what is this the age of? listening to the program today, these themes, this is going to be the age of corruption and cruelty. you think about what you've been talking about, how you book-end these things and how often that seems to play into the -- what donald trump is doing but also what he's doing to us and what he's making acceptable. >> powerful words from charlie sykes always. paul butler, thank you. nick confessore, thank you, jonathan lemire and zerlina thank you as well. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi, chuck. >> hello. >> don't you wish you had charlie sykes? >> i love charlie. you know when you have him at 4:00 -- you know the way the rules work. give charlie my best. if it's thursday, it's a rudy awakening. tonight, law and disorder. how rudy giuliani's mueller strategy is about anything but the law. plus, inside the lawsuit over d.c.'s trump international hotel.

we'll talk to the man leading the legal charge against the president over a key clause of the constitution. and the award for worst pandering to the masses goes to, the oscar. this is "mtp daily" and it starts right now. good evening, i'm chuck todd here in washington. welcome to "mtp daily." rudy giuliani is a lawyer but he is not playing one on television. folks, if you want to understand the president's legal strategy, don't look at it as a legal strategy. first rule of legal strategy in trumpland, don't talk about a legal strategy. his lawyer, rudy giuliani, is now all but telling us that they're running a political campaign. listen to this quote. when i first got involved, i would have told you that the president not testifying would be the right legal strategy. now i'm thinking the continuance

of the investigation would actually help because people are getting tired of it and the president needs something to energize his voters because the democrats look like they're energized. nothing would energize republicans more than let's save the president. in other words, it's a campaign built on buying time. and what do campaigns do with air time? they try to discredit their opponents. >> i've never been involved in an investigation on either side that's more illegitimate than this one. if it isn't over by september, then we have a very, very serious violation of the justice department rules. the investigation here has to be on the investigators. unless the president could have really been cracked by this, there's a lot more to what they did that nobody knows about yet. mueller is going to have a lot to answer for. >> a campaign might also try to discredit their opponent in print like this. quote, this is an illegally brought rigged witch hunt run by people who are totally corrupt

and/or conflicted. it was started and paid for by crooked hillary and the democrats. phony dossier, fisa disgrace and so many lying and dishonest people already fired. 17 angry dems. stay tuned! he really tweeted this today. and yes, that was just about every tweet the president has ever written about mueller condensed into one tweet. throw them all in there. fisa, did you catch how it ended? stay tuned. mr. trump and rudy giuliani have turned the private talks between their team and mueller's team into a public game of stall tactics. if you're having trouble following giuliani's side of the negotiation, that's the point. in fact, sometimes it seems as if giuliani appears to be negotiating with himself. but again, this all comes back to the president's strategy of buying time. it's actually the one thing he's been consistent upon his entire adult life. it's what he did as a businessman when he was navigating his bankruptcies. it's what he did as a reality tv star teasing the big reveal.

frankly, it's what he does all the time now as president. complete with a trademark phrase. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see what happens. >> we'll see, we'll see, we'll see. we'll see if we can work something out. we'll see how that all works out. we'll see whether or not that comes to fruition. we'll see how it all melds out. >> we shall see. let's see if our panel are seers tonight. kimberly atkins, chief washington reporter for "the boston herald," bill kristol, and howard fineman. welcome all. all right, guys, bill kristol, you've run campaigns. if it looks like a campaign and walks like a campaign -- by the way, campaigns brand their opponents, don't they? the president illegally rigged witch hunt paid for by crooked hillary, totally corrupt and conflicted, the phony dossier. i think we get the point here. is that what you see here, it's

just a campaign against mueller? >> totally. i've always thought the lawyers, as much as i love them all who sit around on msnbc and everywhere else, rudy is getting the law wrong here, does he understand this is not going to help the defense of the president. he probably can't be indicted while he's sitting president. it's entirely a political campaign. mueller is not running a political campaign. some of us have tried to help him a little by making the case for him but it's a one-sided campaign and that's why he's succeeded in eroding some of the support for mueller especially by republicans so far. on the other hand, there is a reality. at some point -- >> eventually the voters weigh in. >> or there's a recession, a war or failed presidency and in this case there's an actual trial of paul manafort going on that will be resolved in the next week or two. there are other developments that are going to happen in the very near future in terms of trump testifying or not, being subpoenaed or not, other indictments or not. so i do think the legal system i hope can stand up to this political campaign. that to me is what this is

about. can the legal system resist a political campaign led by the president of the united states. >> my favorite weird anecdote of yesterday, at one point giuliani was running out of so many people to talk to, he had to talk to a fellow lawyer. jay sekulow had a radio show. here is jay sekulow interviewing rudy giuliani, his boss as the attorney. listen. >> mayor, i know you've said and i've said we want to see this come to closure soon here. mayor? >> yeah, we do. it's about time that it ends. i also think, and i hope the special counsel is as sensitive to it as we are. we do not want to run into the november elections. so back up from that. this should be over with by september 1st. >> is that a threat? >> look, it's throwing everything at the wall and trying to see what sticks. i think everything that's said here is correct. this is a political messaging campaign, but it's not without peril, right? everything rudy giuliani said sort of reveals what the legal

team is afraid of. they're talking about a perjury trap, how this would be a perjury trap. first of all, that's like saying put your wallet in your pocket is a robbery trap to a thief that walks by. you can't perjure yourself if you don't lie. so they're afraid that he's going to lie. they're talking about collusion is a crime. well, they're worried about that there's enough evidence there to find some sort of conspiracy. he's giving away all of the things that are the weaknesses that they see in the case in this effort to discredit it so that the public doesn't see it as so bad if it actually comes down. >> howard, what do you make of the difference between in many ways rudy giuliani, jay sekulow, donald trump, there's a playbook for this. bill clinton, lanny davis, mark fabiani, they did this for clinton back in the day. but the difference was starr fought back. mueller stays quiet. are we going to someday say if trump is successful at fuzzing

all of this that that was a mistake? >> well, i covered the bill clinton controversy. and, yes, the clinton people went after the prosecutor. but i think what donald trump and his team are doing here is something far broader and deeper than that. they're going after the entire department of justice. they're going after the entire judicial system as bill was saying. the angry -- there's the angry 13, who are the prosecution team. there's the angry 17 plus who are the grand jury. >> we assume he uses 17 as some bizarre qanon thing or not. they randomly started moving from 13 to 17. >> no, they're talking about the grand jury, i think. >> no, he calls them the lawyers, but okay. >> in any case -- no, he c conflated with the kbragrand ju the other day. they're going after the legitimacy of the entire

judicial branch of the government. that's something bill clinton didn't do. he had a prosecutor who was well known that he used as a tart. this is much, much different, much deeper and much more pro founding. will the judicial system as a whole be able to weather it? and that's ultimately going to come down to the supreme court in one way or another down the road. >> i think it is the o.j. strategy, you discredit not just the individual prosecutor but in the case of o.j., in a sense the l.a. police department. there there were some things that could be discredited -- >> we went down this o.j. -- by the way, in our meeting today, we went down the o.j. rabbit hole. i said who's mark fuhrman and somebody said peter strzok. >> but that september 1st mention is ominous. giuliani is purposely conflating two things. the justice department informal guidelines, i believe, not law, you shouldn't bring an indictment in a politically sensitive case 60 days before the election. not that the investigation

shouldn't continue. >> says you should stay quiet. >> which mueller is capable of doing. but that is ominous. and what trump said at the end of the tweet you showed on the screen, stay tuned. i do wonder if labor day they say, look, he hasn't resolved this yet, this is an outrage, you shouldn't have these things going on in the election season and he starts firing rosenstein and mueller. >> i raised that possibility here last week that i think he's not ruled that out by any means, trump hasn't. he's looking for the timing, not the possibility. and by the way, the other thing they can do, the prosecutor can do is go silent between september and november, which i think is what's likely to happen. >> kimberly, i think a big factor here in whether the president acts, manafort is guilty or innocent. >> i think that's a big thing. i think this is what we're seeing this getting kicked up so much right now is we see the first real trial in this mueller investigation, the first evidence and it's not looking

good at all for manafort. i think that that is a big factor in this. but to the point of the potential for firing rosenstein or someone else in the investigation, what does -- if that happens before the midterms, what does that do but serve as the best get out the vote device for democrats leading up to the election? how is that a politically good move? i just don't see it. >> here's more rudy giuliani. sometimes you just want to play it because you can't believe what you're hearing on television sometimes. this is rudy giuliani basically as you pointed out earlier, kimberly, openly admitting what they're afraid of. >> he knows the answers to every question that he wants to ask. he's going to ask him, did you tell comey to go easy on flynn? the president will say, no, i didn't. hey, bob, you know it. why do you want to get him under oath? you think we're fools? you want to trap him into perjury. we're not going to let you do that. he doesn't need to ask a single question on obstruction. he has all the answers. they're not going to change.

the president is not going change his testimony. so stop the nonsense. you are trying to trap him into perjury because you don't have a case. >> the president has lied, he's going to continue lying. >> we're not putting him under oath. then he lies under oath. >> the president really wants to testify and his lawyers are holding him back. i think that's all nonsense, it's all a political narrative. they have convinced a fair number of reporters because i think the president probably tells his staff so they can tell the reporters, i'd love to get in a room with mueller. i think i could convince him. >> one thing he said is true is that mueller knows all the answers. if the president doesn't testify and somehow that's protecting him from something is utter nonsense. certainly the idea that they can negotiate. okay, as long as you don't talk about obstruction or collusion, that somehow mueller will go on with this, mueller has not agreed to anything on the record. this is only giuliani's sort of spitballing publicly that we have to go on. >> but howard, this is the trump

m.o., delay, delay, delay. this is how he handled debtors. every time you thought he was done as a businessman, he kept buying time, offer them 10 cents. keep negotiating. eventually the bankers are like, fine, i'm done. >> i agree with that. if i can go back to an earlier point about manafort, i think the people around manafort for sure see this as a whole with trump. in other words, you were saying that it's going to depend on what happens in this manafort trial. i was out there today and talking to some people there. they see it -- he sees it as part -- they're pushing the illegitimacy of prosecution thing in the same way. how much they're going to be able to get that on the record in court i don't know. but their whole spin is that the only reason -- that he's being pru prosecuted for illegitimate reasons. >> they're basically saying because of mueller, what, somebody else might not have

found the crimes? >> well, that he wasn't -- they're going to say if they can't put it on the record in court, they'll say he wasn't audited. this is a standard thing that happens but they'll make that assertion. >> you know why he wasn't audited? because the irs has had its funds cut year after year after year. audits are down overall. do you think white collar crime is down? >> my point is when it comes down to it, assuming he's convicted on some of these charges, they will make the manafort trial part of the larger narrative of how this is all an illegal prosecution. rudy is basically -- what he said, they're going -- there's going to have to be an investigation of the investigators. >> he actually said it. we've been joking that's what they want. he just went and said it. >> and if republicans do pretty well on november 6, which i'm not sure what that means, certainly if they do really well -- >> it's about holding a chamber. >> i think we are looking at

pardons and looking at trump two or three months after the election before we get into the 2020 cycle to really clear the decks. of course there could also be more indictments this month or a mueller report this month. cohen tapes. there's so many moving parts in this. >> i also think that the manafort trial is harder to discredit a jury verdict than it is -- >> what if they get lucky and get a hung jury? what does trump do if that happens? >> fires rosenstein. >> see, it's a witch hunt. hung juries can happen, right? >> it has to be unanimous, by the way, in the federal criminal trial. it has to be unanimous. >> there you go. we've all seen the movies and they do those things. where's john cusack, is he involved in this? kimberly, bill, howard, stick around. up ahead, the latest on the paul manafort trial. what actually happened in there. and a surprise from the judge. (ford chime) it's the ford summer sales event and now is the best time to buy.

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i'm not really a, i thought wall street guy.ns. what's the hesitation? eh, it just feels too complicated, you know? you know, at td ameritrade, we can walk you through your options trades step by step until you're comfortable. i could be up for that. step-by-step options trading support from td ameritrade welcome back. the president and rudy giuliani's attacks on the russia investigation have taken a toll on robert mueller's credibility with the public, at least among republicans. at what point can or should the special counsel feel as if he has to push back? well, let's have that conversation. joining me now is an msnbc contributor and former u.s. attorney, barbara mcquade. all right, barbara, that's my simple first question here. i know that u.s. attorneys, sometimes you want to use the press, sometimes you don't. bob mueller is a man who does not want to use the press at all. but it's a one-sided fight right

now. if it is a pr battle, does bob mueller need to rethink his strategy? >> well, i think it is his m.o. certainly to stay out of the press. he has been known for saying that the press is -- can be your friend at times but at other times not, so he prefers to keep his head down and to do his work. so i doubt he's going to change his ways. although you make a good point, which is he's used to working in a world where the ultimate decision maker is a judge or a jury and it doesn't matter what the press has to say and doesn't matter what public opinion says. in this scenario where it could come down to a report for impeachment consideration, it very much is a political situation and up for public debate so is he out of his comfort zone here where he's dealing with something where the political stakes are so high. nonetheless, i doubt he'll change his game. my guess is he will make a decision to either persuade president trump to sit for an interview, serve him with a subpoena or decide to go forward

without it. >> this hemming and hawing by giuliani where it looks like he and mueller's team are going back and forth, and we don't know whether that's true or not because mueller's team are so mum and whether this is giuliani playing to the cameras. but i am curious, mueller could end this, as you just said, if he decides, you know what, i'm going to split the baby here. i'll do the subpoena that i know i can win, which is to question him about all of his actions as a candidate. and i punt the questions about obstruction. is that the fallback scenario here? >> i don't see robert mueller going that path. i think he very much would want to ask the questions about obstruction, so i think the demands that giuliani's team are making are quite unreasonable. i don't see any reason why robert mueller would give up on those questions. there's some very real questions here about obstruction of justice. the only person who can really answer those questions are president trump himself because corrupt intent is so important. but really i see his sitdown as

president trump's opportunity to tell his side of the story. if he doesn't want to avail himself of that in some ways, maybe robert mueller just walks away and assumes the worst about him. but if he were to file that subpoena, i am very confident that he could win unless we get a new supreme court, brett kavanaugh is someone who has written on a strong executive and strong executive privilege and so maybe the calculus changes once he comes to the court. but that case of u.s. versus nixon, unanimous opinion from the 1970s, seems like the law is very strongly in favor of robert mueller, at least as of this point. >> let's talk about the other big legal drama in trump world, the one where we have you tethered to a camera there for us, the paul manafort trial. you're outside the court house. prosecutors are back at it. they're showing how they say manafort committed bank and tax fraud. the latest example, apparently manafort claimed a new york city condo was a second home when he was renting it out on airbnb. that allowed him to get a bigger loan and lower mortgage rate from the bank.

the airbnb listing disappeared right around the time manafort was trying to secure that loan. how airtight, how good was the testimony today, how good were the prosecutors today at making their point in your opinion? >> i think it was a very strong day. today was a prosecutor's dream. it can be very dull and tedious for the jurors and for the court watchers, but the case comes in through documents. they had bank witnesses who were just up there talking about how they do their jobs and walking through all of these different loans and all of the contradictory statements that were made by paul manafort. i think a very strong day for the prosecution. the defense tried to make some points by saying that rick gates was involved in some of these communications or that some of these statements weren't a big deal, but i think that the evidence really does not support their theory that this is all rick gates. we've got paul manafort personally sending e-mails, personally attending the closings, so i think today is a very strong day for the prosecution. >> the fact that the defense keeps bringing up rick gates, is it pretty clear that's their whole strategy here? it's not manafort that did all

this, it's gates? >> it is. and you know, rick gates is not a bad person to try to pin this on. he came across as a really despicable person and someone who will lie to do whatever he wants. but the rest of the evidence corroborates the testimony of rick gates and isn't consistent with the theory that the defense is trying to pin on him. he's certainly involved in some of these things and works together with paul manafort to commit some of these bank frauds and some of the tax fraud, but you see paul manafort very involved. the testimony of accountants who say that paul manafort was deeply involved in his finances and knew where every penny was spent, i think, is going to be enough for the jury. you never know what a jury wants to do, but if they act reasonably and rationally, i think there's sufficient evidence to convict. >> all right. let's talk about judge ellis. it was quite a shock to some. he had a star turned today with a big profile on "the new york times."

part of me thinks he made the apology thinking his star turn isn't playing so well. obviously it had to do with an official complaint by the prosecution. one, was he truly apologetic? and two, has the judge hurt the prosecution's case with the jury? >> so the request of the government overnight was a curative instruction, because the judge had admonished them in open court, really scolded them for allowing their expert witness to sit through the trial, which he hadn't known until he was called to the stand, despite the fact that the government had filed a motion to do that and the judge had granted it. and so they asked for a curative instruction to tell the jury that the government had not done anything wrong. he did that, but he did it in a way that sometimes you see celebrities make apologies. i apologize if anyone was offended. he said something to the effect that i may have been wrong and so you should set aside my comments made to the government yesterday. so whether that was effective or not, whether you can unring the bell, i'm not sure. but he did at least say that his

instruction may have been a mistake and that they should disregard that. has he hurt them in the case? you know, he interjects his opinion from time to time in some ways in a very inappropriate way that could have a harmful effect. >> we shall find out how he behaves next week when the defense puts on some witnesses and if he acts the same, maybe everybody quiets down, right? >> absolutely. i am told that this is the way he rolls. >> yeah, that's what you hear. barbara mcquade, i'm glad you're not getting wet today, so thank you. glad no rain. >> thanks very much. up ahead, our tribute to the academy awards. and during the break, our tribute to all the people who make the movies possible, key grips, bus boys, lighting, production. if you're turning 65, you're probably learning

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welcome back. tonight i'm obsessed with the oscars. in what appears to be the academy awards' gilded glittering march towards irrelevance. on wednesday the folks at the academy announced it's changing the awards next year. the telecast will be shortened to three hours instead of four, only two pitching changes allowed. they will also present select categories during commercial breaks. so some behind-the-scenes folks won't get to give their speeches on tv like what happened to me. i was trying to give our camera guys some love. but there's one change in particular that really irks me.

they're adding a new category. outstanding achievement in popular film. it seems the oscars believe best picture is really code for outstanding achievement in unpopular film. last year's winner was "the shape of water." it made $64 million domestically. meanwhile "jumanji" made $400 million. so let's just give everybody an ard wa. how about best adaptation of a theme park ride, best indifference to acceptance speech interruption music, best american accent by a british actor, best british accent by an american actor, most disappointing sequel, best remake of a movie that sucked the first time, best film featuring dwayne "the rock" johnson, best film not featuring dwayne "the rock" johnson, outstanding achievement in going overbudget. longest dramatic pause.

how about that liamnest neeson. seriously, giving oscars to everybody is no way to become popular. if you stick with this monumentally half-baked plan, maybe it's time to rethink the design of those statuettes. we'll be right back. (man) managing my type 2 diabetes wasn't my top priority. until i held her. i found my tresiba® reason. now i'm doing more to lower my a1c. i take tresiba® once a day. tresiba® controls blood sugar for 24 hours

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i'm contessa brewer with this cnbc market wrap. u.s. stocks closing mostly lower with the nasdaq posting gains for the eighth straight day. the dow fell 74 points, the s&p dipped 4, but the nasdaq picked up 3 points. tesla shares fell as much as 6% amid reports the s.e.c. is looking into the company's public statements even before elon musk's taking tesla private tweet tuesday. the tesla board has since announced plans to meet and explore going private and may ask musk to recuse himself. the stock is up, though, 3% in after-hours trading. that's it from cnbc, first in business worldwide. now back to "mtp daily."

welcome back. the president's former campaign chairman of course is on trial. his former personal attorney is the focus of a federal investigation. and a special counsel named robert mueller, who's investigating russia, that's still going on. but president trump has another legal headache and it's a headache that threatens to expose his past business dealings, and it's a headache that could even expose publicly his tax returns. it's a lawsuit that was filed by the district of columbia and maryland's attorneys general accusing mr. trump of violating the constitution's emoluments clause. barring a last-minute appeal, which could happen, the suit now heads to the discovery phase. of course that's where things could get interesting and, well, a bit ugly. that's where we could learn more about which foreign government officials have stayed at the trump hotel in d.c.

we could find out how much they paid during their stays. and perhaps most importantly, the public may get its eyes on the president's tax returns that he has been so reluctant to reveal, at least the 2017 ones. with me is one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, maryland's attorney general. mr. attorney general, welcome to the show. >> thanks for having me, chuck. >> in pretty simple terms, the emoluments -- you're filing under the emoluments clause. explain why the state of maryland has standing. how does the state of maryland being harmed by the president's hotel in washington, d.c.? explain it. >> we've claimed standing on a number of different bases. the judge has found we have standing because we have institutions that compete with the trump post office hotel in maryland and we have constituents, businesses in our state that compete with the trump post office hotel. >> the biggest one being marriott actually for what it's worth. >> right. >> i'm curious, did you ask any

private companies to join you in this lawsuit? >> we did not. but standing is -- we've also argued when we joined the union, maryland joined the union, we made a deal. we ceded sovereignty to the american government with the understanding that the president was going to put our interests first, not look at his bottom line and have that guide the country. that's the purpose. there are original anti-corruption laws. >> they strongly maintain there is nothing unconstitutional about a foreign government paying for a hotel room and what his lawyers call a routine business transaction having to do with his presidency. what do you say to that argument? >> the judge has said that they're wrong. their interpretation of the emoluments clause is tailored to suit donald trump's interests and conflicts with the plain meaning of the clauses and with what is very clearly the intent of the framers of the constitution. >> for what it's worth, let's put up the emoluments clause here.

no person holding any office of profit or trust under them -- under the united states shall without the consent of the congress accept of any present emolument, office or title of any kind whatever from any king, prince or foreign state. >> right. and you'll notice that that clause has four uses of the word "any." it's very broad. of any kind whatever. the justice department arguing on behalf of the president has said, oh, it's very narrow. it's only if he's making a profit. the root word comes from a latin word that means to grind corn so only if he's engaged in manual labor and making a profit would that be an emolument. the judge found it's any profit gained or advantage. that's what the framers were going for. >> it is the department of justice and not a personal lawyer that is defending the president. is this because -- who are you suing here, the office of the president or are you suing the individual, donald trump? >> our original complaint we

sued donald trump, president of the united states. we've amended it to include him as an individual. right now he's being defended in the original part exclusively by the justice department. so we're paying for his defense. but he also has private counsel that has entered appearances to defend against the suit against him as an individual. >> if he can prove that he has donated all his foreign profits back to the federal treasury, does that get him out of this? >> not good enough. >> why? >> because he's receiving payments from foreign states and foreign princes. i mean there was just an article last week -- >> the saudis. >> the saudi prince who had all his retainers stay at the trump hotel in new york. and so they would like to define it as profit, pure profit, and they claim that's $151,000. which seems insanely low. but it's not that. it's the receipt of payments themselves that violates the

emoluments clause. let's say you win. what's the -- you know, what do you get? what's the recourse? >> at a bare minimum, he would have to stop receiving foreign payments. >> so the governments right now, kuwait, malaisia, the philippines, no official foreign entity could do any business at the trump hotel or he would have to turn down that business? >> he would have to stop receiving those payments. how he does that is in part up to him and in part up to the court. there's another emoluments clause, the domestic emoluments clause and that says the president only gets only his salary during his time in office and the trump hotel lease itself is an emolument. it says no federal official can receive any benefit from this lease. >> wait a minute. we just learned this year in his new filing, there was an llc formed where he earned $100,000 just off the sale of presidential paraphernalia. so is that in this instance defined, then that's a violation

of the domestic emolument clause? >> his ownership of the lease certainly is. >> so owning an llc getting profits this way would be too? >> i was unaware of the fact that he was actually selling mugs -- >> we were too when we saw this llc. he reported income based on that. >> well, the short answer is he can't profit from being president of the united states. and that's what both emoluments clauses are set up to prohibit. and he is the first person in history to profiteer from this high office. >> does that extend to his family? i mean if his sons are profiting off of the office but it's not him, does that get him out of this? >> well, we're not suing his sons. >> no, i understand that. >> and his daughter is a federal official of some kind and prohibited by the foreign emoluments clause from receiving any payments, emoluments of any

kind whatever from foreign states. >> last question. discovery is going to happen soon. >> yes. >> assuming this appeal gets denied. whether they do appeal or not. what is the soonest that we might see discovery, which might mean the tax returns? >> the judge asked us for a schedule and it's due next week. so we are in negotiations right now with the justice department to determine how quickly we will get discovery and what happens after that. >> this is one of the under radar legal problems for the president. thanks for coming in and explaining your side of this. >> enjoyed it a lot, chuck. >> thank you. up ahead, florida senator bill nelson and the terrible, no good, very bad week for him. and packages. and it's also a story about people. people who rely on us every day to deliver their dreams they're handing us more than mail they're handing us their business and while we make more e-commerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget...

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nelson told "the tampa bay times" that russian operatives had penetrated certain counties in florida. asked to elaborate, nelson said it is classified. the state says it has zero information supporting his claim. obviously if true, this would be not just a big story, a major story. but with no evidence to back it up, it just raises a lot of questions. florida is a prime opportunity for republicans to pick up a senate seat in november. bill nelson needs to be playing error-free ball against a billionaire. this week he had two unforced errors. more "mtp daily" after this. do you want the same tools and seamless experience across web and tablet? do you want $4.95 commissions for stocks, $0.50 options contracts? $1.50 futures contracts? what about a dedicated service team of trading specialists? did you say yes? good, then it's time for power e*trade. the platform, price and service that gives you the edge you need. looks like we have a couple seconds left. let's do some card twirling twirling cards e*trade. the original place to invest online.

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tremfya® works better than humira® at providing clearer skin, and more patients were symptom free with tremfya®. tremfya® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections. before treatment, your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis. tell your doctor if you have an infection or have symptoms such as: fever, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough. before starting tremfya® tell your doctor if you plan to or have recently received a vaccine. ask your doctor about tremfya®. tremfya®. because you deserve to stay clearer. janssen wants to help you explore cost support options. welcome back. time now for "the lid." panel is back. howard, we just heard this whole thing about the emoluments clause and we've got this -- obviously it just feels like everywhere you turn, there's some sort of just icky deal. >> don't get technical on me. >> it just feels icky.

i think a lot of us go how come the voters don't seem to care. i have a theory. they knew going in that donald trump didn't -- wasn't a boy scout when it came to business and maybe none of this is shocking them and that's why there's no outrage over it. >> i think we don't know what level of outrage we're going to see until november, number one. and i think there's insensitivity, but there's also throwing things in people's face. and there's a wall-to-wall quality to the stories coming out of washington, whether it's chris collins in buffalo -- >> we've been here before. and when it comes, it comes in waves. >> we were saying during the break, this emoluments thing sounds so arcane but actually it's the accusation of the president profiting off the presidency. in another day an time, that alone would be a huge story. >> some would say it's an impeachable thing. >> the voters out there knew

what they were getting going in, but they didn't vote for donald trump for this purpose. they didn't vote for him to step on the gas pedal of this kind of thing and they wanted him to be an outsider who would do some things to maybe clean it up a little. and that's certainly not happening. >> kimberly, i would say this. there's plenty of trump voters who say he's getting his. what about the clintons. >> right. >> that's always what it is, what about the clintons. >> during the campaign this whole connection to people who had access to the clinton foundation. it's worth keeping in mind that the clinton foundation was an actual charity doing good things for people. >> that was a legitimate concern and plenty of obama white house people were uncomfortable with because it looked back. it was not a nonentity. that was a fair hit. >> without question, but at this time there's not even a charity involved. >> no. trump has taken it to another level. >> exactly. this is just personal profiting.

but the piece that gets left out is the national security concerns. we have people, governments that are purposely going to stay at trump properties in order to curry favor with the president of the united states. that is something that is unprecedented. >> which is what the founders were worried about when they wrote that. >> right. go ahead. >> if you were a democratic challenger, i do think the chris collins story is amazing. what's amazing is what's legal. he also happened to do insider trading. but it's legal to be a congressman, to be on the board of a startup -- >> in the house, not the senate. >> to introduce lengislation tht helps that company. to buy and sell shares in that company as that legislation like moves through congress or doesn't move through congress and to dump the shares. his only mistake was there was insider information. i think a democratic challenger would be well advised to run on an anti-corruption, anti-washington platform. what makes them credible, they have to say some of the things the clintons did may be uncomfortable too.

i want to clean it all up. i think that's an effective message against an incumbent republican congressman but they have to be willing to run against inside democratic party as well. and that's nancy pelosi. >> beto o'rourke's campaign say we thumb our nose at the no corporate money, no pac money. they claim that resonates. >> i would also suggest that even though i try to get outside the beltway as much as possible, we are all creatures of that here to some extent and i think we're a little dulled by it. >> we're numb. we know all these people that get rich off the system. >> and donald trump is not -- he could have easily said a few words of shock and outrage of his own. >> if you're a democratic challenger, you don't have to mention trump. just say i am going there to clean it up. why is there not legislation. you could run a nonpartisan outsider campaign as a democratic challenger that i think would be pretty effective. >> we've gone more than 24 hours

since chris collins was arrested by the fbi, his first congressional endorser and he's tweeted nothing. >> a rare show of restraint on the part of this president. >> maybe the pardon papers are getting drawn up, i don't know. >> i think that's probably the best thing for him to do at this point, but it does make it surprising. >> it's -- >> well, and he hasn't resigned. >> not only is he not resigning, he's going to fight. but why shouldn't he? and i don't -- >> that's the atmosphere now. >> ironically, look at everybody that quits. al franken wishes he didn't. anthony weiner probably push he didn't in some bizarre way. >> senator menendez didn't. >> and he's about to get re-elected. >> the atmosphere here now is not only that anything goes, but in your face. >> it's brazen. >> if there's a brazen got to it i think if the american people if brought properly to their

attention, aren't going to like. >> the mar-a-lago country club stuff with the -- first of all, when you read that the marvel entertainment chair is calling the shots at the va, i don't even know -- it just seems like parody. >> it does. i think it all goes into this idea that trump is running a grievance campaign where he sees -- he paints everyone as attacking him and so no allegation sticks. if you look at the connections, his love affair with vladimir putin, if he could get away with that, then this idea that he has other people running the va, the idea that he's sort of benefitting from his presidency in a financial way, it's harder to make those things stick. >> everybody that does an argument only goes so far when you have to choose on election day. >> that's why they like hillary clinton on the ballot. kimberly, bill, howard, thank you very much. up ahead, creating a safe space.

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...and brake too hard. with feedback to help you drive safer. giving you the power to actually lower your cost. unfortunately, it can't do anything about that. now that you know the truth... are you in good hands? in case you missed it, if president trump has his way, our u.s. military tree might grow another branch. vice president pence laid out a new plan for a space force to be established by 2020. the white house says the proposal would help maintain american strength in the great beyond. >> now the time has come to write the next great chapter in the history of our armed forces. to prepare for the next battlefield, where america's

best and bravest will be called to deter and defeat a new generation of threats to our people, to our nation. >> the next generation of threats up in space. anyway, the idea is drawing plenty of -- you know, this is not the right way to tell this story. it doesn't feel right. i think i have a better idea. so there you go, space

force. space force 5. maybe it's a trap and then again maybe it's our only hope. that's all for tonight. believe it or not, by the way, the trump campaign sent out a fund-raising letter to let you vote on the logo of the space force. we'll be back tomorrow with more "mtp daily" and find out the results of that vote. "the beat with ari melber" starts right now. >> was that an admiral akbar reference? >> it's a trap! it's a trap! >> happy to hear it. i'm a big "star wars" fan myself. >> a lot of good bothens died to get you this information. >> i feel like we're endear ourselves to only part of our audience, but "star wars" over "star trek" any day of the week. we begin with breaking news tonight. we can report the feds are moving forward on two fronts. the first is in the michael cohen case in new york and the other is based on new information we've obtained here on "the