Facts that could, at a minimum, embarrass the president. The white House Counsels review of documents was triggered by the ongoing house impeachment inquiry. Earlier today house intel chairman adam schiff talked about the importance of linking the president s decision to freeze ukraine aid to his efforts to dig up dirt by the bidens. Yes, the president s chief of staff, the person who meets with the president every day on live camera admitted exactly that, veisavis the most serious and that is the mill aritary aid. What ambassador sondland did say was everyone was in on the loop of the precondition of the meeting that ukraine desperately sought for its recognition that the United States had its back, that everyone was in the loop on this. It was a clear quid pro quo, and with respect to the military aid, in the absence of any other explanation and in light of the president s own record of pressing for these investigations, two plus two equals four. What every judge tells every jury and its no different here is you dont leave your common sense at the door. Everyone understood this was merely pressure to get the president s investigations, and even more and i thought this was notable about ambassador sondlands testimony, he wasnt even as interested in the investigations as he was the announcement of the investigations. That gives lie to the whole idea that this was ever about corruption. It wasnt. It was about the Reelection Campaign of the president. I want to bring in cnn contributor john dean. He was the former white House Counsel to Richard Nixon who testified before congress about what nixon knew and when he knew it. As an important figure as there is in watergate. We just learned of a possible smoking gun here according to the Washington Post reporting at least. Instead of tapes youve got emails. How big of a deal is this new reporting . Is it a smoking gun . Im not sure its a smoking gun because i think weve already seen the smoking gun in the memoranda of conversation that trump had with zelensky, asking him to do him a favor and clearly mentioning biden and 2016. Thats to me, always been we started with a smoking gun and this is just further corroboration. Ana, one of the problems with what he was doing with military aid and the uncertainty about it is that its illegal post watergate to withhold spending. This was an issue that came up during nixons impeachment. He impounded funds. He reached back to thomas jefferson, Warren Harding and fdr to justify his actions so Congress Kind of put it aside, but after nixon was gone, they did adopt new laws that make it very clear you cant do anything to withhold spending once Congress Appropriates the money. In fact this is what, im sure, these memos reflect. In fact, according to the Washington Post, there were email exchanges asking whether this was legal to withhold the aid and they came to the conclusion, guided by some of the Legal Counsel in all of these email exchanges that it was okay and legal to do it as long as the hold was temporary. Does that i guess give them cover . It sounds like lawyer talk giving them cover for temporarily withholding the aid when they didnt even know why he was withholding it at the time, just what it was doing, and it was buzzing throughout the system that this aid was being withheld and they had to do something before the end of the fiscal year when the aid would expire. That was one of the other problems they had to confront. These would be enlightening. I dont think well ever see them because it sounds like lawyer to lawyer material. The lawyer in the office of management and budget and the white House Counsels office. This is purely work product and protected by most courts so i dont think well ever see these documents unless they leak. Can you speak to the timing here . How relevant is it that it was after the fact that the white house was trying to justify the reason for withholding the aid. Is this proof the white house knew the president did something wrong . I think its highly suggestive of that problem, that the president im reading the book anonymous and this president doesnt think through anything. He just goes and does things and his staff is the last to learn often by reading his twitter account. Im sure this is what happened here. My god, does the man know that hes breaking the law if hes trying to put a freeze on this money that he cant do. So im sure that that was part of the after the fact look at this. Theres just no doubt in my mind what happened and i dont think theres any doubt in anybodys mind as ambassador sondland said, two plus two does equal four. However, republicans say there is reason to doubt because nobody has said under oath, yes, the president told me you are holding up this aid until ukraine investigates the bidens or until ukraine investigates any potential meddling in the u. S. Election in 2016 which has been debunked of course, just a Conspiracy Theory there, but there hasnt been somebody to say the president told me this. Ana, in the current republican party, two plus two does not equal four. It doesnt equal anything. Im not even sure they can do the math anymore. Its pretty striking the way they analyze problems and jump onto conspiracy theories that have no basis in fact. Theyll get three plus six equaling four. To me its just denying reality and thats what they choose to do and theyre trying to look for an excuse to take their partisan action and not take the responsible course and look at what the president has done and why hes done it. Its a very, very serious offense of what hes done, is to use his personal office to advantage his election, reelection, using a foreign country. Weve never had a president pull a trick like this. Nixon, in his darkest thoughts, i dont think would envision doing this. Thats why this is so serious. Well see how this all plays out and i think it will get sharpened up in the coming weeks before we get to the sending articles of impeachment to the senate. Let me play a clip from the Closing Remarks of adam schiff following the two weeks of public testimony in which he invoked a little watergate history. Listen. The difference between then and now is not the difference between nixon and trump. Its the difference between that congress and this one. John, you said during the testimony even a week ago or so that democrats had already had more than they had against Richard Nixon to impeach him and youve said something similar this evening and yet we keep learning more. Its like this bombshell Washington Post reporting. It doesnt feel like the investigation is complete. Is it too soon to vote and hand this over to Senate Republicans . I think it is. Whats going to happen is the House Intelligence Committee is going to write up a report and send it to the house Judiciary Committee. The Judiciary Committee can further investigate this before writing articles of impeachment. I hope they do. I think they should. They also have to look at issues like was paying off Stormy Daniels something that should be included in an article of impeachment. Michael cohen, his personal lawyer, is now serving time for it. Should the Mueller Report obstruction of justice instances, ten of them, be part of the articles. These all have to be examined and filtered and further witnesses may be called. This week we expect a decision by the District Court in the District Of Columbia on mcgahns claim of privilege. The former white House Counsel. Yes. A definitive opinion on that could well result in not only mcgahn coming but other witnesses doing so because theyll realize its so well drawn that nothing is going to happen in the court of appeals and the court of appeals might flip it around quickly and the Supreme Court wont take it. So all those issues have to be confronted between now and when articles are drawn and sent to the senate or voted on by the house. Congressman schiff indicated that investigations would continue and theyll continue to let things play out in the courts but they arent going to slow down the current track theyre on necessarily, that it would be happening in tandem. I do want to remind people of your famous quote during watergate. Lets listen. I began by telling the president that there was a cancer growing on the presidency and if the cancer was not removed, the president himself would be killed by it. I also told him that it was important that this cancer be removed immediately. With the new explosive reporting in the Washington Post and what we have learned during the public impeachment inquiry, where are we in history as it pertains to the presidency of donald trump . You know, thats a very fair question, a very good question. He is facing reelection. He wants badly to be reelected. Weve never had a president be subject to an impeachment proceeding during their first term. Its always occurred in the second terms. It will have an influence on the election. There have been a number of commentators who have said really the American People are going to have the final say on this regardless of what happens in the house and senate because this president is going to have to deal with this issue before voters. I think thats correct. John dean, i really appreciate your perspective and expertise. Thanks for joining us this evening. Thanks, ana. Right now, ukraine is in the middle of this impeachment inquiry connected to a quid pro quo and bye dunkdebunked conspi theories. How damaged is ukraines relationship with the u. S. . Well talk to a former u. S. Ambassador to ukraine next. Youre live in the cnn newsroom. Imagine a disease is caused by too much of a bad protein, but a Company Develops a way to actually attack it. What drew me to Capital Allocation in Health Sciences was the potential to help many people through investments that help fund medical innovation. My team and i often choose to invest at the very early stages of human trials. Investing lets me use everything ive learned as a doctor to help make a positive impact. So thats why i go beyond the numbers. Oh, ho oh, ho, ho, ho you. You got me. Uh, what do you want . Ive got uh, ai robots, ive got vr goggles. I want your sled, please. No. [ chuckles ] timmy. Itd be a shame if this went viral. For those who never compromise. The mercedesbenz winter event. Whoa. 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In the impeachment inquiry into President Trumps actions regarding military aid to ukraine the former soviet Union Country is strategizing how the reverse the president s negative perception of ukraine and salvage its relationship with the administration, according to sources who also say ukrainians are not sure who they can trust now to make their case in a way that is compelling to President Trump. A u. S. Diplomat testified on capitol hill this past week that although military aid was finally delivered to ukraine after being held up for months, ukrainian president zelensky still has not received a much sought after white house meeting although he and trump did meet at the u. N. With me now is the former u. S. Ambassador so ukraine, steven piper, who served as ambassador during the Clinton Administration and also served as an official in the george w. Bush administration. Ambassador, i really appreciate you being here. You have extensive experience on this region. How important is the u. S. Support of ukraine there both monetarily and diplomatically, and what impact has President Trumps apparent hesitancy to deliver support had there . Well, the ukrainians consider it very important. Ukraine would like to become a normal european state but in terms of the current conflict that russia has inflicted on ukraine, ukraine sees the United States as the geopolitical counter weight to russia. Germany cant play that role. The European Union cant play that role. France cant play that role. So its very important and i was in kyiv about three weeks ago and the ukrainians are very nervous about the degree of american support given how important it is in their standoff with russia. I want to play something republican senator john kennedy said this morning. Listen to this. Senator kennedy, who do you believe was responsible for hacking the dnc and Clinton Campaign computers, their emails . Was it russia or ukraine . I dont know, nor do you, nor do any of us. Ms. Hill let me interrupt to say the entire Intelligence Community says it was russia. Right. But it could also be ukraine. Ambassador, a sitting u. S. Congressman is pedaling what diplomats have said is a russian Conspiracy Theory. Whats your reaction to that . Well, its very unfortunate. Not only has the u. S. Intelligence community but the senate Intelligence Committee and the Mueller Report all made very clear that it was russia that interfered in the u. S. Election and hacked into the dnc mail server. What weve seen is a russian effort now going back a couple of years to deflect that story and say, no, it was ukraine. Its unfortunate that we now have senior members on capitol hill saying that perhaps they believe that. Its wrong. Its unfortunate, and its taking our attention off the russia problem which was big in 2016 and may come back in 2020. Another republican congressman made this argument on ukraine aid this morning. Take a listen. The july 25th call, president zelensky in his own words, said there was no demand, no pressure, no quid pro quo. He didnt know about a hold on aid to ukraine. The readout from ukraine after that call, theres no reference to a quid pro quo or a hold on aid. On july 26 president zelensky meets with ambassador sondland and volker, makes no reference to a quid pro quo and a hold on aid. Its not until they read it in politico on august 29 that president zelensky and his team received confirmation that theres a hold on aid. I just want to ask you about the front end of that when hes talking about ukrainians never felt pressure, they didnt know the ukraine aid was being held up, do you buy that argument that they didnt feel pressure, that we should take their word for that . Lets make clear, in july about the time of the july 25 phone call between President Trump and president zelensky what the white house was saying is we want investigations in return for a meeting in the oval office of the white house. It was only later on in later in august and Early September that the white house then began to say that we have to have those investigations if you, president zelensky, want the meeting at the white house and military assistance. So thats point number one. Point number two, its wrong to say that zelensky was not aware of this. When president zelensky met with Vice President pence in warsaw on september 1, it was the first issue he raised about military assistance. I think theres a certain amount of deflection here and trying to throw a little bit of confusion about what exactly happened here. Finally, one last point, if youre the ukrainian president and you see american sport as so important, particularly as youre getting ready to sit down with Vladimir Putin for the first time ever, youre not going to come out and contradict the president of the United States. Youre not going to say hat the was a quid pro quo, there was pressure. Theres no advantage for president zelensky or ukraine for him to say it. But at the same time, when i was in kyiv a few weeks ago, i also dont see the ukrainians doing any of the requested investigations. Ambassador steven piper, your insight is much appreciated. Thank you for being here. Thanks for having me. Breaking news in the case of navy s. E. A. L. Eddie gallagher, the Navy Secretary is now being asked to resign over what he allegedly said to white house officials about the case. Youre live in the cnn newsroom. Dont go anywhere. Im a verizon engineer, and im part of the Team Building the most powerful 5g experience for america. 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