thank you for watching, "deadline: white house" with nicole wallace begins now. hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york. donald trump described in today's washington post as possessing a fascination with the possibility of his own impeachment, is executing his deflect, distract and lie strategy of governing by calling the polls that call him behind in key states fake and blocking access to more documents to congress. the white house claiming executive privilege over census documents subpoenaed by the oversight committee. now the oversight committee is set to vote on contempt charges. that has vote is happening any minute and that committee's chairman, elijah cummings has had always he can take of the

white house coverups. >> in all of of our investigations, the white house has not turned over one single shred of paper in response to any of our requests. . the hurricanes in puerto rico, the white house has produced nothing. security clearance abuses, the white house has produced nothing. efforts to transfer nuclear technology to saudi array bee ya, nothing. hush money payments, nothing. it doesn't matter what the matter is, the tactics are the same. this begs the question, what are they hiding. >> as the president's poll numbers show him behind joe biden and half a dozen over democrats his thoughts are increasingly on impeachment.

"the washington post" out with tremendous new reporting on the president's post mueller obsession, his own removal from office by congress. the post's ashley parker reports he has peppered confidants and advisers with questions of how an impeachment inquiry might unfold. and he has coined his own cheeky term, the i-word, that threatens to overshadow his presidency as he heads into his 2020 election campaign. that's where we start today with some of our favorite reporters and friends with us heidi prez bella, mimi rocah, and john heileman. joining us from washington, peter baker, and white house reporter with "the washington post" ashley parker. ashley we'll start with you and your reporting about the i-word, take us through it. >> basically what i wanted to look at was there was a theory

floating out there -- a fla plausible theory, between democratics that the president and united states in stalling for these were trying to goad democrats into impeaching the president because he believed it would be beneficial for him. the truth is somewhere in the middle. . at the end of the day everyone i talked to, president trump does not want to be impeached he understands that will be a bad thing, but he is curious and intrigued by it. he does understand -- he looks at what happened to bill clin n clinton. saw his approval ratings went up, it backfired on republicans when they impeached him in the '90s. he does call it the i-word. the truth is he's talking and asking about impeachment but it comes less from a place of

anxiety and it's a little more defiant. one things he's saying to aides is it they can't do that, right, they can't possibly impeach me because i did nothing wrong. >> ashley one of your tweets sending the article out when it posted was called the president impeachment curious. i wonder if he's curious enough to understand that if impeachment proceedings commence, that congress actually has a few sharpened tools in their arsenal that it might strengthen their hand in getting their hands on witnesses like don mcghan and getting some of the grand jury evidence possibly that the justice department at least was in a posture to be more forthcoming should impeachment proceedings commence. is he curious enough to understand any of the legal implications of his own impeachment? >> you're exactly right about that. that's why at the end of the day he doesn't want to be impeached. he's curious about the political

upside by wary of the danger and what a process would look like. as you say it gives congress a bit more tools at their disposal to come after him. if it were in any real way to go forward it would be an asterisk on his presidency. and he believes the democrats are trying to undermine the legitimacy of his election which we all know drives him crazy. >> it's such a great piece, i started thinking he would be the double asterisk president, aided by putin, and impeached by congress. >> i'm glad ashley did this reporting because my gut said knowing trump that's true. the political thing is not what drives him. most of the time is it's his i.d. things closer to the

surface and closer to his psyche. >> and a direct line. >> people sit down and say you wouldn't get convicted in the senate therefore you can play the victim card. trump loves playing the victim card but that's a double bank shot, that's not the way he plays pool, right. i have to say, every time i hear the i-word, i think imbecile. insane. idio idiocy. not impeachment. but my gut says trump, if you explain to him there might be a political upside, he might be i get that but he doesn't want it. he wants to beat his foes and beat them back to the point he can say, they wanted to impeach me but couldn't. that's where trump lives in that kind of triumph, not the kind that he would have to say i got impeached but not convicted in the senate. that's where he wants to stand up. >> peter baker if donald trump is impeachment curious, bill

barr would seem to be contempt curious, walking up to the line again over another stonewalling strategy, it's unclear whether it was hatched at the white house or at doj this time other census documents. take us through what you and your colleagues are reporting on that front. >> of course, the congress wants to look at the decision made to add a question to the census asking if people responding are american citizens are not. that's been challenged in court by opponents who say that's a way of depressing people who might be afraid of answering that question and colluding, possibly who are legal residents but not citizens. that has a lot of impact on government funding, districting of congressional districts and so forth. so it's seen by opponents as having a partisan purpose rather than legitimate let's get information kind of purpose. but the president decided to assert executive privilege not to hand over documents regarding

that decision today. congress is now in one more confrontation with them saying whether they're going to go to court, to push this issue or hold you in contempt to compel you. is executive privilege a blanket thing to protect you from everything. elijah cummings went through the investigations they've received nothing, it's the obstruction of justice, the hush money payments, the security clearance process, foreign influence, communications with putin, tax returns, nuclear ventures with saudi arabia can they expect for that to work, the claim of executive privilege to stone wall congress on all those probes? >> no. it's just amazing. they're treating executive privilege like it's this magic wand they can pull it out whenever they don't feel like producing something and say we're asserting executive privilege. go to court to get it. it works to a certain extent, but i think the courts are going

to take that into account. they're going to look at this just complete stonewalling and judges look for reasonableness in part. and it isn't this catch all. i mean, it has specific requirements that apply to certain kinds of communications between certain parties. and the -- and most of the cases here where it's being invoked, those requirements are just not going to be met. so it will put it off for a while but i think in the end it will hurt them in court. the thing i think is most remarkable about this latest exertion of it is that you have barr saying, i'm going to tell the white house to invoke executive privilege. so you have this barr/trump conspiracy going on, which we saw back with the mueller report and the roll out of it and it looked like barr was protecting him. now you have, it really looks again like barr and trump in cahoots to keep this information from congress. >> here's the thing.

the question is not if. you're probably right about that in terms of it winding its way through the court system but when. because that is the problem the democrats are facing right now. as of right now they don't have the documents, the witnesses, and if you look at the white house counsel, pat cipollone's letter to jerry nadler a couple weeks ago, i don't think that's gotten enough attention because he's essentially saying article 1 of the constitution is not relevant and is not in effect right now because congress doesn't have oversight powers over the executive, contrary to what article one actually says and you congress have to have legislation or an agenda to get any information -- >> the courts rejected that, right? they laughed at it. >> yes. but they're continuing to do this. this is why we're having this impeachment discussion at all, it isn't the obstruction in the mueller report, it's the obstruction going on right now. the question again is how long, because right now it's very effective a strategy.

>> to build on something mimi said, it is extraordinary right because normally in my career covering white houses, the white house counsel, and the team of lawyers around the president make decisions about executive privilege, the attorney general being an appointed position but an independent top law enforcement official in the country, attorney generals don't weigh in on that topic generally. i'm trying to think of an example where i heard ever of an attorney general who said i'm advising the president to invoke executive privilege. that's something the white house counsel would normally do. so it is an extraordinary thing to have barr essentially seeming as though he's acting, as we said many times before, as a personal counsel to trump or at least a government counsel to trump, riding shotgun with the white house counsel here, rather than being an actual attorney general of the united states. >> of the united states of america. i believe it was said in an interview with you, peter baker,

that donald trump was looking for a roy cohn. he admired this model he had in his mind of the president having an attorney general, a fixer/bouncer, but you covered white houses, you covered the one in this which i worked and executive privilege was almost like a -- used as a scalpel, you could carve out, not even certain aides but certain communications between certain aides and the president. it was never thrown like a tarp over everything that happened in a white house. are there smart people in the white house that understand a tarp strategy is not sustainable? they're trying to buy time? >> i think you're right, the assertion of executive privilege has been with the nixon administration and a lot of presidents have not wanted to look like they were repeating what happened in watergate which led the supreme court slamming richard nixon now and forcing him to release the tapes. president clinton tried to use

executive privilege and attorney-client privilege and other privileges against ken starr and it didn't work. i think president bush and others looked at it saying we don't want to get too far down that road. in this case it is a tarp. it's a blanket policy they're saying we don't recognize your right, congress, to do this thing. you're partisan, you're going after us for political reasons. of course, that's true to some extent, obviously there are politics involved in the political system but that's not necessarily a legal argument in terms of executive privilege. we'll see how courts respond to this. so far the trump administration har hasn't had a winning record in courts on this. >> they didn't try, i'm surprised to, to assert executive privilege over donald trump jr.'s testimony. he's on capitol hill, behind closed doors, with the senate intel committee. a lot of theories, mimi, i wonder if you can take us through them. a lot of smart people have weighed in after reading the

mueller report and the mueller report in describing what they were able to investigate around the trump tower meeting listed two individuals with whom they were not able to communicate or talk, it was natalia veselnitskaya, a russian operative and donald trump jr., what do you think happened? did he take the fifth? did he lie? what could he have done to have been described the way he was described in the mueller report? >> it sounds like he did take the fifth with mueller. and mueller -- he didn't, once again, he said it without saying it. he hinted at it. but he didn't take the fifth today. that is what donald trump jr. probably couldn't have asserted executive privilege but he could have taken the fifth, and he didn't, i think in part because it seems like he was able to limit it so much. >> today? >> today. there was two hours and there was, you know, maybe three topics. i don't think they really asked him about the trump tower meeting. i think that was one of the sort of places that they didn't go. and so, it seems like he was

able to limit it so much that he didn't really necessarily fear that as much as looking like he was guilty and hiding something by taking the fifth amendment. >> what's your theory on donald trump jr. today and in terms of what happened between him and the mueller investigators? >> this is a place where i tend, because of my lack of actual legal expertise, i defer. i think what mimi says makes a lot of sense. i think the place -- to go back to the prior conversation, the bush administration, obama administration, others in the wake of watergate, as peter said, have not wanted to invoke executive privilege because of fear it would look bad if the courts said it went too far. the trump administration don't care as long as it takes time. the things are politics hurt, pleading the fifth. the headline of donald trump jr.

takes the fifth is a bad scene. and i think that they have successfully, and somewhat mysteriously to my minds in terms of how this negotiation played out, they were able to get this testimony limited to a place where donald trump jr. would never have to take the fifth and to the extent i have views, most of the smart lawyers who have read the mueller report sort of seem to suggest that is what he did with the grand jury and with mueller and that's where we are right now. and i do think that everybody who has suspicions about his culpability and what happened in that room are still left wondering, are we ever going to get to the truth of the meeting. >> this brings me back to the politics of having him at all today. this wasn't without a lot of blow back for the republican leader of the committee, richard burr, if it's as limited as mimi suggests it may have been, what was the whole exercise about? >> i think that's a great

question. and we don't really know what he said. i will say i remember at that moment when it turned out he was going to be the first witness who, you know -- republican-led committee was going to subpoena, there was a lot of discussion at the end of the day when they finally reached these terms which were quite limited in terms of the number of hours and topics and the scope. his -- sort of his band -- they're not really official advisers. they're these merry band of mischief makers who are all donald trump jr. allies. they kind of crowed and you should take it with a shaker of salt. they said, listen, this is how it is done. this is the art of the deal. you make them go after you and then you reach an agreement where you get exactly what you want, and you go up to the hill and get the positive coverage as john was saying that you haven't taken the fifth and you don't have to answer questions on the topics you want. we don't know the exact topics, on the other hand you have to

assume for them to bring him back there at all there must have been specific issues and holes that they really wanted to press him on. >> i want to put up some tape of jerry nadler speaking with more certainty than i've heard the chairman of the house judiciary speak about bob mueller being on capitol hill. let's watch. >> you've also been negotiating with now former special counsel mueller. has he agreed to come in voluntarily? is there a date by which if he does not you would subpoena him? >> we're carrying on conversations with him, he will come in. if we have to subpoena him, we will. >> will that be, say, by the end of the summer if he doesn't come in. >> i think it'll be before that. >> is this a surprise to anybody or is it locked and loaded on capitol hill, robert mueller they booked a car, he's on his way. >> there's so much frustration right now if you talk privately to these judiciary committee members who believe we should be in the midst of an active

impeachment inquiry right now and mueller should have been there weeks ago. but there's not a lot of faith that it's going to happen, because they've been pushing so hard for this and no one understands why mueller is putting up such a fight. we understand the basic contours of it, he doesn't want to get in the middle of a big political fight and make the rest of his life worse. any worse than it's already going to be having been the person at the center of all of this. so -- but nothing changes in terms of the dynamic right now, unless and until he comes up there. if you talk privately to democrats, just so much air has come out of this nicole, they're depressed. >> i would argue all the air has come out. i heard arguments from people close to robert mueller, why he doesn't want to go. i've heard all the same things you have. but the reality is, i think, this thing is over without some human beings that either

conducted the investigation or were interviewed by the investigators. this is a lights out moment. you have ten days where people that did the -- and i don't think it has to be robert mueller but you have the obstruction investigators up there explaining why they didn't reach the decision that barr reached, the declination of donald trump. or it is over and we all turn the page. do you see the stakes any differently? >> no. absolutely. look, i too have heard all the reasons and i do understand mueller's reluctance. i think that hopefully he can differentiate between needing to testify and spin his report, sell his report, versus testify and just describe and explain the findings in his report. that's what we need right now. i think every time as you highlighted on your show, one piece of evidence from the report gets examined and highlighted, people go, whoa, really, that happened? but it's lost in the sea of bad

facts from trump. and mueller needs to be there to walk people through it. he shouldn't think he needs to come on there and be a political pawn or sell his report. he needs to walk people through it. >> mueller, if he were sitting at a table with all of the investigators, whose names are well known to people like us, the country may not know who they are, they're his trusted deputies, they all worked alongside one another in this sealed -- you know, it's almost taken on a mythical identity in political journalism but no one in america knows that really people interviewed these people. but at the end of the day what mueller said was that crimes were committed. >> yeah. >> that crimes were committed. he didn't need to say anything more than that. but john heileman, it is to me, we are at the edge of a cliff -- >> yeah. >> -- and ashley's reporting about impeachment, all of this is the same story and ties to the same thing.

they either explain what the crimes were, who committed them, saw them and they bring them up or they turn the page. no middle ground. >> the whip count is stalled, public opinion is where it is. they could both could change. but they're only going to change if stuff happens. bob rubin used to say events will occur. if events don't occur, things won't change. robert mueller would be huge, but it doesn't have to be robert mueller. don mcghan or hope hicks would be huge. that is what's going to have to happen. >> or mueller's deputies. >> the investigators who did the interviews with don mcghan. >> i agree. there are lots of possibilities but events must occur. if they don't occur, putting john dean up there, putting legal scholars doing things to

discuss this from the abstract, not going to be then event to change things. >> thank you, big stuff. thank you for walking us through this. after the break, the unraveling of donald trump as news reports about his weak standing in state polls threatens his fragile ego, trump lashes out at the media in front of a foreign leader, or as we call it here, wednesday. and the back and forth with joe biden got under the president's skin but did it offer a road map on how to go after donald trump's lack of character and decency. speaking of lack of character, a new book about the death of decency in politics. stay with us. deccyen in politis stay with us my insurance rates are probably gonna double. but dad, you've got allstate. with accident forgiveness they guarantee your rates won't go up just because of an accident. smart kid.

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just stick with us. don't believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. just remember, what you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening. >> do you have internal polling -- >> we have great internal polling. they were fake polls released by somebody that is -- it's ridiculous. we are winning in every state that we've polled. we're winning in texas very big, ohio very big, winning in florida very big. >> what you're seeing and reading is not what's happening said no one innocent or doing well politically ever.

recent polling hinting at serio serious peril for donald trump's reelection so now they're fake polls. and not only that, there are secret internal polls that show him winning every state they surveyed. but a source with direct knowledge of what he's referencing, tells nbc news the numbers are, quote, troubling for the campaign. that first poll reported by peter's colleagues for the "new york times" and completed one month ago show the president trailing joe biden in the vast majority of those states. but trump can't let it go the source said he, quote, hates the narrative. joining our conversation is elise jordan, peter baker is still here. you guys are poking the bear this week, i've seen more attacks on your colleagues' reporting and your reporting

than in any sort of recent spell. take us through reality versus delusion. >> he issued orders to his aids that they should deny the polls showed what they showed. so he's going to follow the same talking points, he's going to deny that. we've seen it time and again, he sets a narrative and sticks to it. and he finds if he repeats it again and again it becomes persuasive to people out there. one thing today talking about the mueller report, he said mueller cleared him of collusion and obstruction, which is not the case. he said that mueller's report said they pushed back, they repelled the russians, when the russians tried to influence the election. of course, which there's no -- i didn't read that in the mueller report, maybe it was in the mueller report you read -- >> no. >> -- but an extraordinary thing to say. he's very good at determining the narrative by denying things

reported in the press, denying things his own aides say, denying polls his own campaign issues, and people around him sort of shrug their shoulders and say that's the reality we're going to go with. >> it's laughable because he looks like such a wienie but it's terrifying. you think about 9/11, anthrax in the mail, a helicopter landing on a roof in midtown manhattan, you think about a flood in one of these horrible, horrible states that have been ravaged this spring by floods and there is a point you need people to believe the federal government. and i don't know when donald trump says from the podium, don't believe your eyes, don't believe your ears, what happens? >> that's the problem with this buildup to possible war with iran. we hear from the administration that there is a heightened

threat and you don't necessarily want to believe something of critical importance because of all the lies that are told on such a constant basis. >> you're laughing. go ahead. >> i'm thinking about the fact there's some appendix of the mueller report that trump has. appendix a -- >> it would have to be the coloring book version. >> appendix a cleared him of the charges and b says the moon is part of mars. >> and c says they got light sabers. >> we don't need polls because we had the 2018 election which showed us the same thing that's happening in the state by state polls right now. the point he has is hillary clinton consistently polled ahead of him, but that was right. she won by 3 million votes so you have to look at the state by state polls. and even in this case his road, his pathway to the white house is now -- he's under water. he's at negative approval ratings in these states.

he's at 50% disapproval and a number of these theoretical candidates is beating him. even the self-described socialist, bernie sanders is 12 points ahead of him in michigan. >> let me put up for you something also that undid him today. this is the back and forth between donald trump and joe biden yesterday. >> and you see that with biden we would never be treated with respect, because people don't respect him. even the people he's running against. >> i have absolute power, no, you don't, donald trump. or only i can fix it. fix yourself first, donald trump. >> he was someplace in iowa today and he said my name so many times people couldn't stand it anymore. no, don't keep saying it. sleepy guy. >> he gets up in the middle of the night while he is at normandy and tweets an attack on bette midler?

>> i heard biden, who's a loser -- >> he's name calling, china is building roads and bridges and high speed rail. >> joe biden is a dummy. i think joe is the weakest up here. >> i believe the president is literally an existential threat to america. >> it's a choice, folks. there it is, possibly. >> i have to say, his takedown -- there's so much more material to work with that joe biden has and his responses, donald trump's responses just sound so schoolyard. sleepy, dumb, like they're just not clever. and joe biden on the other hand is showing us how he's going to go at donald trump. i actually using a lot of his words and his record and his policies against him. he does it in a very clever way, in a funny way, but he's getting at real content too. >> peter baker there is nothing

more devastating in terms of a political attack than using your opponent's words against him or her. and my own history was in the bush/carey campaign where carey paid a price saying he was for iraq war funding before he was against it. there are too many examples to count. one of the weaknesses donald trump has now, even today if you glance at twitter and even on fox news they're calling out the things that are simply untrue. full-throated lies, messy lies, stupid lies. the senseless lies seem to be the ones that might break through even to his base. where do you see this moment of this pretty striking back and forth yesterday between trump and biden? >> you know, nicole you're right on this. carey's line about that was so devastating to him in 2004. yet today we see, you know, a president who says things all the time and they don't stick in the same way.

i wonder about that. is that because in 2004, 2012, and other election years we were dealing with a different environment which candidates were paying a price if they said something that was dumb or in politic or not true. and now the president says stuff all the time that fact checkers take apart and then move on so quickly to the next one they don't have staying power. nobody focuses on the one thing day in and day out the way we did on john carrie's line, for instance. i think a lot of people write it off, thinking it's the media going after him, his opponents, the establishment resisting his brand of change. so a lot of people, and even people at these rallies i interview they say we know he's not telling 100% the truth but we like he's out there fighting. so i don't think any of these things stick in a big way the

used to in 2004 or other years. >> i think peter is right about the lies, but i heard something else in biden's attack. in describing donald trump's conduct -- biden had it right, he woke up in the middle of the night and started tweeting about bette midler. that's more than a lie. it suggests instability. >> i agree in the old world using an opponent's words against them was sometimes devastating, because first of all politicians would be ashammed. you could shame someone and people wanted to assume the politicians they were looking at, potential leaders were telling the truth so when they were caught in a lie or inconsistent it's hypocrisy. trump lies so often i agree with peter it doesn't stick. the other thing in politics that's devastating is when you become the object of laughter, the butt of a joke when you become -- >> feeble.

>> -- feeble, pathetic, ridiculous. i think the bette midler thing doesn't walk into he's a liar, a fraud. it's he's a clown. this man is not worthy to the dignity of the office and someone you would make fun of. in your own life, are you nuts? out of your mind? >> you sent that tweet, i would call you and see if you were drunk. >> you'd be calling saying what are you doing with the bette midler thing? delete that. >> peter you would never tweet anything i would call and say what's wrong with you. >> no. >> we are glad you spent time with us. after the break, one democratic candidate for president said when she's president her justice department will prosecute donald trump. we'll bring you that story and more on 2020 next. story and more on 2020 next.

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so the democrats first primary debate is two weeks from

tonight if you can believe it. you can watch it here on msnbc. and while every single one of the 23 people running to replace donald trump agree he shouldn't serve a second term, there's a question as to how exactly to beat him as mark points out in his "new york times" column, know one knows for sure after a paradigm shifting election in 2016 the conventional rules are out the window, quote, up close the early race for the democratic nomination can resemble a mass reconnaissance process with the troops scouting an electorate that their party misunderstood the last time around. how do you run for president in 2019? what are the rules, what should you say and who's listening. at the best, campaigns can be sprawling idea labs. joining our conversation, author of a brand new book, the death of politics, which we'll talk

about in the next blocks, one of the most thoughtful and smartest people i worked with in the bush white house, i described you earlier today as the conscience of the bush administration, and you've become the conscience of republicans who don't have amnesia, who haven't sold their souls. what about this idea that mark lays out in his piece that everything is so upside down people don't know how to run against this president. >> the rule book has been thrown out so there is a fluid time. it's a fluid time in the country in general but particularly fluid in politics. if i were consulting with democrats i'm not sure i would know what to tell them. my instinct, my gut is they should be decent to his indecency, they should serious to his lack of seriousness. there is still something in the american soul or psyche that wants our president to be a man of integrity. you see that in the fact that

trump's poll numbers are so low compared to conditions of the country. you all have been out more than i have probably but i sense a real exhaustion out there and a sense -- the way i put it in the book is a lot of times in the life of an individual or life of a country certain virtues and values that are important, that you took for granted and you forgot why they're vital, when they're stripped you understand why you cherish them to begin with. think i we're reaching that moment, hope we're reaching that moment in this country, including in the political act in this country. >> one of the fights in the democratic party is whether or not donald trump should be held to a different standard, quite frankly, whether he's above the law. a lot of democrats feel if you don't move forward with impeachment proceedings or look at prosecuting him when his roy cohn isn't running the justice department, you've held him to a different standard when it comes

to the rule of law. kamala harris was asked about what her justice department would do about the mueller findings. let's listen. >> if you become president would you want the department of justice to go forward with the obstruction of justice charges? >> i believe they would have no choice and they should, yes. there has to be accountability. >> so robert mueller has said, john heileman, if he could have said that donald trump didn't commit crimes he would have. so there is a report that details conduct that robert mueller couldn't say wasn't criminal, so i think the opposite of that is was criminal. what do you think of kamala harris' position? do you think other democrats will follow her there? >> let's take out the question of like the right is a wrong position. we have stated those in various times. the politics for a democrat running for president in this nominating electorate. there is no position other than her position. if you have a position more

conservative, moderate, tell me rethan that you're not aware of who the electorate is. i'm not saying this to take credit from kamala harris and her point of view, but that is the main stream position. and if she said no we shouldn't prosecute him, that would be the opposite in the democratic field right now. i don't criticize to say they don't have the complexities that nancy pelosi has to manage. nancy pelosi is like i have to keep this -- we have to hold the house, i have to keep the caucus intact and i look at the freshmen who won in trump districts where public opinion is not the same as the democratic nominating electorate. she has a difficult political choice to make. kamala harris does not. >> nancy pelosi may be making those democrats in trump districts nervous by being so hand wringing about it. >> i'm not saying she's doing the right thing. i'm saying for her the political

choice is complicated. for kamala harris, elizabeth warren, bernie sanders not a difficult choice. >> justin amash, a republican, seems to view the facts of the mueller report the same way that kamala harris does. >> the question is what does his political future look like, because the president is talking to potential primary challengers wi with, justin amash is rumored to be possibly mounting a third party challenge. but the irony is by beating up on him, the more the president corrals the party to beat up justin amash, it almost leads no option than to launch the third party bid out there. is it going to be kasich or some other republican to create that other lane, which would be detrimental if there was people like pete or you looking for some other place to go. >> we fit in a small rental car. but we have breaking news -- >> it's a yugo.

>> it's like a scooter, they're all over d.c. those scooters you rent. all right. "the washington post" out with breaking news news that hope hicks will testify before the house judiciary committee next week. she will become the very first trump aide to do so. the testimony will occur behind closed doors. big, big, big deal that hope hicks, who, for better and for worse, saw everything, heard everything, knows everything about both the contacts with russia which pop late the first volume of the mueller report and she was a fly on the wall, i think that's a fair and accurate term, for all those interactions or many of those interactions between donald trump and don mcghan. >> hope hicks was a witness to obstruction of justice on multiple occasions. she was a witness to the president encouraging lies about the pivotal meeting in trump

tower with natalia veselnitskaya, if i pronounced that right. she decided -- she's been on the outside, outside the administration, she decided it wasn't worth risking getting subpoenaed, potentially going to jail by not testifying, and she's choosing the right course. >> this is a big deal you have your first witness. however if i may humbly submit, the ideal here for the democrats was to have this first big testimony in a public forum because every single person on that committee has read from cover-to-cover probably multiple times the report and already knows what hope hicks' contribution to that is, and she's probably going to restate that behind closed doors. the idea behind the democratic strategy here is to reinact that for the american people. at the same time i don't want to pooh pooh it because it's progress. and they haven't been able to get any witnesses. >> you're right. she's not going to slip up. she's going to be a smooth,

polished witness. >> let me reset the breaking news. hope hicks greeagrees to testif. hope hicks a top aide to president trump during his 2016 campaign and his first year in the white house has agreed to testify before the house judiciary committee next wednesday. hicks will be the first former trump aide to go before the committee in investigating whether trump tried to obstruct a probe into russian interference in the 2016 election. pete, the white house did not want her to do this. the person who had the title that hope hicks had was dan bart let in our white house. i think if we were a witness in any sort of investigation, if the president had done anything wrong, it would be devastating, whether or not she remains loyal to the president, simply as a fact witness to donald trump's conduct in office, which robert mueller said was criminal, is a devastating development for this white house. >> i agree with it. i think they're not happy and

probably fearful. it's important historically to remember alexander butterfield when he revealed that the white house had tapes. archibald cox did not reveal that, it was during the is goin to happen and all of us involved in politics know it is never a straight line trajectory as john was saying earlier, events, dear boy, the british prime minister, events dear boy. you don't know what is going to happen. with the trump presidency and donald trump himself one thing you can be pretty sure of is if you lift up the rock there is a lot underneath it and they can't control all that information. we'll see what she has to say, but this story isn't over. there are new chapters to be written. we don't know what they are but we're not at the end of this. >> you and i agree, john, without witnesses, without events intervening, this could be over for democrats before the hour even ends. we have a new development in

someone who -- and i think one of the frames trump allies put around this as well -- these are all trump loyalists, don mcgahn. chris christie. that doesn't matter. if they simply recount what they witnessed, donald trump exploding at don mcgahn, asking the staff secretary to write a phony memo to the file saying a "new york times" story was told. if you worked there you witnessed donald trump obstructing justice. >> yeah, so the question was would events occur? apparently events will occur. it had been said to me by friends of hope's over the last couple weeks she was going to testify and i think if you think about the five aides subpoenaed, most of them are somewhere between privately willing to if compelled to or in fact slightly eager to but still needing to be compelled because they don't want to be on the wrong side of the white house. i think public versus private matters in terms of politics.

i don't know how polished and buttoned down a witness hope hicks will be. she is not -- has not done that much public stuff in the course of a whole life working with trump on the campaign and being in the white house she was not a regular face of the administration. she was not on camera that often. she's not done much public testimony. so the question i have at this moment is why the agreement that they reached was an agreement that allowed her to testify behind closed doors and i am certain there will be some democrats especially on the more hawkish, activist side of the democratic party asking the committee, guys, what are you doing? you had -- probably had the ability to compel her to do public testimony with the right kind of threats. why did you let her get off with testifying behind closed doors? >> the hits keep coming. one more factor and then i'll let you weigh in on both of them. the house oversight committee just voted to hold the attorney general william barr and the country's commerce secretary in

contempt of congress by a vote of 22-15. one republican, glad you're here today because now there is one. one republican voted with all the democrats. >> he is the rare politician who actually does what he says he is going to do. >> or who can read. >> also that. it is heating up. wow. democrats are finally looking like they're putting on the pressure. i frankly felt they've been slow and reticent and needed to up the tempo a bit. to your point about how interesting it is going to be to see if hope hicks testifies, i am most interested in don mcgahn's chief of staff who took copious notes. >> and memos. >> that is the testimony i'm really waiting for. >> before we start ranking them like, you know, basketball players, this is where mueller has a point. it is all in the mueller report. this exercise is the one in

educating the public, the people who have not, i know my viewers have read the report, but there are people in the country who have not. hope hicks saw things, it would seem to me these twin developments that hope hicks would be on congress in some capacity maybe not with cameras rolling but that she'll be on capitol hill, she is also the one aide who admitted already to congress that she told lies for donald trump. she called them little lies. >> right. >> i think anyone as kids, trained in pattern recognition, if you told little lies chances are you told big lies. >> that's right. he is not going to be dislodged from the presidency because of this because he has an iron grip on the party and the senate won't send him out no matter what he does. he famously said he could shoot someone on 5th avenue and they wouldn't leave him.

thai ma ha that may have been literally the case. in some respects that hold is deeper than with ronald reagan i suspect so that is not going to happen. at the same time it can affect the political calculations. these things matter. they matter for history and for reality and for truth. we have to have the story. i don't know what the political ramifications will be in the next year or two years. but the truth and reality of things matter. and we should hear what this story is about because one day we'll look back at this era and we're going to say, how did this happen? and i hope we learn the right lessons from it. >> i feel like such a debby downer at this table but i just can see this all playing out next week. what is going to happen is she'll go behind closed doors. she'll regurgitate these lies, little lies, big lies. she was told to tell. the republicans will say it's not obstruction. the democrats will say it is obstruction. and most importantly, there will be no -- none of these there. no cameras. and we won't be able to play

those sound bites and digest them and beam them out to the public. fox news won't be forced to cover that and put their lens on her. so unless there is some big breakthrough that is then relayed to us in the media after this meeting i'm just skeptical. i hope i'm wrong. >> listen, i don't think anyone is expecting public opinion to change in a news cycle but if you look at what the 22-month mueller investigation, which never had a public facing element to it, did to donald trump, it completely unnerved him. i don't think things have to be public facing to destabilize donald trump. right? >> i just want -- actually it is a really good point. you think about if joe biden can get in donald trump's head and bob mueller can get inside donald trump's head. hope hicks could make him mental. just more mental than he is now. what is going to happen between now and then with hope? you can just imagine what happening in the trump dome at this point. >> we'll call it a dome.

we're going to sneak in a break. . we're going to sneak in a break.

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things did not go according to plan this hour. we were supposed to talk about pete's brand new book so we'll have him back another day to do that. for now, my thanks to my guests, and, pete, whose new book "the death of politics" how to heal a frayed republic. thank you. if it's wednesday, president trump lashing out denying the actual existence of polls. some of them his own that show him behind his democratic rivals. one of those rivals bernie sanders makes his move today with a big speech.

on the