Shipment of aept tank missiles trump countered with these words, i would like you to do us a favor though. Were learning of the danger the president s own conversation posed. In speaking to white house officials the whistleblower says they were deeply disturbed by what had transpired on that phone call. They told me there was already a discussion going on with white house lawyers about how to treat the call because of the likelihood they had witnessed the president abusing his office for personal gain. Thats the white house people. And then the whistleblower learned its senior white house officials had intervened to lock down all records of the phone call especially the official word for word transcript they hid. The complaint says the officials were directed by house lawyers to remove the electronic transcript from the computer system, which was then loaded into a separate Electronic System that is otherwise used to store and handle classified information. So the people around the president knew his conduct in that phone call was wrong and used National Security protocols to hide it. The complaint reveals additional potential evidence of the president s efforts to leverage through ukraine. Two months before trumps july conversation with president zelensky, officials told the whistleblower it was made clear to them that the president did not want to meet mr. Zelensky until he saw how zelensky chose to act in office. Additionally the officials told me that a phone call would depend on whether, catch this, zelensky showed willingness to play ball with trump. Play ball with trump. Across town at the white house nbc reports theres rising anxiety, unease and concern that the whistleblowers allegation could seriously wupd thound thi president. Im joined by u. S. Senator and Kamala Harris and questioned the director of National IntelligenceJoseph Maguire and the intelligence Inspector General michael atkinson. Senator, we know about the quid pro quo, we know about the president saying if you want your javelin missile, the antitank missiles, if you want them to keep the russians from invading your country more, help me with this stuff i need to get on biden. And now today we find out basically the term was if you dont play ball you cant even get on the phone with our president. Heres how i feel about it. Donald trump even when he was running for office told us who he is. He told us if i shoot somebody on fifth avenue, i will get away with it. Hes a lawless president , he literally is. He believes obviously hes above the law, hes beyond reproach, that he can do anything and get away with anything. And this is yet another and serious examples about this fact, and its outrageous. It is outrageous that on top of everything else, on top of everything bob mueller told us in that investigation, that hes on the phone with yet again a Foreign Government attempting to influence the election for the president of the United States, and in that process not only understanding that the job of commander in chief of the United States of america should be to defend and protect us against all enemies foreign and domestic. But this president , donald trump, does not understand his job and frankly this is why for so many reasons that the process of impeachment should begin. Is this guy running a criminal enterprise in the white house . Is this a racket, a rico violation . Its certainly a racket and well see in terms how the evidence plays out. But it certainly reeks of corruption. It reeks of selfservice. It reeks of a president who is not truthful. He is lawless, and he is running an administration that reeks of corruption. Yes. The reason i bring that up is youre the prosecutor, you know all the dirty stuff that goes on in business. I hear about the rackets where in the old days of the 30s the mob controlled i. C. E. , so they could extort any money. If they controlled cement, if you want cement, youve got to talk to them. Its like trump says you want military aid, youve got to talk to me. Youve got to go through me. And this is understanding integrity of the United States and us as a people. Its all about selfservice. The guy is scared because he knows that he is going to be defeated in this election. He is desperate, and so his natural behavior that is about lawlessness, it has now blossomed into having a conversation with a foreign head of state in front of many people who have taken an oath to defend the constitution of the United States where he is bartering u. S. Aid to support a democracy over what he wants in terms of an investigation into one of his political rivals. Hes no better than any other dictator when it comes to using the resources of the people and in the name of the people for selfaggranddizement and for benefit, personal benefit. The report in the whistleblower complaint that not only did he conduct this extortionist move against the head of ukraine, but these people around trump, but they did was they took the verbatim word for word transcript and buried it somewhere in some sort of catacomb used for very sensitive top secret information. And thats called a coverup. And you are right, my career as a prosecutor in a court i would be arguing that this is evidence of consciousness of guilt. This is evidence of knowing that what happened in that phone call was wrong, it violates ethical rules, it violates the law, it violates the position of trust that the president should hold. And i ran the second Largest Department of justice in the United States, second only to the United States department of justice. This is completely by every act that this president has done including this one, an attack not only on our democracy but our system of justice. What did you think of Joseph Maguire, the acting director of National Intelligence today . I watched the early performance which was on tv this morning, public testimony. He kept saying i went to the white house to get the approval whether it was released or not. It seemed to be he was in a position of asking the people being complained about, the president and his people, whether it was okay to put it out or not. What did you make of the whole well, i cant talk about we did listen to in a classified setting, but there was clearly an attempt to cover up and the investigation needs to continue. He continues here with his coverup. Earlier today President Trump told staff from the United States mission to the United NationsCareer Foreign Service employees, career people that the whistleblower was, quote, almost a spy. And person revealed the president s behavior to the whistleblower was treasonous. He then made a startling reference to punishing the individual. The l. A. Times was provided with a recording of the video. Heres part of what the president said. Theyre almost a spy. I want to know who is the person who gave the whistleblower the information . Because thats close to a spy. You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart, right . The spies and treason. We used to handle it a little differently than we do now. Hes talking about the chair. Hes talking about the rosenbergs. Thats what he seems to be talking about. He sounds like a criminal, chris. Who snitched . Who gave up the goods . Lets find out who gave up the goods on us and make sure theres a consequence and its serious and let that be a lesson to everybody else. And it sounds like its straight out of some bad drama, but the fact is this is the president of the United States, and the concern that i have is that we have created a system for whistleblowers to come forward because we want people to be trance parent about the abuses in our government. And weve created laws that say we will protect them, and it should be the president of the United States above all who says that we welcome and well always protect people who are fighting for the integrity of our democracy. Well, the complaint the whistleblower highlights that during his or her call the president s call with the ukrainian president the president implicated his own attorney general in the scandal bill barr, which shows trump repeatedly urged the ukrainian president to speak to william barr about the investigations trump was pushing. And while barr is denying any involvement, it was Barrs Justice Department that advised the director of National Intelligence not to pass along the complaint to congress. So he was covering up. And were also learning the Justice Department decided not to investigate the concerns raised by the whistleblower complaint saying there was not sufficient cause to launch an investigation. It seems to me the president has replaced the normal government with two or three people, giuliani and bill barr not operating has the head of the department but as his personal lawyer. We saw that when attorney general barr delayed in sharing the mueller report, mischaracterized it, let that mischaracterization stand before actually sharing it with the american people. And lets talk about so the attorney general of the United States who seems to think that hes the president s personal lawyer instead of the peoples lawyer, lets also talk about Rudy Giuliani. Well, hes got two here looking out for him. Im actually calling on the i. G. And state department to actually investigate and figure out who in the state department was in cahoots or facilitating giulianis interactions with ukrainian officials, who was giving him if they gave him any kind of intelligence, and who facilitated Rudy Giuliani, the personal lawyer of the president to conduct himself as though he is an emissary for the United States. And the other thing, chris, the new York Bar Association needs to investigate youll yawny and probably disbar him. Let me ask you about your vote because the way you talk and a lot of people talk, the high crime is in front of us now. We see it. It was an extortionist effort he selfadmitted it. Is it done . Should they just go to a vote in the house the next couple of weeks and get this done with . There should be a process in which the investigation is conducted and facts are presented and then let there be a finding. This is what we do weeks or months . I think that, listen, i would like that it be weeks. It has to be quickly. I think thats what the speaker wants. Thank you so much. Well keep covering your president ial campaign. Good luck in iowa. Im moving to iowa. Youre raising the stakes in iowa. By the way, director Joseph Maguires dramatic public testimony for the House Intelligence Committee, heres a bit of it. I believe the whistleblower is operating in good faith. I think the whistleblower did the right thing. I think he followed the law every step of the way. Thats something the president , donald trump, does not want to hear but he just heard it. Im going to talk to two Congress People who questioned maguire today on the significance of what was revealed by the whistleblower. Plus where does this go next and how long will it the house to vote on impeachment . Weve got much more to get to tonight as you can see live from the capitol. Stay with us. T as you can see lm the capitol. 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Color. Full of energy. Full of. Woo its fresh and filling. This bowl is full of good. So you can be too. Try a new baja or mediterranean warm grain bowl today. Panera food as it should be. And the facts are these. That the president of the United States in his actions in a telephone call with a head of state betrayed his oath of office, our National Security, and the integrity of our elections. This is a coverup. This is a coverup. Welcome back. It is a coverup according to the testimony today from a whistleblower. They didnt really make an attempt to cover up that conversation between the president of the United States and the president of ukraine. In fact, they cept it off in some sort of catacomb somewhere where well never see it again. The accounting which was provided by a whistleblower in the Intelligence Community was corroborated by the Inspector General and found to be credible and raised urge want concern, they say. And spent the past weeks to try to dirty up the whistleblower. Its a partisan whistleblower. They shouldnt even have information. Its just another political hack job. I just hear a partisan person meaning it comes out from another party. They say it was a very partisan person, the whistleblower. The socalled whistleblower information. In his testimony to the House Intelligence Committee, the acting director of National IntelligenceJoseph Maguire defended the whistleblower against these claims. I want to stress that i believe that the whistleblower and the Inspector General have acted in good faith throughout. I have every reason to believe that they have done everything by the book and followed the law. The decision and the recommendation by the Inspector General, that in fact the allegation was credible. I think the whistleblower did the right thing. You dont have any reason to accuse them of disloyalty to our country or suggest theyre beholden to some other country . Absolutely not. Do you believe that the whistleblower was spying on one of our intelligence agencies or spying on the president sph. As i said several times so far this morning, i believe the whistleblower complied with the law and did everything they thought he or she thought was responsible under the Intelligence Community, whistleblower protection act. I would say the whistleblowers complaint is in alignment with what was released yesterday by the president. Joining me right now are two democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee who took part in that hearing today. Let me go to mr. Maloany on this one. Do you think theres any question of the integrity of the whistleblower at this point . No, i dont see any reason to question that. The complaint is very thorough and well documented. It matches very well, by the way, with the memo of the call. I think we have every reason to believe its largely accurate, but we should check it out. Is this a high crime the president of the United States extorting dirt on political opponents by holding up aid to a military ally . Is it a high crime . What is it is president ial extortion and an ongoing coverup. How come the president didnt know or didnt care . This is the day after he got past muellers testimony, and did he think oh, now that i got rid of that, now im done with that, get dirt for another country and goes i didnt get caught getting it from russia. Its a hands off to interference in the next election, and this time hes soliciting it and willing to smear a political opponent using military aid knowing hes being taped, knowing hes got people in this own government listening to what hes saying, and he seems to be the only one that didnt know or care he was breaking the law and creating a high crime. A leopard doesnt change its spots. Its a pattern of corruption. He did want learn his lesson from 2016 what the american should be offended by is hes using their taxpayer money, our taxpayer money to benefit nobody would get away with this job if you try to use your employers money to benefit himself. It looks like a racket. The mobster that controls the cement industry says you want to put that building up, youve got to talk to me. Look what he said about the whistleblower today. The director of National Intelligence bent over backwards to say this person did it right, hes following the rules by the book. The president said hes a spy. The president said we used to deal with guys like that. Hes going to rub them out. Look, i dont know what that language is intended to do except chill others from coming forward because we know from the complaint that theres a dozen white house officials who are deeply disturbed by this and a bunch of other folks in the agencies. We want to hear from them, we want them to feel they can come forward with the truth. Nancy pelosi, the speaker, shes been a resister to the process for months and then along the way she said something i thought was brilliant. She said hes going to impeach himself. Hes going to go do it in broad daylight and then well have him. He copped to the crime. He said he could sho