down axes in need of grinding, consensus is building around why robert mueller refused to exonerate the president in the obstruction of justice. james conway writing in today's "the washington post," the report does not exonerate the president? that's a stunning thing for a prosecutor to say. mueller didn't have to say that. indeed making that very point, the president's outside counsel, rudy giuliani, called the statement a, quote, cheap shot. but mueller isn't prone to cheap shots. he plays by the rules every step of the way. if his report doesn't exonerate the president, there must be something pretty damning in it about him, even if it may not suffice to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. former u.s. attorney steve if raria puts a finer point on it -- >> it's clear robert mueller found substantial evidence of obstruction and other facts that might mitigate the standards he found, almost by definition

there's substantial evidence if you think it's such a close decision you cannot make a decision about whether the president committed a crime and you took the step of saying when the president, there's any document that touches upon these issues at all, robert mueller made it clear to say this does not exonerate the president. that raises a lot of questions. >> just this afternoon we're getting a closer look at what's likely one of the key flashpoints in the obstruction case. mark corallo, a member of trump's legal team, is speaking out about the decision amid air force one to craft a false statement about the trump tower meeting. corallo is saying what he saw was so alarming, it led him to resign. >> i pointed out the statement was inaccurate and there were documents -- that i understood there were documents that would prove that. hope hicks replied to me when i said look, there's documents, she said well, nobody's ever going to see those documents

which made my throw dry up immediately. and i just -- at that point i said, mr. president, we can't talk about this anymore. you've got to talk to your lawyers. for me it was just the fact she was even -- after, he would say something like that in the presence of the president of the united states, that you would not be aware that could be construed as obstruction. the threats to withhold documents. what does that mean, no one is ever going to see them? what are you going to destroy them? >> "the new york times" weighing in on the lasting damage of the president's efforts at obstructing the investigation into himself. quote, mr. mueller's decision to not take a position on whether mr. trump's many norm-shattering interventions in the law enforcement system constitutes obstruction of justice means that future occupants of the white house will feel entitled to take similar actions. more than perhaps any other outcome of the mueller investigation, this may become its most enduring legacy. with weeks to go before anyone sees the actual mueller report, the question now is how much

damage will trump and his allies do in terms of bullying the media that covered the two-year investigation, threatening the investigators and law enforcement officials and seeking out scores to settle among the most vulnerable americans. the victims of hurricane maria and disabled americans who will suffer under unprecedented cuts to the special olympics. that's where we start today, with some of our favorite reporters and friends, ashley parker, white house reporter for "the washington post," former u.s. attorney joyce vance, with us at the table, berit berger, a former federal prosecutor with the southern and eastern districts of new york, where not much happens ever. executive editor for bloomberg opinion tim o'brien's back and anna palmer, senior washington correspondent for politico. joyce vance, i have to start with you and picture coming into focus from folks like yourself who are helping us understand that a nonconclusion around obstruction does not mean that there was not sufficient evidence of obstructive conduct

on the part of the president. >> you know, it's hard to foe what it means, nicolle. and that's why it's so important that the department of justice release as much of special counsel mueller's report as they can, because there's no way for the public to have confidence or to understand what's going on. for bob mueller to take this extraordinary step and say he's not making a charging decision, even though the evidence doesn't exonerate the president, that leaves more questions open than it answers. certainly makes it incumbent upon congress to thoroughly investigate this matter. >> joyce, let me ask you about this flashpoint. mark carollo, maybe not known outside the close mueller watchers in conservative legal circles, he came with maybe four, five six lawyers before rudy on the trump russia defense team and his job was to do what he did for karl rove in the valerie flame leaking

investigation, very savvy in doj issues, press person. someone i knew in the interest of disclosure. a source close to corallo told me he turned over all of the notes he was talking about that from his interaction with hill pics about a crafting of statement and sat for interviews himself with the folks investigating obstruction of justice. if you had to sit predict what the actual obstruction report looks like, even if it came up well short of reaching that level where you can suggest or allege criminality beyond a reasonable doubt of a sitting president with vast authorities, what might it look like? >> the point here is we've seen all of these dots out in the public domain, indications of obstruction and apparently mueller wasn't able to connect them. and the question is why, was it because no crime was committed? was it an evidentiary failure? there just wasn't enough? and the obstruction statutes are

pretty technical. they come ten plate socontempla sort of ongoing proceeding so it's possible he found all sorts of evidence like what mark carollo indicates here that somehow it slipped past the legal standard which really wasn't written for a president using his official office to obstruct. and what we're left with at the ends of the day is this notion that even if there's no proof beyond a reasonable doubt available that would convict a president of a crime -- that's the high standard we use in the criminal justice system before we lock somebody up, even if that level of proof isn't available, should we let a president off the hook if there's substantial evidence of obstruction? if we see all along the way he took steps to hinder an investigation? that's why it's right for congress, the inquiry doesn't die with the end of the mueller investigation. >> berit, i wonder what you hear when you hear legal voices making these points from george comey, the report does not exonerate the president.

that's a stunning thing for a prosecutor to say. for preet to say there's clear evidence of obstructive congress, for mark corallo to detail what to him felt like in realtime an effort to obstruct justice. what even rudy giuliani acknowledged was a much graver fear among the president's legal team about the obstruction investigation than the conspiracy investigation. >> yes, i think we know there's more to it than this obstruction bucket then there was on the conspiracy/coordination bucket, based on the way the special counsel reached his determinations on this. so on the coordination conspiracy, he had problems say there's not a physical crime here. but more equivocal on the obstruction piece. that leads me to believe there's more there. maybe it's a so close call. we don't know physical we see

the final report but there's certainly more there, in the obstruction piece, than the other. what does it take for the prosecutors, and i think the ones involved in the obstruction case included jim ka rollous, who was the mark, mark carollo i know spent time with andrew goldstein, chronicled in "the new york times" as being thoughtful, one of the top deputies who interacted with the president's lawyers around don mcgahn's testimony and what he would testify to. what would it take to put that line in the report we do not exonerate the president? >> yeah, i agree with mr. conway, that is not a line prosecutors tend to throw around. one reason for is that is there's not a mechanism for that. usually prosecutors are usually indicting somebody or choosing not to bring charges. there's not a mechanism where you do these public i will say you're kind of cleared but not really cleared. beside from special counsel investigations, that does not

exist. i think in them to put a line in there like that, that had to have been significant ob strucktive acts that caused them to think about it. it had to be a tricky, difficult decision to make in order for them to put such strong language into the report. >> i raise that because we have an example in very recent history of sort of a mixed verdict. jim comey was blasted for coming out and giving that press conference in the summer of 2016 and saying hillary clinton did not commit crime but then harshly condemning and characterizing her conduct. it seems mueller didn't even get that far, he didn't even get as far as to classify the conduct as criminal or not criminal. >> yes, and we don't know the reason why he didn't. we don't know if it was because he really couldn't reach a decision because he thought it was such a close call. we don't know if it's because he thought this was a more appropriate decision to be left to congress because he thought this was more in their per vipe.

we don't know what is underlying that or the underlying piece of evidence that went into that. and you remember from barr's summary, there's only some of the obstructed act that's have been in the public's sphere. there are things ob stensively we don't know about that went into making that decision. >> ashley, you had your byline on amazing pieces about this moment for the president, where to him his experience is one of full exoneration, even though the words we do not exonerate the president showed up in the highly filtered and summarized and edited barr summary, which is always seen as the mueller report. a trump ally described this as an apex experience for trump. this is as good as it's going to get. this is the least information we'll ever have about the mueller report. within weeks we will see more theoretically of the obstruction investigation and this is his chance to do what he does best, brand the entire exercise with tweets, send out menacing threats to his perceived enemies

and try to caower the media. how does the white house feel the endeavor is going and did i accurately describe it? >> you did. and they feel like it's going quite well. i would add he's not just branding this previous investigation as a witch-hunt and full exoneration but he's using it to sort of brand any future investigations, any investigation congress launches, any investigation going on in new york, any future misbehavior, the president's strategy, which he's been quite clear about, look, for two years i said there was no collusion. i said this was a witch-hunt. that is what barr's summary seems to have found, these are the president's words, not my words, and therefore everything else i say is a witch-hunt is absolutely a witch-hunt. the thing that is also interesting is talking to people in the white house before we got barr's summary, there was a sense they thought it would be good. the report would generally be good for them but they were kind of eager to move on and turn the page. once they saw how good in their

eyes it was for them, you're not seeing that sort of eagerness to move on to policy necessarily, a little bit on health care now but you're seeing sort of demands for an enemy's list and vengeance in there, going after the media there, going after democratic lawmakers who they think wronged them and i think you should expect to see that for the next few weeks and heading into 2020 unless something demonstrably changes. >> and to that i say, bring it on. tim o'brien, let me read you something that ashley's craig sergeant writes and analysis, trump and republicans on offense? no, it's the same old gaslighting. given how little we know about mueller's actual findings and barr's decision make, democrats should absolutely be pressing for the release of the former intensifying scrutiny of the latter. the whole point is to get them to back down on the fronts that trump and his allies claim emboldened to do this by

mueller's findings by attacking democrats' efforts to get those released is truly capturing the gaslighting we are seeing here but it should enbolden democrats in pushing forward. and nancy pelosi said we're not setting down a path of impeachment but having been in ray white house having been investigating by a committee, there are a need for democrats to show they can walk and chew gum. >> they also have to weigh the political cost of being aggressive right now, which they really are, around continuing to pursue this line of inquiry. i'm a journalist. i think the information should come out. trump is clearly targeting the people who want the information to come out, whether it's politicians, legal analysts, good government watchdogs or journalists. but the fact of the matter is they are going to be happy for this whole report top come out. that is the most efficient and effective cleansing agent in all of this, put the report out there. if trump feels he was exonerated by it and if sarah sanders feels

he was totally exonerated by it, all we need is the report. and if we don't get it, we're going to continue to get these moments like we had today with rudy giuliani being a carnival barker telling us what's going on at the circus, that mueller is not to be trusted, mueller is schizophrenic. when at his core, i think bob mueller is a dedicated public servant. i think he brought all of that to bear in this investigation. i do think there are glaring questions still about how he chose to proceed. i think he's an institutionalist at his core. i think the fact never chose to compel the president to testify either through subpoena or regular interview meant he was deferring to the office of the presidency. i would obstruct on the obstruction question he was deferring to congress to sort that out. i was imagine he was surprised bill barr took it upon himself to make a judgment about obstruction before the report even got to congress. and i think both of those things are something perhaps bob

mueller could talk about publicly, though given who he is, i suspect we will never hear from him again. >> but someone who is going to have to answer for those decisions is the attorney general. i mean, he will will be called. they are leaning on a lot of law and history around article 2 that the president had absolute authority to fire whomever he wanted. he's leaning on a lot of interpretation and his world view on the law to say without an underlying crime, there can't be corruption. >> justify that point of view. >> on what was he relying when he said he to put his own sauce on the salad of the mueller report? there was this sacred thing that had been walled off from, excuse me language, all of the crap in washington, mueller handed it to barr and he poured politics all over it. >> that's right. and it's not just barr who came in that with some preconceived

notions. rod rosenstein wrote the memo that trump used to fire james comey. >> and then offered to wear a wire why is rod rosenstein even in the room? >> and huddled with bill barr deciding whether or not they should interpret that moment as an obstruction of justice which would have meant rod rosenstein would counteract with conclusions he presumably arrived at in a memo he drafted for the president in 2017. it's conflicted in every way. >> i want to ask you about nancy pelosi because she continues to be this sort of strategic, calm, measured, influence. she said at a private lunch yesterday, let's just get the goods. i know the answer to this, is she holding her caucus, but is that the strategy? is that the strategy, let's just get the goods and see what we have? >> i think she's real tlan a sober approach here. i sat down and talked to her about this for our book that's coming out. she's very concerned about democrats' overreach. she saw it with republicans.

she wants them to win in 2020 and she does not think an impeachment trial without having the goods is going to be good for democrats. >> joyce, let me get you back in here on some of this decision making and what the scrutiny of this might look like as the attorney general is on capitol hill having to answer questions like why did you feel like you just couldn't take the mueller contents, strip out anything that's classified, anything that was part of a counter-intel investigation, and hand it to the congress and let them make what they will of it? we've got a very, very conservative and cautious democratic speaker. we've got a republican-run senate. why didn't barr do that? >> that's i think the primary inquiry that congress will have to undertake with barr, who will undoubtedly face fierce partisan scrutiny on capitol hill. there's a conundrum sort of buried in this riddle for him, which is that if the position that he took in making this decision that bob mueller declieped to make was that the president didn't obstruct justice essentially because the

president by virtue of his executive power cannot obstruct justice, then it becomes even more important for congress to engage in oversight of the president's actions. if it can't be criminal obstruction, the question has to be, is it this sort of what we loosely call a high crime and misdemeanor, which really means conduct from a president that's unbecoming of the office. that makes him in some sense a bad president. and that will have to be undertaken, that scrutiny has to start with barr. congress will have to understand both why he did what he did and how he assessed this information that mueller had amassed about potential obstruction by the president. because we saw it all happening in realtime in plain sight. the president trying to shut down a criminal investigation for what appeared to be personal reasons. the notion that that's not obstruction leaves the question, what was that? and congress will have to grapple with that.

>> and ashley parker, i saved the best for last for you. judge napolitano, i know is someone the president keeps an eye on, making very similar points as famous never trump nor george conway. let's watch. >> if there were no evidence of conspiracy and no evidence of obstruction, the attorney general would have told us so. he didn't. so there's something in there but the democrats and the opponents of the president want to see. they will see it. and they will make hay out of it. and then they will second guess bob mueller as to whether or not it's enough evidence to meet the legal standard of proof of guilt beyond a rm doueasonable doubt. >> ashley, i guess it's safe to say the fox analysis of this outcome, which is you said the white house is taking a victory lap over, is the best-case scenario but even they're ally there is saying the obstruction piece could get messy. >> you're right. he's an unlikely source to make that argument. but my best sense now is that

the president and people around him are not listening to those voices of dissent and those voices of concern of what might emerge if we saw the full report. they're certainly not listening to them coming from democrats or the media. frankly, i don't think they're interested in even hearing them from their own side. my sense is if we see more, the white house will still engage in this kind of ignore the parts they don't like, highlights the parts they do like and kind of steamroll ahead. >> it's truly a gift to live only in an snants. ashley parker, joyce vance, thank you for spending time with us. after the break, nancy pelosi's birthday gift, donald trump promising the 2020 election will be about the very issue that delivered big wins for democrats in 2018. also ahead, barbara bush left the republican party before she died because of what donald trump did to it. that and other revelations from the bush family matriarch in a brand-new biography. and the 2020 taking their claim to the high road and generate

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simple. easy. awesome. xfinity, the future of awesome. donald trump playing his part as our bully in chief, seemingly on a war path this afternoon but his post-mueller enemy's list goes beyond the media. his scorched-earth governing style goes beyond that group. take a look at this. despite to his own cabinet members even, the administration is pressing forward with a new

plan to completely invalidate the affordable care act, a move that could take health insurance away from 21 million american people f that wasn't enough, trump also complaining how much aid puerto rico is receiving in the aftermath of hurricane maria. and his administration is proposing eliminating all $18 million of funding for the special olympics. this is real, folks. something betsy devos was grilled about on capitol hill yesterday. >> you have zeroed out special olympics once again. i still can't understand why you would go after disabled children in your budget. you zero that out. it's appalling. >> do you know how many kids are going to be affected that by cut, madam secretary? >> mr. pocan, let me say again, we had to make hard decisions with this budget -- >> this is a question about kids. >> i don't know the number of kids. >> it's 272,000 kids. i'll answer it for you. that's okay. no problem.

it's 272,000 kids that are affected. >> it's an awesome organization, one that is well supported by the philanthropic sector as well. >> joining our conversation because we need him on a day like today, david jolly, new papa, former republican congressman of florida, now independent and karine jean-pierre, we always need her, from moveon.org, both msnbc contributors. i have to start with you. just go. >> nicolle, it's a remarkable level of stupid. no other way to describe what we're seeing. it's donald trump's 2020 campaign, i'm going take away your health care and defund special olympics but bob mueller vindicated me because we can look back at just last november and realize that policy matterers to voters. one of the things you see in this annual budget process often is administrations will submit cuts they know may not get enacted and it's a way to try to move the numbers, try to balance the budget. but this is not a president that

has talked about balancing the budget. this is not a move of conviction or even a political strategy. so you find yourself asking questions when you see cuts of only $18 million to special olympics in federal numbers, that's not even around de niro, as philip bumper i believe said, five trips to mar-a-lago. do they intentionally start these fights or new level of stupid we should ask what university did their parents bribe to get them in? >> look, it's a fair point, karine. and it's this almost operationalized cruelty. it's either stupid or cruel, and i'm not sure which is worse. >> i think it's both. it's unspeakable cruelty at some insane level and that's one thing this administration will be known for, whether it's big or small, level of brutality he puts forth and as he does as president debasing the office he holds. the things about budgets is they

are -- budget priorities, yes, there are priorities but there also moral documents and they're showing morals now. there's enough money to build a wall but not enough money for special olympics. there's enough money to give tax cuts to billionaires but not enough money for cerebral olympics? it is a level of cruelty that is just beyond the pale. >> and on health care, don't question have a chief justice of the supreme court who's now weighed weighed twice in twice? if they land in the supreme court they will lose? >> yes, the supreme court is the backdrop and they tried and failed. i'm not exactly sure what the motivation is here. it seems they're just playing an unwinnable game. >> it reminds me of the cereal commercial, mikey likes it. mike will eat it. mick mulvaney is like trump will do it, the stupid death wish on

health care. there's no chance it would seem politically in congress or legally to do what they're trying to do. >> if you don't have something that's both legal and politically feasible, i'm not sure what the motivation is for doing it then. but look, we've seen this time and time again throughout this administration that the courts have been called in to really be sort of the final backstop and to say, look, you guys can try all sorts of novel things here but at the end of the day, we have institutions. they've tried this before. i don't think this will be successful. >> the politics are just as bleak as the legal forecast on health care. >> i think a lot of republicans on capitol hill were seriously hitting their heads against the wall. this is not what they want to be talking about. they just went through the 2018 election where trump and republicans said, you know what, we're going to win on tax cuts. they clearly didn't matter. and the caravan. those were two things that would work out. be the sl vague for the republicans. they do not have any plans for

replacement. it failed two years ago right after trump won in 2016 and they are nowhere near any kind of solution there. >> but the person who has a plan to fight about health care for two years against donald trump and his sycophanting congress is nancy pelosi. >> nancy pelosi's been doing this for a very long time. she knows how to legislate. she's a student of public policy. she knows how to move things through the congress. none of those things have been strong facets of how the trump white house has rolled. the other thing i say human data is talking about that's behind them doing this stuff, you can't leave puerto rico out of the mix on this. they're getting food stamps and federal support -- >> there's an ig report whether or not they slowed aid to the island all along. investigation, sorry, not report. >> i have been on two trips to puerto rico since the hurricane. when you go there, san juan is okay, electricity is back, water is flowing. you go into the interior, and it's still devastated. there are families in there who

are in incredible distress. they don't have roofs on their homes, they don't have electricity or running water and they're americans. puerto rico is not a foreign country. that's an island populated by americans in distress and i think i can only assess trump's administration is doing this out of peak they don't like the back losh he got after the no response when it lapd ahappened wonder if this plays into the special olympics. >> what did they do to him? >> kennedy started the special olympics. >> oh, my god. i didn't know that. david, i need you to jump in, not just the politics of cruelty but dangers of president which ended up exactly what hillary clinton warned he could be, baited by a tweet. >> baited by a tweet and nb in the long length of history wro destroy the brand of a once-noble political party.

what i mean is take a step back. all of the thiengs we're talkin about, special olympics, for the rico -- >> can you believe those are the three things we're talking about. here are the three things we're talking about, donald trump trying to destroy the special olympics, health care for all and aid to puerto rico. those things were not even debated. health care was debated but there were not big debates around aid for disaster relief in the good old days. there were not debates about around special olympics. it's remarkable >> consider how this translates obviously to the very simple messaging that moat votest vote use to determine which party they will support. in the case of health care, democrats have a plan. republicans say we don't like a health care plan. special olympics, democrats are for it. republicans are now against it. even the green new deal conversation, while a lot of republicans have trouble with it, donald trump said to senators keep it around long enough so i can run against it. democrats are for an environmental plan to deal with climate science and climate

change and republicans are against it. and at the end of the day in this very busy week, nicolle, look at the message that's on the streets now about the next election. republicans are saying we need to investigate hillary clinton. we're going back to investigating hillary clinton, barack obama and bob mueller now because of whatever the high jinx are and democrats are saying let's move forward on policy. it is a vast difference between the two parties. that's why in a tough week for democrats, i think they have a lot to be optimistic about 20 months from now. >> i have to give you the last word. >> i want to go back to puerto rico for a second. i went to puerto rico in january. it's very much a devastation when you leave san juan and people tell you they can't find a doctor or rebuild their home. it's incredibly inhumane. we have to remember more people died in the aftermath from hurricane maria than people died on september 11. we have to think about that. that's what we are dealing with.

it was a disaster of epic proportion. what the administration is doing is truly inhumane. with the health care, the president is saying in an election year, he's going to take health care away from 20 million people. we're talking about poor people, senior citizens, people who truly need health care. maybe it's because he's looking for a foil, right. he loves to have a fight. >> 6-year-old disabled children and hurricane relief. >> really unbelievable. >>. after the break, a famous first lady on her trump angst. us as people.

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we learn to strive to be genuine and authentic by the best role model in the world, her authentic plastic pearls. her not curling her hair. by the way, she was beautiful until the day she died. her hugging of an hiv patient at a time when her own mother wouldn't do it. her standing by her man with a little rhyming poetry in the 1984 election. and a thousand other ways

barbara piece bush was real, and that's why people admired her and loved her so. >> it takes revisiting a moment like that to remember just how colossal a figure barbara bush truly was. bright, bold, blunt and always honest. that's why the new biography carries such weight with stories unheard until now. she's the matriarch of the republican world and asked about how the world was going in the age of trump, she said this, i'm trying not to think about it, as the first anniversary of trump's election approached. we're a strong country and i think it will all work out. even so she was dismayed by the division and direction of the party she worked for so for so long. did she still consider herself a republican? in an interview with me in october 2017 she said yes. when i asked her again four months later in february 2018 she said, i would probably say no today.

david jolly, that was susan paige writing about her interviews with barbara bush. remarkable. >> we are reminded in the trump area of the decency of leaders like george bush and many on the other side of the aisle as well, grace and dignity. nicolle, i remember in the waning days of the '92 election, it was largely lost to george h.w. bush 41, and barbara bush was undeterred about that. still exhibiting a level of class and dignity that honestly stands in stark contrast to this president. in many ways we're all barbara bush today. we're all barbara bush in this era. i think in contrast to the news of the mueller report and president claiming exoneration, what i worry about is there also is a whole population of bush-type republicans who have decided to go along with this president. what i fear is the exoneration in this one issue of collusion and obstruction will somehow be

conflated with now fulg handing over the reins to trumpism and donald trump, where before perhaps the bush republicans that held their nose some, now i think perhaps they wrap their arms around this president and it indeed fully might be the end of an era. >> let me press you on that a little bit. i think the obligation is also on republicans. the bushes are elevated and celebrated, and i think even joy would acknowledge this in this moment because of the debasement, not just the party, but of the office of the presidency. because whatever you thought of them, their reverence for the office is what laid the foundation for the true friendships with president bill clinton, george h.w. bush, you know, reached toward and held on to and introduced to george w. bush. they became close friends. george w. bush followed that model, reached forward to president obama and mrs. obama. those friendships came from a reverence for the office of the president. it's not just holding their nose

because the president got a headline that said he's been exonerated, which a property said we do not exonerate by robert mueller, who oddly also worked in the bush era, both wxts aw and 41. it's acknowledging a debasement of the presidency, it's greenlighting the basement of the very office of the bush family and obamas revered. >> it is. for the supporters that have traditionally come along during the bush years. they made their own deal with the devil. what are they getting out of a trump administration? to your point i think it was bush 41 in a note to bill clinton who had just bian him by a very tough re-election bid and won in which he took the defeet personally. bush 41 said i believe to bill clinton, you're now my president. that's not something we will ever see from this administration and the voices where current republicans, bush republicans if want to call them that truly fall silent, it's in checking donald trump on that

issue. at the end of the day, those are the type of issue that's define us, that moment where finally we are laid to rest. it's not the policies. yes, we can fight over health care policies. how to ensure equal access to quality health care. at the end of the day the dignity, moral decisions made by individuals where they're in leadership or choosing to support leaders of different kinds, those are how people, voters included, are defined at the end of their days. >> karine, this is a feeling, it's not a fight, right? this is a feeling that the democrats have a clear advantage on. i mean, to be totally honest, there are people -- there are only about a minivan full of people, like me and david. because if there were more of us, donald trump wouldn't have won the primary and sailing to 90%, 95% approval in the republican party. how did democrats capture this feeling of all that's been lost in this office and differentiate themselves? >> i actually think the democratic base has been there already.

i think the feeling for them was launched really that weekend of the inauguration, right, when the hundreds of thousands of women came out and said no, we're not doing this. we're going to stand there for each other. some of them decided to go out and run and look what happened in 2018. and then we're talking about health care. if it wasn't for 2017, what happened that summer with people coming out and saying no, we're not repealing aca, we're not taking away our health care. i think the energy is there. and i think what democrats need to do is continue that. and that's the hard part, right? how do you continue? what do you do? you have to inspire. you have to talk about what's the future somewh? what are we going to go for this country? not just the party but the country as a whole. and that's what the 12 or so candidates in the race need to do. we have to set a contrast. we have to say this is what's going on now in this white house but this can't be who we are. >> and i talked to republican allies of this president this

week, and i said, are you relieved or worried? and they said he does the most damage when he feels good. so they said they thought the political picture for the party was slightly better than him worried than emboldened and feeling liberated. >> i don't think they're wrong. we see what happens time and time again, when this president goes on offense, it's the scattered-shot approach. the health care, tweeting and talking, that wasn't a planned tragedy and approach republicans were on board with. we're going to move forward here. when he's in a crouched position is when he goes quiet and things go along. there was a period right before the report came out where mueller gave it to barr, bill barr, where they were concerned. they didn't know what would happen. now it is free range. you have them going what's happening at puerto rico and health care and the special olympics, expect more of the same. >> you know him. >> i think they could have spent this week entirely saying look

at all of these fools who have been shouting collusion and criticizing me for two years. they've all gotten the comeuppance. he could have spent one day on the press and one day on the political opposition, et cetera, et cetera, all through the next week. instead within 24 hours of it, they do a bellyflop on health care, for exactly the reason you're saying. when donald trump gets comfortable, he doesn't aim higher, he jumps off the diving board and he lands on his stomach. >> aye-yi-yi, from the insane to the sublime. as we go to break, i want to take a moment to remember an american hero. just a few minutes ago at the white house, president trump awarded the post chew mouse medal of honor to the sergeant in iraq. he saved the life of three fellow soldiers. we are all grateful for his service to the country. biopharmaceutical researchers.

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one of robert mueller's most important witnesses, former fbi director james comey, whose firing is at the center of the obstruction of justice case against the president, just sat down exclusively with our friend lester holt in his first interview since barr's summary of the mueller report was released. here's the preview. >> then the firing may 3, 2017, you go before the senate judiciary committee, talk about a lot of things, clinton e-mail server but decline to answer questions about evidence of collusion at that point. a couple days later you're fired p a few days after i sit down with president trump. he said when i decided to just do it, talking about firing you, i said to myself, this russia thing with trump and russia is a made-up story. what did you think when you heard that? >> i thought that's potentially obstruction of justice and i hope somebody is going to look at that. again, the president appears to be saying -- i don't know what's in his head which is why i can't

reach the conclusion, but what he appears to be saying is i got rid of this guy to shut down an investigation that threatened me. >> so, berit, again, i don't know what's in his know what is in his head, and robert mueller doesn't know what is in his head because robert mueller did not interview him. >> that is a fantastic question, and i think we won't understand it all until we see the report. to the extent that james comey is confused -- sflt part that is confusin confusing, this is also from former director comey, i can't quite understand what is going on with the obstruction stuff, and i have great faith in bob mueller but i can't tell from the muller why county didn't he

these questions. >> no, and one thing that sticks out to me is that if james comey is confused about this conclusion, what about the prosecutors around the country currently building obstruction charges of their own. but they're trying to build cases that that perhaps they don't have rock solid evidence, but they think they i have a pretty strong case of construction. they have to be incredibly confused now by the guidance their getting from the attorney general and the well settled case law that said it doesn't matter if someone committed the crime, it can still on instruct the investigation. >> i a have often wondered that when the president said, coming out and attacking flippers, people that cop rate with federal investigations, coming out to attack michael cohen that

tried to kpocooperate with the investigations into him. what effect does that have on law enforcement down the line. >> i then when he is going on twitter to potentially speak to witnesses around him, he is dandling a parddangling a part n pardon. they are still doing, rudy julianny just did today, and even in the wake of something that should have been a win for them, lying about events, the fact pattern and the chronology.

if you have nothing to lie about, don't lie about it. >> what do you make of jim comey who is so central to this story for so many reasons, donald trump cleared the oval office out, he asked jim comey to see to it to let mike flynn go, and he went through some of that history, trump talking it through, throwing open the curtains saying i fired him because i didn't like the way this investigation was going and we learned from reporting in the new york times, and that the act of firing the fbi was considered to perhaps also be the collusion. it also triggered new questions around counter intelligence,

what clarity did robert mueller, who spent two years looking at this, give us? >> i think james comey believes that donald trump committed obstruction. i just think that james comey doesn't have a position in which he is able to make that declaration, but i think he continues to point to the world and prosecutors that indeed he did. this is where i think william barr's testimony to congress will leave us with more questions than answers. there will be a lot of daylight establishes between muellers findings in and of themselves. . he is telling us there is behavior there that raises questions. we saw it in helsinki. we have seen the behavior. the question is how did bill barr draw his conclusions of mueller's report, and bill sbar

a political actor. he made is decision to sit out there and let the president claim exoneration. what we must not do is allow the president to conflate exoneration. find indication is very different from legal exoneration that the president is claiming. >> the danger for republicans seems to be getting too involved. if they would just let -- i mean there is plenty in here for them to latch on to. no criminal conspiracy. instead calling names is like a path that will guarantee that they will step on political land

mines. >> they say we want to see the documents. i think they're trying to move slowly and step by step, and they want to have, they're definitely going to call bill barr up to testify. they are trying very hard not to get out in front of their skis. i any you have seen some senate republicans say we need to move on. the american public is ready to do other things besides talk about this investigation and they're clearly looking to the next election. >> and they will talk about donald trump's efforts to take health care away from 20 million people. watch more of that exclusive interview with jim comey tonight on why the nbc news with lester holt. ews with lester holt what it means ♪ ♪ to walk along the lonely street of dreams ♪

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my thanks to my guests, that does it for our hour, thank you for watching, i'm nicolle wallace, i'm talking fast, you were fantastic this week talking to us through the staning breaking news, i could not take your eyes off of you. zlaun >> thank you, we had an amazing team here, i had everybody in place to make it all -- >> i'm going to pass this down to