Directing Lewandowski News Today

President trump? welcome to "the lead." im jake tapper. we begin with breaking news. house democrats right now holding their first impeachment inquiry and it has gotten ugly fast. testifying today is former trump campaign manager corey lewandowksi who at the direction of the white house is refusing to answer most questions. lewandowski never worked in the white house. which makes the white house claim of executive privilege quite questionable according to legal scholars. democrats want him to ...

On. >> it is -- it is utter dysfunction. and the most surprising thing is corey lewandowksi would show up on the hill and chaos and dysfunction would reign. that is about what you could expect from him so i dont know what they thought they were going to get by having him come. basically stonewalling in the beginning and then finally trying to answer questions but in a pretty dishonest way. he didnt not deliver it because he went on vacation. that kind of fails the smell test. >> you think he did...

Wondering, youre a person of faith, is jesus really invested in sean spicer winning "dancing with the stars"? >> jesus loves sean spicer. he loves everyone. >> he loves all of us. >> but he doesnt care about who wins "dancing with the stars." listen, i like "dancing with the stars" because i think we need light-hearted happy and fun television but they made a choice to bring sean spicer in the program and now it is blowing back on the show because hes making crude plays for votes by playing the ...

It was a good decision but i cant. and frankly, i dont know why they didnt just stop it midway through. and obvious this is how it would play out. they now this is how lewandowski is. rather than let him sit there and be disrespectful and say president swalwell, i would have just stopped it and said if you are not going to take this seriously, then contempt of congress or whatever it is, but dont give him the air time to continue to make a mockery of this whole thing. >> what do you think? >> le...

Saying? >> that is correct. that is where i stand on it. i certainly would not try to have suggested what mr. nadler should be doing. but if i were in his shoes, that is what i would be doing because it is clear what they want to do. they want to prevent us from doing a full investigation of impeachment and they will prevent people from coming to testify. well then go to court under a civil contempt proceedings where then that will wind its way through court over a long period of time, and well ...

Elements of the report and and pushing back and attacking democrats at one point, jake, saying that democrats appear to hate the president more than they love this country. >> and manu, repeatedly lewandowski cited the white house counsel even though hes never been an employee of the white house. >> reporter: yeah and that has absolutely frustrated democrats throughout this hearing. they said he has not been an employee and the white house has no right to say that he cannot talk about his conver...

An -- antagonist. as kyung lah reports from los angeles. >> i wont roll over. one thing i wont do is capitulate. >> reporter: californias governor gavin newsom clutching tighter the leader of the trump resistance. >> we are nothing less than a progressive answer to a transgressive president. >> reporter: this week the president is fundraising in his backyard, enemy territory for the trump agenda. >> look, stay out of our way. let california continue not to survive but thrive, despite the head wi...

Lewandowski, to confirm what the mueller report said. no one has challenged a singular factual report. do you have any factual basis for the mueller report and they should impeach him or not impeach him. >> and by the way, corey lewandowksi is staying to -- trying to say hes covered under the executive privilege. he did not ever have a job at the white house and not part of the executive branch and not part of the administration and being used perspectively and the courts have never looked at th...

Based on doj guidelines, that doesnt mean that the congress doesnt have the right to impeach. in fact, that is exactly where it should be taking place. >> congresswoman jackie speier, thank you for your time. really appreciate it. >> thank you, jake. lets chew over this with our experts. amanda, let me start with you. so one of the questions here is about the meeting that president trump had with lewandowski when he told him to tell jeff session, then attorney general, that to instruct session...

Manu, what has lewandowski been able to see about the meetings he had with president trump? >> reporter: rl hes defending meeting and he said he didnt have any concerns with the presidents private comments about limiting the scope of the mueller probe. now he did confirm the elements that were in the mueller report. namely, that the meetings that occurred in 2017, the president directing lewandowski to deliver a message toev sessions to unrecuse himself and to limit the investigation going forwa...