♪♪ hi, everyone. welcome to monday. it's 4:00 in new york. the start of a critical week for the investigation into the twice impeached ex-president's handling of government documents with potentially huge developments on the way in the ongoing court fight over that special master to review the seized last month. donald trump's lawyers informed the judge that they oppose the two candidates for special master proposed by doj citing what they call specific reasons that they then refused to explain, at least publicly. it comes hours after trump's legal team filed a motion opposing doj's request that investigators be allowed to work with the 100 dallasfied

documents found by the fbi at trump's private residence and golf club. they dismissed the criminal investigation as a document storage dispute that has sfie ruld out of control. most notable aspect of their filing, trump's lawyers tip-toeing around trump's claim that he declassified any or all of the documents. it's a claim for which they can't and don't provide a single shred of evidence. instead, saying this. quote, the government has not proven these records remain classified. that issue is to be determined later. "the washington post" notes, a section of their 21 page filing does not say that trump declassified the material before he left office. while trump's lawyers would like us to think this is what they say, document storage dispute, it's worth remembering in the court filing last week doj made clear that the country's national security may very well be in jeopardy if the government

loses access and time, even temporarily, to the documents that were seized. from "the new york times" reporting on that quote, doj said the prohibition on using those materials was hindering the intelligence community's review of the potential harm caused by the insecure storage of national security secrets and a classification review of the materials arguing those efforts were inextricably intertwined with the investigation. monday trump's lawyers dismissed the government's claims saying those assertions appear to be exaggerate and only a brief pause would be required for the special master's review to be completed. friday trump said they expected it to take three months. the judge has to thursday to grant doj's request to use the classified documents or else doj will take their case to the circuit, to the appeals court. donald trump's latest salvo in a

high-stakes legal battle over appoint ago special master to review the documents seized at mar-a-lago is where we begin today with some of our most favorite reporters and friends. luke is back, also asher, former fbi special agent for counterintelligence, a lecturer and assistant dean at the yale jackson school of global affairs. andrew weissman is back, former justice department prosecutor, a senior member of robert mueller's special counsel investigation and also lucky for us an msnbc legal analyst and friend the former senator claire mccaskill is here. let me start with you, pluk. on the reporting of the president's objections, they seem narrow and vague at the same time. clearly, outing the president's legal moves as just a delay tactic, no? >> yeah, i mean, one tactic that

donald trump and his allies have used throughout these investigations is to delay and delay and delay. and, you know, it's definitely could be seen through one lens as that's the main function here. you know, i think former attorney general bill barr said on fox that he viewed this as a rain delay in the middle of the investigation. but this is causing frustration. i mean, i was talking with people on the hill today. they wanted to get a gang of eight briefing about these classified documents and about the national security implications therein, and that's been put on hold while this special master dispute is being ironed out, and of course, the fbi investigation is being hindered or at least slowed down somewhat. so it may well be that the justice department prevails in the end here, but what will the cost of that time be to the investigation, into the wheels

of justice? >> andrew weissman, i don't know that i would have put on the bingo card asking you if you agree with john yu. he said this. trump is not allowed to have the records and keep them. he can't get copies but he can't keep them away from the archives that. is settled. he told nbc news in an interview with the national conservatism conference, it's not whether trump violated the law. he did. it's not whether the government had legal grounds for the search warrant. it does. question really is whether he could be charged and the real issue people on both sides should recognize is it a good use of prosecutorial discretion to charge him. it should be something more important like this, like being involved with the january 6th conspiracy. oh, john, you give us a minute, right? we now have bill bar and chris

christie, too. these are not republicans who saw trump for the threat that he was. these are far-right wing republicans. this is bill barr, chris christie, john yu saying he broke the law and he could be charged. >> yeah. i also, look, i agree with a lot of that statement. i don't agree with the part that is, you know, if you are going to charge a former president, it has to be something really serious like the january 6th conspiracy. obviously, that is really, you know, a really serious crime that. is overthrowing a democratic election. it's hard to see something more serious than that. but here is the thing. donald trump is a civilian. he may be a former president. he is a person like all of us on tv right now talking to you. if we break the law, we should be held to account. there are many junior people who

work in the intelligence community, who work in law enforcement, who get prosecuted for doing much less than what the former president did in mar-a-lago. so this idea, oh, you know what? he is kind of above the law, is really, i think, just wrong headed. i mean, either we have a system where we are all accountable to the law or we don't. and i have to say, the statement that you read and page 1 of trump's brief, which is this is a mere storage dispute, is preposterous. my analogy is to, you know, willie sutton saying the fact that you found my proceeds in my home, that's a mere storage dispute that i'm keeping, you know, my bank robbery proceeds at home instead of at a bank. i mean, this is preposterous for a former president. i mean, to me, the filings, i think, make it very clear that

there is not much of a defense if he is charged. >> andrew, it also makes clear they don't have evidence that trump declassified anything. >> yeah. well, as you pointed out, they go up to the line but they don't quite cross it and say he declassified it. and the reason is you could be charged with lying to a judge. that's 18 usc 1001 if you make that false statement. and this is where, as asher and claire knows, any normal judge would bring the parties in and say, what are you saying? are you saying that you declassified it? if so, where is the affidavit to prove that. >> don't get to make allegations in a brief. you are supposed to actually put some evidence on as to what happened. i don't think that's what this judge will do. she doesn't seem terribly experienced.

in a normal court of law you don't get to say this in a brief and not have any evidence to back it up. >> andrew, for anyone, viewers of this program know who john yu is, he is the architect of the legal memos arguing, among other things, for extraordinary steps taken during global war on terror and he made those comments at the conservatism conference. it's interesting to me that bill barr and john yu and chris christie are speaking for another day, a day in perhaps which they will be -- i hate to describe it -- these people being capable of being embarrassed or ashamed, but the way they are speaking suggests they want to cleave themselves away from arguing that the government doesn't have the right to charge and prosecute a former president for this conduct they want to their toe it down to prosectorial discretion. is that how you view the

comments? >> yes. he is interesting to say the january 6th material would be an appropriate use of discretion. and so, you know, i do think -- i think, as you have mentioned, and this is really outside of my bailiwick, but as a political matter, it is very useful to have people like bill barr, john yu, liz cheney, i mean, people who 1:32 ago we would be describing as hard-core republicans distancing themselves from what donald trump has been doing both at mar-a-lago and in terms of overthrowing the -- or trying to overthrow the election. >> so in that vein, ashley, chris christie an ail lighting the executive privilege claim that judge cannon saw. i am not sure in the first go around trumpard you'd this. >> the justice department's

chances are good because the main thrust is some of these may be covered by executive privilege. there is only one who could assert that, that is joe biden. biden will not assert executive privilege over thesedocuments and the idea that they are somehow attorney-client privileged is a reach and i think they have to show in some respect they have a good faith basis to make that claim. >> so, asher, again, when you have the likes of bill barr and john yu and chris christie annihilating your lame legal arguments as lame, where to you go next? >> yeah, i would probably not be so generous to say that they care so much about prosecution. i think that this well gets to the underlying legal theory that they have been prom you will gating for several decades, the unitary economic div, which is articulated by chris christie, that all executive power rests

in the president. this has justified so many actions and assertions of presidential power that what trump is actually claiming undercuts that. it is slicing and dicing up the executive branch where they can be at cross purposes and, you know, all diced up and even a former president can assert a claim against it. so i think what they are trying to do is preserve this conservative legal theory which gives the president expansive power more so than trying to, you know, protect -- or trying to turn against trump specifically. it's just an absurd legal argument, and i agree that it's not going to hold up in court because you have proponents of that unitary executive throughout the conservative judiciary. unfortunately, maybe aileen cannon is not well versed on that. but i think that the department of justice has a good claim to make moving forward.

>> let me show you one more from a member much trump's executive branch. this is jeff berman talking about what he would have done with a case like this. >> it was an extraordinary revelation by the department of justice that donald trump and those around donald trump were being criminally investigated not just for the mishandling of classified documents, but for obstruction of the subpoena requiring production of those classified documents. that is a very, very serious charge. if the southern district of new york had that charge, it would have our highest priority and we would be moving on it very quickly, and you can see in all of the department of justice's filings in that case there is an urgency to move forward, and i can see that and i believe it's entirely justified given the seriousness of the crime. >> so this is a little different

than that philosophical bend that barr and yu and probably christie have go the government, the sort of strength of the executive. this is someone who stared at case and had to decide whether to move forward with them. he hones in on the obstruction of the subpoena. again it an aisle lates the trump argument this is a document storage dispute that spiraled out of control. that might have been the case in february of 2021 or january of 2022 when the archives was working nicely to get everything back, but that certainly wasn't the case once trump was in receipt of a grand jury subpoena. >> that's right. nothing that trump has filed in court so far, all of these changing defenses, this idea that the latest defense being that he actually categorized these as personal records, which makes them his, and they can, i guess, they are sort of declassified. he is not saying that, but

that's why they're allowed to be at mar-a-lago. they are not great defenses on their own and they are not going to hold up. they also don't address the obstruction part, which is the most problematic part for trump, in my opinion, because throughout this entire timeline, you know, he has been acting as though he was complying with the government, certifying that he had returned all of these documents and then it turns out that he didn't and i don't know how he gets around it except by perhaps trying to obfuscate the legal issues has he has done here somewhat successfully with this particular judge, but i don't know how he is going to get around the obstruction of justice part because that's pretty cut and dry in terms of what he certified to the department of justice and what they found at mar-a-lago after. >> also it goes back to his clear intent to hang on to something that he was informed over and over again wasn't his. and the objection on trump's

part to the national security review in some ways raises the most questions about why he won't turn it over and why he doesn't want the national security review to go on. it would appear in he actually thought there wasn't a big deal in what he took, he would say, go ahead, examine it, you will see i didn't do any harm? >> typically, if you file a pleading with the court you put your best food forward. this pleading plays fast and loose with the facts and the law. here's what it didn't say. it didn't say why he took them as has been pointed out. it didn't say that he declassified them. it did say, and this is a joke. i mean, this is a just a cold stone joke that somehow national defense documents were personal to him. i mean, for the lawyers to assert that, i'm embarrassed for them. and they are -- and andrew

points out something really important here and i think it's really important that we dwell on it just for a second. these lawyers are having to walk a tightrope because if they plead in court what trump has been saying out of court, there is all kinds of legal liability they have. and that trump has. what the doj needs to do and what this judge needs to do is tell them to put up or shut up. they need to actually swear in an affidavit some of the things that they are kind of, you know, nibbling around the edges on. they need to come into court and show the evidence that these were declassified or some evidence as to why they would ever in any scenario consider national defense documents that are highly secret and classified personal to the guy who we now know wanted to refuse to even

leave the white house after he was defeated. >> claire, let me show you something that your former colleague, senator mark warner, said about why a briefing for the intel committee is so important. >> let's remember what is at stake. i don't know what's in these documents, but if these documents contain human intelligence, people's lives could be lost if that's exposed. if it's signals intelligence, years of work could be destroyed. intelligence from allies, we talk about how we are working with the british in terms of supporting the ukrainians, if that information that is shared amongst allies was somehow exposed in these documents, that's why getting to the bottom of this and making a damage assessment, the doj effort, that's -- we don't have purview over that. but the damage assessment to our intelligence capabilities is critical -- >> it seems that as a legal matter this is where doj has

aggressively argued that a special master completely jeopardizes the ability to do just this, to continue with this intel community review of compromised sources, compromised methods, compromised programs. we saw in the subpoena all of the different classifications that were on the materials. hoarded, taken, and then lied about returning at mar-a-lago. claire, how would you counsel your intelligence community former colleagues? >> well, they may have to be patient because i think the priority here is preserving what they must preserve at doj for possible prosecution as long as the defense security and intelligence can community has a chance to adequately review these documents. there needs to be oversight here, but it may not be immediate. i get why they want it immediately, but there are a lot

of people in the intelligence community that, frankly, have not shown their ability to stand up to donald trump and his nonsense. so and the other weird thing about this, and this was talked about by another member of the panel, you know, the court seems to be dancing with executive privilege and not understanding that you can't say, well, there is executive privilege maybe here that would allow trump to hold on to these documents. by the way, in another of the executive branch, you can look at them. it's either executive or it isn't. it either belongs to the government or it doesn't. her trying to bend this thing like a pretzel in order to placate trump and his supporters frankly makes her look silly. >> no one is going anywhere. when we come back, some incredible new reporting about how donald trump's conduct puts his own lawyers at risk. one joke going around is that

mega means making attorneys get attorneys. we will have that story next. plus, the ex-president's problems are getting worse in that other major investigation from doj. one of his biggest backers, enablers, architects, top aide stephen miller was served with a grand jury subpoena in the january 6th probe. what he might be telling prosecutors. that and what we are learning today about the congressional public hearings that start back up again later this month and later in the program a remarkable advance for the ukrainian forces over the weekend. retaking huge swaths of their country back from russia. what a victorious and defiant president zelenskyy is saying about what comes next in this now 200 plus day war. when "deadline whitehouse" continues after quick break. don't go anywhere. inues after q. don't go anywhere. when i first brought her home, she was eating little brown pieces in a bag and it was just what kind of came recommended. i just always thought,

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this over the weekend. for trump's lawyers legal exposure comes with the job. the story went on to say, a dark joke has begun circulating among lawyers following the many legal travails of former president. maga actually stands for making attorneys get attorneys. his attorneys have been asked to testify themselves. last week a justice department filing revealed that trump's lawyers had misled federal investigators about whether he handed over to the justice department all the classified documents he took from the white

house when he left office. that razed questions about whether the lawyers, mr. evan corcoran and christina bob could be prosecuted themselves and might ultimately be forced to become witnesses against their client. it started almost immediately can don mcgahn spending 30 hours with robert mueller's very able and skilled and at least it appeared protective investigators who was reported by your paper ushered mcgahn out of a loading dock. what's amazing is that people keep signing up. i mean docks they think michael cohen's checks to porn stars ar fluke? >> so, yeah, mike schmidt and i took a deep dive over the weekend in an extraordinary month of blowback against trump attorneys. there have been two attorneys named recently as targets or potential targets in criminal investigations. then you had a slew of subpoenas that went out, including to some

trump lawyers, in more criminal investigations, and then 17 lesser known attorneys all connected to trump had ethics complaints filed against them within the state courts or the state bar just in the last few weeks. and what we've seen is that a bunch of these lawyers are having to get their own lawyers, including christina bob, one the lawyers who signed that statement to the justice department falsely indicating that all of the classified materials had been transferred back to the national archives when we know that wasn't through now. so we are seeing a lot of blowback on these attorneys and i was talking with a gentleman who is aching the lead in filing some of these complaints against them and he said it's his goal to make sure that the next time rudy giuliani goes around asking a lawyer to sign on to a frivolous lawsuit or to lie

about election fraud or mislead, try to mislead a judge about election fraud, they are going to say no, that there will be enough blowback against this type of behavior that fewer attorneys will be encouraged it be involved with it. >> luke, what are you -- and i guess this requires you to sort of put them on the couch. i talked to some. folks in the dominion lawsuit and they are stopping at nothing. they are deposing basically the lineup of fox news and everyone behind them. what fuels -- i mean, it comes at grave reputational damage outside the coup plotting, you know, club. it comes at extreme financial repercussions and it feels like the effort to hold them accountable to various bar associations is sort of catching up to the disreputable legal conduct. how does he keep getting people to work for him? >> well. >> it's a range of thing. we have looked at the trump financing and some of the

lawyers are paid quite well. others are not paid at all. we know, for instance, that john eastman had requested something like $10,000 a day to keep pressuring mike pence and pushing forward some of these legal theories for donald trump and we haven't seen that he was necessarily paid for that from the filings. in john eastman's own words, he said that he had staked his professional reputation on the idea that the election was stolen and he felt he had to go out and prove facts be damned that this was a stolen election and so he felt the need to keep you pushing on that. i think some these attorneys came out early making these false claims and then felt they had to try to somehow back then up. others maybe there is some, you know, i had i'd have to analyze them a little more, interview them at length, but maybe they felt there was a professional benefit to being associated with donald trump. there would be for other patients would are prestigious.

in this case i think there is more backlash than necessarily benefit. >> i mean, andrew weissman, they turn into sort of low-brow criminal defense lawyers. nothing against the defense bar. most of them come from a very principled place as former public defenders move into the space. but that's not the profile of a republican private practice lawyer. they hold themselves out as former prosecutors who are on the side of the law. this book of business and able to coup against the united states of america. >> yeah, you know, i have been a defense lawyer as well as a prosecutor. everyone is entitled to a defense. the question is how you do it. here, when you, as a lawyer, are representing things from your client that are false, even if you are not doing it knowingly, you are becoming an instrument of your client's crime.

and that is something that -- you know, christina bob is going to be in a world of trouble. it's either going to be her or it's going to be him. it's either her or the person you said -- which has got to be, you know, donald trump. and this is exactly what happened, for instance, in the manafort case. he made representations to the department of justice that were quite similar saying, you know, i don't have any documents, i fell u fully complied, and he had a lawyer do that. well, the chief judge of the d.c. district court, who is involved in this -- in the january 6th case, issued a ruling saying that lawyer can now be a witness against paul manafort and can relay certain things, such as the representation that you made to the department of justice. where did you get that information? and sure enough, she had to

testify and said, i got that information from paul manafort. and so there is a roadmap here for lawyers now being interviewed and being turned into witnesses against their client, and it's rightly so. if donald trump is conveying this false information to be relayed to the department of justice or as we talked about, to the court, to say i have declassified everything when in fact he, obviously, didn't, those are false statements and he could be prosecuted for that. >> asha, it is a more -- without luke and mike's reporting, it's a more opaque piece of the mega assault on the rule of law.aga assault on the rule of law. if you take trump's pardons and how he corrupted that process and put it next to lawyers like don mcginn, sitting white house council, he didn't want to talk

to weissman or talk to the obstruction investigators. he was afraid of being a party that was obstructing justice in the larger investigation, into the trump campaign's days to russia. how are more of them not concerned with the kinds of things don mcgahn was concerned with? >> nicole, i have to believe that this cult of loyalty around trump is just something that is recalling hard for us to understand because we see so many people fall prey to it. this idea that loyalty is above everything and we know that that is trump's highest value. if you go back and read mary trump's book, which is fascinating. this is really the culture that he was brought up in and one that he creates around him. and it's, i think, partly the need to be loyal, the fear of being ostracized and what that would entail.

apparently, for lawyers the fact this could impact their livelihood appears to not enter the equation. i am glad you mentioned the pardon. there is also, i think, this implicit promise of some kind of reward where maybe down the line if they are successful in these efforts that anything they do that transgresses the law will somehow be erased and if you look at trump's history of pardons, what does he pardon for? process crimes. obstruction of justice, perjury, contempt of court. he doesn't believe in those rules. and i think it's sort of this very strange, you know, internal culture and infrastructure that he creates that makes this possible. >> and again, claire, he takes this norm, you know, that everyone is -- everyone is entitled to a defense, and he perverts it. he is the rule break eb. he is the line ordering people to break the law on his behalf,

holding out in lots of instances, luke's paper did great reporting on the pardons that were promised if people broke the law and enforcing the southern bored early. he does it all in full view. what do you think as sort of respectable lawyers to still sign on? >> well, there is this idea that it's prestigious to work for someone who was president of united states and then there is also lawyers who support donald trump. but here's the problem for lawyers. you know, you could -- i know everybody in america thinks all politicians lie. they don't. donald trump, that's the main thing he did. he doesn't believe that telling the truth is a value. he thinks it's more important to lie when you need to, to hold on to power, and to get what you want, and to have everything look good for you. now, lawyers are taught that you can really get in trouble and

use your -- lose your law license if you lie while doing your job as a lawyer, if you lie to the court, if you lie to law enforcement. so there is the rub. if you are going to represent a liar who doesn't think there is anything wrong with lying, then you have got to have a bright line that says, hey, i'm not going to lie for you. i am not going to lie for you. that's why i think the pleadings don't say a that he declassified the documents because these lawyers don't want to lie for him. so it will be interesting to see how this all turns out. now, the lawyers that were willing to lie for him, giuliani, has been disbarred, the target of a criminal investigation, eastman, admittedly was pushing a scheme you knew was i will little. bob signed a document which either he lied to her and she believed it which she should know better because he is a liar or she lied, the ones that lied are in trouble and that's why i think these pleadings are such

weak tea because i think the lawyer representing him now doesn't want to lie. >> amazing. thank you for the reporting and for joining us to talk about it. thank you for starting us off. claire sticks around. we are keeping an eye and air on the twin january 6th investigations happening now. the reporting and details on what the next couple of weeks will look like when we come back after a quick break. don't go anywhere. don't gony awhere. ♪ we believe there's an innovator in all of us. ♪ that's why we build technology that makes it possible for every business... and every person... to come to the table and do more incredible things. for people living with h-i-v, keep being you. and ask your doctor about biktarvy.

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there is some news today in the return of those highly produced incredibly compelling public january 6th hearings. nbc news learned the next is likely to be held september 28th. the panel is expected to meet tomorrow to discuss their next steps which could include how many fall hearings we should expect and lots of major end game decisions ahead of their final report. over at the justice department, "the new york times" says that two top political aides of the twice impeached ex-president were among morninger more than a dozen people to receive subpoenas in the probe into the fake electors plot and post-election fundraising dubbed the big rip-off by the january 6th select committee, including none other than the former presidential advisor and speech writer stephen miller, who talked about an alternate set of electors on television in december 2020 and who "the times" says was among those paid

by trump super pac since he left the white house. joining us, jackie, investigations reporter, also tim miller, writer at large for the bulwark, claire still here. jackie, you are all over this story about the select committee on the investigation at doj. tell us what to expect, first, on the congressional side. >> yeah, nicole, there has been no formal notice from the committee yet. they have said previously they were going to reconvene in september and we are expecting at least a handful of hearings before they go back home again in october. the members do return from recess tomorrow where they are going to likely spend the next week sort of feverishly hashing out the plan ahead as they did spend august sort of picking up loose ends, putting them together, interviewing some people and witnesses and targets that they previously had not been able to get in contact with or new people that came forward or sort of materialized out of

the previous investigation and the interviews that they had conducted ahead of the summer series of hearings. we do know that over the summer they also have subpoenaed a few people, including most recently newt beginning rip. they are expecting more documents to roll in. we reported a few weeks ago that in the wake of the mar-a-lago raid of the -- the fbi raid to recover boxes from trump's home and club that mark meadows did actually return and shut some documents to the national archives that had been requested by the january 6th committee. so things like that sort of, again, these loose ends are being played out. we know that members are going to be working until the bitter end. we were told that at one point some members were even googling the latest possible day they could hand in the final report in order for it to be actually processed by the government services administration. and i imagine tomorrow once we

see all these people back in action and in person again, this sort of the pace is going to pick up where they left off. >> jackie, do you have any sense from your reporting whether -- because i asked congresswoman lofgren if the focus visiting and turning to the mar-a-lago search, if that aided them and let them work under the radar as they were not able to do in june and july. i wind you are if you have a sense the focus on that or acceleration of the justice department probes have made things easier or harder for their work over the last month. >> that's a really good question, nicole. i have been really searching for this sort of nexus that i feel like must be there between the mar-a-lago search warrant being executed and the investigation into trump and the january 6th

investigation. so far we have not really found anything explicit there, but one thing that has been sort of interesting that has come out of my reporting in the last few weeks is that you've got to wonder whether or not the january 6th committee should get some responsive documents from the documents that have been obtained bit fbi and whether this pause due to the special master might impact their investigation in some way. again, as we all know, the committee made a sweeping and broad request to the national archives for any and all documents related to january 6th over a year ago, and based on the volume of documents that have been recovered from trump's mar-a-lago, there are members who do feel like they want sort of a thorough search done to see if there are any documents that would be relative -- relevant to their request and should be turned over to the committee. but there are some sticking points here as that investigation is now currently

in sort of in a stalemate until the special master situation is figured out. but i do think that the doj investigation and the select committee investigation have done a pretty good job, the january 6th doj investigation, of being complementary and working in tandem. we do know that according to chairman thompson that transcripts have started to be handed over to the doj. but it does seem like at the end of the day the select committee was pretty ahead of the curve on their evidence and intel gathering. >> that is so interesting. and tim miller, it certainly makes sense. we have had never had a president plot a coup and run a fake electors scheme. if you plot a coup, maybe some of what you steal are your coup plansism have not heard that before. that's an open question. it certainly makes sense. >> well, sure, you don't know what you don't know, right? we have seen the pictures the top secret service documents. you figure some are mementoes

that the egomaniac former president trump wanted to keep. memos from kim jong-un or whatever. i have the reporting of my friend jackie over there, what is happening on the hill i talked to friends working for members on the committee. they feel like there is more material, you know, left that they have to show this fall, right? you know, despite the fact that they told a pretty complete story over the summer, obviously, there are a lot of different elements to this, right? and what was happening with other cabinet members is a big, you know, question, a big part of that i think we will hear kind of discussions of the 25th amendment and who trump was pressuring during this period and, you know, whether he took additional documents, i think that's also an open question. it's relevant you mentioned the lead in "the new york times" story today about stephen miller and brian jack having to

testify. brian jack is a name maybe the viewers may not know, but i think it's a potentially important nexus here bus because he went from being political director of the white house to kevin mccarthy's political director, right? so this kind of question of how much coordinating was happening not just on the alternate slates of electors but between the boost and rudy and, you know, trump's kevin, et cetera, trying to get their members to vote to overturn the election, brian jack is right there at the center of that. and so i'm interested to see, you know, what that might produce. >> i want to ask both of you the other side. as you are speaking, i'm reminded of will liz cheney said in one the final public hearings in the summer. she said to the republican colleagues in the house specifically, the stain of dishonor lasts forever. for that to be part of the investigative unveiling of their final report is a pretty good guess. stick around.

we will dig into it. tim just mentioned steven miller's subpoena and the others and what they mean. don't go anywhere. don't go anyw.

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if you've got it, we've got you. start today at godaddy.com/payments hi, i'm eileen. i live in vancouver, washington and i write mystery novels. dogs have been such an important part of my life. i have flinn and a new puppy. as i was writing, i found that i just wasn't as sharp and i new i needed to do something so i started taking prevagen. i realized that i was much more clear and i was remembering the details that i was supposed to. prevagen keeps my brain working right. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. nobody should be surprised by it because financial crime follows in donald trump's wake. it's always been a scheme for self-enrichment for him, and he converted the government into an

instrument of capital gain for him and his family and his friends. >> that was january 6th committee member jamie raskin on the justice department's interest in trump's super pac fund-raising scheme. we're back with the panel. claire, this was the topic of one of the two public hearings. i think they coined it the big grist, the big ripoff. now under justice department scrutiny, just like his role in the insurrection and his hoarding of classified documents. >> can i just say, nicolle, all i want for christmas is to watch liz cheney question newt gingrich. i just think that would be -- that would make my day. now, obviously, i don't know if that's going to happen because they have to get him on the record first and then she would be able to in essence cross-examine him in a hearing setting, which would be great.

but here's what the january 6th committee has done well. they've laid out what happened and how donald trump was the puppetmaster. what we haven't heard enough of and what may take subpoenas in front of a grand jury and the giving of immunity, and that's why these aides being subpoenaed is so important, what did donald trump say? what was he saying to people? that's why pence and mark meadows and pompeo and stephen miller, the people he was talking to every day, what did he say to them about trying to hold on to power even though he'd been voted out of office? i would love to see some of that come from the january 6th committee before they wrap up their work. but clearly now the department of justice is hot on that trail. >> tim, say more about these open questions about the role of republican members of congress who were proudly and publicly kevlar-wearing participants in

the insurrection. >> steve bannon laid this out. the nice thing with these criminals, they all told us what they were going it do before they did it. laid it out on his podcast, which was the idea that the january 6th rally or riot was supposed to disrupt the proceedings obviously in the senate to give them more time, maybe an alternate slate of electors could then emerge from one of these -- well, in this case what would have had to have been a couple of states in order to get joe biden's number down under 270, at which point according to the electoral count act the election would go to the house of representatives, and republicans had -- and it's not a straight vote of representatives. it's a vote of the entire state delegation. and republicans held more states even if liz cheney had pledged to vote with the democrats, they still would have won by one. so that was the plan. it was a ham-fisted plan.

i think we were lucky the election wasn't closser. it might have been a more realistic plan. but the fact that kevin mccarthy and other members of the house, andy biggs, paul gosar, were working with the white house, maybe with brian jack on that plan, again shows a premeditated effort to try to use these phony slates of electors to overturn the election using -- going through the house of representatives. and to the extent the political director both at the white house and then for kevin mccarthy is now being subpoenaed shows i think -- maybe there's other information of course. but that is one thread that they could and should be looking into. >> we're almost out of time. i have to ask you, do you or anyone at the post know why donald trump is in washington? >> no, nicolle. >> we don't need that. >> so far it seems like he's there on his sterling virginia golf course promoting who knows what. the last time i was there

actually, funny blast from the past, was in 2015 before he had announced he was running for president and there was a caravan of reporters chasing him around on those very golf carts that you all snapped pictures of. so yeah, if anyone does know why he's there, please e-mail me. >> call jackie. call us. exactly. go get it straight to the air if we learn. i had this bizarre notion that maybe he was there to flip on john eastman. but you know, stranger things have happened. jackie ailmany, timm r tim miller, claire mccaskill, thank you so much for being part of our coverage. when we with come back, a turning point for the war in ukraine. ukrainian troops pushing deeper today into parts of their country that had been overtake binn russian troops. president zelenskyy's message to his nation after a quick break. don't go anywhere. break don't go anywhere. but asthma has taken enough. so i go triple... with trelegy. with 3 medicines in 1 inhaler,... it's the only once-daily treatment for adults that takes triple action against asthma symptoms.

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we know how is it when terrorists attack you at home. so we always have to keep in mind that russia still can do a lot of damage. but we don't have any other choice. we will advance. as we said before, we will not surrender. and we see from the footage, from more than 1200 square miles which have been liberated during the past literally eight days, the most fast counteroffensive since the world war ii. so we have to win, and this counteroffensive shows that we can win. hi again, everyone. it's 5:00 in new york. a potential turning point there in the war in ukraine. that's how some are describing the dramatic gains made by

ukrainian forces in recent days. they have forced russians to retreat from previously occupied areas in the east. ukrainian troops have taken back large swaths of the northeastern region around kharkiv. that is ukraine's second largest city. ukrainian forces claim to have liberated more than 1,000 square miles of territory, which to give folks a sense of how much that is, it's more than the land area of los angeles and new york combined. but perhaps more importantly, it's more territory than russian forces have captured in all since operations began in april. that's according to a report from the institute for the study of war. nbc news has not independently verified those claims. but today's offensive continued to pick up steam. the general staff of ukraine reports that soldiers have lib raifted more than 20 settlements over the last 24 hours. this weekend video circulated showing soldiers raising ukrainian flags in central izium, which has been a major base for moscow's troops and

other nearby towns and cities. they're gains that are a huge morale boost to a nation that has been defending itself against this senseless invasion which they described as a campaign of terrorism for nearly seven months now. some western experts describe the withdrawal of russian troops as the worst defeat for russian forces since they were forced back from the capital of kyiv back in march. "new york times" describes ukraine's gains like this. "the speed of ukraine's advances over the weekend in the northeast, an area used by russia as a stronghold, has muted the gung ho bluster of kremlin cheerleaders. it has also undermined arguments in places like germany that providing more and better arms to ukraine would only lead to a long and bloody stalemate against a russian military destined to win." russia in retaliation has attacked infrastructure facilities in the kharkiv region, cutting off power and water to thousands of people there. but the ukrainian people are undeterred and at least today they remain determined in their fight.

in a powerful message to the russians posted on facebook last night, president zelenskyy writes this. "don't you understand who we are? what we are for? what we are talking about? read it on our lips. without gas and without you. without you. without or without the light. without you. without water or without you? without you. without food or without you? we choose without you. cold, hunger, darkness and thirst. for us are not as scary or deadly as your, quote, friendship and brotherhood. but history will put everything in place. and we will with gas, lights, water, and food, and without you." ukraine's surprising gains in the east is where we begin this hour with some of our favorite reporters and friends. retired four-star admiral james stavridis, the former supreme allied commander for nato, is our guest. he's now msnbc's chief international security and

diplomacy analyst. also joining us, ben rhodes, former deputy national security adviser to president obama and an msnbc contributor. and my friend, nbc news correspondent cal perry, who has reported on the ground for us from kyiv throughout the war. cal perry, i'll start with you. i know you're not there now, but you gave us the most vivid reports. not just of what was happening in terms of the war but of this thing that has come to pass. this commitment and determination on the part not just of the ukrainian military and the ukrainian president but the ukrainian people. tell me what you see in this news over the weekend. >> so i think what we're seeing is what we saw russia fail at, which is a well-organized military that has been well trained and is well supplied, is making its way to the eastern part of the country and reclaiming territory. somewhere between 1,000 square miles and 2,000. we just had an updated number in the last 30 minutes. that's like the size of delaware. and they're not in front of their supply lines. they're not retreating sort of

sporadically. they're doing all the things, again, that the russians were unable to do. the russians left behind in and around the capital an army that looked as though it came from another time. and what we're seeing is a continuation of that in the east. now, that is sort of the small picture that president zelenskyy is looking at when he gives these speeches. he is operating as a commander in chief who is singularly focused on winning this war militarily on the ground. the big picture, however, is a little more complicated. you have the russians now retaliating not only on power facilities in and around ukraine but retaliating against europe as a whole. starting to shut off all the oil and gas that they are sending to europe. where they used to provide europe with 40% of its oil and natural gas, they're now providing about 9%. and according to vladimir putin, it could go to zero. so the leverage that russia has is now humanitarian leverage. it is keeping europe in the dark, in the cold, and doing so at a time when winter is approaching. there are european leaders

including the new prime minister of the united kingdom who have to be worried about the weather. they have to be worried how cold is it going to get in europe and will that start to break the back of what has been until now sort of a unified stance against russia. >> and as usual president zelenskyy's public messaging is very aware of the dynamic you described, cal. let me show you more of what he had to say yesterday. this is from cnn. >> our goal is to deoccupy our home territory. the main goal is deoccupation. we just cannot allow russia to continue the same occupation that they started back in 2014. that's their strategy. very gradual, very slow. dinner. well, dining. they are eating you piecemeal bit by bit. russian cannibalism, i would

call it this way. we will not be standing still. we will be slowly, gradually moving forward. >> now, i think what he's speaking to is that russia with their defeats on the battlefield has increasingly turned to a campaign of terrorism. and we covered some of this while you were still there and a lot of it since you've been out. but the targets are clearly civilian. they're not missing military installations. they are targeting -- as zelenskyy said right there, they're trying to hurt the civilian population as a tactic of war to damage the country's resolve. it would appear from what we can see from the outside that that is not working. what is your sense from your sources there, cal? >> so my sense is that it's not working yet and that there's real fear that the longer this goes on the more that it could start to work. and you and i have talked about this now for 200 days. this is now day 200 and change i think of the war. it is civilians who are paying the heaviest price. it is going to be kids who are

going to be freezing to death come winter if they cannot get the power back on in some of these ukrainian cities as it gets cold. the russians know what they do when they hit these infrastructure targets. they make it unlivable. they make it an ungovernable country. ukraine right now is solely focused on defeating the russian army, pushing it back into russia, recouping some of those lost gains on the ground, and keeping the russians there. the problem is going to be the civilian population. today volodymyr zelenskyy said there are hundreds of thousands of people without power. if that backs hundreds of thousands or millions without power and heat, it becomes a very different situation. and we have not even started talking about the nuclear facilities, of which russia is clearly using as a point to strike fear into the population and to maybe one day just stop providing basic services to people. >> ben, i want to read more about the russian retreat.

i won't characterize it. i'll just read it. amid ukraine's gains liberated villages describe russian troops dropping rifles and fleeing. "in the end the russians fled any way they could on friday, on stolen bicycles, disguised as locals, hours after ukrainian soldiers poured into the area hundreds of russian soldiers encamped in this village were gone. many after their units abandoned them, leaving behind stunned residents to face the ruins of 28 weeks of occupation." they just dropped rifles on the ground, elena matvenko said sunday as she stood still disoriented in a village littered with ammo, crates and torched vehicles including a russian tank loaded on a flatbed. the troops who have been rewarded personally by putin are the units that carried out the massacre in bucha. i wonder, ben rhodes, what happens to this unit. >> well, nothing good. the reality, nicole, is i think

what we're seeing is russia is a rotten, corrupt, and kleptokratic system. that's what vladimir putin sits on top of. that's been the case for years and it's just been getting worse. a president who steals from his own people, enriches his cronies and stafshds the population and frankly underpays his military. and the people fighting this war for vladimir putin, they don't even know why they're there. it's not even called a war. it's called a special military operation. they are poorly paid conscripts in some regard. they're people that are being recruited in prisons. they're mercenaries. these are not people that have a tremendous will to fight. they don't even know what the objective is. and the objective itself has changed as russia failed in its initial political objective of taking kyiv and essentially installing a puppet regime. it seemed to downgrade the objective to taking eastern ukraine and getting the land bridge to the south to connect crimea. but the troops in the field don't even know what they're fighting for. and so i think what you see is a

highly motivated ukrainian armed forces. this is reflective of an incredibly resilient society, incredibly proud society, and frankly very strong and forceful leadership from ukraine's president. and they're facing off against people who don't know why they're there, who don't want to be there. and again, admiral stavridis can get into military tacttactics, we're seeing russian troops are a reflection of russia's political system, which is weak and rotten and corrupt. and the gains on the battlefield i think demonstrate that vladimir putin has a big problem because he's not going to be able to fix that overnight. he's not going to be able to fix that, period, because that's the system that he's built. >> admiral stavridis, i want to turn the floor over to you, but let me add one more piece of reporting. this is from the a.p. "ukraine keeps up momentum. claims it reached russian border. the moscow-backed leader of the russian region of chechnya publicly criticized the russian defense ministry for what he called mistakes that made the ukrainian blitz possible. even more notable such criticism

seeped onto state-controlled russian tv." uh-oh. "people who convinced president putin that the operation would be fast and effective, these people really set up all of us, a former parliament member said on a talk show on ntv tv. we're now at the point here where we have to understand that it's absolutely impossible to defeat ukraine using these resources and colonial war methods." where in your view do things stand? >> well, this has been a very good sequence for our ukrainian friends. you know, tactically, as we pointed out several times, they've taken this big chunk of territory. operationally what's significant here is effectively they're opening another front on vladimir putin. they telegraphed that they were going to be attacking in the south and they have up to a point. but the real main effort it turns out is around kharkiv. so the russians have been caught on their back foot operationally. and then strategically, if you

will, psychologically, this is a pretty hard blow for vladimir putin. he's about to go off and have a summit with president xi. you can picture some uncomfortable moments in that conversation. you can see where the ukrainians really have a lift underneath them. big morale boost. i think it's been a very good sequence. break, nicolle. there's a lot more war to go here. russia is going to still be able to consolidate in their land bridge, as was mentioned a moment ago. that's really at the end game what they want here. that's what is still achievable in their minds. there's going to be a lot more fighting to go, unfortunately. but it's been a good sequence for the ukrainians. i'll close with this. and a couple folks have mentioned it. the potential for vladimir putin

as he continues to fail and flail is going to be you know what, if i can't take it i'll break it. meaning he'll go after all of the critical infrastructure, pound the civilian targets. you're going to see aleppo on the dnieper river if he is really backed into a corner. that's the dark end of the spectrum here. >> i want to press you, admiral stavridis. how did we get here? i remember in the earliest days of the war, pre state of the union, current and former government officials suggesting that kyiv would fall in days. this war would be over in a matter of days. that there was no way ukraine could stand up to the mighty russian military. so i guess it's with that that i don't even ask anyone to make predictions anymore because it's clear that there's sort of an x factor that other than journalists who've been on the ground and seen it and touched it and felt it it's hard to know what's going to happen next. but what could sort of continue to defy the military analysis as

these two countries, as you said, rage on in their war against one another? >> war is unpredictable. that's a simple fact. and i think that when you balance all the factors here so often morale when it's coupled with good equipment and good advice will ultimately carry the day. i'll put it this way, nicolle. if we were playing the game of risk, i would not want vladimir putin's laydown at the moment. he's got real challenges ahead. i'll close with this thought. and picking up on your point. you know, 200 days ago many thought that this would be a game over, lights out, five days into it. yet here we are. and putin has nothing to show for what he has taken on other than 80,000 russian killed in action and grievously wounded.

that's a pretty bad score for him to tally up, and you can see it in the cracks beginning to emerge back in the kremlin from his normal toady group. >> ben, i want to read you something that anne applebaum, as astute a reporter on these issues that we've come to know, has reported, or written this weekend. "it's time to prepare for ukrainian victory. putin's original mission has already failed. there will be no such new era. the soviet union will not be revived. and when russian elites finally realize that putin's imperial project was not just a failure for putin personally but also a moral, political and economic disaster for the entire country, themselves included, then his claim to be the legitimate ruler of russia melts away. when i write that americans and europeans need to prepare for ukrainian victory, this is what i mean. we must expect that a ukrainian

victory and certainly a victory in ukraine's understanding of the term also brings about the end of putin's regime." what do you think of that? >> well, look, i think that if you're vladimir putin right now you do know that russian autocrats who lose wars of empire, things don't usually end well for that cohort of people. and he staked it all on this war. it's existential to him. this is what he's invested the last decade in. this is what he's ginned up his people around. and he's told his people a lot of lies and promised a lot of easy victories. when that doesn't come to fruition, things can boomerang back on you. and if you think about what sustains putin's support at home, there's the kind of broad nationalism that he can tap into, which is going to be undercut as they don't achieve battlefield success and as those casualties move into the six figures it's harder and harder to keep that on the margins of society. but then what is the power structure in russia? you've got the oligarchs, the

people who've been enriched through the putin years. you've got the military. obviously the people with guns. and then you have the kind of core fsb security services elite. and if you just look at the conduct of the war in the last several months, the oligarchs are taking a hit. some of them are able to ride it out in dubai or the seychelles. but they're taking a hit. the military is taking an enormous hit. and frankly there has to be building resentment from the guys all the way on the front line with the guns to theing or to do things that they're not able to do frankly. so you already could see some cracks in that power structure that vladimir putin depends upon. and he's relying on a shrinking inner circle of people that are increasingly either divorced from reality themselves or forced to tell vladimir putin things that are divorced from reality because they don't want to deliver bad news. and so i don't think we should be counting the victory yet. i don't think we should be anticipating the regime change yet. there's a lot more war tragically to be fought.

there's still really critical strategic territory in the south on that land bridge to crimea. you have destroyed cities like mariupol. you've got putin weaponizing energy and trying to affect european support for the ukrainians. there's a lot to do here. but i think what the ukrainians have done is they've punched the bully in the face. and once you do that and you lift that veil of fear, you've seen how the ukrainian public has reacted. hopefully the world will sustain its support for ukraine. and i think you're going to start to see these cracks in the edifice of power that putin has built over the course of the last 20 years. and that's going to put him in danger. if he loses this war, his capacity to hold on to power i think becomes sand running through an hourglass. >> wow. this will stay with me. they have punched the bully in the face. my thanks to all three of you. it's a pleasure to start with all of you today. retired admiral james stavridis. ben rhodes and cal perry. thank you so much. when we come back, reaction from on the ground in ukraine, from kyiv. from reports of russian fighters

dropping their rifles and fleeing has left the country stunned. we'll check back in with our dear friend igor novakov in kyiv on the mood of his country today. that's after a quick break. and later in the hour much more on that brand new book from the former u.s. attorney for the sdny, southern district of new york. geoffrey berman. his new book pays a disturbing picture that the department of justice under the disgraced ex-president was even worse, even more politicized than we suspected. and moments ago at the john f. kennedy presidential library in boston president joe biden announced his cancer moonshot and initiative to cut the number of deaths from cancer in this country by half. watch. >> we know this. cancer does not discriminate red and blue. it doesn't care if you're republican or a democrat. beating cancer is something we can do together. and that's why i'm here today. when moderate to severe ulcerative colitis persists...

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besides all of the fact that so many people are tired physically, still we have high morale. a lot of people stayed there because we believe in our country. we are patriots because we have what to fight for and stand for. i was talking to so many devoted volunteers, people who supply humanitarian aid, and they're really devoted 24/7 to 7 for this victory. so we believe that the victory will be soon, and we hope that before winter we will have a lot of results and we will kick the russians out of our land.

>> that was yiulia mendel. she's now a you can other rainian journalist. she's the former press secretary for ukraine's president zelenskyy. that was early this morning on "morning joe" on the remarkable strength and resolve of the ukrainian people that has persisted through the last six months of the war. it is one of the driving forces behind not ukraine's latest successful military push, their advances in the east of their country. joining us now is somebody who gave us a window into that in the first hours and days of the war. our friend igor noveikov, former adviser to ukraine's president zelenskyy. i think i knew when you went back to kyiv, you and your family spent some time in france and then you went back, that the way you saw your country when you went back was to me this sense that you had some feeling that the war was turning decisively in ukraine's favor. is that what has happened? and is that how you see it? >> hi, nicolle. well, i think the war has

actually turned in ukraine's favor in the first couple of hours of the war. everyone expected kyiv to fall in three days. and it's taken the russians months to capture some of the cities that have been liberated in days now in the kharkiv region of ukraine. i think the key factor here is morale. and i think when our armed forces, when our volunteers know what their sacrifices mean, what they're fighting for, it doesn't matter how long it takes. it all leads to victory. and i can tell you the first positive story for today, and there will be plenty of those, will be this. i mean, i look forward to saying this for like six months. while president zelenskyy still zg for ammunition, i'm asking for ammunition, it looks like the russian army at least in the kharkiv region and donetsk region is asking for a ride. maybe somebody should give them that. >> tell me what you're hearing.

i know your friends and family still fighting and on the front lines. tell me what you're hearing from them. >> well, i've spoken to a number of people on the front lines. one very surprising report came from kharkiv. basically, one of the units has reached the russian border. and they were surprised to find no border guards there. so in some certain areas of the russian-ukrainian border in the kharkiv region the russian border guards have actually fled deep into the russian territory. so if it were a war of conquest for us, we could have moved further along. but we're just fighting for our land. so our forces stopped. and my cousin told me exactly the same thing. he told me nobody expected the russians to flee in quickly and this fast. i mean, in certain cases they just kind of drove off and were driving up until they ran out of gas, and then they ran. i think it's a tribute to the stellar preparation of this operation and the informational preparation as well.

because you know, a number of people knew about this counteroffensive and yet it still managed to fool the russians. and it even fooled tucker carlson. i watched his show on friday and he said ukraine is losing badly and near kharkov, as he said, the russian pronunciation, here's your first clue, but at the same time he was saying ukraine should negotiate peace with russia because the war is going really badly for ukraine. that was literally like minutes before the counteroffensive properly started. so yeah. it's a stellar operation. and kudos to the army. don't make a mistake of thinking the war is over. but i think the tides are turning and you know, hopefully everything, most of it will go ukraine's way. >> let me ask you about two things that cal perry, one of my colleagues, a great journalist who has spent a lot of time in ukraine over the last 200 days raised. he said -- and you've said this too on the show for months. that putin remains capable of

continuing down his path and his campaign of terrorism. it is a campaign of terrorism he's waging against the civilian population in ukraine. and he still has in his arsenal a nuclear weapon. do you think his sort of interest in using that increases as he fails so publicly and in such a humiliating fashion as you're describing, no border guards even at the border of russia? or do you think that that's been available to him the whole time and the threat is there but it's not greater or lesser? >> well, i would say first of all it's a moment of reckoning for him. so you know, obviously the tides are turning on the battlegrounds in ukraine. there's a lot of discontent, especially from the hawks within russia domestically. also the breaking news just now, you know, coming from azerbaijan and armenia, hostilities kind of beginning between those two countries. i think putin will need to make

that decision quick. i'm deeply concerned there will be an escalation from russia. it hit critical energy infrastructure yesterday. and we expect those kind of hits to continue. but the same time as i said, it's all about morale. we can survive the winter without water, without electricity, without heat, without food, without anything. you know, just as long as it leads us to a place where we are without russians forever in this country. without their meddling, without their involvement. so you know, the morale is high on the ground. and that's the most important thing. i mean, that's the first precursor to a victory. >> you just answered what was going to be my next question. they've made clear that using oil and energy and heat and basic things like water and safe water and all those things is a tactic of their warfare. but i guess what i hear you saying is you'll go without all those things to get russia out of your country.

that stipulated, how is ukraine, how is zelenskyy preparing for the weather to turn in the fall and winter? >> we're doing everything we can. and we've shown something to the world over the last six months is how adaptable and creative this nation is. i mean, we can surprise everyone, including putin. it's not going to be easy. it's going to be the most difficult winter, not only for ukraine but i think for europe as well. one of the reasons putin has started with ukrainian infrastructure is to prevent those energy experts to europe. and with no proper like gas flowing from russia to europe and with disruptions there, that's a war against europe as well. but as i said, i mean, we're thinking out of the box. we're very creative, innovative. so i think it's going to be okay. and if i may, because i don't know how much time we have -- >> please, go ahead. >> here's the main positive story for today. i know nicolle is a very modest person. so a few weeks ago during the celebration of ukraine's independence day president

zelenskyy has awarded nicolle wallace with the medal of merit in ukraine. somebody needed to announce it publicly. so here i am doing. and that's the main positive story. >> i'm most proud of this. our wonderful show, our wonderful team's been nominated for an emmy. i hope -- that's a very nice thing. but i am most proud of being recognized by your president and your country. and our viewers miss you when you're not here. so thank you for being here on this day. and on days that were a lot more difficult for your country and your president and for ukraine. thank you for embarrassing me on live tv. not many people pull that off. but thank you, my friend. >> thank you so much. and i look forward to doing this on a victory day for ukraine. >> we'll talk to you soon, igor. well, when we come back, we will shift gears completely to the investigation into the twice-impeached, disgraced ex-president. what we are learning about how he used what he saw as his

justice department to exact revenge on his political opponents. we'll also tell you about some brand new reporting on doj's investigation into january 6th. it's breaking news, and it's next. riders! let your queries be known. uh, how come we don't call ourselves bikers anymore? i mean, "riders" is cool, but "bikers"...is really cool. -seriously? -denied. can we go back to meeting at the rec center? the commute here is brutal. denied. how do we feel about getting a quote to see if we can save with america's number one motorcycle insurer? should flo stop asking the same question every time? -approved! -[ altered voice ] denied! [ normal voice ] whoa.

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advisers and allies for their roles in the january 6th attack. citing sources familiar with the situation, the "times" is reporting this hour that doj has issued around 40 subpoenas just in the last week or so. some names you might recognize. the social media guy dan scavino. boris epischteen. mike roman. those last two people reportedly had their phones seized. joining us to discuss this, barbara mcquade, former u.s. attorney, now law professor at the university of michigan and msnbc legal analyst. pete strzok is also here, former fbi counterintelligence agent. pete, this is, this is something that has probably been churning under the surface, but i wonder if it's a sign that it is more advanced, that so much of it is now poking out above the surface. >> well, nicolle, i think absolutely it is. and what's important to remember is this was not the department of justice announcing these subpoenas and these search warrants. these are largely information

that is coming to i believe "the new york times" by the people who received the subpoenas, the people who received the search warrants, or their attorneys. so it may well be this group is even larger than the 40 that the "new york times" is reporting on. but this is exactly the sort of thing as an investigator and certainly working with prosecutors, you know there are events in the course of your investigation that are going to likely become public. so it doesn't surprise me that the department of justice was looking as they conducted their investigation, as that investigation progressed closer and closer to former president trump, that they decided okay, at some date certain we are going to go out, we are going to issue a lot of these because of the likelihood that knowledge will become public and that you saw a burst of activity like you're seeing in this reporting. make no mistake about it, 40 subpoenas is a lot of subpoenas. multiple search warrants for cell phones is at an even higher standard of evidentiary proof that's required to obtain that warrant. these are significant investigative steps. and the fact that they're people who were in direct contact with

the former president recommend speaks to the gravity and the advanced nature of this investigation. >> pete, with that in mind, let me ask you about this line from the "new york times" reporting. the story broke just a few minutes ago. and it says according to one subpoena obtained by the "new york times" "the subpoenas asked for any records or communications from people who organized, spoke at or provided security for trump's rally at the ellipse." they also requested information about any members of the executive and legislative branches who may have taken part in planning or executing the rally or tried to, quote, obstruct, influence, impede or delay the certification of the presidential election." we know from cassidy hutchinson's public testimony there were 19 republican members of congress in the white house doing exactly that, planning or executing the rally and trying to obstruct, influence or impede the certification of the election. they did it in full view. they were seeking fake electors. is this subpoena indication that republican members of congress

may also be under scrutiny? >> well, nicolle, i think that's certainly likely. two things strike me about this. one is the breadth of the activity that is revealed in this article. one, you're talking about people on the ground providing security. you're talking about the physical aspects of the people who were at the rally, who moved to the capitol. but you're also talking about the fake electors slate. there's some information there about potentially allegations of false fund-raising for a political action committee that was involved. so this isn't just one event. you're seeing a variety of potential criminal activity that's implicated by all these various things. and the other point is these are all people who are approaching the inner sanctum of trump. these are people who were in touch with trump. and certainly to your question about congress, one of these people, mike roman, he is the person that delivered the fake slate of electors to michigan and wisconsin that ultimately ended up in the hands of ron johnson. and of course ron johnson's staffer apparently tried to get that into the hands of mike pence. so this is right at the feet of not only congressmen but

senators as well. and i think there are a lot of people who are probably very uneasy tonight reading this news, sitting up at capitol hill or back in their home districts as we really head into the election, the meat of the general election coming up for many of them. >> barbara mcquade, i imagine them reading that "new york times" story about maga making attorneys get attorneys right now as their phones are probably ringing off the hook. i want to read you more from this breaking story in the "new york times." we're talking about there being on the doorstep of republican members of congress and senators. it also sounds like it is already on donald trump's doorstep. from the "times," "bernard kerik, a former new york city police commissioner who promoted baseless claims of voter fraud alongside his friend rudy giuliani, was issued a subpoena by prosecutors with the u.s. attorney's office in washington, d.c. his lawyer timothy parlatore said on monday. mr. parlatore said his client initially offered to grant an interview voluntarily. the subpoenas seek information in connection with the plan to submit slates of electors

pledged to trump from swing states that were won by joseph biden in 2020. trump and his allies promoted the idea that competing slates of electors would justify blocking certification sf biden's electoral victory during a joint session of congress. the subpoenas also seek information into the activities of the save america political action committee, the main fund-raising conduit for trump since he left office." it sounds like everything trump touched is now under criminal investigation. the violence, the rally, the slates of electors which trump was told by his lawyers was not legal. and the grift. the superpac that raised money based on a lie. it didn't use it to save the election. it used it to, i don't know, dole out slush money to mark meadows among others. >> yeah. i think there are two slivers here that appear to be under investigation. one, the one you just mentioned, the grift, which is actually a pretty easy case to make out for prosecutors. if somebody raised money under

one representation and used the money for another or solicits money on the basis of a lie, that is the basis for wire fraud. it's a pretty easy case to make. but of course the bigger case and i think the one that really matters for accountability is to what extent was donald trump directly involved in the violence at the capitol? we've had some hints about that. remember, there was that testimony from cassidy hutchinson that when she walked rudy giuliani to the car he he said words to the effect of "isn't it going to be great on january 6th, cass? trump's going to look so strong. he's going to go into the capitol. he's going to be there with the members of congress and the senators." what did that mean? was that part of this plan with members of congress, that he was going to have some sort of grand arrival and they were going to stop everything and halt the vote? was that part of the plan? did it change? there was also indication that there was a plan for a second rally on the steps of the supreme court, which is of course right across the street from the capitol. was there an effort and planning by trump and these members of

congress to breach the building and to do something more than just vocalize their political views? i think that is what part of this investigation is about. and enough questions have been raised, i think that the justice department has a responsibility to find out. >> barbara, let me read this line to you. because i keep reading it. it seems extraordinary. the subpoenas requested information about any members of the executive and legislative branches who may have taken part in planning or executing the rally or tried to obstruct, influence, impede or delay certification of the election. i mean, we know from cassidy hutchinson's testimony that that was trump. we knew he was happy the night before when he heard it happening. it cheered him up for the first time in a long time. one of the other white house aides who testified before the january 6th committee told us. we also know that the members of congress were in the white house. and that is not in dispute. that's been proven and is not

disputed. so how much scrutiny do you think trump and elected republicans are under based on what we're learning in this new report? >> oh, i think they want to know exactly what was said at those meetings. we also know there's a meeting at the willard hotel on the night of january 5th. mark meadows was going to go. snl cassidy hutchinson said that would be a bad look. so instead he participated by conference call. what happened in those meetings? was it simply we are going to have a show of support on the ellipse and share our views about this election or did it go further than that? it did it go to look, we know some people are going to breach the capitol? remember there's also that testimony that members of the oath keepers and proud boys did not go to the ellipse, they went directly to the capitol. was the idea they're going to open the doors and others will follow it in so that that certification could stop? i think that you have to go in with an open mind, without presupposing the conclusion, but there are many unanswered questions about how all of it took place and some real hints that there was planning to breach the capitol and halt that

certification. so i think all of these people who were involved in that planning should be nervous if their role was anything other than a protest protected by the first amendment. >> yeah. and the subpoena also reportedly says they're interested in people who provided security for the rally. we know from the security radio traffic that secret service were well aware of trump supporters with a.r. style weapons. it's interesting they're looking at as broad of a swath of conduct and individuals as the congressional probe has looked at. there's so much happening today. barbara and peter are sticking around. when we come back, new details have emerged from former u.s. attorney geoffrey berman, the former top prosecutor of the southern district of new york, about how much worse things were than they even appeared at the justice department under donald trump and bill barr. that's next.

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had never been successfully prosecuted. so in about 220 years this criminal statute was on the books there are in criminal convictions. >> that face may not yet be familiar to all of you, but it's about to be very familiar. it belongs to jeffrey berman. we told you about him on friday. he was the top federal prosecutor in manhattan, a big job. right up until they tried to fire him and couldn't and had donald trump do it. now he has an explosive tell-all coming out called "holding the line". it details seven instances of extreme pressure from trump's department of justice to prosecute trump's political enemies and take it easy on his political allies. berman will join us live on this program tomorrow. his account illustrates a sad truth that however bad things

look or corrupt from the outside, the reality was much worse. we're thankful people like berman were there, but there in lies the possible danger. quote in the axios, he writes, quote, i did not leave with a sense of triumph. what i felt and do not feel is worry. it's important to understand how fragile the system and is how vulnerable it can be when powerful people attempt to abuse it for political gain. in sdny we did not let that happen, but it could. barbara, you read the book. this episode with kerry, sdny is one of the most powerful -- in the country. those cases were elsewhere. that seems to be the ultimate perversion of justice. >> yeah, for somebody who's worked at the justice department to see this, i found it

absolutely astonishing, especially astonishing wasn't just that, you know, we -- reasonable minds disagree. some saw it as a charge, some saw it as not a charge. with craig it cops to charging republican congressman as well as charging michael cohen who was donald trump's former lawyer. and jeffrey berman reports that he received a call from the justice department, ed o'callahan who worked in the office saying, it's time for you guys to even things out. wow, that's astonish. the idea you would charge somebody to even things out politically. part of the justice department's manual, the bible of the justice department says you may never consider politics in making a charging decision. that to me is an astonishing fact. same with regards to the john kerry charges. seemed really flimsy. rather than accept the independent decision of the u.s. attorney's office in the southern district of new york, they said, okay, we'll shop it

to another attorney's office. in the case of greg craig, they accepted it the case of john kerry they said, we agree, there's no case here. troubling plilk worse driving these cases in the justice department in the trump administration. >> shocking but not surprising. this was your read on the barr doj the whole time. >> right. nicole, it's really chilling. it kind of puts the line to bill barr's current rehabilitation tour, where he's speaking about mar-a-lago be the classified documents, but it really shows -- at least the reviews i've read, the heavy handed nature of how he was going after anything that displeased trump and doing everything in his power to please him. we knew that the department of justice during trump's presidency was doing things like walking back the conviction of mike flynn, walking down the sentencing of roger stone, but it's entirely more chilling when instead of taking care of your friend us start persecuting and

targeting your enemies. it's one thing if somebody escapes justice. it's another thing if somebody is put in jail. time and time again we're seeing confirmation of what we expected. greg craig's two-week trial with a not guilty verdict. the same thing when john durham went after michael susman who's perceived to be an enemy of trump. acquittal. it's staggering the department of justice and these folks but for jeffrey berman allowed themselves to be use in the such a crass partisan way where not just people's liberties were at stake, physically their liberty. their imprisonment potentially was at stake here, and that just is something that's deeply, deeply troubling and really concerning to see the confirmation coming out now is beyond belief for me. >> it's beyond the pale. i've read the book. i'm under an embargo until tomorrow when jeffrey berman is here. but he goes so deep, and we have

the time to go deep with him. it goes beyond the desire to prosecute craig and kerry. it goes into the perversion of u.s. policy. it is for me one of the most stunning blockbuster takedowns of the corruption at the highest levels of the justice department. barbara mcquade, pete struck, thank you for for spending time with us today. quick breaker if us. we'll be right back. we'll be right back. but couldn't keep up. so my husband just stopped taking his medicine. and then he had a stroke. i can't get back what i lost, but thanks to aarp, a new law will protect seniors with a cap on their prescription costs. that could have changed everything for us. i'm just grateful that no one will have to face the terrible choices that we did

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thank you so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. we are grateful. "the beat" with ari melber starts right now. hi, ari. >> hi, nicole. i was prepping for my show starting to watch yours on the break in coverage. we track which trump aides have been investigated. it's been only a handful of top aides since this "new york times" story which now says it's approaching dozens. >> it really is breaking it open, and again, we know about it from the