said. tonight "new york times" says the opposite. four sources ordered him to give security clearance over their objections. that contradicts what his on-the-record denials. "hardball" with chris matthews starts right now. more witnesses. let's play "hardball." ♪ . good evening. i'm steve kornacki. michael cohen appearing behind closed doors with the house intelligence committee, this as the president lashed out at him from overseas. spoking just after his negotiations broke down in h ashes noi.

>> he lied a lot but he didn't lie about one thing. he said no collusion with the russian hoax and i said i wonder why he didn't just lie about that to like he did everything else? >> cohen did tell the oversight committee that he doesn't have any direct evidence of collusion between the trump campaign and russia, though he did say he was suspicious. trump also said it could -- shouldn't have been scheduled to co inside with his trip to vietnam. >> i think having a fake hearing like that and having it in the middle of this very important summit is real a a terrible thing. they could have made it two days later or next week and it would have been even better. there would have been more time but having it during this very important summit is very incredible. >> the front pages of this

morning's newspapers played up the revelations and accusations made during the public hearing yesterday. those papers went to press just before the summit which ended early this morning with little to nothing in the way of reesults. wednesday's explosive six-hour hearing, he suggests that president suborned purnlry. and that stemming from the testimony that trump hint said him in a code that cohen understood. and cohen did testify as well that the president didn't directly tell him to lie. the most direct evidence did come in the form of a check signed by trump while he was president. intended to reimburse for the elicit pay off. it sunlests the president committed a campaign finance crime. here is congressman elijah

cummings. >> do you believe the president committed a crime while in office? >> based on what? looking at the texts and listening to mr. cohen, it appears that he did. >> but yesterday's allegations may only be the tip of the iceberg. cohen also said he knows of more wrong doing currently under investigation in new york. >> is there any other illegal act you're aware of regarding donald trump that we haven't yet discussed today? >> yes, and again those are part of the investigation that's currently being looked at by the southern district of new york. >> the chairman of the house intelligence committee, congressman adam schiff said cohen will return again to give additional testimony next week. he also announced a russian born

american citizen who helped trump pursue a trump tower moscow on his behalf. joined by democrat from california. he was in that closed door appearance he had before the house intelligence committee today. all for -- another closed door appearance before the intelligence committee nbst week from cohen. sader also being called to testify. explain the reason behind each one of the decisions. >> there was lot we learned today. new information that mr. cohen will bring corroborating evidence to the committee on wednesday of next week and it's just a lot more to learn from him. i'd characterize today's hearing this way. i found him very credible.

we interviewed him for about a eight hours a year 1/2 ago. and he's got a lot to lose. so he was very forth right. donald trump running for president was very eager to do business in russia, very eager to receive the help from wikileaks and very eager to learn what his son was doing with this meeting michael cohen thought was around it the trump tower meeting june 2016. >> let me make sure i got what you said at the beginning correctly. are you saying next week the purpose is to provide specific kra corroborating evidence? >> that's a purpose but we still have a lot of different areas to

explore with him. he's seen donald trump's personal life and has acted on his behalf in that regard. and he did place and particularly as it intersect would the trump tower mosqcow project. also he's assured us he has documents on some of the the areas we didn't know about. >> one more question on today's hearing. yesterday the whole world got to watch this. the cameras were there. people say sometimeinis the cams can change the nature of these hearings. how would you describe the mood behind closed doors today? was it as contentious? were they pursuing the same lines of questioning? >> i think it's important that occurred in that manner. our hearing touches on some

investigative equities that other investigations could have and so emr. ecohen did not want to go into some of those areas yesterday as he said in his testimony and we were able to dive a little bit deeper today. now of course these are tense proceedings but they were civil and respectful and i understand republicans they've sdwrub do. we've got job to do. but we learned a lot that will benefit the american people in securing the ballot box and holding accountable anyone who work would the russians. >> it's not just trump who may be in jeopardy. a number of trump associates may also face collateral damage from yesterday's testimony. here are just a few of the names dropped in that hearing. >> which specific lawyers reviewed and edited your statement on the moscow tower

negotiations? >> he knew in advance about the wikileaks drop of emails. >> who else knows the president said this? >> matthew lieberman -- >> and who was the campaign chairman? >> lewandowski. >> trump jr.ory weiszingbering. >> david picker, barry luvoavinr dillen howard. >> and elijah cummings says he will likely seek their testimony too. >> all you have to do is follow the transcripts. there were names orr records mention said during the hearing. we'll pick out who we want to talk to and bring them in. >> if any names came up multiple times in that hearing. >> they have a good chance of hearing from us. >> a source with direct knowledge tells weisselberg will

be called to testify before the house intelligence committee. there are lots of different pieces here, legal, political. different investigations. let me try to draw upon our experts here. on the question that we've been talking about for the last couple of years, this issue of collusion, which is at the heart of the mandate that robert mueller, the special counsel, has. what we heard from cohen yesterday was he was suspicious but he had no evidence of collusion. and he never visited prague. that seemed to cut into the dossier story. unterms of mueller's man dot, where does that stand after what we heard from cohen yesterday? >> he said listen, i didn't see any direct evidence of collusion

and that givers me a comfort level with a witness when it would be easy for him to throw lies into the mix and saw of course i saw collusion. the fact he didn't over state, didn't gratuitously tried to dirty up trump i think can give us a certain level of confidence with respect to the balance of the testimony. sometimes witnesses don't know the import of evidence that they actually do have to offer. for example when he said he over heard a phone conversation between trump and roger stone talking about future wikileaks drops, i can tell you as a prosecutor when i'm looking to see whether trump and the campaign coordinated with russia, with wikileaks, stone about the release of those stolen and damaging emails, i would assess that as evidence of collusion or conspiracy. not rock solid evidence on its own.

not evidence that standing alone proves anything beyond a reasonable doubt but i think he actually may have said he didn't see eany direct evidence of collusion but he sure saw circumstantial evidence of collusion. >> paul butler on this issue of suborning perjury. the idea of incouraging others. the accusation. he says trump did not directly tell him to lie before congress about the mosque oo edeal but that trump communicated to him in a language a code that michael cohen, as a decade long employee understood. that line between he didn't directly say it but i inferred it from the way he speaks. legally where did that larnd? >> experienced criminals and it's starting to sound like donald trump might boo in that group, don't talk about their crimes explicitly.

they talked about it in code the way michael cohen suggested. he also suggested trump's lawyers change his testimony. if that's true, then those lawyers would not be protected by attorney client privilege. gutsy prosecutor could well hall trump's lawyers into the grand jury. there would be a legal fight but if they prevail they could be asked why did you change muccal michael cohen's truthful testimony? if they say the president, our client, directed us to, then the president is guilty of suborning perjury and not just a federal crime but an impeachable offense. >> we saw the president's public reaction to this. what is your sense of the folks around trump? the foebs inside the white

house, the very sense of what they consudor the most sniff can can't aspect of yesterday's testimony. is there a particular aspect they are worried about going forward? >> i would say they're battle tested. it takes a lot to get on their radar. i think a lot of people felt like this was another circus day unwashington and there will be another crisis that they'll move on to. but among the president's advisors, the growing concern is about the southern district of new york investigation. and he gave us a glimpse when he mentioned this financial statements used to try to get a loan from the buffalo bills. it seems he only has a piece of this puzzle. it's one of the strands they could unravel and investigators could as wem. and i think that's why we hear

them talking about adam weisselberg. it would not be a stretch of the imagination to see him brought in and there's not that much they'd be able to do because they're private citizens. they have no executive privilege. and remains to be a concern to those close to the president. >> there are pliticate questions as well. one around the most direct and clear piece of evidence that was produced yesterday at this hearing from cohen was that check which gets to the question of a campaign finance violation, the question of a felony there. the political question, if you have the chairman of the oversight committee saying i believe this is a crime, the political question that's raised is, do you as a member of

congress believe that rises to the level of a high crime which would be an impeachable offense. and if i understood you skrektly, you said that particular piece of it, even if you established a campaign finance crime there, you're not sure that rises to the high crime level. >> steve, that's right. >> and i would be interested what mr. butner and kushner feel as well. i think there's nan indictment when he leaves office as a co conspirator for a false statement regarding campaign contrabuses or for the legal campaign contribution. what i'm looking at are bigger issues here. what's at stake for our national security with russia, whether the president is financially compromised. i would look at them as prior bad acts. they inform me as to how the shadowy operator in donald trump operators. if he's paying off women, he's

probably doing the same with his taxes and over sea investments and cashing in on the oval office and care about what the american people care about if their national security is at risk, if the rule of law in our count rais at risk, i think woo will have bipartisan buy in if that's where we're going. if that's all we have, i don't know if that's worth pursuing for impeachment. >> swalwell, appreciate the time. thank you to all of you as well and coming up the bad break up. how michael cohen went from i'd take a bullet from him to he's a racist a cheat and a conman. and once again taking a dictator at his word. >> i don't believe that he would have allowed that to happen. just wasn't in his advantage. >> this time he is publicly

letting kim jong-un off the hook over the death of ootto warmb s warmbier. and that he ordered his chief of staff to give jared kushner a top security clearance. e jared top security clearance vo: epclusa treats all main types of chronic hep c. vo: whatever your type, ask your doctor if epclusa is your kind of cure. woman 2: i had the common type. man 2: mine was rare. vo: epclusa has a 98% overall cure rate. man 3: i just found out about my hepatitis c. woman 3: i knew for years. vo: epclusa is only one pill, once a day, taken with or without food for 12 weeks. vo: before starting epclusa, your doctor will test if you have had hepatitis b, which may flare up, and could cause serious liver problems during and after treatment. vo: tell your doctor if you have had hepatitis b, other liver or kidney problems,

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that. they were willing to denuke large areas that we with wanted. >> north korea's foreign minister telling reporters that country only demanded partial sanctions relief in exchange for shuttering its main nuclear complex. deskpiet trade and talks, he continued to praise kim. >> we spent pretty much all day with kim jong-un who is -- he is quite a guy, quite a character. i think we'll end up being very good friends with chairman kim and north korea. there's a warmthing at the we have. we have a good relationship. >> and that phrase comes despite kim's brutal record when it comes to human rights. he's placed more than 100,000 of

his own citizens in prison camps while starving ten oz of thousands more. and the president dismissed intelligence reports while appearing to back off his reversal of denuclear zaz. >> you have seen chairman kim increase the number of missiles and continue to produce more nuclear material. >> some people are saying that and some are denying that. >> are you still thinking you want north korea to guv up everything too, do complete, verifiable -- >> i don't want to say that to you because i don't want to put myself in that position. >> joined by former national security staffer under both obama and bush administrations. and former analyst for the cia.

you've got those conflicting vurzs of events. they want all the sanctions taken down and north korea saying it was only partial. what is your understanding of where this broke down and was there somebody around the president who prevailed on him ultimately to take this posture? >> that's a great question because in fact there are people around the president who don't want any sanctions, whether partial or complete until north korea has accomplished what it says it's going to accomplish. opposed when bush talked about what he called an action for action staged agreement on which the united states will release some sanctions in response to progress towards eliminating the nube leer program. so you can imagine in these conversations the last few days that he's talked to the president why that would be a bad idea and so whether in fact

north koreans are asking for partial san partial or full sanctions relief -- >> and there was speculation coming into it this that president, especially in light of what was going on with his former lawyer there, before that house commit a, that he might be very eager to cut a deal, perhaps to can cut a deal more favorable to north korea than others would like. there's ultimately no deal here. can't make the case he gave away too much. was anything gained from this exercise though e? >> i actually think this was a serious embarrassment for the president. this summit should never have happened. he should never have been in the position where he was in that room having to turn down any sort of deal. i think this is bad staff work. i think this is amateur hour.

i think the president has this belief that only he can solve big problems like these and i think it's proven to be a folly and amateur hour in mew opinion. in diplomacy, it's really hard. you have to be prepared for setbacks. i remember when we were negotiating with the iranians and it fell apart, butty with had a plan. a plan in place to deal with that setback. i don't have a sense this team has any plan. >> kim jong-un is taking another one of those 65-hour train rides. when he gets back home, how does he look coming outof this summit? >> he's going to try to spin it that he played hard against the united states. so he's going to be fine domestically and the problem is two leaders misjudged each other. trump misjudged kim jong-un

thinking he came because of pressure and fire and fury, never mind that he got his nuclear and missile program -- and kim thought president trump so eager to have this foreign policy victory that he was going to give away. they did request relief on five sanctions, that's most of sanctions. in this case trump is right to walk away from this no deal. no deal is better than a bad deal. i'm okay that president trump walked away from this >> you saw they misjudged each utter. is there any reason to have a snu third? >> they shouldn't have a 3rd unless all of this stuff is worked out. because president trump gave away last minute so easily, scrapping the exercises, he thought maybe he could do this again with president trump.

now third summit is very unlukely unless working level. and i it don't see that happening any time soon. >> the michael cohen news the last two days, the north korea summit now there is this being reported tonight from the "new york times." thaw are reporting that president's son in law was granted top secret security clearance because president trump over ruled top intelligence officials. oo according to the times that was so troubling to senior seniorficials he he had been ordered to give kushner clearance. and mcgahn also dock ynlted his concerned. earlier this month >> there were anonymous leaks about there being issues. but the president had no

einvolvement pertaining to my clearance or my husband's clearance. >> peter baker, again this news breaking tonight from your newspaper. but take us through, if you will, a little bit about what was playing out behind the scenes with president trump reportedly giving this order over ruling the folks around him and what are the implications if that can be established and these public denials are on the record, is there a fallout from this? >> i know it's very interesting of scores. there was some disagreement among professionals that evaluated him. some of them thought it was fine to -- and others thought there were serious concerns that had to be weighed first. year not going to recommend that kind of thing and he basically said to john kelly make it happen. it's interesting he made a point of making aricered of this and arriving at time so there would

be no question, from his point of view. we were in the oval offices with the president one month agoe. whether he had anything to do with kushner's security clearance and he told us flatly to our face, no he did not. a mem oein the hand of his own chief of staff and the second memo, his white house counsel at the time wrote out also directly seemed to contradict it and he talks about the concerns he had that led him to not recommend the he security clearance. this is a big deal on the merits and unterms of what the white house and the president himself have said behind closed doors. >> we've seen this a number of times, a number of different fronts. in terms of what goes on behind the scenes, the normal procedures in the executive branch.

the trump presidency through this drama has shined a light on an area a lot of people haven't paid much attention to before. this issue of security clearances, of a president personally getting involved. are you aware of a precedent of this happening at all in utter administrations? >> i am not aware of any precedent for this. it's a pretty sacred process. all national security officials and civil servients have to go through that process. it's done by our law enforcement, investigation agencies and the fact that the president interfered in an investigation or some sort of background investigation is unprecedented. >> thank you all for joining us. and up next the clock is ticking as beto o'rourke inches closer to announcement.

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>> so this question about -- >> will you be running for president? >> so, that's a big question for us to thing through. >> what's it going to take for you to say yes, i'm doing it? >> for me, it quiwill be family. >> beto o'rourke, remember him? he was a sensation on the midterm campaign trail. he was talking to oprah winfrey. he didn't win but he caused such a stir running for the u.s. senate in texas. there's been all sorts of talk will he turn around and run for president in 2020? and we've got some new hints in fact in the last 24 hours. he says he has made up his mind.

and in the last 24 hours, seems to be suggesting his decision is not to run for the senate, but maybe that would mean he's not running for the senate. maybe he is going to run for president. we're on the cusp of beto o'rourke being in the races. these are the kinds of crowds he was drawing. you don't see a lot of democrats untx tbs draw those crowds. and what caught everybody's attention there was the money he was brining in. almost authy million poured in from all over the country. more than double what the next best democrat did. they're all incumbents. they had a built-in fund raiser. and he doubled up his nearest rival when it came to raising money. that was telling people he was

tapping into something. that's when his idea began to originate. he's not a senator he lost by three points to a democrat in texas, that's pretty good. barack obama lost it by 16. last time a democrat carried this thing, you got it tago back to 1976. that's pretty good. but all that money, he was the one democrat running against ted cruz who national democrats don't like. you can see right now in the initial polling, he's running somewhere in the midsingle digits. he's got ground to makeup if he gets in this race. think of the 8 million bucks. it is one thing to be the it democrat who's running against ted cruz.

then every democrat is going to love you. every democrat's going to want in. but when you're running against eight, ten, twelve other democrats, maybe ea it's a different story. so we will see if beto mania that we saw in texas, if that carries over, we'll be finding out soon if there's go itting to be one. don't make the same mistake that i did, he said. tracing his trajectory from blind loyalty to prison time. s blind loyalty to prison time (burke) at farmers, we've seen almost everything, so we know how to cover almost anything. even rooftop parking. strange forces at work? only if you're referring to gravity-and we covered it. talk to farmers. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two.

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welcome back to "hardball." for more than a decade michael cohen was president trump's blindly loyal fixer and friend. he told vanity fair i'm the guy

who would take a bullet for thes. president. >> high schools, colleges the college board not to release his grades or sat scores, asked me to handle the negative press surrounding his medical deferment from the vietnam draft pay off an adult film star with whom he had an affair. o cohen's testimony is a nasty public break up of a relationship forged over a decade. it was evident in cohen's assessment. >> i regret all the help and support i gave him along the way. ib am ashamed because i know what mr. trump is.

he is a racist. he is a con man and a cheat. i have lied. but i am not a liar. and i have done bad things but ib am not a bad man. i have fixed things but i am no lawner your fubser, mr. trump. >> he tried to explain his change of heart and offered a warning to congressional republican whose defend the president. that's coming up next. that's coming up next. ♪ let me be by myself in the evenin' breeze, ♪ ♪ listen to the murmur of the tall concrete, ♪ ♪ send me off forever, but i ask you please ♪ ♪ don't fence me in. ♪ don't fence me in. whei just put in the namey,

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welcome back to "hardball." michael cohen was asked bot his change of heart. >> there are several factors. helsinki, charlottesville, watching the daily destruction of our civility to one another. it's that sort of behavior that i'm responsible for. i'm responsible for your silliness because i did the same thing you're doing now. for ten years. i protected mr. trump for ten years. and i can only warn people the more people that follow mr. trump as i did blindly are going to suffer the same consequences that i'm suffering.

>> and joining me is tim o'brien, executive editor at bloomberg opinion and a republican strategist. there are the accusations that he level the evidence. but when it comes to just michael cohen and the idea of a change of heart, he's suiting charlottesville and these other things. how much of a sns that this guy got caught? >> his sentencing memo from federal law enforcement officials, we don't believe this guy authentically had a change of heart? and he was sawing this to a judge who had to decide how much he sentenced. he put a messenger out. and he inauenabled trump for a decade. he's making hame more grand yoes

figure than he was. what he's saying is i feel guilty because i'm seeing the result of enabling somebody unethical, lawless and it destructful. that's not a hypothatical. it's we've already been going on. the republican party, up until this point at the feet of mitch mcconnell and paul ryan. both of them essentially put their institutional powers, in checks and balances at the feet of donald trump. >> so susan, pick up on that point because you're around politicians. you know the incentive system. so this question about why won't republicans uncongress do "x" do "y". in term oz of their motivations. in terms of understanding the

motivation, what's trump's approval rating with republican voters? 89%. nobody in politics stands up to that ever. >> and yet i still think they never properly test if if donal you know, if there was a viable option to donald trump. those numbers change. there is room to soften the support of donald trump and let's look at some of the primaries he got involved in. he wasn't always successful as we know. so i wish that -- >> can i just say, the fact, in 2016, he comes into the primaries, not a single republican member of congress endorses him. he got no traditional support, and he, psychologically. >> as a republican for 30 years, i wish i could say, steve, this is how the party, and this is why and maybe i'm not in sync with it anymore but there are too many republicans that i know of who aren't necessarily in

politics who are frustrated and who are disgraced and it's hard to say, i'm a republican in certain circles. even me, it's in new york but it's like, i'm kind of say it a little quietly now. i had no problem with it. but the republican leadership is a disgrace because not only are they selling out to donald trump, they're selling out the reason why they were elected. they're selling out their oath to the constitution. they're not doing their jobs in washington. right now, mitch mcconnell, letting the president supporting him to take this emergency action is absurd. this should never have happened. it very well could be unconstitutional. it's certainly against everything republicans stand for. so it's a disgrace the way elected officials are reacting and if they're only thinking about their jobs, well, it shows we need a new crop of elected officials. >> what are the other thoughts, tim, too? just watching this yesterday. as you look at michael cohen, you look at everything he's laying out yesterday and just his own life.

he seems to be a shattered man yesterday before that committee. certainly seemed that way. none of this happens to him if donald trump doesn't run for president. >> that's the devil's bargain, when you enter into a relationship with donald trump. most of the people who have long-term relations with him, only people who have long-term relations with him are family members or a small group of people inside the trump organization. everyone else, he tends to chew up and spit out. you have to be a certain kind of person to fall into that trap. with cohen's testimony, waxing poetic about the joys of working for donald trump. you felt like you were part of something larger than yourself. people with more healthy orientation to who they are don't get that easily enamored than of michael cohen, but he is a metaphor, going back to the challenges of the gop face because trump is not a true conservative. he's in this for himself.

he's neither conservative nor liberal. he's just a force of nature who's profoundly self-absorbed and to the extent the gop puts its reputation and values into his pocket, they'll suffer long-term in a way. >> steve, i do think there's, quickly, one thing that wasn't necessarily, craig, he would have ended up here. let's not forget. michael cohen got investigated because of his involvement with taxing medallions and his business partners owing hundreds of millions of dollars in back taxes. he already had his back up against the wall. >> the trump tower campaign, there were a number of things involved. anyway, tim o'brien, susan, thank you. up next, seven years ago. a presidential candidate warned about the dangers of russia. some are saying, sorry, you were right. you're watching "hardball." saye right. you're watching "hardball.

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that could reveal what your body isn't telling you. i'm gonna tell you that was the best $150 i ever spent in my life. life line screening. the power of prevention. call now to learn more. governor romney, i'm glad that you recognize al qaeda is a threat because a few months ago when you were asked, what's the biggest geopolitical threat facing america is russia. not al qaeda, you said russia. in the 1980s or now, calling to ask for their foreign policy back, because the cold war has been over for 20 years. >> welcome back. that was one of the big lines of attack that barack obama and democrats used against mitt romney in the 2012 campaign. it was apparently effective then but to many, it looks very different now and it's back in the news this week in an interesting way.

the background, if you have forgotten, romney in 2012 was accusing obama of being soft on russia and he had called russia, without question the number one geopolitical foe. democrats say it shows how naive romney was. and russia was a regional nuance and not a global threat. they had a lot of fun with it. here was john kerry at that year's democratic convention. >> he blurted out the preposterous notion that russia is our number one geopolitical foe. sarah palin said she could see russia from alaska. mitt romney talks like he's only seen russia by watching rocky iv. >> he had not launched his invasion of crimea and before the meddling in the 2016 election here but also true, there were some troubling signs already out there in 2012. russia had already invaded the country of georgia.

putin had already been implicated in deaths, in disappearances, of journalists, d d d disso dants. few would bat an eye but that was not the case in 2012 and the backdrop for what happened this week in a hearing of the house intelligence committee. testifying before that committee was madilyn albright, former secretary of state and in 2012, albright was one of those democrats who ridiculed romney. featured in an obama campaign video saying mitt romney's claim about russia showed he, quote, had little understanding of what was actually going on in the 21st century. now, albright said she looks at that episode very differently. quote, i think we forget that we forgot we're dealing with a kgb agent and i think he's played a weak hand very well and i personally owe an apology to now senator romney because i think

we underestimated what was going on in russia. a lot of people in politics have changed their tune on russia since 2012 and that certainly includes republicans who now largely back a president with a very different view of putin than romney had back then but few did what albright did is admit it and grapple with it in public. that's all for "hardball." "all in with chris hayes" now. >> who else knows the president did this? >> the cohen fallout grows. how democrats expand their investigation to criminal activity inside the white house. >> i am no longer your criminal. >> rashidah talib on her stand against racism and the president. >> donald trump is setting a precedent, i reclaim my time.

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