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attorney looked at it and found that none of those allegations were true. >> jeffrey rosen forwarded an email from mark meadows asking the department of justice to look into the possibility that italian satellites were changing votes from trump to biden. >> they said these new numbers backed up to this military satellite, a tiny italian military satellite. >> i was skeptical. we found that was not a well- founded allegations. we told the chief of staff and others, as well. >> what is going on over there? >> the top law-enforcement officials in the nation were investigating and finding nothing substantive. in the courts, the usual venue for claims about boating misconduct, the team of the president lost over and over again. >> courts again shutting down more desperate attempts to overturn an election. >> you were on george w. bush's short list for a supreme court. you are not some raging liberal. is that fair? michael luttig is a highly respected retired judge. he did not hear any of the trump fraud cases. he and his colleagues that analyzed more than 60 of them. >> we reviewed each i

the deputy to jeffrey rosen, the new acting attorney general.states, fighting to hold onto an election. he falsely claimed had been stolen. >> trump felt the justice department was an arm of his presidency in a way for him to tell them what to do and they should do his bidding and what he wanted. >> as the new targets of trump's iyer, rosen o'donoghue fielded nearly daily complaints of donald trump. between december 23rd in genera 23rd, the president either called me or met with me virtually every day. the common element of all of this expressing his dissatisfaction that the justice department, in his view, had not done enough to investigate election fraud. >> but they were investigating. the department of justice had been debunking trump's wild election fraud lies, one by one. but president trump chose to not listen. on the december 27th phone call with rosen and donoghue, trump said the department had an obligation to, quote, tell people this was corrupt illegal election, despite no evidence of widespread fraud. trump also pressed into publicl

judiciary committee, based on interviews with trump's top officials at the justice department, jeffrey rosend so nine times. and his chief of staff mark meadows broke with longstanding policy and pressured the doj to look into election fraud claims. >> the wildest theory was this thing called italygate. mark meadows sent an email to the acting attorney general at the time asking him to look into this theory that there was some italian contractor who was using satellites to change vote tallies on machines, voting machines, in the united states. >> on a december 27th call with the new acting attorney general, jeffrey rosen, trump pushed him to, quote, just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the republican congressman. >> trump knows, if the justice department goes out and raises questions about corruption or fraud, just saying that they're investigating, looking into it, that allows republican congressmen to go out there and do the rest of the work and to put the pressure on the states to start their own audits and again, gives him room to operate between then and januar

reports of crime. >> rosen stood firm on this call saying that there's not much the justice department could do. >> trump also plotted with another justice department official, jeffreytrump's fraudulent allegations. but that scheme imploded at the dramatic white house showdown on january 3, 2021. >> this is a scene straight out of "apprentice." trump has rosen and clark vie for the job of attorney general of the united states. and the president is told that if he replaces rosen with clark, there are going to be huge consequences. a number of top officials at the justice department were going to resign. there were probably going to be hundreds of other resignations of political appointees across the country as a result of this. it was a murder-suicide pact was the way this was described during this meeting. >> trump decided that the effort would not be earth the embarrassment of mass resignations and abandoned the p plot. he then pinned his hopes to overturn the election on mike pence based on a legal memo written by conservative attorney john eastman. let's talk about the he sayman memo. what was your reaction when you first heard about it? >> just breathtaking that

last few days of december, and into early january 2021, trump process the acting attorney general jeffrey rosen election fraud claims in wisconsin, georgia, and pennsylvania. all of which are debunked. on december 28th, coconspirator full, who appears to be ex doj official jeffrey clark sends a draft literal to rosen and donahue. he pushes them to sign. the letter he wants to send to this if interpreted state contains election lies and claims the justice department had, quote, identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election and multiple states. luckily, donahue rejects that. trump, no. he doesn't give up. he keeps going. on december 31st, trump meets with rosen and donahue and other advisers were he again raises election lies. trump suggests he much ainge doj leadership at this meeting. ungenerous iken, trump makes that now infamous phone call to georgia secretary of state brad raffensperger, asking him to find 11,870 votes. the next day, he tells mike page that he has the absolute right to reject electoral votes. he does not. he does not have that authority.

jeffrey rosen, the president of the national constitution center.as constitution podcast. and we've had such a great reaction to the velshi banned book club, that we're making it a podcast ourselves. each week, i'll be joined by the author of a band book. authors like margaret atwood, nikole hannah-jones, and more, who will talk about their books and why it matters that people are able to read them. the first two episodes drop this coming thursday. the 11th hour with stephanie ruhle begins right now. >> tonight, a historic week of legal woes for the former president. started off with a fourth indictment, what comes next is donald trump is expecting to turn himself into georgia authorities next week. trump's decision to skip the first republican debate, instead to upstage the big night. then, the devastation and destruction left by the wildfires in maui, what it is like on the ground for the people there needing most right now as the 11th hour gets underway on this friday night. good evening, i'm alicia menendez in for stephanie ruhle.

in which he was trying to get donahue and the acting attorney general, jeffrey rosen to write letters to states, specifically georgia, but also others, saying that lying that the justice department had identified serious problems with the election. i asked donahue about. that let's roll a clip of we can. >> a letter claimed that the u.s. department of justice has signify identified quote significant concerns it impacted the election in multiple states including the state of georgia. equate was a true? >> no, it would've created chaos in the states. i think it would've been disastrous for our country and the constitution. >> but was not the point of the letter tigray chaos? >> i think so. >> so this isn't the first amendment issue despite the fact the trump's lawyer was talking about this. it's a scheme, it's a conspiracy to lie and, to the election of perhaps even cause riots in history. >> that's absolutely right and i think elie honig put it really well in the last segment. you cannot lie for the purpose of cheating and stealing people of anything. there are multiple criminal statut

in which he was trying to get donoghue and the acting attorney general jeffrey rosen to write letterso state, specifically georgia, but also others, saying that -- lying that there were -- that the justice department had identified serious problems with the election and i asked donoghue go that. let's roll that clip if we can. >> that a letter claimed that the u.s. department of justice's investigations have, quote, identified significant concerns that may have impacted the outcome of the election in multiple states including the state of georgia, unquote. was that true? >> no. it would have created chaos in the states. i think that would have been disastrous for our country and constitution. >> wasn't that the point of that, to create that chaos? >> i think so, yes. >> so this isn't a first amendment issue despite the fact that trump's lawyer was talking about that. it's a scheme, it's a conspiracy to lie, to undo the election and perhaps even cause riots in the street >> that's absolutely right. so and i think elie honig put it well in the last segment. you cannot lie for the purpos

jeffrey rosen, the president of the national constitution center. and akilah maher, professor of law and political science at yale university, and host of the americas constitution podcast. and we've had such a great reaction to the velshi banned book club, that we're making it a podcast ourselves. each week, i'll be joined by the author of a band book. authors like margaret atwood, nikole hannah-jones, and more, who will talk about their books and why it matters that people are able to read them. the first two episodes drop this coming thursday. the 11th hour with stephanie ruhle begins right now. th hour with stephanie ruhle begins right now >> tonight, a historic week of legal woes for the former president. started off with a fourth indictment, what comes next is donald trump is expecting to turn himself into georgia authorities next week. trump's decision to skip the first republican debate, instead to upstage the big night. then, the devastation and destruction left by the wildfires in maui, what it is like on the ground for the people there ne

jeffrey rosen is the president and ceo of the national constitution center, and that does it for me. thank you for watching. catch me back here tomorrow morning, 10 am, to noon eastern. don't forget, velshi is also available as a podcast. in which i wear a vest. follow and listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. stay wherever you are, alex witt reports begins right now. you ar >> a very good day to all of you from the tom brokaw news center here in los angeles. welcome, everyone, to alex witt reports. developing this hour, donald trump and his 18 codefendants now have six days to surrender at the fulton county courthouse in georgia, on racketeering and conspiracy charges. three senior law enforcement officials tell nbc news, they are anticipating the former president will turn himself in at the atlanta jail, no earlier than thursday, but they stressed nothing is yet officially it. democratic what congressman, eric swalwell, gave msnbc his assessment of what happens next for the former president. here it is. >> donald trump is going to get a justice system that he's never been

proceeding, coconspirator for, that is ffrey clark, tried to coerce the acting attorney genel, that is jeffrey rosen, and acting dutattorney general, that is richard donahue, to sign and send clarks draft letter, which contained false statements estate officials. he told them that donald trump waconsidering making him, clark, the new acting attorney general, but that clark would decline trump's offer if rosen and donoghue had agreed to send the proposed letter to the targeted to states. but they refused. that is an allegation of a criminal act, to commit crow fraud against the united states. >> it is, it's part of the factual predicate about all of this. sometimes cases come down to one question, why? why did you engage in all of this behavior? conspiracies talk about that phrase the meeting of the mind, a conspiracy at its core asks the jurors to understand the why. what was the purpose, why were you agreeing, as they articulate in the actual indictment, the purpose of the conspiracy was to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election. going to the, why because then certain thi

it's not the attorney general, bill barr, or his replacement, the acting attorney, jeffrey rosen. it is a group of lawyers that vice president pence yesterday referred to as crackpot lawyers. >> that's the answer. he was told repeatedly by people in the justice department, by white house counsel, by campaign counsel that he had lost the election or the specific claims that he was making were false. and that's the thing about this. i mean, the whole, you know, the other big talking point, i'm sure, that was on there, i didn't see the talking points, is weaponization. this is weaponization. this is a democrat -- the democrats are weaponizing the justice department. the fact of the matter is, if you take this indictment and go through it paragraph by paragraph and look at the facts, figure out which witnesses they're going to use, to have to use to prove these charges, each fact in the indictment, they're all republicans. republican appointees from the vice president of the united states to the chairman of the joint chiefs to jason miller to, i mean, you name it. everybody. and what

attorney general bill barr, trump's attorney general that replaced bill barr after the election, jeffrey rosenral, richard donahue. and his former white house chief of staff mark meadows. there sure are a lot of republicans included in this democratic witch hunt against donald trump. when it comes to stopping trump's over -- attempts to overthrow our democracy, it was not democrats but republicans who actually stepped in and stopped. and they were doing their jobs, like rusty bowers, the former arizona house speaker who refused to go along with rudy giuliani scheme to go around the arizona state legislature and replace illegitimate electors with fake ones. a conservative republican, i don't like the results of the presidential election, i voted for president trump and worked hard to reelect him. but i cannot and will not entertain a suggestion that we violate current law to change the outcome of a certified election. republicans like brad raffensperger, the georgia secretary of state pushed back against trump's request to find votes and explains about 5000 people voted in georgia. raffensperge

>> let's bring in joyce vance and jeffrey rosen, a contributing editor at "the atlantic." what do you make of what went down yesterday and what trump's attorneys are arguing? it feels like delay tactics, but also it feels like this judge is going to be pushed to the limit every step. >> reporter: sure. i think that's right. with trump, when doesn't it feel like delay tactics? that's his only legal strategy here. we never hear denials that he engaged in criminal conduct or any kind of substantive defense. it puts pressure on the judge hearing the d.c. prosecution of donald trump. we've now reached the point where we have to work to keep the many criminal cases separate. the judge seems to be more than up to it, firing back on his own, sometimes within minutes, setting hearings, requiring responsive pleadings. she seems fully engaged and ready to go. what's at stake here is whether donald trump gets to try this case in the press, taking information and letting him talk about it in public or whether he'll be required to try his case in court like any criminal defendant. prote

the bankruptcy deal was announced by trump deputy attorney general jeffrey rosen just two weeks beforek times" reporter, barry meyer, author of the book "painkiller, empire of deceit and the origin of america's opioid epidemic epidemic ," released as a limited series on netflix yesterday. barry, your first reaction when you heard about the supreme court's pause? >> well, i was stunned to be frank. you have a situation where the sacklers engineered a deal where they could coat tail on to this bankruptcy deal, and it's very unusual that you have a family that doesn't declare bankruptcy itself being able to take advantage of it. and companies like purdue pharma have been very successful at manipulating the legal system to their benefit over these past two decades that i have been covering the story. and it's possible that the sacklers have finally run into that inevitable brick wall. >> when you talk about covering the story for the past two decades, you first covered the potential for oxycontin abuse in february of 2001 with an article entitled quote "cancer painkillers pose new abuse th

he didn't like what he was hearing from rich donoghue and jeffrey rosen, who were telling him the truthed someone who was going to take action to politicize the department of justice without factual foundation. >> you know, there's something, tim heaphy, as you're talking that i think is just a pause to hit here. he's not forum shopping among liberal democrats, right? like bill barr, who happily put his finger on the scales of justice when it came to the cases involving trump allies mike flynn and paul manafort and others, bill barr does something if not of legal questionability, certainly of ethical and not standard practice, he uses doj to investigate baseless claims of voter fraud. now, i know there's an argument that some members on the committee have made that it's a good thing because it's more evidence that trump knew they were all baseless. but it doesn't slow trump down. and i wonder if you could just speak to this sort of sliding of our frame of reference. i mean, these are -- these are the people that stayed with trump to the end when bill barr couldn't and wouldn't, telling

jeffrey clark was quite ready to take that jump. he actually went basically to tell his boss, the acting attorney general, jeff rosen, i'm here to replaceff rosen said, i don't think i'm actually going to resign to a subordinate, so we're going to go talk to the president, did that not happen. but this was this idea that your vote does not matter. donald trump thinks jeff clark should be attorney general so he can do his bidding, and take that election over. this is central to the whole operation. >> it's central, and do his bidding after every single one of his other appointees, the people he handpicked and said these are my people, said, from bill barr to his acting, u.s. attorney general to his own white house counselors, saying, no. you can't do this. this is wrong, and we don't have evidence of substantial voter fraud. this was not only in the public eye because we had governors, republican governors, from nevada to arizona, saying no. this is not true. you have him trying to pick and choose the people who will do his bidding in despite the assertions of his own people telling him, no. that is not right, that is not true. and i jus