Ambassador sondland told me that President Trump told him that he wants president zelensky to state publicly that ukraine will investigate burisma and alleged interference in the 2016 election. Ambassador sond lond told me he now recognized that he made a mistake by earlier telling the ukrainian officials to whom he spoke that a white house meeting with president zelensky was dependent on a public announcement of investigations. In fact, ambassador sondland said everything was dependent on such an announcement, including Security Assistance. Ukraine involvement in 2016 has been proven false and burrisa hired joe biden son, hunter biden. You could hear a pin drop as the ambassador laid out his Opening Statement. Reporter a source familiar with the testimony said sondland was only speculating about the political investigations. Sondland told taylor the aid may have been frozen because of corruption generally or because the europeans werent giving enough money to ukraine. The testimony fills in the gaps between the Text Messages with other diplomats over the summer in which taylor raised alarm over the delay in money for ukraine. As the nthe new ukrainian president was vying for a meeting, sondland texted, are we now saying that the aid and meeting are conditioned on investigations. Call me. As i said on the phone, i think it is crazy to withhold Security Assistance for help with a political campaign. Hours later after speaking with trump, sondland replies, bill, i believe you are incorrect about President Trumps intentions. The president has been crystal clear, no quid pro quos of any kind. Taylors appearance behind closed doors left some democratic lawmakers rattled. This is my most disturbing day in congress so far. Reporter meantime republicans said theyre still waiting to hear from witnesses closer to the whistleblower who set off the impeachment inquiry. These are the people with supposedly the firsthand knowledge who gave the whistleblower the information that formed the basis of his complaint. Reporter now this makes clear, this Opening Statement, how uncomfortable taylor was about accepting the job originally and how concerned he was about the backchannel diplomatic efforts and in his Opening Statement he continued to note that the backchannel diplomatic channels through Rudy Giuliani were the ones that appeared to be taking over rather than what the top diplomat in ukraine was trying to do on behalf of the u. S. Jake. Sara murray, thanks so much. Lets chew over this. And phil mudd, let me start with you. Is this testimony significant . If so, why . Yeah, for a couple of reasons. The big ticket item is, we knew at the phone call, the president was squeezing the ukrainians for Opposition Research and the question was fuzzy but this gets us more than one step closer and i think mr. Sondland has more questions to answer based on my quick read and that is direct linkage between our taxpayer dollars and the request for ukraines to do Opposition Research and this names a lot of names. Gives the democrats on the hill a lot of potential to say i want to talk to other people to corroborate this. This is rough. And lara, from the top diplomat in the u. S. Ambassador in ukraine describing a call with ambassador sondland running the point when it comes to the president s push for this and said ambassador sondland tried to explain that President Trump is a businessman and when a business man is about to sign a check to something that owes him something, the business man asks him to pay up before signing the check. And then he goes on to say Ambassador Kurt Volker used the same terms. What do you make of that . I make of it that there is he was not mistaken, but he thought there was a quid pro quo at stake here. He is not mistaken that was a oneoff, it was a calculated concerted effort to have taxpayer dollars, not the check of a businessman writing from his own slush fund or his own checking account. But from the powerful purse of congress that is fueled by taxpayer dollars. So what you have here is what we think the idea of the text, this is crazy, how can this be conditioned in this way. Guess what . He had reason to believe that based on a series of events. And talking and reading through it still, notice the detail of this document. This is somebody who has receipts, several of them. It is hard to undermine his credibility or say maybe he got some aspect wrong. He kept notes. He relayed them. It is very, very clear that the reason he took this position in the first place is because he knew the importance of ukraine and their vulnerability and it is exploited. He saw it and reported it and he called him on it. And that is interesting, mary katherine, because one of the things that we lose sight of is this 400 million in aid to the ukrainians, one they desperately want that money to defend themselves against russian separatists and two, it is not President Trumps money, it is our money, taxpayer dollars. And that is the crux of the inappropriate nature of this obvious from the second they said here is the thing we did and here is the transcript of us doing the thing. Now whether there was an explicit quid pro quo or how far that went, the money did get released, those are open questions which is why were working on this. But the Trump White House as usual is like, yeah, we did the thing, here is the transcript. You sort of have the goods from the beginning. Get over it. And alamo Mick Mulvaney attempting a a walkback. Youre god damn right i did order the code red. And i think this stuff is damaging since we saw the text last month between sondland, the ambassador to the e. U. And bill taylor where he said i think this is crazy and sondland text back lets stop talking about it on text. That is a paraphrase, yes. Has to be other i was or trump will say i made up words. He said call me. No the words were i suggest we stop the back and forth by text. But now you have 15page testimony and laura is right it is harder to undermine a person like this but doesnt mean they wont try. This is the Trump White House. Would you be interested to know how long he keep this is job and so he could have bullet points and pictures to explain it and well be furious. The phone call summary established a quid pro quo and were back filling and making clear how it worked out and what amount of money was at stake, who said what where but it is clear from the beginning that this is impeachment offense and there was a quid pro quo and even without a quid pro quo asking someone to investigate your political rival is outrageous. I want to put this in context. To the average American Voter out there thinking if this is not impeachable or if this is accepted, lets put it that way, what does the United States look like in a future where it is okay for the president , or the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs committee or the chairman of the Senate Foreign policy to push Foreign Governments to do things like that. What does that look like. In the last few days Silicon Valley said were seeing iranian and russian interference and you would say of course were interfering. The americans have invited people to participate. The president said on a public podium, why doesnt the russians get Hillary Clintons emails. I would say just a bit of irony here at 4 30 in the afternoon. The president squeezing the ukrainians on corruption while hes holding up money so they could investigate a political rival is really precious. I mean, lets push them to investigate corruption except at the white house. I think ill leave that one aside you know how much donald trump fighting corruption. One thing he did mention in this letter is he did not realize and thought maybe with holding the aid was about a meeting with the white house. Which in his mind i think he thought, well perhaps that is as far as you want to take it but he said it is the first time i realized the Security Assistance not just the white house meeting was conditioned on the investigation into burisma and hes talking about hunter biden and his ties and this is what the whistleblower complaint had to say which corroborates another aspect of the white house and now this person is very credible and the document does it again. And mary katherine, i want to raise the issue of hunter biden and this is the point that interceptor made eloquently which is putting aside for one second if we can the president s lies and behavior about this and the prosecutors have said there is no evidence of any criminal wrongdoing by hunter biden, but still thats the whole situation with him on that board, that stinks. It is swampy is one word for it and hes admitted to it, im stepping down because it is not a good story. Biden doesnt want to talk about it because it is not a good story. There is something there. It is not the thing that trump thinks is there and it is again inappropriate to have a Foreign Government trying to investigate your domestic political adversaries. We have americans to do that, jobs americans will take. And i dont understand that component is okay and President Trump sparking a racial controversy in the middle of this. Because why not. Why not throw some racial logs on the fire. He called the impeachment probe a lynching. And then as bill taylor stunning new testimony enough to convince. . We well talk to one of the potential jurors. Stay with us. Announcer the lead with jake tapper brought you to by Dell Technologies. When youve got public clouds, and private clouds, and hybrid clouds things can get a bit cloudy for you. But now, theres the Dell Technologies cloud, powered by vmware. A single hub for a consistent operating experience across all your clouds. That should clear things up. Is just like our originalhn sandwiches. Only littler. So we bought a little ad. On lil jon. Little johns, yeah 3, what . doprevagen is the number oneild mempharmacistrecommendeding . Memory support brand. You can find it in the vitamin aisle in stores everywhere. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. Brownbagging it. So why you paying so much for wireless . I dont know. The new Tracfone Wireless gives you all kinds of control. Leftovers . 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Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders treating, no lynching was racial terror by White Supremacists who murdered thousands of africanamerican men and women and children. If you are nervous about an impeachment inquiry you should not have violated the constitution, unquote. As Kaitlan Collins reports. Many republicans are publicly backing the president s term lynching. Reporter President Trump has derided democrats impeachment probe as a witch hunt and a fraud. But today he drew swift condemnation after he went even further and likened it to a lynching. Trump tweeting at the impeachment inquiry is without due process or fairness or any legal rights as he urged republicans to remember this in the future. But critics said he should remember the past. Democrats immediately rebuked the president for invoking the racist history of barbaric white mob murders of black people. You knew exactly what he was saying and exactly how it would come across. Why would you use the term lynching. Why would you say that . Reporter members of trumps own party distanced themselves from his words including majority leader mitch mcconnell. Given the history in our country, i would not compare this to a lynching. That was an unfortunate choice of words. Reporter tim scott the only africanamerican republican senator had this to say. There is no question that the impeachment process is the closest thing of a political death row trial. So i get his absolute rejection of the process. I wont use the word lynching. Reporter the president did find a vocal defender in Lindsey Graham the senator from South Carolina who endorsed his choice of words. So yeah, this is a lynching in every sense. This is unamerican. Reporter at the white house, aides insisted trump wasnt comparing himself to one of the darkest moments in american history. Hes receiving zero due process from democrats on the hill and that is what hes talking about. Are we going to talk about this or continue with the tweet . [ inaudible ]. Reporter the president s tweet coming as pressure on the white house over the probe is intensifying. Is this intended as a distraction . Reporter a steady stream of current and former officials have continued to testify under oath on capitol hill. Despite a white house vow not to cooperate. Today a new cnn poll revealed that 50 of americans now support impeaching and removing the from office though his Approval Rating is remaining steady at 41 . Now, jake, when jim jordan another one of the president s allies was asked about his comment today and whether or not it was appropriate, he said he thought the president was frustrated over this whole process with impeachment but that is something weve heard from republicans today. Theyre frustrated with the president using this word because now theyre having to defend that instead of attacking democrats for what they say is an unfair impeachment inquiry and instead focusing only on the president s use of the word. Kaitlan collins at the white house. Thank you so much. Joining me now is democratic senator mazie hirono of hawaii. Senator, what is your reaction to the testimony from bill taylor . He gave an Opening Statement we obtained and he said that he was told that President Trump wanted a public commitment from the president of ukraine, that ukraine would conduct these investigations into matters that the president wanted investigated, that would help him politically such as into the bidens, et cetera, in exchange directly in exchange for military aid for ukraine. What is your reaction . Apparently mr. Taylor took really accurate and extensive notes. And his testimony from what ive read as to the Context Content of his testimony is that he corroborated and provided context what the president when he said to the ukrainian president i would like a favor though. One of your democratic colleagues today called taylors testimony, a quote, sea change. Do you think that is true when it comes to republicans . Im not exactly holding my breath because they are still busy trying to defend the president the president s actions. And so i do think, though, this testimony is further corroboration that the president asked a Foreign Government to get dirt on a political opponent for his political and personal gain. Congressman Gerry Connelly said it is more urgent now that trumps former security adviser john bolton testified but the white house made it clear theyre not cooperating and the people who have testified have done so because they were subpoenaed. John garamendi of maryland i believe suggested that if witnesses wont cooperate, the sergeant of arms may need to take them off and haul them to the capitol jail. Is that a serious option the democrats are talking about . I dont know if that is a serious option but the fact is that the white house and the president is stonewalling every effort on the part of the house to subpoena or have witnesses testify. So that is still what we should be focusing on and i think the house would consider adding that kind of behavior to their articles of impea