and plainly tells jeff sessions that, "you are the reason why all of this is happening."to >> nar sessions-- trump's hand-picked attorney general-- had recused himself from the russia investigation. and now sessions was powerlessto stop mueller.as >> trumpurious and took it out on sessions and humiliated him. trump obviously felt himself enl,ngered by a special coun and, uh... lost his temper. >> there are things that jeff sessions apparently won't do for nald trump, and donald trump won't forgive him for that. >> narrator: sessions had had enough of the president's anger. >> sessionjust ends up bolting out of the white house, rushing out to his car. he said, "you wante to quit? i'm going to quit." >> he's resigning as, as attorney general. he's distraught, and he's had it. he's at the end of his rope. he's been insulted by trump. he's, he's decided that that's it. >> narrator: in the west wing, all hell broke loose. >> don mcgahn,he legal counsel, bursts into reince priebus's office and says, "we've got trouble. not only do we have a special counsel appointed, but jeff s

please welcome jeff sessions. mr. sessions: thank you. thank you all. thank you. thank you.nk you so much. jim, for your remarks and service to this department. your energy and leadership has .layed a powerful role we used to claim that the reagan class was the best. i'm honored to be back with all of you to share in a special moment in a department we love. today marks the departure of one of the most important leaders in his history. he came here almost 29 years ago for as held the position little over two years. before that, held a number of key positions including the united states attorney of maryland for 12 years. 3% ofe told me that only united states attorneys only served 12 years and that he and i were two of them. i don't know how he calculated already, as you know he is good with numbers. wharton school of business perhaps has something to do with that. some of the prosecutors know he is good. heard of rod before and remembered how he was nominated by president bush, but was blocked by certain senators. another thing we had in common. their complaint was he was to

like today's guest of honor, before joining the department's leadership, jeff sessions served as unitedtes attorney for 12 years. most recently general sessions led the department of justice from february 2017 to november of 2018. it is wonderful to have him back home for this occasion. ladies and gentlemen, please welcome jeff sessions. [applause] >> thank you. thank you all. thank you. thank you. thank you. thank you so much. thank you, jim for your remarks and your service to this department. your energy and leadership really played a powerful role in having the best group of united states attorneys ever. we used to claim my class, the reagan class was the best but this class was the best. rod, we have picked a good group. i'm honored to be back with all of you to share this special moment with rod and the department that we love. today marks the departure of one of the deputy of justice's most important leaders in its history. rod came here almost 29 years ago and has held a deputy position in this $27 billion agency for a little over two years. he held a number of key positions in

you are listening to steph new ruehl at the salt conference interviewing former attorney general jeff sessions and new jersey governor chris christie. i will keep an eye on it. we will bring you a little more of it as it happens, we will get stephanie to talk about that remarkable decision. i want to move on to itseother , neither the attorney general or president trump will comply, before declaring to make a protective assertion of executive privilege. moments before the house judiciary committee began her to vito hold the attorney general in contempt of congress, the president asserted executive privilege to shield the unredacted version of special counsel mueller's report and all the underlying everyday that comes with it. the president's defiance was followed by a full throated approval, which wrote, in the circumstances you may properly exert executive privilege with the entirety, entirety of the department of justice's material the committee has demanded. any moment now, the house judiciary committee is expected to vote in favor of holding barr in contempt, officially leaving it to the f

attorney general jeff sessions told us to follow regular order and ensure the nonpartisan administration of justice. and that is what we did every day. and is that is what the department will continue to do under attorney general, bill barr. >> former attorney general jeff sessions was in attendance today. >>> 5-g is the new buzzword. why wireless carriers haven't exactly been honest about the technology. >> and new privacy questions about amazon's smart speaker for children. parents demanding to know what kind of personal data is being recorded and safe. >> a woman who once lived at the ghost ship warehouse says the conditions inside unnerved her so much, she ovmented to sleep in her, opted to sleep in her car instead. >>> a school bus driver is being credited to with saving a student from getting hit by a car. he stopped to let the student off the bus in new york. that car seemingly ignores the bus, just keeps on going. the school district hopes the video y's mr is verye importance of grateful to the driver. >>> a new iconpopping up on cellphones around the bay kpix reports the cellpho

and we will interview jeff sessions and chris christie.it over to kristen welker. >> hi there, ali. good afternoon, we will be tracking that it's 11:00 a.m. out west and 2:00 p.m. right here in washington where it has already been a day of fast paced headlines. the house judiciary committee will vote this afternoon on whether to hold attorney general william barr in contempt of congress for delivering the full unredacted mueller report. the president asserted executive privilege over the report. 2 committee has requested. we will have much more coming up in a few minutes. >>> with president trump's current attorney general in the spotlight, in about 20 minutes as we herd, we will take you live to the salt conference, where stephanie ruhle will be introducing jeff sessions along with former new jersey governor chris christie. we will bring you that as it's happening. first, the story that's dominating today's headlines, the "new york times" latest bombshell about the president's personal

in my opinion, jeff sessions and rod played a decisive role in putting together i think the strongest team of presidential appointees in the department that i can ever remember, and the department and the country will long benefit from the focus and energy that rod put into that process. and rod assembled and outstanding staff in the deputy's office. as we all know, the deputy's job is perhaps the most challenging management position in the government today. rod has excelled in that role , and he would be the first to tell you that a large part of his success has been the team of consummate professionals he recruited and forged into an effective and efficient staff in the office of the deputy attorney general. rod's legacy of leadership is also reflected in the record of accomplishment under his stewardship. under rod, the department has achieved record levels of productivity, it has advanced critical priorities, reducing violent crime, vigorously enforcing the nation's immigration laws and fighting hard against the scourge of illegal drugs, especially the opioid epidemic. he has face

not only do we have a special counsel appointed, but jeff sessions has just resigned." prbus says, "you're kidding me." priebus goes running down the staircase into the west wing parking lot. >>r..finds sessions in his preparing to leave. and he bangs on the door. "you got to come out. you got to come back in.e you can't leis way. you can't just blow up like this."ri >> andus essentially almost has to drag him back up into the west wing, where vice president pence and stnnon then come in and join priebus and, and talk sessions off the ledge. ♪ is >> i said, "here any doubt in your mind that this was divine providence that put us here?" he says, "no do" i said, "and you're never gonna quit?" and he says, "i will never quit." i go, "no mter how bad it gets?" he goes, "i'll never quit." and that's why i knew he was gonna hang in there. and he had some very very very tough days. >> it's clear that the mueller investigation is just getting started. we're going to head to washington. >> narrator: across town, in an bdisclosed secure location... >> ...continues told something o

and mueller in the report shows how it happened, jeff sessions sitting with trump literally trying to interview for a new fbi director in that tense time and rosenstein calls. sessions steps out of the oelva to take this call from his deputy and tells him about the special counsel appointment. now, as you know, you don't just interrupt a meeting with the president unless you have huge news. rosenstein called sessions because he knew he had to tell him immediately even if he was with the president and he knew he was dropping a bomb. now we all know how the president reacted when he got rosenstein's news delivered via jeff sessions. >> oh my god this is terrible, this is tehe end of my presidency, i'm fill in the blank. >> his spot was this is the end of my presidency i'm ef f'd. >> he said i'm [ bleep ]. i'd like to live for a little longer in the moment of him saying this is tend of my presidency i'm [ bleep ]. >> that got everyone's attention and it was in the report. what was trump so concerned about among other things? he did explain his thinking succinctly a month into the probe.

on multiple occasions in 2017 the president spoke with jeff sessions about reversing his recusal so he could take over the russia investigation and begin an investigation and prosecution of hillary clinton. for example, early 2017 sessions recalled the president asking him to on recuse the sessions did not take it as a directive. with the president raised the issue again in december 2017 the president set as recorded by porter, i'm not telling you to do anything, i'm not going to get involved. i'm not going to do anything or direct you to do anything. i just want to be treated fairly. the duration of the president's efforts which spanned from march 2017 through august 2018 and the fact that the president repeatedly criticized sessions in public for failing to tell the president that he would have to recuse is relevant to assessing whether the president's efforts of sessions on recuse could qualify as obstructive acts. as described above by mid june 2017 the existence of a grand jury investigation supervised by the special counsel was public knowledge. in addition to july 2017 a differe

donald trump bullied no one more than jeff sessions, but jeff sessions lasted all the way until the endn. >> that's true. the difference is that he fired an fbi director once. >> he has. >> and everything that we're talking about is kind of the ramifications of what that did. so he does have that somewhat recent memory of touching the hot stove and getting burned. >> he certainly does. all right, guys, stick around. there's more breaking news. desperate housewives actress felicity huffman breaks down in tears after pleading guilty in the college admissions cheating scandal. you're turning onto the street when you barely clip a passing car. minor accident -no big deal, right? wrong. your insurance company is gonna raise your rate after the other car got a scratch so small you coulda fixed it with a pen. maybe you should take that pen and use it to sign up with a different insurance company. for drivers with accident forgiveness, liberty mutual won't raise their rates because of their first accident. liberty mutual insurance. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ >>> some breaking news

, further efforts to have the attorney general take control of the investigation, trump pushed jeff sessionsly announce that he is no longer recused, but sessions didn't reverse his decision. eight. the president's efforts to have mac began deny that the president had ordered him to remove mueller, but mcgahn told investigators the truth any way. number nine, trump's conduct toward flynn, manafort and other b possible witnesses those are redakt mueller notes his sympathy tword them could be intended to limit their cooperation with the investigation and ten, trump's conduct toward michael cohen. once cohen began cooperating, donald trump's relationship with him became hostile. on collusion, the report found no findings of direct conspiracy with russia. but it did note that the trump campaign knew about russian interference and that the campaign expect to benefit from information released by russian efforts. let's not forget, there are still 14 open cases that robert mueller referred for outside prosecution. >> but the question will be with bill barr as the attorney general giving, will they b

the effort to fire jeff sessions and install a loyalist. why not bring those folks through who have no privilege and no sort of -- not controlled by the white house? >> they have not been ruled out as witnesses who could be called to congress. based on conversations with house democrats, they are leaning their shoulder against the door -- against the per's door saying we've got to impeach this president now. she keeps telling them privately, let the committees do their work. let jerry nadler and adam schiff and all the other chairs build the case against the president. she keeps telling them privately, i'm told, the country is not fully aware of the pleasant president's behavior. as you said, paint the picture. for now don mcgahn, annie donaldson, hope hicks, another level of cory lewandowski, all the characters from the mueller report. this could take the rest of 2019. that's what the speaker's strategy is. you couldn't rush the process, begin impeachment proceedings even though the president is defying congress. billed witness by witness

so harris was asking, question know that he made that request of jeff sessions and other individuals,de that request of you? and bill barr should be in a position to be able to say, absolutely not. >> that's my point. and then when he was asked, i think it was by lindsey graham, i don't knowing i lost count. someone said to him in this kind of very semiautomatic bullet point, do you agree with this? do you think there was spying, yes. do you think they need to look, yes. do you think the dossier was a problem, yes. do you think we need to look at clinton, yes. it was all the way down the line of checking every box of consideration for the president. where does that take us next? >> look, you know, the discussion of the evidence in the mueller report was kind of limited today. there was some -- >> because he said he didn't look at all of it. >> there was some time spent on the mcgahn issue and the fact that the president asked mcgahn to write a memo that was false and he didn't actually try to order him to fire mueller. but, you know, there is so much else in that report. consider the

against one of your colleagues at his confirmation hearing when you testified against senator jeff sessionstion hearing to be attorney general. are you still glad that you did that? >> it's one of my prouder moments. i sat next to cedric richmond a young and up and coming leader in congress and jon lewis and felt this conviction because i don't think americans understand how it still punishes entire communities and jeff sessions is a guy who stood against constructive reforms that would have made a difference. not only that but against voting rights and against protecting lgbtq kids. we knew and i've now seen it happen that the justice department would pull back from defending voting rights, civil rights, to fighting against a criminal justice system broken and even just police accountability measures. things that were happening all around our country holding police accountable. and making sure we have police departments especially in police involved violence that are doing -- >> dropping the consent decrees. >> yes. >> let me ask you about the man who is likely to be jeff session's replace

jeff sessions, this is a favorite lindsey graham quote.id there would be hell to pay if jeff sessions was fired or removed as attorney general. donald trump removed jeff sessions as attorney general the day after the 2018 election and lindsey graham before that said i think the president deserves tov an attorney general he agrees with. john mccain, without question john mccain was lindsey graham's mentor in the house and the senate. donald trump has repeatedly attacked john mccain post his death before when he was sick from brain cancer and when he passed away. lindsey graham has said i don't think we should cast aspersions but no condemnation. impeachment, you mentioned this. lindsey graham was one of the house impeachment managers in 1998 against bill clinton. that's where the clip came from. but now the idea that there's impeachment we should all move on, nothing has to has been, i think we have some sound from lindsey on impeachment. let's roll that. >> so the point i'm trying to make is you don't even have to be convicted oh of a crim

telling lewandowski to bring this note to jeff sessions. trying to get jeff sessions to un-recuse. he intends to commit it, but people just are not following his orders. >> that's absolutely right. i do think it is important to remember, sleel lyegally speaki attempt at obstruction of justice is exactly the same thing as obstruction of justice. so just because people like corey lewandowski, don mcgahn, decided not to go through with what the president was asking them to do, that doesn't mean mealy speaking that he is in the clear at all. i think it is incredibly damning that, as you say, you see him attempt this pattern again and again and again, pushing sessions to un-recuse, pushing sessions to investigate even hillary clinton. >> yeah, the pushing sessions to investigate hillary clinton, marcy, seems germane to where we are now. you have bill barr, basically looking ready to play ball and use the justice department in the way the president wants it used. part of the consequence of being essentially no accountability for what is described in the court, repeated efforts to obstruc

sort of piggy backing on what ken said, the president got rid of jeff sessions effectively because he was not willing to carry the president's water, do the president's bidding as a personal attorney would. this was a partisan attorney general. everybody knew sessions' record. it wasn't sufficient. i think there's a leadership there now and i guess a relationship with the justice department that doesn't have a respect for the rule of law, but is playing fast and loose with it. that's driven by the president. it is really a shame. the justice department, people that work there take themselves very seriously, take sort of this lofty integrity stuff seriously, you almost want to roll your eyes at it when not there, but it is a shame to see what's gone on there. >> eugene, i am of the opinion the mueller report needed a writer. i say this as a matter of civic and public education and not partisan politics. it is way too consequential a piece of work to not have what a writer would give to it. take out some of the dryness, none of the substance, tell more of a narrative. having said that,

indicatesl evidence that the president's efforts to have jeff sessions limit the scope of the specialounsel's investigation to future election interference was intended to prevent further investigation screening of the president -- investigative scrutiny of the president and his campaign conduct. 97.me 2, page congresswoman barbara lee. two days after the president directed mcgahn to have the special counsel removed, the president made another attempt to affect the course of the russian investigation. on june 19, 2017, the president met one-on-one with corey lewandowski in the oval office and dictated a message to be delivered to attorney general sessions that what happened had the effect of limiting the russia investigation to future election interference only. volume 2, pae 90. fromyield to congresswoman -- a congresswoman to conduct the rest of the hour. >> czajkowski said democrats will read more from me redacted mueller report on the house floor next week. >> washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. this morning, wisconsin republican congress

personal attorney and this sort of piggy backing on what kim had said, the president got rid of jeff sessions effectively because he didn't carry the president's water as a personal attorney would and this is a very partisan attorney general. everyone knew what sessions' record was but even being loyal on a partisan level to the president isn't sufficient and wasn't sufficient and so i think there is a leadership there now and i guess relationship with the justice department that just doesn't, hesitate to say don't have a respect for the rule of law but playing fast and loose and that's driven by the president. it's really a shame. the justice department and people who work there take themselves very seriously, take the sort of lofty integrity stuff very seriously as you almost want to roll your eyes at it and it's really a shame to see what has gone on there. >> eugene, i'm of the opinion that the mueller report needed a writer and i say this as a matter of civic and public education and not partisan politics. it is way too consequential piece of work to not have what a writer would give to

you know, he beat up jeff sessions on twitter, you know, public remarks for, you know, for basicallyt the entire term he was in office. bill barr new exactly what the president has wanted, you know, in this regard. and there's just a lot of evidence, you know, bill barr is willing to kind of parrot a lot of this language the president uses, really the sort of saying the american intelligence agencies were spying on donald trump. that is music to his ears. that is what this president expects of total loyalty even from republicans who once were guided by evidence, were guided by their own independent judgment, were guided by their constitutional duty. now it's what the president says and you follow in lock step. >> today lippedy graham, one of the president's staunchest allies said he was going to back off his own russia investigation. do you think he would do that if he didn't think barr was looking out for trump? >> i'm not sure how lindsey graham would come out on anything. he's a loose canon now. but you know what's unprecedented, don, is the fact this investigation is going forwar

they threw jeff sessions under the bus.is was a doj decision and the fall out stemmed from the department of justice implementing this policy and stephen miller had some influence on that as a long time aide to jeff sessions. this was a multi-agency failure. the department of justice, department of homeland security that separated the children and didn't keep records that connected the parents and the children and ultimately hhs is the one that ended up with thousands of kids on its doorstep and had to figure out what to do with thep and get them back to their parents. i think hhs bears the least of the blame. they had to figure it out. doj and dhs share it equally. >> thank you for your continued reporting. >>> up next, he spent eight years as a leader in the neo nazi movement. now he tries to combat the very racism he once propagated. you're watching msnbc. propagat. you're watching msnbc. urkey. so chantix can help you quit slow turkey. along with support, chantix is proven to help you quit. with chantix you can keep smo

you tried to browbeat jeff sessions, it didn't work. everyone held steady. but you've been making the point the pressure itself is having an effect and i do feel like today in the wake of the barr news is where that is becoming its most obviously manifest. >> yeah, look, i think for a long time the system was holding -- there was a deleterious effect. you've seen the reputation hurt publicly. i assume republicans across the country think the fbi and justice department are out to get the republican party, which is damaging. the institution was mostly holding. that changed when bill barr became attorney general. and now you have an attorney general who is acting the way the president always wanted an attorney general to. he's basically found his roy cohn in bill barr. i think the change -- mimi made the right point about this investigation, i assume, will go on through the election. that's if john durham takes his time. he took a long time to investigator tour. the president will always have this talking point. that in itself is bad enough. the long-term effec

told advisers that it was the end of his presidency, sought to have attorney general jefferson jeff sessions unrecused from the russia investigation and to have the special counsel removed and engaged in efforts to curtail the special counsel's investigation and prevent the disclosure of evidence to it including through public and private contacts with potential witnesses. those and related actions are described and analyzed in volume two of the report. the special counsel's charging decisions. in reaching the charging decisions described in volume one of the report, the office determined whether the conduct if found amounted to federal criminal law chargeable under federal prosecution see section 9-27. the standards set forth in the justice manual is whether the conduct institutes a crime, whether ad missable evidence would be sufficient and whether prosecution would serve a substantial federal interest that could not adequately have served by prosecution elsewhere or through noncriminal alternatives. see justice manual section 9-27.220. section 5 of the report provides detailed explanation

you hear reports of the president pressuring his former attorney general jeff sessions to open an investigationlinton, the pressure on don mcgann, on jim comey t. seems to him this goes back to what a roy cone should do. this is something he has reported to doing the past couple of years and the most uncomfortable part of that was him looking around the room today and to his hhs secretary for sort of validation and support and no one really knew how to respond to him. wanting to agree that, in fact, he was in violation of the logan act or should be prosecuted. this seems to fit a pattern of the president's we've been reporting over the past couple of years. >> we'll speak about that later with anderson cooper and to our viewers, by the way, stay with cnn for a live town hall with the former fbi director, james comey. anderson cooper will moderate later tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern. >>> coming up, we're learning about an ominous warning of conditions at the colorado school where a deadly shooting occurred this week. one parent feared a repeat of columbine. uh-oh, looks like someone's still nervo

on march 3rd, 2017, shortly after attorney general jeff sessions did recuse himself from the russia investigation, the president summoned mr. mcgahn to the oval office. according to the mueller report, quote, the president opened the conversation by saying, i don't have a lawyer, end quote. the president told mr. mcgahn that he wished that roy cohen was his attorney instead. roy cohen is known as the chief architect on the mccarthy hearings that destroyed so many lives back in 1954, an actual political witch hunt not the imaginary kind the president decries. mr. cohen served as president trump's lawyer for a long time, defending the president from federal suits before he was disbarred in 1986. mr. mcgahn told the president that the department of justice ethics officials had weighed in and that mr. sessions would not unrecuse himself and he advised the president not to have any contact with mr. sessions on the matter. days later, the president did exactly the opposite. he summoned mr. mcgahn and mr. sessions to mar-a-lago where the president again,expre expressed his anger. he said he wanted mr. s

jeff sessions was attorney general for a while, seemed to tell republicans, stop with this.oing to be looking into this. just wanted it to go away. >> yeah. so much of this has to do with the president's reaction throughout this investigation and the results of the investigation coming out. we know the president has been, overall, very bothered by the fact that there is an investigation to begin with, then the releasing of the mueller report, even though he took sort of the celebratory victory lap. he still has been very bothered by the fact there was an investigation to begin with. the fact that we have law enforcement now launching this investigation into the investigation, you could argue, and especially if you're a critic of the president or the administration, that this is sort of a ploy, or this is a move to appease the president and his desire to get more information about why the investigation actually started in the first place. >> i think it is fair to say, it is not just something that can be argue it d, but it is someth that can be rooted in reality. let's not fo

they had assumed this was going to be the role that jeff sessions had played, but jeff sessions actually took a far more different approach, a far more hands off approach than bill barr has. and the question i guess going forward is, is there any remedy to this? remember, barr was supposed to be called, was supposed to go in front of the house judiciary committee, but he declined to do so on the basis that they were going to have lawyers on the committee ask the question. at the time that was a big deal but because we live in this sort of hyper news cycle, that story seems like it was eons ago. so i don't know if there is a house remedy that democrats can summon to push back against what barr is actually doing now. >> joyce, back over to you for a question i saw you ask, at least rhetorically on social media yesterday that people will be left with for a good long time, what if mueller had spoken first? >> there is no reason that the comments we heard from special counsel mueller yesterday could not have been the american people's first introduction to what was after all the special couns

after learning his white house life failed to get then attorney general jeff sessions to take controlueller investigation. trump got what he wanted n. william barr, he a general wonderful enough to turn into trump's advantage. mueller failed to exonerate trump on obstruction of justice, did just that. never mentioning the heard of the mueller report that began the russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion. even roy cohn could not have protected the president with such lack of shame. all in with chris hayes starts right now. >> tonight on all in -- >> has the president or anyone at the white house asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone. yes or no, please, sir? >> um, the president or anybody else? >> big new questions for the attorney general as the man attempting to clear donald trump meets the senate. >> you lied to congress. you knew you lied and now we know. >> bill barr responds to robert mueller's stinging rebuke.

on march 3, 20 17, shortly after attorney general jeff sessions did recuse himself on the russia investigationthe president summoned mr. mcgahn to the oval office. according to the mueller report, the president opened the conversation by saying, i don't have a lawyer. the president told mr. mcgahn that he wished roy cohn was his attorney. roy cohn is known as the chief architect of the army mccarthy hearings that destroyed so many lives back in 1954. an actual political witchhunt, not the imaginary kind the president decries. served as the president's lawyer for a long time before he was disbarred for unethical practices in 1986. to follow refused blindly into unethical behavior. mr. mcgahn told the president department of justice ethics officials had weighed in, that mr. sessions would not on recuse himself, and he advised the president not to have any contact with mr. sessions on the matter. days later the president did exactly the opposite. he summoned mr. mcgahn and mr. sessions to mar-a-lago, where the president expressed his anger, unquote. he said he wanted mr. sessions to act as his fi

chris christie was onstage with jeff sessions, attorney general sessions.l friend of mine and agreed to come out here and i think he was very clear about his position on william barr, attorney general barr doing the best he can in this circumstance. what i would like to see, liz, is less use of our agencies and our departments in the criminality of things in the political process. liz: of course. >> i think we are weaponizing, mike huckabee once said to me, so did rudy giuliani after meeting with benjamin netanyahu, your country is becoming like our country, build a jail cell for people, then try to get them in the jail cell after they have been elected. i tell my democratic friends if hillary clinton was elected president, they would have investigated her the same way on this, that, e-mails, et cetera. i would like to see an end to all that stuff. liz: you also said last night there are people from all political parties here and they care about money and investing. you are back now at skybridge, your hedge fund. tell us exactly what you see for investing r

it's what he wanted from jeff sessions which is why jeff sessions isn't the attorney general anymorehat he want present matt whitaker and barr is giving him what he wanted because many of us had high hopes for william barr. >> you are a former assistant director for the immigration and customs enforcement or i.c.e., they're looking to change rules for people seeking asylum. the president says it's too easy to get in the sids. take a look at some of the proposed changes. the biggest one may be the charge of fees for asylum, applications and work permit applications. what do you think of that specific proposal? and do you think it holds up in court? >> what do i think? no is what i think about that specific proposal. it's hard to see whether it holds up in court. it will be a lot of litigation. i think the fees thing, it's inhumane and horrid but a lot of administration's approach to immigration has been inhumane and horrid. what do we think asylum is? fleeing persian cushion, fleeing harm. imagine if we required doechl violen -- domestic violence victims to pay fees before seeking ref

he was appointed by jeff sessions. and a doj inspector general investigation by michael horowitz, which should be completed soon. three is the charm here? >> well, bill barr kind of has to do this. i mean, one of the whole points of having bill barr in this role as opposed to jeff sessions, who the president grew to almost december pi decemb despise by the end of his ten e tenure, is having the confidence of the president. he has to take this step and put his own spin on it. that being said, it seems he has appointed someone who has the experience in doing this under both democratic and republican administrations. this is, in some ways, a durham specialty. i think that there is the sense here that barr chose someone who has specific experience in looking into this specific type of thing. but there's no question in my mind that barr has almost no choice but to do this because the president basically appointed him into this position in order to delve more deeply into this very issue, which is almost of paramount importan

according to him, trump asked him to bring a note telling jeff sessions to give a speech that would say the following. this is while they are investigating what they know is a breech. this hack by a foreign adversary. now a group of people want to subvert the constitution of the united states. i am going to meet with a special prosecutor that explain this is very unfair and let them move forward with election meddling for future elections so it can't help in future elections. this is an attempt to shut down the whole thing. >> not just to shut down the investigation into trump, but also an attempt to shut down the investigation into the russian hacking. no one gets this. in the summer of 2017 at the same time that trump had just met for the first time with vladimir putin in this crazy meeting in the g-20, he went to lewandowski and dictated to him in the report and made him write it down and he said he never dictated anything to me before. he makes him write it down and in that paper, he said go tell sessions to shut down the investigation into the russians who hacked us in 2016. he can

investigation. >> woodruff: picking up on that, john carlin, carrie mentioned the then general jeff sessionsom the report indicatings substantial evidence of th'spreside effort to have sessions limit the scope of the special counsel's inveigation to future election interference was ertended to prevent furth investigative scrutiny of the president and his campaign conduct. >> so there are three elements to obstruction of justice and they're lied out in the report. number one, some typef act taken that impairs an in ystigation. wh've laid out are clearly acts. they tried to shut the investigation down. as a prosecutor that would be overwhelming evidence you're trying to impede the investigation. two, there's a nexus, and this le important in terms of the statement mr. mumade today, he said the matters they were investigating were of paramount importance and that when a subject of investigaruon obs or lies to an investigator, that that strikes at the heart of the government'd effort to he truth and hold wrong doer's accountable. that's clearing out there was a nexus there was a hugely important

trump asked corey lewandowski, his former campaign manager to tell jeff sessions to limit the specialnsel's investigation only to be future election interference. trump said lune cao dow ski should tell sessions is he was fired feld not meet with minimum. trump used his pardon power to influence his associates including paul manafort and michael cohen not to fully cooperate with the investigation. trump through his own statements such as complaining about people ho flip and talking to investigators and through communications between his personal counsel and manafort, cohen, gave at impression that they would be pardoned if they did not fuly cooperate with investigate perds.manafort ultimately breached add agreement to cooperate with investigators and cohen offered false testimony to congress including denying that the trump tower moscow project had extended to june, 2016 and that he and trump had discussed traveling to russia during the campaign. both men have been convicted for offering false information and manafort's lack of cooperation left open some significant questions such as

all right, so, one area that you say democrats may have hung him up on a little bit was about jeff sessionse issue that they change from, in that part of the testimony, was they went from whether there was obstruction to whether there was full cooperation. what sessions or what barr was pressed on at that point was, had he completely cooperated? that's the president. what they are trying to show is anything that is less than full cooperation in the sense of encouraging everybody to tell everything they know to the prosecutors and all that stuff. that that's not going to make the standard of full cooperation. i think what barr tried to do, which was the right thing to do, was moved back to the decision he had to make, which was whether there was obstruction or not. you are not called on as a prosecutor to resolve, "did somebody give perfect cooperation?" her decision is the prosecutor is, "was the investigation obstructed beyond a reasonable doubt?" we want just to clear it up, it was senator leahy asking him about the president wanting jeff sessions to unrecuse himse. so barr's answer was -

it would take someone like william barr to make jeff sessions and even matt whitta r whittaker, barr makes them look better by comparison. to see donald articulated. he attacks don mcgahn for being a note taker. what kind of lawyer are you. don mcgahn didn't just take notes, he had a chief of staff who was the note taker to the note taking lawyer. donald trump was so uncomfortable with people keeping a record of his conduct that it's jarring to hear now on two occasions william barr at that press conference the day the muleeller report came out before we seen it, he said no collusion but he did a good little dr. phil and said the president was so frustrated. it wasn't obstruction. he was frustrated. i have a 7-year-old. i don't excuse his conduct. he doesn't get to bang on the table at restaurant because he's frustrated. the ag made excuses for the sitting president that i wouldn't make for my 7-year-old son. to hear it again today and this parsing as the country's sitting attorney general offers some defense of donald trump that really wasn't rooted in anything legal. it was sort of

over any documents and communications he has about any efforts to reverse or attempt to reverse jeff sessions' recusal from such matters. don mcgahn is told to hand over any documents and communications he has about the contemplated termination of special counsel robert mueller. that's point 13 of 36. point 28, he's told to hand over any documents and communications he's got on the subject of prosecuting or investigating james comey or democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton. he's hold to hand over information -- point number 29 -- about presidential pardons, whether possible or actual for paul manafort, michael flynn, michael cohen, rick gates, roger stone, individuals associated with the trump campaign or individuals involved in matters before the u.s. attorney's office for the southern district of new york. speaking of sdny, point 31, don mcgahn is also told to hand over information he's got reflecting any white house communications or discussions or documents about investigations at sdny. hmm. and specifically, the recusal of u.s. attorney geoff berman from sdny, from sdny inves

jeff sessions could look at this.ded to sit on his hands they had entire time, fall to the institution and protect bad actors. so the fact that now you have the attorney general trying to be transparent -- remember, we are only debating things that he cannot release by law. by law! and they still aren't pleased with that. >> harris: know, but they could change the law. >> lawrence: exactly. congress isn't going to -- this is a political thing. at the end of the day, the attorney general's going to do his job. quite frankly, all americans should want to know. most people at home are saying this. "if they would do this to the president of the united states, why wouldn't they do it to me?" >> katie: there's been lots of players in this, jessica. we have new fox news polling on who you are going to believe in terms of who you trust. people say about the mueller investigation that people trust trump -- they trust mueller over trump, 45% to 27%. and they trust mueller more than ag barr 40% to 22%. robert mueller did the inv