President ial candidates is being groomed by russia to play the spoiler in 2020 and she said it is happened before but does she have any evidence for this charge . Welcome to the lead, im jiha im jake tapper. The white house working overtime after the act of the center of the impeachment inquiry Mick Mulvaney denying saying that trump withhold security aid to pressure the country to conduct an investigation to help President Trump political denying it but that is clearly what Mick Mulvaney said yesterday. Take a listen. To be clear, what you described is a quid pro quo. It is funding will not flow unless the investigation into the democratic server happened as well . We do we do that all of the time with Foreign Policy. And i have news for everybody, get over it. There is going to be political influence in Foreign Policy. That admission or confession if you will shocked the nations capitol including individuals in the white house and mulvaney was quickly ordered to clean it up. He issued a statement claiming he had not said what he very clearly said. Congressman Francis Rooney of florida, a former diplomat said in response to the attempted walkback, quote, it is not an etchasketch. How on life could you do those things when you just said it right there on national tv, unquote. Rooney saying the admission shocked him and he wants more information. President trump and his aides are today trying to pretend they are not worried about this as cnns Boris Sanchez reports now from the white house. Reporter President Trump dodging questions today about Mick Mulvaneys damning press briefing in which the acting chief of staff admitted trump held back aid to ukraine in exchange for political favors. Asked about mulvaney, trump pivoting sharply. Mr. President do you want to clarify what Mick Mulvaney said yesterday i think he clarified it. And i do have to say this, we, yesterday, had a tremendous day in texas. Delving into a rant and refusing to take any more questions about Mick Mulvaneys controversial confession. To be clear you just described is a quid pro quo. It is funding will not flow unless the investigation into the democratic server happened as well . We do we do that all of the time with Foreign Policy. Reporter mulvaney since walked that back but that is not stopping the concern on capitol hill from both sides of the aisle. Was he talked about just general corruption or specifically about the biden issue. The biden issue is what is very concerning because it would be using, if it is true, using taxpayerfunded aid and policy for a political reason which is totally wrong. This is an administration that obviously is off the rails and mchad a moment of truth and then realized that is not good for the president and had to walk it back. Reporter behind the scenes at the white house, a source close to trump said the president is unhappy with Mick Mulvaney who baffled the legal team by contradicting repeated denials of a quid pro quo with ukraine. There is no quid pro quo. There was no quid pro quo. Ive didnt do it. There was no quid pro quo. Reporter that is possibly why last night mulvaney blamed the media, claiming they misconstrued his remarks. The white house also trying to spin the contradiction. He did a great job and mentioned the same message over and over and now the media of course is we put a statement out clarifying some of the things that the media got themselves in a in a tissy over. We all saw mulvaney say we should all get over it and the Trump Campaign is looking to profit and put a slogan on the tshirt and selling online. Jake. So first then they denied the quid pro quo and then admitted it and then denied it and now selling tshirts. The attorneys deem baffled. Lets chew over this. Kaitlan collins let me start with you. President trump and allies are dismissing this and acting as though it is no big deal but take a listen to republican congressman Francis Rooney of florida on cnn earlier today. Youre saying at this point you are not ruling out the possibility that this is an Impeachable Offense for the president . I dont think you could rule anything out until you know all of the facts. It doesnt seem insignificant that a republican congressman would say that. No. And this is what Mick Mulvaney did, essentially putting republicans in a bind here. Because they had been essentially saying the president has denied this, this wasnt the agreement and Mick Mulvaney came out and undid all of that. People were stunned after that briefing. People inside of the white house were texting me, a lot of the president s allies were incredibly critical of Mick Mulvaney including sean hannity who described i believe what he did as dumb and essentially they dont understand what the strategy was in Mick Mulvaney coming out and making those remarks and now the white house is saying that Mick Mulvaney has clarified what he said. He has not clarified. Hes denying saying what he said on camera. And we also know, nia, that President Trump according to the rough transcript definitely pushes the ukrainian president to investigate both this crazy dnc server, 2016 Conspiracy Theory and also the bidens. That is in the rough transcript. And then Gordon Sondland who is one of the witnesses, the ambassador to the European Union testified that the president told him to talk to Rudy Giuliani about ukraine and giuliani said the president wanted corruption investigated, specifically the dnc server 2016 Conspiracy Theory and burisma which is the firm that hunter biden, joe bidens son worked at. So we very clearly see the quid pro quo. Yeah. And of course in the phone call you have this i need you to do me a favor though when he said that to the ukrainian president after the ukrainian president brings up the idea of needing military equipment. So it wasnt it was startling to hear Mick Mulvaney say that but it is in line with this set of facts that have come out over the last three weeks. He was very, i thought, glib and smug and almost proud of what he was saying and very comfortable and confident up there. It is really hard to imagine that the president didnt know that this was part of what he was going to go out and try to sell. And what he was trying to sell was essentially, well it is okay to look into this dnc server thing because the Justice Department is also looking into this, william barr going around the world looking for the roots of the russia probe when, in fact, we know what the roots of russia probe are right here. And so it doesnt seem like it is going to sell. But they are certainly going to try to sell it. And amanda, it did seem that we reached the trump scandal went like this. That never happened. Maybe it happened a little bit. Okay, it happened but there is nothing wrong with it. You did it. I thought that and then get over it. And i thought we had reached point three of oh, yeah, fine, it happened and there is nothing wrong and that is standard for trump scandals but apparently not. Mick mulvaney is right, there is no quid pro quo. There are quid pro quos for the two reasons. Biden dirt and dnc stuff. But representative rooney was the first one i heard ask this publicly. Why is donald trump so hung up on finding the server in ukraine and taking the heat off russia for interfering in the election and hacking the dnc . That is really i think a bigger deal and a more interesting question for Senate Republicans because they have been part of producing intelligence reports which clearly lay the blame on russia. So theyre at odds there and i think this is a good question of how taxpayer resources are being used to undermine those reports. I dont think these things are independent. The attitude and approach to dismissing what is going on with the impeachment inquiry is in line with what recently happened in syria and the negotiations failed with turkey and broader behavior of accepting and acceding to what putin wants geopolitically and part of that is a Distraction Campaign and focusing on issues that would potentially in trumps mind hurt democrats and undermine the 2020 election but there is a Broader National Security impact of this. And we should point out that in addition to Everything Else weve talked about coming out in the congressional testimony, the Washington Post is reporting that bidens office according to somebody testifying, george kent, a state department official, seemed to brush off a warning back in 2015 that Hunter Bidens work in ukraine could prove to be problematic and at least an appearance of impropriety from george kent testifying this week, kent raised the issue with bidens office and told the Vice President didnt have the bandwidth to deal with his son hunter as beau was battling cancer. So we should point other stuff as coming out in this testimony as well. Not just damaging to the trump white house. And it is interesting how they said essentially that this person who testified yesterday went to a topranking official with this concern about the appearance of a conflict and it doesnt confirm what the president has been pushing, that the elder biden acted inappropriate live and used his office inappropriately but it points to Something Else interesting, another thing you saw from mulvaney yesterday was distancing himself from the people who have been testifying on the hill, even though one was a Senior Adviser to the secretary of state and one a trump appointee, ambassador sondland and he was essentially acting like he couldnt remember their names or what they were saying but george kent is disproving the theory people are going up there just to go after President Trump and these are antitrump or career deep state people trying to get the president but when you see people like george kent. We did have some questions of what this would look like with joe biden and what his potential attorney were doing. The appearance of all of this, because the same press conference that Mick Mulvaney talks about the quid pro quo is announcing that the doral resort in florida failing is going to host the g7 leaders and bring multimillions of dollars into the president s coffers. But it does show that joe biden has work to do on this issue still. He talked about it a bit in the debate. We of course heard from hunter biden in an interview and joe biden just kept referring to that interview as if the case was closed. It is not closed. And he has to deal how to deal with this and why he himself didnt recuse himself from ukrainian business if he knew his son had a business deal. But is a a good point. You cant take issue with the swampiness of hunter biden if the g7 is at doral. Mike pompeo is feeling like the victim in all of this after diplomats buried the Trump Administration in testimony and what he is victimized about. And the president announced a cabinet original is out but why is rick perry suddenly stepping down after the questions about his role in the ukraine scandal are popping up. Stay with us. Can match the power of energizer. Because energizer ultimate lithium is the longest lasting aa battery in the world. [confetti cannon popping] energizer. Backed by science. Matched by no one. Where people go to learn about their Medicare Options before theyre on medicare. Come on in. Youre turning 65 soon . Yep. And youre retiring at 67 . Thats the plan its also a great time to learn about an aarp Medicare Supplement insurance plan, insured by Unitedhealthcare Insurance Company. Heres why. Medicare part b doesnt pay for everything. This part is up to you. A Medicare Supplement plan helps pay for some of what medicare doesnt. 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Entrust your heart to entresto. amber jagger if we dont give students from an underserved background the technology that they need in school, theyre not going to be competitive in the workforce thats waiting for them. Since verizon innovative learning, students have hardware, connectivity, and quality curriculum. The jobs of tomorrow will involve technology. Now students are truly hopeful for what they may achieve. We have breaking news for you in the politics lead, President Trump has named his replacement for Outgoing Energy secretary rick perry, the president tweeted hes nominating the current number two deputy secretary dan brouillette. Reporter staring down a subpoena deadline for documents related to his dealings with ukraine, Energy Secretary rick perry decided to make an exit. Im announcing my exit reporter his video to Energy Department staff came after he informed the president in writing. Perry is a central figure in the probe as Gordon Sondland explained perry was critical to the u. S. ukraine relationship. We have what are called the three amigos and they are secretary perry, again ambassador volker and myself. And weve been tasked with sort of overseeing the ukraine u. S. Relationship. Reporter perry a former Texas Governor who spent nearly three years in the Trump Administration without any major scandals denies the impeachment inquiry has anything to do with his leaving. While ukraine and its Energy Independence are in perrys portfolio, he acknowledged to the wall street journal he also discussed investigating the debunked theory ukraine played a role in interfering in the 2016 election. With the president s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. But denies discussing joe biden or his son hunter. As god is my witness, not once was a biden name not the former Vice President or his son ever mentioned. Reporter in may perry led the way to zelensky inauguration at President Trumps request and then met with kurt volker and sondland in the oval office. The president told them to deal with giuliani before making any deals with the ukrainian president. Perry defends the president s question to circumvent official channels. As the governor of texas i use people outside of government to give me information all of the time. I respect the state department but i happen to know people in the Energy Industry that are smarter than the state department folks. Reporter well perry has also admitted he urged the president to make that now infamous july 25th call to zelensky which was the basis of that whistleblower complaint. But perry said he pushed for discussion on Energy Issues but we all saw that transcript and there were no substantial mentions of that on the call. Jake. Rene marsh, thank you. Also in the politics lead, mike