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American citizen held for nearly four weeks. TRANSCRIPT: 7/26/19, All In w/ Chris Hayes.

Guests: Philippe Raines, Donna Edwards, Ezra Levin, Francisco ErwinGalicia

CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC HOST:  That`s HARDBALL for now.  Thanks for being with us.  "ALL IN" with Chris Hayes starts right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST:  Tonight on ALL IN.

REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD):  There`s no formal constitutional or statutory or even House rule for how an impeachment inquiry is to begin.

HAYES:  Democrats take a step toward impeachment.

RASKIN:  I would say we are in an impeachment investigation.

HAYES:  Tonight, what we know about today`s move by the Judiciary Committee.

REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY):  Today we are filing an application for the Grand Jury material underlying the Mueller report.

HAYES:  As Congress leaves for recess and the impeachment push grows.

REP. MIKE LEVIN (D-CA):  I must now support an impeachment inquiry and we`re going to get to the truth for my constituents.

HAYES:  Then --

Am I freaking out unnecessarily or is this an extremely big deal?

SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D-CT):  Yes, freak out.

HAYES:  New pressure on Mitch McConnell after the bombshell revelations about Russian interference in our elections, Donald Trump`s new torture legal argument to keep his taxes hidden, and my exclusive interview with the American citizen detained against his will by ICE.

FRANCISCO GALICIA, U.S. CITIZEN DETAINED BY ICE (through translator):  We`re all people.  We all deserve the same respect and the same treatment.

HAYES:  When ALL IN starts right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES:  Good evening from New York I`m Chris Hayes.  I have said it before, but if you have one foot on the boat and one foot on the dock, you`re likely going to end up in the water.  That is increasingly what it feels like the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is trying to pull off as she tries to slow a growing call for impeachment from within her caucus.

Now, here`s the basic problem that she and the Democrats face.  CNBC`s John Harwood quotes a Democratic leadership aides saying, we don`t have the votes within our party for impeachment.  Here`s Congresswoman Katie Hill who defeated an incumbent Republican to win her seat saying that months from now there may be a time when she would consider impeachment, extremely gentle, extremely amorphous and ambiguous.  Well, one of her several primary opponents fired a warning shot-calling her pretty mild statement "divisive and dangerous."

Democratic leadership is concerned about the politics for those 30 to 40 frontline members that constitute their majority.  They worry that impeachment would hurt them politically.  And let`s be clear, it`s not at all crazy for Speaker Pelosi to worry about that or to make that kind of calculation.

A big part of her job perhaps really the biggest part of her job, when they don`t control unified government, is to protect her current majority so there can be one when and if there`s a Democratic president.

On the other hand, impeachment is a constitutional duty.  It is powerful legal force behind it because it is literally a specified power of Congress in the Constitution.  House Democrats are currently being stonewalled by a White House that refuses to hand over basically anything at every turn.

It is generally the feeling of most scholars that if Democrats were formally pursuing an impeachment inquiry, they would have stronger legal standings in the courts.  In fact, House Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler himself said that on this show just last week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NADLER:  The courts have held that our ability to investigate is at its -- is at its zenith when we`re -- when we`re doing an impeachment.  We can get 60 information in a judicial proceeding.  Impeachment has been held to be a judicial proceeding or part of a judicial proceeding.  Yes, that is -- that is valid.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES:  60 information, that`s grand jury information.  So that brings us to what it looks like that they have done today.  Essentially Democratic leaders are attempting to thread this needle and say we are not formally opening an impeachment inquiry and pulling all of our at-risk members on the record about it.  But who`s to say what an impeachment inquiry is anyway?  We`ll just investigate the president`s possible high crimes and misdemeanors so we`ll have a stronger legal position in court.

And lo and behold, today, Jerry Nadler announced his committee has indeed filed a petition with the court for that grand jury material that underlies the Mueller report.  The reason that`s significant is that grand jury material can only be given over in a few cases, one of those is in a judicial proceeding and as Nadler said, previous courts have ruled impeachment counts as one.

This is how you get what we`ll call schmimpeachment which is kind of impeachment-esque, a little bit of impeachment, a tincture of impeachment depending on who you ask.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA):  We won`t proceed when we have what we need to proceed, not one day sooner.

NADLER:  Among other things, we will consider are obviously are whether to recommend the articles of impeachment.  We may not do that, we may do that, but that`s a conclusion at the end of the process.

RASKIN:  From my personal standpoint, I think we are in an impeachment investigation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES:  But in the committee`s own filing for grand jury material, they say part of the justification for seeing it -- seeking it is because "this committee is conducting the investigation to determine whether to recommend articles impeachment.  And now tonight, four members of the Judiciary Committee have penned a brand-new op-ed title why we`re moving forward with impeachment.

Joining me now are Philippe Raines, former adviser of presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Donna Edwards former Democratic Congressman from Maryland, Ezra Levin the Co-Executive Director of Indivisible which is a progressive organizing -- organization building a grassroots movement to defeat the Trump agenda.

Congresswoman Edwards, let me ask you first your read on all this and how you view leadership`s position vis-a-vis the polling, the politics, and protecting what they view as those 30 to 40 frontline members.

DONNA EDWARDS, FORMER CONGRESSWOMAN:  I think right now -- I mean, obviously leadership is in a bind but it was really clear in the petition to the court seeking the grand jury material to enforce subpoenas that Jerry Nadler in the Judiciary Committee actually recognized that their strongest hand is in using the language of the Constitution and an impeachment otherwise it would be difficult, more difficult to obtain that information.

And so you know, I think right now there`s a growing call for impeachment, there have been a half dozen members who come out actually since the Mueller hearings.  I suspect that when members go back to their district, they`re going to hear directly from their constituents that they cannot let this president get away with his lawless criminal behavior, and that will make a difference.

When the speaker says that you know, they`ll act when they`ve got all the facts in hand, one of those facts is also what she describes as public sentiment.  And I think at this stage it`s really important for the public to rise up and demand that this president be held accountable and this process today begins that.

HAYES:  So there`s the chicken-egg issue with that Ezra, right?  I mean, about whether you`re leading or following public opinion.  And for people that are skeptical and there are people who make the case that look, the better part of valor here is not to essentially walk the plank with something with high risk politically for what will ultimately almost surely be an acquittal in the Senate.

Here`s the latest polling today and I want to get your responses.  37 percent of voters said they support beginning impeachment proceedings to remove Trump from office basically steady from last week`s survey, down two points from a January poll, and 46 -- I wish we had the other part of that but I think it`s like 46 percent who say o 41 percent -- it`s 46 percent who don`t want to start impeachment proceedings.

EZRA LEVIN, CO-EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, INDIVISIBLE:  Yes.  You know, I think the striking thing about those numbers is they`re far, far higher than the numbers for removing President Nixon from office when the Watergate hearings began.  And I think this is a really key point that the purpose of impeachment proceedings is indeed to eventually lead to a vote on whether or not to impeach but it`s also to educate the public.

And that`s the really important piece here that we need to be able to send a clear message to the public as to why are we even pursuing impeachment?  What are the crimes the Trump is committed?  And that`s the opportunity in front of the House Judiciary Committee to make clear.

Now, I wouldn`t lose sight of the context we`re in right now.  Yes, Mueller just testified but that`s not the only important political event we`re facing.  Today is also the start of August recess, congressional recess where members of Congress all over the country go back to their hometowns.

And I think Democrats didn`t want to go back to their districts without being able to say something.  And Jerry Nadler deserves some credit.  This isn`t everything but this is a step in the right direction where they`re able to say, yes, we are starting to move forward on impeachment.

HAYES:  OK, but here`s the tricky thing, right, because you`re trying to -- Philippe, trying to have it I think a little bit both ways and not -- again, not -- it`s not -- strategically it`s not crazy right, like why they`re trying to do both these things.  They want the constitutional force of impeachment inquiry in the courts without getting all their members on the record at this point, right, on something that might not be popular in their district.

The issue then becomes the momentum of the thing.  You can see Pelosi is scared about this, right?  You open an inquiry, then you find out more bad things about what the president did, the next thing you know you`re not controlling where it`s going.

PHILIPPE REINES, FORMER ADVISER TO HILLARY CLINTON:  Yes.  I think what we`re seeing here is what we`ve been reading about which is that Nancy Pelosi and Jerry Nadler have been having conversations behind closed doors about disagreeing about what to do next.

Now we`re seeing it out in the open.  Now this is maybe the legislative version of taking to the streets for Jerry Nadler, but you know, but for what he did today, we might be sitting here saying his impeachment dead.  They`re going to a recess.

HAYES:  That`s a good point.  He did something just as the sort of window - -

REINES:  He knew what he was doing.  And he didn`t do it --

HAYES:  That`s interesting.

REINES:  And he didn`t do it yesterday.  He did it a day after seeing the cumulative deflation of people like me who think my god this guy has broken the law in so many ways, you have to do what`s right.

And he was talking to us, he was talking to his members, because yes, while there have been somewhere between six and ten that have come out for impeachment in the last 48 hours and the numbers around somewhere between 98 and 100 now, that`s less than probably would have been because there are people don`t want to stick their neck out.  Remember, this is not 100 people who are for impeachment and 135 Democrats are against it.

HAYES:  Right, yes, well said.

REINES:  This is 100 who are willing to buck the Speaker.

HAYES:  The leadership.

REINES:  That is a big deal.  And you know, where we are now it`s better than where we were 12 hours ago.

HAYES:  Well, and I`ll say this, Congresswoman Edwards.  This is Jared Huffman saying -- writing yesterday week prediction.  Week of September 9th, that`s when I predict solid majority of Dem caucus will publicly support impeachment inquiry a tipping point.  Grassroots pressure during August recess is key.  Lots of memories are leaning.  Let them hear from you, folks.  The rule of law hangs in the balance.  Do you think this August recess really is key in that respect?

EDWARDS:  Well, you know, look, ten years ago during an August recess, the Tea Party practically shut down every town-hall meeting across the country, and I think that we`re at one of those kinds of moments here where it`s really important for people out in the country to let their members of Congress know that it is unacceptable for this president to get away with crimes, and that will be a really important moment.

Look, today, one of the senior Democratic leaders Katherine Clark came out for impeachment.  Lisa Blunt Rochester came out for impeachment.  These are not people who generally travel all the way on the left side of the spectrum.  Those things are really important and it`s important for people to hear from their members of Congress.

And let me just say this lastly, that Jerry Nadler here is really trying to galvanize what had been dead following the Mueller hearings.  And I think that he`s pushing --

HAYES:  That`s interesting.

EDWARDS:  -- he`s pushing the envelope right here.

HAYES:  Ezra?

LEVIN:  I totally agree, and frankly, I`m excited.  Look it is so rare in American politics that if you are an individual in the community, you`re looking at things and you`re asking what can I do and we`re in one of those moments right now.  Donald Trump doesn`t care what you think, the Democratic House leadership doesn`t particularly care what you think.  But you know who does care what you think, your individual member of the House of Representatives.

And if they`re a Democrat, chances are they`re not yet out in favor of impeachment, but they depend on your vote for re-election and they`re about to be back home.  So you`ve got a shot right now over the course the next few weeks to make clear with other constituents that they need to come out in favor of impeachment.

HAYES:  OK, but let me -- I just want to counter that and then I`m going to come to you again, Philippe.  I mean, do you worry that the political analysis is wrong?  Do you worry about the fact that maybe you, Ezra, and the individual folks don`t actually have the best sense of what`s going to help those 30 folks get reelected in the districts they won from Trump, that this really would put them in a bad spot, that it might actually risk the majority.

REINES:  I think we got to consider all angles.  But frankly, nobody knows what the future holds.  What we do know is what Donald Trump has done and we do know where the grassroots is on this.  We know that people who were knocking doors, who were making calls, who were sending texts, they voted in a House majority to hold this administration accountable.

So if you want those people out knocking doors, sending texts, and making calls to build the 2020 blue wave, you got to give them something.  You ought to actually say we`re out here fighting for you.  Fecklessness and cowardice does not win elections.

HAYES:  You know, Yale -- I think it`s Yale historian Samuel Moyn had an interesting op-ed that I was just reading before I came on air about sort of basically making the case that like people have been looking for this kind of white knight savior the Mueller investigation that they`ve sort of stumbling through this nightmare from a huge part of the country, right, not all of it obviously, and they want to wake up from it they want to be saved.

They want someone to come and slay the dragon and that`s kind of a -- it`s a mistake to think that way.  It`s mythical and that even maybe the entire hopes put on Mueller in the Mueller report and his testimony and even impeachment.  The only way to beat this guy is to beat him.

REINES:  Yes.  Well, there`s a fair amount of fantasy going on.  I mean, the notion of you know, I don`t want to see him impeached, I want to see him dragged off in cuffs.  I want to see --

HAYES:  That`s so ridiculous.

REINES:  It`s not happening.  But you know what, there`s a fair number of people who keep moving the goalposts and you know, I have the highest respect for her, and I hope that we do impeach because she`ll be a great speaker, but Nancy Pelosi is doing a little of that too.

And here`s the problem.  You know, the question you just asked Ezra about the political calculus, it is a valid conversation to have what is the calculus.  The problem is people are not having an open mind.  They`re just saying 1998 Bill Clinton was acquitted and nothing happened and the Republicans lost forever.  You know what, I just don`t see that.

HAYES:  No, that I agree with.  I think --

REINES:  You know, there are a lot of people don`t and people won`t even entertain that.  And it`s having a circular argument.  And the person you know who believes that more than anyone is Nancy Pelosi.

HAYES:  You know, the other historical thing that I`ve been thinking about and this isn`t apples to apples at all, but in the fall of 2013, a massive fight opened up between Republican leadership in the grassroots over shut down to repeal the ACA, and the leadership said you guys are nuts.  This is idiotic.  This is suicidal.  It`s not going to work, and the grassroots said fight, fight, fight.  We don`t care.  And the grassroots won.

They shut down the government, and everyone said this is a disaster.  The polling on it was terrible, and everyone said this is going to cost him from a year from now.  And a year later, not a single vote was cast in America on that shutdown, not a single one.  People moved on to other things.

I mean, people are thinking I think a lot that like impeachment is going to happen and the election is the next day.  But that`s not -- that`s not the way it`s going to work.

REINES:  That`s what happened in 98 where --

HAYES:  Right.  That`s exactly --

REINES:  -- straddled the midterm.  We`re a year away.  And the two previous impeachments have been three or four months.  I mean, we could be done with this and have a whole year to get our act together.

HAYES:  Lord knows what will happen in that year.  Philippe Raines, Donna Edwards, and Ezra Levin, thank you all.  Next, new fallout from the stunning Senate Intelligence report that says Russia targeted election systems in all 50 states.  A new outrage at the man of the Senate who is at this point essentially single-handedly blocking our government from doing anything about it in two minutes.

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GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ANCHOR, ABC NEWS:  Your campaign this time around, if foreigners, if Russia, if China, if someone else offers you information on opponent, should they accept it or should they call the FBI?

TRUMP:  I think maybe you do both.  I think you might want to listen.  I don`t -- there`s nothing wrong with listening.  If somebody called from a country, Norway, we have information on your opponent.  Oh, I think I`d want to hear it.  It`s not an interference.  They have information.  I think I`d take it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES:  Yes.  Maybe the Norwegians just text the pres with a little dirt, you know, you read the text.  So this is how this week went.  On Tuesday, FBI Director Chris Wray testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee and said that Russia is still intent on interfering in our elections.

On Wednesday, former Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified for about seven hours largely about Russia`s sabotage of our campaign and election.  And then yesterday the Senate Intelligence Committee released a stunning report on Russia`s 2016 election interference.

And then following all that, Senator Mitch -- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked two election security bills yesterday.  One of the bills, the Duty to Report Act required candidates and campaign officials to notify the FBI if they are offered foreign contributions or assistance.

McConnell blocked that bill too.  It seems like that`s the kind of provision he might think President Trump would run afoul of particularly because the president has said he would run afoul of it.  But let`s not forget that back in September of 2016, when the CIA presented the gang of eight with its assessment that Russia was at that moment intervening in that election to help Donald Trump win the presidency, President Obama suggested putting out a bipartisan statement urging state and local officials to take federal help to protect their elections from Russia`s cyber intrusions.

And you might remember that Mitch McConnell stood in the way of that statement "according to several officials McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly in active partisan politics.

Joining me now MSNBC Intelligence Analyst Malcolm Nance, 36 year veteran in terrorism strategy, author of The Plot to Hack America.  Well, a lot happened this week, Malcolm.  What do you make of McConnell`s maneuvering in the last day or two?

MALCOLM NANCE, MSNBC INTELLIGENCE ANALYST:  The only thing that I can make of it is that I have to go and I have to look back at what precipitating event would make him not want to defend the United States from a Russian attack.  I don`t like the word intrusion.  What happened in 2016 was an attack.  As Robert Mueller said, we are still in an on-going attack.

And the only thing that I can think of is that Oleg Deripaska, one of the oligarchs who was implicated in the 2016 election activities has opened -- has promised to open an aluminum smelting plant in the state of Kentucky providing jobs in Kentucky.

Anywhere else in any other point in history, that would be considered a bribe especially when you consider the next immediate thing that he does is stop the United States from defending itself in cybersecurity and specifically stops to make it a crime not to report foreign contacts who are trying to impact our elections.

HAYES:  Wait, but it also seems to me there`s an even simpler Occam`s razor explanation although the Deripaska thing is true.  Deripaska has offered that they`re going to invest in aluminum factory in Kentucky which is just that he thinks it helps Donald Trump in the Republican Party retain power, that he wants to win again.

I mean, it seems to me that to a lot of Republicans, like it works the first time.  They`re now going to run again.  They lost the popular vote by three million votes, like maybe they could use a little help.

NANCE:  Sure.  And obviously, no one is going to be held accountable for it if it turns out that is you know, that Russia does this again, or China, or Iran or even worse North Korea which has a pretty robust cyber warfare organization.

HAYES:  They started all at the Sony.  They were -- they were the blueprint for this whole thing when they hacked Sony.

NANCE:  Sure.  And they could get combined attack the American electoral process and throw it into chaos.  You don`t need to have Donald Trump have votes tallied for him.  You need to make it appear that the Democrats have done something and then throw it into chaos and have the entire thing be what Donald Trump call it, a rigged process.

Mitch McConnell as Joe Scarborough has named him has earned his title of Moscow Mitch.  He either will stand up and defend this nation or he should just admit that he wants Moscow`s assistance in this next election.

HAYES:  There`s also the question of just how extensive -- I mean, obviously we know about the WikiLeaks -- about the you know, the hacked e- mails.  We know about the troll factories and all that.  But the degree to which you know, Russian hackers were inside election systems including efforts in Illinois -- this is a recap of the most to me, unnerving part of that report which specifically discusses efforts in Illinois in an unnamed state too where details about meetings in cybersecurity efforts appear to mostly jive with what`s previously been disclosed about the election system hacking attempts in Florida, which by the way matters a lot more for a presidential election.

The Senate Intelligence Committee apparently unwilling or unable to provide more information.  Florida`s politicians and election officials remain stuck and yet another guessing game.  This just seems insane to me.  Like how it -- how is it the case that there is no -- like coordination happening?

NANCE:  Well, it`s not as insane as the fact that in 2016 I actually had the secretary state of Florida attacked me for saying that their system had been scanned, their subcontractor had been scanned by Russian intelligence and said no such thing has happened.

Now we found every state that`s happened.  The Russians are not stupid.  They are doing what is an extension of the old Soviet systems wanting to dismantle and destroy American democracy.  And they have learned breaking the confidence of the fundamentals of American elections is the way to do it.

And so by going after every state, we don`t know whether they`ve planted Trojan horses, we don`t know whether they have taken registrations and are intending to change them.  All of these things could happen the day of the election or a week before the election, and again throw us into chaos.  That is their number one goal and that works to Donald Trump`s advantage.

HAYES:  All right, Malcolm Nance, thank you so much for making some time.  President Trump and his administration and his lawyers are still doing everything possible to keep Democrats from getting his tax returns.  Their latest ploy to keep those tax returns from coming out next.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD NIXON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES:  I`m going to say this to the television audience.  I`ve made my mistakes.  But in all of my years of public life, I have never profited, never profited from public service.  I`ve earned every cent.  And in all of my years of public life, I have never obstructed justice.  And I think too that I can say that in my years of public life, that I welcome this kind of examination because people have got to know whether or not their president is a crook.  Well, I`m not a crook.  I`ve earned everything I`ve got. 

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES:  I`m not a crook.  That, of course, is one of the most if not the most notorious things that Nixon ever said.  A phrase that has been repeated ever after with a wry chuckle because of course, if Nixon was anything, he was a crook.  The funny thing is that that speech wasn`t about Watergate or the Watergate break-in, it was about his personal tax returns.  And unlike Trump, Nixon ended up releasing his taxes.

And not only that, but when Congress sent the IRS request for Nixon`s returns in 1973, the agency turned them over on the same day according to letters released by House Democrats yesterday showing that contrary to the current Treasury Secretary claim, the current congressional request for Trump`s taxes is unprecedented.

It is not unprecedented for Congress to request a president`s tax returns, nor is it unprecedented for the IRS to provide them.  The House Ways and Means Committee has asked for the President`s tax returns under clear statutory authority and under a subpoena.  They`re trying to ways to get them.  And amid continued stonewalling from the federal government, New York state passed a law allowing Congress to get the president`s state tax returns.

Well, Trump`s personal lawyers are now suing to prevent that from happening using a truly insane to my mind legal theory.  Here to explain is MSNBC Legal Analyst Nick Ackerman, former assistant Special Watergate prosecutor.  All right, so --

NICK AKERMAN, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST:  It is truly insane.

HAYES:  OK.  I`m glad -- you`re the lawyer here, but that was my -- that was my amateur diagnosis.

AKERMAN:  That was a legal phrase, truly insane.

HAYES:  It`s truly insane.

All right, so you`ve got -- the law says that, you know, the IRS shall provide any of the returns the ways and means committee asks for.  So, they asked for that.  The government is saying no, so they`re in court about that.  Then they subpoenaed.  So there is a case about that.  And then New York state said you know, we just passed a law.  You can have his state tax returns.  Trump sued them.  And one of the arguments...

AKERMAN:  Preemptively, I might add.

HAYES:  Preemptively because it hasn`t been turned over.  One of the arguments this is unlawful violation of his first amendment rights, that it`s retaliation and discrimination in violation of the first amendment, that it singles out President Trump because he is a Republican, a political opponent, enacted to retaliate against the president because of his policy positions, his political beliefs and protected speech, including the positions he took during the 2016 campaign.

AKERMAN:  This entire argument is like the kibosh is put to it by this Eastland Case the Supreme Court came down with in 1975 saying that the debate and speech clause of the congress, which is in the U.S. Constitution trumps any idea that you can question the motive of congress, as long  as it`s for a legislative purpose.

And clearly, we`ve got the president of the United States where it`s shown he has a long history of his family trying to evade taxes, not to pay his taxes, being constantly audited, that there is an absolute legislative purpose in trying to get to the bottom of this to determine whether there should be  legislation requiring any candidate for president to turn over his returns.

HAYES:  Clearly, OK -- but that`s the federal case.  I`m saying on the stateside, right, where he`s saying you`re discriminating against my protected speech rights.

AKERMAN:  The courts have no business even being involved in that.

HAYES:  Right.  Right.

AKERMAN:  I mean, that`s what the Supreme Court has said.

HAYES:  I see.  I see what you`re saying.

Why -- so there are three different ways they`re trying to get them.  One of the things that I sort of wonder about is there was a gap between the filing of the lawsuit to block New York State and New York State passing the law, and there are some people who say like why doesn`t Richard Neal on the Ways and Means Committee just get them from New York state.

And there are people arguing saying if he does that, it might mess with the arguments he is making before the courts.  Do you think that`s true?

AKERMAN:  I think there is something to that.  I think he wants to keep it a pure argument.

HAYES:  Right, because then if you get them from -- you might sort of complicate things in your court arguments if you get them from New York State.

AKERMAN:  Right.  And besides, I mean, the federal returns are better.  There is more detail on those federal returns.

And if I were the prosecutor, I`d want to get those, because Michael Cohen testified that Donald Trump had different financial statements for different situations.  If he needed to have more money, then he would show that on a financial statement to a bank.  It was the old Paul Manafort trick, his former campaign manager.  When you needed to buy -- to lower your taxes, you lowered your financial statement.  When you didn`t want to pay taxes, you lower it.  You`d up it for the banks.

And so you`d do it both ways.  And if you took all these financial statements, spread them out, put the tax returns together, you would find major discrepancies would show that he lied to the banks or he lied on his returns or he did both.

HAYES:  I mean, I think there is basically The New York Times public report.  There is reason to think that`s absolutely the case.

I guess my question is we saw Robert Mueller under questioning by Sean Patrick Maloney basically say look, I wanted to interview the president, but he successfully ran out the clock.  That was basically what he said.  He said, look, he tried and then it was going to be a year of litigation, and then it worked.  Donald Trump has been doing that for 40 years.  There is nothing he wants less than people to see his taxes.

I guess the question is like are they going to be successful?  Can they run the clock out on this in their litigation against congress?

AKERMAN:  They shouldn`t be able to.  I mean, this should go pretty quickly.  Because whatever the district court decides they`re going to take to it the appellate court in the District of Columbia.  The Supreme Court is not going hear this.  I mean, this is going to go pretty quickly.

HAYES:  That`s a lot of faith in the Supreme Court.

AKERMAN:  Well, after today, you may be right.

HAYES:  Which just ruled that the president can start building his wall with Pentagon dollars in a 5-4.

AKERMAN:  But I just don`t see this being an issue that the Supreme Court is going to look at.  The statute is very clear.  This statute goes back to Calvin Coolidge.  I mean, this was enacted because of the Teapot Dome scandal.

HAYES:  This is the language: "upon written request of the chairman of committee on ways and means of the House of Representatives, the chairman of the committee on finance of the senate or the chairman of the joint committee on taxation," that is who requested Nixon, "the secretaries shall furnish such committee with a return or return information specified in such a request."  And when they did that to Nixon, of all people, Nixon turns it over the next day.

Nick Akerman, thank you very much.

HAYES:  Thank you.

Ahead, my exclusive interview with the American citizen detained against his will by ICE.  The stunning details.

But first, Fox News fails to bend reality enough to satisfy President Trump.  It is tonight`s Thing One, Thing Two, next.

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HAYES:  Thing One tonight.  It`s the end of a long week for the proud warriors carrying the president`s water over at Trump TV.  With the Mueller testimony driving Trump nuts, the folks at Fox had to work extra hard to spin for the boss man.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE:  Even with this albatross around his neck, the president has once again beaten the elites at their own game.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NOWS:  Never meet your heroes, that`s how the saying goes, they`ll only disappoint you.  Well, that`s true, by the way, as Democrats across the country learned the hard way today.

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS:  Today`s hearing capped off what will now go down in history as one of the single biggest, most epic embarrassments in history.

RUDY  GIULIANI, TRUMP LAWYER:  Democrats are such idiots.  They call him to testify and now he`s going to have to have a mouthpiece to help him.  This guy was the director of the FBI.

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HAYES:  The channel really pulled out all the stops, even bringing in this dynamic young legal analyst to join the gang on Trump TV and Friends leading up to the Mueller hearings.

As it turns out, on closer inspection, it was actually the president`s own lawyer in some sort of disguise.  But today Fox News had to go and release a new 2020 poll.  And the audience of one was not happy.  Trump turns on Trump TV.  That`s Thing Two in 60 seconds.

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HAYES:  One of the few remaining parts of Trump TV not in the tank for the president is their polling operation.  And so when Fox News conducted a legitimate poll with what appeared to be legitimate results, Trump seemed to have a legitimate tantrum.

Now, we`re not talking about the Fox News poll results published Wednesday on the economy.  He loved that one.  Fox poll says best economy in decades! But then Fox release these numbers yesterday, and mind you, they are from the same poll showing Trump losing in a 2020 matchup to Joe Biden by 10 points -- ouch -- to Bernie Sanders by six points, and a statistical tie with Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris.

OK, now he hates the poll.  And today, Trump hates Trump TV.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE:  The president tweeted about the polling today:  "Fox News is at it again," he wrote.  "So different from what they used to be during the 2016 primaries and before, proud warriors.  Now Fox News polls, which have always been terrible to me, they had me losing big to crooked Hillary, had me down to Sleepy Joe."

The Fox News poll did have President Trump losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton.  And the Fox News poll was accurate.  The poll predicted Hillary Clinton would beat Donald Trump by 4 percentage points with a margin of error of 2.5 percent.  So Clinton would win the popular vote by a margin of between 1.5 percent and 6.5 percent.  She did.  Her margin of victory was 2.1 percent, close to 3 million voters.  The polls were accurate.

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HAYES:  This was the moment when 18-year-old American citizen Francisco Erwin Galicia was finally reunited with his mother after nearly a month in detention by ICE.

For 23 days, he was offered no shower and says he lost 26 pounds.  Things got so bad that at one point he almost grid to self-deport, an American citizen.  And you will hear all this from him in just a moment.

But this was him on Wednesday morning at the McAllen, Texas bus station with his mom.

The Dallas Morning News was first to break the story last week, quote, a Dallas-born citizen picked up by the border patrol has been detained for three weeks. 

It was completely beyond belief that an American, a teenager not accused of a crime, who committed literally no infraction other than having the wrong skin color, the wrong last name could be held in detention without a trial for a month.  Here in the U.S., in Texas, but it happened, and here is his story.

Francisco`s mother is an undocumented Mexican immigrant.  She had him in Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, Texas in December of 2000.  Shortly after his birth, they moved back across the border to Reynosa, Mexico.

I should tell you, Reynosa is a border town.  It sits on the southern bank of the Rio Grande.  In fact, it is literally across from McAllen, Texas.  The bridge separating those two towns is called the McAllen Hidalgo Reynosa Bridge.

Francisco stayed on that other side of the river, in Mexico, until he was 15 years old.  And then he moved back to the U.S. with his younger brother who is undocumented.

On June 27, Francisco and his brother were traveling to North Texas for soccer tryouts when they were stopped at a border patrol checkpoint.

They were pulled over by customs and border patrol.  His undocumented brother had no papers, but Francisco did.  Knowing that checkpoint was there, he had brought with him a card version of his birth certificate, basically, a kind of short form certificate.  He brought his Social Security card.  He brought his Texas state ID.  Three forms of identification, all in anticipation of this checkpoint.  And despite all that, border patrol agents accused Francisco of not being a citizen.  They threw him in detention where he stayed for 23 days.

After two weeks, his lawyers got them the full birth certificate.  But it took another nine days  until they let him out. 

Francisco`s case was raised by California Congressman Ted Lieu on Thursday during a House Judiciary hearing with the U.S. border patrol chief, who said that Francisco never told them that he was a U.S. citizen. 

But that appeared to be flatly untrue.  His own lawyer provided this document, which is a citation issued to him that proves that he told authorities he was a U.S. citizen from the moment he  was detained. 

After 23 days in detention in a small room with 60 men, no showers, no way to brush his teeth, Francisco Erwin Galicia is out and has been reunited with his family.  And for the first time, he will tell his story right here, next.

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HAYES:  18-year-old Francisco Erwin Galicia is an American citizen, but he was still detained for nearly four weeks by immigration authorities who just didn`t believe him, didn`t believe his documents, who didn`t believe his lawyer.  He was released on Tuesday of this week.

Because Francisco spent almost all of his life in Mexico, he felt more comfortable doing his first live taped TV interview in Spanish.  I spoke with him yesterday night through a translator.

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HAYES:  And here with me now is that American citizen, Francisco Erwin Galicia.  Francisco, first, I want to ask how are you feeling now that you are out of detention?

FRANSISCO ERWIN GALICIA, AMERICAN CITIZEN DETAINED BY ICE (through translator):  Well, much better after all the suffering that I lived.  Now, being able to be next to my mother I feel much better.  The truth is it`s the ability to be free.

HAYES:  Can you describe a little bit of what it was like inside detention, what the conditions  were like, the food you received, the ability to shower or brush your teeth or things like that.

GALICIA (through translator):  From my experience, we went through something inhumane, all  of us who were in that detention center.  There, we couldn`t bathe or brush our teeth.  Nothing.  You didn`t have anything.  The only thing that they would give us from time to time to clean ourselves were wipes.  We would wipe ourselves but the dirt would stay, unable to come off our skin.  They wouldn`t clean us.

And those wipes, they would give them to us every once in a while, every seven days maybe,  or every three days, but we wouldn`t shower.

HAYES:  What kind of room were you in?

GALICIA (through translator):  It was a small room, super small for the amount of people there.  We were about 60 people in one small room that we would call the freezer, because, well, it`s really cold.  With one single bathroom for all of those people, without beds or anything.  And we would sleep on the floor.  And the bathroom, what separated the bathroom was a wall about this high.  It didn`t cover anything.  The room was so small that there were people sleeping in the bathroom.  We would take turns to be able to sleep.

HAYES:  People sleeping on the floor, sleeping in the bathroom, it was very cold, you had blankets, it was crowded, 60 people in the room.  What -- you were there for three weeks in that facility?

GALICIA (through translator):  I spent 23 days in that place.  And from there, they brought me to Piersol (ph), Texas, to a bigger center for the detained nationals.  I was there for around three,  four days.

HAYES:  And I read that you lost 26 pounds.

GALICIA (through translator):  Yes, I lost around 26 pounds when I was in that detention center in La Fordias (ph).  The 23 days without eating well.  The truth is no one ate well, because it wasn`t only me.  There were many that suffered that.

HAYES:  I want to talk about what happened when you were apprehended.  But one more question about the conditions.  Were other folks that were in there with you, had they been there for long periods of time, like yourself?

GALICIA (through translator):  Yes, there were people there for some 30 days, including one for 43 days.  There were people who were there way more time than me.  I was there 23 days.  There were people who had been there for much longer time.

HAYES:  You were apprehended at a border check point with your brother.  Your brother does not have papers.  You do.  You had them in your wallet.  You had a birth certificate, a Social Security card, a Texas ID, when you presented them at the checkpoint, what did they say to you when you said I`m a U.S. citizen?

GALICIA (through translator):  In the moment when I showed my identifications and everything, they said that the documents were false, that I was not an American citizen and they didn`t believe me.  I would tell them after showing them all my documents that I was an American citizen and they would still not trust what I said and so they then decided to lock me up.

HAYES:  So just so people understand because you`re speaking to me in Spanish, you were born in Dallas.  You`re a U.S. citizen.  You lived most of your life in Mexico, recently came back to the United States after being born here.  And there were some papers, you had a travel visa.  There were some papers that raised their suspicion, but today an official with the U.S. Immigration Services, the CBP, said you never told them you were a U.S. citizen.  Is he telling the truth?

GALICIA (through translator):  From the first moment that I presented myself at the checkpoint, I always said I was an American citizen.  I showed my documents.  They even charged me because they said my papers were falsified, and I have proof because they contradict themselves because they charged me for supposedly falsifying my citizenship when I am a citizen here.  It doesn`t make sense what they`re saying.

HAYES:  Did you worry when you were in detention that you would be there forever, that no one would belief you?

GALICIA (through translator):  Yes.  The truth is I felt fear that they would not believe me, and that they would leave me there for a much longer time, being that I was able to prove it to them and they still didn`t believe me.

Yes, I felt fear that they were going to deport me even because it was so much, the pressure they put on me to sign the deportation order that at a certain point I was about to sign it because there was so much pressure that I sign it.

HAYES:  Can you describe the pressure to sign, to deport yourself, what is that pressure like? What do you mean?  What did they say to you?

GALICIA (through translator): Well, they would -- it was more psychological.  They said they were going to charge me, that they would insult me so that I would sign my deportation order.  And well, it was all psychological damage, all that so they could pressure me to sign it, telling me they were going to charge me three felonies that I would go to jail, all that, that it`s better for me to sign.  It was like they were going to deport me anyway.

HAYES:  When finally they came to release you, did anyone there say we`re sorry that we  made this mistake?

GALICIA (through translator):  No, no one.

They just called me and said get your stuff together, you`re leaving.  I got my things together.  They gave me my clothes, what I brought on me.  And then the moment my lawyer got there and the media was outside, they told me there`s your lawyer.  You can go.  Go with her.  Nothing.  Not one apology.  Nothing.

HAYES:  For people that think it`s important for there to be very strong borders, border patrol, border check points to be tough on people that don`t have papers that are in this country, is there something you want to say to them about what happened to you and your experience.

GALICIA (through translator):  Don`t be so inhumane.  Here under god`s eyes, we`re all people.  We all deserve the same respect and the same treatment, regardless of your nationality, we all deserve the same respect.  We`re all people.

HAYES:  Francisco Galicia, thank you so much for taking the time.  I`m so glad that you`re out and be well.

GALICIA (through translator):  Many thanks.  With all my heart, I really appreciate it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HAYES:  Under god`s eyes, we all deserve respect.  Hard to argue with that.

That is ALL IN for this evening.  "THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW" starts right now with Ari Melber in for Rachel.  Good evening, Rachel.

  THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END