i think you have heard of sally yates. sally has served for 13 years in the department of justice. first as united states attorney for the northern district of georgia, in that capacity, she litigated a wide range of cases including issues involving cases of political corruption and terrorism. in 2013, president obama appointed sally to be deputy attorney general of the united states and during her confirmation hearings, then senator jeff sessions asked sally offensive she would refuse to enforce a president's unlawful order, to which she replied that she would have an obligation in all circumstances to follow the law and the constitution. a commitment that she later had an opportunity to fulfill. so, sally on this initial point, -- perhaps you can talk a bit about the historic independence of the department of justice. >> jeff went through and outlined some of the principles for the rule of law. >> the core for the department of justice is the concept of the actual application of the laws, that the law is to be applied impartially. that's why lady justice has the blindfold on, tha

there's an interesting point here because sally yates who was fired as we remember as the acting fbi just after following through on the flynn investigation. at the time she said one reason she was concerned was because flynn had lied about his contacts with the russians and because of that was vulnerable to blackmail. to -- do you have the same concern for jared kushner or donald trump jr.? >> if this was truly the russian government seeking, as the email said, now they want to you to take that meeting, knows what happened and this is to gather compromising information on individuals and use it when it can effect their agenda. and that's the compromise where they put you in extortion position. either you work for us, help us or we'll expose you. so it's still too early to tell if that's what they were doing but if this was the russian government, more than the evidence now. that would be embarrassing and damaging to the trump campaign. >> did it strike you the specificness of the email. it said this is incriminating evidence about hillary clinton from the russian government, which,

to -- >> sally yates, acting attorney general said her concern about michael flynn not being forthcoming is he would be open to blackmail by the rushzs. russians. is it not a reasonable question to ask? does a kushner or donald trump jr. open himself up? and again, i know with michael flynn we were talking about a series of meetings to this point it has been one meeting that has been lied about in effect. is blackmail a fair question? >> it's not a consequence, but it's not just one meeting that has been lied about. it's been several meetings that kushner has been involved at least obfuscate. and even if you want the say okay, those are mistake, there is a judgment call. and the ranking democrat brought up yesterday he believed this meeting was potentially something that could be held over to the president, could be compromised information that the russians knew about, and could presumably influence the president's viewpoint on key policy decisions. and that's one of the things. and also going back to the notion of just credibility and telling the truth, they can say one thing in the pub

and sally yates tweeted that potus attack on russia recusal reveals he had again his violation of theependence of doj, a bedrock principle of our democracy. you're an attorney. you were an attorney advising the nse. this is a case where the president is first fired sally yates and now basically pushing the attorney general out the door, he didn't quit today. other cabinet officials, current cabinet officials tell me they have would have quit under similar circumstances. >> it is really unfortunate. i think from my own perspective as an attorney and also somebody who really believes in our institutions and the importance of them to sort of the function of our democracy, i think it has been particularly problematic the degree to which he invinces a disrespect for individuals who are working within the institutions, the institutions themselves, and particularly as the person that is responsible for taking care to execute the laws and being a part of the framework at a time when frankly public mistrust and views of our public institutions are at an all time low. it is concerning. and i th

you served with sally yates. you can imagine and probably not surprised her answer was she would say no. she stayed true to her word. as soon as she said no, when she refused to defend president trump's discriminatory muslim ban, she got fired. i'm going to ask you the same question that jeff sessions asked of sally yates. she kept her word and of course got fired for it. if the president asked you to do something unlawful or unethical, what do you say? >> first, i would try to talk him out of it. if that failed, i would resign. >> why did the president fire director comey? >> you know, senator, i don't know. i'm not familiar with all of the information that the president may or may not have had. i'm really not in a position to speak to that. i know there's a special counsel investigation now under way with my former colleague director mueller leading that. i think that issue falls within his investigation. >> of course, former director mueller is looking at whether crimes took place. what i worry about when the

i'm going to ask you the same question that jeff session asked of sally yates and you know, she kept her word and of course got fired for it. but if the president asks you to do something unlawful or unethical, what do you say? >> first, i would try to talk him out of it. if that failed, i would resign. >> thank you. >> why did the president fire director comey? >> you know, senator, i don't know. i'm not familiar with all of the information that the president may or may not have had so i'm really not in a position to speak to that. i know there's a special counsel investigation under way with my former colleague director mueller leading that. i think that issue falls within his investigation. >> well, of course, former director mueller is looking at whether crimes took place. what i worry about when the president has said and i quote him, face great pressure because of russia, close quote, and that pressure was "quote, taken off by firing director comey. does that explanation trouble you? >> senator, i really don't know all of the circumstances surrounding that state in the context.

sally yates recently spoke about an investigation into talked aboutence actions taken by president trump and her experience working in this administration. week at theace last aspen ideas festival in colorado. it is an hour.

we now that the justice department, including sally yates, she went to the white house at the end ofey informed -- she and another sean your career justice official informed the white house counsel that mike flynn had had contacts with the russian government that were not only undermining u.s. government sanctions against russia, these were contacts that he lied about and they told the white house that he had done it. and we know that the white house knew about that for weeks and they took no action. why did they take no action? why did they continue to let michael flynn have the access to the president and the access to classified information that he enjoyed up until the night he was fired. "the new york times" and the washington post have both reported citing multiple sources that his contacts with the russian government didn't start once she was national security adviser, they didn't start once trump was elected. michael flynn was in contact with the russian government during the campaign, before the election, while russia was interfere in the u.s. election in multiple ways trying

talk to us about when you see that kind of response from someone like sally yates. >> well, i think she'scting what many people are thinking inside and outside of the intelligence community. the president also, in recent days, said it was only four intelligence agencies that came up with this conclusion. it was really the ones that count, the nsa, the cia, the fbi, and joined by the office of the director of national intelligence, which oversees the whole community. so whenever he gets a chance, and you saw this in the readout with rex tillerson today, they diminish and dismiss the significance and the importance of this. he says he's honored to meet putin, the guy who attacked this country. he was talking this morning in a tweet about john podesta not giving dnc servers to the cia. all that is wrong. it has nothing to do with this. >> isn't this part of the problem. so then folks are trying to clean it up. so we're talking about 17 agencies versus four, and you get the feeling that this is a person who is a master of pettifogging, a master of parsing. how do you think the factual communi

could sbrn susceptible to blackmail and sally yates warned of the white house about michael flynn. i want to talk about donald trump again in terms of how he is reframing this whole donald trump jr. thing. he's calling him a wonderful young man. he's not really that young. i think he's 39. the same age as macron is. and he's also, i think, changing donald trump jr.'s story. right? i mean, donald trump jr. said that he regretted this meeting nap hindsight is 20/20. essentially -- >> he would do it differently. >> and donald trump here is essentially, as you said before, normalizing this and saying that -- >> framing it the way he would do it. >> and also said that the woman was not a, not affiliated with the government. >> right. just a russian lawyer. he said. >> not how it was billed in the e-mail. >> yeah. >> can i take a step back and note that one of the things that i talked to people inside the white house that they were sort of taking it a sigh of relief about, was that a day after this whole thing broke he was getting on a plane and going to paris. that they could try to cha

sally yates: yes, i have and, no, i can't give you details.haryl: all concerned have said their actions were not politically motivated and were in the interest of national security. it's in this context that congress will decide whether to renew government surveillance powers that expire at the end of the year. hoekstra says significant new safeguards should be added. pete: i think in too many cases, congress has become deferential to the intelligence community and to the executive branch, and they have to exert themselves. sharyl: interestingly, erosions that you say occurred under republicans continued under democrats with president obama. what does that tell you? elizabeth: it tells me that when congress or the president invokes an emergency to expand surveillance authorities, those authorities have a way of becoming institutionalized. sharyl: the national security agency recently instituted some court-approved changes to prevent further violations of surveillance rules. ahead on "full measure." do you trust the media? we have the results o

. >> he did get rid rest acting director sally yates before he dismissed her.s this something -- is this a road you think he would go down again by letting jeff sessions go? >> it's a tricky road here. so, trump doesn't have leverage over sessions or to make sessions resign. he doesn't have any better options so deputy attorney general rod rosenstein has already proven that he's not going to phoned trump's wants and needs and sessions has already been a supporter of trump. he was the first senator to come out and support trump's presidency. and aside from recusing himself in the russia investigation he's he alliance with trump on most of his policy. he loves cracking down on sanctuary cities and putting the bad guys away and so trump doesn't really want to have sessions resign because he doesn't really have a better option. >> and i know you've heard this a thousand times by now but we're going play it for everybody at home. this is jeff sessions today had a press conference related to something totally different but the topic came up. listen. >> i have the hon

in his first month in office he fired, sally yates, the acting attorney general, over her opposition flynn resigned after only 23 days on the job over discussions he had held with the russians. then at the beginning of may, the president fired the fbi director james comey. at the end of that month white house communications director mike dubke resigned. in his place this man, anthony scaramucci, but his appointment led to another resignation press secretary sean spicer. speaking from los angeles, the conservative radio talk show host, amanda head, gave me her thoughts on all the movement and drama in this administration. i think we can all agree that donald trump's presidency, there is not a whole lot of tradition involved. there really hasn't been, from the very beginning. the issue with the reince priebus is that they had something of a contentious relationships in the beginning. it is no secret that there are a lot of republicans who didn't want trump to win the nomination. he did, and the contention continued on from there. reince priebus was a great rnc chairman. he did a fantas

trump fired sally yates, the acting attorney general - after she refused to uphold the administration'stravel ban.on february 13th... michael flynn was forced to resign as national security advisor after he misled white house officials regarding his communications with russian ambassador to the united states.and on may 9th... the president fired fbi director, james comey... who was handling the investigation into the trump campaign's possible collusion with russia during the election. i'm john lornic reporting. ( marty ) special counsel robert mueller is asking the trump administration to preserve any evidence pertaining to the russia investigation. mueller sent a letter to the white house last week, ordering the preservation of all documents related to the june 20-16 meeting at trump tower between donald trump junior and a russian attorney. according to bloomberg news, mueller is reportedly investigating potentially russia-related business transactions of the president and his associates. the president has suggested mueller doesn't have the authority to look into trump family finances.

that the number of people who knew what was taking place was within the scope of the fbi, doj and sally yatesto, it would be simple to find out who did that. >> lou: second in the command in the fbi is andrew mccabe whose wife is a democrat, and who is a beneficiary of the largess of virginia governor mcauliffe and who received hundreds of thousands for hear campaign in virginia. >> actually 700000. she received 500000 from a political action committee that was basically associated with mcauliffe and received over 200000 from another democratic committee. very tied in. >> lou: the relationship between general flynn and andrew mccabe how was that? >> that was a contentious relationship. two years ago, general mike flynn came to the aid of robin grits. i have gone through so many letters in support of her, probably one of the premier counter terrorism agents in the united states. she was also in charge of robert leavenson hostage crisis in iran. and excellent reports from the beginning of the tenure of the fbi under she came under mccabe. she file would a sexual discrimination lawsuit against m

. >> we saw this with sally yates.he was a holdover from obama, but you have seen trump sort of -- i don't think we should assume he will fire him yet but they want every option on the table. >> here's something important, and in fairness to the president, every special counsel, every one of them went far outside of their purview went after the presidents on issues they weren't supposed to deal with. whitewater and land dealings became sex with an intern. we don't need that in this country. setting up parameters to deal with the issues is fine but i think his lawyers should be doing it. >> what does the president's finances have to do with this? this is like a spiderweb, at what point do you stop. >> the issue is was there collusion with the russian government to affect the election. not did donald trump have business dealings with the russians ten or 15 years ago or his kids. >> absolutely. but if you have some of those people involved with business dealings sitting in with agents. and jared kushner. we don't know. >>

as early as his first month in office he fired, sally yates, the acting attorney general, over her oppositionn. then his national security advisor michael flynn resigned after only 23 days on the job over discussions he had held with the russians. at the beginning of may the president, fired the fbi director, james comey and at the end of the month white house communications director mike dubke resigned. the hiring of anthony scaramucci to replace him then led to the resignation of press secretary sean spicer earlier this month. we can now go to washington and speak to our correspondent, laura bicker. laura it's quite a list, is it unprecedented 7 it sometimes resembles or feels like the apprentice tv show which the president once hosted. but when it comes to reince priebus, perhaps he was doomed from the start. he was pa rt was doomed from the start. he was part of the republican establishment, a politician's man. he never seemed to win the confidence of the president. so far his replacement, donald trump has once again looked at what he described as the washington swamp. he has gone tojohn

as early as his first month in office he fired sally yates, the acting attorney—general, over her opposition. then his national security advisor michael flynn resigned after only 23 days on the job over discussions he had held with the russians. at the beginning of may the president fired the fbi director james comey, and at the end of the month white house communications director mike dubke resigned. the hiring of anthony scaramucci to replace him then led to the resignation of press secretary sean spicer earlier this month. 0ur correspondent in washington laura bicker explained how these changes had come about. well, the republican party has been praising reince priebus, it sometimes resembles all feels like he apprentice tv show which the president once hosted. reince priebus was perhaps doomed from the start. he was part of the republican establishment, a politician's man, and he never seemed to win the confidence of the president. so far his replacement by donald trump has once again looked out at what he describes as the washington swamp. and that is generaljohn kelly. he is a marine g

you have served with sally yates and you can imagine her answer was she would say no. she stays true to her word. of course as soon as she said no, when she refused to defend president trumps discriminatory muslim ban, she got fired. now, i'm going to ask you the same question that just session asked of sally yates and she kept her word and got fired for it. if the president asked you to do something unlawful or unless i ethical, what you say. >> first i would try to talk him out of it. if that fails i would resign. >> thank you. why did the president fire director comey? >> senator, i don't know. i'm not familiar with all of the information that the president may or may not have had some really not in a position to speak to that. i do know there's a special counsel investigation underway with my former colleague leading that and i think that issue falls within his investigation. >> of course former director muller is looking at whether crimes took place. what i worry about when the president said, face great pressure because of russia and that pressure was taken off b

trump fired sally yates, the acting attorney general - after she refused to uphold the administration'scontroversial travel ban.on february 13th... michael flynn was forced to resign as national security advisor after he misled white house officials regarding his communications with russian ambassador to the united states.and on may 9th... the president fired fbi director, james comey... who was handling the investigation into the trump campaign's possible collusion with russia during the election. i'm john lornic reporting. (justine) special counsel robert mueller is asking the trump administration to preserve any evidence pertaining to the russia investigation. mueller sent a letter to the white house this week, ordering the preservation of all documents related to the june 20-16 meeting at trump tower between donald trump junior and russian attorney, among others. according to bloomberg, mueller is reportedly investigating potentially russia-related business transactions of the president and his associates. trump has suggested mueller doesn't have the authority to look into trump fam

let's not forget michael flynn was the one who had to resign because sally yates, the acting attorney compromised and open to russian blackmail. what we've learned this week is that it's possible that the crime in this case is worse than the cover up. the cover up has been bungled, there's no doubt. they've done a horrible job getting information out. but on top of it, it seems that a lot of people and a lot of high-powered positions are lying. and i have to wonder what are they try to cover up. >> and howard and i both kind of exclaimed when you said the michael flynn point, yeah, yeah, good point. >> yeah, that's a really great point. >> yes, and was he there in that meeting, we don't know. and did he know about the meeting? >> i suspect attorney general mueller is investigating that very question. that's a great question. >> if he wasn't before, he is now. >> yes, i'm sure he is. >> and it shows president trump has hit a record low approval rating for any president at the six-month mark, just 36%. that sounds bad but, howard, how much does that number mean? do we give it too much c

. >>> so ten days after being inaugurated president trump fired sally yates for refusing to defend the immigration debate. less than a month later attorney jeff sessions asked dozens of u.s. attorneys to resign. all of them agreed apart from one who said trump said he could keep his job after he was elected. a fuse weeks later katy walsh left the white house for another job and the president fired jam james comey and the spokesman for the legal team defending the president on the russia investigation, he stepped down. sean spicer stepped down and now chief of staff reince priebus has been replaced making him the shortest chief of staff in white house history. >> joining me now, good morning to all of you and let me start with you. we know you support the president and you believe that he has not been served well. what is your expectation for this incoming chief of staff will be able to do. what do you expect he'll be able to change? >> it's interesting, victor. we've had to the best of my knowledge, three presidents, franklin roes vel franklin roosevelt and president eisenhower all of

with the private premise -- prison memo coming out last august by then deputy attorney general sally yatestry to phase out the government's use of private prisons for a number of reasons. but he has been able to kind of come right in and sort of immediately issue his own number saying that is gone -- his own memo saying that is gone. he has been able to quickly dismantle a lot of items that event in place. some very recently, others in place for several years. oliver: with $6 billion in debt, the state of illinois is on its way to another credit downgrade. carol: here is elizabeth campbell. >> we are on the verge of entering her third straight fiscal year without a budget as lawmakers and the governor don't come together by july 1, we are going to start fiscal year 2018 without a spending plan, billions of dollars in the red, and the state is in big trouble. we are heading for another credit downgrade which is put us in injunction territory. carol: but a number on how much they are in debt. >> because of the ongoing budget impasse, about $15 billion of unpaid bills. that is a record. at th

trump fired sally yates, the acting attorney general - after she refused to uphold the administration's controversial travel ban.on february 13th... michael flynn was forced to resign as national security advisor after he misled white house officials regarding his communications with russian ambassador to the united states.and on may 9th... the president fired fbi director, james comey... who was handling the investigation into the trump campaign's possible collusion with russia during the election. i'm john lornic reporting. (justine) turning to weather now, meteorologist lawrence karnow has our forecast. warmer temperatures are expected this afternoon, especially inland. temperatures will then begin to moderate on sunday as a weak upper level trough begins to develop off our coast. a more pronounced cooling trend appears on tap for the first part of next week, with a deepening marine layer and increased onshore flow. but then by the latter part of the week, high pressure looks to build back in again resulting in a return to warming temperatures. aside from some possible coastal drizzl

flynn has always been the person, sally yates gets concerned and goes over there twice, they don't fire him. they fire him, and start defending him in public. he asked james comey not to go after them. the through line here between the two parts of this story, which is whatever happens with the russians and what they were doing about trying to stop james comey for what he was doing, michael flynn is the nexus of both of those. >> we believe although it's unclear, we bereave the requests the president made to them may also have been specific to the flynn case. rather than being in general about russia. that's a little -- we have much less information about that, because we don't have much public testimony about it as we do from comey. there's a lot that doesn't make sense about flynn in the first place. why did they hire him, healed on to him for so long. after they got hair on fire warnings about him from the justice department. why did they let him stay on for 18 days thereafter, and then they didn't fire him. they never collar phied on the record any of the false statements that he ma

. >> we have heard from former acting attorney general sally yates were fired by president trump. yates tweeted potus attack on russia recusal reveals yet again his violation of the essential doj. the president today effectively asked sessions for his resignation. will he resign or insist on being fired? what kind of situation does this leave jeff sessions in? >> chris, let's note that this now completes the circle and that the president is now trying to undercut or discredit every single major official who has anything to do with this russia investigation. jeff sessions was one of his most loyal supporters throughout the campaign and i think if he were to actually follow through with this, it would create more problems than if he just left him in place as kind of dysfunctional a.g. the reason why is think about what kind of chain events that could set off. sessions is recused right now from heading the russia investigation. if trump puts someone else in there then his a.g. then has control over bob mueller. let's take the long view of this. i don't think that the president's nece

attorney general, sally yates, tweeting this morning, the president's attack on the russia recusal reveals yet again his violation of the essential independence of the department of justice, a bedrock principle of our democracy. an important note, she was also fired by the president. ron, to you. is it possible that president trump is trying to get jeff sessions to quit, because he knows the optics of firing him would not look good after comey, to quit so then he can replace him with a more friendly attorney general, who can subsequently fire a special prosecutor mueller? >> certainly possible. i mean, there are a couple of big messages of this incredible interview. the first wi, i think, to underscore salena's point, jeff sessions was the first and for lock periods the only major elected official who was supporting donald trump. he is the closest to him, ideologic ideologically, really of anyone, any major figure in the republican party, in terms of his views on immigration and trade and the trump world view. and the fact that the president would turn on him so publicly and really, kind o