in a way conspiracies under the major crime would be collusion crime but as we remember as a political person from president nixon's ordeal during watergate it's not the crime that is you in it's the cover up and the president's decision to fire james komi and then participate in a dissembling dishonest explanation for the meeting that took place in june of two thousand and sixteen where there was a conversation about the russian government representative sharing incriminating information according to the e-mail to donald jr president trump himself participated on air force one and denied in a misleading report that constituted potentially a cover up so the subpoenas from mr mueller seem to me to be starting with the outer layers of a conspiracy to cover up or obstruct and when they if they ever do get the

collusion evidence they still have a crime in obstruction of justice potentially and conspiracy. beginning to look like it looks like that that sounds like adults. well what we're seeing is is with the turn over documents just a critical necessary and ordinary in the sense part of an investigation you can't really speak to the key witnesses until you have every scrap of paper of e-mail of anything so that you've got all the information otherwise either whether it's refreshing the witnesses recollection or catching the witness on some misstatements you're just not ready to go to the witness interviews so that's that's what they're going to do and lanny very properly touched on some of the areas of of criminal law interest there is certainly in the campaign phase and these are campaign documents of a focus on was there a criminal conspiracy collusion itself isn't

a crime so what they're looking to do is see whether they have evidence during the course of the campaign of criminal conspiracy which could include anything from hacking computers or conspiracy to accept improper campaign contributions from foreign nationals or a foreign government the additional categories of of criminal interest are of course whether people who went into the trump administration falsified through inclusion or omission material information on their financial disclosure forms or on their national security forms and we know already that there are a couple people including general flynn who got some real questions about that the third area and lanny mentioned this is often the most important area is possible obstruction or false statements and that's going to get a lot a lot of attention that may not be the focus of the campaigns documents because that was largely pre pre. inauguration but it's nevertheless all part of the

picture because the more guilt you show during the the earlier phase the more motive there is for people to obstruct later on so this is all part of a continuum and while it's significant that documents are be. turned over we still have a ways to go they've got to go through them they've got to categorize them they've got to classify them hannum out to all the different agents and it will be a while before their interview so we i think we're still a number of months before this investigation concludes with any findings lenny what do you think the significance is of looking into michael flynn's son. because of the system was involved the father's not going to want the son to go to jail. i don't know a thing about the allegations against the son and i always warn people when they're . attacking clients of mine that there's a presumption of innocence and we shouldn't let media jump ahead of the facts which they always seem to do so even when it comes to michael flynn son or president

trump or anyone those of us that once in a while appear on the great larry king show have to be very careful about any conclusions if this son is under suspicion dad is going to be concerned and by the way that applies to a son in law the president of united states mr cushion or has failed to reveal many of the financial matters on his disclosure form such that he's had to amend a number of times and the reasons for that omission are very troubling because it can be over and over again that you forget material information so that's an area that he has to worry about i think the biggest area i'm going back to is the president of the united states i wouldn't say smoking gun has admitted to participating if not directing and dictating a public misleading statement by definition misleading because it omitted material facts about the email exchange with his son donald jr if i were the counsel to the

president as i used to be many years ago i would be astounded that the president himself was involved in drafting a publicly misleading statement in the middle of a criminal investigation where that statement is actually potentially evidence of an obstruction of justice kendall levy's and i'd also like you to comment being a former u.s. attorney about sarah sanders the person saying that the justice department should investigate more about komi and false testimony he gave to congress to to look. prosecute james komi what do you make of that kendall well let me first about the president's alleged we'll call it spinning the statement that his son was to issue about the meeting and trump laws or it as we know it's

a crime to mislead federal investigators it's not a crime to mislead the press so that'll be the key issue but what's going to be fascinating is when the day comes and the f.b.i. and mahler interview trump what is the president going to say about that. well lenny apparently this has some technical difficulties with here in los angeles and a fiber connection to miami so if you could pick up on what i was talking to campbell about we apologize to kendall coffey we hope to have him back soon at another date but lanny what about what he was commenting on and about the white house claiming that tommy gave false information to the justice department should prosecute him well first of all kendall has it right it's not it's not a crime to lie to the public otherwise we have a lot of presence in jail but it is a crime to make false statements when you're questioned about it. the president will have to explain at some point to mr miller and it's prosecutors whether he

participated in that false statement that was issued to the public if he says yes i did then all have to be honest and explain why he intentionally misled everyone was he afraid about evidence of occlusion meeting that occurred in june of two thousand and sixteen with the russian government talking about trashing hillary clinton and what does he know about that so there's a chance that it will still come back to haunt him on mr called me if there was a crime of poor judgment mr komi would be serving a lot of time he exercised poor judgment in the handling of the killer of clinton e-mails the deputy attorney general who president trump raised wrote exactly the truth that mr komi exceeded all boundaries of good judgment and possibly justice department rules when he expressed a personal opinion on the evidence in public as a investigator you're just not allowed to slime people without charging people and

that's what he did to hillary clinton and the poor judgment of sending a letter without any facts that caused the election outcome to change which i believe the data shows was the stream we put judgment eleven days. from the election but in terms of prosecuting him this is donald trump doing as usual change the topic because the focus on him is making him uncomfortable it's an absurd charge by i don't take sarah could be seriously anymore just as we stop taking mr spicer seriously because he carries forward lies from his client and no press that could present the terri that i've ever heard of does that so whatever ms huckabee says she's being told to say and it's just not a serious comment this is ministration has been a boon to the. new all of the new york times and washington post the press was in trouble no longer at least on those two papers in trouble the post

especially has been doing an incredible job where they get these ins. there's a lot of. well this is a white house that leaks like a sieve which shows very low little oil to the to the president. as i said it's very common for people in the white house to give reporters stories that benefit the president tried to do that all the time and that's what i meant in jest about being a leaker i was trying to get reporters to write defenses to the attacks on president clinton or favorable stories this is a group of people working for president trump who are leaking stories detrimental to the president and i find the disloyalty in the inner circle and in the white house. quite remarkable so it does suggest to me that mr trump is worrying people around him that they may get involved in the criminal prosecution by being associated with some of the activities that are under review that's my only way to

figure out all the leaking going on mr kelly a strong man chief of staff do something about. oh probably going back to george washington every president i'd states has tried to stop leaking in among his rank so i would say mr kelley don't waste your time it was richard nixon's desire to stop the leaks that actually got him in trouble with obstruction of justice and ultimately war gate the only thing you can do is inspire loyalty among people and they're going to be talking to the media what is a leak it's somebody who's a reporter calling you on the phone can you comment on something and my answer would be i can't comment to you on the record but there's something about president clinton you should know i'll be on background that's what's called a leak means not for attribution this white house like every white house does that with reporters and they should do it if it's in defense of the president was unusual here are the number of people within the president's inner circle on

background without attribution quote leaking detrimental information about the president even though i opposed this president there's something called loyalty if you don't like working for president trump you ought to resign or get out you should be leaking detrimental information always great talking to lanny thanks thank you thank engel coffee i'm sorry i. missed them we hope to have campbell back soon thanks to both of them for the time today we'll be back with more politicking right after the break. about your sudden passing i found the just learnt you worry yourself in taking your last turn. to us we all knew it would i tell you i'm sorry. so i write these last words in hopes to put to rest this thing that i never got off my chest. i remember when we first met my life turned on each spring. but then my feeling started change you talked about more like it was

a kid still some more fun to feel those that didn't like to question our our kids. they promised to never be like it's one does not leave a funeral the same as one enters the mind it's consumed with this one. to speak to you because there are no other takers. claimed that mainstream media has met its maker. prescribe medication is widespread on the us market and a frequent cause of death at that point in my life. like everything was ashes my family was literally coming unglued i had actually planned. to commit some sight

was all who was made antidepressants so commonly used we were doing what the doctors told us to do we were being responsible and what the real side effects. was chemically altered when i did was done on a cocktail of legal drugs. just because something's legal doesn't mean it's safe. the television station you're watching now in the russian news agency sputnik may find themselves in legal jeopardy in the united states the drive to designate both as foreign agents under the foreign agents registration act is disturbing and dangerous it would seem to those in power decide who can freely speak.

about do politics let's turn to political news with two political my dynamic. joining me to talk about that political analyst is amy holmes in new york she's a former staffer to senate majority leader bill frist previously served as acting for the blaze t.v. and in washington democratic strategist julian epstein he served as special mouthing counsel to the house judiciary committee and is the former staff director of the government oversight and reform committee let's start with steve benen he says guys that the firing of james foley was the worst mistake in modern political history and we agree i don't think you're going to get any disagreement from me or i would suspect julianne it was a huge mistake and at the time i was really stunned that the white house thought that it would be a popular decision because komi was criticized from both sides of the aisle we've

heard hillary clinton criticizing him as she's embarked on her book tour but you know james komi as steve benen said he was the head of an institution is also the middle of an investigation so when you fire someone it's going to certainly be explosive and as james comey testified to congress he said that he said that memo of his meeting with president trump to his friends at columbia university in the hopes that it would be released publicly and that that would trigger the special counsel and indeed that chain of events you know it happened and now president trump is facing robert robert mueller julian i assume you agree with that and what do you make of the white house now continuing to try to get the justice department to criminalize mr combing who i think it shows that sarah huckabee sanders and the rest of the team over there are really kind of the bad news bears when it comes to how they're handling this investigation i mean. there's no other

word for it other than lamebrained there was nothing remotely illegal about former f.b.i. director call me. dividing the memo either to a friend a law school or to the new york times it's perfectly legal it's perfectly within the scope of whistleblower laws so long as no classified information is being revealed and the idea that the president and the white house would then try to sic the inter the inspector general on former f.b.i. director komi is part of a larger narrative of obstruction of justice i mean the president has the authority as amy pointed out on the show last time to fire an f.b.i. director but he doesn't have the authority to fire the f.b.i. director if the purpose of that firing is to stop an investigation into his administration and the president admitted in an interview on n.b.c. news that the reason that he fired. komi was because of his frustration with

the russia investigation and that's almost admitting the kind of the corrupt purpose requirement under the obstruction of justice statute and now in fact the president is under criminal investigation seven months into his office for obstruction of justice and not only that but the appointment of the new special counsel robert mueller who was widely respected on both sides of the aisle and fact republicans have introduced legislation in the senate to protect him from being fired by the president now you have a much broader investigation that's not just looking at obstruction of justice but looking at all kinds of possible collusion between the trump administration and the trump campaign with russia and looking at a whole host of other financial arrangements that trump and the trump inner team have may have had with russian interests that could have violated criminal laws so

this thing has gone from bad to worse by the mishandling by this white house and media to ben to be a constant troublemaker. you know that's it seems something he likes to do which is to set fires as he has said you know by his own testimony that he wants to bring the whole system down bring down the establishment and that includes republicans and when he was you know heading up a breitbart dot com that was you know his his bread and butter what he seemed to really relish to mix my metaphors or pile them on everyone to say but will he be influential i think that's a separate question and in so far as donald trump is still calling him up which has been reported yes he's he's influential he has a direct line to the present a united states and he can also be influential if he is sort of directing his readers slash followers of braveheart dot com to be thorns in the side of republican leadership and he can do that by you know publishing article after

article which he has done in the past in opposition to paul ryan and basically joining up steve bannon base to be in a constant state of warfare with the republican party at least julian sixteen members of congress republican members of congress are not running for reelection let me make of that. i think it shows that donald trump may have the unique ability of making the house of representatives great again. in the sense that he may turn the house of representatives democrat in the next election democrats in twenty four a pick up of twenty four seats and if you listen to what the republicans who are not running what they're saying on the record and off the record. often not for attribution kind of the way loni was just talking about a previous segment segment many of them are rebelling against the illogical rigidity that some on the far right want to place on the on the republican party so

i think it shows that there is a civil war going on inside the republican party between the establishment anti-establishment wings and i think it's a civil war that's gotten much worse under trump remember trump's approval ratings right now or about two thirds of the american public don't like him don't trust him and don't approve of the job he's doing and the as a republican are you discouraged your reply you're an independent you're a republican you support of candidates you know you're a long time you're not a democrat ok ok now you're not so hot and i live i'm a conservative. republican by. are you disturbed by the actions of this administration. as a conservative i see that donald trump in certain ways is trying to be or is rather not ideological that he's being pragmatic we saw this with the debt ceiling deal that he reached out to chuck schumer nancy pelosi they had

a summit in the white house where they were all smiles and raise the debt limit without any sort of you know without cuts to spending that some republicans are demanding but i would remind viewers that donald trump long broadcast this intention to work with the other side back in march he had steve minucci his treasury secretary meet with moderate democrats moderate republicans in the house caucus called the problem solvers caucus to address tax reform he had stephen nugent as treasury secretary meet with chuck schumer and mitch mcconnell to talk about the debt ceiling and that was the spring when he said he wanted to raise that debt ceiling a clean hike he did not want all these things attached to it so it really shouldn't have come as any surprise that that was what he was driving toward last week or what he's going to do now on tax reform i think republicans they have a big question in front of them which is are they going to try to pass tax reform or slash tax cuts however they want to go about it or are they going to try to pass this on a partisan party line vote under these special rules in the senate is called reconciliation

or they actually going to get on donald trump's playbook and reach out to democrats to try to fashion a bipartisan piece of legislation and piece of law i actually favor the latter because i think when you have bipartisan buy into something that you need bipartisan buy in rather to something that big and that you know consequential for the american people i think it should have happened with obamacare for example. the president turning a little. no i think it was kind of a last minute impulse on his part last week to make a deal with nancy pelosi and chuck schumer on something that most people don't really understand it's a the extension of the debt limit for three months while they work out the continuing resolution of the budget donald trump is hemmed in with the far right conservative base it's the only portion of the voting public that actually support him about the third of american voters who are far right and we actually continue

to support him he has offered almost nothing that would be considered bipartisan or centrist the economy has worsened under donald trump the job production numbers are worse under donald trump than they were under. under president obama. he has failed on almost everything he has tried to put forward it's not just health care which was not in any way bipartisan the tax plan he hasn't put hasn't put forth other than just general kind of ideas notional ideas but there's no indication the republicans have any ability to pay for what's in the tax reform proposal particularly if they want to cut corporate rates to fifteen percent in the individual rates substantially there's no idea nobody has anything on the table in terms of how you pay for it and i think just what the president did last week was for the really neat republicans the only people who are in his corner you know republicans are probably going to do their own thing on tax reform in the house and senate the justice department is ignoring the president's desire to drop the

russian vest a geisha in north korea isn't paying attention to donald trump's threats they launched a missile after he said if they took another step there would be fire and fury mexico won't pay for his wall the republicans in congress won't pay for his mexican wall business leaders don't want to sit on his business councils i mean you see at every turn this president's political potential political support dwindling and him becoming cornered in him any thought of going to the farm. like republican base you know what i for a second i think when it comes to the republican side of the aisle the picture is a lot more complicated mark meadows congressman from north carolina he's the head of the freedom caucus the so fold the so-called super right wing in the house he said this summer he told the hill he said look their strategy of trying to you know sort of like run the table you know g.o.p. partisan legislation wasn't working and that he was open to alternatives and reaching across the aisle he said that he was willing to you know vote for raising

the debt ceiling without any you know attendant spending cuts but then they change their mind and then they go back before they get very political about it i think that julian is not characterizing what's going on in the republican side of the aisle accurately and well and you know to my right i'm not here and i struggle to virus to my whole bundling to my frustration they're going back and forth and they don't seem to have a clear strategy that's why i say they don't seem to be on the same page as this president who has said from the get go that he would seek moderate democratic support for legislation moving forward but so much as we know have been the resistance and it's been part of their strategy not to cooperate with this president congressman brad sherman of california he told the los angeles time not just two weeks ago that he can't do anything that would be seen to be cooperating with this president without his constituents going crazy ok but let's clarify what i said don't put words in my mouth amy i think there are plenty republicans on the hill including the leaders in both the house and senate mitch mcconnell and speaker ryan who would be willing to reach across the aisle and find bipartisan compromise

and i applaud that i think a lot of democrats would be open to that. i would note however that republican said for the eight years during the obama prep presidency if we just get the white house will fix health care we'll fix taxes will fix immigration they've been able to do nothing and they've been able to agree on nothing so you have to think a lot of what the republican party was doing during the eight years of the obama presidency was just pure bluster and politics and not really serious about doing the american. people's business without the criticism that i would make of the republicans in congress although i would agree with you many are open to bipartisan compromise my point was different about already rob the point i was making want to go far right sure well sure and your point about meadows is well taken my point about donald trump was entirely different other than the debt ceiling which i think is is not a significant indicator of the president's ability to reach across the aisle the president has done nothing to reach across the aisle and my other point was that

not only that he is a guy seven months into office who's under criminal investigation right now with as many of a as a dozen republicans in the senate criticizing him either for how he's trying to obstruct the investigation into russia or for his really foolish remarks as you pointed out last time amy on his charleville response on both sides lauding white nazis or white nationalists in the nazi movement as good guys on both sides so my point is the president has not reached across the aisle in any meaningful way i hope that he does skeptical as to whether he will in a meaningful way and the second point is that this is a guy who his political base is shrinking amongst voters his political base in washington on capitol hill is shrinking and he's a guy that needs more friends because he's under criminal investigation right now and then julian as always thank you you are terrific thank you larry. because you

would they go and thank you to the viewers for joining us on this edition of politicking remember you can join the conversation on my things book page a tweet me at games things and don't forget use the politics hash tag and that's all for this edition of politicking. about your sudden passing i've only just learnt. and taken your last wrong turn. caught up to you as we all knew it would i tell you i'm sorry. so i write these last words in hopes to put to rest these things that i never got off my chest. i remember when we first met my life turned on each day. but then my feelings started to change you talked about war like it was a cave still some more fun to feel those that didn't like to question our arc and i secretly promised to never be like it said one does not leave

a funeral the same as one enters the mind it's consumed with death this one. i speak to because there were no other takers. that mainstream media has met its make. a scene years ago i traveled across the united states exploring america's deadly love affair with a gun if

a bad guy tried to get to one of my family members he would have better luck with a better knife. and hurting whatever by my babies since my book was published in the year two thousand more than haul for a million americans have been killed by falling. in the us how does the team yes i did this this is a middle school we go through drills and we put ourselves in a real scenario so it was interesting to see who actually got hit. and i just saw i did to return to the subject to track down each gun owner who i'd met and photographed those years ago i don't know this but we are not.

coming out is launched another missile which reportedly flew over japan again that softer south korea conducted next and saw as destroying a mockup of a north korean military bunker on wednesday. an oil rich area of syria a spark of the government control of the operation to liberate their sole province continues this i would take a closer look at the importance of this region to the ongoing battle. millions of dollars in aid money pledged to help syrian refugee children is vanished according to a new human rights watch report on the case about one and also coming up tonight.