portions of new england and we still have one to get through, happy thanksgiving to you, jim. >> ivan cabrera, thank you so much. i'm jim acosta, thank you very much for watching and happy thanksgiving, everybody. erin burnett "out front" starts right now. out front next, breaking news. rudy giuliani reportedly tried to cash in to the tune of half a million dollars on ukraine while digging for dirt on joe biden. is trump about to turn on his personal attorney? plus new details tonight on a highly anticipated report about the russia investigation and it completely undermines what trump has been claiming for years. and the navy secretary who was fired tears into president trump in a new op-ed tonight saying he doesn't understand what it means to be a military man. let's go out front. good evening, everyone. i'm bee abiana gol dreegodryga

erin burnett. rudy giuliani was trying to line his pockets with half a million dollars from ukraine while digging up dirt on joe biden. giuliani was in talks to represent government officials including the same prosecutor he was working with to get information on biden and his son. giuliani claims he ultimately backed out of his deal because of his ties to trump and moments ago tweeted i did not pursue a business opportunity in ukraine, but this comes as trump for the first time distances himself from his personal attorney. >> i knew he was going to go to ukraine, and i think he canceled the trip, but rudy has other clients other than me. >> you didn't direct him to go there on your behalf? >> no, but -- no. >> not exactly a warm embrace there. trump says he didn't direct giuliani, but that explanation doesn't add up, look at trump's

own words. mr. giuliani was a highly respected man, the mayor of new york city, a great mayor and i ask him to call you along with the attorney general. rudy very much knows what's happening and he is a very capable guy. if you being speak it him that would be great. and here's trump's hand-picked ambassador to the eu, gordon sondland under oath. >> in response to our persistent efforts in that meeting to change his views, president trump directed us to, quote, talk with rudy. mr. giuliani emphasized that the president wanted a public statement from president zelensky committing ukraine to look into the corruption issues. mr. giuliani specifically mentioned the 2016 election including the dnc serve are and burisma as two topics of

personance to the president. >> jeremy dimon is traveling with the president tonight and he's out front live in west palm beach, florida. jeremy, this sounds like the president may be getting to throw giuliani under the bus, no? >> that certainly is the key question, biana, the president is distancing himself from rudy giuliani, and the mayor becomes increasingly central to this ukraine scandal and we have seen how central rudy giuliani was to these efforts to pressure the ukrainian government to carry out these politically motivated investigations. as you just saw gordon sondland there describe how the president directed him to speak with rudy giuliani and rudy giuliani then directed u.s. officials to pressure the ukrainian government to carry out these investigations. look, we know how seriously the president takes loyalty, but oftentimes loyalty with this president is a one-way street. we saw this previously, of course, with the president's former personal attorney,

michael cohen who the president ultimately said something very similar about where he said i never directed him to do anything wrong. those comments are very similar to what the president is now saying about rudy giuliani, and like michael cohen, rudy giuliani is also now under federal investigation. the difference so far is that rudy giuliani has not turned on the president. he has rejected requests from congress to come forward and testify and of course, bianna, many of the president's allies and white house aides who work with the president every day have bemoaned the president's relationship believing that rudy giuliani is not helpful to the president and in fact, causes a lot of self-inflicted wound, so that, of course, remains a question, but so far the president just distancing himself and we'll see if he goes further. >> i recall john bolton calling him a hand grenade. >> congressman adriano esplayat.

thank you for coming in. a lot of news on this thanksgiving eve. let me get your reaction to the story now about rudy giuliani allegedly going to ukraine to dig up dirt on the bidens while at the same time trying to ren rich his own pockets working with the same prosecutors. >> it has been reported with the corrupt ukrainian prosecutor and that there was perhaps a money talk as well. the president himself said that giuliani has other clients besides himself and sondland said that the president directed him to giuliani, the july 25th conversation with zelensky and obviously he's a central figure in this investigation. >> and is it plausible what the president says that he didn't direct julian toe do anything in ukraine? >> clearly, he had confidence him. he expressed confidence in him to zelensky, and to sondland, as well. he instructed them to go directly to him.

so, yes, it seems very likely he had confidence with him and he had a working relationship with him. >> it may be an easy exkrus prior to these, because the one commonality we saw from all of them was this link to giuliani and that gordon sondland said no one wanted to work with him. they were just told by the president to work with him. what does that say about the president's excuse now in. >> it seems it has all of the characteristics of the cohen incident and it may be well that he's thrown him under the bus and she's very muhe's very much impeachment process and we'll continue to find out what his business was in the ukraine. >> i'm glad you brought up michael cohen because it does seem that history is repeating itself and we saw this how the president who was once close to his attorney seems to be distancing himself and let's take a listen to some of this past history here. >> michael cohen is a very talented lawyer. >> rudy giuliani is a great lawyer. >> i've always liked michael.

>> i think rudy is a great gentleman. >> you have to ask that to rudy. >> they've got cohen totally unrelated to the campaign. i'm not involved. >> rudy has other clients other than me. >> that's quite the evolution. we know ultimately that michael cohen did flip on the president and he's now serving time in prison. you know rudy giuliani very well. rudy giuliani and this president go way back. how concerned do you think the president is right now that giuliani being possibly flip on him, too. >> i won't make prediction, but i know as a common practice, rudy giuliani was a former u.s. attorney when defendants or suspects are facing a time in jail and very often they're skeptical about their previous decisions and i'm not going to make predictions to say whether he will or will not flip on the president and it would have crossed the president's mind. >> we saw over 12 witnesses and over 30 hours of testimony all fact-based witnesses and many of

your democratic colleagues say there's no doubt about it, these were all impeachable offenses and we have yet to see one of your republican colleagues say the same. does that alarm you? >> yes, it does. i think the evidence has been compelling and i feel many of them should adhere to constitution and not to political winds and we're all facing reelection this coming year and we should not be scoring political points and our compelling and historical commitment to the constitution and what our duties are as duly elected members of congress. >> is there now any debate within the party as to how to proceed forward regarding impeachment or centering the president and one of your fellow congressmen walked back and that idea had floated earlier on. is that the better route to go down now that we are approaching an election year? >> no, i think that chairman schiff has done a tremendous job in the investigation process.

i think that body of evidence might have that before him and my colleagues will make the decision as to whether or not to proceed with articles of impeachment and that will begin -- not this coming tuesday, a week from now and so we'll see what happens then, but i think we're in the right course and we've heard from all of the witnesses and i think we've been deliberate on all of this and we haven't acted off-the-cuff and we would adhere to what the constitution tells us we should do and we should continue on that route. in terms of other witnesses given the judge's ruling earlier in the week with regards to mcgahn and his now ability to testify, do you think it's worth waiting now to see if you do have john bolton testify and neck mull vaivaney and mike pom?

>> i'm sure the commit will look at that and pompeo and bolton will have an opportunity to reconsider their position not to come forward, and in the process as it moves forward the president and the white house will be able to have counsel there, and they'll be able to be a part of the process and this is something that they complained about in the past. guess what? right now you have it right in front of you. >> what's the likelihood that you think we'll see -- >> this is a process guided by the constitution of the united states of america. i think they should not hide urn the rock and they should be fully a part of this process. we must hear from them. >> happy thanksgiving. >> same to you and the american people. happy thanksgiving. breaking news. new details about the justice department inspector general report and it undercuts a major trump conspiracy theory. plus a key witness in the impeachment investigation and a trump ally ambassador gordon sondland accused of sexual misconduct. the reporters who broke that story are out front. breaking news, more breaking

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tonight, one of the president's biggest conspiracy theorys is unraveling. "the new york times" is reporting that the justice department's inspector general's upcoming report on the origins of the russia investigation will show that this is not true. >> they were spying on my campaign and it went right up to the top and everybody knows it. >> nothing terrifies democrats more than the fact that all of their spying -- spying, they actually spied on my campaign, can you believe it? >> they spied on my campaign, it's as simple as that. it is so illegal and it's probably the biggest political scandal in history and they got caught doing it. >> the times reporting there's simply no evidence that the fbi tried to place agents into the trump campaign. former fbi assistant director

julia kayyem and ross garber, cnn legal analyst. greg, let me begin with you. what's the significance of this report finding that there was, in fact, no spying? >> frankly, bianna, it's not surprising to those of us who were at the fbi or doj at the time. i think for the most part the president's allegations and accusations at the time were seen as absurd and irresponsible and it appears as though according to the reporting that this oig report will confirm that there was no spying. there was no misconduct at the senior levels of doj or the fbi. there was no political -- politically motivated efforts to get the president and it simply didn't happen, but again, those who know how the fbi and doj works knew that that wouldn't be the case at the outset. >> and we'll know more once this report officially does come out. ross, we know the president wasn't the only one promoting these theories.

in fact, the attorney general said similar things. he won an expedition to europe looking for answers here and here's what he said before. >> think that the spying did occur. yes, i think spying did occur. >> we know he doubled down in an interview with the wall street journal that power was used to spy on american citizens, did should report hurt the attorney general, as well? >> it may. get ready for a crosshire hurricane of spin here. it's already started, but we will see it later. it will be interesting to see what the attorney general says about this. what he could say is, look, i heard these issues and the president raised them and so we got down to the bottom of it and it turns out there's no basis for it. that could be what he says and it also could be the case that it depends on how you define spying. there was spying sort of, but not the and it will be

interesting to see how the attorney general handles it and juliette, we all remember the series of tweets early on in the press dnsy and greg, i want to turn to you and the president accused president trump of wiretapping and he, in fact, said terrible, just found out that obama had my wires tapped in trump tou are just before the victory and nothing found. this is mccarthyism and how low has president obama gone to tap my phones during the very sacred election process. this is nixon/watergate bad, or sick guy. does this categorically put this allegation it rest now? >> of course, we haven't seen the report, but if the reporting by the times and the posts and others is correct, yes. those kinds of allegations were

shocking at the time. not so much that people at the fbi or doj were shocked that that could have been happening, but the shock is that the president so could -- could so cavalierly be making such allegations like that, and they were hard to believe if not unbelievable at the time and it appears as this report by the independent oig will finally put them to rest. >> i mean, that allegation itself was so alarming that president obama who has been for the most part quiet throughout the process had to respond to it because it was such an egregious and outrageous allegation. juliette, we have you. i know we had a problem with your satellite earlier. as you know and as was mentioned by ross, this will likely be cherry picked and both sides will find things they can claim validation in and the doj is

reporting that they're expected to find that there were lower level employees who made some mistakes and cnn first reported that a former fbi lawyer is under investigation for allegedly altering a document that was related to the surveillance of the former trump campaign aid carter page. that didn't alter the the investigation. what does that tell you? >> it tells me that the damage is already done and that's what we have to remember. nearly two years later, and just think of the time, effort, money, focus and talking points and everything that's been expended to prove or essentially disprove a series of unsubstantiated tweets from donald trump and what has happened now is that donald trump has created a narrative for fox and people that support him and that somehow he's the victim in the 2016 election rather than the american voter because given what happened with russia and russia'sen filtration

in my election. >> russia, doesn't think he do anything wrong and a few things, and dhs is down to a skeleton staffer and in some issue, it sdn matter, and it's allowed donald trump to crete eight a myth ol ye and reese is the runway into 2020. >> ross, do you agree with juliette and the fact there hasn't been enougha, tension focused on russia's involvement in 2020? >> i think there has probably been some damage to the fbi. there certainly has been, but i think once this report comes out, i think then we'll actually be able to sort of see the details behind it and actually get at the facts. so far there have been so many

allegations and so much spin and a good idea to get down to the facts. >> the president said he was wrong or slim to none. >> all right. >> i hear laughter there. >> do turkeys fly? >> thanksgiving optimism, right? >> juliette, greg and ross, thank you very much. we appreciate it. >> out front next, a former navy secretary comes out swinging hard against president trump accusing him of not understanding what it means to be part of the military. plus breaking news. president trump signs a bill that is seen as a major rebuke of china at a time when he's trying to hammer out a major critical trade deal. should have seen this coming. a stampede unleashed 55 years ago. built for freedom, power and rebellion.

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we have some breaking news to bring you. richard spencer writing a washington post-op-ed just days after resigning over the president's handling of the case of a war crimes. it was also a reminder that the president has very little understanding of what it means to be in the military to fight ethically or to be governed by a uniform set of rules and practices. out front now, republican congressman mike johnson of louisiana. he's a member of the house judiciary commit ptee. congressman, thanks so much for joining us. >> hey. thanks for having me. >> let me get your reaction of this. a former navy secretary says the president has no understanding of what it means to be nil military. that's a pretty stunning allegation. >> that's a stunning statement

from the secretary of the navy. i just read it myself right before we came on the air and to me there was a surprising statement in there, he admitted that he wanted to do everything he could to prevent the president's involvement in this particular case, and that's going to raise some eyebrow, i think. look, i'm talking to you just a few moments away, a few miles away from the air force base, the home of the nuclear triadand there are a lot of military folks in my district who love the president and they love him as commander in chief and he's unconventional and that's true and they have a lot of confidence him and that's a sentiment that's shared across the military. what you hear from, not only from spencer and others in the military is how impressive it is for the president to try to intervene in these types of legal situations that as we know are handled separately within the military itself. so that doesn't alarm you? >> well, he is the commander in chief. he's ultimately the authority over all those military affairs and i think what the president was concerned about in this

particular case is the chilling effect that a conviction would have across all of our military fighting forces and all of those on the front lines and without re-litigating the facts of the gallagher case, there are a lot of people who are deeply concerned about how that matter was handled and i think the president was and it's his prerogative given to him by the voters of this country to step in and let his opinion be heard on that, so we support him in it. i think a lot of members of congress do as well and there's been a lot of discussion about that case and we'll have to see where all of the chips fall on it. >> we know the president continues to talk about it and here's what he said at a rally last night. >> i stuck up for three great warriors against the deep state. i will always stick up for our great fighters. people can sit there in air-conditioned offices and complain, but you know what? it doesn't matter to me whatsoever.

>> congressman, there you see the former navy secretary who we should note he appointed the deep state. is that appropriate? at this point, who is not the deep state? it seems that anyone who speaks out against the president they're labeled the deep state. >> didn't hear him call any names in that clip, and i wasn't at that rally and you can gauge by the reaction of the crowd that they support those actions and activities. the president is a president for special forces, for anybody who serves in our military and for first responders. he likens himself that way. he takes great pride in it and i think the people of this country do, as well. he supports our men and women in uniform and he's trying to show that every single day. he's done it by increasing funding to the military and defending them as he said in his own words there when he believes they're under assault, and i think that most americans salute him for that. >> it is quite stunning. i just have to read how spencer closes out his op ed because the last line is biding.

our allies need to know that we remain a force for good and please bear with us as we move through this moment in time. that almost sounds like a message that mattis had for troupes wh troops when he was defense secretary. do you disagree with that comment? >> think our military is respected around the world and we have equipped and armed the military with the funding to do their job and i think america is back and america is strong and that's what the people in this country respond to and understand. secretary esper is the one that let secretary spencer go. you know, that's his job, there is a chain of command and i think by secretary spencer saying that. he is going outside the chain of command and i mean no disrespect to him. >> spencer, as he read the op ed acknowledges he was wrong in circumventing secretary esper and let me move on as we have

you here in the final few minutes because i want to ask you about the impeachment hearings. you said they produced no bombshells and we obviously have had a lot of new information over the past 48 hours. we now know the president was aware of the whistle-blower's complaint when he told ambassador sondland that there was no quid pro quo and that the aid was soon released after that. doesn't this timing now look extremely suspect to you? >> it doesn't. i don't have a concern about that timing at all. i think the president was very consistent. look, his mindset was he thought of ukraine as a corrupt country. it wasn't just his opinion. that's the opinion of all experts around the world and non-governmental organizations that monitor corrupt nations always list ukraine at the top of that list. he wanted to root out corruption and he talked to president zelensky who ran on a similar platform to drain the swamp so to speak around the country and he said to ambassador sondland in the phone call you referenced that he wanted zelensky to do

the right thing. it warrant about the quid pro quo and he wanted to clarify that everyone understood that. november 14th, the ukraine foreign minister came out with his statement and the military funding had nothing whatsoever to do with the public statement of anticorruption. they did not see a link between this at all. >> one could argue that ukraine was the weaker of the two parties who desperately needed the help of the president of the united states and would do anything to get that aid even if they came out with a message saying there was no pressure. i understand your point. we'll have to leave it there, though. we're out of time and i appreciate you joining us, congressman. happy thanksgiving. >> same to you. thanks so much. out front next, trump backs down signing a bipartisan bill after suggesting he might veto it because it would offend china. and a new report out tonight about three women who accuse ambassador sondland of sexual

misconduct. that's next.

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and we have even more breaking news for you tonight. gordon sondland, the u.s. am to the european union and the central figure of the impeachment hearings is facing multiple allegations of sexual misconduct in retaliation tonight. three women are accusing sondland such as forcible kissing and exposing himself. there are claims that sondland retaliated against him when they

refused his advances. all of the accusations occurred before sondland became an ambassador and sondland is denying them all. out front tonight julia silverman one of the reporters who reported the story and the editor in chief worked with republica to report this story. how and when did these three women decide to come forward? >> thank you, bianna. we started working on the story back in october when sondland's role in the impeachment hearings was very different. we heard first our owner, nicole vogel. she told her story in public at a charity event in seattle, and that was sort of the first time our current editorial team heard the story, and we decided pretty quickly that if we were going to pursue the story we would need

to bring on an independent, investigative partner and we did that with pro-publica and they've been a fantastic reporting, fact-checking and writing partner in this story. >> and is that because of vogel's association with the publication and any sort of conflict of interest that could bring up? >> correct. we wanted to minimize any appearance of conflict of interest. she was not given any sort of access to the story. we treated her as we would any other source. >> and julia, there is a woman in the story by the name of janet solace and she's claiming that sondland invited her to his home to evaluate his art collection and then, quote, she says i get out of the poolhouse and he is now naked from the waist down. he said something about i thought we could chat. that's a shocking claim. >> it is, and that is janice

solace's recollection which she shared with us. i'd like to note that we spent the better part of two months reporting these stories. we checked and re-checked everything and we spoke to multiple people for each woman who being confirm that they were told the story at the time, so verifying a contemporaneous account. >> marty, in response to your story, sondland's lawyer had written a statement to us, that given the timing of intended story a reasonable conclusion is you are attempting to affect ambassador sondland's credibility as a fact witness in the pending impeachment inquiry. given the politically charged climate in which current events are unfolding some might consider this to be veiled witness tampering. you started investigating this just a few months ago, as well. >> we are reporters first and

foremost and it is not our job to worry about what is going on where these events happened before sondland became the u.s. ambassador to the eu, and -- and. >> we can only tell you what wooe reported in our story and we cannot speculate on the politics. you've given great detail to these three allegations from these three women. can you expect more women may come forward now? we are eager to share our stories and our contact information and that of our colleagues at pro-publica is at the bottom of the story so we are eager to hear from anybody who has further information to share and bianna, i want to add that we responded extensively to sondland's lawyer in the story and i encourage your viewers to read it.

we quote his lawyer and his response extensively and we have -- >> addressed those points. >> and there are details in this piece, as well. marty and julia, i appreciate you joining us tonight. thank you. >> thank you very much. >> thank you for having us. >> i want to bring in jim mccarthy and he's ambassador sondland's personal spokesperson. thank you for coming in late notice. what is the ambassador's response and you say you had known about the story and was in the works for a few months. >> i'm amazed with those reporters say they were thorough and i've tried to be in contact with missile isser haveman and she's refused to share who, what, where and how they're substantiated and she wouldn't discuss any of those details with us and we didn't have an opportunity to hear any of the fundamental basics of it until just a couple of days ago with a 24-hour deadline and it was horrendously irresponsible journalism and the fact that their own boss is the primary source for the story is

appalling, a brazen conflict of interest. >> you've heard them say that's the reason they brought in pro publica which did their own investigation and corroborated for that very reason. >> both of the reporters spent weeks calling dozens and dozens of employees waving innuendo at them and trying to solicit similar kinds of stories and their own boss is the primary source. she signs their checks to pretend that that's somehow objective journalism is ridiculous. >> but again, the whole point of going to another publication, and i think that you would agree with that. >> i wouldn't. >> that's a discussion for another time. regardless of what appearances may have been. so how does the ambassador respond to that? >> well, we have an accident tensive response that you can find on his personal website which is gordon sondland.com and

in there we detail how pro-publica's reporting was unethical and also underhanded. they, too, would not share basic details with us how the sources were noting it and one of the main sources changed the date of when it occurred from 2003 to 2008. >> does he deny knowing these women? does he deny parts of their stories because they're very detailed and there's going into a pool house and in the car and forcible kissing, exposure and all of that. >> he details how each of these individual his business interaction with him and they came to him with business proposals. one wanted to sell insurance. miss vogel, again, the boss of these reporters wanted ambassador sondland to invest in her magazine and he did due diligence and declined and that's turning down a business deal and the third didn't get the job she wanted and they each came with proposals and were politely declined.

there's nothing improper about that. >> you heard me asking the reporters about the timing about this all and there are people at home that view it suspicious that it comes after his testimony and sort of linking this to be politically motivate period. who would stand to benefit from smearing the ambassador? >> it's uncan they ny that it s like witness tampering. she donates to the democratic party, and the congressman is a frequent contributor to the publication and he's spent weeks maligning ambassador sondland and one is a former democratic congressional staffer and it wreaks of partisanship and it's backed up by garbage journalism that never gave us a fair opportunity to verify and look back into the fundamental facts. >> you mentioned that you had been aware of this story for some time now. had the ambassador made the white house aware that this story was coming and where does the white house stand now? are they in support of the

ambassador? >> well, we've tried to brief his colleagues in the state department to let them know that the reporting was under way, but more important, we tried to get to the bottom of it with the reporters themselves and we wanted to give input and find out what the facts were and portland monthly wouldn't give us anything -- zero details. >> has he speaken to the president? >> that i don't know. >> do you think that given this allegation that he can continue doing his work as ambassador to the eu. >> it's a sad day in america when these stories are trying to affect political outcomes and readers and public officials, too, will see right through it and it's underhanded and it's garbage. jim, we will continue to follow this story. we appreciate you coming in. >> out front next, president trump just signing a bill that is no doubt, angering china tonight. >> and a doctored photo of donald trump has social media all pumped up. ♪ ♪ we made usaa insurance for members like kate.

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news. we have more breaking news to bring you. a rebuke against china. the president signed legislation that supports pro-democracy protesters in hong kong threatening sanctions on chinese for those responsible for human rights abuses. the president saying, i signed these bills out of respect for president xi, china and the people of hong kong. let's bring jeremy diamond back out front. jeremy, this is a huge slap on china. the president in recent days refused to commit to sign this legislation. what's happened tonight? >> that's right, bee ann saw, it appears the reticence collided with this hard reality of support for this legislation overwhelming bipartisan support for the legislation, both the house and the senate. the house passed this bill 417-1. and the senate passed it unanimously. rarely do you see such substantive legislation pass with those margins. so ultimately that meant that even if the president did not sign this or if he vetoed it as he threatened to do, floated the

possibility a few days ago, ultimately this bill would likely have become legislation. so that appears to be the reason why. >> a lot of pressure from congress. that's for sthur. but it's also coming at a critical time in the trade negotiations with china. the president had been expressing some sort of optimism as far as those talks were headed. where are they now? >> and that is ultimately why the president has been so reticent to express his support for protesters in hong kong and to sign this very legislation. because he is concerned about the impact that this could have on the trade negotiations. look, we know that earlier this week trade talks were still continuing between the u.s. and china. they are still working towards that phase 1 agreement that the president so, so very much wants to get signed. we know that the president previously promised xi jinping back in june that he would not criticize chinese actions in hong kong with regards to the protests until they actually reached a trade agreement. that is obviously out the window now, but we do know that the president has been extremely

concerned about the impacts that this could have. and the chinese government, bianna, has already threatened to retaliate against the united states. that is why you saw that statement from president trump in which he said, look, offering a peace offering essentially, some kind of olive branch here even as he signs this legislation in effect that could enact tough sanctions against chinese officials, hong kong officials involved in human rights violations. the president trying to extend an olive of i have branch to xi jinping saying i want to move forward on the trade relationship. this is not necessarily a slap in the face. >> we have yet to see how president xi will respond to this. jeremy, thank you so much, we appreciate it. well, up front next, jeanne moos on president trump's tweet and the rocky reception it received. man: sneezes

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what are you doing back there, junior? since we're obviously lost, i'm rescheduling my xfinity customer service appointment. ah, relax. i got this. which gps are you using anyway? a little something called instinct. been using it for years.

yeah, that's what i'm afraid of. he knows exactly where we're going. my whole body is a compass. oh boy... the my account app makes today's xfinity customer service simple, easy, awesome. not my thing. it's the fake photo that's hitting a real nerve.

here's jeanne moos. >> reporter: looking at this, you may see a president tossing keep america great hats. but maybe president trump sees a greek olympian hurling a discus. after all, he tweeted out this doctored image of his own head attached to the chiselled torso of rocky balboa. here's the original. instead of doing sit-ups or pumping iron, president trump tends to just pump his fists. critics compared the president to homer simpson checking out his reflection and imagining impeccable pecs. >> it's as if i look in the mirror and saw this. yikes. there's nothing like a flattering presidential photo shop to have other photo shops. when you order something online versus when it arrives, perception versus reality. you're delusional. the president's son don junior

joked, i've heard from reliable sources that it's not doctored. the daily wire doggedly doctored the already doctored photo by adding conan, the hero dog. the president, at the moment, seems to have his chest on the brain. at his latest rally, he railed at the press for supposedly saying he'd had a heart attack when he went to recall twalter hospital the other day. >> they say he's not wearing a tie. take off your shirt, sir, show us your gorgeous chest. >> reporter: that gorgeous chest on a guy who once told reuters, i get exercise. i mean, i walk, i this, i that. fake torso trump was compared with real bare-chested putin. who wore it better? some critics rubbed it in. #obama didn't need photo shop. president clinton's former press secretary tweeted, now we know what they did to him at walter reed. in that case, i want what he's

having. jeanne moos, cnn. new york. >> i have no words other than thanks for joining us. ac 360 starts right now. >> from america's mayor, perhaps to america's defendant, tonight rudy giuliani's potential legal problems are mounting and now president trump appears to be distancing himself from the attorney he once said, quote, very much knows what's happening. i'm john berman, in for anderson. and on top of that, new reporting from the "washington post" in "the new york times" that says at the very same time rudy giuliani was conducting his shadow diplomacy campaign for the president, attempting to drum up dirt on the bidens in ukraine, he was also working to secure contracts with those same officials that would have paid him hundreds of thousands of dollars. it also appears no deal was ever finalized, but he was essentially trying to leverage his white house connections for money. someth