Show: MTP DAILY Date: February 2, 2018 Guest: Benjamin Wittes, Jennifer Rubin, Joshua Johnson, Jim Jordan, Mark Meadows, Deirdre Bosa, Joshua Johnson, Ben Wittes, Carol Lee
NICOLLE WALLACE, MSNBC HOST: MTP DAILY starts right now. Hi, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD, MSNBC HOST: Hi, Nicolle. I didn`t find my shadow. Did you find yours?
WALLACE: Because that means -- what does that mean again? Cold -- I forget.
TODD: I don`t --
WALLACE: Cold or not?
TODD: I don`t know.
WALLACE: Winter is over or still going?
TODD: I think it means we`re just -- we`re six more month of what we`re doing right now.
WALLACE: Oh, God.
TODD: There you go.
WALLACE: That`s like three more seasons.
TODD: All right.
WALLACE: Have a good show.
TODD: Well, if it`s Friday, the memo saw its shadow. We`re getting six more months of the Mueller probe.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Tonight, the Republican memo is out.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think it`s a disgrace. What`s going on in this country, I think it`s a disgrace.
TODD: Will the President use it as an excuse to fire Rod Rosenstein?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you still have confidence in Rod Rosenstein?
TRUMP: You figure that one out.
TODD: And shadow games. Why I`m obsessed with Groundhog Days.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, campers, rise and shine, and don`t forget your booties because it`s cold out there today.
TODD: This is MTP DAILY and it starts right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Good evening. I`m Chuck Todd here in Washington and welcome to MTP DAILY. It`s Groundhog Day again. And the President is calling his Justice Department a disgrace -- some would argue, again -- claiming it`s a partisan arm of the Democratic Party and he won`t rule out firing a senior official in charge of overseeing Mueller`s investigation.
The apparent evidence behind all of that? This memo. Which has, quote, material omissions, according to the President`s own FBI.
It was compiled by a former member of the President`s transition, House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes, written by staffers on the Intel Committee.
There are many, many reasons to be skeptical about what the memo says, mostly because of what it doesn`t say.
But it`s main contention is that the Justice Department leaders, including a Trump appointee, used information from Fusion GPS` Steele dossier in an application to spy on campaign adviser Carter Page after he had apparently left the Trump campaign and that the FBI failed to tell the FISA court, which approved the warrant, that the Clinton campaign and the DNC was funding Steele`s work.
If that`s all accurate, does it raise some questions? Yes. Should a judge be told about that stuff? Perhaps yes.
And it may be the judge was told more than you think because a Democratic congressional source tells NBC News that the FISA judges were made aware that there was a, quote, political context to Steele`s information. Meaning that it came from a political opponent of Trump. Perhaps they didn`t utter the word "Clinton."
So does the GOP memo prove what the President is saying it proves?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I think it`s terrible. You want to know the truth? I think it`s a disgrace. What`s going on in this country, I think it`s a disgrace.
The memo was sent to Congress. It was declassified. Congress will do whatever they`re going to do, but I think it`s a disgrace what`s happening in our country.
And when you look at that and you see that and so many other things, what`s going on, a lot of people should be ashamed of themselves and much worse than that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: President Trump also would not rule out firing his Deputy Attorney General over this memo.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Does it make you more likely to fire Rosenstein? Do you still have confidence in him after reading the memo?
TRUMP: You figure that one out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: And this morning, hours before the memo`s release, he tweeted this, quote, the top leadership and investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans, something which would`ve been unthinkable just a short time ago. Rank and file are great people. Exclamation point.
Let me bring in Ken Dilanian, NBC News intelligence and national security reporter.
OK, Ken, let me start with the memo itself and, I think, what the central question and critique of the memo is. Should the FBI have included more information about Steele and his potential motives to the FISA judge? Was that an error, and is that, in fact, what happened?
KEN DILANIAN, NBC NEWS INTELLIGENCE AND NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Well, the problem, Chuck, is it`s pretty clear we can`t rely on this memo to tell us what they did and didn`t include because, as you mentioned in your intro, a Democratic source has told me that, in fact, the FISA judges were told that there was a political context here; that, in fact, some of this information came from Trump political opponents.
The House Nunes memo makes it seem like that was completely omitted, so we just don`t know what to believe here.
But the other thing to remember is the FBI gets information all the time from criminals, from spurned spouses, from turncoats. This is how investigations are built. So it wouldn`t be anything out of the ordinary that they would get information from someone with an axe to grind.
TODD: There are some things in the memo -- it was interesting, the hype about the memo indicated that this could be -- this was going to be sort of the silver bullet in the Mueller investigation.
And it was -- the implication was that the Steele dossier was the lone document, the lone piece of evidence, used to launch the investigation, but the memo itself admits the investigation was launched beforehand. So in some ways, does that give the memo more credibility?
DILANIAN: Actually, I think that makes the memo pretty much a bust. For me, as a journalist, I was hoping to learn something about the Mueller investigation. I learned nothing from this memo.
And you`re absolutely right, a lot of Republicans have been saying that this memo will essentially show Mueller investigation is a poisonous tree and this memo was the fruit. It invalidates the entire investigation because it`s based on, essentially, a fraud on the FISA court.
But what we learned in the memo is that, in fact, the investigation started months before the surveillance of Carter Page and we knew that.
But the memo confirms it in black and white in a formally top-secret document, you know, that the investigation started with something having nothing to do with Carter Page, with a guy named George Papadopoulos and a tip from an Australian diplomat, and the surveillance of Carter Page happened months later.
So how could whether all this -- even if all this is true, how could this mean that the Mueller investigation is invalid? And it doesn`t -- the memo doesn`t explain at all how Carter Page is relevant to today`s investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia. In fact, he may not be in the list, Chuck.
TODD: And there is one other part that`s missing in this memo -- and, apparently, it`s missing in the Democratic memo too -- which is when you renew a FISA warrant, you have to show that you have been making progress, that the warrant itself has produced something.
Is that always the case? Because if that`s always the case, then that appears to be a big missing piece of the puzzle in this memo and, frankly, the Democratic memo.
DILANIAN: According to legal experts, yes, you have to show that the surveillance was productive. And our reporting is that four separate federal judges ruled on, first, the initial application and then the three renewals, two of which came during the Trump administration.
So that`s significant. Actually, that is one thing we did learn from this memo, is that the surveillance of Carter Page, a former Trump campaign aide, continued well into the Trump administration.
TODD: All right, Ken Dilanian, I will leave it there. Ken, thanks very much.
DILANIAN: You bet, Chuck.
TODD: Let me bring in tonight`s super-sized panel. Carol Lee, reporter right here at NBC News; Ben Wittes, editor-in-chief at "Lawfare" blog, senior fellow at Brookings, and an MSNBC legal analyst; Jennifer Rubin, "Washington Post" opinion writer; and Joshua Johnson, host of "1A" on NPR. Welcome, all.
Mr. Wittes, I`m going to start with you. This memo, was it primarily a political document or an oversight document?
BENJAMIN WITTES, SENIOR FELLOW IN GOVERNANCE STUDIES, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: Oh, I think it is entirely a political document. Look, it is not at all obvious that the fundamental allegations in it are true. In fact, there`s a lot of reason to doubt whether the fundamental allegations are true.
Even if they are true, it does appear that there was substantial enough other information in the Carter Page warrant to justify repeated renewals of the material. So it doesn`t seem like there was a grave defect in the Carter Page warrant.
And by the way, even if there was a problem with the Carter Page warrant, it`s not clear that the fruits of that warrant have played any substantial role in the subsequent investigation. Carter Page himself has not been indicted, so it`s not clear that this is a meaningful contributor to the current Mueller investigation.
And so the fact that we had weeks of hysterical build-up to this release is entirely a political phenomenon, not a phenomenon about the actual Mueller investigation or the actual state of the Trump-Russia discussion.
TODD: Carol, it didn`t, though, try to impugn Mueller. I think a lot of people thought the memo was going to try to impugn Mueller.
So what I can`t figure out here is why the hype didn`t match the memo and why so many members of Congress who read the memo were willing to say the things that they said because it`s nowhere near any of that.
CAROL LEE, NBC NEWS NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: Here is what -- it seems that this was all driven from the President, in the sense that even -- there`s reporting that John Kelly said to the President that, having read it, it just really wasn`t all that people who were advocated for it had said it was cracked up to be. And still, he really wanted to move forward.
And look, this is a president who is willing to take any short-term political gain at really any cost over the long-term. And he felt very -- you saw him in that tape. He seemed -- he did not seem to be happy today in any way. And in fact, he seemed really annoyed.
TODD: Yes.
LEE: And so I think that he -- this came from him, this was driven by him. I think there is a chance that this could backfire in the sense that Ken made a very good point at the end there where he`s pointed out that one of the things we`ve learned is that this investigation has found information - - enough information to continue a FISA warrant during this administration.
That`s a terrible headline for this White House.
TODD: Yes. What`s the fairest part of this memo in your mind? I feel like why shouldn`t we have extra oversight and care about the FISA process, right?
I mean, that`s the central -- and I think that`s part of this, that I don`t care how bipartisan the Democrat is or how convinced they are that President Trump is guilty here. This is an extraordinary tool, and you got to dot every I and cross every T.
JENNIFER RUBIN, OPINION WRITER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Right, but this is not the way you do oversight. You do not do the oversight by spilling it out into the public where, arguably, methods and sources of information are now available at large. You don`t do this on a partisan basis.
They have taken what, more or less, has been a bipartisan agreement on how to oversee the intelligence community since Watergate, and they`ve turned it into a three-ring circus. And if I`m the FBI or I`m the CIA, do I want to share information with these people? I don`t think so.
And to Carol`s point, there is one other that`s a pretty startling admission here, and that is that this campaign employed someone who four different judges essentially thought was a Russian spy. I`m not sure how that makes that -- the President look good. There is a large element of just kind of buffoonery here, and that picture, I don`t think, helps him much.
TODD: Joshua, well, you`re based in D.C. I think more than any of us here, you have tried to lift yourself out a little bit. Meaning, you`re at least trying to say, what is the country seeing? Well, what do you think they`re seeing with this week?
JOSHUA JOHNSON, NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO HOST: Well, the people who -- I think people are partly seeing what they saw.
You know, it`s kind of a roar shock test where the people who find the Trump campaign entirely morally bankrupt see this as further evidence of its bankruptcy either because the memo would be released at all or because the memo doesn`t substantiate any major problems. I think the people that support the President will support the effort to have more oversight.
The larger concern is that very thing. I mean, remember that the beginning of the memo asks about the legitimacy and legality of what DOJ and FBI have been doing. Legitimacy and legality.
And you`re right, there is a legitimacy question about oversight. I mean this is the FBI we`re talking about. Not everybody trusts the FBI.
But legality is the real issue. Nowhere in the memo does it allege that the information in this dossier was false or that there was a legal problem with not giving the entire provenance of the information.
And because people are kind of seeing what they saw, I feel like it makes it harder down the road for us to suss out what`s real, whether or not there are really problems. Especially if Robert Mueller comes back at the end and says, look, there is a problem, but under the law, I don`t really have enough to act. Then this just muddies all of the waters and the roar shock test gets darker.
TODD: All right. I want, look, to ultra pin on this next thing I thought was interesting. I want to pick up a point you said, Carol, about that -- I think the President was getting advice to sort of back off a little bit.
Don McGahn`s cover letter here included an interesting caveat at the end, and I want to read this carefully. He goes, based on this assessment and in the light of significant public interest in the memorandum. Why was there significant public interest in the memorandum? Because they created a campaign, but let`s set that.
The President has authorized the declassification of the memorandum. To be clear, the memorandum reflects the judgment of its congressional authors.
Huh? Then it`s basically saying it`s an opinion piece. Don McGahn himself is saying we know this is not anything other than an opinion piece.
WITTES: Yes, and so that should tell you a lot. And what it should tell you is that this is not classic oversight, right? This is not a situation in which, you know -- and I agree with your point earlier, the FISA process deserves special attention.
TODD: Yes.
WITTES: Right? And if you had done -- given it special attention and you had identified real problems, would the counsel for the President be saying in his cover letter, by the way, you know, this reflects just the opinions of the congressional authors and we don`t stand by it?
RUBIN: Yes. I mean, I think that`s the real problem. And I think what we haven`t yet talked about but I think is a bigger problem is how the President himself set it up.
Essentially, he tweeted out this morning, I`m looking to impugn the integrity of the people who are investigating me. He could just as well get on top of a building in Washington, D.C. and shout obstruction of justice, obstruction of justice.
It is so clearly a political act which the President can`t help himself but underscore, but highlight that you wonder if this is, if not an act of obstruction itself, at least very good evidence of intent. Corrupt intent.
LEE: The thing that strikes me about that is that Don McGahn is a witness in the Russia investigation.
TODD: I know.
LEE: And the whole thing is just --
TODD: I don`t know how he has stayed in his job.
LEE: I don`t understand how he -- you know. And so --
TODD: I don`t. I agree, I don`t get this.
LEE: How he wrote that, what he -- you know, he is now involved in this. What if, you know, this becomes something that winds up being looked into? What does that mean?
Does he -- he`s just -- this whole thing has become kind of this sauce that -- where nobody can sort of figure out who is what and who is doing -- and that right there is another piece of evidence.
TODD: Yes. Go ahead.
JOHNSON: I do think though -- it`s interesting, I`m going back to my high school speech and debate days.
(LAUGHTER)
JOHNSON: It`s kind of nice when the other side speaks first because then you not only have your argument, you know what they just said.
TODD: Right.
JOHNSON: So now I can go line by line and say, OK, that thing you said in paragraph three, here is my rebuttal. I feel like, tactically, at least for me as a citizen trying to make sense out of this, it would have helped me to look at both side by side or maybe look neither and just let the investigation go.
But now that the Republicans have put their side out first, I bet there are some very savvy Democrats who are ready to say not only do we want this document out, now we know exactly how to attack it in a very different way. It feels like a weird way to go.
TODD: By the way --
WITTES: Well --
TODD: Yes, go ahead.
WITTES: But, again, I mean, if you`re doing real oversight, you don`t end up with an advocacy document --
JOHNSON: Right.
WITTES: -- that there is going to be a point, counterpoint response to by the other side. You end up with a factual account of what happened that, you know, people can look at and say, OK, here are the facts. Now, how do we assess them?
I`ve read that document, you know, pretty carefully. I still can`t figure out what Devin Nunes thinks happened except that somehow Chris Steele stuff got into a FISA warrant and they didn`t mention that there was --
TODD: All right. Maybe we`re being totally cynical here.
WITTES: -- with Democratic money and that was bad.
TODD: Would the House -- would the President have been better off if the memo -- if they kept delaying the release of the memo and let the mystery continue?
JOHNSON: Maybe --
TODD: Let the mythology --
RUBIN: Yes.
TODD: The mythology was growing. And it may have grown out of hand, but it was growing in ways that were probably oddly helpful.
RUBIN: Absolutely. And he could have come up with a nice defense that, see, I`m so responsible. I`m taking care of national security.
TODD: Yes.
RUBIN: I`m not going to let this get out there.
TODD: No --
RUBIN: So I think, sometimes, a little mystery is preferable to the dud that the memo is.
TODD: He loves the mystery.
LEE: He can`t help himself.
TODD: He can`t.
LEE: He is never going to do that.
TODD: No, that`s for sure. All right, guys. You guys are sticking around.
But up ahead, how Republicans are responding to today`s big memo drop. We`ll talk to two top members of the House Freedom Caucus. Mark Meadows and Jim Jordan together on set. I think they`re going to have to say in response to many on the panel said. So stay tuned for that after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: Welcome back. So was the memo a political dud? It`s hard to say and it depends on who you ask. But one thing that`s for sure is it would be hard for anything to live up to all the hype behind the memo.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MARK MEADOWS (R), NORTH CAROLINA: I`m here to tell all of America tonight that I am shocked to read exactly what has taken place. I would think that it would never happen in a country that loves freedom and democracy like this country.
REP. JIM JORDAN (R), OHIO: But what I read today in that classified briefing room is as bad as I thought it was.
REP. MATT GAETZ (R), FLORIDA: You are describing the very elements of a palace coupe.
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: If Hillary bought and paid for a dossier was the foundation to do this, wow.
SARA CARTER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Sean, this is bigger than anything anybody could imagine, and what --
HANNITY: And when you say that, this makes Watergate like stealing a Snickers bar.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Well, I`ll speak to those hype men when we come back in 60 seconds.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: And we`re back. Let`s bring in two House Republicans for their reaction to today`s big news on the FISA memo.
Joining me now are North Carolina Republican Congressman Mark Meadows and Ohio Republican Congressman Jim Jordan, both from the House Freedom Caucus. And, yes, it is now, even on set, Jim Jordan refuses to wear a suit coat.
(LAUGHTER)
JORDAN: Oh, yes.
TODD: My grandmother will say, why doesn`t that young man wear a suit coat?
(LAUGHTER)
TODD: All right. Let me start with this simple question. It`s not unusual for the FBI to use oppo. The Clinton cashbook was reportedly used to launch -- to help with an FBI investigation in Uranium One and the Clintons. What makes the use of the Steele dossier wrong, Jim Jordan?
JORDAN: Jim Comey said it was salacious, unverified --
TODD: He said parts of it --
JORDAN: He says it`s unverified under oath.
TODD: Hang on. Parts were confirmed, parts were salacious and unverified. That does matter.
JORDAN: Salacious, unverified.
TODD: That specifically happened. Go ahead.
JORDAN: They took it to a secret court to get a secret warrant to spy on a fellow American citizen. And they didn`t do it once, they didn`t do it twice, they didn`t do it three times. They did it four times.
Four times, they took this dossier and dressed it all up like it was some legitimate intelligence, take it to a court to spy on an American. Four different times they did that. Not telling the court that it was paid for by the Clinton campaign.
You do not -- that`s why Mark said what he did on the House floor. You are not supposed to do it that way in this great country.
TODD: You -- that is a fact, four times, Congressman Meadows.
JORDAN: Right.
MEADOWS: Right.
TODD: But the way FISA courts work, it was four different federal judges, number one. Number two, in order to get the renewal, you have to show that the wire had shown something. There is nothing in this memo to indicate that that wasn`t the case.
MEADOWS: You have to show additional information.
TODD: That`s right.
MEADOWS: Let`s be clear about that. Every 90 days --
TODD: So to get it four times, it`s clear they got new information.
MEADOWS: Well, part of the new information was information that Steele leaked to Yahoo! News and they used that as justification.
So it`s one source, whether it`s a dossier or a Yahoo! News report, to justify spying on Americans. You wouldn`t do that in your journalism. You make sure you double source everything --
TODD: Did you read the entire FISA application? Were you allowed to?
MEADOWS: We`re not allowed. And you know --
TODD: I mean, but that`s --
JORDAN: I asked Christopher Wray that, show us the application. Show us the material you put in. And we weren`t allowed to.
MEADOWS: And we were perfectly willing to --
TODD: Trey Gowdy has.
JORDAN: Yes.
TODD: Right? I believe --
MEADOWS: Yes.
TODD: Trey Gowdy and Adam Schiff apparently are the --
MEADOWS: And Trey Gowdy had --
TODD: -- only two who had.
MEADOWS: -- actually draft this memo. And so --
TODD: But Trey Gowdy doesn`t seem to be saying what you two are saying about it behind your process (ph).
MEADOWS: No, the memo -- he stands behind the memo.
TODD: Right.
MEADOWS: And we actually had the FBI come in over the weekend and said, is there anything factually inaccurate in this memo? And there was nothing factually inaccurate.
Now, you could have the Democrats say, well, we wouldn`t have told the story that way or we would have told it a different way but nothing factually inaccurate. And I`ve read the Democrat memo, and I can tell you that even in the Democrat memo, it does not suggest that there is anything factually inaccurate in the four pages that you`ve read.
TODD: OK, let me ask you this. What about Carter Page shouldn`t have raised suspicions by the FBI? So here you have -- they have -- on again, off again, this guy is on their radar. Lo and behold, he shows up again, this time in an outside oppo intelligence report and all this.
They had already dealt with him earlier. That`s what the FBI does. It`s an investigative tool. It doesn`t mean that they know he is guilty of anything, but, boy, he seems to be acting suspiciously. You look at his actions, there is a lot of suspicious activity with him. Is there not?
JORDAN: Yes, but Andrew McCabe, in the memo itself, says the dossier was the basis for going to get the warrant. It wasn`t Carter Page --
TODD: In that -- I thought --
JORDAN: It wasn`t Carter Page --
TODD: -- he said without --
JORDAN: It wasn`t --
TODD: Let me ask you this. Here is what is missing in that part according to the Democratic memo, and you tell me, which is --
MEADOWS: So you`ve read the Democratic memo?
TODD: We can`t. I only have the highlights, unfortunately --
MEADOWS: Well --
TODD: -- as you haven`t released it to the public. But let me ask you this, the allegation is this. Yes, Andrew McCabe, but he also said they didn`t have enough -- that either part wasn`t enough, but together, it was enough.
JORDAN: They bootstrapped this dossier up. That`s like -- we said this months ago. We believe they did it, and this memo now shows they did it. The facts now demonstrate that they bootstrapped this dossier up into legit intelligence to go get a warrant. And like I said before, they did it four times.
TODD: OK. So when did dossier --
MEADOWS: Chuck, your viewers --
TODD: But I mean --
JORDAN: Not telling them who paid for it.
MEADOWS: But, Chuck, your viewers --
TODD: How do the dossier fit --
MEADOWS: Hold on, Chuck. Your viewers, don`t you think --
TODD: The dossier is just not fully confirmed, but it`s not fully discredited.
MEADOWS: Don`t you think your viewers would believe that a judge making the critical decision on whether to spy on an American should know whether the Democrats were paying for a particular opposition research? Don`t you think that that would be a material fact?
Most of prosecutors would agree that when you go in to ask for a warrant, you`ve got to give them both the good and bad --
TODD: You`re not --
MEADOWS: If it trumps the bad --
TODD: So you don`t believe political -- I believe they said there was a political -- there was a --
MEADOWS: A context?
TODD: Political context, right. You don`t see that as enough?
MEADOWS: Well, I mean, obviously --
TODD: I`m just asking you if you don`t --
MEADOWS: -- everything that was done was a political context.
JORDAN: It was done in the context of a presidential campaign.
MEADOWS: But there were no political specifics we`re offering, Chuck.
TODD: OK, let me ask you this. Why should the American people look at a memo that alleges, essentially, partisanship drove an FBI investigation when it was written in a very -- and released and sort of hyped in a very partisan manner?
MEADOWS: Taken into broader --
TODD: Go ahead, Mark.
MEADOWS: Oh, well, I think one of the key question --
TODD: I mean, isn`t that a problem?
MEADOWS: You and I have been together before. Part of that is Peter Strzok, the head investigator, and his text messages. It`s obvious that he was partisan.
JORDAN: Right, take it in context.
MEADOWS: Lisa Page who was an attorney for part of the investigation, obviously partisan. So when you add all of that together, it has a partisan tone. And what we`re saying -- Jim and I have been saying for six months --
TODD: So if a partisan sees a crime --
MEADOWS: -- let`s get a Special Counsel to investigate.
TODD: If a partisan sees a crime being -- a political -- a crime being committed, they should be discounted as a witness?
MEADOWS: Oh, no, no.
JORDAN: No, no, no, we`re not saying that, but --
MEADOWS: When you go --
TODD: No, but I -- but that`s where we`re -- are we going down that road?
MEADOWS: When you go to get a warrant, you need to give all the facts. And so when a warrant is obtained, they say, well, this is the person giving us the information, here is the credibility factors that you have to weigh as a judge. And yet that wasn`t done.
You`ve got lawyers on your other panel that would weigh in on that. All of that, as prosecutor, needs to be accounted for.
JORDAN: Chuck, they didn`t tell them who paid for it. They didn`t tell them about Bruce Ohr`s relationship with Chris Steele. They didn`t tell them about his wife`s relationship with Fusion GPS.
That`s -- they didn`t tell important pieces of -- they omitted important pieces of information to get a warrant to spy on a fellow citizen. That`s what they did.
And you know what else they didn`t tell them? They didn`t tell them they had terminated their relationship with Christopher Steele because he was leaking to the press. So they -- the three renewals they did?
TODD: Yes. Do you think they --
JORDAN: They didn`t tell the court that important piece of information.
TODD: Let me ask you this. Do you think --
MEADOWS: And that`s a critical piece.
TODD: Do you think judges -- do you think these judges -- some of these renewals took place after all of this was made public. Do you think these judges lived -- stick their head in the sand and don`t read newspapers? And now, because it`s in court --
MEADOWS: No, but here is one of the interesting things, is no one, including you or me, knew that Christopher Steele was fired by the FBI for sharing with the media until recently. And yet three different FISA applications were renewed without that knowledge being given to the judge. Don`t you think that that`s a problem, Chuck?
TODD: Well, I didn`t hear -- what do you mean --
MEADOWS: Is that a problem? I mean --
TODD: I don`t know because I don`t what I don`t know.
MEADOWS: It`s a problem.
TODD: That`s the problem. I don`t know and I will say --
MEADOWS: Well, we`re all in favor of releasing everything. And here is one of the things we`ve been criticized saying that they didn`t have footnote and sources. Well, part of that is so that you don`t release your methods and sources from an intel perspective.
TODD: But what about the Mueller investigation isn`t legitimate at this point? I mean, there is plenty of suspicious activity that the Russians did. Do you guys concur with that?
JORDAN: Our focus --
TODD: Do either of you --
JORDAN: Our focus today is on the memo.
TODD: No, but I want to know --
JORDAN: Our focus is on what that memo --
TODD: Do you believe the --
JORDAN: -- shows about how the FISA process --
TODD: Do you believe the Russians --
JORDAN: -- was abused the top people of the FBI.
MEADOWS: There`s --
TODD: Do you believe the Russians tried to infiltrate our election?
MEADOWS: There is two different questions. One is, was there collusion? And there was no collusion.
TODD: We don`t know that.
MEADOWS: Did --
TODD: How do we know that?
MEADOWS: We do know that. And I mean --
TODD: How -- no, no, no, we don`t. That`s what --
MEADOWS: Well, you have Dianne Feinstein --
TODD: That`s what Mueller is doing.
MEADOWS: -- that`s come on with you that says she has seen no evidence of collusion. And so --
TODD: That is a different -- my -- the point is --
MEADOWS: Well, she did.
TODD: If you say I don`t see evidence --
MEADOWS: But she`s a Democrat.
TODD: No, my point is --
JORDAN: She said that.
TODD: There is a difference between saying there is no evidence yet and that we know there`s nothing -- I`m just saying that`s what Mueller is investigating.
MEADOWS: OK.
JORDAN: There is no evidence --
MEADOWS: Did the Russians try to influence the election? Obviously, there is evidence that would suggest that.
TODD: Right.
MEADOWS: Is there collusion? There is no evidence that would suggest that. And no one has been able to bring forth any evidence.
TODD: Then why is the President so afraid of this investigation?
JORDAN: Chuck, here is what we know.
TODD: Why is there many effort --
JORDAN: You talk about coordination --
TODD: Congressman Jordan, why is the President wanting to thwart the investigation? Doesn`t that bother you?
JORDAN: Because to date there is no evidence showing that there was any type of coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia to influence the election. What we know --
TODD: Then great! Then Mueller will then --
JORDAN: But --
TODD: Then Mueller will then find him not guilty.
JORDAN: And I think that`s what will happen, but understand --
TODD: Let the investigation go.
JORDAN: -- we know today just as sure --
TODD: Yes.
JORDAN: -- as sure as you and I are talking, we know that the Clinton campaign paid the law firm who paid Fusion who paid Chris Steele who paid Russians to do what? Influence the election. And guess what?
TODD: Wait --
JORDAN: When they went to the FISA court, they didn`t share that with the court.
TODD: So are you alleging that -- you just alleged that the Russians --
JORDAN: I`m not alleging --
TODD: -- were working (ph) with the Clintons?
JORDAN: No, I`m alleging that dollars went from the Clinton campaign through the law firm, Perkins Coie, to Fusion GPS to Chris Steele who, most likely, paid Russians to get that information. Right?
TODD: And now you`re just -- most likely?
JORDAN: Well, come on, what do you think he did with the cash? Like you got to -- are these people just going to volunteer information to him?
TODD: Yes.
JORDAN: Right, he`s paid -- he`s a paid informant, right? Paid for by Fusion GPS. So we know that took place.
TODD: OK.
JORDAN: And they did not share the fact that the DNC was paying Fusion and paying Chris Steele when they took this application to the FISA court.
TODD: Well, let me -- what makes -- just because something is made by a political partisan or just because somebody sees evidence that scares them and suddenly, they become biased against the individual they`re investigating, how does that undermine the facts of that they have found?
MEADOWS: From a standpoint of the facts, it may not. But from a standpoint of a warrant to actually spy on an American citizen, it`s a no-no. You just don`t do that.
TODD: I understand that, but --
MEADOWS: What I`m saying is --
TODD: -- we don`t know -- you are alleging that the only information that there is -- of the dossier and there is no evidence of that either.
MEADOWS: Well, there is evidence because, you know, here`s what we -- not only in this memo, but when you look at the facts, everything revolves around a single source. A single source that continued to put it out with multiple people to appear that there were multiple sources. But -- and in actuality it comes back to one particular paid operative. TODD: All three of us have one problem here. None of us have read the FISA application.
JORDAN: I hope they make it public.
TODD: And that is something that -- because you`re -- I don`t have the information. I`m doing the best I can. You`re making allegations without any supporting evidence of the FISA application. JORDAN: An officer of the court has an obligation to share critical information with the court. On four different occasions, they did not share (INAUDIBLE) or the fact that the DNC paid for the dossier. They did not share that. TODD: Why isn`t your committee the one doing this oversight?
JORDAN: We are starting it. We are --
TODD: The Intel Committee --
JORDAN: We are starting --
MEADOWS: Actually we are doing it. And I`m on oversight. There is four people task force looking at this. TODD: And the FISA thing, that is a legitimate concern. MEADOWS: It is.
JORDAN: James Comey has left the FBI. McCabe is leaving. Bruce Ohr has been reassigned. Lisa Page has been reassigned. Jim Baker has been reassigned. That should tell you something is what went on at the top level of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
TODD: And I know the person would say --
JORDAN: And Bruce has been reassigned as well. TODD: An another person would look at all that and say why is the president trying to eliminate people that are investigating him. JORDAN: Bob Mueller did that.
TODD: I`m talking about James Comey and I`m talking about Andrew McCabe. But -- MEADOWS: So you are suggesting that -- TODD: I`m not -- MEADOWS: -- he got rid of Andrew McCabe because that is not what has been reported.
TODD: I follow his Twitter feed. I think his Twitter feed does tell another story. Anyway, Congressman Meadows, Congressman Jordan, pleasure to have you guys on set. Appreciate it. And my grandmother will be --
(LAUGHTER)
TODD: That is all right. A wild day on Wall Street as the markets take a dramatic plunge. We`ll get a live update from CNBC. Plus, meet Rachel Brand. You probably don`t know who she is, but she might just become the most powerful person in the Russia investigation.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: A couple of exclusive guests for you this Sunday on "Meet the Press." Former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus joins us for his first interview since leaving the Trump administration and former CIA Director John Brennan makes his debut as a senior international security and intelligence analyst for NBC News and MSNBC.
If it`s Sunday, it`s "Meet the Press" and we`ll be knee-deep in a lot of Russia there. Now, let`s get to the latest on a dramatic day on Wall Street. Deirdre Bosa with the active "CNBC Market Wrap."
DEIRDRE BOSA, TECHNOLOGY REPORTER, CNBC: The sell off, Chuck, indeed stocks were in free fall today, the market`s worst day of the Trump presidency. The Dow plunging 665 points to close at 25,520. This is the first time since June 2016 that the Dow fell at least those points. The S&P fell 60 points and the Nasdaq Composite at 145 points.
So what is to blame? A better than expected jobs report which in turn could lead to more interest rate hikes this year. That is it from CNBC, best in business worldwide.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: Welcome back. Plenty to dig into with our panel following our interview there with Congressmen Meadows and Jordan. Panel is back. Carol, Ben, Jennifer, Josh. All right, Joshua, sorry about the Josh there.
JOSHUA JOHNSON, HOST OF 1A, NPR: That`s OK.
TODD: It`s all right. You are allowed one a year. There you go. OK. Meadows and Jordan. They are standing by the memo, but they did tone down the hype of it. JOHNSON: They toned down the hype of it, but there were some factual issues and some logical issues with some of what they said. Mr. Meadows said the FBI said nothing was factually inaccurate in the memo. There`s also the issue of whether the memo was complete. There was concern as to whether there was information that was left out of what we heard. TODD: Missing information doesn`t -- you know, it means it is factually maybe misleading. JOHNSON: Misleading and particularly as we talk about this idea of spying on other Americans which is very visceral. You know, it`s not like the FBI has never done that before. Read the files on Dr. King and I think you`ll understand that has been in the playbook for a while.
But the issue remains that the argument they`re making is this is inherently partisan. I understand the argument about saying that it is important for the FISA judge to know that the providence of this information was from the DNC.
That is not entirely true because it was republican before it was democratic, so that is an issue. But it is material if you believe the investigation is inherently political.
TODD: And in fairness, Steele was something we reported here. That Steele wasn`t hired until Clinton was paid.
JOHNSON: Right.
TODD: For what it`s worth, so that is a fair critique. JOHNSON: But the issue is about this evidence. It is -- I kept thinking that the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. This idea that we have said there is no evidence of collusion doesn`t mean there is none. It just means we haven`t heard of it or it hasn`t come out yet. So there is some logical issues that we got to keep straight. RUBIN: And in fact there actually is evidence of collusion. We keep using this word collusion which has no legal meaning and is very amorphous. Was there cooperation? Sure. WikiLeaks released the hacked e-mails and Donald Trump hyped until the end of the election.
TODD: Released e-mails on the day of the Access Hollywood tape.
RUBIN: Correct.
TODD: That is coordination, may not be collusion.
RUBIN: Exactly. I`m sorry. They offered a meeting to give them dirt on Hillary Clinton and they all met. All the top campaign people met at Trump Tower. That is corroboration, that is collaboration, collusion, I don`t know what that means.
Now, as far as the congressmen go, they said a bunch of stuff that just wasn`t true. We don`t know, for example, that the dossier was part of each one of those applications.
We also don`t know as you pointed out that it wasn`t mentioned to them, the implication of their statement was that it was entirely omitted, nor do we know that Christopher Steele knew who was paying for it. If this was the Fusion GPS --
TODD: You may not have known about the Clinton --
RUBIN: Correct.
TODD: And that is a fair point. Ben, I want you interpret Mr. Comey. His tweet today. James Comey says -- let me put it up here. That`s it! Dishonest and misleading memo wrecked the House intel committee, destroyed the trust of Intelligence Committee, damaged relationship with FISA court, and inexcusably exposed classified investigation of an American citizen. For what? DOJ and FBI must keep doing their job.
Pretty fiery statement.
BEN WITTES, SENIOR FELLOW, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: Yes, so let me translate that.
TODD: OK.
WITTES: Then keep for people who can`t read it for themselves.
(LAUGHTER)
WITTES: There is a really simple way to know whether representative Meadows and Jordan are in the aggregate correct here. And it is that now that this memo is public, the FISA court itself is going to be aware of these allegations.
And there is an institution -- by the way, it is not the House Intelligence Committee, it is the foreign intelligence surveillance court that in fact gets to decide whether the application submitted to the FISA court was or was not deficient, was or was not adequately candid with the court.
The court is now on notice and you can rest be very confident that the Justice Department and the FBI will bring this memo to its attention, to the extent it isn`t aware of it already.
And they -- we`re going to find out I think relatively soon, whether the FISA court is outraged, like the congressmen were, or whether they react more like Jim Comey did, like, yeah, really? That is it? That is why you`re sort of defaming the FBI and attacking career officials?
And so I think you have between -- between your outrage congressional guests and the former director`s tweets, you have the poll of the discussion, polls of the discussion, and we have an institution that is going to be able to tell us which is accurate and my bet is with the former director. TODD: I have to say, Carol, I want to read a McCain statement here because McCain maybe gets at the root of the larger -- of the larger concern.
Latest attacks on the FBI and Department of Justice serve no American interest, no party`s, no president, only Putin`s. Our nation`s elected officials including the president must stop looking at this investigation through the warped lens of politics and manufacturing partisan sideshows. If we continue to undermine our own rule of law, we are doing Putin`s job for him.
CAROL LEE, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, NBC NEWS: Yes, I think a lot of people feel that way, in the sense that we are not in the middle of an election right now and yet the Russians have managed to inject themselves in our election, and then watch the impact. And it continues to have effects on the way that our political debate on what we are seeing in terms of this memo.
I thought your interview with the congressmen was so interesting because while there was all this outrage, if you peel that away, they were really not outrage waving around the memo, it was just going back to what we all thought this originate from which was the accusation of bias from the FBI and the Justice Department.
TODD: They keep coming bag to that, but the problem with bias it is not a legal issue. But it can -- it can work with a jury of your peers. Just ask O.J. Simpson.
All right, Carol, Ben, Jennifer, Joshua, stick around. Up ahead, I`m obsessed with two things. The same thing happening over and over and the same thing happening over and over, and the same thing happening over and over, sorry.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: OK campers, rise and shine, and don`t forget your booties because it is cold out there today. All right, as you may have guessed, tonight I`m obsessed with Groundhog Day, more specifically I`m obsessed with how Groundhog Day the day has been completely redefined by Groundhog Day the movie. Think about it.
When someone says the words Groundhog Day, they are rarely talking about the actual Groundhog Day, February 2nd, when Punxsutawney Phil comes out of hibernation to tell us if it is an early spring or six more weeks of winter. Sadly, folks, it won`t be an early spring thing year according to Phil.
No, these days when someone says the words Groundhog Day, they are talking about the idea of reliving something over and over and over again, like Bill Murray does in the film. Believe it or not, that meaning is now part of the dictionary definition of Groundhog Day. Why is that? Why doesn`t Groundhog Day the day, the tradition, hold up on its own. Here is one possible explanation.
(START VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is one time where television really fails to capture the true excitement of a large squirrel predicting the weather.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: Here is a challenge to you the viewer, can you think of another example like this where a term or concept has been totally redefined in this way. Tweet us at "Meet the Press" using the hashtag "MTP Daily." If we get some good answers, we might be doing this again at the same time next year. It is only fitting, right? We`ll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: Welcome back. It`s time for "The Lid." Let`s bring back the panel one more time. Carol, Ben, Jennifer, Joshua. Believe it or not, I think a lot of people are wondering, is this memo trying an attempt to create the conditions to have the president fire Rod Rosenstein. Believe it or not, there is a super PAC out with a digital attack ad against Rosenstein from the Tea Party Patriots. Take a look at the quick excerpt.
(START VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice over): Rod Rosenstein, a weak careerist at the Justice Department, protecting liberal Obama holdovers and the deep state, instead of following the rule of law. His incompetence and abuse of power have undermined congressional investigations. It`s time for Rod Rosenstein to do his job or resign.
(END VIDEO CLIP) TODD: I have to say, Carol, between this and what happened to Andrew McCabe, these attacks on unelected sort of, yes, they`re political appointees, but civil (INAUDIBLE), is unprecedented in our political and this is just --
LEE: Yes.
TODD: Are you kidding me?
LEE: No one would even really know who these people are in, you know, prior administration. You know, this is -- we`ve seen this movie before, this is the renewed version or, you know, ramped up version of what we saw with Andrew McCabe.
And, you know, the president said everything we need to know today when he was asked about whether he had confidence in Rosenstein in the Oval Office today, and he said, what do you think, or you figure it out, or whatever it was.
And then you have this situation that ran where, you know, our White House team reporting that there`s no discussions whatsoever in the White House about any firing of him. We all know we can`t rely on any of that.
TODD: The attorney general today, Jeff Sessions, stuck by not only Rosenstein but also Rachel Brand, the number three at the Justice Department, remember I want to talk about her in a minute. Take a listen to Sessions.
(START VIDEO CLIP) JEFF SESSIONS, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES: Those two, Rod and Rachel are Harvard graduates, they are experienced lawyers, Rod had 27 years in the department, Rachel had a number of years in the department previously, so they both represent the kind of quality and leadership that we want in the department.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TODD: By the way, let me put up the Rachel Brand baseball card here, if you will, really quickly to meet her. She`s number three. If Rosenstein either refused to fire Mueller or resign, she would be the next person to oversee it. As you can see, she sort of has a lot of republican credentials in the legal arena. Ben, you know her a little bit. Tell us about Rachel Brand.
WITTES: Rachel Brand is an extremely able Republican lawyer. She served in the Justice Department in the Bush administration. She`s a very bright and capable woman and I -- you know, I honestly can`t imagine she would carry out an order to fire a special prosecutor in the absence of reasonable cause to do it. I think more highly of her than that. TODD: Jennifer, she does have a mark against her here, if you`re a partisan Republican. She was appointed by President Obama to a bipartisan privacy and civil liberties oversight board. So she`s been an Obama appointee.
RUBIN: The state is so deep that it includes people that Donald Trump appointed.
TODD: Right.
RUBIN: That`s how you get kind of, who appointed Rod Rosenstein? Donald Trump. Who appointed Rachel Brand? Donald Trump. So at some point, these conspiracy feel is sort like a black hole that collapse upon themselves because there`s no substance there.
But I will say this, and that is that there is a long-term damage to the justice system and to our government. Good people do not want to go into government if this is the way they are treated and you will get a worse and worse and worse quality of person.
TODD: Joshua, you reminded there`s been some plenty of dark periods in the FBI, what they did to Dr. King, frankly some can question why the building is still named after Hoover, the way it abused the FBI, it took us a long time, but the FBI did restore its reputation quite well over the last 25 years.
JOHNSON: It`s interesting how this whole period has had a lot of Americans thinking about an agency that we don`t think about that much. I mean, people have an opinion on the FBI if you ask. But between the FBI and the federal government more broadly, this whole episode is really rocking the way that people view service to the country in terms of being an employee.
And Jennifer, you are right. I mean, we have had conversations on our programs about where is the next generation of diplomats and civil servants going to come from.
I don`t -- I think a lot of Americans are thinking for the very first time about what this process actually is, actually involves which is why conversations like the one you had with the congressmen are still illuminating in terms of what we expect from the government and what the government expects from itself.
TODD: Thank you very much. Supersized panel on this supersized day. We think, then again, it may be just another turn in the hamster wheel of this investigation. Anyway, Carol, Ben, Jennifer, Joshua, thank you. We`ll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
TODD: We had a supersized show which means we didn`t miss anything tonight. And if you missed anything, we`re going to have it this Sunday on "Meet the Press." So, watch us on "Meet the Press." That`s all we have for tonight. "The Beat" with Ari Melber starts right now. I know, Ari, man, keep it going, brother.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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