that completes the circle and reduces plastic waste. please help us get every bottle back. if it's tuesday, russia begins pulling back some troops around kyiv. what it means for future of the war as russian and ukrainian officials meet face-to-face or peace talks in istanbul. president biden is expected to deliver remarks alongside the prime minister of singapore this hour, a day after the president refused to back down on his comment that putin cannot remain in power. and later, giada members pressure attorney general merrick garland to take action as it refers to more trump allies for criminal contempt of congress. a top member of that committee,

congressman jamie raskin, joins me ahead.a top member of that c congressman jamie raskin, joins me ahead. welcome to "meet the press daily." i'm chuck todd. after more than a month of war in ukraine, today there are very small signs of possible progress towards some form of a peace agreement. talks between russia and ukraine resumed in turkey today. ukrainian negotiators appeared to balk off any intention of joining nato in exchange for security guarantees from other countries. russia vowed to drastically reduce its military activity near capital of kyiv and the nearby city of chernihiv. whether that decision to scale back is by choice or necessity, however, that's still not clear. a white house official tells us that russian troops appear to be shifting away from kyiv and it

could suggest putin is adjusting his original plan or they're regrouping and could change plans at any moment. remember, watch they to do not just listen to what they say. intelligence from the uk suggests russia has resorted to calling in mercenaries in order to shore up their struggling military units. they're afraid of bringing in conscripts from their own country. earlier today, secretary of state antony blinken urged caution when it came to any potential progress towards a peace agreement. >> i would leave it to our ukrainian partners to characterize whether there is any genuine progress and whether russia is engaging in meaningful dialogue. i would say there is what russia says and there's what russia does. we're focused on the latter. and what russia is doing is the continued brutalization of ukraine and its people.

and that continues as we speak. >> as i said earlier, we are expecting to see president biden at some point this hour. he is in the midst of welcoming singapore's prime minister to the white house. we'll bring you any remarkings he makes about the situation he makes in ukraine live when it happens. keir simmons is covering for us in istanbul. eng seng in kharkiv, ukraine. and i have a national security analyst clint watts as well as former commanding general of u.s. army troops in europe, retired lieutenant general ben hodges, now the chair at the center for european policy analysis. keir, in turkey, we'll discuss later whether russia is doing this out of necessity because they can't keep up their push towards kyiv, but it seems as if -- are we to read this as some sort of progress?

>> reporter: well, both sides seem to think there is some progress. i would say this, you know, chuck -- any peace deal in any conflict is born out of necessity unless one side kind of wins outright if you like, inevitably there are compromises. the big question i think tonight is whether the compromises that were talked about in the building behind me here for just four hours today -- they came prepared and they walked out with proposals, but whether those compromises are going to be agreed to. one thing i would point to as a hurdle, the chief negotiator from the russian side talked about taking the proposals back to president putin, so clearly president putin will have to agree to anything that's agreed here, and we don't know if he'll do that. there is talk from the russian side that president putin and president zelenskyy might now meet in person. that would be progress. on the ukrainian side, they are

talking about what they would like to see and they are talking about this new security framework where nato countries like the u.s., uk, even turkey here, would guarantee their security. it raises so many questions. but just think about this, chuck. before these talks started, the ukrainian side were suggesting that they wouldn't eat anything, drink anything, or touch any surfaces for fear they might be poisoned. according to the ukrainian said, there wasn't even a handshake at the beginning of the talks. >> wow. >> reporter: so a little bit of trust has been born of the two sides facing each other and talking here in turkey, and that, i think, everybody thinks is some progress. >> keir, the issue of crimea and the donbas region, is it -- what's the bigger sticking point, that or the security agreement that ukraine is seeking? >> reporter: that's a great question. you know, ultimately territory

is the big sticking point. you know, president zelenskyy has said that they won't sacrifice sovereignty, territory. well, the question in the end that will come when and if president zelenskyy and president putin meet face-to-face, you have to assume at some point they will, it may well be that question of territory. the two things are intertwined, of course, so if you are going to have, for example, security guarantees from the west, how much of ukraine is in those guarantees? does russia get to keep the wilder donbas area or just a smaller area in the beginning of the conflict that were held by pro-russian separatists? there are many questions inevitably. for answers there will have to be a lot more talks. >> keir simmons, than you. let's go to where the war is still raging, and that's where richard engel is in ukraine. so, richard, the line that

everybody has been uttering, which is what are they doing, not what are they saying, so what are you seeing? >> reporter: well, we just heard a loud explosion in kharkiv just a few moments ago, so the offensive by russia, by the ukrainian side still continues. the war is not pausing while these talks are under way. the only possible development today is this announcement from one of the top russian negotiators, the deputy defense minister, who said that there would be a de-escalation, particularly around kyiv and chernihiv, and that this u.s. official said that they are seeing some indications of ukrainian troops pull back. that's all we really have in concrete terms. rest is we're hearing more about the framework, how the ukrainians eventually see a peace deal. as keir was saying, they see one form lating with not ukraine joining nato but declaring some neutrality but neutrality that

is protected by 11 other countries including the united states, israel, turkey, and the united kingdom among the 11. but i'd love to hear what general hodgings has to say since he was a senior nato official, a ground commander. how would this possibly work if you're a nato member? how can you form another alliance that could see you go to war against russia? independently, one of the things that the ukrainians want, they want to be stronger than nato. they want the security guarantees to be immediate, that if russia were to invade again, that there would have to be an immediate no-fly zone. how could the united states agree to that when it's not willing to agree to that now for fear of sparking as president biden said world war iii? so you have these still quite amorphous ideas of a security agreement from the ukrainians. they've punted the issue of crimea for the next 15 years. they said we will deal with that

over time. president zelenskyy has said repeatedly that he's willing to negotiate over donbas without getting into the specifics. he said they could talk about language, that that effectively can be worked out. now, they may have more details about how that will be worked out in the talks, but publicly hasn't given any indication of how that specifically would play out. so, to go back to your question, what are we seeing that's different? this commitment by the russians to pull back from some parts around the capital and some indications that perhaps they are, but that was also the area where they were already being in retreat, where they had already been suffering combat losses. >> right. >> reporter: so, yes, there is some diplomatic progress because they met and apparently will again and they'll take this to vladimir putin, but are we anywhere different today than we were yesterday? it doesn't seem that we are. >> well, look, you've given me my first question for general

hodges, so i appreciate that. before i get to you, general, and get that -- because i'm curious on that answer too -- clint watts, you're watching the troop movements. to build on what richard was implying, this retreat from kyiv in some ways was being forced already by ukrainian -- by the ukrainian forces, were they not? >> that's exactly right. i think the russians finally figured out after a couple weeks of just taking steep losses and not really advancing that their plan was not going to work. there are some other considerations too. they could not encircle kyiv. they've taken big-time losses. certainly that's the eastern military district essentially of russia. that's their troops. they performed very poorly in comparison to say on the southern front down out of crimea. when you watch what's going on there, why continue to lose combat power if you're russia when you can fall back there and reinforce in other places, particularly the east? i would not be surprised if in two to three weeks' time that

combat pourer they had around kyiv in a failed effort is redeployed towards luhansk and donetsk essentially to reinforce, because even when they advanced in the ooets and had success, they cannot hold ground. you need troops to handle the governance parent of it. this has been the great strategic flaw of the plan of attacking on three fronts. it's a way for them to shift from something they know they can't achieve, reinforce where they have made gains, and i would not be surprised if two to three weeks russia has secured gains in the east, you will hear more about a settlement and this might be what putin is after say a month from now if he's able to secure that area. >> clint, have we seen any sort of letup by russians around mariupol? or are they still acting as if this is an aggressive war front? >> absolutely not, chuck. you see all-out combat. when you see peace talks --

richard made excellent points that, yes, it seems like there could be progress but it is also progress in the sense that it is masking what russia is probably trying to do in terms of strategic objectives, which is focus their energy in the places closest to the border and build that land bridge to mariupol like we've been talking about this month. >> clint watts, national security analyst, appreciate you sharing your expertise with us. general, let me land on you here. let's talk about the ukrainian ask here of basically its own -- it wants its own security treaty, and it certainly -- they want it to be stronger than nato. obviously, we have other treaties, security treaties we're a part of, but how would that work with nato and is there some inevitable potential trip wires here? >> well, this is quite an ask.

certainly, i think for the united states, an important part of improving ukrainian security would be for us to have our strategy for greater black sea region. so much of the conversation goes bach to ukraine as if it's an island somewhere, but it's in a region where we have three nato allies -- turkey, romania, and bulgaria -- there's huge economic potential for the region as a connector between europe and eurasia, so a longer-term relationship with ukraine that is not only about security cooperation but also diplomacy and economic investment, that would be a part of it. we've done -- i think the department of defense has done a great job helping ukraine with their training at brovary, working with other allies, canadians in particular, helping ukraine over the years. but a longer-term strategy for helping them modernize and get where they want to be, after what i've seen in last five

weeks, the russians should be looking for a security guarantee against ukraine, the ukrainian forces have performed so well. >> right. >> i think helping them continue to modernize their military and all their democratic institutions is an important part of this. >> general, i guess i want to go back to this idea that ukraine wants a security agreement but can't join nato, wants a security agreement that includes the united states. as far as vladimir putin is concerned nato is the united states. >> yeah. >> so this feels like a distinction without much of a difference. >> i think that the united nations has a role to play here, and then i also think about the dayton peace accord where the alliance was able to implement an agreement with the security forces from multinational security forces. now, russia probably would not be real keen on a nato implementation force like we had after dayton, although we did have russian troops as part of

the i-4, the implementation force. so there's a model if there's a mandate and an actual peace to be implemented. the problem, of course, with any of these things is that if it doesn't respect ukrainian sovereignty, if it allows the lines to harden, then russia ends up being rewarded for their adepression. and i think obviously this is not the direction that we would want to go. there has to be some sort of arrangement where we can help them militarily with training and cooperation, but i don't see how we can get past the hurd that will you just talked about. >> you can't imagine -- you can't imagine us agreeing to what ukraine wants if russia steps back foot, you know, comes back into ukraine the next time, basically we have an article 5-like commitment, which is what they're looking for to join with

their defense. you think that would be probably a bridge too far for us? >> actually, i think we could do it. you know, we have allowed ourselves to be deterred by russian threats when, in fact, the reality is i think it's a very, very low likelihood they would use chemical weapons. i think it's a very low likelihood they would employ a nuclear weapon. we have all the advantages of the alliance, and we haven't been using them. too much talk about avoiding escalation when. in, we have the advantages and we should be pouring it on right now in ukraine, helping ukraine. we need to talk about winning actually, not avoiding escalation. we need to talk about winning and giving the ukrainians the ability to continue the pressure. don't let russia start digging in in their newly gained territory. >> it's interesting you say we

have to start talking about winning. it feels as if we're in a situation where putin isn't going to -- he needs to come away with some win here, and i don't see how the ukrainian people feel comfortable giving him a win. if anything, as i've said, if your next-door neighbor tries to kill you, how are you supposed to live next door to that person? because a police officer came and said no, no, no, your neighbor is not going to do it again. >> well, i don't think i'm willing to accept the conventional wisdom that putin needs to have a win of some sort. i mean, honestly at this point, he has -- i don't know that he deserves some kind of an off-ramp. look, i'm not a diplomat, and being able to give them some sort of a way to back -- to get out of this mess that they have created entirely, i understand the conventional wisdom. but i think frankly the

situation now has changed to a degree that we have all the advantages. ukraine is getting the momentum. we should not be willing to accept anything short of at least going back to the pre-24 february line. and frankly, president biden talked about in warsaw the other day that this is about democracy versus autocracy. we need to back that up. he's the president and he's right. and i think we need to use all of the assets we have, not just military, to continue to push back and help restore all of ukraine's sovereignty. >> so you're getting at something that i've asked others. it looks like we have our foot on putin's throat right now in a way that we haven't ever had before. and i assume that -- you know, is it -- it's got to be tempting to say, hey, we can keep this up another six months, he may not survive.

>> 1 april is a big day. on this day on friday, 130,000 russian families are supposed to send their son to report as conscripts. this is the normally scheduled next wave of conscription for the russian army. i hope there is a massive information effort under way. i know that there is in some places to reach those families and say, really, do you want your son to become cannon foder in putin's army to fight and die in ukraine the way thousands of russian soldiers have already died? it's not just about providing javelins to ukraine. this is about providing truthful information to russians so that they understand. no mat what happens in the next six months, there is zero positive outcomes for russia. nothing good is going to come out of all this, so i think the top priority candidly is not getting a cease-fire, the top priority is making sure that democracy is successful and our

longer-term strategic interests, which includes a democratic ukraine. >> lieutenant general ben hodges, appreciate you coming on and sharing your expertise and perspective with us. thank you. >> thank you. still to come, we'll dive deeper into russia's potential next move and putin's potential end game with a former foreign minister of russia. before we go to break, breaking news involving the pandemic that could impact a lot of people. the fda has authorized a fourth dose of the pfizer and moderna vaccine for certain immunocompromised individuals and for everyone aged 50 and older. the agency said that evidence suggests some waning of protection over time against severe infection for these groups. we've seen it in other countries. a second booster given at least four months after the first. do the math, folks. that would help increase protection. the fda bypassed the independent panel of experts it usually uses

that have issued these recommendations throughout the pandemic and it comes as health officials are trying to gauge the threat posed by this omicron subvariant as it's been spreading through europe and other parts of the world. once upon a time, at the magical everly estate, landscaper larry and his trusty crew... were delayed when the new kid totaled his truck. timber... fortunately, they were covered by progressive, so it was a happy ending... for almost everyone.

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according to the british government in a call with president biden and the leaders of france, germany, italy, and the uk, prime minister boris johnson said exactly what we were saying at the top of the hour. "we must judge putin's regime by their actions, not their words." joining me is a former top russian diplomat. he was the russian federation's first minister of foreign affairs after the soviet union's collapse in 1991. he's also the author of "the firebird: the elusive fate of russian democracy." it's about his tenure in moscow. appreciate you coming on. start with what should we believe today and what do you think is the motivation for

russia to at least announce that they're going to pull back some of their military efforts focused on kyiv? >> thank you for having me. the motivation is one and only one. they suffer a defeat near kyiv, it looks like that, and that's the advantage that they understand, that putin's achieved, not him alone, but they've achieving. he created some kind of institutional regime, but they understand only the language of force, nothing else. so don't be fooled about those negotiations. but the west should continue to provide military and other supplies unabated, and then they

will talk a little bit of reason as long as they know they have force behind the other side. >> what's your sense of how long he can sort of keep the russian public from totally turning on him, maybe he's able to, you know, black out some of the coverage of the war, but at some point the sanctions are having an impact, they know their economy's cratering, people are leaving the country, anybody with a professional degree appears to be fleeing, you know, is it a month, two months? i mean, is he operating on his own time line of i got to find a way out or maybe the people will revolt? >> oh, he is not operating on time lines. he's not operating in anything

which sounds close to that. simple steps. as long as he can't impose his rule on russia and as long as his propaganda is in his hands, then he will continue, and he will not stop in ukraine and otherwise only by external force. but inside, he might be stopped only from russian people actually breaks up and starts to attack. that's my -- which unfortunately the population, but they should be long after this war is stopped because it's much easier to stand against him forcefully

in ukraine, believe it or not, than in inside. but how long? you never know. i mean, it might be tomorrow. i lived in the soviet union. one day it just crashed. it was like a superpower. >> right. let me ask you this. if you were advising the ukrainian side in these negotiations, it sounds like you wouldn't give them much. it sounds like you would feel confident don't -- you know, don't feel as if you have to give in on the donbas region. would you be counseling a more rigid position by the ukrainian government? >> i don't want to advise people in that desperate situation, but they are negotiating under the gun and there's important. unfortunately, european advisers

or workers did not help the last eight years ukrainians because they're negotiating from position of weakness instead of strength. and now america thanks god. and president biden should not apologize for his language. he should just back up his language with more military supplies. that's what is needed, the same message, back up, but coming back to negotiating positions, ye their negotiating position, i like it because they are speaking of some concessions, which were addressed by european advisers, but they insist on the guarantees, around guarantee is something very difficult, especially the united states. you know of course better than

me that congress will take probably years before they'd give a guarantee. so they are very smart people, very courageous people, and zelenskyy is great war president, and i start to suspect he is great at remaining president too. >> last question is this. do you think that anybody around putin is giving him an honest assessment of things, or is everybody around him now that afraid of him? >> they are afraid. they will not -- never give -- you know, it's not in russian tradition. a autocrat, be it ooh czar, stalin, putin, will give some kind of reasonable advice. but one day those guys around

him might export him, to so say, out of the office, all of a sudden. >> andre, the first foreign minister in the post soviet union russia, really appreciate you coming on and sharing your experiences and expertise with us. thank you, sir. >> thank you so much. please stick around. the president has just begin speaking. we'll take you there when we expect the address. in fact, according to my little signage there, we're doing it right now. so let's listen in. >> -- soviet union to answer putin's brutal and unjustified assault on ukraine. today with the prime minister's visit and singapore's strong leadership on this issue, it's clear that putin's war is unacceptable in every region of the world, not just in europe. it's an attack on the coroner of the national principles that

underpin peace and security and prosperity everywhere, including in the indo-pacific. today, singapore and the united states are united in sending the message to all nations, to all nationings, regardless of their size of population, they are equal in their rights on the global stage. they have a right to sovereignty and territorial integrity and to determine their own future, free from violence and interim dags. mr. prime minister, our nationings cooperate closely on security and counterterrorism. we have for some time. and we have deep commercial and economic ties. we've developed deep personal tieings as well, i must acknowledge, and we'll continue to deepen our partnership and see -- >> all right. we're going the sneak in a quick break and go back to the president's event when he starts taking questions. see you in a minute. would be the last thing on my mind. thankfully, voya provides comprehensive solutions, and shows me how to get the most out of

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and disruptive muscle aches. you can count on fast, effective relief with motrin. new projects means new project managers. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. when you sponsor a job, you immediately get your shortlist of quality candidates, whose resumes on indeed match your job criteria. visit indeed.com/hire and get started today. as we left you before the commercial break, president biden is doing a joint press conference with the prime minister of singapore. we bring in kelly o'donnell here. kelly, you know, we do expect the president probably to get a ukraine-related question during the q&a. we'll take you to that, which may begin literally any second now. but correct me if i'm wrong, kelly. this meeting is coming because there was going to be a much larger meeting of southeast asian allies and the united states and that had to be postponed i think or at least some parts rescheduled. what's the genesis of this?

>> reporter: this is an opportunity for the president to meet with the leader of the prime minister of singapore. you're right, i'll be delicate here, the control room will let us know when they go to questions. we expect one from each delegation, the u.s. reporters and the contingent that came from singapore. what the president emphasized in his early remarks is that the issue of ukraine was discussed with his counterpart, and that every region of the world, he mp sized, is concerned about what is happening in ukraine, not just europe, because of course the president just came back from europe and it was clear that g-7 countries and the nato partnership are obviously deeply new jersey devilsed in that. but looking at singapore, a city state in asia with an enormous banking component and is obviously in a part of the world where the north korean threat is perhaps more of concern and china's potential as the mag gnat of power in that part of

the world is a concern. but he wanted to emphasize their conversation did include concerns about ukraine and the unjustified war of vladimir putin. so please stop me when there is the q&a. >> i will. >> that is the issue here. >> very quickly, kelly, i'm curious, you got a direct response from the president saying nothing has changed, i'm not walking back anything. that was sort of a moral call he was issuing regarding putin. describe to me the behind-the-scenes efforts that you were privy to when it came to sort of interpreting the remark the president made about putin's future. >> reporter: well, one of the challenges is that the united states is a country that has a very clear role in the world to play about democracy, that the u.s. position is not about changing the governments of other nations, is not about regime change is the term of

art. and so any suggestion of that on the world stage can undercut the u.s. position around the world. at the same time, vladimir putin's actions have gone to such a point of being in conflict with any norms, with any reasonable position, that the president is now saying it's moral outrage he was voicing and not a policy shift. it took the white house 48 hours to get there, but that's something that many people could have heard just as their own human reaction to say of course putin shouldn't remain in power based on what he has done. >> all right, kelly. >> reporter: here we go. let's see what the questions are. >> let's listen in. >> -- associated press. >> thank you, mr. president. what is your view of russia's announcement today that it will, quote, fundamentally scale back its military operations near kyiv and another northern city in ukraine? do you see this as possibly the

war beginning to come to an end? or do you see this as russia trying to buy time and to recalibrate for a new military effort? >> we'll see. i don't read anything into it until i see what their actions are. we'll see if they follow through with what they're suggesting. there are negotiations that have continued today with turkey and others. i had a meeting with the heads of state of four allies in nato -- france, germany, the united states, and great britain. and there seems to be a consequence that let's just see what they have to offer. we'll find out what they do, but in the meantime, we're going to continue to keep strong the sanctions. we'll continue to provide the ukrainian military with their capacity to defend themselves, and we're going to continue to keep a close eye on what's going on. thank you.

>> all right. we're going to sneak in one more break there. you heard the president basically with the same attitude that pretty much everybody has when russia makes an announcement -- let's see what they do. we'll be right back. ech vo: thir had auto glass damage, but he was busy working from home... ...so he scheduled with safelite in just a few clicks. we came to his house... ...then we got to work. we replaced his windshield and installed new wipers to protect his new glass, while he finished his meeting. let safelite come to you. >> man: looks great. thank you. >> tech: my pleasure. that's service on your time. schedule now. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ get help managing your money for the life -- and years -- ahead. with fidelity income planning, we'll look at what you've saved, what you'll need, and help you build a flexible plan for cash flow designed to last. so you can go from saving... to living. shopping on public wifi is sketchy.

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welcome back. a bit of january 6th news in the last 48 hours. we'll turn to that where we're seeing big headlines, all raising questions about where this probe is headed. yesterday a federal judge ruled in favor of the committee's request for more documents and made a determination that trump and his lawyer likely committed a crime. the committee, meanwhile, is looking into a seven-hour gap in white house phone logs on january 6th. it's also considering a push for testimony from ginni thomas via subpoena, wife of supreme court justice clarence thomas, she of whom urged then chief of staff mark meadows to pursue some of those outlandish conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.

and then last night, the january 6th committee itself voted to refer to more former trump advisers to the justice department for contempt of congress after they ignored subpoenas, peter navarro, dan scavino. we heard some committee members vent apparent frustrations with the justice department's handling of these types of referrals, two of which they've sent so far. >> the department of justice has a duty to act on this referral and others. without enforcement, there is no oversight. >> the united states of america, no one is above the law. this committee is doing its job. the department of justice needs to do theirs. >> i will echo what my colleagues have already said, but more bluntly, attorney general garland, do your job so that we can do ours. >> joining me now is maryland democratic congressman jamie raskin, a member of the january 6th select committee and served as the lead impeachment manager

for the second impeachment during former president trump's 2021 trial. congressman, it's good to see you. let me start with this issue of the justice department and providing some teeth for your subpoenas here. look, the time line, you know, anything could happen in november, but the way, if you look at the time between the one they are pursuing with bannon, between your referral, and the actual trial, if they're on the same time line for, say, scavino and navarro here, we may not find out until sometime next calendar year whether they have to turn this stuff over. what is your hope that the justice department does going forward? and how fast do you think they can act? >> well, i think members of the committee expressed our general sense that they need to step it up if they're going to be part of the process of bringing these people to criminal justice and accountability.

of course, our role as the select committee is different. we're trying to promote accountability in a much broader sense. we want to tell the complete story of what happened to the american people and to congress and then make very specific recommendations. but what we need to do to fortify democratic institutions and processes against future coups and insurrections against our government. >> let me ask you this -- why do you think the meadows referral has not been taken up yet? >> i don't think i could say. you know, each one of those cases seems to be on its own time line. we're just hoping that the department of justice understands the urgency with which we are acting here. >> well, in fairness, it doesn't look like they are. i mean, how do you -- how do you coax them -- you know, privately it would look like nobody wants to look like you guys, everybody

is working in cahoots. on the other hand, there's a part of me that wonders why isn't there a special group of people at the justice department basically solely focused on this right now? >> well, of course there could be a special counsel and a special counsel has been recommended by a number of people including professor tribe to deal with this issue. one to have things we're trying to rebuild after the wreckage of the trump administration is both congressional and presidential respect for independence of the law enforcement functions. so i don't think anything we say is going to dictator the course of action at the doj. we want to make sure that people understand they're the ones in charge there. but we've got a very big responsibility here because, you know, they have brought more than 700 different prosecutions against people for criminal trespass and interference for federal proceeding and assault on federal officers.

there have been charges of seditious conspiracy, conspiracy with the government, so they're working their way up. but our job as a select committee is to give a report to the american people threwthrough hearings and through written and perhaps video document explaining what happened so we can make sure that the country gets together on rejecting violent insurrectionism and coups against our constitutional process for electing people and the peaceful transfer of power. >> let's talk about the ruling the judge made in california that maybe gets you a step closer to getting john eastman to have to turn over records that you guys have subpoenaed. this is the lawyer that essentially tried to plan this legal -- that came up with this legal theory trying to get the vice president to delay certification in some form. the judge said it's possible the president himself committed a

crime here. i know the committee has not ruled out the idea of a criminal referral for the former president when all is said and done. what did you make of that judge's assessment? >> it was an extraordinary thing. i'm glad people across the country are a united states dist court judge now who says that it was likely and more likely than not that the president engaged in a criminal effort to interfere with a federal proceeding and essentially to defraud the public of its right to an honest election. and then he went beyond that to say that it might have been the -- might have spelled the end of the peaceful transfer of power in america undermining democracy and the constitution forever after. and if you look at the very last sentence of the decision, i think it may be the most important one because there he orders john eastman to turn over

directly to the committee the documents that we're looking for. and i hope that that will establish a precedent now for these judges who are rejecting all of the phony claims of executive privilege and attorney/client privilege, nub of which can cover criminal activity like insurrections. these judges can now not just reject these claims, but actually compel these witnesses to turn over the evidence that we're looking for. >> let me move to the phone log part of this story and this identification of a massive gap in phone logs at the white house on january 6. you know, given what we've seen with the former president, we found out that he took classified records, those that were turned over, he regularly would try to tear things up, had to be taped back together because he was violating presidential records act.

was this gap unique or is this a continuing pattern as you've been trying to get where there is a lot of missing records and is it just around this period? how much of this is a regular practice of the trump white house? >> well, that is an important question. i'm not sure that we know the answer to it. i'm very curious about these sudden and very long gaps in the record of phone calls, guests and so on. one possibility when a gap like this exists is that the president or whomever we're looking at is using a different phone. and it could be a different office phone number. and it could be a burner phone for what we all know. there is also at possibility that somebody is deliberately suppressing the release of these materials. and we just don't know. and that is something that we

want to look to. i will say that it seems like we've had overwhelming participation and cooperation from the witnesses that we want to talk to. but the closer that you get to trump, thereis an entourage around him that is blocking our ability to get information and very specifically about the events that took place over the course of the afternoon of january 6. >> the former president seemed to almost confirm something that he did differently. he claimed, and it was a very typical trump statement, i'm sure it probably made you smirk, where he said that he never heard of the term burner phone, but of course he never issued a denial that he might have been using a different phone. >> yeah. one can be using a burner phone without understanding that that is what they are commonly called. and so we don't know, perhaps he was using a staffer's phone. we're not sure. but the point is this shouldn't be a gameof hide and go seek.

is this not a game of cat and mouse. if congress comes calling for information that it needs for us to do our job, you turn it over. and to me it is scandalous that you have anyone much less the former president of the united states who is encouraging people not to cooperate in an investigation into a violent insurrection, a deadly insurrection against our own government. >> one of the reasons that i keep pursuing this, i wonder if you guys have stumbled on where they just have been doing this for years while they were in the white house and the amount of, you know, that there is a more massive coverup here perhaps than just the narrow window which you guys have been looking at. and again, that is -- we're all going to find out the answer to that question. let me move to the ginni thomas situation. what would be -- why would you want to subpoena her? >> well, look, let's start with

this, ginni thomas is a private citizen who has every right to engage in political activity. but she also is equal to everybody else and has no more right to engage in criminal insurrection or coup plotting. and so we're trying to figure out what happened to us on january 6. so to the extent that she entangled herself and embroiled herself in these efforts to actually overturn the presidential election result, then we would be interested in talking to her. if she was not interested in that, and was just expressing her political views, well, then we wouldn't be interested. so i would say we should just follow where the evidence leads us. >> sounds like what you are saying, if there is evidence that she was involved in some of the planning or organizing of any of the rallies, that makes her relevant. if they is essentially a very famous commenter and texter to mark meadows, that that isn't,

was there more than just her bizarre rants in mark meadows' phone. >> i think that is basically it. even organizing a rally doesn't necessarily make you someone that we need to talk to. but we're interested in people who have information about two streams of activity. one was the organizing of violent insurrection, an attack on the capitol that wounded, injured and hospitalized 150 officers. and then a separate but related and connected stream of activity to try to coerce mike pence into rejecting electoral college votes in order to lower joe biden's total from 306 to 270 and to try to kick the whole contest into the house of representatives for a contingent election. and to both of those, they involved illegitimate means. and if she was involved in either of both of those or knows something about it, we would want to talk to her. and if he some -- if she wasn't,

just disappointed in the election result, she has a right to say it. so we treat her just like anybody else. she gets no special pass because of who she is married to but also no special targeting because of who she is married to. >> congressman raskin, glad that we were able to do a little more than our four or five minutes here. thank you, sir. and thank you all for being with us. we'll be back tomorrow. more "meet the press daily." and msnbc coverage continues with hallie jackson right after this break. hallie jackson righ this break ting ready for his solo... but no. he's currently checkin' his investments. you gotta have a plan outside the band, man. digital tools so impressive, you just can't stop. what would you like the power to do? ♪ ♪

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i'm hallie jackson in for katy tur. and we're coming on the air with the first peace talks in more than a week between russia and ukraine and the new reaction just a couple minutes ago from president biden on the kremlin's promises. basically he will believe it when he sees it, talking about the new pledge from russia to reduce military activity around kyiv and chernihiv, and they willing meeting face-to-face at some point soon. the president was asked about the pledge made that russia would start