hey, everybody. i'm chris cuomo. we have a new day of arguments and newer surprises. today, as main player comes back to potentially haunt the trump defense. our special impeachment trial coverage continues right now. ♪ the elephant in the room, what would the trump defense do when it comes to dealing with the obvious elements of what's in the news about bolton and what would they do? here's a look. >> if a president, any president were to have done what "the times" reported about content of the bolton manuscript, that would not constitute an impeachable offense. let me repeat.

nothing in the bolton revelations, even if true, would rise to the level of abuse of power or impeachable offense. >> now, i was surprisedhat you heard even that from the defense. i didn't understand why they want to introduce bolton at all. when it's just not good for them. now you hear arguments, well, they talked about bolton. they opened the door. that's a rule that doesn't apply here. this is about politics. talk about what's good for you and ignore what's bad for you. this bolton situation at least optically is bad. if you're one of these senators who is nervous about what to do and now you hear that someone who's being kept from you as a witness directly spoke to the president about what exactly he's being accused of, that's tough. so, now we have even more news dropping on this about what is in this manuscript from bolton. what is it? well, not only does bolton suggest that he spoke directly to the president, and we don't

know if he can prove that. the president says it's not true, but he also says that he went to the attorney general, barr, and said that he felt that the president was effectively granting personal favors to autocrats in different countries not -- this wasn't about ukraine specifically. turkey, china, that's what he was talking about, and he says that the attorney general was equally concerned and pointed to investigations that were going on with specific companies in foreign countries and saying he was worried that the president was exerting undo influence. undue influence. nobody said anything at the time. let's bring in the "a" team to weigh in on this situation. andy mccabe, i'll start with you on this. they brought up -- i didn't think they would. try to combine the idea of what he means in a case in terms of legalities and what he might or might not mean in this particular theater that we're in. >> well, chris, in any normal

case, to find out on the eve of the defense presenting their case that there is another witness, a direct witness who hear -- who heard statements from the subject of the case, subject of the investigation, making incriminating statements, especially in a situation like this where you have so much criticism there is not direct evidence, which, of course, we know isn't true. there's been so much criticism, it's all hearsay. here you finally have a witness coming forth with direct evidence that is highly relevant to the credibility elements of this case and the idea that that witness will not be heard from is ridiculous in a normal criminal case. now, as you said, this is not a normal criminal case, it is politics, it is a trial in the senate not the federal court. so where this plane lands, i don't think anyone knows. >> asha, what's being argued i

even if this all happened and bolton heard what he heard and trump did what he said he did, they're not impeachable. dershowitz accented that most heavily today. your take? >> my take when i heard that because it was appended on to the rest of his argument, which is that any quid pro quo that's done with any kind of policy goal, even if there is a personal benefit or there is some mixed motive, is not a crime, it's not impeachable. and my takeaway was, then what is there to investigate with joe biden? because he has the same defense. i mean, he can claim the same thing. he was working on behalf of the obama administration. so, dershowitz actually kind of undercut everything that the other lawyers had been saying earlier in the morning. i think he threw that out there because he kind of had to address, as you said, the elephant in the room, but it actually destroyed the rest of the case they were making about

why the bidens needed to be investigated. >> jennifer, the defense on -- we were just talking about this before the show started. obviously you don't bring in fact witnesses who can't know anything about the facts that you're looking at in trial. but, again, not that kind of trial. they want to bring in the bidens, we hear, because, well, if we can show that there is stink on the bidens then what the president did is okay because he believed there was stink on the bidens. we just showed you there's stink on the bidens, so the way he did it is irrelevant. >> yeah, it makes no sense at all, right? because the issue here is why the president asked for that investigation. really, he asked for the announcement. why did he do that? because he genuinely thought it was good for the united states or because he wanted this personal benefit, right? well, what is hunter biden going to talk about? he's going to talk about what he actually did in burisma, how much he got paid, et cetera. he doesn't know what trump was thinking other than the rest of us know he was thinking from the evidence, right? but he doesn't have any special, individual knowledge about that, so his testimony is entirely

irrelevant here. >> so, yes, comma, but, if they wanted to and they vote for witnesses and now there's going to be a process, right, that process is entirely up to the senators, is it not? so, jennifer obviously made a very cogent argument could be irrelevant, right? the republicans say -- say it a little more quiet if you were on the republican side because that's not the way we're going. they can have whomever they want. it's more about number than any subjective qualification for the person who's called, right? >> that's right. so, a lot of what's going on even today is political theater. the lawyers are trying to engage in political talking points, trying to make that political case for themselves, appeal to the base, make the president happy. as they're doing that, they're also trying to argue about the law. and as somebody who cares about the law, my concern is the more they push their political case, the more of a mess they make about the law. and they may succeed politically. they may get the acquittal.

odds are they will, but at the end of the day, if that's what happens, the law appears to be torn into pieces at the end of the trial. >> do you think part of this analysis -- doesn't seem to be, but do you think the democrats should be thinking about, well, what happens if we do have witnesses? do we change votes? what do we expose versus what we could do in the house and what happens if they get joe biden on the stand for four, six, eight hours asking him about things, the chance of a mistake, the chance he says something that's not true? should that be part of the calculus? >> that is part of the calculus. of course, everybody's playing to different audiences. the democrats are only -- the house managers are really only playing to theers to some extent. they're really making their most important case to the american people. you know, if and when joe biden appears, i'm not sure he will, but if he shows up, he's going to understand that this is a political trial -- or political theater for himself as well. it's not just what's happening in that room, it's how it's going to play with the american

people, so joe biden' going to keep an eye on that as well. >> all right. let's take a break. when we come back, let's discuss where are we now? what difference has this made? even bolton and the big developments about what should be in his book. should he just give an interview? come on down. we've got plenty of time for you, mr. bolton. you can make your case whenever you want. or can he? we'll answer these questions next. (sensei) when i started cobra kai,

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get a 4-week trial plus postage and a digital scale go to stamps.com/tv and never go to the post office again. now, you cannot forget the strategy component and the political component to all of this. the president's team knows that most of you aren't going watch this wall to wall. maybe you will see some distance therefor between the arguments. for example, the president's phone call with ukrainian leader. the white house counsel started with this on saturday. >> the president did absolutely nothing wrong. >> okay.

but on monday, former whitewater independent counsel robert wray said this. >> i know that many of you may come to conclude or have concluded that the call was less than perfect. and i have said on any number of occasions previously and publicly that it would have been better in attempting to spur action by a foreign government and coordinating law enforcement efforts with our government to have done so through proper channels. >> now, that is actually what robert ray thinks. he said it right on this show. what are they doing what is the effect? we have a group to talk about this. well go around the horn again. what is that? why isn't that just obviously inconsistent argument. what's the strategy behind it? >> well, it seems that mr. ray is the only one who is willing to embrace the reality of what happened on that phone call.

if you -- if you listen to the arguments today about particularly the agents put forward by pam bondi, hunter biden and joe biden and this pile of innuendo and suggestion that all sorts of corrupt things took place there, if that were the case, if there was a single credible allegation of corrupt practices perpetuated by hunter or joe biden, the proper place for those allegations would have been to the department of justice. it is not ever to go to -- direct to a foreign government, especially one whose criminal justice system is legendary corrupt as ukraine's and essentially heave the fortunes of a u.s. citizen into their justice system. we don't do that here. we have the laws and the agencies to do that. the trump administration took absolutely no effort in that direction, and i think that undermines their argument now that they were merely seeking some sort of coordination on corruption.

>> asha, it's there is something for everybody strategy going on here. s cipollone, nothing wrong, perfect. robert ray, wasn't perfect. but even if he did all these things the wrong way, it's not impeachable because he didn't commit a big crime. then you got bondi. don't forget who the real criminals are, the bidens. something for everyone. could be effective. seems to be with the gop. >> yeah. you know, i do think that it's ironic that their argument is, you must stick to the evidentiary record that was created in the house and then a lot of what they put out there is not in the evidentiary record. because they never brought any witnesses into the house. so there's some irony there. i do think that a lot of this will come down to the questioning, and i think if the democrats can be strategic in their questioning and not go down the rabbit hole of challenging the president's lawyers, but, instead, asking their own lawyers the assertions that were made by the defense

and let the house managers bring up the clips again, the video clips that will contradict everything that they put out. i think that could be very effective. but as michael knows, the democrats aren't always great about being strategic in that way, and they -- i'm worried that they'll go down that rabbit hole. >> but that's clever. and i'm actually surprised to hear it from you. you know why? because you, andrew, jennifer, michael, you know the problem with you guys? you're too smart. and you guys are so smart and the analysis is so sophisticated, and that's why i love you and need you on this show. but, jennifer, here's my point. they're, like, creating this argument for senators who are, "a," desperate to get out of this situation, okay? they couldn't be more -- i don't care which way it comes out. they all care which way it comes out. and secondarily, their audience is people who will never absorb it in this granular way because they don't care. and they won't get the concepts

because they're complicated. so the whole, you know, as inconsistent, as contemptible it is for people who have done real legal argument. he did nothing wrong. if he did, doesn't matter because he certainly didn't commit a crime. by the way, if you want to talk about bad people and crimes, look at these guys. wouldn't fly where you are. could be perfect for you. >> that's why it's really all about the sound bites. these republican senators need to have something to say. >> they have been echoing it, to your point. >> that's why the whole bolton thing threw them for a loop because all of a sudden these talking points were called into question. so they need to get comfortable again with these talking points. it's a shame that the house managers won't get a rebuttal period. that's where you stand up this argument, wrong. you go through them systematically and quickly and point all that out. and instead, we're going to have these questions. i hope that asha's right that the house managers will use that time properly, but there is no

immediate follow-up. they go to the judge. it's going to be very awkward and it the n's not going to wor well in terms of getting those rebuttal points in. >> right. >> so i worry the talking points the republican senators are getting, they're going to stick. >> andrew, how effective do you think you can be in this questioning period of senators' questions in terms of vetting the argument? >> you know, i think -- i think the questions have to be very specific. i mean, hopefully they will reference actual theories or actual statements by presenters on the defense team. so you could imagine a democratic senator saying, i'd like the house managers to address the claim from ms. bondi that hunter biden supposedly took whatever action -- >> right. >> and that would essentially tee up the house managers to kind of focus on that theory or that innuendo that they want to -- that they want to kind of cut off. so, hopefully we'll get specific

questions like that that are directed to theories or statements of some of the defense presenters, but, again, it's a really shaky process. it's kind of hard to imagine how this thing's going to go forward. >> my immediate thing, professor, was to ask you, well, wouldn't you just stick to the obvious? the defenders have been somewhat helpful in terms of cross-questioning by saying things that aren't true. whether it's they didn't ask bolton to come in. they could have had all these people if they wanted. things like that. that was my instinct. but is there a risk in that as well, that nobody is here vetting this on the facts? the republicans who don't want to vote -- and i'm not trying to be cynical, but those who feel we don't need witnesses, this is done. it's not because they believe every the president is saying. they think doesn't amount what it needs to. >> well, i think what you're going to see and we're already seeing is two completely different narratives. almost like two ships passing in the night.

so, for the house managers it's the evidence they presented, and they'll largely stick with that because that's the factual record and it helps -- it's good for them. that's their case. for the president's lawyers, facts don't matter. they have an entirely different narrative and you're hearing it. it's their political talking points. they keep pushing them. it could be there are a few things the president has done or white house lawyers have done which open doors for the house managers and you'll see them try to go through those doors, but they're not going to waste a lot of time nitpicking the white house arguments because it's simply going into the weeds and losing your audience. their audience, again, is the american people. the white house's audience are the base and those senators. so that's what each argument is being tailored for different audiences. >> we'll see. i want to talk to you guys a little bit more about this. i bet it will come out in the wash, today the most compelling for them was ray. because ray gave them a little space. did not say it was perfect, but gave them room to say here's why it's not enough.

we'll see. thank you all very much. thank you for being a gift to the onnience and helping us understand what matters so, so much. more ahead on impeachment. first, it's been 24 hours and there are still a lot of unanswered questions about what took the lives of these nine people in the helicopter. of course you know the face on your screen, kobe bryant. the incredible layered loss of him also losing his young daughter and the other eight people who lost their lives. why did this happen? and why has this taken the world the way it has? we have someone here to help us shine a light on why this nba superstar is so much more than just that. a friend, a teammate, loved him. next. will back up our system. but dad, rid-x contains billions of enzymes proven to break down even paper to keep your whole septic system healthy. for paper, grease or waste breakdown. use rid-x.

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it's hard not to be thinking about kobe bryant. hopefully all the victims of sunday's helicopter crash. it's going all over the world. the empire state building here in new york lit up in lakers' colors. philippines, you see the shrine being created in manila. friends, coaches, players, fans mourning the death of the black mamba. and for all the danger that that suggests about him on the court, it was the love that he gave off of it, the sincerity, the intelligence and the drive that is what's really resonating with somebody who is bigger than the game. now, carron butler, all right, was not only a teammate, but he was a friend, he was a father, raising kids with kobe, a brother, and a mentor.

this is why he says kobe must be remembered. >> carron butler, thank you so much. i am very sorry to meet you under these circumstances. >> yeah, it's tough. just been sitting at home the entire day surrounded by loved ones and positive energy and just, you know, reminiscing and sharing stories about, you know, my brother and his beautiful daughter. >> is it helping you to talk about it? to tell people who he was and help really cement the legacy of the man who you knew, let alone the ball player? >> yeah, i think it has helped a lot, you know? i've been crying. i've been emotional. i've been high. i've been low. somewhere in between. my grandmother, strong woman of faith, she told me, don't ever question the lord's will. and ask why. and in the beginning i was asking why. i was asking that question, but, you know, now i'm just, you

know, trying to find some resolve in this situation and, you know, just tell everyone to pray for the bryant family and the family of, you know, so many more that lost loved ones in this devastating tragedy. >> yeah, this is -- i guess you put something like this under the category and the mystery of faith. you know, we don't know why stuff like this happens. you just have to trust that there's some meaning somewhere. but the man, the father, the friend that you knew, when did you meet him? >> yeah, i first met kobe when i was playing the game of basketball that i love, and i remember in one of the off-season after my rookie season, i came to los angeles and he was training. he was always at, you know, the ucla facilities and at the boys & girls club. and, you know, i just admired him and i wanted to see his

workouts, his legendary blackout sessions, what he was known for, and i just wanted to understand the method to the madness and the secret recipe. he gave me all the ingredients. he showed me in real time. not long after that, i was eventually traded and he became my teammate, and ultimately my big brother and my mentor. you know, someone i can lean upon any time. >> what was the depth of what he was willing to share and what he meant to you man to man? >> he was -- he was -- he was everything, man. honestly, i take numbers and accolades aside, you know? he was just an unbelievable human being, and i think a lot of that gets lost in the storytelling when you're talking about kobe and he was an unbelievable husband. he was an unbelievable father. he was an unbelievable, you know, confidant. someone that you can just rely upon. he was a guy that elevated the people around him and believed in the people around him. he was a visionary, you know?

he saw things before it happened. and i'll never forget our conversation that we had in sacramento during his farewell tour, where he was talking about all the things that has come to fruition, you know, writing books and being a best-seller. one day holding up an oscar trophy. he accomplished those things. creating content and giving a platform to his beautiful daughter gigi and created the mamba academy and so many more. inspiring lives. that's exactly what he was doing and his work will continue. >> loved his kids. they're young. some of them very young. gigi was the one who had taken at this point most of basketball. what was that bond like and what was it like for him and for her to try and, like, bring her down the path of basketball? >> it was precious to watch, you know? and it was special. i'm a father of four girls myself. and when we had always

communicated or texted, we was talking about that. i have a daughter as well that loves the game of basketball, and all she was talking about is, you know, going to the next level one day and playing in high school. he was talking about the importance of fundamentals. and spending that time with his daughter gigi, and just elevating her and making her understand that you got to put in all that hard work and that sweat equity. he was with her all the time. that's what brought him back around the game of basketball, because of her passion he began to love the game again like he always has. he started to come around the game more. coming to courtside games to critique the game and study the game with her. >> for him, it was about her, though, and that's the beautiful part about. when you think about -- or as you're starting to come to grips with what you've lost, what is the hardest part in this for you emotionally? >> it's, like, you can't even put it in words. you really can't. like, i lost a big brother.

i lost a friend. i lost someone that was always an asset to my life. far -- far away from the game of basketball. and when i arrived in los angeles, many years ago, you know, back in 2004. he told me that we're going to be friends long after basketball and we shared a lot of things in common. he was always just someone that i could rely upon, you know? he made time even when he didn't have time. and that's a true testament to, you know, who kobe bryant was. and you see the outpour of love all around the world globally, not just in professional sports but people in all walks of life just talking about what a great person and individual he was. and that's what he stood for, and that's ultimately his legacy, and his legacy will continue through all the loved ones and everybody that was inspired by his hard work. >> now, this may be a little

tricky for you, but i've reared that he didn't have a lot of basketball buddies. some people say it was because he was so intellectual and so intense and -- but you were one of them. what made you special to kobe? >> we just had an honest rapport. we had an honest relationship. i've never been an individual to judge anybody by a conversation that i had with someone else, you know? i always want to see for myself, you know? the narrative was created about me long before i came on that platform. you know, my adversity that i went through early on in my life. so i never fell victim to that phrase of just judging someone from reputation. and when i immediately arrived to los angeles, i just wanted to pick his brain. i played for the legendary pat riley. and he was telling me these things, theese conversations

about how to prepare for the game of basketball. then fast forward, i come to los angeles and i'm playing with arguably the greatest player ever to play the game of basketball in real time, and i'm watching his preparation, i'm seeing how he's preparing for these big moments that look like routine shots. and i'm just like, man, this dude is on the next level. and i just embraced him. he embraced me because i never shied away from workouts. i never shied away from being educated or being told the hard honest truth, and that's how we just, you know, we just jammed immediately. >> so what are you telling yourself? how do you make this okay? >> it will never be okay, but i think that in order to move forward, i have to get out of my own way, you know, my emotions, my feelings. like i said, i had some highs, i had some lows, i surrounded myself with a lot of loved ones, and now i'm just thinking about

his family. >> how to help them. >> thinking about vanessa. thinking about his kids. yeah, how to help them, you know, and how to be strong for them. you know, i don't want to talk about basketball. >> right. >> i just want to talk about what a great human being he was. and that's what we continue to do, you know? all the stories that we're sharing at the roundtable with my loved ones, talking about the moments we went up and he had sesame street at his home and all our kids enjoyed the moment. stuff like that. just sharing stories and trying to get through this window of hard times. but forever going forward, it's going to be hard for the bryant family, but, you know, we have to be there for them, all of us. >> that's what friendship is about. what do you think he'd tell you to do? >> man, keep going, cb. keep going. that was always his advice. he told me to stay goal oriented. i recall i was feeling myself in one period of my career.

i had a major accomplishment and i rested there. he was like, now what? what you going to do now? what's next? then when you do that, what's next after that? so now that we dealt with something so devastating, and the love and the support is there and it's real and we see how much his legacy meant to the world globally, not just sports, now what? now what do you do? what do we have to do together collectively to comfort his family and be there for them? and i think that's what's next. >> caron, i am so sorry for your loss. i hope that the friendship, lessons and the stories stay with you. he was so young. you're so young. you have so much lives in front of you. and i hope it helps -- i hope it helps on solme level for you to achieve what's next as your friend would have wanted you to do. god bless to you, his family and your own. >> thank you, appreciate it. >> got to feel for anybody who

has lost. there's never anything right to say in these situations. i'm sure many of you have suffered loss yourselves. i know i have. there is nothing to say. but we shouldn't forget who else was lost here. kobe bryant, his young daughter gianna, gigi he called her. but he's got three other girls. one of them is just a toddler. think about the challenge of reminding that child who were father was. of course there's video, but she won't have the memories the same way. that adds to the tragedy for the mother and other kids. ara zibayan was so well trained, the pilot. we don't understand this. he's gone. the altobellis, the family, keri, alyssa, john, they leave a son and a daughter. now they've lost their mother and their father. imagine that challenge for young kids. sarah chester. payton chester, mother and daughter.

they played on the team, too. she was a ball player. and now they're gone. think about the rest of their family. christina mauser, assistant girls basketball coach. also an assistant coach on gianna bryant's mamba team. she has a husband. she has three kids. and, you know, when we get caught in these situations, the reason it's important to remember, of course kobe loomed large. he's bigger than the game. he was just coming into his full. he's only 41 years old and his family's broken in a way that's hard to repair. so many families were broken, and it has to give the rest of us a little bit of perspective about appreciating what we have because you just never know, no matter how lucky you have it, no matter how good it is, how quickly it can be gone. and now we're searching for answers, some that we can't have, some that hopefully we will. the ntsb said it's going to spend days at that crash site. i don't know if you looked at the flight path, but a lot of weird things going on.

i'm not speculating. i'm not trying to paint anything as wrongdoing, but we have answers to get about why this happened. there have been too many affected not to. now, ahead, you're going to hear the account of a witness and a leading aviation expert. so much loss we have to do what we can to understand how this happened. we'll do that next. $9.95 at my age?

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so, what happened on this helicopter flied that killed kobe bryant, his daughter and all these other good people? the ntsb is investigating. helping to try to piece everything together. using witnesses as well. listen to one. >> what did the impact of the helicopter sound like to you? >> to was not very loud. you could hear the crushing, collapsing of the fiberglass, the plexiglass. i did note the thing that stuck in my mind is, when it impacted, the rotors stopped immediately. therefo there was no secondary. rotors weren't flying off and

things flying off. it all stopped. the clouds were low enough the helicopter went in basically at the cloud line. must have just came out of it, but flew probably straight into the hill. i didn't hear any malfunctions on the aircraft. he had power and sounded like he was in control. it's hard to control a helicopter when you're in a hover or slow. you've got to have command of the aircraft. so i think he just was disoriented and did not know where he was. >> all right. cnn safety analyst david soucy is an accident investigator. from what you understand at this point, how does this make sense to you? >> well, it really doesn't yet, chris. there are still so many questions that i have about it. if you look at the flight path and then listen to this witness, they're just contradictory. everything about it is contradictory. this helicopter is well-equipped. the pilot was extremely experienced. and there was really nothing wrong with what was going on at the time. people are speculating that he was in the clouds and couldn't

see what was going on. it's just too early to see that. if you look at the flight path of the aircraft, that didn't make sense. he climbs very steeply toward the end and falls very steeply towards the end of that. that isn't the way you react in a cloud situation or low visibility situation. that just doesn't make sense to me that that would be the cause here, chris. >> now, he was instrument rated. so he didn't have to just use what you call vfr, visual flight rules. why would he have been asking to do so? why would he have been flying so low instead of higher where he could just depend on the instruments? >> well, what he was flying under, chris, is actually special vfr. what special vfr means is he's below 1,000 feet. you have to request that to the tower. you say, well, the surface of the cloud ceiling has reduced or limited itself down. with an ifr, you want to call an ifr before you make that plan.

in this case it was vfr. he felt he had enough visibility. when he got the special vfr clearance from the tower, he went below the 1,000-foot mark so he could get below the clouds and see where he was going. >> when you see all the circling and taking this path far intended from where he was intended to go, what does that suggest? >> well, the circling you see earlier on in the flight, what that is typically in that area, you'd fold in that area to make sure you are clearing or could be holding, waiting for the clouds to come up or down. that circling is not a sign of disorientation. you notice the circling was in one spot. very clear he knew where he was. it's not like it's going 200 -- 200 yards one way or 200 yards the other. it's actually staying in that same area. then when he breaks off and goes up the side, he could have been holding for traffic, could have been holding for visual or, again, waiting for those clouds

to rise before he asked for that special vfr clearance. >> obviously so many families ruined by this. we'll need more answers. hopefully it comes. we know there is not a black box involved. hopefully the tower and investigators can let us know more. when we do, i'll come to you, david. david soucy, thank you very much. all right. the impeachment trial, obviously it's a major focus. it must go into next week if there are going to be witnesses. if there aren't, it could end this week. and then lead right into the iowa caucuses. how big a deal are the iowa caucuses in the scope of this trial and how will it affect them? the political picture next. - do you have a box of video tapes, film reels, or photos, that are degrading? legacybox professionally converts them to dvds, thumb drive, or the cloud. legacybox is simple and safe, with over half a million satisfied customers. visit legacybox.com today, and get 40% off.

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here's one potential reason why you hear about the bidens today in the impeachment trial. it comes from republican senator joni ernst. >> iowa caucuses are this next

monday evening, and i'm really interested to see how this discussion today informs and influences the iowa caucus voters, those democratic caucusgoers. will they be supporting vice president biden at this point? >> ron brownstein is here. what's your answer to the question? >> well, you know, talk about saying the quiet part out loud, right? for senator ernst there. look, i was just in iowa. you do meet some democratic voters who worry that all of this smoke around hunter biden could create problems for joe biden as a general election nominee against donald trump. but that not the dominant reaction. the dominant reaction i think among most democratic voters is that this shows that republicans are most concerned about joe biden as a possible opponent. and, you know, whatever else is going on with biden in the polls, whether he's up or down in the individual state, he was generally maintained a

consistent lead over the other democrats when voters are asked which one of the potential nominees would have the best chance against trump. in fact, in the polling in most states and the national polling, the abc/"washington post" polling that just came out, biden does run better usually against trump than any of the other democrats. >> what's going to matter on the ground, where you just were in iowa? >> you know, look, you know, the question really i think as is often the case is turnout. you know, 2008, we had the biggest turnout ever in the iowa caucus. up to 240,000. double what it has ever been before. in 2016, it kind of rolled back to about 170. biden is competitive at a lower turnout. i think even his campaign believes if he gets really big they kind of run out of voters. to me the core question is if he gets really big, where does it get really big? if it's primarily in the college towns at iowa state and the university of iowa that obviously benefits bernie sanders. there is another possibility. that a lot of these superben,

white collar voters, especially women who crossed over. might have been republican-leaning before, voted democratic in 2018. if a lot of them show up and they're the principal driver of increased turnout. that could benefit pete buttigieg and elizabeth warren who are the candidate of those college educated white collar voters in iowa. >> how big a deal is it to lose the two weeks for the senators? >> it doesn't help, but i think the cake is pretty well-baked in iowa. people have gotten a lot of chance to look at the candidates. you know, the famous joke about people saying, well, i've only met them all twice. how can i decide? people have really had their chance to look at these candidates. it's a tactical disadvantage, but i think they've had a chance to evaluate these candidates and i don't think it's that big a demerit for those who have to stay in washington. >> what's the chance of a shocker in iowa? >> always. always. a caucus is a weird beast, you know, chris? i mean, it's not a primary.

there's the whole reallocation question of candidates who don't reach that 15% threshold, literally get up and go stand with others. so who doesn't reach threshold? if amy klobuchar doesn't reach threshold in some places, that's probably going to benefit biden. and the bigger question for me is, what is the impact on iowa on what comes next? the last four iowa winners have won the democratic nomination, even when new hampshire has gone another way, and i don't think that's a coincidence. i think it's largely a function of the way the modern media has gotten, you know, so much media now there is enormous value in dropping that first rock into the pond and all the ripples that flow. but each of those previous four iowa winners who got the nomination, gore, kerry, obama and clinton, subsequently ran very well with african-american voters. it's entirely possible that the iowa winner, whether sanders, warren or buttigieg, you know, will face an uphill climb with african-american voters. we'd have a new situation that we haven't seen, at least in this century. >> that is such a key insight.

it's not just the result, it's how that result plays in the media, who they take about more, more importantly, who they talk about less. thank you very much, ron brownstein. appreciate it. the rest of you, keep it right here for special coverage of the trump impeachment trial. more highlights from the defense lawyers. day two next. human. and wake up don't eat me i taste terrible! mucinex nightshift cold and flu. fight your worst symptoms so you can sleep great and wake up human.

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the president's lores try to flip the script in the impeachment trial. they're focusing on the bidens while washington wonders what's next for john bolton. all of china under warning from the coronavirus. the emotional fair well as the lakers postpone their return to the court. >> welcome to our viewers in the united states and around the world. this is "early start." thanks so much for joining us. i'm laura jarrett. >> and i'm chris tone romans six days until the iowa caucuses. today's the third and final day for the trump team opening argument trying to sway against removing him from office. on day two the legal issue was one the team avoided john bolton claims president trump told him he wanted to hold back military aid to ukraine until the c