nice. i want to thank stephen colbert and john bativity who was playing the go-goes. we got the beat. that's it for the show. "hardball" with chris matthews is up next. >> crisis. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. the top democrats on the house judiciary said donald trump plunged the country into a constitutional crisis. here's new york congressman jerry nadler. >> we talked for a long time about approaching a constitutional crisis. we are now in it. we are now in a constitutional crisis. now is the time of testing whether we can keep a republic or whether this republic is destined to change into a

different tyranical form of government as other republics have over the centuries. >> nadler's committee voted by party line to hold william barr in contempt of congress to refuse to testify and hand over the mueller report. this will mark only the second time in american history a u.s. attorney general was declared in contempt of congress. for six weeks, committee democrats sought the full un redacted version of the special counsel's report. however, just before today's hearing, the justice department informed the committee at least for now the president asserted executive privilege over the entirety of the subpoenaed materials. the latest white house resistance is one of many efforts to block congress from fulfilling its responsibilities and the contempt citation with the first and dramatic escalation in the ongoing standoff. i'm joined by the vice chair of

the house judiciary in today's hearing. white house correspondent from the pbs news hour and joyce vance, former u.s. attorney. it's a great thing to have you on, but it's a terrible time. explain that to the person who remembers civics and where we are at. it's a strange time. even though it's trump time. it's still strange. that's how i got here. i have been a civics educator and it's a thwarting of the government and the coequal branches tra is really the reason why many of us ran. it's seeing that we have a president who doesn't know how government works and doesn't care how it works and isn't in government for the good of the country. you stunned by trump's behavior or used to it because it seems like every day he says enough. i don't care what you think. i don't see what the protocols of the constitution is. he said no. i am not going to give you the documents and let anybody testify. even if they once worked here.

nobody will do it. >> he is bringing the bare-knuckled real estate world to washington, but washington doesn't work that way. >> let me go to joyce on this. i'm back to my problem which is i believe in the constitution. i believe in regular order. i am boring and things should work the way they always have. if you are seaped, they always have. there has to be a referee. even nixon would go along with the courts. he turned over the tapes and gave up his career because they said to do it. i don't trust trump to do it based on what's going on right now. >> i think that's right. there is no reason to trust. and to compare this contempt situation with attorney general barr to the time when eric holder's attorney general was held in contempt, that ruling came after the justice department turned over something like 7600 documents and made multiple wnlss available. there is this good faith effort to comply with subpoenas and

here we have a president who issued a flat out eat it to his people. do not show up. do not testify. exert executive privilege over all documents. this is an executive president who wants to remain immune from any scrutiny and that's not how the constitution works. >> the closer every day we are going a crazy country where there is no history of democracy. i don't want to knock any other country. we are better. we have been doing it since the late 18th century and sounds like they haven't done doing it. we are academying like we haven't had 250 something of getting elections every two years and the branches respect each other and have arguments and they are resolved by the courts and we move on. this president is saying i'm going to exert executive privilege over the universe. anybody i know who worked for me and any paper that comes out of any agency, i own.

>> i put the question to sarah sanders, the press secretary today. i said what do you make of the people who say president trump is edging us closer to a constitutional crisis. she said democrats are overreaching the white house is being bullied by another branch of congress and of the government. democrats say this is oversight. this is our constitutional duty to do this. i should tell you i talked to people from venezuela and haiti. they say look at this very carefully. this is how authoritarian governments start. he was talking to jailing opponents and he doesn't have to answer to congress. mostly democrats are from authoritarian governments say america really needs to watch out. >> people from cuba like that. a misleading attack, he repea d repeatedly accused democrats of asking the attorney general to break the law. let's watch.

>> democrats and chairman nadler and this committee are asking the attorney general to break the law. break the law by releasing grand jury information to congress. >> what we are doing is forcing the attorney general to break the law. >> comply with the subpoena, he must break the law. if he obeys the law, he must disobey the subpoena. >> anyway, democrats argued since early april they are not asking barr to break the law. they are asking him to obtain permission to allow the disclosure of those materials. here's chairman nadler reiter e reiterating that point. >> all we asked is the department asked us in petitioning the court to see if it's proper to have access to this material. >> explain to the viewers why it's important for congress, your committee judiciary to get his hands on the full mueller report. what are you looking for in there? >> when robert mueller filed his

report, he explicitly said i'm not going recommend charges against the president because i don't think i can under the rules of justice. we need to preserve this evidence. i found obstruction of justice. i'm going to lay it out and we preserve that evidence and congress can act on this. that's what we are going do. >> let's talk about one bit of beef here. the reality of began's testimony. to the special couple. the president of the united states told him to fire the special counsel. that to me is enough. that's right up there with saturday night -- not "saturday night live," but saturday night massacre. what do you think of that? if you want information, you have enough for me to prosecute. >> well, it sounds like it from the mueller report. it sounds like there is more there. but we haven't seen what mcgahn said. we haven't seen the underlying notes. there is extensive notes and it's not what you mentioned that he was told to fire mueller, but

he was told to lie about it and manufacture the evidence to support a lie. there is a lot there, but we need the evidence. >> it's important to note that the white house has told don began not to turn over documents to congress. i was pushing on that and it's another issue separate from barr, but still executive privilege. the white house is saying we are worried about what could be happen figure don mcgahn testifies before congress. >> something i read in history is that joe carthy didn't want to censure him because he was awful to witnesses. a lot of them were bad. they did censure and ruin his career and he drank himself to death by censuring him on his behavior in confronting the investigating committee. it was that behavior that they cited him for. the behavior of this president right now, denying evidence to the committee investigating him, denying witnesses and any live

witnesses and documentary evidence, anything that they ask for to try to do their job of oversight he said i'm not going to let. isn't that obstruction of justice in our face? >> this president has engaged in a constant pattern from day one of obstruction in plain sight. this is why it's so important for congress to have the ability to access documents and witnesses that it needs. impeachment is a lot like indictment. prosecutors don't just show up and say let's indict this defendant. you have to investigate and compile the evidence. you have to look at it carefully to make sure you understand what the misconduct is and what conduct he may dislike that doesn't cross the line. congress needs to engage and have the ability using evidence and witnesses from the white house where necessary to engage in that careful process so they can determine whether any action against this president is warranted to try to short circuit their consideration and

not let them engage in the process is a violation of the constitution as cleara as we can contemplate. >> you are in a difficult situation because you want to get something done. i think that's right. you go to the fact that from the beginning of this investigation, it's clear that the president and his people obstructed justice so that you couldn't get enough evidence on collusion. you can't get that case made. he continued to avoid you getting any evidence to use against him and investigating with regard to obstruction. he won't let mcgahn testify and see the un redacted report. he doesn't want you to see his tax returns. noing that might incriminate him. what happens if he wins and you don't get anything and you can't indict and begin the procedures aiming towards impeachment. >> you and i are both fans of the constitution. i don't think they are there yet. the courts will stand up and the republican senate issued a subpoena against a member of the

trump family. >> you trust the courts. it's 5-4 republican supreme court justices. >> i still believe in our government. what we are seeing donald trump talks about a wall. he's got a wall. it has nothing to do with immigration. it has to do with mnuchin and barr. he built a war wall to protect him from the rule of law. >> the arrogance of him. i know they have a lot of money, but the arrogance. i'll consider that on may 6th. i'll make up my mind then. they set their own deadlines. it's a premature request or it was partisan. they act like their own referees. breaking news right now tonight. adam schiff, democratic chair tweeted that the house intel subpoenaed doj for all counter intelligence and foreign intelligence in the probe. the full report and underlying evidence. doj responded with silence and defiance. we will not be obstructed.

this is a lot of this stuff that may not be criminal. of course there is questions about they have the collusion piece against the part that have the questions. 50-50 in terms of obstruction at best for him. now we do need the counter intelligence information. what were the russians up to and who on the american side were playing ball with them, criminally or not and they won't turn it over for that purpose for the intelligence committee of schiff. >> the counter intelligence part of this investigation has always been critical. this is within congress's area of responsibility. bob mueller may not have found evidence sufficient to prove a experience between the campaign and the russian government, but that's a far cry from saying there was no collusion. a far cry from saying the president hasn't unwittingly been compromised. they need to see what they concluded to protect this

country from whatever russia is planning on bringing next. >> i don't know if this is important, but it's interesting. the republican-led senate and all the committees are republican led subpoenaed the president's son, donald trump, jr. i they want to question him about his true involvement in his father's attempts to build a trump tower in moscow in the 2016 election. during the campaign itself. ask in 2017 if he had involvement, trump, jr. replied he was only terrorist rally aware of it. the former trump lawyer testified under oath that he briefed trump on it 10 times. >> i think this is a remarkable showing by the republicans to say we want answers. you can't lie to us. >> is barr burr okay? >> i think he will be okay if he goes forward and something that donald trump, jr. can say and he can show that donald trump, jr. was misleading the congress and i think he will be okay.

>> i wonder whether he is serious and prosecuting the bad guys. will richard bur, a republican, be the only republican that's serious. he would be the only one. >> i think the subpoena is something that is very, very serious and we have not seen this action from republicans. i will say if we go broader picture, 2020 is going to be resolving a lot of this. if the president can get reelected when doing all of this, you have to ask yourself about americans and their understanding of the constitution. it said there is a precedent set that any republican and democratic president can do this and keep their job. >> because of all kinds of tribal alliances, i noticed in every community, they will reelect the guy who is of theirs even if they are a crook. we never apply that to the president of the united states before and we hope never will i hope you do well out there. it's a great honor. what a great area to represent you. joyce vance, thank you so much.

the art of the myth. back in the mid 90s, donald trump passed himself off as the super successful deal maker and businessman. now comes the reality, a report from the "new york times" showing years of enormous business losses. he lost a billion dollars of real money from 85 to 94. will he pretend to be something he wasn't. will delay obstruct the new norm. >> every single day the president is making a case. he is becoming self-impeachable. >> i can't wait to see what that means tonight. she said and speaker pelosi won't go ahead and impeachment. she is still cautious. will trump ever get held accountable? will he ever get caught? stick with us. he ever get caug? stick with us.

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welcome back to "hardball." we are also following another blockbuster story about president trump, but this one threatens to cross with his family. yesterday the "new york times" reported that donald trump lost over a billion dollars in a roughly 10-year period. look at him bragging that he lost a billion dollars. the "new york times" obtained tax transcripts showing from 1985 to 1994, trump reported a negative gross income year after year. in 1990 and 91, he lost 250 million sdlz a year, more than double those of the nearest taxpayers. after comparing his information with similar high income earners, the times figured out he lost more money than nearly any other individual in american history. one of the years, 1987 trump was selling a different reality, however, in his best selling book, the art of the deal. in the first line of the book,

he said i don't do it for the money. i've got enough. much more than i'll ever need. he went to lose $42 million that year. earlier today, trump called the reporting very old information that is highly inaccurate. old news is one of the oldest tricks in the business. you say it's old because you don't want to hear it again. david cay johnson, a journalist whose nonprofit d.c. report got access to trump's 2005 tax returns. let's talk about the meeting. a period in the mid 80s to mid 90s appeared when he was justigating famous. the way it hit me and it's different than all the producers. it hit me like working guys and women who make average incomes and don't like people who don't pay taxes. they don't believe they run the losses and think they are all depreciation. they think there is all kinds of gimmicks involved and they can't

stand a guy living like the king fish, like the richest guy on the planet with planes and boats and yachts and he is losing money? they don't believe it. what did you think when you heard the report? >> the myth of donald trump is the modern midas who turns everything to gold died yesterday afternoon, killed by an article in the "new york times." the losses reported here are much larger than any of us who had been closely following trump imagined. many of these are real business losses. the paper losses he gets for the supposed decline in the depreciation, those don't account for these at all. these were losses from his business failures. frankly, donald is not a very good businessman. >> why is he rich? >> because he draws money out of

these businesses and puts them to himself and doesn't pay his vendors and doesn't pay workers and cheats the government and doesn't do all sorts of thing that is normal business people do. >> does he skim? are you saying he's a skimmer like skimming the profits? >> no, no, no. he does this through contracts and things. his casino company when it was public, the investors lost everything and the bond holders lost almost everything, but donald got $82 million in pay. >> let me go to charlie. your view, you know my theory. people who don't pay taxes look like crook crooks. your thoughts? >> how does it play with his base? nothing moves the needle it. should chip away at the myth that he is a populous. it is a tribute to the flagrant act of journalist that david cay johnson was surprised by. donald trump is just a lousy businessman, but an incredibly

successful con man. you can say at this point he may be the most successful con man in world history. he parlays a failed business career into an image of the master of the universe and parlays that into the presidency of the united states. to a certain extent we knew the man was a conand a fraud and a huckster, but we didn't imagine how deep it was. going your point about all of this, the details of this, the way in which he scammed the system, manipulated the system and much of it is within the system legally. it really ought to raise questions in the minds of working people in ohio and wisconsin. is this guy really the champion of the average working guy? democrats would commit an act of political malpractice if they couldn't use this to chip away at the image. >> going back to david on this.

i don't know if he's a billionaire or half a billionaire or three times. a lot of people have been hurt by this guy. the people who went to trump university thinking here's a chance to make a career. they were just discarded people. the people that invested coming back from south jersey and all the hopes and all the working people and african americans and poor people and the hopes they had. how many of them went bust? remember the expressway aimed directly into his casino. you went right into the casino. that's how much power he had. kaput. everybody lost their money. all the working waiters out of business. i still have one big question. how much has he got now? do you think he's not rich? >> there is never been evidence that he is actually a billi billionaire at any point in his career. he's a wealthy man without question, but he has a desperate

need for cash. donald's business model is get ahold of an enterprise and squeeze the money out and don't pay your vendors and let them go broke and do everything to not pay your bills. it's long running instead of over a weekend. he's wealthy, but nowhere near what people think. i had several, about a half dozen people who are trump supporters who are livid at me and the new york times and msnbc, but not trump. they are convinced he's committed hardly any crimes compared to hillary. >> that's a mind set. president trump has often boasted that he's a self-made billionaire and vowed to bring business skills into the white house to help the country. here he goes. >> i built an unbelievable business. a great, great business. some of the greatest assets in the world. >> i have been in business and made a lot of money which i'm going to do for the country. i have been focused on jobs and money and deals.

that's what i do. that's what the country needs. >> i loved business and i have been good at building things and have been very successful at making money. >> a billion dollars in losses, the largest tax loss in history. the "new york times" published a huge expose that showed that trump got a huge helping hand on his path to greatness. trump received $413 million adjusted from inflation from his father. how much of the myth is real? >> very little of the myth is real, but i remember in the 2016 campaign when i used to have a regular talk show in wisconsin, how often people fed back the line. donald trump has been so successful, we need somebody who is that successful as a business person in the white house and even when you reminded them of the failed businesses and the airlines and the stakes and the vodka and the trump university, it didn't penetrate because of the one thing he did

successfully. he created the brand. he had the show. he was able to project himself. he was able to craft this myth and made it bullet-proof. what david was saying before, even when confronted with this information, you are seeing the trump fan base saying this is a sign of a brilliant businessman he was. everybody did this sort of thing. it's something that he has been able to create and i think history is going to look back on this as one of the greatest successful film flam operations that will cross the line from business over to politics. >> what he doesn't have is more. a couple of them know more about this than any of us. what is out there if from him. thank you for the unique look into reality. the showdown over executive privilege coming to a head with speaker pelosi saying -- here's

a phrase we will remember. self-impeaching. that's what he is doing by continuing to stonewall oversight. is trump trying to force democrats into impeaching him and saying come on, make my day? i sometimes think he wants it. is it a win-win if he gets impeached? we don't know. we'll be right back. impeached? we don't know. we'll be right back. the fire going for another 150 years. ♪ to inspire confidence through style. ♪ i'm working to make connections of a different kind. ♪ i'm working for beauty that begins with nature. ♪ to treat every car like i treat mine. ♪ at adp we're designing a better way to work, so you can achieve what you're working for. ♪

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welcome back to "hardball." trump logged another grenade to deny informs to congress by invoking executive privilege to block the release of the un redacted mueller report to congress. even before that, nancy pelosi suggested the president is "effectively daring congress to impeach him." >> every single day, whether it's obstruction, obstruction, obstruction. obstruction of having people come to the table with facts and subpoenas, every single day, the president is making a case -- he's becoming self-impeachable on the things he -- >> self-impeachable. she later elaborated on the comments with house democrats saying he's putting out the case against him. he's doing work in a certain

suspect. she tamped down calls for members of a democratic caucus who can go ahead and begin impeachment. it echoes an argument that president trump is baiting congress to act. >> trump is goating us to impeach him. he is at what pointing, taunting, taunting. he knows that it would be divicive, but he doesn't really care. he wants to solidify his base. we can't impeach him for political reasons and we can't not impeach him for political reasons. we have to see where the faxes take us. >> like someone's cell phone. i'm joined by congressman ted liu of california. white house reporter for the "los angeles times." as always, do you think in trump's head which is crazy like a fox sometimes, he thinks impeachment is a winner for him if the economy stays strong with

the 3.6 jobless rate and if he goes into next year with the good economy and the democrats chasing him, he can say i'm the winner and i'm helping your country and you economically and these darn democrats are getting in my way with this impeachment nonsense. is that his game? does he want to be impeached? >> thank you for your question. i'm not sure the president thinks 20 steps ahead. i don't think he wants to be impeach and if you look at his statements, it seems like he does not, but with the actions of denying every subpoena request from congress, that may push us to a place where it's our only option. we held the attorney general in contempt. that's a tool we have and will start escalating the options we have. at some point when we get no information, we may have to consider impeachment. >> it's never clear. we were talking about predicting anything. you never know.

i'm not sure anybody knew when clinton was impeached for his misbehavior and history is not even clear what the final result is. nobody wants that mark against you in history, but it didn't hurt him in realtime. >> you're right. if they were to go down this road, we don't know how it plays politically until you get there. that's true. i can tell you there is no way that president trump wants his name associated with the word impeached. look how insecure this guy is about the 2016 electoral victory. that's the reason why we are in this situation and he can't crack down on russia and why he obstru obstructing. >> why is he bait something. >> i don't know that he think thinks about it that way. his actions almost force the reactions that make him go and upset him so much. what she is saying is he's behaving in such a way that they have no choice. he's moved her off of saying we

are not pursuing this to now with the mueller report coming out and the president's response to it. she is basically saying yeah, we as oversight committee, we don't have much choice. >> yesterday the president's would be 2020 rival, elizabeth warren, one of the potential rivals renew said a call for impeachment in a lengthy speech on the senate floor. >> this is not a fight i wanted to take on, but this is the fight in front of us now. this is not about politics. this is about the constitution of the united states of america. we took an oath not to try to protect donald trump. we took an oath to protect and serve the constitution of the united states of america. and the way we do that is we begin impeachment proceedings now against this president. >> meanwhile the associated press reports impeachment talk emboldened his campaign, write trump's team is cheer every call

to impeach the president believing such talk motivates trump supporters and turns off moderates from the democratic party. the president still intends to run as the victim of perceived slights by the media and the democrats because he believes the stance rallies supporters to his defense. how can that not be true? this is the catch 22 for the democrats. if trump believes that playing the victim works, if he looks like the underdog against the deep state and the unfair media and partisan democrats, he rallies the people that voted for him who feel their votes are being denied them. yet the constitution said that congress should be an equal branch of government. >> i agree with eli. i don't think trump wants to be impeached. trump is trying to not get impeached which is why he is trying to hide information from the american people. he didn't just stonewall the judiciary, but every committee from trying to get information for the american people to

conduct oversight. that's because he knows the mueller report is bad for him. that's why republicans change their tune. republicans voted earlier this year by a vote of 420-0, bipartisan to get the full mueller report and now they say no, no, no. we don't want it. they read the redacted version and realized how bad it is for the president and enablers. >> only 17% of the american people believe congress should begin impeachment proceedings. just 17%. do you buy that? >> i don't believe any single poll, but the polling shows a majority of the country believes the president was not honest in terms of the investigation and at the same time a majority is not interested in pursuing impeachment. as the speaker said, the facts are all out there in the open. the obstruction has taken place in the open. a lot of folks. >> that's what blows people's minds, including mine.

he can clearly do obstruction of justice moves, trying to fire mueller and firing comey in broad daylight. the public said since he didn't bring it down, it must be sort of legal or something. ted lieu of california. up next, with new sanctions and military deployments, is president trump putting america on a path to war with iran. look at what we are doing. new reporting on what john bolton might be up to as national security adviser. more on that a minute. al securi. more on that a minute. alright, i brought in ensure max protein...

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welcome back to "hardball." as tensions continue to rise between the u.s. and iran, president trump announced new sanctions designed to further hurt iran's economy. the iranian president said earlier today iran will stop complying with parts of the 2015 nuclear deal and might resume

high level enrichment for nuclear fuel. this comes as the trump administration announced it was moving a carrier strike force and a bomber task force to the persian gulf. the shipping is there. according to the administration, the move is in response to intelligence reports that attacks are being planned by iran and the proxies against u.s. forces. however it appear peers that are questions about the intelligence reports. numerous government officials told the daily beast that president trump's national security adviser john bolton and other war hawks in the administration have overstated the intelligence. according to one official, we are sending a message with this reaction even though the threat may not be as imminent as portrayed. the reason why this is scary is because the purpose the purpose in trump's ear was also a vocal cheerleader all the way up to the invasion of iraq using the notion that they had nuclear weapons. we had that one. that's next. weapons. we had that one. that's next.

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maria ramirez! mom! maria! maria ramirez... mcdonald's is committing 150 million dollars in tuition assistance, education, and career advising programs... prof: maria ramirez mom and dad: maria ramirez!!! to help more employees achieve their dreams. >> welcome back to "hardball." president trump called for no more stupid wars. it was a blow last year when he picked john bolt on to be his national security adviser. the daily beast reports that some say bolton is overreaction to the intelligence out of iran. he was serving in george w.

bush's administration that saddam hussein sad had nuclear weapons. >> iraq despite sarngzs maintains rebuilding the nuclear, biological and missile programs. no doubt that the program was clandestine and camouflaged and going on at a considerable magnitude for at least five years. we have very convincing evidence that iraq maintains an extensive program for the production and weaponization of weapons of mass destruction. >> it is our strongest hope that by eliminating the regime and the weapons of mass destruction which are functionally the same thing, that we give the people of iraq an opportunity to live in freedom. >> it had nothing do with weapons from, mr. bolton. you wanted to liberate iraq according to your purposes and had nothing to do with weapons. it was a big lie. bolton appears to be leading the

drumbeat as he did with iraq. earlier this year, bolton rattled pentagon officials last year when he requested military options to strike iran following an attack by iranian-backed militants in baghdad. according to a former senior official, people were shocked. it was mind-boggling. how cavalier were they about hitting iran. betsy woodruff from the daily beast and author and investigative reporter, ron, thank you for coming. i'm asking a question i all right know the answer to. do these hawk know that persia is a real country with a modern weaponry we helped them build. israel used to be in the league with them. you talk about going to war with iran? >> one component of this administration's iran policy is they are operating with the strategy that damaging iran's

economy is in and of itself is a stra teenlic end. even if the sanctions don't result in a change in leadership or the posture of the government, just damaging econo making it poorer and reducing its ties to other countries in the world is something that the trump administration sees as valuable because they believe it will make it harder for iran to support terror groups around the world. >> the problem with that is, i mean, it is not a country that's going to get gripled overnight by sanctions. they're a real country. it is real. it is pretty much first world in terms of its military power and economic power. maybe not with some of its cultural aspects. but talk about it. does the united states stand to have a quick and bite sized war with iran? i don't think so. >> in 2003, to make this clear, it wasn't just weapons of mass

destruction in iraq, bolton said real man go to tiran. they're really our target. it's back to the future. here we go again. this war hawk with this desperate and opportunistic president is alarming. especially during the election year, that's what we're fearful of. we have been fearing that wag the dog opportunity for the president. mind you, chris, it's got either a second term or possible jail time. this is a bad set of circumstances. and right now i think it seems like they're setting the table for many options, including potential military. i'm not seeing a full scare war. but anything will be just what trump will know he needs in the

fall of 2020. >> he will kiss up to putin. pretty much. he's cozy with him. same with kim jong-un in north korea. why won't he talk to him. >> i don't have a clear answer for that from my reporting. but we know there's zero daylight between bolton's view on the iran situation and trump's himself. >> is he doing this for political -- i mean, donaldson is a tough anti-iranian guy. i understand that. did he have something to do with putting bolton in that job? that's what i heard. >> i don't have any knowledge of that. what i can tell you, particularly when it comes to this intelligence question is that the view the administration has pushed about the intelligence is it constrains to the political appointees in the trump administration. we were told by a senior

administration official that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff brought some of this intelligence to the white house and asked that bolton be the one to talk about it and raise it as an issue. but for the sources also very familiar with this intelligence and with the situation at hand, that doesn't change in their mind, according to the folks i talked to, the notion this administration has presented the threat as more immediate than it may actually be. >> along those lines, it seems like trump is a good salesman. fine. he's a salesman. he's a p.t. barnum. what is he about warrior? what is he about having our guys killed or our women killed? what is he about actually even galking in a military confrontation with a country like iran? how does he tease his way through that without getting into a war? >> trump is a reckless guy. he acts recklessly. he shattered everything around him. i mean, this is a situation

where trump is probably sitting and looking at option and probably asking bolton some of these same questions. how do we do something that's limited? how do we get involved in something that brings heat, shows our power, maybe even uses some of that armament we're so famous for but doesn't get into a full scale confrontation with a real power in the region. the iranians are not like the iraqis. but even a little dance with the iranians that might lead to something bigger where we get to shoot someone or do something is going to be very, very good for trump just when he needs it. that's what i'd be watching. that's what i'd be watching right now. >> i'm wondering whether the iranians who don't forget are willing to let him get away with punching them in the nose. >> thank you, betsy, for your great reporting. and ron, great to have you back, sir. up next, two brave young

people that gave up their lives to stop a gunman. they will never grow old because of their courage and incredible generosity. you're watching "hardball." "har. so, i needed legal advice, and i heard that my cousin'sr. wife's sister's husband was a lawyer, so i called him. but he never called me back! if your cousin's wife's sister's husband isn't a lawyer, call legalzoom and we'll connect you with an attorney. legalzoom. where life meets legal. toujeo provides significant a1c reduction, and stable blood sugar control,

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yesterday, in a colorado high school classroom, an 18-year-old lunged at someone holding a gun. he was killed. he had acted in a split second

in which so much depended, giving his class mates just enough time to duck or run for cover. out of courage, generosity and spirit and love for others, he placed himself between death and those he cared about. in a north carolina college classroom last week, this 21-year-old charged a gunman until three bullets stopped him. this is what it takes in this country now to save lives. in a country known for its love of firearms, there are those who would give their lives to protect others from the horror. we have long been haunted by those bitter lost souls who open fire on their neighbor. who moved them? hatred, revenge, a darkness of the spirit? but what of the true wonder of that person in the instant of dread wills themselves to walk in the face of horror, to stand and deliver in the face of god and man. grace under pressure.

john's gospel teaches us there is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one friends. we are a country of many guns, but we're also a country of true souls who would give up their lives to save those of others. and that's hardball for now. thanks for being with us. all in with chris hayes starts right now. mr. president, if the mueller report clears you, why not let congress see all of it, sir? >> this was a very grave and momentous step. >> and democrats move to hold the executive accountable. >> we talked for a long time about approaching a constitutional crisis. we are now in it. >> tonight how president trump provoked a constitutional crisis. >> the president now seeks to take a wrecking ball to the constitution of the united states of america. >> plus, why senate republicans have