i know bob muller. and folks ought to have tremendous confidence in him. i mean, he is the consummate professional. he's going to call it like he sees it. he's going to do in the right way. but bob muller is going to be deciding whether or not crimes were committed that could be used for prosecution or for impeachment. surely that's not our bar. that's not the standard of conduct that we're looking for from a president or our administration. it shouldn't just be whether you committed a felony or not. it should also be whether or not you're observing the kind of norms that we've been talking about here today that are so essential to really the fabric of the rule of law. while i have total confidence in robert mueller and his ability to conduct this investigation, i don't think that we should just be putting all of our hopes in -- that will tell us whether anything bad happened here because there's potential and i don't know what the facts are. so i'm not drawing conclusions about what -- about what he may ultimately determine. but you know, there are facts

they're all involved jared pushchair and donald trump jr now there i'm afraid he'll end up hiring bob muller because that's the way he is and that's what he did to jim comi and if he does that you'll have to go through people at the justice department to do it will be like a saturday night massacre and you'll see unrest around the country because it'll be the equivalent of a war on the rule of law so you better be going back to the nixon era. and indeed it will and it's scary this is even you know nixon did a few good things with the some environmental. issues the clean air act and going to china but he had he had a. moral deficiency morally challenge drummer son in law gerry cushing and his campaign for attended that meeting the done who do you went to what about their legal liability should clear shouldn't still have security clearance i don't think he should i mean that's an important thing and. you need to have allegiance only the united states of america now only to meet with the russians which was improper but he didn't disclose that until recently there have been too many areas where

bob muller is as fine a gentleman as i've come in contact with in the united states government he was highly respected this highly respected by everybody that knows this job he did at the f.b.i. he is a class act. do you really think trump could draw but. i think he might you know his his impulse was to go after people and to fire people that's what he did on television you're fired that's what he likes to do. he did it with cali i believe that was because he was hot on the tracks and i think he'll do what mahler tell you. why these things steve that he has it in seems to regard putin so things are a bit. it's bizarre larry he treats angela merkel with disdain on occasion he has run ins with the australian prime minister he very you know that mt bunting they grow president the mexican president so many people he has bad things to say about but who he treats like. is best friend in the world. who's not a good guy he was a k.g.b. agent once k.g.b. always k.g.b. i was in minsk at the time the trumpet who we were talking at the g. twenty. we had votes there on human rights democracy elect

a mistake for him to recuse himself i think they're just going door to this endless probe by by bob muller that's going to drag in the next year and be used to essentially as a as a way to bring down the administration and also the very first day he walked into office he should have set up a test task force to seek out leakers and indict them and throw them in jail where is the secretly impaneled grand jury handing down indictments as far as i know it's not happening or else that would have been leaked and said he's giving speeches talking about nancy reagan just say i don't know drugs and stepping up civil forfeiture is those are not the things that should be the top of his agenda so if these criticisms which i don't think should be done publicly can focus him on what the president's agenda are and start putting some of these deep state leakers in jail that would be a good start you know and do the whole issue of loyalty and not in the old lordi way of the jim comi i thought that was just absolutely clownish of him going in front of the congress but you know they were the biggest the bigg

charlie: that there is something that will be discovered by bob muller that will be more than embarrassing. john: let's say at a minimum that the investigation could presidency at the minimum, consume it and allow get anything done and at the negative extreme could be it.hreat to end mark: he may fear much more than this but without knowing any than either ofth you, he fears that the independent counsel will investigate things beyond russia. he fears -- charlie: meaning the building of his financial empire? mark: right. he fears his children will be dragged into this in a way that will be bad for their lives and he fears that people will start cooperating with the independent all sorts ofting potential problems. charlie: to save their own skin. and: to save their own skin obviously he fears that this he could donything to be considered a great president. charlie: and ruin re-election? mark: oh, sure. he may fear substantially more least at aut at minimum, those things. john: don jr. is now dragged into the middle of this, jared is dragged into the middle of this, dragging at least by marri

the real news is that it is now on the record that bob muller is investigating trump jr.'s meeting. he called the eighth person's lawyer over the weekend and said would he be willing to answer questions and be interest vurd and he's willing to cooperate and that's the first indication we have he is investigating trump jr.'s meeting which is a big deal. >> what do we know about this eighth person and should this be something eyebrows are raised about or the fact we did not know about it until now. >> he has ties to -- he's firm that is owned by two of the men who are in the meeting as well and who have close ties to put inin kremlin. he is rush ran and u.s. citizen and i think win thing to note that may have gone overlooked is in 2000 he was president of company in del dem and it was under congressional investigation for russian foreigners living in u.s. laundering money illegally for u.s. banks through russia. he was never charged with anything. lawyer maintains he was never indicted or there was no indication of wrong doing just the fact he has close ties to the kremlin and was in

he fired the fbi director and that led to bob muller becoming the special counsel. every time they take a step to obstruct this investigation because he wants it shut down, it ends up back firing. i think this effort to discredit the staff is going to end up the exact same way. >> brian, how much of the sum total of mistakes made thus far by the administration can be chalked up to ignorance, ignorance of how washington works, ignorance of the law, ignorance of all matters integrity related and even ignorance that the world contains people like robert muller who see this as a calling and cherish their integrity? >> well, i'm going to check probably number d, all of the above. look, brian, you make a great point and i actually caught a repeat of a movie i hadn't seen in a long time, "all the president's men" the other day. there's a great scene where woodard and deep throat were in the parking garage and how hull bert tells redford, you have to understand these guys in the white house. they're just not all that bright. i think, you know, history repeats itself is a fa

advice in an fbi investigation, a department of justice investigation supported by the fbi with bob muller really want somebody that could be implicated or might say something they didn't say to the fbi. i was a little surprised to see that they are going to actually testify on the hill. they are under oath. they could be charged with perjury if they lie. if they tell the fbi one thing and the senate another thing, they have trouble ahead of them, legal trouble. they might now only be in political trouble. i was a little surprised to see it. it is going to be interesting to watch. i guarantee you, there are going to be folks watching from the department of justice patching as eager as any other viewer of that testimony. >> so the former campaign manager, paul manafort, is the vet here among the three in terms of politics, being involved in many political arenas. how much will he be pressed on knowing how this proposed meeting with russians should have been handled? he wouldn't be able to proclaim being naive. >> if a foreign government says that, i don't buy that argument as a former fbi a

surprised to every sentence but i think he has got to protect the justice department and protect bob mullerion. can he do that? we have john podesta with us giving advice for the incoming white house chief of staff general john kelly. and when it comes to john miller transit secretary john kelly taking the reins tomorrow in the west wing. more testimony is expected in investigation by muller and delving into a variety of areas. the president repeatedly questioning his impartiality and whether or not he can be fair. the president also shown his cards about jeff sessions. what does all this mean for the investigation? must bring in our panel robert ray is a former whitewater independent counsel. a criminal defense attorney also both of you welcome. bob let me start with you. because you are the former independent counsel and you issued a wide-ranging report. the president's criticisms and attacks, do you think that they will derail robert muller and his investigators? >> i think what we find ourselves at the end of july that there was a trial balloon sent up, the outcome at least for the fore

has hired a lawyer and that he and his lawyer are going to have some follow-up conversations with bob muller and his team, it doesn't matter whether you actually act on an illegal meeting. the state of mind is part of any crime. the intent matters. when you are talking about conspiracy or collusion, the state of mind is most of what we are talking about here. if you get together and you know that. there is an e-mail that proofs it. there is an e-mail saying that the russian government has compromising information on hillary clinton. would you like to meet and talk about it? you are three-quarters of the way to having a real problem. whether you decide to do something or you figure out all of the information, there is a problem here. it cries out for further investigation. who else knew about it? where did it come from? did you pass the information on to anybody else? what was your state of mind or the state of mind of the campaign. were you looking for this kind of information from other sources? did any of it ever come? on and on and on. the fact that you now have these seven people that ke

bob muller, i have no idea where it's going or how long it's going to take, and frankly, i should notnow where it's going or how long it's going to take. >> bret: here is jared kushner from yesterday about being pretty definitive. >> i did not collude with russia. nor do i know if anyone else in the campaign who did so. i had no improper contacts. i have not relied on russian funds for my businesses. and i have been fully transparent in providing all requested information. >> bret: do you believe that to be true? did he answer all the questions today behind closed doors? >> he answered all the questions even when the democrats ran out of good questions, he kept answering them. he stayed one hour longer than he was supposed to. in fact, he stayed for one hour longer than dni dan coats date, who is the head of our intelligence committee. if you played a quote he used the phrase in the campaign. i went back through the quote with him word by word and said take out part of the campaign. do you know of anyone period who can do not collude in and could have inspired with the russians 2016 p

going after the media in this case doesn't work, because these are his own words and going after bob mullertigators, that may buy them some time, i don't think that when them the argument. >> bret: it's tough with manafort in the room? >> it is and he was caught with the emails. he saying he didn't read it. >> being an amateur explains to me why you didn't take the meeting, you have to be a professional to know what's right and what's wrong. it's been with the story obviously not ending and more just on the other side of this break. ♪ >> bret: just another programming note. a reminder that donald trump should and will tell his side of the story tonight here on fox news channel. with sean hannity. we'll get reaction to the rhetoric coming out of democrats, some republicans even, and the democrats using words like perjury and even treason. it is a "hannity" exclusive here on fox news channel. you don't want to miss this. set the dvr if you're not going to be home. there will be talking about it for a number of days, as will be, and cover all of the news here on "special report." that is it fo

that they had with this russian 'emmisary, this woman attorney, and that's going to be the job of bob mullerl of those at moss fimospherics. >> so some supporters say the president essentially shrugged it off. obviously some people are defending it. on the other side i heard a lot of people say to me today, you know, ig nornls norance is no d when it comes to the law. if this had happened and the president or donald trump jr. had come forward with this information last year, what do you think jim comey who was then fbi director would have done? >> i think they would have considered, you know, certainly looking at the background of this russian emmissary, this woman who is representing herls as herself as a representative of the government. looking at that from a criminal perspective, a counter intelligence perspective, digging into her background very quickly, evaluating whether they should wire one of these folks or all of these folks or the room up for consensual monitoring to capture follow-on conversations, to see if she would perfect what she was proposing, that she had some sort of rus

that you told me when we met privately that you would provide whatever resources are needed by bob muller to do that investigation. >> i would invite all appropriate resources. my experience with director mueller, when we worked together before, was always terrific. and i feel confident that he would be professional and only make appropriate requests. >> will you commit to report to this committee any attempts to deny him and that investigation resources or other support that are needed by others in the administration? >> senator, if there was an inappropriate request to deny him appropriate resources, i would try to evaluate the circumstances and take all appropriate action. >> will you be making records of your conversations as jim comey did? as you recall, director comey contemporaneously made memoranda to reflect his conversations with the president and others. would you do the same? >> i think it would depend on the situation, senator. i can commit that i would be listening very intently to any conversation i had with anybody of consequence. to me, that's the most important thing. if

but it's exactly those decisions about the access to resources, the scope, the trajectory of bob muller's investigation that i wanted to make sure i got to. will you commit to studying the scope of attorney general sessions' recusal and ensuring appropriate procedures are in place to honor it at the fbi and then reporting any violations of that recusal to this congress? >> well, senator, i'm not sure i'm the authority over his recusal scope. what i would commit to you is that i will take a close look shortly upon being confirmed, if confirmed, to, as i said, making sure that former director mueller, now special counsel muller, has all the appropriate resources that he ought to have. and my expectation is that i would remain committed to that support, regardless of any decisions by anybody else in the department. >> so in a directive came down from the attorney general about prioritization or resources that you thought inappropriately interfered, were interfered in any way with the resources requested by special counsel muller, you would act to prevent that from hindering the investigation

. >> he has to protech the justice department, and he has to protect bob muller and the investigationgoing on there, from the con continued assault fbi president and by the white house. it is his job to provide a -- against interference by the white house which in the enof day is going to get them in more trouble rather than less. >> according to the -- president trump is hoping kelly can bring some military order to an administration that is rocked by leaks and infighting. >>> our time is 733 tim. people who park at -- who park at bart will do more to shake tour they're cars are not -- their cars are not burglarized. there were several car burglarys in oakland over weekend. >> reporter: yes, car break-ins are a growing problem for cities throughout bay area. this is an on going issue in bart parking lots are not immune the is next to the rock ridge bart station. you can see this parking spots filled up compare today an hour ago as people example toward the train station. here on friday, at least two cars were broken into and the burglar who block into being of those vehicles did get

. >> and look, i do think there was a shift around when they announced bob muller. that was a way to le but to mark's earlier point about the contours of the timeline and what was going on very early in the campaign, remember what the russian m.o. has been not just here but around the world, which is to he was an agent of chaos that was potentially undermining the whole rest of the field. so from that perspective, that represents an opportunity. >> well, he remained that way throughout the entire process. >> and remains it now. >> yeah, remains it now. sam stein, two new stories out on russia. two more pieces that we're learning about that obviously bob mulle -- mueller and the justice department have to be investigating, this new digital piece that hillary clinton's been suspicious of for some time but also that we've quietly been hearing about and now we know the justice department's looking into it. >> yeah, on the digital piece, you know, i did a story shortly after the campaign where i reached out to voters who said they had decided in the last week why and how

there are bipartisan investigations led by republicans in the senate and the house, bob muller, a republicanl over a year since the campaign and it just doesn't hold water. >> what they have been saying is there was no collusion. that is a far different cry. i think it's inaccurate to say there was collusion when all the evidence, despite hours and hours of democratic witchhunt, there are no evidence of collusion. >> he has said they're not involved. he's never come out clean and said yes, russia influenced our elections. these investigations are being led by republicans in congress. >> i want to ask you this pointed question. this administration has been accused of leaking, do we really think collusion, if it had been happening, would have been kept a secret this long when we have seen so many leaks out of this white house? >> i'm not going to say whether or not there was collusion. i'm an essay there needs to be an investigation and there are and we should not prejudge it. that's essential. we have topline investigators who are bipartisan, looking at this, and i know believe we should say

muller much as he did fired fbi director james comey. democrats aren't the only ones who would call that crazy. >> it sort of looks paranoid to me. and the fact is i know bob mueller for a long time. i worked in the justice department. he is a man of integrity, very highly respected in washington. when he was pick, very bipartisan support for this man. we need to let him do his job. wherever that may lead. i think if he fired bob mueller, i think he'd see a tremendous back losh responsibilities from democrats but also house democrats. >> become lash from both sides, democrats and republicans. it really could happen, especially as muller continues to dig in to his investigation. and it could lead to a final disclosure of donald trump's tax returns or at least add to a little bit that has dripped out over the last couple of years people have been looking for them. david kay johnson, richard painter, chief white house ethics lawyer under george w. bush. and steffi pinkel. david, if i recall correctly how it came to you, what would bob mueller be looking for specifically in going through trump's tax records? >> well, donald trump has had dealings with the so-c

the real story as ever is bob mueller and special council what he's looking into and you see in that "new york times" interview real news that the president's concern muller is looking into his personal finances in the trump organization. >> rose: some speculate that's the reason all along why donald trump did not want to reveal his income taxes. >> the question about russian money past ventures over the last decade has been an unanswered question throughout this entire process. clearly if you just look at the president's remarks, he's skittish about the idea the tacks returns being reviewed by mueller or elements of his financial record being finally reviewed. because the president believes he can perhaps escape any kind of obstruction charge or how he handled the investigation with comey and others. if it becomes a broader investigation with a scope that goes way back into the 1980's, 19 0's when he was struggling with his finances, when his businesses were in death and hw foreign inversus played in it that's something he doesn't want to confront. >> rose: bob costa from "the washington post." thank you so much. >> thank you. >> rose: we'll be right bac