Summary
The DOJ is investigating Donald Trump for crimes that include possible violations of the Espionage Act. The Mar-a-Lago search warrant is released. Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi speaks out. Unprecedented events involving Donald Trump this week are put into historical context.
Transcript
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: Welcome to this second hour of a live special edition of THE BEAT WITH ARI MELBER.
Joy is out on vacation. So we are here to cover what has been this confirmation for the first time in public where you can read it yourself. The DOJ is investigating more than one crime, including possible violations of the Espionage Act.
Here`s what you need to know, a federal judge unsealing these documents connected to the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. So, we have for the first time the receipts that you see on your screen. The documents include the warrant authorizing the search, this property receipt -- that`s the little receipts -- showing exactly what the agents found, catalogued, and took, seized, because it wasn`t Trump`s property, from the property compound you see on your screen.
That includes 11 sets of classified documents, some at the highest levels of classification, at least one set marked top secret SCI. That refers to top secret, sensitive, compartmentalized info. The documents are only supposed to be viewed in special government facilities. Mar-a-Lago is not one of them.
Then there`s four sets of top secret documents, three sets of secret, and three of confidential. All of this comes after Donald Trump had returned what looks like, I guess, the partial amount that was also, according to the government, not authorized to be there, 15 boxes that went back in January.
Now, on this basically third go-around, they`re still finding top secret documents. The property receipt does not detail the substance, which makes sense, because the whole point is, the government doesn`t want everyone to know what`s in them.
Meanwhile, "The Washington Post" reporting FBI agents were looking for classified documents that could relate to nuclear weapons when they carried out the search. NBC News has not independently confirmed that rather harrowing "Washington Post" story.
As for the search, the Warren says that the locations included the 45 office, storage rooms and other areas within the premises used by the former president and his staff. That specificity seems to suggest the FBI had some idea not only what it was looking for, which it found, but where to find it.
Did they have an inside tip? That`s one of the many questions that is still on the table, while, for the first time, we have the receipts.
I am joined now by Ben Rhodes, a former deputy national security adviser and MSNBC analyst, and Tali Farhadian Weinstein, former federal state and prosecutor who clerked for them Judge Garland.
Welcome to both.
Ben, we have been covering this now. We`re in live coverage. There`s a lot we learned and some things we still don`t know. In terms of what we learned, when you go through these receipts, what do you see? Something that is concerning, but typical, something a little atypical, or a very concerning security breach that apparently was ongoing?
BEN RHODES, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, I think, Ari, this is very concerning.
I mean, it can`t really get more concerning than the levels of classification that are in these documents. When you talk about top secret documents, and you talk about top secret secure, compartmented documents, you`re talking about the most secret and sensitive information that the U.S. government has.
You`re talking about information that is derived from or refers to really sensitive sources or -- and methods of intelligence collection, or perhaps assessments of foreign adversaries or defense nuclear information, as "The Washington Post" reported. This is really secret stuff.
And it`s also stuff that is very clearly marked secret, Ari. Like, this is stamped on every page. These had to be printed out and to be taken out. These are that the kinds of things are just lying around. And this stuff cannot leave government facilities.
When I was in government, I had a security clearance for all this kind of information. It never left my office at the White House. It`s not the kind of thing you even took home with you to work on when you`re in government, never mind when you`re out.
So I think this raises the enormous question of, why did Donald Trump want this information? For what purpose did he have boxes of this information with him in Mar-a-Lago? Why did he not return it?
But in terms of the nature of the national street information, this confirms, these receipts confirm, this is the sensitive stuff that you don`t want to fall into the wrong hands and that, frankly, people could aim to profit from in ways that are very harmful to U.S. national security.
MELBER: Ben, can you expound at all on what that highest-level stuff might be, not that we`re asking what it would be in this instance, on the property, but, in general, what kind of material is that?
RHODES: Well, again, in general, you`re talking about material that`s not just like an assessment of the U.S. government. It`s not just the intelligence community writing a report about something.
It`s material that would be a blueprint, frankly, to intelligence sources and methods. How did we collect that information? What is the underlying intelligence that informs it? Or what are the positions of U.S. defense or intelligence resources? It would not be top secret if it was, again, just like some finding or some report about an interesting issue or leader from the intelligence community.
[19:05:17]
That classification indicates that the revelation of this information could provide adversaries or anybody who has an interest in this information with not just proprietary information of the U.S. government -- that`s confidential, that`s secret -- but, really, the blueprints, the manner in which we collected that information or a defense program that we want to stay secret.
And in the case of a secure, compartmented piece of information, this is something that, even if you have a top secret security clearance, you have to be read specifically into this program of U.S. intelligence. They make these levels for reason. And the whole system depends upon people abiding by the rules.
And Donald Trump clearly acted as if the rules did not apply to him when he took this information with him out of a government facility.
MELBER: Yes, you -- as you say, there are levels. I`m sure you know Kendrick Lamar said there`s levels to this you and I know.
And it sounds like everyone involved knows these levels, including potentially Donald Trump, which brings us to Tali and why it`s legally worse if he`s on notice, if he`s under subpoena.
But let`s start at the beginning, Tali. I don`t know about you. I`m old enough to remember Monday.
(LAUGHTER)
TALI FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN, FORMER LAW CLERK FOR MERRICK GARLAND: Yes.
MELBER: And I remember a lot of people around Donald Trump and on the right on Monday saying, well, what are they going for, and is this even valid, and was this political persecution, almost as if this might never come out.
The attorney general who you once worked for played this out legally, lawfully, but it`s out.
First question is the simplest, Tali, and then we can build. Does the warrant and the material suggest that this was a valid search.
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: Oh, Ari, there`s absolutely no question that everything here was by the book.
It`s actually pretty tightly written in terms of where they wanted to look for materials and what they wanted to look for. And they cited three really serious federal statutes.
Now, I should say that it is not required and not really the practice to cite every statute that you`re thinking about, so there`s probably even more where that came from. But those three are serious crimes. These are not sort of technical violations. And at least one of them was very surprising to me, the citation to the obstruction statute 1519, which I think we will talk more about.
MELBER: Go ahead, yes.
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: Yes.
Well, so I think we had all anticipated that there would be reference to some of the various statutes that prohibit the concealment, the destruction, the passing to others of classified or other government records, but that one, 1519, that`s just a garden variety obstruction statute.
It`s in the part of the U.S. code that has a list of crimes that people commit once they have committed other crimes and they`re trying not to get caught, so things like tampering with a witness or destroying documents or concealing materials.
And that was a surprise, and it raises a bunch of questions. And I also think it puts Donald Trump or whoever may be the target of this investigation in a pretty precarious place. It raises questions, because what is it that he was trying, if it was him, to obstruct?
Was the hoarding of the documents itself some kind of obstruction? He didn`t want people to see these documents? Or once he started to hear, look, you can`t have this stuff, you got to give it back to us, he wouldn`t do that, and that`s the reason for citing that statute?
And the reason it kind of puts him in hot water, Ari, is because that`s pretty guilty behavior, right? If someone says to you, well, you can`t have this, and then you say, well, I`m not going to give it back to you, it`s going to make it hard for him to say, oh, I didn`t realize that this was illegal.
MELBER: Right, because he`s so on notice.
He clearly thought, from what we can tell, that he could continue to run this out, that they wouldn`t really go in and conduct a search or a raid, whatever you want to call it, that they wouldn`t send the agents in.
Did he fundamentally misjudge your former boss Merrick Garland?
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: Absolutely, he did.
And let`s not call it a raid, first of all, because a raid suggests something unlawful. And there was nothing unlawful about this. He misjudged Judge Garland -- excuse me -- Attorney General Garland -- that`s what I used to call him -- and how steely he is.
And I think he sort of demonstrated the casualness about national security that is at the heart of everything that is going on here, because we still don`t know if that -- the execution of that search warrant an end, in and of itself, just to go and get the stuff out of danger, out of an insecure place, where people are walking around. Who knows who could have access to it. Who knows what he wants to do with it.
[19:10:15]
Or it was a step in a criminal investigation that is still unfolding. But I think it was at least -- at least the former, and maybe both. And just it sort of tells you I think something about the state of his mind and the people around him...
MELBER: Yes.
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: ... that they didn`t understand what kind of insecurity this creates for the entire country if these kinds of documents are lying around, for all the reasons that we just heard.
MELBER: Right, and, as you mentioned, the legally authorized and valid measure here, what Attorney General Garland called a more assertive measure, does not, in and of itself, the four corners of this very interesting material does not reveal to us whether, as you say, it`s measure to obtain the documents back, for all the reasons stated, or whether there are other potential charges.
And we have been careful in that tonight because people are -- even some wire stories are sort of jumping to say, oh, well, this must mean something. Well, no, a warrant doesn`t always tell you who the target is, although people might want to infer and then people can speculate.
But the warrant itself doesn`t necessarily confirm that. I appreciate your precision there.
Let`s take a listen to Trump`s lawyer in this case who was on site from FOX last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS: Is it your understanding that there were not documents related to our nuclear capabilities or nuclear issues that had national security implications in the president`s possession when the agents showed up at Mar-a-Lago?
CHRISTINA BOBB, ATTORNEY FOR DONALD TRUMP: That`s correct. I don`t believe they were. And if they thought...
(CROSSTALK)
INGRAHAM: Well, do you know for a fact? Do you know for a fact they were? Have you spoken to the president about it?
BOBB: I have not specifically spoken to the president about what nuclear materials may or may not have been in there. I do not believe there were any in there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Ben, there`s a lot of things I don`t believe in. I`m not sure how probative that is, as Tali might say, or as Judge -- then Judge Garland might say.
(LAUGHTER)
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: Yes.
MELBER: What would it take, expertise-wise and time-wise, for someone to go through all the material and make that determination? And does it matter, as there are people in and around this for Donald Trump, whether they`re legally defending him or they otherwise are charged with dealing with this stuff, that there`s these other unauthorized, I guess would be the word, people dealing with this material in the first place?
RHODES: Well, there`s so much going on here.
I mean, first of all, part of what you`re saying, Ari, is part of the claim you have heard about the Trump people is that he declassified this information. Well, he clearly didn`t. It`s still classified. They`re still not detailing what it is. It went through no process of declassification. So let`s put that aside.
Then, yes, I think, in these national security cases, you would normally have a cleared number of people. The lawyers who are working on the cases would need to get security clearances themselves to review the underlying documents.
In terms of figuring out what these things are, it`s not going to be hard. They`re going to be able to take a look at this really fast and know what was taken out of the White House.
I think what is more concerning, potentially -- and this gets to the conversation you all were just having -- is, for what purpose was this removed from the White House? Because I can tell you, Ari, like, no part of me -- sentimentally, maybe you want to take, like, your White House baseball with you.
I can`t think of any reason to pack up boxes and boxes of top secret information just to have some mementos around Mar-a-Lago.
(CROSSTALK)
MELBER: Yes, let`s slow down on that, because that gets obscured sometimes. You`re making the point, that let`s put people`s opinions of Donald Trump to the side, which can actually get in the way of the facts.
You`re just saying that it is weird or suspicious, or worse, to amass this much material of this nature, march it out, and then go to these lengths to hide it, and then, after you turn some stuff back in, continue to keep some extra part of top secret stuff. You`re saying this doesn`t seem what to you?
RHODES: Well, at a minimum, it is reckless and illegal to take that information, those documents out of the White House.
That just -- the whole system of classification is set up so that that never happened, so that those documents never leave the custody of a secure government facility. So that`s the baseline that we`re already starting from.
So then the question becomes, to what motivation do you take that out? And if the motivation is, I like these documents, they remind me of something when I was president, I like to have him around, well, that`s not a justification.
But anything beyond that goes into more dangerous territory. Was he going to seek to profit from this information in some fashion? Was he going to see it as some leverage he had on people, if this was stuff that he wanted to show to other people?
Well, that`s obviously a flagrant violation of national security, because we only entrust certain people with this kind of information. So, really, there`s no justification whatsoever for him taking it.
[19:15:03]
And we may hear that he didn`t know he was taking it out. Well, this is a lot of boxes with a lot of pieces of paper that are stamped top secret. So I don`t think that that flies.
MELBER: Yes.
RHODES: And then the question becomes, again, what was he doing with this information?
And that`s, I think, the most important thing to be filled in, in the coming days. What was his motivation for having all of this sensitive information at Mar-a-Lago, instead of where it belonged, in the cusp of the U.S. government?
MELBER: You know, after listening to both you tonight on a story that has so many layers, I don`t feel better, but I do feel more informed. And that`s my honest reaction.
In that spirit and maybe with those materials, gosh, what were they being used for, for that long is what Ben Rhodes is leaving us with pondering.
I wish you both a great Friday night and weekend.
Ben Rhodes, Tali Farhadian Weinstein, appreciate your expertise.
Let me tell folks what`s coming up, because you have this history of a problem with national security protocols. Who could have seen this coming? A lot of people. We also have a member of the House Intelligence Committee, as we look at a crackdown on safety, security and the rule of law around America and why people say it`s more important than ever to enforce the rule of law.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:20:45]
MELBER: These records that the FBI got from our logo have classifications that include top secret and sensitive, compartmentalized information, which is a category that`s designed to protect secrets that which, if revealed, could harm U.S. interests.
But the FBI executed this search warrant. And they did that based on these several laws, as we have reported, but we don`t know who would be targeted or if this was, as we were discussing with our experts at the top of the hour, just a focused effort to recover materials, and there might never be any charges.
Donald Trump had the power to declassify, which certainly complicates some aspects of this, although it`s not a blank check for anything after he left office.
Given the issues of intelligence here, having done what`s in there and the receipt and what`s the law, we turn to, well, a co-equal branch of government that also deals with intelligence.
Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois is on the House Intelligence Committee.
Thanks for making time tonight.
REP. RAJA KRISHNAMOORTHI (D-IL): Thank you, Ari.
MELBER: When you look at this as a security matter, almost putting to the side the difficult, intricate questions around the criminal enforcement of the intelligence laws, which, as we have reported, have been used against many senior officials, Democrats like Sandy Berger in the Clinton administration, General Petraeus, who served both parties, but was cheered by Republicans.
Let`s put that to the side and just ask you, what do you see as the national security risk here, if any, based on the new information we have - - I`m looking to pick it back up -- based on the new information we have in this rather remarkable list?
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Well, I think that what draws my attention more than anything else are the statutes that are at play here, including the Espionage Act and the portion of the Espionage Act related to defense information.
And when you mix the classification, TS/SCI and the words defense information, that raises a big question, because I -- members of the committee, Intelligence Committee, such as myself and others, we deal with these TS/SCI documents every day.
But there are literally people looking over our shoulders as we review these documents. And never have we ever taken those documents out of a secure facility. In fact, they take it -- they keep an inventory to make sure that every single document remains in the possession of the folks who are the custodians in the secure facility. This type of...
MELBER: Would they have specific material? I mean, again, we`re not asking you reveal what you can`t or speculate on what`s in there. We have been careful about that.
But because we`re in -- we`re an acronym soup now here. You have given me five letters twice.
(LAUGHTER)
MELBER: If we were in a movie or a hypothetical, are we talking about an assessment? Are we talking about the locations of things? What kind of thing are we talking about?
KRISHNAMOORTHI: It could be any of those issues. It could also be about covert action programs.
It could be about -- in fact, it could be about programs that not even all members of the intelligence community at even senior levels are aware of. That is how sensitive that information is.
When they say compartmented, that means that only certain people even within the intelligence community are allowed to see those documents, and others are not. So we`re talking about stuff that, quite frankly, our adversary should never get ahold of.
MELBER: Yes.
Republicans have had a couple different points of attack this week. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): When you have got an attorney general that has a history of going after parents because they go to a school board meeting, but not to talk to the American public, that creates real problems.
SEN. RON JOHNSON (R-WI): I do not trust the FBI. I don`t trust the upper echelons of the Department of Justice. This corruption has run deep. It`s been running deep since the Hillary Clinton e-mail scandal.
REP. ELISE STEFANIK (R-NY): The FBI raid of President Trump is a complete abuse and overreach of its authority. So, before you jumped to conclusions and just accept information from un -- from sources who are not the attorney general, who are not the director of the FBI, let`s see what the facts are.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[19:25:00]
MELBER: Let`s see.
I mean, this is what I guess some people didn`t know, that it would come out.
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Right.
MELBER: And it would appear -- again, you have -- this is subject to the courts.
And I will report if there`s a court proceeding that casts doubt on any of this, if this material is not substantiated. We will go beyond the warrant. But we already have more information now than we did yesterday that does suggest that the FBI found a lot of material that was, in their view, improperly taken or stolen by Donald Trump or others around him and held even after it was under subpoena.
And that`s what they took. Now, if they took any of Mr. Trump`s personal property, for example, that they don`t have access to, as you know and I think viewers understand, he can go to court and try to get it back.
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
MELBER: What does the evidence here show you in response to what we just heard from some of your colleagues?
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Well, look, I don`t think the FBI was there to take his bowling trophies from the White House.
I think that this was stuff that, obviously, they -- at some point, they asked for it back, it appears. It appears at the National Archives, working with lawyers, tried to get it back, even had a subpoena issued for this information, and it didn`t get returned.
And so, given all the other concerns we have about the president, people who are surrounding him, their extensive foreign ties, their financial distress, there`s always been a concern about just a counterintelligence risk associated with people like that, especially when they have access to such precious information.
Can I just address one other thing that was mentioned in some of those comments, which is, you hear a lot of vitriol, and you hear a lot of rather sometimes violent rhetoric from these folks. And when they do that, it leads to the problems that we saw yesterday at this FBI field office in Cincinnati.
And I think that they really need to cool their rhetoric big time...
MELBER: Are you saying that...
KRISHNAMOORTHI: ... whether it`s my colleagues...
MELBER: Are you saying that -- we just heard from House leaders, McCarthy, Stefanik. Are you saying they contribute to the environment that caused that violence?
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Yes, it kind of feeds a climate where pretty much people engage in what I think is politically violent rhetoric.
And we all know what that -- what happens when you have a -- kind of an echo chamber of this stuff, especially on social media. There are nuts out there who will basically act upon that rhetoric.
MELBER: Yes, I appreciate you raising that. We have been covering and tracking all of that.
Final question. These are major intelligence breaches, according to the FBI. What, if anything, will the Intelligence Committee that you serve on do about this?
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Well, I think, first of all, we will probably want to ask for an update or briefing on these materials in a little more depth and what, if anything, is being done to make sure that anything related to those issues is safeguarded.
And, of course, we want to know if there were any consequences associated with any potential breaches that occurred here. Suffice it to say that I`m sure that there are professionals right now, as we speak, in the intelligence community who are trying to figure this out.
And, of course, as part of the Intelligence Committee, we have to exercise oversight with regard to that process.
MELBER: Understood.
Congressman, thank you for making time here on a Friday evening on a big breaking story.
KRISHNAMOORTHI: Thank you.
MELBER: We are going to fit in a break.
You`re watching a special edition of THE BEAT WITH ARI MELBER here, as we track this breaking news, this warrant released.
Next, we turn to the lessons from history and why some of them make Trump look even worse.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:33:24]
MELBER: This FBI search for documents has spanned many topics. We now know some of them from the FBI`s own description.
But then you have "The Washington Post" reporting on nuclear information. You have to remember that, as president, Donald Trump revealed all kinds of intelligence, including to top Russian officials about a plot that Israel had provided to the U.S. That was a big deal.
He tweeted at one point an image of a failed rocket launch by Iran. Some people said that that would have been classified. Now, then, he was president, so he had the power. That doesn`t mean it was anything positive or a good idea.
So, for years in plain sight was those type of problems. Call them sloppiness or a lack of seriousness about the job. Then you have the total attacks on anything that could be a check on his power.
So, Donald Trump clearly and publicly said. This sounds like criticism, but it`s just how he operated, was attacking independent intelligence, national security officials, the FBI and the DOJ as basically bad because they were somehow a check on his power.
He raged against the intelligence chiefs who talked about cyber threats of Russia and China. And -- and this was quite clever, I have to say, in all seriousness. I thought this was very funny.
He said -- quote -- "Perhaps intelligence should go back to school."
I`m now joined by Peter Strzok, former FBI counterintelligence agent, and Sarah Kendzior, a scholar who specializes in authoritarian -- I should say -- excuse me -- authoritarian states, the author of "They Knew: How a Culture of Conspiracy Keeps America Complacent."
First of all, serious day, a lot going on, Sarah, but I think we can all agree that was a very funny and sick burn, the president`s play on the word intelligence at the time. Just real hot stuff there.
[19:35:09]
SARAH KENDZIOR, AUTHOR, "THEY KNEW: HOW A CULTURE OF CONSPIRACY KEEPS AMERICA COMPLACENT": Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
MELBER: Having said that, the pattern and the history here does seem to matter. It matters for security. It matters for some of the authoritarian issues that you have focused on.
And it also matters for any potential further legal process that looks at whether or not this was somehow -- quote, unquote -- "an honest mistake" or something else.
Your thoughts tonight?
KENDZIOR: Yes, this was not an honest mistake.
We have had a very clear pattern of illicit behavior, destructive behavior from Trump, not only in his time in office, but going back to the 40 years beforehand.
Trump has been linked to organized crime for my entire life. And I was born at the end of the Carter administration. There is no reason that he should have been able to ascend to the presidency, given his illicit foreign ties, his bankruptcies, all of these, I don`t even want to say conflicts of interest, because they`re more serious than that, all these offenses that he carried out with people in his circle, like Roger Stone, Manafort and other people who were indicted and then pardoned.
So his presidency was a culmination of this. It was very serious. It was always a national security threat. It remained so in office, and it remains so after he left office. And all of this, the taking of illicit documents, the refusal to hand them over and so forth, was entirely predictable.
And so my question is why something was not done earlier, say, in the `80s, or 90s.
MELBER: Peter?
PETER STRZOK, FORMER FBI COUNTERINTELLIGENCE AGENT: Well, I think that`s a great observation.
I mean, the irony of this is that, throughout his administration, the intelligence community bent over backwards to try and get him interested in intelligence, to try and get him to sit down and review the president`s daily brief, a compendium of the most sensitive, most relevant intelligence information collected across the government.
He could care less. He -- it got so bad that allegedly, reportedly, they went to the point where they had to build dioramas, like you might do with a bunch of third graders to try and get them interested in what they`re seeing.
Yet, at the end of the day, having left the administration, he`s taken box after box after box of the most sensitive intelligence that our nation has, and for what? He didn`t have any use for it when he was in office. Why on earth does he need it down at Mar-a-Lago?
The fact of the matter is, Trump is conclusively the largest counterintelligence threat that we have ever faced in a president in our nation`s history. And so it isn`t surprising to me that this information was found, but what I`m really dying to know is, why on earth did he keep it? The man doesn`t read. The man doesn`t have a sincere curiosity about the intelligence process.
What on earth possessed him to want to take it down to Mar-a-Lago?
MELBER: You know, you make such a great point there, Peter, that is separate from what I would say are the more urgent points.
At the top of the broadcast, we`re saying, what`s in it? We`re talking to the lawyers, the prosecutors. But you`re actually going to the theory of the case, which sooner or later comes up, right? If you find that someone has a criminal stockpile of rancid meat, and maybe it`s not this level of national security concern, but it`s still, for whatever reason, bad, and then you find out they`re also vegan, when you`re investigating that case, now it`s even weirder.
And you have to actually unplug -- like, unspool, what is going on? And, sometimes, you might find something worse. Oh, they`re in some criminal conspiracy hiding something that`s worse related to whatever else.
You`re saying that Donald Trump was -- when it came to the hard, serious work of reviewing intelligence, he was a vegan. He wasn`t taking it in on a regular basis. And then, now, when he leaves office, and we all know under the cloud he left, having failed at a coup and cheered on a violent insurrection, which remains under investigation in multiple jurisdictions, he suddenly stockpiles the stuff he wasn`t interested in when he had the lawful obligation.
As a theory of the case, what are you pointing out? What are you -- what would you want to investigate, given that you have justified an odd -- an odd gap?
STRZOK: Well, are there two big buckets that I`d want to know.
The first is, for him, what does he stand to gain by having this? We know, back at a meeting he had with Prime Minister Abe of Japan, that he reportedly took out some very sensitive intelligence information about a North Korean missile launch, was showing it there in the balcony in plain view of every person who had enough money to gain acceptance into Mar-a- Lago that evening.
We also know that there are these odd patterns of behavior, notwithstanding his sort of attraction to Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin. We know, for instance, the Saudis just gave $2 billion, against the advice of their investment advisers, to his son-in-law. We know the Saudis are promoting his properties as the part of the new golf tournament that they were doing.
We know, in addition -- that`s the first bucket. The second question is, every president and former president is a huge target for foreign intelligence services. So, the question then extends to Mar-a, Lago separate and distinct from Trump, where were these documents stored? Are they under the buffet line at the pancake station at the restaurant there at Mar-a-Lago?
[19:40:17]
Who -- every intelligence agency worth its salt, whether it`s the Russians, the Chinese, the Cubans, and others are going to try and get people into and around Mar-a-Lago. That might not be a Mar-a-Lago member, but it might be a member of the custodial staff, an electrician, somebody delivering the food.
Every avenue that might get you into Mar-a-Lago are absolutely the kinds of things that foreign adversaries are trying to penetrate. So, if you have these dozens of boxes of classified information, unsecured just sitting there at Mar-a-Lago, who on earth is keeping track of who has access to that and what they`re doing with it?
MELBER: Yes. Yes.
And then, Sarah, I just wanted to broaden out here, the final question to you. There are authoritarian tactics used by Donald Trump, echoed on the right, that are designed right now, on a host of issues, to intimidate, to threaten violence, and to delegitimize the actual court-supervised independent law enforcement.
Where does that fit into all this at the end of a week where the facts actually did come out, partly boomeranging on them, but they are continuing those kinds of tactics?
KENDZIOR: Yes, we have reached a crisis point due to the failure to act earlier.
When you have an unpunished seditious coup, which was in itself a failure of officials to act earlier in all the previous crimes committed in office, people become emboldened. They want the same elite criminal impunity that Trump has been granted. And he has given a signal to his followers that, if they obey, if they fall in line, they too will be protected.
That was the great appeal of him. Now, this is, I think, the most serious raid or investigation of him that has happened in the past. As I mentioned before, he`s been under investigation for my entire life. I don`t quite know whether he will get out of this. If he does, you should still expect that base to be emboldened, whether it`s average Americans or the elites in a circle who also remain unpunished, Michael Flynn, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, et cetera.
This is not about one individual. This is about a crime syndicate. This is about an attempted kleptocracy, an attempted autocracy that we have never come fully to terms with.
MELBER: Yes, Sarah Kendzior, Peter Strzok, thanks to both of you.
Here we are on a Friday night. We have been covering this story, this special edition of THE BEAT.
And I`m going to tell you, up next, we`re going to broaden out a little bit, take a breath, and take this word we keep hearing, unprecedented, unprecedented, unprecedented. There`s objective reasons why we have been using that so much this week.
Well, our friend NBC historian Michael Beschloss will walk us through it, as we take a breath -- when we come back.
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MELBER: Unprecedented, we might overuse that in the press, but I can show you exactly why -- and historians will be talking about why -- this week has been unprecedented, not once, not twice, but, yes, thrice. That`s our fancy lingo for three times.
Today, you have the confirmation Department of Justice is actually investigating these multiple statutes, including an Espionage Act, and that they use that as a basis for the search of a former president`s home and that they unsealed the actual receipts. We use that term receipts I mentioned. This is what they call it. They actually call it property receipt when they seize items that they say were allegedly improperly taken or stolen by the former president.
So, we have all three of those things in one week.
And we bring in our friend NBC presidential historian Michael Beschloss.
I said we will take a breath because it`s been a lot. But we`re going to slow down and do the sweep of history.
Welcome back, sir.
MICHAEL BESCHLOSS, NBC NEWS PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Wonderful. Thank you, Ari. Great to see you.
MELBER: Monday, you have the search. Wednesday, the president invokes the Fifth Amendment, which, just to remind people, because, boy, that was just two days ago, is something that you can only do legally if you can actually demonstrate that there is a real possibility you would be criminally investigated or indicted for the things you would say for telling the truth under oath.
BESCHLOSS: Right. Right.
MELBER: And, apparently, that`s the standard that he feels he`s met.
Thursday, the attorney general calls him out. Friday, we have this.
Before I get into my questions, just tell us where your mind is at as you think about history tonight.
BESCHLOSS: Well, my mind is that this sounds more like something out of "The Godfather" than out of some statesmanlike Frank Capra movie, and it sounds more like that all the time.
As you think of these documents in the basement of Mar-a-Lago, you can almost see it on a rainy night with the lightning above. And it calls the question. Presidents don`t do this, Ari. This has never happened before.
Dwight Eisenhower in 1961 went back to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, had this wonderful house at the edge of the battlefield. And he was beginning to write his memoirs. And he wanted to consult classified documents that he had written and used when he was president.
The documents were not in the basement. They were at Fort Ritchie, which is a military base across the Maryland line, not too far. And because Eisenhower is a military man, hero of World War II, abided by presidential rules and military rules, he had to apply for every single classified document he wanted to look at.
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And it was brought up, a handcuff around the wrist of a military officer that was attached to a briefcase. He was shown it. The document was taken back. That`s the way it`s supposed to happen. You don`t have just an ex- president flying down to wherever he lives in Palm Beach with an armload, figuratively, in a leather-bound box. It almost sounds like a horror film - - the leather-bound box, as you noted, was on that inventory -- and put that stuff in the basement with nuclear secrets.
That`s bad enough, because if those things are vulnerable, someone can easily break in, take a look...
MELBER: Yes.
BESCHLOSS: ... endanger every American and every American child.
Above and beyond all that, why did he do it? Was he planning to sell them? Was he planning to share them with friends and foreign governments from whom he wanted money or other favors? We don`t know that yet. But we have got to ask those questions.
And forgive me for the long answer, but this is so unusual. That`s why he`s being investigated for possible criminal violation of, just as you were saying, Espionage Act, possible obstruction of justice, just like Richard Nixon.
MELBER: Yes, you are forgiven. You mentioned precedents.
We wanted to get your views of a Republican known for a real intensity about national security, Ronald Reagan. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RONALD REAGAN, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Espionage, theft and diversion of our technology and Soviet active measures threaten us as never before.
This part of your duty, about which I can say little in detail here, is vital to our national security. And I ask that you continue to devote the special attention which this difficult task requires.
The FBI`s record of fidelity, bravery and integrity is a long and distinguished one. At each turn in your history, when criminals have engaged in new or advanced forms of criminal activity, you have led the law enforcement community in responding to these threats.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: This was one of those things that, across many presidents, it would seem, was a bipartisan tradition, yes, debates over how to use intelligence...
BESCHLOSS: Right.
MELBER: ... but this breach at this level, is it hard to think of any other modern ex-president going near this?
BESCHLOSS: No, you`re absolutely right. Donald Trump is in one category of his own. Every other president is on the other side.
And the other thing, Ari, is that, Ronald Reagan, we may have disagreed with a lot of his policies. But, as a conservative, he did what conservatives in American history tend to do, supported the rule of law, protected our national security, respected the institutions of our democracy.
Those are things that progressives can agree with. And if that`s what conservatives did these days, you wouldn`t have this deep national chasm. What you have got is not conservatives, but someone like Trump, a member of what I would call the radical right, that wants to destroy, doesn`t care about the rule of law, wants to take an axe to our institutions of democracy, and, as we have seen during the last 24 hours, doesn`t give a damn about national security.
MELBER: Right. Right.
Are you familiar with the slang term flex, Michael?
BESCHLOSS: I certainly am.
MELBER: So, you`re going to have to tell us...
BESCHLOSS: But you tell me how you`re going to use it.
MELBER: Well, you`re going to have to tell us.
Is it -- I`m going to put the headline up. Is it a historian flex when someone like you, who`s esteemed, is part of a meeting with the current president meeting with historians and looking at this threat from that larger perspective, from pre-Civil War era to the fascist movements that led up to World War II.
I`m sure you have your own ground rules about what you can share. But the silly question is, is it a historian flex? You tell us. It`s your business, your industry.
And, two, what can you share about the type of level of concern that independent historians and perhaps the current president have, given what we`re up against right now?
BESCHLOSS: Yes, I would like to think, Ari, it`s not a historian`s flex.
Presidents have been seeing historians for about 30 years. I first did this under Bill Clinton. I never went to the White House ever under Donald Trump, but everyone else had meetings with historians. So that`s sort of what we do, to some extent.
But, as far as what Joe Biden was trying to do, this was a two-hour meeting. We were in the Map Room. He`s still at COVID eight days ago. He was upstairs in his office. So this was by video link.
And he has said in public he feels that we`re at a time that this is like, I would say, 1860 or the 1930s, when people were dissatisfied. There were outbursts of violence. The country was terribly divided. And we were in danger of civil war.
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It really happened militarily, of course, in the 1860s. And I don`t want to say that he agrees with everything I say, but he has in public said that he feels that, if this country does not succeed, if our society, if our system does not seem to be working for everyone`s benefit, we are in danger of losing our democracy.
MELBER: Right.
BESCHLOSS: And I would agree.
MELBER: Yes, and that is important right now.
Michael, thank you.
We will be right back.
BESCHLOSS: My pleasure.
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MELBER: Thanks for spending time with us on this extended edition of the THE BEAT WITH ARI MELBER .
You can always find me online at AriMelber.com. That`s AriMelber.com, the best way to connect with me, or @AriMelber on social media.
"ALL IN" starts now.