i'll be right back with sally yates. need a change of scenery?re tool shows you the places you can fly on your budget. so you can be confident you're getting the most bang for your buck. alo-ha. kayak. search one and done. >>> we are back with sally yates, acting attorney general of the united states and before that she was the deputy acting attorney general of the united states which we have a better understanding of. do you feel that rod rosenstein who is deputy attorney general because of jeff sessions being recused from the russia matter, he is overseeing the russia matter and other things, do you feel like he is insulated enough in his position in terms of undue influence? if you were still in his shoes, what kind of protections would you want people pushing for? >> that's one of the things has worried me. that so many people are worried about bob mueller isn't fired. we need to be equally sure that rod rosenstein isn't fired either. he really has the ability to control the special counsel's investigation in terms of significant step that's

sally yates joins us for the interview. next. ♪ [ coughs ] ♪ ♪ [ screams ] ♪ [ laughs ] ♪ whoa, whoa, whoa. your one item would be the name your price tool? it helps people save on car insurance. why wouldn't it save me? why? what would you bring? a boat. huh. whoooo. tripadvisor makes finding your perfect hotel... relaxing. just enter your destination and dates. tripadvisor searches over 200 booking sites to find the hotel you want for the lowest price. dates. deals. done! tripadvisor. if you have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis, little things can be a big deal. that's why there's otezla. otezla is not an injection or a cream. it's a pill that treats psoriasis differently. with otezla, 75% clearer skin is achievable after just 4 months, ... with reduced redness, thickness, and scaliness of plaques. and the otezla prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. otezla may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. tell your doctor if these occur. otezla is

sally yates right here. can't wait.ime for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. >> good

sally yates right here. can't wait. now it is time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. >> good evening. "the new york times" has published the breaking news of the night. and it turns out donald trump knew and he knew weeks before the inauguration. listen to this opening for this article. two weeks before his inauguration, donald j trump was shown highly classified intelligence indicating thatvla russia has personally ordered complex cyber attacks to sway the 2016 american election. the evidence included texts and e-mails from russian military officers and information gleamed from a top secret source close to mr. putin who has described to the cia how the kremlin intended to hack. mr. trump sounded grudgingly convinced, according to several people who attended the intelligence briefing. but ever since, mr. trump has tried to cloud the very clear findings he received on january 6th, 2017, which his own intelligence leaders have unanimously endorsed. >> this is two weeks before the inauguration? he was shown dire

sally yates right here. can't wait.ast word" with lawrence o'donnell. >> good evening. "the new york times" has published the breaking news of the night.

james comey, sally yates, dana fuente, andrew mccabe, rod rosenstein, they all signed off on this warrantin all three subsequent renewals.y they repeatedly lied to fisa court judges, four separate times. rod rosenstein lied, mccabe lied. they all lied and they all signed off on a warrant application based on a document that was so duplicitous that even steele himself in court proceedings in great britain conceded that the dossier was not confirmed or verified, you referred to it as raw intelligence and said the chances of some of it even being true were 50/50. andy christopher steele was ultimately fired as an fbiur source for lying and leaking,af and still in the fight is a warrant after his firing, the claims that he was credible. he was fired for lying and leaking. meanwhile, james comey admitted he knew the dossier was unverified and let's not forget, fired fbi director, actually denied hand pulled alive to our own bret baier that the dossier was in fact playing a major role in the fisa application. >> c you part of the document unverified installations, why did you use that to ask fo

when then acting attorney general sally yates was looking for guidance from the justice department about her being fired, she went to scott schools for that advice. when the department sent instructions on justice department employees that they needed to save records and documents to turn over to the special counsel, especially related to the firing of james comey, that request for preserving documents. that came from scott schools. when acting ag had to let the higher ups know he was being called as a witness to the special counsel investigation investigation, that notice went straight on scott schools. look at the hand written notes. took notes to scott schools. provided to scott schools. for the past year and a half, scott schools has been kind of a guardrail. the work the investigators do trying to protect them from the chaos that has been rattling around. the doj since donald trump became president, providing a rudder for his colleagues in terms of right thing to do, sticking to the rule of law and, and they regarded his as a sort of snuggy. today scott schools quit. npr broke the n

matt axelrod, former deputy to acting attorney general sally yates. kind of an exciting breaking news night here. it was really a pleasure and an honor to have you all here. >> thank you, rachel. >> now it's time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. good thing you had a bunch of lawyers around for the release of the cohen -- cohen tape number 1. there's going to be many more. we're going to play it in its entirety for people to decide what it is they're hearing here. but let me begin by telling you who's not going to be on our show tonight. rudy giuliani declined to come on and explain what his client donald trump is actually saying on that audio that we're going to play in a moment. but michael avenatti is here and he has a

on the signage page of this fisa warrant they all signed it okay and that includes john brennan, sally yates, james comey, peter strzok so john brennan, he's the man who deserves a belated bit of scrutiny according to the wall street journal, the op-ed just this past week. we know that john brennan has been all over town trashing president trump and trashing the hearing that your committee actually did with peter strzok. what are your thoughts on john brennan's involvement? >> well, we have lots of questions for john brennan and he will definitely be sought by the committees for an interview. this is an extremely disturbing thing to see both he and james comey supposedly impartial government officials carrying out their jobs in very important areas in intelligence gathering and law enforcement express the kind of extreme bias that they've shown now which i think reflects quite accurately on what they were doing back in 2016. maria: so he's on your list of witnesses to have into interview >> absolutely. maria: who else is on that list? >> well, we're going to go through, we've received a list

when then acting attorney general sally yates was looking for guidance from the justice department ahead of her congressional testimony about her being fired, she went to scott schools for that advice. when the department sent instructions to justice department employees that they needed to save records and documents to turn over to the special counsel, particularly related to the firing of fbi director james comey, that can request for preserving documents, that request came from scott schools. when acting deputy ag dana boente had to let the higher ups at the department know he was being called as a witness in the special counsel's investigation, that notice went straight to scott schools. look at the handwritten notes in some of these documents. took notes to scott schools. provided to scott schools. scott schools, scott schools, scott schools. for the past year and a half scott schools seems kind of a guardrail at the justice department, protecting investigations and the work that the investigators do, try to protect them from the chaos that has been rattling around the doj since don

sally yates was on air last night saying the white house absolutely was aware that flynn was the subject after open investigation when the president went to the fbi director and pressured the fbi to end that investigation. can the president be questioned whether or not that was obstruction of justice? i mean, salary yates said last night he was trying to influence that open fbi investigation. was that actually criminal obstruction? when does the president get asked about that? on the michael cohen case, if on this tape the president is heard planning to reimburse this publication that paid off his alleged mistress because they wanted to keep her story out of the press before election, was that a criminal campaign finance violation of the kind that could put a guy in jail? could that hush money payment which the president said he didn't know about further criminally ipply indicate him in terms of fraud or anything more serious. >> reporter: completely separate and part from whether or not he and his campaign were involved in the russia attack, the other big story this week, these other th

two at the justice department to the deputy attorney general and former acting attorney general sally yatesgentlemen, thank you for being here tonight. we never do this. >> it's unusual for me. i'm rarely in new york. >> i'm glad you can all be here. before i talk about the things i meant to start talking to you about, we have a little bit of breaking news i get to get your immediate response to because it has just become known. this is the tape that became known to the public just a few days ago. it is a recording reportedly made by michael cohen who is the president's long-time personal attorney. although the president had previously denied that he had any knowledge of any payment having been made to a woman named karen mcdougal, a sort of hush money payment to keep her talking about her alleged affair with president trump. it was a tape recording apparently seized by the fbi of mr. cohen apparently unknowing -- unbeknownst to mrs. trump tape recording a conversation they had about that payment. it is now released. i'm going to hear it right here with you guys for the first time. i'm told

matt axelrod, former deputy to acting attorney general sally yates. thank you all for what turned out to be kind of an exciting breaking news night here. it was really a pleasure and an honor to have you all here. >> thank you, rachel. >> now it's time for "the last word" with lawrence o'donnell. good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. good thing you had a bunch of lawyers around for the release of the cohen -- cohen tape number 1. there's going to be many more. we're going to play it in its entirety for people to decide what it is they're hearing here. but let me begin by telling you who's not going to be on our show tonight. rudy giuliani declined to come on and explain what his client donald trump is actually saying on that audio that we're going to play in a moment. but michael avenatti is here and he has a novel take on what's going on with these tapes. adam schiff was here already to talk about what rudy giuliani's been saying about the president possibly cooperating or not with the mueller investigation. we'll get his take on what his

the only signature on this entire document is james comey, comey, mccake, clapper, susan rice, sally yatescall it the deep state signature page, all big fans of then candidate trump. one thing i find in this document which is standard in fisa applications but meaningful in this context, these authorities, the authorities that come from a fisa warrant may acquire owner foreign intelligence info. so maybe carter page was the nose under the tent to incident naincidentally surveil other people. that's in black and white. they didn't redact that one shockingly. this application wasn't just about carter page. it was about a lot more than carter page. >> what is the big picture on this. i am like, does this have an impact on where we are? is this going to lead to anything big? is this going to impact the russia, the mueller investigation? >> good point. listen. pull not the sheets back over your head. tune in, wake up. you don't have to get out of bed. but listen. it matters because it is the basis fundamental level, the methods through which we surveil people like carter page and the basis that