here is the headline again. fbi opened inquiry into whether trump was secretly working on behalf of russia. quote, in the days after president trump fired james b. comey as fbi director, law enforcement officials became so concerned by the president's behavior that they began investigating whether he had been working on behalf of russia against american interests. that is according to former law enforcement officials and others familiar with the investigation. the story continues, the inquiry carried explosive implications. counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president's own actions constituted a possible threat to national security. agents also sought to determine whether mr. trump was knowingly working for russia or had unwittingly fallen under moscow's influence. agents and senior fbi officials had grown suspicious of mr. trump's ties to russia during the 2016 campaign. but held off on opening an investigation into him, the people said, in part because they were uncertain how to proceed

there was a debate within the fbi. it says, "a vigorous debate has taken shape amongst some former law enforcement officials outside the case over whether fbi investigators overreacted in opening the counterintelligence inquiry during a tumultuous period at the justice department. other former officials noted that those critics were not privy to the evidence and argued that sitting on it would have been an abdication of duty." for the fbi investigation by james comey decided that this sort of investigation was necessary must have meant there was enough evidence for them to want to go forward with it. >> ali, i think we should all be heartened that the counterintelligence investigation was up and running because, you know, for the last couple of years we've seen what -- at least to my eyes as a career -- former career prosecutor to be collusion with russia in plain sight. i mean, we have a president who add best has this strange afaint for putin and for russian positions and at worst has been conspireing and doing russia

the fbi and department of justice have run amuck. ery aspect of the mueller investigation and everything that will be well-documented dell rati deliberations around the fbi for the purpose of the stability of our political system, the public is going to need and history is going to need to be able to scrutinize and understand the decisions that were made. >> we know that the house intelligence committee is a different committee than run by republicans. can you see your way clear to talking to key people mentioned in the reporting privy to one of the two things that caused the fbi to ratchet up the inquiry. don mcgahn and rod rosenstein whose on his way out as deputy attorney general. >> of course we will and all of the house committees over sight judiciary, we're all way behind the mueller investigation because of course, under republican control, the intelligence committee on which i served, under the chairmenship of devin nunes became the defense attorney for the president of the united states. we're way behind with an investigation

why the fbi had concerns about president trump? e explosive implications they found and the reaction from the president himself as well as former fbi director james comey, one of the reporters who broke the story for the "the new york times" will join me in just a moment. >>> plus longest shutdown ever. hundreds of thousands without a paycheck and now the threat of a national emergency. former congressman and chairman of the house financial services committee barney frank shares his thoughts. >>> and reality on the ground. we'll talk about the potential roadblock a wall could create for both residences and businesses on the border and why every member of congress who's district actually runs along that border is against it. >>> also running for president, two more democrats now throwing their hat into the ring, their message and why one of them believes they can beat trump. >>> we come to you now on day 22 of the longest government shutdown in u.s. history. more on that in just a moment, but first explosive new details on mueller's

the operations. there's only been one fbi director in the 110-year history of the fbi, that was willie freed. and it doesn't stop the investigation. that might have been what the president thought and if that can be proven, we'll find that out when the report comes out from mueller. >> i just want to review the tweet of president trump. a couple minutes ago. >> he wrote, wow, just learned in the failing "the new york times" that the corrupt former leaders of the fbi almost all fired to leave the agency because of very bad reasons opened up an investigation on me for no reason and no proof after i fired lying james comey, a total sleaze. "the new york times" laid out the reasoning why they had to begin an investigation. to all of us, was it overreach, or was it duty? >> again, christi, i read through that "the new york times" piece and it was pai painstakingly reported. and two pieces in that piece where the authors of the piece pointed out they interviewed people close to the investigation and people inside the fbi and outside the fbi. i'm outside the fbi. there were groups of people that feel

you were in the fbi. you said the fbi should be disbanded? >> it should be replaced with a new organization. they are not above the law. >> sean: we are talking about maybe 5 or 10 people. i love fbi agents. >> i do too. >> sean: this is not the average fbi guy. they are honorable and hard working people that arrest bad guys and are to be commended for it. the senior leadership infected have the fbi with a cancer. if they are punished for their crimes wouldn't that solve the problem? >> you can still employ the agents but replace it with a new organization answerable to the attorney general not the deputy attorney general. >> sean: more to come. thank you. when we come back, a lot to get to. president trump's senator and newt gingrich weigh in on congressional democrats that are partying in puerto rico and the latest on the deep state discover straight ahead. my teeth have always been a very sore spot for me, emotionally, socially. if i would've known that i was gonna be 50 times happier... i would've gone into aspen dental much sooner. it was

at the fbi. o forget it was rod rosenstein who is actually the one who called for comey to be fired? he's gotta be a double agent, don't you think? maybe triple. why was there no collusion investigation when president obama's administration aligned itself with iran. gifting $150 billion, clearing the way for the iran nuclear weapon development. the largest state sponsor of terror in the world. a big old kiss from the obama administration, nuclear style. who could forget obama's 2012 meeting with a russian counterpart. >> nono on. >> lou: they touched, and they understood. whoa. why didn't anyone in the fbi started investigating president obama for collusion? ignoring, ignoring his obvious reach out to the russians. why did the concern counterintelligence agents within the fbi did not open an investigation into one a rushers greatest benefactors? namely secretary of state, hillary clinton. she was responsible for the reset of russia relations. all is forgiven, let's start a new, she said. maneuveri

the fbi straddles both of those worlds. that's why they're such a beautiful organization. >> say that again slowly. i want to make sure that i get it and that everyone else gets it. >> well, in the case of a law enforcement investigation, you have to follow the rules of evidence. there's processes that must be followed. due process. probable cause and all of those kind of things. if you're doing an investigation that could lead to a prosecution and a conviction. the counter intelligence investigation, in contrast, you're actually looking at the behavior of a foreign power, particularly a foreign adversary power that's trying to influence or spy on or gain access or coerce somebody in this country. so the rules are different. now it's possible that a counter intelligence investigation of a foreign power could lead to a criminal investigation if it involves a u.s. person. it's a nuisance but it's an important one. >> a reporter from the new york times talked about that and said he struggled with this story because it's so nuis

it says in the days after president trump fired james b. comey as fbitor, officials became so concerned by the president's behavior that they began investigating on whether he was working on behalf of russia against american interests, according to former law enforcement officials and others familiar with the investigation. adam goldman shares the by line. he joins us now by phone. adam, this is an issue of there being a trillicriminal investig. and tonight, i think for the first time, correct me if i'm wrong, your reporting is that there was a counterintelligence investigation into whether the president of the united states was a threat to the united states. >> caller: yes, essentially that's correct. when the fbi started investigating president trump in the days after comey was fired there were two elements, essentially to the investigation, one was a criminal element that dealt with the possibility of obstruction, and the other was the counterintelligence element to this. and, you know, i think while broadly people had assumed that, you know, mueller

nobody appointed the fbi to lecture people will who were grossly negligent the fbi's job is to identify violations of the law, not to lecture people on good citizenship so -- but how is that an example of deep state that were discussing here. the example fails for me . >> expect it's an example of what i just referred to me told you don't like the term deep space. i can't describe to you what the deep state can do are properly duplicates an example of bureaucratic checking which is wholly improper. the constitution gives power to congress and the president and the courts and that power flows downward to the bureaucracy cannot upward from the bureaucracy to the elected officials of the american people that's the point . >> i actually totally agree with michael about that example about both of his examples now. i wrote at the time that comey's press conference before he even got to the letter to in which he excoriated hillary clinton for having done something he didn't approve of was really close to the kind of political interference by the fbi that we saw in earlier ages and you've analy

the fbi agents become fbi agents and employees of the fbi join the fbi to protect the american people from enemies, both foreign and domestic, and that equates to thousands of investigations that fbi agents are doing across the united states on a daily basis. it's getting harder and harder to do those investigations because the money is not being replenished. >> i want to talk to you about morale. this is already a president who has repeatedly showed his disdain for many of the institutions that we have all come to depend on, including the fbi. i'm not suggesting that any fbi agent would do anything to undermine our national security. but can everyone do his or her job after the agency has been under attack and now they aren't getting paid? i mean, just as human beings, what's it like now to be part of the fbi? >> the fbi and the fbi agents association, we're not involved in the politics of anything to do with this shutdown. we want our elected officials to come together and fund the fbi so we can do our operations and our employees, fbi agents, our members, can get compensated for th

the fbi said that they believe that could've happened. hey spied apparently on the president of the united states. while, shocking, does not even begin to describe the story. nothing like this has ever happened in this country. these allegations are literally without precedent, that is not an overstatement. and the allegations are not tru true. the fbi did not find that donald trump is an fbi agent, no charges were filed against them. none will be, but an equally important question remains unanswered. how did this happen? deciding the sitting president should be investigated for treason is not a small thing. officials within the fbi had to push for this investigation. and then marshall evidence to justify it. legal leaders had to sign off on the whole thing, all of that happen. but on what grounds exactly? that's what we would need to know in order to understand thi this. well, thanks to the "times" story we have some sense of the answer. if you are imagining a secret transmitter discovered hidden in the lincoln bedroom, no. think again. t

here is the headline again. "fbi inquiry into whether trump was secretly working on behalf of russia." quote, in the days after president trump fired james b. comby as fbi director, law enforcement officials became so concerned by the president's behavior that they began investigating whether he had been working on behalf of russia against american interests. that is according to former law enforcement officials and others

it is obvious why the fbi did not want anybody to know about this at all. ou were getting with adam of investigating the president of the united states to see if the american president is working for the russians is just, it is just too much to wrap your mind around and having said that, we don't know what happened. we don't know how quickly it wrapped up or if it is wrapped up. and obviously, it is connected to the much larger robert mueller investigation. this is before. it seems as though the fbi started this before robert mueller was appointed by rosenstein. >> mueller took it over and merged to an extent of the criminal investigation. josh campbell, you were there at the time. first of all expla, explain to verify what you can about the reporting. >> yes, john, obviously i have to be careful of information that i talk about that i knew when i was in the fbi. as you mention working for director comey after he was fired, i continued on as my role as a director. it is kind of hypothetically of the mechanic and the impact of such an investigation. i think f

and the fbi didn't care. this is unbelievable. i'm really stunned by the increasing similarities between the likes of venezuela and what we are seeing here in the u.s. more on the bombshell revelation next. will it feel like the wheend of a journey?p working, or the beginning of something even better? when you prepare for retirement with pacific life, you can create a lifelong income... so you have the freedom to keep doing whatever is most meaningful to you. a reliable income that lets you retire, without retiring from life. that's the power of pacific. ask your financial professional about pacific life today. you might or joints.hing for your heart... but do you take something for your brain. with an ingredient originally discovered in jellyfish, prevagen has been shown in clinical trials to improve short-term memory. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. a business owner always goes beyond what people expect. that's why we built the nation's largest gig-speed network along with complete reliability. then

we learned of this -- >> is that why the fbi jumped on him? they think why is he blasting out the news that this was for russia? >> correct. was the president trying to fire comey as a way of slowing interfering with the investigation, the larger investigation into russia's meddling in the election, to help russia? that, the fbi's general counsel testified on capitol hill, was the national security concern of the firing. they saw the firing as a counterintelligence issue, an intelligence issue. not just a criminal thing, not, hey, let's make a case. it's hey, let's use all the authorities and powers we have to figure out whether the president is tied to russia and firing comey to stop the investigation. >> you know what grabs me in this reporting? that we thought a long way for months now, more than a year, that the investigation by the fbi is whether trump was protecting himself through obstruction of justice. now comes the report he was obstructing justice to protect the russian role in the 2016 election. he was working for moscow. that's wha

again, the fbi agent at the door says, fbi, warrant. moments later, there is roger stone in the doorway wearing what looked to be sleepwear. he had a brief conversation that we were able to overhear with the fbi agent. they asked him, are you roger stone. he confirmed he was roger stone. then they took him into custody on what we now know is a hefty indictment. we were moved down the street in the middle of this. it was a dramatic and chaotic moment. we did not see the moment when he was taken into custody. we don't know what their conversation consisted of. what we did see was peaceful and calm. this happened quickly. as i said, they were prepared for something. if something were to happen. from what we saw, roger stone coming in to custody without incident this morning. >> we know he'll appear in court. first court appearance at 11:00 a.m., less than two hours from now. before you go, marty, if you can pull up the raid again. just so people can see the first moments david was there. tell us why you were there. you're based in washingto

here is the headline again. fbipened inquiry into whether trump was secretly working on behalf of russia. quote, in the days after president trump fired james b. comey as fbi director, law enforcement officials became so concerned by the president's behavior that they began investigating whether he had been working on behalf of russia against american interests. that is according to former law enforcement officials and others familiar with the investigation. the story continues, the inquiry carried explosive implications. counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president's own actions constituted a

work in the fbi is, by far, the most regulated part of the fbi. don't even want to work counterintelligence because you've got to keep the rulebook in your top drawer. i lived as a counterintelligence agent with the attorney general guidelines in the top drawer of my desk and referred to them daily until i memorized entire portions of them. that's how heavily regulated it is. so, any notion that some agent can open some case willy nil ly against a president is misguided. the level of review, the department of justice review, the number of lawyers that would have to have touched this to allow this to happen is almost immeasurable. so i want to try to dispel that nation, that there would have to be multiple points of failure, multiple people in the conspiracy to even open this case and it's just wholly unrealistic to think that happened. >> we are so grateful to our guests tonight, to michael schmidt, of course, for starting us all off. barbara, chuck, frank, our thanks. >>> and coming up for us, as our coverage continues, the night's other major st

so if you are the fbi, you now have seen the president move against your investigation. he's fired the fbi director and more tellingly, you've seen the deputy attorney general help the president do it. >> rod rosenstein? >> yeah. rod rosenstein. the person that you would go to consult with about this decision, you think maybe he is working with the president to end the investigation. i think what they were doing, they decided we need to make this explicit with the lester holt interview and the letter when he included russia but they are trying to protect the investigation and bureaucratically the one thing to make this investigation unkillable is make it an investigation into the president. make it hard for anyone to move against it and maybe force the deputy attorney general to point a special prosecutor which is what happened. >> so that movement from a bureaucratic perspective is protecting it as you're watching the president in realtime attempting to obstruct justice. >> yes. making his a subject of the counterintelligence investigation doesn't give them anything the

this is not the average fbi guy. these are honorable, hardworking people that arrest bad guys and are to be coming commended for it. the senior leadership has infected them with a cancer and it has metastasized. >> we will replace it with a new organization, top leadership, answerable to the attorney general. not the deputy attorney. >> sean: thank you. t when we come back, we have a lot to get to. president trump's attorney jay sekulow will rate and on dozens of congressional democrats. and that's coming up straight ahead. during episodes of low blood sugar, or if you're allergic to insulin. get medical help right away if you have a serious allergic reaction such as body rash, or trouble breathing. don't reuse needles, or share insulin pens. the most common side effect is low blood sugar, which can be life-threatening. it may cause shaking, sweating, fast heartbeat, and blurred vision. check your blood sugar levels daily. injection site reactions may occur. don't change your dose of insulin without talking to your do

the fbi officials. ead of releasing them the department of justice dithered for reasons that were never really clear. if the president got distracted and we've never seen those documents. i's obvious at this point that the reason for not releasing them isn't protecting american national security, they just leaked the information about the fbi investigation to "the new york times" on friday. clearly have no problem leaking information when it helpsew the. they haven't been released because those documents might embarrass the fbi. this endless shadow investigation has caused vastly more harm to this country than any russian facebook ad. the president should order then declassification of all documents related to this. it's clearly an abuse of federal power. if you want to restore confidence in the federal government, bring in some sunlight. tell the doj to do that. and if doj personnel refused to doo that, fire them and replace them with people who understand that they serve elected leaders, which is to sa

and the fbi didn't care. this is unbelievable. i'm really stunned by the increasing similarities between the likes of venezuela and what we are seeing here in the u.s. more on the bombshell revelation next. when you retire will you or will you just be you, without the constraints of a full time job? you can grow your retirement savings with pacific life and create the future that's most meaningful to you. which means you can retire, without retiring from life. having the flexibility to retire on your terms. that's the power of pacific. ask your financial professional about pacific life today. coaching means making tough choices. jim! you're in! but when you have high blood pressure and need cold medicine that works fast, the choice is simple. coricidin hbp is the #1 brand that gives powerful cold symptom relief without raising your blood pressure. coricidin hbp. we all make excuses for the things we don't want to do. but when it comes to colon cancer screening... i'm not doin' that. i eat plenty of kale. ahem,

at the fbi. those were the four ringleaders in this whole sordid affair. we want to get the answers and that's why we continue to push. >> we should point out that despite all, that none of those people you just enumerated, have been punished for what is obviously, as you say, we hope. but to this point, not punished in any way for their abuse of power. and just flaunting the law and regulations of the two most agencies and law enforcement. carla's been jim jordan, always great to have you with us. >> take care buddy. >> you two. up next, the left media praising nancy pelosi call to stop or two and, who knows, the presidents state of the union address. >> the chief is power now, this is up to her. >> the democratic base, i'm sure that her caucus is thrilled by that kind of a show of force. >> we are seeing turn after turn after turn, president trump underestimating nancy pelosi. >> is this nancy pelosi trolling trump? >> yes, to a jury gate. she is certainly reminding him that it is her domain. >

so the folk at the fbi see there's a russia investigation. d to open this counterintelligence investigation on the president for a long time. and you see him providing cover to the president to do the firing. so they're sitting there saying what is going on around us? what do we do? and it's in that context they open this double pronged investigation that is an incredibly historical moment to be looking at the president for such a charge. >> and those two investigations be thk criminal inquiry and a counterintelligence investigation, those then are both taken over by mueller when he's appointed? >> correct. days later the rosenstein apoints mueller to be the special counsel and mueller inherits all of this. and has been looking at all these questions since then. we know he spent an enormous amount of time talking about the president's actions. was he trying to halt the inquiry? was he trying to halt it and impede it? and many people's minds law enforcement, former law enforcement and experts and such have thought there was the counterintellige

he was fired for lying and leaking from the fbi. yet he is still in contact with all these top officials and trying to feed information to mueller, which we have got in the exchanges with bruce ohr. >> remember how we got here. we set up a task force, we gave a list at the end of the last congress, actually last summer, a task force was created to conduct a bunch of interviews. what s supposedly now is leaking out are pieces of these interviews that chairman galligan chairman bob goodlatte have asked for the fbi and doj toto release them. they sat on them. now i think what is happening as people are selectively leaking pieces of them. i read the story in me times, i have not read all the transcripts. i don't know if that is true or not. but obviously, it's very alarming. if it is true, that in that time, they were already trying to t go back to christopher stee and get him to come back after they knew he was terminated for lying and misleading the fbi, very, very concerning, and i think we need to know more about this, which is why t

the fbi opening an investigation into the president of the united states to see if he was working against against american interests. law enforcement was concerned by the president's behavior. a source tells the times there were two specific instances where president trump tied comey's firing to the russian investigation which helped spark this counter intelligence probe. here's one of those moments. >> regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey knowing there was no good time to do it. and in fact, when i decided to just do it, i said to myself, i said you know, this russia thing with trump and russia is a made up story, it's an excuse by the democrats for having lost an election that they should have won. >> a second instance, a draft letter the president intended to send to comey listing the reasons that he was firing him, but his lawyer blocked him from sending it according to "new york times." this sparked an angry tirade from the president via twitter this morning. cnn's erica orton joins me. what more can you tell me about the investigation and status of it now? >> repo

that means the fbi and all u.s. intelligence would be on what we knew at the time and now what we know was a spy hunt. that's what counter-intelligence means. it means they are looking for u.s. citizens who are in communications or active activities with a foreign intelligence agency or government. this is nothing new. we're just learning now, the fbi officers after the lavrov meeting in the white house, donald trump realized his behavior and activities, and whether we have collection from our sister intelligence agencies, i worked at nsa, i've done activities like that, it doesn't matter, the collective body of knowledge showed the fbi's counter-intelligence spy hunters thought donald trump was an asset enough that they started an investigation. now, believe me, robert mueller has a lot more information than they had. i think this will end up that he was dirty. >> it's extraordinary. ben, i was reading this morning the law fair post you put up on friday that talked about -- what i brought up a little bit earlier, th

the fbi was not worried that trump was colluding with the russians. they were worried he might be working for russia against the u.s. either unknowingly or even on purpose. around the time comey was fired in may of 2017, two events prompted them to launch a counterintelligence operation. the first was the president's insistence on referencing russia in a letter drafted for the former fbi director, thanking him for saying he was not under investigation. the second was trump's interview with nbc's own lester holt when he mentioned the, quote, russian thing was on his mind when he decide to fire comey. over the weekend, trump was asked point blank about the report from a very friendly interviewer on fox news and here's what his abc was. >> are you now or have you ever worked for russia, mr. president? >> i think it's the most insulting thing i've ever been asked. i think it's the most insulting article i've ever had written. and if you read the article, you'd seal they found absolutely nothing. >> but the important thing here is that if "the times" is ac

also, what did the fbi really know about these links to russia? have i the doj official who wrote the rules. i'm ari melber. you're watching "the beat" on msnbc. 300 miles per hour, that's where i feel normal. i might be crazy but i'm not stupid. having an annuity tells me retirement is protected. annuities can provide protected income for life. learn more at retireyourrisk.org annuities can provide protected income for life. come hok., babe. nasty nightime heartburn? try alka-seltzer pm gummies. the only fast, powerful heartburn relief, plus melatonin so you can fall asleep quickly. oh, what a relief it is! oh, wow. you two are going to have such a great trip. thanks to you, we will. this is why voya helps reach today's goals... all while helping you to and through retirement. can you help with these? we're more of the plan, invest and protect kind of help... voya. helping you to and through retirement. (burke) parking splat. and we covered it. talk to farmers. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum,

this is "the new york times" reported that the fbi allegedly looked into whether or not the presidentas secretly working on behalf of russia during and following the 2016 campaign, a suggestion that drew a scathing review from the president's attorney john dowd who wrote "the new york times story is an deprecation of the corruption of their oath by comey and their colleagues to undermine the free election of the president of the united states. >> are you know or have you ever worked for russia, mr. president ? >> i think it's the most insulting thing i've ever been asked. i think it's the most insulting article i've ever had written. >> quite a week here in washington. by the way the white house has asked the army corps of engineers to look into additional possible ways to help fund border security including an examination of the 2018 february emergency supplemental. they say that would actually draw funds from disaster relief. we will see if that happens. >> chris: kevin corke reporting from the snowy white house, thank you. joining us now from south carolina south carolina, republic

you know, first of all, i don't envy the fbi guys that decided we need to do this. is a really serious thing. you don't walk in the morning with a donut and cup of coffee and say, yeah, i think i'm going to start an investigation against the president of the united states. there are some really serious th thresholds. but predictably, the white house has come without this deep state stuff. this is not a political move. you don't get because they fired comey. this is because there are specific legal and regulatory tle thresholds that have to be met. they had that. that's why the investigation moved forward. this is a significant thing. >> i want to bring in now congressman castro. he is on the intelligence committee. he joins us now by phone. thank you very much. what do you make of this breaking news tonight? >> it's just jarring. even as someone who sat through all those interviews on the intelligence committee as an american to read that fbi has opened the counter intelligence investigation against the president with the idea he made may basically be an asset workin

the fbi counterintelligence probe was prompted by the firing of former fbi director james comey. y 9th, 2017. >> today marks the longest shutdown of the federal government in history. talking about more than 800,000 federal employees who do not have a paycheck now nor is there one in sight. and we're hearing all of these stories of people selling things that are very valuable to them, their cars, momentos, books, whatever it takes so they can pay their bills. cnn national correspondent dianne gallagher with us, she sat down with one tsa worker that didn't get paid yesterday. that had to be a jolt to get a paycheck and see a zero. >> most people don't look at the paychecks, it shows up in their bank account. you notice when the bank account is light an entire paycheck. more than half of the 800,000 workers are still going to work every single day and not getting paid, including those at the tsa. i went to little rock, arkansas yesterday and i spoke with a woman with the tsa 13 years, one of many veteran officers there. she's six months pregnant and unsure what exactly she's going t

tonight, did the fbi target fbi project the former assistant director of the fbi who is outraged at his former agency here. and we are driving the judges be how a lawless judiciary is imperiling you with resistance,n immigration in another commentary. you will not believe this. a new battlefront opening the war on men. how the left is conflating rank abuse and violence with classic masculinity. can't miss debate ahead. first, dems get away from governing. that's the focus on tonight's angle. while the president remained in washington over the weekend, very snowy, ready and willing to do with deal with the democrats to reopen the government, nancy pelosi and her crew left town. but they talk a good game. >> why punish people who are applying for food stamps because the president is having a temper tantrum? open government first. i hope he does the right thing. reopen the government. more or to security? let's have edited but while we were having the debate, let's reopen the government. >> open up this government tomorrow. >> laura: as they always say, forget at what they say, look at wha

was then near the top of the fbi leaked this to the new york times. president trump, not surprisingly, went on a twitter storm about this story yesterday. here's just one of his tweets. wow, just learned the failing new york times that the corrupt leaders at the fbi, almost all fired or forced to leave the agency for for some very bad reasons, opened up an investigation on me for no reason and with no proof after i fired lying james comey, a total sleaze. one sentence, incidentally, pretty impressive. [laughter] juan, you have to assume if they had found evidence in the last year and a half that the president was a russian agent, they would have intervened. >> no. i think it was the, as karl said, it all went to the mueller probe -- >> but they -- >> they're an investigative agency. chris: i understand. but if the white house found out the president was an agent for the russians, you don't think that -- they'd just sit on that? >> no. >> i think it's up to mueller. it's up to mueller to say this is, one, provable and part of my ultimate report. you do

you at one point in your career worked at the fbi. en you hear that kind of talk, for example, by the president, a bunch of bad cops who are responsible for this over at the fbi, what's your reaction? >> i'm afraid they might give him some ammo here. look, i think the right question was raised here earlier by david. that is we don't know exactly the intelligence they're looking at. so i've got to put a huge asterisk by what i'm about to say. but if you're going to investigate the president of the united states because some of his decisionmaking and judgment is erratic, first, that's donald trump for 72 years. he's taken u-turns on other foreign policy, north korea, iran, would be two examples. sort of china. i want to see evidence that tells me why something as profound as an investigation of the president of the united states for having an agent of a foreign power should take place. final thing i'd say, quickly, is i was just re-reading what the inspector general of the fbi said about mr. comey's judgment during the hillary clinton in

the fbi was afraid that the firing of comey was a way to help the russians stop the fbi from figuring what they did in the election. >> are they- is this still a investigation into whether mr. trump himself is acting as a russian agent? is that what the mueller probe inherited? >> we know the mueller probeit inherite we know the mueller probe has spent an enormous amount of tim tryinggure out what the president has done in office in regards to theinvestigation. his interference with it, they have talked to all these white officials. do we know if there is still this belief and aspect that the president is working for the russians? i can't answer that. >> all right, ben, this was all -- the nut of this scoop was based on testimony by now a former fbi general counsel, james baker, and this is what he told congress. this was in "the new york times" story about why they vieed it as counterintelligence. he said not only would it we an issue of obstructing the investigation, but the obstruction itself would hurt our ability to figure out what the russians had done, and that is what would be

let's not forget about lying to the fbi. after all, this crime shouldn't only apply an american war hero like general flynn and trump campaign staff like george. andrew mccabe was fired over that charge. is he going to receive the same treatment as general flynn and be prosecuted. the doj also will need to tackle the unauthorized leaks. we now know that james baker is already facing a criminal investigation tonight over this charge but so, too are we going to look ought john brennan and james clapper and what about susan rice and samantha powers. should they be investigated over the marv amounts of names that they unhavocked while serving in the final year of the obama administration. and because of james comey's biased and inhe want investigation of hillary clinton exoneration before investigation obvious violation of the espionage act, mr. barr must also revisit hillary clinton's various driment. like oh e the deleting your emails and hard drive and washing it with bleach bit and busts up devices and ripping out sim cards.