of july celebration in washington is launching all kinds of copy cats, but in a good way. that is our broadcast on this monday night as we start a new week together. thank you so much for being here with us. good night from nbc news headquarters here in new york. happy monday. former cia director john brennen will be joining us in the studio this hour. very happy to have director brennen here on the show tonight. he and more than 50 other former senior national security officials have just signed onto the a statement that says, in part, quote, we have lived and worked through national emergencies, and we support the president's power to mobilize the executive branch to respond quickly in a genuine national emergency. but under no plausible assessment of the evidence is there a national emergency today that entitles president trump to tap into funds appropriated for other purposes to build a wall at the southern border. to our knowledge, the

president's assertion of a national emergency here is unprecedented. this statement from former senior national security officials who have served both republican and democratic administrations, this declaration from them comes as congress prepares to vote on a resolution that would block the president's declaration of an emergency, which he is using to try to build his wall between the united states and mexico. one of the things we will be talking about with john bren and then otherwise this hour is the fact that that congressional resolution is going to be brought up in the house of representatives tomorrow where it will definitely pass. and then republican senate leader mitch mcconnell will not actually have the opportunity to do his usual everyday trick where he doesn't allow things for a vote if the president doesn't want him too. in this case mitch mcconnell has no choice but to allow for a vote on this resolution, blocking the president from declaring an emergency. i mean, we won't know for sure

how it's going to go until that vote actually happens but talks to actually looks now like enough republican senators are peeling off from the white house on this issue, that when cornell is forced had to put resolution on the floor, it looks like this thing is not just going to pass nancy pelosi's house of representatives, it looks like it is also going to pass mitch mcconnell's republican-controlled senate too. again, we will have more on that over the course of this hour, including with john brennen here live in studio coming up. but that expected rebuke of this president, this rare instance of congress and what's expected to be a bipartisan fashion, you know, getting up on their hind tloegz block this president from doing something that's a historic thing. we were in this eerie situation for six hours today when both the president and the vice president were out of the country at the same time. so it's a little weird all these things are happening all at once. the president's trip to asia, of

course, is for his next one-on-one summit with the dictator of north korea, kim jong-un. the last time he did this was in june of last year when he met the north korean leader in singapore. do you remember what the big surprise was from the singapore summit that trump had with kim jong-un? remember the one thing that happened there and people were like, wait, was that supposed to happen? that was the one where, surprise, president trump announced that the u.s. would pull out of joint military exercises with the south korean armed forces. that's something that the u.s. military and the south korean military have been doing for decades, but in singapore, president trump union laterally announced that the u.s. would stop doing those exercises, and that announcement in singapore was a surprise at the time. it also just appeared to be sort of a gift a unilateral concession in which the president got nothing from them. you might have seen headlines in recent days as he heads off to

this next summit that national security officials, including trump white house officials, are worried that at this next meeting with kim jong-un trump might again blurt out some sort of spontaneous assertion. people are expressing concern that trump might be allowed to sort of freelance and thick up his own deal points in the moment when he sits down with kim jong-un. part of the reason there are those concerns about this summit he's about to have is because last time he just unilaterally blurted out that the u.s. would pull out of those joint military exercises. after that last summit and that weird out of the blue concession from trump there emerged this awkward back story. because several months before that summit in singapore, "the wall street journal" reported where trump first came up with

that idea that the u.s. military should pull out of those joint exercises with south korea. "the wall street journal" previously reported, quote, around the same time in the summer of 2017, mr. trump had an idea about how to counter the nuclear threat posed by north korea. where did he get that idea? he got that idea according to "the wall street journal," quote, after speaking to russian president vladimir putin. so, i mean, big picture, of course, russia wants to augment its own influence, they want to show off their own strength and intimidating presence, especially around their own borders and their zero-sum view of the world. russia, of course, also wants to minimize the influence of the united states, the presence and projected power of the u.s. military and also nato. as such, since russia is a country that borders north korea, russia had long opposed there being joint u.s. military exercises with south korea on

the korean peninsula. russia had long been against that is why apparently in the summer of 2017, vladimir putin called up donald trump and told mr. trump that russia was against those joint military exercises, and putin reportedly told trump that trump should be opposed to those exercises too. president trump god got off the phone with vladimir putin in the summer of 2017, apparently convinced and told his white house advisers that as far as he was concerned, putin was right, and those military exercises should definitely end. that was trump's big idea for north korea. a big idea that he got on a phone call with vladimir putin. white house advisers, including defense secretary james mattis apparently talked trump out of ending those exercises in the summer of 2017, but then, in fact, when trump went and met kim jong-un last summer in singapore, in his own little art of the deal moment, he blurted

out that apropos of nothing, in exchange for no concessions from the north koreans, the u.s. would pull out of those joint exercises. and everybody in national security, everybody in the trump administration, white house advisers, everybody was like, dude, where did that come from? it's actually in the public record, he got that from putin. that is where he got the idea. and then he enacted it when he was given the opportunity at a one-on-one meeting between him and kim jong-un. then just last week there was another awkward episode in this same tragic comic opera when andrew mccabe published his book about his experiences with president trump and the fbi's challenges in the context of the trump presidency, one of the an dotes he shared was about what vladimir putin told trump about north korea and how trump reacted to that. >> the president launched into

several unrelated die tribes, one of those was commenting on the recent missile launches by the government of north korea, and essentially the president said he did not believe that north koreans had the capability to hit us here with ballistic missiles in the united states. and he did not believe that because president putin had told him they did not. president putin told him the north koreans don't actually have those missiles. >> and u.s. intelligence was telling the president what? >> intelligence officials in the briefing responded that that was not consistent with any of the intelligence our government possesses, to which the president replied, i don't care, i believe putin. >> you know, i don't care, i believe putin. you hear so much about how president trump doesn't work well with staff, he doesn't to listen his briefings, he doesn't

take any advice from his so-called advisers. seems like that's not true about north korea. seems like on north korea he is very, very willing to be briefed. he is very willing to take advice on north korea from one very, very special adviser. just the one, though. and his name is vlad. today president trump heads off again to meet one on one with the north korean dictator again. now today the foreign minister of russia, sergey lavrov, the same guy who met with trump in the oval office, today on the occasion of trump flying off to go meet with kim jong-un once again, sergey lavrov today bragged to the press about how the trump white house has been asking the kremlin for advice ahead of this summit with kim jong-un too. this is the headline in the associated press today. quote, russia. u.s. asks for advice on north korea talks. here's the lede.

sergey lavrov says the united states has asked moscow's advice. quote, in comments carried by russian news agencies today, lavrov said, quote, the u.s. is even asking our advice, our views on this or that scenario, on how the summit in hanoi could pan out. yeah, i bet. it's worked out so well for them before. i should mention also that the russian foreign minister sergey lavrov, the one bragging about how someone in the trump administration has been begging for kremlin advice about what to do with kim jong-un at this summit , that same russian foreign minister somewhat randomly also happens to be in vietnam this week. he happens to be in hanoi. while the trump/kim jong-un summit will be taking place in hanoi. hanoi is lovely this time of

year. high 70s, low 80s, cloudy and thunderstorms all week. so be on your toes over the next few days. that is going to unfold over the next few days. actually, it's worth noting, seems like small-balance logistical stuff, a lot may happen and it will take place in the middle of the night u.s. time. we'll have a cheat sheet later on as to what's going to unfold over the next few days and when. it's a bit awkward because of the time difference between here and vietnam, but it's going to make for a real 24-hour news cycle. and then when we're supposed to be sleeping, there's going to be more big news happening where the president is all those time zones away in vietnam. don't worry, there will be plenty of time to catch up on sleep next year. one of the first things that's going to happen here in the u.s. is the president arrives at the

kim jong-un summit in vietnam is that perhaps not coincidentally the house intelligence committee will be convening their first open hearing of the new congress since democrats took the majority. their new hearing, quote, national security implications of the rise of authoritarianism around the world. for a president who has praised the north korean dictator as, quote, very honorable and has gushed publicly about he and the north korean dictator, quote, fell in love with each other, those were the president's words. the house intelligence committee will essentially be playing a little theme song tomorrow for the amazing spectacle of an american president jumping into this particular dictator's lap again. tomorrow's hearing will be about authoritarianism, and also the u.s. response to that. quote, the world has witnessed

the steady asen dance and the demands our full attention. from putin's russia to xi's china, to duterte's philippines, there is a global rise of autocracy and a growing appeal of the authoritarian model which ought to concern every american. which just has a different resonance when it turns out not every american has the same take on this issue or same instinct a authoritarian government has an i can factor when looking from an american perspective. when our current president came back from meeting kim jong-un in singapore last summer, he told fox news upon his return about kim jong-un, quote, he is the head of a country and i mean he's the strong head. do not let anyone think anything different. he speaks and his people sit up at attention. i want my people to do the same. i think it is fair to say it is

not an accident that while president trump is meeting with an doubtly effusively praising and offering free stuff to kim jong-un tomorrow, house democrats will be convening a hearing on authoritarian government and its dangers. tomorrow will also feature that vote in the house of representatives that is expected to rebuke and potentially block the president from using a declaration of a national emergency in order to get something he wants as a policy that congress will not agree to. more on that with john brennan in just a moment. the most interesting thing in that vote tomorrow and the following vote that will happen in the senate is those are likely to be bipartisan votes. in addition to those 50 plus former senior national security officials from both parties who wrote that letter condemning that emergency declaration today, there was also a really interesting separate letter from more than two dozen former republican members of congress and some former republican

senators advising their own republican colleagues who are currently in congress that they too should vote with democrats to opposite the president on this if for nothing else because it doesn't comport with republican party values for a president to do something like this. so this is turning out to be something where there's interesting fault lines, interesting nonpartisan and sort of post-partisan stuff going on there around the president's attempt to use emergency authority to defy congress. and, of course, it's playing off as he goes off to have another summit with this dictator who he says he's fallen in love with. and, of course, this is all playing out while the continuing scandal that surrounds this president and his election in the first place proceeds at pace. this is week we're expecting three straight days of marathon testimony from his former personal lawyer, michael cohen. michael cohen will speak behind

closed doors to the senate intelligence committee tomorrow. he'll speak again behind closed doors to the house intelligence committee on thursday. but in between those two days while the president is having his big summit with kim jong-un, michael cohen that same day, kind of that same time, will be testifying in an open hearing that will be televised, that will start wednesday morning at 10:00 a.m. before the house oversight committee. that house oversight committee announced in advance of cohen's testimony that one of the things cohen will be testifying about is the president's alleged involvement in two campaign finance felonies, two of the felonies that are among the charges that are sending michael cohen to prison for a considerable stretch. these campaign finance felonies are charges to which both cohen and federal prosecutors in southern district of new york told the court that president trump not only benefited from the commission of those felonies, cohen and prosecutors told the judge in that case that president trump directed the commission of those crimes, that

he basically ordered them. that is what makes the president effectively an unindicted coconspirator in those two felonies. we expect michael cohen to be testifying about that on wednesday morning. and in addition to all the cohen testimony this week, we're also expecting a status hearing in open court tomorrow for maria butina, one of the many russian citizens charged with felonies in conjunction with robert mueller's russia investigation and the federal prosecutions that have derived from it from that investigation. even though she's one of many russians who've been charged, she's the only russian actually arrested and brought to court to face those charges because russia doesn't extradite its citizens. she was arrested in the united states and charged last summer, last december she pled guilty and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. since then, accidentally unredacted filings in her case revealed she has been testifying

to a grand jury as part of her cooperation efforts. this status conference we'll have in her case tomorrow originally was scheduled for a couple weeks ago. but both the prosecution and her defense team jointly asked the judge hearing her case to delay that status conference until this week because they told the judge, quote, her cooperation is not yet complete. by that point, by the time they were asking for an extension, by the time they were saying her cooperation was not yet complete, maria butina's republican operative boyfriend had already been arrested in south dakota and charged with employment felonies. by that point, the last person indicted in this scandal, roger stone was already arrested and indicted in a case that prosecutors said is related to the gru indictment to the russian military intelligence indictment brought last year by mueller's office. so since maria butina's cooperation was not yet complete as of a couple weeks ago, we haven't seen any other action by

mueller or other federal prosecutors that would indicate the fruits of maria butina's continued cooperation. but nevertheless she's expected to be in court tomorrow for that status hearing. we will get the first substantive update on what's going on in her case. here's one thing to keep an eye on. her defense lawyer told a russian news agency within the past few days that maria butina's passport has been handed over to i.c.e. her passport has been handed over to american immigration authorities, a move her lawyer suggests could expedite the process of her being deported back to russia as soon as her case is concluded. butina's defense team is hoping her cooperation is substantial enough that she will be sentenced to very little time in prison or perhaps she'll be sentence today time that has been served already. if so, the ultimate resolution of her case will likely be that she's deported back to russia. where who knows what awaits her. she's accused of being an agent

of the russian government secretly working here in our country on the kremlin's behalf. on the other hand, the only way she'll get out with little to no jail time presumably if prosecutors and the fbi attest to the fact she's been an effective cooperator helping the u.s. justice department and the fbi in their inquiries into, among other things, russia's interference in our presidential election. if she has substantialhelped wi justice department inquiries, that's the way she'll get out soon, but that might make going home a mixed-emotions sort of thing, right? we will know tomorrow when we get that status hearing in maria butina's case. her lawyer tonight has confirmed to our office what he told russian news media within the last few days, that butina's passport has, in fact, been handed over to u.s. immigration authorities and in robert driss

elk's words, it means we're working to make sure that deportation after her sentence will not be unnecessarily delayed, acknowledging her sentence is yet to be determined, but they're hoping once she gets sentenced they want her not to be held basically in immigration custody for a long time while her deportation gets sorted out. they want her deportation to be sorted so she goes straight from custody right home to russia. we shall see. this weekend, of course, we couldn't a 25-page sentencing memorandum and 800 pagaes of exhibits from mueller's office. they described 22 years in

prison for paul manafort, this is just his washington, d.c., case. that sentencing range was spelled out already and agreed to my manafort himself in his plea agreement last fall. what wasn't surprising in the recommendation from prosecutors to my eye, there were a couple things that were interesting if not surprising. first of all i thought it was interesting that prosecutors went out of their way in example after example in their narrative about his crimes. they get going out of their way to talk about how dangerous and corrosive it is to have people secretly being paid by a foreign government. i thought it was interesting the few times they brought this up. prosecutors from mueller's office stressed that point when it comes to paul manafort's own history. when he had worked in the 1980s as a public official appointed by ronald reagan, he had been part of the overseas private investment corporation while he was serving in that public

capacity, prosecutors say manafort was also acting as an unregistered foreign agent. at the time he was confronted by the justice department about the fact that public officials cannot be agents of foreign principals. he was confronted with a choice, either keep that political appointment in the reagan administration and continue to serve as a politically appointed public official, but if he was going to do that he would have to give up the money foreign governments were secretly paying him, or he could quit that appointment, quick as a public official, but he could keep the foreign money. guess which one he picked in the 1980s. he quit the reagan appointment, quit the public job, kept all the foreign money. then years later when it came to his work with ukraine and the unregistered lobbying he did, prosecutors explained in detail how manafort duped members of congress and the executive branch by having them meet with

european officials who appeared to be independent, credible authorities on what the u.s. should do with its policy toward ukraine. they purported to be people who were independent authorities who had come to their own conclusions about what u.s. policy should be, when, in fact, manafort had those guys on the payroll. ukrainian government. this comes up again and again for prosecutors when they're asking for this sentence for paul manafort. it's the most narrative we have seen from mueller's office about how dangerous it is for americans and public officials and other people involved in the democratic process to be secretly taking foreign money while the other people involved in the democratic process don't know that they're on the take. so there was a lot that is still redacted in the manafort sentencing memo from mueller's office. we can't tell from this van tang point how many of those redactions are about live, ongoing case or people who haven't been charged with any

crime but may be charged sometime in the future. just within the last few minutes before we got on the air we also got the response from manafort's defense team that was just filed with the court and made publicly available. the bottom line of the defense sentencing submission, no surprise, they are asking for manafort to receive as little prison time as possible. they're actually restricted as too what they can argue when it comes to manafort's sentence here because manafort did enter into a plea agreement where he signed away his right to contest the sentencing guidelines. when he broke that plea agreement by lying to prosecutors that, freed up prosecutors from their side of the deal, but paul manafort is still bound by what he signed for and part of what i what did he signed for is he can't contest with the sentencing guidelines say in his case. the defense tonight has filed this big pile of exhibits, which is letters from his wife and his relatives and people who have known him that say he's a boy scout. they also filed a lengthy 50-page memorandum asking for

lenience, but their hands are essentially tied as to what they can ask for because paul manafort when he pled guilty agreed he wouldn't contest with the sentencing guidelines. we'll have more on that later. that defense memorandum just filed in manafort's case. manafort's sentencing itself is going to happen march 8th in virginia and march 13th in washington, d.c. meanwhile over the next few days, this is going to be a 24-hour a day, seven day a week news cycle. lots happening all at once during the day and the overnight hours. we have former cia director john brennen here with us tonight in the studio. lots to get to. stay with us. ostume, we're finally going on the trip i've been promising. because with expedia, i saved when i added a hotel to our flight. ♪ so even when she outgrows her costume, we'll never outgrow the memory of our adventure together. unlock savings when you add select hotels

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we're working to make things simple, easy and awesome. it's a busy night. lots going on. joining us in the studio is john brennan former director of the cia and intelligence analyst for nbc news and msnbc. good to have you. >> good to see you, rachel. >> i want to ask about your decision to sign on. this joint declaration of former u.s. government officials. this is former senior national security officials, including yourself, more than 50 of you signing on to this declaration

that essentially says the president invoking a national emergency to try to do what he's going to do with the border wall is unprecedented and improper. why did you decide to sign on to this? >> in my discussions with former colleagues, we decided to do so this for several reasons. one is that the claims mr. trump is making about an emergency on the southern border is specious. there's no basis for him to make that climb. and so as we talked about it and as we worked these issues for so many years including border security, even the trump administration's statistics and assessments do not support his claim. we decided we were going to speak together in unison, several dozen of us that are going to take issue with it. number two, it's a clear circumvention of the congress's budgetary authority. he went to congress, tried to get the money for his wall, was denied it. and so this is undermining the checks and balances system that we have within our government. it is congress' purview.

its responsible to appropriate funds. for him to make moneys appropriated for other causes and uses for his border wall is wrong in our view. and third, it sets a very dangerous precedent. we don't know what mr. trump might decide next week or next month is a national emergency. there has to be a foundation to do something as significant as this and the previous declarations were solidly grounded in fact, that's why individuals who worked for both republican and democratic administrations decided that they were going to speak out and they were going to call the lie a lie. >> this is another instance, i don't know if it's fair to see it as this part of pattern, i do. i feel like this is another instance in which the president has heard he can do something and/or that he might arguably be able to do something and testing to see how far he can go. the president has done this with all sorts of different red lines where he's told there is no coming back or will be politically damaging.

i wonder what your expectation is if as seems likely the congress is actually going to pass a resolution brushing him back on this. the house of representatives tomorrow will vote to block the president from invoking this emergency that will certainly pass. it has more co-sponsors than it needs votes to pass. it's increasingly starting to look like the senate will have enough votes to pass that, as well. the white house says the president will veto that but i wonder how you anticipate and i sort of an intelligence question. when somebody is testing the waters like that to see how far they can go, how they react to being brushed back. >> i think mr. trump has a track record of mischaracterizing the fax facts and the events. i am so glad that some of the republicans and the congress are now going to stand up against mr. trump. so it is going to be interesting to see what trump does in terms of pushing back. is he going to pursue this in some other way? who knows. as you say, he continues to test the limits. he doesn't understand what his

authorities are and he's going to continue to push it and the fact that you have people around him in the white house who are not trying to rein him in really gives i think a lot of us great pause in terms of what he might do next. >> in terms of the president's trip to vietnam now, he's on -- en route and will be meeting with kim jong-un one on one. i opened the show talking about concerns expressed by anonymous national security officials currently serving worrying that the president might give away the store when he's one on one with kim jong-un. i have identified a few instances in which the president seems to have done things that were a surprise even to his own administration that happened to line up with the preferences of the russian government, president vladimir putin. what are you thinking about or watching for as he heads to this north korean summit? >> i'm looking for whatever concessions he might be tempted to make with the thought that it's going to get kim jong-un to denuclearize. i was very concerned when he

decided to suspend the training exercises with the south koreans. this is so important for u.s. military forces to be able to interoperate and train with our allied and partnered forces in the region, not just for north korea but any eventuality there. he gives up the things without understanding the implications. who knows as he gets together with kim jong-un in a tete-a-tete, if vladimir putin is whispering in his ear or president xi. president xi is the biggest offender of kim jong-un. mr. trump needs to listen to his experts inside of the intelligence community inside of the department of defense and others who understand and recognize that kim jong-un is masterful in terms of how he has manipulated donald trump's engagement. >> hearing that the president has been masterfully manipulated while he's on his way to the second part of summit. john brennan, can you stick with us for one more segment?

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back with us now is john brennan and senior national security analyst. thanks for being here. >> sure. >> there has been a lot of discussion and anticipation about how the mueller investigation is going to end and when and what sort of report will be produced, if any, and what sort of access we'll have as the public to that

information. i wanted to ask you about something that happened at the outset of the russian investigation. andrew mccabe said the gang of eight, the heads of both parties in both houses of congress and heads of the intelligence committees were briefed in detail about what was going on with russia and election interference. and that is something that we had known in broad strokes, i think andrew mccabe filled in details there that we didn't necessarily know before. what is distressing to people is seeing the behavior of some of those members of congress that were briefed after they had that information. people like senator richard burr, the respected head of the intelligence committee in the senate who's leading their bipartisan investigation into this matter. publicly denying that there was any reason to attribute these attacks to russia after we now know he was personally and briefed in detail on the fact that russia was carrying out

these attacks. and i know you can't talk about anything classified. you can't talk about the content of the briefings but i wanted your reaction now that we the public know more what happened. >> i briefed a gang of eight on the intelligence community saeft assessment in terms of what the russia was doing. andy briefed him on the investigation the fbi was engaged in. i was dismayed some of the members, the gang of eight seemed to be rather dismissive of the intelligence community's assessment and were being protective of the candidates of their choice during the campaign. it is disheartening that a number of members of congress have come out very publicly against the intelligence community assessment and fbi's work. burr and mark warner have been doing a good job working in a bipartisan fashion. unfortunately devin nunes just totally, totally undermined the

house intelligence committee's credibility by defending to an nth degree mr. trump. so i think now with adam schiff in the chair of the house community intelligence, i think there is a much better shot of getting to the bottom of this but too many individuals in congress are playing partisan politics on something of great importance. to our national security. i'm sure it's disheartening to me and a lot of members of the intelligence and law enforcement communities. >> as a member of the public now, somebody with the experience that you have, what are you expecting in terms of how the mueller investigation will end? >> i think robert mueller is a meticulous prosecutor. and i do believe that there is going to be more indictments. i would think the indictments are going to be probably presented along with the final report. so far we haven't had any indictments of for example members of trump family, as well as any indictment that might identify americans who are involved in a criminal conspiracy.

if in fact, there is evidence to that and if the special counsel decides to go forward, i would expect it to be the final act because i think bob mueller and his team would know that cutting that close to the bone, so to speak, would be the final bill for them and so i anticipate that sometime in march we're possibly going to see of the indictments, the final report. i don't have any insight into it but i do believe that bob mueller is going to hand off the southern district of new york, the eastern district of virginia to state attorney generals as appropriate, the investigative threads that will need to be continued to be pulled. but i do think that we're going to see more in the coming weeks that will then be the addition to the final report. >> former cia director john brennan. thank you. appreciate you being here. >> thank you. much more ahead tonight. stay with us. hear those words...

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sentencing memorandum from paul manafort's defense team. this is paul manafort's response to the sentencing submission that came from robert mueller and the special counsel's office. that was the filing in which mueller's prosecutors said that paul manafort, donald trump's campaign chairman, quote, repeatedly and brazenly broke the law. the special counsel's office this weekend told the court in the manafort case, there were many aggravating factors when it comes to manafort's behavior that should make manafort's sentence worse, and there were no mitigating factors that should make it better. according to federal rules, the federal judge in the d.c. case can't sentence manafort to more than ten years in prison specifically in the d.c. part of his case. he's facing up to five years for each of the two felonies that he pled guilty to. the max that judge can give him is ten years. but manafort and his defense team tonight, they are arguing manafort should in fact get less

than that, that he should get no jail time at all if possible. the reason they are saying that manafort should get as little jail time as possible is because of all the bad things paul manafort didn't do. manafort's case they opened up a submission by saying manafort's case is not about murder, drug cartels, organized crime, the madoff ponzi scheme or collapse of enron. okay, i didn't do any of those, either. his crimes are also, manafort's lawyers claim, not related to the primary focus of the special counsel's investigation, i.e., any links or coordination between the russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of president donald trump. nevertheless, these offenses led to mr. manafort being vilified in a manner this country has not experienced in decades. manafort's lawyers argue the special counsel's office charged manafort with the crimes he eventually pled guilty to only because they couldn't establish that manafort engaged in any

quote, russia collusion. in other words, what manafort is going for in the filing tonight is the argument that he didn't do anything that bad, that he's the victim of a political prosecution and even though his defense is sort of constrained by the fact that manafort pled guilty already and conceded what his sentencing guidelines would be in this case, they're still arguing for stuff to be as lenient as they can make it. how will that go for him? joining us is ken vogel, reporter for "the new york times." ken, thanks very much for being with us tonight. i know you're joining us on short notice. i really appreciate you making the time >> great to be with you, rachel. >> what do you think we should understand right now in terms of the ultimate fate of the president's campaign chair and, importantly, what we learned about the course of his case in these two federal jurisdictions? >> yeah, my biggest takeaway from his lawyer's sentencing memorandum was this continued effort to try to recast his work in ukraine and his work around the world, his international work around the world over the

course of several decades where he made a ton of money working for some very unsavory characters whose interests were often not aligned with those of the u.s. foreign policy community or orthodoxy. and he makes that case acutely in this memo talking about his work on behalf of the russia aligned ukrainian president, victory onkovich, which is the source of a lot of the charges that he didn't register working for all these foreign leaders although they may have appeared to be bad guys, what he was trying to do is further u.s. foreign policy interests by bringing them into alignment with the west. in the case of onkovich, with the european union. the answer to that as well, how

how did that work out for you? onkovich turned his back on the european union, being driven by office by mass street protests related to his pivot towards moscow and the perceived rampant corruption within his regime. and manafort ended up making $60 million much of which he didn't declare as we now know because he has admitted in this case where he is now asking for leniency in his sentencing. >> there's another piece about this i want to ask you about. we're getting manafort's defense claiming bluntly, they are only prosecuting for this because you couldn't get him on collusion. there was one collusion-specific aspect that remains unanswered in the public-facing filings, but you've done a bunch of reporting on it this weekend. that involves konstantin kilimnik polling from the tump campaign being sent to this russian guy linked to russian intelligence. if you can stick with us, i'd love to talk to you about that new reporting when we come back.

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joining us once again is ken vogel with the "new york times." ken, in this new filing just within the past hour or so, paul manafort has just told the judge who's considering his sentence that since manafort isn't being charged with any crimes related to russia collusion in the grand scheme of things his crimes aren't that serious so effectively he shouldn't get a tough sentence.

you have been reporting on konstantin kilimnik, and this interesting sort of contention that manafort may have sent kilimnik internal proprietary information at the time they were interfering in the election. can you sum up the importance of that and what we know about it at this point? >> our sources tell us that when this first occurred, when manafort actually instructed rick gates, his deputy on the campaign, and also his deputy during his time in ukraine, to transmit polling polling data to kilimnik who was assessed by the fbi to have ties to russian intelligence, when they first did that, it was in the spring of 2016, which was both right as trump was wrapping up the republican nomination, right as konstantin kilimnik was

preparing to go to new york to meet with manafort and he told associates he hoped to meet with trump as well. and most importantly, just as russia was really ramping up its social media disinformation campaign to benefit donald trump's presidential campaign, you could see how potentially, and this is the tantalizing aspect we don't know this for sure, but how potentially having very detailed polling information that showed how donald trump was polling with various segments of the population in various places, having that could potentially assist someone who was trying to launch a social media campaign to help donald trump. >> ken vogel, reporter from "the new york times," thank you for your reporting on this. thanks for helping us understand it tonight. >> thank you, rachel. >> we'll be right back, stay with us. great news, liberty mutual customizes-

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that does it for us tonight. we will see you again tomorrow and every day now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening, lawrence. >> now i'm ready. i'm wearing my glasses tonight, rachel. >> why? >> well, actually, now that you mention it, the president decided -- he decided to make fun of people who wear glasses today. and that made me go look up how many people wear glasses, say, in the united states, like how many voters. it's only 60%, rachel. it's only 60. and so i'm going to stand with the 60% who the president made fun of today, because we need a little help. >> you know the president always says, like, i'm your president