imagine a fact that never have the russian had more leverage over him than right now. think about that. think about the things they still know that we don't know as he goes down to negotiate with world leaders. elie mystal, elizabeth holtzman, thank you both. that is "all in" for this evening. "the rachel maddow show" starts right now. good evening, rachel. >> good evening, chris. thanks, my friend. much appreciated. and thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. you ready? i'm going to start right in. deputy clerk -- change of plea hearing, counsel, please state your appearance. for the government, rush atkinson, who is a prosecutor working for the special counsel's office. good morning, your honor, rush atkinson on and a half of the united states. we're joined by special agent michelle taylor from the fbi. the judge says, and for the defendant? and then we hear from michael cohen. for michael cohen, guy petrillo and amy lester. good morning, your honor the

judge says good morning. my understanding is mr. cohen who like to wave indictment. is that correct? cohen's defense lawyer, that's correct, your honor. the judge, okay. the judge then says please state your full name. the defendant says michael dean cohen. the judge, how old are you? cohen, 52. the judge, how far did you go in school? cohen, jd degree. >> judge, are you recently or are you recently been under the care of a physician? >> no, sir have you seen a psychologist or had mental health counseling? no, your honor. the judge, have you ever been treated for any psychiatric condition? no, sir. judge, have you ever been hospitalized for drug abuse or alcohol abuse? michael cohen, no, sir. the judge, does defense counsel have any doubts about your client's competence to proceed?

i do not, your honor. i find that mr. cohen appears alert. he has answered the questions appropriately. i find he is competent to proceed, and we will continue. the judge says, quote, mr. cohen, i want to make sure you understand that you're being charged with a felony offense. do you understand, sir? michael cohen, i do, sir. the judge, the sole count of the information charges false statements. it states on or about august 28th, 2017, the defendant michael cohen in the district of columbia and elsewhere in a matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch of the government of the united states knowingly and willfully made a false, fictitious and fraudulent statement and representation. to wit, cohen caused to be submitted containing materially false statements about the moscow project. including false statements about the timing of the project, discussions with people in the company, the trump organization and in russia about the moscow project, and contemplated travel

to russia in connection with the moscow project. the judge says do you understand the nature of that charge, mr. cohen? michael cohen says i do, your honor. the judge, do you have any questions for me before we continue? no, your honor. defense counsel, are you aware of any reason why your client should not plead guilty? defense for michael cohen, guy petrillo says no, your honor. the judge says are you aware of any legal district attorney's office the charge? cohen's defense lawyer guy petrillo says not that would prevail at trial. the judge says, mr. cohen, are you satisfied with your legal reputation up to this point? yes, your honor. are you willing to give up your rights to a trial and all the other rights we have discussed? cohen, yes, sir. the judge, how do you plead to the sole count? michael cohen, guilty, your honor. and then it gets a little confusing. the judge says how do you plead? michael cohen says guilty, your honor. and then the judge says guilty or not guilty?

and michael cohen says sorry and the judge says that's fine. guilty? and michael cohen says, yes, sir. the judge did it really quick. i really am here to plead guilty. sorry, were you not done. guilty! did i say -- but then at this point in the proceedings is where the spotlight really turns on michael cohen, and this is a surprise proceeding. everybody who is there in the courtroom has arrived on short notice. there was no advance press that this was going to happen. the plea says a little something, but now here is michael cohen in court really getting to explain, put a little narrative on what's going on here. the judge, after he has just plead guilty, the judge turns to michael cohen and says to him, quote, okay, tell me what it is that you did that makes you guilty. michael cohen so if i may stand, your honor, if i may stand up for it. the judge says what's that? michael cohen, may i stand for

this on this? you may. it may be easier if you sit and speak into the microphone. michael cohen, then that is what i shall do. the judge says all right, go ahead. michael cohen clears his throat. ahem. thank you. prior to the 2016 presidential election, i had been the executive vice president and special counsel to donald j. trump and the trump organization. by 2017, i was no longer employed in this capacity, but continued to serve on several matters as an attorney to the former ceo of the trump organization who is now president of the united states. he is referred to as individual 1 in the criminal information. as i had in the years before the election, i continued in 2017 to follow the day to day political messaging that both mr. trump and his staff and advisers repeatedly broadcast, and i stayed in close contact with these advisers to mr. trump. as such, i was aware of mr. trump's repeated disavowels of commercial and political ties between himself and russia, his repeated statements that investigations of such ties were

politically motivated and without evidence, and that any contact with russian nationals by his campaign or the trump organization had all terminated before the iowa caucus, which was on february 1, 2016. in 2017, i was scheduled to appear before the senate intelligence committee as well as the house intelligence committee concerning matters under their investigation, including principally, whether russia was involved in or interfered in the 2016 campaign and election. in connection with my appearances, i submitted a written statement to congress, including among other things a description of a proposed real estate project in moscow that i had worked on while i was employed by the trump organization. that description was false. i knew at the time it was false in that i had asserted that all efforts concerning the project had ceased in january 2016 when in fact they had continued through june of that year. it was also false when i asse asserted that i had very limited discussions with mr. trump and

others in the country concerning the project when in fact i had more extensive communications, and it was false when i said i never agreed to travel to russia in connection with the project and had never asked mr. trump to travel when in fact i took steps to and had discussions with mr. trump about travel to russia. he then says i would like to note that i did not in fact travel there nor have i ever been to russia. he says, quote, i made these statements to be consistent with mr. trump's political messaging and out of loyalty to mr. trump. and at that point it kind of feels like it's over, but it turns out he left something out, something that turns out to be important. and so the prosecution sort of jumps in to fill that in. so the judge at this point says, quote, any further allocution requested by the government? and the prosecutor from special counsel robert mueller's office, rush atkinson, he says yes, your honor. as set forth in the criminal information, which is like an indictment except you get a criminal information when you

plead guilty instead of going trial, as set forth in the information, mr. cohen submitted in his statement falsely that upon reaching out to the kremlin in january 2016 about the moscow project, he had not received any response. in fact, he had received a response from the kremlin. so in essence, mr. cohen minimized his contacts with the russian government and stated so falsely in his submission. the judge says you want that as part of this allocution? mr. atkinson says yes, please. mr. cohen, did you hear that? i did, your honor. is that correct? it is correct, your honor. there is one contact. the judge says any further allocution requested by the government? the prosecutor says no, your honor, thank you. and that's where we get to the curtain call. the judge says, quote, i find mr. cohen is competent to proceed. i find he understands the rights that he is waiving by pleading guilty. i further find there is a factual basis for this plea, and i accept his plea of guilty.

so today the president's long-time personal lawyer, long-time executive of his business plead guilty to a cover-up, a criminal cover-up. he plead guilty to lying to congress about the extent of the real estate dealings that president trump and his business were engaged in and pursuing in russia with the help of the kremlin while trump was running for president, and while the kremlin was simultaneously mounting an international military intelligence operation to skew our election in order to tilt toward trump. the lies that michael cohen told congress about this matter i should tell you had consequences. his lies about this trump tower moscow thing made it lock, stock and barrel into the report that house republicans announced yesterday when it turns out trump didn't do anything and it really is all one big witch-hunt. remember when house republicans came out with that report months

ago? michael cohen's lies to congress about the trump tower moscow project made into it the report. cohen attempted to reach out the members of the russian government in an attempt to make the project proceed, but apparently did not have any direct points on contact. it does not appear cohen ever received a response from anyone affiliated with the russian government. neither president putin nor any element of the russian government was actually involved in the project. those were all lies, but the republicans in congress bought them all, hook, line and sinker. they regurgitated them in unprocessed form as their report about what happened between trump and russia during the campaign. now michael cohen has confessed in open court that those were lies. now that was just the house republican report on what happened between trump and russia. you might remember the democrats on the intelligence committee, they didn't sign on to that report. they were sort of furious about it when the republicans issued that report. you might remember they put out

their own minority report explaining what they had come to learn, what they had come to believe about trump and russia during the 2016 campaign, and it's a minority report. people in the minority in the house have no real power whatsoever. so it's an object of sort of academic interest, but it wasn't going to go anywhere. theirs turns out to have been remarkably prescient, though. and one of this they think the democrats in the house under the leadership of adam schiff on the intelligence committee, one of the things they very helpfully published months ago as part of their democratic report is this e-mail, which we had never previously seen. and this e-mail shows where the money was going to come from to build trump tower moscow. this is on page 50 of the democrats' report. this is an e-mail we had never seen before. it was dated october 12, 2015. so it's during the republican primary season, right. it was from felix sater, who worked at the trump organization, to michael cohen. it was titled andrey kostin.

and in the body of the e-mail, it said costin is putin's top finance guy. he is on board and has indicate head would finance trump moscow. this is major for us not only the financing aspect, but kostin's position in russia extremely powerful and respected. the e-mail concludes i will call you later to discuss getting the letter of intent signed. and sure enough, within a couple of weeks, on the night of the third primary republican debate during the 2016 election, that same day donald trump in fact signed the letter of intent to go ahead with trump tower moscow. to be financed by a russian bank called vtb. apparently they were that far along in the negotiations they could do a letter of intent because they had one of the main things you need to go ahead with the project like this to go ahead, the financing on board. it was going to be vtb. it is a very large bank in russia. it is state-run. it is also sanctioned by the government so americans aren't

allowed to do business with them. maybe that's a small point in the larger scheme of things, but i point this out because there is a really neat trick that happened in today's news. so today we have this court transcript. this surprise federal court in norm, long-time trump lawyer michael cohen turns up in court, pleads guilty to lying to congress. what happened today with michael cohen tells us a few different things that are really interesting in terms of where we are as a country right now and where this presidency is and is going. number one, it tells us that mueller's prosecutors are willing to bring felony charges against people who have lied to congress in conjunction with this scandal. "vanity fair" reported weeks ago that the president's eldest son, don jr. has been very concerned and there have been serious concerns in the white house that he would be indicted for having lied to congress that was never quite sure how seriously to take those kinds of reported worries, but if you didn't take the prospect of felony indictments for lying to congress -- if you didn't take those prospects seriously before, now that somebody just plead guilty to a

felony for lying to congress you take that a bit more seriously after today. the fact that this prosecution today was for lying to congress, it also raises really interesting live questions, new questions about the relationship between congress and the mueller investigation. at a time when democrats are poised to take over the house. i mean, if mueller will bring charges against people who lied to congressional committees, this is now this live issue for members of congress as to whether or not the committees are going to hand over the transcripts from witness testimony on the russia investigation so mueller can review those transcripts for potential perjury and potentially bring more charges. congressman adam schiff made clear today that when he and democrats do take over in the new year, at least at the intelligence committee, they're going to be sending to mueller immediately all of the transcripts of all of the witnesses who have testified who may find their testimony newly relevant to the mueller investigation now that people are starting to plead guilty to felonies for lying to congress in conjunction with this scandal. another thing today's court

appearance tells us is that robert mueller is alive and well. the last time michael cohen plead guilty in new york, he was up against prosecutors from the southern district of new york. today it was prosecutors from robert mueller's office, and it was robert mueller's name and signature on the court filings. if matthew whitaker was installed at the justice department to bring the mueller investigation to a halt, today shows that that has not happened. this was a significant new step in the mueller investigation. whitaker didn't stop it, and in fact msnbc's nicolle wallace reported today that matt whitaker in fact is not directly supervising the mueller investigation on a day-to-day basis. the mueller investigation according to nicolle's reporting today is still being overseen by rod rosenstein in the deputy attorney general's office on a day-to-day basis. and what that means in a practical sense, according to "the washington post" tonight is that matthew whitaker was

notified about what was going to happen today, but he wasn't asked. he wasn't asked to approve it. it was approved by rosenstein. so whitaker knew it was happening but he didn't get to say yeah or nay. that seems important. another thing this action tells us today is we're to be get a whole much more -- a whole big bunch of information out of mueller. in the plea agreement that michael cohen signed on to today, there was a statement of the offense, the criminal information, also a plea agreement. sometimes it's hard to tell how much of this stuff is boiler plate, but even if it is boilerplate, this line from cohen's plea agreement still seems important. it says in cohen's plea agreement today, quote, the government reserves the right to describe fully both orally and in written to the sentencing judge the nature and seriousness of your client's misconduct, include anything misconduct not described in the charges to which your client is pleading guilty. oh. michael cohen is due to be sentenced on december 12th on

the previous felonies to which he plead and the felony he plead today. the special counsel's office and his plea agreement is thereby reserving the right to tell all in open court on the occasion of cohen's sentencing. which is in just a couple weeks. reserving the right to tell all, even stuff that's not in the charges. just stuff that cohen happens to know about or have been in on. and this of course comes just a few days after the special counsel's office told a different court in d.c. that they intended to file a detailed report outlining the crimes and lies of trump campaign chairman paul manafort. so this is essentially robert mueller reserving himself a podium and a live microphone atop both of these active cases for use at a time and occasion of his own choosing. there will be a hearing in the manafort case tomorrow in d.c. at 9:30 a.m. we don't yet know whether the judge will ask mueller's prosecutors to start elaborating on manafort's crimes and lies,

but we will be watching that proceeding very closely tomorrow when it convenes in the morning. the big picture here, though, of course, is that robert mueller and his team of prosecutors at the special counsel's office, they know about and they have evidence of a sort of ridiculously damning scenario involving the sitting president, and mueller has now started to lay it out in public. what we now know that mueller knows is that the president during the campaign in 2016, he was secretly trying to arrange what would have probably been the largest business deal of his life in russia through direct contact with the kremlin. he was trying do this business deal while the kremlin was orchestrating a military intelligence attack by the gru on our election to help trump win. the deal was kept secret at the time. he and his business associates lied about it publicly. they then launched an elaborate public campaign to keep it secret, including lying to congress. now that it has been exposed,

one big neon question mark blaring on and off above this revelation is whether there was a direct connection between putin mounting that attack on our election to benefit trump and trump simultaneously trying to do this big real estate deal in moscow involving the kremlin. now buzzfeed news previously reported six months ago that when michael cohen had discussions with foreign contacts about the trump tower moscow deal, those foreign contacts included more than one person who was directly involved in russia's attack on our election. why would you be talking to people attacking the election when you're supposed to be talking about a real estate deal? why are those two things connected? tonight buzzfeed news follows that up with this somewhat gonzo revelation that part of the trump tower moscow deal was that vladimir putin personally would be offered a free $50 million penthouse apartment on top of trump tower moscow, basically to

sweeten the deal. sure, why not, right? it's the least you can do for the guy who is rigging the election for you. what a nice hostess gift. you give me america, i give you nice apartment. this is deal. this is deal any language. here's the neat trick about all of this in today's news. on the same day that all of this happens, right, on the same day that michael cohen, surprise, turns up in federal court, plead guilty about try lying about the trump tower moscow deal to be financed by a sanctioned russian state-controlled bank vtb, when turns up to plead on that today, we get all this information than deal that the president was secretly involved in involving the russian government, the offices of high-ranking officials in the kremlin, and a state-controlled russian bank as we get all of that today, boom, today also in germany, the world headquarters of deutsche bank was raided by german authorities. and here's why that is the other bookend on this remarkable,

remarkable story in the trump presidency today. deutsche bank famously is the biggest lender to donald trump by far. long after other banks would turn off all the lights and pull the drapes and pretend they weren't home when he came knocking, deutsche bank was somewhat inexplicably bli happy to keep funding trump to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars even after he had, forgive me, screwed them multiple times. deutsche bank's over the top generosity towards donald trump has always been a little bit of a fiscal mystery. why were they so willing to shove money in his direction? that led to questions about where the money came from that they were so willing to shove in his direction. deutsche bank last year got nailed for laundering a gigantic amount of money out of russia, like $10 billion. $10 billion and it was 10 billion from vtb.

now today as michael cohen is pleading guilty to lying to congress about the vtb financed trump tower moscow project, deutsche bank's world headquarters got raided in what is said to be fallout from the panama papers leak. in the panama papers leak, deutsche bank was accused of more russia moneylaundering linked to vtb. so that's the news god's neat trick today. they make it pretty easy to follow the dots when there is only two dots, right? if russia wants to buy itself a u.s. president, they need to figure out how to screw up our election and they need a candidate that they have compromised to win that election. go back to the fricking fracking christopher steele dossier. how was russia reportedly trying to compromise and cultivate donald trump for years? by offering him lucrative real estate days in russia. perhaps a little something arranged with kremlin help. you need financing from a state-controlled russian bank?

kremlin can help with that. and hey, if that state-controlled russian bank is involved in massive moneylaundering schemes with the bank that bank rom rolls you anr business, hey, who is ever going to know about any of it? just lie. they'll never be able to track this stuff down. now today we're learn thanksgiving have tracked it down. trump told "the new york times" months ago it would be a red line for the mueller investigation if they ever got into his business and his business finances. that red line is crossed. we are past it. we are wile e. coyote having run off the edge of the cliff, afraid to look down. or maybe that's the president out there. and i don't know if he is capable of looking down. but this thing has entered a whole new phase. stay with us. i like chillaxin'. the united explorer card makes things easy. traveling lighter. taking a shortcut. woooo! taking a breather. rewarded!

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at comcast, it's my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. my name is mike, i'm in product development at comcast. we're working to make things simple, easy and awesome. in may of this year, buzzfeed published what they called the definitive story of the effort to build a trump tower in moscow during the 2016 presidential campaign. that piece is where it was first reported, that the efforts to build trump tower moscow didn't end before the first primary

started, which is the official trump line on the story. buzzfeed had it back in may. actually the trump tower moscow project went on for months into the campaign, into the summer of 2016 by which time, frankly, the primaries were over. buzzfeed at that time published texts between felix sater you see on the left and michael cohen you see on the right. texts from that summer which showed the two men during the campaign trying to arrange a meeting between trump and putin to discuss this real estate deal. quote, sater texted cohen. i had a chat with moscow. assuming the trip does happen, question is before or after the convention. cohen writes back, trump, once he becomes the nominee, after. that very same text message which was first reported by buzzfeed news in may, now today six months later, it turned up again in today's criminal charges against michael cohen. anthony cormier and jason leopold had this story before anybody else figured it out, and now they're reporting once again

is born out by what mueller's office just charged michael cohen with in federal court. well, now tonight, as cohen has just plead guilty, these same reporters from buzzfeed have broken something new on the same story, and as a little public service announcement, if you are drinking or eating anything rights now, pause. swallow. i don't want you to spit anything out on your nice couch. i like your couch. this is their headline tonight "the trump organization planned to give vladimir putin the $50 million penthouse in trump tower moscow." quote, president donald trump's company planned to give a $50 million penthouse at trump tower moscow to russian president vladimir putin as the company negotiated the real estate development during the 2016 campaign. two law enforcement officials told buzzfeed news that michael cohen, trump's personal lawyer at the time discussed the deal with the representative of dimitri peskov, putt ten's press secretary. the representative of the trump organization planned to forge

direct financial links with the lead over a hostile nation at the height of the campaign raises fresh questions about president trump's relationship with the kremlin. oh, i don't know. doesn't every presidential candidate in every election offer a $50 million gift to a foreign leader who at that time is running a military intelligence operation to help that candidate become president in the united states? don't they all do this? yawn. isn't this normal? joining us now is anthony cormier, reporter from buzzfeed news who has been ahead of this story from the very, very beginning. i have to say congratulations. >> thank you. >> first, let me ask you, obviously, a lot of what was charged today by mueller and that michael cohen plead to is stuff that you had previously reported. there anything else you have previously reported that relates to cohen that you were surprised to not see come up today? >> no, not really. i mean, this came out of left field a little bit. i don't think there were a whole lot of people who knew he was negotiating at this level. we had heard some rumbles.

i was actually really surprised that they actually confirmed that he made the phone call to peskov. if you recall, he has long held that i just went to kremlin.gov basically and sent an e-mail. i never had any contact with peskov who is fairly high-ranking kremlin official. so it's really curious to me that the special counsel's office has nailed that down. >> what does that suggest to you about their access to intelligence information and sources? >> either they have signals intelligence or michael has just given up the goods. either they've got him or he's simply cooperating. i can't tell at this point which one it is. >> michael cohen did not previously have a formal cooperation agreement with the government, and he now does. what's the difference? we know he was cooperating before. now he is cooperating under an agreement. it's been suggested to us that maybe the difference is that under cooperation agreement you don't have a choice to hold anything back. you actually have to tell them everything, back to like stealing gum balls when you were 8. given your reporting and your

extensive sources on this subject, do you feel like if michael cohen is a wide open book to prosecutors, there is nothing that he can hold back, are there areas in which his potential testimony is quite dangerous? >> oh, god, absolutely. the things that that man knows, the amount notes he kept, the recordings? michael cohen is a very dangerous threat to the president of the united states of america. he is. and it's very clear that the white houses that been trying to bury michael cohen through series over leaks over the past sort of few months and i know michael a little bit. and i know people that know him, and the people that are familiar with his thinking are very clear that he is acting in what he has decided to be a patriot. he is acting in his mind to help the public understand exactly what happened in 2016, come hell or high water. >> do you believe that the trump

tower moscow deal, or anything else that michael cohen was personally involved in during the course of the campaign is directly related to russia interfering in the election to help trump, any cooperation, conspiracy, collusion between the russian government and the trump campaign to work together to help trump get elected with foreign assistance? >> so there is a small line in the story in both the one we published in may and the one we published today in which two fbi agents with direct knowledge of this inquiry before mueller got involved told us that michael cohen had communications with more than one individual who either knew about or took part in the election interference. >> so he is talking to them about trump tower moscow, but they themselves were involved in or had knowledge of the interference operation? >> that's exactly right. >> why are those two things related? why would the same two people be involved? >> good question. i don't know who they are. we're up tree with our source trying to get them to tell white house it is. in fact we spoke to them today.

slow down, we're still work it. i don't know. i can't tell. i don't know which individuals, i don't want to speculate. but there is something about this particular deal, this moscow tower and the interference connect there is a nexus there, and i don't get it yet. >> briefly, and this is not your reporting soy don't want row to ask you to comment on something you don't know personally about. but "the new york times" reported one of the people involved on the russian side is a russian general with military intelligence background. >> yeah, he is. we reported that first. >> very good. they're furthering your reporting on that today tonight. >> that's great. >> does that gate there is a military intelligence, there is a russian intelligence operation element to the trump tower moscow deal? >> i understand it, and i've heard that you don't -- no one ever leaves the gru. no one ever leaves russian intelligence. but my understanding is this person was a bit of a gray hat, that he may have aided the u.s. in the number of intelligence missions in the past. i'm not certain. that wouldn't be the guy that i bet on.

he is a friend of felix saters, right. felix sater is involved in this deal. but i'm not quite certain. none of my sources have suggested it, and i'm not certain that he is the guy i would immediately sort of pivot to. i would be more curious to know who either at the banks or at the kremlin were these individuals talking to. who was working that behind the scenes? >> who at the banks or at the kremlin. >> i feel like i'm following your breadcrumbs a lot these days anthony cormier for buzzfeed news. absolutely groundbreaking work. >> thanks. >> much more to get to tonight. stay with us. ♪ the greatest wish of all... is one that brings us together. the lincoln wish list event is here. sign and drive off in a new lincoln

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this summer, just days before president trump was going to head off and have his summit with vladimir putin, remember that? robert mueller dropped a 12-count indictment against russian intelligence operatives who had hacked into our election. so when mueller filed those charges, president trump was on his way to meet with the guy who ordered those 12 russian intelligence operatives to hack into our election in the first place. good luck with your meeting, sir. we packed you a snack for your trip, this indictment of putin's guys should give you two plenty to chat about when you meet face-to-face. then today the president left for argentina for the g20 summit. while he is there, he may or may not have a meeting with vladimir putin. the president said today he probably would meet with

vladimir putin. then less than an hour later he announced on twitter the meeting is cans lceled. either way president putin and president trump will be at the same summit all weekend. so like the last time, the president has been sent off on his trip with another travel gift from the announce. here is your inflatable neck pillow for this flight, sir. robert mueller picked today to charge the president's personal lawyer in the russia investigation with lying about the president's secret financial dealings in russia right before trump and putin are set to bump into each other in argentina. the mueller operation is opaque in terms of what they're doing and why they're doing what they're doing. but we've got pretty good evidence now that they seem to time some of the most provocative shots at russia and the most provocative evidence about what russia did to land right before trump gets a chance to see his guy, gets to see putin. we've got a lot more coming up tonight on this new guilty plea

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given the opportunity to approve or disapprove of this step. msnbc's nicolle wallace reporting today that acting attorney general matt whitaker isn't directly supervising the mueller investigation. he is not having run by him decisions like today's new felony charge against the president's long-time lawyer. rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, according to nicole's reporting today is still doing all of that just like he used to. i have questions. will we be allowed to know? will congress be allowed to know, particularly with democrats taking over the house? will there be any visibility into whether or not mueller's operations are being impeded, especially if they're being impeded impropler any the justice department. should we have confidence that mueller's actions mean that mueller is acting in an unimpeded fashion? and while we're on the subject, when the house is taken over in january by democrats, what are democrats going to do with the fact that mueller has now brought charges against a witness in the russia investigation for lying to

congress? do they believe that other witnesses should be subject essentially to the same sort of charges, the same sort of penalty given that house democrats have expressed concerns that some of the testimony given by trump allies and trump aides in the course of the investigation has been untrue? joining us now is congressman jim himes, congressman himes, thank you very much for joining us. it's a real pleasure to have you here. >> good evening, rachel. >> let me first get your reaction today to this guilty plea by michael cohen and the new revelations that it brought us about the president's involvement in this business deal with russia involving directly the kremlin during the campaign. >> well, it's stunning. i mean, it's particularly stunning for the congress. the charge obviously being that he lied to congress. i mean, you sit back and you look at this thing and you realize that everybody, everybody is lying about their contacts with russia. it started with mike flynn to papadopoulos to manafort and now

to cohen. lying to congress is a pretty big deal. people don't do that as a normal course. so it obviously raises the question why. why would there be all this lying? what's underneath? and that's obviously something i suspect we're going hear from mueller, and as you were just saying, this certainly gives us some threads to follow up on, because of course, the transcripts of the various witnesses that came before the house intelligence committee before it was abruptly ended, you know, now i think are going to be subject to some extra scrutiny. >> in terms of those transcripts, obviously they take on renewed interests now, given that we're told that mueller was allowed to review the transcript of cohen's testimony to the senate intelligence committee with -- in the presence of cohen's lawyer. there has been some ambiguous information from the committee what kind of criminal referrals they might have made or what information they handed on the mueller. in your committee in the house, as far as i understand it, there was actually a vote that these transcripts should be made available, should be made in

fact public. what's the status of these transcripts now? >> well, so, just -- before that, of course, the democrats on the committee had made a motion that all of the transcripts be conveyed to the special counsel, because at the time we had suspicions that there had been in fact lies told to the house intelligence committee. that motion was defeated by the republican majority on the committee, but subsequently, as you point out, a vote was taken to make all the transcripts public. my understanding is that that process is getting pretty close to being finished. it had to go through declassification. some of the transcripts contained classified information. but of course, once the transcripts are out in the public realm, it won't just be mueller and others who are looking for possible lies. everyone, including the media, will have the opportunity to do so. >> given what you saw from cohen's testimony and from the other people who have testified behind closed doors to your committee, do you believe that there are other people either within the administration or people who are associated with the campaign and with the president's business who will be on the hook for the same kind of

charge that cohen faced today for bluntly lying to congress? >> it really wouldn't surprise me. and without getting into the specifics of the testimony and what is still a closed investigation, i'll tell you this, which is that needless to say, we asked a lot of questions about contact with russia, precisely what michael cohen lied about, we asked that of lots of witnesses. and at the time, again, without getting into specifics, at the time i don't recall thinking well there is obviously inconsistencies here. i do suspect that michael cohen is probably not the last one to come under scrutiny for possible lying to congress. there is a whole other topic here too. when this investigation was being run by the republicans that. >> effectively stopped us from asking follow-up questions, from executing subpoena, from getting corroborating information that might either prove a witness having been truthful or not. the republican majority allowed anybody associated with the white house to claim executive privilege in one of the most, you know, outrageous and broad

ideas of executive privilege you can imagine. so i do think that after january, we will have plenty of threads to follow up on. >> just i know that you can't be specific about the testimony of witnesses who spoke behind closed doors, but just to pick on something you just said there, you said that when you heard answers to questions about contacts with russia, including for michael cohen, the answers from witnesses didn't seem inconsistent with one another. we now know that michael cohen's answer was full of lies. does -- you suggesting that a number of different witnesses may have all told the same lie as if it were a coordinated effort? >> i'm not quite sure i'm trod sate was coordinated, but again, we would have noticed. you made the right inference. if somebody had told a radically different story about contacts with russia on the subject of the president's business interests, we probably would have noticed and say wait a second, this is completely inconsistent. and i don't certainly recall noticing that. and, of course, again, now

everybody's testimony is -- remember, it was only 48 hours ago that paul manafort, it turns out he was lying while he was cooperating with the special counsel. so, yeah, i think particularly since we weren't allowed to do follow-up, i think every single witness that was there, you know, talking about the president's investments and business interests in russia, those transcripts need to be scrutinized and examined with a criminal eye. >> thank you for your time tonight. really appreciate it. emily jane fox joins us next. stay with us. hello mom. amanda's mom's appointment just got rescheduled - for today. amanda needs right at home. our customized care plans provide as much - or as little help - as her mom requires.

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joining us now is our friend emily jane fox, a senior reporter at vanity fair. she's been following the travails of michael cohen. including this new piece tonight, cohen's guilty plea came together very fast. the latest she just posted at vanity fair. very fast. you're saying this happened within the last two weeks. this is not something that's been percolating for a long time? >> and two weeks is the period of time in which the president submit his written questions to mueller's team. this is something we know the president's team had been concerned about, was this what they called a perjury trap was the guilty plea entered today related to the answers and the timing around that. i will say, let's put this in

context for a second, michael cohen's guilty plea also came together over a period of five days. it's possible when it comes to cohen they just moved quickly. but i don't think the timing here is something we should look past either. >> in terms of the president potentially having lied to the mueller investigation about the trump tower project, having said things about the trump tower project that were congruent with cohen's previous statements to congress or statements in public, thinking that cohen would stick with those, once cohen proclaims those as a lie, if mueller's team has evidence to back up it's a lie, then he's nailed the president for lying about it, too. >> sure. rudy giuliani, the president's attorney said today that the answers they submitted line up. >> rudy giuliani says thing, that's how i hear that. >> i was on your set this summer when rudy giuliani also said, i

had talked to him just before i came on your set, that the tape they had of michael cohen was the president saying they couldn't pay the national inquirer by cash, that was cohen's suggestion and that the president corrected him and he had to pay by check. then we heard the recording three days later and it was actually the opposite. >> you have had a long reporting ark when it comes to mr. cohen. one of the things i wanted to ask you about because you really highlighted this for me in a way nobody else has, after cohen pled guilty in august he did start cooperating with other prosecutors as well. but he didn't do so pursuant to a cooperation agreement. he still hasn't signed that plea agreement. >> still has not. >> but he did sign a plea agreement today. so he does have a formal cooperation agreement. >> i don't think it is a traditional cooperating agreement, the kind that paul manafort had signed before he

was released. i mean, i do not think it's the same kind of cooperating agreement that michael flynn had signed. this is not the kind of cooperation -- the way i understand from people around cohen is that this is not the kind of cooperating agreement where he has to start from the day he was born until today and confess to everything he has done wrong and everything -- >> you are correct in my understanding if that's the case. >> this is how i understand it from the people in the cohen world. >> why would it be important for him not to sign that kind of a deal? >> i think there are a number of reasons why people don't sign that kind of a deal. some of the reasons include that you want to be seen as doing the right thing. other reasons include that when you are a formal cooperating witness you not only have to confess to what you have done wrong but what you have known others around you to have done wrong. >> do we know if anybody was granted immunity in conjunction with cohen's legal proceedings today?

>> i'm not aware of anyone. >> this a developing story. thanks for being here. we'll be right back. stay with us. g important stuff. the hitch? like you, your cells get hungry. feed them... with centrum micronutrients. restoring your awesome, daily. centrum. feed your cells.

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lease the gla 250 for $359 a month at your local mercedes-benz dealer. mercedes-benz. the best or nothing. just so you know what's going on here behind the scenes, i'm like with the control room right now reading every line of michael cohen's plea agreement. very exciting story continues to develop as our understanding of it. that does it for us tonight. i want to get back to reading the plea agreement again. see you again tomorrow. now it's time for the "last word" with lawrence o'donnell. >> good evening, rachel. and i have something else you probably haven't read yet which is the president of united states has tweeted. this actually looks like it was typed up by the staff. it's basically a fox news transcript. he quotes greg jarrett. speaking of fox news -- >> wait, is the president quoting the fox news guy? >> yeah, a kind of legal