>> are you feeling this yet? does that make you feel better? that's just stock footage. if that didn't work, let me fupfix with this stock footage of a puppy trying to eat a pumpkin. by the way, we have one week left. that's all we have for tonight. we'll be back tomorrow with more mtb daily. >> tons of news right now. robert mueller bearing down on roger stone. later, a fact check on the midterms at trump's rallies, and the view meets the beat as joy behar joins me live in about 20 minutes. first, our top story is breaking news. the fbi is probing a credible plot to frame bob mueller. we rarely hear directly from special counsel bob mueller's office, especially as an election approaches, but

tonight, we're reporting a rare announcement from the russia probe that confirms the fbi is now investigating an apparently credible plot to try to frame mueller. an effort to smear him in order to either discredit him or get him potentially even removed from the probe into collusion in the trump operation. this sounds big and unusual. because it's big and unusual. in a moment, i will be joined on "the beat" by someone who was approached by people apparently working on this scheme. first, here is exactly what we know. multiple news outlets reporting on a plot by a republican linked operative trying to frame mueller on what appeared to be made-up allegations of either harassment or sexual misconduct that would be pushed against mueller. the atlantic reporting the details from a woman who recounted this explosive offer, up to $20,000 to make accusations of workplace misconduct against mueller.

she said they would be false and an republican offered to pay off, quote, all my credit card debt and bring me a check for $20,000 if i would do it. so far, she's not doing it. also, to cover any potential tracks this offer came from someone refusing to use a normal phone line but asking her instead to talk on an encrypted app to evade authorities. he said i want you to make accusations of sexual misconduct and workplace harassment against mueller and sign a sworn affidavit to that effect. other evidence matches this account because berkman released a video online last week trying to smear mueller along these kind of lines. now, i'm not airing the audio of his words in our reporting from the video because that's not the headline. the headline tonight is that the smear plot itself is now under fbi investigation. that's brand-new. not that there's any evidence supporting the smears apparently linked to berkman. while the fallout from this quite strange story is obviously

still reverberating because this is all brand-new, legal experts and some white house veterans already noting that if the order of what i just told you had been reversed, if, for example, the world first learned about this kind of accusation in theory against mueller before these leaks about its potentially illegal framing, well, it could have upended his career and the probe into the heart of the trump presidency. >> the kind of accusation that can ruin someone's life. they were peddling something like this, and even their co-conspirator, the woman, had the i guess wherewithal to confess to reporters on the phone she was offered a lot of money to smear robert mueller. >> as for what i mentioned, the special counsel's office rarely says something on the record, certainly outside of the cases it's pursuing, but not tonight. mueller's chief spokesperson going on the record stating, quote, when we learned last week of allegations that women were offered money to make false

claims about the special counsel, we immediately referred the matter to the fbi for investigation. peter carr, chief spokesman to bob mueller. in a moment, i'll be joined exclusively by a law professor who was also approached in the smear against mueller. i begin with prosecutors, former watergate prosecutor nick ackerman and former federal prosecutor john flannery. nick, when you look at this unusual announcement and this unusual plot, what does it tell you that mueller's office is speaking on the record and referring it to the fbi tonight? >> i think this is very important for the public to know. i mean, this is a situation where everything has been thrown at robert mueller. they have tried to undermine him through the congress. they have tried to undermine the manafort jury deliberation. you had one juror even referring to the whole investigation as a witch hunt, copying basically what giuliani and trump have been saying. they have tried everything. so it does not surprise me that

they would go to this length of trying to obstruct this entire investigation by going directly after mueller. >> you said they. tonight, we're looking at this plot to make false smears, sexual accusations against bob mueller, who are they? >> first, there's berkman. there's the investigative firm that he's working for. somebody's financing this. somebody -- he is not doing this on his own. if you have an fbi investigation, they're going to be looking at everybody that is involved in this plot. >> you worked on the watergate investigation. there was a lot of talk there about money for political and counterespionage efforts in the u.s. that looked sloppy and the money led really high. do you think that's something the fbi is going to look at here? >> absolutely. this is exactly what's going on. this is like the end result of the meeting that occurred in attorney general mitchell's office at the beginning of this whole watergate scandal where they were looking at ways to try to undermine people, compromise people, and to create false

stories. >> let me bring in john flannery. does the conduct described here, a breaking story, there's much we don't know, and as i say, we're talking about one name on the record, this republican linked conspiracy theorist, but does the conduct described in the reports look to you like a potential crime? >> yes, it is. i mean, the obvious is a continuation of the obstruction of the investigation. they have not really been able to lay a finger on mr. mueller. in fact, everybody started with praise for him. but now, as the election is about to end and he's about to reactivate his office and to do who knows what with all sorts of suspicion about likely targets and reports, i think it's time to re-up and to find a way to attack him. and there are provisions both obviously use the conspiracy code, and that could be ove overt acts don't have to be cri crimes, but there are several provisions in obstruction of justice where you're impeding or threatening or harassing or

trying to affect or influence an investigation, or an officer. in this case, perhaps mr. mueller. and there are very serious penalties involved. a lot of these people, if they have done this, and that's the hypothetical, the investigative hypothetical, did berkman and others with sources of funds from whomever actually try to influence the investigation by false attacks against the chief investigator, mr. mueller himself? if so, that's big news. >> who has $20,000 lying around to pursue this? isn't just a conspiracy tweet, as reported. >> right, well, also, i don't know what her credit card debt is, and if there are women as have been reported, that is that they want to look and see what women were affected in this, that's more than the one person that we have seen figured in today's releases and press. and it does seem to be linked back to berkman, having the sense that he's announcing on november 1st we're going to know what's happening. and in the past, he's offered $25,000 to anybody who would

give any dirt on the fbi in connection with this ongoing investigation. so he has a track record which makes him a highly suspicious character worth investigating by the fbi. >> let me pull on the thread as promised to the audience. john, stay with me, nick, thank you as always for joining us on a busy night. i have an exclusive right now. jennifer tobb said she was personally targeted as part of this plot. she says a man approached her offering to compensate her for this kind of dirt on mueller, and jennifer joins me now. thanks for joining me tonight. >> i'm glad to be here. thank you, ari. >> i think you may have some information that is of interest to people as we pull on these threads. i'm going to start by reading what you have provided to our newsroom here at "the beat." october 22nd e-mail. a man kax you claiming to work for sure fire intelligence and says it's my understanding you may have had past encounters with bob mueller. i would like to discuss these with you. i believe a basic call which i would compensate you for would be a good place to start. reading continuing this, he says

my organization's conducting an examination of mueller's past. tell me a decent method to contact you by telephone or signal, and a beginning rate to talk with you about all encounters you had with special counsel mueller. goes on to say we would likewise pay you for any references you have and appreciate your discretion. it's very sensitive. what did you make of that inquiry? >> i found it really creepy, to be honest with you. and immediately upon reading it, i went on the internet to try to find a phone number or some other method to contact the special counsel's office. and all i could find was an e-mail, so i immediately forwarded the e-mail. just so i should add, i have never met robert mueller. had no encounters, no phone calls, stow i don't know him at all. >> you don't know -- jennifer, you don't know bob mueller, and you don't know why they came to you other than i suppose that as a law professor, you're in this space? >> i have no idea why they came to me.

i mean, one thing i'm thinking is i had published an op-ed a few weeks earlier about the kavanaugh hearings. maybe that's how my name got to these people. but certainly, i'm the last person you would want to send something to. i found the end of the e-mail, they said something about please be discreet or keep this confidential. i found that so amusing the minute i pressed send to send it off to the special counsel's office so they could look into it. i want to say one other thing. >> i want to get these facts out. when did you send it to mueller's office, and did you hear back? >> i immediately sent it. i don't know how many -- as soon as i could find the e-mail address, i sent it. and then i didn't hear back. but i didn't really expect to hear back. i'm not sure. i assumed -- this was odd enough that i assumed i was not the only person being contacted. and i imagined probably other people had done the same and they were investigating it. and then we got overtaken by the

terrible events of last week, and i didn't think much more about it until today. >> did you view this inquiry as an effort to discredit him or find false material to attack him? >> i thought it was either that or some kind of set-up of me. you know, sometimes we get very strange e-mails from people. but i was concerned enough about it that i took a screen shot and shared it with two friends. i have never shared a screen shot of a random e-mail, but i shared it with a law professor and a former federal prosecutor. that's actually how i even found out about this today. i was teaching all day, and they happened to see the story that natasha bertrand put out and asked me -- >> sure, at the atlantic, which we quoted in our report, and she's a contributor here as well. you mentioned other former prosecutors. john flannery is one. a final thought on this or a brief question for jennifer if you have one. >> the brief question is, if they chose you and you had no

relationship, it doesn't show much investigation. maybe they just hope that you would make a complaint and create a bogus story in terms of the dimensions of accusations against the special prosecutor without any real evidence that any such thing occurred. and they were just hoping that it would feed the alt-right sound machine of attacking and believe to be true, attacking mueller so that in the days ahead when he does do something, they'll try to discredit it. i guess they hoped that when i say they, rudy giuliani and company, hope that the only attack on the president could be a report for impeachment that may or may not be made public, it may or may not be acted on. >> there's so much flying around. you're referencing the wider pushback from the white house. we're not reporting any link whatsoever regarding his counsel and the attacks they have publicly made on mueller and this very new, very explosive situation. thanks to jennifer for telling

us about her side of the story. john flannery for your expert e expertise. we have lot more on this right now. another bombshell breaking in the mueller probe is yes, there are tapes and mueller has them. he's listening to roger stone's confrjs calls from 2016 where he's heard saying he was at the time in touch with julian assange and revealing plans about the hacked e-mails before the election. shelby holiday broke this story. here, though, first, is roger stone on that conference call, august 4th, 2016. >> in the background of this entire race going forward, the fact that julian assange, who say anything you want about him, he's not a fool, is going to continue to drop information on the american voters that are going to roil this race. he has made that very clear. >> that same day, stone sent former trump adviser sam nunberg an e-mail that stated, i, quote, dined with mew nigh pal julian assange last night. stone later said that was just a joke, but it was sfebt days

after that that he tweeted to the world, quoteerse trust me. it will soon be podesta's time in the barrel. we know he focused on stone's links to wikileaks and interviewed people about the calls. they were promoted as a call with the political insider there. stone has denied advance knowledge of hacked e-mails. >> let me be very clear. i had no advance knowledge of the source, content, or the exact disclosure timing of the wikileaks disclosures regarding the dnc. i received nothing, including allegedly hacked e-mails from wikileaks or julian assange or the russians or anyone else. >> question is, if he was making all these claims in public and on these conference calls, was any of it going back to the people running the trump campaign? well, i have news on that as well. bob mueller's team questioning steve bannon about these very claims that stone made privately about wikileaks. that's also new tonight. a busy time.

shelby holliday who broke the story put this in context for us. >> so we know that we're reporting today that robert mueller has subpoenaed people and records affiliated with these conference calls that roger stone held. they were started in august and promoted as biweekly conference calls with the man in the arena. you showed that graphic. and on them, he would talk about his relationship and friendship with paul manafort. he would talk about the inner workers of the trump campaign. he was an insider in that he had connections to the trump campaign and he talked about them on the calls. he also talked a lot about wikileaks' plans to release e-mails and he used the quote, roil this race. and a witness in the probe, jason sullivan, who helped him organize the calls said he claimed contact with julian assange. >> is the idea that him claiming it privately more operationally feels more real than what could be dismissed as public boast sng. >> that's possible, but it also could be mueller scrutinizing the number of times roger stone claimed contact with assange. roger now says he never had

contact with assange. but beginning in early august, he talked a lot about being in touch with assange, having a foreshadowing of the materials assange would release. he went on alex jones' show and said he knew what was coming but he couldn't say too much. now it appears that mueller is looking at every single statement and scrutinizing what he said publicly or privately. >> you're being very careful, as you often are meticulous about it, yet david corn who is also with me, there's another way to look at what shelby is saying, because if someone just lies a lot, whoever they may be, investigators find, oh, they lied five times or ten. that's not altogether more interesting the tenth time. if, though, there's a different context, if they're interviewing bannon, who has already been in for several days because they actually think some of these weren't lies, wouldn't it be worse potentially for stone and anyone who worked with him. >> i guess if you can get people testifying to private communications, particularly people who are in a position of trust with roger stone, then that may have more weight than him just saying what he says on alex jones' show or in these

conferences in which he's trying to basically separate people from their money. roger stone's defense at this moment in time is that i am the world's biggest liar. i publicly said again and again that i was in touch with julian assange, i knew what he was doing. >> be honest, david. do you find that a potentially credible defense? >> unfortunately, some people, with roger stone, it is credible. >> was that a yes? david corn, was that a yes? >> yes, it is a yes. because he is known for lying and being a provocateur and saying whatever he thinks is necessary to say at that moment in time. particularly as a self-promoter. at the same time he was doing all this, he was also in touch with gus affccifer 2.0, and in public, he was saying the russians are not involved with this at all. he's writing a story for breitbart and going on and on, defending the russians and

amplifying russian misinformation. so there's a lot, not just on the wikileaks sield, but on the russian side, for roger to account for. >> what do you think of bannon being hauled in? >> it's really interesting because as we have been reporting at the journal, mueller continues to bring stone associated in front of the grand jury and in front of mueller's prosecutors. we know that some of his associates are still talking to mueller. we know they are scrutinizing every comment roger stone made in that time, so steve bannon coming in is significant not just because we know they're focused on roger stone, but because he was actually running trump's campaign and that's the big question here, was there collusion between the trump campaign and russia? vis-a-vis wikileaks. >> and david, before i let you go, your final thought on this bizarre effort that's clearly of interest in washington to try to frame bob mueller? >> you know, i think we still need to figure this out. it could be that the original letter was some sort of hoax to hook in reporter, to report in

something that wasn't true, but your guest coming on and saying she too was approached and there's a surefire outfit that really seems to be a bogus intelligence gathering outfit run by people who are completely unprofessional, there's a lot more here. reminds me of the peter smith effort. remember that during the campaign? >> which rachel covered a lot. >> to try to get the hillary clinton e-mails from russian hackers. there are all these players out there. we see them in every scandal. i'm hoping the fbi can get to the bottom of it, but if the democrats get the house back, this is just one more thing for them to investigate because we may never hear what the fbi finds out about this subject. >> and david and shelby, thank you so much. coming up on a breakdown, donald trump's political promises that aren't possible to fulfill, and i'm going to sheyou what happens when trump's fox news propaganda is debunked on fox news. >> there is no invasion. no one is coming to get you. there's nothing at all to worry

about. and the one and only joy behar is here on the show. can't wait to see her. she's going to talk old trump, new politics. i'm ari melber and you're watching "the beat." can make you feel like you have no limits. but mania, such as unusual changes in your mood, activity or energy levels, can leave you on... ...shaky ground. help take control by asking your healthcare provider about vraylar. vraylar treats acute mania of bipolar i disorder. vraylar significantly reduces overall manic symptoms, and was proven in adults with mixed episodes who have both mania and depression. vraylar should not be used in elderly patients with dementia, due to increased risk of death or stroke. call your doctor about fever, stiff muscles, or confusion, which may mean a life-threatening reaction or uncontrollable muscle movements, which may be permanent. side effects may not appear for several weeks. high cholesterol and weight gain; high blood sugar, which can lead to coma or death; decreased white blood cells, which can be fatal; dizziness upon standing; falls; seizures; impaired judgement;

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politicos. will it be a 2006 midterm backlash to a controversial president that hand the speaker gavel back to nancy pelosi? we never know until election night, but the clues show despite donald trump's attempts to troll and outrage his way into the headlines, the fundamentals show strategists in both parties see the democrats on offense. so yes, watch what the politicians do, not what they say. trump has been talking about a host of last-minute midterm ploys, but his party's spending and battle plan shows a scramble to protect candidates even in red districts that overwhelmingly back trump. take this kentucky district that went for trump by 15 points. republicans sent paul ryan there today, deploying star power to a place that was once a safe seat. same story in red south carolina, a district that went for trump by 13 points. now the gop is buying ads there. so yes, there's plenty of noise about these trump rallies. but look. they are in these red places. playing defense.

as for the swing districts that went for trump last time, democrats just pulled up five points in a key new york race. that's one of the places where independents are the key. and more than half of them now disapprove of trump. or take a red district that featured the tea party insurgency, where dave brat once unseated a top republican, eric cantor. now he's in a dead heat with his democratic challenger. a quarter of voters there are independent and most disapprove, you guessed it, of donald trump. so those are the races that could determine control of the house. swing districts packed with independents. if donald trump is such a great campaign asset, if his closing instincts are so good, surely he and the gop are deploying him in those key districts, right? wrong. and this is one of the largest signs of the political weakness for trump right now. yes, of course, he's campaigning and insulting and shouting, but he's doing all of it at a huge distance away from these key districts. and that's crucial for separating the signal from the

noise. here are the places you're looking at right now where donald trump has been holding this campaign rallies in the midterm homestretch the last two months. they're almost all in states he won in 2016. so he's actually sticking to defending red states where he retains support, not taking his message to those swing districts, let alone going on offense to win back any blue districts. so yes, trump's holding lots of rallies, but no, they're not generally in places likely to decide who wins the house a week from tonight. and while we know trump loves spending money to put his name on anything, buildings, tv screens, whatever, consider how bad he knows he's doing in these districts that he just approved his 2020 campaign spend $6 million on new ads this week that don't even mention him. we have all heard of the witness protection program. this is kind of a president protection program. where he can kind of go underground. his former aide told us this is a necessity because even republicans in the swing

districts don't like him. >> in terms of republican suburban or republican independent leaning women, what we have seen is, one, they do not like donald trump. they don't like the tweeting, they don't like the personality. it's too much for them. >> it's too much. so trump's closing argument is on defense. in red states, for red states, with talk of immigration orders that he doesn't have the power to order and ploys like sending troops to the border this week before the midterms for a caravan that is two months away. a fact check so glaring it even occurred within the confines of fox news. >> you have a highly organized, motivated, and undocumented trove of migrants headed straight to the united states as we speak. where are they from? who brought them here? why are they coming here? an obvious major security concern for the country. >> the migrants, according to fox news reporting, are more than two months away. if any of them actually come here. but tomorrow is one week before the midterm election.

which is what all of this is about. there is no invasion. no one is coming to get you. there's nothing at all to worry about. >> when your red meat message is getting grilled by your own side, you may have a problem. and when you're one of the world's most well known self-promoters and you're spending millions of dollars on ads so you can hide in plain sight, you may know you have a problem. that doesn't mean anyone, certainly not me, knows what's going to happen a week from tonight, because it depends on what everyone does a week from today. that's the great thing about democracy. but sometimes in politics, just like in a bar, the loudest person in the room isn't actually that confident and isn't actually ready to win a big fight. i'm going to get into all of this and a whole lot more when the one and only joy bay behar joined me.

as proms, we're back with the one and only joy behar, co-host of the view, a long time friend of mine. >>ia came to my birthday show at the view. that was so sweet. >> your first time on "the beat." thank you for coming in. >> you're quite welcome. >> i want to start by looking at all of the fun and action, political action you've had in some of your time on "the view." let's take a look. >> okay. >> we're back with senator john mccain. you stood up to that. why are you so different from

everybody else? >> you know a lot about politics, a lot about the law, but do you know about pop culture. >> we need you to stay engaged. >> we need you guys to keep it going. >> i don't know where that is today in the republican party so i'm not comfortable being a part of it. >> which part bothers you. >> it's a give and take, not just from the administration, but also from the news media. >> is the media not supposed to report on the fact that 95% of what he says is a lie? >> you say in the book you should have said this or shouldn't have done that. say it now. say it. >> we got you something that you can just wear from now on. >> back up. >> you get to see a lot more of these people up close than most americans. >> yes. >> what have you learned seeing our politics up close in this country? >> everybody is in the best behavior at "the view" and they're scared of us, too. >> you don't seem that scary. >> i'm not scared. you mean scary? >> yeah. >> they don't know what's going to happen, what we're going to

say. i mean, even joe biden years and years ago told me he would much rather go on "meet the press" that "the view" because "meet the press" is very, "the view" is -- >> it's bah bah bah versus what's the second one? >> by the way, can we give a shout out to that woman who told the fbi or told whoever? >> jennifer tobb. >> they were telling her to say that mueller sexually harassed her. >> can you believe that? >> he's now inoculated against the sexual harassment claim because no one is going to believe it now. >> we had the headline up here, and it said a plot to frame mueller. that's where we are. >> i would like to say salute that lady. >> because she knew what to do and reported it, and now as you say, inoculated. i want to show some of your times with donald trump on "the view" over the years. >> i know him. i went to his second wedding to marla. >> they say the second wedding

is a best one. >> there wasn't a wet eye in the room. >> you have also at times gotten along with him, as you have known. >> who knew he was such a psycho. i liked the guy in a way, like he's a new york character. >> character, yeah. i think that the funny thing about -- i grew up on the west coast, but you spend time in new york and you see some of this people up close and it's different than the way the rest of the country might see them at a distance, perfectly coifed and well presented on a reality show. >> well, new york, as you know probably, did not vote for him. >> i heard that. >> because we knew -- we know. >> i didn't know you were bringing news updates tonight. >> sometimes i have to do that. you know, we know the beast. we knew him. we get it, just like michael bloomberg said, i know a con man when i see one. new yorkers are hip to it. the rest of the country, they really didn't know him the way we do. >> here, let's look at you and him over the years. >> all right. >> he says it's his own hair. so i believe him because i

believe donald. he's an upstanding american, but america doesn't belief him. >> come here. check it out. >> it's true. it's real. >> it's not very pretty, but it's real. >> if you're known as a patsy, as somebody who takes it, i think it's terrible. >> but the adhomnn attacks are really not effective. >> do you think he knew what adhomonym meant? >> no, but he'll pick up one of the things because he is a real creative con type of salesman, he'll pick up anything you say. you say it, he'll say it back to you. fake news was a term that was used to describe the right wing articles that spread on facebook in october that helped him. and after he heard the criticism, he grabbed it. now everyone thinks it's his term. he goes i guess i won. >> also, lock her up and build the wall, i think somebody

mentioned to him at the beginning of one of his rallies. that's good because they responded to it. he doesn't have his own mind. he picks up, as you say. >> but did he change from what we just saw? >> obviously, i never thought that he would be this bad, never. even before he won, i said, well, if he wins, god forbid, he can't be really such a maniac. he's much worse. >> a lot of people said, well, if he wins, he would get a little better, more responsible. you think he's worse. >> i think he's worse. i thought he was also a secret democrat, which he shows us he's not. he's just an anarchist as far as i'm concerned. i don't mean that in an adhomnn sort of way. >> i also want to talk to you about democrats. people love you, people really love you. >> not everybody. the right wing hates my guts. >> here where i'm going. as we say in the business, run and tell that. i'm going to run and tell you that a lot of democrats love you. a lot of your viewers love you. and yet can you always give the love back when you see that

there are mistakes that the democratic party does seem to make? i want to play for you, we put this together, just some of the questionable calls over the course of just the trump era and the question being for your consideration, do you really think the same people should be back in charge after the elections, especially if they take back the house? take a look. >> all right, ari. >> the government this morning is back at work, and boy, is there a lot to do. democrats are divided with some upset chuck schumer didn't fight longer to protect dreamers. >> democrats raised the prospect, raised hopes by sticking together through the shutdown and sticking to their principles they could somehow get protection for the dreamers passed into law. that obviously didn't happen. >> well, look, we have advanced the cause. >> joe manchin is speaking. he just announced his support for brett kavanaugh. >> i gave my reasons for my decision. i had to deal with the facts in front of me. >> chuck schumer somewhat inexplicably cut a huge deal. the democrats agreed to essentially wave through 15 trump judicial nominees.

>> what grade do you give chuck schumer and nancy pelosi? >> well, nancy has been very effective in her job over the years. i understand. i mean, i'm not in the nitty-gritty of what goes on there, but she's been very good. and i like nancy. i think that, you know, it's time to probably move on a little bit. people do get older. >> who would you get rid of first, chuck or nancy? >> chuck, last time he was on "the view" he came alive, like wow. he was actually animated and everything. i didn't think he was doing this bit, which hello, chuck, if you're reading, yes, but when you're reading a prompter, you don't need them. take them off. >> when you see them get outworked and then he says, oh, i made a deal with mitch mcconnell on these judges, and then they get worked over. then he says, they're not being fair. >> because they don't play with the same marbles. the republicans are vicious. mitch mcconnell, i don't want to talk about him. i think you have him on -- i chose him for your throwback person. >> fallback. >> fallback person, that's it.

i chose him. because to me, he's like an improv comic. he makes up as he goes along. today, i think i'll change this rule and i think i'll change that law, and everybody says okay. >> he just gets away with it. does he get away with it because the democrats don't fight hard enough? >> they don't have any power. we know they have no power right now. hopefully, i'm making an ovina that next tuesday they'll get some power back so we can do something, turn the lights on with some power, you know. but he's feckless. >> can i show you also before we go, can i show you fred armisen doing you on snl. >> some day, i pray a woman will be imitating me. >> fair, i'm dapping you. that's fair. let's take a look. >> as if we have never seen this. >> you know what i always say? you know what i say? who cares? just go out and have a glass of pineio grigio.

so what? >> he has captured my philosophy. so what. don't sweat the small stuff. >> isn't that your essence and you can banter with so many people across politics and culture. >> and not care. i care a lot. i care a lot. >> you care a lot. >> sleepless nights. >> you care in a nice, authentic way. you don't demean. >> other people? i try not to. well, you know, it's hard not to with the president pinocchio in the white house. come on. >> you know what your being right now? >> what? >> ad homonym. >> are we done? >> snare they're telling me we' of time. you know how it works. you have something else? >> i'm done. >> are we done? >> i'm done. >> you know what? who cares? so what, we're done. joy behar, thank you for coming by. >> you have been begging me to come op. was it good for you? >> you're asking me was the segment good for me? i think it was great. >> all right, that's all that counts. >> i have been begging you. you're letting the audience in,

because we have known each other a long time. i said come on the show, and then a year in, you hadn't come on the show. they call me up, say come wish joy a happy birthday. i would love to. i would also love it to be mutual. >> when's your birthday? >> march. >> i'll be there. >> okay. >> all right. >> joy behar, the one and only. coming up, the democratic strategy in the face of some ugly rhetoric. >> do you know how the caravan started? i think the democrats had something to do with it. and in that caravan, you have some very bad people. >> but how do you actually address and confront that without playing into trump's hands? we have a very special guest, george lacoff, the framing master, and bill kristol coming up. g, a little bit of water, it really- it rocked our world. i had no idea the amount of damage that water could do. we called usaa. and they greeted me as they always do. sergeant baker, how are you? they were on it. it was unbelievable.

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a catch 22 for the trump era that you have probably talked about once or twice. how do you respond to him without playing into his hands? trump today proposing one of the hardest lines ever on

immigration. he says he would try to overturn birth' right citizenship. he doesn't have the power to do that, so it's another ploy. and that in a sense is similar to many of trump's midterm messages. claiming democrats are an angry mob or they're secretly paying for that caravan or saying the caravan includes middle eastern terrorists. >> going to the middle of the caravan, take your cameras, and search. you're going to find ms-13. you're going to find middle eastern. you're going to find everything. >> are you saying you have evidence that there are terrorists in the caravan right now? >> over the course of the year, over the course of a number of years, they've intercepted many people from the middle east. they intercept -- they could very well be. there's no proof of anything. there's no proof of anything. >> there's no proof of anything. there's actually proof that that is false. and probably a lie. george lakoff is an expert on these debates and the language

of political framing. he's the author of don't think of an elephant, know your values. frame the debate, and bill kristol joins me as well. professor, you know the debate. what is the solution? >> first, what to avoid. avoid negating, as in don't think of an elephant. don't just negate a frame because that just helped the frame. what you do instead is you introduce your own frame. you know, if you're going to talk about the caravan, you talk about a caravan of people who are fleeing poverty and gangs and crime looking to work hard, earn a decent living, and be free. you know, impose your frame. another thing, if you're in the media, there's a very important thing to do. use truth sandwiches. start with the truth. if there's a lie, what you do is give them the truth, you expose

the lie, say what it is. say the truth again, and then follow that up with the consequence of why the truth matters as opposed to the lie. >> you're making bill kristol hungry. >> that's a complicated recipe there for politics. i'm not an expert on this, and honestly, given my failure to stop trump in 2016 and 2015 and other political failures, i'm not sure i'm the best person to speak on how to counteract that rhetoric, but i think you need to call -- >> modesty? what's happening? >> a rare moment after joy behar and all that, i'm intimidated to bow on this very show. i just do think at the end of the day for the sake of our public discourse, you have to call lies lies. you just need to say it. now, maybe there are more skillful and less skillful ways to say it politically, but you cannot let him demonize immigrants, talk about them as less than human beings, you know, just whip up anger and anxiety. we have seen the consequences of

this in the last week, and people need to stand up, serious people need to stand up, and people who are not simple idealogical opponents of his and call them lies. >> it's great that democrats are standing up to trump, but if i were running a congressional race, i would find republican voters and find republicans in that district, actual people, and put them on the air and say, i usually vote republican. that's where i have been most of my life, but i cannot vote for this man. that i think is a little more effective than someone on the other side simply saying, boy, trump is getting worse and worse every day. >> and george, you mentioned truth, which fits into journalists and other people in that role. for opponents of trump, be they political electoral opponents or the so-called resistance, is it also about changing the subject? debating the caravan, which is a far away thing, isn't really the most important thing in the country. >> right? changing the subject is very important. that is part of what reframing

is. saying what you think is most important and getting it out there. >> i want to read a little bit of one of your essays. trump covering for the gop. and you write, trump provides cover for republicans, draws fire from progressives, protecting republicans. attacks on trump aren't directed at republicans as long as trump is the enemy, republicans are not. that's so well stated. we have done reporting on this show about a lot of the wider agenda. looking at what's happening with obamacare, which we hit several times this week, looking at paul ryan on deficits. it seems by being a stylistic out outlier, trump has given them that support, which you identify. >> trump gives cover to republicans. republicans are saying all the same things. they're saying all of the things that support trump. 85% of republicans are pro-trump. but that doesn't come out as such. trump is taking the heat, and he knows how to take it well.

and to turn it back. >> but he's damaging republicans. republicans are going to lose the house of representatives because of trump. the gender gap is a trump specific thing. republicans have held the house for what, 24 of the last 28 years. 20 of the last 24. the house is to their advantage in terms of the districts and so forth. yet i think trump is going to cost them the house. i'm not so sure trump is so wonderful for republicans ultimately and not so sure it's unwise for democrats at times then to hold republicans responsible for what trump is doing. because he's been lucky so far with the economy. he's kind of lucky in foreign policy, but at the end of the day, trump is not going to succeed. reality does matter. and if i were a democrat, i would, you know, make the case against trump rather than sort of try to avoid dealing with him. >> joerm, we have about 20 seconds left, can you speak to that? does reality matter? >> reality matters. and republicans have supported trump. they have legislatively supported trump. and they have supported trump in the media.

so, you know, it's just false that they have been against trump. i don't hear a whole lot of republican criticism of trump. >> this has been interesting. and we'll do it again and maybe even with more time and look, i think reality does matter. i'm going to land on that side of that particular debate. bill and george, thank you both. still ahead, oprah weighing in on the midterms. we'll show it to you next. ito take care of anyct messy situations.. and put irritation in its place.

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we're independent and we know that we've lived long enough to understand that this is a really important moment in our country. >> democracy depends on it. >> okay. not only democracy depends upon it, our country depends upon it. so vote, vote, vote. >> vote! >> i'm not going to do that. november 6th, please vote. >> oprah winfrey making waves tonight with new message on the mid terms. vote. women are expected to be a crucial factor. tomorrow we'll have a panel of women candidates. take a look if this could be another year of the woman. it's an important conversation. we'll bring it to you tomorrow live at 6:00 p.m. eastern on "the beat." we'll be right back. let's begin.

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big news leading off our show tonight that bob mueller's team had brought back steve bannon for a new interview on friday. that's interesting given the roger stone heat. here's what bannon told me this summer about the way that he is a witness in the probe. >> were you a witness of fact to the investigation regarding obstruction or collusion or both? >> i think i'm a witness of fact for all of it. i think i'm a witness of fact for all of it. when they call you up there, they don't bifurcate, they go through the whole thing. i've been to capitol hill a few times. i'm a witness of fact up there. >> how many times did you talk

to mueller's investigators? >> i don't want to go into the details. i had a thorough session. several days. >> several days, that was when we spoke earlier. you can add another one because bob mueller's called bannon back. that does it for us. "ha "hardball" with chris matthews is up next. >> one week from today americans head to the polls for an historic election that will determine the balance of power in congress. >> i'm not on the ballot but in a certain way i'm on the ballot. >> it will either create a check on president trump's power or embolden him. >> i'm really looking to make america great again. >> and it could all come down to texas. >> do we defend freedom or do we give in to tyranny? >> ted cruz has the backing of his former bitter rival. >> he's not lying ted anymore, he's beautiful ted. >> but beto o'rourke has caught

fire. >> i