Show: All in with Chris Hayes Date: April 12, 2017 Guest: Ben Cardin, Matthew Miller, Jess McIntosh, John Lewis, Eric Swalwell, Bernie Sanders, Gabriel Sherman
CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC HARDBALL HOST: Maybe we`ll strike it just right, like the proverbial monkey given enough time on the keyboard will type "Merry Christmas." But should we dread the thought of how many other combinations he`s capable of in the meantime? Here`s something to really worry about: late today in his press conference, I thought for a few minutes that when Trump was talking about giving our relationship with Russia a time. When he talked about really getting to know China`s President Xi, when he called Bashar al-Assad a "butcher," I thought I heard someone say, Merry Christmas. And that`s HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us. "ALL IN" with Chris Hayes starts right now.
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CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC ALL IN HOST: Tonight on ALL IN.
DONALD TRUMP, UNITED STATES PRESIDENT: Putin is the leader of Russia. Russia`s a strong country.
HAYES: Foreign agents.
TRUMP: Paul Manafort, has done an amazing job.
HAYES: New questions about Trump aides working for foreign governments, as Rex Tillerson meets with Vladimir Putin.
REX TILLERSON, UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF STATE: We touched only briefly on the issue of cybersecurity.
HAYES: The latest on the Trump campaign probe and the state of U.S. foreign policy.
TRUMP: I said we`ve just launched 59 missiles heading to Iraq.
MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK MORNINGS WITH MARIA HOST: Headed to Syria?
TRUMP: Yes.
HAYES: Then, after a strong showing in Kansas, Democrats hope to flip a GOP seat in Georgia. Congressman John Lewis and Eric Swalwell join me from Atlanta on the resistance. Plus, Bernie Sanders on how Dems plan to take back Congress. Gabe Sherman, on his bombshell Bill O`Reilly report.
BILL O`REILLY, FOX NEWS CHANNEL THE O`REILLY FACTOR HOST: Caution.
HAYES: And all of the promises-
TRUMP: China cheats. They devalue their currency.
HAYES: The President has broken in just the last 24 hours.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it`s fairly safe to assume that was hyperbole.
HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.
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HAYES: Good evening from New York, I`m Chris Hayes. On a day in which the U.S. Secretary of State met in person, in Moscow with Vladimir Putin, tonight new details on a third member of the Trump campaign who may have acted as a foreign agent. Today, a spokesman for Paul Manafort says the former chairman of the Trump campaign is now in talks to register retroactively with the U.S. government as a foreign agent for his lobbying work in Ukraine, where Manafort had worked for a pro-Russian political party. He would not be the first.
Last month, Trump`s now disgraced former National Security Adviser, Michael Flynn, registered retroactively as a foreign agent for his lobbying work on behalf of Turkey after having resigned for lying about his conversations with the Russian Ambassador. And last night, The Washington Post reported that the FBI had obtained a secret court order to monitor the communications of former Trump campaign Adviser Carter Page. A judge finding probable cause that Page was acting as a foreign agent for Russia. That`s three potential foreign agents in Trump`s campaign, all with ties to Russia, and they`re just the ones that we know about.
Today, Trump`s Secretary of State, former ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, seen here receiving the Russian order of friendship from Vladimir Putin in 2013 after signing deals with a state-owned Russian oil company; made his first trip to Russia for a marathon day of meetings, including a nearly two-hour meeting with Putin himself that both the Americans and Russians portrayed as tense and contentious.
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TILLERSON: I expressed the view that the current state of U.S.-Russia relations is at a low point. There is a low level of trust between our two countries. The world`s two foremost nuclear powers cannot have this kind of relationship.
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HAYES: It is a fraught moment for U.S.-Russia relations for a variety of reasons starting with the fact that Russia is supporting a Syrian government, last week appeared to use chemical weapons, prompting the U.S. to attack Syria with 59 cruise missiles. Putin`s government has also been subject to multiple rounds of U.S. sanctions, most recently, for allegedly interfering in the U.S. Presidential election on behalf of the sitting President. A hostile foreign power engaging in criminal sabotage to explicitly affect an election outcome is a huge deal, of course. But Tillerson declined to mention the alleged Russian hacking during his opening remarks today, only discussing it very briefly when pressed by reporters.
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TILLERSON: We touched on it briefly on the issue of cybersecurity and, in particular, on the challenges that it is placing on everyone in terms of a new threat and emerging threat. But I think I do make a distinction when cyber tools are used to interfere with the internal decisions among countries as to how their elections are conducted.
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HAYES: Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, took a hard line at one point going on a long monologue about U.S. efforts in the past to oust hostile dictators. But he also said, he and Tillerson had agreed to nominate special representatives to examine, "irritants" that have dogged U.S.-Russia relations, "particularly under the administration of President Obama." At a White House news conference this afternoon, President Trump was asked if his views of Putin had changed.
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TRUMP: We may be at an all-time low in terms of the relationship with Russia. This has built for a long period of time, but we`re going to see what happens. Putin is the leader of Russia. Russia is a strong country. We`re a very, very strong country. We`re going to see how that all works out.
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HAYES: That`s the President meeting with the NATO Secretary General, today. While the President was once again refusing to criticize Putin, the investigation was continuing into possible collusion between Russia and members of the Trump campaign. And for Trump`s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, things appear to be getting worse quickly. After a handwritten ledger surfaced in Ukraine last year suggesting that Manafort had gotten off the books payments from a pro-Russian political party. Manafort, at the time, called claims that he had accepted such payments, quote - and I`m quoting him here, "unfounded, silly, and nonsensical."
OK. But today, the associated press reported that at least $1.2 million in payments listed in the ledger next to Manafort`s name were actually received by his consulting firm in the United States. This time around, Manafort didn`t deny his firm got the money, but he insisted the payments were legitimate. As for possibly registering as a foreign agent, his spokesperson said in a statement, "the work in question was widely known, concluded before Mr. Manafort began working with the Trump campaign and was not conducted on behalf of the Russian government."
That`s a very specific statement, we should know. Former Trump Adviser, Carter Page, for his part, says the news the FBI got a secret warrant to monitor his communications as part of its investigation into possible collusion between the Trump camp and the Russians, "confirms all of my suspicions about unjustified politically motivated government surveillance."
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JAKE TAPPER, CNN THE LEAD HOST: So, The Washington Post, as you know, has reported that last year the FBI went to a FISA judge and argued successfully that there was probable cause to believe that you were acting as an agent for a foreign government. So, my question is, were you?
CARTER PAGE, TRUMP FORMER FOREIGN CONSULTANT: Of course I wasn`t, Jake. This is - it`s just such a joke that it`s beyond words.
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HAYES: Joining me now, Democratic Senator Ben Cardin a Maryland ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. What did you make of today`s meeting with Lavrov and then with Putin?
BEN CARDIN, UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM MARYLAND: Well, good. First, it`s good to be with you. The meeting left a lot of questions. I didn`t hear Secretary Tillerson talk much about Russia`s attack on the United States on our election system. That seemed to be a subject that was not talked about directly. I`m curious to see how strong he was in regards to the chemical weapon attack where there were Russians on the airfield, on which the aircraft took off. I didn`t hear much about how Russia could have been complicities in the chemical weapon attack last week. So, there`s a lot of questions about this meeting that I really don`t know.
HAYES: Let me ask you this, Senator Cardin. I mean, obviously, this is a very fraught time in terms of U.S.-Russia relations. I think what happened in the election is a huge part of that, obviously. The support of Assad and Syria, the continued occupation of Crimea, the rebels sort of agitating in eastern Ukraine. Do you fear, however, that the political tenor in America, particularly from the Democratic Party because of the election, will produce momentum towards confrontation with another nuclear power?
CARDIN: Look, we want to have a reasonable relationship with Russia, but when a country attacks you, you need to understand why and take precautions to make sure you`re not attacked again. When a country is facilitating the type of atrocities that we see in Syria-
HAYES: Wait. I want to stop you right there, Senator. Attack, though. That word is a specific word. It connotes warfare. Do you view what the Intelligence Community says that Russia did in terms of hacking during the election - you view that as an attack?
CARDIN: Well, no. Then they used that information in a way to try to influence the results of our election and to discredit our election. That`s interfering with the internal democratic institutions that we have here in America. We know that they were directly involved in Montenegro in funding the opposition party in that parliamentary election. We are concerned that they`re going to be actively engaged in the German and French elections. So, no, this is interfering with the internal affairs of our country. That`s a hostile act, and we need to know exactly why they did this, how they did it, what connections they had?
You`ve also mentioned some of the other findings we`ve seen with Trump agents that are now being - information about being foreign agents. We need an independent investigation as to what Russia was doing and what contacts they made here in the United States in order to protect ourselves. So, yes, we want to have a friendly relationship with Russia, but we can`t sit back and let them do what they have against our National Security interests.
HAYES: Have you - you served in Congress for a while, and you`ve served with Presidents of both parties. Have you ever seen this amount of sort of drift or strangeness in terms of the sort of knots that you get tied into trying to describe U.S. policy as this President?
CARDON: Well, you know, clearly, the administration does not have their full team in place. They are still struggling to be able to articulate policies. We don`t know what their policy is in Syria. We don`t know what their policy is in many of our foreign policy challenges. So, yes, we seem to be reactive. We`ve seen what Mr. Trump did in regards to the use of chemical weapons, but we don`t see a Syrian policy. We know that Mr. Tillerson was in Russia meeting with the President and with their Foreign Minister, but we don`t really know what the Trump administration`s strategy is in regards to its relationship with Russia. So, there are a lot of questions that I think need to be filled in.
HAYES: All right. Senator Ben Cardin, thanks for your time tonight.
CARDIN: My pleasure.
HAYES: Joining me now MSNBC Contributor, Naveed Jamali, former FBI Double Agent and author of the book "How to Catch a Russian Spy." And Matthew Miller, a former Spokesman for Attorney General Eric Holder. Matthew, let`s start with the Manafort news. There`s a lot of it. I mean, he was angry that people would suggest that these ledger accounts in the Ukraine actually flowed into his company. Now, it appears they do - they did. He`s talking about retroactively registering as a foreign agent. What do you make of this?
MATTHEW MILLER, FORMER SPOKESMAN FOR ATTORNEY GENERAL ERIC HOLDER: I think the biggest mistake Paul Manafort ever made was going to work for Donald Trump, because when you clearly have the kind of baggage in your background that Manafort does, you know, it`s such a mistake to take a job where you`re going to come under intense media scrutiny. And that scrutiny is going to produce stories that are going to put you under intense legal scrutiny. It`s pretty clear that the Department of the Justice, the Department of Treasury which enforces money laundering are looking at everything in his background now, and they`re finding a lot of ugly things.
And the fact that the ledger, which he denied was true, now turns out to be true, makes you wonder about some of his other denials. You know, there was this report a couple weeks ago about fraudulent invoices where they had, you know, sold through a shell company, computers to a foreign country, to Belize. He said those weren`t true. That would be a clear act of fraud. Now, you wonder was that true. There`s just a lot, a lot of problems he appears to be in, and it`s clear he`s under scrutiny by multiple agencies.
HAYES: Yes. I mean, every Manafort article I read, I`m like, that guy`s legal team has to be large at this point. Here`s the New York Times. And I`m going to ask you about Carter Page in a second, but just another in the avalanche of stories. After campaign exit, Manafort borrowed from businesses with Trump ties. Papers were recorded the same day that he left the campaign in August, creating a shell company controlled by Mr. Manafort, that soon received $13 million in loans from two businesses with ties to Mr. Trump. Who knows what`s going on there. Naveed, you had experience in counterintelligence, particularly with Russian intelligence.
NAVEED JAMALI, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Yes.
HAYES: And I want to get your sense of the question that everyone`s asking, which is what is the deal with Carter Page? People cannot make heads or tails of the guy. We now know from the Washington Post, if their reporting is correct, there was a FISA warrant for him specifically, he`s been named in charging documents in the southern district. What do you make of the role this guy could have played?
JAMALI: Well, it`s so interesting because his history with the FBI dates back till 2013 at a minimum, right? It goes back to this case that wrapped up in 2015 in New York. Look, I think it shows two things. One, first and foremost when it comes to the Russians, it shows they have shifted in terms of how they approach and how they target U.S. persons. And this is so critical. You know, I think that they`re going to start using business, and we - look at Manafort, when you look at Flynn when you look at Page.
You know, the fact is that, what Page did, what Manafort did, offered an entree to an intelligence service potentially to come in not through some sort of crazy side door, but rather through the front door through legitimate overt business. So, the question that - the first question is, does that - does his entanglements, does his business entanglements, as much as Paul Manafort, does that offer an entree for an intelligence service to come in? I say yes.
HAYES: Well, here`s a key point, remember the Manafort denial about talking to Russian intelligence was they don`t, they don`t wear buttons saying they`re Russian intelligence, which sort of squares with that account, right? I mean, the idea that you`re having business interactions with someone who has another agenda. All right. Matthew, here`s another - I`m going through the like cavalcade of questions here. Now, we have also after the sort of a button on the Nunes-Rube Goldberg machine of nonsense as I`ve been calling it. Classifies docs contradict Nunes` surveillance claims GOP and Dem sources say, which he guesses, we all knew but now that other people have seen the docs, that entire wild goose chase that the world was let on.
MILLER: Yes, it was all a farce. I mean, it`s clearly that the thing that doesn`t make sense to anyone about what Nunes did, it was clear from the beginning that it was all a farce. I mean it was obvious from the beginning that this thing didn`t going to add up. It wasn`t going to add up and now that people, as you say, are actually seeing the documents, people other than the White House Devin Nunes, and other than Nunes it`s clear that, you know, it was all made up, you know to try to justify Trump`s tweets.
HAYES: Well or now you have seen people, occasionally defenders of the President saying, look, there was a FISA warrant for one of the candidate`s advisers, which seems like a strange place to find yourself on defense. Naveed here`s my question for you, if you could see anything any document I kept wondering, I won`t get these dribs and drabs. There is just seems to be an improbable number of entanglements, particularly with Manafort. What would you want to see? What would you want to know?
JAMALI: You know, I really feel and what I`d like to know is when the actual relationship when there was this nexus that Manafort could have actually connected with the Russians. I really find it hard to believe that all these -- Manafort, page, Flynn, all these people were contacted or potentially had these entanglements starting when they joined the Trump team. I think that this started long before. And you know, what fascinates me is if in fact that these relationships started 2012, 2013, how did these people all end up on the Trump campaign? That it is -- it is more than a coincidence, right?
HAYES: To me, the number one question right now, and I asked Carter Page in an interview, and I still have not seen him answer it. If this guy was sort of randomly out of nowhere which I think it`s fair to say he was, he was not a -- how did he end up on a sheet of paper that Donald Trump said the name of in front of the Washington post if he was so tangential? That question is unanswered. I would like to know the answer to that. Naveed Jamali and Matthew Miller, thanks.
MILLER: Thank you.
HAYES: Still ahead, a big lineup tonight. We`ve got Congressman John Lewis, the one and only, Congressman Eric Swalwell, plus Senator Bernie Sanders, who will all join me. But coming up in two minutes, more from that new interview with President Trump, the man in charge of the missiles.
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DONALD TRUMP, UNITED STATES PRESIDENT: So what happens, as I said, we`ve just launched 59 missiles heading to Iraq.
MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK, MORNINGS WITH MARIA HOST: Headed to Syria?
TRUMP: Yes, heading toward Syria.
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TRUMP: I was sitting at the table. We had finished dinner. We`re now having dessert, and we had the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you`ve ever seen. And President Xi was enjoying it. And I said, Mr. President, let me explain something to you. This is during dessert. We`ve just fired 59 missiles.
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HAYES: In an interview with Fox Business, The President recounted the moment last week over dinner at Mar-a-Lago when he informed the Chinese President he had just ordered missile strikes against Syria. A response he said to the regime`s use of chemical weapons. But while the President was very sure about the dessert, he was less clear about which country he`d just bombed.
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TRUMP: What we have in terms of technology, nobody can even come close to competing. Now, we`re going to start getting it because, you know, the military has been cut back and depleted so badly by the past administration and by the war in Iraq, which was another disaster. So what happened is I said, we`ve just launched 59 missiles heading to Iraq.
BARTIROMO: Headed to Syria?
TRUMP: Yes, heading toward Syria. And I want you to know that.
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HAYES: Misspeaking on the detail on military tactics is one thing, but the President also did complete 180s on some key parts of his agenda today. After bashing the export-import back up bank on the campaign trail President now stating his support for it in an interview with Wall Street Journal at a press conference of the Secretary General NATO, the President said NATO is no longer obsolete, calling it the "Bulwark of International Peace and Security". And according to the President`s Budget Director, we can now dismiss Trump`s pledge to eliminate the national debt.
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MICK MULVANEY, OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET DIRECTOR: I think it`s fairly safe to assume that that was hyperbole. I`m not going to be able to pay off $20 trillion worth of debt in four years. I would be being dishonest with you if I said that I could.
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HAYES: I`m joined by Jess McIntosh, Executive Editor of Shareblue; former Senior Adviser in the Clinton campaign. So there one way of interpreting all of these, I mean I don`t care either way about the EXIM Bank, but you know, some of the NATO rhetoric was worrying. Obviously, they`re not going to balance the budget in four years. I guess there`s some way in which it`s encouraging to see them move towards reality.
JESS MCINTOSH, CLINTON CAMPAIGN FORMER SENIOR ADVISER: I think that they have to move towards it. That is like the cheerfulness spin I could possibly put on the fact that the President has no idea what he`s doing. Like the President doesn`t know anything about foreign policy or domestic policy, and he has no interest in learning it. This -- the guy that we saw today in that interview is the same guy who said, healthcare is hard. Who knew? And everyone around him raises their hand and says, we actually knew this. We knew that healthcare was hard. And so he backtracks real quick. I am happy to see that he is willing to backtrack, I guess it would be weirder if he was, like, no, NATO is still terrible now that he knows what NATO does.
HAYES: Right. He had another moment; the healthcare is complicated moments today when talking about North Korea. Mr. Trump this is from the Wall Street Journal interview. Mr. Trump said he told his Chinese counterpart he believed Beijing could easily take care of the North Korea threat. Mr. Xi then explained the history of China and North Korea. Mr. Trump said I`m putting the President here, after listening for 10 minutes, I realized it`s not so easy, Mr. Trump recounted. I don`t pretty saw tremendous power, but it`s not what you would think.
MCINTOSH: After listening for 10 minutes, I realized it`s not that easy. He literally had to become a world leader to be forced to sit with another world leader in order to learn a thing, and that man is President. So, yes, I`m glad that he will occasionally bend to reality, but he`s in charge of the missiles.
HAYES: OK, right. So let me -- there`s two theories here. One theory is that it was all a con, right? So in many ways what I think is notable about the stuff like the EXIM Bank and NATO is that was actually stuff that distinguished him in certain ways from the rest of the Republican field, particularly this kind of like nationalistic NATO is bad, no military entanglements, et cetera. That distinguished him. He beat 17 other people of the republic. Now it`s out the window within 80 days. Was that a con, or is your theory of the Trump Presidency that is just -- it is literally who was in the room last?
MCINTOSH: It`s who was in the room last. I don`t think this man is very smart. I think he repeats the last thing that was said to him, and I think he got a crowd reaction when he said the stuff about NATO, so he kept saying the stuff about NATO. He-
HAYES: Crowd that`s a great point which is that his policy was being driven and called a response with the crowd on the campaign trail and that`s no longer the case when he`s in office.
MCINTOSH: Absolutely, and those are people who do not understand the -- I don`t understand the intricacies of foreign policy. Things sound great to me until I get into it and then realize that it might not be possible. So being able to govern by will of the crowd is not something he`s able to do, and I think we`re seeing this sort of fall apart as he has to -- that`s why I`m so afraid of the people he has around him.
HAYES: Well are you encourage by there`s been all this news about Bannon right? The President refusing to say confidence in, I like Steve. You have to remember he was not involved in my campaign until very late. He`s a target of people in the left, I think for understandable reasons does it encourage you to think he`s honest?
MCINTOSH: One, I think that this palace entry stuff is distraction tactics. I think Trump likes to step on his own bad news cycle with other news with other bad news. So it`s easier to distract from the investigation into his Russia ties by saying, I might fire Bannon for my son-in-law. Like that`s attractive go look at that. So, one, I don`t really buy it. Two, the white nationalist problem in the White House is Trump. It`s not Steve Bannon.
HAYES: And there`s also, I mean there`s also what`s happening in the DOJ. Thank you, Jess Mcintosh.
MCINTOSH: Appreciate it.
HAYES: Coming up, explosive new reporting from Gabriel Sherman that Bill O`Reilly could be cut loose by "FOX NEWS". Gabriel Sherman joins me just ahead.
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HAYES: Republicans managed to pull out a win last night in the Congressional election in Kansas but not without a 20-point swing towards Democrats. Ahead I`ll talk with Congressman John Lewis and Eric Swalwell who spoke with millennial voters named Georgia, which has a special election next week. And Senator Bernie Sanders joins me on the surging resistance movement ahead.
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BILL O`REILLY, FOX NEWS: Often around this time of year, I grab some vacation because it`s spring and Easter time.
Last fall, I booked a trip that should be terrific, not going to tell you where it is, but we have a contest on Billoreilly.com. Guess where Bill`s going? I`ll have a full report when I return.
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HAYES: Bill O`Reilly said he`ll be back on air April 24, though it`s not clear that he will be returning.
Gabe Sherman of New York Magazine exclusively reporting that according to four network sources there`s talk inside Fox News that last night`s show could be his last. Lawyers for the law firm Paul Weiss hired last summer by 21st Century Fox to investigate Roger Ailes are currently doing a deep dive investigation into O`Reilly`s behavior.
Gabe Sherman will join me in a moment.
Now, this all follows closely on the heels of that explosive New York Times story about the five different women who settled lawsuits with either Mr. O`Reilly or Fox News Channel for alleged behavior by O`Reilly ranging from verbal abuse to unwanted advances.
21st Century Fox and Bill O`Reilly have issued statements denying the merits of those claims. Those five instances, of course, do not include ongoing litigation by former Fox News Host Andrea Tarantos against both O`Reilly and Roger Ailes, who was fired, you`ll remember, for his own massive sexual harassment scandal last summer.
Wendy Walsh, who was a regular guest on the O`Reilly Factor, and who recently launched a formal complaint against O`Reilly, through the Fox News hotline, is a focus of a current investigation by the law firm hired by Fox News.
Walsh is not pursuing litigation at this time. In the past 10 days, advertisers amidst all this news have been deserting The O`Reilly Factor at a truly astonishing rate. According to the Cantar Media (ph), the O`Reilly Factor`s paid national advertising has absolutely plummeted, dropping from about 15 minutes per show to about four minutes at its lowest.
Joining me now, MSNBC contributor Gabe Sherman, national affairs editor at New York Magazine.
OK, do you believe the vacation was pre-planned?
GABE SHERMAN, NEW YORK MAGAZINE: Yes. All my reporting inside Fox News indicates that Bill O`Reilly did plan this trip before.
Now, what I find striking is that management let him go. You know, when you`re in the middle of a major public relations crisis, if they were backing him, they would say, listen, stay on the air. We got your back. Don`t make it look like this is a suspension.
HAYES: Ah, that`s interesting. So letting him go on the pre-planned vacation is a little bit of an indicator.
You think - your sources say his fate is being decided inside the company right now.
SHERMAN: Yes. You know, really there is a split in the Murdoch family. Rupert Murdoch is inclined to keep Bill O`Reilly. Now, his son James Murdoch is much more skeptical, wants to clean up the culture at Fox News, has been pushing for him to go.
Lachlan Murdoch is more in the middle saying let`s see what we find.
But really the problem is they can`t sell the show, as your graphic just showed. Advertisers do not want to be on Bill O`Reilly. So, this is a long-term problem for them.
HAYES: It also seems you`ve got this problem which is that Paul Weiss is now investigating. And lord knows, and obviously O`Reilly claims these are all merit-less, as does Fox News, but it seems like there could be other stuff they find.
SHERMAN: Yeah, and I got calls today from people inside the network that say there`s actually really bad stuff that they`re finding that could come out.
So, again, rumors are swirling. But, again, the sense inside Fox News is that Bill O`Reilly`s days are numbered.
HAYES: Remember the trajectory of Roger Ailes, which was that the when they started doing the internal investigation, lo and behold they found a huge consistent systematic pattern.
SHERMAN: Yeah, and I think maybe the spot that O`Reilly teed up that said, you know, guess where he`s going, I think one possibility is retirement.
HAYES: Here`s - Wendy Walsh has been retained - has retained Lisa Bloom. Lisa Bloom on the last word last night basically saying, I have more women calling me now.
We saw a little bit of this with Gretchen Carlson and Roger Ailes, which was that it`s very hard for women to come forward with these allegations because of the professional consequences, because of the scrutiny, because of the pressure. But there is a kind of group solidarity effect that happens.
SHERMAN: Yes.
HAYES: And we saw that with Ailes.
SHERMAN: Yeah, and of course these things tend to go in waves. There`s a safety in numbers. And now that these allegations are so public, I would not be surprised that we see a floodgate of more women.
HAYES: You also reported today that in the interview with Maria Bartiromo with Fox business news, that Trump had something to say about all this on the hot mike at the beginning of the interview.
SHERMAN: Yeah. You know, he said that, you know, Rupert Murdoch has been great for Trump and much better than Roger Ailes ever was. And I think, you know, really.
HAYES: Wait, say that again. He said Rupert Murdoch has been great for Trump and better than Ailes ever was?
SHERMAN: Yes. And so this is a case where there`s a strategic alliance, as I`ve also reported on, between Fox News Channel and the Trump White House. Rupert Murdoch has business interests in having a very close relationship with Donald Trump. So that is why, you know, no little fact that the FBI and the U.S. attorney`s office is investigating Fox News. Donald Trump`s Justice Department is investigating Fox News.
So Rupert Murdoch has a financial interest in sort of propping up this White House.
HAYES: We should say that investigation is for the possibility of improperly disclosing or not disclosing cash payments for Ailes` settlements.
SHERMAN: And more of that as, I`ve also reported. It`s for possibly illegal surveillance that Roger Ailes` black ops department had done.
HAYES: Gabe Sherman, thank you.
SHERMAN: Thank you.
HAYES: Still ahead, signs of life for the Democratic Party in Trump country. I`ll talk with Congressman John Lewis and Senator Bernie Sanders about the resistance forming under President Trump.
Plus, candidate Trump versus President Trump in tonight`s Thing One, Thing Two after the break.
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HAYES: Thing One tonight, it was a signature campaign promise from the very moment he announced his candidacy. Donald Trump believed China was manipulating its currency, devaluing it, and he was going to do something about it.
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TRUMP: China is killing us. They`re devaluing their currency to a level that you wouldn`t believe. It makes it impossible for our companies to compete.
China has so manipulated their currency.
China so manipulates their currency.
They manipulate the hell out of their currency.
And by the way, I love China.
When I hear devaluation of the Chinese currency, you know the word, the sucking action. That`s called a sucking like a vacuum cleaner. I hear their sucking action.
Currency manipulation. It is a disaster.
China, they devalue their currency.
China is a tremendous abuser of the United States.
It`s probably the single greatest theft in the history of the world, what China has done to us.
What they do with their currency is unbelievable.
There`s no better currency manipulator ever in the world than China.
They manipulate their currency, and nobody in history has done it like China.
China cheats. They devalue their currency.
We can`t continue to allow China to rape our country, and that`s what they`re doing. It`s the greatest theft in the history of the world.
I`m going to instruct my Treasury Secretary to label China a currency manipulator.
A currency manipulator.
Nobody has ever manipulated currency like China.
They`re devaluing their currencies. We do nothing about it.
Folks, I`m going to do so much about it. It`s going to be so easy.
A currency manipulator. The greatest in the world.
I like China, they buy condos all the time. But you know what, they are a currency manipulator.
I will direct my secretary of the treasury to label China a currency manipulator. They are. They know it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: This was so important to Donald Trump. He promised that on day one of his presidency, he would label China a currency manipulator. OK, so spoiler alert. Trump did not label China a currency manipulator on Day One. But on Day 83, he did get around to addressing the issue. That`s Thing Two in 60 seconds.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Just one week after his Mar-a-Lago summit with the Chinese president, Donald Trump retracted one of his key repeated campaign promises. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Trump said his administration won`t label China a currency manipulator in a report due this week.
They`re not currency manipulators, Mr. Trump said. Literally the exact opposite of what he said repeatedly ad nauseam on the campaign trail.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: China so manipulates their currency.
They manipulate the hell out of their currency.
They devalue their currency.
They manipulate their currency.
China cheats. They devalue their currency.
We are going to label China a currency manipulator.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: When The Wall Street Journal asked about his complete flip-flop, Mr. Trump said the reason he`s changed his mind on one of his signature campaign promises is that China hasn`t been manipulating its currency for months and because taking the step now could jeopardize his talks with Beijing on confronting the threat of North Korea.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: The first presidential tweet of the day, "great win in Kansas last night for Ron Estes. Easily winning the congressional race against the Dems who spent heavily in predicted victory."
There is only one thing that is factually accurate in that tweet, Republican Ron Estes, the Kansas state treasurer, did indeed beat Democrat James Thompson in a special election to fill the open seat of now CIA director Mike Pompeo,
But it was not a great win, and it didn`t happen easily, and the Dems definitely didn`t spend heavily or predict victory.
Back in November, Trump won that district by nearly 27 points. Pompeo won his re-election bid by more than 30 points.
It should have been an extremely safe Republican seat, so safe that according to the Democratic candidate, Thompson, the national party stayed away because they had concluded early on he couldn`t win.
In fact, as The New York Times points out, only on Monday when it became clear the race was being seriously contested did House Democrats announce they were spending money on a late wave of get out of the vote calls whereas national Republicans spent about $150,000 on the race.
Republican Estes ended up winning by roughly 8,000 votes, about seven percentage points, 20 points less than Trump`s victory just five months ago.
Another Republican seat is up for grabs next week, the seat formerly belonging to Trump`s Health and Human Services secretary Tom Price in Georgia, a candidate has to get 50 percent to avoid a runoff. Right now, the Democrats polling in the 40s.
Current Georgia congressman John Lewis and his congressional colleague Eric Swalwell were in Atlanta today. They told me there`s lots of enthusiasm for next Tuesday`s election.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
REP. ERIC SWALWELL, (D) GEORGIA: Georgia is the right place to be right now. I`m here with Congressman Lewis to reach out and talk to Millennials, learning from someone who has organized and continues to organize, but we have an opportunity just next week with John Ossoff in Georgia`s sixth congressional district. And the energy I saw in the room today as we talked to a lot of young people is they want to be heard and that they see an opportunity here in Georgia to put us closer to being in a position where we can extend more opportunity to more people.
And so that - yesterday I think really gives us inspiration that next Tuesday, we can make some real progress.
HAYES: Congressman Lewis, as the other congressman was saying, you`ve been organizing and working in politics for decades. And the Democrats have had this problem, 08, 10, 12, 14, 16. They`ve had problems with mid-term elections, particularly with younger voters who show up in presidentials and don`t in mid-terms.
Do you feel like you`ve learned - gained some insight into what the switch is that gets them excited and activated?
REP. JOHN LEWIS, (D) GEORGIA: Well, I think more than anything else, what happened in November of last year had turned the switch on. People prepared, ready. They`re fired up. They`re ready to go. They`re ready to organize, to mobilize people, to turn out and vote like we never voted before.
HAYES: Congressman Swalwell, fill in this blank for a tweet-length version of what the Democratic message is right now in a place like Georgia. And obviously there`s geographic differences. Every district`s different. They have their own issues. But you should come out and vote to elect the Democrats in the house because -- blank.
SWALWELL: We`re going to extend more opportunity to more people in more places. And right now our party is uniting, we`re resisting, and we`re going to reclaim our country.
HAYES: What is your version of that message, Congressman Lewis?
LEWIS: It is very simple. I think Eric is right. Some people are saying, you know, I`m a little nervous. I don`t know what to do. What we`re saying, don`t be nervous. Don`t get lost in a sea of despair. Keep the faith. Get up. Get out there. Be bold. Be courageous, and do your job and do it well.
HAYES: Congressman, what would you say to someone who is considering right now -- there`s been a lot of folks talking about recruitment and not just at the level of congress but all sorts of levels of office. And I`ve seen a lot of people, particularly after the election, feeling like maybe this is something I should do.
You`re relatively young right now. What would you say to someone who is relatively young who is thinking about whether they should run for office?
SWALWELL: Right now we need you. And it may not be running for congress, but it could be -- I started out on a local arts commission. It could be on a city council. It also could be just organizing your neighbors to write to your representative about an issue that you care about or volunteering for an organization that is actually reaching out and helping people on the issues that really move you.
So there`s so many ways to do it. But, you know, Chris, at the end of the day, all of the streams need to flow to the same body of water, and that`s the ballot box. So we need to move people to the ballot box.
HAYES: And Congressman Lewis, having served in congress as long as you have, it`s interesting to me to think about wave elections. Because there`s been a few. And you`ve been on the right side and the wrong side of different wave elections and the time you served. Do you feel like you`ve developed some sort of sense for when something - when a wave is coalescing, whether in the favor of the party you`re in or against it?
LEWIS: Well, during the past few days and few weeks I`ve traveled all across the America, I can feel it. I can feel it almost can touch it.
The American people are ready. They`re ready for change. I think we`re going to have a great and good and extraordinary election in `18.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: My thanks to Congressman John Lewis and Eric Swalwell. Up next, Senator Bernie Sanders joins me right after this break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: This is how 538`s Nate Silver characterized last night`s Republican congressional victory in Kansas, "Estes underperformed Trump`s margin by 20.3 points. If every district behaved like that, Dems would be 122 House seats next November. It would also win Senate races next year in Texas, Utah and Mississippi, plus Arizona and Nevada.
Joining me now, Senator Bernie Sanders, independent from Vermont. And Senator Sanders, two ways to look at the Kansas result. One is, close doesn`t cut it in politics, the other is a 20-point swing in favor of the Democrats.
What`s your take away?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (I) VERMONT: Well, I think what Thompson and the progressives in a conservative district in Montana did was very, very impressive and I think it speaks very positively about what we`re going to be seeing happening around the country in the next months and years.
I was in Kansas a couple of months ago. We had 5,000 people out in Topeka. I think what you are going to see are people who voted for Trump, because he said he was going to stand up for working families, but now understand that his agenda is for the billionaire class, that he supports disastrous health care proposals, which threw 24 million people off of health insurance, $800 billion cut in Medicaid, $300 billion in tax breaks for the very rich.
So, I think what`s happening is a lot of working people saying I voted for Trump. He said he was going to stand up for me. Turns out that`s not the case.
What Democrats need to do - two things, Chris, number one, a 50-state agenda. Do not surrender parts of the country to right-wing Republicans. Number two, a progressive agenda that makes it clear that the Democrats are going to stand with working families. They are prepared to take on Wall Street and the 1 percent. We do those things, I think you`re going to see fundamental changes in the way politics works in America.
HAYES: On that first thing, 50 states surrendering, do you think that`s what the DNC and the DCCC did here who put in very, very little resources?
SANDERS: Yeah, I do. I do. I mean, I think the word is, well, this is Kansas. How can anyone do well in Kansas? It`s a Republican state.
Well, it turned out that you had a lot of activists, you had a lot of working people standing up and taking on the Trump agenda, and with a little bit more help they might have pulled it off.
And I would hope that the Democratic leadership learns that lesson. Where there is grass roots activism, let`s support that activism.
HAYES: You know, it`s interesting. You talk about this sort of theory of what`s happening, of folks who voted for Trump being dismayed with him. And I think the polling reflects that.
But I was looking at the results in Kansas and one thing that jumped out to me was if Democratic turnout was about 68 percent of what it had been on election day, which is very high for a special election, Republican turnout was 38 percent.
So you`ve got, you know, there`s sort of a persuasion part of it, right, people that were Trump voters who are now not so into him, but there`s also just the activation factor which to me seems the driving force in politics right now.
SANDERS: Well, Chris, this is what we`re seeing all over the country. That`s what the women`s march was about, blew everybody`s mind. Millions of people came out. It`s what the rallies that we saw against this disastrous Republican health care plan was about. It is people flooding into Republican town meetings was about.
So, I think what we have to do now is make it clear to the American people that if you don`t believe that the Republican and Trump agenda of hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks for the top 1 percent while they cut Medicare and Medicaid and education and affordable housing and child care, if you think that doesn`t make sense, if it doesn`t make sense to expand military spending by $80 billion, while you have Republicans in congress working to cut Social Security, if you think that doesn`t make sense, you`ve got to get involved in the political process. You`ve got to stand up and fight back.
HAYES: I want to ask you about that. You`ve mentioned the health care bill, because I`m sort of astounded by this. It was one of the most dramatic legislative failures I`ve ever seen in covering politics. They said we`re moving on because they got their butts kicked so badly, frankly.
Now the president is saying, no, we`re going to come back and do it. And I wonder as sitting from your position in your caucus, there`s part of me, I think if I was a Democratic Senator, yes, please try to pass this terrible bill again because it was such a disaster the first time.
SANDERS: That`s right. And this bill talking about is going to be even worse. Chris, here is my view. This is my view.
My view that is that there is no state in this country, not Kansas, not Alabama, not Mississippi, no state in this country where people think it makes sense to give hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the rich and through out 24 million people off of health insurance and raise premiums for older workers by three or four times. Nobody believes that makes sense.
What the Democrats have got to do is take the fight into Kansas, and I want to applaud the people of Kansas for what they did last night. Take it all over this country, start putting that agenda, that disastrous right-wing agenda, the denial of the reality of climatechange, defunding Planned Parenthood. Very few people support that agenda. We mobilize, we educate, we`re going to win and we`re going to win big.
HAYES: All right, Senator Bernie Sanders, thanks for joining us.
SANDERS: Thank you.
HAYES: That is All In for this evening. The Rachel Maddow Show starts right now.
END
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