Eye on america the hunt for a man who Police Believe is responsible for thousands of deaths from the u. S. To mexico. And the air force hero who always seems to turn up when hes most needed. This is the cbs evening news with Norah Odonnell. Odonnell good evening. This is our western edition. And thank you so much for joining us. Tonight, an explosive allegation by a government whistleblower that the white house engaged in a coverup by stashing records of the president s phone call with a foreign leader into a topsecret computer. And in that phone call, President Trump repeatedly urged ukraines new president to investigate joe biden and his son. According to the complaint, multiple Administration Officials told the whistleblower of their concerns. Tell, today, the acting congress the allegations are unprecedented. The pressing questions tonight who ordered the phone records to be hidden and why . We have a team of reporters investigating this fast developing story. Were going to begin tonight with nancy cordes on capitol hill. I think the whistleblower did the right thing. Reporter the nations top intelligence official told lawmakers today he has no reason to doubt the whistleblowers intentions. Et a detailed, ninepage complaint, the whistleblower says senior white house officials worked to lock down all records of a president ial phone call this summer out of fear that they had witnessed the president abuse his office for personal gain. And the allegation was determined to be urgent and credible by the inspector general. Is that right . Es yes, it was. And if theres coverup activity because the president is working improperly with a foreign government, that could oumpromise americas secrets. Is that right . Congressman, there is an allegation of a coverup. Reporter the phone call in question took place on july 25, stst after mr. Trump unexpectedly froze millions in ukraine aid. According to a summary of the call released yesterday by the white house, mr. Trump asked the president of ukraine for a favor, to look into campaign rival joe biden, and bidens son hunter. The whistleblower says white house officials were deeply disturbed and were directed by white house lawyers to remove a transcript of the call from the regular computer system, placing it instead in a separate system normally reserved for classified, sensitive information. He says aides saw this as an ituse of the system, but that it was not the first time they had done this to protect the president. Okay you believe it is okay for the president of the United States to pressure a foreign country into helping him or her win an election . It is unwarranted. It is unwelcome. It is bad for the nation to have outside interference, any foreign power. Thank you. And by extension, it would be equally unacceptable to extort that assistance as well. All i know is that i have the transcripts, as you have. I think its wrong. And i think we all know it. It is illegal, and it is wrong. E federal bureau of investigation. Reporter the New York Times reports the whistleblower is a c. I. A. Officer. Republicans noted that this person, by his or her own admission, was not a direct witness to most of the events described. The whistleblower tells us the officials that i spoke with told me and i was told that. And white house officials told me that. In other words, all of this is secondhand information. Reporter but the acting director of national hetelligence, chosen by the president himself, says some key details do check out. I would say that the whistleblowers complaint is in alignment with what was released yesterday by the president. Then why, director, when the president called the whistleblower a political hack and suggested that he or she might be disloyal to the country, why did you remain silent . I did not remain silent, mr. Chairman. Its a sad week for our country. Reporter House Speaker nancy pelosi told scott pelley of 60 minutes that this incident is now the primary focus of the impee impeachment inquiry. What message do you have for the white house regarding cooperation . Speak truth. Speak truth. We are at a different level of lawlessness that is selfevident to the american people. Odonnell nancy cordes joins us now from the hill. Nancy, what an extraordinary day today up there. Mpere does the impeachment herestigation go from here . Reporter well, norah, democrats say that the whistleblowers report gives them ey nowant toalk to. Nail down an interview with the whistleblower, who they think will give them even more leads. Some democrats want to move to a vote on impeachment very quickly, perhaps as early as next month. But Speaker Pelosi disagreed with them today. She said theres no rush. She wants more time to gather the facts, norah. Odonnell all right, nancy, thank you so much. Another key detail that we learned today the whistleblower also alleges that President Trump canceled a planned visit to ukraine by Vice President ennce. De report says mr. Trump did not want a toplevel meeting with the president of ukraine until he saw how he chose to act in office. Well, ben tracy is at the white house with what the president is saying in his defense. Reporter mr. President do you care if youre impeached, sir . Reporter President Trump did tot answer questions as he returned to the white house, but at a closed door event in new york this morning, he had questions of his own. Whos the person who gave the whistleblower the information because thats close to a spy. Reporter in audio obtained by the l. A. Times the president suggested whoever spoke to the whistleblower about his phone call with the president of ukraine might be a traitor, even though the whistleblower claims they received the information through the course of official busines punishments, such as imprisonment or execution. He reporter so far, the white louse is treating the fallout from the whistleblower complaint as a p. R. Battle. Sources say there is no war room or army of lawyers. Its another witch hunt. Here we go again. Reporter the white house plans to discredit the whistleblower by seizing on the fact that he had no firsthand knowledge of the call. Cbs news has learned there was disagreement inside the white house about releasing the call summary, but ultimatel hes done nothing wrong. My call was perfect. The president yesterday of ukraine said there was no pressure put on him whatsoever, none whatsoever. Reporter but the white house is not responding to theteouse s intervened to lock down all records of the phone call, knowing how bad it looked. Instead, today, President Trump ashed out at democrats calls for impeachment. What these guys are doing, democrats are doing, to this country is a disgrace, and it shouldnt be allowed. There should be a way of stopping it. Reporter a white house official told me today that impeachment now looks like a ball rolling down a hill with nothing to stop it. But other white house sources are saying with every passing tey we get closer to the wection and it becomes etlitically more difficult for fimocrats to impeach. Odonnell Michael Morell is a former acting c. I. A. Director, now cbs News Senior National security contributor. Michael, so good to have you here. L,know you have read this full whistleblower complaint. What stands out to you . So the first thing that stands out to me is this was probably highly likely written by an analyst. Odonnell a c. I. A. Analyst. A c. I. A. Analyst. Cu can tell by how careful they are with laying out the evidence, how careful they are about how they found this out, uten how it is structured with short bullets. Its a c. I. A. Analyst. Odonnell in terms of the substance, how damaging is it . So four allegations, right . One is the phone call. One is the coverup. T e is the activity that took place the next day with the u. S. Reaching out to ukraine to say, p kay, were following up now on the president s conversation. And then the fourth is the topping of the assistance, right, to create the leverage. We know that the first allegation is absolutely, 100 right. ss going to take an investigation to figure out if the other three are right. Odonnell on that specific charge thats in the utistleblowers complaint about moving the transcript of this call into another computer. What does that say to you . So i dont know if thats onue. Well figure it out. But the computer that the whistleblower says it was moved to is for the mostsensitive information in the United States government. ss for c. I. A. Covert action information. There wasnt anything close in the summary to putting it in there. Odonnell so does that suggest there was a coverup . Yes, if that happened. If that indeed happened. Odonnell all right, Michael Morell, thank you so much. Youre welcome. Odonnell and now we want to take a closer look at two names that feature prominently in the whistleblowers complaint. They are attorney general bill barr, and in particular, mr. Trumps lawyer, Rudy Giuliani. Paula reid looks at how americas mayor has become the president s fixer. Reporter the whistleblower singles out Rudy Giuliani as a central figure in the scandal. Awe president s personal lawyer is mentioned 30 times in the complaint, which cites meetings ad had with at least seven ukrainian officials. In early august, just eight days after President Trumps call with his ukrainian counterpart, giuliani flew to madrid to meet with one of the ukrainian leaders advisers. According to the complaint they toscussed cases the two leaders usd raised. Seuliani has admitted pressuring ukraine to open an investigation into former Vice President joe biden and his son hunter. So you did ask ukraine to look into joe biden. Of course, i did reporter the whistleblower alleges, starting in midmay, u. S. Officials were deeply concerned by giulianis circumvention of National SecurityDecision Making and efforts to relay messages between the white house and ukraine. President trump defended his personal attorney wednesday. Rudy giuliani is a great lawyer. He was a great mayor. Hes highly respected. Reporter responding to the whistleblowers allegations, giuliani said, it is impossible that the whistleblower is a hero, and im not, and i will be the hero. Scott frederickson is a former independent counsel. Weve never in the history of t r country that im aware of, ever seen a personal attorney engage in this kind of foreign diplomacy, especially with respect to these very specific requests. Theeporter the complaint also singles out attorney general william barr. President trump told the esrainian president , barr would reach out to discuss investigating the bidens, but the Justice Department said the president never asked barr to contact ukraine. Netonit. Ueis key question, the attorney general, what role did barr play . Reporter its interesting, norah. Ble whistleblower didnt include a lot of details about barr in the complaint. But we know barr played a key rele in preventing these galegations from getting to congress. So this once again raises new abestions about whether the attorney general is acting as the president s defender or the nations top Law Enforcement official. Odonnell and paula, what is the legal vulnerability of the people around the president who may have carried out this cover up . Reporter if congress decides to pursue impeachment, the Justice Department is going to be under significant pressure to open a parallel criminal investigation. Yo can charge a sitting president , it could potentially charge accomplices. And if it turns out this is bribery which is one of the things theyre look at giuliani could have some exposure. Odonnell incredible details youre reporting tonight. Thank you, paula. Weve got continuing coverage on our streaming cbs service cbsn and on cbs. Com. Cbsnews. Com which include a link to the whistleblowers cmplaint so you can read it yourself. Also, theres breaking news in the vaping crisis. Tonight, the c. D. C. Is confirming at least 12 deaths linked to vaping in 10 states. That does not include a death that was reported just today in inth carolina. The number of illnesses jumped to at least 805, and thats up more than 50 from last week. Federal safety investigators have put out the first new guidelines since two deadly crashes forced the grounding of 73e boeing 737 max. Now, the n. T. S. B. Found that boeing and the f. A. A. Overestimated pilots ability to handle the plane when the mcas mstem malfunctioned. Now, that Flight Control system, olsigned to prevent the plane neom stalling, misfired in both of those crashes. It forced down the nose of the plane and it set off a wave of alarms that likely caused confusion in the cockpit. The recommendations include rethinking how an average pilot would respond to multiple alerts. There is still much more news ahead right here on tonights cbs evening news. Eye on america were going to follow the hunt for a man blamed for putting a third a third of the Illegal Drugs on u. S. Streets. And a third parent is sentenced in the College Admission scandal. 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S. , and in tonights eye on america, adriana diaz takes us on the hunt for this dangerous drug lord. Reporter its just after sunrise, and on chicagos west side, were out watching the morning rush for drugs. Its 7 15. Reporter 7 15 in the 5. Rning. Yeah. Reporter and there are people in the alley back there. The seller is behind that boarded fence. Reporter the d. E. A. s Brian Mcknight showed us what is going on in broad daylig. Theres literally a line. Now everyone is coming bag out. The guy is putting his right hand in his pocket. Reporter last year in chicago alone, almost 800 people died from drug overdoses. What percentage of drugs in chicago do you think come from mexico . A significant amount, probably about, you know, 90 . Reporter 90 . Yeah. Reporter the d. E. A. Says this man is a major part of the problem. Hes a rising mexican drug lord named nemesio osegera cervantes, known simply as el mencho. Hes the number one priority for d. E. A. , and, frankly, federal Law Enforcement in the United States. Reporter Matthew Donahue is the d. E. A. s top agent in mexico cod has helped uncover dozens of el menchos drug labs in the jungle. Put your hands up reporter el menchos cartel is responsible for fughly a third of the drugs d tering this country by land eay byonan s. His head. Ironically, he lived in california some 30 years ago where he was arrested on drug foarges and deported back to mexico. Nd hes got an enormous amount of weapons r. P. G. S, 50caliber weapons. He basically has his own swat teams. Reporter from shooting down a mexican army helicopter, killing six, to being implicated in a public hanging this summer, uml mencho protects his empire with impunity. Back in chicago, the mexican drugs seized are so toxic, they cant be handled without protective gear. At the d. E. A. s lab, packs of cocaine are stamped with traffickers brands, and more than a third can be traced back to el mencho. Hes the one responsible for sending the poison thats actually killing innocent women and kids. So what happens when someones dhild dies . You know, good chance it probably came from his organization. Can you stay with me . Open your eyes reporter this is the aftermath an overdose in chicago. This man survived that day, but last year, more than 67,000 americans did not. Flooding the u. S. With drugs, el menchos cartel makes hundreds of millions of dollars a year. The d. E. A. Says part of the challenge in capturing him is he has entire Police Departments in mexico on his payroll. Rorah, as one agent puts it, if el mencho wants you to work for him, you have two options say yes or be killed. Odonnell incredible reporting tonight, adriana. Thank you so much. And still ahead, what uber is doing to keep riders like you safe. Ok everyone our mission is to provide complete, balanced nutrition. For strength and energy whoohoo greattasting ensure. 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