would send followers this image, stating "biden should concede, i want his concession on my desk tomorrow morning, don't make me come over there." he promptly went to congress, stood up, and opposed the certification of the electoral college results. >> i rise up for myself and 60 of my colleagues to object to the counting of the electoral ballots from arizona. >> reporter: the end of his speech interrupted by the very mob he helped stir up. former republican congressman denver riggleman has been warning of the impact of lies being fed to the public by america's own leaders. >> i think there's a massive issue here with education and facts. these individuals don't have it. disinformation is being pushed by people in positions of power. >> reporter: gosar's arizona colleague andy biggs was near gosar on the house floor january 6, and met with president trump along with others protesting election results, even provided a taped message to be played at one of the arizona rallies. >> we're fighting for the

freedoms that made this country great. >> reporter: biggs now strongly denies any involvement in the protest. his staff stating biggs can't even recall meeting with ali alexander. mo brooks is more direct. >> today is the day american patriots start taking down names and kicking ass! >> reporter: this is the alabama congressman the morning of january 6 in washington, d.c., a few days later he told an alabama news service "i make no apology for doing my absolute best to inspire patriotic americans to not give up on our country and to fight back against anti-christian socialists." former congressman charlie dent says the actions of his former colleagues show it's time for a serious reckoning with the republican party. >> we have to rid ourselves of these radical elements. i would recommend to every one of my republican colleagues, sometimes you have to risk your job in order to save it. well, this is the time.

>> that was drew griffin reporting. let's hand it over to chris for "cuomo prime time." >> thank you, anderson. i am chris cuomo. welcome to "prime time." tonight there is reason for hope. things are very much in flux. we've never heard what we've heard tonight. republicans may want their party back from trump. reportedly, senator mitch mcconnell thinks trump has gone too far. "the new york times" reports that mcconnell may be indicating to the caucus that impeachment could make it easier to rid the party of trump. now, i know that's hard to believe, especially coming from him. but you'll hear from a senator tonight that is hearing from his colleagues that members of the gop in the senate may want to break with the retrumplican number in their ranks. a number may be open to convicting trump in the senate. in the house, it looks like impeachment is not going to be

an all-democrat affair. the third-ranking member of the gop is liz cheney. she said tonight she will vote for impeachment. so did representative adam kinzinger and representative katko. the names keep coming. a white house official says there may be 20 or more republicans in the house who may vote to impeach. add that to the top goper in the house, mccarthy. now, he sat silent for so many lies by this president. and advanced many of those lies for trump himself. but now, mccarthy is reportedly trial-ballooning trump being pushed to resign. it sounds kind of like a nixon situation, where the heads of the party would go to him and say, look, you don't have the votes, you don't have the confidence, you need to go. that's how it happened with nixon. democrats didn't throw him out. republicans got him to resign. do they have that kind of resolve now? i don't know. but i've never seen any indication of it, until now.

this is a moment in history. if only because of this degree of shift. so here is the state of play. the house is now debating a resolution on whether pence should invoke the 25th amendment to remove trump. i'm a seller on this proposition and i'll tell you why. first of all, the vp sent a letter to speaker pelosi a short time ago this evening, saying he's not in favor of this. now, that's because the 25th amendment, to be fair, was not meant to be punitive, okay? it was meant about actual physical or mental incapacity whereby the president can't on their own accord step away. that's what it was meant for. impeachment is the right process here. and if anybody is motivated to push that way, it may be vp pence. why? we just learned that trump said to pence on the phone, just before the vp headed to the capitol to oversee the electoral

vote count last wednesday, okay, "the new york times," citing two sources, says the president told pence, "you can either go down in history as a patriot or you can go down in history as a p-blank," ends in a "y." five letters. we think it's too crass to say. in these crass times we should be worrying about the realities but i'll spare you the word, you get the meaning. can you imagine the president saying that to pence and he still did what he thought was right. we haven't seen anything close to that in these republican ranks let alone from pence. and look, you can say why now, he's about to leave. look, that's obvious. there have been so many egregious situations, so many ugly instances where anyone of good conscience should have stepped up and said i'm not about this, and they didn't. and that must be remembered, absolutely. but for this to be happening at

all marks a moment in history that should not be forgotten either, because congress, because this country, could the no be in a more dire situation. the joint chiefs have issued a statement to remind u.s. forces of their duty to the constitution. why? what kind of signal does that send you about what the level of concern is here? all 50 state capitols have gone on alert for more potential violence in the run-up to inauguration day. the attorney general of michigan is saying their capitol will not be safe. members of the gop considering whether to finally amputate trump is meaningful. and you know who helped this a lot today? trump. by going to alamo, texas, and making it very clear that he makes no apologies, and more importantly, that he is ready to say the same things that he said before the insurrection, again.

>> this impeachment is causing tremendous anger. i think it's causing tremendous danger to our country. if you read my speech, and many people have done it and i've seen it both, uh, in the papers and in the media, on television, uh, it's been analyzed, and people thought that what i said was totally appropriate. >> who? not you. not me. the only people who thought it was appropriate were the members of that mob, those would-be terrorists that responded to his words by attacking our democracy. turns out that now, even diehard retrumplicans are doubting their dedication. mccarthy, okay, big man for republicans in the house, seeming to step away from trump. >> we will not wait for four years from now to change this. we are going to fight this now. president trump won this election. everyone who is listening, do

not be quiet. do not be silent about this. we cannot allow this to happen before our very eyes. join together and let's stop this. >> i want to remind you, that's who this guy is. okay? does that sound like "this is just due process"? does that sound like, "sorry that we lost, not happy about it"? no. "fight this now." "stand up now." "come now." this is a call to arms for them, okay? that's how they played it. now, did they think it would result to an actual call to people carrying arms to the capitol? maybe not. but they still said it in a way that obviously wound up instigating it, because it happened, okay? and what did mccarthy and all the others do when they came, the people he invited to come, the people he told to fight? they ran, because they knew it was wrong. you didn't see ted cruz there with open arms, thank you for

supporting my efforts on this. they ran. so where does it stand with them? it's hard to tell, because a lot of this is reporting, not coming out and saying it to you directly. they may say it with their votes and their mixed signals. lindsey graham stood up, everybody started giving him a little thought that maybe his mind is come back into some kind of concert with his heart, "count me out, i'm done with this." now it's "count me in." lindsey graham today, the senate judiciary chair, was with trump when he went to alamo, texas. why? well, they went there on air force one, obviously, because it was supposed to be about the wall. but what it really was, he's from south carolina, it was just a comfort campaign, showing dedication to this president, okay? a president who is still effectively inciting an insurrection. it's called alamo, it's not the alamo, but you really think it was a coincidence?

there are lots of texas towns with walls in it. why do you think they went there? what do you think the symbolism is? what do you think they're trying to inspire? against great odds you must put it all on the line, put your life on the line. it's easy to say. it feels good, when you know people are that dedicated to you. but what about the cost? think about what kind of mentality it takes to come out of what happened last wednesday and not apologize, not to address the country, not to talk about how wrong it is, profoundly. what trump said today was pro forma. he was reading words off a teleprompter and we both know he didn't write them. there he was at the border, trying to gin up a manufactured crisis while the real one he created threatens to destroy the democracy. caravans of mexicans. the brown menace. remember that? brown menace is coming, look out. you know what wound up coming? a virus. a pandemic. that he ignored.

he made up something that was coming to get us and what did come to get us, he ignored. and it killed more people than ever, just today. these are the times we're living in. it's not rhetorical. it's reality. so where are we now? it seems to be not enough for lindsey graham and others to just give a nod to have been they saw. they have to speak up and speak out. i don't want to read it just in "the times." i don't want to read it just in my own reporting. i want to hear it. they have to stand up and be counted. now is the time. admit what happened was wrong, admit you were wrong to be part of it. that is what will stop the division. it will stop it here and now. and the first briefing on the capitol attack today, the feds say, we will be shocked about what they're uncovering. significant cases of sedition and conspiracy are being built. 70 cases already charged. the number will grow to the hundreds.

but their big fear is what happens next and who will stand up to prevent it. let's bring in david gregory and norm eisen. politics and law. thank you both. david, how moved are you by the apparent move by gop leadership? >> look, i think it's significant. and the biggest reason why is that if impeachment moves forward as we expect it to tomorrow, it's such an important statement to the country, to those insurrectionists who led this assault on our government, and to history, that there were republicans who were willing to step forward and say, shame on you, mr. president, you don't deserve to be in office, you deserve the shame that comes with being the only president in history to be impeached twice. liz cheney is a study in leadership tonight. that's mature leadership. leadership, doing something that

could be really politically difficult in leading the way. i've always felt, chris, and you and i have talked about this over the years, why don't more republicans stand up to trump? because he was too strong or they perceived he was too strong. mcconnell's reported views tonight say to me there is finally a sense of vulnerability that trump, who not only lost the election, but who also preceded to then lose the senate for republicans, is done. and that republicans, conservatives, and even republicans who want to appeal to his more populist base, say we can do it without him. this is the time to break away without him hurting us. >> so the question becomes, while there may be the political will on some levels, is there the case for trump to become the first president that we see not just impeached a couple of times but removed? norm, i'm marrying heart to head. what is the high crime or

misdemeanor to charge him with here? it was just a speech, he'll say, i was just giving a speech, i didn't say go to the capitol and insurrect. i said we have to fight. it's rhetoric. >> chris, thanks for having me back on this historic night when we're finally, finally on the cusp of accountability for donald trump. the voters delivered their verdict. i think the congress is going to deliver a proper, legally and factually grounded verdict. first, the law, chris. incitement of insurrection. it's the most fundamental of high crimes and misdemeanors. our founders and the framers of the constitution, when they said you can remove a president for a high crime, they feared the mob. they talked about a corrupt president who would try to break the electoral process. that's what he did, chris. >> speech is protected. brandenburg. you can even cry "fire" in a theater.

it's just speech. it's protected. he just said it. >> no, sir. the president's speech is not protected. this is not a private setting where an individual can say whatever they want. this is a president who has sworn a solemn oath to uphold the constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. guess what, chris, he became an enemy. the first amendment does not protect that. the impeachment clause overrides. and then the facts. this isn't empty rhetoric. he said we have to fight. he said if you don't fight for your government, it will be taken away from you. now let's march down pennsylvania avenue. and we saw the results, chris. those shocking images, the worst attack in over a century and a half. you have to look to a foreign war, the british invasion and the war of 1812, to see things like that. no. it is a high crime. it is legally based.

it is factually based. you cannot have a president for another day, another hour, who would attack his own government. not just the senate. not just the house. but mike pence, his vice president, who was in the building. >> of course you know the politics i think control here, because obviously norm is laying out the legal case what have would be the impeachment charge. but we remind ourselves when we talk about impeachment that it's a political process. and i think what it's rooted in here, and whatever bipartisanship there is, and by the way, we haven't mentioned tonight, there are republicans who are going to vote to impeach but the leadership, so far as we know at this point, are not going to lobby other republicans to oppose impeachment. they're going to let people have some room. that in and of itself is significant, especially compared to all the enabling we've been seeing from republicans over the years. this was an attack on another branch of government, but it followed an attack on our election system. so the notion, as a political

matter, that you could have one party or the other every four years reject the will of the people is simply unacceptable in a democracy. >> right. >> particularly one like ours. >> i'll just end on this. remember what president ford said. what is an impeachable offense? anything congress says it is, because it comes down to the votes. david gregory, norm eisen, thank you for living history with me. what's it like in washington right now? how strong is this pull of the gop's moving against trump? a senator who would be on the jury if trump is impeached again thinks that things are different. how different? ideas he think that? senator joe manchin is very much the man in the middle, next. mizr car insurance so you only pay for what you need? really? i didn't-- aah! ok. i'm on vibrate. aaah! only pay for what you need.

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there's more proof of concept here that things are changing in real time. cnn has just learned another gop member of congress will vote yes on impeachment in the house. fred upton of michigan. now, that is the fourth republican to say yes by name, all right? you have congresswoman liz cheney, you have kinzinger, you have katko, and now upton. but a white house official tells cnn they believe there may be as many as 20 members of congress joining democrats tomorrow and backing this effort. now, remember, democrats don't need it.

but this is about politics. this is political will. this is not a legal process. it really isn't. we have to remember that. i know you heard it a ton last time, but we forget, because on our head is a maelstrom of new problems all the time. again, president ford said it right. an impeachable offense is anything congress says it is. that's why consensus is so essential. if you have republicans in the house joining democrats, what momentum will that cause in the senate? i have an insider, senator joe manchin of west virginia. what does he see in the state of play? senator joe manchin, thank you. >> thank you for having me, chris, always good to be with you. >> so as my straight broker on the situation, what do you make of all this talk? are you actually seeing things shift? >> i'm seeing the same statements everyone's seeing this evening, chris, that things are shifting a little bit. you have liz cheney coming out,

very direct and forcefully. you have mitch mcconnell sending complete different signals than i've ever heard from him before. so we just don't know. before i said i thought it was ill-advised for us to go down this path again and have the same result. the bottom line is everyone knows democrats will vote to impeach. we're still a country where the rule of law is bedrock and every person is innocent until proven guilty. so we have to go through a trial, there has to be a defense, and how much will that disrupt joe biden putting a functioning government together to build confidence with the american people? >> would you have ever believed that we were anywhere near a day where not just liz cheney but senator mitch mcconnell was allowing stories to come out that impeachment could be a good thing, that high crimes and misdemeanors may be present with president trump? >> it's so obvious what has

happened, you know, because we have it all in color, if you will, we have all the video, we have all the audio that is needed in any type of a trial. i can't imagine anything different than that. we haven't seen the backstory to this yet, when they start looking phone records, how long that is this been going on, who's been planning, who's been coercing. that has to come out too. with what we see on face value, it's absolutely tremendously damaging. and i think they even have a hard time of denying it. and i think maybe they're just tired of it, enough's enough. >> so your concern was that if you have another impeachment situation where it's all democrats, no republicans, it enhances the divide. but now you're saying that there is a number of republicans, there are a number who may actually vote for removal or for conviction in the senate on the republican side? >> i -- the way i'm reading between the lines of what mitch

mcconnell is saying, maybe it's time that we can rid ourselves of this bully, truly, and be able to move on to more normal procedure and bring our republican party, the grand old party, back to where she should be. maybe he looks at this opening and thinks there's a chance. i can't read his mind, it's hard with mitch, but i haven't seen signals sent from mitch the way they're being sent right now. >> are you hearing from your republican colleagues a change in tone? >> i haven't yet, i will probably later this evening as they kind of decipher everything and they talk back and forth. we have our bipartisan, bicameral group that continues to talk all the time. we chat back and forth many times a day. i'm sure the lines will be hot tonight. >> is there a line short of conviction that is still seen as political progress in your mind, meaning something between all democrats, no republicans, and a two-thirds vote to remove?

>> well, just all democrats is not going to be a surprise to anybody. it just politicizes it too much, chris. that's what i've said. >> right. >> we're in a political process. i believe we have justifiable cause to go down a judicial process. a judicial process will do the proper investigation, the evidence will come forth, charges will be made. those who have been charged, there will be a trial, and no person is above the law, and we go from there. if they do impeachment, the only thing i asked for, i was pleading, if you're going to do an impeachment, and they're bent on doing it tonight or tomorrow, then please consider holding that until three, maybe four months, so we can see everything else unfold. give the people a time to breathe, to digest, to see all the evidence coming forth. it might make it much easier to bring the entire nation with us

or the largest part of this nation back together. >> the counterargument is, you let it linger, it keeps trump relevant well into biden's term, and what was supposed to be seen as a change of urgency and dynamic, you would still have trump being part of the mix if you delay it for three, four months. is that part of the calculus of plus/minus on that plan? >> my only concern would be this. if you go for impeachment, and it goes down political lines, then you've done worse than that. you've done worse than that. and he can basically say exactly what he will say. "i told you it was a witch hunt, they just won't quit." the supporters and sympathizers will entrench themselves and we've got what we've got, stalemate. we have a chance to move the ball or to let the judicial -- i think basically the quicker we can take it out of the political arena and put it in the judicial courts and judicial arena, it would be much better. let the third branch of government do their job, chris. >> do you believe that trump is a clear and present danger to this country?

>> oh, i most certainly have said that, and i do. i think that larry hogan, my fend, the governor from maryland, put it very succinctly, that he believes that the sooner that the president leaves, the safer our country will be and the safer the world will be. >> do you believe there's any chance that senator mitch mcconnell may allow a move of censure or something else against senators cruz and hawley? >> you know, when you look at what they did, and here's the thing i'm looking at now, i would like to know this. i want to see the transcripts going back, i want to see the tweets coming out from their phones. i want to see if there was fundraising requests going out at the same time all of this attack on the capitol and right after the attack on the capitol. that would change me completely, whether i think they have the right to serve in the senate, in the united states senate. if they basically capitalize for their own political gain, basically at the peril of our

government, and they put their party and their politics ahead of our constitution and our democracy and the republic, then i would have a complete different change, and i would be as hard as anybody could be that they should not -- >> is there any proof they did it for any other reason, senator? neither presented any proof of any allegation that they brought up. cruz never has. he pointed to polls and said, well, you know, a lot of people believe the president. of course they believe that it was rigged, he's been telling them it was rigged for weeks. but no proof. >> months. it's been basically -- i think the president saw the polls long before the election and he saw that he was in trouble and it was very obvious that what happened could happen, he would lose. with that, he started basically sowing that doubt. he's been a master with the media. >> but he didn't do it alone, senator. without cruz and without hawley we would have never been there last wednesday. >> and many, many more. can you imagine, if you were sitting in a joint session with

the house, and see 50, 60, 70 republican congresspeople stand after the attack on our capitol, after people had died, and still object, knowing that it would incite more violence? can you believe that you would ever see that? i couldn't. someone has to be held accountable, absolutely. >> understood. senator manchin, thank you so much. what amazingly dynamic times we live in, that literally, 24 hours has a different atmosphere in washington. we hope the change continues to be positive. >> we're better than this, chris, we truly are. god bless america. i truly believe god has blessed america and we need more blessings now than ever before. abraham lincoln says, let that better angel inside of you fly. it's time to let her fly. >> beautiful. senator, thank you. >> thank you, chris. >> angels and demons in our midst.

did you ever think you would hear a sitting u.s. senator say that a president is a clear and present danger to the united states of america? think about the times that we're living in. now, what to do about it. also, happening on our watching in real time, speaker of the house nancy pelosi is saying, open your eyes, hold the president accountable. but she's talking right now about the 25th amendment, okay? the vp sent a letter to her tonight saying, i don't think it's the right course. i have to say, this is an interesting political play by the democrats. with this momentum moving toward impeachment, which is a legitimate avenue of punishment for bad behavior, see, they're making two plays here. bad and sick. 25th amendment has to be about incapacity. what does incapacity mean? the 25th amendment, section 4, has never been invoked. when you look at the legislative history, what the discussions were at that time, it was the "god forbid" scenario, if he's

sick. then there is a mechanism that's very intricate, because you don't want someone to just seize power, it was like coup-proof, section 4. they need the vp, they have to go to the cabinet, there are delay periods, letters being sent, and actually there's a vote. but it's about incapacity. you could well make the argument it wasn't meant to punish bad behavior. it was meant to deal with someone being sick, not bad. bad is impeachment. bad is somebody who gives fuel to the fire that we've burning in our country right now. and we have real threats. forget about what politicians say. it's about what bad people are doing. growing dangers that will require unity among all of us to stop. this is not over. we have a democrat chairing a house panel probing the attack on the capitol.

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today is the day american patriots start taking down names and kicking ass! our ancestors sacrificed their blood, their sweat, their tears, their fortunes, and sometimes their lives to give us, their descendants, an america that is the greatest nation in world history. so i have a question for you. are you willing to do the same? >> now, look. you can say hindsight is 20/20. and that political rhetoric is often heated. that's congressman mo brooks, okay? now, mo brooks had a very special place for me and really for all of us who were watching what happened when steve scalise, the member of congress, was shot during that baseball practice. mo brooks took us through those events that morning.

he was brave. and he was positive. and he was conciliatory. and that man is gone, because the man who was up on that lectern now is saying all the kind of things that should never be said again. not if you don't want people to respond with anger and violence. and yet he is doing the worst trump imitation he can. he stands by it. he makes no apologies. he was getting people to just get out there and exercise their rights? no. that's not how it came across. you know how you know that's how it came across? on the morning of january 6, it didn't come across that way because that's not what they did. they didn't all go out and register voters for the next time, right? it was an insurrection. and then everything seemed to go wrong, the right way for the mob. you saw these waves of security

this summer when trump wanted to go and hold the bible in front of the chapel. how was it so weak on so many different levels? and what is the real level of threat now going forward? somebody has answers for us tonight. democratic congressman tim ryan. good to see you, brother, thank you for joining us. >> thanks, chris. >> i hope the family is well, happy new year to you all. >> happy new year, god bless. >> so we're in a weird time. i've never heard this kind of chatter from the republicans before. we'll see what happens. i want to ask you something first about what you've learned in your committee. am i wrong to have this sense that the security was so weak on so many different levels, that it's almost hard to understand how it could have been that way in the midst of such a charged environment? what have you learned? >> well, we're still baffled by the whole thing, chris. let me be very clear, the rank

and file members of the capitol police and washington metro, did a great job. except for a small sliver that we're looking into, but the vast majority are heroes, 98, 99%. we have to be clear talking about what the command and control did, what the leadership did, the sergeant at arms leadership, they failed and put the rank and file members in a lose/lose situation and it was very dangerous. >> but why? >> we have to honor the heroes here. >> i'm totally with you, i saw what was happening there, i've been in situations like that. they were totally overwhelmed in terms of numbers. it may have been a death sentence for them to have been more aggressive than they were in certain instances. i'll allow for that, it seems totally reasonable. but how? how, when you have this charged environment, how were we not more ready? because it almost smacks of a setup. and we don't want to feed that.

how do you dispel that notion by explaining how inept it was? >> it was so incompetent that yes, it brings about these ideas that maybe it was a setup, maybe it was an inside job, because it was so unbelievably irresponsible for the capitol police and the sergeant at arms offices not to have thousands and thousands of people backed up, national guards, other federal agencies there to help and support. because nothing happens in a vacuum. so you go back to charlottesville. this has been a run-up from all along. and trump tried to manipulate his followers to vote for him. but then he lost. and so it got escalated even more. and he precisely starting this date, as you said a million times on your show over the past week. january 6, it's going to be wild. he targeted this date.

and that led to the ramp-up and that led to the online chatter. and then you get mo books, who couldn't feed himself out of a wet paper bag, is up there getting everybody else riled up and hawley and cruz and these guys, the phoniest people you would ever want to see in your life are now inciting more and more violence. so it was the context that makes the failure even that more significant, because anybody could have seen this coming. and we were promised, as chair of the appropriations subcommittee that funds the capitol police and sergeant at arms, i was promised that everything was taken care of of, that the national guard was available, and other committee chairs were as well. we need to honor the heroes and we need to make sure there's some significant changes as we move forward. >> agreed that overwhelmingly, the small number of people you had relative to the threat did what they do, agreed and accepted. but, you know, just to kind of give people a little bit of a wide-eyed sense of reality, how

lucky did you get, given what you've learned about the intentions of people in that mob, and the level of protection you had against the level of force, that everybody made it out of that room? >> almost a miracle. i would say that senator manchin said god bless america. god has blessed america. it would have been an absolute catastrophe, if they came in a few minutes sooner, when there were senators in the chamber, vice president pence, it would have been a horrific scene because they were out for blood. and we are very, very lucky. now, in the united states, like winston churchill said, we try everything else before we get it right. you will see a show of force during the inauguration that will prevent anything like that from happening across washington, d.c. there will be a significant amount of security here. national guard, federal

agencies, secret service is taking the lead, which gives us a lot of comfort. we'll be ready for it this time. >> so i'm hearing -- okay, i have something you're going to want to hear too. john katko, republican, is on the floor right now supporting impeachment. >> -- to defend the united states and protect those who work here. many officers were severely injured and beaten, including one of my former interns. and tragically, one officer, officer brian sicknick, succumbed to the injuries he sustained. to officer sicknick and his family, i extend my sincerest condolences. we are deeply thankful for the capitol police officers' bravery. because of you, lives were saved and the people's work was able to resume. now congress must match their courage and protect the constitution. our democratic processes and this nation. the president's role in this

insurrection is undeniable, both on social media on january 6 and in his speech that day. he deliberately promoted baseless theories creating a combustible environment of misinformation and division. to allow the president of the united states to incite this attack without consequences is a direct threat to the future of this democracy. for this reason, i will vote to impeach this president tomorrow. the bill before us tonight as a nonbinding resolution which requests the vice president to invoke the 25th amendment, a step he's already said he will not take. it is merely a symbolic gesture and i will oppose that resolution. after last week's attack on the capitol, it is clear our nation is more divided than ever in recent history. we began this great experiment over 240 years ago. and to preserve it, we must remember that our faith, race, or political party is not what unites us. what unites us is that we are americans. i would encourage member of this body and everyone at home to remember that simple truth. with that i yield back. >> the gentleman from ohio.

>> i want to get back to representative tim ryan. i have to tell you, i would have never thought we would have heard that from a trump supporter. but there he was, saying exactly what you were saying, that the president's words were instigating the actions that became the reality on january 6. he's against the 25th amendment. i've got to tell you, i think they have a good argument that the 25th argument wasn't meant to be punitive, it was about incapacity. i get the sense of desperation to try to suffocate this president's words especially after what he said today, that everything he said was appropriate. and i want to identify what you know about the threat going forward. you said the force will be in place to deter any kind of group activity. but in terms of not just what they want to do but to whom, congressman, how has it developed in terms of what members of congress by name are being tarted? targeted? >> the first -- we may need to republish kennedy's book

"profiles in courage," because i think katko and liz cheney and these others -- >> upton, kinzinger. >> absolutely, adam's been great. just consistent in standing up when the country needs you to answer the call. and they should be commented. i'm a democrat, they're republican, but no one understands as much as they do how much pressure is applied. they are literally putting their political lives at risk because of this vote that they're making and they should be commended for that. moving forward, there have been different scenarios that have been reported about surrounding the capitol and shooting people to make sure they can't vote, preventing biden going into the white house. there are a lot of scenarios. there will be sufficient protection here, chris. there are already -- the fbi and others are already preventing people who were at the last rally from even being here because they're getting charged in the process, so a lot of the

activity won't be as much. but who knows, we will be prepared and this congress will be prepared. >> how heavy can you go? are you allowed to have military? no. you're going to have national guard. what can you do that can show the kind of force that you may need if you have thousands of people there demonstrating? >> well, part of it is this global fencing. part of it is making sure you have these barriers up around the capitol and then around the neighborhoods, really around the city. you know, no one should be here. there's not going to be any tickets. it's not going to be like obama's inauguration or anything like that. it will be very, very small. and i think they will be able to identify people who were here. i think they're going to monitor people coming in and out. it should be a pretty safe place. it doesn't mean something can't happen. but even walking around now, chris, i was outside earlier just checking things out. national guard, all around.

and that frees up the military and the law enforcement to do the job they need to do. and lastly, the use of force which a lot of us questioned, why the capitol police weren't allowed to be a little bit more aggressive which i would have liked to have seen them been able to do, they weren't getting permission to do that. and those rules of engagement are going to be a little more in favor of making sure that those officers can protect themselves which we're all supportive of. >> as long as they have the numbers. you know, you're sophisticated in the dynamic, it's easy for people to say they're going to be tough, but they can be overwhelmed. you were right to draw the distinction between command and control and the men and women on the ground keeping people safe, but for them, god forbid. >> no question. which is why we have to be very careful, see a video on social media and draw an immediate conclusion. you can't do that if you're in law enforcement and policing.

you have to have the context and know what's going on. if there's a thousand people bull rushing three people, you have to do what you have to do especially when their main mission is to protect the members of congress. their main mission isn't to protect a portrayed in an ornate room in the capitol. their mission is to protect the members of congress and they accomplished that mission. >> you have the opportunity, as always, sir, and i wish you well, and i really, you know -- about the level of threat. what information they need to know. you have the opportunity. all of you are going to be in my thoughts because this is a very tender time in this country. so thank you for the information, congressman tim ryan, god bless you and the family and good luck. >> always great to be with you, thanks. >> thank you very much. that was great to get the state of play, that they are really preparing for what's happening next week. we are monitoring what's happening on the floor of the capitol. this is a nonbinding resolution,

okay? what does that mean? this is the democrats standing up and saying something has to be done. there are basically two avenues, really three. one is, push him to resign and get out, just so you can have a truly peaceful transition because he won't go to the inauguration, or least not go to the inauguration in a way that would make it better, that's one. we saw that with nixon. two, the 25th amendment. i have to tell you, doing the scholarship on it, you can