ty cobb says, i'm not shaping this time line to calm anybody. and he goes on to say, my time line gets reported the whole thing would be over. what i have said for the last several weeks, is that the interviews will wrap up shortly after thanksgiving and there's a foblt entire mueller matter can be resolved in early january. that again is brand new exclusive reporting. ty cobb, the criminal defense attorney for donald trump, on these reports about how he has been managing both the case and his client in the white house. cobb shooting back on the idea that he would try to sugar coat any bad news to the president. he said in my job, you have the responsibility to give the commander in chief honest information. let's get right to it. the former federal prosecutor, pro if he issor at georgetown law who specializes in public corruption. abigail, i'll go right to you. obviously your story has struck a nerve. what do you think? >> i think he is making a point. he is saying the interviews are different than the entire investigation. this time line that

about three months ago, trump special counsel ty cobb spoke to reuters. in the interview he said, quote, i'd be embarrassed if this is still haunting the white house by thanksgiving and worse if it's haunting him by year end. but now, of course, three days from thanksgiving, a report from "the washington post" landed with a thud. it looks inside the white house amid this investigation. it says, among other things, "one republican operative in frequent contact with the white house described mueller's team working through the staff like pack man" and adds, "witnesses questioned by mueller's team warn that investigators are asking about other foreign contacts and meetings that have not yet become public and to expect a series of new revelations." well, here to talk about all of it, robert costa, national political reporter for "the washington post" and moderator of "washington week" on pbs. julia ainsley, and chuck rosenberg, former federal prosecutor and u.s. attorney, who worked on the staffs of both robert mueller and james comey at the fbi. good evening

ty cobb, they had him brought in once when kelly came in.art of this whole new regime. >> to cooperate with mueller. and bannon says that's a terrible idea. have you talked with steve bannon about this. >>? let me not say whether or not i've talked to anyone. >> it sounds like a yes. >> it sounds like a yes. >> because it would be easier to say no. >> what i would say in general, what i've heard from alan dershwitz. what i heard from him in general you want to say publicly, we'll cooperate. but ty cobb has made it a point to say we're going to give everything over. if you look at the "new york times" report, which you reported organization it goes into how people like trump loyalists, who are not around him anymore, are saying you have to fight this. you have to be on offense. >> then you get into jared kushner. >> he's terrible. he's an absolute joke. >> the worst political adviser. >> he is. he is an absolute joke. and by the way, i would say, i would say, you know, he should go back to real estate in new york. unfortunately i hear, i don'

is ty cobb just engaged in client mood management? >> i think he wants to. he's trying to tell the people within the white house, it's okay. it's almost over. relax. don't panic. as this gets closer and closer to the inner circles of the white house. yeah, that was just some sort of internal control. of course, there was no evidence at all that this investigation is wrapping up any time soon. it's probably going to go well into next year and this is going to continue on and on. as the point that paul made, we talk about collusion which isn't actually a crime. there's crimes of conspiracy and things like that, but there are other things outside of collusion that could be problematic to the prrkts suesi. we do know it's not close to being over. >> ty cobb can whisper all he wants but someone pointed out today that it's simply not backed up by the 12 counts that were brought against paul manafort and mr. gates. they had to do with business activities that the two of them were engaged in years before. there's absolutely no clue, there's no tie to anything that w

but ty cobb tells us this. as of tonight, special thanks to kristen welker from nbc news who spoke to mr. cobb. he items us this, quote, once that fund is fully approved and operational, it will be for the benefit of witnesses, staffers and campaign workers forced to incur extraordinary legal expenses, merely because they were witnesses. that fund will not include any indictee is or current targets. that contradicts what the white house said. it's not just for people that only worked in the white house, according to this latest news from the white house, ty cobb. that fund would also be for people who worked on the campaign, for campaign staffers. as long as they were witnesses. nobody will be allowed to tap that fund if it ever comes to exist if they are an indictee. so, that means gates, manafort and papadopoulos, nor are they allowed if they are a current target of the investigations. well, who that applies to, i don't know. we also do not have word from the white house whether or not our billionaire presiden

ty cobb tells us this as of tonight, special thanks to kristen welker from nbc news. he tells us this, once the fund is fully approved and operational, it will be for the benefit of witnesses, staffers and campaign workers forced to incur extraordinary legal expenses merely because they were witnesses. won't include indictees or current targets. in one sense it contradicts the guidance from the white house about legal fund. not just for people who only worked in white house, according to this statement from ty cobb, fund would be for people who worked on the campaign, campaign staffers, as long as they were witnesses. nobody will be allowed to tap that fund f it comes to exist, if they're indictee, that means manafort, gates and papadopoulos are out. nor if they're a current target of the investigations, who that applies to, i don't know. also don't have word from the white house whether or not our billionaire president himself will be contributing to such a fund for legal defense of campaign staffers and white house aides. it's not legally clear that president could

all indicates, indications we have is president trump is sticking with ty cobb, he trusts his legal team and that's not changing. >> the humor shared among white house staffers about how they start the day many of them, what do they say to each other? >> good morning, are you wearing a wire. and again, i should explain no one i don't think actually believes anyone is wearing a wire or they certainly hope not but it is sort of an indication of the human they're arises in a situation like this. >> ashley parker, thanks. >>> ordered out. the trump administration ending its temporary residency status for victims of haiti's earthquake. why? what happens to them next? and why group of immigrants could be next? >>> also ahead, border mystery. questions remain about what the fbi is calling a tragic incident in texas. it left one border patrol agent dead, another one in serious condition. authorities are set to update their investigation this afternoon. i >>> the trump administration is giving nearly 60,000 haitian refugees 18 months to either live the country, face deportation or apply for a dif

i don't know whether that's ty cobb's client management or whether ty cobb believes it or maybe he does have information and federal prosecutors not normally in the habit we're not about to indict you or on the verge of closing the investigation. i want to point to something and this is a point you have often made, lawrence, about remember -- this all started with michael flynn having a conversation with russian ambassador but not renewing sanctions in a trump administration. the senate has voted overwhelmingly. the congress voted overwhelmingly to reimpose the sanctions and the president used the discretion to not allow them and not in effect almost at the beginning of december. the promise to the russian ambassador honored. there's something here more than just a legal story. there's also a big foreign policy story. >> joyce, that's such an interesting point that david makes. are prosecutors looking at that? are they actually looking at the policy choices that the president is making that are within his legal discretion but do seem to favor russia? do they look at that as they're inve

what is the pitch from ty cobb to the president to try to keep him cooling his heels? >> the white house lawyer ty cobb who has been on the job since this summer basically has said to the president and everyone in the white house we are turning over records. we are providing in a cooperative manner all of the needs of the special counsel bob mueller. we are providing him with interviews with former and current staff. and all of that will be completed by thanksgiving or december or the end of the year. and in truth, that stage of the process could very well end by the end of this year. but probe is going to go on for some time and remember every prosecutor is looking at a big wide circle of people on the outside to get closer and closer to the inside. and we just don't know what we don't know. we don't know what's going to happen as a result of lower level aides and even paul manafort, former campaign chairman who has been indicted, rick gates, another campaign aide, george papadopoulos, another foreign policy adviser to the campaign being charged. we just don't know al

ty cobb is telling the president, this is going to be over soon. he's signalling to white house staff, look, this is -- we saw sarah sanders say this earlier this week. this belief this probe is going to end when all evidence appears to be to the contrary. they are saying cooperate, cooperate, cooperate. and i think we know the president has told people close to him he's growing frustrated with this. this is not his style to -- >> bannon is right because at least to the extent that this investigation poses an extential threat to the trump presidency. >> of course, but they can't line out his funding, though. >> the other flunkies in trump world may be saying it's a nothing burger. this is the real deal. >> let me ask you about something john mccain says. this is a centipede, said john mccain who has served in congress longer than mr. papadopoulos has been alive. some exquisite reporting from peter baker. >> yeah. ty cobb is right. this will end. i don't know about soon, but it will end. the way things are going, it's not going to end in a way the p

the mood is pretty zen and pretty calm, and they believe ty cobb.e is the lawyer inside the white house handling this. they believe his assurances that this is all anythigoing to wrap. that they've done nothing wrong, that they're going to be fine and they point to the fact this investigation is moving into the president's inner circle. they believe that means it's coming to an end. a lot of experts we talked to said maybe what they need to do is to go to work every day. but this is not wrapping up any time soon. the trial of paul manafort and rick gates. this could go well into 2018. that's just wishful thinking. >> ken dilanian, what's your take on that? is it wishful thinking? >> it is. ashley had a great line in her story. ashley had a wonderful line in her story from an ally who called it a classic gambino style roll-up. i think that is -- >> that's an ashley parker quote. >> that's a terrific line. and i think it's right and that's why it's not going to be wrapped up by the end of the year. obviously, the russians intervened in the election to

. >> eli, to you, ty cobb certainly has a unique and different client.quires different care and feeding. >> i think that's right. he does have an obligation to be direct and honest with his client. but he also knows that this is a client in donald trump who is very much put at ease with good news and compliments and flattery and someone who can sort of freak out very quickly with bad news or criticism. so it would make sense that what he would emphasize to this president is the good news, the best possible scenario, the fact that maybe this will be open -- wrapped up by the end of the year. just relax, cooperate, because every time the president lashes out, tweets something negative about mueller, and we really haven't seen that since he started listening to cobb over the last month or two, but every time he would say something harsh about mueller, every time he would emphatically declare his innocence or try really hard to sort of win that point in the news cycle, short-term political expediency, he was opening himself up to further legal jeopardy by po

i think ty cobb knows this. >> can he avoid going under oath? >> no, probably not. they'll try to stretch it out as long as they possibly can. so they know as much as they possibly can. so they can create a narrative he can hopefully stick to as a witness. >> he can't go under oath because he's not being truthful or he can't go under oath because he may not recall or he doesn't have the ability to recall all these moving parts? >> i think he can't tell the truth, that's what i'm saying. i think he can't go under oath from a legal jeopardy standpoint because he doesn't tell the truth with respect to what he knows. that is a problem, and if you're ty cobb or john dowd, you have to make sure the president is protected. the way you protect him is by keeping him from testifying under oath if possible, or have him testify at the very end, when you know as much as you can about people, you can create a narrative you can stick to that's truthful. >> what do you think? >> i think that the fact that they're getting kushner's take on what happened with the comey firing makes i

and the reason is they believe the assurances of ty cobb who is the white house lawyer inside the whitethe russia probe that this all be over. ty cobb originally said he expected the focus on the president and white house to wrap up by thanksgiving. in an interview at the post last week he revised that timeline to say by the end of the year. they sort of tell us ty tells us it will be fine and we frustrate him. that said these people outside the white house and in the president's orbit who think it is a deeply naive view and there's no way this is wrapping up anytime soon. they understand you may have to convince you're going to be fine to go to work every day but they say it's wishful thinking on the part of some of these aides. >> a little bit of gallows humor about who is wearing a wire? >> yes, so people are responding to this in different ways. a lot of it is sort of putting their head down, believing reassurances and going to work. other people avoid the mere mention of russia or the investigation and, of course, an is we wrote some gallows humor and joking who here is wired and t

white house special counsel ty cobb responded this way. so the argue here, the defense, joe, that, yes, papadopoulos mentioned a russia connection, but it was shut down immediately, nothing else was made of it. the problem is those clips we played at the top of the show saying donald trump and jeff sessions saying we never heard of any russia connection on our campaign. >> right. exactly. and ty cobb can say all he wants to about how insignificant it was. but it is the president's own words that dams his lawyer's case against him. it's the president's own words that will follow him around. it's the president's own elevation, michael! midt of this unknown young staffer, as ty cobb would have us say, where he goes into the washington post. this is one of his first, if not his first significant editorial page meeting and he was asked about his foreign policy team and that was the second name that he discussed and talked about what a bright man, young man he was, he was an expert, et set remarks et cetera, et cetera, so i'm sorry, it's just li

they say ty cobb, who is the lawyer who is handling this has reassured us.y said it would be over by thanksgiving. that's obviously not the case. look we did nothing wrong. we have nothing to worry about. and then there is other people in the president's inner circle, and certainly people close to the probe who say that's very naive. the way things like this work is it starts off less damning and you sort of work your way. in the fact that he went after people, gates and manafort on moneylaundering issues means it's an opening salvo and he is only going get closer. >> can you tell, joyce, by watching this, it seems to be moving away -- well, this week at least, it seems to be moving away from the collusion question, the moneylaundering question by people like manafort, gates and flynn and over towards the obstruction area that seems to be where they're pushing the fresh. if i were thinking, that would be a whole another kettle of fish. different white house people who may have been part of a conversation about how to shut comey down, shut the whole prosecuti

they have ty cobb in there. they're running out these people to be interviewed. if mueller real has his hands on the collusion case, the only way to save themselves is to attempt to blow it all up. >> you're not saying they're ethically right. >> no. >> you're saying strategically -- howard is saying they strategically understand if there's an existential threat, you don't want to cooperate with someone who may be trying to legally slit the throat of your organization and that is a view that this is too cooperative. so speak to that that he so intelligently laid out. if there is a collusion case and papadopoulos is cooperating, you have a report in bloomberg that he says a secret meeting was approved by the campaign. >> so let me start with howard's first point and i think it is a profound one. i think the words were, blow the whole thing up. as an american, somebody involved in law enforcement, what we're referring to is the american criminal justice system. the sense of rule of law that we have. and the idea that the president of the united states would try to

and how although ty cobb and others around the president say we have nothing to fear from flynn, thecloseness of flynn to trump, the overlap between the campaign and the administration, the overlap with russia, all of the things that flynn touches on, how much time he spent with important michael flynn is to robert mueller. and how although ty cobb and others around the president say we have nothing to fear from flynn, the closeness of flynn to trump, the overlap between the campaign and the administration, the overlap with russia, all of the things that flynn touches on, how much time he spent with trump, the things he's been involved in and his degree of legal peril, his own and his son's make him -- you think about the two big fish so far. paul manafort and michael flynn. manafort is small guppy compared to michael flynn in terms of what he can do for this investigation, and this interview with kushner just amplifies and clarifies to the extent that's true. >> so, philip, we heard the big fish theory put another way thrown down here. does flynn in effect the way headline writers l

and i think that ty cobb and john dowd know this. i think that's his personal greatest liability -- >> can he avoid going under oath at some point? >> no, probably not. but they'll try to stretch it out as long as they possibly can so they know as much as they possibly can so they can create a narrative that hopefully he can stick to as a witness. >> are you saying he can't go under oath because he's not being truthful or he can't go under oath because he may not recall or he doesn't have the ability to recall all of these moving parts? >> i think he can't tell the truth. that's what i'm saying. i think that he can't go under oath from a legal jeopardy standpoint because he doesn't tell the truth with respect to what he knows. and that is a problem. and if you're ty cobb or john dowd, you have to make sure that the president is protected. and the way you protect him is to keep him from testifying under oath, if possible, or at least have him testify under oath at the very end so you know as much as you can about people -- what people

. >> reporter: ty cobb, the white house lawyer overseeing russian matters declined to comment.eanwhile, manafort told the court he will put up more than $12 million in real estate and life insurance assets in order to avoid ongoing house arrest. kate. >> thank you. >>> senator rand paul is recovering tonight after he was allegedly assaulted by a neighbor at his home in kentucky. according to a criminal complaint, senatorau police that the neighbor, dr. renee bouchet, came on to his property and tackled him from behind, forcing him to the ground. a senior adviser says paul suffered five broken ribs and is in considerable pain. the suspect was arrested and charged with assault, then released. >>> in saudi arabia dramatic moves as 11 princes, four sitting ministers and dozens of former ministers were detained. the arrests appear to be the latest move to consolidate power by the young crown prince who is next in line to lead the oil-rich kingdom. nbc's lucy kavanaugh reports on the crisis. >> reporter: it is a shakeup sending shock waves across the kingdom and the world. saudi arab

white house special counsel ty cobb giving this statement to nbc news about that appearance.he white house is delighted that mr. schiller will have an opportunity to shed some light on these scandalous allegations and we are sure that his testimony will be of great interest to all fair-minded people. joining me now is john lauro, formerly a federal prosecutor in the eastern district of new york and currently a white collar criminal defense attorney. john, so much to talk about here. keith schiller. he is expected to be asked about president trump's visit to moscow in 2013. a trip at the center of certain allegations in that salacious dossier. how do you expect him to approach that interview? >> well, what's interesting is that his appearance is not related to the mueller investigation. this is actually a congressional review. so the question is what an the the congressional folks are going to come at. i suspect he's a friendly witness to president trump. and probably doesn't really have much information to give the mueller investigation. >> and when it comes to the russia inv

to a vote in the senate in the next few days, but when it comes to russia, he's being advised by ty cobb and other attorneys that this is going to play out in his view. there's an optimistic view and that continues to be his view. let's remember, his patience is thin when it comes to this and some of his confidants wonder how long he'll share the confidence of his own lawyer. >> what a dicey period this must be to know that former associates are perhaps flip be on him, kim. the president needs distance from people like retired general flynn, but they were once very tight on the campaign trail. >> they were tight on the campaign trail, and michael flynn was a white house official. this is a white house physical now who is seemingly cooperating with the bob mueller investigation. that's a huge change. that's very different than anything we've seen so far with campaign officials likes paul manafort. so this has got to be very uncomfortable for a president who really detests anything having to do with russia or this russian investigation. so to know that somebody who has that insight in the

. >> you've got honus wagner, ty cobb, cy young, christy mathewson. >> i'm thinking to myself, "oh, mymillion sitting in a chair." >> but is it almost too much of a good thing? >> it certainly changes the market in a negative way. >> i'm jamie colby, and today, i'm in northwest ohio, on the edge of an area called the

people feel like this could drag on for many more months than ty cobb the president's lawyer has said to wrap up soon, but it shows no sign of that taking place. you even have this "washington post" report saying that they expect a long winter in the white house. you're going to have these headaches of investigations and interviews of key aides and also some humor in the white house right now. people joke, are you wired. are we getting wiretapped. so they're trying to make light of a sticky situation. >> even jeff sessions cracked a joke during the speech at the federalist society where he asked if there were any russians in the room. >>> let's talk about a piece that your colleagues at politico are putting together. about donald trump's first trip to moscow way back in 1987. tell us what you found out. >> sure. luke harding, a long time guardian journal itseist. wrote an excerpt on trump and russia. reveals the kgb played a big role in helping set up that visit that trump made in 1987. they were trying to cultivate americans as agents. there's no indication they were successful with

and it's important to remember that ty cobb originally said that this investigation would wrap up by thanksgiving. of course we're past that date and now they've slid into this convenient fiction that it will wrap up by the end of the year, but when you think about just the work that we're aware of that's left, that's improbable if not impossible. manafort doesn't go to trial until next spring, along with his co-defendant, gates. we don't know what will be general flynn's fate yet. will that be a trial, will it be the cooperation agreement that we've been looking at? there are witnesses left to interview. even when you think about obstruction, perhaps the most discrete risk where the president could potentially be at risk, that's unlikely to be an indictment. we know that there is a longstanding d.o.j. practice against indicting a sitting president, so that would likely take the form of a recommendation that mueller might write to the congress regarding impeachment or saying he had not found facts supporting obstruction of justice if that were to be the case. in any event, it's hard

regarding the special counsel's investigation white house lawyer ty cobb says he thought the mystic robertueller steam all wrapped up his interviewing of the white house aide, hopefully in the next week or so but shortly after thanksgiving and hopes the investigations will be coming to a close very soon as well. gillian: lots of folks inside the administration that this is perhaps part of the reason why 10 months into the administration mr. kushner doesn't have his official security clearance pastor yet. thanks so much for that. leland. trent is democratic senator al franken faces the possibility of an ethics probe over sexual harassment allegations, his fellow members of congress are looking at tackling the problem of harassment on capitol hill. carolyn shively following now for us. it seems as though it's a lot more widespread than what we just heard about. >> horrifyingly so. if your senator and one of the senator getting crushed this weekend with female members of congress calling for change. republican alabama senate candidate roy moore now has at least nine women who say he pursued t

what do you know about the current state of the mueller investigation, and when ty cobbs says we expect the mueller interview to be done by christmas, is that wishful thinking? >> i think it is. mueller's team is going to talk tolife these witnesses and then present them before the grand jury. and they're going to focus on statutes as they go through each of these people. so we know he's focusing on michael flynn. now he's going through a lot of these people in the white house. talking to them, figuring out what they know and putting this whole story together. and he's also going to be using this evidence he's buildsing to hold people and build a narrative to answer the question of how the trump campaign may have worked with russia to influence the results of the 2016 election. >> and jeremy bash, you watched that hearing by the attorney general i guess it was yesterday, and it can't be something mueller and his team enjoys watching, the rolling disclosure nature of this story. >> yeah, and i think really what mueller is probably thinking about is what's the common sense understanding o

i'll listen to what the president's attorney ty cobb has said that the president thinks highly of flynn at the same time everyone has their separate path with mueller and jay sekulow says we shouldn't jump to conclusions on this. flynn has some issues. number one, being his lobbying with turkey that he did not disclose and his communications with russia. there is a good chance he and he alone will be paying the price for this and his son possibly but it remains to be seen what his coordination will be with the special counsel. look, i've talked with a former senior staffer on the campaign and they say look, loyalty is a two-way street and some that feel that donald trump may not have been loyal to them so it will stop with them. it might be every man for himself but i don't think it's at this point appropriate to jump to any conclusions with regards to what this means. >> listen to what a former trump campaign manager cory lewandowski said today about this flynn news. >> mike is not a bad guy. he served his country with distinction for a long time. if he didn't fill out the paperwork pr

inconceivable to me that that could be wrapped up in one way or another before the end of the year, as ty cobbreporters have been saying. if you need the testimony, if you're robert mueller, of the testimony of paul manafort or mike flynn, he may have to go to trial. >> do you think the president or anybody else could be questioned by robert mueller? >> i actually think it's a likely scenario. i think the team would be remiss if they didn't approach the president for an interview. that's going to happen. >> then there's jared kushner, who's being accused by the senate panel of not providing key documents alleging -- a series of attempts by russiaens in 2016, to make inroads to the campaign. and an email from don jr. about the communications the trump son had with wikileaks. this isn't the first time they have had to provide information with regard to russians. >> i know the investigators would like him to come up to the hill and clarify these discrepancies. but the other thing this has done, charles grassley, chastising kushner's lawyer, has put a new spotlight on a meeting with a man named al

ty cobb said the interviews will ideally be completed by thanksgiving or shortly thereafter. all of this brings us to our leadoff panel. mike emkrchael crowley, nationa security editor, john heilemann and former u.s. attorney joyce vance. it's so good to have you back here in new york where you belong, john. here's our leadoff question. have we entered the age of the rolling disclosure? >> i think we've been in the age of the rolling disclosure for a little while now. it's certainly the case that attorney general sessions high dujon i believe is the phrase you would want to apply to his affect now. he says "i have not lied, i have not lied" and even within the statement in which he is saying he has not lied, he asserts he has not changed his story. he's clearly changed his story if you go back from his confirmation hearings from today. if raises the question, even on the basic matter of the question of has my story changed and you're asserting it has not when it clearly has, doesn't that call into question whether or not you are, in fact, a liar? >> michael crowley, did we ge

white house lawyer ty cobb saying the president decided to stick with a strategy of cooperating with mueller for now despite being urged by taking a harder line at steve bannon. one of the presidents closest aides will be interviewed mid-november by mueller's team. president trump ignoring questions about former foreign policy adviser george papadopolous after he pleaded guilty to lying to the fbi about his contacts with russia during the campaign tkpwhrfplt what papadopolous did was lie. that's on him, not the campaign. >> reporter: they are distancing the president from him after he called his former adviser a low-level volunteer. >> he was a coffee boy. he had nothing to do with the campaign. >> reporter: paul gates and manafort both on house arrest. failure to file reports of foreign bank and financial accounts. he traveled to mexico, china, ecuador with a phone and e-mail account registered under a fake number. gates frequently changed banks, opening 55 accounts with 13 financial constitutions and both were frequent travel stories cyprus where the banks are based. >> we could se

>> if you're ty cobb and dowd, you want to avoid having the president testify under oath. but mueller can compel him to do so. have it be at the 11th hour so you have heard everybody's story and you can compose a linear truthful narrative. >> let's play it right now. >> you don't believe that surrogates from the trump campaign had communications with the russians? is that what you're saying? >> i did not, and i'm not aware of anyone else that did. and i don't believe it happened. >> and you don't believe it happened? >> i don't believe it happened. >> this was october 18th. this was two weeks ago, gregory. we know carter page told the house intel commission yesterday that he told jeff sessions that he was meeting with the russians. we have the picture of george papadopoulos sitting next to him, i guess three people down from sessions, saying he is talking to the russians right now. this is a real problem. >> it is a problem. jeff sessions's former colleagues want to get him back in front of the committee and try to reconcile with the facts that we now know and push him on

the lawyer ty cobb said paying his own legal fees was quote always president trump's preference.why didn't he? [ laughter ] >> if he really wanted to pay his own legal fees, what, did the rnc body block him? i mean, does the president think it was a bad idea for the republican party and donors to be paying for him and his son? if so, why doesn't he repay them? so many questions. joining us is white house correspondent for bloomberg news. nice to have you with us tonight. thank you for being here. >> thank you. >> this story confounds me. it's confounded me from the very first inkling we got from members of the administration and campaign would need provide legal counsel. without getting into the -- all the back and forth detail that i just ran through in the new reporting, do you understand basically what is going on in terms of paying for legal fees in this investigation? is there some method to the madness here? >> i understand what is going on at the moment but i thought i understood that before and i have been asking the questions you've been asking since the summer, since th

and how although ty cobb and others around the president say we have nothing to fear from flynn, theerlap of russia, all the things flynn touches on, how much time he's spent with trump, the things he's been involved in, and the degree of legal peril, his own and his son's, make him -- you think about the two big fish so far. manafort is small guppy compared to michael flynn in terms of what he can do for this investigation, and this interview with kushner just amplifies and clarifies to the extent that's true. >> so, philip, we heard the big fish theory put another way thrown down here. does this get you to the closest to the oval office to date? >> i think certainly if you're comparing flynn to manafort and rick gates and papadopoulos, the three figures we had to indictments for last month. flynn was actually in the oval office working. he was the national security advisor at the white house, the most important national security job in this government. and was at the president's side throughout the ansition period. i think it's important to note this meeting jared kushner had with

second, what i disagree with ty cobb and jay sekulow on, that it is not an indication of likelihood of cooperation. or at least exploring the possibility of some plea agreement. it makes no sense otherwise to me. >> how concerning is this for the white house? >> well, as shimon said, flynn was there from the beginning. he knows if there is anything to know, he should be in a position to have known it. with respect especially to coordination with russians and also with wikileaks. he may know something about cambridge an letca and its outreach to julian assange. so he may theoretically have a lot to say. remember, early on he said, i have a story to tell, and if you immune eyes me, i'll tell it. so now he's not going to get i'm unionized but may get a plea agreement and we'll see what does he know, about whom does he know it, and how legally important is it to the mueller investigation. those are the things that mueller, i think, has to explore with flynn. because flynn has a lot of exposure. he's got all of the manafort exposure. you know, the failure to file foreign bank accounts and t

. >> reporter: white house lawyer ty cobb wouldn't comment directly about hope hicks and when she will the special counsel's team, only this, that it is my hope and expectation that shortly after thanksgiving all the white house interviews will be concluded. and they also plan to interview don mcgahn. hicks is being represented by robert trout, a former assistant u.s. attorney who represented president richard nixon's attorney general john mitchell during watergate and monica lewinsky. >> he's going to tell her tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth and protect yourself and nothing else. >> and mueller's team has already interviewed sean spicer and former white house chief of staff reince priebus. >> jessica schneider, thanks for that. coming up, snl alum offer their take on al franken. >> if i saw him in supermarket, i would be like, hey, leave that fruit alone. well watch this. i pop that in there. press brew. that's it. so rich. i love it. that's why you should be a keurig man! full-bodied. are you sure you're describing the coffee and not me? (avo) if you'rand yo

. >> if he's teasing some of that, is he saying look out ty cobb, i have more papadopoulos? >> yeah, and even if you call papadopoulos small fry, sometimes the small fries can fry the higher ups depending what they know. and right now there has to be a lot of nervous people in washington. >> what are you watching in terms of the next steps for mueller? >> i keep watching michael flynn, because of all the people who seem to be clearly indictable, he's center stage and also strategically placed to know a lot about russia. and finally the question of what was trump's motive in trying to allegedly tell comey please go easy on that guy? was trump trying to protect a good guy or trying to protect something about himself? and that's a question that michael flynn should it be answer to answer. >> you brought up the big one. that is the $64 billion question. mike flynn, has he flipped? >> it's tough it tell. but i'll say from the congressional perspective mike flynn is it also in trouble as well. >> so, also, that is you folks in the legal space are thinking about that. mike flynn is

there's questions about some of his disclosure forms, but the ty cobb strategy, the president has said let's cooperate and play this out with mueller, he'll be fair to us, for now that view is holding. we'll see if it holds if more charges are brought. >> and as pamela showed to your point, his lawyer said mr. kushner has voluntarily cooperated with all relevant inquiries and will continue do so. michael, i want to bring you in now. the kushner meeting happened earlier in the month as has been reported but we have learned only in the last few days that flynn's legal team is no longer communicating with the white house. and there are lots of speculation about a plea deal. what do you think? >> well, this surely portends that when flynn said to the other people in the group, we have no mutuality of interest, our paths are departing from one another, that's an indication that he's trying to work out a plea deal and/or trying to work out a plea deal and a cooperation agreement. what mueller is going to do with kushner is tie up loose ends, make sure he has everything he needs to know about