STEPHANIE RUHLE (HOST): First of all, yesterday, Sean Spicer said Russia, President Trump's not speaking about it. That's over to the lawyers. And then the president tweeted about it this morning. He continues to contradict his own communications team. What's the deal here?

MATT WELCH: Yeah, and it's going to get him in trouble in this. He won't be -- you referenced executive privilege at the top -- he won't be able to use executive privilege, I don't think, because of -- he's tweeting about this too much.

From the June 1 edition of MSNBC Live with Hallie Jackson:

HALLIE JACKSON (HOST): Pete Williams, I want to get over to you because James Comey has been, in the words of a source close to him, “cleared for takeoff” to testify in front of Congress next week. But what do we know about the president's ability to maybe block this testimony, unilaterally, from happening? 

PETE WILLIAMS: Well the president could, in theory, invoke executive privileges. But there's three reasons why that may not work. Number one, James Comey doesn't work for the government anymore because the president fired him. So the president's ability to tell James Comey to do or not to do anything, is pretty limited. The second reason is that the president has made it a little hard to say -- remember the theory of executive privilege is you want to have confidential conversations, you want the executive, the president, to be able to get advice from people without fearing that it's become public. The president has to a large extent already opened this door by talking about his discussions with Comey. And the third thing is this, even an assertion of executive privilege isn't absolute. And the president, remember, has a couple of times actually invited Congress to investigate certain aspects of this. The tweet this morning is the latest example. So it's pretty hard for the president to try to frustrate a congressional investigation that he has, to some extent, invited. And finally I guess this is the other thing is, if it came to it, they could go to court and try to force it. But for all these reasons I think trying to use executive privilege to stop Mr. Comey from testifying is not going to be very successful.

Previously:

Trump Lied About Why He Fired Comey, And Right-Wing Media Helped Him Sell It

Law School Dean: Trump's Comey Actions “Are Evidence Of Obstruction Of Justice”

Conservatives Deflect From Trump's Cover-Up By Calling Comey A Criminal