Making claims about President Trumps interactions with ukraine. Were told he or she has firsthand knowledge between President Trump and the president of ukraine that undercuts the arguments from some republicans who demeaned the first whistleblowers account as hearsay. The question now is really what else will this second whistleblower say and how will that affect the impeachment inquiry . The inquiry is ramping up on capitol hill with two more depositions planned this week from two key players at the state department implicated in the initial whistleblowers complaint. All of this comes as the white house is bending over backwards to come up with more and more explanations. Some republican allies now shifting away from outright defense of the president s actions to simply saying, he doesnt deserve impeachment for what hes done. And breaking news, a huge change in u. S. Foreign policy. U. S. Forces are stepping aside, retreating from the northern border of syria as turkey plans this military offensive against kurds in the northern part of that country. The u. S. Backed Kurdish Forces, u. S. Allies, they have been americas most reliable partners in syria and played a huge role in the fight against isis, Kurdishled Syrian Democratic forces are calling the move a stab in the back and the latest from the middle east in just a moment. We are going to begin, though, with the latest developments, the impeachment inquiry. Joining me is democratic congressman jim himes, a member of the House Intelligence Committee and congressman, we do understand that there is this second whistleblower who has firsthand knowledge of the events surrounding the phone call between President Trump and the leader of ukraine. What does this add to the case youre all making . Well, good morning, john. Hard to know because, of course, nobody has actually seen what this purported second whistleblower has to say. Presumably that will change this week. Im glad this individual, by the way, is going through the whistleblower process. Thats what the first whistleblower did, its the right thing to do. Ive made the point to a couple of people now, i sort of get a kick out of the president s rage on twitter at adam schiff, nancy pelosi, at the democrats. As a democrat in the room i will tell you, were like a bunch of folks in the outfield just catching constant pop flies coming from people actually in the room or in and around the president. You know, the first whistleblower certainly that was true of, the media now for weeks has been getting stories about other president ial conversations with leaders. This is not a democraticled thing. This is people around the president who have watched his behavior to a very long time and are finally saying this cant happen anymore. Im going to come forward. You hope they do it through the whistleblower process. Some of them are doing it by talking to the press which is not the ideal way to do it. We always welcome people coming forward and telling us their version of events. I think the American People would very much like to know what happened there. Look, we have evidence at this point in our hands. We have the rough transcript of the phone call and we have the texts that went back and forth between u. S. Diplomats. What more do you want on the committee before you draw up articles of impeachment . Youre exactly right. I chuckle at the everchanging defenses of those in congress who at all costs will defend the president saying its hearsay even as you point out the transcript comes out validating exactly what the whistleblower said. To answer your question, we have to learn about at least two more things. Number one, and probably most important, is something that i think well be taking up this week which is this question of whether an ambassador, maria von vich, the ambassador to ukraine until relieve of her duties was she relieved because she was refusing to go along with the president s political agenda as channeled by Rudy Giuliani. If that fact pattern is true we have a huge problem, right. Thats almost as bad as using u. S. Aid for political purposes. Messing around with the career of a dedicated diplomat because she didnt go along with some crazy run for political dirt on your opponent. We will learn more about that this week and need to get to the bottom of that. I think we need to talk to Rudy Giuliani. He was running a oneperson ambassadorial effort for the political benefit of the president. We need to understand exactly what he was doing and who he was talking to and what kind of promises he was making. Youve gone further on that point, you went further than chairman adam schiff has gone he hasnt said he wants to hear from Rudy Giuliani. You want to hear from Rudy Giuliani . I do. I dont speak for the chairman and he makes the final decisions, but, you know, to my way of thinking, Rudy Giuliani has, you know hes the lead actor in this whole drama. Meeting in madrid, you know, going and putting pressure on state department officials. Ill defer to adam on exactly who were going to talk to but to me Rudy Giuliani is probably the central actor in creating the pressure on the state department and other people on behalf of the president s political interests. I interrupted you. You were going to tell me there was a second area you want more information before you start drafting articles of impeachment . Yeah. It really is secondary, but, you know, this whole notion that the white house actually took the transcript of the president s call with the ukrainian president off the traditional server and put it in a highly classified server, theres two questions about that. Number one, was that a coverup . It happens to be against the law to classify something in order to avoid embarrassment. If that happened, then we need to ask the question, did that happen with other conversations that the president had with foreign leaders . Remember, the allegation is that people were so shocked, lawyers inside the white house, again, the president s people were so shocked by that conversation, that they said hey, were going to reduce the distribution and put it on this more classified server. Again, thats not quite to my way of thinking as serious an aelgs as some ambassadors career being wound up because she didnt go along with the plan, but i think we need to understand what happened there. To be clear, putting it on the more secret server wouldnt require classifying unclassified information. It would just be putting it somewhere else, correct . That is true. I should clarify, theres not an indication it was improperly classified. What you have here is at least the allegation or the appearance of a coverup. Again, i think the American People deserve to know if that happened, why it happened and why they felt it needed to be covered up. A number of republicans, there have been different defenses of the president , but theres one that i want to focus on, Tucker Carlson, wrote it and it almost seemed to be a plea to republicans in congress to take this line, to say, you know, what the president did was wrong. He should not have leaned on the president of ukraine to dig up dirt on a political opponent. Thats bad, but not impeachable. How would you respond to that line . Well, i guess at some level of all the crazy defenses ive heard in the last couple of weeks, that one at least has some coherence to it. To hear my republican colleague saying that the whistleblowers complaint is based on hearsay when the white house itself confirmed that the whistleblowers account of the phone call were accurate, theres been all sorts of crazy defenses. At the end of the day, that at least has some coherence to it. What is impeachable is one thing and one thing only, that is what the congress of the United States determines to be impeachable. Does it clear the barrier of high crimes and misdemeanors. If it is true, were still in an inquiry, if its true the president held up hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to a vulnerable country in order to achieve a political objective of getting them to find or manufacture dirt on joe biden, hey, if thats not impeachable, i dont know what is. You know, if barack obama had done a tenth of these things, he would have been impeached twice before lunch time. Again, theres at least some coherrens to what Tucker Carlson is saying, but the notion if all of these allegations are true that is somehow acceptable behavior by the president , i dont think thats an america that any of us would recognize as the kind of country we believe in. Congressman himes from connecticut, thanks for being with us this morning. Thank you, john. Another pressing Geopolitical Development overseas and that is the war in syria. The white house says u. S. Troops are moving out of northern syria, making way for turkey to invade the region. And the move essentially abandoned americanbacked Kurdish Forces in the fight against isis. Ben wedeman live in beirut with the breaking details. Ive been following your tweets all morning and reaction coming in from around the world. Reporter yeah, bianna. Its not really a surprise that President Trump wanted to pull american troops out of syria. Last december he made that announcement and that, of course, led to the resignation of the defense secretary, mr. Mattis, but the way that he announced it really did shock people, than the kurdish allies of the american in that part of syria. Around 11,000 of their forces were killed in the war against isis. Now already were seeing that u. S. Troops are pulling out of two locations on the syrian Turkish Border from tell abyad and ein eiss. The turks are occupying about 19 miles deep, all along the border from the Euphrates River in the west to the rocky border in the east. Now the Syrian Democratic forces, which is the predominantly Kurdish Group that has been the main ally of the United States in the war against isis, has come out and described the american decision as a stab in the back. The statement they put out today says that, among other things, the Turkish Operation in northern and Eastern Syria will have a large, negative impact on our war against isis and will destroy all the stability that has been accomplished over the past years. There is a real concern that this will create a vacuum as the Kurdish Forces focus on the turkish invaders into which isis will be able to move be and perhaps have a resurgence. John . All right. Ben, thank you very much for that. Were watching this very closely because these are significant developments. It is a big week in the impeachment investigation of the president with some key witnesses speaking to congress. What will they have to say and what questions will they answer . Thats next. dramatic orchestra performance comes in lots of flavors. Theres the ampedup, overtuned, feedingfrenzyof sheetmetalkind. And then theres performance that just leaves you feeling better as a result. Thats the kind lincolns about. Itheres my career. s more to me than hiv. My cause. And creating my dream home. Im a work in progress. So much goes into who i am. Hiv medicine is one part of it. Prescription dovato is for adults who are starting hiv1 treatment and who arent resistant to either of the medicines dolutegravir or lamivudine. Dovato has 2 medicines in 1 pill to help you reach and then stay undetectable. So your hiv can be controlled with fewer medicines while taking dovato. You can take dovato anytime of day with food or without. Dont take dovato if youre allergic to any of its ingredients or if you take dofetilide. If you have hepatitis b, it can change during treatment with dovato and become harder to treat. Your hepatitis b may get worse or become lifethreatening if you stop taking dovato. So do not stop dovato without talking to your doctor. Serious side effects can occur, including allergic reactions, liver problems, and liver failure. Lifethreatening side effects include lactic acid buildup and severe liver problems. If you have a rash and other symptoms of an allergic reaction, stop taking dovato and get medical help right away. Tell your doctor if you have kidney or liver problems, including hepatitis b or c. Dont use dovato if you plan to become pregnant or during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy since one of its ingredients may harm your unborn baby. Your doctor should do a pregnancy test before starting dovato. Use effective Birth Control while taking dovato. The most common side effects are headache, diarrhea, nausea, trouble sleeping, and tiredness. So much goes into who i am and hope to be. Ask your doctor if starting hiv treatment with dovato is right for you. [narrator] do you remember that day . That day you met your hero . Ms. Bird, do you think i could be a champion like you . Of course you can. And you can call me sue. [jibber] jibber jabber, coming through salutations, famous female of orange round ball. Would you like an autograph . [jabber] excuse me. crowd muttering [woman] is that paper mache . Its you. [woman] wow. [narrator] jibber jabber ruins everything. Is it . [woman] i am confused. [narrator] at Symetra Life Insurance Company were cutting through it, to help you choose the Retirement Benefits and Life Products that work best for you. So this new whistleblower has come forward, apparently corroborating the story from the first whistleblower. There is that. Plus, two witnesses will talk to the House Intelligence Committee this week. What more will they provide . What are the Big Questions that need to be answered in the impeachment investigation . Joining us Political Correspondent dana bash, cnn political analyst David Gregory and cnn Political Correspondent abby philip. I want to start with something congressman jim himes told me, two additional areas he wants his committee to look at, number one, was there mill retribution against state department officials, namely ambassadors maria yovanovitch, was she fired to forward the president s Political Goals and to what extent has there been a white house coverup . It was interesting to me he said that. One of the Big Questions to me that hasnt been answered what more do democrats want since they already have so much evidence . Fascinating because the more they believe they can get, look, theyre on this path, its pretty clear, and they feel that they have enough already to, even though theyre doing the investigation, they feel they already have enough to move forward with articles of impeachment. Thats pretty clear. The more they have evidence wise as wide as they can get in and around this one topic of the president asking for political dirt on his opponent and the ramifications of that, the better case that they have. Thats probably stating the obvious. On this new whistleblower, one thing he said and also senator chris coons said earlier to you guys, where that could lead them to visavis the other officials named in the complaint and calling them to the hill or at least having to fight to try to get them to the hill. That is another avenue for them to explore in the question of the most basic thing, what were looking at now, the potential crime and the coverup. David, let me ask you, could expectations be a bit too high from the democrats standpoint given what were going to hear this week from Marie Yovanovitch and gordon sondland. Gordon sondland was an ally and supporter of President Trumps. Marie yovanovitch, theres no indication she was recalled for merit, and yet there are a lot of grievances im sure she has, she happens, though, to still be a state Department Employee so unlike kurt volker who resigned could there be anything that holds her back from being as forthcoming as we heard from kurt volker . Shes still there and there are are pieces of this larger pu puzzle to figure out how much of a political agenda was being pursued and what was done to make sure that agenda got carried out, basically the president s political wish and agenda and using the government for that. I think whats important about other officials coming forward is not just additional numbers of officials who knew what was going on, thought it was wrong, and are now speaking out about that, thats important, and i think moving the summaries of the calls on to a separate server is very important. The more evidence there is to suggest there were people who saw what was going on, thought it was wrong and had to be hidden, you know, thats directly in contrast to the president who says what i did is perfectly fine and defensible because this is where the political argument is going to go, wisconshich is, tucker carl oped, this is wrong but not impeachable. I think thats where its headed. Abby, where are you on the what else discussion this morning . I think sondland has a lot that he has to answer for, specifically, we should remember that he told senator johnson that he had heard that there was some kind of scheme holding up the billions of dollars in aid to ukraine related to the president s desire for ukraine to investigate the bidens or investigate the 2016 election. We already know that based on the reporting. Hes going to have to answer for whether or not that is true and why he would have said that, especially given the Text Messages that were revealed last week which suggested that he was deeply involved in the back and forth. There were references in those Text Messag