There are 23 ayes and 17 noes. If you follow the news, you knew this was coming. You watch the process unfold, the hour that is led up to a little moment, a party line vote. But it is a vote that actually changes everything. It puts House Democrats on record and on track for a full oat in the United States congress on the house floor next week. From what we can tell right now, theres no going back, and if the house passing impeachment, it will then tap the managers who could act as prosecutors in this battle. Youre looking at some of the famous faces under consideration. Then it would tee up the senate trial. Republicans rallying around a blatantly partisan approach, senator mcconnell saying he is going to full court nation with trumps lawyers. That actually may violate an oath that he has to swear excuse me. Were going to get into that later tonight as well. But before i go any further, i want you to just understand as we go there live through these times together that this is historic no matter how you count it up. Donald trump on track now to become only the third president ever impeached and the first elected president to face such a rebuke in his first term. Pause on that right there and understand thats an asterisk thats far worse than steroids next to a home run record. Thats a historical blight on his record. America has never done this, never ever impeached a president elected in their first term, never happened. And donald trump may not be a student of history, but he is certainly a student of ego and comparisons. And he knows this, and he doesnt like it. So, everyone out there whos saying well if it doesnt lead to anything or doesnt change anything, what does it mean . It means a lot. The judiciary hearings may have, i would admit, exhausted viewers and participants alike. We want to show you briefly some of the important moment that is got us here. Were here today because the president abused his power. Were here today because he solicited foreign interference in the 2020 election. Hes a serial solicitor. What are the consequences for National Security, for the integrity of our elections, and for our country if we fail to act . I am proud to have written a bill that was signed into law by President Trump. I am not proud of the president s actions that bring us here tonight. Not proud. But there we were. Now, the house is marching towards impeachment. Donald trumps advisers now admit he was basically lying when he spent those weeks claiming that he was down with impeachment, that he wanted it to happen. The reports are now trump views this as a quote, humiliation. The pr conscious president will see his presidency with nixon and johnson. He broke his own record for tweeting during the Judiciary Committee mark up and the ensuing process because he tweeted 123 times over a roughly 24hour period, another form of anger release. Now, today, President Trump gave extended remarks in response to this vote. As he spoke, we should note three of his top aides sat by. You can see them right there that are embroiled in the scandal. Theyve been called out by congress, mike pompeii, mick mulvaney, mike pence. The president laying out for his allies how he wants to fight this looming senate trial. And note that unlike some of the past discredited complaints about bias or witch hunts, trump also hitting on a defense of the ukraine conduct itself. Its a witch hunt. Its a sham. Its a hoax. Youre trivializing impeachment. They kept saying me. It said us. Can you do us a favor, our country, comma, our country. The white house essentially backing up that argument releasing this new memo that says well, military aid that was withheld from ukraine temporarily was about u. S. Policy, not some kind of political vendetta against the bidens. As all this is going down, the defense of Donald Trumps action, where was ukraine hinchman rudy giuliani. He went walking into the white house right before the Judiciary Committee voted on the articles. All this fresh off the trip to the ukraine last week where he was again basically soliciting the very investigations and the type of meddling that donald trump is getting impeached over. Look at all this together and youll see what democrats are arguing. High crimes. They occurred and they arguably continue to occur, a reminder of the ongoing stakes in this historic battle. Im joined now by formal prosecutor John Flannery and brittney cooper. What does it all mean when you take together an event that was understood to be expected but now has happened . I think what you have is exactly the historical drama that you suggested, unprecedented in American History even among those three president s who were impeached. You have congress recoiling from a lawless tyrant who seems to have been encouraged to do worse and worse things until, we hope, now that hes been labelled for the rest of his life as an impeached president. The next step of course is going to be a brutal one which is the senate. Were already going to be before we get there because im going to sort of slow it down a little. This is one of the features of the press. Sometimes we rush ahead to the next thing. We have a senator later with us on the senate preview. But just on this history that now unfolded, americans across all channels got a taste of the Judiciary Committee. The republicans did their best. I want to play some of them to try to make it feel like it was all a bitter partisan frock. It was as if it got loud enough that might tell americans tune out the whole thing. I want to play some of the republican sound. Take a look, john. Sure. Democrats said that the evidence would have to be overwhelmed and yet in hearing after hearing the evidence they presented was either hearsay, speculation and conjecture. Reporter that had no proof, no evidence, no crime but they went ahead anyway. And theyre tearing the country apart, and they should be ashamed. Youve got to understand, for folks who dont follow this closely and dont know what mark ups look like, you zoom in and go gosh, this is a loud, hot mess. It was. Walk us through your view of what i know you believe, that there are shortcomings to that that that would be giving credence to a bad faith attempt to hijack those hearings, and the same question to brittney. I dont know that they succeeded in hijacking it. Democrats held to demeanor of facts and law. It felt like we were listening to auction neaeers when we list to collins or no jacket jordan. They kept saying to read the read out and misrepresent what it said. I thought there were two critical patterns that were suggested during the debates yesterday and the mark up. One was the notion that they, the republicans, would bend their knee to trump, perhaps out of fear, perhaps out of fear of a primary opponent should they not adhere to the trump line of loyalty. But the second point which underwrites, i think all of the positions that they take defiantly and ridiculously without factual support or Legal Support is a notion that we got into deuced to by bar. And that is that under the article under the second provision, the article of the constitution, the president has this notion what nixon said, the co corollary that if a president does it, it is not illegal. I think that drives all their positions afterwards. Theres the fear of trump, and there is the actual embrace of this position which is antidemocratic, monarchical and slow in arc. And it goes back to hamilton. From hamilton to barr to this fight we had in the Judiciary Committee and that we may have in the senate, it goes back to that proposition. Once you take those two pieces together, then you understand why theyre prepared to say and do anything and to look like a reality tv show. The contrast between the democrats and the republicans yesterday was a study in Good Government and chaos. And the seeds of this we saw when they were having the hearings for the intelligence committee. When they went down and violated their own rules and tried to breach the security of that room when republicans were in that room. We all talk about the fact witnesses which of course we had heard from. Stay with me, i turn as promised to brittney with me in headquarters. Thinking about the stakes of this, not the predictions, not the oh well, he gets away with a lot. But here we are gathered at a table in a news room talking about National News that is history that even four months ago was not going to be. Give us your thoughts on all of it. Yeah, look, one i am totally amused by republican hysteria about all of this. They are deeply scared about the symbolism of this and what it means. You know, we are subjected to a bunch of faux outrage in order to match the levels of outrage. I think republicans are deeply angry at a country they see slipping away. And i think at the heart of that is a bunch of fear. But i also think that their outrage is pure theater. They know that this man committed these high crimes and misdemeanors. He admitted to them on the television. We all saw it with our own two eyes. I think theyre trying to asked americans not to trust themselves, not to trust their own moral compass of what is right and what is wrong. I think its egregious that theyre willing to go along with the idea that its fine for foreign governments to interfere. Theyre trying to normalize it. Theyre trying to normalize it with trump as the exception. Theyre trying to say under no other president would this be okay but with trump everything is fine. Theres nothing this man is ultimately doing for them. Hes a sinking ship. He takes everyone down with them. All of these folks around them have been arrested. And yet these republicans, the party of family values, the party that the christian right loves, is really telling the American Public that its okay for our president to lie. Its okay for him to cheat. Its okay for him to steal. And, you know, look, i too am a church girl and we say that its the devil who lies, cheats, and steals. So, theyre saying that its okay for donald trump to embody the worst of any kind of moral values and act like the devil. I know im being provocative but im trying to talk to them in a language that they understand which is a language of a sort of christian morality which they have totally advocated here. I think in terms of the stakes ill jump in briefly and then let you finish. Yeah. There are those who would say that youre being unfair to any politician when you call them the devil. We have had trump allies on the show and we welcome them back if they want to respond. They have a president who was disparaging greta thunberg, a child, who happens to be on the spectrum. So, as you say, its going both ways politically. I just mentioned that because we bring all views here. Ill let you finish the larger point youre making with the real thing that jumped out to me. Viewers may know im part of just a lot of like a lot of people watching it closely. And i keep thinking wow, the pretense that used to exist even in politicized washington to say but of course the congress has this authority and of course we take it seriously yes. At least on the house side hearings, that went out the window for some of the minority party. Weve got to ask im giving republicans a hard time by calling donald trump a devil and i know that. But im also trying to pair the hysteria calling this a witch hunt saying folks are coming after him for no reason. Weve got to ask why this man is worth the erosion over american norms that we have fought many wars in this country. Many folks have lost their lives to secure these things we can all agree on. The party that claims to support our troops are saying those deaths were in vein. The revolutionary war, world war i, world war ii, these things that enshrine in american democracy, the rule of law, separation of powers, notions of checks and balances, peaceful transfer of power, these are hallmarks these folks have eroded because they want to assume this was an attack on their candidate rather than admitting what they did is voted for a president that doesnt respect american values. They instead want to erode american democracy solely for the purpose of being right. Yeah, i think you are on a tear, if i may. Absolutely. And i think your tear landed on a very significant point which is look at the way this president is conducting himself on foreign affairs, on undermining democracy, on blatantly saying. Do you want to do this just to clear up corruption. Maybe you did it for a couple of reasons. He said no. No. I want a Major Investigation of the binds. No. I want to cheat in the e lectio. Is that impeachable . Only the congress decides that. Not my job to decide that. Sure. But if you take that serious, you have to weigh that evidence. Not pretend it didnt happen. Im releasing mr. Flannery now but im bringing him back later in the show. We bring in another special guest on our special broadcast tonight, retired federal judge, Nancy Gertner now at harvard. Im thrilled to have you this big night. How are you . Im good. Im good to be here. Its great to have you. I wonder as a judge who is so steeped in some of the words and concepts and determine nolg tte fit sbo fits into a word like impeachment, whats important for people to understand, where were headed, and what should people tune out or not worry about . One of the things that i saw which is so so troubling is this caricature that there is no direct evidence, right . I mean, one of the things i looked at, if there was no direct evidence in this case, then all of the drug dealers that were ever convicted in my court should go free. You have the president s voice on the phone. You have the transcript of the president s comments. You have coconspirators describing what the president told them. You have giuliani who is the president s agent describing what his what he was told by told to tell other people. You have, you know youre a lawyer, theres a thing called consciousness of guilt where the stories begin to change after the fact. We have really substantial evidence. To be sure there isnt bolton and mulvaney and the others that trump kept from speaking. But there is substance shl evidence here which would have been sufficient in any court across the country. So, im troubled expound on that point. When you say this evidence against a citizen in court, what would happen . What do you mean . Well, for example, giuliani is obviously trumps agent. Hes described himself that way. So, he goes to the ukraine and represents what hes doing, what hes digging up, what he says is essentially attributable to trump. Hes trumps agent. Theres no lawyer client privilege because hes not functioning in that situation. Hes communicating what trump has said to everybody else which is then not a privilege communication at all. So, the tentacles of this evidence really look like much more substantial than the evidence i often times saw in my court. Its like, you know this may be sort of an Old Fashioned reference, but its almost as if the republicans are saying that unless this case is like the old perry mason tv show where invariably someone who wasnt perrys client got up in court and said i cant stand it anymore, i did it. Unless you have that, you dont have good evidence. Shout out to perry mason. Right. The best evidence of what trump was doing is the horrified reaction of the nonpartisan individuals who are working for the civil service. Right. Wasnt just one. Wasnt just two. It was people saying oh, my goodness, and to some degree theyre drawing the inferences that all of us should have drawn. Thats why on the show weve tried to report out some of that evidence which is the Judiciary Committee is having a lawyerly debate on the Legal Committee about what these things are. They can hash it out. As you remind everyone, it was a whistleblower. It was cia folks. It was nsa folks all saying woah, we cant do this. We dont abuse the power, military and otherwise of the United States government to take out rivals. You dont have a democracy if you can do that. Briefly and ive got to take a break. But they understood this was out of the ordinary and they understood that this was criminal. Thats why they went to the National Security to the lawyers for the various services because they understood that something was terribly, terribly amiss here. So, it shouldnt this shouldnt be an outrageous conclusion. Well, you said earlier im a lawyer. Ill give it right back to you. Youre a judge which is a way bigger deal. Former judge, retired judge. Way bigger deal than a lawyer and hearing you lay it out clearly and also make the comparison to the evidence against drug dealers that lose their liberty over evidence that is not as strong as whats been laid out. Thanks to both of you. I hope you both come back. Happy friday. Great. I say we have to fit in a break because i have a lot more ahead including what i told john we would get back to. What happens over in the senate trial. Mitch mcconnell admitting today he will coordinate with the potential defendant here. Were going to get into all of that. Also new reporting on the ukraine, the white house admitting in a new footnote theyre still missing some of the money. And my live interview with the special guest whos been advising Speaker Pelosi and the Top Democrats on impeachment. Then fall back friday tonight with Harvey Firestein and peggy knew nano. 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