire careers making good decisions in very difficult situations faced challenging circumstances. and the i.g. concludes that they didn't get everything right. i think comey is certainly on record as respectfully disagreeing with that. the real problem moving forward is that we live -- and i say we as a country, we're now living in this hyper-charged partisan environment where everything has to be about politics. and the problem is we're forced to take a side. democratic or republican, one way or the other. we now need leadership that allows us to move forward and to say that not all issues are partisan. here we have a criminal justice system that should not be destroyed. it should be supported by our political leade political leadership. and americans should be encouraged to see these judgment issues for what they are. this was not a choice between hillary or trump. these were difficult issues that

people were trying to resolve on the fly. and now frankly we need to move forward and learn the lessons. >> joyce, let me -- >> and support the institution. >> let me press you. i never disagree with you, and i agree about the moment in which we are in. but in real-time, donald trump rolls his hand picked fbi director chris wray, who represented one of trump's closest allies, chris christie. he rolled him on the nunes memo, he rolled him on the outing of the informant. we don't know the extent to which rosenstein and wray are rolled on issues that haven't come to light. but what you just described as justice system functioning as it should, the only reason trump didn't attack horowitz today is he found enough in here to say, he trashed comey, too. let's keep this real. the only reason the president hasn't lit up twitter and burned down horowitz's house, too, is because he has been told, i'm sure he didn't real 500 pages, that there's a lot of heat in here for comey and strzok and page.

>> i fully expect he will burn down horowitz as soon as he has more time to think through some of the things that are said in the report. i mean, my support is for the institution and not for the president's approach in this. i think his leadership is functionally deficient when it comes to these issues. he in many ways is the cause for the hyper partisan climate that has really done such an enormous disservice to these foundational democratic institutions that we rely on. >> so functionally deficient is joyce's nice word for saying he is a freaking wrecking ball to the d.o.j. and the fbi. >> he has done -- >> it's southern for freaking wrecking ball. >> he has done such enormous harm to the credibility of the fbi and the reputation of the fbi and the justice department. not with everyone in the country, but with the percentage of the republican party listening to him. >> and the people who did these things are gone, long gone. >> they are. the thing that hurts so much in reading the report is it's people at the fib anybody and the justice department that kind of cracked open this hole that

he has been driven through. he's obviously taking this report or use ing it for his own gain, taking it for actions using it for his own gain, he's gaslighting the american people saying things that aren't true. they did behave inappropriately in the election. it was a way that helped donald trump, not hurt him. loretta lynch put the department justice in play as a political football. if i could tell people to read one thing in this report, there is an account from a guy named george, long-time prosecutor joyce will know, frank will know, who talks about the importance of following the rules. and he says, you can talk about big cases, as joyce would say a 10,000-year case. the rules exist so when these things happen, you can fall back on the rules and know you've done the right thing and not had to rely just on your own judgment. that's the mistake they all made. >> in praise of bureaucracy -- that would be a best seller. that's what the report keeps coming back to. they should have followed the

rules. comey had this mess yanick complex and he didn't want to follow the rules. >> after the break something our guest spotted and calls infuriating.

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steng steng making our guests work today. they serve multi media purposes. matt miller tweeting this. this october for the e-mail from comey to brennan and clapper on publicly acknowledging russian interference is infuriating. i think this is comey writing to brennan. i think the window was closed when the opportunity for an official statement with four weeks until presidential election. i think the marginal incremental disruption inokinawa lags impacted the statement would be hugely outweighed by the damage to the intelligence community for independence. trump did that anyway. i'm frequently wrong, the russians are monkeying around for one candidate. begs difficult questions about both how we knew that and what we are going to do about it and exposes us to serious

accusations of launching our own october surprise. the last bit is utterly untrue, but a reality in our poisonous atmosphere. why did that infuriate you? >> taken by itself it's hard enough to understand. the russians were actively interfering with the election. the administration, senior national security officials had decided it was their obligation to warn the american people and his justification for not doing it is it will look like an october surprise. it's too close to the election. by itself i think that's hard to understand. when you take it in context with what he did two weeks later, sending this letter to congress about the clinton investigation which at the time was not a finding of wrongdoing, it wasn't a finding that -- they hadn't found something new and incriminating. they just knew they had new e-mails and throwing a hand grenade in the middle of the election much closer to election day, 11 days before, i don't see how you can justify sending that letter when you've told the american people -- when you said internally, you want to hide a matter of national security. he kept talking about disclose versus conceal. this is concealment right here.

but under his terms of something that was important for the american public to know. >> it's vastly different, a foreign power trying to meddle with the most sacred part of our life versus a child molester with a few e-mails on his laptop. >> frank, i saw you nodding. >> this is what comey spent a lot of time in his book and now addressed in the i.g. report, the disparity with which he's treated the hillary case in terms of feeling compelled to go forward to congress and public and not feeling compelled to do the same when the russians are meddling with our election. and i respectfully disagree with his judgment on that. americans want know what they're looking on facebook and on twitter is coming from the russian intelligence service especially when it's cohappenin during campaign. top secret, classified information, a forward moving case, but something needed to come out publicly to say, look, we have a problem here and at least the social media propaganda could have been pointed out. >> all right. after the break, a brand-new lawsuit filed by the new york

attorney general alleges chronic corruption at the donald j. trump foundation accusing the president and his three adult children of persistently illegal conduct. that's next.

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my favorite role so far? being a non-smoker. no question about it. talk to your doctor about chantix. well, he was focused on the release of the i.g. report today, the president got some more bad legal news, that once again reveals the shady nature of his business and charity dealings. the new york state attorney general filed a lawsuit against the trump foundation and its directors which happen to be the president and his three oldest children. the attorney general accuses trump of using the foundation as one of his personal checkbooks alleging, quote, a pattern of persistent illegal conduct occurring over more than a decade that includes extensive unlawful political coordination with the trump presidential campaign, repeated and willful self-dealing transaction s to benefit mr. trump's personal and business interests, trump is accused of using the charity's money to settle legal disputes

that involved his for-profit businesses using funds to payoff creditors and even at one point using funds to decorate one of his own golf clubs. trump has responded on twitter saying, quote, the sleazy new york democrats and now disgraced and run out of town a.g. eric schneiderman are doing everything they can to sue me and the foundation that took in $18 million and gave out to charity more money than it took in. i won't settle this case. rick? >> you know, at the risk of making light of it, everything in trump world is like the bizarre world episode of the seinfeld show where everything is the opposite of the way it was supposed to be. >> my favorite. >> his charitable organization, charity is supposed to give to people in need. the people in need that they gave to was the trump family. they paid off people with the charity. they commissioned that $10,000 portrait of him. they used it to make political contributions. everything that is the actual opposite of a charitable philanthropic enterprise and it speaks to the corrupt

organization that they had from top to bottom. >> let me get you, joyce, to weigh in on what kind of legal risk this is for the president. i'm told by a source close to donald trump that as with the trump university case, when he senses legal risk, he usually does settle. >> you know, he's in legal peril here not just on the civil side of the house, but potentially on the criminal side of the house because there's been a referral by the new york a.g. to both the irs on tax issues and also to the federal election commission. but it's the facts in this case that are just a knock-out. it's everything from the complete lack of fiduciary standards, you know, no board meetings, no minutes, no nothing. all the way down to skipping the january 2016 debate on fox news so that he could have a fund-raiser raising $2.8 million and then the campaign directs the foundation on how to spend that money, making contributions in iowa just days in advance of the caucus.

the facts here are spectacular and any prosecutor worth their salt can make a lot of investigative progress using the information that's contained here. >> what strikes me -- we've been talking all hour about how hillary clinton was the one that was actually harmed by comey's actions, donald trump benefited, yet he is after the fbi. hillary clinton's foundation was used against her to great effect by donald trump and his allies and it really was the trump foundation that was seemingly and allegedly rotten to its core. >> it was basically a slush fund. and what's amazing, if you look at this complaint by the new york attorney general's office is how brazen they were. you have corey lewandowski sending e-mails in the middle of the campaign, not just calling someone, sending e-mails take this charitable money and spend it in iowa in a way that will benefit the president. i think joyce is right. the problem here is not the new york attorney and the civil case. the charity will probably be shut down, he'll have to pay a 2350i7b to new york whether it settles and ultimately goes to

trial. the problem is the federal government, the fec and department of justice where they are going to have a criminal investigation for violations not just charitable law but campaign finance law. this ends up being the second or third if you count michael cohen, criminal investigation into the president and his organization. >> i laugh, frank iffigliuzzi, u have other things to do, but we need you every day at 4:00. there is criminal liable, civil liability, people investigating misconduct under every stone you turnover with trump and his family. >> yeah, so, look. it's widespread corruption. it's a genetic trait apparently. this is going to be tough for him because it touches directly on ivanka and on eric, right, because of their roles in the charity. they're named in this new york state action. and then it's a reminder to trump that you may have federal issues. you can fire mueller, you can fire rosenstein, but there are

state attorneys general out there that you still have to deal with. you are not above the law. >> last words, this is a story you're most fired up about today. >> is he allowed to pardon his daughter? >> not in new york state. the pardon won't get him anyway. up next, things get heated in the white house briefing today over an issue the administration didn't exactly have an answer for and it should have. on his brakes out of nowhere. you do too, but not in time. hey, no big deal. you've got a good record and liberty mutual won't hold a grudge by raising your rates over one mistake. you hear that, karen? liberty mutual doesn't hold grudges. how mature of them. for drivers with accident forgiveness, liberty mutual won't raise their rates because of their first accident. liberty stands with you. liberty mutual insurance.

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the trump administration is

blaming everybody but itself for what's going on at the border right now. children, infants being separated from their parents as part of the white house's zero tolerance policy on illegal immigration. immigration. sarah huckabee sanders was asked about attorney general jeff sessions citing the bible in his defense of the policy earlier today. and things to the heated. >> i can say that it is very biblical to enforce the law. that is actually repeated a number of times throughout the bible. however this -- hold on jim, if you will let me finish. >> from their parents. >> i'm not going to comment on the comments i haven't seen. >> you said it's in the bible to follow the law. >> i know it's hard for you to understand even short sentences, and please don't take my words out of context. the space of alien families is a product the same legal loopholes that the democrats refuse to close. these laws are the same that have been on the books for over a decade. and the president is simply enforcing them.

>> it's policy ching from handling them as civil matters to criminal -- >> it is not a policy change to enforce the law. that's been this administration's policy since the day we got here. >> in april, they were going to move them from civil. >> it's our policy. >> they are separating families to deter people from coming here illegally. >> our administration has had the same ajen za since we started that we were going to enforce the law. i wasn't a high priority in the obama administration but it is on ours. >> you are a parent, don't you have empathy for these people. they have less than you do. seriously. >> brian, please. i'm trying to be closer. >> you are saying it is a law. and these people have nothing. >> brian, i know you want more tv time but that's not what this is about. i want to recognize you. did go, jill. >> it's been a while since i unloaded on one of these. that was unbelievable.

first all the, it is a policy change. that's lie 4 ab 072 told from the white house podium. the idea that she has to speak to them in short sentences so they understand is skprud wrong. it is strayed up inhumane. why don't they say straight up, we are cruel and inhumane, what's the next question. if you are going to rip an infant from a mother's arm, just do it. but she wants to have it both ways and smear the reporters. what was that? >> my dad was a bop test pastor. i read a different bible. the bible taught me growing up that you are supposed to extend a helping hand to the peep this the world that have the least. sometimes you have to defend things you may not completely agree with when you work this the government. they may be hard or tricky. this isn't one of those things of it is an immoral policy. >> there is no witness in government that thinks this is wogt quitting over?

have they not seen the fix? >> cruelty is the intention of this policy. not a by-product of it. they arent intending to be cruel not just to deter people coming through the border but so they can tell their base look at what we are doing to keep these people out of country. >> the irony of the president running around the country making people afraid of criminal gangsz. a lot of people are. that's justifiable. when the u.s. government is acting like a gang, terrorizing children by ripping they from the arms of their parents. >> you know, it is appalling and i think it's not a political issue. whether you are a hardliner on immigration or whether you believe we should have more lax policies and permit people in, one thing we can all agree upon is children shouldn't be forcibly separated from their parents. this morning on "morning joe," thereof a photograph of a 2-year-old child crying while her mother was frisked by i.c.e. agents. we should all be able to agree

that that's not america. that's not who we are. and we need to send a very strong message to our elected officials that this needs to be ended immediately. it's not a goodol policy. >> we have fruitless conversations about what has happened to the republican party. we know the answer now. they are all afraid of the big bad trump twitter feed. what's wrong with the people that work in the administration and watch these pictures and have families of their own? this will be on their resume forever i worked for the administration that was responsible for the policy that ripped young children out of their mothers' arms. >> truly what you do for the least among us, you do for me. matthew 25. that should have been a part of republican party platform for its whole life. >> instead we lightened up on russia and -- >> i think that -- i mean you make this point that there isn't anybody who takes a moral risk anymore in the republican party and says this violates everything i stand for as a human being i'm going the resign, protest this. i don't understand why that

doesn't come up at all. it's like truly have you no decency, sir? why is there not somebody saying that every day? >> it was ronald reagan who enacted amnesty and george w. bush who fought for comprehensive immigration reform which included amnesty. there have been republicans who have tried but they are complicit in this. >> those days are over. there are some advocating for immigration reform but there is no push for it. the push is coming from the top down, and it is a push as i said to be cruel to immigrants. it' not just not to let them in the country. et cetera a to be cruel. one of the smartest things i heard somebody say about donald trump is he may not be ale to do anything for the people in the midwest who supported them but he can sure do something to punish the people they don't like. that's what he is doing here. >> ronald reagan used to say

hispanics are republicans, they just don't know it yet. that was the republican idea. >> george bush won 44%. we will sneak in our last break. we'll be right back. the line between work and life hasn't just blurred. it's gone. that's why you need someone behind you. not just a card. an entire support system. whether visiting the airport lounge to catch up on what's really important. or even using those hard-earned points to squeeze in a little family time. no one has your back like american express. so no matter where you're going... we're right there with you. the powerful backing of american express.

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sweet, oblivious peace. donald trump has tweeted about jim comey 79 times. they are now displayed behind me. we expect, before we come on the air tomorrow at 4:00 to be able to add to this wall some of the harshest attacks yet. don't you think? >> yeah. >> read them though. they are amazing. >> it is a little overwhelming. you feel like you are in a mad house looking at all of these. it's overwhelming to see them at once. look, he definitely gets under his skin and has gotten under

his skin from the beginning. and it's -- you know, it was true when he was the fbi director in the administration and it has gotten worse since he yet stereo we haven't heard from him yet. when we do we will update the wall and put them up for you tomorrow. my thanks to the panel. that does it for this hour. i'm nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi chuck. >> i think they would rather with you than back in their old government jobs. trust me. >> look at this wall. >> that's a great wall. >> do you want it. >> i think that should be the backdrop for the show the next couple of days. tell you this, you better make room. more is come? right? that was a point. >> yes, ma'am, i get it. >> have a good show. >> if it's thursday, the much anticipated ig report is out. but what's in it? well, that depends on who you ask.