unless, ambassador, you ve given us a lot of evidence of precisely that condition of both the white house meeting and the military assistance. you ve told us, have you not, that you emailed the secretary of state and said that if these investigations were announced, the new justice person was put in place, that the ukrainians would be prepared to give the president what he wants and that would break the log jam. you ve testified and showed us documents about this. i have. and in your written statement you say that the log jam you re referring to includes the log jam on security assistance, correct? correct. as my presumption. and he also have seen, and you testified that you have also seen acting chief of staff mulvaney, himself, acknowledge that the military aid was withheld in part over the
render it moot. and then mick mulvaney tried to jump in today. yes, mull va vaney wanted to piggyback on the complaint or motion, rather. and they opposed it. they said that mulvaney didn t belong with them. their argument was many fold. one argument they made was they were hitching much of their argument to the fact they were involved in national security conversations. and mulvaney doesn t have that behind him. he doesn t have that to draw on. and this national security factor is one that bolton wants the court to weigh carefully in deciding what their obligation to testify might be. that was part of it. they noted mulvaney may have breached anyway because he had that disastrous white house press conference where he announced there was a quid pro quo and the american people should get over it, that political influence was typical in foreign relations. they felt that, quite frankly,
petition for a ruling by a court by this subpoenaed witness. bolton joined it. the house withdrew it, trying to render it moot. and then mick mulvaney tried to jump in today. yes, mulvaney wanted to piggyback on the complaint or motion, rather. and they opposed it. they said that mulvaney didn t belong with them. their argument was many fold. one argument they made was they were hitching much of their argument to the fact they were involved in national security conversations. and mulvaney doesn t have that behind him. he doesn t have that to draw on. and this national security factor is one that bolton wants the court to weigh carefully in deciding what their obligation to testify might be. that was part of it. they noted mulvaney may have breached anyway because he had that disastrous white house press conference where he announced there was a quid pro quo and the american people should get over it, that political influence was typical in foreign relations.
he did not specifically say those words quid pro quo. listen to what he said. reporters will use their language all the time. my language never said quid pro quo. it is legitimate for the president to want to know what s going on with the ongoing investigation into the server. everybody acknowledges that. at least i think most normal people do. it s completely legitimate to ask about that. number two, it s legitimate to tie the aid to corruption. it s legitimate to tie the aid to foreign aid from other countries. i can see how people took that the wrong way but i never said there was a quid pro quo because there isn t. you can see that even as mulvaney didn t say the words quid pro quo, he says that the president s interest was part of the calculus. we re told that the president is frustrated with mulvaney as he spent his weekend watching
does that mean that mulvaney is on his way out? not necessarily. and i reported along with others one of the reasons is because the president is well aware he s already on his third chief of staff and four chiefs in three years is not necessarily something he s going for. good to see you, dana. amazing reporting as always. for more on this, let me bring in former republican congressman and now cnn commentator. great to see you. it s been a while. good to be with you, kate. you ve been dodging me. we ll get to that later. republicans are standing up to the president and he s actually backing down in a couple situations. it appears very clearly in one and possibly when it comes to making some change in terms of syria. what do you read into this though? are you looking at this in this moment as a new chapter?