Are liberals benefiting by pushing Russian conspiracy narrative?
The Intercept co-founding editor Glenn Greenwald weighs in on 'The Ingraham Angle.'
This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," March 26, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
LAURA INGRAHAM, HOST: All right, I'm Laura Ingraham, this is the Ingraham Angle from a very busy of course Washington tonight. The Left sets its sights now on Attorney General Bill Barr. You knew that was going to happen and what does the President think of the media's refusal to admit the truth about Mueller's no collusion finding. The President's lawyer, Rudy Giuliani will join me in just moments with answers plus from anchors at CNN and MSNBC, the internet grifters and never-Trumpers.
We're going to reveal the people willing to tear the country apart so they can profit from the Mueller probe. Glenn Greenwald weighs in and Chicago Mayor and police are livid tonight after all charges were dropped against 'Empire' actor Jussie Smollett.
And is Michelle Obama's former staffer responsible for the Smollett deal, we're going to expose the suspicious link but first, the left in denial, that's the focus of tonight's Angle.
Die Hard Democrats and assorted never-Trumpers have developed a severe personality disorder. They don't reason, they rant.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And a lot of you that were (EXPLETIVE) and moaning last night and being morally self-righteous, you are the bad actor. So save your breath, all right? We're not going to divert our eyes. This President lies more than any other President in the United States.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, for more than two years now, most have lost any sense of individuality and they've all defined themselves almost completely in their opposition to President Trump. They live for any headline, regardless of how ill-founded that spells trouble for the President.
And if such news would be bad for America, they don't care as long as it's really bad for Trump or a member of his family or maybe his inner circle. They identify as anti-Trump or never-Trump on social media and are so invested in their conspiracy whack job theories and negative narratives about him that a paralysis has set in.
They cannot move toward deeper thought or introspection or heaven forbid, contrition when it turns out as with the Mueller case, they got it all wrong. No evidence of collusion, no problem, they were revert to their old Trump is evil narrative, they maybe tweak it a bit and then they proceed to the next attack.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. GERRY CONNOLLY, D-VA: What's happening is that the Attorney General working hand in glove with the White House is gaming the system to frame the narrative.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald Trump is legitimate, he's a legitimate tyrant. He's a legitimate dictator in waiting.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: They're taking a victory lap for not being felons.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: And then this from the political sage of our age.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't need the Mueller reports to know he's a traitor. I have a TV.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, from Maher and his ilk, villains and heroes are predetermined by them. And new information in no way will disrupt that narrative. Now this dynamic is also at play in the case of actor and race hoax choreographer, Jussie Smollett.
Today we learn that all of the charges against Smollett have been dropped following a deal with prosecutors at the Cook county attorney's office. After all we've learned about this case, the two Nigerians purchasing the hats and the rope used in the alleged assault, the police saying Smollett sent threatening letters to himself.
The actor had the gaul today to maintain his innocence and invoke his mom for sympathy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JUSSIE SMOLLETT, ACTOR: I've been truthful and consistent on every single level since day one. I would not be my mother's son if I was capable of one drop of what I have been accused of. This has been an incredibly difficult time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: He's a Baghdad Bob of race hoaxes and presto, with that his brand rehab was under way.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SMOLLETT: But make no mistakes, I will always continue to fight for the justice, equality and betterment of marginalized people everywhere.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, that's true if marginalized people include other purveyors of fakery and hate crimes fraud. He's a super hero in that regard for sure. And of course the media themselves in denial are always there to provide a much needed assist.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was an over step by the police department to come out, how does he ever get a fair trial when you have the superintendent going on Good Morning America, blasting him.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's also the question about how the Chicago police got so duped.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The narratives once again change from victim you know, to villain, back to victim, we may never really know what happened on the streets that night in Chicago.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Think of how often liberals have derided conservatives as a no nothings, anti-science, anti-facts. Yet to left wing fanatics, if you're vehemently anti-Trump which Smollett is, facts don't matter at all.
Forget the fact that Smollett made an outrageous charge to advance his career and his profile and forget that the hoax attack could have incited racial or political violence in the city and forget that he sent the Chicago police on a wild goose chase.
The left is always quick to forgive their own. The studio that puts on his show, 'Empire' released this statement. "Jussie Smollett has always maintained his innocence and we're gratified on his behalf that all charges against him have been dismissed."
Translation, we're gratified that this celebrity got off with community service for his crimes and that there will be no more repercussions for our liberal friend. But thank goodness, there were a few who called out the state's attorney handling of the celebrity crime for what it was, a complete injustice.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EDDIE T. JOHNSON CHICAGO POLICE SUPERINTENDENT: My personal opinion is that you all know where I stand in this. Do I think justice was served? No. I think this city is still owed an apology but it shows the hide behind secrecy and broker a deal to circumvent the judicial system.
I stand behind the detective's investigation and at the end of the day, it's Mr. Smollett who committed this - this - this hoax.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Even Clinton loyalists, Rahm Emanuel not running for re-election had had enough.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RAHM EMANUEL, MAYOR, CHICAGO: Mr. Smollett is still saying that he is innocent, still running down the Chicago police department, how dare he? Even after this whitewash still no sense of ownership of what he's doing he says that in fact he is the wronged in this case.
Is there no decency in this man? It sends a clear message that if you're in a position of influence and power, you get treated one way, other people will be treated another way, there is no accountability then in the system.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: A deep sense of outrage and disgust, even liberal Rahm Emanuel's expressing there should be what we all feel, every fair minded American, about the Trump Russia collusion hoax.
This is really the tale of two hoaxes. One perpetrated by Smollett on the city of Chicago, the other perpetrated by anti-Trump political partisans and the media on the entire country.
The Smollett hoax ruled a city but the Trump hoax had both national and international implications. It could have affected policy, it may have likely tilted the 2018 mid-terms and is already destroyed several lives. One of the Mueller victims will actually be joining us later on in this show.
As we've been arguing for months, there must be consequences for bad actors in and out of government. Innocent people who are unfairly targeted, deserve justice and so do the American people whose money is wasted.
We need accountability and transparency across the board. A good start would be the public release of both the Smollett grand jury report and the full Mueller report, then we'll see who the real victims are. Even when we do, do not expect the rabid left to leave their denial comfort zone. And that's the Angle.
Joining me now with reaction, Rudy Guiliani, Attorney for President Trump. Mayor, thank you so much for being here.
RUDY GIULIANI, ATTORNEY OF PRESIDENT TRUMP: Nice to be here Laura.
INGRAHAM: Yes, you just me say that--
GIULIANI: Great opening.
INGRAHAM: Thank you. There must be repercussions for bad actors, whether it's Chicago or in this case-
GIULIANI: Absolutely.
INGRAHAM: --lot of victims in this Trump-Russia collusion hoax.
GIULIANI: I think the President puts it best when he says this can't happen again and the only way you can assure this doesn't happen to another President is to find out what happened and who is responsible for it.
I think it's got to be clear to any fair-minded person that whole idea of conspiracy with the Russians to interfere in the election, collusion if you want to call it that, is totally untrue. Three investigations, not a single bit of evidence, every single witness who CNN said was a blockbuster in this totally fell apart.
INGRAHAM: Jeff Zucker today, I'm going to get to this in the next segment as well, he said they had no regrets, he says we have nothing to apologize for.
GIULIANI: Maybe they don't have a conscience.
INGRAHAM: They're not investigators, they're journalists.
GIULIANI: Maybe they don't have a conscience. I mean, they hyped every - how many blockbusters was it? Papadopoulos, Manafort, one after the other, Cohen - Cohen, I mean totally fell apart, the guy's got to be prosecuted for perjury so who did it?
This started somewhere, it didn't come out of thin air. Somebody came up with the idea that they were going to get Manafort, they were going to get Trump and perpetrated this hoax and then a lot of people committed a lot of crimes in order to work it out, just - if you just focus on the four affidavits, clear perjury.
Comey - Comey has to be brain dead to have thought that the - that the Steele dossier was a legitimate intelligence document, it is a joke.
INGRAHAM: Oh no, no. Oh, Comey actually spoke out tonight by the way.
GIULIANI: Oh, he came out of the trees.
INGRAHAM: He's out of the red woods.
GIULIANI: Did he make it out of the trees?
INGRAHAM: I couldn't tell the redwood from Comey.
GIULIANI: I couldn't tell either.
INGRAHAM: All right, so here's what he--
GIULIANI: Totally confused.
INGRAHAM: These are--
GIULIANI: I think he was looking for the emails.
INGRAHAM: New comment, he said, "The part that's confusing is I can't quite understand what's going on with the obstruction stuff and I have great faith in Bob Mueller but I just can't tell from the letter why he didn't decide the questions, when the entire rationale for a special counsel is to make sure that the politicals aren't making the key charging decisions."
So he's hitting his old pal Mueller there.
GIULIANI: He's not political?
INGRAHAM: Apparently - he's another one saying Bill Barr, he's hitting Barr obviously.
GIULIANI: Yes, I'll take a look, take a look at the affidavit, right? The affidavit puts forth the Steele dossier as a real legitimate intelligence document. Well, first of all, they don't disclose, he withholds which I think is perjury, really.
Certainly misleading the court, fraud on the court, he withholds the fact that $1.1 million was paid by the opponent of Donald Trump. So it's not an intelligence document, it's a $1.1 million campaign document.
Second, the thing has in it, totally absurd things like Trump was an agent of the Russian government for ten years and they decided five years ago from that date, he was going to be President.
INGRAHAM: But he's around in the red woods, he's touring the country on his book tour.
GIULIANI: Now, I'll give you another one why maybe he's the laziest guy in America but Steele dossier says that Michael Cohen was in Prague on a specific date. How difficult is it to call up the state department--
INGRAHAM: They didn't want to check it.
GIULIANI: Well, why not check it. They're supposed to do that. So we're talking about - I think, the word he made up was 'gross negligence.'
INGRAHAM: Yes, gross negligence.
GIULIANI: Maybe he's guilty of not just Hillary, this guy has got to be investigated, he's got to be investigated.
INGRAHAM: Well, do you think Barr will do that?
GIULIANI: I hope so. I hope, he doesn't get off because he likes to look at redwoods or I mean, he perpetrated a fraud on the court and he's wither grossly - grossly negligent or he was acting deliberately.
INGRAHAM: Mayor, we spoke about some denialism at the other networks and this was Don Lemon and Chris Cuomo's reaction to your interview on CNN, last night. Let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CUOMO: Rudy Guiliani, I've known most of my life, okay? We've had plenty of nasty back and forths, we try to disagree with decency. He demanded an apology from me, tonight.
DON LEMON, CNN HOST: For asking tough questions?
CUMONO: Look and I - I meant what I said. There ain't no damn apology coming. They're taking a victory lap for not being felons. That's how low the standard is for behavior right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIULIANI: That's pathetic. Felons? First of all on collusion, he was completely exonerated. Really sad.
INGRAHAM: The President said the report couldn't have been better, is that - do you agree with that, the report couldn't have been better?
GIULIANI: Look, I probably did a 100 of those declination letters. I've never seen one stronger and with that slight little but I can't exonerated him. I can't charge him but I can't exonerate him.
INGRAHAM: I thought that was a weak sister moment from Mueller.
GIULIANI: No, not only weak, it's totally inappropriate and totally unethical. You're not supposed to say that in a declination letter, you're not supposed to say--
INGRAHAM: Why did he?
GIULIANI: I think why - I think there are two sides to Mueller, he has the good guy side and the Weissmann side and I think Weissmann won a few of the battles and I do think it's pathetic that Mueller couldn't make up his mind, I actually do.
INGRAHAM: He couldn't get - he couldn't get you guys to bring the President and to sit down for questioning because why would you - why would you?
Did you ever get close to sitting down with the President sitting down with the Mueller team?
GIULIANI: We let them think we were.
INGRAHAM: Because you guys strung them out for a long time which I thought was brilliant.
GIULIANI: But I - but I was absolutely convinced that they're a bunch of - I mean, half of them are good guys, good women. Half of them are totally unethical prosecutors, the kind of prosecutors I would've fired in two minutes when I was U.S. attorney. Weissmann should never go near the court room in his entire life.
INGRAHAM: I haven't seen him since--
GIULIANI: The man is a - the man is horrible, no ethics.
INGRAHAM: By the way, they're going after Bill Barr now. Former H. W. - George H. W. Attorney General. Now Attorney General for the President who - before he talked about Trump, everyone loved Bill Barr but now, let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There were two major criticisms of what Bill Barr did, one, that he inserted himself into the process when he didn't need to and two, that he did it hastily.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They have the fragile peer baby to a political appointee in their Attorney General with very aggressive views.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what we saw last week is why a lot of people on the other side didn't want to trust him because they were afraid he'd do something like this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GIULIANI: Well, first of all, there's nothing political about Bill Barr. He wasn't at the Trump victory party like Weissmann was crying at Hillary's Christmas party. He didn't run the Trump foundation like Jeannie Rhee who worked for Mueller ran the Clinton foundation.
That's where the political partisans were. Bill Barr is a professional, professional law enforcement guy, professional lawyer. He happens to be Attorney General, the way Michael Mukasey was Attorney General, not the political operatives like Clinton, like Obama had.
So I don't get it but in any event, the decision was also made by Rosenstein. Rosenstein started this investigation, you think he's going to sell out on an obstruction? The theory of obstruction, you have to give in your law degree if you bought into obstruction when the whole investigation took place, what did he obstruct?
INGRAHAM: You don't need an underlying - you don't need an underlying crime but it is an important element.
GIULIANI: As he pointed out, you don't need it, it's not critical, very difficult to prove intent when there's no underlying crime.
INGRAHAM: Why would it take weeks to get this full report instead of a--
GIULIANI: Because there's a - there's a whole pitfall of 6E material.
INGRAHAM: 6E meaning?
GIULIANI: Meaning the grand jury material which is a felony if you make him stay, I mean. And if you think, if Barr made a mistake, what do you think Schumer and Pelosi and Adam Schiff. Schiff was no Schiff.
INGRAHAM: Yes.
GIULIANI: Adam Schiff would do? Right? They'd be yelling and screaming, he should be prosecuted so he's got to be very careful, maybe he's going to go to a judge to get it released, maybe they're going to try to exercise from the - I would like the whole thing out Laura.
I'm absolutely convinced we can answer.
INGRAHAM: The President wants it out, he's not just saying it. He really wants it out.
GIULIANI: There's no - if you read this - this letter, there's no smoking gun, you can't come to the conclusion, there's absolutely no evidence--
INGRAHAM: But they're saying over the other networks that, well, there's a lot of obstruction like behavior.
GIULIANI: No.
INGRAHAM: That is written about.
GIULIANI: There's not a single fact that you don't know about the--
INGRAHAM: But you haven't seen it, how do you know it?
GIULIANI: I know - I know what's in it. God Almighty, you don't think after all these months, we don't have a pretty good idea of what's in there? Having debated with him, talked to him about--
INGRAHAM: You guys are preparing for like let's say, the bizarre happens and House of Representatives has a death wish, a political death wish and goes down the--
GIULIANI: Well, we'll fight them.
INGRAHAM: --impeachment road. Are you all ready for that now?
GIULIANI: Of course, we are, absolutely. We have a - we have a very, very long, multi-faceted memo written already that we can cut and paste depending on what they - I mean the collusion part of it probably isn't necessary now so we can take that all out.
So if they want to battle over obstruction, they're going to make fools out of themselves. How about you bring a case against Trump on obstruction, he didn't delete 30,000 emails, he didn't bust up a server. He didn't have a hammer - didn't take a hammer tool--
INGRAHAM: For that you can infer intent, right? Rudy, I remember that in - you infer intent when you're smashing the stuff, you infer intent.
GIULIANI: But you know - you know what they want to do? Their whole theory, we had this debate with them often, they want to look in his brain and say although he didn't do anything to obstruct the investigation, he was--
INGRAHAM: His thought must have been there.
GIULIANI: --thinking about it. During one discussion with him I said, you know we haven't - we don't have a brain X-ray machine that gets your thoughts and if we started prosecuting people for thoughts, half of America would be in jail.
INGRAHAM: We wouldn't have - this town would be emptied out. Finally we could drive around, no traffic Rudy.
GIULIANI: Crazy.
INGRAHAM: All right, some of your friends in the media said a few things about you a few weeks ago.
GIULIANI: Oh really?
INGRAHAM: And they love you but now it's kind of come up and it's time, let's watch.
GIULIANI: Let's see.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did Rudy Giuliani harm the President?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I think it hurt the President and the White House.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is Rudy Guiliani helping or hurting the President? Helping or hurting?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, yes or no, I don't know. It seems to me hurting unless there's some deep strategy, I don't understand here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: So that was on - depends on whose colluding or--
GIULIANI: Maybe they're just not smart enough to have figured out this right. I feel sorry for them. Of course, there was a strategy to it and of course, I came to the conclusion when I came into this case, a year ago, we had to defend it on two levels, we had to defend it legally with them, argue the law, argue the facts.
Try to delay them as long as possible so we can build as good a case, in case they did give us a subpoena that they don't get a subpoena, they're not entitled to it. But on the second hand, I realized immediately we don't have a jury here.
We're not going to try this to a jury, we're going to try this to a possible impeachment so who is that? It's the American public. We had to change public opinion.
INGRAHAM: Political but public opinion still says, I mean, this is a new poll that came out today that half of the - nearly half of the country thinks that Trump obstructed justice which is a messaging problem for the White House.
I don't know why the number would be that high, not with what happened.
GIULIANI: Okay--
INGRAHAM: Because Mueller - that's that little - the little line that Mueller left it.
GIULIANI: I don't know what poll that is but I saw one, five days ago--
INGRAHAM: Yes, politico poll.
GIULIANI: I saw a poll.
INGRAHAM: Still don't care about it.
GIULIANI: 50% - 50% thought it was a witch hunt. Look, as long as those polls are within striking distance, they're not going to impeach him. And today even on CNN, there were two political experts, Democrats on saying, impeachment is out of the question now.
And Pelosi gave you the standard, which is you got to get bipartisan support, there's no Republican that's going to support impeachment, given what--
INGRAHAM: What did you do to celebrate? Did you do anything this week?
GIULIANI: Nothing special. We had nice dinner and the President had us over to the White House on Sunday night and he had us for lunch on Monday and he let us fool around with the with the Washington Capitals who have much bigger rings.
INGRAHAM: I saw, it finally got the collusion with the [inaudible] there. I saw that, that was the closest of all the players.
GIULIANI: I grabbed the [inaudible] and I said, I'm going to destroy that picture like Sonny Corleone. I'm going to take that camera, I'm going to break it and throw it.
INGRAHAM: Did he look at you and say, I must break you, Rudy?
GIULIANI: He is so big and so strong.
INGRAHAM: He's a big-hand, you could take him. All right, Mayor, great to see you as always, thanks for coming in. So who's profited off this Mueller travesty, we expose the entire cottage industry that cashed in on this charade and they got rich next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Here's a question, we think is worth answering for you tonight. Why were so many intent on fanning the flames of this Trump-Russia conspiracy in the first place? Who are the folks willing to foment all this is deep division in the country to lie just to make a quick Buck.
First, there were the internet grifters. Now, this is a veritable cottage industry of folks who popped up out of nowhere and professors all with the book to sell.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the most complex, far-ranging, federal, criminal investigation of our lifetimes. What will be found, what will be reported by Robert Mueller, what you find in my book is the collusion acts as a useful, lay umbrella term for several dozen federal statutes that we will see were violated here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: On cable news, network struggling for ratings and relevancy went all in. Lawyers, former Intel folks and ghosts of Watergate past were everywhere. They all pushed the same boring anti-Trump Russia hysteria.
Now while I love to attack the prime time host at this network as enablers, the likes of O'Donald, Cuomo and Lemon were more than happy to spin tall tales that kept the audience watching, if only temporarily.
They all of course took a backseat to Rachel Maddow. Now, it's important to know that during this process, she didn't just unpack the dossier or Cohen's non-existent trip to Prague, nope, she went full red scare.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: What would happen if Russia killed the power in Fargo today, right? What would happen if all the natural gas lines that that service Su falls just poofed on the coldest day in recent memory and it wasn't in our power whether or not to turn them back on.
I mean, what would you do if you lost heat indefinitely as the act of a foreign power on the same day the temperature in your front yard matched the temperature in Antarctica. I mean, what would you and your family do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Get a coat, maybe a down blanket. I mean, there's not tin foil in the world for that hat. And then were there was the never-Trump brigade, folks like Iraq war cheerleader Bill Kristol and people at a website that you've never heard of called Bulwark.
Well, they spent the last two years spinning their Trump derangement into wild conspiracies in this shiny new website. And who was the Pied Piper to this crowd. None other than Mika Brzezinski's better half.
Now remember, it was just a few short years ago, that former Republican Joe Scarborough was saying stuff like this about Trump becoming President.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE SCARBOROUGH, MSNBC HOST: He would know what to do. He would put really good people around him and you know what, we're talking about how would he negotiate against Vladimir Putin and think of that out. Donald Trump's been in a lot of really tough situations before as far as negotiations.
He sets himself up so he wins and you lose. He is a tough, mean, incredibly successful negotiator.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: But after years of drinking, I don't know, the cooling whatever at MSNBC, here's how he reacted to those on this network who dared to question the media's role and helping create the collusion narrative.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SCARBOROUGH: If you watched last night, you would heard - you've heard a lot of those clowns actually suggest that any Russian interference with the 2016 campaign was a scam. They were sounding like Vladimir Putin last night.
Just because you're not a journalist, just because you have sold your soul to a personality cult, don't knock reporters at The New York Times or The Washington Post or the Wall Street Journal or the broadcast networks for doing their job right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Does he think that when you yell, you're more believable? So we can never question the New York Times or the Washington Post or the Wall Street Journal, they always get it right.
Okay, that's an interesting theory but did you really catch what he said? What Scarborough and the rest of these opportunists are saying is that if you ever raise doubt about the collusion narrative, you're either mouse feast or just a Trump bootlicker.
There's no room for anything in between. That's how they attempt to smear people and shut down debate. Well, our next guest has been a skeptic from the start of this probe. Journalist and co-founder of The Intercept, Glenn Greenwald joins us now.
Glenn, we have seen this shift in the media. The same people who are just exposed, now say that either Barr is running a conspiracy with Trump and massaging Mueller's findings, or that Mueller himself might be in on some type of conspiracy. So what can we expect from here from the media that got this so wrong from the start?
GLENN GREENWALD, CO-FOUNDING EDITOR, "THE INTERCEPT": First of all, if any of those people had any honor, they would go before the camera, hang their head in shame, and then apologize to everyone that they misled for the three years, and then resign away never to be heard from again. But of course, they won't. They're addicted to their paycheck and to the bright lights of the camera, so they will continue do that. They are kind of like an apocalyptic cult, you know those cult leader who promise their followers that the world is going to end on a certain day, and then the date arrives and the world doesn't and all their confused flock need an explanation. That's what MSNBC and CNN are facing right now is a very confused flock of people who kept being told that it was only a matter of time before Bob Mueller saves them all from the Trump administration by dragging Trump Jr. and Jared Kushner and everybody else out in handcuffs.
And now not only didn't any of that happen, but he specifically found that there was no collusion, the thing that they were told there wasn't even any debate about. And so what they are doing now is spinning all new conspiracy theories. It's kind of like a Ponzi scheme were it keeps collapsing so you keep having to feed it.
(LAUGHTER)
GREENWALD: So their argument now is that, you know what, we haven't seen the Mueller report. All we have seen as William Barr's claims about what is in it, which means they are implying that probably Bob Mueller did find collusion but William Barr is lying about it. And for some reason Bob Mueller and his team of 19 high-powered lawyers are totally fine with that. They are just completely silent and passive as William Barr goes around lying about the last 22 months of their work. How stupid and gullible do you have to be to believe that? But that is the desperation CNN and MSNBC anchors face for having gotten caught with this scam.
INGRAHAM: Speaking of CNN, by the way, first of all, Chris Cuomo said not a chance would he ever apologize last night when Giuliani brought that possibility up. He said not a chance. He ridiculed Giuliani after he left the show, which is low class. But this is what CNN's coverage looks like, just for people who haven't caught it over the past two years.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to read the definition of "treason."
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: He said it was treason.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We do know that Donald Trump Senior has lied throughout this investigation.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This goes to the heart of everything we have been talking about for the last couple years, the collusion and the coverup.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: But yesterday, Glenn, the network president, Jeff Zucker, defended the network's coverage, and he told "The New York Times," quote, "We are not investigators. We are journalists. And our role is to report the facts as we know them, which is exactly what we did. A sitting president's own Justice Department investigated his campaign for collusion with a hostile nation. That's not enormous because the media says so. That's enormous because it's unprecedented." Your response to his defense?
GREENWALD: Jeff Zucker has no understanding of what journalism is, and all you have to do is look at the network that he runs to see that.
You want to hear something so interesting, Laura? I spent a lot of years being on CNN and MSNBC constantly. I used to get invited on all the time. Starting in 2017 when I began to express serious skepticism about their cash cow, which was this hoax, this fairy tale, this conspiracy theory that they were peddling every day, they just banned me from going on their network.
And it's not just me. It's other high credentialed journalists who were expressing skepticism, like Jeremy Scahill, Matt Taibbi, lots of other people on the left who were just banned because they wanted to deceive their audience into believing that the only ones who question what they were feeding them were either the Trump White House or hardcore Trump supporters. They lied not just of their audience but what really happened, but they did it on purpose to keep anybody was questioning them off the air.
They are right, they are not investigators. They are also not journalists. They are propagandists. They're fraudsters. They made lots of money lying to people and misleading people on purpose, and their entire hoax just got exposed.
INGRAHAM: Glenn, thank you very much for joining us and your continued coverage of these important issues. They go right to the heart of accountability, and we have to keep it up.
And coming up, all charges dropped against Jussie Smollett on this hoax attack? And there's a very suspicious political link. Could it be related to Michelle Obama's office? No. We'll expose what we found, next.
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INGRAHAM: Did Michelle Obama's office have a role in shutting the Jussie Smollett case down? Now, follow me here. Just days after Smollett reported his alleged hate crime to police and the Cook County State's Attorney Kim Foxx tried to persuade Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson to turn the investigation over to the FBI. The request came after FOX received this text according to "The Chicago Sun-Times" from Tina Tchen, a Chicago attorney and former chief of staff for former first lady Michelle Obama. Quote, "I wanted to give you a call on behalf of Jussie Smollett and family who I know. They have concerns about the investigation."
Shortly after that, a Smollett family member reached out to Foxx, having been given her number by Obama's former assistant. Foxx then replied in a text message that she, quote, spoke to the superintendent, and that she was, quote, "trying to figure out logistics." The relative then replied "OMG, this would be a huge victory," referring to the FBI taking over the case. FOX then texted, "I make no guarantees, but I'm trying."
This is so great. So let me get this straight. The top prosecutor at the office that ultimately decided not to prosecute Smollett was actively seeking to help the defendant. And this was all set in motion by Michelle Obama's former chief of staff.
The Chicago Police Union is calling for a federal investigation into Foxx's handling of the Smollett case. Here now is Tim Grace. He's the attorney for the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, and former Assistant State's Attorney in Cook County and a man who has been on the case from the very beginning, Fox 32's Chicago anchor and reporter Rafer Weigel. Rafer, I want to start with you. You are hearing from sources that believe Ms. Foxx never actually really recused herself. Now, why do they think that?
RAFER WEIGEL, ANCHOR AND REPORTER, FOX 32, CHICAGO: Because this would not have been handed down without Kim Foxx's blessing. There's no way that the deputy state's attorney would have done this without her involvement. This is her office, and the big question is, why would she do this? She created a deep divide between the Chicago Police Department at the mayor, who is on his way out, and the state's attorney office.
So what did she gain out of this? And that is why your theory is not that far-fetched. Either one of two things happened. Either she didn't think she was going to win the case, and she feared the optics of losing this case would make her look like a Marcia Clark, which your younger viewers might have to Google that, or she secured some kind of political favor that she's going to collect on the road.
It is no secret that Kim Foxx has higher political aspirations than this office, but we'll never know because they're not talking about why they actually did it. They just said this is not abnormal. This is done all the time. I can tell you, this is not done all the time. The fact that they did not contact the mayor or the superintendent, Eddie Johnson, before doing this, they were furious.
INGRAHAM: They were blindsided.
WEIGEL: Completely.
INGRAHAM: I've never seen anything like this. I have been doing media stuff for like 23 years. I've never seen anything like what happened today.
And Tim, I have to go to you here. You've got Emanuel coming out, you've got the police superintendent coming out. They were loaded for bear, these guys. They felt like this was an unfair, throwing this out in the public consciousness without so much as a heads-up. How could this possibly happen if it weren't for some outside force coming in here and tweaking the system or nudging the system?
TIM GRACE, CHICAGO POLICE UNION ATTORNEY: Yes, absolutely, Laura. I think it is amazing. Every single day I represent Chicago police officers, men and women, and I am humbled by their dedication and courage. And then to have them go out, do the heavy lifting in this city to go run towards the bullets, not away from the bullets, and then to have this happen under some theory of restorative justice, it is absolutely causing a lot of angst amongst many Chicago police officers.
INGRAHAM: There might actually be conflict, Rafer, within the prosecutor's office itself, because someone signed off on this Jussie Smollett working at Operation Rainbow Push as has community service. He was stuffing envelopes for them, I guess. He did that for a couple of days or 12 hours or something like that, 18 hours.
WEIGEL: Sixteen hours, yes, something like that.
INGRAHAM: Whatever, that is community service. And so this is what we are told Jussie's service included stuffing membership envelopes. We knew it wasn't for like Planned Parenthood or something -- I mean, for a pro-life group. But this is what Joe Magats, assistant state attorney said today about this. let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is Mr. Smollett innocent of the charges against him?
JOSEPH MAGATS, COOK COUNTY FIRST ASSISTANT STATE'S ATTORNEY: No, he is not.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what lead you to say that?
MAGATS: We stand behind the Chicago Police Department investigation. They did an outstanding job, an incredibly professional and phenomenal job in investigating this case. Based on all of that, we stand behind their investigation. We stand behind their investigation to charge him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Rafer, it looks like he was passing a kidney stone there. He did not look happy to be doing that interview. That was brutal.
WEIGEL: He looks to be an uncomfortable position. And it's interesting, Laura, because when I was notified, I was notified by my source at Chicago PD who was furious. And he said I want you to go down there and I want you to ask Jussie Smollett if he intends to reimburse the Chicago Police Department for the number of man-hours that we put into this investigation.
INGRAHAM: Oh, please.
WEIGEL: Originally, he said that they did that he did community service. We asked what that community service was. Initially when they came out in the press conference, they said that his community service went back to when he was 16-years-old being a fine, upstanding citizen. The other stuff about the Rainbow Push Coalition came later on. And so my question is, if you already had set that up beforehand, why not come right out with that right away? And it just added more confusion to all of this, and it just doesn't seem like they care how bizarre this thing looks.
INGRAHAM: Tim, back to you. The Fraternal Order of Police wants an investigation into Foxx, this state's attorney here, which has to happen. What triggers that? How would that take place? Who would have to greenlight that?
GRACE: First of all, the Department of Justice could get involved. The chief judge of the circuit court of Cook County could get involved. The FOP has been struggling with this administration since she took office with decriminalizing drugs, certain drugs. We are not charging certain cases. People can walk around and drive a car and not be charged with driving with a license suspended. But God forbid you put your hands on a cop, she's very dismissive about aggravated battery charges on police officers. So it's really interesting, and I think an investigation should be looked into by at least the local authorities I would suppose.
INGRAHAM: We want to see the documents. What are the chances, Rafer that you're going to get this grand jury report unsealed?
WEIGEL: Zero.
INGRAHAM: Zero.
WEIGEL: And that's the other thing that enraged Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Not only did they drop the charges, they sealed all of the documents. So my Freedom of Information Act requests are not going to be responded to. So we will never know all of the evidence that Chicago police say that they had on Jussie Smollett. They say that that bond proffer was just the tip of the iceberg. They say there was so much more that we will never see. That infuriated the mayor, and if you're going to do that, you at least get a plea deal.
INGRAHAM: It was reported that he wrote that racist letter to himself. That was reported by multiple outlets. Where are the Nigerian brothers? I'd find them if I were you, Rafer.
WEIGEL: I am working on it.
INGRAHAM: I bet you are.
WEIGEL: I am working on it.
INGRAHAM: I bet you are.
(LAUGHTER)
INGRAHAM: I want to know what their other side line is now. All right, guys, thank you so much for joining us. It's very important. It's nothing to laugh about, but you have got to find the humor and some of these situations.
Now, there are more questions to be answered in the wake of the Mueller report. Will Obama's intel chiefs really be let off the hook? And what about those in the president's orbit that suffered as a result? Former advisor Mike Caputo joins us next. He will be with us telling his story, what it's like to be in Mueller's crosshairs.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: If it weren't for President Obama, we might not have done the intelligence community assessment that we did that set off a whole sequence of events which are still unfolding today, notably Special Counsel Mueller's investigation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Quite the admission. And we know that Obama's intel community took that ball and ran with that directive. John Brennan, Jim Clapper, Sally Yates, Susan Rice, even former U.N. ambassador Samantha Power, someone with no intel function, all of them made requests to unmask American citizens.
But it was Brennan who worked the hardest. He signed a cable contract and worked diligently to advance this narrative that Trump is treasonous, blah, blah, blah. And he offered a tepid apology yesterday, I wasn't buying it, that he might have had that information. But there were innocent Americans that were caught in this political hit job. Where is the apology to them?
One of those people, former Trump advisor Michael Caputo, had to liquidate his kids' college bond to pay for legal counsel. He joins me now. Michael, what has the last 675 days been like for you? No laughing matter.
MICHAEL CAPUTO, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN ADVISOR: And myself and dozens more former Trump associates, myself, J.D. Gordon, Carter Page, the list goes on and on and on. I think a lot of them want to keep their names out of the news because they're trying to hold onto a job. But I know many fathers and mothers who lost their jobs. In fact, I know one family where the father and the mother lost their jobs. This has been tough on every single one of us.
I tend to run my mouth about it and get out there and talk about it, but I feel like I'm speaking for a lot of people who have been through a ton of crap that we didn't deserve. And also, by the way, Laura, this is upwards of 50 people who would've been -- most of them at the assistant secretary level of a government appointment. The president lost a whole cadre of true Trump supporters in his first round of appointments in his administration. The list goes on and on as to what this caused.
INGRAHAM: I think he should hire some of them back, or bring them back. An injustice was done to a lot of people. And while it is fun to play the old sound bites and hit Brennan, there's human carnage. And I think -- I thought about you. I heard you were coming on today. I thought about you, because you pop up on TV, you are very well-spoken, you know the media landscape. But there a lot of people who really don't have anyone to speak to them at all. And you are right. Where do they go to get their reputations back or the money they lost?
CAPUTO: I spent the day today at my local police department reporting what is about the 58th threat of violence and death against my family. This one came in Sunday night at 9:02 p.m. on Facebook. It's not just how much money we have spent or jobs we've lost some, the homes we've lost, the revenue opportunities we've lost, the tuition payments we missed for our children. It is not just that. None of us are safe. I talked to a criminal psychologist who I have worked with through this two-year period, somebody who helped me put together the security systems on my home, advised me what kind of weapons to carry during the day. He told me that now is when we really have to be careful, because the most unhinged of the resistance now don't have a report to look forward to. Now they're going to get really crazy, and some of them are going to go on the attack.
INGRAHAM: Michael, please be safe. We want to make sure that justice is done, and that means anyone who suffered, they should somehow be compensated. Somehow. We have got to figure it out. It can't end here. Thank you for joining us.
When we come back, the Last Bite. The queen of collusion, who could she be?
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: Why did Mueller make that determination? Was there a full investigation of Trump's intent regarding obstruction? When are we going to be allowed to see it? Will Mueller testify to Congress?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: I've got to say, I like the graphics. Those are cool graphics. But I have some questions, too, Rachel. When will the liberal media apologize? When will the left accept the Mueller probe results? When will the Dems end their pointless investigations? Why does the left keep pushing collusion? And when will the Democrats stop stonewalling Trump? Well, that's all the time we have tonight.
I didn't even have a graphic to do it. Shannon Bream and the "Fox News @ Night" team take it all from here.
Shannon?
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