mary mccord, former justice department senior national security official. you for your time on this tonight. scary situation. thanks for your expertise. >> sure. >> we'll be right back. stay with us. shipstation saves us so much time it makes it really easy and seamless pick an order print everything you need slap the label on ito the box and it's ready to go our cost for shipping, were cut in half just like that go to shipstation/tv and get 2 months free ♪3, 4♪ ♪ just like that ♪hey♪ ♪ ♪are you ready for me♪ ♪are you ready♪ ♪are you ready♪ hi. are you ready? are you santiago's mother? yes, i am. and she's a thief! [silence] let's go. dice dreams, attack your friends and steal their coins. play now. shipstation saves us so much time it makes it really easy and seamless pick an order print everything you need slap the label on ito the box and it's ready to go our cost for shipping, were cut in half just like that go to shipstation/tv and get 2 months free in order for small businesses to thrive, they need to be jus smart, efficient, savvy. making the most of

. >> mary mccord spent nearly 20 years as a federal prosecutor in d.c., where she served at the chiefnal division. katie phang, served as a prosecutor in miami, she's of course the host of the katie phang show -- and they both join me now. katie, i want to go to you, again, we don't know what's gonna happen in new hampshire, we don't know what's gonna happen in these trials. amanda talked to mary in a second about the timing. it's amazing to me that -- this real possibility combined with the polling has been utterly absent, almost completely from the entire republican contest when it would seem like from just the basic level of a pragmatic decision about your nominee, the most obvious thing? >> the first question that i have for you chris, which felony are voters willing to not vote for him if he's convicted? you have an embarrassment of riches, if you're trying to pick a felony for which donald trump could be convicted. all kidding aside, the fact that we're having this conversation is a stunning one. i think it creates the need for at that check for people to not only understand how

mary mccord, former justice department senior national security official.ry situation. thanks for your expertise. >> sure. >> we'll be right back. stay with us. >> sure. >> we'll be right back stay with us if you struggle with cpap... you should check out inspire. honey? inspire. sleep apnea innovation. learn more and view important safety information at inspiresleep.com the long-lasting scent of gain flings made it smell like dave was in his happy place... ...the massage chair at the mall. but...he wasn't. gain flings with oxi boost and febreze. ♪♪ here's to... one year bolder. ♪♪ ♪boost♪ nutrition for now. when i was diagnosed with h-i-v, i didn't know who i would be. but here i am... being me. keep being you... and ask your healthcare provider about the number one prescribed h-i-v treatment, biktarvy. biktarvy is a complete, one-pill, once-a-day treatment used for h-i-v in many people whether you're 18 or 80. with one small pill, biktarvy fights h-i-v to help you get to undetectable—and stay there whether you're just starting or replacing your current tr

joining us now former justice department senior national security official, mary mccord.u for your time. >> my pleasure. >> what do you make of the puzzle pervasiveness of these threats right now, how disruptive and dangerous they might be? >> as you know, we are already in a heightened environment of threats, online threats, offline threats, coming in all sorts of forms. we have been in this state really since 2020 and even before that. and this seems to be the latest epidemic. a point, though, even in march of 2023 less than a year ago when within one week, dozens of schools across the country were swatted, you know, causing lockdowns, et cetera. it seems to have gone from schools to government buildings to synagogues, as part of, you know, terrorism after the israel-hamas war broke out, terrorism type of efforts to terrorize and intimidate. and now, we are saying, like you say, a whole episode of attacks on government officials. and i think part of it, the motive, it's often to intimidate the subjects, particularly in the individual cases where you are calling in hoax

that was a better introduction of mary mccord than i could ever possibly offer. of this gap between what we're hearing between a lot of legal analysts and what we heard from glen about the possibility of the supreme court almost wanting to take an off ramp. we're not talking about the merits. we're not talking about case law. we're talking about what is the supreme court going to want to do? >> i think there is part of that, and certainly the cynic is, you know, they have a preordained result and they'll find a way to get there and that's where the idea of an off ramp comes in. there are some legal commentators and just others who think that the supreme court at least some -- at least maybe five members, maybe six, will have -- and maybe all nine to be honest, will have some trepidation about being the people responsible for keeping someone off the ballot. there is a lot of talk that says this feels undemocratic. on the flip side of it, i mean, this is a provision of the constitution, it was added there for a reason, as judge ludic likes to say, the most democrat

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joining me now is "the new york times" investigative reporter and mary mccord a former security advisor for the national division and msnbc analyst. thank you both for being here tonight. you were in the courtroom and a lot happened there. there was a lot of back and forth. we talked about it on the show earlier this week about whether or not trump could give a closing argument, and the ruling from judge engoron was, no, if you wouldn't agree to these limitations he couldn't speak. but he did end up speaking anyway, right? how did that happen, and how did that unfold for the people inside the room? >> well, in the limitations that were to be placed on him were limitations that would be placed on any lawyer giving closing arguments, any individual giving closing arguments, which is you have to stick with the facts of the case, and that's what donald trump declined via his lawyers to do, and that's why we didn't think he was going to be giving closing arguments today. and for most part he didn't. after a few minutes after a few of his lawyers got up, one of his lawyers asked if donald tru

joining me now is so crane, new york times investigative reporter and mary mccord -- and an innocent b.c. legal analyst. thank you both for being here tonight. so, you are in the courtroom. and a lot happened there. there was a lot of back and forth we talked about on the show earlier this week about whether or not trump could give a closing argument. and the ruling from judge engoron was no. if he wouldn't agree to these limitations, he couldn't speak, but he did speak anyway. how did that happen and how to the unsolved? >> in the limitations that were to be placed on him, that limitations that would be placed on any lawyer given closing arguments, any individual given closing arguments. you have to stick to the fact of the case. that's what donald trump declined his lawyers to do. that's why we didn't think he was going to be given closing arguments today. for the most part he didn't. but in the last minute, after a few of his lawyers got up, one of the lawyers asked if donald trump could speak and i think the judge said yes. i think a judge was inclined to let it go for a few minu

and mary mccord, former acting assistant attorney general for national security, msnbc legal analyst, and cohost of the msnbc podcast, prosecuting donald trump. thank you both for being here. i normally would do ladies first, and happy new year to both of you, but i'm going to actually do this in reverse and start with you, jeffrey rosen, and get your level of confidence that the supreme court of the united states cannot rule that a president is immune from prosecution and that the founders somehow divined every member of congress, every member of the united states senate, and house, to be officers of the united states but not the president. >> so on the first question, i am pretty confident that the founders did not expect the president to be a king. and the idea that the supreme court would induce sweeping immunity for all presidential acts is not convincing, and therefore, i think jack smith will get a good result on that case. the second case is much harder, and the question of what the supreme court will do involves a series of questions. first, what's an insurrection? second, is

so, to understand this, as my colleague mary mccord -- there's something called an interlocutory appealto the weeds, but the normal role in a criminal case is that nothing goes up to an appellate court until the case is over. another waits, until there's a verdict. you have a trial, and the jury decides one way or another what should happen. that is the normal time there is an appeal. there are very few exceptions to that. and this, apparently, falls into an exception, and i say apparently because it's really not clear that this should've been allowed for what's called this interim, or interlocutory appeal. so it seems pretty clear that the d.c. circuit is going to talk about that on tuesday. they actually issued an order to the party saying that -- friends of the court briefs where this was raised by one of the friends of the court. in a brief about whether the state -- bring this up now. so stay tuned for the discussion on tuesday about that issue. >> a big thing to watch, it sounds like. okay, andrea, i can't let you go without asking, because i'm sure you saw the former president ca

mary mccord, former acting assistant attorney general for national security, and cohost of the prosecutingp podcast, and nick ackerman, former watergate assistant special prosecutor. and nick, i'm going to start with you since we did make a nixon reference. what did you make of the dual uses of richard nixon's former cases by the counsel for jack smith's office and the counsel for trump? >> well, it's just amazing how much richard nixon is still haunting us after all these years. 50 years since richard nixon. but i think it's pretty clear. this whole business about immunity is really total nonsense. you go back to the 1974 opinion where the supreme court unanimously ordered richard nixon to produce his tapes. it's pretty clear throughout that the supreme court is basing that ruling on the notion that the president is not above the law. that the president has to answer the same in the criminal system as any other citizen. in fact, recently, the 11th 6t in the case overruling the judge in florida on the classified documents case made it quite clear that donald trump has to be treated just li

. >> reporter: mary mccord is back with us. all president, all the time, right?is or do you that he was always on the job, he always protected because of immunity. does it fly? is that the rest of us, speaking to both sides of his mouth? how does the court see that? because now it has a different color, because there's a real case and controversy in front of him. >> reporter: it's interesting. because the d.c. circuit has already ruled with respect to presidential immunity in this break. braces that brought by congress members for civil liability, for harm done based on january 6th. and what the court said there is that, at least at this stage of those proceedings, there is a big difference between what the former president did is part of his official acts, and what he did as an office seeker. so when campaigning for election. and the court actually pointed to what mr. trump and his lawyers wrote when they sought to intervene in the supreme court in that period between the election in 2020, and january 20th, 2021, when the power was turned over to president biden

mary mccord predicted one week, i thought one to two weeks. i think it's going to be very fast. a lot that the circuit judges really need to wait for at this point. they've had the briefs. they knew this case was coming along. they now have the benefit of the oral argument, know that they have expedited the case and so i would think it would be very quick. the one thing i would say is it's not absolutely clear that the supreme court will take this case. i think donald trump is going to lose and he will seek eventually to go to the supreme court. he might seek rehearing for the whole d.c. circuit to hear the case. why would he do that, because it delays the matter. he could also try to go to the supreme court. it's not clear, though, that the supreme court will take it. i think they probably will, but they may just decide to sit out because, remember, the standard rule is the supreme court takes a very, very small fraction of the cases where people are trying to get their case heard by the supreme court. so they may decide that this is such a frivolous argument, they don't need t

department of justice mary mccord.ly worth the read for those who haven't fully registered that in most of our lives, the inside of a court, a lawsuit, and a lawyer are elements of last resort. we try to avoid getting there. if we have to, we have to. for donald trump, it's not a never has been. it is central to not just his life, but most of his successes. suing and threatening litigation is what he does. >> that's absolutely right. i do commend reading that article to all of your viewers. it catalogs in a way i hadn't seen elsewhere. it's such a history of coopting the legal system for trump's own purposes. just like he tried to cop is and the purposes clearly political purposes. using it for campaigning, and there was nothing he was possibly going to say or even could have thought that he was saying that would move the needle on the law or the facts with the judge yesterday. he was using it to attack the judge, attack the attorney general, attack the entire legal system, yet this is something he's been coopting his

table former acting assistant attorney general for national security at the department of justice mary mccord. tim, let me start with you. what do you make of the arguments trump's lawyers are making here? >> they are making the same argument again and again and again. they are the same arguments that mark med doses made in georgia. they are the same arguments that witnesses made when faced with select committee subpoenas, which is everything that happened was connected to the official business of the white house. and that's just not accurate. again, not everything a the president does, not everything a white house chief of staff does is part and parcel of their official responsibility. there's a clear line between what's official. the conduct of foreign policy or domestic affairs, the things clearly within the range of a president's official responsibility and things that are outside of that range and that's the question before the supreme court. what is alleged of the president's official responsibility. there's really nothing in this pleading, which is just a reply to jack smith's pleading

. >> mary mccord, she is one of many people who's been sweating calls as well.s afternoon. >>> doors are open, or about to open, i should say, minutes from now in caucus sites around iowa. those caucus is getting underway in about two hours from now. our special coverage will continue right after a short break. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ when my doctor gave me breztri for my copd things changed for me. breztri gave me better breathing, symptom improvement, and reduced flare-ups. breztri won't replace a rescue inhaler for sudden breathing problems. it is not for asthma. tell your doctor if you have a heart condition or high blood pressure before taking it. don't take breztri more than prescribed. breztri may increase your risk of thrush, pneumonia, and osteoporosis. call your doctor if worsened breathing, chest pain, mouth or tongue swelling, problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain occur. ask your doctor about breztri. every day, more dog people, and more vets are deciding it's time for a fresh approach to pet food. they're quitting the kibble. and kicking the cans. and f

counterintelligence at the fbi, frank figliuzzi, and the co-host of msnbc's "prosecuting donald trump" podcast, mary mccordto trump's words, about there will be bedlam. he is only adding fuel to the fire. he knows what he's doing. >> we're having flashbacks back to january 6th. things will be wild -- be there. it's happening again. this is not random. it is an all-out effort to intimidate anyone he views as a threat to his power and campaign, and people are heeding the call. the rise in swatting incidents, in bomb threats is not something that's just the work of a lone actor here or there or copycats here or there. it's people heeding the call. what i've learned from law enforcement is there's enough commonalities, particularly in swatting incidents, to believe pool are similar in origin. i'm hoping soon that law enforcement will bring to justice or at least identify the people responsible. but there's a much larger picture here. every time one of these threats is issued, our democracy is eroded again, our constitution is weakened. what do i mean by that? i mean these threats are coming out for people who