Schumer also demanded the white house release specific documents and emails that could shine more light on the hold on military aid to ukraine. Take a listen. We say to President Trump, release the emails. Let your aides testify. We say to leader mcconnell, a fair trial with the facts. Only the facts. Schumers comments come after the Trump Administration released a series of emails to the center for public integrity. In one email, a Senior Budget Office official wrote to the pentagons controller about the hold on military aid to ukraine on july 25th. Thats less than two hours after President Trumps infamous call with ukraines president. It reads, quote, given the sensitive nature of the request, i appreciate your keeping that information closely held to those who need to know to execute the direction. Now, democrats say that proves the white house was aware that the nature of that hold was somehow improper. But republicans say that that is not the case. And the white house is saying that those emails were, effectively, taken out of context. So joining me to discuss all of this, nbc news chief White House Correspondent hallie jackson. And nbc news correspondent heidi przybyla. Hallie jackson traveling with the president in florida. Do we have hallie, we havent heard a whole lot from the white house about these newlyreleased emails. What are your sources telling you . And any indication theyre going to comply with what Chuck Schumers demanding . So that would be i think, kristen, breaking with the precedent that the white house has set so far in this process. Right . You and i at the white house back home in washington and even here over these last few days in maralago have watched as the white house has been very consistent. They do not want to cooperate or at least share information or witnesses or documents with what they perceive to be this partisan investigation. This partisan impeachment led by House Speaker nancy pelosi. So any change would have to have been instigated by something dramatic at this point. And unfortunately, i get the sense that Chuck Schumers letter isnt going to cut it, right . Thats simply not dramatic enough for this white house. And laying those out. Keep in mind, the president is getting backup from his republican allies. For example, you had louisiana senator john kennedy out today. Also echoing what we have heard from senator Mitch Mcconnell today and others. Which is that they believe that this impeachment simply is not fair. The democrats are trying to sit on these articles of impeachment led by the speaker. And so without a significant crack in the wall of gop support here, its difficult to see what incentive the white house has to, frankly, reverse course and provide democrats what theyre looking for, which are these documents related to, for example, ukraine. That said, kristen, i would just note its interesting to watch the documents that we are seeing, right . And the ones we have seen over the last 72 hours have come not from the white house releasing them but from freedom of information act requests, right . These foias submitted by outside groups like news organizations, like the center for public integrity. Great point, hallie. Heidi, pick up on that point, if you would. Clearly no indication that the white house is going to comply or change course, as hallie notes. What is the strategy that you are seeing play out . Because right now, we have a lot of tweets from President Trump directed at House Speaker nancy pelosi. Well, this perfectly illustrates why Speaker Pelosi is pursuing the strategy that she is and withholding the articles. Because she knows that once she sends them over to the senate, democrats effectively have no control anymore. Unless they can find sympathetic republicans. And so far, theyre just not seeing them. So what this email underscores is that there is much more information being held under wraps by the white house that there is, in fact, a paper trail. That shows us that the timeline here is very poignant. Okay . It tells us that within 90 minutes of the president asking for investigations of bidens son, that that hold, which they had been discussing previously, was formalized. It was formalized until the email from duffy to the pentagon. And then 24 hours after that, kristen, what did we see . We saw Gordon Sondland confirming with the president , loudly, over a cell phone, that they had pressured president zelensky into acquiescing to those investigations. So all of this is very important. It underscores that these omb officials, who have more information, are refusing to testify. We know from mark sandy, who was the one omb official who testified behind closed doors, that at least two omb staffers quit. One of them, because they were concerned that there was a violation of the law that the president was withholding aid that was congressionallyappropriated. And they werent being given reasons why. Also, remember that in the testimony that we saw before the intelligence committee, that there was someone there was one of the witnesses who testified that they heard an omb official saying that order came from trump. Mr. Duffy could tell us whether thats accurate. Heidi, just to follow up. Do we have any sense that there have been any negotiations between leader mcconnell and Chuck Schumer . Are they getting anywhere . Or is this a standoff that is just deepening by the minute . Its a standoff through the holidays, which i have to say, like i think were all personally thankful for that a little bit just in terms of the timing. But it is a real standoff. That we dont know how thats going to end because, you know, leader mcconnell is technically accurate that in 1999, there was an agreement between trent lott and tom dashel at the time to effectively set out a framework for the logistics. And then later, they had a partisan fight over the witnesses. But there is a big difference, kristen, between today and 1999. And that is that the witnesses in 1999 had already provided provided grand jury testimony. We knew what they were going to say. Bill clinton had provided a blood sample. In this case, all of the key witnesses are refusing to testify. And, hallie, youve talked about the fact that, yes, the president is there in florida. But his team is pretty busy at work on this, right . Oh, yeah. And ive talked to sources in and around the white house, kristen. Who point out that, listen, you have to remember the president has his top aides and advisors who flew down with him here to south florida. There will be sort of a shift change, if you will, for maralago duty at some point over the holidays with other aides and advisors coming in. Ive been told they are meeting to work on this plan for the Senate Impeachment trial. Whenever that may end up beginning. What you are hearing from Top Administration officials is a publiclyprojected confidence that there will be a deal, right . You and heidi just talked about are there any negotiations happening . Were in this holiday standoff. Heres what we know. If there are negotiations happening, theyre in public, which is probably not a good sign, right . When you have Mitch Mcconnell saying i talked to schumer and he said this. And you have schumer saying i talked to mcconnell and told him to think about it over the holidays. That said, white house officials do think there will be some kind of deal made for trial. This isnt going to be hung over them indefinitely. But every minute this goes into january, the end of january, the closer closer it gets to the iowa caucus. Very important point. Ultimately, white house officials feel like they will get to a trial. The question is, when is that going to happen . And of course the political backdrop to all of it. Heidi przybyla, hallie jackson. Political reporter and msnbc political analyst nick confessore. Republican strategist susan del percio. Also, an msnbc political analyst squchlt from d. C. , doug thornell, former Senior Advisor for the dnc and the dn triple c. So thanks to all of you for being here. Nick, let me just pick up right there. I mean, how do we get to a trial in the senate when you basically have these two sides that are digging in . Slowly is the answer. And i think that President Trump has already lost all of his leverage when he tweeted last week that he wants a trial as soon as possible. That gave nancy pelosi permission, so to speak politically, to say hold on a second now. So senator mcconnell was out there saying, look, im not concerned about the timing here. And then the president comes out and says, oh no wait, im very, very concerned. So i think, look. In a sense, pelosi wins either way. If she gets some concessions on the scope of the trial, she wins a little bit. If she gets none, she still has a chance here to extend the period of public discussion over this question of documents and witnesses. And if people, like duffy, are being misconstrued, the obvious answer is, well, construe it for us. You know, provide some documents. Provide some witnesses. Bring more to the table. Instead, its been a blockade. Susan, let me just read some of what were hearing from leadership. Pelosi tweeting today on a Senate Impeachment trial, quote, the house cannot choose our impeachment managers until we know what sort of a trial the senate will conduct. President trump blocked his own witnesses and documents from the house and from the American People on phony complaints about the house process. What is his excuse now . This was the response from Lindsey Graham. Trump ally. He says stop playing games with the constitution and our system. You cant be the speaker of the house and the Senate Majority leader at the same time. The senate will decide how we dispose of this sham created by the house. Heres my question. Speaker pelosi clearly thinks this is her best leverage. Her best chance at pushing for some of these witnesses. To come forward. Is this an effective strategy . Could she, at the end of the day, actually get some witnesses . Its a twofold strategy that makes sense. First is, she let donald trump twist in the wind for two and a half weeks while hes in maralago. That just is enough to have him just go crazy as it is. The chances of them transmitting the articles of impeachment to the senate when they come back on january 6th is highly likely. But in that interim, they can control, nancy pelosi can control the narrative because all shes asking for is a fair trial. And the public deserves to hear witnesses and see documents. Its a very easy thing for the public to understand. To have a trial, you would have witnesses, of course. Like, they dont understand what what Lindsey Grahams talking about. Of course, you would have witnesses. Of course, you would see documents. This is a trial. So i think thats the narrative shes trying to build. Which she can do over this time and really just let the president go off on twitter. Doug, i dont have to tell you this but republicans are piling on, essentially, saying that shes playing politics. I want to just play a few of the comments that were hearing and get your reaction on the other side. Yeah. As i said repeatedly, we cant take up a matter we dont have. And so hopefully, itll theyll be on the way over at some point. Speaker pelosi is now telling the senate youre prevented or youre im prohibiting you from doing something you really dont want to do. Unless you do it in a way that i approve of. And its its very odd. I think its a mistake on the speakers part. I think this is pretty political anyway. And this is sort of the icing on the political cake. Where at the end, the speaker still cant let go of this as an issue to try to wring the last vestige of politics out of. Do doug, i know a lot of democrats wanted Speaker Pelosi to take this strategy. They wanted her to play hardball effectively. But does she run the risk of having this backlash not only on democrats in those house races but of course president ial candidates potentially as well . I dont think so. And, you know, john kennedy, i just dont think has any credibility. Hes been pushing russian propaganda for the last month about ukraine hacking the dnc. So i just dont i dont even listen to what he has to say. But i would say that i think the speaker has played this whole thing perfectly. You know, the house has done their job. And i think these emails show that were just released, show how important it is that we have a fair, honest, and open trial. Where theres witnesses. Now, the one thing is, is that i think were just underestimating the ability of of of mcconnell to not really care about whats in the best interest of the country and do whats in the best interest of the party. Much like he did with merit garland. So id be surprised if he acquiesces to anything. Let me, doug, follow up with you on something leader mcconnell said today on fox news. He said, look, im getting criticism for saying im not going to be an impartial juror. He said, look, do you think Elizabeth Warren will be impartial . Will Chuck Schumer be impartial . Does he have a point there . That politics is at play for all of them. Well, i look. These arent traditional jurors in the sense that, you know, when this trial starts, its not like theyre going to be sequestered. Right . But i do think that all most of these senators are on the record as far as their views of what trump did. But that doesnt mean you dont conduct a fair and open trial where witnesses are called. And where if the if the president truly believes and if his defenders truly believe that he did nothing wrong, then you would think he would want to have his you know, he would want people to testify to that point. And clear all this up. And then he would have a you know, a sort of clean slate to run for reelection. Right now, you know, i think their strategy of of continuing to block witnesses, documents, you know, look. I think that just makes him look even more guilty. Susan, what do you make of that argument that leader mcconnell is making . That, hey, look, yes. I was just telling the truth. But basically, a lot of the senators are not going to be impartial. Have their minds made up. You know what . That may be true. This is a partisan, political process. However, they are about to take an oath to carry through and be, in fact, nonpartisan and listen to the evidence and come to their conclusion. The fact that Lindsey Graham, the chair of the of the Congressional Committee i mean, thats insane if you think about it. And the and leader mcconnell. Both are willing to just say, hey, what what does my oath mean . I mean, it means nothing. And thats a very interesting thing to say and its reflective, frankly, in their behavior. Their oath to office, their oath to the constitution, and in this process is worthless. Its meaningless because they are not honoring it. Nick, let me shift gears here for a moment and talk about Rudy Giuliani. Our Josh Lederman has some new reporting on what hes been up to in ukraine. Essentially, digging into various different investigations. Some of which have been debunked already. Relying on some people who arent necessarily reliable, who are questionable at best. And then he gave this new interview to the new york magazine. Let me read just a part of it. It says of giuliani if they think, the sdny, that i committed a crime, theyre out of their minds. Ive been doing this for 50 years. I know how not to commit crimes. And if they think ive lost my integrity, maybe theyve lost theirs in their insanity over hating trump with some of the things they did that i never would have tolerated when i was u. S. Attorney. What do you make of where Rudy Giuliani fits in with all of this with President Trump saying hes going to release his findings to doj and to the senate . Im sure the mayor hasnt forgotten its not actually up to him to decide if hes broken the law or not. Its up to prosecutors and they will decide. Whats uncanny is his ability to get into new messes over and over and over again. Sometimes that the new mess is the same as the old mess. Hes going back to ukraine and creating more problems for the president. And perhaps he comes up with some kind of a new conspiracy theory. Like the old one. But then whats going to happen is the press, the mainstream press, the real press, will take a look at it and probably debunk it if its a conspiracy theory. Then back to square one. Susan, the president thinks that Rudy Giuliani is helping him. Clearly, hes keeping him very close still. Well, the president also likes seeing rudy out there just yelling and screaming and defending him. So its no wonder that the president keeps him close. He also likes the fact that rudy is willing to which as someone who worked in the giuliani administration, i cant tell you how opposite this is to everything that was being done when he was mayor. And how he ran the city. But right now, mayor giuliani is willing to go out there and just create messes. And use it as a deflection technique. And its really sad to see him do it. Great conversation, guys. Stay with me. Nick, susan, and doug, we have a lot more to discuss. Ahead, the speakers standoff with Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell. Shes holding off on sending the impeachment articles to the senate. But how long could we be waiting for a trial . And later, north korea says it has a Christmas Gift for the United States. New satellite images could reveal the potential threat. All thats next. At chevy, weret bringing families together. This time of year, thats really important. So were making it easier than ever to become part of our family. Man thats why our chevy employee discount is now available to everyone. The chevy price you pay is wha