the report's findings. do you know what they're referencing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i think -- i suspect that they probably wanted, you know, more put out. >> did bob mueller support your conclusion? >> i don't know whether bob mueller supported my conclusion. >> all right. attorney attorney william barr in testimony to the house and senate last month, saying he was unaware of any objections from special counsel robert mueller. we found out late yesterday he was well aware of mueller's concerns. attorney general barr is scheduled to testify before the republican-controlled senate judiciary committee this morning. >> a lot has been going on. >> yeah. >> certainly since right after 7:00 p.m., when the news broke that robert mueller had sent a letter to attorney general barr

a month ago, talking about how he did believe that the report had been mischaracterized and released in such a way, the letter, that it undermined -- and these are mueller's words -- it undermined one of the central purposes of the justice department appointing a special counsel. >> which would make those comments basically a lie. >> certainly would make his testimony to charlie crist a lie. if done under oath, perjury. the statement he made in the senate, he deliberately misled the united states senate in a hearing which, of course, judges have been impeached for doing as much. federal judges have been impeached for doing as much. certainly, a lot of republicans that are still in the united states house and senate voted to

impeach bill clinton for committing perjury, the type of which the attorney general of the united states did while testifying before the house of representatives. >> let's lay it all down. we'll start at the beginning. it is wednesday, may 1st. good morning. along with joe, willie, and me, we have msnbc contributor mike barnic barnicle. "the new york times" reporter michael schmidt. law analyst and editor in chief of law affair, benjamin wittes. and national political reporter heidi prisbilla. democrats are calling for special counsel robert mueller to testify after the "washington post" broke news last night on communications when him and william barr. >> "washington post" started with the headline, then the takeaway that mueller had been disappointed. then michael schmidt and "the

new york times" dropped the story a few minutes later, mika, where they told us and gave us contents to the letter about mueller come plaplaining that b four-page memo, drafted in the span of 48 hours, was twisting the public's perceptions of the findings. >> according to a copy of the letter reviewed by the "washington post," mueller said, quote, the summary letter that the department sent to congress and released to the public late in the afternoon on march 24th, you'll remember that was a sunday afternoon, big, breaking news, that letter did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this office's work and conclusions. there's now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. this threatens to undermine a central purpose for which the department appointed the special counsel, to assure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigations. justice department officials told the "post" that the letter

made a key request, that barr release the 448-page report's introductions and executive summaries, and made some initial suggested redactions for doing so. mueller wrote that the redaction process need not delay release of the enclosed materials. release at this time would alleviate the misunderstandings that have arisen and would answer congressional and public questions about the nature and outcome of our investigation. mueller's letter was sent on march 27th, the same week as barr's summary. a day after the letter was sent, barr and mueller spoke by phone for 15 minutes, about 15 minutes, in which the "post" states he expressed his concern. >> michael schmidt, you wrote the story, broke the news, the full extent of the story for

"the new york times." tell us about this and how it came about. >> well, what we're looking at here is a sentiment within the special counsel's office that bubbled all the way up to mueller. there was widespread sort of frustration, disbelief, at the way barr characterized their findings. i think folks in the special counsel's office understood the severity of the way barr was doing this. in the way it was casting the die on their findings. in the way that the public's consumption of this would be so important, and that they really wanted for their work to be looked at. instead, barr simply put out the findings and not given the full picture. there was deep frustration with this, to the point that bob mueller, who is really someone by the book, took the unusual step to send this letter to the attorney general. bob mueller has known the attorney general for a long time. it's not like he just called him up and said, hey, you know, i

don't get this. i don't understand this. he memorialized it in a letter, setting off this subsequent conversation in which he sort of pushed barr to put more information out. at the time, there was just barr's letter. the president had seized on it. that's the thing you have to understand. the president was saying that all of this exonerated him. if you were in mueller's shop and you looked at the president doing that, i can understand why that'd bother you. that's not really what they found. >> willie, it's very interesting. many people have wondered why robert mueller didn't speak out earlier. he is a by the book guy. he's also a lawyer. you learn very early as a lawyer, when you're practicing, you memorialize something in writing, it puts a timestamp on it. we all now know. because robert mueller put it in writing, put a timestamp on it, we know he misled the united states senate. we know barr lied to the house of representatives.

we also know that he sat on that letter and held it from the american people to continue misleading the american people, knowing that robert mueller had said doing so would undermine the central purpose of the justice department's appointment of the special counsel. >> you don't have to take it from us. you can take it from the special counsel himself. the attorney general of the united states was doing what we suspected he was doing, hoped he wasn't. he was running interference for the president of the united states on the mueller report. michael schmidt, to be very clear about what we're talking about here and what bob mueller's complaint was, his problem was with barr's four-page summary and his presentation to the public, he was concerned about the question of obstruction of justice. it remained true that in volume one, bob mueller said he could not establish a conspiracy between the trump campaign and russian government. he didn't like how barr summarized the obstruction of

justice, where barr effectively said, i couldn't find evidence to establish a charge of obstruction of justice. that's not what mueller said in his report. >> see, the problem sort of stems from mueller's decision not to make a decision. >> right. >> mueller says, i'm not going to make a determination about whether the president broke the law. that left the door open for barr to come in and say, i don't think that he broke the law. if mueller had said, yes, i think there is evidence the president broke the law, it would have put barr in a more difficult position. sure, he could have said, i don't think the president did break the law, but that would have been politically a more difficult position. by mueller not making a determination, sort of saying, hey, look, here are the facts about this, maybe a decision could be made on this after the president leaves office, it allowed barr to sort of come in and seize the narrative and sort of outplay mueller here. barr comes in, is able to characterize the findings

however he likes. it allowed the president to go out. the other thing we have to understand here is that there are several weeks, i think at least a month, between tennessee four-page letter and when the report is released. that allowed things to really set sort of in cement that there had been nothing wrong here. the president had sort of been cleared of all wrongdoing. i think regardless of whatever political party you come from, if you read the report, it's a much grayer document than the way it was sort of initially portrayed publicly. if you worked on that investigation, i can see why you're frustrated. >> you know, by the way, this is -- the mueller report finally being released was bad political news for the president of the united states. he dropped three, four points in the morning consult polls to his lowest position ever in that poll. this is going to be bad political news for the president, as well, but don't take our word for it. just know that the president of the united states is in a

frantic tweet storm. already 30 this morning, hoping -- re-tweets, hoping, praying, that people will be distracted once again by this old tactic. we will not. instead, benjamin, i want to ask you if what president trump's roy cohn, as i call him, william barr, may have committed perjury when answering charlie crist. crist asked if there had been frustration that the report had not been properly and fully characterized in the barr letter. >> as you know, perjury is a sort of ridiculously technical statute, and it requires a very precise parsing of the exact question and the exact answer and all the possible things that that answer could convey.

i don't think we're realistically talking in that land at all. i think we are talking in a different land, which is, you know, would a reasonable member of congress feel grossly misled by what the attorney general said? i think the answer to that is yes. you know, the attorney general sitting on a letter that the special counsel had written, expressing frustration with the way he had characterized it and the way that had spurred a media sto storm, asked a question about, you know, what can you tell us about frustration, kind of scratches his head and plays dumb. i think people are going to feel misled by that. >> misled. also, certainly, could that not be considered an abuse of power, if you use your position to, quote, undermine the central purpose for which the justice

department appointed the special counsel? >> look, bill barr has, i think, abused his position in a number of respects. the most important of them is exactly the one that you just described, which is, taking a document -- and there is nothing technical inaccurate in bill barr's letter -- but taking a document that is rich and complicated and conveys a great deal of information, and characterizing it, intentionally, in such a way that an entire media ecosystem can go nuts for two weeks about how it is a simple vindication and clearing of the president, which it was quite obviously not. i think the fact that we reacted that way at the time, you know, you and i and a hundred other

million people, it is not surprising that, internally within the justice department and the special counsel's office, bob mueller, who knew that report intimately, because he wrote it, reacted quite similarly. >> you know, it is so funny to listen to trump apologists, trying to blame this on the media, as a lot of them did last night. of course, it was the president of the united states that was jumping up and down, screaming the loudest, with the largest megaphone, using attorney general barr's letter to misrepresent the contents of the report which, of course, the media would then have to pick up on that, as well. >> barr himself used his own letter to mischaracterize the report. in his press conference the morning of the report's release, he adopted a series of lines about the report that were, you know, directly tailored to the

way the president was talking about it. he used the phrase "no collusion" multiple times. i -- it's not simply that the president was mischaracterizing or was, you know, using his characterization to misdescrikc what was in this complicated document. he himself, on more than one occasion was, again, without saying anything that was technical inaccurate, grossly mischaracterizing the document. >> mike barnicle, grossly mischaracterized the document. to borrow a phrase from former chief justice rindquist, held a highly misleading and politicized press conference. after that, testified before the senate and the house misled,

grossly misled, united states senators, and outright lied to charlie crist and the house of representatives. >> yeah, joe -- >> that, under any circumstance, is an abuse of power. >> at the least. >> all the king's horses and all the king's men and all the hacks on the right, on the new trump right, can't put that mess back together again. humpty dumpty fell off the wall, and he pushed himself off the wall himself. his representation lies in a thousand pieces. he abused his official power. >> yeah, joe. in this case, humpty dumpty had a partner in crime, it appears. rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general of the united states. michael submchmidt, i'd like tok you the following question. it appears from your reporting and the "washington post" reporting that the sitting

attorney general of the united states, the deputy attorney general of the united states have, at minimum, twisted the truth about a critical report worked on for two years by bob mueller and several other people who work for bob mueller. now, bob mueller, having laid out ten separate instances of potential obstruction of justice, the sitting attorney general of the united states said what he said. the bottom line here is, the justice department, again, from your reporting, indicates they were somewhat miffed, angered, frustrated by bob mueller's letter. what would possibly frustrate them about the truth? >> well, i mean, here's the fundamental problem. a special counsel was appointed to protect the investigation from the appearance of politics and from politics seeping into their work. here we are, two years after

that happened, and the entire desire has been exposed to politics. part of that is based on the fact that mueller decided not to make a decision about whether the president broke the law. he sort of said someone could make that call after the president leaves office. that allowed barr to come in and make the decision and expose the final product to the winds of politics. as we look at that now, this thing that everyone talked about for the past two years, about how mueller was there to protect and everything, the result is looked at completely in a political context. that was not the goal from the beginning. that is not why you have a special counsel. you have a special counsel to try and prevent this from happening. now, we're going to spend the next two years talking about how the president's political appointees were the ones that made the ultimate decision about whether the president was charged. that's just not how the system

was supposed to work. >> mike, to follow up on what you said about rod rosenstein, this is a guy who blasted critics of bob barr's letter and sid it w-- said it was bizarre. said it was bizarre that anyone would question the letter was misleading. rosenstein, the guy who acted weasely when donald trump asked him to write a letter, justifying comey's firing, then broke down in tears after the media started attacking him, that rod rosenstein, he knew that the special counsel, he knew robert mueller had said the very things he was telling the press and the public he thought were, quote, bizarre. >> joe, this all adds up to something i'm sure you and many other lawyers when you were practicing law, this adds up to

a common phrase heard over and over and over again, unfortunately, bag job. >> yeah. >> it was a bag job. you know, mika, the most shocking thing is, i can tell you at least in pensacola, florida, you knew not to lie to other lawyers. you knew when the truth was going to come out, you had to keep your representation in check or your word would never be trusted in front of a judge again. you'd never be able to get a deal on the side with another lawyer on pleadings or on some other question. you always had to be straight. it is unbelievable, how stupid, how stupid. what bush leaguers, rod rosenstein and the attorney general of the united states turned out to be. they knew this was coming out. >> right. >> barr was holding mueller's letter, that he was lying about. he hold it in his drawer. he held it in a file for a

month. then went to the hill and lied to the senate and lied to the house. >> so this is -- i want to get to hieidi on the opportunity fo republicans here and whether they'll take it. joe, some people are texting me, saying that president trump is tweeting like crazy right now. can you tell your friend that -- >> hey, donald. >> you can tweet nudes. we don't care. we're not looking. not interested. >> sorry. >> we're going to stay focused. >> sorry it turned out the way it did. >> can't be friends with a guy who wants to be an autocrat. >> stop that. doesn't work. >> eat a sandwich. get some kfc in the morning. i always found the variety pack, like right before breakfast, is fantastic. eat your kentucky fried chicken. >> yeah. >> get a big mac. get an egg mcmuffin. mcdonald's makes great pancakes. we're not going to pay attention

to your tweets. now back to our regularly scheduled program. >> heidi, attorney general barr is scheduled to testify before the republican-controlled senate judiciary committee this morning. what's the opportunity for republicans to ask the right questions? what kinds of questions might he face in light of all of this? also then, moving on to house oversight and other questions, this changes everything, doesn't it? >> of course. there's been a dispute, mika, whether barr would even show before the committee in the house. now, i think this completely changes that equation. if he refuses to show, you better believe the subpoena cannon is going to fire. secondly, i'm being told by house democratic leadership sources last night that the timeline for getting mueller up in the chair is expedited if they get barr this week. hopefully, they'll get mueller next week. joe, it's not just charlie crist who barr may have lied to when

he testified. van hollen was tweeting he point-blank asked barr in his testify, whether mueller agreed with his conclusions on obstruction. the answer to that was, yes, then i don't know. well, we you know that was when he was in possession of the letter. of course he knew. there are also increasing questions over whether, to this day, information is still being suppressed. if you look in the "washington post" report, there seems to have been a dispute over the redactions. mueller was unhappy not only his executive summary wasn't released, but also that there may have been a dispute over redactions. as we know with the precedent here over classified information being released to congress, that was done in previous instances, where you had these outside investigations, both with ken starr and with watergate. we the people may not see that classified information, but it is customary for it to go to

congress. the questions are going to be much sharper and, mika, to your point, yes, let's watch and see how many republicans step up versus letting democrats take the reins on this. >> michael schmidt, you actually had this story written yesterday. you guys were holding it just to get the final confirmation from the justice department, is that correct? >> yeah. we were -- look, this is something that we've been looking at and working on for some time. there's a lot of, obviously, interest in this. there is a, you know -- it is a very fraught issue that we've had to spend a lot of time trying to unwrap. it is not the easiest thing. >> how long have you been working on this? how long did this process take for you? how long -- let me just ask it this way, how long have you known about the existence of this letter? >> well, i mean, look, we've known about the letter, you know, for as long as we knew about the letter.

this stuff takes a lot of time. we've been working on it for a while. >> yeah. >> when we get it, we know what we know, we go. sometimes we don't know what we have. that's just part of the process. that's okay. it's sometimes frustrating, but it is okay. >> all right. michael schmidt, thank you very much. >> thank you, michael. incredible. >> thank you for your reporting. still ahead on "morning joe," senate democrat chris murphy joins us. also, republican congressman tom cole. plus, the former director of the cia, john brennan, joins the conversation. we have a lot to talk about with him. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

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my position is that there is no tool that is in our toolbox that we should not explore. okay? whatever it is. >> including jail? >> again, let me say it again.

did you hear what i said? i said there is no tool in our toolbox that we should not explore. >> that is house oversight chairman elijah cummings, saying his committee is prepared to use all of its options in response to trump administration officials refusing to comply with subpoenas. it is extraordinary, mike. this is one of these things in the trump administration that pass under the radar because there's so much else going on. refusing to show up. refusing to respond to subpoenas. you can be held in contempt and much worse. what elijah cummings and other democrats are now saying is, we're going to punish you for that if you don't show up. >> you know, willie, this is the first time in our history, when you have an entire political party, it seems, in the capitol of t in washington, d.c., to obstruct the acts of government in every day, in little and big days. it doesn't bode well for the future of this republic.

yesterday, they had a meeting at the white house. speaker pelosi was there. chuck schumer was there. the president of the united states was there. they came out, and they were almost mildly euphoric about the way the meeting went. the president had agreed to spend trillions on infrastructure. the truth is, nothing will happen. >> correct. >> nothing will happen. >> i mean, it is the same thing he said on immigration reform when he turned to diane feinstein in 2017 and said, i'm going to sign any agreement that you all put together. you come up with a plan, i will sign it and we'll get immigration reform. here's the thing about donald trump, he talks a lot but nothing ever happens. >> yeah. >> speaking of talking a lot, benjamin willis, of course, barr is going to the hill today. that will, of course, provide as much light as roy cohn testifying before congress. i expect the next critical testimony we'll hear on this

subject comes from robert mueller himself. how important is it for the united states congress to get mueller testifying before them? >> i think it is very important. for at least three reasons. one is today's testimony, i think, is going to turn out to be simply an accountability exercise for barr. how he explains his past statements, how he explains his characterizations of the document. there's another side to that story, which is, you know, hinted at by the stories in the "washington post" and "the new york times" today, which is, how does bob mueller understand bill barr's characterizations of his report, and how does he understand bill barr's representations about their interactions? i think that's a very important question. the second thing is that there is a lot of debate and

discussion about why bob mueller didn't come to a judgment on obstruction. now, the report answers that question to some degree, but i do think there is a real, important set of questions to ask mueller about how, you know -- how he came to that judgment and what he means in those passages of the report. whom is he deferring? was he deferring to bill barr, or was he, as the report suggests, referring to congress and its impeachment authority? the third aspect is that there are a whole bunch of, both on the russia side and on the obstruction side, there are a whole bunch of evidentiary fact patterns in this report that he lays out very clearly and doesn't assess. to the extent that congress can tease out of him any sort of indication of his judgment as to

how he evaluates, i suspect he'd be resistant to that, but that would be super interesting and super useful. >> willie, of course, robert mueller brought up in the report ten instances of possible on strx obstruction of justice. looking back on bar's lr's lett we see the letter, more likely than not, appeared to be a desperate attempt for the headlines to not state that -- >> to please trump. >> -- the special counsel could not clear the president of obstruction of justice, and that there were ten instances of obstruction of justice that the special counsel could not clear him of. so robert mueller decided to play roy cohn for donald trump. then, again, went to congress and lied and misrepresented

robert mueller's own viewpoints, a man who wasn't speaking for himself. >> you boiled it down to the essential point. we've seen trump defenders say, what bob mueller was saying in the phone call is he was upset about the media coverage. that's not what he was saying. >> what a joke. >> he said the media coverage was misguided because the media was working off the four-page document presented by attorney general barr which mischaracterized and misrepresented the mueller report. what mueller is saying, baseline here is, barr put out this report and said something that wasn't right about obstruction of justice, which there was no evidence to support it. that's not what bob mueller said in the report. bob mueller called -- first wrote a letter and then called his old friend, william barr, and said, you have this wrong. put out the full report. you need to go fix it. >> wow. something is up with him. >> he misled deliberately. he misled and lied to the

american people. he misled and lied to the american people not just in the letter, but as benjamin wittes brought up earlier today, in his press conference the next morning. >> who would do this? >> then in his testimony before the house of representatives. then in his testimony in front of the united states senate. and held the letter for over a month. so, no, no, sorry. fake news, trumpists. wasn't the media that misled america. it wasn't the media. that's not what robert mueller was saying, mika, but it shows you, like donald trump tweeting wildly this morning, frantically this morning, the gig's up. i just want to say this, too, there have been people that have been talking about how what attorney general barr did with that letter somehow was a gift for donald trump. no. number one rule in politics is,

don't overplay your hand. it always blows up in your face. people trust you even less later. that's the reason why donald trump's numbers keep collapsing. >> numbers. >> they've gone down 3, 4 points. now, william barr has done it again by lying in the letter, wretching the words from the proper context, misrepresenting the views of the special counsel, lying before the united states senate, misrepresenting the views of robert mueller, lying to the house of representatives, lying about the fact that he believed, robert mueller believed, that his views, his report, had been twisted for public consumption. mika, that's not a political win for donald trump. >> no. >> that's -- that is more bad news politically for donald trump, which is why he's frantically trying to change the subject this morning. >> benjamin wittes, thank you very much. coming up, attorney general

william barr is just hours away from heading to the hill to testify before lawmakers. democratic senator chris murphy says the attorney general is supposed to be the nation's top, impartial lawyer, not a white house spokesman. he joins the conversation next. we humans are strange creatures. other species avoid pain and struggle. we actually... seek it out. other species do difficult things because they have to. we do difficult things. because we like to. we think it's... fun.

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joining us now, member of the foreign relations committee, democratic senator chris murphy of connecticut. great to have you on, senator. first, on attorney general william barr, did the attorney general lie to members of the senate and congress and to the american people about what he knew and when he knew it? >> well, this is a big day, and there's no doubt that the attorney general has done more to compromise america's faith in the attorney general's office than any other attorney general in my lifetime. clearly, the special investigator has a belief he misled congress, and he'll have to answer tough questions today. he's become a political actor.

he has compromised the independence of the attorney general's office. it, frankly, makes me much more worried about the decisions he made on what to redact from his report. >> senator, did he lie though? senator, he told charlie crist in the house of representatives that he had no information as to whether the special counsel or anybody on the staff were not pleased at his incomplete airing of what they had uncovered. did he not deliberately lie to the house of representatives and then to chris van hollen in the senate. >> i have not seen the interactions personally. this news broke overnight. if he did represent to a congressional committee he had not heard from the special investigator about his distaste for the way in which he communicated information to congress, clearly, he's not telling the truth. i have not seen those personally myself. >> we'll play them for you later in this interview, really. >> senator murphy, willie geist. your colleague, chris van

hollen, one of the interrogators on april 10th who caught william barr in a lie called last night for the attorney general to resign. would you support that? >> well, i never thought that william barr should be there in the first place. >> right. you voted against him. >> right, i voted against him. you know, again, i don't think that he can fairly sort of interact with congress regarding the next steps on the mueller report, given that he has exposed himself as a political actor. i didn't think he was worthwhile as attorney general to begin with. although i wonder who would come next. i don't think you're going to get anybody better. trump is very clearly trying to put people in the attorney general's seat who are going to do his political bidding. >> senator, we're going to play for you the clips. one from april 9th, where charlie crist asks the question of attorney general bar, followed by chris van hollen the day later. let's listen. >> reports have emerged

recently, general, that members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter. that it does not adequately or accurately, necessarily, portray the report's findings. do you know what they're referencing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i think -- i suspect that they probably wanted, you know, more put out. >> did bob mueller support your conclusion? >> i don't know whether bob mueller supported my conclusion. >> senator, that was april 10th, where the attorney general said, i don't know whether mueller supported my conclusion. we know from the reporting in the "washington post" and "the new york times," march 27th, mueller sent the letter to barr, stating how he felt about the four-page summary. was he lying there? >> doesn't sound like he is telling the full truth. listen, i think there is subtlety about the answers to

those questions. i think we need to know more about what mueller told the attorney general. then we need to hear from mueller himself. i mean, i think it is hard to get a full picture of this unless congress talks to the special investigator. >> sorry, don't mean to interrupt, but i'm going to play you the clip, only -- i'm going to only play you the charlie crist clip. one of the problems president trump administration is, they won't tell the difference between the truth and a lie. i need you to listen to charlie crist and tell us whether barr is lying. play the clip again. >> reports have emerged recently, general, that members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter. that it does not adequately or accurately, necessarily, portray the report's findings. do you know what they're referencing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i think -- i suspect

that they probably wanted more put out. >> so charlie crist's question, he said that they were frustrated that it does not adequately portray the report's finding. that's almost robertbatim in th >> he said, i suspect they wanted me to put more out, when he clearly had a conversation with robert mueller, in which robert mueller must have told him exactly why he sent the letter. >> is it a lie when he said he did not know whether they were frustrated. >> if he is claiming that he did not know that they were frustrated, then that is a lie. if he is claiming that he didn't know the basis for their frustration, then i think we need to know more about the conversation that he had. i get it that i'm parsing his words here, but i do think that -- >> you certainly are.

>> i think it is important for him to talk about this today. i think we'll be in a better position to determine whether he lied or not at the end of today's testimony. >> mike barnicle? >> senator, let's throw the rules of order out the window right now. bill barr will not resign. bill barr will not be impeached. what recourse does the united states senate, specifically the minority democrats, have about this? what can you do? >> in the minority in the senate, we have little recourse, except to support the house in their work to hold this administration accountable. let's be clear, whatever you think about whether the information in the mueller report are necessary or enough to move forward on impeachment, the obstruction of an investigation that follows up on this report certainly could rise to the level of impeachment.

i think the administration has to understand that if they shut down any ability for congress to do our requisite follow up on this report, if they try to stop bob mueller from coming and testifying, that in itself could trigger impeachment proceedings. that is a choice of the house of representatives. the senate, i think, right now, has to support the house, where the tools lie, to try to get to the bottom of all of this. >> incredible time. senator, let's get to policy right now. you are rolling out a universal medicare buy-in bill. tell us about it. >> it is important to remember despite all the attention on barr's testimony today, the trump administration is going to court to file briefs to eliminate the entirety of the affordable care act through a court case that attorney generals have filed. frankly, this is what is worrying millions of families all across the country today who rely on the affordable care act for coverage. senator merkley and i are unveiling a proposal today that

would allow every single american to buy into medicare, and every single business to buy into medicare. there are a lot of my colleagues who support bernie sanders' proposal to eliminate private insurance and to have everyone be required to go into medicare. our proposal is a little different. we give everyone and every single business, which makes our proposal unique, the ability to choose medicare. we think that this may become the consensus proposal for democrats heading into 2020. i think, today, it is important to remember that there is a court case proceeding to try to strip away protections for people with preexisting conditions, coverage for millions american es under medicaid. we need to keep the focus on democrats, even as the temperature rises on the mueller investigation. >> senator chris murphy, thank you very much for being on this morning. >> thanks. still ahead, a new snapshot of the democrats' primary race

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we'll have much more this morning on robert mueller breaking his silence. >> boy, mika, that has caused such shock waves. >> yeah. >> not only across capitol hill. this is going to have an impact politically. it is why the president of the united states was in a meltdown this morning with a tweet storm, mainly of bots, but a tweet storm of bots and other people. >> distractions. >> they just follow him and do nothing but tweet positive

things abthing s about him. >> the special counsel vented his frustrations over attorney general barr's summary over the russian report, saying it caused confusion. >> and undermined the central purpose of the justice department's special counsel. >> we will continue to cover this. turning now to the chaos in venezuela. in a video posted on social media, recorded outside a military base in caracas yesterday, opposition leader juan guaido, who the united states and dozens of other nations view as the interim president, called for an uprising and mass, non-violenon anti-government protests and it is what he is calling the, quote, final phrase of opposition freedom. to remove maduro from power. roughly an hour later, maduro's government said it was confronting a small group of military offices, looking to, quote, promote a coup.

the ambassador to the u.s. responded it was not a military coup but a constitutional process. thousands of people took to the streets around the country. while some of the protests remained peaceful, things did get violent. clashes occurred between demonstrators and maduro's security forces, who used tear gas and rubber bullets in addition to what we should warn you may be disturbing footage to watch. this footage shows what appears to be a military vehicle ramming into a group of demonstrators and running them over. in all, at least 57 people are reportedly injured. president trump, vice president pence, and secretary pompeo all tweeted their support of guaido and the protests. >> and the secretary of state had said that maduro was getting ready to leave for the airport and was going to actually leave the country but received a phone call from vladimir putin. >> oh, my gosh.

>> who urged him to stay and fight it out. >> we'll continue to cover this. ahead, we'll ask the former cia director, john brennan, about this volatile situation. we'll also get his take on the vast discrepancies of william barr's characterization of robert mueller's russia report. the attorney general is heading to the hill, where he will face tough questions over his handling of the special counsel's findings. >> and the fact that he's already been caught lying to the house of representatives. >> the "washington post," robert costa, will have this latest reporting. we'll be right back. 'll be righ. ♪ rub-a-dub ducky... and then...there's national car rental. at national, i'm in total control. i can just skip the counter and choose any car in the aisle i like. so i can rent fast without getting a hair out of place. heeeeey. hey! ah, control.

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i am going to make as much information available as i can, consistent with the rules and regulations. my goal will be to provide as much transparency as i can consistent with the law. >> well, he actually lied there. >> that is not true. >> he lied because he took the words of the mueller report from its context, misled the american people off, chopping up sentences in half to try to make things look so much better for donald trump than they actually were. then he held a press conference the next morning, once again misrepresenting the findings of the report. >> this is the attorney general. >> then he went to capitol hill and lied under oath. senator didn't want to say that. let me just say, mika, again, let's be really clear here, when he was in congress, he was asked

by congress, charlie crist, whether he had knowledge of the special counsel's office being, quote, frustrated the letter did not adequately convey the findings. william barr, the attorney general of the united states, said he had no information to that effect. in fact, mika, two weeks earlier, my god, that is exactly what he was told in the letter written to him by robert mueller, the special counsel himself. >> then his comments we opened with was william barr back in january, telling congress he was committed to transparency. apparently, bob mueller isn't so sure about that. welcome back. >> we all know that's not the case. he held mueller's letter. >> i know. >> held mueller's letter in a file, in his drawer, for over a month. >> welcome back to "morning joe."

it is wednesday, may 1st. with joe, willie, and me, we have mike barnicle. national security expert, columnist at "usa today," and author of "the death of expertise," tom nichols. political -- >> again, i'm expecting the zeppelin song. >> political reporter betsy woodruff. former aid to robert mueller, now an nbc news law enforcement analyst, chuck rosenberg. and political reporter for the "washington post" and msnbc political analyst, robert costa. he is the moderator of "washington week" on pbs. >> willie, sometimes, willie, you tweet something that has unintended consequences. yesterday, mika tweeted out, it's worse than we thought. worse than i thought. >> yeah. >> there were some great answers. some people saying me at the end of the night when i'm looking at my bar tab. >> yeah. >> the best though was from ben

who said, hey, you're the one who married him. >> that's not what i was talking about. >> that's tough. >> i was talking about the mueller report news. >> she opened herself up to that though, didn't she? >> she did. >> i did. >> willie, what was your take of senator murphy, who we like very much? what was your take last hour of him refusing to state the obvious, that william barr had misled and lied to charlie crist and the american people? talking about the report being miskra miscash ti mischaracterized. >> senator murphy is usually straightforward with us. i don't know if he was parsing through the language. to us, it is cut and dry.

he testified he didn't know what mueller thought about his four-page summary. we know on march 27th, 13 or 14 days before that testimony, william barr received a letter from robert mueller, raising his objections to the presentation made by the attorney general. clear cut from where we're sitting. >> yeah. let me say, at least when i was practicing law, in northwest florida, if you had lied like that to the federal judges, you'd be in jail. >> yeah. >> you would. you know, i know everybody is talking about the legal niceties of perjury. i'm telling you, at least maybe it was back in the old days, but there is not a federal judge in northwest florida that wouldn't put you in jail if you lied to them in their courtroom the way william barr lied to the united states congress. >> there's so much more here. democratic lawmakers are calling for special counsel robert mueller to testify after the "washington post" broke the news

on communications. barr's four-page memo, drafted in the span of 48 hours, was twisting the public's perception of his findings. according to a copy of a letter reviewed by the "washington post," mueller said, quote, the summary letter the department sent to congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of march 24th did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this office's work and conclusions. there is now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. this threatened to undermine a central purpose for which apartment appointed the special counsel, to ensure full public confidence. department officials told the "post" the letter made a key request, that barr release the

448-page report, introductions, and executive summaries. release at this time would alleviate the misunderstandings that have arisen and would answer congressional and public questions about the nature and the outcome of out investigation. mueller's letter was sent on march 27th. that's the same week as barr's summary. a day after the letter was sent, barr and mueller spoke by phone, just to make things a little bit more clear. for about 15 minutes, in which the "washington post" repooe"po

concern. >> reports have emerged recently, general, that members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter, that it does not adequately or accurately, necessarily, portray the report's findings. do you know what they're referencing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i think -- i suspect they probably wanted, you know, more put out. >> did bob mueller support your conclusion? >> i don't know whether bob mueller supported my conclusion. >> i mean -- >> wow. >> it is pretty shocking. so, robert costa, you broke the news yesterday. and it is incredible. the line i go back to is the line where mueller tells barr

that the incompleteness of the miskra mischaracterizations in his report sow confusion and, quote, threaten to undermine the justice department appointing the special counsel. i take it that was a widespread feeling throughout the special counsel's office? >> my colleagues broke this story, but if you read the report that they put out last night, and you read the "post" subsequent reporting, it is clear that many people within the robert mueller orbit were increasingly frustrated in communicating to mr. mueller, who had his own concerns he anticipated in that letter. in talking to adam schiff, the house intelligence committee chairman yesterday, senator blumenthal and other top democrats, there's one and immediate desire to get robert mueller to come testify

publicly, to have him come to capitol hill before house judiciary, senate judiciary, house intel and senate intel, and tell his version of how this played out, not only the report but the handling of the report. also from senator blumenthal and some of my top democratic sources who are staffers, there's beginning to be a clamor, private for now mostly, should the attorney general be involved innimpeachment? rank and file democrats are having the conversations behind the scenes. >> in some ways, it is not surprising mueller septembnt a r to barr. we had the reports, referenced by crist there, that other members of the special counsel team had complaints about the presentation made in the four-page summary by attorney general barr. as you see the details of what robert mueller was complaining about to barr, what was your takeaway? it is not surprising in some ways and it is in others,

willie. let me explain. it is not often in the department of justice we go to paper, that we commit in writing our disagreements or our disappointments, particularly with our boss. right? so only when you really feel that there has been sort of a misdeed or misdirection would you go to paper. the fact that bob mueller wrote a letter, right, which he must have known would become public someday, to the sitting attorney general, to his boss. mueller is a subordinate. it is remarkable to me. when we have disagreements, and that happens all the time, how do you typically resolve them? you pick up the phone and you make a call. maybe mueller thought that would not be sufficient here. he had to make a record for history. >> wow. >> chuck, i'm glad to hear you say that. last night, mika and i were talking as this news was breaking. again, i found it extraordinary that he had reduced his concerns

to writing. was telling mika, as a practicing lawyer, whether in criminal or civil, that's something you learn to do. you sometimes write letters for the file. you sometimes write letters knowing that in writing that letter, you are actually leaving the person who is the recipient of the letter no choice to respond because you've opened them up to claims of negligence if they don't make corrective actions. >> he ran it over. >> in this case, as you said, for mueller to write a let tore l letter to a guy who has been a friend a long time, wives are friends, who is his supervisor, for those who said robert mueller did not do enough to complain, in this world, is that not an extraordinary action for him to take, where he put it

there and, as i often said in congress to my staff members, when you write a letter and put it on somebody's desk, it is a ticking time bomb that they must respond to. is that not the effect of this letter? >> it is extraordinary, joe. i think your reaction is spot on. look, the way we were brought up in the department of justice culture is that we are one family. you don't want to put other members of the family in a box. you try very hard to work things out in a reasonable way. often face-to-face or over the phone. when things get bad, and apparently they did, you put it in writing. so it does land, you know, with a thud on bill barr's desk. he has to respond, perhaps not in writing, but maybe today when he testifies. it's a very unusual turn of events, and i don't believe for a minute, having worked for bob mueller, that this is something he would have done lightly. >> chuck, would you agree that

volume 2 of the mueller report lays out at least ten pretty good examples of potential obstruction of justice? >> yes, although i take one word out. potential. >> okay. >> it is an extraordinarily compelling volume. those ten episodes of obstruction are in and of themselves deeply disturbing. i was a federal prosecutor for a long time, mike. i've brought cases in federal court and obtained eed convict on a fraction of the evidence mueller details. >> would you agree in volume 2, again, that the mueller report indica indicates, quite strongly and leerily, that the reason they can't go forward with an indictment of the president of the united states is because of justice department policy? >> 100%. so the policy is that you can't charge a sitting president. the rational is that doing so would stigmatize the president and burden the presidency. if you adhere to that rational, neither can you charge a sitting president. that, too, would stigmatize the

presidency and burden the president. >> given that assessment from you, would you agree with the sup pi -- what was said by bill barr public publicly, along with rod rosenstein, they've trimmed the truth? >> misled and lied are different. everybody who lies misleads, but not everyone who misleads lies. i don't know where on that spectrum this stuff fits. the attorney general is better than that. he should neither mislead nor lie. he should adhere to the spirit of this and not to the letter of this. that's what bothers me. we need more from our public leaders. we need more from the department of justice. that's painful. >> so, joe, to what chuck just said, misleading, lying, where is the in between. >> right. >> what is clear is this letter

was received. this phone call happened. there was a difference in opinion as to what was released to the american public and told to congress. i think the intention and the fact that this was purposeful on the part of the attorney general is very clear. >> yeah. i'm glad i am not in law school right now because i am sure that people are going to get an assignment, given the attorney general's statement before the senate when he is testifying to chris van hollen and then, of course, the charlie crist statement, and they're going to be asked to determine whether it is perjury or not. actually, every day, i'm glad i'm not in law school anymore. chuck does bring up a good point. there is a spectrum there, between misleading and lying, then perjury. i have to say though, you look, tom nichols, at the question

charlie crist asked. >> yeah. >> in the house of representatives, of the attorney general. it was -- let me grab it again -- quote, was the counsel's office frustrated the letter did not adequately portray the report's findings? the answer to that was clearly yes. now, we can -- again, we can debate where that falls on the spectrum, but i think most federal judges i've worked with before would call that lying and perhaps perjury. at the very least, this is an abuse of his office, abuse of power as attorney general. he held that letter for over a month while he was claiming to members of congress in sworn testimony that there was no concern from robert mueller or his special counsel's office. here, we have, again, our former

party, the republican party, last night coming out quickly and defending this attorney general and his lies. >> which should tell you how desperate they think things have gotten. that william barr would do this. you know, during this past 24 hours, the thing i keep coming back to is the moment in william barr's confirmation, where he says, i'm 68. i don't really need this job. what that really meant was, apparently, what it really meant was, i don't care about my representation. i have to do this one last service to save what's left of the republican party and to save this administration. republicans are going along with that. it is like the last few hours on the titanic. if they have to push the children out of the way and dress like women to get in the lifeboats, that's what they're going to do. you know, if that's what it takes, and that's what they need to survive -- because barr knows he's not going to be impeached. at worst, he'll have to go

through some grilling in congress. the public has more or less made up its mind. i think the one thing barr did that was very savvy is that he said, look, i'm going to put this story out. i'm going to put the top line out. i know that the president's followers are going to believe it. everybody else? well, i'm 68. i don't need the job. i think it is really -- it really has reduced public service to just kind of doing this sort of service for your guy at the last minute, to kind of save yourself. i mean, it is really disturbing, and it is really bad for our democracy. >> incredibly disturbing. this is the attorney general of the united states of america. i have been wondering for months, what is going on with him? something doesn't seem right. now, we see it, laid out and in black and white. to frame something really important that you said, joe, robert mueller put it to paper. he made it clear that there is something wrong going on here.

the attorney general, i'm not sure what his state of mind is or health or anything at this point, but i think he understands what means to get a letter like that and, yet, still, he continued to mislead the american people. >> well, really quickly, mika, this is, again, he is not helping the president politically. he oversold what he had. it blew up in his face when the report came out. donald trump's poll numbers have fallen three or four points, the lowest ever in the morning consult poll. you'll see his numbers again fall, or at least stay low. once again, the american people are finding out that, once again, the president of the united states and the attorney general are corrupt. what does donald trump talk about from 2016? the system was rigged. now, donald trump is the ultimate insider, and he has

hired a hatchet man as his attorney general to rig the system. no one has rigged the system like this since richard nixon. that's bad for our constitutional republic. for donald trump, more importantly, it is bad for his political fortunes. >> well aware of the political consequences of that. that's why i'm marveling at the stupidity here. i question what is going on with him. betsy woodruff, let's go to you. in terms of now this, you know, moves into congress. i believe barr testifies for the senate today. there are a lot of questions heading his way. what's happening next in congress? >> that's right. i reviewed the statement barr is going to be reading at the beginning of his testimony to the senate judiciary committee this morning, and there's a line in there that is going to raise a lot of eyebrows. in the statement, barr tries to explain why he didn't take mueller's advice and release

portions of the report so that people could have a better understanding of what mueller was doing. the explanation that pabarr giv for withholding the report and only have his four-page letter be out for weeks until the full report was released is he didn't want there to be public debate based on incomplete information. the immediate pushback is this idea that we've been debating the mueller report based on incomplete information for the last two years. it has been one of the biggest stories in the country. that hasn't kept anybody from talking about it. barr suddenly to becokocome cautious, oh, what if people talk about it on incomplete information? it is a departure about how the mueller investigation has moved forward. >> we've made clear over the last hour and a half through our interpretation of what happened, the way barr conducted himself, especially in light of this letter from bob mueller, but

defenders of president trump might say the attorney general put out the pull report with limited redactions. only, you know, grand jury testimony and classified information, for the public to see. it is all out in the open. while his four-page summary may have been incomplete, may have been confusing, he may have been concealing some of the truth on the obstruction question, the information is out there for the public to see. >> it is. that's a fair point with a huge but. the false narrative had a head start. >> right. >> not just minutes and not just days but weeks and weeks. everybody would have to read 448 pages carefully and understand it and its implications to understand that the false narrative is, you know, three blocks away now. the truth is not going to catch it. that's what concerns me. >> well, yeah. bob costa, i guess that's a question. the purpose of the false narrative, was it just to make

sure that the headline wasn't that there were ten examples of possible obstruction of justice, that barr wanted to give donald trump at least a one-month head start to rally republicans around him so there would never be a threat of impeachment? any word about why barr has been behaving this way and why he continues to behave this way? >> in recent days, and again in the past 24 hours, i've spoken with long-time friends of bill barr, the attorney general, his associates. when mr. rosenberg talks about the culture at the department of justice, it is clear talking to associates of barr, he sees a different kind of culture. people tell me, who know him well, he believes the special counsel, going back to his days of working for bush 41, is always subordinate to the attorney general. he runs the department of justice. robert mueller or whoever serves as special counsel may have their own assertions or opinions, but he's in control of

the process. the word, control, often told to me. he doesn't come out of the prosecutorial mindset of many people at the department of justice, though he is a long-time friend of robert mueller. this is someone who came out of the cia, was a china analyst, someone who has been in private practice for years. this is not someone who comes at this entire process with the same mentality as a robert mueller or chuck rosenberg. he has a tircdifferent, more idealogical, more outside of the doj culture, so to speak. >> one more question. let's change topics quickly. joe biden jumping into the race. numbers, obviously, are very impressive. he's had an impressive launch. the president seems to be very worried about him, tweeting about him non-stop. been insulting him for the past few days. biden, of course, jumping up in the quinnipiac poll.

warren at 12%. sanders at 11%. buttigieg at 10%. harris, 8%. o'rourke at 5%. booker at 2%. what do all the presidents' men and women think of joe biden? are they concerned about the threat that he's going to pose not only in pennsylvania but also across the upper midwest? >> inside the president's circle, there's a widespread belief that vice president biden is well-positioned for a general election. there's also somewhat of a hope inside of the west wing, in the president's campaign, that vice president biden will be torn apart by the democratic primary race. that party, in their view, is too far to the left, and they're going to go to a more progressive candidate and profi profile, someone who has a more diverse background. they believe biden could be a real threat in wisconsin, michigan, washington, ohio. they still believe he can't make

it through for a variety of reasons. >> betsy, if you look at the polls that have been put out this week, it's joe biden versus everybody else. joe biden, again, is lapping the field in this latest quinnipiac poll. he is up at 38%. warren, by the way, up eight points, jumping into second. that's fascinating. what are your thoughts on the 2020 democratic field? >> these polls are interesting, in part, because of what they said and, in part, looking at them through the lens of the . president. trump loves data. he loves stock market numbers. he loves polling numbers. there is no question that the fact that biden has polled so well is a huge part of the reason the president spent most of the morning re-tweeting people criticizing biden and the people who endorse him. these polls are front of mind for trump. that's something that's useful for biden because it lets him point out to his potential donors and potential supporters,

it lets him make the case that trump is afraid of him. that's invaluable for someone in a democratic primary. especially in a primary that's crowded and especially in a primary where biden doesn't really represent the progressive, sort of left wing of the democratic party that au often has a huge influence in the outcomes of primaries like these. >> betsy, robert, thank you both for your report this morning. chuck rosenberg, thank you, as well. we want to mention msnbc's newest original podcast, "the oath" with chuck rosenberg is available now. each week, chuck will talk with former public officials who are shaping this pivotal moment in american history. listen to the first two episodes with james comey and pree preet bharara. available for free. >> fantastic. >> learn more about "the oath" with chuck rosenberg at msnbc.com. ahead, joe mentioned the democratic race as being joe biden versus everyone else.

listen to this. >> i'm not going to get into a debate with my colleagues here. plenty of time on the stage. i'm proud of my record. >> that's joe biden reacting to a new broadside by bernie sanders, who is going after the former vp on a number of fronts. we'll show you what the vermont senator said straight ahead. first, former cia director john brennan joins the conversation. "morning joe" will be right back. and home to three bp wind farms. in the off-chance the wind ever stops blowing here... the lights can keep on shining. thanks to our natural gas. a smart partner to renewable energy. it's always ready when needed. or... not. at bp, we see possibilities everywhere. to help the world keep advancing. high protein. low sugar. tastes great! high protein.

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amy, maybe we could use the voice remote to search for something that you're not in. show me parks and rec. from netflix to prime video to live tv, xfinity lets you find your favorites with the emmy award-winning x1 voice remote. show me the best of amy poehler, again. this time around... now that's simple, easy, awesome. experience the entertainment you love on x1. access netflix, prime video, youtube and more, all with the sound of your voice. click, call or visit a store today. live picture of new york city. 7:33 in the morning. welcome back to "morning joe. "joining us in studio, john brennan, senior international security and intelligence analyst for nbc news. good to see you. >> morning, willie. >> tell me your reaction to the news we've seen overnight. we have not seen the letter from pop mueller to attorney general barr that was sent march 27th after barr's four-page summary of the mueller report. we've seen it characterized in

the "washington post" and "the new york times" as mueller being displeased with barr's representation on the obstruction of justice. what do you read into the reports? >> they underscore that there is a grievious sickness in washington, that is causing individuals to forego their obligations to the american people. it is clear the source of the sickness is donald trump, who is infecting not just the people around him in the white house, but also those public officials who are entrusted with leading the institutions of government that are supposed to protect the american people and the rule of law. i find it rather appalling, in terms of what we have seen now coming out of the attorney general over the last several months. i was one of those earlier on who thought the democrats were being too hard on him during the confirmation hearings because of what i heard about his representation. i thought he'd protect the rule of law and department of justice. this reinforces that he is

acting as donald trump's personal lawyer and not the attorney general of the united states. i'm not surprised at all that politicians like lindsey graham continue to give donald trump a pass, but i am surprised not more republicans are coming and speaking out. fortunately, we have somebody like bob mueller, who is immune to the sickness. this country, the future basically rests on bob mueller's ability to continue to speak truth to power and to maintain his integrity in a sea of this sickness. >> how do you explain the behavior x r behavior, if you can attempt to, of attorney general barr? he is not a fox news washington. he's previously been the attorney general. why would he run interference in his position for the president of the united states? >> i don't know. i don't know. i don't know what he has to gain, other than just trying to continue to reinforce his view that the office of the presidency is almost immune from these types of legal challenges that are being brought forward now. also, someone like rod

rosenstein, who at times i've been very pleased he's been able to support the mueller investigation, but then the fair we farewell letter to donald trump, where he praised him for the inaugural address. it was one of the darkest and gloomiest of any president's address. i just -- again, i see it as a sickness. as they get into this trumpian vortex, they have a skewed perspective about right and wrong. they don't have the moral compass about what is doing right for this country. their moral country is doing what is best for donald trump. >> you actually said on this show, after we got william barr's four-page summary on march 26th, you said, i don't know if i received bad information, but i think i suspected there was more than there actually was. have you changed your view of the mueller report since that time a month ago? >> well, i think when the four-page barr memo came out, we were in a state of shock, in terms of how it was portrayed. once the mueller report came out, it was clear that it

chronicled all of the collusion that was taking place. i take bob mueller's decision, that it did not establish that criminal conspiracy which is necessary to indict somebody. on the obstruction of justice iss issue, this is clear bob mueller was not going to go against prevailing policy about not indicting a sitting president. that's why i -- you know, the fact bob mueller went and put this language down in a memo, objecting to what the attorney general did, i think it demonstrates the depth of his anger. he wanted to memorialize that. that's why we need to have bob mueller in front of congress, answering questions. he will do it very honestly and very objectively. >> mika, a lot of united states senators calling for that overnight, that bob mueller must sit before congress. >> director brennan, how important is it he memorialized, put it to paper? there was also a phone call, but which is more important and why? >> well, i think it is clear to bob mueller that the four-page

memo that kocame out really did m misrepresent in a very, very unfortunate manner what the mueller team did for two years. i think bob mueller was expressing the concerns of his team and himself about the importance of not misleading the american public with this narrative that clearly was designed to give donald trump a pass, on the collusion as well as the obstruction of justice issue. i think i agree with chuck rosenberg, it was a very, very unusual step, for bob mueller to put down in writing the depth of his objections to what the attorney general did. i think bob mueller is looking for the opportunity to express what he believes was the real bottom lines of the investigation. >> john, the actions, the rhetoric of the sitting attorney general of the united states, seems to be one more swipe at the institutions of this country, weakening them. last week, there was another

continued swipe ordered by the president of the united states, who whatever he says is a megaphone and resonates throughout the country because of the way it is carried, in which he basically said that people like you and several other people in the intelligence community were responsible for trying to participate in a coup, to undermine the presidency of the united states and to premove t remove the president of the united states. what does it do -- nevermind to you personally, what does it do to institutions like the cia, the fbi many. >> it shows president trump's disdain for the intelligence communities, who are trying to do their jobs irrepresentatispe political winds in washington. it is demoralizing for mr. trump to continue to say there is this deep state that tried to launch a coup, and that he is trying to clean the swamp while, in fact,

it is those professionals within the intelligence community, law enforcement community, who are trying to carry out their duties and responsibilities to the american people. mr. trump just continues to go down this road. i think it is having a very damaging impact. >> what do you think dire, dire brennan, happens from here? i think people watchi ining go, okay, mueller didn't like how the report was characterized by the attorney general. fine, on the issue of obstruction of justice. now, is it mueller sitting before the senate and asking questions about what is inside the report? what is the outcome of this? >> barr has to be interrogated. >> that starts this morning at 10:00. >> mueller has to get in front of congress, then congress has to do its job. i'm waiting for the republicans to realize that the trump ship is a sinking one. there are still rats on that ship, and there are individuals who are not going to separate themselves from trump. they do so at their own peril. they need to fulfill their

obligations, irrespective of their political affiliations. this is now the presidency and institutions of government we rely on to keep us safe and secure. >> tom nichols has a question on venezuela, didn't topic. >> director, it seems the people defending the president somehow think they're saving the country by going into this all hands mode. yet, here we are in the middle of a crisis with venezuela, with a direct challenge yet again from the russian president, who has determined that yet another dictator cannot be overthrown. how dangerous is it to our national security to have the entire executive branch just being sucked into the black hole of constantly defending donald trump, while there are all these other things going on in the world, including in venezuela, where we are getting a direct challenge from the kremlin? >> well, even on calm news days, it is apparent donald trump does not read his intelligence briefings, does not take these issues seriously.

when there is such political waters involving mr. trump, i can imagine how distracted he is, and whether or not he'll opt to do something that will be reckless and put our national security interests at stake. whether you think about venezuela or iran or north korea or others, we need right now a president who is going to be able to lead this country during some very difficult and challenging times internationally. the more he's consumed, the more he is focused, and the more our political environment in washington is focused on these political issues, we're not going to be able to step up to that leadership role that we need to play today. >> former cia director john brennan, good to see you. >> thanks. we'll speak live next hour with the "washington post" reporter who helped to break the story of bob mueller's concerns with william barr's conduct. plus, we'll check in with our justice and white house correspondents for the latest reaction to all of this. nbc's peter alexander and pete williams join the conversation just ahead. "morning joe" back in a moment.

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joining us now, white house reporter for the "associated press," jonathan lemire. any response from the white house? what are you hearing? >> what's happened in recent

weeks, mika, is the president has been extremely pleased with his attorney general. since the release of that summary which, of course, as you might imagine, was well received in the west wing. its conclusions were there was no collusion. even though robert mueller didn't make a decision on obstruction, barr did. the president has been telling people around him he finally has his attorney general. we know how disappointed he was in jeff sessions, who was one of his most loyal campaign surrogates, for recusing himself from the russia probe. he told people all along he wanted to find his eric holder, his bobby kennedy. he feels he does, despite having no real ties to barr before this. he felt barr had his back which, of course, made others question, democrats in particular say, barr's job should not be the president's lawyer. he has a team of those, rudy giuliani and others, but he should be the top law enforcement officer. the president thinks differently and wants barr to have his support. what i heard from people close to the president last night is that he is, you know, upset,

obviously, about this robert mueller letter makes its way public, that again, he feels this has been rigged against him from the beginning, and he has some faith that william barr will go up there and have his back again before congress. >> of course, john, the reason that the william barr four-page summary is significant is it did give the president his headline out of the gate before we saw the report, which was, no collusion. they could not establish a criminal conspiracy. >> it was a strategy. as soon as the letter came out, the president and his aides ran with that. his surrogates put a playbook in action, that they wanted to give the top lines. we're going to run with this. we'll try to set the narrative first. grab the headlines, suggest that anything beyond that was partisan overreach. even after the redacted version of the report came out, that was their strategy. look, barr made his conclusions. the stuff in here, you can ignore. you can try to paint as just political noise and try to, even further, discredit what the democrats want to do going forward.

>> do we know, does anyone in the house or the senate know how many, if any, conversations were held between the president of the united states and his sitting attorney general bill barr prior to barr's initial analysis? >> the reporting we've done and others doesn't seem to indicate exactly how many conversations there were. the president did talk to people in the department of justice prior to that summary, if not barr. remember, the interim attorney general, matthew whitaker, whether there would be update on the report. it is not clear whether the president and barr had been in direct contact prior to the summary. rudy giuliani and others suggested they weren't, they didn't receive a heads up, they weren't given advance notice about the summary, and only received some advance notice about the redacted version of the report just a couple releas. >> tom, tom nichols, the gop house judiciary spokesperson has released a -- there's this

statement. let me just read the last line. as the senate judiciary committee prepares for tomorrow's hearing, house democrats have another opportunity to put partisan conducting himself in an kplemp lair manner. really? and how is this actually going play out? because there are some serious questions about him either lying or misleading congress and the american people. >> it sounds like they are trying to lean on his reputation to say, you know remember this is a long-standing public servant and we can recognize his many years of service. but like everyone involved in this administration, like director brennan was just saying. like everyone involved they end up completely mortgaging their reputations, setting on fire

their credibility and, you know, that statement to me sounds like try to remember who you thought william barr was, not the person who's doing the things he's actually doing right now. and i don't think that is going to get very far. on the other hand again, the senate -- republican senate is goimpk for him. he's going to get tough questions but think that their way of saying we're going to weather is it sto weather the storm and this isn't really going touch him. i don't know if that's true anymore but that is the position they have left. >> still ahead, nick mulvaney, long known as the budget hawk says the $22 trillion national debt doesn't seem to be holding us back. we'll talk about that with republican congressman tom cole coming up on mortgage. -- morning joe. -- morning joe. you've had quite the career.

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all right. we have much more this morning on robert mueller breaking his silence. the special counselal vents his frustrations over attorney general william barr's characterization of his rush report saying it caused confusion. turning to other stories wore following, this moments ago from london. a british court sentenced wik leakes founder julian assange to serve fifty weeks in prison. assange was seeking to avoid extradition to sweden where he was wanted for questioning over rape and sexual assault allegations which he has denied. assange was arrested on april 11th after ecuador revoked his political asylum. the alleged gunman accused of killing one and three others

saturday in a synagogue has pled not guilty. he appeared yesterday in san diego county superior court where he also pled not guilty to a single count of arson. authorities believe he's part of an anti-semitic, ante muslim manifesto found posted on name. the judge has ordered he remained held without bail. police in north carolina are trying to determine a motoive following a deadly shooting on a college campus. two people were killed and four others injured after officials say the suspect walked into a classroom on the last day of classes at the university of north carolina, charlotte yesterday afternoon and opened fire. police disarmed the suspect and he was taken into custody. they say he did not say anything to officers once he was

captured. officials say he faces charges including four counts amurder. two counts of attempted murder and four counts after assault with a dwep. and fresh scrutiny over barr's handling of the mueller report. nbc news's intelligence reporter kendall lanian joins the conversation and the devlin barrett who broke this story. and john meachum joins us to put it all in perspective. in persp. to managing your fleet... to collaborating remotely with your teams. giving you a nice big edge over your competition.

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because, they really need their space. pnc - make today the day. (alarm beeping) welcome to our busy world. where we all want more energy. but with less carbon footprint. that's why, at bp, we're working to make energy that's cleaner and better. we're producing cleaner-burning natural gas. and solar and wind power. and wherever your day takes you... we have advanced fuels for a better commute. and we're developing ultra-fast-charging technology for evs.. at bp, we see possibilities everywhere. so we can all keep advancing. joe and i have very different pasts in terms of how we have voted and very different visions for the future. and that is something we should be discussing. i voted against the war in iraq.

joe voted for it. i voted against a nafta. i voted against free trade agreements which cost us millions of jobs. joe supported those. i voted against the deregulation of washington. joe supported it. >> i'm not going to get into a debate with my colleagues here. have plenty of time on the stage. and i'm proud of my record. >> joe biden yesterday declining to engage with bernie sanders who outlined his argument against biden's record as he seeks to wage what he called an issue-oriented campaign. welcome back to "morning joe" it is wednesday may 1st. still with joe, willie and me. we have msnbc contributor.

mike barnicle. and jonathan lamere. and john meachum. >> the bard of bell belmead. >> and kevthank you very much fg with us this morning. wii less than two hours away from attorney general william barr appearing before congress and democratic lawmakers calling for special council robert mueller to testify after the "washington post" broke the news on communications between him and bar in which mueller complained that barr's four page memo was twisting the public's perception of his findings. of course to a copy of that letter reviewed by the

"washington post" mueller said "the summary letter the department sent to congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of march 24th did not fully capture the context, nature and substance of this office's work and conclusions. there is now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. this threatens to undermine a central purpose for which the department appointed the special council to assure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigationsalsell to assure confidence in the outcome of the investigations investigationsal. requested that barr release the full reports and executive summaries and made some initial suggested redaction for going doing to. mueller wrote that process need not delay the release of enclosed materials. release at this time would

alleviate the misunderstands and answer congressional and public questions about the nature and outcome of our investigation. mueller's letter was sent on march 27th. the same week as barr's summary. and a day after the letter was sent, barr and mueller spoke by phone for about 15 minutes in which the post reports mueller expressed his concern. and yet here is the sound we've been second and goal this morning. in tm to the house and senate the attorney general said he was unaware of mueller's objections senate the attorney general said he was unaware of mueller's objections. >> reports have emerged that members of the special counsell's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter that it does not adequately or accurately necessarily portray the reports findings. do you know what they are referencing with that? >> no i don't.

i think -- i think -- i suspect that they probably wanted, you know, more put out. >> did bob mueller support your conclusion. >> i don't know whether bob mueller supported my conclusion. >> let's take a step back and put this all into perspective. the attorney general of the united states who intentionally misrepresented the findings of a two year special counsell's report. he did so first in a letter. extraordinary thing to do inside the justice department, especially to someone who is your supervisor. then held a press conference the next morning talk about no collusion. no collusion. again just politically

motivated. it is straight out of the playbook of roy cohen. and then we just played you the testimony where, i'm sorry. i ask this question, not being melodramatic. i ask you this question, wondering thirty years from now, historians looking back at what's happened the past month with william barr being extraordinarily misleading, hiding a letter from the special counsel for a month while a political debate raged. how will he stack up to members of nixon's administration?

how will he stack up compared to other attorney generals? >> not well. to say the least. and i think one of the diabolically complicated things about this is that barr is no dummy. right? so even if your conversational preface to the question s he could pick that apart. good lawyer. right? and would say well i didn't misrepresent. i was selective. i was forced to make a judgment. there's been some reporting that mueller in some way maybe even agreed with barr's pushback in the phone call. here is why i think, to go to the essence of your question, bill barr has for whatever reason. i think it may be evident that decided that being on the right side of the donald trump is more important than being on the right side of history. there's -- he has a theory of

executive power. it is a controversial one. but in conservative legal circles a fairly common one. that is interacting. that sort of more traditional washington conservative view has now been put to service of someone who is unstable. a president who is unstable and whose interested in power for power sake. i don't care the president cares a lick about the unitary executive theory and whether article 2 should dominate article 1. i don't think that sentence would track for him. what i think attorney general barr should answer and he won't do it today. dick cheney back circa 2005. even the face and way about him. but they are using what is intellectually interesting visions of executive power for

very narrow political purposes right now for someone who history is is not going treat well for a president history is not going to treat well. and i think that ultimately, right now the quick verdict would be bill barr's taken a tlee theoretical view of the presidency and bailed out someone not commensurate what that. >> the revelation of the letter from the attorney general. can you boil down for those waking up and tuning. mueller's complaint to barr. what was he upset about in that four paige summary. >> he's saying the public doesn't you saunderstand our wo. that's what he says in the letter and in the follow-up phone call with the attorney general. remarkable he felt he had to write a letter about this.

that memorializes the issue. the they are far apart on this. the attorney general and the special counsel and that is what the letter shows. >> so mueller's complaint is not about the volume 1 effectively of the mueller report which is on that question of conspiracy. >> correct. >> he could not establish a conspiracy between the trump campaign and the russian government. his complaint was the -- from attorney general barr about obstruction of justice. >> this is about the obstruction issue and mueller's work on obstruction. i've been told there was this no meaningful discussion or damms about the collusion, conspiracy question. the this is all about obstruction and mueller's feeling the public was not understanding what they found when it came to obstruction. >> devlin, congratulations to you and matt zepatoski for your work. clearly not an oempblt project here. your choice of words in the reportage this morning in the

"washington post." that you reviewed the letter. have you seen the whole letter? >> yes. >> if you had to apply an adjective to the letter itself given what we've known about bob mueller and we've known him a long time, what adjective would you choose? anger, disgust? what would it be? >> i wouldn't use apg anger or disgust. what's striking is even justice department officials when they read the letter were shocked and taken aback by it. and i think shocking is the main adjective that comes to mind when i first read that letter. and i think it still applies because it shows the depth of the disagreement really. and what i'm told is in the follow-up phone call it was actually a little more of a cordial conversation but look they still have a very serious disagreement at that time and could have real consequences.

>> the president has been tweeting rapidly this morning, obviously nervous about the political fall out from the events of the last 12 to 15 hours. what can you tell us? >> i think that's right. sometimes i think we oversubscribe to the idea that donald trump is deliberately trying to distract. that something happened he wants to change the subject so he starts to tweeting about somethings else. what's clear is there are two things going on. he's starting to tweet about the mueller report again suggesting this as democratic fueled witch hunt and that he's already been exonerate sod why is it still going on. and then more than fifty retweets in an hour about firefighters. the rank and file firefighters support him and not joe biden who of course picked up an endorsement of a important firefighter regime on the show the other day. and that's something that cuts the to his core. he feels trump's base voter is this working class blue collar

often white voter from the mid west. the same kind that joe biden could appeal too. the kind of voter that would be a firefighter. the kind of voter that the president needs again for 2016. so i think this is a moment where, yes, could it be the president's impulse. because he sigh something on tv about the biden endorsement and goes often a retweet binge? possibly. he also knows the headlines this morning and bad and it is only going to get worse the next couple of hours. >> you have been covering the special counsel investigation for more than a couple of years at this point. does anything change with the revelation of this mueller letter? as devlin said mueller did not argue with the conclusion about conspiracy the first question in volume one. his questions were about obstruction on the next piece of it. >> i just think it under scores the need to get robert mueller

to congress to testify. because at every stage of in this what we've seen is robert mueller exclusively following what he believed to be his obligations as a subordinate member of the justice depth aart and running up against william barr who is doing the president's bidding. you could make an argument that the public would have been better off if volume 1 had more expansively discussed how maybe there wasn't a conspiracy but there was behavior that looked like it was unethical and perhaps unpatriotic. more than a hundred contacts with russians. you had a campaign acting in concert with the russians. a lot of counterintelligence information mueller felt the need to leave out that the facebook is still chewing on. it allowed barr to step in and say no collusion. that does not actively reflect the spirit and text of volume 1

of the report. and you could make an argument that robert mueller should not have made a decision to not even entertain a judgment about whether the president obstructed ju justice. you have a situation where a experienced prosecutor looks at the evidence and says i've made cases on much less. but barr was able to say there was no case here because mueller felt scrupulously he had to follow the spirit of the memo that said not only can the not be indict bed but we can't make judgment. maybe this is an argument that the special counsel regulation as tulted do not adequately apply when a president at united states is being investigated. the whole point of mueller was he was supposed to be independent of the president and the president's appointee william barr stepping in and making important decisions and shaping the public narrative. >> the attorney general is supposed to be somewhat independent and representing the american people.

there is also new scrutiny for the official who appointed special counsel robert mueller two years ago this month. deputy general rod rosen stein defended william barrs four page letter that interpreted the special counsel's bruising findings on instructions in a way that pleased plump. and even after reports that mueller's team felt the report was more damaging than depicted, rosenstein stood by barr telling the wall street journal an april 11th "he's being as forthcoming as he can." where do we put that ken? >> that's one of these enduring mysteries. is rob rosenstein's evolution. for a long time he was a protector of the mueller investigation. why he chose to go out there way, praising the president.

only rod rosenstein can answer for that. >> and devlin, are we going to see this letter? >> yeah i expect that we'll see the letter today. for one thing the democrats on the house side have demanded it be delivered to them this morning. but also there is a hearing coming up. i think it would be really -- it would put the attorney general in a impossible situation to be publicly testifying on live tv and say no i won't give you the letter. i do think we'll see the letter today. >> i want you to clarify something a lot of trump supporters seized on in your piece last night which was that primarily bol was kpbing about media coverage.b mueller was kpg about media coverage. what did he mean that that? >> it is a key distinction. the thing to remember is in the

letter. what mueller cites is barr's four page summary. and barr obviously disputes that summary is the right term but that becomes a semantic game. so in the letter mueller is saying that he has concerns about what barr has said publicly. but then according to people who are familiar with the conversation the two have later by phone, the conversation between these two guys quickly turns to really the media according to muellers, the media misunderstanding on what he found on obstruction was his primary concern. where would that misunderstanding come from? it is a fair question to say could they have only gotten that misunderstanding from barr's letter? but there is a distinction between the two conversations i think is important. >> the "washington post" devlin barrett. thank you very much. >> thanks. >> northbound's ken dilanian. thank you as well. and the coverage surrounding william barr continues. up next we'll go live to the

white house and nbc news peter alexander on the president's league team reacting on the reservation oaf mueller expressing concerns to barr. and justice correspondent pete williams has his latest reporting. you are watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. you are watching "morning joe. we'll be right back. the matters.ar... introducing the all-new 2019 ford ranger, it's the right gear. with a terrain management system for... this. a bash plate for... that. an electronic locking rear differential for... yeah... this. heading to the supermarket? get any truck. heading out here? get the ford ranger. the only adventure gear built ford tough. high protein. low sugar. tastes great! high protein. low sugar. so good! high protein. low sugar. mmmm, birthday cake!

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hearing? >> beyond the tweet storm president trying to distract from the focus. as they relate to that letter from robert mueller to william barr. we've not heard from the president of topic but overnight i did speed to rudy giuliani, he thought it was odd what he was hearing from robert mueller. here is part of his cuetoth quote to me last evening. he said if mueller didn't want confusion he should have made a decision. he was made special counsel to make decisions and in fact he kidn't said to me president trump was innocent. robert mueller noted the office of legal counsel opinion that said you can't indict a sitting president but said you certainly can investigate one. and he didn't let the president off the hook but e also didn't accuse hoiim.

t guidelines you say continue do. the mueller report says congress may apply the laws --. while the president has said total vindication. total exoneration. mueller himself said i'm not making a conclusion which would have made it a lot easier for everybody. but he did effect leave to it congress to take it from here. >> this letter revealed from bob mueller last night from the "washington post" and the "new york times" makes today's hearing more interesting. what do you expect to see in that room today in about an hour and a half. >> i suspect barr will say. and we've already seen his testimony. so i'm not guessing here. i have a pretty good idea of what he's going to say. he'll say he did get the report out publicly even though he

didn't have. that only 8% of it was redacted. he doesn't say in the letter. he'll say he didn't want the report out piecemeal he tried to get it out as quickly as he could but that it had to be redacted for all those considerations that he spelled out in the past. and i suspect that he'll explain why he made the prosecutorial decision he did. are we going co-charge or not? and the fact that mueller didn't, he felt he had to. >> peter and jonathan. i'd like both of you to think about this for a second and address it. years ago when your fellas were in about 6th grade, covering the white house was a little like covering the police headquarters. you would sit there and wait for

the and ask question. but now covering the white house every day in this climate it seems to an observe they are it rises to the level of a daily tension convention. how does that affect the consumer of news and how does it affect you starting with peter. >> good question, mike. to give you a behind the scenes look, each day when we have these conversations with you on "morning joe" when it is done often times white house administration official wills go on fox news, for example, do an interview with the anchors there. which the president likely is watching and then they will come to the gathering of reporters from here. happened within the last 24 hours. kellyanne conway the president's counselor did one of these and i asked specifically d determined that president had delivered 10,000 lies or falsehoods or misrepresented the facts that many times. she disputed that. said in fact it was us lying on a regular basis. but she still cooperates with us and speaks us to. the bottom line is it has become a remarkable setting here on a

near daily basis where some of these exchanges particularly with some of the president's aids can get contentious on camera. and they deliver the message and try to do it in a way that is grinded up the media. the delivering of information. what some have called alternative facts and the bottom line for us each day is when you hear things from the president you are forced to sort of digest that and then go to the actual facts themselves and communicate those to the american public to make the determination for themselves. >> it is more than that. we also have lost the ability to ask administration officials in the best possible setting which is the white house briefing. we haven't had in nearly two months i believe. before that it was very sporadic. now we're relying on gaggles on the driveway of the president who his credit does take questions from the media but usually in setting he prefers. on the white south lawn with marine one in the background where it is hard to hear and he can walk away and ignore

questions he doesn't want to answer. and let's not forget. not trying to suggest people should feel bad for white house reporters. even one like peter. the president at the same time has made us, put us in the center of his campaign in unprecedented way with labels. the other night at the correspondence dinner it was a celebration of the first amendment and what we're trying to do which is to find information and deliver it to the public. and what instead at the same time in green bay the president went off another secrete against us. and that is something where it is not just about spin. politicians spin. but he's putted the point where he's echoing authoritarian leaders across the globe and potentially putting people's lives in danger. >> john meachum. >> pete wanted to ask you a quick question. are you surprised at this edition, this version of bill

barr? 30 years on since his first tour? or does this fit in with your basic sense of his character and philosophy. >> well i didn't know cover him the first time he was here. my first attorney general was janet reno. i was in the government when bill barr was attorney general the first time. and people who did cover him though say that he is somebody who believes very strongly in the power of the president and executi executive power and is a staunch defe defender of that. i think that is part of this. part of this is the process that he's forced into by the special counsel rules. and i think one thing that may happen as a result of all this, you know, the special counsel rules that we have now that mueller operated you shouunder result of unhappiness with the

special counsel law and way it was carried out and perhaps the pendulum's swung too far here and i've asked justice department officials whether they are going take another look at the special counsel rules. i think the answer is yes but not right now. when things calm down i think they will look at whether they should be revised yet e again. the rules don't call for public release of the report at all that barr operated under. no matter where you sit on barr's conclusion the president obstructed justice. you have to give him credit for the fact that he did push for a public release. you could argue it was going to hapuna. congress would have clambered for it. but the fact he did what he didn't have to do under the rules. >> peter alexander and pete williams, thank you both for joining us this morning. up next, republican congressman tom cole is standing by with his reaction to the special counsel expressing frustrations with the

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is the debt troublesome? sure it is. i worry about exogenous shocks to the system where if something happen, particularly overseas that cause a crisis typically we're able to fall back on the borrowing ability and get us through that. i don't know if you can do that 22 trillion dollars in debt. i'll be the first to admit i complained about the debt in 2009. it doesn't seem to be holding us back from an economic standpoint yet. >> ha. as the l.a. times headlines puts it. mulvaney says soaring u.s. debt isn't holding us back. the deputy whip for the republican congress. tom cole.

congressman, i find this especially rich. and you and i may be able to relate on this. because people like me, when i was in congress, was a pain in the ass for people like you. just like mulvaney was a self righteous pain in the ass, just like i was, for people like you, always preaching about how you didn't care about the deficit and the debt and the world was coming to an end. i'm not just mocking mulvaney, i'm mocking myself because that's been my issue. i'm from that wing of the conservative movement. and, you know, not everybody is. i'm just wondering how do you feel watching this flame thrower, this deficit hawk say $22 trillion, eh, maybe it is bad. maybe it is not. who am i to say. >> you can feel their pain. so that's okay. we need people like that by the way. he's my friend. obviously he's arguing a

position he's not very comfortable with and doesn't believe in. he worked for the president of the united states. his job to defend the policies of the president even when he doesn't agree with them. i have no privately he disagrees with some of the decisions but no question given has background it is an awkward spot for him to be in. >> i may ono longer be a republican but i'm still a conservative. >> we welcome you back with open arms. we think you are a republican. >> i hope one day -- well we'll talk this later. so what do you say to conservatives like myself who are still deficit hawk, who are still so concerned about the national debt. we republicans failed from 2001 to 2009 when we controlled washington to control the debt. the republicans are failing to do that again. can you give conservatives who are deficit hawks like me some hope that perhaps that $22

trillion debt at least will be slowed down? >> i can. we actually lowered the deficit the last two years we were in the majority in '07 and '08 pretty substantially and we lowered it again from $1.4 trillion in 2010 down to less than $500 billion in four years immediately after. we did that by restraining. >> that was the sequestration, which of course i support bud now boy all these spending caps have been blown to pieces. what do we think of now? >> we have to go to entitlement form, look we are spending less on defense and military operations today than in 2010. we're spending less on non defense than we were in 2010. to that is nine years. what we haven't tackled is medicare, medicaid, social security. those are the things that are unbalancing the budget. and the last president didn't want to deal with them. this president doesn't want to deal with them. i what i think is a good

bipartisan bill on social security. but off the have the encouragement to go after entitlement spending. one of my concerns on the democratic side is they are going further down the road. proposing medicare for all. we had a hearing on it yesterday in the rules committee. that would add 32 trillion dollars of spending to the federal budget. it would increase the annual budget from 4.5 thrill to .7.7 trillion dollars in a matter of two years. so we haven't learned ourless san yet. if we're going to have all these things off the start paying for him and the bill we dealt with had no tax provisions, nothing as to how we would pay for this. >> medicare part b was 7

trillion dollar plan and nothing how to pay for it. i'm curious about the infrastructure that nancy pelosi, chuck schumer and donald trump put together. the broad spending outlines at least. $2 trillion. i think most of us believe that our infrastructure is dilapidated. our airports, bridges, roads need to be fixed. how can we pay for that $2 trillion? i think we should, as a fiscal hawk. i still think we should. how do we pay for that $2 trillion bill. >> if numbers all well and good. you put your fing attorney problem. till you say how to pay for it doesn't matter. off the look at gas leoline tax. how to tax electric vehicles. they pay no road tax and they are a growing part of the fleet. and you have to probably look at additional money as well in other areasem that is a big bold

item and i'm waiting for someone to actually tell me how you can write this check. i don't think you can put it on the national credit card. >> barr is going to the hill today. we've been concerned, i've been concerned about his testimony in the house where he seemed to offer at the very least misleading comments to charlie krist. are you concerned about misrepresenting positions to your committees? >> i'm a creature of congress. i'm always skeptical of the executive branch. doesn't matter who happens to add it up. but that is why we have these kind of hearings. obviously the attorney general will have a chance to answer any questions that congress wants to put to him. i think that is a good thing. so we'll just wait and see what he has to say when that very question you just framed is opposed to him by a member of

congress. >> are you concerned the letter. >> i'm concerned of transparency. on a variety of fronts here. to me if the special counsel had a concern he either should have been indicted or he should have said very clearly look, i would have indicted other than we have a justice department policy that prevents. he didn't say that. he left it to the justice department to make the determination. >> did he do that? or was he actually leaving it to congress to make that determination? >> well he said he left it toyota the justice department. congress is free to make that determination. mr. mueller frankly deserves a lot of credit for releasing as much of the report as he has. caused a great deal of consternation up here. if my friends on the other side want to proceed they are free do that. in the end if mueller wanted to

flag something it should have been a little clearen they are he was. and this sort of complaining after the fact when you knew who you were turning the report over and knew what the likely determination going to be strikes me as trying to have it both ways. >> congressman, i'm just curious whether you agree with me that this justice department dplooin that a president can should someone middle of fifth avenue. and let's say the democratic president next and not be indicted.middle of fifth avenue. and let's say the democratic president next and not be indicted. do you find that guideline trouble study guide. >> i do. i don't know how the justice department came to that conclusion. i'm not an attorney but it teams so me we're a country of laws or we're not. and we're all subject to the law. that includes the president. >> tell me one thing about your

state, oklahoma, who's going on this summer. >> we're going to turn your second string quarterback from alabama into the third heisman winner in a row from the university of oklahoma. a great guy. >> and a great quarterback. he's a great guy. and i'll tell you the thing i liked about him the most was he was such a team player. throughout the entire year. >> total class act. >> total. >> we're lucky to have him. >> yeah you are. and it is sad a that we've lost him. thank you very much congressman. >> up next. the top four democratics in quinnipiac's new poll. three have seen their support jump if recent days. just one, bernie sanders has seen the opposite effect. we're going run through the numbers next on "morning joe." g numbers next on "morning joe."

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title x for affordable natbirth control and reproductive health care. the trump administration just issued a nationwide gag rule. this would dismantle the title x ("ten") program. it means that physicians cannot tell a patient about their reproductive health choices. we have to be able to use our medical knowledge to give our patients the information that they need. the number one rule is do no harm, and this is harm. we must act now. learn more. text titlex to 22422 a third national poll shows democratic voters are welcoming joe biden into the presidential

race. the quinnipiac poll finding biden at 38% up 9 points since last month and 26 points ahead of his nearest rival sneere nearest rival, senator elizabeth warren. >> say that again. elizabeth warren rises eight points to 20%? >> senator bernie sanders takes a tumble to third place in this poll. and mayor pete buttigieg ranks fourth with 10%. >> jon meacham, i'm trying to draw some historical comparisons but certainly joe biden assumes the front-runner handle much like george h.w. bush did in 1998. of course, that's fraught with pitfalls as jeb bush, his son, found out many years later. but what's your take on joe

biden's service this week? >> as president reagan used to say, he always asked president dewey how the polls looked. so tap the brakes on that. but it's a really interesting reaction because i think the conventional wisdom and i certainly thought so as part of that some weeks ago was this is not biden's moment, he's not down with the progressive base here, but it's a reminder, these polls are reminders the democratic party is in fact more -- once you get off twitter, it's much more broad based than you might think, and i guess it will be a fascinating either concluding act in the age of trump or middle act in the age of trump if we have two sent ga narian white guys who believe they're working class going at

it in 2020. my sort of back pocket analysis is it's possible, isn't it, that there are so many young newish progressive candidates that that splitting of that energy and people are kind of confused and they know biden, they associate him interestingly with president obama so they're thinking, you know what, let's send our guy into the ring with trump. >> you know mike barnicle, one of the interesting headlines this week i think was that the most important constituency in the democratic party as it pertains to primary voters are black women, who are supporting joe biden in big numbers. and it reminds me -- it reminds me of 2007, the frustration that many of the obama camp felt because black voters were not naturally moving over to barack obama. he had to earn those votes. right now joe biden looks like

he has those votes. that's mayor pete's weakness. that's bernie sanders' weakness. but he's got them, and it seems to me as long as he stays disciplined, sticks to the script, stays on teleprompter and runs as disciplined, control campaign as barack obama did in 2008, he's going to be hard to catch. >> yeah, i wouldn't disagree with that, joe. i would tell you though something you know, obviously, that this really is just the first week of spring training. we haven't even had any combination games in terms of the political contest. but looking at the numbers in the poll, there are a couple of really interesting things. one that just jumped off the screen at me is the way that mayor pete, pete buttigieg, has really stripped beto o'rouke of much of his campaign. >> yes. >> the second element that is really surprising as well as well deserved i think is

elizabeth warren's jump in the polls. she more than any of the other candidates has brought substance on a daily basis to her campaign. she's talking substance. if you go to any of her rallies, she has specific proposals, she backs them up with evidence. then you get to joe biden, and in the public's mind deservedly so again, he's handcuffed to barack obama. people see joe biden and they can think of and easier -- not necessarily domestic or international, but calmer time in this country. and that's what a lot of americans are looking for and that is the ultimate issue is one defined by joe biden's presence in the campaign, these polls take account of ordinary people and putting them together and ordinary people want one thing above all else, they want to beat donald trump. >> beat donald trump is right. mike talking about beta, he sent out a fund-raising letter yesterday subjects leveling with you, we want to level with you

about fund-raising, no one doubts we have the people or support to raise what we need team but beto, lately our fund raising has slowed down. if we don't pick up the pace, we will be heavily outspent. that sent out yesterday from a panic beto o'rouke fund-raising team. >> we're just one hour away from william barr's testimony on capitol hill. msnbc, 0inof course, will have e coverage of that. as the attorney general is questioned about bob mueller's concerns with his response to the russia probe. and as we go to break, a note on knowing your value this week, we're looking at risk taking and helping women understand sometimes it is important to push the envelope a little bit. i have a piece posting today on "my big gamble." you can check it out on know your value.com and join the conversation on all of our social platforms. we'll be right back. like.. pnc easy lock,

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yesterday? >> i think we're all officially waiting for mueller. joe? >> we are waiting for mueller. it will be fascinating to see what happens. certainly a lot of focus today on whether you want to call it a lie or misleading answer -- >> misdirected. >> the lack of transparency will be focused upon by members of the united states congress today. >> that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. thank you very much, mika. hi, there, i'm stephanie ruhle. wow, what a morning. within this hour attorney general bill barr will arrive on capitol hill to appear before the senate judiciary committee. the already-high stakes now ramped up to 11 after last night's stunning revelation of a confidential letter robert mueller wrote to barr complaining the attorney general mischaracterized mueller's report. plus, chaos continues in caracas. we will go live to venezuela as the push to get maduro out