of impeachment hearings in the u.s. congress today donald trump became the 4th and the entire world is watching tonight i'll ask a former watergate prosecutor what they should be watching for will the hearings convince enough lawmakers to remove the president will that would be a 1st or will the hearings deepen the political divide and turn the world's oldest functioning constitution into an irrelevant piece of paper that would be the worst i'm burnt off in berlin this is the day. is this what americans should now expect from their president what we witnessed today is a televised the actual performance the facts of the present inquiry are not seriously contested they are trying to impeach the president if this is not impeachable conduct what is this is

a carefully orchestrated media smear campaign all rants are to these questions will affect not only the future of this presidency but the future of the presidency itself. also coming up the swedish teen in climate change activists credit to bear made headlines when she crossed the atlantic leaving practically no carbon footprint or now she's coming back to europe and she's found a green ticket to rock. this interation would of course have been different if he was not the president and i thought when he got elected that now people will finally now people must finally break out. to our viewers on p.b.s. in the united states and all around the world welcome we begin the day with the impeachment hearing of u.s. president donald trump and a 21st century test for a democracy working from an 18th century handbook when the founders of the us wrote

the constitution in $1787.00 they imagined a future for the republic that could include a president guilty of abusing his power as they laid out how impeaching trying and removing the president should proceed albeit in very general terms today donald trump became only the 4th president to ever face impeachment hearings in the u.s. house of representatives if he is tried it convicted in the u.s. senate that would be a 1st and regardless of partisan politics it would be a trauma for the country but this impeachment process is already facing numerous firsts never before has an alleged abuse of power by a president been retold in public on live television by witnesses directly connected to the alleged abuse never before has the president been so vocal on his own behalf in the run up to impeachment hearings trump's twitter feed is full of

tweets referring to the impeachment and a witch hunt and never before has an impeachment been undertaken in a hyper polarized congress representing a deeply divided nation presidents richard nixon and bill clinton never enjoyed unquestioned support by almost everyone in their political parties so far it doesn't look like republicans will abandon this president. the questions presented by this impeachment inquiry are whether president trump sought to exploit that allies vulnerability and invite ukraine's interference in our elections whether president trump sought to condition official acts such as a white house meeting or u.s. military assistance and ukraine's willingness to assist with 2 political investigations that would help his reelection campaign and if president trump did either whether such an abuse of his power is compatible with the office or the presidency the matter is as simple and as terrible as that

our answer to these questions will affect not only the future of this presidency but the future of the presidency itself and what kind of conduct or misconduct the american people may come to expect from their commander in chief that was adam schiff speaking earlier today in that 1st hearing with let's turn to a man now who knows what a day like today in washington is like nick ackerman is an attorney and a former watergate prosecutor he was focused on the impeachment of the 37th us president richard nixon you may remember nixon resigned before his case went to a senate trial mr ackerman joins me tonight from new york it's good to see you again mr ackerman you know when you and i last spoke a couple of weeks ago you said you had complete faith that the hearings would shed enough white on president trump's alleged abuse of powers that his republican senators would pull their support for him well as it stands right now $53.00 out of

the $100.00 senators say no to impeachment after seeing and hearing the testimony today have you changed your mind at all. no i don't think i really said that i said that the question is whether or not the public adding been educated and what trump did would demand of their senators that they vote to remove trump from office so i think it remains to be seen exactly how this plays out how these witnesses do and what we hear over the next couple of weeks in the 1st 2 witnesses today were pretty powerful. but again present i think we're we are right now i was in the 3rd phase of this pietschmann realty the 1st having been in the depositions where various pieces of that sort of leaked out to the public it was in the press and then we had leak transcripts kamar i would say most people didn't read those transcripts but

they gave more context in depth to what people said but now the public really has a chance to look at that evidence and here with these witnesses are saying so and this is where the real test is going to be it's not so much the senators changing their mind it's bringing the public along to the point where the senators have to react to the public opinion when we think about those moments during the watergate hearings. but we're thinking about the hearings in the senate not the house of representatives what is it about the hearings beginning today in the house of representatives what is it that makes them potentially explosive in your opinion. well i think what's different here is with richard nixon for example most of the evidence that the house judiciary committee had was developed by prosecutors assume it was developed by the senate select committee investigating the watergate break in this is a situation where the house of representatives has really sink in this matter right

from the beginning and has developed the evidence on it and is doing it on its own without any other organisation having been involved in this beforehand so it's kind of a unique opportunity in the sense that they have total control over the evidence they know what the evidence is and they're putting it together to the public so i think it remains to be seen how this all plays out my but this is the right way to do it i'd like to take a listen to part of the testimony that was given today i wrote that withholding security assistance in exchange for help with a domestic political campaign in the united states would be crazy i believe that then and i believe it now i do not believe the united states should ask other countries to engage in selective politically associated investigations or prosecutions against opponents of those in power because such selective actions

undermine the rule of law regardless of the country best isaan also told me that he now recognized that he had made a mistake by earlier telling ukrainian officials that only a white house meeting with presidents alinsky was dependent on a public announcement of investigations in fact about solomon said everything was dependent on such an announcement including security systems he said the president trump wanted presents alinsky in a public box by making a public statement about ordering such investigations the member of my staff could hear president trump on the phone asking ambassador solomon about the investigations. assignment told president trump the ukrainians were ready to move forward following the call with president trump the member of my staff asked investor solomon what president trump thought about ukraine as a song the respondent the president from cares more about the investigations of biden which giuliani was pressing for this judgment i mean that testimony is

certainly damning for the u.s. president but have we reached that moment where we can say as it as they said in the 1970 is that there is a cancer on the presidency have we gotten there yet you know are definitely there is no question about that the question though is whether or not at what point do we get public support on removing troops from office such that you're going to get 66 senators to vote removal that's the question does this is not just a matter of look. it's also a matter of how it effects the u.s. president today said that he was too busy to watch the hearings but his reelection campaign we understand has set a fund raising goal of $3000000.00 over the next 24 hours because of the hearings i mean this is the 1st time in u.s. history that a president faces both impeachment and reelection how important is that do you

think well this is exactly richard nixon said during the time on these hearings that he did watching him pay attention to me it's hard to believe his name and to mention it here but sure this is a reality t.v. president who kind of rebels in this sort of behavior where he can create lots of conflict and get people all riled up and use it to make money i mean that's what he done. in 2016 trump said that he would recognize the election results if he. was declared the winner maybe remember when he said that. trumps white house has ignored subpoenas in this impeachment investigation i mean for the 1st time we've got a president who openly shows his disrespect distain or violates the rule of law and he gets support from his party in congress so it's highly doubtful that trump would

accept a conviction by the senate in this process mr trump trump's not a richard nixon who flies away on a helicopter i mean do you agree do you see trump accepting conviction if it were to come. i don't think you have any choice because if there's a conviction it means that the republicans would jump ship and it turned on me at that point be very similar to what happened to richard nixon when barry goldwater who was really the dean of the senate republicans took a delegation from the hill to the white house and basically told richard nixon it's all over he doesn't have the votes and by the way i'm one of the senators that's not going to vote for you so that's where it has to be and if there's that kind of support in favor of removal i'm trying to trample the industry at that point but that remains to be seen as it is a former prosecutor today the republicans said that they want to subpoena the

whistleblower and they also want hunter biden and joe biden to testify what are your thoughts on that. both that all those are ridiculous i mean then 1st of all the whistleblower has nothing to add he didn't have firsthand knowledge he was told by other people what happened everything that the whistleblower is said is all to now confirm the corroborated by other witnesses who have come forward including most importantly the transcript of the conversation between president trump and president selenski so that's just a diversion that dividing and hunter biden and stuff is precisely what trump was trying to do it on this trying to somehow create an inference that they did something wrong when there is absolutely no evidence out there that either of them did everything wrong i mean again this is a typical trump diversion tactic to try and throw whatever's out there in

a different direction on somebody else if you signed an open letter along with other watergate prosecutors recently calling for impeachment proceedings against president dropped if trump is impeached but not convicted in the senate and then reelected next year what will that in your opinion mean for were the the health of the u.s. constitution. i'm probably would be pretty anemic in the mic at them. no i don't think that would be just a terrible result. but the democrats have no choice with this i mean if this is not an impeachable offense it's essentially bribery which is listed in our constitution as a grounds for impeachment i mean this is classic bribery where the president was holding back on nearly 400000000 dollars in military aid to the ukrainian government and using that as leverage to get them to open these best

a geisha and where trump was holding back a promised visit to the white house and using that as furthering the average to have them announce investigations i mean if that's not impeachable and that doesn't result in an impeachment or removal either by the senate or by the voters we're in big trouble in this country let me ask for one out of time we've been talking about the role of social media in this impeachment proceeding and the role of fox news what do you think if richard nixon had had twitter and fox news in the early seventy's do you think he would have resigned. i think the still had the the smoking gun tape that came out at the end where he's. telling his subordinates i'm to have the cia call the f.b.i. in tell him to lay off on the watergate investigation because of national security i mean i think that basically put the nail in this

a tortoise coffin so i mean they just couldn't go forward to the now. curse the problem here is you've got some of these people i mean no matter what he does they don't really care which is problematic so it really comes down to the public again is the public going to be moved by this testimony of this evidence that's going to come out over the next few weeks that's 2 critical question here because you can't go ahead with a new teacher in and once you've got the public behind you it's the public that's going to move the boat since and we will definitely be watching and measuring public sentiment moving forward mr nick argument attorney and former watergate special process prosecutor mr ackerman as always we appreciate your time in your insights and we hope to talk again pretty soon thank you thank you for having me. or the american electric car maker tesla is set to build its 1st european factory

on the outskirts of berlin the c.e.o. elon musk announced the plan of a ceremony here at the german capital the new gigafactory will produce vehicles power trains and batteries musk says tesla chose germany because of the country's reputation for having engineering prowess the new plant will be built near berlin's new long delayed airports it's expected to create around 7 to 10000 jobs and as you might guess germany is pretty happy about the jobs an expanded tax base that the new factory will bring take a listen. scott i mean that's more than over the last months there has been intense competition from various european countries and the fact that germany has won this award is important and good news in this offers germany the chance to provide new and long term jobs for the future. germany now gains more international

appreciation as an automotive hub. and 3rd this is a milestone in electro mobility and battery cell production. javier aguirre does is hear from all we're business. thought when i hear the economics minister say that there were no subsidies involved in this that's hard to believe how would it too good to be true what i mean is it true it's probably not really true most of the talks that led to this decision where held behind closed doors there were even secret talks but let's not forget that even if there is no direct negotiation with tesla some subsidies and some incentives will come automatically 1st of the level of the european union any company that makes bold investments and brings jobs to the e.u. gets incentives from the european union then we have the federal level of the federal government of germany even though they might not have to cust subsidies or

incentives with tesla the federal government of germany in september announced a big package of measures including heavy incentives for electric mobility that is part of the climate change package of the federal government that must have played into the equation as well and last but not least there is the regional government of berlin the city that is also a state and the neighboring state of brandenburg where the airport is and where the factory will be located where the airport is supposed is supposed to be and those officials have already said that anyone bringing vestments and jobs to the region will also be supportive of that support will look like is probably. to be said ok so the subsidies are kind of built into the system as it were you mentioned the european union so what happened to britain in the competition for this factory was is this a bricks related decision from mr musk probably yes himself said that britain was simply too risky to build this planned on right now and it is true that britain

would have been a logical choice 1st because of course it's a close ally of the united states tesla is an american company and there's no language barrier and it is also a big player in the auto industry and other companies have made similar decisions to at least hold investments in britain right now we're talking about the likes of nissan or dyson that want to produce an electric car so this is a pattern that we've seen in other big players as well i mean you have to think the brits when they must be hearing this news and kicking themselves and what about the car makers here in germany though you've got both swag and you've got dimer tesla is coming right into the middle of that nest how bad it is or how big is the competition going to be for tesla well the competition is already big for tesla tesla as most important achievement perhaps is showing the world that you can build electric cars that you can make it work and that electric cars don't have to be uncomfortable eg you sit in while you drive through the city but they can be big

and cool and fast. other car makers especially here in germany the luxury car makers the likes of dime there with mercedes-benz audi portion have listened closely and they are also developing electric cars as we know folks have pledged to convert all its models the complete lineup to electric or at least offer electric versions within 4 years so they have something coming out next year as well mint made many models have been either turned electric or are being a producer electric only so that means that they are making bold investments but according to many experts despite that. tesla is still years ahead in some key technologies because it's. not only about being a lecturer it's also about self driven cars in the long run that will play an important role in the german carmakers because of german legislation that is was more difficult are definitely lagging behind in that aspect as well all right so this has definitely been going to be a major win for for germany for building cars for the local economy

besides being a catalyst to get this airport finished here in britain i mean how important is it for berlin it is extremely important for berlin because if you think of berlin it is a big city it is a start up hotspot if you will but it is not an industrial city that has to do with the time where germany was split up and berlin was essentially an island within communist germany so industry industry had to go away that's why german car makers are not here they are in southern germany they are in western germany berlin is definitely not a natural choice because of that so it is very important as a sign that berlin can again become an industrial hotspot in germany that being said the city the local government the local government of brandenburg are now inexperienced when it comes to hosting a company in a factory like this yeah that's a good points you make i was also reading today a commentary that said you know if you look at help things have gone with trying to

open this new airport then mr musk is you know he may run into some serious serious problems in dealing with the locals that said let's talk a little bit about iran musk he is known for having the midas touch he's known for alpha male behavior and decisions is he going to fit in here in germany i would dare to say he might fit in and berlin perhaps but not necessarily in brandenburg not necessarily in the rural areas that are will be crucial as well. his mentality in general is definitely not german especially when it comes to. regulations when it comes to permissions bureaucracy many foreigners have big problems with those aspects here in germany and that delays production wants to go fast he has to move fast because the competition is moving fast so it will definitely be a problem for elon musk to move as fast as he wants to and have this factory ready within 2 years and when he is 21 right there will see it as

a challenge but he is known for challenges which he likes we'll see if you can keep his word on that savvy as always thank you. big climate change activists credit she sailed across the atlantic to new york as part of her campaign to get world leaders to take action on climate change she wanted to continue on to the cup 25 climate conference in chile next month but the conference has been moved to madrid leaving 2 in bear on the wrong side of the very law ocean hitchhiking hoping to catch a no carbon footprint wrong. she's found the right. back wants to go back to europe but won't take a plane so she asked if anyone was sailing her way and gotten off. fittingly for a campaign and his message spread around the world via social media she's traveling

with a family that found fame and income for a instagram. many say the teenager has been pivotal in raising awareness and pushing for action on climate change she credits u.s. president trump he is so extreme and he says so extreme things. so i think people wakes. people wake up by that in a way so i think if he this situation would of course have been different if he was not the president. that i thought when he got elected that's now people will finally now people must finally. she's done her best to leave a smaller carbon footprint as possible but she's left a mark on the united states as gratitude to him but prepares to leave america artists unveiled a tribute in san francisco her next focus 1st the climate conference if i get

to the cup 25 in time then i will participate in that because i received an invitation to do so and then i'll go home i think. to go with a shy smile and a fierce message is on her way. you know she's ready to go home the day is almost done the conversation continues online. news you can follow me at brant golf t.v. don't forget when you want to is to use the hash tag of the day and remember whatever happens between now and tomorrow is another day we'll see you then everyone.

equal opportunities for everyone regardless of ethnicity or appearance unfortunately for many migrants in germany that remains a distant dream. many companies are trying to make their application process is more inclusive but does that really help against discrimination. made in germany next d.w. . into the conflict zone with sebastian with time running

out cold brussels in london to get a back seat deal the e.u. is planning people of a blame on the britons before they go she ations fight my guest this week here in prague is the czech foreign minister tomas patricia he has surprisingly clear differences with the government so why doesn't he resign conflicts of in 60 minutes p.w. . you know that 77 percent last week are younger but thanks a lot. that's me and me and you. and you know what it's time all voices. on the 77 percent to talk about the issue stuff. from the politics to flash from cars like to point to gloom

top this is where. welcome to the 77 percent. this weekend on the d.w.i. . what it takes to be successful let's see a good education for sure good not pleasing looks it can do any harm if you're well spoken to ideally in more than just one language yes i think those things could lead to success but there is one major hurdle hugh have very little influence over .