mr. whitaker. i think he did so because of mr. 's prejudicial statements against the investigation. i wish i shared senator graham's confidence, but right now we are going to have to very carefully scrutinize mr. whitaker's next actions with regard to mr. mueller. >> is there anything you can do in which to shorten his potential length of time as an acting attorney general given the fact that he doesn't have the senate confirmation? >> as you know, there is talk about a lawsuit and so forth, challenging the constitutionality of his appointment. that is certainly something that people are strongly considering. i personally hope that the president nominates someone to be the permanent attorney general and that his temporary appointment of mr. whitaker is just that. temporary. he should not be there right now. >> congressman krishnamoorthi, thank you so much. >> thank you, fredricka. >> tonight is the final episode of "parts unknown" with a personal tour of anthony bourdain's lower east side. >> in the new york city of the 70s, nearly

mr. whitaker does or tries to do is invalid. at that same press conference on friday the president was asked about it. >> kellyanne conway's husband -- >> you mean mr. kellyanne conway? >> he wrote that you were unconstitutionally appointing people. >> he's trying to get publicity for himself. why don't you do this, ask kellyanne conway that question. >> here we are. >> here we are. >> a few things. spouses disagree every day. i'm sure you can appreciate that. >> you don't agree with your husband's argument? >> no. it's not relevant. people disagree on the constitution. we have a u.s. circuit court system there to interpret the law and they disagree about the constitution regularly. i think there's something else instructive here. the president's lawyers told him it's constitutional. there's a statute from 1998, the vacancies statute, there's the d.o.j. opinion from 2003 and there's also, as they said, supreme court precedent. more to this point, the journalist asking the president of the united states referred to him as kellyan

mr. whitaker has said. i think -- i believe that many republicans will find the same. >> you raised concerns about the legality of whitaker's appointment. >> yes. >> in a letter you sent to the white house friday. if an officer or executive agency resigns, the president may direct an officer or employee to perform the functions and duties of the vacant office temporarily in an acting capacity. i get that you have objections to matt whitaker. isn't the president in his legal authority to put him in as acting attorney general temporarily? >> the constitution requires advise and consent for principal officers and if the attorney general isn't a principle officer, who is? there are a number of senators who are looking at a lawsuit. we'll have to see if they have standing. there are people who have standing who will pursue this in the courts and i believe it will be found that mr. whitaker cannot be put in as attorney general because he has not been approved by the senate. it's not only the right thing to do, i t

mr. whitaker crosses such a lean? >> well, mr. whitaker crosses the line is moment he accepts the job and doesn't recuse himself and we know he's not going to recuse himself. because the only reason he was appointed was to sabotage the investigation and we know that because the president's only criticism which he expressed for months of attorney general sessions is that he did recuse himself. he didn't sabotage the investigation. he had no other criticisms of him. so the president obviously was not going to appoint someone who would repeat session's sin of not recusing himself. he put whit der there because he expressed extreme hostility to the investigation. because he prejudged the issue and because he obviously is prepared to do what the president wants, which is to subvert the investigation. i will tell you if mr. whitaker does this and for that matter the president's attempts, these are all further evidence of a conspiracy to obstruct justice. >> strong words. i also want to ask you while i have you given your mandate with the

mr. whitaker is someone who has called for an end to that investigation. so does that mean the president expectwh mrsaker to shut the investigation down or limit it? >> no, that is not the reason that the president asked matt as theer to step in attorney general and with an eye for a new attorney general to be nameprsoon, as theesident said today, judy. we have been told by many people in public repor that perhaps the mueller investigation is winding down. we're not sure. you know, because pbs has reported awell, that there have been different negotiations between the presdent's outside counsel and mr. mueller and his team. but e far as th investigation goes, with it winding down, the president has said, "let's comply," and hopefully we'll be able to get through it quickly. the president in his press conference today judy made reference to the mueller investigation. he said thereas no rus collusion. we spent millions and millions of clars in taxpayer money. we'll wait for theeport, but if this was about russia collusion from the beginning, as the president

mr. whitaker is now the acting attorney general of the united states, mr. whitaker himself could be in the cross hairs of bob mueller. >> shepard: bigger picture is protecting bob mueller something that the democrats can get done right away or is this avalanche coming down the mountain so quickly and by design possibly? >> i don't know that it can be done right away without any republican support. our colleague chris stirewalt says there's numerous republicans in the senate that will not accept this. jeff flake is still in the senate. senator sasse is there. lindsey graham himself, the president's champion on the floor of the senate said an effort to interfere with robert mueller could provoke a crisis. it's beginning to appear this was an orchestrated effort to shake up the justice department with such voracity that the shaking upreaches bob mueller. >> shepard: no reporting in from eric holder. anyone that attempts to interfere or obstruct the mueller inquiry must be held accountable. this is a red line. we're a nation of laws and norms, not subject to the

mr. whitaker included in the documents.ning us now, "wall street journal" senior writer james grimaldi. take us through your great reporting, and the documents seem to s for themselves. what do we know about how mr. whitaker responded to these fraud allegations? >> we know for sure that he got them. he appears to have at least reviewed some of them. he forwarded them to the ceo as you quoted from our story there. and this is all from records by the way that we got through the freedom of information act. i think we're seeing a body of evidence that's building that shows mr. whitaker was complicit, willfully ignorant or, in fact, ignorant of the schemes that were going on at world patent marketing, none of which look good for an acting attorney general. especially for a company that's now under active fbi investigation and had the serious allegations filed against them by the federal trade commission. >> that was my next question for you. so you obtained the documents through a freedom of information request. is it your assum

mr. whitaker. mr. whitaker i think is legally qualified and otherwise qualified to oversee this investigation. until a new attorney general will be appointed and i think that will happen early next year. >> brennan: early next year. what is your first question for that nominee? >> well, depends on what the lay of the land is. if mueller is still not finished with his investigation, going to allow him to do his job, but lot of questions about how the department of justice works. >> brennan: the president issued an order this week and says he's going to issue another executive order having to do with immigration. does he have the authority to bypass congress in doing these >>ound? amendment birthright citizenship that's got to get to the court maybe the executive order is the way to start that discussion. but when it comes to changing solemn law saying that somebody here illegally cannot apply for asylum, i don't know if you can do that by executive order but i support that policy. right now, people march

mr. whitaker does or tries to do in that position is invalid. that's interesting. >> the argument that has been made is you can't put somebody in that job that is not senate confirmed and now you have somebody that just skirted around the process. this is a role that points directly to the president which is why it's supposed to be senate confirmed. if he makes matt whitaker the permanent, he will face a hearing. the affect of this could be if he does choose somebody else to be his permanent choice, let's say chris christie, it might be that chris christie's confirmation hearings are less aggressive and nasty than he might been otherwise because he has a long resume of qualifications of this. >> the time is 210 days and he cannot be the nominee, he cannot be made permanent under the legal rational the white house is using to put him in there on a temporary basis. >> i don't think he needs anymore than 210 days. >> that's the point. >> it's all about mueller, and i am not sure he needs more time than that. if that's not what it's about, we shall

mr. whitaker in place as an interim person, correct? >> they can say what they want. it's not what the constitution provides. it's not what the statute provides. and it's not what the rules of the justice department provide. further, this guy, his views are at there. he hasarently opined that mar buryv. madison, the case esblishing the role of the supreme court in the united states when thomas jefferson was entering the white house, that that decision suld be rethought. that is bizarre. >> so what can democrats do at this poin the senate widened its majority as a result of the midterms. >> well, there will be litigation if the president doesn't rethink this. you can't have an invalid appointment. you can't just avoid t constitution. that's the president's decision, not m decision provided that he follows therule. the issue here is also the muelleinvestigation. we all believe mr. mueller should be permitt to finish this investigation, let the chips fall where they may, whatever he reports, i'm to accept, whether it chon rates the president or doesn't, he should just fi

mr. whitaker. likewise, as chief, i did not know mr. whitaker except primarily as he traveled with ag sessions, no social contact. he goes on to say mr. whitaker very highly thought of armrest terry brand stad, former iowa governor, leonard leo and many more. i feel certain he would make an outstanding acting attorney general. fda fast forward to other piece of news, "new york times." goldman, sheer and smith report president trump first noticed matthew g. whitaker on cnn in the summer of 2017 and liked what he saw. so that july the white house counsel don mcgahn ii interviewed mr. whitaker about joining the president's team as legal attack dog against the special counsel robert mueller. so phil rucker, he came startup organic way, saying things the boss liked. what do you make of what appeared to be an attempt to distance himself and now tonight at 4:55 a.m. all the way across the atlantic an attempt to defend the guy. >> yeah, this is classic donald trump, right? as soon as one of his associates gets in hot water embroiled in controver

happen here it's just not acceptable that mr whitaker now is the supervisory official over mr mohler that's a fine thank you very much for your expertise on this as always that is bruce fein live washington d.c. thank you and to anderson palace here now the news about jeff sessions of after it was a contentious day at the white house when we saw really astounding behavior at the trump news conference anderson what are people saying online about it yeah i mean you would have thought that sessions being fired would would have been the biggest story on social media survey but it certainly wasn't this is just going by the number of tweets here now this is actually a bigger story than sessions and pretty much everyone seems to be talking about it or has been talking about it over the past twenty four hours and what are they talking about one person c.n.n. reporter jim acosta we looked into this there have been one point three million tweets mentioning his name in just the past twenty four hours because of this i think that's an ask one of the other folks that stood out for me ma'am on thi

mr. whitaker has just been installed directly by president trump to oversee that investigation. mr. whitaker quite clearly is a person who has already made up his mind about the key questions at the heart of that investigation. >> i think we would know from was a smoking gun, or any gun, or any smoke. i think we would know. i think we would know if there was evidence suggesting that there was a crime that happened here. >> let's assume that the president asked him to stop investigating flynn. that doesn't rise to the level of obstruction of justice. this idea that there was some collusion with russian nationals and even putin to interfere -- and did interfere -- with the election i think is just ludicrous based on what we know at this point. >>> the truth is there was no collusion with the russians and the trump campaign. there is not a single piece of evidence that demonstrates that the trump campaign had any illegal or even improper relationship with the russians. it's that simple. >> clearly this is a man who has made up his mind in terms of this investigation. you know, and that'

mr. whitaker's appointment itself is unlawful? >> this appointment of matt whitaker is an end run around the constitution, an evasion of that system of checks and balances that americans rightly pride. what the president has done is install a lackey or lap dog, exactly what the constitution sought to prevent. and alexander hamilton and other founders wrote about the dangers of someone of such insignificance as to recommender them the instruments of the president's pleasure. that kind of appointment here, the eyes and ears of the president as he was known under jeff sessions, threatens not only the special counsel investigation, but it threatens the rule of law. >> i think you make the point forcefully, and we were just discussing how vital it is to have this kind of accountability. i think your problem, and i share with viewers my unvarnished objective view of your problem in the courts, is not whether or not what you're saying sounds good, senator, but whether or not this is really going to have any traction based on what past ju

mr. whitaker should recuse itself for the duration of his timer as acting attorney genera. just so people know was we're talking about. i want to play the sound bite from mark whitaker. it from cnn in july of 2017. let's take a look, watch. >> i can sigh a scenario where jeff sessions is replaced with a recess appointment. that attorney general doesn't firent bob mueller but products budgets so low, it grinds to the same halt. >> laura: he was working for the network grounds for recusal? >> no, two, wick points. one, if every time a lawyer made comments about some matter of public interest, and then later would have to recuse himself. joe wouldn't be able to practice law. but secondly, your point is well taken. >> i'm doing just fine. >> this was a different time. i different set of facts and i'm sure matt will make his decisions, in this case based on what ever circumstances he becomes aware of. >> laura: just for our viewers edification act attorney general you have all of the powers of the attorney general, you just haven't gone through senate confirmation. it is thought

mr. whitaker remains in office, he should follow ethical guidelines and recuse himself from the mueller investigation. thank you. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition? mr. thompson: mr. speaker, request unanimous consent to address the house for one minute, revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. thompson: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, on veterans day i had the privilege of being in st. mary's pennsylvania. the american legion recognized vic all-star break for his service. i was honored to be there. i professioned colonel straub with a flag that had bns flown ver our united states capitol. the red, symbolizes courage dating back to sitting in the cockpit of a range of experimental planes as an airman. the white symbolizes purity of purpose, being selfless in all his work. the blue symbolizing his loyalty to his family, his community, and to his country. and the stars, well, what more can i say? colonel straub is a talented and proud air force guy. mr. spe

mr. whitaker could decide not to issue them, and if there was a conflict it would have to be reported to congress. we will have to see how this playeds. o mr. mueller is in a precarious situation. best case scenario, he's very rushed. laura: do you have any indication that the eanate majorityr will all out legislation to be brought to the floor that would proct the investigation how you outlined? >>nfortunately, no. his public statements recently is that there is no need for it. as an independent law professor, i don't know how you can say there is no need for oversht over any government actor. this is what we are talking about, whether the president could be above the law because the congress has decided to look at the oth way. laura: do you see turbulent times ahead between the president and the rule of law? >> absolutely. you are already in turbulent times. the separation of powers exists to ensure we do't have kings d whoever is installed in the white house, republican or democrat, has to watch his or her back they crossed the line, they don't get in trouble. at this point, e tcutive

mr. whitaker. >> well, i assume they have googled mr. whitaker.nk all of our discussion of what the merits of this are, in a normal circumstance. what should happen are all kind of conversations that are quaint rolex -- there sessions recuse. >> he did. in that sense, sessions was a relic of an earlier time, too. he arrived if office -- >> babies with cages for christ's sake. >> with a shred so of a memory, vestigial mor memory and he consulted the ethics and did the right thing. in this instance, he did what tradition and what the merits on the questions of the case would dictate. this situation, obviously, on the basis of what we seen in our google search. there is probably much more that would suggest on the same basis he should recuse himself and director bren naen is making the case of the merits the reality is no longer are we living in that world, do we have a president that doesn't care about that the white house doesn't care about those things the merits the traditions, the norms, all that stuff, but it seems as though this person now it

mr. whitaker in that position? >> first it's unconstitutional. the appointment is article 2 section 2 requires the acting attorney general to be confirmed by the senate. mr. whitaker has not beenir cod and has been pointed sut by several scholars everything he dn that position would be invalid because his appointment is invalued. >> but i think there are rules, though, that the trumpon administra is pointing out that allow the president to put mr. whtaker in place as an interim person, correct? >> they can say what they want. it's not what the constitution provides. it's not what the statute provides. and it's not what the rules of the justice department provide. further, this guy, his views are out there. he has apparently opined that mar buryv. madison, the case establishing the role of the supreme court in the unheed states thomas jefferson was entering the white house, tiot that dec should be rethought. that is bizarre. >> so what can democrats do at this point? the senate widened its majority as a result of the midterms. >> well, there will

mr. whitaker in this interim position. there's no question, by the way, that he can't move him and nominate him permanently to serve as u.s. attorney general unless he moves them out of the position. but for interim, if, if, if, imagine that you have folks in the justice department that say, this was not a constitutional appointment and therefore, we will ignore, ignore the direction that you have given us because there's supreme court precedent that says if it is, in fact, a violation, the appointment itself, then you actually what the supreme court called any decisions he made that are not within the scope of authority are null and void at the point of making the decision. i think the bigger issue here, though, is the fact that we don't have a requirement that he seek an ethics ruling on his ability to oversee the mueller investigation. that to me is a clear problem. there's no question that he should not be serving as -- essentially the president's protector in chief by being able to interfere with that investigation an

mr. whitaker in conjunction with this case, would he be obliged to follow that advice?well, there is an ethics apparatus at the department of justice, it's centered in the deputy attorney general's office, so, it's centered in rod rosenstein's office. one of rod's senior staff people is the senior ethics official for the department. i happen to know that individual. he's a fine lawyer, a fine person, a long-time career official. if asked to, i'm sure he would produce a fine legal analysis with a recommendation. but this is a more subjective kind of, you know it when you see it, it should be so obvious that someone with statements attributed to him that mr. whitaker has, should have nothing to do with oversight of the mueller investigation. and so, unless a kind of ethics insurrection arises within the department where he is pressed on to recuse himself, it's improbable he's going to give any credence to recommendations that he recuse himself. and it's inconceivable that he would recuse himself, because the president installed him in this job to get rid of an attorney ge

mr. whitaker or the outcome. it is possible that bob mueller will find lawfully no obstruction by donald trump, we'll have to wait and see. but i would note we are dealing with a president who is under investigation for the way he acts as president. the president does have pardon power and chris and i have covered presidents who have made mistakes with the pardon power but the president of the united states cannot go around auctioning off pardons. cannot exchange pardons for things. so yes donald trump oversees the justice department. can he shut down a probe into himself and his family? no. no real scholar thinks that. so the question today is what is the purpose of mr. whitaker, who is a former prosecutor but also a former republican candidate in iowa and also someone who as chris matthews said spoke on the one issue when donald trump seems to care about, which is constraining the russia probe. >> by the way, you're the attorney here, ari, but getting rid of the guy that recused himself, the guy who allowed the

mr. whitaker. >> what will you ask mr. whitaker?> the questions we will ask him will be about his expressed hostility, how he can possibly supervise it when he has come out and said that the investigation is invalid, that contrary to the findings there was no russian interference and when he has expressed ridiculous legal opinions he is totally unqualified and his only qualifications seem to be that he wants to be -- that the president wants him to be to destroy the mueller investigation. >> be that as it may, you know, you called his appointment illegal. the law in this case, it's the federal vacancy to replace the attorney general with any senior official serving in the same department as long as they are acting capacity for fewer than 210 days. >> yeah. >> he meets those requirements. >> well, i don't think so. there's very good constitutional law that regardless of the vacancy act you cannot have an attorney general or for that matter an acting attorney general that hasn't been confirmed by the senate. it may very well be tested

mr. whitaker. but they're important to compliance with your subpoenas, if the world thinks that they can claim i'm moving from one house to another or i'm moving from washington, d.c. to iowa or iowa to washington, d.c. and that's enough reason to just say -- forget about it. you'll have diminished compliance with your subpoenas and that will take more resources to enforce them. >> i agree with you. >> so it's really in your interests to have answers to these questions. >> if i could jump in for one minute. as a junior commissioner on the commission, it is my responsibility to work with the general counsel's office to respond to motions to quash, motions to limit subpoenas and c.i.d.s, there has been an instance recently where i worked with the general counsel's office to say no, we are not going to process a cid and we fully expect that the respondents will not comply and we will take them to court to make sure we get the information that we need from them. i actually told my staff that i would li

mr. whitaker who i do not know.ut seems to have the biggest asset being that he is very much a trompe l'oeil list. and i think that he has an enormous conflict of interest if he oversees what he has written in fed, but also from the fact, and this gets a little complicated. i will be very brief, that he was affiliated as a campaign treasurer, and was affiliated with george papadopoulos who is the beginnings of the investigation. and already brought into the robert mueller investigation. that seems like an obvious ethical conflict of interest. so, if you like the president could've avoided these kind of problems if you pick somebody who had already been approved by the congress. spewing many of your colleagues say that at the very least he should recuse himself, chuck schumer is of that mind-set. many more have come forward since. our any of you saying that in the departure that it really does risk the mueller investigation itself, or bob mueller personally? >> there are two things that we have tried to draw a bright

mr. whitaker and the acting a.g. could be eliminated if we had a nominee. >> as a commentator on cnn he defended ways to weaken the mueller probe by defunding it and vox said that he privately provided advice to the president last year on how he might be able to pressure the justice department to investigate mr. president trump's political adversaries, including hillary clinton, and even pressure the justice department to name a second special counsel to investigate her. >> why in the world we would be so sangwine about this is beyond me. >> jeff flake says he will not vote for any more of the president's nominees until the senate protects mueller's job. >> he's suggested ways to diminish the probe, to starve it of funding, for example. >> and there's this threat from democrats. >> if whitaker does not recuse himself, we democrats are going to attempt to add legislation to the must-pass spending bill in the lame duck session that will prevent acting attorney general whitaker from interfering with the mueller investig

mr. whitaker does anything unethical. and we ought to expect everyone in the justice department to abide by the highest ethical standards. that includes particularly the attorney general. >> there's been some theorizing, a miss was written the other day on this, that essentially the mueller investigation is far enough along that it will find what it will find and that at this point there's not that much even a ma-- -- can do to stifle it. >> not my view at all. that presupposes all the work has been done. let's remember that he cannot only in this position interfere with what bob mueller is doing, he can interfere in what the southern district of new york doing. to the degree bob mueller has more work to do, let's say the mueller team has decided it needs to subpoena the president to force him to testify, that's something that can be prevented. that may very well be the best evidence, an interview with the president on the issue of obstruction of justice. there's a great deal he can do to harm the investigation. we in con

mr. whitaker is talking to the president. the president has to know what's going on, whereas i would suspect knowing rod rosenstein, under rod rosenstein that was not the case and then the question becomes where is mr. trump going to actually pull his levers of power, is he going to stop it at his former associates, would it be his family, his business, or him? and, of course, if there's any criminal liability for him, whether it's impeachment or indictment, then we are in a full scale constitutional crisis. i have little doubt that will be pushed into its limit. >> barbara, i sort of when i take a step back and look at the scope of what this office has done, as we're sort of here, we feel like are possibly, you know, towards the day we want, here's an incomplete list of people interviewed by the special counsel, or his grand jury. i follow this professionally every day. i have to jog my memory about some of the names. the scope here is really remarkable. >> yeah. you know, i think, though, that one of the things robert muell

mr. whitaker do you see this as a move not just to distract from politics, but to interfere with the mueller probe? >> i think the latter is the primary purpose, to interview with mueller. the timing of the mueller investigation -- the timing of it is to distract from the big defeat that the president suffered in terms of our taking the house. >> do you believe it's constitutional what happened with the attorney general jeff sessions? what's your concern here? >> first of all i think he's been outspoken in saying he wanted to curtail the mueller investigation, that it should be curtailed. article 2 section 2 clause 2 of the constitution says that principals in our government like the attorney general have to be confirmed by the senate. the president appoints with advice and with the confirmation of the senate. that didn't happen. you've seen some of the quotes today that this appointment makes a mockery of the constitution and the vision of our founders. >> what's your concern about the move politically and what can you do about it? >> our concern is that they will interfere and say the pres

mr. whitaker said on that? hitaker has basically said that he believes that he will, he has basically said that he is not refused or declined to recuse himself. so it is unclear where he stands right now.er are people inside the justice department who say he would not have been appointed acting attorney general had he already agreed to recuse himself from this matter tht would have angered president trump and he never would have gotten this job in the first place. so there are big open questions about fla right now. >> certainly are big open questions. carrie johnson following it all at the justice department, thank u very much. >> thank you. s >> woodruff:ngress prepares for new members to join their ranks, they're decidingll who e the face of each party following the midterm elections. lisa desjardins has the latest from capitol hill. d desjardins: a chilly fa in washington brought a swarm of energec faces: freshmen members of congress posing for a photo of what is one of the largest groups of new members in r

days and if that's was his conception to get rid of mr sessions you have to ask well is that what mr whitaker told the president he would protect him from the arm of the law and that gets you then into impeachable offenses and obstruction of justice for both mr clinton and mr nixon word concluded by congress to be impeachable now a singer joined in the said the u.s. by all accounts to c.n.n. has had his press credentials of all thought that he was accused by the white house of inappropriate behavior during a press conference with donald trump jim acosta was trying to ask a second question of when and to try to take the microphone off him and he resisted the white house press secretary said to send a shade a video of the incident slow down and zooming in on a costas hand she tweeted that we will not tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do his job as a white house and ten c.n.n. says acosta did nothing wrong and accuse sanders of lying about the incident. still ahead on the bozeman vote counting is underway in madagascar.

mr. whitaker will do anything that's going to jeopardize that. in fact, mr. the department of justice regulations. he's not said one thing about disobeying the regulations. all the attacks on him personally are speculative. arthel: let me play sound mr. matthew whitaker. he was on c. cnn in july. >> i can see a scenario where jeff sessions is replaced and the attorney general doesn't fire bob mueller but he reduced the budget so low so the investigation grinds to almost a halt. arthel: your reaction to that. >> he didn't say he was going to do that. he certainly has the power to do that. whether he exercises that is absurd. he's not going to do that. nobody right now in the white house, in the department of justice is going to take steps to reduce what mueller is doing. what he's actually saying is that he has responsibility to oversee as the acting attorney general what mueller is doing. if mueller acts inappropriately or contrary to department policy, then mr. whitaker can intervene. >> what i think is wrong about that, i think the willful blindness of peopl

mr. whitaker to see whether he should, in fact, be recused from heading up or supervising the mueller investigation. >> paul, whitaker's anti-mueller comments, are they any different than peter struck's anti-trump comments? >> i guess that depends upon your perspective. i agree completely with glen that the right course here is for mr. whitaker to talk to the preo in the department of justice and seek an opinion. that's what deputy attorney general rosenstein did when it was suggested that he recuse himself from supervising the mueller investigation, and it is that kind of inquiry that invokes the authority of the career office in the department of justice that would give the american people confidence that mr. whitaker is acting properly or not, as the case may by. like, glen, i don't know the facts fully, but that's what the inquiry is all about. >> paul, you would concede it certainly looks and smells a little funny? >> absolutely. that's why i think it's mandatory that mr. whitaker ask the question and get an answer and that that answer be made public to us all. there's more than ample evidence

mr. whitaker is doing with regard to mueller? have i some informed suspicions, and i underscore suspicions, because matt whitaker has provided a kind of road map for what he thinks should be done to the special counsel investigation. namely, kind of death by a thousand cuts, cuts in funding, cuts in authority, cuts in declining subpoenas or indictments. all of those actions may have been preceding. you're absolutely right. we have no real view into what's happening in this investigation. and that is precisely why we want the courts to rule quickly, because congress is going to be out of town and then out of session. and there will be no check and balance unless rod rosenstein continues to be in charge of this investigation. and here's the other point, that matt whitaker is really unqualified for this job by virtue of what he said in the past. >> you said he would never pass the advice and consent test, meaning if he had come before the senate, he never would have been confirmed? >> and i believe he would have been rejected as a n

mr. whitaker could rescind. sshe could a new referral to mr.ller that drastically narrows the scope of the investigation. or he could fire him -- he has to have cause. is unclear under the legislation if you did fire hime for something than cause -- it is unclear if anyone could sue if mr. mueller goes to the courts. we have three branches of government, the executive branch, congress- congress can't do anything -- and the courts, and the questiou would be canet a case to a judge to exercise oversight. laura: have we learned the lessons from watergate when it cometo protecting a special counsel who did president feels threatened by? >> ino, interesting how history is repeating itself. with the famous saturday night massacre, president nixon fired his attorney general for not firing the special prosecutor in that instance and it went down the line. lthere is a lot of politi pressure. congress was ups, thinking that the president abused his office too much. there was regulation after that process. regulation was rescinded, etc. then we have the i

mr. whitaker should recuse himself for the duration of his time as acting attorney general. st so people know what we are talking about, i want to play this sound bite from mark whitaker. this was from cnn and it was back in july of 2017. let's take a look. watch. >> i can see a scenario where jeff sessions is replaced, a recess appointment, and that attorney general doesn't fire bob mueller and he reduces the budget so low that his investigation grinds to a halt. >> laura: different life when he was working for a network. grounds for refusal? >> no. two quick points, laura. if every time a lawyer made comments about some matter of public interest and later got involved and would later have to recuse himself, poor joe wouldn't be able to practice law. but secondly, your point is well taken. >> i'm doing just fine. >> this was a different time, a different set of facts. i'm sure matt will make his decisions based on whatever circumstances he becomes aware of. >> laura: just for our viewers' edification here, as acting attorney general if you have all the powers of the attorney

mr. whitaker's appointment is legal. >> we may have 210 days to figure that out.to turn to the "wall street journal" bombshell on the president's involvement, silencing the women alleging an affair with him. does this implicate that the president committed a crime? >> yes. i've thought for a long time that he was implicated in finance reform laws and actually paying the women off, some campaign finance laws. the question is whether or not anyone acts on it. the we've got a republican heading as the attorney general. whether or not he's going to act on these laws is a whole different story because any time you've got a prosecutor, they've always got discretion. even though a crime could have occurred, they've got discretion whether or not they want to prosecute him. that's what this comes down to. whether or not they're going to exercise their discretion in prosecuting the president. >> ashleigh merchant, thank you for joining he. great to have you. >> thank you. >> that will do it for me. i'm dara brown. thank you for watching ziechlgt up with david gura at top of

mr. whitaker. first of all, you don't know whatyo happens where actually in the job.e expressed those opinions when he was a political pundit for cnn. he has take than oath as a u. attorney in iowa. you don't know what happens when he's actuallyti g briefed by robert mueller about what he's und. in fairness to mr. whitaker, we have to see what happens when he gets briefed. robert mueller knew this was coming. this was telegraphed. he knew he s going to have a new supervisor soon. he's off-loaded parts of the inveutigation. he'some of it at the southern district of new york. and the east district of virginia has gotten a piece of it. he's protected the probe that there isn't much whitaker can do. he may be the eyes and ears for the white house. that is not illegal.pl many p would call that unethical. perhaps, he's therenc to l another investigation. maybe he has als atalkedbout opening an investigation into hillary clinton. maybe he's not there to c or trim the sales of mr. mueller but maybe to add a probe which of course as far as the president's concerned is all abou