wednesday night. msnbc prime starts right now with ali velshi. good evening ali. >> it is worth underscoring the efforts that people went to to undermine that story, and they continue to. they continue to say it's not true, that joe biden was out of line when he said, it is true, that joe biden was out o line when he said, it is when he said it it's not provable i appreciate you bringing it up. have a good night. thanks to you at home for joining us this hour we have two guests we are very excited about tonight. senator chris murphy and beto o'rourke, the former congressman and current candidate for texas but first, one revelation that got yesterday about donald trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election did not come from the big public hearing yesterday about the january 6 investigation, rather, it came from mother jones magazine, which obtained leaked audio of this guy, steve bannon, former trump white house adviser and

double-layered button downed shirt aficionado, the leaked audio is just a few days before the 2020 presidential election. rewind a little bit and remember with me, a couple of months earlier, steve bannon had been arrested on charges that he had been bilking unsuspecting donors out of their money by telling them theirct donations were goi toward building a wall on the southern border when in fact, the money was going to steve bannon's pockets. bans was arrested on this luxury yacht off the coast of connecticut,ry belonging to an exiled chinese billionaire kind after patrongi of bannon. bannon out on bail is at a meeting with a bunch of the chinese billionaire friends, fine crew of folks who work on a sprawling online network peddling far right disinformation and an activist meeting a few days before the presidential election, bannon is

filling themes in on how electi night is going to go down. >> what trump's gonna do is just declare victory, right? he's gonna declare victory. but that doesn't mean he's a winner. he's just gonna declare m victo. the democrats, more of our people vote early that count. theirs vote in mail. so they will have a natural disadvantage and trump's going to take advantage of it. that's our strategy. he's gonna declare himself a winner. if trump is losing by 10 or 11:00 at night, it's going to be even crazier. no, because he's gonna sit right there and say, they stole. it i'm directing the attorney general, to shut down all ballot places in all 50 states. he'sot not going out easy. if biden is winning, trump is going to do some crazy [ bleep ]. >> which is in fact, pretty much how it happened. i mean steve bannon got the exact time of night slightly

off, trump didn't say the election was stolen at 10:00 or 11:00 on election night, he waited until after 2:00 a.m., he didn't direct the attorney general to shut down polling place, but as we saw at yesterday's hearing about six weeks later at an oval office meeting he entertained the idea of having the military seize all the voting machines. but the fact steve bannon clearly seemed to know the basics of the plan, and what it would lead to. mother jones reports that elsewhere in the leaked audio, bannon says that any chance for ao, quote peaceful resolution o probably gone. end quote. he said, quote, this is a revolution. this election just triggers more fighting. end quote. and look, you did not have to have special knowledge or psychic powers to know that going to likely contest theha results of the election. the foreshadowing was pretty heavy. we were all forewarned about the so-called red mirage that would appear on election night that early returns would look good

for trump because of the order in which ballots were counted which allow him to claim that his victory was being stolen from him, and his lead started being eaten away by democratic ballots. exactly what steve bannon described as quote our strategy. it wasn't like trump was shy himself about talking about o ts in the weeks before theas electn either. >> the only way we will lose thison election is if the elect is rigged. remember. that the onlyio way we will los this election. we have to be very careful. >> the only way they can take this election away from us is this is a rigged election. >>s the democrats are trying t rig this election. because it's the only way they're going to win. >> so the tendency to hear this bannon audio and whatever, we know trump was thinking about doing that but in terms of

holding trump accountable for his actions between election day ande january 6, especially in trump will have any criminal liability for his actions, there is a really big difference between on the one hand trump was never going to accept any loss, and he was grasping at anything he could after the election. and on the other hand, trump had formulated a plot to stay in power if he lost the election, and began carrying that plot out on election night. and based on what we learned yesterday's hearing, there is reason to believe that steve bannon wasn't just spit-balling when he was scribe trump's plans to deny the election results, he may very well have heard about those plans from donald trump himself. because that is certainly what seemed to have happened a couple months later with trump's plans for january 6th. >> on january 5, the day before the attack on the capitol, tens ofay thousands of people converd onds washington. whilepe certain close associate

of president trump privately expressedcl concerns about what would occur on january 6, other members of the president's inner circle spoke with great anticipation about the events to come. the committee has learned from the white house phone logs that the president spoke to steve t bannon, his close adviser, at least twice on january 5. conversation they had lasted for 11 minutes. listen to what mr. bannon said that day, after the first call he had with the president. >> all hell is going to break loose tomorrow. >> allng converging, and now wee on to say the point of attack, right? attack tomorrow. i'll tell you this. it's not going to happen, like you think it's going to happen. it is going to be quite extraordinarily different and all i can say is strap in. >> from those same phone logs, we know that the president and mr. bannon spoke again on the phone that atevening, this time for six minutes. >> here's the thing. if you heard steve bannon make

those remarks on january 5, and they weren't a secret because many of us did hear them that day, you might think he was pumping up his listeners or engaging in bravado or quite likelyen rung another scam like his build -- likely run another scam like the build the wall fundraiser butr it entirely changes the way you hear bannon's words that day. when you -- when you know that he had just had anor 11-minute conversation with donald trump. quote, it's not going to happen likedo you think it's going to happen, end quote. left unsaid there is because donald trump just told me the secret plan for how it's going to go down. remember, we alsow learned yesterday that trump and his allies apparently planned in advance to march on the capitol but deliberately kept that plan secret so it would appear that the march to the capitol was spontaneous. the point here is not about steveol bannon.

it's about donald trump. one of the goals of the january 6d hearings is to clearly plac donald trump at the center of the decision making around the actual plot to overturne the election culminating in the attack on the capitol. it was donald trump who spoke to steve bannon the day before the eye tack -- attack, prompting ban ton tell his supporters that all hell was going to break loose the next day. it was donald trump who on january 5th told the chief of staff to call mike flynn and roger stone, allies who had connections to the right wing militias who led the capitol attack. it was donald trump who gathered oval office the day before the attack, and asked them what the best route was for the mob to take to the capitol thee next day. >> every one of these elements of the planning for january 6th is an independently-serious matter. they were all ultimately focused on overturning the election. . and they all have one other thing in common.

donald trump participated in each substantially and personally. he oversaw or directed the activity of those involved. >> the january 6 investigation is laying out the best case it possibly can. not just for donald trump's responsibility for the capitol attack, and the plot to overturn the election, but for his criminal liability for it. joining us now to discuss, is congressional investigations reporter for the "washington post" and msnbc contributor jackie, good to see you tonight. what are the key take-aways from yesterday's very interesting hearing was learning about donald trump's hidden plan to direct his supporters to the capitol denight knowing as we learned from cassidy hutchinson that many of them were armed. you summarized this in the "the post." do you have any insight into how trump pivoted from wanting to seize voting machines on the night of december 18th, 2020, to

convening a mob via tweet hours later? >> that is still a gap that has not been filled in by the committee despite the litany of revelations that were revealed yesterday. but one thing that i found interesting in watching the hearing was it was quite noticeable that most of those people who were featured in that seven minute montage that was brillianty put together to recreate the unhinged meeting that happened on december 18th with the crazies versus those who were actually working at the white housee at the time, sidn powell, mike flynn, the overstock.com guy, eric hishman and others, was that most of thosesh people who did testify behind closed doors to investigators did not specifically and explicitly reference the former president. insteadnc they were throwing fo at each other, describing their

actions with each other, rudy giuliani pretty profanely describing how the former white house aides were acting, but noticeably none of them described the former president's action, what he was saying, how he was feeling, how he weighed in, until pat cipollone addressed the elephant in the room that the former president still wanted to go ahead and appoint sidney powell as special counsel. that being said, there was still, despite tons of color provided, there was still some gaps if you're looking at it from the department of justice's purview which is how president trump ultimately made that pivot and that leap to realizing that some of the avenues that he had been previously considering were closed, and that he then needed to look towards the march on the capitol as a way to hold on to

power. >> and the pivot is, the committee went out of its committee and liz cheney particularly went out of her way to articulate the idea that at some point, everybody was, everybody, you know, was telling donald trump he had lost the election. you can't keep on pretending that he didn't think he had lost the election. and that the committee was pointing out that donald trump is responsible for the actions, thatha he deliberately took, an liz cheney wants to be clear, don't think about it as omission, in those 187 minutes, or in those days leading up to it, it was an act, it was commission. it was donald trump trying to overturn an election that he knew he had lost. >> yes, that's exactly right. and that was a not so subtle jab at the department of justice, a message to them that their bottom-up approach has been misguided, according to liz cheney at least. and from the prosecutorial

approach, it is important for the department of justice and hence some of, why, i think, and explain some of the committee strategy here, in trying to show that trump knowingly was trying to overturn the results of the election, despite knowing that there was no fraud, evidence that would not be any fraud identified by these people who were trying to find it, and that he was told over and over and overer again that there wasn't y evidence of election fraud by his senior-most advisers. but this sort of tet a tet between the department of justice and the committee was certainly noticeable yesterday in liz cheney's comments where she was again, as you just noted, trying to paint this picture of, yes, there might have been people in the white house who are now sort of pivoting strategies, they've moved from the deny and delay, to trying to say that the former

president was influenced by bad actors around him. liz cheney is pre-emptively cutting right through, that saying at the end of the day, this is the president of the united states, who is responsible for his own actions. >> the committee was also making the argument that the tweet, the infamous tweet, promoting the protest on january 6th by donald trump made the proud boys and the oathkeepers two extremist groups who had no previous history working together join hands in coordination for this attack, on the capitol. why is that significant? >> it's extremely significant, because it does exemplify this call and response which we've been talking a lot about, which when the former president trump put something out on the internet and into the world, there was immediate activity and a response from violent extremist forces, and that essentially, as you heard in the words of the whistle-blower from twitter, a former twitter employee, that trump was well awarepl of the impact that his words and his tweets were

having, and sort of saw it in realtime explode and really snowball into active coordination. it's also notable, because these are two groups that historically, in their past, have not been aligned on interests. but were actually brought together by a trump ally, roger stone, someone who was able to do that coordination for him. so that sort of brings i think the committee closer to connecting the dots there, connecting former president directly to the violence, that it was a trump campaign person, helping them coordinate their plan on january 6th, to foment this insurrection. >> good to see you tonight. we appreciate it. congressional investigations reporter for the "washington

post," jacqueline alemany. we have learned a ton of new information, but is that enough, as i was discussing, is that enough for the department of justice to make a decision on prosecuting donald trump? we will have more on that ahead? >> senator chris murphy and beto o'rourke will join us live. stay with us. y and beto that's been saving people money for nearly 60 years. for a great low rate, and nearly 60 years of quality coverage- go with the general. o'rourke will join us live stay with us

did you see a ufo in that cloud? nope. run! ♪ ♪ [ droning sound ] it's been almost two months since a gunman in uvalde, texas, took an assault style weapon in the robb elementary school and

shot 19 fourth graders and two teachers dead injuring several more. the story of that tragedy has evolved nearly every week since, families of the victims and residents of uvalde and journalists trying to cover the massacre have been peppered with statements and narratives from members of law enforcement in that state of the austin american statesman along with the tv news partner station kvue in austin obtained a surveillance video from the school that shows what the gunman did and how police responded that day. it's generated fresh outrage about the length of time that elapsed before they finally entered the classroom where the gunman was. now the full video is an hour and 22 minutes long. we are going to play portions of it for you, highlighting key moments from that day, but obviously, before we play this, i have to warn you, this is very difficult to watch. so if you would like to look away or leave the room for a moment, now is the time. i will note that you will hear

several rounds of gunfire but not the sound of children yelling or crying which is on the actual tape. the statesman made the editorial decision to remove the sounds of the kids screaming. here we go. first, you see the gunman enters the building unobstructed at 11:33 a.m., he checks the hallway before approaching two classrooms. now watch this. a child walks out of the bathroom, and before the child rounds the corner, you are going to see in a second, they see the gunman, they hear him open fire. the child runs out of the frame. the gunman enters the classroom and continues shooting. officials say the gunman fired 100 rounds in total. the gunfire starts and stops over and over. about three minutes later, a small group of police officers enter the building. and approach the classroom where the shooter is firing at students and teachers.

they retreat down the hallway after the gunman fires a burst of shots. watch this. one officer touches his head, the back of his head seemingly concerned that he was hit. now over the course of the next 70 minutes. more federal local and state officers arrived. they got body armor, protective shields, gun and equipment. they walk back and forth, in that hallway, not entering the classroom where the shooter periodically fires more rounds. we know some officers asked for keys to the unlocked classroom, they still waited, they even brought in a sledgehammer. they still waited. an hour and 14 minutes after the first officer arrived on the scene, the officers pushed into the classroom and killed the gunman, an hour and 14 minutes. that's where the video ends. a group of officers finally firing entering the classroom, as another officer, you can see there in the middle of the screen keeps a september group of officers back.

hours after the statesman released this video, the uvalde city council held a meeting, the council voted to accept the resignation of the uvalde school police chief pete arredondo, the incident commander the day of the robb elementary school shooting and ostensibly the guy in charge of the hour and 14 minute lag time in response. he was by the way recently elected to the uvalde city council before the shooting. you can hear the meeting attendees applauding his resignation. there was also a heated exchange between the mayor, members of the council and uvalde residents after the mayor commented on the statesman's decision to release this video. >> the way that video was released today did one of the most chicken things i have ever seen. >> the mayor said chicken. it was chicken -- chicken. >> i'm not going to get into an argument with you on that. >> the eder to of the austin american statesman published

this explanation for releasing the surveillance video. quote, this tragedy has been further tragic by changing stories. heroic-sounding narratives proven to be false and a delay or in most cases rejection of media requests for public information by law enforcement leaders, public officials, and elected leaders. but there are heroes, elected leaders, public officials, law enforcement officers, survivors of the massacre, who want the truth out. the truth always wins, maybe not on our cloak, but the truth always prevails. and this is the reason that we publish alongside kvue. joining us now is beto o'rourke, former democratic congressman running for governor of texas against the incumbent republican governor greg abbott. thanks for joining us tonight. >> we spoke after the event in uchbz and at that time we didn't have a tenth of the story that we have now and we know the reality that the gunman had killed students and teachers but

i have never seen a story like this that changes so much, where the information is so inaccurate, and now, we see this video that lays waste to the narratives that we were hearing from some of the police officers and officials in the days after the shooting. >> just in uvalde, this past sunday, i got a chance to meet with many of the parents who lost their kids, met with the children's brothers and sisters, met with the relatives of those two teachers who gave their lives, trying to protect those children in their classroom, and to a person, they want the same things. they want to make sure that the memory of their children, of their family members, is never lost. they want to make sure that there's justice to the point that you're making tonight, that the truth comes out, all of the truth and the facts, and that there's accountability at the end of the day for what people did, and for what they failed to do. those families have waited day after day, week after week, now more than a month later, and still nothing.

and they're learning about it through the news media, one day at a time, one fact at a time. which is further exacerbating the suffering that they're feeling, the torment that they're going through right now. and the third thing they have all said to me, they don't want any other family to ever feel the way that they do now. they want action. they want changes. they want to make sure that our kids, all of our kids are safe going back to school. in el paso, my hometown, our kids will be returning to school in 17 days. that's when the el paso independent school district begins the new school year, and nothing, nothing has changed in this state since that shooting in uvalde. or since the shooting at santa fe high school. or since so many other acts of gun violence in the state of texas. the only thing the governor has done is make it easier to carry guns publicly without a background check or training orvetting whatsoever. what those families deserve right now, is justice and

leadership. and all of us in texas, those of us who love texas, need to stands up for those families right now, and fight for them, until we get them what they deserve. >> two things have changed since that shooting. one is that there is some movement, albeit modest at the federal level, the first movement we've seen in decade, the second thing is opinions in texas have changed. a state that has relatively widespread support for guns and the second amendment, the support for stricter gun laws is up 20 points since that shooting. and the support for universal background checks is through the roof. the support for raising the minimum age to buy a gun to 21 is up 48%. so public opinion was always in support of safer gun laws in texas and now the current governor is completely out of step with changing public opinion. >> you're absolutely right. and those changes that we're seeing in congress and my thanks to your next guest, senator chris murphy, for being a leader

on that, and making it possible, you know, that was really produced by the grass roots leadership of groups like brady and giffords and march for our lives, and literally hundreds of thousands and now millions of americans who are standing up to be counted at this moment of truth and you will be pleased to know that when we were there on sunday, in uvalde, we were also there to march with these parents, and with these young students who had organized a march for the community, hundreds of people turned out, and they have been rallied in the plaza, they had served as a memorial for those victims, and demanding action, demanding changes to our gun law, common sense stuff, like universal background checks, or red flag law, or safe storage law, most of us can get behind that as you pointed out. the polling indicates that. but we all feel it in texas. and we just have leadership right now, that won't take that action. and that's why we need change. >> when you and i talked in person, in uvalde, you felt confident that there's a tipping point, there's a straw that

breaks the cam am's back in texas -- cam am's back in texas, texas has led in voting, texas has led in the suppression of reproductive votes, and texas continues to lead in unusual and out of step gun laws. do you think that has an effect in the end? because republicans keep winning at statewide races. >> absolutely, it does. our current governor has not only badly failed these families, and the community of uvalde, but is letting down this entire state. you have to look no further than our electricity grid, where they're issuing conservation notices today, because as the temperature rises, we can't depend on the power and the energy capital of the world. a state that has a total ban on abortion with no exception for rape or incest and a governor that is completely out of line with the long proud tradition of responsible gun ownership in texas. like many texans i grew up with

guns in the household and we grew up with the understanding of the responsibility and the accountability that comes with owning a gun and using a gun. he is beholden to the nra and the gun lobby and she instead be focused on these families and listening to them right now as they ask him to dot right thing, as we enter this next school year. the governor could call a special session of the legislature right now and get those laws passed. but he won't. and we must ask ourselves why. and then we must do what it takes to change the person in that office so that we can have real leadership that looks out for all of us. >> beto owe rob, thanks for joining us tonight. we appreciate your time. beto o'rourke, a former congressman running against the incumbent governor greg abbott for governor of texas. thank you for your time tonight, sir. >> thank you. we talked about chris murphy, he joins us live next. we have a lot to ask him. and later what the department of justice is learning from the january 6th hearings and whether or not it will be enough for them to charge donald trump. aryr or not it will be enough for them to charge donald trump.

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. president biden arrived in jerusalem today, in what may be one of the geo politically most complex trips abroad of his presidency. in four day, biden is expected to both attempt to slow iran's nuclear program, and to rebuild america's relationship with oil rich saudi arabia somehow without helping to rebuild the image of saudi arabia's human rights abusing crown prince. which is one serious diplomatic balancing act.

when biden ran for office in 2020 he vowed specifically and some would say correctly that we make a pariah of the saudi crown prince for his murder in the vicious murder of the "washington post" writer khashoggi. and a report concluded that the crown prince himself personally approved khashoggi's murder. and before he makes it to saudi arabia, officials from the administration are depending off questions about whether the trip is really about getting hem from -- help from saudi arabia on oil prices, telling "the new york times" that quote while no explicit deal is expected to be announced on raising saudi oil production, out of concern it might be coming across as unseemly, a reward for the crown prince's return to the diplomatic fold, that may come in a month or two. as for iran, a large part for the reason biden is in jerusalem today is to try to get buy-in

from israel on starting talks for a renewal of the iran nuclear deal, something that israel currently opposes. but even that is diplomatic 3d chess following the death of the palestinian american al jazeera journalist who was killed in the west bank in may. the state department says she was rightly killed by accident, by israeli troops but the u.s. has not carried out its own investigation into the american citizen's death. 24 senators and 57 congress people are demanding that they do so. our next guest is one of those senators. but the biden administration so far has been reticent to investigation. president biden spent decades on the senate foreign relations committee. if anyone can walk this tight rope, it should be him. joining us now is chris murphy, the senator from connecticut, a member of the senate foreign relations committee. senator, good to see you and while we had the conversation about guns a few minutes ago, shy tell you, when you and i last talked about that legislation, before it went through, you expressed that it would, and did, and that's a big

deal in america, to congratulations on getting that piece of bipartisan legislation done. i do want to talk about this trip, though. last week, president biden published an op-ed in the "washington post," explaining his decision to go to saudi arabia, essentially acknowledging the diplomatic win that this is going to be for saudi's crown prince, despite his human rights record but saying it is a worthwhile trade, given the importance of the partnership with saudi arabia when it comes to oil and when it comes to regional security and when it comes to building a coalition in the middle east, with regard to iran, do you buy that? >> well, it's the president's prerogative to travel anywhere he sees fit to meet with world leaders, i long argued that the presidents of the united states should be meeting with allies and adversaries, saudi arabia is most traditionally an ally, but they certainly very often carry out foreign policy objectives that conflict with ours. my contention is that if the

president is going to make this trip, if he is going to sit down across the table from the saudi leadership, he should get some significant concessions. concessions on the saudi's political repression, there are over 100 political prisoners locked up in saudi arabia, we should demand that those prisoners be released, and every day that the united states aligns ourselves with a country, with this kind of brutal campaign, of political repression, and it hurts our image abroad but also commitments when it comes to the saudi behavior in the region. the cease-fire in this horrific war in yemen, that saudi's have been perp pet waiting that the united states have been helping to perpetuate, and the saudis have a lot to say about that, but think the president is right to say about that, that the president has a right to go to the middle east and you are meeting with regimes in the regen who are sometimes against us, sometimes with us and i hope

he can get some significant concessions from the saudis while there. >> let me ask you about this letter. you're one of the senators leading the charge for an independent u.s.-led investigation into the death of the reporter, the plin palestinians have conducted an investigation, and the israelis other than the first few days have stopped denying that it was them, why is it important that the u.s. conduct an independet investigation? >> first and foremost, any time an american dies overseas, we should apply the highest degree of scrutiny to make sure we get to the bottom of the story as to how an american citizen was killed. and in this case, given that it might have come at the hands of foreign security forces, that is even more important. we are simply asking that we do a thorough review. a review that we are not confident the israeli authorities have done themselves. so i think it's important to get to the bottom of this. even if the bottom involves some

unsavory truths about what an important ally of the united states may have done or elements of the security forces may have done to contribute to this american's death. >> senator, you joined families from uvalde and highland park in dc today, pushing for a ban on assault weapons. just weeks ago, as we discussed, you managed to get the only piece of gun control legislation in decades through congress. your republican partner to that legislation texas senator john cornyn has said he is done. he does not want more legislation, he does not see more legislation getting through congress. what do we do now? that was good legislation, it was meaningful legislation, it was a big change, what happens next? what happens when more things happen and people want more, and republicans say we're done? >> well, listen, senator cornyn

and i were engaged in a month of 24/7 negotiations around the most significant piece of anti-gun legislation in 30 years, i can understand why he wants a break. but what i know is that the demand for action isn't abated around this country, it is increasing and what i also know is the strength of the movement is what moved the needle, 15 republicans supporting this bill, supporting a bill this significant, would have been unthinkable. just years ago. but the republicans came to the conclusion that there was more political gain to be had, voting for this bill and standing with 90% of the constituents and once again backing up the gun lobby and that movement of families of parents who want additional changes in gun laws is going to be stronger after uvalde, after highland park. i'm realistic. i don't know that we're going to come back and pass another major anti-gun violence bill in the next 30 days and i don't think these parents will stop and i

think congress will do more, that's what happens with the social change movement, once they get a taste of victory, they come back for more and more and more and normally get more and more and more. >> senator, we appreciate your time as always. thank you for covering so much ground for us tonight. chris murphy, thank you. during yesterday's january 6th hearing that we learned that january 6th investigationers have referred a matter of potential witness intimidation by donald trump to the justice department. just in the past hour, there has been breaking news that may give us a clue as to who the target was of donald trump's investigation. the story on that next. stay with us. s investigation. the story on that next stay with us

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during our last hearing, president trump tried to call a witness in our investigation, a witness you have not seen in these hearings. that person declined to answer or respond to president trump's call, and instead, alerted their lawyer to the call. their lawyer alerted us. and this committee has supplied that information to the department of justice. >> that was just one of the explosive new revelations from last night's january 6th hearing. donald trump personally attempted to contact a witness in the investigation, which is an act of potential witness tampering, that we now know has been conveyed to the department of justice. now tonight, we've got breaking news about that witness. just within the hour, cnn has

reported that the witness trump is alleged to have called is quote a member of the white house support staff who was talking to the house select committee. nbc news has not independently verified that report. but according to cnn, the call was made after former trump white house aide cassidy hutchinson testified publicly to the committee. the white house staffer was in a position to corroborate part of what hutchinson had said under oath according to the sources end quote. cassidy hutchinson's testimony included multiple explosive revelations about the former president's behavior during his time in the white house including accounts of the president becoming physically aggressive with members of the secret service, and throwing food across the room that white house staff had to clean up. joining us now is the former federal prosecutor joyce vance, good evening to you. let me first start by getting your reaction to the news, it's important because of the potential for this to be witness tampering, right? the idea that whomever it is, in this case a pretty important person, the former president of

the united states, calls someone who might know something about what cassidy hutchinson had said, and tell me why you think it is a problem and what you think of story that is developing. >> the core of this witness intimidation is the notion that you can't have someone who is perhaps a target or a subject of an investigation attempting to use any sort of inappropriate pressure to either hinder, delay, prevent, or alter a witness's testimony, a very broad statute, it tries to contemplate all of the possible circumstances where someone could try to tamper with a witness, and perhaps importantly here, it even reaches an attempt to intimidate a witness that ultimately is not successful. so that sort of pops the context for us to appreciate the breaking news tonight that what we would be learning about would

be a call made by the former president, someone on the white house support staff. and that's a really unlikely call for him to make in just the normal course of his operations. this is someone who spoke dismissively of people of being mere coffee boys in the past and unlikely he would have a sort of sustained friendship here and i think that feeling is confirmed by the fact that whoever the target of this call was reached out to his or her lawyer. >> and just in that short amount of time that you were delivering that answer, we have now confirmed that this story is true, the cnn reporting and msnbc has now confirmed to be true. talk to me about the point you were just making. there might be a situation where donald trump or anybody who is even marginally the subject of an investigation would have an ongoing relationship with someone who may or may not be talking to the committee. where's that line between just calling him, versus witness intimidation and how does that get established?

>> that line depends upon the government's evidence. for instance, if there was a voice mail message that was left, probably unlikely, since trump is notoriously shy of leaving any kind of a trail but if he left a message that said listen i want to talk to you before testify, i'm concerned, that might be some helpful evidence. but something that we know here is because liz cheney had announced that they had referred this to d.o.j., that means that there is no more proactive investigation going on. d.o.j. has evidence of witness tampering or they don't. it is not necessary to have anything undercover. and perhaps a phone call take place that would be taped. so whatever the situation is, it should be clear from the d.o.j.'s point of view, remembering that this statute is meant to be very broad and very expansive. because at the heart of our criminal justice system is the need to find out the truth about situations and if witnesses can

be intimidated, can be threatened, and can in other ways be encouraged to not tell the truth, then our system breaks down. so d.o.j. has a history of pursuing these cases pretty aggressively. interestingly both roger stone and jared kushner's father were prosecuted for witness intimidation. it is not something that the d.o.j. tends to sit on when the evidence is there. >> joyce we did have you scheduled to talk about other things of the investigation but it is good fort aun that you were here as the news breathe and we appreciate you -- as the news broke and we appreciate you helping you analyze. appreciate your time, joyce. thank you. one more story to get to tonight. how someone born in the 1800s is making history in the halls of the capitol in 2022. that's next stay with us. histof the capitol in 2022. that's next stay with us

good morning. we're starting "way too early" a little earlier than usual today, president biden in jerusalem

with the israeli prime minister. let's listen in. >> mr. president and i, we discussed saudi arabia. trying to build a more great coalition here, in this region, and we discussed the ukrainian threat, and to ensure there would be no nuclear alignment. and we ask --

>> president biden and israeli prime minister declining to take reporter's questions there at the end of their one-on-one bilateral meeting in jerusalem. kicking off the second day of the president's middle east trip. we will come back to that, with much more on this "way too early." it is thursday, july 14th. i'm jonathan lemire. thank you for being here. back to the middle east in a minute. but now, to washington. and we begin with the latest on the january 6th investigation. and the revelation from the committee that former president donald trump tried to make contact with a witness. a source tells nbc news the person is a member of the white house support staff. as yet to be publicly identified. the committee vice chair liz cheney said trump called the witness sometime after the bombshell june 28th testimony of former white house aide cassidy hutchinson. the person declined the call and to t