>> it's a nationwide strategy. i'm going to go everywhere. >> we are out of time. thank you very much. good luck on the campaign trail. that does it for us. the "the rachel maddow show" starts now. good evening. >> good evening my friend. thank you so much for joining us. happy monday. by the summer of 1970, the u.s. military had been in vietnam in one form or another for nearly 15 years. richard nixon had taken office the previous year, sworn in at the beginning of 1969, promising to finally end that endless war in vietnam. but there, of course, was no sign that it was ending by the following year, 1970. on june 21st, 1970, this was the story on the front page of "the new york times." the headline inquiry quar stirs more dissent among gis." as the war drags on the army is finding itself plagued by a

growing struggle of another sort, against dissidence in its own ranks. the ultimate aim. dissidence aided by civilian rallies is to stop the war machine, bring all american troops back from overseas and did he mock ties the u.s. army. they are also seeking to create a radical force in the military that will carry its commitment back into civilian life. these are the men who are publishing the g.i. underground newspapers, organizing protests and peace demonstrations, working closely in many base areas across the country with at least eight coffee houses and with other projects sponsored by such civilian support organizations as the united states servicemen's fund. g.i. coffee houses. hm. starting the late '60s through the end of the vietnam war, individual anti-war activists and organizations like the united states servicemen's fund,

they established these coffee houses, these gathering spots sided near u.s. army bases across the country. that were basically trying to support and build anti-war sentiment among serving soldiers, the idea was to give service members a place where they could safely vent their frustrations with the military or vocalize their opposition to the vietnam war or connect with civilian activists to organize against the war. the times report that the u.s. servicemen's fund was providing assistance to these coffee houses to anti-war underground newspapers and to other anti-war projects. the "times" interviewed one regional coordinator for that fund, pointed out he wears the mustache and moderately long hair now in style in the movement. you know what that means. the following year in 1971, the

actress jane fonda, and a troop of other actors and comediennes d -- comedians did a tour with readings and skits. the "times" filed a report from one of their stops from a servicemen's fund coffee house near fort bragg in north carolina. in one skit as the "times" reported it, jane fonda played first lady pat nixon, and in this skit he rushes in to tell her husband the president that there's a massive demonstration outside preparing to storm the white house, and the president nixon character says, oh, i'd better call the army. jane fonda/pat nixon says, you can't, richard. he says, why not? and then jane fonda with the punch line, dick, it is the army out there. so these coffee houses, this slice of the anti-vietnam war movement, this provocative organizing effort targeting

serving g.i.s, it started to get a bunch of media attention. once it did, it got congressional attention, and that got really aggressive really fast. the senate convened hearings into where the you asked servicemen east fund was engaging in activists harmful to the morale of the u.s. armed forces. and then the senate subpoenaed the bank that the u.s. servicemen's fund used as its bank, demanding their financial records. and the u.s. servicemen's fund fought back against that. this is how the case was described in the journal of the american bar association in 1975. quote, the senate subcommittee on internal security issued a subpoena to the bank at which ussf had an account. they brought suit to restrain enforcement of the subpoena and to prevent the bank from complying with the subpoena. the organization alleged that the sole purpose of the subpoena was to harass, chill, punish,

and deteriorate the servicemen's fund in their exercise of their rights and duties under the first amendment. the senate subcommittee on internal security. the senate subcommittee on internal security was the entity that issued the subpoena to the bank of this servicemen's fund that was running these coffee houses. it's not considered to be one of the high points in proud american governance. it was kind of a senate equivalent to the house on american activities committee. it was ultimately abolished not long after in 1977. but for the two decades leading up to his abolition, it was chaired by the white supremacist segregationist mississippi senator james eastland. that's why this case involving the servicemen's fund and the anti-war g.i. coffee houses, the case was called east land v

servicemen's fund. it was decided in 1975 and ended up being a landmark supreme court case. it recognizes law when it comes to subpoenas from congress. and the grounds on which you might challenge a subpoena from congress. or you might resist one or decry one as improper and thereby getting out of having to respond to it. and the reason it is seen as a foundational case in that regard is because the u.s. servicemen's fund, the group that was funding the gi coffee houses, part of anti-war movement, they lost that case in the supreme court. the supreme court ruled as long as the congress is performing its legislative duty, which necessarily includes investigations relating to all sorts of things including the functioning of the armed services or any part of the u.s. government, as long as they are pursuing a legislative duty, then the question of why congress is undertaking any

particular investigation or issuing any particular subpoena, it's none of the court's business. this is from a con occurring opinion in the case by thurgood marshall. a court's inquiry in a setting is limited. if the senator's actions were within the legitimate legislative sphere, the matter ends there and they are answerable no further to the court. i mean, you could be forgiven here if the side you were rooting for was the anti-war activists funding these little g.i. coffee shops near army bases, right? if you're sympathies here were not with the segregationist white supremacist senator who was running his own personal dissent smashing subcommittee in the u.s. senate. i also think it's fair to assume that justice thurgood marshall who vote the con occurring opinion in this case, he was not a huge fan of james eastland in most of the things that james eastland did in the u.s. senate.

but so much more to the point here, that the law here ever since 1975, reaffirmed over and over again since then, is that even when congress is terrible, even if the worst case scenario when congress is being a bunch of freaking jerks, even when congress plainly is issuing subpoenas in what is obviously terrible bad faith, even when they are at rock bottom in terms of their credibility and what they're trying to do, they have absolute authority to do what they want to do. the courts may or may not like why a particular committee or subcommittee in congress is seeking some kind of information. but they're congress. they are a coequal branch of government. they get to decide what they want to look into. and the courts, as a coequal branch of government, they don't get to weigh in on whether a subpoena idea from congress is noble or sober or wicked or dumb.

what congress investigates is up for congress to decide, and how congress subpoenas information is congress' decision. and that clear precedent, that clear and unequivocal precedent means that our president today did something desperate, that is, destined to fail and fail quickly when the president today decided he was going to bring a personal lawsuit against congress. president trump in his personal capacity today sued congress, sued the oversight committee in the house for them having the temerity to issue a subpoena for his financial records from an accounting firm that spent a lot of years doing various financial work for him including preparing his taxes. even if it were a super far-fetched investigation they were pursuing, what the case law in this area tells us is that the courts would still stay out

of it. but in this case it's not that farfetched. i mean, the president's longtime personal lawyer just testified to congress under oath that president trump committed multiple financial felonies, and he pointed them to the documents that would show evidence of that. kind of seems like there might be a really good reason for congress to see those records. and yes, the president filed this lawsuit today trying to block the oversight committee from subpoenaing these years of records from his longtime accounting firm. you can see in the lawsuit that the oversight committee chairman, elijah cummings is personally named the defendant in that lawsuit from the president today. but as much as i'm sure the president's lawyers are enjoying the billable hours here, this lawsuit appears on track to fail and without much suspense. i'm not a lawyer. don't hire me for anything. once the president did this today, we spoke with a number of people today who are lawyers,

including experts in the field, and they told us this is not an area of law where there is wiggle room. this lawsuit may be an effort by the president to slow things down but it's certainly not going to stop what congress is doing. congressman elijah cummings for his part responded to this lawsuit against him today by saying there is simply no valid legal basis to sbeefrp with this subpoena from congress, this complaint reeds more like political talking points than a reasoned legal belief. in terms of the target of the subpoena, trump's accounting firm, mazars, they say only they will, quote, respect the legal process and fully comply with our legal obligations. and that in an uncomplicated way would include complying with a legal congressional subpoena. so, i mean, we sort of now how this is going to end. it is fascinating. he really does not want congress

to see his finances. in addition to this lawsuit to try to stop the subpoena to his accounting firm, the president has hired a whole team of lawyers that is specifically and only working on the task of keeping his taxes and finances secret. i mean, that's their whole job. that's who's doing this lawsuit for him, concerning the mazars subpoena, that is presumably who is also going to do the other lawsuits that he will file like this for the other subpoenas that will pursue other elements of the president's financial history. that same team of lawyers has written multiple letters to the irs telling the irs that they shouldn't comply with the demand for the tax returns that's been issuing by the chairman of the house ways and means committee. in this case, the law is not gray. the law is very clear cut. the irs is required under law to hand over those returns as requested by the committee chairman. but they're sending threatening legal-sounding letters trying to slow the whole thing down. presumably we expect similar

letters if not additional lawsuits to deutsche bank and all the other financial institutions that have worked with the president who were recently subpoenaed by the chairs of various house committees. congressional democrats are just going ahead and pushing forward with investigating this stuff, despite the fact that the president seems fairly desperate to pull out all the stops to try to block them, slow them down somehow. even when it's clearly legally pointless in the end for him to fight this in some of the ways that he is. the question that democrats are wrestling with is not whether or how much investigating to do. they're all on board with that. the question for democrats is whether their ongoing investigations should stay under the rubric of congressional oversight of the executive branch as they have been doing or whether they should pursue some of these investigations and pursue some of this fact finding under the rubric of an impeachment inquiry.

senator elizabeth warren of massachusetts friday night became the first democratic presidential candidate to see an impeachment inquiry should begin in the house based on the findings of robert mueller's redacted report, which were made public last week. this weekend, elijah culminations, congressman adam schiff of the intelligence committee, jerry nadler, his committee would be the venue for an inquiry, they edging up to the line of considering an inquiry but ultimately said they weren't there yet. house democrats held a conference call among themselves tonight to discuss how they might move forward. the upshot of which was that if the committee chairs committed to conducting aggressive and extensive investigations and oversight of the president, but they did not commit to opening an impeachment inquiry, at least not yet. in terms of the oversight and in terms of these congressional investigations, democratic committee chairs plan to summon a number of interesting witnesses in the days ahead, including newly appointed

attorney general bill barr and the seshpecial counsel himself chris ray. the house judiciary chairman issued a brand-new subpoena to former white house counsel don mcgahn. now, this is a big deal. this subpoena to don mcgahn marks the first subpoena to any trump white house employee encounter or former since the report became public. calls on him to hand over documents and testify on may 21st. if you were planning on going on vacation in the third week in may, you should cancel that. if the don mcgahn testimony is happening may 21st, you're going to want to watch that. don mcgahn is what seems to be the key witness in at least three obstruction of justice instances laid out by the special counsel in his redacted report. these include trump asking mcgann to tell the attorney general jeff sessions that he

should unrecuse himself. trump also ordering don mcgahn to reach out to the justice department about firing robert mueller as special counsel. the president later pressuring don mcgahn to deny that he had ever received that order from the president once word of it leaked to "the new york times." mcgann is memorably quoted in the mueller report saying he needed to quit, leave the white house and leave the job of white house counsel because the president was asking him to do crazy -- rhymes with sp"spit". so, i mean, if don mcgahn is going to testify, you will want to see that. in terms of attorney/client privilege and executive privilege, there will certainly be a fight over that. but the white house counsel is not the president's lawyer. the white house counsel is the lawyer for the office of the president and the start of attorney/client privilege afflictions might attend to the president and some lawyer who was working directly for him not

as white house counsel will not be available to shield mcgann's testimony in the way that donald trump might want. so we shall see how the democrats decide to settle the issue of whether they're going to investigate all of this stuff. but one of the reasons lawmakers seem pretty well-justified in demanding particularly the president's financial information, even as he sort of freaks out in response to these demands, one of the reasons this line of inquiry seems sort of different and maybe more importantly than all the others is that they will be plumbing these depths for the first time. it appears that robert mueller's special counsel investigation, this huge criminal investigation just accounted without mueller having looked at trump's finances at all. and given what a key issue money and influence could be in the counterintelligence matter at the heart of russia investigation, it doesn't seem crazy that congress would feel

the need to look at this stuff trying to get to the bottom of this scandal overly. that said, remember, in terms of the case law here, even if congress was being totally crazy, even if this was a total wild hair and they're doing this out of pure animus, the president would be fine. he would still lose against a congressional subpoena even if it came from some old racist personal activist targeting committee. it doesn't matter the is pursuing things that a court might find objectionable. if congress is pursuing this stuff, subpoenas work. in this case, following the money doesn't seem crazy. i mean, we know that robert mueller didn't follow the money. there was a counterintelligence component to the mueller investigation. he did not produce a counterintelligence report on the findings of that investigation. instead, we learned from mueller's redacted report that he took all the information his investigators gathered that did

not fit into the criminal refutation and sent it to the fbi for them to deal with it in am some other way. this is from mueller's draerktd report. from its inception, special counsel's office recognized its investigation could identify foreign intelligence and counterintelligence information relevant to the fbi's broader national security mission. fbi personnel who assisted the office established procedures to identi identify and convey information to the fbi. the counterintelligence division met with the special counsel's office regularly for that purpose for most of the tenure of the special counsel. the fbi embedded personnel at the special counsel's office wo didn't work on the special counsel's investigation, but whose purpose was to review the results of the investigation and to send in writing summaries of foreign intelligence and counterintelligence information to fbi headquarters and fbi field offices. those communications and other correspondence contain

information derived from the investigation, not all of which is contained in this volume. this volume is a summary. it contains in the special counsel's judgment information necessary to account for the special counsel's prosecution and declination decisions and to describe the main factual results. in other words, this isn't the counterintelligence investigation. in other words, the special counsel's report, robert mueller's redacted report last week says we developed all kinds of information in the course of this investigation that we're not going to put in our report here because it doesn't propaer to it. that said, we turned up some intelligence information and counterintelligence information, we shoved that off to the fbi. nbc news reported late last week that the fbi's counterintelligence investigation of the trump team and russia is still active now.

house intelligence committee under congressman adam schiff made clear they expect a full briefing on what has been found thus far in that ongoing counterintelligence investigation. and i mean, clearly some of what mueller found does have intelligence consequences in terms of thinking about the prospect that people in the government or people associated with the trump campaign may have potentially been compromised by a foreign power. i mean, we now have all this new detail about trump campaign chairman paul manafort and his right-hand man from his years in ukraine. mueller repeated asserted in court documents that the fbi has reason to believe that kilimnik has ongoing ties to russian intelligence. well, in his final redacted report, which we just got, mueller lays out for the first time why it is that they think kilimnik is actually an agent of the russian government. the report says that kilimnik

has been working on behalf of the russian government in recent years trying to get a western pr company to sell the western press some positive spin on russia taking over crimea. he's also been traveling on a russian diplomatic passport. oh. in that context we still don't know why in 2016 during the campaign paul manafort repeatedly gave this guy, kilimnik, months and months and months of internal trump campaign polling data, repeatedly. he also gave kilimnik the status of the trump campaign and manafort's strategy for winning democratic votes in mid-western states. he also briefed kilimnik on the campaign's messaging, including battleground states which manafort identified as michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania and minnesota. what was all that about? this guy that mueller is telling us all these reasons why they believe that he's a link to

russian intelligence and he is actively working with the russian government, why is that guy getting months of internal polling data and everything from the trump campaign about how they're planning on winning the election, targeting democratic voters, midwest earn strategy. why was that all going to russia? is that some of the counterintelligence stuff of mueller's work that we have not seen? there's also something that broke on friday night, which seems relevant to all of this stuff and seems like reason enough to pursue the counterintelligence part of this investigation wherever it leads. maria butina is scheduled to be sentenced on friday of this week for working as a foreign agent in the u.s., infiltrating the nra and conservative circles on behalf of the russian government. just as an example the kind of thing that congress might want to know more about, in friday's sentencing memo on maria butina,

they lay out her conversation in 2016 in the days afterwards during the transition, including specifically about who donald trump should nominate for secretary of state, a position that eventually went to oil executive and putin whisperer rex tillerson. we had seen some of this in court filings before, but on friday prosecutors laid it out three days after the election according to prosecutors, butina, quote, provided the russian official with a name of an individual she claimed was being considered for u.s. secretary of state. she asked the russian official to seek the input of the russian government on the name she provided and told him, quote, our opinion will be taken into consideration in the united states. the russian government's opinion will be taken into consideration in the united states? as to who should be the secretary of state, as to who trump should put in the cabinet as secretary of state?

to the extent that this intelligence stuff was not reported on in mueller's redacted report that we got last week, to the extent that the counterintelligence investigation as nbc news reports is not over, to the extent that this counterintelligence stuff is a live matter of inquiry that has not been resolved, it's congress, presumably, that is going to be trying to resolve it from here on out, and to the extent that this stuff is it going to be pursued through the intelligence committee, through the fbi, through congress, it turns out there is a problem with that. at the very, very top. and i do not mean trump. and that story is next. was ahead of its time. still, we never stopped making it stronger. faster. smarter. because to be the best, is to never ever stop making it better.

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this can't just hang out there the way it has been left in mueller's report. quoting from the mueller report. on march 22nd, 2017, the president asked direct of national intelligence dan coats and mike pompeo to stay behind in the oval office after a daily briefing. the president asked them both whe whether they could say publicly that there was no link between him and russia. coates responded that his office had nothing to do with investigations and it was not his role to make a public statement on the russia investigation. so that sounds familiar. that jives with what we knew heading into the release of the mueller report. "the washington post" reported months ago that president trump had asked the director of national intelligence dan coats to make a public statement exonerating trump on the russia scandal. coates refused to do so. "washington post" was right in that reporting. but then listen to this next part. this is the part that i think is going to leave a mark. quote, according to a senior official at the office of the

director of national intelligence, michael dempsy, coates said after that meeting with the president that the president had brought up the russia investigation and asked him to contact james comey to see if there was a way to get past the investigation, get it over with, end it, or words to that effect. dempsy said coates described the president's comments falling somewhere between musing about hating the investigation and wanting coates to do something to stop it. turns out that was not the only person dan coats described that conversation to. quote, edward jus taro on the walk from the executive office building, he kept him bhiengd to ask him what he could do with the investigation. another staffer who had been waiting for coates outside the oval office talked to him a few minutes later and called him reporting that coates was upset

because the president had asked him to contact contact james comey to convince him there was nothing to the russia investigation. this is multiple staffers recalling all of the same thing all around the same meeting, immediately after an oval office meeting with the president, direct of national intelligence dan coats walked out of that meeting and was upset and told multiple staffers that the president had just asked him to contact the fbi director james comey to tell comey to drop the russia investigation. multiple staffers heard this from comey. they described among themselves that coates was upset about having received this reported request from the president. we know that because the staffers were called in by the special counsel and they testified about what coates had told them. but when those same investigators spoke to director of national intelligence dan coats himself, quote, coates

told this office that the president never asked him to speak to comey about the fbi investigation. so you made it up back then? i mean, we now have competing stories about what happened in that meeting with the president. are the staffers for dan coats misremembering this extraordinary thing they say he told them about? did dan coats make that up at the time and feign being upset about it? did dan coats, in fact, get that order from the president and tell his staffers at the time but by the time he got in to talk to the special counsel's office, he forgot all about it? or did dan coats tell his staffers one thing about receiving that request from the president and they saw him be visibly upset in response to it. when it came time to talk about it, he told the special counsel something that sounded better for the president. something that didn't indicate that the president had ordered him to shut down the investigation.

i mean, which one of those explanations is what happened here? what would any of this mean for his tenure as the director for national intelligence. from a legal standpoint, how do you square the competing versions of this story? joining us the barbara mcquade. thank you for being here. >> thanks, rachel. >> so the thing that i have trouble with here is that dan coats is obviously still the serving director of national intelligence. the competing stories that are told in the mueller report suggest that best-case scenario, he forgot that this happened, he told his staffers at the time that it happened, but later when he talks to the special counsel's office, he couldn't recall. that seems like the best-case scenario, in which case i don't want him as director of national intelligence if he's forgetting stuff like that. the worse case is that this happened and then when it came time to talk to the special counsel, he covered up for the president. i find both of these scenarios disturbing given that he's still in his role. >> this could be one of those

instances that we see quite a bit of in the mueller report where there's some evidence of a crime but not enough to establish all of the elements of a crime. and so we have some contradictory statements. you have to look at if the elements are established of an offense. here you have to show the person knew the statement was false when he made it, and that it was material. so difficult to know which of those may have been missing here. but one of the things that i would look for is is it the kind of thing you might remember? you might not remember you talked about the weather or someone asked about your weekend. but something as startling as the fact that the president asked you to ask james comey to stop an investigation is of such significance that it's difficult to imagine that he simply forgot that fact. >> as testified to by the fact that multiple staffers of his who he spoke to at the time not only all reported the same story about what he told them. i guess if you were trying to pursue this as a prosecutor, you

would try everything you could to get as close to the facts that you could about the conversation in question without the opportunity to interview the president about this, is there any other way that prosecutors might pursue this? >> i think if they were interested in pursuing it, they might reinterview some of these people. at the time of the interview, i think only three months had passed from the initial meeting. that was when memories were very fresh. and i would really love to see the underlying reports. we get just a couple sentences from the fbi 302 reports. i would be curious to see what happens in those reports. did they ask dan coats to follow-up these things. did they refresh his recollection by saying, that's funny, because one of your aides said you understanding this thing about comey. does that refresh your recollection about that? he may say it never happened or now that you mentioned it, i do remember that fact. i don't know whether any of those efforts were made to try to do that. looks like all these interviews

were conducted on the same day, so it's difficult to know what the sequence of those interviews were and how hard they pushed to find out the truth here. there's also rules of evidence when you make decisions about whether to charge. one of these sounds like it's likely hearsay because it was thirdhand information. so it can be difficult to prove. we often talk about information that is awful but lawful, so it may be that he lied and it can't be charged as a crime. >> fascinating. not only is it interesting in terms of dan coats, it's a case study in terms of why it is that congress wants not just the unredacted report but all of the underlying evidence, including those reports. barbara mcquade, thanks for being here. >> thank you so much, rachel. >> much more to get to tonight. stay with us.

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for memorial day in 2006, "nbc nightly news" reported on a new book of photos that was taken by soldiers serving in

iraq, including a young lieutenant from massachusetts. >> i felt a little bit awkward taking photographs, but it was one of those scenes that i thought we should remember. the decision was made to have a memorial service on christmas day. so right after this we had a fantastic christmas dinner, which was one of the best meals we had had in months. and so there's this dichotomy that you have incredibly sad moments followed by happy enzymes that's first lieutenant seth moulton. he decided to join the marines a few months before 9/11 after he graduated from harvard in 2001. he ended up serving four combat tours in iraq in five years. for his service he was awarded the bronze store for valor. but it's interesting. seth moulton didn't trumpet those medals, quite the contrary. his own parents didn't learn he won the bronze star in iraq until 2014 when a reporter dug

it up for "the boston globe." when the lieutenant was running for congress that year, he had not mentioned those metals at any point nor even to his family. in the democratic primary that year, he defeated a nine-term, 18--year incumbent democratic congressman named john tyranniny. he won a seat by upsetting the established order of things. since then he's stayed through to form. in 2016 moulton joined a small coalition of democrats trying to unseat nancy pelosi as the democratic leader. that did not work, but seth moulton did not give up. even as democrats were still celebrating their historic gains from this last election in 2018, seth moulton was working on it again trying to block nancy pelosi from regaining the speaker's gavel. his constituents at one point let him know what they thought about that effort. >> the majority of americans want this change. the majority of democrats want

this change. >> the congress came for the queen twice, two election cycles in a row, both times he missed, with consequences. there has been open talk on the left about a primary challenge to him for his congressional seat if he runs for his house seat again. but it's an interesting question about that house seat because that's not the only platform that congressman seth moulton has. today congressman seth moulton announced he has a whole other idea. today he announced he's running for president in the crowded democratic primary: full speed ahead. joining is the congressman from massachusetts, presidential candidate. sir, thank you for being here. >> thank you very much for having me rachel. >> i'm going to go right to it. >> go for it. >> so i said on twitter today that i was going to have you here. and i have a lot of people following me on twitter. i don't know why, but it's great. and i said that you were going to be here, and there's something that's called getting

ratioed on twitter, which means more people respond with a reply than retweet your message to pass it to other people. i have never been ratioed before, but i was today when i said that you were going to be here because people are so mad autofor the nancy pelosi thing. and i got to think when you decided to make this run today, you have to run to be nominee in the democratic party. this is fresh in the minds of activists right now, this effort of you to take on pelosi. tell me how you feel about that being a big part of your national profile as you start to do this. >> look, i'm willing to challenge the washington establishment. and, frankly, we should have a nominee who is willing to challenge the washington establishment because outside the twittersphere, that's what people want on the ground. that's what i've heard everywhere i go. when i go to early primary states this hardly even comes up. but if we are going to challenge donald trump, we have to show that we're willing to change washington. as a result of that challenge,

which, by the way, was never just about pelosi. it was about the top three leadership positions and it was about gazing new generation a voice in our party. as a result of that challenge, we got the climate change subcommittee, we got the voting rights subcommittee, we got term limits on leadership. they're going to allow this historically diverse class of freshmen to actually have a chance to lead themselves. >> you don't think the climate change subcommittee would have happened without that challenge? >> absolutely not. that was a product of that challenge at that time when our leadership said, okay, we have to do some things to win more people over to our side. the fact that we came to a compromise on term limits, let's not forget that gave speaker pelosi the votes that she needed to become speaker. and it did so without forcing these freshmen who had won their elections on a promise to vote against her to have to change that vote. >> you don't run against her in the end? >> no, because i wanted the freshmen to keep their promise. in exchange for that term limit deal, i said i would support

her. that's good for the party, it's good for her, and she's doing a fantastic job of standing up to donald trump. but it also ensures in the future people will look at our leadership and say not only are they willing to stand up to trump, but they're the party of the future. frankly, if i'm chosen to be the nominee, going into the generally election with that position will make me stronger against donald trump. >> the majorities of voters in the democratic party and the majority of voters in america are women. after hillary clinton's loss to donald trump in 2016, nancy pelosi standing there as the most powerful woman in american politics, she's the most powerful woman in american politics ever. for you to be shooting at her, i think, made women mad. i think that there's been a response against you on that, against tim ryan on that, that's going to be a foundational thing for you both running for president now. and i wonder just how -- obviously you're unafraid and unafraid about going at this

stuff straight on but with women voters being mad about women at the top of the democratic party getting shots from within, how do you regain trust? >> you know, you showed a picture of my town hall. there were about 100 people there. there were 20 to 25 protesters. you got a good clip where those protesters were speaking up, but i can't tell you how many women have come out and said we want generational change in our party as well. we want to make sure there is a new generation that's able to step up and lead. these amazing women who are an incredible part of this class, of the 40 seats we flipped to take back the house, 21 of them were endorsed and supported by my serve america group, and a lot of them were women. they are the new leaders in the party. many of them pledged themselves to vote against pelosi in order to win. >> pelosi has a 70% approval rating. >> i'm not disputing the fact that she's doing a good job right now. we're talking about the future. >> and she's beloved within the party. the part of prem you don't agree

with is the idea that you were channelling a ground swell of anger and upset about pelosi being a problem within the democratic party. >> the fact of the matter is it changed. there was a ground swell for that change before the election and then it changed afterwards. a lot of people changed their position. a lot of people in the party said now i'm not against her. a lot of people called me and others in the group, including a lot of women, there were women at the forefront of this movement as well, kathleen rice, marcia fudge, who were leading this group as well. and said we want change. after the election they said, okay, we're fine with her. look, i stick to my guns. i don't just talk about new leadership, i fight for it. i think that will make me a stronger nominee if i'm chosen to take on trump. but the fact of the matter is, this is who you get. i'm someone you may not always agree with, but you know where i stand. and the toughest job i ever had

to do in my life was take an incredibly diverse group of americans, people from all over the country, different religious beliefs, different political beliefs, different races, different them united behind a common mission to serve our country in the most difficult circumstances imaginable. literally in the middle of a war half of us disagreed with. that kind of leadership is fundamentally what we need in the next commander in chief. there will be some women i've got win back. that's okay. that's okay. i'm proud to do that. i'm proud to take on that challenge because we have got to defeat donald trump to bring this country back together. >> seth moulton is our guest. we'll be right back with senator moulton. is he a declared presidential candidate, the 19th democrat who has announced. we'll be back with congress m mannman molten right after this. man molten right after this. i'm working to keep the fire going for another 150 years.

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ba back. >> back with us is seth molton. you believe president trump did obstruct justice. >> it's too soon to vote on impeachment. i voted in the house to start debate on impeachment last year. we've waited way too long to start this investigation to seriously start debating whether the president should be impeached. look, he's clearly committed crimes. i mean, he's profited off his office, violated the emom mol umts is clause of the constitution. over 30 of his close associates have been indicted. his campaign chairman is in prison. don't tell me there's not enough to debate right now. >> you think the judiciariry committee should have. >> they should have done it a year ago. we backed ourselves into a corner by waiting for the mueller investigation to come

out. that's why i voted a year ago to start this debate. congress debates things and they vote on things. we don't have all the facts yet. we haven't seen the full mueller report. it's not time to have a shoet vote on impeachment but we should be debating it. >> where do you fall on the issue whereby democrats can pursue these investigations and pursue a positive legislative agenda? your priorities include veterans issues, narnl security issues. you've talked a lot about cyber defenses and very specific in terms of the stuff you want to pursue in congress. can you do bothing? >> we must do both. what a lot of people are policing about the mueller report, the one unmistakable conclusion is ha russia interfered in the election. they wanted donald trump to be elects president. every american should want to know why putin wants trump to be our president. that's a fundamental national security question. >> do you know what the answer toes that question is. >> i don't. i can guarantee you this, russia

is interfering in this election today. i mean, there's probably watching the show and this whole transparency of democracy. >> hi, guys. >> they are not fans. seriously, they are interfering in today's election because we've done nothing to stop them. if you think about it, after japan attacked us on pearl harbor, we had a pearl harbor commission. it was very critical of roosevelt. after the terrorists attacked us on 9/11, we had a 9/11 commission that was critical of the bush administration. roosevelt and bush didn't say no, no, don't investigate because it might look bad on me. russia attacked us in 2016. i guarantee you they'll attack news 2020 and we're doing nothing to stop if. that's a national security concern we needed to he talk about and need to lead on as democrats because it's where trump is weakest. we've got to attack him where he's weakest and that's what i'm talking about this in debate. the congressman seth moulton,

you know i was going to talk to you about the pelosi stuff. >> that's totally fair. it's important to have that debate. if there's anything that you liked or even didn't like but want to hear on the debate stage, i hope people go to the web site and donate a dollar so i can get on the debate stage so i can bring the national security issues which no other candidate is talking about in this race. and where donald trump is weakest. if you want those issues on the debate stage, i hope people donate. >> thanks for being here. we'll be right back. stay with us. hanks for being hee we'll be right back. stay with us

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i have accidentally lands on real estate that belongs to another tv host. now it is time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening, lawrence. i'm sorry i'm standing on your show. >> this is the demilitarized zone. this is the shared space. this is as much your territory as mine, rachel. and thanks for the first presidential campaign interview of seth moulton. we now eventual two military veterans running for the democratic nomination. >> three. >> who is the thirded? >> tulsi gabbardard, pete buttigieg and sething. > all among the