mimi rocah, let's take a look at this. >> how many times did mr. trump ask you to threaten an individual or entity on his behalf? >> quite a few times. >> 50 times? >> more. >> 100 times? >> more. >> 200 times? >> more. >> 500 times? >> probably, over the -- over the ten years. >> over the ten years, he asked you -- >> and when you say "threatened," i'm talking about with litigation or an argument. >> mimi rocah, what is your takeaway there? >> look, i would have wanted to know what he meant, particularly by threaten them with an argument. what does that mean exactly? you know, this could be something in the category of thuggish, bad behavior that, you know, certainly a legitimate lawyer wouldn't have engaged in on behalf of a client who would not have condoned such behavior. but it could rise to the level of crimes. i know we keep making this comparison to the organized crime world, but this is exactly you know, the kind of thing that lawyers on behalf of mobsters are employed to do, is to go out and sort of -- in fact michael cohen said, one of t

mimi rocah joins us, former u.s. attorney who has dealt with a lot of these cases. what makes this so potent of course is that this is not just allegedly a personal situation, a sex crime. it involves the allegations of human trafficking and the real victims here could well be these women. >> absolutely, andrea. i worked on a lot of cases like this at the federal level. and these really are just horrible cases for many reasons. you know, some of the details of this case i think highlight how you have these women who are brought here under false pretences. they think they're coming here for legislatimate jobs. they don't speak english. they are really powerless to escape the situation that they're essentially held prisoner in. and they become sex slaves, and it's done for, you know, profit. it's done for power. and it's just absolutely some of the worst crimes i ever saw. i will say that so far, these are state charges. i don't know all of the details, but based on the facts i'm hearing, it sure sounds like there could be serious federal sex trafficking charges here.

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with me is mimi rocah, former assistant district attorney in the district of new york. about paul manafort that is supposedly not connected to mueller and not part of the investigation ends up revealing what we think is the central thesis of bob mueller which is sanctions, ukraine, all of that was the quid pro quo. is that how to read this? >> what was strike being this transcript and why people are talking about it, it was someone from mueller's team. one of the top prosecutors putting into word what is all of us on cable news in news reports have been hypothesizing and surmising on public evidence what we think happened here. could have happened here. russia helped get trump elected and perhaps promised him some kind of trump tower down the road. in exchange, they were explicitly or implicitly promised sanctions relief. i think that the report today thaw mentioned, senator burr saying there was no direct evidence of that kind of conspiracy, that also really struck me. first of all, without getting too much into a law school course, prosecutors almost never have direct

mimi rocah, former assistant u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york, now a distinguished fellow in criminal justice at the pace university school of law. and jeremy bash, former chief of staff at cia and the pentagon and former counsel to the house intel committee. jeremy, i'd like to begin with you. mark mazzetti set separately, again, one of the four reporters on this piece, said separately tonight they gave the white house a heads-up, looked for comment days in advance. apparently the white house chose not to, save the president's response today that this was fake news. does that tell you anything about its contents? >> brian, i think when the history of this is written there are going to be chapters. one is russia's attempts to undermine our democracy. and the second is the president's efforts to undermine democracy by accruing power to himself in the same manner than autocrat would. if you think about waving around the pardon power, if you think about hiring family members. if you think about declari

. >> mimi rocah, we're doing it again, staring at the trees and missing the forest.spicer is another person who told another set of documented lies about, ding, ding, ding, russia, and someone's contacts with russia. >> exactly. i mean, it's just overwhelming at this point the number of lies told by trump and people around him. and everything we're talking about with this scenario reminds me a lot of the scenario regarding the trump tower meeting which we know trump was involved in crafting that false statement about the trump tower meeting and claiming it was about adoptions w s when it was really about sanctions. so, you know, he lied about being involved in that statement initially, but we know that he did. i just want to make the point, i think harry made it a little bit, but the statement lies to the press. you know, which we, again, have all become almost numb to, that we're trying not to. are not in and of themselves crimes. but if trump is orchestrating them, as he seems to be, in some way, to also try to mislead investigators, then it certainly can be part o

mimi rocah, thank you for joining us. tim o'brien, we needed you tonight more than ever. >>> when we come back, one of the senior democrats on the committee gerry connolly stunned the room when he got michael cohen to reveal he had a meeting with donald trump in 2017 before michael cohen falsely testified before the house intelligence committee. michael cohen will testify tomorrow in a closed session. congressman eric swalwell will be in that closed committee hearing and he will join us later in this hour. guys do whatever it takes to deal with shave irritation. so, we re-imagined the razor with the new gillette skinguard. it has a unique guard between the blades. that's designed to reduce irritation during the shave. because we believe all men deserve a razor just for them. the best a man can get. gillette. >>> in today's hearing, virginia congressman gerry connolly led michael cohen through questioning that revealed that michael cohen had a meeting in the white house with president trump and the president's private lawy

mimi rocah, former assistant u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york.tional security analyst for msnbc and a former fbi special age. and julia ainsley, nbc news national security and justice reporter. julia, i want to start with you. bring us up to speed. what's the takeaway, what's the significance here? >> kristen, "the post" is simply reading this transcript, the 143 pages that came out thursday night. and it was from a sealed meeting that was then released with some redactions in which weissman, a prosecutor for mueller, said that the meeting that paul manafort had with konstan kilimnick in august 2016 goes to the heart of the investigation, because at the time he was donald trump's campaign chairman, meeting with someone with ties to the kremlin, they discussed polling data he would share and they also discussed a peace plan in which to possibly ease or end sanctions on russia that have been in place since their annexation of crimea in 2014. why weissman is making this argument to the judge goes to what could happen today at 1:30 when these prosecu

mimi rocah, thank you for being with us. we should mention andy mccabe will be our special guest live in the studio on wednesday. coming up next, when a trump emergency goes bad. gency goes bd what do you look for when you trade? gency goes bd i want free access to research. yep, td ameritrade's got that. free access to every platform. yeah, that too. i want to know what i'm paying upfront. yes, absolutely. everything you want. one low price. td ameritrade. ♪ ♪ don't fence me in. ♪ let me be by myself ♪ in the evenin' breeze, ♪ listen to the murmur of the tall concrete, ♪ ♪ send me off forever, but i ask you please ♪ ♪ don't fence me in. special offers available at your local mini dealer. >>> answer my question, can you name one case where a president has asked congress for money, congress has refused, and the president has then invoked national powers to get the money anyway? >> well, this current situation -- >> yes or no, sir. >> the current situation pertains specifically to the military construction authority. >> i'm ju

. >>> mimi rocah is back with us. go to the point raised by congresswoman alexandria ocasio cortez. she's talking about asset inflation. has donald trump ever engaged in asset inflation to which she got a very quick yes from michael cohen. it seems to be a matter of asset inflation for insurance purposes which then could lead to insurance fraud and are there other worms in that can? >> a couple of things. first the insurance fraud is implicated here directly. but that's both federal and state insurance fraud. the key thing is always looking whether it's a state criminal liability. because that deals with which other prosecutors might get involved. new york state prosecutors. and that prevents the pardon problem. but that also implicates state tax fraud. so all of these actors could be implicated. and the bigger picture, there could be indictments of trump organizati organization, additional indictments of trump foundation and potentially the dissolution under the new york state law. the new york state attorney general

and mimi rocah, nbc news legal analyst and former assistant u.s. attorney in the southern district of new york. first to you, jeremy bash, you were a former counsel to the house intelligence committee, among your other titles. as a lawyer and as a former counsel on one of these investigative committees, what is your takeaway? >> a lot of sound and heat. but when you cut through it, andrea, here are the crimes for which evidence was presented today. first, bank fraud. documents propounded by the trump organization to deutsche bank to help donald trump buy the buffalo bills, according to michael cohen, contained fraudulent, false information. second, campaign finance violations. the checks to reimburse michael cohen to pay the hush money to the adult film actress. third, false ethics filings. fifth, false charitable activities and fraudulent financial activities of the trump charity. and then two things related to russia. one is that he knew that roger stone had called trump and said we know about the hacked e-mails being dumped in advance. >> he was

mimi rocah, thank you as well. mr. rucker, thank you. >>> some breaking news on this thursday. facing a felony, "empire" star jussie smollett in custody facing charges after prosecutors say he made the whole thing up. in the last hour, the chicago police department delivering a scathing statement. we are live in chicago with the latest as the actor prepares for court roughly three hours from now. >>> also my one-on-one interview with secretary of state mike pompeo. you'll want to hear what he has to say about big issues like north korea. and andrew mccabe explosive statements. >>> to run or not to run. income taxes has new reporting on what could be keeping joe biden on the sidelines. weeks wi, i was cured and left those doubts behind. i faced reminders of my hep c every day. but in only 8 weeks with mavyret, i was cured. even hanging with friends i worried about my hep c. but in only 8 weeks with mavyret, i was cured. mavyret is the only 8-week cure for all common types of hep c. before starting mavyret your doctor will test if you've had hepatitis b which may flare up and cau

i'm joined now by former federal prosecutors mimi rocah and cynthia. welcome to both of you.thank you for being with us. the manafort stuff, no surprise in the sentencing memo. the most interesting thing is the mueller report. what do you think, mimi, is likely to happen with the report and how, if at all, will people find out about it? >> these are big questions, ali. i certainly am not going to get into the business of predicting when it is going to come out. it's become somewhat of of a guessing game and parlor game. i think at the end of the day congressman schiff is correct, that the information has to get out there. it's going to get out there, because otherwise we have a world in which donald trump, because he's president, apparently now cannot be indicted because of d.o.j. policy. and i'm not saying i agree with the policy. i'm saying that's what the policy is. and at the same time, if we follow another d.o.j. policy, which is to not talk about people generally who are not going to be indicted, then we're just left in a black box when it comes to trump and his knowled

jed sugerman and mimi rocah, thank you for joining us tonight. really appreciate. that is tonight's "last word." "the 11th hour" with brian williams starts now. >>> the breaking news tonight. michael choens violent break with his friend and former boss. his daylong televised takedown of the president, including some moments that will be replayed for years. his allegation that trump knew about wikileaks in advance. the canceled check with that trump signature as evidence of hush money payments as president. and there's more. and on the other side of the world in hanoi tonight our american president arm in arm with the north korean dictator and word emerging from their meeting that the u.s. won't demand north korea disclose its nukes and missiles. our edition of "the 11th hour" for a wednesday night starts now. >>> well, good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. this was day 769 of the trump administration, dominated by a gripping and at times intensely personal day of testimony from a man who lied for donald trump, a now disbarred lawy