all of it because elections have consequences. we should also add in this season of playoffs, nature always bats last. that is our broadcast on a monday night. thank you so very much for being here with us. good night from nbc news headquarters here in new york. rachel has the night off but she will be back tomorrow. meanwhile, we have a big night of news to work our way through. the political world is still sorting out the sight of a president of the united states introducing a new supreme court justice with a partisan speech thanking his fellow partisan combatants. we're going to take a deep dive into the landscape that is coming into view for the big election that's just 29 days from now. also, late this evening we got a new jolt of news from the mueller investigation into the trump campaign. this time the story involves a deputy from the trump campaign and the inauguration. rick gates struck a plea deal

with the special counsel back in february. he agreed to cooperate fully with mueller's prosecutors. tonight, "the times" reports on an apparent attempt by rick gates to help the trump presidential bid, potentially via a campaign of social media manipulation and intelligence gathering. we're going to be joined by one of the reporters on that big story in just a moment. but we begin tonight here. it is done. this weekend after being confirmed by an historically narrow 50-48 in the united states senate, brett kavanaugh was sworn in as the newest justice of the supreme court. he was sworn in immediately before anything else could happen. and then this evening he got a formal installation ceremony at the white house with donald trump and a bunch of his conservative friends. it was 89 days from kavanaugh's nomination to his confirmation on saturday. 89 long, long days. brett kavanaugh's nomination was not the longest nomination battle in recent history. if you set aside for a moment

the merrick garland debacle because, of course, his nomination was never actually taken up by the senate, thanks to mitch mcconnell, then kavanaugh clocks in as the second longest in the last 27 years. the longest was clarence thomas. on an october night in 1991, after the senate had debated all day long and narrowly confirmed him, clarence thomas, the newly confirmed supreme court justice, spoke. something he really doesn't do that much anymore. he emerged from his home in alexandria, virginia, and addressed the nation. accompanied by his wife, future tea party activist virginia thomas and the nearly 90-year-old arch segregationist strom theuthurmund.

>> what a great day it is. >> my wife and i came out just to say a few words. first of all, i'd like to say that i'm thankful, we're thankful that the process is over, that it's finally come to a conclusion after 3 1/2 months. this is more a time for healing, not a time for anger or for animus or animosity. >> not a time for anger or for animus or for animosity. we have to put these things behind us. who can say exactly what effect clarence thomas' speech on his front lawn that night had, whether it helped at all to calm some of the turmoil around his nomination. but tonight at the white house where justice kavanaugh was sworn in for a second time, the president did not seem to want to let the fight over his

nomination end. kavanaugh tried to reset himself as the impartial justice unity and healing guy, despite his hyperpartisan weepy fury during the confirmation battle, but the president apologized on behalf of the nation to brett kavanaugh and declared that he had been, quote, proven innocent, which, of course, isn't true. if one thing has become clear in the 48 hours since brett kavanaugh was confirmed by the senate, it's that republicans do not want this to be the end of it. they think the battle over brett kavanaugh was great for them and they don't want anyone to forget about it any time soon. >> the behavior of first the democrats on the senate judiciary committee and then the overreach of the protesters at the capitol have actually energized the republican base. i want to thank the other side for the tactics that have allowed us to kind of energize and get involved our own voters. >> all i can say is that this is going to the streets at the ballot box.

i'm going to -- i've never campaigned against a colleague in my life. that's about to change. >> i think it really has energized conservatives across the state of texas. i think a lot of texans, a lot of americans watched what happened the last few weeks and were disgusted by the behavior of senate democrats. >> i think the analysis that the republican base is very much activated as a result of this. >> i think a lot of democrats are going to vote republican because i have many friends that are democrats. the main base of the democrats have shifted so far left that we'll end up being venezuela. this country would end up being venezuela. i think a lot of democrats are going to be voting republican on november 6th. >> literally everyone in the gop is reading from the same talking points right now. it's been impossible to turn on a tv in the last couple of days without hearing that the kavanaugh nomination couldn't have gone better for the republicans, that the democrats and the woman mob have given

republican candidates a gift one month before the midterms. is that actually true? well, we'll find out one month from tomorrow. but here are a couple of things to keep in mind. first of all, this particular supreme court nomination has left a lot of loose ends hanging. there are thousands, if not millions of documents related to brett kavanaugh's time in the george w. bush white house that the senate and the public never got to see. more of those documents will be released and even more will be foia'ed over time and even more evidence may emerge that kavanaugh lied under oath about his activities during that time. we've also learned that chief justice john roberts has received more than a dozen judicial misconduct complaints against kavanaugh, passed along by a judge on the d.c. court of appeals, where kavanaugh was a judge until this weekend. we don't know what, if anything, will become of those complaints now that kavanaugh is the chief justice's colleague. "the new yorker's" ronan farrow who broke the story of kavanaugh

accuser deborah ramirez hinted there might be more accusers to share their stories of sexual misconduct against kavanaugh. we don't have a roadmap to handle the prospect of a supreme court justice with so many outstanding complaints or potential complaints against him. how will such complaints be adjudicated if and when they come to light? that's one thing to keep in mind as we go forward. we are in completely uncharted territory right now. the other thing to think about is this, it's not really clear that the republicans have much data or historical precedent to back up their conviction that imposing kavanaugh on an unwilling majority of americans is going to give them a boost victory next month. cnn is just out with this new poll tonight, taken thursday through sunday, so the final days of the fight over kavanaugh's nomination and his confirmation vote this weekend. the poll found a majority of americans are opposed to kavanaugh's nomination and they opposed him by a ten-point

margin just in the last few days. this poll, like other recent polls, did also find an increase in republican enthusiasm for kavanaugh. but it's worth remembering that increased republican enthusiasm has not always been a silver bullet in the current climate. after alabama republican senate nominee roy moore was accused of sexual misconduct in the middle of his senate race, polls show that republicans stood by him as partisans rallied around a candidate they saw as under attack, but ultimately that was not enough. the backlash to roy moore was so strong alabama elected its first democratic senator in 25 years. who incidentally just cast a vote against brett kavanaugh. in indiana, where senator joe donnelley is considered one of the democrats' most endangered incumbents, recent fox news polling found that donnelley's vote against kavanaugh would have a negligible impact on his chances. a third of voters in the poll

said it would make them more likely to vote for him, a third said less likely and a third said it made no difference. the greatest cautionary tale for republicans probably remains the fight over clarence thomas. that night in october of 1991, the freshly confirmed clarence thomas told the nation it was time to put the fight behind them. but a year later, an unprecedented number of women were elected to congress, many of them inspired to run for office by the shabby treatment of anita hill in the elevation of thomas to the high court despite her allegations. this year, of course, there are more women running for congress than ever in american history. a new "washington post" survey of 69 battleground districts in this year's midterms find the democrats have a narrow edge in the race to control the house. thanks to a nearly 20-point swing in those districts from preferring republican candidates to preferring democrats. joining me now is scott clement, polling director for "the washington post," the pollster who conducted that survey. mr. clement, really appreciate

your time tonight. >> certainly. good to be here. >> let's talk about, first of all, how you chose the districts that wound up in this poll. >> sure. so we started off with the districts that the cook political report rates as toss-up or leaning republican or leaning democrat at the beginning of the fall campaign. so in late august. we also had some additional districts that political staff identified as potentially competitive. we drew a random sample of voters in those districts and wound up interviewing more than 2,600 likely voters. >> of the 69 districts included in your survey, 63 are held by republicans, just 6 by democrats. hillary clinton carried the other 21. likely voters are split in the trump-won districts. 48 for the democrat, 47 for the republican, and in the districts carried by clinton, democrats have a clear advantage, 54-43. can't you quantify how dramatic of a swing is that overall? >> well, it's substantial. it shows that likely voters at

this stage in the campaign are looking at the congressional candidates in a different way than they were two years ago. you know, a big factor in that is trump's approval rating. most of these are republican-held districts so trump's approval rating is a few percentage points than it is nationwide, but it's still underwater. you have a slight majority who disapprove of the president's job performance. that means it's going to be a struggle for some of these candidates to outrun that. we saw this with barack obama in 2014. very few senate candidates could get too far above his job approval rating in the state. that makes him a liability. >> i'm looking just at the, you know, some of the states where these districts are located. states like arizona, california, lots in california, colorado, florida. is the challenge republicans are going to face is that some of these are states like california where republicans are already pretty endangered and states like colorado that seem to be going more blueish purple than reddish purple, is that a challenge or is it more the president's approval rating? >> well, it's a little bit of

column "a" and a little bit of column "b." particularly in the districts that clinton won in 2016, those are the districts where republicans tend to be most endangered because they were already places where there was a lot of split ticket voting. voters voting for hillary clinton for president and then voting for the republican candidate for congress. it's the larger chunk of those districts where trump won where handicappers like cook political report think are competitive, where the race is nearly even in our survey. that means that a number of those candidates are going to be endangered. >> were you able to quantify sort of what was driving this shift toward the democrats? is it national politics or are these really issues like things like health care? because we knew those kinds of issues were important to voters before this kavanaugh nomination. >> well, voters said a lot of issues were really important to them. health care ranked highly. so did supreme court appointments. no surprise given the timing the poll was conducted. but when we asked people to

choose between those issues and also the importance of president trump, trump stood out as the single most important issue, really issue or item or reason for the congressional vote, and this was particularly true among democrats. so 40% of democrats and democratic-leaning independent voters said that trump was the single most important issue in their vote. that compares to roughly 15% of republicans who said the same. >> interesting. so a check on the president being an important issue to these voters. scott clement, "washington post" polling director. always love talking polls. join us now, a democratic strategist and senior adviser with moveon.org. hello, kareem. >> hi, joy. >> let's talk about it. we had scott clement go through some of this data. health care, important, supreme court, important, but trump, most important. is that the way that democrats are going to be able to run into this? it really is a tailwind for them. >> absolutely. there is no denying it. donald trump is on the ballot. for sure.

his divisiveness, the racist kind of rhetoric he's been doing for the last two years, the way he's attacked dr. ford and he continues to attack women who have accused people that he knows of sexual assault. it is going to be on the battle. he will be on the battle for sure. i do have to say, since mitch mcconnell wants to thank us for exciting their -- >> the mob. the lady mob. >> i have to thank mitch mcconnell for making us excited about the scotus pick, which we know it's not usually a dem base type of excitement around the scotus pick. we've seen that the last couple of weeks because of the allegations against brett kavanaugh. >> one of the challenges that democrats typically have in the midterm elections is that younger voters, voters of color, don't really vote in midterms. are you seeing any evidence on the ground that this might change this year and the kavanaugh nomination might be fueling additional voting among those groups? >> the way i like to talk about that, yes, talking about a kavanaugh bump, right, for the lastly week or so. then the other side was really excited about it, but it's not really the bump, it's the

outcome of the kavanaugh hearing. now, if republicans had lost, i would say, oh, no, they're going to be energized in 29 days. >> right. >> they're probably going to come out. they won and we lost and the energy on our side is just there. and it's so funny because they were excited about a bump, right? but they were in the gutter. of course, the only way they can go was up. we have been consistent. democrats have been consistent for a year with the energy, with the generic ballot. it hasn't gone down. it's been consistent. >> right. >> so that's what's important. what we have seen in the long term. virginia, we won because of health care. >> mmm-hmm. >> that was the number one thing that people cared about. we took alabama, as you guys were talking about, a seat that 25 years ago was the last time a democrat held. so the energy is there. women -- and in virginia, suburban women crossed over. >> right. >> and the governor, the democratic -- who ended up -- the democrat who ended up being the governor won by higher

margins than hillary clinton the year prior. so the energy is there. we just have to get people out. that is the big thing right now. >> and also making sure that people's voter registrations are still valid. >> exactly. i would argue that election day is happening now. people are voting early so we have to get folks out as soon as we can. >> what's the core message that democrats are putting out? is it a check on trump, you know, what is the core message democrats are using to get people out? >> so the way when i've gone out on the road where people have really understood that republicans in congress are not a check on this president, and they understand the people, we the people have to be that check. so they understand the importance of their vote this time around, and just the divisiveness of this president. the racism. the sexism. the misogyny. there is a lot of anger for that. and, of course, they care about health care, the economy, education, all of those things are really important and we're actually on the right side of history on all of those issues. >> the tea party managed to stay mad for eight entire years of

obama. all democrats have to do is stay mad for 29 more days. thank you very much. senior adviser to moveon.org. up next, there are -- a new window open tonight in the mueller investigation. one of the reporters who broke that story joins us next. that story joins us next the le. we need to fail down here so we don't fail up there. there's no easy way to say this... they're gone, neil. we need you to be commander. 5... what are the chances this is the last time the boys are gonna see you? 4... somebody got a swiss army knife? swiss army knife? 3... we have serious problems. 2... [ dramatic music playing ] good luck. first man. rated pg-13.

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when you're in charge of a presidential campaign, everything you do seems to take on extra importance. this is a picture of paul manafort riding in an elevator at the republican national convention. check out the official caption on this picture not reuters. paul manafort, campaign manager for republican presidential candidate donald trump, rides the elevator at the republican national convention in cleveland, ohio. stop the presses. that's just one in a series of paul manafort doing mundane, routine things at the rnc that have been preserved for all eternity by the press corps. here is paul manafort opening a door, sitting in a folding chair. here is a woman fixing paul manafort's lapel. here is a woman fixing paul manafort's lapel while he's talking about a cell phone. can you handle the history? now those photos might not

always totally capture it, but paul manafort actually was super busy at the rnc in 2016. the whole reason paul manafort was on the trump campaign in the first place was so that he could whip delegate votes at the convention. as the primary started winding down, there was major fear in the trump campaign that their candidate would not have enough delegates to clinch the nomination. but no republican candidate would outright win. in that case, the rnc would be a brokered convention, a floor fight. it would be up to the candidates to whip votes on the convention floor and persuade individual delegates to swing the nomination in their favor. and that is why the trump campaign hired paul manafort. he was supposed to be their delegate guru, the expert pulling the strings behind the scenes to make sure donald trump got the delegates he needed to clinch the nomination and face off against hillary clinton in the general election. the idea was to get paul manafort to work his magic. that's what the trump campaign was doing in public in the summer of 2016 to secure the delegates needed to win the

nomination. well, tonight, more than two years later, we have new details about what the campaign was apparently doing in private. this is brand-new from "the new york times." trump campaign aide requested online manipulation plans from israeli intelligence firm. quote, a top trump campaign official requested proposals in 2015 from an israeli company to create fake online identities, to use social media manipulation and to gather intelligence to help defeat republican primary race opponents and hillary clinton. according to interviews and copies of the proposals. the campaign official, rick gates, sought one proposal to use bogus personas and target and sway 5,000 delegates to the 2016 republican national convention. by attacking senator ted cruz of texas. mr. trump's main opponent at the time. and that was not the only service the israeli intelligence firm reportedly was offering to the trump campaign. quote, another proposal

describes opposition research and complimentary intelligence activities about mrs. clinton and people close to her. a third proposal sketched out a months-long plan to help mr. trump by using social media, to help expose or amplify division among rival campaigns and factions. "the times" tonight reports that those are the proposals that were sent to the trump campaign by the israeli firm offering their services. the paper says the correspondence was conducted in secret with code names for trump's republican rivals. donald trump was code named lion, ted cruz was bear. in addition to the times, the documents were also obtained by one special counsel robert mueller. quote, investigators working for robert mueller have obtained copies of the proposal and questioned psy-group employees. according to people familiar with those interviews. "the times" identifies deputy

manager rick gates as the person who sought the proposals from the israeli intelligence firm. rick gates, of course, pled guilty in february in the mueller investigation and has agreed to cooperate fully. what could the special counsel's office make of this and what happens now? joining us now is ronan bergman, one of the "new york times" reporters who broke this story. he's a staff writer for "the new york times" magazine based in tel aviv. mr. bergman, thank you so much for joining us tonight. >> thank you, joy. thank you for inviting me. >> thank you. we have a slight day. let's first talk about this company psy-group, who are they? >> sy group psy-group is one of israeli intelligence companies, private intelligence companies, there are a few of them. you probably heard of another company called black cube involved in the harvey weinstein case and others. what is in common, they're staffed with former israeli intelligence members, people who

have great expertise in the different realms of intelligence, human, and manipulation of the social media. clerking of intelligence and deploying this intelligence to manipulate people. they are veteran israeli intelligence. they want to earn some money and they formed these intelligence companies. one of them psy-group. they specialize in the surveillance and manipulation of the social media. they offer their services to countries and organizations worldwide. they are not a liquidation, but during the years of 2014, '15, '16 and '17 they were very, very successful. as you correctly said, they offered their services -- they were solicited to offer their services to the trump campaign. >> twedo we know how they were solicited? do we know how they were connected to the trump campaign in the first place? >> yeah, a person by the name of

sager connected an election expert by the name of george byr bernbalm. he was close to the master of the victory of prime minister netanyahu back in 1996. he was the one who met with rick gates of the trump campaign and spoke with him about psy-group. rick gates in that meeting in the mandarin hotel in d.c. expressed concern by the trump campaign highest authorities that delegates of the republican parties are going to sway away from trump and not vote for him. and was pitched a proposal to ask for a proposal from psy-group to have their expertise into first identifying 5,000 delegates of the republican party, then -- then

deploy a pleat of bots of fictitious identities and fictitious bots over the internet, approach the delegates, connect with them on special different reasons, not necessarily about the elections, and then feed them with pro-trump and anti-ted cruz reasons why to vote for trump and not for the -- for anyone else. this would be followed up sometimes by other means of connection, even phone calls. the legality of the proposal was also. please -- >> no, no on. go on. >> the legality of the proposal was under question and psy-group even seek the help and the legal review of the company of a legal firm in the u.s., one of the most prestigious ones, and they have come up with legal review saying there are problems with the legality of this action and

the company psy-group has to maintain that much of the activity should be performed by u.s. citizens. and if the proposal was executed, they wanted to hire many, many more operatives, some of them dual citizenship, israeli and american, and open a special office to execute the whole campaign. >> it sounds like lcambridge analytica. fascinating report. ronen bergman, thank you so much for your time tonight and skr congratulations on the big scoop. >> thank you so much, joy. >> thank you. this week, we've got not one but two scoops from the mueller investigation. the first was this story about the israeli intelligence firm. the second scoop is just ahead. stay with us. much more to come. much more to come. just one free hearing test at

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file this one under mystery. last summer, "the wall street journal" was out with this blockbuster scoop about a republican operative named peter smith. in the final stretch of the 2016 presidential campaign, peter smith was on a quest hunting for what he believed to be e-mails stolen by russian hackers from hillary clinton's private e-mail server. "the wall street journal" interviewed mr. smith for that story. smith implied to "the journal" that his secret endeavor was somehow tied to michael flynn, who had been an adviser in the trump campaign. then about ten days after he talked to "the wall street

journal," peter smith died. he was found dead in a minnesota hotel room in an apparent suicide. before we had much time to digest that bombshell, the very next day, "the wall street journal" was back for round two. according to "the journal," it was not just mike flynn who peter smith implied was connected to his search for hillary clinton's e-mails, according to smith, it was always a handful of other top tier campaign aides like kellyanne conway and steve bannon. from the beginning, this whole story about the republican operative tries to get his hands on stolen e-mails has been kind of an outlier. it's been this obscure avenue of reporting that feels like it could be explosive but it's hard to nail down exactly what any of it means. well, today, "the wall street journal" added a little bit more to the picture. here is the headline, "gop operatives secretly raised at least $100,000 in search for clinton e-mails." quote, peter smith sought and collected the funds from at least four wealthy donors as part of the plan to obtain mrs.

clinton's stolen e-mails from hackers just weeks before election day in 2016. his fund-raising efforts were clandestine. "the journal" says mr. smith appeared to have used an alias, not just for himself but also for the money he was raising, making references to a washington scholarship fund for russian students. which "the wall street journal" says they were unable to confirm even exists. if you're wondering what all of this means, if you're wondering what might connect all these dots, you're in very good company. "the journal" reports that robert mueller is also investigating peter smith's quest for clinton's e-mails and his mysterious donations for the russian scholarship programs "the journal" has not yet found. quote, associates of mr. smith have been interviewed by mueller's investigators or summoned before a grand jury as early as this summer. as well as his encrypted hard drives. those hard drives are also in the hands of congress.

the senate and house intelligence committee is investigating russia's attack on our election. and a member of the house intelligence committee joins us next. stay with us. us a once-in-five hundred year storm should happen every five hundred years, right? fact is, there have been twenty-six in the last decade. allstate is adapting. with drones to assess home damage sooner. and if a flying object damages your car, you can snap a photo and get your claim processed in hours, not days. plus, allstate can pay your claim in minutes. now that you know the truth...

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ask an asthma specialist about fasenra™. . it was a surprise late last month when devin nunes suddenly publicly agreed to release the transcripts of more than 50 interviews his committee conducted during its shortlived russia probe. something the democrats on the committee had been clamoring for for months but republicans had blocked. those transcripts, which will first need to undergo an intelligence review are expected to released in the next few weeks. exactly why republicans on the committee had a change of heart is unclear. when one of the democrats asked nunes if this decision was made in coordination with the white house or trump's legal team, nunes refused to answer. the release is also selective because nunes is not releasing all of the witness interviews. the private testimony of former fbi director james comey, former cia director john brennan and

former nsa director mike rogers will remain secret, as will the transcripts of two sitting members of congress, florida congresswoman debbie wasserman schultz, who was in charge of the democratic national committee at the time of the russian hack, and california republican dana rohrabacher. republicans said their transcripts were being withheld from public view as a, quote, professional courtesy extended to members of congress. how, wasserman schultz's office told us today they have zero issue with the congresswoman's testimony being released. as for rohrabacher, different story. he has repeatedly cast doubt on when russia hacked the dnc at all. he's met with several key russian figures in the probe and his staunch pro-russian policies have led to him being -- rohrabacher said, quote, i'll think about it. now we may know the reason for his hesitancy. in an op-ed this weekend --

nunes buried evidence on russian meddling to protect trump. no way because i'm on the committee. quote, our investigation did reveal worrisome contact between the russians and candidate trump, his family, his businesses and his campaign, yet every time we sought to learn more we were blocked. as for rohrabacher's testimony specifically, swalwell wrote, i took part in that lengthy interview and i was disturbed with his contacts with russia before and during the 2016 campaign. democrats at our hearing moved to release rohrabacher's transcript. nunes killed our effort. he's burying that transcript to protect his friend. joining us now is the author of that op-ed and member of the house intelligence committee, california congressman eric swalwell. >> thanks for having me, joy. >> okay. let's first talk about mr. rock buker. what do you know about mr. rohrabacher involvement in election meddling? >> that transcript should be released yesterday, as the republicans promised, but, you

know, we saw just a number of concerning contacts that he had, you know, for decades with the russians, but particularly as the russians were interfering in our campaign. he would run into russians all over the world and didn't seem to think there was anything unusual that, you know, russians would be popping in and out of places where he has traveled. that, you know, is quite concerning, but also his contacts with people on the trump campaign as the russians were interfering. the republicans say that from the very beginning these transcripts should be made public. we have fought for that every single time. ranking member schiff has pressed for them to keep that promi promise. even today after voting them out two weeks ago, the public has still not seen them. >> is it something potentially criminal? >> it shows that we should have been able to pursue more leads, you know? we had a take them at their word investigation that the republicans led, which was they put people on the chair, republicans would say, did you collude, no, great, all right. next witness. >> yeah. >> we would learn a lot from our questions. what the public will see is it

was almost 10 to 1 as far as the amount of time we spent questioning witnesses and what little the republicans asked, but every time we learned something, we would say, well, why don't we subpoena a phone record here? why don't we subpoena a bank record. why don't we see if michael cohen went to prague and look at his travel logs. every request they shut down. every, you know, piece of evidence that we needed to pursue that would tie all of that together, they stopped. >> are you accusing chairman devin nunes of literally thwarting the efforts to investigate this and doing so on behalf of the white house? >> it was clear he was doing this on behalf of the white house. he did thwart every effort that we took to get to the truth. this committee has always worked in a bipartisan way. it's one of the worst things that has come out of this russia attack. we should have had unity as an antidote. sti instead you saw the chairman work to protect the president when we needed a leader while

our democracy was on the ropes. i didn't take this lightly. it's rather unusual to write an op-ed in someone's hometown, but he's the one guy who controls the subpoena power on that committee and there is so much more the american people should see and more we would learn if we had run the investigation the right way. >> we're learning from "the new york times" and other reporting that it was very similar to what cambridge analytica was doing to the american public, at least there was a proposal to potentially do it to republican delegates. is that something that the house intelligence committee would look into if democrats get hold of it? >> yes, some of the evidence that we saw, whether it was the president who invited more hacking from the russians at a public press conference, to his son in an e-mail said i love it when offered dirt on hillary clinton. up and down the campaign there was just this eagerness to work with the russians. now we're starting to see in this new reporting it wasn't just the russians. they were willing to do anything it took to win. >> we know that at least according to the polling, a

check on the president is something that a lot of voters are expressing they want. if democrats get the gavel on the house intelligence committee, what are the things that you guys are going to do? are you going to try to get donald trump's tax returns? where will this committee go? >> do the investigations that the republicans weren't willing to do. i hope we can do it in a bipartisan way. i don't want to write off republicans who were fearful over the last two years. one republican on the committee said that when the president tweets at you, he wins. so i have seen that fear, but i don't think we should just write them off. we should hope that they see that the president is toxic. he can't save you. that it's time for us to do the right thing for the country and hopefully these investigations are bipartisan. i still have hope for that. >> all right. that's good. hope is good. congressman eric swalwell, thank you very much. >> my pleasure. >> all right. much more ahead tonight. stay with us. ore ahead tonight. stay with us your dad's gonna land on the moon.

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about a year ago, the president's son-in-law jared kushner made an unannounced trip to riyadh, saudi arabia. it was his third trip there, but this was a secret trip, so he decided to fly commercial. he went there to immediate with saudi arabia's crown prince known to most as mbs. kushner and mbs, both in their 30s, bonded. they reportedly stayed up into the wee hours of the note, quote, swapping stories and planning strategy. days after that trip, mbs rolled out what he called an anti-corruption crackdown throughout saudi arabia, where he rounded up hundreds of saudis and imprisoned them in riyadh's

ritz-carlton hotel. some were subjected to torture. "the intercept" later reported that mbs bragged that kushner had leaked information from the presidential daily brief that included names of saudis who were disloyal to the crown prince. in response to that crackdown, donald trump said he had, quote, great confidence in the crown prince. they know exactly what they're doing. that was from november of last year. this last april, 2018, the state department put out a report on human rights in saudi arabia. in the executive summary from that report, they did not seem quite as confident as the president. quote, according to media reports, members of the security forces coerced with relative impunity at least some of the detainees to the point of requiring medical care. a little further down, quote, in september 2017, well-known saudi journalist jamal khashoggi said

he moved to the united states in self-exile and could face arrest upon returning him. he started writing a column for "the washington post." about a week ago, he entered the saudi consulate in istanbul, turkey, around 1:30 tuesday afternoon. to obtain a document that he needed to get married. he never came out. his fiance waited for him outside until midnight and returned the next day when the consulate re-opened. questions started to circulate about what happened to him. did the saudis detain him? was he still in the consulate? to that, jared kushner's buddy, the crown prince of saudi arabia, mbs, insisted the journalist left the building not long after he entered. adding that turkey can feel free to search the consulate for the journalist because, quote, we have nothing to hide. since then there have been reports that he was killed and dismembered in the consulate. led a 15-member team from saudi arabia true into turkey to carry it out.

turkish president erdogan is now demanding that the saudis prove that the journalist left the consulate with footage. now, if you're keeping track, so far the uk and french foreign ministries have released statements on the disappearance of the saudi journalist. the u.s. state department, which initially included him in their human rights report, have not released any official statement. when asked, they said, quote, we are not in a potion to confirm these reports but we are closely following the situation. and today when donald trump was asked if he was concerned about the saudi journalist he said, i am concerned. i do not like hearing about it and hopefully that will sort itself out. hopefully. joining us now is karen attia, global opinions editor for "the washington post." ms. attia, we really appreciate your time tonight. >> no problem. thank you for having me and covering this. >> for those who didn't read your moving piece in "the post," tell us a little bit about him and how you came to be his

editor? >> yeah, so it was a year ago obviously that we were reading more about the crackdowns in saudi arabia. jamal was very often quoted in media reports talking to officials, just giving insight into the kingdom, so i saw that in figured, you know, why not just have him explain to our readers what was going on in the kingdom. that particular op-ed, you know, in the previous six months or so he had actually been banned from writing. he had been told not to tweet. so in a lot of ways that was his sort of coming out, so to speak. in that op-ed, that's where he discussed fleeing the kingdom and leaving his job, leaving his family and also just saying that saudi arabia had never been that unbearable. and in that he said, you know, saudi arabia deserves better. so that's how he started. we started to do a lot more.

we've done dozens of op-eds, and, yes, he was critical of mbs. there were op-eds where, you know, he compared mbs to putin. he just said the crackdown on dissent. even for people who initially supported the reforms that mohammed bin salman proposed were being locked up and jail and felt that he could not remain silent. as i've been saying, he didn't want to be labelled as a dissident. he really -- he wasn't trying to overthrow the regime. he was an adviser to the royal court for such a long time. he just really honestly wanted to advise the prince. there were times -- i was looking back over our whatsapp messages and there were times he just said, i just want to advise this prince. i don't want to insult him. i don't want to pick on him. if he'll read it, i just hope that he'll do the right thing, and i really -- that's where he was coming from. >> yeah. to your knowledge, did he have reason to fear being inside that

embassy in turkey? >> to my knowledge, according to specific reports specifically to this case, he was warned by his fiance, by friends. you know, i've heard that he received, you know, personal assurances from the ambassador here in washington. but he decided that it was fine. i think reporting said that he said that the staff seemed friendly enough. but as far as whether or not he had any specific threats that he communicated to me. i mean, i know he felt under pressure, particularly his family, his family being threatened or slapped with travel restrictions. his ex-wife divorcing him because of these pressures. he was under tremendous pressures and he often communicated how he felt sad that he couldn't go home. >> i called it an embassy, a consulate. most importantly, karen attiah,

opinions editor for "the washington post." we're so sorry this is happening. thank you so much for being here and telling us a little bit about him. thank you very much. up next, what happened when one red-state democrat went home for the weekend after voting no on brett kavanaugh? that story is next. avanaugh that story is next hi! cinturones por favor. gracias. opportunity is everywhere. ♪ it's gonna be fine. it's a door... ♪ it's doing a lot of kicking down there. waiting to be opened. ♪ whatever your ambition... ♪ whatever your drive... ♪ whatever you're chasing... driver, are we almost there? we're gonna have a baby! ♪ daddy! daddy! opportunity is everywhere. ♪

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you get a strong repair that you can trust. plus, with most insurance a safelite repair is no cost to you. >> customer: really?! >> singers: safelite repair, safelite replace. so if you decided to avoid your television tonight during brett kavanaugh's swearing in, i totally feel you. the president's apology to brett kavanaugh on behalf of the nation, his lie that kavanaugh was proven innocent and painting kavanaugh as the victim was the latest republican slap at the me too movement. in a steady stream of joelts during the kavanaugh hearings. exposing republicans' raw contempt for all things me too. consider democratic senator heidi heitkamp's republican opponent kevin cramer who told "the new york times" he and other north dakotaens don't buy into the idea, quote, that you're just supposed to believe somebody because they said it happened, referring to dr. christine blasey ford, calling the me too movement, quote, a

movement toward victimization and saying that the women in his family couldn't relate. comments that did not sit well with his democratic opponent heidi heitkamp. she told "the new york times," quote, i think it's wonderful that his wife has never had an experience, and good for her. it's wonderful that his mom hasn't. my mom did and i think it affected my mom her whole life and it didn't make her less strong. heitkamp told "the times" reporter, quote, and i want you to put this in there. it did not make my mom less strong that she was a victim. she got stronger and she made us strong. to suggest that this movement doesn't make women strong and stronger is really unfortunate. senator heitkamp says her mom doreen who passed away in april was sexually assaulted as a teenager. not long after that emotional interview, the strength heidi heitkamp inherited from her mom doreen was on full display when

she pulled together the strength to sing with the bands. you know the words. >> actually took a political risk with her vote this week to stand up for sexual assault survivors and for her mom. not a small thing. that does it for us tonight. rachel will be back here tomorrow. i will see you saturday morning on my show "a.m. joy." now it's time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. good evening. nce o'donnell. good evening and a deputy attorney general took place today on air force one. it was a meeting that president trump scheduled specifically to set up a competing television event on the day that christine blasey ford presented her accusations about brett kavanaugh to the judiciary committee. the strategy seemed to be to draw cameras away from what the white house expected to be a e damaging hearing for brett kavanaugh. a but there was a genuine sense of urgency about the meeting the president wanted to have with deputy attorney general rod rosenstein because rod