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Basically there was no thing of value, therefore the president broke no laws. the doj had that with regard to the whistle-blower's report. it would seem there's a limit to how far bill barr is willin to go to sully his reputation. >> it raises questions about that. it raises questions if there's a line between barr and giuliani. maybe barr won't lift a finger. i want to talk about these public impeachment hearings. the first witness will be ambassador bill taylor. the top diplomat in ukraine. and then the most recent u.s. ambassador to ukraine marie yovanovitch. bill taylor is the witness we a...

Political correspondent abby phillip. >> the knowing look you just gave me is you think something is going on there. that he declined to do so. what did that mean? >> here's why i have that knowing look. he's done it in the past. of course president trump would think bill barr would defend him. he was the first to misleading summary. why wouldn't president trump think that bill barr was going to do it again? why didn't bill barr want to come out and do that? >> that's the real question. why didn't he do it? he at other times seemed willing to go as far as president trump wants him to go on thi...

Facing part of this. just convincing the american public it's not just that this was inappropriate. it was also dangerous. >> right. and one of the things we learned from testimony is he's saying, look. russia is happy about this. the president may think he benefits politically from this, but vladimir putin is benefitting geopolitically. those are the stakes whenever dealing with ukraine. with regard to the televised hearings, when the american people see something as well as read about it, it will have more impact. it will escalate around all these witnesses. they are republicans are in a tig...

Put out a statement saying we don't know anything about this. we are not involved in this in any way. bill barr has never investigated joe biden or has never been asked to. and when mick mulvaney claimed this effort was part of some legitimate justice investigation, the department put out a blind statement saying we don't know what he's talking about. there seems to be a line here they don't want to cross. and it goes to show just how inappropriate some people think this whole saga is. it is clearly not something that is on the up and up, that everybody is perfectly cool and happy with. >> you...

Quo with ukraine. with trump freezing military aid in exchange for ukraine announcing investigations against the president's rivals for political gain. trump's republican allies continue to change their defenses. including highlighting this part of curt volker's testimony telling lawmakers, i didn't know there was a quid pro quo. >> his account is consistent with the fundamental facts. there was nothing wrong on the call transcript. >>. >> reporter: other republicans taking it a step further. >> what i can tell you, it was incoherent. they seem to be incapable of forming a quid pro quo. >> rep...