Personal attacks on congress while making his case about why he should be able to go it alone. Plus, iran lashing out again as some there are calling for further retaliation against trump, while their government tries to explain away what appears to be a horrible and brutal truth. Iranian missiles shot down that commercial jet liner full of innocent passengers just after take off the night of that missile attack. And Speaker Pelosi says shell be sending over those impeachment articles to the senate soon, but then theres the matter of congress leaving town for another long weekend as the 11th hour gets underway on this thursday night. Well, good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. Day 1,085 of the trump administration, and 299 days until the president ial election. Donald trump is making a new case for ordering the killing that brought the u. S. To the brink of a wider conflict with iran. This morning in the roosevelt room, trump defended the drone strike that dispatched the iranian commander one week ago now, and he continued to make his case tonight at his first rally of this 2020 Election Year in the critical state of ohio. We caught a total monster, and we took him out. And that should have happened a long time ago. We did it because they were looking to blow up our embassy. He had more than that particular embassy in mind. And he was looking very seriously at our embassies and not just the embassy in baghdad. He loved planting the road side bomb. So now hes gone. Up until now, all this administration had said is that soleimani was planning imminent attacks on americans and u. S. Interests in the middle east. There was also the explanation top Trump OfficialsGave Congress at that classified briefing yesterday. Democrats came out highly critical and, indeed, so did some republicans. Late this afternoon the house passed a war powers resolution that forces trump to go to congress for authorization before taking any future military action against iran. The vote was 224194, mostly along party lines. Tonight trump blasted the vote and House Democrats moved to put a check on his powers to reassert congressional authority. Theyre all trying to say, how dare you take him out that way. You should get permission from congress. These are splitsecond decisions. You have to make a decision. So they dont want me to make that decision. They want me to call up maybe go over there, let me go over to congress. Or come on over to the white house, lets talk about it. We heard where he was. We knew the way he was getting there. And we had to make a decision. We didnt have time to call up nancy, who is not operating with a full deck. Can you imagine calling crooked adam schiff . They want us to tell them so they can leak it to their friends in the corrupt media. As for the public, a new usa today ipsos poll shows a majority of the public, 55 , think the strike on soleimani made the u. S. Less safe. Less than a quarter say the u. S. Is safer as a result. Tonight one tragic result of this latest conflict has become clear. It appears iranian missiles shot down a commercial jet liner just after take off on the same night as that missile attack. Well have more on that a bit later on in our broadcast. Meanwhile, trump is trying to manage the fallout from all of this as he watches Mitch Mcconnell fight his battles on impeachment. Nbc news reporting the two met yesterday at the white house to talk about it. Today mcconnell issued this new warning to pelosi who has yet to transmit those articles of impeachment over to the senate. If the speaker continues to refuse to take her own accusations to trial, the senate will move forward next week with the business of our people. We will operate on the assumption that House Democrats are too embarrassed too embarrassed to ever move forward. It appears that everything will have to wait for congress to come back from yet another threeday weekend recess. Pelosi, who was featured on the cover of this weeks time magazine, responded to mcconnell and made it clear she is not about to be pushed into making any moves. We are concerned that the senators will not be able to live up to the oath that they must take to have an impartial trial. The articles indefinite . No, im not holding them indefinitely. Ill send them over when im ready, and that will probably be soon. We want to see what theyre willing to do and the manner in which they will do it. We need to see the arena in which we are sending our managers. Is that too much to ask . She has used that word before. Her concern about the arena has to do with whether or not there will be witnesses called or allowed at trumps trial. Thats a matter mcconnell wants to settle after things get underway. Former Trump National security advisor john bolton is someone the democrats and maybe a few republicans are eager to hear from, and hes agreed to testify if, indeed, he receives a subpoena. Today trump sounded somewhat hesitant about the prospect of this particular former employee under oath. John bolton testifying in the senate trial . Id have to ask the lawyers because we have to to me for the future, we have to protect president ial privilege. When we start allowing National Security advisors to just go up and say whatever they want to say, we cant do that. So its about future president s just to have that down. And here with us, for our lead off discussion on a thirst night, susan page. Washington bureau chief for usa today, best selling author who on the heels of barbara bush is currently working on one nancy pelosi. Jeremy bash at the c. I. A. And the pentagon. Jonathan lemire, White House Reporter for the associated press. Good evening and welcome to you all. Jeremy, on the National Security front id like to begin with you. Talk about the actual Serious Business that the gang of eight is charged with and how seriously in normal times they take those roles. Well, the chairs and vice chairs or ranking members of the intelligence committees and the congressional leaders from both houses and from both parties are eight members of congress, the socalled gang of eight, and they are charged with overseeing the most sensitive intelligence activities and sensitive intelligence operations. And as Congress Asks pertinent questions tonight about whether or not the information about soleimani can be shared with congress, what are they asking . Theyre asking, number one, why was this so imminent . What information did the United States possess . And i think heretofore, the answers have been vague and they have been unspecific and they have been, therefore, unsatisfactory to members of congress who are trying to discharge their responsibility for oversight. I think theyre also going to ask the Intelligence Community a broader question, which is are we indeed safer . Is all well, as the president said on the night of the Ballistic Missile strikes against our forces in iraq. Is, in fact, iran going to retaliate in other ways beyond that overt missile strike . Are they going to engage in proxies and surrogates, terrorism, building out their Nuclear Capability and Cyber Attacks . These are all questions that have to be debated, which is why Congress Passed this important war powers resolution act tonight. And, susan page, indeed, talk about how safe or unsafe we feel. Talk about Public Opinion as you wrote about it today. You know, this was a surprise to us, a level of concern we found americans felt about what was happening in the wake of the drone strike that killed soleimani. Usually these things, often they divide along party lines. Republicans would say its great, democrats would express concern. Thats not what we found. By more than 21, americans said we were less safe. A majority of americans said that the president was acting recklessly when it came to iran. So we saw a high level of concern about the repercussions, not the defense of soleimani, nobody is defending soleimani as someone who didnt deserve to die. But about the repercussions of the action that the president took. And you know, we saw the president take a very different tone yesterday than he had taken in the previous couple days and i wonder if the white house, which is constantly doing its own poll and survey work, understood the chord that the president touched with his more provocative rhetoric of the previous days. Jonathan lemire, lets take that point from susan page. Have you seen a migration of attitudes and talking points from the president , from the white house . Is it clear that anyone told him anything about the after effects of this unilateral decision . Well, this is a decision that was made rather hastily at maralago last week. And i was there as part of the president ial pool for a few days. There were a group of reporters who travel with the president. He had been given a series of options. To the surprise of his advisors, he took the most dramatic one. He ordered the strike that killed soleimani. They spent a couple days going over options, they went to another time, he went for it. There was some certainly discussion of what the aftermath could look like, but i think that people that weve talked to, the reporting weve done, thats not where the president s focus was. Looki looking tough, striking out defending american interests. He authorized the raid to kill al baghdadi, thinking that shoe showed americas reach, youre not safe from us anywhere in the world. They thought this was good for his reelection chances. Projecting american leadership. And he forged forward. But instantly there was not a real instinct from this president for this to devolve into a significant shooting war. He was looking very quickly for an off ramp. He made the statement. There was an understanding iran would retaliate. The missile strikes on the iraqi base the other night, thankfully, did not cause any casualties. And, you know, some of that perhaps by design, by the iranians, although certainly we shouldnt suspect they will not try to retaliate again. At least for the time being they didnt. There was no loss of life, no real damage. And the president was able to sort of claim victory. And, yes, this is a crisis largely of his own cree avgatio. Lets not lose sight of that. In the short term he got to have it both ways. Its his Foreign Policy gambling. This is what he does where he sort of talks tough. He doesnt want to have involved military action. And then he tries to claim victory even if its returning to the status quo. In this case he did, of course, kill an iranian general. Well have to see whether teheran which for the moment seems like its willing to take down the temperature, whether that continues. Jeremy bash, weve seen movement. I use the word migration on the talking points. Suddenly today we learn that the definition of imminent strikes was this guy was planning to try to take out our embassy in baghdad. Tonight the president switches to plural, embassies. So, Lawrence Odonnell asked democratic massachusetts senator ed markey, you were in the big briefing on the hill. Was this ever mentioned . Heres what transpired a few minutes ago on this network. We did not hear about blowing up the embassy yesterday in that briefing. And i sat through it from beginning to end. So, jeremy bash, why on earth w would the story change in 24 hours and why wouldnt you share information like that with the United States senate . Well, the fact that the story changes is a red flag. And second, if the president can announce it at a political rally, or at a political event in the white house, certainly they could tell the members of congress in a sensitive compartmented information facility in the basement of the capital when all members of the congress have checked their cell phones at the door and its a classified briefing. Youve got the chairman, the secretary of defense, the c. I. A. Director standing there. First of all, the president , maybe to echo jonathan, hes trying to have it both ways as well. Hes trying to trickle out details for political purposes, but hes not willing to brief members of congress who have the constitutional responsibility to oversee these activities. And hes also trying to say that this was totally imminent, but, in fact, hes also saying that this should have been done long ago. The story is not adding up and i think its going to invite a lot more scrutiny, a lot more conversation and a lot more resolutions like we saw from the house of representatives tonight. Susan page, so many of our print friends on this broadcast come on this broadcast. Theyre deadline journalists by day and go home and they are knee deep in a book project that puts them in another subject entirely. I ask this, knowing you are and youre hours away from usa today, knee deep in the subject of nancy pelosi. Talk about the ongoing effect she is still having on this president who, again tonight, went deep and went personal against her to cheers at that rally in ohio. You know, there is some division there is actually some concern i think among democratic ranks about exactly where shes going with withholding the articles of impeachment, how long shes going to hold onto them, whether she has an end game in mind. She has an extraordinary control of her caucus that is really quite remarkable, much more significant than the control her previous republican speakers had over their ranks. They had dissidents as you have in the Democratic Party who are much more public. Today you had a house chairman, adam smith of the Armed Services committee, say in an interview this morning that he thought it was about time to turnover these articles of impeachment. By the afternoon he was tweeting that what pelosi wanted to do. She has definitely, whatever else is withholding the articles of impeachment, it has gotten under president trumps skin. It clearly bothers him in a way it does not bother Mitch Mcconnell. And so for some democrats theyre saying, well, we dont know what else the strategy is for nancy pelosi, but that for democrats is a good thing. And, jonathan lemire, to take off on that, democrats have marvelled at the unity of the republicans, and that committee chairman, that exact episode is republican seeming under trump more than it is democratic. Can the democrats, will the democrats try to duplicate that kind of sticktogetherness . It was a rare break for the republicans yesterday when senator lee and senator paul questioned that briefing on the air strikes. And then some. Called it a disgrace. Lee said it was the worst hed ever heard. Beyond that there are few exceptions where the republicans are willing to break with the president. Helsinki was another. They march in lockstep with him and seem to be here on impeachment as well. The democrats, its a slightly different group, there are certainly characters who are not afraid of speaking their mind nor should they be. Speaking as a testament, susan was saying, Speaker Pelosi over the caucus where we had a few voices the last few hours, its time to send the articles over. Its time to transmit them. Suddenly that went away. Some of the members of the other chamber, too, senator blumenthal tim kaine. Yes, tim kaine, within a few hours reversed themselves. We should get this process going. No, lets wait and see. We trust the speaker. Shes in charge. To this point shes handled it pretty masterfully. The end game is certain. If it is certainly to annoy the president , she has succeeded. Jeremy bash, a lot of the standard stuff at tonights clintons rally clinton rally Hillary Clinton was called, crooked hillary again and again and again. You heard chants of lock her up at the trump rally in ohio. But then there is this Washington Post headline i wanted to raise with you. Justice department winds down clintonrelated inquiry once championed by trump. It found nothing of consequence. Jeremy, where does that leave us . Well, i think it leaves that u. S. Attorney who made that conclusion probably wondering whether hes going to have a job tomorrow because, of course, bill barr and the leadership of the Justice Department have played such an active role in advancing president trumps conspiracy theories and his attacks on the clintons and the obamas and anybody else. So its an unusual vindication here. But, of course, investigation was bogus to begin with and probably shouldnt have ever been launched. Three of our very best. Just one of whom is knee deep in nancy pelosi. Susan page, jeremy bash, and jonathan lemire, our thanks. And coming up tonight, the view from teheran as iran tries to convince the world they didnt shoot down a civilian aircraft. All evidence to the contrary. And later, with just 25 days sorry, we had to say it. 25 days till iowa, another democrat has reached the threshold and will be on the stage at the next democratic debate. 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