Ainsley Earhardt previews her interview with President Trump

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Ainsley Earhardt previews her interview with President Trump

'Fox & Friends' co-host sits down with President Trump to discuss allegations made by Michael Cohen; Ainsley Earhardt shares a look at the exclusive interview on 'Hannity.'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," August 22, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: Welcome to "Hannity."

Four hundred and sixty-two days into Robert Mueller's witch hunt, still no evidence of collusion. But tonight, we do have proof the destroy-Trump forces, they are working overtime not only to smear this president but every single person around him -- Manafort, Cohen, Flynn, Papadopoulos all targeted specifically because of crimes that had nothing to do with Russia but because they are friends with the president.

Dozens more of the president's allies now forced to endure what is excruciating, long hours, interrogations, new or serious legal threats and fees, all while the destroy-Trump liberal media is cheering in unison for team Mueller every step of the way. Now, with the midterm elections only 76 days away, Democrats are foaming at the mouth, as I have been warning, using Mueller's witch hunt as the basis for what they want, which is impeachment, so they regain power in Congress. Very scary political future and picture and it's the reason that these upcoming elections, I keep telling you, the most important midterms in our lifetime.

And meanwhile, President Trump is now fighting back. In moments, we will bring you an exclusive preview, Ainsley Earhardt's interview with the president from earlier today.

We will also bring an important update on the horrific murder, that case in Iowa, 20-year-old Mollie Tibbetts senselessly murdered. The illegal immigrant who admitted to this horrific crime appearing in court earlier today, and the president responding with a video on Twitter. We will show you that tape.

Sit tight, buckle up. We have a lot to get to in tonight's breaking opening monologue.

(MUSIC)

HANNITY: All right. Since March of last year, I have been warning you, the American people about five forces that are working to destroy President Trump. You have partisan deep state bureaucrats. We learned a lot about them in the last year and a half.

Liberal Democrats, your corrupt, pathetic media, weak establishment Republicans and this group called never-Trumpers. Yesterday, what we have been telling you for more than a year is playing out as we predicted. Led by Robert Mueller's merry band, the Democratic donors and witch hunters, the deep state has successfully now targeted several Trump associates. They never would have been targeted if they weren't friends with the president.

And yesterday, Paul Manafort, he was convicted on 8 of 18 bank and tax fraud charges. Nothing to do with Russia collusion and during an exclusive interview that will air tomorrow morning on "Fox & Friends", President Trump weighed in on that and so much more.

Let's get a sneak peek.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AINSLEY EARHARDT, CO-HOST, "FOX & FRIENDS": Are you considering pardoning Paul Manafort?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I have great respect for what he's done in terms of what he's gone through. You know, he worked for Ronald Reagan for years. He worked for bob dole. I guess his firm worked for McCain. He worked for many, many people. Many, many years, and I would say what he did, some of the charges they threw against them, every consultant, every lobbyist in Washington probably does.

If you look at Hillary Clinton's person, you take a look at the people that work for Hillary Clinton. Look at the crimes that Clinton did with the emails and she deletes 33,000 emails after she gets a subpoena from Congress and this Justice Department does nothing about it? And all of the other crimes that they've done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: We're going to have a lot more on the blatant legal double standard in the moment but first, also yesterday, prosecutors compelled Michael Cohen to plead guilty to bank and tax fraud charges and some phony campaign finance violations.

Again, none of these charges have anything to do with Russia, Russia collusion, President Trump or the election of 2016.

And last night, right here on this program last night, the great one, Mark Levin, completely debunked campaign at related charges. Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK LEVIN, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: The general counsel for the Clinton mob family Lanny Davis, he had his client pleaded to two counts of criminality that don't exist. These campaign finance violations all over TV, they're saying implicates the president of the United States directly.

First, let's back up. It is a guilty plea. It is a plea bargain between a prosecutor and a criminal -- the criminal who doesn't want to spend the rest of his life in prison.

That is not precedent. That applies only to that specific case. Nobody cites plea bargains for precedent. That's number one.

Number two, just because a prosecutor says that somebody violated a campaign law, doesn't make it so. He's not the judge, he's not the jury. We didn't adjudicate anything, it never went to court. That's number two.

A campaign expenditure under our federal campaign laws is an expenditure solely for campaign activity. A candidate who spends his own money or even corporate money for an event that occurred not as a result of the campaign, it is not a campaign expenditure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: In other words, most of the liberal lawyers who see on TV are dopes. They don't know the law.

Look at Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz also debunking these charges. Guys, watch, listen, learn. It will help you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, HARVARD LAW PROFESSOR: The law is clear that a president may contribute to his own campaign. So, if the president had paid $280,000 to these two women, even if he had done so in order to help his campaign, that would be no problem. That's legal. And if Cohen himself made the contribution, that would be unlawful because he has a limit of $5,200.

So, the complicated issue is, what if Trump told him to do it, as Cohen says. Then, Cohen would be acting for Trump, as Trump's representative, and the campaign contribution would be lawful as long as the president ultimately paid for it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: That's 100 percent right. That's the law. And during an interview with Ainsley Earhardt again, she will join us in a few minutes, the president reiterated these payments were in no way a campaign finance violation. Look at the law.

Take a look, listen, learn.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EARHARDT: Did you know about the payments?

TRUMP: Later on I knew. Later on.

But you have to understand, Ainsley, what he did, and they weren't taken out of campaign finance. That's a big thing. That's a much bigger thing.

Did they come out of the campaign? They didn't come out of the campaign. They came for me and I tweeted about it. You know, I put -- I don't know if you know, but I tweeted about the payments.

But they didn't come out of campaign. In fact, my first question when I heard about it was, did they come out of the campaign? Because that could be a little dicey, and they didn't come out of the campaign and that's big.

But they weren't -- that's not a -- it's not even a campaign violation. If you look at President Obama, he had a massive campaign violation, but he had a different attorney general and they viewed it a lot differently.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Now, while the media, they want you to believe that Michael Cohen, a central player in all things Trump, the president, well, he had a much different take. Let's listen to him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EARHARDT: Michael Cohen, tell me about your relationship with him.

TRUMP: Well, he was a lawyer for me for one of many -- you know, they always say, the lawyer and then they like to add the fixer. Well, I don't know if he's a fixer. I don't know where that term came from.

He's been a lawyer for me. Didn't do big deals, did small deals. Not somebody that was with me that much. You know, they make it sound like I didn't live without him.

I understood Michael Cohen very well. He -- it turned out he wasn't a very good lawyer, frankly. But he was somebody that was probably with me for about ten years. And I would see him sometimes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Now, Michael Cohen's attorney Lanny Davis said that his client would not even accept a pardon from the president. He actually said that today.

Lanny, I've known you a lot of years, who are you representing here? That Michael Cohen wouldn't accept a pardon? He's facing as many as five years in jail?

Look, Lanny, I know you are so embedded into the Clintons, you love all things Clinton, but you are supposed to represent Michael here and if he was ever offered a pardon, it would be pretty stupid not to take it. What a disservice.

Now, no person would be better off spending years in prison with a felony conviction on their track record or getting a pardon. Basic simple common sense, Lanny.

Now, regardless of what you think about Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort. It is clear they have been targeted. They have been singled out for their one time connection to President Trump and now both men, you can add Michael Flynn and George Papadopoulos, they all face time in jail.

A horrible example of what we have been exposing on this program, a two- tiered justice system. Equal justice under the law, equal application of our laws, that's -- the great system of our constitutional republic.

In 2008, you may recall the Obama campaign, they kept $1.3 million in illegal contributions. Guess what? Nobody got charged. Nobody got indicted. Nobody went to prison. No one was slapped with a felony, just a campaign-wide fine, 375 grand.

2017, the Clinton campaign, the DNC, they were reported to the FEC for failing to properly disclose their financial contributions to the dirty dossier. You know, those funneled through Perkins Coie, the law firm that then hired, oh, Fusion GPS, the op research group that then hired Christopher Steele, the foreign nationals not supposed to impact our election, that then paid for Russian lies that he doesn't even stand by. Then became the basis to lie to the American people before the campaign, then became the basis of four FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign associate.

That's the whole thing. They didn't report that money. They paid -- oh, that's a legal expense. It wasn't. Robert Mueller, nowhere to be found.

And on the tax front in 2015, according to a report from the then- Congressman Jason Chaffetz, he's in for Laura Ingraham tonight. Federal workers owed a billion dollars in unpaid taxes. That's right, they work for your government, including many in Obama's White House.

Of course, no special counsel, no investigation, no indictment, nothing against these tax cheats. Remember tax cheat Geithner? They are working our federal government, a lot. A billion dollars is kind of a lot of money. I read that somewhere.

It's not really clear that there is one system of justice for Hillary Clinton, the Democrats, deep state bureaucrats. The Obama White House, they have one system of justice. Anyone else, you and me, anyone tied to Donald Trump, a different system of justice.

This republic can't survive with a dual justice system, which brings us to our next critical point. I have been shouting this from the rooftops since May. We are about to face what I'm calling the most important midterm elections in our lifetime, 76 days from today, while the deep state is working around the clock to dig up dirt on anybody, anything associated with this president that you elected, the American people, Democrats are now planning to use this information to bring articles of impeachment against the president.

It doesn't matter that there's no collusion. Mark Levin was right last night. Robert Mueller will write an impeachment document. It doesn't matter that the president did nothing wrong and broke no law.

Mark my words, if Democrats, if you stay home on election day, and Democrats take back the House of Representatives, I promise you, mark my words, they will bring articles of impeachment against the president. I have been warning about this for a long time. If you don't believe it now, I don't know what will make you believe it.

Seventy-six days, you will decide if the president and his agenda goes forward, because they will stop that. If this November, the future of this continued successful economic boom continued peace through strength, all of this, a lot of stuff at stake, and sadly, that's not all. We know what the Democratic agenda is. It's pretty scary actually.

What they called crumbs, your tax cuts, they want their crimes back and as we said, they want to impeach the president. As we told you, they want to preserve Obamacare. Lose your doctor, lose your plan, pay more. That seems to work for them.

They want to block Judge Kavanaugh and constitutionalists to the Supreme Court, originalists. They want open borders. They want to eliminate ICE. They are saying as much.

They want to kill off all of these investigations, just drop it right there for their deep state friends and this massive abuse of power and that we have been able to expose.

And as always, the mainstream media, the destroy-Trump media, they are just doing the bidding of the left, the Democratic Party. They are an extension of their press office and like a broken record, from what seems like the millionth time, the crisis peddlers in the news media in this country, the echo chamber, they are all predicting the same thing because it's what they are hoping for, impeachment.

This is what they wanted for a long time. This is their shot. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Given the events of today, the likelihood of impeachment, I'm not saying it's high but it certainly went up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeach.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president is clearly guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors. He should resign his office or be impeached.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today, the term presidency took a giant step toward impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment implications are now in the air.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If it is a crime it certainly is an impeachable offense.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeach Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Impeachment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Remember s-hole, s-hole, s-hole. Remember Stormy, Stormy, Stormy. Russia, Russia, Russia.

They hyperventilate over whatever the issue is of the day. For over 24 hours, your apocalyptic press have been working overtime in overdrive, pushing anti-Trump conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory.

We have the evidence, take a look. You decide.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The man who once said he would take a bullet for Donald Trump today in federal court was essentially calling his old boss and client now the president of the United States, a crook.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So there are a lot of players now who start to potentially construct an enterprise, a criminal enterprise that is around, or may even involve the president.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As of now and is not going to change that Donald Trump is indeed a scumbag. Voters know that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just -- I think there is something worse than useful idiots and that would be a useful idiot under legal siege and that is what president Donald Trump is this morning.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: You really want to stay home in 76 days? Do you vote for the president, happy with the economy? You want to stay the course, you like the judges appointed, you want borders secured? Do you want health care transformed? Do you want peace through strength?

But it's this kind of reckless abuse of bias, it's the very reason the president has rightly criticized the media, including this moment in his interview on "Fox & Friends" that will air tomorrow morning with Ainsley. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EARHARDT: The press. It is the press the enemy of the people?

TRUMP: No, not at all, but the fake news is and the fake news is comprised of -- it's a big chunk, OK? Somebody said, what's the chunk? I said 80 percent. It's a lot. It's a lot.

If I do something well, it's not reported, other than in the 20 percent. I mean, "The New York Times" cannot write a good story about me. They are crazed. They are like lunatics.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: As you can see from tonight's monologue, I told you a long time ago, the very beginning, it actually started the day he and Melania came down the escalator. Five forces that have been working against the president, they are now more active. They sense there's blood in the water. They are literally harmoniously working together and, yes, most of them would love the impeachment of the president you voted for and stop the progress, ruin his agenda.

Now, this is real and never has it been more important if you care about your vote in 2016, you might want to register and vote knowing that this hate, this destruction, this havoc that will occur if the Democrats take back the House. It's a clear and present danger.

So, don't tell me, by the way, the morning after the election, that you didn't have sufficient knowledge of what they would do. Seventy-six days from today, you have a massive opportunity to protect your vote in 2016, preserve that vote, repair the system of justice, make this country a better place for every American.

There's a lot riding on this midterm. They want to undo the agenda you voted for. They want to stop the progress we have obviously made that they will never talk about in the media.

All right. Before we wrap up our monologue tonight, let's turn to this horrific sad story out of Iowa. Twenty-year-old college student Mollie Tibbetts senselessly murdered. Her body recovered in a cornfield and now, a Mexican national in this country illegally has now confessed to stalking and murdering Mollie Tibbetts while she was out jogging.

The monster likely responsible for this crime is now being held on $5 million in bail.

Earlier today, the president, he reacted on Twitter. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Mollie Tibbetts, an incredible young woman, is now permanently separated from her family. A person came in from Mexico illegally and killed her. We need the wall, we need our immigration laws changed, we need our border laws changed. We need Republicans to do it because the Democrats aren't going to do it.

To the family of Mollie Tibbetts, all I can say is God bless you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Foxnews.com has been covering the tragic story for weeks. We will have more coverage on this later in the show.

Joining us now first with reaction our top story of the night, back from her exclusive interview with the president today, she is "Fox and Friends" co-host, Ainsley Earhardt.

How are you? Good to see you.

EARHARDT: Hi. Good seeing you, Sean.

HANNITY: What's going on? Congratulations.

EARHARDT: Thank you for having me on.

HANNITY: Big interview. There's a lot there.

Let's first start to the news from yesterday. He talked a lot about Michael Cohen. We just heard part of it, Paul Manafort. Tell us what you see.

EARHARDT: Well, so, when we sat down with him, my questions were Michael Cohen story changed. Originally, he said that I paid off women, the president didn't know about it, and then all of a sudden, his story changes. And then he's also pleading guilty to eight different counts.

So, do we believe him? That was the question this morning. You know, this is a guy that's lied, tax returns, fraud, all this, and now he's changing his story about the president. So when I sat down with the president, I said, my number one question that I wanted to ask him is what happened? Did you know? Did he pay off these women? Did you know about it?

And he said, I didn't at first and now I know about it and he -- I said, well, if it wasn't illegal, because we've had several attorneys that have been on our morning show saying it's not illegal to do this, so if it's not illegal, then how did he get a plea bargain? How did he get -- he was facing 65 years behind bars in prison. How did he go from 65 years possibly max to three to five years? If it wasn't illegal, why are they using that?

He said because if there something negative that they can say about me, they will use that and they will lessen their sentence, that extreme just because they hate me. Keep in mind, this is the Mueller investigation.

HANNITY: Right.

EARHARDT: The Mueller investigation was looking into Manafort's past, was looking into Cohen's past and that led them to all of these tax fraud. It has nothing to do with Russia.

HANNITY: Is he more mad at Michael because of the tape than, say, Paul Manafort?

EARHARDT: Absolutely, yes.

HANNITY: Because I noticed in his comments yesterday, he mentioned Manafort but not Michael.

EARHARDT: He mentioned pardoning Manafort and then you have Michael Cohen's attorney, Lanny Davis.

HANNITY: He did mentioning pardoning Manafort.

EARHARDT: He did, he did, and said that he considered that. He feels I think -- I think he feels so -- I think he feels bad for Manafort.

They were friends. He didn't work for him for very long. Worked for him for basically 100 days. The president didn't know about all of the tax stuff. Of course, he wouldn't know about that.

HANNITY: That was way before their relationship, yes.

EARHARDT: And he did say, he said, keep in mind who worked for Reagan for a long time.

HANNITY: He worked for a lot of people.

EARHARDT: And no one is talking about that, yes. Just because he is associated with me and they hate me so much.

HANNITY: Did you -- well, what I'm pointing out and I believe and I talked about this for a long time is that there are these forces against the president. I talk about five of them.

I also believe with the Democrats agenda, they are telegraphing it. Seventy-six days from now, there's going to be an election.

EARHARDT: Right, midterm.

HANNITY: I believe, and I've been saying on the air that they would want to impeach him. Did any of -- with all the hysteria in the media. Did that come up at all?

EARHARDT: It did. I asked him that question. I said, if the Democrats win the midterms, their agenda is going to be to impeach because there's no Russia collusion at least so far. So what's the next step if they hate you so much? What are they going to do?

And he agreed that impeachment -- they are going to try to impeach and he says he basically expects that.

HANNITY: You know, there so many key players here and there is such a double standard, because we have -- we know a lot.

We know Hillary obstructed. We know that she paid for Russian propaganda to influence the American people, which is kind of cheating because it was never verified or corroborated. These were lies that she paid for, funneled money, which is another issue we just pointed out.

But then you've got, you know, you got the FISA warrant abuse. Nobody seems -- nobody's getting indicted in those cases. A lot of this goes back to Jeff Sessions.

EARHARDT: Yes.

HANNITY: And did he talk about either Jeff or Rod or Mueller?

EARHARDT: He did, he did, he did. I can't tell you about what he said about that but I did ask him. I've got to save it for the morning show.

HANNITY: Well, give us --

EARHARDT: I did ask him, I said, are you going to fire Jeff Sessions? There are rumors you're gong to fire him. There are rumors you're going to fire Rosenstein, and, you know, what are you thinking?

And I'm not going to tell you. You got to watch the morning show because I can't give it all the way here, but he did say --

HANNITY: Wait a minute, this is too important. Give us -- yes.

EARHARDT: He did say that it's such a double standard, beyond a double standard what happened with Hillary Clinton, how she got off, what happened with the IT guys and Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

(CROSSTALK)

EARHARDT: That's going to break news, yes.

HANNITY: What he said about Sessions and Rosenstein and Mueller?

EARHARDT: Absolutely, absolutely.

HANNITY: Wow. What else can you tell us?

EARHARDT: There was so much more. We asked him about Mollie Tibbetts and ICE and how he has doubled down. You know, he's gotten -- so many people are saying abolish ICE, abolish ICE, but he doubles down. He brings ICE to the White House and honors them.

HANNITY: So, there is a lot of news here that people want to see in the morning.

EARHARDT: I was really -- I will say, there was so much breaking news yesterday and there was so much negative news, hats off to him for sitting down with me today. I think that was very brave because we learned in journalism school, if someone sets a narrative you've got to defend yourself.

HANNITY: All right. Six a.m. tomorrow.

Thank you for sharing your interview with us. We appreciate it.

EARHARDT: Thank you so much.

HANNITY: Tomorrow morning, 6:00 to 9:00.

All right. We have a lot more coming up straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Just minutes ago, the president tweeted out: The only thing that I have done wrong is to win an election that was expected to be won by crooked Hillary Clinton and the Democrats. The problem is they forgot to campaign in numerous states.

Here with reaction: author of now three weeks and running number one New York Times bestseller, "The Russian Hoax: The Illicit Scheme to Clear Hillary Clinton and Frame Donald Trump", FOX News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett, and Fox News investigative reporter, contributor, Sara Carter.

I was a little intrigued by what Ainsley said about in the interview -- she didn't give us -- about Rod Rosenstein and Sessions. It seems at this point, we're never going to get -- they are defying subpoenas, they're not listening. Jeff Sessions literally created this mess.

GREGG JARRETT, FOX NEWS LEGAL ANALYST: Here's why they should be fired: I talked to a former career guy, a lawyer at the Department of Justice today. He said it is outrageous that Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein would authorize a guilty plea to a non-crime and this is a guy who spent much of his career doing election law and he laughed and he said, this is not a crime. It's not a violation of federal election laws for several reasons.

First of all, you can -- it's not a crime to contribute to your own campaign and that's what the president did. Even if he ran it through an LLC temporarily, that's nothing more than a loan or advance, that is not a crime.

And second of all, he said it doesn't even count as a campaign expense, why? Because there is another dual purpose of personal or commercial reason for it. So, this is outrageous that there was a guilty plea for a non-crime.

HANNITY: Wait a minute, two of the eight counts we are talking about here, not one, two.

JARRETT: Right. And they were -- Professor Dershowitz is right. They're add-ons. They didn't care about Michael Cohen. They wanted to give him a sweetheart deal so that he would say something to implicate the president and he implicated the president in a non-crime.

HANNITY: You know, whether or not the media is aware of the issues we pointed out in many of the stories that you've been able to break, Sara, there are still legal issues that are out there. We still have top -- we have Comey and McCabe and Strzok and Page and Sally Yates and this deep state. We do have FISA court judges lied to. We did have a fix in the investigation with Hillary Clinton and the evidence was overwhelming and incontrovertible. The biggest obstruction case we've ever seen.

So all of this is still percolating as the media is getting all giddy here and I know for a fact--

SARA CARTER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: But there--

HANNITY: -- there's a lot more information coming out probably sooner than later.

CARTER: Absolutely. Let me just go to one point, Sean, about Mueller. This is the most important point. As he's targeting everyone in Trump campaign, previous campaign officials, remember, its Attorney General Jeff Sessions that was with him for some point in time.

Rod Rosenstein also wrote the letter that asked President Trump to basically fire Comey and he listed out a number of reasons.

So let's think about this. Jeff Sessions could be a potential witness. If that leads me to suspect that he may himself resign from the position of attorney general eventually if he is called by Mueller. He can't serve as the attorney general and then be a witness, and then you have Rod Rosenstein.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Well, Rod Rosenstein has already been conflicted the whole time.

CARTER: Isn't he a potential witness? Yes, of course. He's been conflicted. So these are two very real possibilities. If something that can happen.

And mark my word, this is something that could drag Jeff Sessions right into the Mueller investigation, so the irony here is that it may work in the favor of getting rid of Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein.

JARRETT: Think about this. Mueller is already interviewed his own boss Rod Rosenstein. I mean, talk about a conflict of interest.

HANNITY: There's a new book out. It's not as good as yours of course, no. But Peter Schweizer is the guy that brought us Uranium One, the guy that brought us Clinton Cash.

(CROSSTALK)

JARRETT: Government Accountability Institute.

HANNITY: Government accountability. Do you know that Jim Comey worked for Lockheed Martin?

JARRETT: That's right.

HANNITY: We're going to break a lot of this tomorrow. I'm just getting a little teaser here. In one year, 2009, alone, they say in the book that James Comey was paid $6.1 million just for Lockheed Martin working for them--

JARRETT: Right.

HANNITY: -- and this was on, you know, new important spy information. I'm not suggesting anything necessarily as nefarious but it's never been disclosed and that Robert Mueller was at the FBI and that signed off on that 6.1 -- in that one year, there's five other years I don't know how much he got paid of the other five. He also got $6 million that reports from a hedge fund. That's an awful lot of money it seems to me.

JARRETT: Yes. These guys were leveraging their government positions according to the book to enrich themselves and the company and the private sector they were working for.

HANNITY: Yes.

JARRETT: It's very much the same arguments I make in my book of how they were leveraging their relationship with each other for a long period of time, in which is why this is a conflict of interest for Mueller to be investigating the president on a case in which his longtime friend, ally and partner, James Comey, is a key witness against the president.

HANNITY: I think when people see this and Sara, give us a little hint of what you are working on in the next couple of weeks.

CARTER: Well, we have a lot more stories coming forward. Especially on the Clinton Foundation and members of the FBI and a little bit more on the FISA application. So, I say, stay tuned.

HANNITY: I can't wait to talk to those FISA court judges that were fraud was perpetrated. I wonder how they feel. I was brought up old-fashioned that if you are subpoenaed you don't delete your e-mails and acid wash the hard drive and bust up devices.

And I was also taught to a judge you say yes, your honor, no, your honor, and you don't purposefully lie to judges to get a warrant to spy on opposition party candidate but I might just be old-fashioned. I'm maybe a little bit out of touch and I know that's not the same as let's see, taxes going back 10 years.

JARRETT: You wouldn't fit in the current DOJ, FBI.

HANNITY: All right. Good work, both of you. When we come back, Michelle Malkin, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi reacting to an illegal immigrant charged in Mollie Tibbetts murder. And later, Newt Gingrich joins us as well. A lot to get to tonight. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: All right. Earlier tonight the president released a video on Twitter talking about the murder of Mollie Tibbetts, about the need for border security. We showed you that earlier.

And joining us now with reaction, she is the host of CRTV's Michelle Malkin Investigates, Michelle Malkin. Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. By the way, she's filling in on the Five this week. Congratulations. Good for you.

PAM BONDI, FLORIDA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Thank you.

HANNITY: They are a great group of people, everyone is great on the show.

BONDI: Awesome.

HANNITY: Let me start with you. You have a lot of statistics.

BONDI: yes.

HANNITY: This election, we hear all these people. We hear about the sanctuary cities which basically to me is aiding and abetting lawbreaking because we do have laws, we are a nation of laws. The same thing with abolishing ICE and demonizing them for doing their job.

BONDI: Right. So our ICE agents do so much in this country for us and in Florida alone as attorney general they are amazing. Look at this, OK, first of all, there are so many gangs from out of this country in my state.

Listen to this. In 2014 with no border security, 1200 criminal gangs were identified, 1200 separate gangs, 53,000 documented gang members, documented by law enforcement.

HANNITY: In Florida.

BONDI: In Florida. And over 11,000 gangs in prison or on DOC supervision in my state. That's why we have to build a wall.

HANNITY: Why would you send them back if they are in the justice system?

BONDI: Exactly. And they are not only doing burglaries, robberies, supporting drug habits, they're into human trafficking.

HANNITY: Well, we can't bring Kate Steinle back and we're not going to be able to bring Mollie Tibbetts back. Michelle, Pam is talking about one state. I mentioned it a lot on the air. We've shown it a lot on the air. But down to the border, Rio Grande to San Diego at least a dozen times.

Horseback, all terrain vehicle, my horseback was embarrassing. Helicopters, boats, I've been there. I sat through a security briefing in Texas alone. During a seven year period 642,000 crimes committed against Texans alone.

This is, and by the way, some of those were murder. And some of them are heinous violent crimes. To me, the fact that we haven't secure the border and Democrats don't want to secure the border, it probably could be campaign issue number one and 76 days, Michelle.

MICHELLE MALKIN, HOST, CRTV: Well, it should be. And it will be if Americans finally rise up and push back against the politicization of this issue. Not by President Trump and not Republicans and conservatives who are talking about Mollie Tibbetts' death today.

And who talk about criminal activity of illegal aliens pretty much every day as I have for the last 25 years, I've devoted much of my career to exposing the bloody consequences of open borders. I wrote two books about it. I too have been to the border many times and I have many sources I have developed at all levels of government that deal with these problems.

Here's the point. The case that we are talking about today underscores a message I have been sending. These examples are arguments for more and vigorous and better enforcement and not less and as a campaign issue you have Democrats who are all lockstep that ICE should be abolished.

They are finally openly brazenly, like Keith Ellison is saying that we should have no borders at all. It is a disgrace. You've got Elizabeth Warren now lecturing people about which family separations they should be caring about.

Mollie Tibbetts has been permanently, violently separated from her family. Of course we should care. And now you have members of the media who are attacking this channel and people on it for caring about cases like this that happen every single day.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Yes, people on Fox are talking about this. I want to get to that in the next segment. It is sad -- and this is preventable. That's the thing. And especially, you know, you look at the sanctuary city laws and, Pam, this is what -- they won't hand over to ICE people that are in the criminal justice system. They literally refused to obey the law.

Why again, it's all like Hillary and her e-mails that, you know, delete, destroy, break up devices. I think I'd go to jail if I committed a fraud to FISA judges, I think I would go to jail. These are dumb things to do.

I also think that if I was able to release a criminal and hide them and not hand them over to law enforcement, why do I think I would go to jail on that too? And how do they all get away with it? Because they are complicit, they are aiding and abetting crimes.

BONDI: They certainly are and then you have people like Elizabeth Warren enabling them by her ridiculous statements about this is one girl who died, how sorry she is. But we have to look at what's best for all of these illegal immigrants. Well, one death is too much.

HANNITY: Yes. But it's OK if you don't pay her taxes and your friends with Donald Trump or rely on the loan application and your friends with Donald Trump. There is our two-tier justice system. Michelle Malkin.

MALKIN: Yes. I want to say this too. There's no such thing as a free lunch and there's no such thing as cheap, illegal alien labor. Every person in this country has a responsibility to help uphold our immigration laws and that includes employers.

E-verify is only used by 10 percent of employers in America. That is astonishing. They need to be both real civil and criminal penalties for employers who knowingly and intentionally and deliberately employ illegal aliens in this country. They have blood on their hands too.

HANNITY: All right. Michelle Malkin, thank you. Congrats, Pam, on The Five all week here on the Fox News Channel. You don't want to miss it.

When we come back, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich will talk about the election in 76 days. Mollie Tibbetts' murder, wait until you hear what was set on conspiracy TV MSNBC. And his reaction to Manafort and Cohen and will be ever get to the truth about lying to FISA judges and fixing and rigging an investigation into Hillary? Straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TRUMP: You heard about today with the illegal alien coming in very sadly from Mexico and you saw what happened to that incredible beautiful young woman. It should have never happened. Illegally in our country.

We had a huge impact but the laws are so bad. The immigration laws are such a disgrace. We are getting them changed, but we have to get more Republicans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: All right. The president last night reacting to the arrest of an illegal immigrant for the murder of Iowa college student Mollie Tibbetts. Yesterday, just hours after the arrest, well, a guest on conspiracy TV MSNBC while bashing President Trump and Fox News refer to this young woman Mollie Tibbetts as, quote, "a girl in Iowa." really? Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTINA GREER, PROFESSOR, FORDHAM UNIVERSITY: They have been so willing to move the goal post every single time with this president, no matter what he says, no matter what he does, right?

The fact that he was even sworn in as president after the Access Hollywood tape let me know for a fact that the Republican Party is actually not working on behalf of the American people, they're working on behalf of Donald Trump. And he's been able to bully them into their silence and I don't think that today changes much unfortunately.

I'm sure we'll hear about what he has to say about this at his rally. But Fox News is talking about, you know, a girl in Iowa and not this, right?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: All right. So the MSNBC guest later apologized for the comment and tweeted out, quote, "Yesterday I said something flippant that was unintended. Mollie Tibbetts was a promising young woman who lost her life. My hope is that her family will find peace and justice and that her murder is not used to justify a discriminatory immigration policy." Wow.

Joining us with more, he is the author of the best seller, "Trump's America: The Truth About our Nation's Great Comeback," former Speaker of the House, Fox News contributor Newt Gingrich.

It's actually the opposite of what this person, this girl over at MSNBC has said and this woman is saying and that is it's really clear that the Trump economy, which you point out in the first half of your book, is what is driving so many people to support him.

We have a record low unemployment, 14 states. African-Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian-Americans. Youth unemployment is at an almost all-time low. Women in the workplace.

So that is a big part of the story and yes, he wants to protect our nation from what is happening with illegal immigration. NEWT GINGRICH, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, look, I think it's very telling that Mollie Tibbetts was an American, a young lady with a great future. She was killed. The person who killed her was illegally in the United States.

Now when people say well, we would like to protect Americans but let's not discriminate, look, if discriminating means you are to discriminate against criminals, let's have a debate. I'm pro-discrimination against MS-13. I am pro-discrimination against violent criminals. I am pro-discrimination in favor of Americans having their lives saved.

So let's talk about what the left means by discrimination, because in their use of the word in the end it means open borders. It means abolishing ICE, it means anybody who wants to can come in and it means a total lack of judgment.

And I think that Mollie Tibbetts could be a more important person in September and October than Paul Manafort ever dreamed of, because while he was convicted of things he did as a private citizen, none of them involving Donald Trump.

She was killed by a person who is exactly what Trump has been warning about and I think the left has to bear the burden of being the party that's tolerating Americans being killed by people who are here illegally.

HANNITY: Well, I want to talk about with 76 days away from this election. You are one of the great political strategist in our time. You took back control of Congress for the first time for Republicans in 40 years. I was there the night you became speaker, 1994.

But I want to look at these. we got, for example, General Flynn lying to the FBI. Papadopoulos lying to the FBI or lying to investigators. Then you've got tax, bank fraud, Cohen, Manafort and then you have campaign finance issues, which, again, every smart lawyer knows doesn't impact Donald Trump at all.

And my question to you is what does this have to do with Russia? Because I'm beginning to sense and feel that everybody is so overreached and people are asking this is it? This is what the Russia thing is? That I think it's going to create a backlash in 76 days that may be people aren't seeing.

GINGRICH: We are in the middle of a two-universe fight over the nature of America. The left would like Paul Manafort and all these other legal things to be the deciding issue in September and October.

We want lowest black unemployment in American history. Lowest Latino unemployment in American history. Over 4 percent real growth. Wages going up. Americans having conservative judges approved in record numbers. Bad regulations being thrown out in record numbers.

We want to have a debate in which our universe is a universe of real accomplishments and their universe is a universe of essentially trying to block everything, and I think if we communicate that correctly, we will win by a huge margin.

You know, I did this the other night with you and you were shocked, I think I was on your radio show -- because I was so optimistic. And you said, are you really this optimistic and my answer is simple.

If the president and his team and the Republicans in Congress and their consultants can wage a campaign that insists that this election is about the issues that matter to the American people, we will shock people on election night with one of the most astounding off year elections in history.

HANNITY: I agree with that. All right. Newt Gingrich, thank you for joining us. When we come back, Rush Limbaugh mocking Robert Mueller earlier today. We've got the video. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: All right. Rush Limbaugh was earlier on today with the special counsel and his witch hunt, Robert Mueller.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUSH LIMBAUGH, TALK SHOW HOST: Add this to the reasons this has me so frosted and why all of this is a fraud. Mr. Integrity, Mr. Honor, Robert Mueller knows all of this lawbreaking went on and he's ignoring it. And so does everybody else in this investigation know that everything about this is bogus and fraudulent and it didn't happen.

And yet they pursue it while at the same time ignoring the real crimes that they participated in themselves. And that's why I say all of this is an ongoing continued cover-up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Check mate, Rush. All true. All right. That's all the time we have. We will always be fair and balanced. We're not the destroy-Trump media.

Quick programming note. Don't forget. Set your alarm. Wake up early. You can watch the entire interview, Ainsley's interview with President Trump tomorrow morning on "Fox & Friends" starting at 6 a.m. We hope you will tune in.

Also tonight at 11 p.m. Shannon Bream has an exclusive interview with one of the Paul Manafort jurors. That's tonight at 11. All right. As always, thank you for being with us. And let not your heart be troubled. The news never stops. It continues in second for a second, filling in for Ingraham, former Congressman Jason Chaffetz. Sir?

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