let me take it to chuck rosenberg who is also joining us. uck, we now have a couple of charges that we know routh is facing, possession of a firearm by a prohibited person, particularly a convicted felon, as well as possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. that at least are the initial charges. your thoughts on these charges and where this case goes next? >> sure. ana, so what happened today in federal court was an initial appearance where a defendant who has been charged by criminal complaint, in this case by federal prosecutors, appears in front of the federal magistrate judge who advises the defendant mr. routh of the charges. we heard what they are. no surprises there, as tom winters surmised with all of this gentleman's previous arrests at least one resulted in a conviction that makes him a prohibited person, that means he can't possess, own, carry a firearm. at this point all the prosecutors have to do is file a charge, one charge, in this case they filed two to hold him. that gives them more time to investigate, that

back with us is chuck rosenberg. chuck, were you struck by anything that the mayor said during his comments? >> well, several things, jose. first and foremost, his lawyers cannot possibly want him out there talking to the press, commenting on the evidence, explaining what he knows and what he doesn't know, taking responsibility for, you know, being the main point of contact for all city agencies. you know who else is listening to his press conference, jose? the prosecutors. and anything that mr. adams says publicly, anything he talks about, all that could be used as evidence against him if there's ever a trial in this matter. so, terrible idea for him to be doing that. second, and lisa rubin alluded to this earlier, and i think she's right, there are almost always cooperators. in this case, i don't know exactly who they are and i don't know exactly what they said. that will be -- that story will be told in the months to come. but a case like this is not built solely on documents, although documents will have an import

attorney chuck rosenberg, and maura gay, a member of the "new york times" editorial board., these are serious charges. >> that's right. i was struck by the tone of u.s. attorney williams today. i have seen him speak at public events, do a host of press conferences speaking about the things that his team and the fbi have uncovered in the course of their investigations. what struck to me today was his tone. just how pointed he was in going through the allegations step by step, which are contained in the indictment. we heard the same thing from the new assistant director in charge of the fbi in new york, talking about the violation of public trust. the thing that was said at the end of the briefing -- he did not take any questions. but one of his last remarks was, we will hold more people accountable. you know as i do, andrea, that typically at the end of the press conferences, they say the investigation is ongoing. we will continue to look into things. we know the investigation is ongoing because as you showed, the fbi showed up at gracie mansion this morning. the tip-off is

chuck rosenberg? >> i think katherine laid out very well the issue for judge merchan.s the verdict get set aside because of what happened at trial, what already transpired, essentially violated a supreme court decision that came after, or was the harmless error? in other words, was there official act -- evidence introduced at trial and if there was did it prejudice the jury and the case? or was it of little consequence given the overwhelming nature of the other evidence? there's a big distinction between what judge chutkan has to do and what judge merchan has to do. judge chutkan has to take a decision from the supreme court and apply it to a case that has not yet been tried. judge merchan has to take a decision from the supreme court and apply it to a case that has already been tried. and so in some ways, i think a harder task for judge merchan. i don't know where he's going to come out. i think katherine would agree, there are arguments on both sides. my sense of it, chris, is that most of the evidence, if not almost all of the evidence, introduced at the hush money

and msnbc legal analyst chuck rosenberg. what are we hearing this morning? >> several things.y, federal prosecutors are petitioning the court to keep ryan ruth behind bars. one of the things they are trying to show is how much of a potential danger he might be to the community and what their investigation has uncovered so far. so that's why we're getting these revelations. you're seeing the photo of the serial number on the rifle. here's a bigger picture. they were able the to get a fingerprint off that and that's contained within that photo is where they were able to get that fingerprint from and match it to ruth. it pertains to possible motive. a month ago, ruth dropped off a box of documents, which also contained ammunition, building materials, and within that is a letter where we talks about a failed assassination attempt among other things involving donald trump. so he specifically referencing a failed plot. so i think that's something that, obviously, speaks more to motive, not that anybody thought walking around the trump golf course while donald trump is golfing is for