it also appears to try to play down the importance of felix sater and his involvement in this project especially sater's comments in the e-mails that have been handed over to congress now and to some reporters in which felix sater brags that there's something about this real estate deal in moscow that in the end will result in donald trump becoming president of the united states. quote, our boy can become president of the usa and we can engineer it. i will get all of putin's team to buy in on this. i will manage this process. felix sater wrote this to michael cohen. michael, arranged for ivanka to sit in vladimir putin's chair at the kremlin. i know how to play it. we will get this done. michael cohen's strategy in releasing these documents to the press ahead of him giving them to congress involves him playing down whether or not felix sater would could have been serious about that. he said, quote, over the course of my business dealings with mr. sater, he has sometimes used colorful language and been prone to salesmanship. that said, when the "times" today went to check out felix sat

and now you've got felix sater saying to trump's personal lawyer, michael cohen, "let's engineer thelection with putin." ( laughter ) like, these people are so heavy handed, it's almost like the emails were composed by a porn writer. that's how blatant it is. "hello, i just moved in next door, and i'm so horny for collusion. yeah! yeah!" ( applause ) now, look, we don't know how bad this is. we don't know how it's going to end. what we do know is that now handsome bird has all the reason he needs to add trump's personal lawyer to this investigation. and i don't know about you, but my lawyer knows some ( bleep ) about me. no, i'm just joking. i don't have a lawyer. i don't even know what lawyers are. so this "buddy boy" email may not be the smoking gun for trump, but what it could end up being is the broken tail lights. yeah, the thing that gives law enforcement the excuse they need to look into trump's trunk. and we all know, he's got a lot of junk in that trunk. ( laughter ) ( applause ) we'll be right back. introducing the new moto z with moto mods. hello moto. ♪ ♪ (3-2-1 liftoff)

that e-mail sent by felix sater, with known mob ties. he was behind the trump's soho project in new york city. the recipient of the e-mail, michael cohen, president's long time lawyer and executive of the trump organization. in the wake of russia's interference in the trump administration and amid collusion in the trump campaign the president himself insisted he had no russian ties to compromise it. >> i had no dealings with russia. i have no deals in russia. i have no deals that could happen in russia.

we have felix sater saying this will get our guy elected president. ra knock ash meshen testified before the grand jury. is it possible that the circling never went anywhere other than the circling? >> no. i think it did go somewhere. i think where it went was on the russian intelligence side and not this traditional mfa, the equivalent of the state department. in the case of the testimony, the slam dunk in front of the grand jury would have been if anyone who was in the meeting with don jr. would come out and say not so much what they said to don jr. but admit that they were tasked directly by the kremlin. because they're russian nationals doesn't mean they're russian officials. i do think that there is a link there. at the end of the day, one of the last things president obama did before he left office was to throw out 35 russian spies and seize two intelligence compounds in the united states. i don't think that that was coincidence. i am sure there's a connection here, we just don't know about it publicly yet. >> jill, i want to ask you about anoth

i think the felix sater, michael cohen thing feels like it's in one category.e of the president's rhetoric. it doesn't feel central. this >> yes. i think he is looking at two things simultaneously. he is looking at obstruction, which is the easy one. whi why did he fire comey? why did he make certain statements? why did he come up with an excuse for firing comey? that only makes sense if he was trying to cover up something. you're seeing his efforts to impedes or divert or stop the investigation. i think he's going to go down these two tracks simultaneously. at the end we'll see what he's got. >> it does seem as though that the president, you hear this, he's more comfortable with the power he has on some of these things. i don't think mueller will get fired but a lot of people might get pardons. >> it's almost as if he was sending a message to the broader folks. if you sit tight and you're right by me, not necessarily right by the law, we'll issue pardons your behalf. >> there's no piece of the news in russia the last three days that's been excapultory to this

that e-mail sent by felix sater, with known mob ties. he was behind the trump's soho project in new york city. the recipient of the e-mail, michael cohen, president's long time lawyer and executive of the trump organization. in the wake of russia's interference in the trump administration and amid collusion in the trump campaign the president himself insisted he had no russian ties to compromise it. >> i had no dealings with russia. i have no deals in russia. i have no deals that could happen in russia. because we've stayed way. >> while that may have been strictly true when he said it this past january we now know it did not tell the whole story. "the washington post" broke this weekend. the trump organization did seek a deal to build a trump tower in moscow while its chief executive was act live i running for president. that effort led by sater and cohen lasted until january 2016 on the eve of the first primaries. but that point trump was leading the field for about six months. we know that sater and cohen weren't just going rogue beca

but now with 2015 and 2016 e-mails from trump associate felix sater coming to light this week, thereose statements were. trump himself tweeted back in 2013 that he'd be planning a tower in moscow. when did that planning ever stop? and also in the russia investigation could robert mueller be putting the squeeze on paul manafort? "the wall street journal" reporting that manafort's former lawyer and former spokesperson have been subpoenaed by mueller and his team. nbc news still working to confirm that report. and here to guide us through all of this is is our russia sherpa, nbc's ken dilanian. thank you for taking the time to kind of explain this. i mean, look, we have been focused very understandably on hurricane harvey. there are a lot of reports, new details from "the washington post," "new york times," from nbc news and you and your team. can you walk us through what you think the top line frame on this, what do we know now about the investigations that we don't know at the beginning of the week? >> absolutely, kasie. a number of things. the thing you just mentioned about this pote

. >> reporter: cohen also traded emails with felix sater, a business associate involved in the trumpower moscow project. sater claimed to have deep ties inside the kremlin. "our boy can become president of the u.s.a. and we can engineer it," mr. sater wrote. "i will get all of putin's team to buy in on this, i will manage this process." in a statement today, cohen described trump tower moscow as "a building proposal that did not succeed and nothing more." the project was scrapped shortly after cohen emailed peskov, the kremlin spokesman. >> the campaign is on its way to victory. >> reporter: cohen did not take a formal role in mr. trump's campaign but regularly appeared on television to praise the candidate. negotiations over trump tower moscow occurred between september 2015 and january 2016. a period during which mr. trump praised putin and russia. >> think of putin, pretty tough cookie, right? if putin likes me and he thinks i am a good smart person which i hope he believes that i am. actually he's right, i am brilliant, you know that. >> reporter: six months later, the president

in an email to trump's lawyer, real estate developer felix sater wrote -- "our boy can become president of the usa and we can engineer it. i will get all of putins team to buy in on this, i will manage this process." at the time, the trump organization was pushing to build a a massive trump tower in moscow. sater claimed to have secured financing for the project with vtb bank, a russian bank under u.s. sanctions. sater was also a former fbi informant who immigrated from russia as a child and grew up in brooklyn. the plans to build trump tower in moscow were abandoned at the end of january 2016, after the project failed to secure financing and government permits. trump is currently facing multiple investigations into his campaign ties to r russia. philippines president rodrigo dutertrte has told police offics to kill suspects if they try to resist arrest amongst his bloody so-called war on drugs. on monday, duterte told a locacl police chief -- "if he resists, and it is a violent one you are free to kill the idiots, that is my order to you." on saturday, more than 1000 faith leaders, res

he described those discussions as short and the intermediary he was working with was felix sater.cow to tour this proposal and even suggested to him that he could help him win the presidency. >> which is obviously an incredible thing at the end, to even suggest that he could win the presidency. how significant is all of this? >> well, i can tell you that special counsel robert mueller will likely be interested in this as part of the possible collusion with russia during the campaign investigation. investigators on the hill are interested and they received the e-mails today. he denied having any dealings in russia. michael cohen after the election denied having any dealings with russia and those statements are belied given the fact that they were trying to secure a real estate deal during the beginning of the campaign. >> pamela brown, thank you. >>> april, the trump administration was pursing plans to build a trump tower many moscow. we know that, contrary to what they said before. this went on well into the presidential campaign, 2016. his personal lawyer reached out to putin's t

but kushl crucially that is not now felix sater, the other side of the deal, portrayed the e-mails published again bit new york times. suggesting that the deal's success and vladimir putin's involvement could be the factor that put donald trump in the white house. i quote from that e-mail. buddy, our boy can become president of the usa and we can engineer it. i will get all of putin's team to buy on this. i will manage this process. i'm joined by two of the reporters who have been breaking these huge stories. ross lin helderman. and thank you both. ros rossalynn, i will start with you. complicated things in terms of the characters whaen we are learning. just the time line of this deal. one of the big revelations that starts in the reporting over the weekend and develops today is we were told that basically there is no overlap between donald trump running for president and trump pursuing a moscow deal. that is definitively not true, as we now know, right? >> right. donald trump starts running for president in june of 2015. we now know that in september of 2015 is when these conversations abou

. >> and ivanka trump got to do that thanks to the intersession of a career criminal, felix sater, aniate of donald trump's. can we -- can you stay with us, congressman? we need to squeeze in a quick break here, and we're going to come right back with congressman eric swalwell. we'll be right back. the average family's hectic home: its witnessed 2 diy duos, 31 crashes, 4 food fights, and the flood of '09. it's your paradise perfected with behr premium plus paint. the best you can buy starting under $25. only at the home depot. if you have moderate to severe ulcerative colitis or crohn's, and your symptoms have left you with the same view, it may be time for a different perspective. if other treatments haven't worked well enough, ask your doctor about entyvio, the only biologic developed and approved just for uc and crohn's. entyvio works by focusing right in the gi-tract to help control damaging inflammation and is clinically proven to begin helping many patients achieve both symptom relief as well as remission. infusion and serious allergic reactions can happen during or after treatm

he actually did respond to questions under oath in a deposition about felix sater, the twice convictedually pitched the whole trump tower and moscow idea and he said i wouldn't know him if he walked into a room. there are multiple pictures of trump with him, breaking ground for trump soho. sater had a business card that listed his office at trump tower and identifying him as a senior adviser to donald trump when allen garten was asked about this last year, he said the business card was in 2010 and the arrangement that sater had with the trump organization ended six months later. well, these e-mails show sater pitching a project in late 2015 and early 2016 to the trump organization. so there are a lot of reasons to question the credibility of the statements that the president and his top people have made about this for quite some time. >> jill, i've got an important question tonight about a report on subpoenas from the special prosecutor's office. robert mueller has subpoena's a spokesman for paul manafort demanding records related to his work with manafort, seeking that testimony. also

e-mailing with this russian american businessman with whom trump had done business in the past, felix sater is suggesting this project in moscow that michael cohen was working on, trump tower moscow, was potentially linked to obtaining russia's help in the election campaign, that these were somehow linked and cohen was taking him up on his offer and actually trying to get assistance from the kremlin on this offer. that also shows intent. whether they actually got anything or not and all evidence suggests ha they didn't, nonetheless, that they had acted on something they thought was going to involve russia and be of benefit to donald trump's presidential campaign. that is not to be taken lightly. >> mike mcfaul, this is an interesting one. there was actually a denial issued by a man named dimitry peskov, a press an tash shea to vladimir putin in which he says i confirm among a number of e-mails one from michael cohen came to us. this indeed happened said peskov during a telephone briefing with russian and foreign journalists. if it goes on to say, but as far as we don't respond to business t

and felix sater, long time associate of donald trump, who as you mentioned is russian-born, is in moscow encouraging the deal with a russian partner. and his contact in the trump organization is michael cohen. long time lawyer, council to trump organization. and a person who informally sometimes supported donald trump during the campaign, sometimes speaking for him on television network interviews. and what we know is that they desired starting in late -- in 2015 and through january 2016 to build this structure in moscow with sater often encouraging his boy hood friend and his ally back in trump tower, michael cohen, to encourage a meeting with vladimir putin. at one point suggesting they could get this deal done and they could get, they could help elect donald trump as president of the united states. >> so sater, you have sater here making all these claims, we're going to get this done and got to get you in touch with the russian administration here. is there any indication, is there any evidence of reciprocal interest from the russian government? >> so there is, we know, as you mention

. >> and ivanka trump got to do that thanks to the intersession of a career criminal, felix sater, anociate of donald trump's. can we -- can you stay with us, congressman? we need to squeeze in a quick break here, and we're going to come right back with congressman eric swalwell. we'll be right back. you owned your car for four years. you named it brad. you loved brad. and then you totaled him. you two had been through everything together. two boyfriends, three jobs... you're like nothing can replace brad. then liberty mutual calls... and you break into your happy dance. if you sign up for better car replacement™, we'll pay for a car that's a model year newer with 15,000 fewer miles than your old one. liberty stands with you™. liberty mutual insurance. take the zantac it challenge! pill works fast? zantac works in as little as 30 minutes. nexium can take 24 hours. when heartburn strikes, take zantac for faster relief than nexium or your money back. take the zantac it challenge. if you've got a life, you gotta swiffer the lincoln summer invitation is on. now get our best offers of the

the middleman for the moscow trump tower deal was a convicted felon and one-time fbi informant felix saterother trump deals. at the time of the moscow deal, trump executives denied to abc news that sater had any current role with mr. trump. >> to say he's a senior adviser to mr. trump would not be accurate. >> reporter: yet, sater was given cards by the trump organization, calling him a senior adviser to donald trump. even though under oath in a civil suit trump essentially denied knowing sater. >> if he were sitting in the room right now i really wouldn't know what he looked like. >> reporter: in e-mails turned over to congress between sater and trump's lawyer cohen first reported by "the washington post," sater wrote, buddy, our boy can become president of the usa and we can engineer it. i will get all of putin's team to buy in on this. in a statement, cohen's lawyer says he briefed trump about the russian project three separate times during the campaign but that the project was ultimately abandoned after problems with government approvals and finances. >> and time after time after time

in one exchange, felix sater wrote this.engineer it. i will get all of putin's team to buy in on this." i want to read that again because yori don't think i get full flavor of that quote. >> buddy, our boy. >> buddy, our boy can become president of the usa, and we can engineer it. i will get all of putin's team to buy in on this. >> i think that's bad. >> there have been attempts in the past. >> wait. what did i tell you? did i tell you there was more? >> you are going to get a blender with it. >> there is more if you call now. >> you get a second donald trump russia story. must pay shipping and handling. >> all for $19.99. >> he suggested he was not a trump intimate, but this is further evidence that he was, and to be trying to make a deal with russia at that time and then to act like they had no business interest in russia, there's no doubt that not just the congressional investigator is interested in this, but so is the impending counsel. stuff is leaking out. every time documents go to the hill, it leaks out. this is goi