undercuts what you've just said from the podium. that happened a lot. and plenty of people are being treated badly in the white house. i'm not sure it's the reporters who are to blame for that. i think there's a lot of, uh, nastiness going on in the white house, and it has nothing to do with reporters. ms. grisham might want to ask her boss about that one tonight and evermore if they can find each other on "the ridiculist." all right. trolley to hell continues. let's go over to "cuomo prime time." doo-doo. >> anderson, thank you very much. i am chris cuomo, and welcome to prime time. we have breaking news on our watch once again. it involves the next steps for democrats as this whistleblower mess widens. have democrats finally crossed the rubicon? is speaker pelosi starting to soften her stance on impeachment? we also have former dni james clappert here tonight for the first interview on the scandal.

what does this mean in his experience? how would he handle the whistleblower complaint? does he support or condemn the acting dni's move to withhold it from congress? we also have a very valuable guest, giuliani's allegations about what was done by that member of parliament in ukraine, we got him. you'll hear from him directly about each of the things that rudy tried to sell. and senator cory booker may only have days left to stay in the 2020 race. and he is here with you to help keep him at it. what is the situation really? what do you say? let's get after it. ♪ all right wednesday just got word tomorrow there's going to be a big meeting of house democrats. this is according to three sources. the caucus is going to gather at 4:00 p.m. eastern. the topic is likely the next steps on investigations.

what does that mean? well, a statement from a democratic leadership aid says, quote, a second caucus has been added to ensure adequate time for member discussion on the whistleblower matter and the number of other pressing matters, unquote. president trump's admission that he discussed joe biden in a call with ukraine's president is only adding to democrats' case for potential impeachment. and his loyal lawyer today once again didn't seem to help the case. >> did the president threaten to cut off aid -- no. >> to the ukraine? >> no. that was a false story? >> 100%? >> well, i can't tell you if it's 100%. >> because -- >> there is a game afoot. but sometimes this man is just not on his game. it's a false story, but you can't say that it's 100% untrue. either he was playing with the aid or he wasn't. let's bring in cuomo's court

asha rangapa, jimmy schultz. asha, let's cut through a little bit of b.s. here to practicalities. other than the, well, it's in the constitution and this is congress' job. they are supposed to impeach if they say the things they say they feel. what i don't understand is where does this go? what is their case abuse of power? >> yes. abuse of power, self-dealing inviting foreign influence. basically the trifecta of evils that the framers of the constitution sought to defend against when they created separation of powers. so, you know, if there's ever been a case for impeachment, this is it. the problem is if they don't get unified behind this, they're essentially enabling the difference which is there's no they're there or we need to litigate this, create some kind of constitutional separation of powers argument. this is a prima fascia case of

exactly the kind of thing that would warrant high crimes and misdemeanors, which is, you know, beyond the criminal code and what a violation of the oath of office. >> jimmy, here's why you should be having that smile on your face. if this were a trial, this is like having five of the 12 people sitting on the jury being your cousins. it doesn't matter what they're going to bring. you know members of your party aren't going to vote against this president no matter what it is. to throw a bag of puppies off a bridge, you are not going to get republican senators to remove him in the house. do you dispute any of that? >> so there's no indication that he abused his power here. there is no indication that there was any quid pro quo like there was with biden. there is no indication that the democrats -- >> hold on. one step at a time. jimmy. >> and now all of a sudden -- >> jimmy, when i speak, you stop. listen, jimmy. what is the indication that there was a quid pro quo with

biden? >> well, we've heard publicly him say that he was going to hold up foreign aid for the united states government in coalition with the u.n. and other -- >> but that's more than we know about the president, jimmy it's this same exact thing as we know about this president. i'm not saying it was wrong. >> no, no, no -- >> he is accusing biden of the same thing he did, jimmy. asha, you referee this for a second. >> yeah. let me just -- >> hold on one second. just for the record, i got to correct the record. we have no proof that there was a quid pro quo with biden. we have no proof of what jimmy just said, which is that, hey, we don't know anything was wrong with the aid. we know the aid was upheld. we know that it was released only after schiff -- the whistleblower complaint. about withholding aid. >> chris, can i make my argument? >> asha, what is different between what trump did with the president of ukraine and what

biden did with ukraine? >> there are many things that are different. and i think you've covered them, chris. but i'm going to make a lawyerly argument to you right now which is let's stipulate the facts. let's assume that what jimmy is saying is true. and i don't think they are true. here's the problem is that if the president is arguing and his supporters are arguing that he has the presidential authority to do what he did which is to pressure a foreign government to do something even if it might confer a personal benefit to him, the problem is, is that that theory applies to anyone who is sitting in that seat. and in the previous administration that power also belonged to president obama which means he could delegate that to biden. in other words, if what the president did is okay, there is literally nothing to investigate with former vice president biden. if you are saying what -- >> except there's been no facts. >> then you believe that there

are limits to presidential power and that that can be abused, in which case you are opening the door to grounds for impeachment. so pick your poison, jim. cannot have it both ways. >> okay. and i'll say the same thing to you. now you're making an assumption that there was actual pressure placed on the ukrainian government by this president. there's no indication that there was any pressure. there's no indication -- >> he admitted it. he literally admitted it on national television. what are you talking about? >> he admitted on national television -- >> it was like o.j. >> that's not pressure. how is that pressure? come on. asha, you know better than that. >> here is the problem, jim. he did it secretly and he did it with -- >> don't talk over each other. one at a time. but, jimmy, just as a point of reference to advance asha's argument on this one point, this would be what you counter. >> of course i'm going to advance asha's argument. >> you slip in these little sneaky things. i gotta stop you. but what example do you have of

a united states president ever asking the head of another state to investigate an american citizen? because that's what you're saying trump did, right? he said you really should look at joe biden and his son because i hate corruption. >> phil mud said this the other day that the purpose of having people on those calls is not to spy on the president of the united states and the discussion -- so then they can go talk to congress. >> what's the answer to my question? >> that's not the purpose of being on the call. >> -- the united states president. hold on. >> i am getting to that. >> good. because that was completely off. >> we probably don't know, chris, because you don't have leaks and things like this occurring in prior administrations. >> chris. >> yes, asha? >> listen. a huge distinction here is when an official of the united states takes a public position on behalf of the united states government as its own policy. and it states it out loud, which

is what happened in the biden situation. when you do it secretly, when you're being sneaky, when you're sending a private emissary, that is not an official position of the u.s. government. -- >> probably ten people on that call. so you know. >> if you think that the public one is wrong, then you know that the private one is wrong. and if you think that the private one is okay, then having an official position, you can't be any worse than that. so, again, he's hoisted by his own -- >> can we agree? can we agree that there are a number of people on that call most likely? >> yes. >> there is one call. >> so how are we doing that in secret? the president of the united states knows that all those people are on the telephone call. we are talking about the president and the conduct of the president of the united states. >> jimmy, hold on. >> show me the money, man! where is the beef? let's see it. >> the most transparent administration ever. turn over the transcript of the

call. turn over the whistleblower complaint. if you have nothing to hide, don't hide. and, jimmy, to your point he also knew he was standing next to -- >> and everybody says. >> you also knew where he was standing today a guy who was trying to break down the press readings. he also knew where he was on helsinki on the international stage when the public put a camera in his face next to putin when he said he believed putin and not his own intelligence ideas. so your own day that he's way too smart to do something like this, we've seen him do worse in front of the world. >> he has also lied -- >> are you going to talk over me, asha, or are you going to let me finish my point? the news media here and the democrats have once again the sky is falling. the president of the united states is all of a sudden committing high crimes and misdemeanors and they don't have any facts to back it up at this point. >> they do have facts but they don't have the proof they need. they don't have the proof they need.

because you won't turn it over. you won't comply with the investigations. you won't give them any of this. >> what's the obligation to turn it over, chris? everybody just says it's a foregone conclusion that this thing needs to be turned over. that's not a foregone conclusion. this was a conversation with the president of the united states. it's much different, much different than a member of the intelligence community. and the law recognizes that, and the office of legal council which has been around for a number of years -- >> the inspector general disagrees with you and so does the house of the intelligence committee. asha, your point. >> breaking your own rule. let her talk. go ahead. >> here is what we know. the president has lied to the american public. and if he knows that everyone else's hands are tied, yes, there might have been people listening to that conversation. but if they are not free to speak and if they were whistleblowers and their comment are blocked by the justice department and can never see the light of day, he can literally

say whatever he wants about that conversation. and what you're asking, jim, is for us to take him at his word. and unfortunately he has lost the benefit of the doubt on that front. so, you know, it doesn't matter that there are people listening on the call. let's hear what they have to say or let's hear what someone who saw the transcript has to say. otherwise i don't think it really matters. >> all right. listen. let's talk politically about losing the benefit of the doubt. i think adam schiff in his actions on the russia gate certainly lost the -- >> jimmy -- >> the confidence of the american people. >> and i'll have to leave it there. but, one, let's be very clear. being given the benefit of the doubt and guilty until proven innocent, which is military justice, that's how it works in public life. in a courtroom you get the benefit of the doubt. we're not in a courtroom. we will never be in a courtroom because you can't indict a sitting president. so it's not felony -- >> thank you, chris. >> if you have nothing to hide,

turn this stuff over. and you wind up having high ground because, let's be honest. asha's making legal arguments. she is a law professor and she worked at the fbi. she's not a politician. the democrats don't have any slam dunk case for impeachment. they'll never get the second part of the removal. so this is all politics, jimmy, and i am treating it that way. thank you for making the arguments. asha, for you as well as always. when we return, to the aspect of one part of this debate, which is, hey, they didn't have to turn this over. it's not that clear with whistleblowers if the person's not talking about the intel community the law changes. is that true? james clappert knows. he was in that job as dni. what does he think of how this was handled and what the law demands? next. one on one is brought to you by t-mobile. now connecting 99% of americans. t-mobile, america's network.

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so, this president says there's nothing to see when it comes to ukraine. he also won't let you see anything when it comes to ukraine. so you can't prove or disprove what he's talking about. take a listen. >> perhaps you'll see it, perhaps you won't see it. >> it depends on what we want to do. >> look, there is just one basic common sense notion at play, which is if you have nothing to hide, you don't hide. so now we get to the next level of intrigue. the president's acting director of national intelligence is sitting on the whistleblower complaint as if this were somehow a legal dispute. his own inspector general says this is an urgent concern, which is supposed to trigger congressional review. so let's get somebody now who was a director of national intelligence and had to understand how to apply this very law.

james clapper, it is a blessing to have you tonight. >> thanks, chris. >> help us. the idea that it's not that simple, jim, you know if it doesn't deal with the intelligence agencies and what's happening there, congress really has no say in reviewing a whistleblower complaint. >> well, first of all, i don't agree with that. the way i interpret the law during the six and a half years i served as dni was that if a whistleblower submitted a complaint, i interpreted that if it was within observation range, i'll call it that, of that person, that intelligence community employee. and i never considered whether is the wrongdoing limited to just the what is defined legally as the intelligence community. i never split those hairs. moreover, i never thought i

actually had the option to refuse to ford a valid, credible whistleblower complaint. and i also don't recall one being submitted that was characterized by my i.g., my inspector general as urgent. so i'm very sympathetic to joe maguire, the acting dni. i think he's got caught up in the politics of this. and it's true that the office of legal council and the department of justice is supposed to be the final arbiter about legal issues across the executive branch. but the bigger point here is the observation of wrongdoing, and this employee attempted to use the prescribed by the congress procedure for protecting classified information or potentially sensitive information and also protect himself or herself. and i really worry about the employee because that person now is kind of hanging out there in

limbo. so for me, i never had a case that was characterized as urgent. by my inspector general. i never interrupted or in any way delayed in the interest of transparency the processing of whistleblower complaint that came up during my tenure. >> next level of the analysis. doesn't matter, jim, because the president can say whatever he wants. and even if he said to ukraine's president, listen, you know, you have a problem with corruption, and i hate corruption, you should look into lots of different types of corruption. look at what happened with biden and his son. you got to look at that. >> well, the first thing that bothers me about this is, you know, the congress already had appropriated the funding and approved the provision of $250 million in military assistance, which the ukrainians, you know, and this has been going on since the

russians encouraged it in 2014. so, this is fundamental to the defense of the ukraine. and they become very dependent on it. yeah. i get it. corruption's an issue there. but to me that's separate from protecting the country and particularly thwarting the will of congress. >> what if the president -- >> i'm sorry? >> what if he didn't mention the money? >> even if he didn't, i mean, a direct connection here, it certainly is implied. and whether there was a direct discourse here where, you know, if you don't do something about investigating former vice president biden, you are not going to get the aid. i doubt it was that overt. >> well, yeah. he says it wasn't overt that he never mentioned the money and, you know, if you get the call, you will see that we were

talking about it but only because it's corruption which leads it a very basic question. have you ever heard of the u.s. government asking another government to investigate its own citizens? >> no. i don't know of a case. certainly in my incumbency in the intelligence business, i can't recall a case of that. >> right? i mean, if you had a legitimate question about, you know, a member of congress, you know, let alone a vice president and what he was doing in another country, you guys would take it up yourselves, right? you would either make it a counterintelligence question or it would be a reference to the doj. >> exactly. that should be done internally. you know, with our own investigatory apparatus, not ask another country which, by the way if you're concerned about their corruption to go investigate. on its face it's kind of ridiculous. >> but at the end of the day, jim, let's say they wind up turning over the call. it's gray about what happened with the money vis-a-vis this call.

he just seems to be saying ukraine you've got to clean it up. why are the democrats putting so much pressure on this as a determination for the american people? >> you know, that's a great question. and what would really be edifying here is actually know the facts. first of all we don't know the actual content of the whistleblower complaint. >> right. >> there's all the media hype about what it's about. but we don't actually know that. and i think that's very important to know the content that far because this was actually -- this was done, submitted by a mature seasoned employee. not some junior person. >> right. >> moreover, the i.g., the inspector general of the intelligence community found it credible and urgent. this is an appointee of this administration. the senate confirmed and all that. that to me attaches importance to the actual content of the

complaint. you know, and i hate to suggest this, but it's crossed my mind that even if we got a transcript, well, can we be sure that's actually what was said? so getting the transcript may not be such a great thing either. >> james clapper, it is invaluable to the audience to know how the job is done by somebody who did that job. i appreciate it very much. best to you, sir. >> thanks, chris. >> right. and just so you get that point right, it's not about what i think is the right thing for this to mean politically. i don't know where the democrats are going with this. we'll talk to democrats about it. >> i just don't like when people are lying to you. and that was my perspective with rudy giuliani. so, we found the person who he was talking about, wrote an op ed in "the washington post." now mr. yushchenko is going to come on, and he's going to tell you his answers to m mr. giuliani's allegations about him. former ukrainian government official and journalist.

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again, impeach, not impeach? it's a political consideration and we're going to test people about that tonight. for us it's about whether or not people in power are telling you the truth. and rudy giuliani was not telling you the truth on things that matter. so, we wanted to check the holes in the president's theory several times on this show. it's not just about the biden family. it's about other things that rudy giuliani is calling out. and we went to the source.

>> december 16th, 2018, there is a finding by a court in the ukraine that a man named yushchenko something like that that he produced a phony affidavit that was given to the american authorities and an fbi agent named greenwood and they found him guilty of that. nobody reports that. >> now if you're going to put somebody at the center of your theory, know their name. okay? the man's name is serg sergei lushenko. he's a ukrainian journalist. he is a former member of that country's parliament. we spoke exclusively with him tonight and we covered a lot of turf including what mr. giuliani just left out. >> this was the decision of administrative court in ukraine

and there is no decision stating that i violated any law in the sense of intervention in american elections or something like that. >> look. here is the reality. in the ukrainian justice system, having this initial administrative decision is not the end just like we have appeals here. he did appeal. he won. then there was another level of review and he won. mr. giuliani didn't know this? so either he was ignorant or he knew that what he was making the crux of the complicity here was a false allegation. you can decide which it is. but there is no judicial decision that says that lushenko did anything wrong. then there is the central question that the right has been pushing about the 2016 election and who it was that really interfered. >> several people in the ukraine

knew about a tremendous amount of collusion between ukrainian officials and hillary clinton and the democratic national committee. >> you were a member of parliament during this period. do you know about collusion between members of your government at that time and the clinton campaign in order to hurt donald trump and help her? >> not at all. just conspiracy of mr. giuliani which he constructed and maybe he believed in. and in reality this collusion does not exist, did not exist. >> when you start unraveling the threads of what the president and his supporters are pushing, you find that they come back to a left-wing boogieman, george soros. >> maybe i would be happy to have such relations with mr. soros but it's not true.

as a member of parliament, i was working in parliament. before i was investigative journalist. and when we established our online use outlet, we received some small grants from ukrainian foundation called renaissance, which was founded by mr. soros. but the last payment we received from this foundation was the year 2004, maybe 2005. that's it. >> all right. that brings us to a key flaw in the logic that joe biden personally wanted the ukrainian prosecutor viktor shorkin out. >> mr. shorkin, you mentioned this name. remember the time when m mr. shorkin was particular journalist and he sabotaged this investigation. american ambassador made a public statement with a request to ukrainian prosecutor to investigate this case.

it's very strong argument to deny the whole conspiracy theory of mr. giuliani because he is saying that biden blocked this ambassador. but why -- it's nonsense. >> so you're saying, just to be clear. >> he just closed this case. >> just to be clear, you are saying that mr. shokin wanted to push out actually didn't want to look at this investigation. he wasn't running after mr. biden hunter -- hunter biden, mr. biden's son. you were saying that he was being pressured to investigate, not that he was applying pressure to investigate it? >> um, mr. shorkin was very weak as a prosecutor. he did not deliver this investigation. and the reason why ukrainian society, members of parliament campaigned to resign him from this position. we started to collect signatures

in ukrainian parliament. we collected more than 120 signatures to proceed with his resignation. it was not just the issue for american ambassador. >> it was the issue for the whole society to have transparent and unbiased prosecutor general. >> so just to review, giuliani says this man and others were trying to hurt trump in the 2016 campaign. lushenko says no i was trying to root out corruption in my country. giuliani says, oh, yeah? then why were you convicted of making it up about manafort. giuliani's making that up. that case went away. and you just heard it from the man who was there. and you can google it and you'll find the procedural history on the case. and then giuliani says oh, yeah, but, look, biden wanted to get rid of this prosecutor who was coming after his kid that. makes sense to all of us, right? that would make sense. except this guy, they wanted him out. his own party 89 votes in the

parliament to get him out. western democracies wanting him out, the u.n. wanting him out because he wouldn't take up cases. no evidence that he had taken up a case against hunter biden. so now you know those are the facts. what do they mean here politically? it's an open question. senator cory booker is breathing fire about impeachment. he's also simultaneously trying to pump air into his presidential campaign. very troubling message came out of the campaign. we are going to take up the reality of the situation for cory booker and the political reality for this country, next. imagine a world where nothing gets in the way of doing great work. where an american icon uses the latest hr tools to stay true to the family recipe. where a music studio spends less time on hr and payroll, and more time crafting that perfect sound. where the nation's biggest party store can staff up quickly as soon as it's time for fun. this is the world of adp. hr, talent, time, benefits and payroll.

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cnn special report, the cbd craze sunday at 8:00. more break news that just came in. this is from "the washington post" the newspaper is reporting just tonight citing multiple democratic officials that house speaker nancy pelosi is quietly feeling out colleagues about whether it is time to impeach president trump, specifically asking about the significance of this ukraine situation. sources tell the "post" that she is asking about the president's words about the conversation with ukraine's president and whether or not it is a tipping point. the post says pelosi has been making calls this evening to gauge support. democratic senator, presidential candidate cory booker started calling for impeachment long before ukraine. and he's with us now on prime

time. good to see you, senator. >> chris, always good to be on. thank you for having me. >> so first let me just deal with your campaign, and then we will get into these politics. message comes from the campaign like this is it, either get on board with us right now or the campaign is going on end. is that a reality? are you thinking about dropping out? >> well, look. we built a campaign. we told people this is not an ego exercise or a vanity experiment. we wanted to win, and we were building a campaign till now that is really a winning campaign. remember, the polls this far out have never predicted from our party who would become president of the united states. what predicts it is the strength on the ground. we have inarguably according to the des moines register and others we have the strongest team on the ground, us and elizabeth warren. and we just knew that if we were to stay competitive that had the most endorsements that we had to continue to grow and we didn't have the resources to do that. and so we've been very honest.

we have until the end of the quarter till a week from now to raise about $1.7 million. and we want to be candid. we should not be in this race if we can't grow to win. now the good days is we are three days into it, and we've had the three biggest fundraising days of the campaign online. the momentum of people and i've been hearing from folks all across the country, even people who aren't all in for me just asking me to stay in this race because of the value of our voice and our perspective. so we've got to keep pushing. we are almost at $700,000 of that 1.7 million we need to raise. we hope that people who want my voice out there will go to corybooker.com and keep us in it. >> i get the pitch. i get the need for money. is there anything about this that opens it to criticism as being a stunt, creating a little false urgency, getting people under your tent? >> no. look, we've been very open and transparent with people. in fact this was a risk because we were saying plainly that up until the fourth quarter we've

been raising the money, we needed to be competitive. and inarguably we are. but we just did not have the fundraising trajectory necessary in order to continue the campaign in the way that we thought we should do it. and i think at least my values are if you don't have a trajectory to win, you should not be in this race. >> i hear you. >> and, yeah. and so we needed help. right now a lot of people are responding. and it is exciting to me thousands and thousands of people are making small dollar contributions, our best days of the campaign. we have seven more to go and we really need the help. i'm just being straightforward. if we don't hit our goal, we are going to have to make some very tough decisions. but, god, this has been three of the more affirming days not just of this campaign but in politics because the notes we are getting from people, even people who are neutral in this race saying i'm not endorsing people, they've been shooting out tweets and texts trying to get folks to help us out. and the surge is coming but we've got to keep it up for

seven more days. >> all right. let's talk some party politics here for a second. do you believe the situation with ukraine and the president and our president adds or is stand-alone worthy of impeachment? >> look, as you said earlier, i've already called for impeachment proceedings to begin. one of the reasons i did was because this administration was stopping information from getting to congress for congress to do its job which is to provide a check and a balance on this president. and so he's not acting when it comes to congressional investigation subpoenas and documents, he's not acting like the leader of the free world. he is acting more like a dictator. and so here's another example where this justice department has stopped a -- really subverted or even undermine the whistleblower law that says if this is something as the inspector general found it, something that is credible and urgent, it should've gone to congress. this is not a partisan issue.

i mean, this is a president of the united states withholding information. i've been to ukraine. i've been to the region where the russians are conducting military operations. i met with courageous ukrainian military folks whose comrades were dying and trying to fight against russian aggression. crimea was annexed. this is deeply real and profound that our country, congress bipartisan said we should get support to them and defend them against russian aggression. this president allegedly is withholding those resources in order to go against a political -- >> right. >> opponent. >> but, senator, as we know now the money has moved over there. and my question for you and as an extension of the party is are you guys setting yourself up again like you did on the mueller thing which is where may be acts there that would play a big role in someone's decision in an election. but you're not going to get any republicans to vote to remove this president on the basis of

what happened in ukraine, even if he did hold the money which i don't think it's going to be, you're not going to remove him from office. so if you go down a road that you cannot satisfy, where is the political advantage in that, or is it about something else? >> so, chris, it is about something else. politics be damned. 20 years, 40 years from now, people are going to look back at moments like this. what did we do to hold a president accountable? i swore an oath to upheld and defend the constitution. he is violating our constitutional mandates. he is not saying he is not subject to the checks and balances of our government which undermines the very ideals of our nation. this is not about politics. this is a moral moment and we should do the right thing and hold this president accountable. >> senator booker, i appreciate you being with us tonight clearing up what's going on in the campaign and clearing up where your party is on this. these are going to be very interesting day as head. it's good to have you here on the show. >> thank you, chris. always good to be with you.

good luck to the campaign going forward. all right. we have a rare glimpse of the president's press secretary today. she gave a lot of excuses for why white house briefings have gone the way of the dodo, extinct. are they ever coming back to life? the interesting part is the explanation. and it has spawned an argument for you, next.

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stephanie grisham, can you place the face? she's the white house press secretary, almost three months now. many of you may not know that. she's never stood behind the podium in the white house press briefing room to take questions from reporters. a press secretary who does not take questions from the press. and today over on state tv, she gave several excuses for the moratorium.

number one, the briefings are useless, she says, because the press can just ask the president. >> he's the most accessible president in history as all of the media knows. >> this is approaching another example of orwellian double speak because of this president's -- what he wants you to believe, he just keeps saying it. he rarely does an interview with anyone but a pal and constantly attacks the media. that makes him accessible? >> i'm the most transparent president probably in the history of this country. in the history of our country, there has never been a president that's been more transparent than me or the trump administration. >> keep saying it and saying it until the base starts parroting it the way the press secretary is. that is the goal of double speak -- accessible, transparent. okay. where is the transcript of the call with ukraine's president? where's the whistle-blower

complaint? where are the white house visitor logs? why didn't you testify like you promised in the mueller probe? why not release your taxes? why do you fight every effort of congress to investigate? during the first year of the trump presidency, did you know that more foia requests, freedom of information act requests, were denied or censored than at any time in the past decade. not only are there no white house press briefings, the pentagon barely holds them anymore. same with the state department. and, again, when the president does talk to the press, take a look at the numbers. more than 40 interviews with fox news. that's why we call it state tv, that and the way they treat him when he's there. that's more than all other networks combined. and only once has he talked with chris wallace over on fox. who's second highest? fox business. that's not accessibility.

that's plausible deniability. grisham's second excuse for lack of press briefings -- >> they weren't being good to his people, and he doesn't like that. he's very loyal to his people, and he put a stop to it. >> hmm. you can tell she's new because this is way too close to the truth. you heard that, right? this president will punish the media if they cover people that are close to him in ways he doesn't like. but she lost it on that last part about the loyalty. name me one person that this president has stuck by when things got bad for them. he is about fealty, i would argue to you, not loyalty. but be clear, president trump is welcome on this show anytime to make his case to you. same with ms. grisham, and we wish her well in the job. it is a standing invitation. it won't be the courtesy couch you were on this morning over there at state tv, but i promise you this. we will never treat you the way our president treats us in the

media and a lot of other people in this country. there may be disagreement, but there will always be decency. that's the argument. ahead, we've got a big shot on joe biden's campaign with new reaction to the president's new admissions today on his efforts to get ukraine to investigate his opponent. right back with that and big 2020 news. a special two-hour "prime time" next. with advil, you have power over pain, so the whole world looks different. the unbeatable strength of advil. what pain?

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hey, i'm chris cuomo. welcome to a special bonus hour of "prime time." guess what? breaking news on our watch. the hill is very active tonight. the whistle-blower scandal may be changing the calculus for democrats and particularly