Three more days, what will a trial even look like . Ill speak to jamie rascon and dick durbin next. Plus, three more days, President Trump prepares to leave office having caused the american carnage he railed against after the division, destruction and death, what will his legacy be . General h. R. Mcmaster weighs in. Hello, im jack tapper in washington where the state of the union is on high alert because of the terrorists incited by the president. State capitols are boarded up and washington d. C. A fortress behind fences and barricades some 25,000 troops authorized all to prevent any more riots or deaths during this decidedly unsmooth, unpeaceful transition of power caused at least in part by the white house. Too many Congressional Republicans and maga media. The contrast of thecapitol, it is heartbreaking. The show of force necessary right now because of the out going president of the United States who does not plan to attend the inauguration and is now the record holder for impeachments. After inciting that terrorist attack on capitol hill that led to multiple deaths and attempts to stop the peaceful transfer of power. This morning, incredible and terrifying footage from the new yorker shot inside the siege where the insurrectionists make it clear whom theyre listening to. [ bleep ] a million of us out there and were listening to trump, the boss. Quote, we are listening to trump. This impeachment was the most bipartisan in American History but it remanins unclear how the senate trial will work and how republicans will vote to put an end to his career. We have four significant interviews for you this morning including the president elects incoming chief of staff and National Security advisor and the second highest ranking democrat in the senate, but were going to start with the man who is leading the effort to remove President Trump while also dealing with personal tragedy, lead impeachment manager democratic congressman jamie rascon of maryland. Congressman, thank you for joining us during this time that is hard in so many ways. Lets start with impeachment. The point of impeachment and conviction in the senate is to remove a president from office but hes not going to be president anymore after wednesday at noon. So why even go through with the senate trial . Well, the constitution talks about conviction removal and disqualifications from holding further public office. I dont think anybody would seriously argue that we should establish a precedent where every president on the way out the door has two weeks or three weeks or four weeks to try to incite an armed insurrection against the union or organize a coup against the union and if it succeeds, he becomes a dictator and if it fails, hes not subject to impeachment or conviction because we want to let bygones by bygones. This was the most serious president ial crime in the history of the United States of america. The most dangerous crime by a president ever committed against the United States, and there are republicans who are recognizing it as well as democrats. I want to single out my colleague liz cheney who i think perfect ly said our situation, jake. She said that donald trump summoned the mob, assembled the mob, he lit the match that led to the violent insurrection. None of it would have happened without him. Everything is due to his actions and this was the most sweeping betrayal, the most terrible bet betrayal of a president ial oath in office. Liz cheney, the number three House Republican, very conservative republican from wyoming. And shes the elect the chair of the House Republican although shes under fire by a lot of House Republicans. You say the president poses a clear danger to the nation. So if thats true, why has the article of impeachment not been delivered to the senate and when do you plan to do so . The senate has not been in session so the speaker is organizing the formal transfer of the articles and it should be coming up soon. I know the speaker also considers the president a clear and present danger to the republic. When do you think it will be delivered i dont know. Ive not spoken to the speaker today about this. Look, i know that everybody wants to focus on trial tactics and strategy and so on. I want people to focus on the gravity of these events. Five americans are dead because a violent mob was encouraged, extorted and incited by the president of the United States of america, which break into the congress of the United States into the capitol and came within a hairs breath of hanging Vice President pence. I mean, the w0rds are still ringing in the ears of the members, hang mike pence, hang mike pence. They built a gallows outside the capitol of the United States. There was an Assassination Party hunting for nancy pelosi. So this cannot be at the level of normal partisan push and pull and just kind of throwing rhetorical bricks back and forth. This was an attack on our country. I dont disagree. I know you want to focus on that but there are tactical questions i have to ask how this will work. For instance, Mitch Mcconnell noted that the last impeachment trial took 21 days. Do you think thats about how long this one will take . Well, every prosecutor in this case on my team and ive got an Extraordinary Team of p prosecutors, anyone who ends up defending the president , every senator who is a juror in this case is also a witness to these events. We were all witnesses. Indeed, we were victims to this event. The senate elizabeth mcdunna had to flee her office and thank got she brought the mahogany box. You dont need to call witnesses because they all saw it . Im not going to get into trial strategy i guess what im saying is if you invade a Police Headquarters and ransack and rampage the place and kill officers and people working in the Police Headquarters, you dont need a sixmonth investigation to determine what happened. The impeachment is an ind indictment. These are the charging articles and were going to conduct the trial and senate according to the rules that the senate provides for its up to the house and not senate to define the rules and i trust all 100 senators will live up to the constitutional oath of senators but live up to the oath of office as jurors. Big difference this time as opposed to the impeachment last year, which is this time democrats will control the senate because democrats won the last two senate seats in georgia. So i guess the question is witnesses were not allowed last time because the republicans voted against it with a couple exceptions. Will you want witnesses this time and if so, who would you want Capitol Hill Police officers . You see a lot of lawyers representing the insurrectionists, terrorists are now putting out legal documents saying these people were following the president s orders, et cetera. Will you have witnesses . Ive got extraordinary former prosecutors on my team. Stacy plaskett, ted lou, incredible lawyers. Madeleine dean. The finest and were putting together a trial plan which is designed to get the truth of all of these events out. Now, obviously, were not going to be able to tell everyones story but were going to be able to tell the story of this attack on america and all of the events that led up to it. This president set out to dismantle and overturn the Election Results from the 2020 president ial election. He was perfectly clear about that. He described it as a fraud, a scam. He said it was a stolen election, and he continued to extort of his followers to overturn the result. Its interesting you say that. I was going to ask you, obviously President Trump was setting the stage for this for months even before the election with the lies, the big lie. The big lie. That the election was stolen and fraudulent. An article of impeachment mainly focuses on the january 6th incitement. The speech that the president gave. It gives a glancing acknowledgement it wasnt the first time he said it but focuses on january 6th. Given the fact we know some of this was planned, were getting an indication from Law Enforcement some of the people were not incited that morning but previous weeks and months, does that affect your case . The fact that it was deliberated and planned and premeditated under scores the leadership and complicity of donald trump and all of these events. He was out propagandizing his followers for months, first to prepare them his loss would have to be a fraud. There is no way otherwise he could have lost and to attack the Election Results and some of that took place in freakishly ways like lawsuits with trump appointed judges and turned on to egging on a mob as liz cheney put it, inciting the mob. All of it will be part of the trial. The entire stream of events leading up to this attack on the capitol. Understand, january 6th is not a random date. It wasnt like the president said maybe well do it november 11th or maybe ill call everyone in town december 2nd. Maybe i will tell them it will be wild december 9th or tell the proud boys to stand by and stand back for january 16th. It is january 6th for congress to meet in bipartisan session and all of the members there together to count the Electoral College votes and this is supposed to be a proform ma kind of action where we count the electoral votes sent in by the states. We know the president brought enormous pressure to bear on Vice President pence to step out of his constitutional oath and outside of his constitutional role simply to reject the results that President Trump didnt like and Vice President pence refused to do it, which is why there was a mob that came within seconds of catching him yelling hang mike pence and then it turned to extorting the mob, saying go and fight like hell or youre going to lose your country. I hear ya. Its all of it. I want to turn now to a different subject because i think its a lot of people watching how remarkable it is that you have the energy to do what youre doing given the fact youre dealing with a family tragedy. You lost your son, 25yearold tommy to depression. You wrote a very moving reflection on his quote perfect heart, a perfect soul, an outrageous sense of humor and dazzli dazzling rate yent mind. My wife scar sarah and i wro this together. Tell us more about tommy. Well, tommy was a remarkable person. He had overwhelming love for humanity and for our country in his heart and really for all the people of the world. We lost him of the last day of that god awful year 2020 and he left us a note which said please forgive me, my illness won today. Look after each other, the animals and the global poor for me all my love tommy. And that was the last act in a life that dazzled anybody who came into contact with tommy. He was a poet who wrote these magnificent 20, 30minute poems which he of course knew by heart and would get up and perform them. He was absolutely devoted to human rights for every person. He was devoted to Animal Rights and welfare. He was a passionate vegan and convinced a lot of people to stop eating animals just through the force of his poetry. He was a second year student at Harvard Law School. Beautiful kid. When we lost him, he had not only beloved friends at Harvard Law School but he was teaching, of course, with Michael Sandell justice as a Teaching Fellow so he had students of his own and graded all of his papers and exams and wrote many pages analyzing the work of the students and writing back to them and made donations in each of their names to different charitable groups that he thought would be consistent with the values of the student and some of them went to give d directly. And i asked him why he did that and he quoted something that father barrigan said about the great dorothy day. He said well, like father barrigan said about dorothy day, she lived the truth or true and he said i want to show them that the truth is true and we can live that way. So, you know, people are asking me why i decided to do this, first of all, i dont know if youve ever tried to say no to Speaker Pelosi about anything but shes actually been very sensitive and thoughtful but she wanted me to do it because she knows ive devoted my life to the constitution and republic. Im a professor of constitutional law but i did it really with my son in my heart and helping lead the way. I feel him in my chest. When we went to count the Electoral College votes and it came under that ludicrous attack, i felt my son with me and i was most concerned with our youngest daughter and my soninlaw is married to our other daughter who were with me that day who got caught in a room off the house floor in between them and me was a rampage in armed mob that could have killed them easily and was banging on the doors where they were hiding under a desk with my chief of staff. These events are personal to me, jake. There was an attack on our country. There was an attack on our people. There are thousands of people that work on capitol hill, not just members but Staff Members and Capitol Hill Police officers pushed and shoved and punched in the face and pummeled and hit over the head with fire extinguishers and the president did nothing to stop it for more than two hours while members of Congress Called him and begged him to do something and he continued to watch it on tv and enjoy their, you know, insurrection Tailgate Party where they were celebrating the attack on our democracy. This president has been impeached twice and we just want the senate to conduct a serious trial where every member of the senate lives up to his or her constitutional oath to render impartial judgment as a juror. Congressman, i cant even begin to express my condolences for what you and your wife and daughters and family are dealing with. I cant also imagine having that trama compounded with this other drama. You just lost your son and now youre in congress worrying about your daughter and your other daughters husband because of these terrorists who had attacked the congress that trama on top of trama just seems so d debilitating to me. Im not going to lose my son at the end of 2020 and lose my republic in 2021. Its not going to happen. The vast majority of American People democrats, republicans and independents reject armed insurrection and violence as a new way of doing business in america. Were not going to do that. This was the most terrible crime ever by a president of the United States against our country, and i want everybody to feel the gravity and the seriousness of those events at the same time of course, all of us are deeply invested in president elect biden and Vice President elect harris moving the country forward to repair all of the wreckage and damage of last year on everything from covid19 to the economy but i was thinking on the way over this morning, jake, about the constitution, we the people in order to form a more Perfect Union ensure justice, provide for the common defense and promote the general welfare and the blessings of liberty here ordain and establish. We have to do all of those things at the same time. We have to establish justice. We have ensure domestic tranquility. This is america and the people are up to it and we have a new administration coming to town that is ready to lead america back on the road of progress. As somebody who watched your son deal with this disease of depression. Yes. I have to also note that so Many Americans right now have been struggling with Mental Health during this pandemic and then frankly, during this time of insurrection. During this time where it seems like millions of americans because they have been lied to over and over by the president and his allies in congress and the media believe this big lie. One in four, according to the cdc, one in four americans under the age of 25 have seriously considered taking their own lives in the last 30 days according to the cdc. One in four. What is your message to people who are dealing with this horrible disease or to the loved ones they have as a dad who watched your beloved tommy struggle with this disease. Well, we dont want to lose anybody else. We have been hearing from thousands and thousands of people across the country and if any of them are out there, thank you to the kindness for our family and we will somehow get a chance to reply to everyone but your messages, your heart felt messages come as a comfort and solace to us and we know how many millions of people have struggling with depression, how many millions of families have dealt with it and theyre obviously complicated neuro chemical and psychological causes to that and we want to make sure were investing the resources of the country to deal with it. So one day there will be a year where nobody loses their life because of depression and other forms of emotional and mental illness. But on a personal note, if you could speak to the people out there who are struggling or who have loved ones who are struggling, what do you want to tell them . I would say that as someone wrote me, its a permanent answer to a temporary condition and predicament and i dont mean to under state it. We know how much terrible pain our son was in. One of our daughters said that tommy was above all awanted to promote the happiness for well being for as many well being for people and animals as possible and re