Show: 11TH HOUR WITH BRIAN WILLIAMS Date: July 24, 2018 Guest: Emily Jane Fox, Robert Costa, Mimi Rocah, Jackie Calmes, Bill Kristol, Eugene Robinson, Doris Kearns Goodwin
BRIAN WILLIAMS, MSNBC HOST: The breaking news we`re covering tonight, the Cohen-Trump audio recording released by the Cohen team tonight on prime time television. You`ll hear the President`s voice for yourself, especially the one word he uses which motivated this leak.
Also the President today speaking to veterans suggesting an alternative truth. He told them what you`re seeing and what you`re reading is not what`s happening.
Also along those lines, the President says he`s been so tough on Russia. He fears they will interfere in our elections to favor the Democrats.
Luckily on this night of all night, Doris Kearns Goodwin is here with us with common sense and perspective as THE 11TH HOUR gets under way on a Tuesday evening.
Well, good evening, once again, from our NBC News headquarters here in New York. Day 551 of the Trump administration, and we have breaking news again this evening. We`ll get right to it.
We have one of the recordings made by Michael Cohen back in 2016 with then- presidential candidate Donald Trump. In the recording which first aired tonight on CNN, Cohen and Trump appear to be heard discussing arrangements surrounding payment to former Playboy model Karen McDougal. The payment was eventually made, we know now, by Trump friend David Pecker, head of the company that owns and publishes the National Enquirer.
Cohen attorney Lanny Davis supplied the tape you`re about to hear to CNN tonight. You`re going to hear at first the President who appears to be finishing up a phone call. We do not know if there has been any editing or altering of the original recording. Here it is now in its entirety.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Let me know what`s happening, OK? Oh, oh. Maybe because of this it would be better if you didn`t go, you know? Maybe because of this. For that one, you know, I think what you should do is get rid of this. Because it`s so false what they`re saying, it`s such bulls [bleep].
Um. I think, I think this goes away quickly. I think what -- I think it`s probably better to do the Charleston thing, just this time. Yes.
In two weeks, it`s fine. I think right now it`s, it`s better. You know? Okay, honey. You take care of yourself. Thanks, babe. Yup, I`m proud of you. So long. Bye.
What`s happening?
MICHAEL COHEN, FORMER TRUMP`S ATTORNEY: Great poll, by the way.
TRUMP: Yes?
COHEN: Seen it. Great poll.
TRUMP: Making progress.
COHEN: Big time.
TRUMP: And, your guy is a good guy. He`s a good --
COHEN: Who, Pastor Scott?
TRUMP: Can`t believe this. No, Pastor Scott. What`s, what`s happening --
COHEN: No --
TRUMP: Can we use him anymore?
COHEN: Oh, yes, a hundred -- no, you`re talking about Mark Burns. He`s, we`ve told him to --
TRUMP: I don`t need that -- Mark Burns, are we using him?
COHEN: No, no.
UNDENTIFIED FEMALE: Richard (INAUDIBLE). I`m sorry, Richard (INAUDIBLE) just called. He -- just when you have a chance, he had an idea for you.
TRUMP: OK, great.
COHEN: So, we got served from the New York Times. I told you this -- we were --
TRUMP: To what?
COHEN: -- to unseal the divorce papers with Ivana. Um, we`re fighting it. Um, Kasowitz is going to --
TRUMP: They should never be able to get that.
COHEN: Never. Never. Kasowitz doesn`t think they`ll ever be able to. They don`t have a --
TRUMP: Get me a Coke, please.
COHEN: They don`t have a legitimate purpose, so --
TRUMP: And you have a woman that doesn`t want this.
COHEN: Correct.
TRUMP: Who you`ve been handling.
COHEN: Yes. And it`s --
TRUMP: And it`s been going on for a while.
COHEN: For about two, three weeks now.
TRUMP: All you have to do is delay it for --
COHEN: Even after that, it`s not ever going to be opened. There`s no, there`s no purpose for it. Told you about Charleston.
I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend, David, you know, so that -- I`m going to do that right away. I`ve actually come up and I`ve spoken --
TRUMP: Give it to me and get me a --
COHEN: And, I`ve spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with --
TRUMP: So, what do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?
COHEN: -- funding. Yes. And it`s all the stuff.
TRUMP: Yes, I was thinking about that.
COHEN: All the stuff. Because -- here, you never know where that company, you never know what he`s --
TRUMP: Maybe he gets hit by a truck.
COHEN: Correct. So, I`m all over that. And, I spoke to Allen about it, when it comes time for the financing, which will be --
TRUMP: Wait a sec, what financing?
COHEN: Well, I`ll have to pay him something.
TRUMP: (INAUDIBLE) pay with cash.
COHEN: No, no, no, no, no. I got it.
TRUMP: Check.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: Because it`s important we want to hear again a key part of this conversation. Remember the setting 2016 before the election Donald Trump and Michael Cohen on a recording ultimately seized by the FBI apparently about a payment made to a former Playboy model.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
COHEN: I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend, David, you know, so that -- I`m going to do that right away. I`ve actually come up and I`ve spoken --
TRUMP: Give it to me and get me a --
COHEN: And, I`ve spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with --
TRUMP: So, what do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?
COHEN: -- funding. Yes. And it`s all the stuff.
TRUMP: Yes, I was thinking about that.
COHEN: All the stuff. Because -- here, you never know where that company, you never know what he`s --
TRUMP: Maybe he gets hit by a truck.
COHEN: Correct. So, I`m all over that. And, I spoke to Allen about it, when it comes time for the financing, which will be --
TRUMP: Wait a sec, what financing?
COHEN: Well, I`ll have to pay him something.
TRUMP: (INAUDIBLE) pay with cash.
COHEN: No, no, no, no, no. I got it.
TRUMP: Check.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: CNN says tonight that Trump`s attorney Rudy Giuliani was aware and had the recording. Trump waived his attorney-client privilege that allowed this tape to be released to prosecutors. Giuliani told CNN that the privilege was waived because he and his team believe it`ll help Trump. The two sides disagree about what is heard on the recording.
Lanny Davis, Cohen`s lawyer points to Trump seemingly using the word cash after Cohen mentions financing. Giuliani in a phone call to reporters last week accused Cohen of raising the idea of cash payments.
Tonight, Giuliani was reached by telephone to talk with Laura Ingraham of Fox News.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP`S LAWYER: The President does bring up cash but he says don`t pay with cash. And then Cohen says, "No, no, no," and the President says," check," and then Cohen says, "I got it." The point is the President wants the transaction to be memorialized. I don`t think anyone can suggest that this represents anything where the President did anything wrong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: With that, let`s bring in our lead-off panel on a Tuesday night, a lot to talk about. And with us to do so Robert Costa, National Political Reporter for "The Washington Post," Moderator of Washington Week on PBS. Jackie Calmes, White House Editor for "The Los Angeles Times." Mimi Rocah, former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, now a Distinguished Fellow in Criminal Justice at Pace University School of Law. And Emily Jane Fox here with us in New York, Senior Reporter for Vanity Fair whose new book is about the Trump family. Good evening and welcome to you all.
Emily, because you are most steeped on a day-to-day basis with all things Cohen and Trump, I`m going to begin with you. Why did this come out tonight? What else do you know about this and other recordings?
EMILY JANE FOX, SENIOR REPORTER, VANITY FAIR: What`s interesting about the timing tonight is on Friday night we knew about what was on the recording, according to Rudy Giuliani. And my sources in Cohen world were already telling me at that point that this was not the true narrative in their mind. And I think over the weekend there was some stewing going on, that this was not what they believe was the truth and the truth would ultimately come out. And I think there`s a lot of growing frustration that people were accepting this narrative that Rudy Giuliani put out as truth.
The President and his attorneys had waived privilege on these recordings. And so I think there was a little bit of a throwing their hands up moment today where they were like this is becoming the actual narrative. It`s not the actual narrative in our reading or listening to the recording. And so they wanted to set the record straight. I think that that is the defining reason why this tape came out this evening.
WILLIAMS: Let`s talk atmospheric for just five seconds. I`ve heard this already kind of erroneously referred to as a phone conversation. This by all accounts is an in-person meeting. You can hear room tone, the audio points to it as if it was recorded by, say, a device on Michael Cohen`s lap sitting across from Donald Trump at Trump Tower.
FOX: That`s exactly right. This was a meeting that took place in-person in part of their day-to-day normal interaction. You can hear him basically running through a checklist of all the things that he had to tell the President.
Now, what`s interesting to me, and this is point that actually Rudy Giuliani brought up to me on Friday was that the fact they had these kinds of conversations showed that they couldn`t -- that Michael Cohen was allowed to do these kinds of transactions on his own without running them by his boss, and he thought that that was exculpatory because of the Stormy Daniels stuff where Michael Cohen had said in the past that he acted on his own in those payments. But what I think it is interesting is this recording now shows that Michael Cohen did have the time to run these by his boss and that now President Trump did know about the ins and outs of all of these things that were going on. So even though he was in the midst of this turbulent very busy presidential campaign, he was very well aware of what Michael Cohen was doing when.
WILLIAMS: This brings us to Robert Costa, whose piece has just we noted posted for the Washington Post. You were just off the phone with people very close to the principles in this case.
ROBERT COSTA, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, "THE WASHINGTON POST": My phone`s dead.
WILLIAMS: Really? We should be able to get you a complimentary charge.
COSTA: Sure we can. But we`re in the middle of a legal war here. I mean, there`s a lot going on. I just got off of the phone with Lanny Davis. He said, as Emily was talking about, they felt prompted to do this tonight, to sit down and release the tape because, in Lanny`s words, he doesn`t want Michael Cohen to be a punching bag.
And a few minutes later, I had a long conversation with Mayor Giuliani. And he started almost debating me about whether the President knew about the McDougal deal based on his whole recording. He said it`s open to interpretation. We can have a fight about that.
He thinks the President, in his view of the whole thing, was just learning about this from that conversation. So you already see both sides fighting.
And the most important thing I was looking for tonight from Giuliani was, is a pardon in the works for Michael Cohen. As this escalates, as this whole thing becomes even a bigger fight between the both sides, could a pardon be on the table? Giuliani said he would not say yes or no, he just said it`s extremely inappropriate to talk about pardons at this time. He said there is certainly no discussion at this moment, and he said any pardon would be up to the President.
WILLIAMS: And let`s turkey here for one second since we`re all dealing from the same hymnal, the same recording. You don`t hear the President express surprise or ask questions about this venture that someone is seemingly setting up an LLC to take care of.
COSTA: No surprise from then-candidate Trump. And it`s been deeply reported by "The Post" and others that there`s been a long-standing relationship with David Pecker, who runs American media which is part of that whole media organization with Michael Cohen, with Trump when he was tabloid figure. They`ve had this very close nexus for a long time.
WILLIAMS: Also it`s been pointed out the President`s pseudonym on some of these matters in court papers was David Dennison. So there`s much speculation on the web tonight as to which David they`re talking about.
COSTA: Exactly right.
WILLIAMS: I will not make you answer that. Can we get a charge for Bob Costa`s phone?
COSTA: Thank you.
WILLIAMS: Mimi Rocah, the only adult attorney here in this room, please save us. First of all, do you hear any laws being broken as you listen to that recording?
MIMI ROCAH, FMR. ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: So from a prosecutor`s perspective what I see here on this recording is a good piece of evidence in showing that some laws were broken. On its face by itself probably not. But no piece of evidence stands alone. We`ve talked before about, you know, prosecutors takes it`s building bricks on bricks to build the wall. And this is one brick.
And by the way, the prosecutors potentially are not going to be listening to this in a vacuum. They`re going to have it with potentially Michael Cohen interpreting it for them. And that`s very important because he`s one of the participants in the conversation. And so we can all sit here and try and guess about which David it is and, you know, what they meant when they said ex, but if Cohen cooperates it shows people how valuable he can be because he can interpret conversations like this.
So as the laws that this could show were broken, we`ve all talk a lot about campaign finance violations. One of the hardest things to show in a campaign finance case is showing that a payment was made to impact the election.
WILLIAMS: Right.
ROCAH: I think we`ve talked a lot about the Edwards case and how that case -- they did not get a conviction in large part because they weren`t able to show that the payment to silence the woman in that case was made to actually impact the election. Here, there`s some distinguishing factors. This is made much closer to the time of election.
So we now know we have a payment being made whether it`s by AMI or directly from Trump and Cohen. Doesn`t really matter at the end of the day, but it`s to silence this woman from coming out very close to election. And there`s a little nugget in this recording that`s before the part where they`re talking about the actual payment to Karen McDougal. They`re talking about keeping the record sealed in Ivana Trump`s divorce case.
WILLIAMS: Yes, divorce case.
ROCAH: And Trump says -- Cohen assures him it`s never coming out, they`re never going to be unsealed. And Trump says, well, you just have to keep them sealed for, and it`s not clear whether he says a couple of months or a couple of weeks.
WILLIAMS: Yes.
ROCAH: But clearly what he`s talking about there is he`s looking at a time frame, that they need to keep information under wraps. There he`s talking about Ivana Trump. But guess what, it`s followed right after by the conversation about the payment to Karen McDougal. So that right there is a really -- could be show a really crucial piece of intent evidence in a campaign finance case, showing that this is what they`re doing with that payment of Karen McDougal and that`s often the hardest part of such a charge.
There are also could be a potential fraud charges here. They`re talking about setting up a company. I`m guessing they didn`t tell the bank the truth when they actually, you know, actually wrote the check, if they wrote a check.
WILLIAMS: Purpose of the LLC or --
ROCAH: Exactly. So there`s some potential fraud, there`s even some potential fraud on Karen McDougal if she was scammed thinking she was being paid for one thing but was really paid for another thing. So I do think that there`s a whole host of crimes that this could be evidence of -- contribute to.
WILLIAMS: Wow, that`s a lot. That`s exactly why we wanted you here tonight.
Jackie, I was just going through my head the last time, and I don`t think it`s happened before. We have a senior member of the masthead of an important West Coast publication from the safe distance of Washington reacting to news that broke in New York. That being our set of rules, what do you make early on now of the potential blow back on the President come morning?
JACKIE CALMES, WHITE HOUSE EDITOR, "THE LOS ANGELES TIMES": Well, you`ve just addresses the potential legal aspects of this. I think as a political matter there`s not a lot that I see changing because people have so baked in the cake of Donald Trump that he`s had these relationships with women, that he doesn`t tell the truth, as he didn`t tell the truth about Karen McDougal and his knowledge of the payment, et cetera.
When I first heard this tape, initially I thought it was completely ambiguous and that each side, pro-Trump, anti-Trump, just people in the middle would hear in it what they wanted to. And I still believe that to some extent. But the more I listen to it, the more it`s clear that this is not a good look for Donald Trump.
He`s talking almost in sort of conspiratorial tones almost code with his lawyer or fixer. And it`s clear that he`s not surprised by this talk of Karen McDougal yet he told reporters on Air Force One that he knew nothing about it. And so it`s almost feels like a talk between a godfather and his consigliere. It`s just eke. But whether that changes anything politically, I have to doubt it at this point.
WILLIAMS: Emily Jane Fox, bring us to date. We last quoted you in this broadcast in your reporting Friday night on this effort perhaps more of a notion that Cohen only has a finite number of things proprietary to him upon which he could flip and be of value to the feds. Of course he first needs to be charged. And there was an effort to diminish the value of what he had on Donald Trump. Can you speak to that?
FOX: Yes, it`s interesting. All of this is out there because the President`s attorneys decided to waive privilege on this tape. We wouldn`t have heard this tape. This tape wouldn`t have even been turned over to prosecutors and none of this would be able to be used as evidence in the case. So that`s the first thing that I want to just stress here.
But the belief in Cohen land over the weekend was that the President`s attorneys tried to take a card out of Cohen`s deck in order for him to be able to cooperate if he is in fact charged. But the way it was characterized to me was, yes, there is recording and perhaps one day we would hear the recording and tonight we did. But it`s not just what is on the recording. It is the back story. And that was stressed to me over and over again the weekend that whatever we hear now is only the beginning, it`s only the tip of the iceberg and that there is more explanation to come.
WILLIAMS: Our former fed wants to weigh in on the legal angle.
ROCAH: Well, the point we would never have heard this recording, I still don`t completely understand what Giuliani`s motivation was in releasing this. But there is a theory that in fact the court was still considering this and whether it should be released under the crime fraud exception. And if that had happened that would have been pretty damaging.
That would have looked very damaging for Trump as well to have a court ruling that this should come in under the crime fraud exception, which now having listened to it, I think there`s a very good argument for that. And so they may have been trying to preempt that. So I want to make sure people understand what Giuliani is saying about why he released it may not be true, and in fact they may have been trying to preempt something that would have looked far worse for the President.
WILLIAMS: Robert Costa, yes. Go ahead.
COSTA: This could almost be any one of a nine inning game here legally. I asked Lanny Davis tonight, are there more tapes that had President Trump perhaps on the recording? He did not give an answer to that, but he did acknowledge there are more tapes of Michael Cohen at least talking about President Trump, talking about these different situations.
WILLIAMS: And in the world of the media, this has been all over the place since Friday. Some very good reporters were convinced Friday there was but one such recording. Some very good reporters were convinced by Rudolf Giuliani that on the recording we`ve now heard it`s Cohen who initiates the idea we should pay this off in cash.
COSTA: That`s right. I mean, we have to just listen to the tape. There`s going to be a fight over this tape. You already have both legal camps fighting about it.
The question is how does this play out, how does President Trump react. Is he not considering a pardon? I asked Giuliani tonight what`s his mood like behind the scenes, is he enraged? And Giuliani said he`s disappointed. And I said was he angry, if it`s not angry, disappointed.
But we`ve seen President fuming on Twitter about Michael Cohen, and you could see this just escalate more and more.
WILLIAMS: Jackie Calmes, I`m reminded we heard from the President himself today there was a whole bunch of stories we were going to cover before the audiotape came out tonight. But let me just take two seconds and show you what he said speaking to the VFW about his achievements as President and what to believe and not believe.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Just remember what you`re seeing and what you`re reading is not what`s happening.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: He also called the output of the fake news media a "crap." And on Twitter earlier today, the President decided to throw something of a long ball, going against what we know to be the truth from our intelligence agencies and from Putin himself. He turned it all upside down and wrote this on Twitter.
"I`m very concerned that Russia will be fighting very hard to have an impact on the upcoming election. Based on the fact that no President has been tough on Russia than me, they will be pushing very hard for the Democrats. They definitely don`t want Trump." Putin`s statement in Helsinki to the contrary.
So, Jackie, where does this put us on a Tuesday night running head on into Wednesday morning?
CALMES: Well, it puts us right back at the beginning. It was a week ago today that Trump was cleaning up the mess he`d made the day before in Helsinki standing side by side with Vladimir Putin, when he sided with the Russian President, accepting his denials of any interference in our election, any subversion in our 2016 election and against the overwhelming -- the unanimous conclusions of our intelligence community.
And Tuesday he`s saying, no, no he meant he said would be when he meant wouldn`t be. And he really believes his intelligence community. Well, every day since then up to this tweet you just read he`s given us more evidence, that, no, it`s right back where he started from which is he doesn`t accept the findings of the intelligence community.
And so, you know, now we`re faced with this situation where he`s invited the President of Russia to the White House. The President of Russia seems to be demurring. And tomorrow at 11:30 a.m., the President has a meeting on his schedule with Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, both of whom today said they would not welcome Putin to Congress, to Capitol Hill.
And so I would love to be a fly on the wall when the three of them meet tomorrow, because I thought from the beginning that the two Republican leaders of Congress would do everything in their power to make this Putin visit not come off because it`s the last thing they need before the election.
WILLIAMS: I`m sure it would be nice to have high quality audio recordings of that meeting tomorrow. With that, our thanks to our front four tonight, Robert Costa, Jackie Calmes, Mimi Rocah, Emily Jane Fox. Really appreciate you guys stepping up on a busy news night.
We`ll have more ahead on tonight`s breaking news. Plus, on this day when the President told veterans pay no attention to what they see going on and during this week where Trump surrogates have compared the President to Lincoln, Presidential Biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin is here with a warning about what she sees out there right now that may pose the greatest danger to our democracy.
As we like to say, we`re just getting started. THE 11TH HOUR on a Tuesday night continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WILLIAMS: We are back on a busy night as we established in our opening segment, a lot to talk about tonight after Michael Cohen`s lawyer, Lanny Davis, has released this recording of his client talking to Donald Trump. Here again key portion where Trump and Cohen are apparently discussing buying the rights to a Playboy model`s story about an alleged affair with Trump back in 2006.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
COHEN: I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend, David, you know, so that -- I`m going to do that right away. I`ve actually come up and I`ve spoken --
TRUMP: Give it to me and get me a --
COHEN: And, I`ve spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up with --
TRUMP: So, what do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?
COHEN: -- funding. Yes. And it`s all the stuff.
TRUMP: Yes, I was thinking about that.
COHEN: All the stuff. Because -- here, you never know where that company, you never know what he`s --
TRUMP: Maybe he gets hit by a truck.
COHEN: Correct. So, I`m all over that. And, I spoke to Allen about it, when it comes time for the financing, which will be --
TRUMP: Wait a sec, what financing?
COHEN: Well, I`ll have to pay him something.
TRUMP: (INAUDIBLE) pay with cash.
COHEN: No, no, no, no, no. I got it.
TRUMP: Check.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: As we`ve just discussed both sides disagree about what`s said on that recording. Rudy Giuliani tonight also said the President did nothing wrong.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Are you still maintaining then tonight that the recording that was released this evening is 100 percent exculpatory toward the President and his previous statements about this?
GIULIANI: I think it`s, yes, I just said that. There`s no indication of any crime being committed on this tape, and that is absolutely right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: We have two very learned friends to talk about all this tonight. Bill Kristol is here with us, veteran of the Reagan and Bush administrations, Editor-At-Large of the Weekly Standard, and Eugene Robinson who happens to be a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Washington Post.
Bill, starting with you. As they say on T.V., what`s your reaction to tonight`s lead story?
BILL KRISTOL, EDITOR AT LARGE, THE WEEKLY STANDARD: It`s pretty extraordinary. First of all, we shouldn`t step back to per second and say we`re listening to a conversation taped by the President`s lawyer and confidant and fixer presumably with the President not knowing it`s being taped.
WILLIAMS: Right.
KRISTOL: Two months before the election in a personal meeting in Trump Tower --
WILLIAMS: I guess it`s his voice app on a phone like this.
KRISTOL: But everyone does that, right, when you have a conversation, you scrumptiously record it.
WILLIAMS: I`m recording this --
EUGENE ROBINSON, COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON POST: Minutes of recording --
KRISTOL: One of the two finalists for the presidency of the United States recording a conversation. The whole thing is a little astounding. But for me I guess, if I`ll say this, let`s assume that Giuliani is not just being foolish and his method to it is apparent madness.
I think he`s done this a few times before. He`s put things out that are somewhat damaging but perhaps to make them less damaging ultimately, to sort of prepare the way for the people used to this. And basically what`s on the other tapes, what are they really worried?
This one, you know, as your discussions showed, there could be criminal problems here but it`s not evidently a big crime and it`s confusing a little bit about what`s wrong with this. Why this tape, if it`s even a complete tape, you know? Why did they wave privilege on, why did brought this one out? I guess to me that`s a question.
It makes me think there`s much worse to come and they`re very worried. I`ve got to think the Trump camp based on Giuliani`s behavior here and Trump`s own behavior over the last week or so, the phonetic character of the tweets and all of that, they must be very worried about what`s coming up from with either Cohen or Manafort or from special counsel directly.
WILLIAMS: Eugene, same question.
ROBINSON: Well, you know, funny me, but I`m still in the old school since last century of like remembering what happened before. So remember when the President knew nothing about -
WILLIAMS: Denied that thing out.
ROBINSON: -- remind us this, the whole thing. And then remember when, well, maybe Michael Cohen, you know, whatever he did, the President didn`t know anything about it. This completely explodes the myth that Donald Trump was somehow unaware of what Michael Cohen was doing in paying off, I think we can say women now, plural, and who knows how plural, with whom he had had affairs to keep quiet, keep them quiet before the election.
We know that they were thinking about the election because they`re talking about a time frame, right, before they segue into that part of the conversation. And Trump is being very specifically informed, informing a company, I talked to Allen this about (inaudible) David about this and the other. That`s a lot of detail.
And it does, you know, in the earlier panel I think it was Jackie Calmes who used the dawn and consigliere --
WILLIAMS: Yes, there is that.
ROBINSON: -- one analogy for boy. It does sound like that, doesn`t it? It sound -- it doesn`t sound the way you would expect one of our leading presidential candidates to sound a few weeks before the election.
WILLIAMS: Bill Kristol, we are all of a certain age and we have all spend enough time in Washington to know one Lanny Davis, attorney at law. For those watching, for whom this is their first bouquet of Lanny Davis, what`s the viewer`s guide to Lanny Davis if you`re Bill Kristol?
BILL KRISTOL, EDITOR AT LARGE, THE WEEKLY STANDARD: I assume he`s a good lawyer but he`s better known for the more public relation side of the law. And, of course, worked with Bill Clinton and defended him during impeachment. And his main technique, which I wonder if Guiliani is not (inaudible), was often to something bad was going to come out anyway, put it out, put it out with your own spin. (Inaudible) little use to it.
So your point at that -- I was thinking about this as you spoke. I mean, we`re now going to be used to the fact that Trump lied, totally about a number of things, and we`re going to discount that, though, two weeks from now. And when we learn something perhaps more damning about what he was, now, what he was lying about and stuff. I really just come back to the notion that if the Trump people put this out there`s worse to come.
WILLIAMS: But this was the day when the president told veterans, don`t look at what you`re seeing and reading out of Washington, that`s not real. And when the President tweeted the upside down of what we know to be the provable facts about election meddling, that he`s been so tough on Russia Putin`s answer on the his favorite President notwithstanding. They might come after us just to put the Democrats in.
KRISTOL: Yes, can you believe it? But I guess there is a way, look, if you don`t have -- if you have a lot of problems that you want to -- you don`t want to -- you have very good arguments for, muddy the waters. I guess they really are now into a muddy water.
At the end of the day, we have good attorneys talking about what they would do if they were prosecutors or criminal defense attorneys, but President Trump is not going to be prosecuted in court for crime as -- while he`s the president. And so, it all becomes for Trump muddying the waters enough that he has a solid number of senators and maybe members of the House to stop impeachment.
I think it`s all about muddying the waters, so it`s not clear. The FISA thing is problematic and don`t believe what you say and this tape`s confusing and let`s have a debate about who said the word cash for the next day or two. So I think he`s -- I mean, given that they have a weak hand to play because I suspect the facts aren`t on their side, I think they`re trying to muddy the waters.
ROBINSON: So pay no attention to the facts. I mean, the President really is attempting to create his own reality. I mean, who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes and ears? Don`t believe what you see, don`t believe what you hear, don`t believe what you see.
WILLIAMS: And Lanny Davis looked into the camera tonight on CNN said, "To Trump red America, I`m a Democrat don`t believe me." This is how we put it, believe your ears.
ROBINSON: Yes. Well, I hope people believe their ears. And whatever they think about this tape, just believe what you hear and don`t believe that what you hear is not true just because Donald Trump says he doesn`t want you to think it`s true. I mean, it is weird that we were in this position where we have to defend the very idea of objective reality. But it is under attack, and it`s specific attack by the president of the United States in a relentless way. We can laugh at the tweets and we can, you know, oh, just another tweet.
It`s not just another tweet. These have a cumulative effect of eroding I think the sort of common encyclopedia of facts and the common chronicle of events we need to have to have a democracy. And then we can argue about those events and those facts, but we need to know what they are.
KRISTOL: And the target of that erosion isn`t Michael Cohen, it`s Robert Mueller. And the target is to ultimately make this whole thing so confusing, so what she said, she said, whose to say, what did the deep state do. That when Mueller`s report comes out, assuming it does, it`s on point to maybe recently soon even enough Americans say and enough members of Congress say, too confusing, nothing clear here? Don`t you think? I think that`s their strategy.
WILLIAMS: Well, I`m just supposed to sit here and call balls and strikes. There it is, Robert. In your world right now and in your world view, where does Robert Mueller rank among the important adults of your adult life?
KRISTOL: Very important, honestly. I mean, I think we need to know what happened. I think he`s been incredibly disciplined in trying to pursue what happened and scenically very honorable in doing so. And I think we`ll find out what`s happened from him.
WILLIAMS: I can give you 15 seconds.
ROBINSON: I`ll just say, I think Robert Mueller knows a whole lot more than any of us know, any of us have any idea. And I think he will report it, we`ll see. He`s the guy right now.
WILLIAMS: Well, to our audience I`ll just say on a night like this, these are the guys you want coming into your studio. Bill Kristol, Eugene Robinson, it`s always such a pleasure having you gentlemen. Thank you.
Coming up, Trump friends and surrogates as you know, have started comparing him to Abe Lincoln. We`ll run that by the woman who wrote the book that Steven Spielberg turned into a movie on Abe Lincoln, author and presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin waiting in the wing to joins us. There he us, when we come right back.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: No, folks, stick with us. Stick with us. Just stick with us. Don`t believe the crap you see from these people, the fake news. Just remember what you`re seeing and what you`re reading is not what`s happening.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: That was President Trump again today with those comments that reminded some folks of Orwell`s 1984, sales of which have spiked since inauguration day. Here`s how former long time Republican Political Strategist Steve Schmidt reacted to those words earlier today on this network.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEVE SCHMIDT, REPUBLICAN POLITICAL STRATEGIST: When you`re able to convince somebody what is certainly true is not, when you can embrace the big lie with the same type of effectiveness that fascist movements used it, that Hitler used it, that Mussolini used it, that Soviets used it, then you are well on your way to doing grave and lasting damage to the fundamental institutional pillars of a democratic republic like the United States.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: With us for this important discussion tonight Doris Kearns Goodwin, Presidential Historian and Author with us here in New York. She has written best sellers about all for starters both Roosevelts, the Kennedies, LBJ and Lincoln. Her new book, very relevant to our era, is "Leader and Turbulent Times". It will be available on September 18th and happen to know you became a grandparent for the third time this morning, congratulations.
And back to reality we snap. What do you make of folding tonight`s lead story in our times, and what happens when one side sees it as the president`s word as no good anymore?
DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN AND AUTHOR: Hooray.
WILLIAMS: And back to reality, we snap. What do you make of folding tonight`s lead, story into our times? And I guess the way to synopsize it, what happens when one side sees the president`s word as no good anymore?
GOODWIN: I mean, think the greatest danger as you were saying earlier to democracy is the identity of ourselves as a people depends upon a common political truth. And what we`ve got is an erosion of trust in our institutions, and the president, and the Congress, and the judicial system, because you`ve got different people saying different things, fake news, alternative facts, misspoken statements, half-truth and outright lies.
There`s a pattern here that I think is very troubling. It reminds me in the scary way of the 1850s. In those days, people just read their partisan newspapers. So they get entirely different facts about something that happened.
Lincoln-Douglas debates, in one paper, the Democratic paper did say, Lincoln was so terrible that he fell on the floor in humiliation. They had to carry him out. In the Republican paper, they would say he was so triumphant they carried him out in their arms. And that led to the sectionalization. It led to alternative cultures. It led to the deepening discuss. Thus, it led to the civil war.
We`re in a very serious situation when you don`t have a common direction, a common purpose, a common set of facts.
WILLIAMS: This president you`ve written about so beautifully. Abraham Lincoln of Illinois was spoken about last night. This is former speaker of the house, Newt Gingrich, on Fox News. And we`ll talk about this right afterwards.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I think the person whose situation is the most like President Trump`s was Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln is fighting to preserve the constitution. He`s fighting to preserve the union, and he`s having to do a lot of different things that are very bold and in some cases very radical. And he`s trying to do it in a way that he is deeply bitterly opposed not just by the sway voting (ph) south but also by a substantial number of Democrats in the north. And I think that Trump`s in a very similar place.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAMS: Well, as they say you wrote the book, what do you make of that?
GOODWIN: Well, even just in keeping what we`re talking about tonight, for Lincoln his word was his bond. The most important thing for him was he kept his word. Even to the point, for example, once he said he was going to issue the emancipation proclamation.
There was huge outcry in the north. They thought the army might disintegrate because many were just for the union and not for anti-slavery. And he said my word is out, it cannot come back. On the night he died he had already told people that he was going to go to the Ford`s Theater. He didn`t want to go that night. He was having such a good time at the White House talking to his friends. It was such a happy moment. The war was coming to an end.
But he said my word is out, I`ve told the people. I`ll be there. I have to go. That is the most important part of who Abraham Lincoln was. He had near suicidal depression when he didn`t think he`d kept his word to Mary and broke his engagement, when he hadn`t kept his word to his constituents and failed on an infrastructure project.
So to compare that with that`s happening today, when words mean nothing. They are taken back. I mean, look, we even saw that Hollywood access tape and we heard his voice. And then President Trump said that wasn`t my voice. We heard on an audio he said something about the British prime minister, blasting her, and then he said, no, that was fake news. We can`t success in a democracy unless we have some sense of a common purpose.
WILLIAMS: As much as I hate to pause right there, we`re going to only to take a break, Doris Kearns Goodwin has agreed to stay with us.
And coming up, how past occupants of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue have handled the pressures that come with this job.
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SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Not only is the President looking to take away Brennan`s security clearance, he`s also looking into the clearances of Comey, Clapper, Hayden, Rice and McCabe. The President is exploring the mechanisms to remove security clearance because they politicized and in some cases monetized their public service and security clearances.
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WILLIAMS: That was Sarah Huckabee Sanders just yesterday explaining why the President is considering yanking those security clearances for all former intel officials. It would be an unprecedented move. A lot of people said it would be a dangerous move, bad for our republic. Let`s toss the question to Historian and Author Doris Kearns Goodwin.
It was rumored this was just a fit of anger. This is list he walks around with, of people he feels aggrieved because two of them don`t have security clearances to take away.
GOODWIN: I mean, the ability of a leader to control impulses is absolutely clear and important, and all presidents are going to have moments of peak. They are going to get angry. They have to have figure out ways to get that anger out of their system.
I mean, Abraham Lincoln famously wrote hot letters to people when he was angry, and he get all of his emotion out in the letter. And he put the letter aside hoping he`d cool down psychologically and never need to send it.
What FDR did was amazing, when he would be doing drafts of speeches for the far-side chat, he`d go through five or six drafts. So say in the first, instance, he`s furious at an isolationist Congress, he would talk about the guy, call him a traitor, say this -- call him by name. The young speechwriter comes in and says, is he really going to say these things? And the older speechwriter says, just wait till the second draft. By the second draft, the guy`s name is no longer in there.
By the third draft, he said, pretty good guy. By the fourth draft, all sweet and lie. But he got it out of the system by reading it aloud. They have to figure out ways to channel their emotions and to channel their impulses.
WILLIAMS: Sorry.
GOODWIN: Speaking of channeling, let`s turn our phones off while we`re out here. That one`s on me, I apologize. Let`s talk about sources of information. This is out tonight from the New York Times. President Trump raged at his staff for violating a rule that the White House entourage should begin each trip tuned to Fox. His preferred network over what he considers the fake news CNN, and caused a bit of a stir aboard Air Force One according to an e-mail obtained by the New York Times.
The channel flipping flap was the latest example how Mr. Trump at a pivotal moment in his presidency is increasingly living in a world of selected information and bending the truth to his own narrative.
GOODWIN: And the deeper problem is that much of the country is also watching their own favorite networks. I mean, people today were comparing the possibility of this tape to the Nixon tape. The difference is, during the time the Nixon tape was released, we have three networks. We have people agreeing on facts, 11 Republicans after they heard his cover-up talk in that Nixon tape, they were willing to go for impeachment and that what led to his resignation.
There were consequences when somebody did something. There were consequences to LBJ when his credibility fell part, because we saw pictures of what happened in the Tet Offensive, that belie the truth or the untruth on what he was saying. Now, there`s no consequences because people are watching their favorite channels. They`re in alternative realities just as he is. And you can say it is fake news.
So until maybe as somebody said earlier, maybe there will be an accumulation of these things. Maybe people will start focussing on what`s really happening in the country, what`s happening to the farmers, what really happened in North Korea, what`s really happening with Russia. People`s lives are going on right now. Maybe so long as the economy is good for awhile, that will last. But this accumulation of half truths and lies has got to have an impact on the country. I think it`s beginning to.
WILLIAMS: Unfair to ask you this, we have about 35 seconds left. What about the normalization of all things Russia just in the course in our lifetime say nothing of the last 10 years?
GOODWIN: I mean, I think about when I was a little girl, I hid under the desk for the atomic bomb.
WILLIAMS: The space race to beat the Russians to the moon.
GOODWIN: Of course. I mean, it`s astonish. And maybe it`s a good thing to begin to think that maybe we can do something with Russia but not in the way it`s being done right now.
WILLIAMS: Well you come back and talk to us?
GOODWIN: Anytime you want.
WILLIAMS: Hopefully we`ll sell a lot of books when it comes out in September. We`re excited.
GOODWIN: Thank you.
WILLIAMS: A mazel tov on the new arrival. That`s great.
GOODWIN: Thank you.
WILLIAMS: Thank you. Doris Kearns Goodwin here with us in New York tonight.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEAN SPICER, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)=
WILLIAMS: Last thing before we go here tonight has to do with that man, Sean Spicer, the man who introduced the concept of holocaust centers to the study of World War II. Sean Spicer is out with a book called "The Briefing," and his book tour is going a bit like that first press briefing the day after inauguration.
Let`s quote those have read it for starters there`s Eric Wimpal of the of the Washington Post who describes the book as "a bumbling effort at gas lighting Americans into doubting what they have seen with their own eyes." The Wall Street Journal asked ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl to review the book. And he writes, "Mr. Spicer`s book is much like his tenure as press secretary, short, littered with inaccuracies and offering up one consistent theme, Mr. Trump can do no wrong."
He refers to the author of the infamous Trump dossier as Michael Steel who in truth is the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, not empty British ex-spy Christopher Steele. He recounts a reporter asking Mr. Obama a question at a White House press conference at 1999, a decade before Mr. Obama was elected.
Carl along with other reviewers took time to note Spicer`s description in the book of Donald Trump and we quote, "a unicorn, riding a unicorn, over a rainbow." Well, on Monday, Sean Spicer spoke with Emily Maitlis of the BBC and it didn`t go well for the author.
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EMILY MAITLIS, JOURNALIST, BBC: It was the start of the most corrosive culture. You played with the truth. You led us down a dangerous path. You have corrupted discourse for the entire world by going along with these lies.
SPICER: With all due -- I`m sorry, Emily. You act as though everything began and ended with that. You`re taking no accountability for the many false scenarios and false stories that the media perpetrated.
MAITLIS: He shouts fake news when he doesn`t like something.
SPICER: I wrote -- but I wrote a book that I think is a fairly strong representation of what happened in the campaign, the transition in the White House. I take responsibility where I think I`ve fallen short or could have done better. But for you to lay that kind of claim and make everything sound like it started and ended with Donald Trump is the absolutely ridiculous.
MAITLIS: I guess my question is, you were his press secretary. And I know from what I`ve read that you care about the freedoms, and the institutions, and the democracy on which --
SPICER: I do.
MAITLIS: -- on which your country was built. This is the office of president spouting lies or half truths or knocking down real truths and you were his agent for those months.
SPICER: My job, as I`ve laid out in the book, was to be the President`s spokesperson and communicate his thoughts and his ideas when he wasn`t able to do it or wasn`t present. But at the end of the day, he is the president of the United States and it was his thoughts and his ideas --
MAITLIS: OK.
SPICER: -- and his feelings that it was my job to communicate.
MAITLIS: Just a portion of Sean Spicer`s book tour interview with the BBC that did not go so well.
With that, that is our broadcast on a Tuesday evening. Thank you very much for being here with us and goodnight from NBC News headquarters here in New York.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED. END
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