tv Electioncast BBC News December 4, 2019 2:30am-3:00am GMT
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the democrat—led us house intelligence committee has released a report setting out its case for impeaching president trump. it accuses mr trump of obstructing justice and congress, and soliciting the interference of a foreign government, ukraine, to help his re—election next year. the white house denies the accusations. the co—founders of google, larry page and sergey brin, are stepping down from their roles as chief executive and president of its parent company, alphabet. they said they believed it was time to assume the role of proud parents. google‘s ceo sundar pichai will now run both tech firms. for the first time in its 35—year history, britain's prestigious turner prize has been awarded to all four shortlisted artists. the decision was prompted by the artists themselves, who declared themselves a collective. they said that they wanted to make a statement of solidarity and multiplicity.
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it is about 2:30am in the morning. now on bbc news: electioncast, with adam fleming. good evening all, welcome to tonight's election cast. now, we're looking for examples of where the snap election they have mucked up your life logistics. maybe you are planning a summit of nato leaders, and in the middle of it there was an election campaign instead. it doesn't have to be background. let us doesn't have to be background. let us by e—mailing us. or, you can use the hashtag and we will read out, but probably not be able to solve some of yourjust a cool problems
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because of the election. later on internode‘s programme will be dropping in on the of the uk look at the election in detail there it be your patch. but first of all, there was a special surprise guest in the election campaign because of that nato summit, us president donald trump. i discussed that with chris mason and emily maitlis from newsnight. i wanted to get you back on because we've got another american intervention in the election campaign. although he hasn't really intervened, has he, donald trump? it's interesting. because speaking to conservatives over the last couple of days, they have been staring at today's date in the diary for quite a while — with a sort of circle around the day saying, "ooh, what could happen?" given that last time, the president was barely off the aeroplane and he was firing out
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tweets, i think slagging off sadiq khan, wasn't he, when he got off the plane on his previous visit to the uk? and the extent to which, from a conservative perspective, he would be well behaved or not this time. and the intriguing thing from his news conference this morning. it will be interesting to hear your reflections, emily, again, looking at it through the prism of how borisjohnson might interpret it, he was relatively well—behaved but then you kind of never know what he's going to say in the next sentence. in my head, he's more slightly into homer simpson. i imagine him sort of tiptoeing around a sitting room in sort of carpet slippers or maybe those fluffy white ones you get in posh hotels, and he's trying desperately hard to be quiet and his head's going, "don't mention boris, don't mention brexit, don't mention boris, don't mention brexit. oop! d'oh! boris, brexit", and out it comes. and he's bumped into the standard lamp and you're not quite sure what he's going to do next. as an interviewer, you're very conscious of what i would call the over—vehement denial. so before the question's even out, he's like, "no! never thought of that! never heard of the nhs! don't know what the nhs is. wouldn't want it, don't want it at all, wouldn't even want it on a silver platter. i don't know where that rumour came from. " that's weird because i think it might've come from you.
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and we were all in the room injune when he last came, and he sort of said, everything in a trade deal is on the table. and he just put it out there. so we're kind of trying to work out, as ever, was it the trump last time, the trump this time, the trump that knew he wasn't meant to say anything but he did, or the trump that you know has still got more to say and you're just waiting for it to land? so should the national health service be on the table? look, i think everything with the trade deal is on the table. should the national health service be on the table...? no, not at all. i have nothing to do with it. never even thought about it. when we went on air last night, we were almost certain that whatever we thought we were leading on, some big trump tweet would just land in the headlines. and it was so quiet, we were all a bit shaken. we were all kind of thinking, how does he slip in? i know it's stansted but is the juggernaut here or not? because it was incredible. it was sort of deathly quiet, and we're just sort of waiting to see, you know, homer simpson—wise, how long that can go until the next kind of crash. and here is what homer —
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i mean, the president — said today. are you going to be seeing prime ministerjohnson and do you have any thoughts... i have no thoughts on it. it's going to be a very important election for this great country, but i have no thoughts on it. i will be meeting with him, yes. when will that be? i don't know. i have the schedule over here. i have many meetings. i have meetings set up with lots of different countries. would you be able to work with a possible prime minister corbyn? i can work with anybody. i'm a very easy person to work with. you know that i was a fan of brexit. i called it the day before. i was opening up turnberry the day before brexit. you were there. many of you were there, i recognise that many of you were there. and they asked me whether or not brexit would happen, i said yes. and everybody smiled and they laughed, and i said, yes, it's going to happen. my opinion, it was just my opinion. the next day, they had the election and i was right. but i stay out of it.
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i think boris is very capable and i think he'll do a good job. it is interesting. with every additional comma, the next bit of the sentence, he is saying he is staying out of it but he's pretty much endorsed borisjohnson there — certainly as a character, if not saying he absolutely wants him to win the election. and he said he likes brexit. and the best thing he can say aboutjeremy corbyn is he can work with anyone. yeah, because he's very easy to work with, as we've seen. but also, he called brexit the day before. now everyone will remember, he actually landed... the day after! the day after. that is one hell of a jet—lag. you know, it's a confusing thing, all that time travel. but, yes, i can hear the whirring, can't you? he's like, don't mention boris, don't mention boris, don't mention brexit. oh, it slipped out! ok, just a little bit... don't talk about elections... talk about your elections. i'm good at winning elections. i win a lot of elections for a lot of people. what? i mean, where?
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and also, just trying to decode what he really means. i suppose it's quite meaningful that he said, "oh, we don't want to touch the nhs even if it was on a silver platter." that's quite meaningful for the conservatives, who can say, look, look, your fears are unfounded. but actually, in detail and policy terms, it's a meaningless phrase because you then look at the negotiating directives for the us trade representative, who would be negotiating the us—uk trade deal, and there's stuff in there about government procurement, which is buying services from the nhs from american businesses. so actually, it's kind of all a bit pointless. we understand that meetings have gone on, don't we? we understand that the meetings, on some level, have taken place. so that's what i meant by the sort of over—vehement denial. if you're going to try and get across an authenticity of what you're saying, you know, you accept one part and then you say "but there are questions over this." you don'tjust kind of go, "i've never heard of the nhs" kind of thing.
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and also, i was just watching the statement that he did with emmanuel macron, the french president. and, again, that's full of potentially massive things. they're talking about taxing the tech giants. of course, france is going to do a digital tax. the us doesn't like it. they're retaliating with tariffs on french products. then donald trump says, well, actually, we want to raise loads of money from the tech companies ourselves, and why don't we do it in a way that's mutually beneficial for everyone? has donald trump just announced a giant global tech tax that we didn't know was coming? probably not. so anyway, boris johnson is on a visit to salisbury today, and he was asked whether he was a bit embarrassed to be such good buddies with donald trump. and here's what he had to say. no, on the contrary. and we have good relations with... i have good relations with washington, with the president, with president macron, with chancellor merkel, and that's vital for the uk and we'll be having a series of meetings, bilateral, trilateral, of all kinds in the course of the next couple of days. there's an awful lot of work to be done and, yes, we'll have some important discussions about what's
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going on in syria. we'll talk a bit about the alliance and its attitude towards russia — i know the french are particularly keen to do that. there will be discussion about china and many other matters. he does love that phrase, "on the contrary," doesn't he? he neverjust says no. it's always "on the contrary". the one thing i'm intrigued about, emily — and we probably won't find this out until memoirs come out in many years' time — is the amount of lobbying there has been behind—the—scenes, prior to this visit, to try and ensure that president trump keeps his trap shut? yeah. i wouldn't have a clue. i'm the same as you. but i think... i mean, in a funny way, we will pour over this and the kind of architecture of the visit. and broadly, my guess is that, if you're a fan of donald trump, you may quite easily be a fan of borisjohnson and his policies and his direction of government. and if you don't like donald trump, you may not be a fan. i mean, i don't think it's
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an entirely neat equation, but i'm not sure how many minds will be changed by this. if he endorses borisjohnson, then that will please people — probably — who already quite like what borisjohnson is doing. and if he doesn't, or similarly, whatever he says that helps boris johnson will probably help corbyn because they don't like trump either. so in a funny way, the sort of the architecture, the diplomacy will probably be lost on most of the people who are still about to vote next week. and also, trump is only one of 28 — one of 29, there's 28 others — cos it's a nato heads of government leaders meeting... doesn't feel like that, though, does it? no, he does tend to eclipse all others. "hello! " yeah, poor old jens stoltenberg, secretary general of nato, didn't get much of a look—in this morning. i mean, if you think about it, relatively, he is the least controversial person here. we have had extraordinary comments from macron about the whole direction of nato. we've got erdogan, the turkish president, who's literally taking nato's
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rules and bending them to shape his own political agenda at home. and yet somehow, those two stories aren't ever going to hit the headlines in the way that the trump juggernaut coming to town right now will. no, now, emily, do you start work on newsnight? well, i'm going to answer that in a very sort of "on the contrary"... laughter on the contrary, i get in about 2pm, 2:30pm. but i start thinking about the programme from when i wake up and when we have, you know, early chats, and then we go off and we prepare and we have an idea. and i've been trying to put people on warning. i'm not doing your appraisal! i know! i work very, very hard. i'm very dedicated. and i find it very easy to work with anyone... all times of day! i can win elections at any time of day, yeah. i was trying to segue into, do you come in late enough that
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means you can watch this morning on itv with holly and phil? i did see a little clip or two, yes. yeah, and we'll bring you a clip now, and this isjeremy corbyn, the labour leader, on this morning's sofa on itv1 this morning being asked about anti—semitism. so here is your opportunity now to apologise to thejewish community for any anti—semitism by labour members... look... our party... can i make it clear? just say sorry. waita minute. i and our party... no! just say sorry! can i say something? our party and me... i want you to say sorry. yeah? ..do not accept anti—semitism in any form... are you sorry? obviously, i'm very sorry for everything that's happened. but i want to make it clear. i am dealing with it. i have dealt with it. other parties are also affected by anti—semitism. candidates have been withdrawn — by the liberal democrats, by the conservatives and by us — because of it. we just do not accept it in any form whatsoever. very retro, adam, referring to itvi.
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it's just itv these days. is it? yeah. 0k. i suppose you've been living abroad for some time! it's interesting, emily, the interview there from jeremy corbyn, in that labour have been pointing out for the last few days, since the question has been "why didn't you say sorry when you were on with andrew neil?" that he had said sorry some months ago. and then he goes on to this morning. that was only the tail end of a longer exchange about the whole question of anti—semitism. and he got there in the end, but got there in kind of quite an aggressive way. he clearly feels angered that this question is forever chasing him around. i have to say, i find that whole exchange really bizarre. because, as you say, labour have stated repeatedly that corbyn has already apologised. so either you go into the interview thinking fresh start, and i'm going to do it again, and this is a different audience and it's a week away from the election and i will do it straight up, or else you don't do it and you say, stop banging on about this. i've already explained my position. we've done it before, i don't feel the need to pander to you. it was quite an aggressive line of questioning.
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"i want you to say sorry". i wonder what that achieves from anyone's perspective, because nobody watching that thinking, "oh, finally! jeremy corbyn is sorry for this." because either he was sorry previously and he's already said it or else he was sort of sorry in a rather tetchy way now which i don't think convinced him or anyone watching that that was what he had come into the studio to say. so where does that leave us? it was a sort of semantic exchange where, technically, there was an apology given. for something that he had previously apologised for. but you know, at a different time of day, in a grumpy tone of voice. i don't really understand where that leaves us. i do wonder if it leaves us in a position where, whenever he's doing the next interview like that, he's going to be asked
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the question again. because, as you say, because he had not done it right at the start or at the first opportunity he was given to reflect about anti—semitism, in a way that would have felt definitive and in a way that would have felt different from the previous remarks he's made on this topic, in the end, because of the tone and because of where it was tucked away in had to be sort of dragged out of him, as you say, you do wonder if, in the end, it's just going to carry on following him around. what i think is amazing is his mood swings. because he was being all nice as pie and avuncular because he was on the this morning sofa. and then he switched and you saw how aggressive he was there. and then seconds later, he's back to being uncle again. it's amazing, the mood swings. i think the tone is really interesting. he does come across as a man who loves his rallies, who loves crowds. and i can't get past this word tetchy. and it's not a particularly engaging way of handling interviews because everyone sort of gets embarrassed and a bit riled and you think, you didn't want to be here. you're not enjoying it. and it's a bit of a mood killer, you know, even when you're saying the thing that you might
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have come on to say. it's the classic contrast, isn't it, withjohn mcdonnell, who has developed this reputation for the uncle john routine? right. where he'll be doing an interview with andrew marr, whoever it might be, and... put aside his line of argument, he comes across as a soft kind of chap in his tone and his demeanour. i want to know the size ofjohn mcdonnell's kettle because every single interview, it's like, "come and have a cup of tea!" i mean, i'd just say to them, come and have a cup of tea! and so i've got this image in my head ofjohn mcdonnelljust sitting there meeting sort of media magnates, or perhaps it's the chief rabbi, or perhaps it's the head of unscrupulous companies, or whatever it is, and he'sjust saying, come and have a cup of tea! let's have a cup of tea! he's also got a very fetching pair of curtains. when he does those interviews on sunday morning from home, he's got... the jumper ones? yeah.
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oh, and the lawyers say, please say borisjohnson has said he will do this morning at some point before the election. let's continue our geographical tour around britain and the battle grounds. although, i mean, all tours are geographical, aren't they? yeah. yeah, we're going to go to the northwest. who is there in the northwest of england ? it's claire hamilton. i'm in merseyside at the moment, in liverpool. hello, claire. hello. right, take us for a tour around your patch. what's yourjob title, claire? i'm the political reporter for merseyside but you could say i'm part of the northwest politics team. 0k. depending on what you want to say. why don't you take us on a little tour around your patch? well, the northwest is predominantly labour heartland. i'm speaking to you from liverpool, which is often referred to as the people's republic of merseyside. it contains some of the safest labour seats in the country. in fact, in the little patch of merseyside that i normally cover, around 20 seats, only one of them isn't held by the labour party. and that's southport. we'll possibly talk a little bit
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more about southport later on. and then going right away up to the north. i think if you think of the map and think of the coast, i think that really helps when you think about some of the northwest. you're going all the way up to the cumbrian seats at the top of the patch and then all the way down to liverpool. you've got manchester, lancaster and all of the northwest of england, and it's a big battle ground for both of the main parties. it's a crucial campaign area for the conservatives and labour. and right at the start of the election campaign, the tories kind of set out their stall and really made it their ambition to wrest some of this traditional rugby league supporting towns away from... which ones? leigh, wigan, possibly warrington? those towns were the leave votes in the referendum campaign was very strong but labour has always
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been the dominant party. these are places where there's a sense that, possibly, being left behind is part of the narrative there. post—industrial towns, towns where mining may have been part of the industrial past. but when the mines closed down, what came to fill this place? in some cases, not very much, and there's been a lot of talk about people feeling hopeless, feeling disconnected and that the leave vote was part of those people kicking back and saying, look, this is how we feel. listen to us. this is what we want to happen. now, that's obviously problematic when you get to a labour party whose message on brexit has moved more towards a second referendum, putting it back to the people. and labour voters in places like barrow, leigh, st helens, are saying, we told you what we wanted. we've always voted for you but you're not speaking to us this time.
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and to what extent... i know everyone‘s kind of, to a greater or lesser extent, guessing on this. but to what extent do you detect, speaking to other people in your northwest team and all the rest of it, that the conservatives are managing to make inroads which could translate into them winning seats, as you say, like barrow or wherever it might be that haven't had a conservative mp for a long time, if ever, but maybe this time might? barrow is one of the ones that has been mentioned to me. it's a slightly odd seat. it has been represented by labour for a long time. of course, john woodcock, who was the incumbent, is standing down. he became an independent — and, in fact, he has endorsed the conservatives in this election campaign. so that's certainly one that is within the conservative sights. and burnley. .. i mean, this would be a very, very long shot, but, again, in the last couple of days, it's a seat that i understand that conservatives are talking about in a positive light. burnley last returned a conservative mp in 1910. but on the street, it seems that they are more optimistic,
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the conservatives are optimistic, in those seats. i was going to say — southport. why did you say that southport was so interesting? well, because it's a genuine three—way marginal, and it'sjust... it's very, very exciting. i've spent quite a lot of time in southport in the last few weeks, and you cannot move for banners, placards, posters everywhere in the suburbs. you will see the liberal democrats, the tories and labour posters and pictures of the candidates everywhere. they all think that they can win it. ever since it was created back in the 1880s, i think, it swung between the old liberal party, the conservatives and the liberal democrats. but labour think they can win it. they came second last time. and they've started to win seats on the local council as well. although anecdotally, their campaign might be dropping off slightly, speak to the candidates. they all think that they can win.
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and it's the only conservative—held seat on merseyside. let's hone in, in that way that you imagine someone likejeremy vine marching around on a map doing, on the seats around liverpool. and you were saying, claire, loads of them have been sort of labour since the time of the ark. but that doesn't mean that there aren't interesting stories. because you think of prominent names in liverpool politics of the last... well, a long time. louise ellman, frank field, luciana berger, all in their own way have had interesting relationships recently with the labour party. meaning that there's quite a bit of change going on. absolutely. and of the five liverpool constituencies, there will be three new mps whoever wins, because luciana berger and louise ellman have left the labour party and stood down. and stephen twigg is standing down as well. and the selection battles behind the scenes in the labour party to choose the new candidates have been as interesting,
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i think, as the election itself will be. so there will certainly be new faces in liverpool regardless of who wins. and, of course, birkenhead — over the water in the wirral — frank field, 40 years he was labour's mp in birkenhead, he also has left the labour party. this is following the long—running row over anti—semitism and he claims that there's a left—wing campaign within the party that didn't want him there any more. so it will be interesting to see because i think people will have voted, could have voted for him for 40 years. are they going to stick with him or are they going to choose another party? you were saying a second ago, claire, about the whole business about new labour faces coming up, and obviously the battles you get within local parties about who their candidate is and the role of the national party. is it too simplistic to say it becomes a battle about how left wing a potential labour candidate or range of candidates could be? and how local they are?
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it's a bit of both, i think. i mean, i think this has been absolutely fascinating. because we've always had, with the labour party, these accusations of parachuting someone in — and that, in the past, when stephen twigg and luciana berger were selected in 2010, it was that they did not come from merseyside, particularly with luciana berger... there was a quiz with the liverpool echo, wasn't there, about... quiz? there was! yes, other people have thought of doing quizzes, adam! but what was it? there was a couple of... bill shankley... that was it. as i recall, that was the case. but then more recently, there was a selection issue in liverpool walton with dan carden who, although born in liverpool, had worked in london for unite the union. and there was a complaint that he had not had the sort of local political coming—of—age, if you like, on merseyside and that he had been chosen
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by the party bosses to be the candidate in a safe seat he would win. and this time around, we have had those similar rows where local clps — constituency labour parties — have argued that their people, local councillors or campaigners, have not necessarily been on those selection shortlists. whoever gets on those lists is very likely to become the mp, and there's been, again, a row about how should people be selected and who should decide who becomes that candidate? have you seen much of the liberal democrats? no — in a word. and, again, i think this is really surprising considering that southport, as i mentioned, is a place where they had a liberal democrat for years, two very famous ones locally, and one that's still in the game for them. butjo swinson — and indeed any other senior liberal democrat —
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has not come to merseyside, but as i said, the conservatives and the labour party have sent their sort of headline acts to the northwest repeatedly. thank you to claire and emily fulfilling us in on tonight's episode. you can hear the whole thing on the original podcast, which you can get by downloading bbc sounds. there are loads of other great podcasts on there as well, which are not nearly as good as brexitcast. we will be back same place, same time, same general subject, the election, tomorrow. good night. hello there. we've got quite a mixture of weather coming our way for wednesday. now, the satellite picture shows a stripe of cloud approaching the west. this is a weather front that's
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going to be bringing us some rain. further east, though, we're under the influence of high pressure across much of england and wales, so the skies relatively clearer. now, if you're heading outside over the next few hours, we've got cloud and rain encroaching across western scotland and northern ireland. further south and eastwards across england and wales, there are some patches of cloud. we've also got some clear spells. so contrasts in temperatures — it's mildest towards the north—west of the uk. with the clearer skies across england and wales, it's cold, and indeed cold enough for some patches of frost. could even be an odd fog patch to start the day on wednesday, as well. for many, though, it's a bright start across england and wales, eastern areas of scotland. the rain in the north—west will continue slowly pushing its way eastwards, reaching parts of northern england and north wales through the course of the afternoon. still bright to the south and east, but it's chilly still. highs of around 6—8. the mildest weather towards the north—west, with blustery showers following into western scotland, and some fairly gusty winds too. then, through thursday and friday, we're going to see weather fronts really target western scotland,
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bringing large amounts of rain here. now, we could see around 70—80 mm, maybe more than that over high ground. that's enough to cause some flooding impacts, but it's not the only place that will see rain. on thursday, we'll also see some wet weather pushing across northern ireland. the rain getting into northern england and north wales, too. further south and eastwards, probably a bit more cloud around, but it should be bright enough. it's turning milder as south—westerly winds spread in across more of the country. high for most between 9—12 degrees. what follows thursday night will be a very mild night. now, that might come as something of a surprise, especially when you consider recent nights have seen some very sharp frosts. as we head into friday morning, these are the kind of temperatures —11—12 degrees. now, the reason it's so mild is it's cloudy, it's wet and it's windy, and initially we have the winds coming in from a south—westerly direction. later in the day we'll start to get north—westerly winds following in across the northern half of the country. and so temperatures
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will be dropping away. highs of seven degrees in stornoway. mild day for the midlands, east anglia and southern england, temperatures here around 12—13 degrees. now, the weekend looks like this. a ridge of high pressure to start things, but sunday sees a weather front move in across the uk. so saturday looks at the moment to be the better of the two days of the weekend, where it should be largely dry and bright. perhaps a bit of rain, though, getting in to northern ireland later in the day. sunday looks like it will turn more widely unsettled, with rain at times. that's your weather.
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welcome to bbc news, i'm mike embley. our top stories: in the us, the house intelligence committee releases its impeachment inquiry report, accusing president trump of putting his interests ahead of america's. he was willing to sacrifice the national security of the united states in order to get what he wanted. the two men who founded google, larry page and sergey brin, are stepping aside from running its parent company. the tech billionaire elon musk claims in court that he did not literally call a british cave diver a paedophile. and the winner is — all of them. all four artists shortlisted for the turner prize declare themselves a collective and the prestigious prize is shared between them.
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