I want to show you as she stepped out to the cameras today and made it clear the speaker says congress can impeach President Trump for bribery. Quid pro quo, bribery. The bribe is to grant or withhold military assistance. Thats bribery. Its perfectly wrong. Its bribery. Bribery. And that is in the constitution attached to the impeachment proceedings. Thats bribery. Thats the speaker of the house making headlines today. Pelosi making it plain that she views this as a potential way to impeach trump, that an article of impeachment would be based on accusation that trump demanded ukraine investigate bidens in exchange for money as a bribe. In this case, its your money. Remember, thats donald trump misappropriating money that taxpayer dollars were supposed to go to this other country. Now, this is new. This is the first time Speaker Pelosi has made these specific bribery case against donald trump. Shes obviously the top democrat in power. And several other key democrats have also recently discussed bribery as the article of impeachment that they may lead with against donald trump. So, this is all brandnew this week. Pelosi, brandnew today. Thats why its news tonight. If you happen to watch the beat, some of this may sound familiar because we have been reporting out the constitutional case here about this for some time. In fact, i wrote in october, on october 20th, about why bribery makes a strong constitutional case for impeachment. At the time, the democrats had not settled on a core legal rationale, especially in public, but the constitutionss answer, i wrote, was staring them in the face. Donald trumps action reaguarding ukraine fit one of the few offenses the constitution specifically lists as impeachable, bribery. We wrote that then, we reported on it here on the beat, and it is interesting to see now the Congress Looking at this as one of the potential articles of impeachment. An increasing number of witnesses, of course, are part of the evidence yar reasoning for that. You have now more and more people out in public stating the evidence that would support a bribery case, and you have more democrats getting on board with the bribery argument. The president broke the law. This is a very strong case of bribery. President trump was indeed soliciting a bribe. Its extortion. If you sought to condition, coerce, extort, or bribe an ally, if this is not impeachable conduct, what is . So, thats how the case is being outlined. What is the evidence for that case . Well, again, with these hearings kicking off were learning more and more. Its quite fast the way this is coming in. Let me show you a couple of highlights, a key witness now in hot water today. Trumps Million Dollar donor mr. Sondland is facing evidence about the call that he had with donald trump about the biden investigation. Now, remember, he already spoke to congress in private and reportedly did not raise, address, or honestly talk about this call. He also originally testified in his private appearance that there was no bribery. Then he pulled something that we call a reverse mulvaney. He changed his testimony after other witnesses came forward. He moved over into the bribery camp. Today the a. P. Reporting that another u. S. Official heard that donald trump was on that call. This is in the midst of the ukraine plotting. Thats an article and nbc has not reported that story. More on sondland will be in the show tonight. I have Something Special to look at a problem with trumps defense about it. Before sondland testifies next week were going to hear from yovanovitch tomorrow. She was pressured to back up the Trump Administration in public, threatened in terms of her career. Democrats basically are going to dig into all of this and why that is part of the plotting. Then you think about what happened this week. I can tell you this is new today, the new numbers we have in, those hearings were seen or heard by over 13 million americans across all the different news channels suggesting the story continues to break through. I want to bring in experts right now. Good evening everyone. Juanita, Speaker Pelosi is known to be a careful strategist, to think first, to huddle with her folks, and then come out. When you see her make that very clear, very aggressive bribery case today, what does it mean to you . It means that she knows that she has the information needed to see it through. Just like she waited to hold a vote on this, just like she waited to begin proceedings, she knew the conditions she needed and as soon as he got them, she moved. This is her moving on this. After yesterday, ambassador tailors revelation, the fact you have another staffer coming out saying they can corroborate this story means she feels comfortable in moving her caucus in this direction. What is interesting here is its going to likely yield results. We know that one of those staffers who worked for ambassador taylor is being deposed later this week. So, what is going to come from that is additional corroborating information which is going to drive this forward. And juanita, this is a story line and a question for any investigation is whats the evidence for the story and how do you tell it . So, thinking about her, again, embracing what could be one of the articles of impeachment, a big deal, bribery, right there in the constitution, and then looking at the way that she is taking on trump in public, the communicatio communication. Take a look at this moment today. The president has something that is exculpatory. Mr. President , that means you had anything that shows your innocence then he should make that known. And thats part of the inquiry. Juanita. Look, she knows hes watching. As much as he says hes not, she knows hes watching this with baited breath, huddling with his team in the mouse every day. Hes making the case to him, if youve got something, put it up. If not, everything youve done has obstructed this process and i am not backing down. She sees her mark and is going after it with full force. Robert, i wonder what you think given your experience as a government lawyer at the highest levels of the way the speaker made the case today that there was something trump wanted to help get him reelected, he demanded it, she said in return for money, and she said thats bribery. Well, i think theres a very clear mapping of this under the bribery statute. The bribery statute says its a crime to solicit anything of value in the exchange for the performance of official duties. And in this case, the thing of value was the president s desire to have ukraine aid him in his reelection efforts. The official act was the withholding of the aid. And the solicitation is what weve seen both in the transcript and in the other testimony that weve had about trump insisting that there was a linkage between the two. So, i think as you said earlier, its very easy to fit these facts into the framework. If this were a governor who wouldnt have the type of quasi immunity that president s tend to have in our federal system or thats the way doj has treated it, would a governor be in trouble . Could a governor go to jail for this . Absolutely. A governor, a county official, any kind of Government Official who uses his or her power to take or withhold actions in exchange for something of value to them. Heidi out on the hill, a lot of debate. I want to show a little bit of the highlights back and forth. Take a look. These liberals here in washington continue to try to throw baseless allegations and accusations at the president. The bribe is to grant or withhold military assistance in return for a Public Statement of a fake investigation into the elections. Its a disgrace. I think people saw yesterday they dont have anything. There are no impeachable offenses. Bribery. And that is in the constitution attached to the impeachment proceedings. Heidi. Look, for some time now, Speaker Pelosi has known that she has first hand fact witnesses starting with the acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney who acknowledged the aid was being withheld for political investigations that the president wanted. They felt they had the goods for some time. Whether the actual article of impeachment is going to read or belabel bribery we dont know for sure right now. But what we do know is that theyre narrowing the messaging, that they feel that the message that needs to be communicated to the public in order for this to be understandable is to use words like bribery instead of quite frankly the latin phrases weve been using, quid pro quo, because you dont have to speak latin to speak the language of bribery. It is the president himself, his words, that they believe fit into that bribery framework. And you saw that laid out by the Democratic Council in the hearing with ambassador taylor. Let me give you a few examples of how the president was speaking the language of bribery in their view. He used words according to sondland like stalemate. If the investigations werent performed, they would be at a stalemate. Sondland said he is a businessman and zelenski had to, quote, pay up before President Trump cut the check, that zelenski had to go to a microphone and do it himself, that giuliani wanted the words br burisma in there. Thats the language they wanted in there instead of the quid pro quo language. I think you went through and thats interesting reporting there. Youre talking about the way that the hearing was trying to pin down what each of those things meant if there was a plot. I would say as reminding viewers, this is than language. We think about framing and branding and yada yada. Were talking about what is the reason to remove a sitting president. What is the crime . Right, if congress does that. The reason the constitution gives is bribery, treason, or high crime. The first two were very much defined at the time. The third is a catch all. All of you please stay with me. Lets turn to a member of the intelligence committee, joaquin castro. Good evening sir. Good evening. Good to be with you. Good to have you. You are on this committee. My first question to you is why is the speaker and the chairman of your committee making this case explicitly about bribery right now and do you think that could be one of the articles of impeachment . It could very well be. And i think the reason that Speaker Pelosi mentioned bribery and its likely there could be other things as well in the articles of impeachment is because President Trump was trying to take out a political rival. The way he tried to do it was by withholding military aid in exchange for a favor. He asked directly for a favor. That favor was to investigate a political rival, joe biden and his son, hunter biden, and the company that hunter biden had done work for. Let me ask you a short question and a longer follow up. The short question is do you think that donald trump obstructed justice in the Mueller Probe . I do actually. I know you do. Let me ask it this way because weve talked about that and youve been clear on that. How do you have a set of articles of impeachment against the president that does not include that in addition to ukraine if you and others are on the record saying that that was that bad . In other words, even if Speaker Pelosi and others think that the messaging might be better to be more focused, do you have an obligation as someone who said that its that bad under the constitution to make sure that thats included . Yeah, i think thats a fair question and were not at the part obviously where weve drawn up the articles of impeachment yet. And thats something that the Judiciary Committee will probably take up first before the whole body takes it up. But yeah, i thought there was obstruction of justice in the Mueller Probe so its a discussion well have to have. Stay with me, robert. Im curious what you think of what the congressman just said. You would be an Expert Witness at one of these hearings. The congressman says theres a reason to include that. I wonder what you think. I think that muellers report laid out a very strong case that the president did obstruct justice. I think whether or not to include that in the articles of impeachment is a political calculation rather than a legal one. Its a question of what Speaker Pelosi and the Judiciary Committee think is the most effective articles of impeachment to send to the senate for trial. I do want to make one additional point on the bribery if i can, and that is that its important to understand that the bribe doesnt have to be paid. You heard representative jordan and others yesterday making a big point about the fact that the aid was eventually released. The meeting took place. But the bribery statute makes it a crime to solicit a bribe even if the bribe isnt actually paid and thats a point that should be emphasized all the time. Its such an important point you make. Its not prejudging what the evidence will show, but youre defining the terms which is how a lot of court cases work and how an impeachment process is going to work. We heard a lot about people saying if he didnt pull off the whole plot, does that make him innocent . The answer was no. We were discussing whether governors would go to jail for this. Trying to sell the Vacant Senate seat in illinois where he was governor and he had that power and barack obama vacated his seat to become president. That seat ultimately was not effectively sold because the investigation stopped i cant goi vich from doing it. Thats right and thats a great parallel. That seat was never sold to anyone. And yet the governor ended up in jail. And thats the point that i was making yesterday in the hearing. For example, with attempted robbery, you would still be charged. Attempted murder, you would still be charged. Here with bribery, it doesnt matter whether actually there was an acceptance or not. The president made that offer, or tried, then hes guilty. And its a crime. Congressman, before we lose you, what do you think is the next most important thing we might learn or that you want to get at in these coming hearings . I think that thats pretty clear. Its the interview with ambassador sondland and what he says about that conversation that he reportedly had with donald trump that was overheard in that restaurant. Remember theres a witness who says i over heard a conversation that donald trump was inquirying about the burisma and biden questioning. Theyre going to ask what happened in that conversation. I got you. Thats going to be a big answer people are going to be waiting to hear. Im going thank the congressman and each of you. Heidi, hang with me. I want to play one more piece of business. Take a listen to one of the republican defenses today. The only person i saw yesterday doing the job that they were elected to do was the president of the United States. The question is nothing there is impeachable and we should not be putting our country through this. Were less than a year away from election. I showed the top democrat, heidi. Theres the Top Republican in the house. I wonder if you can give your reporting on that part of the defense were hearing. The defense really is at this point that you cant prove it, right, because theres nobody sitting in the room with trump when he said lets do a quid pro quo. However, youre seeing all of these fact witnesses who are going to come forward who were there including the individuals who heard the president themselves on the phone pushing for investigations. So, what this is is really a preemptive attempt to try and form the narrative early that none of these guys have any credibility because it was all here hearsay. Well, this undercuts that. It was hearsay because he was being pushed aside. Marie yovanovitch was being pushed aside. Now we have proof that the president was conducting this personally on an unsecured phone call in kyiv which is one of the most notorious places for our lines to be tapped for surveillance by the russians. You laid it out. Its a lot there. Wanted to get the last piece from you. Thanks for your reporting tonight. Coming up, a new witness to a different phone call, the one we were just discussing, theyre breaking their silence. Fox news handling the damning testimony like this. A bunch of deep state cry babies. Washed up bureaucrats. Professional nerds who wear their bow ties. What is this with the water bottle . Water bottles and professional nerds . Thats later tonight. Also conservatives have a new defense that involves incompetence and what the jury wants to know as they deliberate in the roger stone trial. We have up ahead. Youre watching the beat on msnbc. He beat on msnbc. Body of proof. Man 1 vo proof of less joint pain and clearer skin. 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