trump justice department officials then told geoffrey berman and sdny officials to do it. fused saying there was no case there. trump justice department officials shopped it to another u.s. attorney, trying to get another prosecutor to bring it. that prosecutor refused to bring the case as well. when the campaign finance hush money case was according to berman purposely stalled out after michael cohen pled guilty in that case, when it was then being investigated by state prosecutors, berman describes the trump guys at the justice department also trying to force berman and sdny into telling federal court in new york that a sitting president not only couldn't be charged with any crimes, a sitting president couldn't be investigated for any crimes. berman did not believe that was true, and he refused that insistent demand from doj. just goes on and on and on. then there's this, one more piece that i want to read you. berman says this, he says, quote, i never speculated about the specific reasons bill barr wanted me out. as an attorney, i avoid allegations that do not yet have t

attorney general the southern district of new york was starting and then geoffrey berman come back, you can't fire me was even more stunning, and ultimately jeffrey berman's in that hour you described it just kind of indescribably important. who knows what donald trump and william barr or really up to and really trying to accomplish by trying to install the prosecutor that their choice in manhattan. >> exactly. what was that about how do we get to the bottom of what that was about? was the integrity of an individual investigation or multiple investigations at stake and will they continue to be at stake? they got away with decapitating and taking control of the u.s. attorney's office in washington, remaining the independents that office in washington. they're clearly making a go over the new york, i don't think this will be the one swap and, but boy do they bought the first shot. at >> what were they trying to block, what were they trying to stop? what was so urgent, so immediate? what is that office up to? we may find out soon, who knows? >> i will say that barr didn't do himself any fa

here is more that we, the american people, now know thanks to this new book from geoffrey berman. quote, while michael cohen pled guilty, our office continued to pursue investigations related to other possible campaign finance violations. when bill barr took over as u.s. attorney general, in february 2019, six months after cohen's guilty plea, he not only tried to kill the ongoing investigations, we were engaged in, but incredibly, he suggested that cohen's conviction on campaign finance charges should be reversed. barr summit my deputy rob khuzami, who was overseeing the cohen case, in late february, to challenge the basis of cohen's plea as well as the reasoning behind pursuing similar campaign finance charges against other individuals. khuzami was told to cease all investigative work on the campaign finance allegations until main justice determined there was a legal basis for the campaign finance charges do which cohen pled guilty, and until barnett term and there was a sufficient federal interest in pursuing charges against others. the directive bill barr gave my deputy, rob k

fortunately, that district didn't charge john kerry either. >> so geoffrey berman is an experienced and seasoned prosecutor and he said what he experienced under bill barr and under donald trump is unprecedented. he's never seen anything like it, never heard of anything like it, never felt that kinds of top-down pressure. what have you taken away from what he's accused of bill barr doing here? >> here's why this is significant. when barr was attorney general, there were -- even before barr was attorney general, there were deep concerns about the political v politicization of the justice department. you had a president of the united states who was out there talking about ongoing criminal investigations, identifying publicly people he thought should be investigated. that was very concerning to a lot of people at the time. it was something that we closely watched. we tried to get inside the justice department as much as possible to understand what was going on. a lot of this stuff was laid out in the muller report about trump's attempts to weaponize the justice department. but we didn't ha

. >> i want to move on to another issue and that is that geoffrey berman, the former u.s.orney for the southern district of new york, is talking about the pressure that he and his office were under from the doj under donald trump to prosecute president trump's political enemies. we didn't know, really, how the lengths that team trump was going to go to get some of his political enemies. such as john kerry. here is what geoffrey berman in his new book said this morning. >> president trump attacks john kerry in two tweets saying that kerry engaged in possible illegal conversations with iranian officials regarding the iran nuclear deal. the very next day the trump justice department refers the john kerry criminal case to the southern district of new york. two tweets by the president and the john kerry criminal case becomes a priority with the department of justice. and the statute they wanted us to use was enacted in 1799 and had never been successfully prosecuted. >> what can you say to that? >> yeah. so it's incredibly disappointing to those of us at the justice department

which brings us to geoffrey berman, the u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york who trump fired in 2020 after he refused barr's request that he resign. a lot has happened since 2020, a lot. but you may recall berman's firing was a big deal. we're talking about an american president strong arming a u.s. attorney general to fire a prosecutor because he refused to obey and to twist his office for the president's political purposes. and therefore had to be snuffed out and replaced with a lackey who would. let's just say we weren't the only ones likening the u.s. to a banana republic that day. berman has a new book "holding the line," it is out today, and in it he details his ouster along with damning allegations that trump sought to use the u.s. attorney's office in manhattan as his own private law firm. one of the ways berman alleges that trump justice department did that was to try to initiate criminal investigations or block them depending on how trump would benefit. the book describes how barr suggested that the conv

out front now geoffrey berman, who was the u.s.ney for the southern district of new york under president trump and is the author of the new book "holding the line: inside the nation's preeminent u.s. attorney's office and its battle with trump justice department." jeffrey, thank you very much. i want to just start off here with this lawsuit, 222 pages, as you pointed out, when we were getting ready to talk here. filled with what the attorney general says is hundreds of examples. evan just laying out two of the -- or a couple of the most egregious seeming ones that basically fraudulently inflating the value of assets to get loans and then also lying about their level to the other side from when it came to paying taxes. so fraud on multiple levels. what do these 222 pages tell you about the size and scope of her investigation? >> it's an enormous complaint. it's a robust complaint. it's filled with facts. and it's very serious. and, so, donald trump and others named in the complaint are going to have their day in court to respond to

attorney for the southern district of new york, geoffrey berman is standing by out with a new book, accusing go after his political enemies and turning the justice department into quote his own personal law firm. mr. berman will join us in a moment to explain those allegations. jonathan lemire is with us and joining the conversation, mike barnicle, pulitzer prize winning columnist at "the washington post," eugene robinson, and special correspondent for bbc news, katty kay. good morning to all of you, we begin with the expansion of the criminal investigation into efforts to overturning the 2020 election. nbc news has confirmed about 20 subpoenas, excuse me, 40 subpoenas were issued over the past week to people associated with the former president. let's bring in nbc news justice and intelligence correspondent ken dilanian. good morning, so about 40 subpoenas, a couple of search warrants, grabbing some phones from people around donald trump. lay it out a little bit for our viewers and who we're talking about and why this is so significant. >> good morning, willie, that's right, this is a subst

and the man of the hour, the day, the week and possibly some weeks to come, geoffrey berman is going

visit indeed.com/hire >>> back now with geoffrey berman. he was the u.s.he is out with a new book "holding the line" about his unprecedented tenure. this is his first interview. thank you for joining us. >> thank you for having me. >> i read the book over the weekend. it is stunning stuff. you paint a picture of president trump and allies pressuring you to protect his friends and prosecute his enemies. have you ever seen anything like that before? how did it play out? >> i had never seen anything like that before. and i was, you know, junior prosecutor in the southern district in the early '90s and never seen anything like that. people had been in the office for 40 years never saw anything like that. it was unprecedented and scary. >> let's talk about the specifics. you talk about an effort by the president's allies and the justice department to get you to indict greg craig, a democrat who worked for president obama. talk about what happened. >> we were investigating greg craig and were pushed by the justice department to indict greg craig, a democrat, bef

for two and a half years that man you see there geoffrey berman served in that role as the head of that district during the trump administration. berman has written a new book out today in which he details several instances in which donald trump abused the power of the department of justice. as berman told rachel maddow last, night trump's doj rapidly is tried to use the southern district of protected allies and punish his enemies. >> i wanted people to understand the full scope of the outrageous political interference by trump's justice department in the cases of the southern district of new york. it demonstrates what trump is capable of and what he is likely to do and it also provides a front line view of just how vulnerable our justice system is. trump turned the department into his own personal law firm. he put in people who do is bidding and they would target trump's political enemies and assist trump's friends. it was a disgrace. >> now we should know as rachel said berman did raise some alarms of the time, wasn't kept all tightlipped until the book came out. and of course this be

geoffrey berman weighed in on that investigation. >> what strikes me as the most significant revelation, is that the department of justice is investigating donald trump and those around donald trump, not just for the mishandling of classified information, but for obstruction of a subpoena requiring the production of that classified information. that is a very serious charge and if that were in the southern district of new york that would have the highest priority and we'd be moving on very quickly. >> that seemed serious. meanwhile there is this an interesting nugget from the national archives. they told the house oversight committee, that is still not share of whether donald trump had turned over all of the presidential records, as his presidency ended. i've a lot of questions about that. let's get to it with the help of our lead off panel tonight. luke broadwater, pulitzer prize-winning congressional reporter for the new york times, katie benner, and justice reporter -- former federal and state prosecutor in new york. she clerked for merrick garland in. katie of the reporter du jour,

geoffrey berman, no relation, speaking out this morning about the claims in his new book.sured his office to prosecute the president's critics. berman led investigations in trump's circle until he was forced out. here he was moments ago on "good morning america." >> talk about an effort to get you to prosecute the former secretary of kerry. >> that was outrageous. president trump attacks john kerry in two tweets saying kerry engaged in possible illegal conversations with iranian officials regarding the iran nuclear deal. the very next day the trump justice department refers the john kerry criminal case to the southern district of new york. two tweets by the president and the john kerry criminal case becomes a priority for the department of justice. and the statute they wanted us to use was enacted in 1799 and had never been successfully prosecuted. in about 220 years, this criminal statute was on the books, there were no convictions. >> cnn's kara scannell is following the story and joining us now. these are important and very serious allegations. >> right. that's just one

geoffrey berman.that the department of justice under the disgraced ex-president was even worse, even more politicized than we suspected. and moments ago at the john f. kennedy presidential library in boston president joe biden announced his cancer moonshot and initiative to cut the number of deaths from cancer in this country by half. watch. >> we know this. cancer does not discriminate red and blue. it doesn't care if you're republican or a democrat. beating cancer is something we can do together. and that's why i'm here today. when moderate to severe ulcerative colitis persists... put it in check with rinvoq, a once-daily pill. when uc got unpredictable,... i got rapid symptom relief with rinvoq. check. when uc held me back... i got lasting, steroid-free remission with rinvoq. check. and when uc got the upper hand... rinvoq helped visibly repair the colon lining. check. rapid symptom relief. lasting, steroid-free remission. and a chance to visibly repair the colon lining. check. check. and check. ri

attorney for the southern district of new york geoffrey berman joins rachel maddow to reflect on hiswith former president trump's justice department. watch don't at 9:00 p.m. eastern only on msnbc. >>> vladimir putin is suffering his biggest embarrassment on the battlefield yesterday. ukraine's armed forces broke through land that russia took earlier in the room with the stronghold of kharkiv. according to the british defense ministry, russian forces have likely withdrawn units from that area. if you want a sense of how much this win-wins to ukraine, its people and forces, look at this video. it shows troops raising the ukrainian flag. they played the national anthem and saluted after pushing through you that city. ♪♪ nbc news foreign correspondent is in kyiv. retired major john spencer, chair of urban warfare studies. good to have both of you here. let's talk first, if i can, meagan, how much territory has ukraine taken back and how much hope and momentum has that given troops? >> reporter: this is a game changer, chris, for the country. certainly for the troops. but residents alway

. >> i also want to ask you about this new book by geoffrey berman who was forced out as attorney forlleging that bill barr, former attorney general, pressured him to indict prominent democrats, including john kerry on the logan act, also a white house counsel who was indicted, when geoff berman refused. he was indicted here in the district of columbia and was quickly acquitted, but at great personal cost to his reputation, his job and a lot of other things. what about the politicization of prosecutions from the former attorney general? >> i used to be an assistant u.s. attorney in that office. i was hired in 1988 by rudy giuliani. i served for three years there. 199 -- 1989, 1990, '91. i believe geoff and i overlapped for a few years ago. this is unheard of. southern district of new york considers itself, always has, fairly autonomous. i was in public corruption, and we prosecuted and investigated republicans and democrats. so the notion that there would be some word on high to prosecute or indict a democrat to sort of even the score is just so foreign to anyone who is a career prose

we'll speak with geoffrey berman, attorney for the southern district of new york out with an anticipatedensive from ukraine as forces continue to regain territory recently controlled by russia, and king charles iii is on the move this morning. this is a live picture of his

attorney geoffrey berman that trump and willier barr wanted him to put his thumb on the

attorney at the time, geoffrey berman is speaking publicly, releasing a book. yesterday on msnbc he was speaking about how he does have reason to believe there was pressure being exerted on that office that he led, especially during the mueller investigation and around that time. here is what he said. >> i haven't focused on whether it's a crime or not, but i can tell you it violated all the norms and traditions of the department of justice which is supposed to be independent from politics. and trump turned the department into his own personal law firm. he put in people who would do his bidding and they would target trump's political enemies, and assist trump's friends. it was a disgrace. >> berman was fired in 2020 from the trump administration. some of his specific complaints here about the leadership of attorney general bill barr who he says at the time the justice department and the leadership there were pressuring his office to purge the mention of individual one, which would be donald trump, in the guilty plea of michael cohen. also that there was some pr

attorney geoffrey berman up online. ask and you shall receive around here. you can now watch that interview in its entirety on msnbc.com. thank you so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. we are grateful. "the beat" with ari melber starts right now. happy friday. >> i believe you, because i always believe what you say, but i don't feel like any of my tweets to you have ever gotten a reply. >> i don't read yours. >> fair. >> i sometimes look at them when we're on and i want to write back -- someone tweeted today, the podcast isn't up, and i wanted to be like the fix-it department and say, i'm on it, but, you know,. >> i'll just say, i'm luckier than perhaps some of your viewers, because i usually get to touch base with you at least once a day, even without twitter. >> there you have it. have a great show. >> have a great weekend. thank you, nicole. welcome to "the beat." i am ari melber. this is one of those busy news fridays. we begin with the bombshell that's led trump's team to really be on alert or in damage control mode e

your insights into what is normal, and it's clear that what the "times" is reporting about this geoffrey berman, the shredding of any sort of notion that bill barr was anything other than what his critics feared he was, an incredibly craven political actor atop doj. >> yeah, let's remember this. every time we hear bill barr sounding like a normal person, trying to rehabilitate himself, trying to look like he's normalized, he's not. and what we're hearing about from this book is the subverting of our rule of law, and the institution that embodies the rule of law, the department of justice. and so, it's worse than we perhaps thought in that it's not just that trump appears to have a doj that pressured prosecutors to open cases, but also to not go there in the sense of not pursuing things, and look, michael cohen appears to be just one of many people who's impacted by this. i hope that when you have berman on as a guest, you ask him a couple of things. first, why wait for the book? did he report this to the doj inspector general, for example? has he been or i hope he will be interviewed by either

attorney geoffrey berman up online. ask and you shall receive around here. so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. we are grateful. "the beat" with ari melber starts right now. happy friday. >> i believe you, because i always believe what you say, but i don't feel like any of my tweets to you have ever gotten a reply. >> i don't read yours. >> fair. >> i sometimes look at them when we're on and i want to write back -- someone tweeted today, the podcast isn't up, and i wanted to be like the fix-it department and say, i'm on it,