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tv   The Rachel Maddow Show  MSNBC  April 13, 2019 6:00pm-7:00pm PDT

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total pie and that's where policy comes in. all right, we've got a great why is this happening this week you should definitely check out in which i talk to a prison abolitionist. it's a way of thinking about criminal justice i think will change the way you see things. that is "all in" for this evening. the rachel maddow show starts right now. thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. happy friday. you made it. today a federal judge handed down the most lenient sentence yet against any of the defendants charged in the mueller investigation or in any of the prosecutions that have derived from the mueller investigation. his name was sam paton. he pled guilty last year to lying to investigators. in a plea agreement in which he admitted a ranging and illegal $50,000 foreign donation into the trump inaugural. he also admitted lobbying as a
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foreign agent without led registering and lying to federal investigators and others about that. sam paton pled guilty last year. prosecutors have since said he started cooperating with prosecutors even before he signed his formal plea agreement, even before he pled guilty. they say he's been very helpful. judge amy berman jackson in washington, d.c. today explained she would have considered a prison sentence for sam paton were it not for his considerable cooperation with prosecutors. but given the nature of his crime and his lack of a previous criminal record and prosecutors wholehearted endorsement and appreciation for whatever it is he's been helping with them all these months the judge ultimately gave sam paton today three years probation and a $5,000 fine. and again we think that may be the lightest sentence of anybody thus far as a mueller defendant. that said with sam paton's case
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now coming to a close and him walking out of the courtroom today a free man, we the people, we the observers of this whole scandal and investigation, we're all still very much in the dark as to how his case and his cooperation fit into the larger investigation. i mean, prosecutors said in open court and in a public facing court filing that sam paton had been a great cooperator. he had very willingly and honestly given them tons of good help with lots of ongoing cases. but when it comes to the details of what he actually helped them with, what he actually told them, those are still a mystery to us because they were all filed under seal to judge jackson in advance of today's sentencing. so who knows if we the public will ever see those details. unless and until we do, we'll never really have any inkling as to what sam paton was helping with, what sam paton gave prosecutors they thought was of so much value. and it's of interest because sam paton had ties to so many
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different elements of this scandal. he had connections to cambridge analytica, the murky and now defunct scandal ridden foreign firm that the trump campaign usedads their data operation during the campaign. sam patten had business collections to konstantin kilimnik. prosecutors have said in court on multiple occasions they assess him to be linked to russian intelligence. sam patten of course also admitted to being involved in funneling foreign money into the trump inaugural. and the trump inaugural we know is the subject of multiple investigations. also reportedly being investigated by multiple states attorneys general, by at least one other u.s. attorneys office and by multiple congressional committees. was sam patten who illegally funneled moeny into the
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inaugural, was he helpful to investigators who were looking into any of those matters? at this point we do not know. whatever he helped with is still all under seal. all we know is that prosecutors were absolutely delighted with him. and that is why he walked today with just probation and a relatively small fine. and speaking of ongoing investigations today we also got this 19-page filing from federal prosecutors explaining actually to the same judge, to judge amy berman jackson in district court in washington, d.c. why prosecutors want her to reject a request from a number of media organizations including cnn and "the new york times" and politico and "the washington post." all of whom are looking to have documents unsealed from the ongoing case against the president's long time political advisor roger stone. roger stone is due to go on trial in d.c. this fall. the media companies that are making this request to the
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judge, they want unredacted copies of the search warrants that were executed against roger stone around the time he was arrested and charged in january. prosecutors at the u.s. attorney's offices in d.c. tell the court today these requested materials, they understand why the news organizations want to see them. but they say in this filing today that those stone search warrants can't be shown to the public because of three things that would be adversely affected if the public had access to those documents. number one, the forthcoming trial this fall in united states vs. stone. it would affect their effectiveness at prosecuting roger stone. also they say there are privacy interests for uncharged third parties which would be affected by unsealing that search warrant information. and they say unsealing that information would affect investigations that remain ongoing. what are those ongoing
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investigations? we don't know. for the same reason that the sam patten stuff was all filed under seal because it relates to ongoing investigations, same thing with the stone stuff. prosecutors are saying, no, roger stone's search warrant materials should motnot be released, at least not yet. in the meantime we actually learned one other surprise fact from prosecutors tonight which is about robert mueller in the special counsel's office. we of course know mueller three weeks ago submitted his report to the newly appointed attorney general william barr. he promptly threw it in a drawer and nobody has seen it since. we'll have more on that later. but the submission of his report three weeks go we were told at the time the report went in the special counsel's office would be wrapping up in days, its
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investigation was complete, and what they'd be doing for their next jobs. we have since seen evidence and court filings of all of the ongoing court cases involving all of the indictments brought by the special counsel's office. those are being handed off to u.s. attorneys offices around the country. mostly to the u.s. attorneys office in d.c. we've seen all this evidence how things are wrapping up around robert mueller and his special counsel's office. but today little surprise at the end of the this filing we learned one of the relatively high profile prosecutors on mueller's team, we had previously not heard where he was going in terms of him getting a new job. but now we know he has been named a special assistant u.s. attorney in the u.s. attorney's office in d.c. so that's new information. one of mueller's prosecutors has essentially been transferred. he's been named a special assistant u.s. attorney in the
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prosecutor's office in that d.c. u.s. attorneys office that has been received most of mueller's ongoing cases. so a special counsel's office lawyer moved over to the office receiving all the special counsel office's cases. the special counsel's spokesman tonight confirmed to us esaaron zulinsky has made that move. as to whether we should expect other appointments to help with on going prosecutions that started with mueller, we don't yet know if any other special counsel's office prosecutors will do that. so far it seems that aaron zelinsky is the only one. thatads we mark today three weeks since mueller's report was turned in and we remainen this remarkable period in american history, this remarkable --
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trump's newly appointed attorney general william barr of course has been saying he assigned a redaction team to cut stuff out of mueller's report before it's released either to the public or to congress. barr says that that redaction team includes staff from mueller's office, from the special counsel's office as well as justice department personnel. this new information today we got about aaron zelinsky from the special counsel's office remind us we have actually no idea which staff from the special counsel's office has been taking part in this so-called redaction team that barr has been describing. nor do we have any ideas who else is on that team. we have no idea what other lawyers or staffers from the justice department had been working on those redactions as well. are the other people besides special office personnel working on that redaction team are they
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career justice department personnel who participated with the special counsel's office in their investigation and prosecutions? or are they random trump appointees who have been put into a room with someone from the special counsel's office and everyone gets a sharpened pencil and no one gets any water and you see who lives the longest and no one makes it out the door. how is that process working? how did anyone earn a role on that team if what they're doing right now is sensoring that mueller report? we have no idea. we are expecting some sensored version, some redacted version of mueller's report to be released to the public some time next week. if it happens over the weekend, i'll see you back on tv. i will be mad if i have to do that over the weekend. but if nothing else, please join me if that happens so that we
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can if nothing else commiserate about the las of weekend time for all the things we like to do on our weekends. we don't necessarily expect it over the weekend. everybody is telling us some time in the next week. we'll see. we'll be right here as soon as it comes in. meanwhile today, though, gregory craig entered a not guilty plea in federal court in december on two felony kounlts. the former white house counsel from president obama's first time in office, from his first year in office. gregory craig entered a not guilty plea today after he was indicted yesterday on charges of lying to investigators about his contract with a ukrainian political party that was a client of trump campaign chair paul manafort. pled not guilty today. was released on personal recog nizance. you will recall earlier this year his highfalutin law firm entered into a settlement with the justice department. it included a non pros cushion agreement. the law firm had to pay a little fine, had to say they were
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sorry, had to agree to do some training. but in that agreement the law firm basically blamed greg craig for all of it, said everything was all ohis fault. that was nice of them. the firm because of that non pros cushion agreement they are not being prosecuted for what gregory craig allegedly did while he was a senior partner at that firm. as of today he says he will plead not guilty. he says he's innocent, he says he wants to go to trial. and on top of all of that tonight elijah cummings tonight has announced to members of his committee that if they have a problem with what he's about to do they can come talk to him about it over the weekend. but unless somebody talks him out of it right now his intention is that on monday morning he is going to deliver a sme subpoena to a company called mzars usa.
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trump organization executive and the president's long time perm lawyer michael cohen testified to elijah cummings' committee earlier this year about the president allegedly committing bank fraud and allegedly committing insurance fraud by misrepresenting his assets and insurance standing. michael cohen provided to cohen's committee a few years of financial statements. comings and his committee started investigating cohen's claims. as part of that investigation this financial firm that works with trump expressed to comings' committee while they didn't have any intention of resisting the committee's inquiries they would rather not respond to a simple request from the committee to hand over information. they would prefer to respond to a subpoena. well, we now know they're getting a subpoena on monday. and we now know this is exactly what they're going to be asked to hand over. and it's sort of breathtaking.
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quote, with respect to donald j. trump the donald j. trump revicable trump, the trump corporation, donald j. trump holdings, the trump post office, the trump foundation and any parent, subsidiary, joint venture or predecessor of the foregoing with respect to all of those, mazars is ordered to hand over all annual statements, periodic financial reports and independent auditor reports compared, reviewed or audited by mazars' predecessor. they will have to hand over all underlying, supporting or source documents or records related to those documents. they're also ordered to hand over communications between a specific named partner at the firm and president trump or the trump organization. i don't know what that's about. and this is the most interesting
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part to me, at least the most intriguing part. this subpoena specifically directs mazars to hand over all communications, quote, related to potential concerns that records, documents, explanations or other information provided by donald trump or other individuals from the trump organization were incomplete, inaccurate or otherwise unsatisfactory. so if there was any discussion within this accounting firm that they were getting a horse pucky from donald trump or the trump organization when it came to his assets or financial standing, the firm is now being directed by subpoena to produce any documents, any internal communications that attests to any worries they had in the firm. any concerns or conclusions they came to at that firm about the prospect that stuff they were getting from donald trump or the trump organization was a lot of
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hooey. so this subpoena demands those internal communications be handed over to comings and the oversight committee. the subpoena is going out on monday. and i think this is big deal in terms of what kind of information congress is going to have to work from ipits myriad investigations of the president. we still don't know if anyone investigating the president either from the mueller investigation or any of the intended investigations that happened in u.s. attorneys offices or any of the congressional investigations we still don't have any sense any investigator has ever had any substantial information when it comes to money, to the president's finances, his businesses, his taxes. if mazars is about to hand all this stuff over for years and years and years of the president's financial matters and his businesses, a, this will be a big piece of information. but this will also ratchet up
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even further pressure on the question why the president still won't allow anyone to see his tax returns. i mean he tried to do this whole thing where he pretended if you were under audit you're not allowed to release his tax returns. even his own irs admits that's not true. the president still sometimes admits that's not true. that appears to be inoperables a potential explanation why the president won't release his tax. he's the first president in four decades to refuse to let anyone see his tax returns either as a candidate or sitting president. why? we know it's not the audit. why? what is he so worried about st.? and know it's among one thing of many going on right now, but on the taxes thing we are really in an unprecedented stand off in which the trump administration appears to be flat out be breaking black letter law by refusing to hand over the president's tax returns after they were requested from the irs by the careman of the ways and
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means committee. the irs has to hand over any return, including the president's return if that return is requested by that committee chairman in the way it was requested this past week, that've to do it under law. the administration is so far just refusing. i mean, they're trying to delay. they're implying they're reviewing it. they're implying there might be some grounds in which they might wage a legal fight over this. they really appear to have no legal leg to stand on at all. they're just defiant in what the law says they have to do. i'm assuming their strategy is to expect nobody will have the wherewithal or bravery to enforce that law while they just continue to fragrantly break it. but this is direct, clear legal confrontation between the administration refusing to do something they're lawfully required to do and no one has any idea how that will be
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enforced. while the oversight committee is about to get a ton of information on the president that may shed light on why he's trying to hold those taxes back. on top of all that drama, today you may or may not seen that a great newspaper in southern california called the palm beach post has also on top of all that broken a brand new story. that is whole other level of, oh, my god, they did what now? i'm not sure if you've heard about it but it is a doozy and coming up next. stay with us. doozy and coming up next stay with us allergy pills? most pills don't finish the job because they don't relieve nasal congestion. flonase sensimist is different. it relieves all your worst symptoms, including nasal congestion, which most pills don't. it's more complete allergy relief. and all from a gentle mist you can barely feel. flonase sensimist helps block six key inflammatory substances. most pills only block one. and six is greater than one.
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those fairy fancy cakes, those deserts where it looks like a normal cake from the outside but then you put your fork on the inside and it turns out it's a not a normal cake, but a stack of like ten different little cakes, apparently this is whole category of dessert. i didn't know this existed before this year on my birthday. the nice ladies in the hair and make-up room they got me a cake like that for my birthday. i looked at the piece of cake they gave me and had a handle in it and i thought it was cheesecake. and put my fork in it and thought no it's 10,000 tiny little cheesecakes all stacked
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on top of each other. it was the greatest thing i'd ever put in my mouth. i had no idea that existed before this month. and that is what this news story out of south florida is except it's not a million layers of cake. it's a million layers of weirdness. one on top of the other that cull culminate in tonight's new stories. it started with the owners of the patriots football team robert kraft and a number of other guys getting picked up on a number of prostitution charges tied a massage parlor. what does this have to do with the president? this is just layer one. we would soon learn that the original owner of the massage parlor and alleged prostitution den in question was someone who was a ubiquitous presence at the president's florida club which is called mar-a-lago. the pictures of this woman with the president alone are their own distinct level of weirdness
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for this story. then you get the next layer on top of that which is miami herald reporting that she seems to be tied to a number of organizations that are sponsored by or affiliated with the chinese government and/or the ruling chinese communist party. including the chinese government inviting her to visit a chinese worship into a florida port. on top of that we're learning through really good reporting that the same woman has been running a very special kind of investment company which she has been marketing in china. the investment she's looking for is a cash investment in her. what her company will sell you if you pay her is she'll get you into mar-a-lago to meet the president or meet a member of the president's family or meet trump administration cabinet members or perhaps you would prefer a white house meeting. you could pay her to get one of those as well, at least so said her marketing company. at this point in the delicious
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layer cake we've got the sellin nationals personal physical access to the president, his family, and cabinet officials in the administration while she is simultaneously hanging out at the president's club, taking pictures with him and working with the chinese commist party and chinese government in a number of murky organizations that seem to have no real public facing purpose. layer on top of that the arrest on march 30th of a new lady we had never heard of before at mar-a-lago and a secret service affidavit that soon followed which explained the strange tail of this woman inexplicably being allowed into mar-a-lago while the president was there. she claimed to be there for a u.s.-chinese friendship event which was maybe something marketed by the chinese parlor lady. it was an event not happening at mar-a-lago that day in any event inasmuch she also told secret service officials at one point perhaps she was just there at mar-a-lago to go swimming.
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the initial affidavit indicated that the woman when she was arrested was not found to be carrying a swimsuit. she was founds to be carrying four cellphones, a laptop, an external hard drive and a thumb drive which they soon realized was infected with malicious malware. a secret service agent who later testified in court admitted part of the reason they knew that while they were questioning her one secret service popped the thumb drive into his computer. it immediately began to install files. the agent saw it as a very out of the ordinary event he had never seen happen before. the agent had to immediately stop the analysis to halt any further corruption of his computer. we then learn that the woman was not just carrying the four cellphones, the laptop, the external hard drive and the thumb drive infected with malicious malware that immediately starts installing itself witness you pop it into any usb drive.
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in her hotel room down the road agents founds she was also storing nine additional usb drives, five sim cards, yet another cellphone so five cellphones and a signal detector apparently used to find surveillance devices like hidden cameras. also thousands and thousands of dollars in cash. she initially told secret service agents who questioned her as to why she had the four cellphones and laptop with her that she didn't want to leave valuable stuff like that in her hotel room. just the thousands of dollars in cash, that was okay to leave there. and remember besides she was just there at mar-a-lago to go swimming. it's been a long time since i was a lifeguard but i would advise you if you've got that many electronic devices on you don't try to swim. today the woman with all the of electronics and cash who turned up at mar-a-lago she was
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indicted in federal court in florida. she has been held in custody. she's receiving consular assistance from the chinese government. it does appear she may have had links to massage parlor lady who was offering to sell chinese nationals access to the president through mar-a-lago. that has not been flushed out in any court documents yet so we await further information on that. look at what the palm beach post has piled on top of this stack. when you thought you couldn't take one more layer. this is the may flower hotel which is very swanky, quite near the white house in downtown washington, d.c. this is the picture of an event that took place in the ballroom of the may flower hotel the night donald trump was sworn in january 2017. 24 event apparently featured hundreds of guests, also an asian opera star, also lots of fancy -- a big fancy dance
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performance. it was a big gala evnlt. this is from a facebook photoee which described the event as a asian-american pacific islander gala to celebrate trump's inauguration. also a registered political committee which is called the national committee of asian-american republicans. guess who's the head fund-raiser of the national committee for asian republican americans? it's the massage parlor lady. of course it is. to attend this inaugural gala co-hosted by the trump committee you had to pay this ticket to get in, which apparently hundreds of people did. but there were also named sponsors of the event according to someone who worked on fund-raiser for the event those named sponsors for this gala paid anywhere between $5,000 and $15,000 to be listed as a major sponsor of that event.
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all of the checks of the people who attend that evmt, all the checks from the big dollar sponsors, they were all made out to that asian-american political commity to the national committee of asian-american republicans. that's who everybody made their check out to. everybody who bought a ticket, all of the sponsors. and then all of the money promptly disappeared. quoting today from today's palm beach post, quote thunes of dollars in donations flowed to an undisclosed source at a trump inaugural ball and dubious donors but no financial records. the lavish asian pacific presidential inaugural gala drew more than 900 people, quote, but there's no trace of the money raised that night as required by law. because the national committee of asian-american republicans the event host is a registered republican committee, any contributions to that committee must by law be quickly reported to the federal election commission.
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but despite this gala event no donations were ever reported. the committee's executive director a florida tech entrepreneur named cliff lee told the palm beach post -- this is the greatest line in the entire thing, that he knows where the money from this event went, quote, but i don't want to tell you. lee has drawn international attention as an associate of cindy yang, the massage parlor lady, the one time head of fund-raising for the committee that had the massage parlor. people involved in the gala event, the inaugural evnlt again say are the checks from this evnlt were made out to the national -- it's not clear if any of those foreign nationals contributed any money to that
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event or paid to get in. of course foreign nationals are not allowed to give money to that kind of political committee. but regardless none of the money was reported anywhere. this is one of the trump inaugural galas. you had to pay to get in and sponsor it. there were lots of named sponsors. what happened to all the money. the only explanation from the people who were running this thing, again who have on the one hand is the trump campaign adjunct group, right, and then it's the asian-american republican committee. again where the li fund-raiser is the massage parlor lady who's linked to the thumb drives at mar-a-lago lady. they're just refuse to say what happened to any of the money they raised at that event. quote, li declined to say how much money were raised that night or how much any donations went to him, the embattled trump inaugural committee or any of the event organizers. he told "the post," quote, the money went into the right account legally but i just don't
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have to tell you where that is. i just don't have to tell you. i am not sure how much taller this particular slice of weirdness can get before it topples over. but the this relates back to the trump inaugural with all of the ongoing investigations of the trump inaugural already including two u.s. attorneys offices, i mean that's going to be linkled as well to the mar-a-lago insane chinese spying story, too? seriously? joining us now a reporter for the palm beach post who broke this story. i really appreciate you being here. thank you. >> thanks for having me, rachel. >> you can tell i think this is little bit of a gonzo story. but let me ask you if i got the basic details in terms of what you were able to find out about this gala, the political committee and what happened to the money. >> yeah, absolutely. you pretty much summed it up. it's pretty complicated but there was this inaugural gala
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and we have no financial records to tell us where that money went. foreign nationals attended and we have no way of knowing if the money came from them, came from these sponsors and who collected it. >> in terms of the potential legal ramifications here, it seems like you've got a scoop on your hands here. you and the palm beach post producing this today is the first time i think anybody's seen reference to this line of inquiry. but you do point out the committee involved here that was the apparent recipient of all these funds they were required to report any donation. in fec filings they've never reported anything to this event. do we know if they're looking into this at all? >> they haven't acknowledged any open investigates as far as we know. but it is pretty recent. this appears to be the first reporting about this, so who knows what lines of inquiry are going to pop up. >> you also mentioned that among
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the -- obviously people had to pay to get in. it was ticket price to get in. but there were also named sponsors of the event that seems to have paid several thousand dollars at least to be sponsored. one of the things you mention in your piece is that the lead sponsor of the event was raided by the fbi just a few weeks after this event happened. first of all, is there any indication there's a connection between the fbi raid and what happened at this trump mysterious gala and do we know what that fbi raid was about? >> so that reporting was actually from bloomberg business week, and we know very little about the raid in saipan, at that saipan casino, but we do know about a month later some contractors hired by that casino company were arrested for harboring or hiring foreign workers illegally on tourist visas. so you can, you know, infer that it possibly had something to do with that.
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but interestingly enough these corporations and businesses that sponsored the gala, several of them benefitted from a bill that trump signed into law a year later that actually assisted them in offering more avenues to hiring foreign workers lisly which essentially allowed these businesses to avoid what we now know some of them did do and hire foreign workers illegally on tourist visas. >> i mean, you're right that we don't know how these dots connect. but the dots you've been able to spell outlet with this reporting and connecting to other reporting here is we've got entities including this raided saipan casino firm donating money to an entity that disappeared it. we have no idea where the money went. it definitely wasn't reported to the fec. after that money was donated to this trump inaugural gala, the trump administration did take action to benefit those firms and others like them. now noble's accounted for that money still. and we don't have any sense that anybody's looking for it.
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it's just -- i realize it's a complicated set of facts, but when you liep them up sort of clonlogically in terms of who got what for what they appeared to spend their money on, this is just a stunning piece. please keep us surprised. >> thank you. all right, much more to get to tonight. stay with us. all right, much mo to tonight stay with us on a john deere x300 series mower. because seasons may change... ♪ ...but true character doesn't. ♪ wow, you've outdone yourself this time. hey, what're neighbors for? it's beautiful. nothing runs like a deere™. run with us. save $300 on x330 and x350 select series lawn tractors. at participating john deere dealers.
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wreyesterday the founder of wikileaks was arrested in
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london. yesterday president trump tried to pretend like he'd never heard of this wikileaks let alone sung their praises hundreds of times on the campaign trail, and frankly based the whole end of his presidential campaign on hyping and promoting wikileaks and its distribution of stolen documents that wikileaks distributed after obtaining them from russian intelligence. i've never -- don't recall. that was the president yesterday. today it was the vice president's turn to weigh in on this delicate matter. it went poorly. >> the justice department is now seeking extradition and we're going to bring julian assange to justice. look, working with chelsea manning. julian assange was involved in one of the greatest compromises of classified information in american history, literally put american military personnel at risk and we'll hold him to
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account. >> what about 2016, the president when he was a candidate welcomed seeing wikileaks and the information that they got from hillary clinton. has that changed? >> i think the president as always as you and the media do, always welcomes information. but that was in no way an endorsement. we now understand was involved in disseminating classified information by the united states of america. >> that was ipno way an endorsement. the president saying i love wikileaks, or wikileaks is a treasure-trove or saying go look at the wikileaks, mentioning the organization 141 times at rallies alone in the campaign's final month. not an endorsement. it's just this is president who's a veracious consumer of information. he's a reader. but i would also draw your attention to that thing that pence said there at the end.
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can we just play that end part? >> that was in no way an endorsement. an organization we now understand was involved in disseminating classified information of the united states of america. >> we now understand. now we know. i mean well after the campaign now we know that this was an organization that was involved in disseminating classified information. you know, back in 2010 around the time of the whole wikileaks chelsea manning gigantic hack thing that has now led to these charges against julian assange, mike pence was like, what, the number three republican in congress? that was kind of a skanldal can the time. the idea that wikileaks was involved in the distribution of classified information we now understand was involved in disseminating classified information wae-- we now undersd
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that? that happened in 2010. i think of myself as a marathon news consumer but i admit mike pence is kind of wearing me out with this. we now understand them to have -- we'll be right back. d t have -- we'll be right back. the unmistakable lexus is. lease the 2019 is 300 for $329 a month for 36 months. experience amazing at your lexus dealer. ♪ the house, kids, they're living the dream ♪ ♪ and here comes the wacky new maid ♪ -maid? uh, i'm not the... -♪ is she an alien, is she a spy? ♪ ♪ she's always here, someone tell us why ♪ -♪ why, oh, why -♪ she's not the maid we wanted ♪ -because i'm not the maid! -♪ but she's the maid we got -again, i'm not the maid. i protect your home and auto. -hey, campbells. who's your new maid? i protect your home and auto.
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dot, new tweet, transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the u.s. military. our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming dot dot dot dot, new tweet, victory that cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. thank you. with that series of vaguely incoherent tweets in july 2017 the still fairly new president declared a new policy on who would be allowed to serve their country in the united states military. he surprised the thousands of transgender troops that seem today be serving just fine. he surprised military leadership whold be trying to implement this new announced by tweet policy. the new policy was fought over in the courts round after round in finally in january the conservative majority on the supreme court ruled the president could impose this rule
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he had unveiled randomly on twitter. and today it happened. the trump administration's official anti-trans policy goes into effect today. if you are currently serving you are counseled on your failure to adhere to standards and, quote, given an opportunity to correct those deficiencies. the advent of this new policy drew sharp approach from medical leaders including former u.s. and military surgeons general who released a blistering statement today condemning the new policy. quote, we are troubled by the defense department's characterization of the need to undergo gender transition as a deficiency. we've already expressed our concern over the defense department's misuse of science to justify discharging transgender service members and deinoog them medically necessary
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care. quote, here we note there's a global medical consensus that the need to undergo gender transition is not a deficiency or defect that stigmatizing transgenders in this way is inappropriate and scapegoating and denial of medical care will compromise the well-being of transgender. i wonder how usee any parallels or lack thereof in terms of how this policy is being implemented and the type of discrimination it means.
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how is this going to work in terms of grands fauring people in who came out under the previous policy when the previous type of discrimination of this kind was dropped by president obama? >> yes, so there were about 14,700 transgender troops today and about 1,000 of them have received diagnoses of gender
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dysphoria since inclusive policy was put into place. >> given the supreme court ruling that effectivally allowed this to happen today, i think the number of transgender troops who are serving openly and proudly and benefitting the military is going to create i think sort of an unstoppable moral force in terms of this being eventually overturned, but
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we'll see you then. now it's time for the last word with al shi velshi. >> he's surging because people know how to pronounce his name. people were struggling him. but they couldn't say his name. >> and you could either do buttigieg or jute budge. >> it fits everybody. >> i'm looking forward to your conversation with him. have a great weekend. >> it's been 100 days since everything changed for donald trump. because the democrats took control of the house of representatives. tonight i'll be joined by several freshman democrats who have already made a big impact on the trump