that bring us to andrew weissman and the question, did he break rules? answer from someone who was mueller's top person and respected prosecutor. i'm interested in the answer, when we come back. the oh, you know what, andrew? we're not coming back. you're here right now. i got confused. sometimes we do that. they call it a tv tease. >> well, that was quite the tease then. >> hey, you can see, it's like in our blood. no, the question remains, did he break any rules? and "b," when you look at that answer, does it tell you he doesn't really want to get into this in any way? or am i overreading it? >> let's start with the did he break any rules. it really depends on what the it is, because barr did so many things that were improper. if you're asking the question about just meeting with a prosecutor and having drinks with them, i mean, it clearly shows a lack of independence, but that's not against the rules, and that could be done by somebody and be totally proper. that's not bill barr's sin. bill barr's sins are so many and so varied, whether it is interven

this is andrew weissman is thean most ethically bankrupt prosecutor i've ever dealt with . think it'swhole crewcally baros. >> i don't think it's coincidental that lisa monacomo is running the shonaco'sw. y >> well, to have learned today that they searched the beach house. right. say regular people don't follow house,, that rig say closely.e they think, wow, they're being really thorough. this is great. , this iso biden's being very y and very transparent, but you have to kind of follow that timeline that we just laid out this november 2nd to february 1st. this is still going on , but it seems like it's a choreographed show . t that's my whole point here.med h itor seemed choreographed oh, to elicit this response from the public of, oh, wow, thank you for cooperating and being so transparent. trump would never have gotten away with anything like this. >> no, you're absolutely right. and that latter point, of course, and the problem also is that in between we've heard assurance after assurance that this is the end of it and there are no more documentcuments s a on . listen,

some of our favorite reporters, barbara mcquade, a law professor the university of michigan, andrew weissmanf robert mueller's special counsel investigation, with me at the table tim o'brien, bloomberg opinion senior executive editor and host of bloomberg's crash course podcast. lucky for us, they are all msnbc contributors. let me show you former fbi director jim comey on trump aka the mob. >> how strange is it for you to sit here and compare the president to a mob boss? >> very strange. and i don't do it lightly. i am not trying to, by the way, suggest that president trump is out breaking legs and shaking down shopkeepers, but instead what i'm talking about is that leadership culture constantly comes back to me when i think about my experience with the trump administration. >> andrew weissman, people up close and personal to donald trump and something that comes through in the transcripts that have been released by the january 6th select committee, people who interacted with trump describe him the way jim comey and mark pomerantz seem to. you have investigated his inner circle. does that r

andrew weissman, the mueller prosecutor. he was general counsel of the fbi. knows all about these issues and has spoken out on them since leaving government, and former district attorney for the southern district of new york and my former boss, david kelly. >> good to see you, ari. >> thank you. andrew, i'm going to start with you because this has so many federal interbranch issues. i walked through some of the history, but bottom line, how strong would pence's argument be, and how long would this take? >> well, the last is really the key, because unlike executive privilege, which i think was a dead loser and the courts are really clear that was not going to be a great argument for donald trump to make to block pence's testimony, this is largely unchartered -- or the absolute -- the claim there's no way for pence to testify at all, to block all of his grand jury testimony, i think that is something courts have not dealt with, this claim that the vice president can be considered within this speech and debate clause is going to be a new issue. so when you say n

. >> all of the intrigue, fresh off the incredible interview, blaine alexander joins us, andrew weissmand lawrence o'donnell, former justice department prosecutor, and senior counsel of robert mueller investigation, he is lucky for us, a nbc legal analyst and at the table, many time zones away, harry litman, former deputy assistant attorney general, we have talked in therapy lately, i will start with you. [ laughter ] blaine was first, it is a huge get. it makes our jaws dropped, because it is such a secretive process we believe but a two- part question, does it need to be, and 2, what happens now? >> it is what is going on at the time, the judge had jurisdiction and say be quiet, now they have been discharged so they don't have to, what happens now? fanny willis takes -- she is not much of a poker player, of course, taken the information that i think we can suss out pretty well that's been given to her, it would be a profound surprise if she departed in material ways, more than a little bit, from what they are recommending. >> is cheapest, did she say darn it? >> yes, in other words, no

pack of really qualified financial forensic accountants who came in and we used to tell them, andrew weissman manafort and others, that was hard complicated financial work. trump's finances are orders of magnitude more complex than anything paul manafort ever did. john durham's team the most i've seen reported is he had at most eight, ten personnel. certainly without any of the same sort of financial expertise that mueller did. so when it comes to a question about where this investigation led that bill barr decided to leave with john durham, my question is what happened? what's the resolution? because again, i'm willing to bet you the resolution was we couldn't figure this out because it was too hard. and time and time again like everybody that bumps their head up against the trump financial empire, it is so big, so opaque, so apparently corrupt that is hard as an investigator to get your head around the facts and prove something out. >> can i just push back gently and respectfully without any of the expertise you have? doesn't trump tell us what he does all the time? i don't pay my taxes bec