tv Meet the Press NBC April 28, 2019 10:30am-11:30am EDT
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$32,500. at the mercedes-benz springvent. going on n. this sunday the president versus congress. president trump says he's done cooperatinwith russia investigations. >> i have been the most transparent president and administration in the history of our country by far. >> vowing to deny congressional democrats. >> but we're fighting everyone. >> i wouldn't give them a damn thing. >> congress has the responsibility, and i would say the obligation, to holds individu contempt who do not comply with a lawful subpesna. >> my gu this morning, emocratic presidential candidate amy klobuchar and ron johnson of wisconsin. plus, some democrats say now is the time for impeachment.
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but polls show it is not popular with the public. and speaker pelosi is not dging. >> there are some people who are more eager forimpecachment. many more eager to follow the investigation. >> if we give donald trump eight years in the white house, he will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation. >> joe bidenets in the race finally and argues presidentne trump s to go and that he can be beat him. joining me for insiegght and alysis are robert costa, pegny noonan, carlos and helene cooper. welcome to sunday. it's "meet the press." fr nbc news in washington, th longest running show in television history. this is "meet the press" with chuck todd. and good sunday morning.
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i'm andrea mitchell filling in for chuck dd. the word stone wall has been associated with the watergate scan scandal. in one of the tapes, nixon tells john mitchell, i want you allto one wall it, let them plead the fifth amendment. fighting congressional democrats, stone walling seems to bepresident trump's whole point right now while the mueller report has certainly not generated a watergate level crisis, president trump this week made clear he a is notbout to cooperate with russia related investigations, despiting the evidence detailed in the mueller report. mr. trump is vowing to fight congressional subpoenas. the president knows this play book well. he's employed a jab and move strategy, hoping to run out the clock until the current criens
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or the next one emerges, all of which has left democrats debating their next move. start impeachment proceedings as some on the left are urging or keep investigating, fight the president and leave mr. trump's fate to the voters. >> the radical, liberal democrats put all their hopes behindus their colln delusion. >> as a campaign rally saturday night president trump on the attack. >> the scum that's leading the very top of government, these were dirty cops. >> with house democrats demanding his current and former top aids testify, the president is prepared to declare executive privilege and run out the clock. >> these aren't impartial people. the democrats are trying to win 2020. >> he's trampling constitution, no doubt about it. they are doing a blockade. >> democrats have subpoenaed don mcgahn to testify next month.
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he is emerging as a central witness toia potent obstruction as the president urged him to fire mueller, mcgahn refused. >> i never told don mcgahn to fire muelr. if i wanted to fire mueller, i would have done it myself. >> the president attacking t investigators. >> an attempted coux. >> they tried for a cue. didn't work out so wel. >> and mr. trump and his advisers, including his son-in-law, are down playing russian interference. >> it is a terriblebuthing, i think the investigations and all of the speculation that's happened for the last two years has had a much harsher impact on democracy than a couple facebook hacks. >> russia is working 365 days to year to undermine u.s. de cracy. >> we're very much viewing 2018
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as just kind of a dress rehearsal for the big show. >> 2020. >> "the new york times" rorted this week that formerriomeland secuty secretary was told don't bring uprussian interference in front of the president. now democrats are divided over next move. 56% of americans oppose impeachment. 37% favor starting the process. although 58% believe mr. trumpl to the public about matters under investigation by mueller and 47% say he obstructed stice. still on the campaign trail democrat candidates arebe nning to push house speaker pelosi to act. >> i believe congress should take the steps towards impeachment. >> but pelosi is trying to hold them offhi >> i don't t there is big division in our caucus about this. there are some people who are more eager for impeachment, many more eager to just follow the
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investigation. >> and joining me now is democratic presidential candidate and minnesota senator amy klobuchar. welcome back to "meet the press." >> thanks, andrea. it is great to be on. >> well,a good to h you with us. you remember the judiciary committee. the democrats say that the presidenis stone walling. he clearly is saying no cooperation, no witnesses, either current or former aids. does this amount to obstruction? >> when you read that report in detail and you start out with h whatpened with russia, to me it looks liken. obstruct and especially the part if we want to protect our nation, maybe russia didn't use tanks, maybe they didn't use missiles, but they invaded our democracy eyl the same. id it by meddling and not just meddling but actually invading our democracy. they actually got into voter roles. we're finding out now they got into some county in florida and ey won't tell us. every time that i have tried to
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do something about this with our secure elections act, the white house has squelched the e effff. hper ballots will ensure that we're able toe a successful 2020 election where we actually have the american people voting and not the russians determining what happened. >> but the president says he's been exonerated. the russia investigation is closed. case closed. it's over. so how does congress get him to provide witnesses, docents if he says that current and former aids will not be permitted to testify? >> well, that's what subpoenas are all about. when i look at this, these witnesses like don mcgahn who we now know the president attempted tto tell him you know, end this investigation and fire mueller, don mcgahn spoke to the special counsel. that is now public so, the american people should be able to know what he says.
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we should be able to ask questions. that's what this is about, getting the fu report, getting mueller. we will see attorney general barr this week, andin i'm go to be asking him on not only why did his administration decide to go to court to get rid of the affordable care act and deny millions of americans coerage, but also why did he not allow this report to come out in full and what is hedoing about russia because, to me, that's the key thing. we have an election coming up in 2020. it doesn't matter if you are a democrat or republican. you want to have a fair election. >> the house democrats are in an argument apparently according to nbc news exclusive today, the justice department is threatening not to threat the attorneyeneral to the house committee the day of you see him in the senate. the justice is objecting to some of the conditions they are
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demanding. they are demanding to go into executive or private session to go over the redacted material. what should they if he refuses? >> they will have to work that out, but he has to come before the house. he is theattorney general of the united states. we haven't seen him in the senate since his confirmation hearing and since he did his four-page summary which turned out to not reflect what was exactly in the report. i dn'tupport attorney general barr just because i was very concerned about this kind of messing around witthe facts, his views of an expansive role of executive power, which basically disses the power of the congress to be a checkand balance on the attorney general. this isn't, having gone all around the country, this isn't e just about t mueller report and what's happening with russia, andrea. this is about what's going on with mmigration. this is about what's happening with the affordable care act where millions and millions of
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americans, ove50% of them, are afraid they are going to lose their health insurance because of pre-exditing cons. he has to come before congress and explain what in the world this administration is doing when it comes to people's every day lives. >> now, i know that impeachment is not popular with theri an people. dne of your opponents, elizabeth warren, has sai there is a moral issue here that you have to begin in the house side starting with impeachment. i know youaid that you, as a senator, would be a juror and you are not going to commit. but don't you have to say whether or not you should at least start the process?th >> house is going to make that decision. and for me the most important thing is to hold this president accountable. and as director mueller himself pointed out in the report, there are many ways to do that. one is with the process through congress which includes these investigations with the president is already stone walling. the second is other investigations that are going on right now, including in the
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state of new york, and the third is pretty straightforward, andrea. that is defeating him in 2020. that's what i intend to do and will do. >> don't you have an obligation to tell democrats in the primaries whether or not you are in favor of at least opening up an impeachment investigation? >> i believe that the president should be held accouhiable. and i that's what people want to know. and i have been incredibly aggressive about puing in hearings, pushing attorney general barr. i'm actually the one that asks the obstruction of justice questions. and now i'm going to have another opportunity to have himm go before next week where i say, you know, when i asked you if it was obstruction to try to impede the integrity of a witness testimony, you said that it was. and now we've got all kinds of evidence of pardons being dangled out. we have got evidence of the president's counsel being told to change his story, evidence of him being told to fire the
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special counsel. o me this looks like obstruction of justice, which is exactly what barr had told me in those questions. so i view this as an opportunity to really push him on what obstruction of justice is, why he answered the questions the way he did before and expect answers this week.t >> i wan to ask you about joe biden who entered the race. he had difficulty on the view yesterday explaining why he hadn't apologized earlier, why he hadn't called anita hill earlier and what he really feels about what happened during the claerns thomas hearings. let me play that for you. >> i think she wants you to say i'm sorry forhe way i treated you, not for the way you were treated. >> i'm sorry the way she got treated. terms of -- i never heard -- if you go back and look at what i said and didn't say, i don't think i treated her badly. >> he had the gavel. she was the chairman. he cutoff the hearings before her witnesses could get on.
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what should he now say to anita hill? >> that's going to be joe biden's issue. let me just tell you my e. perspectiv i was a young lawyer when this happened. nd i remember being captivated by her, watching every moment of that hearing, never thinking i'd end up on the senate judiciary committee. it was actually first letter i ever wrote to my senator. i wrote a letter saying i want you to wrote against clarence thomas. my senator ended up voting for thomas. but it motivated me to get involved in politics. now we go from zero women on that judiciary committee to six. >> let me ask you about what you sere presenting in nevada yesterday, which a retirement plan. how are you going to pay for this retirement plan? >> well, that's simple. and the republican tax bill did
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so much to help the wealthy build up a trillion dollars in debt, all you have to do is make some changes to that and you have the money to ensure that 49 million americans who have no r retirementht now, andrea, except for social security can start saving. we all it up saving counts. it is a great idea. 50 cents for every hour someone works in an account that they w can takeh them no matter where they work, if they don't have a 401(k) where they can take out the first $2,500 for emergency expenses when we've got four out of ten americans that don't even have $400 for an emergency room bill. these are the things that i'mt hearing ouere when i am in nevada or when i am in new hampshire, iowa. it is the same focus. people need help in their every day lives. as we look ahead to this next weekith the topic we just discussed about the sanctity of
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our elections d about the mueller report, we have to remember we can do two things at once, we can present an agenda for the people of this country and still make sure we protect the law and protect the constitution. that's what it is about when you are representing america. and when i hear the president dissing the constitution and when i find out that he doesn't even stand up for our country because hisomeland security secretary is afraid to go talk to him about russia, that is not standing up forec the sity of america. i will do that. >> thanks for being with us today. and joining me now is the chair of the meland security in the senate, ron johnson of wisconsin who was with president trump last night. welcome back to "meet the press." i want to ask you first about the speech last night. the president referred to f officials as scum. is that the right way for the president of the united states
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to speak about law enfcement officers of the u.s. government? >> well first of all, i completely understand the en presids frustration. he knew from day one he was innocent and he was subjected to this two-year investigation, a very thorough investigation. and in that process, certainly andrew mccabe was fired because heied to his own investigators. this is the former deputy director and acting fbi director lying to his own investigators. so, no, i understand the president's frustration. there has ndpoi been a concerted effort since the day after the election to sabotage this gainvestition. i come mekocompletely understan frustrati frustration. >> do you think he should use words like scum? >> i would use different words. but ita cerly question the possibly. now i think the proven fact there wasti definitely corr levels at the highest levels of the fbi. that's one thing senator graham, senator grassley and myself are going to try to uncover now that
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the mueller investigation is over. >>he mueller investigation showed hundreds of contacts with officials, no evidenced that coul prosecuted, but partly because they were e-mails that whre erased. there were people were not available, they refused to be interviewed. they couldn't interview the president himself. are you comfortable with all of the context between this campaign and the russian officials? >> yes, i am because i read the report. it's painstakingly detailed and, you know, time and time again special counsel mueller said there was no evidence of collusion. and there was none. and again we have enormous challenges facing this nation, the crisis at the border. and this has been a huge distraction for th american public as well as this administration that tries to tackle these problids. >> het say there was no evidence of collusion because that's not a legal term. he said he could not prove conspiracy. but the president's lawyer said hes thinks it okay for
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republican candidates to welcome support from a foreign advar adversary, from russia. do you feel the same way? would you welcome support from russia in your campaign? >> no, and i don't believe the trump campaign did. so, again, from my standpoint, this issue is over in terms of collusion. w, i was one of the people briefed by theobama administration when we were told about russian interference. that was back in september to20. the whole point of that briefing in a secure situation was we have this covered.u we want to go out as members of the congress and say the elections results would be legitimate. that's what they wanted us to say. but then the wrong person got elected and all of a sudden we have thishole russian collusion story. it has been a big hoax. it's been a witch hunt, and i understand the president'sfr tration. >> mitt romney said i am sickened at the extent of dishonesty by individuals in the
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highest office of the land, including the president. i am appald that fellow citizens welcomed help from russ russia. that was after his read of the mueller report. why haven't you and other republican senators reacted as he reacted to the mueer report, especially on obstruction? >> maybe it is cause i derstand the president's frustration at being subjected to a witch hunt for two years. i was in rally yesterday. it was a record crowd filled o with people love this country and their support for president trump is actually growing. that's what i'm seeing. i'm seeing an economy grow by 2.3%. i'ngm seei business investment at over 6% in the last two years of presidents obama it wa 0.6%. that's going to drive our economy for years to come. so, again, i'm looking at the results of this administration, and i also think about what we
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could have accomplished had this witch hunt not been occurring for the last two years. i understand the president's frustration. nd the lso unders president's supporters' frustration of the media just continuing, continuing this witch hunt. it is ridiculous. >> m letplay something chris ray said the other day, the fbi director. >> i do think that russia poses a very significant counter intelligence threat, certainly in the cyber arena. that is not just an election cycle threat. it's pretty much a 365 days a year threat, and that is absolutely continued. >> why haven't we heard that from the president? why does the president say he believes putin over his own intelligence officials? >> andrea, i am every bit as concerned about russian interference as any democrat senator. i have seen the attempted cue no
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montenegro. so didn't surprise me at all they were interfering in our election. through social media is theca primary e. that's hard to really police. but in terms of changing vo totals, almost impossible because we have local control of elections. what is certainly a lly at risk voter files. dhs has done a good job to prevent that from happening as well. let's not blow this out of proportion. let's be vigilant and concerned about it. >> mick mulvaney, is cef of staff, made it clear mr. trump equated any discussion of russia activity with questions about the legitimacy of his victory. she coordinated a strategy to y protect ner's election. if the president considers this a top priority, why hasn't here
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ora government-wide cabinet level investigation and a tact to clear. >> they are on the case. it's just continued on into the trump administration. again, they had incredit blie high levels of contact with state jurisdiction they have been consulting with local jurisdictions in terms of files.ting their voter they have done a successful job. we didn't see that kind of interference in 2018. i think we can rest assured that 2020 will be as well. >> doesn't that go beyond dhs? doesn't it have to be all the cabinet departments working on this? >> dhs has the primary responsibilido. they have a pretty good job under chris krebs. >> thank you very much. thank you for being with us today. when we come back, stone walling
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congress. democrats divided on impeachment and what we learned about what rod rosenstein told president trump. and salary yates, who first alerted the trump administration that michael flynn had welcome fowler, indiana. es one of the windi places in america. and home to three bp wind farms. inhe off-chance the wind er stops blowing here... the lights can keep on shining. thanks to our natural gas. a smart partner to renewable energy. sit'ways ready when needed. or... not. at bp, we see possibilities everywhere. to help the world keep advancing. itso chantix can help you quit "slow turkey." along with support, chantix is proveno help you quit. with chantix you can keep smoking at first and ease into quitting. chantix reduces the urge so when the day arrives,
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dounfortunately, it can't anything about that. now that you know the truth... are u in good hands? wethome back. e panel is here. helene cooper, robert costa and moderator of washington week on pbs and former republican congressman of florida. wall street journal columnist peggy noonan. welcome all. let's talk about this whole argument about theueller report and the approach of the president. peggy, you have lived through this before. the president saying that he will absolutely -- it's case closed. he will not cooperate. he will not send witnesses. can he get away with it? >> it's possible. i mean, we have roughly a
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year-long window for this to be worked out in terms of legalisms. i have to tell you, i think the polling you showed at the top of the show with a majority of wa americans not ing to go towards impeachment, which i think implies the hearings and investigations -- >> let's show that. let's put it up one more time for people to see it. 56% saying they do not want impeachment. 37% say they do.an the democrats clearly divided. >> yes. but even more interesting, i think a majority or almost a majority said they didn't not want impeachment because they thou telling the truth.s they didn't think the president k s told the truth. >> 58% said thiney he lied. >> to me i think they got it exactly right. i would throw open the question, i understand the partisan f politics o. i understand the investigator or fervoing on in the house.
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what is curious to me is what exactly, if you devote the next x, nine months to more investigations and hearings are you looking to learn? you will get don mcgahn in, k him what he said to the president, the president said to e m. he'll say what hid in the mueller report. my thought is actually the mueller report did the work it had to do. over two years, 500 people on questi and interviewed, 40 investigators and fbi officials. oh my goodness, let everyone in america read it. they'll get the unredacted version soon. leave it alone. >> but will they? >> i hope they do and i think they pretty much will. but congress has a job to do now. you know, there is social security, immigration, et cetera. my goodness, work for the american people. sorry to give a speech there. >> let me show you what andrew
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sullivan wrote in "new york magazine." if the president wantonly obstructs justice and the opposition party immediately worries about the political costs, we're in deep trouble. >> i have asked house democrats about those estions. why do you need to proceed forward and bring don mcgahn, corey lewandowski up and other people mentioned in the mueller report? they say they have to tell a story to the american people, have people put their hand in hee air and narrate what t said because democrats don't believe the obstruction case has been fully made against president trump. but they do recognize, mostly privately, that there is a big political risk here. what is the appetite out there in the country? when i spoke to president trump this week, he believes he can make a political case against the democrat they're spending far too much time on this. but it's a little bit nuanced. he said he hasn't made a final, final decision on asserting executive privilege. we saw this week with the curity clearance process. the democrats are actually going to be able to bring someone up to talk to house democrats about
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the security clearance process at the white house. >> that's the one exception. >> you know what that reveals? it reveals there is negotiation going on. it's not totally black and white his point in terms of th stand off behind the white house and congress. >> will the president pay any price for stone walling if he continues to object to most of the unredacted or the redacted version not being available to congresse >> here's thoblem with the mueller report. for the president and his supporters, it is obvious that it was not a witch hunt. it was professional. it was thorough, and it was ir, and it does cast the administration in a negative light. however, for the president's opponent, the problem is r similar, that the muelleport was fair, it was sober and it does not obviously provoke impeachment. so the way the administration handles theseri inq, these subpoenas, that's where the public could either support ngpeachment more or reject it more than we're seven today in these poll numbers. that's kind of the squeeze, right? i saw this.
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john boehner went through this. paul ryan went through this. now nancy pelosi is going through it. the squeeze between centrists and the progressives, the 37%, the liberal democratic base, that does want impeach to begin today, it's going to be interesting to watch the speaker navigate these waters. it has been in the early weeks. >> when we look at the republican senators, mitt romney is the only one that spoke up about the mueller report and all the evidence accumulated in the mueller report. and you have got lindsey graham as chairman of the judiciary t committee saying he's noen saying he's going to let mueller testify. let me show you another lindsey graham, a different president, a different impeachment issue. >> you don't even hao be convicted of a crime to lose your job in this constitution republic. if this body determines that your conduct as a public official is clearly out-of-bounds in your role.
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impeachment is not about puniment. impeachment is about cleansing f thce. >> helene cooper? >> that's the sort of video which has been going around all week that makes people so skeptical and so disgusted with politics. i mean, that's why at the end of the day, this entire debate is all political theater. it is all about who is maneuvering to make sure that they look good. let's face it. it is already 2020. we're in an election year. this is the election cycle. the president's election cycle has begun. what you are seeing now is all about how do we maneuver ourselve nancy pelosi trying to balance her progressives versus her more centrist democrats. you see on the republican side they want this mueller report to go away. >> you got to see the republican party today. that interview you did with senator johnson, he's using the word sabotage. president trump wo using the scum, coup. if the house democrats choose to
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peach, every senate republican source i have says that impeachment dies in the senate. a trial will never go forward. >> hasn't the president with tht help of the rney general branded this before the mueller report came out. for three weeks they went around saying exonerated, no collusion, no conspiracy. >> and then people got a look at the report and they saw it was a faly dreadful portrait. i don't think it told us exactly things that we didn't know that were shocking. i think we had a sense of the reigning reality there in the white house. let me throw in, by the way, if the house moves to impeach and if it has big, serious, prolonged hearings, i think as everybody mes the president will really hate that. 's going to use that fact every day on tv. he's going to use it as a foil. he's going to be tweeting. he's going to be fighting. he going to be playing the part of the besieged person. i think he will love it and nothing will get done for the next year. >> we're going to leave it
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there. we'll be back ie a bit. when wcome back next, the woman who raised early alarms about trump administration contacts are russia. former deputy attorney general usly yates joining me next. contacts are ra. contacts are ra. what if other kindof plants plcaptured it too?.s if these industrial plants had technology that captured carbon like treeso we could help r emissions. carbon capture is important technology - and experts agree. that's why we're working on ways to improve it. so plants... can be a little more...li ke plants. ♪
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and welcome back. former deputy attorney general sally yates is one of those figures who ems to showp at key moments in the trump presidency. in january of 2017, only days after the inaugural, yates told administration officials she believed michael flynn had lied to them about his contacts with the russian ambassador to the u.s., sergei kislyak. yates herself wasired as acting ag that samefor refusing to enforce president's trump's executive order from seven predominantly muslim country. the president cite yates who launched the phony fbi investigation. sally yates joins me now. welcome. good to see you. >> thanks for having me. >> i want to ask you about the president in wisconsin night referring to former fbi officials who began this
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investigation as scum. >> yeah. you knowhe's referred to them as scum. he's accused people of spying and, you know, i think those are words that we really shouldn't be ttowing around abou the men and women in law enforcement and in our intelligence community. >> the mueller report cites 140 contacts according to a tally nn "the york times," at least 140 contacts, including 13 from the president himself with russia during the campaign andr afteds in the transition. does this mean the president is completely exonerate even though because of a lot of other issues not being able to interview the president, not being able to talk to a lot of the otherwitnesses, e-mails that were eliminated, there was no grounds for a osecution. >> well, you know, if you read the entire mueller report, i think it paints a devastating portra a president and a campaign who welcomed a foreign adversary's ille interference
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in our election, who have been continually lying about it. and then used the power of the presidency to try to forward investigation into his own conduct. that's oo not exoneration. well, theeport makes it clear that there was no exoneration on obstruction. but speaking first to the russian issue which you just raised, if not for the office of legal counsel prohibition against indicting a president, should there have been further steps? do you think that their effect onbstruction would have been an indictment? >> well, i have been a prosecutor for nearly 30 years. i can tell you i persally prosecuted obstruction cases on far, far less evidence than this. and, yes, i believef he were not the president of the united states, he would likely be indicted on obstruction. >> if you were the ceo of the ompany, if you were a private citizen, the teninstances in the obstruction part of the report would have led to an
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indictment. >> i'm not surehat all ten would. i think special counsel mueller did a fair job in going through all ten instances and laying out the facts that established that e had committed a crime of obstruction, but also pointing out the defenses, both legal and factual. but there are several incidents that he described to which special counsel mueller really couldn't point toignificant or factual legal defenses. >> and which in particular do you cite ashe most significant, the red flags that you see? >> well, the ones that he found that all three elements were satisfied were with respect to trying to fire robert mueller for don mcgahn, then trying to get don mcgahn to lie about it later. not just his own lies, but trying to get someone else to lie about it, too. and then trying toabin the scope of the investigation to what's really nonsensica to campaign interference in future
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elections. >> do yt think tha if he is not re-elected and the statute of limitations does t run out until 2022 that he could be prosecuted after leaving office. >> the mueller respect references that, what could happen in the short term but also the long term wh could be prosecuted. i think the bigger issue is not just whether or not this estaishes a crime that can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, but is this the kind of conduct that shoul expect from the president of the united states? i mean rn, when thes russi came knocking at their door, you would expect that a man who likes to make a show of hugging the flould have done the patriotic thing and would have notified law enforcement. >> in fact, his personalrn at rudy giuliani said on this program last week that there is no problem with a candidate welcoming support from
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a foreign adversary such as russia. in that's a shock statement and it reflects how they have moved the goal post when the truth comes out. they constantly said we didn't have anything to do with rush hns. and when the truth comes out and reveals that's a lie, now we have devolved down to, there is nothing wrong from taking help, illegal help from a foreign adversary. surely that's not where we have come to. >> a lot of people think that whiffed.ueller he should have pushed the envelope and subpoenaed the president and forced the president to take e fifth if he wants to. >> well, look, it is easy to sit in armchairs and say what we woulhohave done in t circumstances. i think what you see is that robert mueller did the job he was asked to do and he called it right down the middle. >> some legal experts looking at the mueller report look at the tnes about donaldmp jr. saying that they wanted to interview him, were not able to
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and then the next portion is redacted according to grand jury testimony with that code. does thatou indicate to y as it has to some legal rex that don jr. may have gone in front of a grand jury and taken the fifth? >> you know, certainly people have speculated as to that. ofere is some indication that, but i don't know for certain. but, you know, beyond that, it is absolutely rmarkable to me that the president of the united states refused to sit down and answer questions about his or his campaign's involvement with the russians in the 2016 election or obstruction. >> going forward, we have t mueller report and now william barr threatening to not even appear before the house. that still has toed be work out. did the attorney general -- i know you don't want to speak about the successors in the ju ice department, but what about the fact that he misrepresented the mueller report in his initial four-page summary and i his news conference referred to collusion
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four times, not a legal term, but a signal apparentlyto the president certainly taking the president's word a misrepresented it even minutes before the report itself was released. >> let me answer it this way is that the department of justice is not just another federal agency. and the attorney general is not the president's lawyer. and icall when i was named united states attorney. we were all called to the white house for what was a photo op with president obama. he came in and the first words out of his mouth were i may have appointed you, but you don't represent me. you represent the people of the united states, and that's the way it's supposed to be. >> and your implication is it is not the way it is right now. >> welthanks for having me. >> newdetails on how democrats gained 40 seats in the 2018 [farmers bell]
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l,wel the u.s. census bureau reported this week the flip was fueled by a huge turnout. and that turnout was fueled by voters typically vote democratic. voter turnout was up among all age groups, but especially younger voters. 36% of voters aged 18 to 29 showed up toin vote 2018. 16 points higher than in the previous midterm and a whopping 49% of 30 to 44 year olds, both groups voting heavily for democrats. obously it was up among all ethnic groups. but the significant gains were among asian andpa miicrs vote compared with less than 30% four years earlier. finally there was a double digit rcentage point jump in what we call educated voters. 55% of people with some college, 56% of people with a bachelors
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degree, 74% of people with advanced post graduate degrees all showing up to vote in november. to does that mean the democrats already have it in the bag for 2020? not so fast. midterm turnout is always lower than it is in a presidential ar ye. and overall 2018 turnout was still eight percentage pointser than it was 2016. president trump wasn't on the ballot in last year's midterms and you can bet the president supporters will vote next year. the 2018 turnout numbers are a good sign or democrats. they offer no guarantees. when we come back with the most diverse roster of candidates, why are kevin, meet your father. kevin kevin kevin kevin kevin kevin kevin kevinn kevi
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and we're back now with end game. joe biden in, all in, and with that charlottesville video sheing he will campaign on character and contrast with donald trump, whys donald trump so worried about him? as early as last fall, trump was talking privately with a about the threat biden posed. how are we going to beat biden. he was assured the moderate biden will never defeat several of his rivals. trump has pushed back, but what if he does. >> the president believes vice president biden is a veryfo
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idable candidate. he talked to voter downs there, rank ae democrats. they say vice president biden was part of the obama administration. he was a very important part of legacy. he has a real history in the democratic party. they're talking about senator harris. they're talking about vice president biden. this is a wide open race, but vice president biden has more political capital on the ground than he may get credit for on places like twitter. >> let's take a look at a poll today. joe bid is up there on the top. this may explain why the white house is focussed on . bernie sanders 11%. kamala harris 4%, o'rourke 4%, all in single digits other than the top three. but peggy, look at the gender issue. we've got three white men ahead
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ofhe all t women and corey booker, a man of color, you know, the diverse field. and it's the white guys who are out front. >> yeah. it is the most diverse field ever, i think. when you look at the early polling, a it isearly, it does come down to these figures like biden and bernie. it seems to me we are going to find out if joe biden's old '70s l style honed in the and '80s can translate into 2020, into this also think because of past issues of his, there will be a sort of daily do you recant, mr. vice president? do you recant on this issue? and we're going so him being pressed to recant on things he actually believes in, which would be uncomfortable. >> i think there are two types of candidates that pose the greatest threat to the president. one is a coalition type
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candidate like debi and another is a movement type candidate. the problem withen is that he has started his campaign with an apology tour. and there are lessons to be learned from donald trump. bob and i were talking about this earlier. you could apologize for your mistakes. you should. but i don't think you shold apologize for who you are. and i have seen a little bit of that from joe biden. and i don't think it's lievable because i don't think anyone believes joe biden at 76 is a different person than he was ten years ago. he hasn't really apologized to anita hill. >> yeah. but i think that story will be gone in a week. this is something that people jumped on because the day that e opened his campaign they somehow ended up, found themselves talking about anita hill. but i don't think people are going to relitigate the clarence somas hearing at thi point in the game. that would be suicidal for the democrats to do now, to turn that sort of an issue into
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a negative for a democrat. and i think what you are seeing with biden-- nobody is going to win the democratic nomination if they cannot galvanizehe african-american vote. joe biden freakishly can. ka kamala harris probably can. bernie sanders cannot. i think what you are seeing when you see this leap of biden straight to the top of polls is that, a lot of black people look at him as an obama guy. so i think you are going to see somef thatind of stuff solidify as we go -- as we move forward. i'm really curious to see what kamala harris does movinth down line. this was a job for bernie sanders in 2016. i think it's still going to be a problem for him. >> the funny thing about the age factor is that bernie sanders has more young people supporting him and he's older than joe biden. but the president is tryingto
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paint sleepy joe with all of these insults and playing on the age. the president is 72. joe biden is 76. >> i just fe like a young man. i'm so young. i am a young, vibrant man. >> if he looks young and vibrant compared to me, i should probably go home. >> this is the president who has had to ride in a golf cart at the g-7 in sicily. >> young or juvenile? young or juvenile? >> everything old is new again. that'sa p of the story of 2020. >> age, put that on a shelf. he has pow inside of the republican party. also interesting this week, governor larry hogan goes to new hampshire. but when you talk to republican voters, they say they're almost 100% like senator johnson with the president. they're at these rallies. ny kind of primary challeng appears to be fizzling.
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>> that base is pretty solid, isn't it? >> i will say age isn't what it used to be. my dad is about to turn 80. he's inea grshape. and trump and biden both make good candidates. >> we will have to leave it there. thank you all for watching.ll chuck wi be back next week because if it's sunday, it's "meet the press."
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