ken dilanian, nbc news intelligence and national security reporter. phil, i need to start with you, though, on the markets. one of the president's favorite things to brag about, to tweet about, is how healthy the market is. today, not a day worth bragging about for this braggadocios president. >> no, not at all, nicolle. we see markets reacting to the supposed deal with china reached over the weekend at the g-20 in argentina. president trump called it an incredible deal and boasted of an agreement to suspend temporarily his trade war with china. the reality, it seems to be much more more hazy than that and see the markets reacting. i talked to an economic analyst a few hours ago who said, look, markets demand certainty and certainty is not at all what this president or administration provide when it comes to the economy because the president will make different sorts of announcements. he'll have to have that walked back by some of his advisers sometimes and it's just very unclear exactly where everything stands. remember, two days ago, he said we've g

joining me now nbc intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian and ben wittes, the editord chief of law fair and an msnbc legal analyst. ken, this is reporting that's coming from our nbc news team, you and our pete williams. can you explain kind of what you've learned that sets up this idea that we could be getting this report in february? >> reporter: sure, kasie. we set out to do sort of a long look at the mueller investigation, a take stock story. in the course of that talking to people, what we learned is that government officials are being told to get ready for the mueller report as early as february, and you know, people can be forgiven for wondering, noticing that trump's lawyers have been saying that this thing is about to end any day now for the last year, and they can be assured that we are not basing this story on the assurances of trump's lawyers or other lawyers with defendants in the case, although all of them seem to agree that from their perspective, they believe this thing is wrapping up by february. this is from government officials who, you know, the gov

ken dilanian, let me turn to you first, if i could, laying out there with some drama what's happening there. what is this laying on the president? >> you said imperiling. i think it remains to be seen whether these investigations imperil him in the sense that they drive him out of office. but they're clearly going to overwhelm his presidency. particularly because he cannot help himself, but engage on twitter. you know, most presidents in this position would sort of put it aside. the way bill clinton did with that massive investigation, which is still bigger than where we are now. and bill clinton was kbreecimpe. he did not talk about it. they said, talk to my lawyers over here. trump is allowing it to infect his presidency. and the interesting thing about the litany that you just read is even if robert mueller delivers a report in two months, and it's less than we all anticipate, the investigations will continue. and particularly, the federal prosecutors in new york, who now seem to be digging into the trump organization, that is so dangerous for donald trump and his children. >> midw

ken dilanian has done some reporting on that himself. he's very familiar with that report. and clint watt has written a book about this. what did you get out of this report? this is a senate report, produced of real evidence, of real tweets and social media postings that says what the russians were involved in. >> that's right, two independent research groups which are really the foremost researchers in the media and the country. examined millions of tweets and facebook posts and instagram posts and shares and interactions by the internet research agency, the russia group in st. petersburg, which has been indicted by robert mueller, accused of conspiring by the united states. trying to interfere in the 2016 election. what they found links to that scene we just saw play out. one of the things they were doing was undermining confidence in american institutions by putting forward conspiracy theorys and fake news. and they continued after -- they supported donald trump's candidacy and tried to hurt hillary clinton. after trump was elected they quickly pivoted to trying to under

we'll find you, ken dilanian. ken dilanian or national security intelligence reporter. still ahead, how nancy pelosi proved she has the chops to lead the democrats by taking on the president today. that's coming up. >>> but first, tonight's thing one and thing two 3. our dad was in the hospital. because of smoking. but we still had to have a cigarette. had to. but then, we were like. what are we doing? the nicodermcq patch helps prevent your urge to smoke all day. nicodermcq. you know why, we know how. (honking) when your craving strikes, you need your wing nut. ( ♪ ) no one can totally satisfy a craving, quite like your wing nut. >>> thing 1 tonight. you may have heard there was a hearing today in the capital with the ceo of google called by house republicans on the judiciary committee who have been looking into allegations of liberal bias online. now, it started out as most hearings do. google's ceo sundar pichai entered a packed room, ready to face the assembled congressmen and women. but as soon as pichai took his seat, the monopoly man settled in right behind him.

leading off our discussion now, ken dilanian, intelligence and national security reporter so far msnbc, mimi roker, legal contributor. john heilman is with us, national affairs analyst for nbc news and msnbc. he is co-host and executive producer of show times the circus. ken, this is what we're waiting for all day. what have you learned with what is not redacted? >> it's a bit disappointing, lawrence, because we didn't answer the crucial question you and rachel were talking about which is why did he lie, and did the president tell him to lie and did the president know he was talking to a russian ambassador. we did learn that he was an all-star cooperator. he's been working with robert mueller for a year. nothing has leaked about that cooperation. i don't believe that the trump team, trump's lawyers know what he has provided. and let me just read one excerpt i thought was particularly telling. his early cooperation was particularly valuable because he was one of the few people with long-term and first-hand insights regarding events and issues under investigation by mueller's office. >>>

we'll find you, ken dilanian. ken dilanian or national security intelligence reporter.till ahead, how nancy pelosi proved she has the chops to lead the democrats by taking on the president today. that's coming up. >>> but first, tonight's thing one and thing two 3. so this christmas, take care of the hands that take care of you. that's me in back in 1987, when i gave isotoner gloves to all my teammates. now i have a different set of teammates. my family. and they all want isotoner gloves for christmas because they keep getting better. there's smartouch. for selfies whenever, wherever. then there's four way stretch for flexibility. they even have smartdri. see? stays dry. so get isotoner gloves for the whole family. take care of the hands that take care of you. >>> thing 1 tonight. you may have heard there was a hearing today in the capital with the ceo of google called by house republicans on the judiciary committee who have been looking into allegations of liberal bias online. now, it started out as most hearings do. google's ceo sundar pichai entered a packed room, re

. >> ken dilanian has joined us. let me read to you from page 22. substantial term of imprisonment is warranted but cohen was asking for was no prison term. it does not look like the southern district of new york agreed with michael cohen. they write in this document, as set forth herein, conversation of the factors set forth in u.s. code 183553 weighs heavily in favor of a substantial term of imprisonment, in particular the nature and seriousness of the offenses in the need to promote respect for the law and afford adequate deterrence are especially weighty considerations. that seems really different, ken dilanian, from the language in the mike flynn sentencing document which kind of had it on the one hand on the other. on the one hand, mike flynn's military service was described by mueller's team as admirable, as impressive. it was also described mike flynn knew better. as someone that served at the highest levels of government, he should have known better than t should have known better than to lie to the fbi. what do you make of the con tres wit

>> oh, yes. >> ken dilanian? >> the answer is yes because this has been the most consequential day yet of the mueller investigation. >> that is quite a statement given how many days there have been. i want to give a special thanks to our entire panel and the legal analysis here. and if you are joining us right now, you've been watching "the beat with ari melber" on a day when bob mueller spoke through speaking indictments and the southern district of new york spoke. and what we heard were two different stories that intersect with criminal activity confessed as well as alleged in the case of confessed and alleged with manafort and obstruction by people tied to the president of the united states. individual one, donald trump, identified for the first time for directing a campaign-related felony, a big day indeed. thank you for watching our coverage. and don't go anywhere because there is a lot more going on and a lot of news developing over the course of tonight. and chris matthews has you covered. ha "hardball wit

with that, let's go to msnbc intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian. are waiting with baited breath for this sentencing memo to come out. what are the kind of things we're expected to learn when this does drop? >> i think it's reasonable to assume, kasie, we're going to learn at least the details about flynn's crimes. he's pleaded guilty to lying to the fbi about his conversations with the russian ambassador, previous memos in the case of george popolopodus have at leasted spelled out the details of their crimes and if we learn that, we learn whether flynn's story is consistent with the story of the united states. if you recall when trump was asked whether he was aware or directed flynn to speak to the ambassador about those obama administration sanctions that were placed at the end of the administration about election interference, trump's thing was i was not aware of it but i would be perfectly fine if he was doing it, it was perfectly okay, and i fired him for lying to the vice president. >> very good summation, ken. we appreciate that. >> thanks. i

joining me on set, intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian. shawna thomas, former spokesperson for vice president mike pence, the national reporter for "the washington post," matt visor and former u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor joyce vance. thank you all for being here tonight. joyce, i want to start with you. to try and put the weight of these investigations around the president into some context, there's been some conversations and quotes i've seen come up. john dean had a tweet suggesting that this was perhaps worse than what happened during watergate. is there any scenario where, if this wasn't the president of the united states, and you were just a businessperson or somebody in -- maybe even in public life who is facing the sheer number of investigations that the president is facing, that there wouldn't be one somewhere that would come up with something that was a major criminal offense? >> you know, as a prosecutor, i always like to wait and see what the evidence says when it's all in. but with that caveat, if the president was a bu

ken dilanian, your view? >> whereas the southern district was not satisfied, cohen cooperated with these documents. i don't think we should lose sight of that. my colleague flagged one part of this. the document says he cooperated with contacts within and around the white house in 2017 and this year. and that's the first mention of the mueller investigation reaching into the white house. this document makes clear that donald trump lied. and i don't use that term lightly, when he said in his first news conference as president that he had no dealings with russia. this document says that in december 2015, trump conferred with michael cohen about reaching out to the russian government and it seems to be related to the trump tower project, it seems to be the same individual who offered the political synergy on a government level. it sure looks like michael cohen was a target of recruitment here by the russians, cohen also talked about the circumstances about why i lied to congress. the implication was it wasn't ju

. >>> i'm joined by the representative of bloomberg opinion, and ken dilanian, national news and securityorter. i want to get back to you, ken, because you have this wide sweeping notion of the whole thing. and i think you've got a pretty good counter punch to what trump has in his brain that he's denying. but you're not denying it. it's your job to tell us about it. so, what does trump think when he's watching a broadcast like this and he's hearing us talk about 14 people around him all had russian contacts? is he saying that's natural? no big deal? how does he explain this russian thing that no other presidential candidate has ever been involved with? >> the thing is, chris, he might have been able to explain it. he did have a policy of trying to reach out to russia and have an approach with russia. he denied it, so he lied about t. and i use that word "lie" t as clear now those clips that you played, those were lies. he knew that michael cohen was reaching out to the russian government. we now know from the friday court filings. it's not something you forget. they were trying to build

joining we now, the other guy i always rely on for these things, ken dilanian, national security reporter and as advertised msnbc justice analyst matt miller remains with us. thank you guys. make sense of this, ken. we've talked about michael cohen and two of the three reports but this one's juicy and interesting. what does it tell us that we didn't know? i wish i could make sense of it, ali. it's a strange predicament paul manafort has himself in. he lied, according to this document, about things that were provable. either that or he didn't realize, perhaps -- some of these things he's said to have lied about, including interactions with this guy kilimnik, the special counsel has documentary evidence, emalts, text, phone communications to prove his lies, did he not realize they had this capacity by now? >> talk about kilimnix. >> he was manafort's right-hand man in ukraine when manafort was representing that russian-backed ukrainian politician. he spoke the language, manafort didn't, he made the trains run on time. there is some suspicion he was a russian operative the entire time. and t

ken dilanian broke the news, joining me with the details next. at booking.com, we can't guarantee you'll find gold in them therr hills on your vacation. but we can guarantee the best price on this rental cabin. or any accomodation from hotels to yurts. booking.com, booking.yeah ♪ ♪ this holiday season, families near you need your help. visit redcross.org now to donate. discover.o. i like your card, but i'm absolutely not paying an annual fee. discover has no annual fees. really? yeah. we just don't believe in them. oh nice. you would not believe how long i've been rehearsing that. no annual fee on any card. only from discover. >>> tonight at donald trump's defense secretary quits in protest and the government teeters on the brink of shutdown. there is also breaking news from the mueller investigation. government officials tell nbc news special counsel is nearing the end of his probe in the russian election interference and is expected to submit his report to the attorney general as soon as mid-february. joined my nbc news intelligence and nationa

. >> ken dilanian, you've been following all of these cases closer than any of us on a daily basis for nbc news. what are the news items today in these filings? what are the things we learned today we didn't know yesterday? >> i think you've already articulated them, lawrence. but just to emphasize the fact that federal prosecutors, not just michael cohen, but federal prosecutors are now endorsing the idea that donald trump ordered michael cohen to make illegal payments to women that were a violation of dam pain financial law. now, the issue with that law unlike many laws, to convict somebody of it you have to prove criminal intent. sometimes ignorance of a law is no defense. in this case it actually is. it's not so simple of linking trump to the payment. but michael cohen is clearly saying he had criminal intent. he knew this was about protecting donald trump for the election. and he would testify at a trial it would seem that was donald trump's intent. and when this first came out donald trump lied about it. he said he didn't know anything about the payments. and the other big piece

. >> well, yeah, ken dilanian, when they say the reason -- they don't say the reason we want to keep this redacted is national security. >> no. >> they do not say this is about national security. they say it's about an ongoing investigation, and the reason you want that redacted is that you don't want the subjects of the ongoing investigation to know that information. >> that is absolutely right. that's why i agree with john 100% this shows there's a lot more investigating to do. and i agree with mimi that giuliani's comments are absurd because this has been one of the most disciplined and relentless federal criminal investigations i've ever seen. these people do not leak and mike flynn's lawyers were not leaking. so there is no way that giuliani or anybody in the trump team knows what mike flynn has given them. it could be substantial. let's not forget, mike flynn was on board with the idea of a reproach -- with russia. he believed you could team up with russia to fight that threat. he had many conversations with donald trump about this subject and he was aware of meetings that were

let's bring in two people who have been waiting all day for mueller's memo, ken dilanian. you've been looking for this all day. >> yes. >> what is this document that we're going to get today? what is it? >> this is a document that's supposed to instruct the judge on what kind of sentence to pass on mike flynn. it's called the government sentencing memorandum of law. close enough. the reason we're all in such suspense about this is because we expect it could answer some of the questions you just outlined. in the past when people have lied, these kinds of documents have laid out not only the nature of their lies, but why they lied, their motive and the circumstance around their lies. it's reasonable to expect that we'll find out whether donald trump knew that mike flynn had lied, whether he knew that mike flynn had gone out and talked to the russian ambassador. he said publicly he didn't know. >> it's a classic argument in the alternative in only the way donald trump says. i didn't tell him, but if i had, i would have liked it. in fact, he should have done it. those are the

i'm joined right now by ken dilanian, reporter for nbc's investigative unit, julia ainsley, barbara mcquade, a former u.s. attorney at michigan. mimi rocah, former u.s. assistant attorney in the southern district of new york. i want to start with ken. i want to focus on one thing first. i want to focus on the criminal violation of the campaign laws, this effort to cover up what is really a campaign contribution of $130,000, $150,000, adding it up to cover up these affairs with these two women. the president directed that activity, according to this memorandum today. ken? >> yes, in fact, michael cohen already stood up in court and said that when he pleaded guilty to these charges in the southern district of new york. but what's different today is the u.s. attorney's office, a representative of the united states of america is endorsing that view in black and white in a court filing, that cohen acted in coordination with and at the direction of individual one, donald trump, who had become the president of the united states. now the reason i've been told it's not accurate to call him an unindi

it's the same group of russians we're dealing with. >> ken dilanian, your view? >> the reason that special counsel robert mueller has said they're satisfied with michael cohen's cooperation, whereas the southern district is not satisfied is because cohen cooperated extensively about the russia collusion, i don't think we should lose sight of that. in fact, my colleague just flagged one part that said he cooperated about contacts within and around the trump white house in 2017 and this year. that's the first mention of really the mueller investigation reaching into the modern trump white house as opposed to the campaign. it also -- this document makes clear that donald trump lied. i don't use that term lightly. when he said at his first news conference as president that he had no contacts with russian during the campaign, no dealings with russia. we had a hint of it. but this document says in december of 2015, trump conferred with michael cohen about reaching out to the russian government and it seems to be related to the trump tower project because it seems to be

ken dilanian broke the news, joining me with the details next. today is the day you're going to get motivated... get stronger... get closer. start listening today to the world's largest selection of audiobooks on audible. and now, get more. for just $14.95 a month, you'll get a credit a month good for any audiobook, plus two audible originals exclusive titles you can't find anywhere else. if you don't like a book, you can exchange it any time, no questions asked. automatically roll your credits over to the next month if you don't use them. with the free audible app, you can listen anytime, and anywhere. plus for the first time ever, you'll get access to exclusive fitness programs a $95 value free with membership. start a 30-day trial today and your first audiobook is free. cancel anytime and your books are yours to keep forever. audible. the most inspiring minds. the most compelling stories. text "listen27" to 500500 to start your free trial today. take care of the hands that take care of you. that's me in back in 1987, when i gave isotoner glove

. >> ken dilanian now, that judge really dressed him down.alk us through with what happened in that courtroom stoday. >> it a stunner. both sides agreed that he did not deserve jail time because he had cooperated with mueller. but the judge had a different idea first he had two messages he wanted to send the public in my view. first, he was very upset that michael flynn's lawyers had filed a pre sentencing dee brief. that even though he's pleading guilty, maybe the fbi trapped him, didn't offer him a lawyer. so the judge put him under oath and made sure he was pleading guilty. en he started to really hammer flynn over the conduct that he was not chargedwith. secret lobbying. he paid more than half a million to turkey. and he was not charged with that crime. the judge said, you sold out your country and i can't cannot tellou i won'te sente to you prison. so the attorneys said, we can ntinue on cooperate. there is a separate case in virginia that he can cooperate on and then we'll come back in 90 days. >> so what more could he possibly >>? t is

ken dilanian, national security reporter and kcraig unger, investigative journalist. ken, watching the pictures of the president as he's in buenos aires and we're all trying to read into what he may be thinking, right, but what you do understand is that we have several headlines that could be swirling through his mind at the moment. and that is the question of will, in one case for paul manafort, for instance, will he face new charges based on what might happen this week? do you believe that might happen? >> it's very possible, richard. mueller's prosecutors on friday told the judge they were considering new charges against manafort as a result of the plea deal falling through and his failure to cooperate and his commission of crimes and lies. they've yet to spell out what those are. we expecting a court filing in a few weeks that will lay all that out. this was a hugely consequential week in the mueller investigation. it's got to have donald trump incredibly rattled. mueller certainly gained a lot of was in from manafort over the many meetings they had and he gained a

and ken dilanian covers intelligence and national security. all right, ken, how do you assess flynn's importance? mueller's delayed sentencing four times so he can keep talking to him. >> is that kim? i think it's substantial given that four times he could have been sentenced earlier, presumably the idea that he's continuing to give information that's relevant to the broader investigation and could implicate other people. we know we have the russians involved in the hacking. we know that there's some high level people close to trump that are bad apples. we add that to the story. that mr. mueller is building. the question is who's left. can they implicate jared, don jr., implicate mike pence? the fact they've held off the sentencing suggest that there's still ongoing cooperation and building potential cases against people of higher level of importance. >> all right, shannon, i want to dig in to michael flynn. we hadn't thought about him for a year. part of the article you wrote in december 2017 after flynn pleaded guilty. it says, michael flynn

my panel, ken dilanian. my dear friend shannon pettypiece. elliott williams, a former assistant deputy attorney general at the justice department. michael steele who i haven't seen in ages. tim o'brien, executive editor at bloomberg opinion. in man knows trump. ken, unlike the rest of us who were at holiday parties this weekend, you were working. now he's saying it's a sell pim private transaction. at the very least, there ain't nothing simple with that. he's saying it's okay. >> a simple transaction with a porn star. in fairness, that is the defense. this is a complicated law that's difficult to prove. the fact that he lied, that's what prosecutors call consciousness of guilt. now saying this was designed to cover up these affairs. that's the very definition of a campaign expenditure. it's not a slam dunk case. you have to prove criminal intent. he would clearly be in the cross hairs of the southern district prosecutors. now the question is, you know, will they wait until he leaves office to bring this case. >> against his consciousness of g

joining me, national security reporter ken dilanian.irst, this report that came out was pretty detailed. it talks about all the pages that russians created in order to target african-americans. 30 facebook pages, ten youtube channels with 571 police violence videos. various instagram accounts, a dozen weapons inspectobsites. why were they so heavily targeting the african-american community? >> it looks like to suppress the black vote for hillary clinton and it seems like they were successful. you know that hillary clinton did not do very well historically very well with black voters. to back up, this is an analysis of posts on social media by the internet research agency, the st. petersburg agency that was indicted. the executives were indicted by robert mueller and funded by putin's chef. it looks like the russian intelligence to help donald trump and hurt hillary clinton. and we've known about this operation. what we haven't known is the level of detail. and in particular, the focus on african-americans. that's getting a lot of attent

joining me now to break all of it down, ken dilanian and back felix salmon and my panel noelle and billthrough the report. russian interference in this campaign does not necessarily tie a line to president trump's campaign in saying that there was any coordinated effort. >> no, that's absolutely right, stephanie. by the way, it's two reports prepared for the senate intelligence committee. there's nothing in these reports that speaks to coordination with the trump campaign. what these researchers did in two reports is analyze millions of social media post business that internet research agency, that entity in st. petersburg, russia, founded by putin's chef and charging executive with conspiracy to destradivaoy the d states. these researchers are giving us rich, new veins of detail. in particular, the thing that is jumping out to a lot of people is there was an amazing sophisticated effort to target the african-american community and there were youtube pages and facebook pages and more than a million engagements with the african-american community on social media and much of that was desi

joining me now, nbc news investigative reporter ken dilanian and former special watergate prosecutor erman. seriously, ken, you're going to have a really busy december. what do you expect to learn from today's filing? >> going to drop in the late afternoon, perhaps as late as 6 p.m. in terms of what we might learn, i've been speaking to legal experts. we're in uncharted territory. normally they're sentenced after the investigation is closed. in this case, the investigation's wide open. there may be some things mueller wants to hold back. at least we can expect to get an accounting of the circumstances under which flynn lied about his conversations with the russian ambassador, who told him to do it and we'll see whether that story is consistent with the story told by the president and top aides. >> it's uncharted territory to sentence them while the investigation is still open, why do it? >> i'm not totally convinced he's going to be sentenced. >> really? >> yes, i never have a situation -- >> what do you mean? >> because normally the government wants to keep the sentencing open so the

joining me now on the phone nbc news intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian who obtained that memo. ken, what's in it? >> ali, it essentially articulates the same explanation we've been hearing all day from justice department officials about what happened here, which is that acting attorney general whitaker was advised he didn't have a legal obligation to retuse himself, and in fact his statements to the media criticizing the mueller probe were not sufficient to trigger a formal ethics review, but what he did was ask for ininformal advice and the senior advisor told him it's a close call, but he would advise that the acting attorney general should recuse himself because a reasonable person could question his impartiality based on the many statements he made denouncing and prejudging the mueller probe. but he declined to take that advice. he's said he's going to continue in his role in supervising the mueller investigation. and as you said that could mean if in fact the mueller report does get sent to the attorney general in mid-february when we expect whitaker will still

i want to bring in ken dilanian and nbc investigations reporter tom winter and elliott williams, formereral prosecutor and former deputy assistant attorney general. i've got a full house. he's cooperating with four different investigations. that one hits drsh s directly tp children. how much of a threat is cohen? i got to tell you, that guy is parading around every upper east side restaurant like he doesn't have a care in the world. >> that would imply there's potential criminal behavior. we don't yet know that for certain. however, what we do know is this person was the right-hand man to the trump organization and to the president. if anybody can help him understand certain things. they could look at e-mails, at documents and say what did this mean, why did you have this discussion? they could look at financial statements and say what was this about and where did this money go? so he is the ultimate tour guide to everything trump. trump organization, all those type of things. for them, if they think they have criminal activity or he can point them to criminal activity to me it says he'

joining us now is ken dilanian and loyola law school professor jessica levinson. ken, let's talk about this. what's the news in this decision from the ethics officials at the justice department? >> well, the news is that matthew whitaker, a man who roundly criticized the mueller investigation as a tv commentator is now the guy in charge of major decisions. let's explain what that means. it doesn't mean he's managing robert mueller or looking over his shoulder. the regulations say specifically that robert mueller doesn't answer on a day-to-day basis to anybody at the justice department. but he has to update them regularly. >> ken, i've got to ask you to hold on. paul ryan has just come out to the microphones at the white house where they're trying to avert a government shutdown. >> they're coming. there's some guys coming. >> we want to see who's the fastest. >> we're punctual people, we're on time. >> we're not, we're reporters. >> that's a cool beard, man. >> can you just give us an update? >> we're going to do that. you've got some guys running. >> we want everyb

ken dilanian, intelligence and national security for nbc news. matt miller, former chief spokesperson for the justice department. cynthia oxny, former federal prosecutor. daniel goldman, district of new york and tom winter, nbc news investigations reporter. i got a full house of big brains. dan, i want to start with you. if ami says it was hush money and cohen said it was hush money, is that enough cooperating evidence or is trump cleared when he says cohen was a lawyer? >> i assuming they both say donald trump was in on it and knew it was hush money payments and he knew that, it is enough. he has been searching around for a workable defense for months now. first, it was i didn't know about it at all. now it's, well, michael cohen is my lawyer and this is advice of counsel. it has some curb appeal. it is a failure from a legal perspective. in order to assert an advice of counsel defense, you have to affirmably seek legal advice about whether something is legal or not. i'm quite confident there's no way and michael cohen would testify to this, at

i'm joined by nbc news intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian.hington post national reporter carol letting, and an msnbc and former deputy assistant attorney general tom dupre. aaron and yamish are also here in washington. carol, let me start with you. the house committee has voted to release these stone transcript. >> it's pretty striking information. my colleagues and i wrote a story yesterday about basically mueller asking the committee for an official transcript of the interview, and so the result is that now, you know, the special counsel is going to get a copy. >> yeah. what does that mean for roger stone? what are prosecutors looking for? >> what we're told by multiple federal prosecutors, current and former, is this is the step you take before you're going to charge someone with lying, because a transcript is your evidence of whether or not someone lied under oath. an official transcript is how you measure whether or not that person, against the evidence, was telling the truth. and there's no other reason for mueller to seek this transcri

back with me, nbc news intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian, and cynthia oxnay, nbc legal analyst. neal was on morning shows this morning. let me play his argument, and i'll get your reaction on the other side. >> it sure looks like when you read that tweet and when you read it next to the other one tweeted right alongside it the minute before about michael cohen and how the book should be thrown at him, this is not the way any ordinary investigation proceeds unless you're dealing with, you know, the mob or something like that. and that is the way the president is talking, which is -- you know, it would be a sure shame if you cooperated with the government. bad stuff happens to those who cooperate, and good stuff happens to those like roger stone who stay silent. >> cynthia, he makes an argument for witness tampering, but is it maybe arguable? is that a question that's still hanging out there? and is it a step too far to suggest the president is behaving like a mob boss here? >> well, i have two thoughts about it. first, about george conway, i think it's rude that he

i'm joined by natasha bertrand with the atlantic and ken dilanian, nation at security reporter. >>> it to me they were sharper than a lot of micro analysts on one of the candidates, hillary clinton. they seem to know exactly how to turn off black voters and make them think, these two guys, hillary and trump, aren't any better than one or the other, so stay home. >> that really was remarkable at this. we knew about this effort. robert mueller indicted the people behind this internet research agency and he described some of their efforts. these reports make clear a huge part of it was aimed at african americans and, in part, to suppress their vote. it was a three-prong effort. they were given misinformation about the timing of the election and polling place location. they were urged to vote for a third-party candidate, jill stein, and they were fed all kinds of conspiracy theories about hillary clinton, and videos about police brutality, feeding into their very legitimate grievances with society, chris. >> i wish i had an african-american on this panel. i feel a little uncomfortable with

my panel on all of this, former watergate prosecutor nick akerman, ken dilanian and joining us by phone, one of the reporters who broke this rebecca. great to have you with us. walk us through your reporting in terms of what we exactly learned and what investigators are looking at at this moment. >> so what we understand is that investigators right now have two prongs to their investigation. the first, as you said, is that they're looking at spending by the inaugural committee, which hases disclosed where it spent $61 million of the $103 million it spent but hasn't disclosed where the other 50 or so million went. the other side of it is that they're looking at donors who gave to the inauguration and what they might have received in return for those donations. >> so how central to the probe are the tapes from michael cohen's office that we referenced earlier? why have they become so critical in this investigation? >> what we understand is this is partially where the investigation came from. there have been questions about the inauguration fund for a while. we know that mueller has looked

back with me our panel of reporters and former prosecutors, danny cevallos, ken dilanian, and jill wine-banks to all of you for being back with us. we know that michael cohen has been addressing the judge from inside the courtroom. what do we know about what he's telling the judge? >> reporter: he's definitely doing the standard allocution of a defendant. he's saying to the judge essentially i was led astray. i trusted in someone that i shouldn't have trusted. he's mentioning his family. he's are all key points to consider, and it's a really challenging thing to thread the needle for a defendant. he wants to look like he's taking responsibility for his actions, and he has to be careful not to pass all the blame onto other people like the president. he must still take responsibility for what he did, but demonstrate to the judge that his case is unique, and he is a unique defendant warranting mercy in this situation. so that's what we're hearing, and it's no surprise because undoubtedly his lawyers have prepared him extensively, and his lawyers have very good reputations and certainly know what

ken dilanian said about the dossier from the very beginning, ignore the sex. follow the money. there's some salacious stuff in there about sex acts that your former colleague jim comey had to brief the president on and describe when i interviewed him at the 92nd street y as awkward. do you think the salacious stuff in there distracted from all the substantive financial ties between trump org and russia? >> no question. and that's a really important point. the dossier is really sort of 16 mini reports. it's 35 pages. there's dozens and dozens of bullet points. the salacious stuff, which the media focused on, and i guess -- >> we're sorry. >> i understand it. it was only a very small piece of the 35-page dossier. all the other stuff has to do with business relationships and political interference and russian hacking. the things that mueller is focusing on. we may never know, frankly, about those salacious acts. i frankly could care less, but i do think it was a big distraction. >> in the media's defense, that was what trump was so triggered by. the salacious aspects of the dossie

i'm also joined by ken dilanian, who covers national security and the justice department. t me just start with you. you got some reporting on whitaker, who was asked, what they were asked, and what they told him at the justice department. >> that's right, ali. the story is a little more confli complicated than we were first led to believe. it's true that whitaker has not recused from the investigation and he's not legally obligated to. but he sought informal ethics advice from the justice department and he was told by an agency ethics official that it was a close call. and if that official were in his shoes, he or she would recommend recusing. now, whitaker has decided not to accept that recommendation and is moving forward in his role to oversee the mueller investigation. but we should understand what that means. robert mueller is not answerable on a day-to-day basis to anyone inside the justice department. what it means is that major decisionses by robert mueller need to be or could be challenged by either rod rosenstein or matthew whitaker. and actually, justice departme

. >> ken dilanian, do we have -- the president tweeted today, when you think about how he has just hammered michael cohen for flipping, michael flynn has flipped. and today let me put up full screen number five here, a trump tweet. good luck today in court to general michael flynn, ken. he tweets. it will be interesting to see what he has to say, despite tremendous pressure being put on him about russian collusion and our greatly obviously highly successful political campaign. there was no collusion. what is this flynn flirtation thing? >> this is so strange because michael flynn told his story. so if it's bad for the president, there's no chance to change it. it's locked in. but one dark possibility here is michael flynn has not incriminated the president and somehow the president learned this, possibly through the attorney general, who is in position to be briefed on this investigation. we have very little visibility into what he's actually doing with regard to this investigation. but you're right, michael flynn has cooperated extensively. he was one of the four original people under coun

i know that ken dilanian and pete williams and some others had reported that all of a sudden gofvernmenticials ar being told to brace for a possible mueller report being issued as early as mid-february. i think if there is a report that's going to drop in february, let's not confuse that with additional indictments that are also likely to drop. the two are not mutually exclusive. i think we have been awaiting a roger stone, jerome corsi indictment for quite some time, and you know, the more i see of bob mueller's investigation, it's sort of the classic bottom up investigation where he's building that pyramid, and he has had the -- you know, the flynns and the manaforts, the papadopoulos es and the van der swans, and others cohen plead guilty as he worked his way up the pyramid. there is still the top of the pyramid, the president himself, his son, his son-in-law, kushner. so i think if mueller is preparing to issue a report, it may coincide with additional indictments that he drops. and you know, the big ticket question is does the president become an indicted co-conspirator in a conspir

. >> ken dilanian, do you have some new reporting? >> reporter: yeah.here's something that judge sullivan said that sheds light on his mind-set and how he's approaching mike flynn's conduct. he said it right at the end of the hearing. he said, i probably shouldn't say this but i don't agree with the petraeus sentence either. he ended up pleading to a misdemeanor and got probation. the implication of judge sullivan even raising that issue is that people who hold high government positions, senior intelligence officials, are held to a higher standard when it comes to things like lying to the fbi or secretly lobbying for a foreign government. so quite apart from judge sullivan's obvious anger over the mike flynn filing that suggests he wasn't responsible for lying to the fbi, holding a three-star general to a higher standard here, guys. >> glenn, dan, danny, thank you all for your analysis. >> can i ask a question? >> i don't think i can answer it but we'll try. >> we had extraordinary experts help break this down for us. when you get on the subway in a few

white house correspondent hallie jackson, nbc news intelligence and national security reporter ken dilanian, and former u.s. attorney and former deputy assistant attorney general, harry litman. ken, first to you. this was supposed to be somewhat of a routine day in court today. sounds like it was anything but. >> yeah, instead it turned into a stunner, katy. i really believe, as you alluded to, judge sullivan set out to send a message today. first, a message about the filing that mike flynn's lawyers delivered to the court, suggesting that somehow he wasn't culpable or as culpable for lying to the fbi because he wasn't warned that that was a crime, because he was somehow trapped. judge sullivan got right to the point of that to clear that up, as if to say, what's all this nonsense i've been hearing on right-wing media about you being entrapped? he got michael flynn to say clearly that, no, that wasn't the case, that he knew what he was doing. he's definitely pleading guilty to lying to the fbi. but then it became clear as the hearing went on that judge sullivan was also very concerned and b

mi mimi, ken dilanian.ments ago, president trump clashing with pelosi and chuck schumer in the oval office over funding for that border wall. it was all captured on camera. here's part of that unprecedented very lively exchange. >> you have the white house. you have the senate. you have the house of representatives. you have the vote. you should pass it. >> we don't have the vote. in the senate, we need 60 votes. >> no, we could bring it up today. >> excuse me, i can't get it passed in the house if it's not going to pass in the senate. i don't want to waste time. we would do it immediately. we get it passed very easily in the house. we would get it -- nancy, i'd have it passed in two seconds. >> we have solutions that will pass the house and senate right now and will not shut down the government and that's what we're urging you to do. not threaten to shut down the government. >> you don't want to shut down the government. the last time you shut it down, you got killed. >> let me say something, mr. president