isis abu bakr al baghdadi, for some of you, "neat the press" will start and we now return you to your regular scheduled program. this sunday, breaking news, u.s. special forces carried out a raid overnight in syria, forensic test secretary under way. isis leader abu al baghdadi is believed to be dead. the president of the united states made the statement. >> we have brought a leader to justice. >> we will speak with new national security adviser robert o'brien. plus mounting behavior. >> shocking behay your of the president.

>> an aid, investigations, quid pro quo demanded by president trump. >> ambassador taylor testified and gave the most sweeping and devastating testimony about president trump's efforts to shake down the ukrainian government. >> mr. trump calls the charge a hoax. >> i had a perfect conversation with the president of ukraine. >> and goes after ambassador taylor. >> he's a never trumper and his lawyer is a never trumper. >> while his lawyers are quiet on the evidence and make false claims of being shot out of hearings. >> maybe they do that in the soviet union, that's not acceptable to the united states of america. >> i'll talk to the chair, akeem jeffreys of new york. joining me for insight and analysis are, nbc news chief foreign correspondent andrea mitchell. foreign home secretary james johnston, amy walter, national editor of the cook report and lonnie chang.

welcome to sunday. it's "meet the press." >> from nbc news in washington, the longest-running show in television history, this is a special edition of "meet the press" with chuck todd. >> good sunday morning. we have breaking news, commandos carried out a raid overnight in northern syria, along the border with turkey. president trump just said isis leader abu bakr al baghdadi is among the dead. the president made the announcement, himself, this morning. >> last night the united states brought the world's number one terrorist leader to justice. abu bakr al baghdadi is dead. he was the founder and leader of isis. the most ruthless and violent terror organization anywhere in the world. >> nbc news analyst evan coleman said this would be a crippling effect for isis and there are few recognized candidates to

replace him. joining me now from syria is richard engel, our chief correspondent. richard, there is a symbolic element to this, death of al baghdadi and possibly an operational one. walk us through both and what you continue to learn. >> reporter: so a lot of detail in the president's remarks just a short while ago. a shocking amount of detail, really. you normally don't get that level of specific information about these highly secretive raids carried out by special elite forces. but president trump laid it out. he seemed to want the world to know how this happened, that he was watching, that american special operators flew in, it took them an hour-and-a-half, eight helicopters landed, that they blew a hole through the wall of a compound and that they killed apparently a number of body guard and that abu bakr al baghdadi was crying and

screaming, he was hiding in a tunnel. he was flushed out with a dog. tremendous specificity. i think to a degree, that's going to help his case. he's going to try to humiliate isis, to just say you were defeated, you didn't just lose your caliphate, your leader died crying and whimpering as he was underground chased by a dog. i think the president had a strong message against isis that is going to be hard for isis to counter. because they did, in fact, lose their state and now they have lost their leader. the other part, however, when he talked about middle east policy and how the united states is changing its interests and it's going to protect the oil sent a very different message, however, a very powerful message that is not going to be lost around the world. it was the kurds in syria who have been fighting against isis for the last five years. they got one brief mention. then president trump said that he's still with turkey. he spent more time thanking turkey and syria than he did

with the kurds who have been fighting with the u.s. against isis for the last five areas who right now are under attack. he once again said those kurds should leave their homes, they should go live around some oil fields, where they have never, ever lived in their existence. and president trump said, well, it's no big deal, they can just move a few miles. it is not a few miles. the safe zone that president trump talked about today is the displacement of the kurdish people. so, yes, he was very strong. he wanted to humiliate isis and rub their nose in this military defeat, but his message on overall syria policy and overall middle east policy i think is still going to be very controversial and very disruptive and a lot of people will say the u.s. betrayed the allies that led to this moment. >> all right, richard engel in northern syria for us. richard, thanks very much. joining me now is the new national security adviser for the president.

you heard president trump talk about him. robert o'brien, ambassador brian, welcome to "meet the press." >> thank you, it's quite a day. >> quite a day to have your first appearance here on "meet the press." so let me start with the president's decision to share so many details of al baghdadi's death, following up on something richard engel said, it seemed that it was important to the president that the world know how he died. explain. >> i think today is a great day for the occupation of america and a gait day freat day for th. this was the number one wanted person in the world. he's a brutal terrorist. the president went into detail. we can talk more about that it's also important the united states has a long reach and the men and women executed the mission flawlessly, took him down and his colleagues that are still alive should be worried. >> let's talk about a few things of the details the president gave us a lot of details. he talked about how al baghdadi

aheard to have died. can you explain how we can confirm, where, do we have dna of him already? where would we have gotten it? how can we confirm this? >> we have dna, visual on him. . the dna has been exploited, it's been confirmed a couple hours ago. >> we had an eyewitness account. did you see him? we have a picture of you in the situation room, the president said it played out like movie. did you guys see al baghdadi? >> i'm not getting into letting folks know what we saw or didn't see in the situation room. those technical capabilities are something i'm not going to talk about today. i can tell you today u.s. forces had eyes on baghdadi. we confirmed his death and took dfa and confirmed the dfa from previous samples we had. >> is his body still in custody? >> his body will be dissupposed of properly. to the extent the president said

he died blowing up pulling at his, thing tole on his vest. >> do you imagine we will follow the same protocol with osaddam saddam? >> i would expect that would be the case. >> the president thanked russia first, the kurds last. should we read into that? >> no, i don't think you should read into that. i think what the president talked about it was a dangerous mission for our troops and the president made a courageous decision not to send them to foreign enemy territory at night long range helicopter raid. it was a courageous decision on the president. but it was incredible bravery and skill of our men and women in the armed forces and the intelligence commission to commit this flawlessly, but they had to fly over areas where significant anti-aircraft capability. the syrians, the turks, others. so i think we appreciate the fact that our helicopters an our plane e planes weren't molested. the kurds played an important

role and we are grateful for the kurd and the sdf and our allies there. >> general mazloum said this was a five-month campaign to track him of sort? was that a fair discrimination in some cases we are tracking him day-to-day? >> i think it's a fair description. you can imagine they're quiet professionals that work for other agencies of u.s. government and heavily involved. the president was aware of this effort. and we thought we had a beat on him thursday/friday for sure. the president made a difficult decision to put men in harm's way. he did that and it worked. and so it was a good day for the united states, a good day for our armed forces and for the president. >> the way the president said turkey was informed, seemed to be that it sound like you really minimized what turkey was to know about this operation. is it fair to say more so than perhaps any of the entities involved in that area?

>> look, secretary pompeo, general millie, secretary esper were involved in alerting their colleagues in these other countries that there was a mission taking place. >> turkey, the president seemed to be concerned that turkey could fire on our folks. >> i wasn't concerned. >> turkey is a fellow member of nato. look, we were flying over other countries we wanted make sure our men were safe. general millie and secretary esper did a great job of reaching out and maid making sure we had an egress and ingress and our troops were protected. >> the president made comments this morning, does he believe we own the oil fields or that we control them? what is his understanding of our role in these oil fields? >> look, i think the point the president made is isis controlled these oil fields and isis was deriveing great income from the oil fields. we took together with the kurds took control of the oil fields. we will stand over them for a

period of time to make sure they don't fall back into isis' hand. they have been providing income for the kurd, hospitals, schools, sdf, we are there, we took control from isis. the folks that had them before the syrians could not protect them from isis. so we will be there for a period of time to maintain control of those and make sure that there is not a resurgence of isis and make sure the kurds have some revenues from the oil fields. >> 100% of the oil fields long to the kurds? >> look, i'm not going to get into any sort of. the kurds have been using the oil revenue. i understand up until now. >> but going forward, that going to continue to be the case? >> we'll have to work that out. as the president said, there will be deals made. they should not fall back in the hands of isis. we want to make sure the kurd versus some source of oil revenue. >> look, and, obviously, we don't have laws governing there, the way we would govern here with land. how is it that we are determining who owns that oil?

who is going to determine who owns that oil? >> well, isis had the oil, we took it back from isis, so -- >> who owns this ultimately? >> that's something the president said we'll have to work out. what i'd like to focus on is not the oil fields, we had a great day. >> the president brought this up. so where do we get the right to determine who controls these oil fields? >> the kurd itses are there. we have forces working with the kurd itself and we're if control of those oil fields now. we'll have to see what happens. the president said that's something we're looking into. we're staying in control to make sure isis doesn't get them. i want to focus on what happened. this leader al baghdadi was the most vishts mcious man. i had a chance to peek with diane foley this morning. we finally brought justice to a man that beheaded the three

americans, two journalists and a humanitarian and caleb mueller working as a humanitarian, a great young girl, one of the things general millie did is named the operation gem joint chiefs of staff named the operation that took down after kayla mueller after what she had suffered. and that was something that the people should know, but justice was brought to those americans who were so brutally killed as were others as the president pointed out. >> richard engel, when these reports came out, he noted this was an area controlled by al qaeda, an option of al qaeda. you know this area really well. you i don't these offshoots really well, who was actually at war at times with al baghdadi. now here they are perhaps was giving him shelter. the indication was perhaps he got turned in, if you will. >> that this may have been an inside hit by al qaeda and isis. is there something to this?

>> i think that's total speculation. that's not something i'm aware of. so, maybe, you know. other sources. >> let me put it another way. what terrorist organizations are you most concerned about now? now with al baghdadi gone, no obvious replacement and obviously, they care a lot about personalities in a little bit of that who is the biggest threat now that remains in that area? >> look, there are a number of threats in the area. number 1, eastern is the largest state sponsored terrorism. we are not talking iran this morning, there are huge states supporting hamas, hezbollah, the houthis in yemen. they're in syria, we got to be concerned about iran every day in that region. >> we had supposedly 100 isis fighters that escaped those prisons during the turkish safe zone period there. what do we know about that folks? >> i think that's twitter intel as well. i've seen that as well, i think the sdf is dog good job at

keeping the isis fighters? . >> lock, there were several thousand under sdf and turkish controls. we made it clear to the kurd itself and others in the region, we need to keep those folks under lock and key. so you know i think it's and will continue to do that. look, we're looking for isis wherever it might re-emerge. this was a huge win for the president. the president came into office. he was given a plate of foreign policy challenges that were probably more difficult for any president coming into office than any president since truman who took opposite since the second world war, he's defeated with respect to isis, he defeated the physical caliphate, which is the size of great britain. we have taken out the leader. i can tell you, it was grit news, 7:15 local time. the commander of the mission called and said 100% confidence jackpot. when we heard that. >> jackpot meant? al baghdadi. >> 100% jackpot over.

that was great news for us. it was great news for the american people and great news for everyone in the world and the region. >> one of your jobs is to sometimes you take in a whole bunch of policy ideas and policy debates, in some way as a national security adviser, you're the moderator when it comes to the debates between pentagons, states, sometimes the president. there is going to be a debate amongts some that says, mr. president, our presence here is what allowed us to get this. the president may view this as this is, hey, see, we can do both. smaller foot print and do this should we assume that type of president sees this? >> i think it's a process question. he asked, it's the president's agenda we're going to implement. i didn't come to this job as national security adviser with my own agenda, others may have in the past. my best job is to get the best from the ic, the treasury department and give those options to the president. the president has a chance to look at those option and make the best decisions for the

american people. if he asks my advice, i'll give it to him. at the end of the day, he's the commander-in-chief and he will make the decision like over the last couple days and last fight, it was a tough decision to put men and women at risk. he made those tough decisions. we will implement them. >> are you comfortable to say no to him? >> look, it's not my job to say no to him? >> you believe it's not your job. >> i wasn't elected president. it's my job to make sure he gets the very best options and advice from his cabinet secretaries and other advisers. it's my job to give him my best advice, my unvarnished opinion of what may happen. >> are you willing to disagree with him privately and say, mr. president, i don't, this is the advice i would give? i don't think you should take that had vice? >> the president is going to get my very best advice. he may decide he wants to go with that had vice. he may decide not to go with that had vice. my advice might be different than secretary esper or

secretary millie might say. he will ultimately get the best information and ultimately make his decision. >> russia, are they an ally of the united states in this fight and isis, are they an adversary in the united states in this situation with ukraine? how would you describe it? >> let me make it very clear. russia is not an ally of the united states, the president doesn't believe that, i don't think so. >> the first country he thanked today. >> there are times when our interest overlaps with the interests of russia. last night it overlapsed. we didn't want russian air missiles executed to our men and women in this raid. and they don't like isis as the president pointed out. last night our interests overhappened with russia. when our interests overlap with russia, there is no reason we shouldn't work with them. have been not an ally of the united states. russia presents a great danger to the united states and something we deep an eye on every single day. >> when it comes to the situation in ukraine and what russian forces are doing right now, threatening and killing

ukrainians, how much of a concern is that to you? >> it's a big concern. i wrote about this long before i was in government. i went to the ukraine to monitor the elections back if 2014. when i went from in 2014, ukrainians were looking at me and saying we can't get bullet proof vest, kevlar, we can't defend ourselves. you are sending us blankets and mres. the united states was once the arsenal of democracy, you are giving us nothing. and since this president took office, we have given lethal aid to the ukrainians, anti-crane weapons and we supported them robustly. if you talk to the ukrainians facing off against either russian supported militias or irregulars or dissidents, armed dissidents in eastern ukraine, they're much happier with this administration, they're actually getting lethal aid. >> bill taylor is the current ambassador to ukraine. how long will he stay in that position? >> i don't know. i don't know ambassador taylor. >> have you ever interacted with him? >> no, i have not. . i manufacturer met him. i think he's the chargee there.

>> he is sort of the acting, the chief diplomat right now, secretary of affairs? >> the principle officer in ukraine right now. i have not interacted with him before the state department. i don't know what his career plans are. >> ambassador robert o'brien, the new national security adviser. quite a morning, quite a bit of information from yourself and the president of the united states. thank you. i appreciate your views. >> thank you, sir, joining me now is jeremy bash the former chief of staff at the u.s. department of defense under president obama and let me start with what you heard, we heard an amazing amount of detail. just your initial reaction. >> well, this was a highly complicated operation, chuck. it involved eight helicopters flying for an hour and ten minutes over complicated and dangerous terrain by my math, that means that there were 50 to 100 u.s. special operations forces on the ground. they had to breach the compound, where u.s. intelligence had identified the location, the

probably location of abu bakr al baghdadi. but there were other individuals on the compound. u.s. forces had to engage them. chase ab abu bakr al baghdadi into this tunnel, abu bakr set off the suicide vesticaling himself and three children. they had to obtain dna and the president appropriately lavished intense praise on u.s. intelligence and u.s. military forces. i think that was appropriate. >> let me ask you this. what should it be our concern going forward now? we've gone al baghdadi. obviously, a big symbolic hit to isis. but what is the real threat now coming from that region to the united states? >> well, the reason isis had been contained in recent months was because our allies on the ground, the kurds, the syrian democratic forces had fought them, had battled them, had contained them and were guarding

them in these prison camps. with the president's decision to come over the border and fight the kurds, that strategy is in doubt. we've heard reports from secretary esper and others that will have been escapes from prison fighters. if isis is able to reconstitute itself, obtain more operational cohesion, control some territory there, that could be very dangerous and they could ignite a reign of terror in that region and around the world. >> let me ask you this, the president seemed to outline what our future near-term military strategy is going to be there, which is essentially, we're going to have a small number of forces in iraq that essentially can continue to do these missions when necessary. what's wrong with that as the footprint going forward, which is basically almost no footprint or almost a small one around the oil fields to what the president sort of seems to telegraph, which is a small base of operations inside of iraq? >> i think the problem was allowing turkey over the border.

once turkey came over the border, the kurdish forces had to in effect abandon their mission of being the ground force, the defeat force against isis. counter terrorism from afar works to an extent. you can have a high profile precision mission, most of the time they'll be effective against one or two elements. if isis regroups. they and their thousands and potentially thousands of followers continue to amass territory and gain operational cohesion, we can't do this from afar. we need people on the ground, the kurds with those people. >> i have to ask you the president's comments about the oil fields and who controlled the oil. he seemed to imply the u.s. had a lot of say over deciding who gets to control that oil in the futu future. in the past, how shwe handled situations like this? >> who controls the oil has not traditionally been a part of any

calculus about our military operations in the middle east. i think it's really inappropriate and somewhat bizarre and strange for the president to focus on it. it's not the roam of our military. it's really not an ambition of the united states to quote control the oil in syria or elsewhere. >> obviously, as an important source of income for the kurds, it does raise to me the question of, okay, we have successfully gotten rid of the caliphate. what's going to happen to what we know on the map now is syria? >> well, is syria is being kind of divided up between spheres of influence, by turkey, russia, eastern will be involved as well, of course, there is another battle raging in the south between hezbollah-aligned forces and israel. the future of syria is very much in doubt. i think we were holding together the balance of power with our forced presence there. we were a trip wire against turkey coming across the border. that now over. we don't know whether or not isis is going to regroup and

pose a more dangerous threat in the future, chuck. >> jerpy bash, a veteran from the obama when you look at the world, what do you see? we see patterns. relationships. when you use location technology, you can see where things happen, before they happen. with esri location technology, you can see what others can't. ♪ when i was diagnosed with ms, the firstwas my family.ht about i came home and cried. but, as i've seen my disease progress, the medicine has progressed right alongside it. trying to make medications more affordable is important, but if washington isn't careful we might leave innovation behind. let's fix the system the right way.

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welcome back. joining me from new york, congressman hakeem jeffries who shares one of the top leadership on the house side of things. welcome to "meet the press." >> good morning, chuck. >> obviously, there are a few topics i want to talk to you about. but the news of the morning, the killing of al baghdadi, your initial reaction to it and i'm curious if you have learned or if you know speaker pelosi has

learned any information outside of what's been said on camera? >> well, it's not clear yet whether the administration has communicated with speaker pelosi as the president indicated he did not do so in advance of the operation. this is a very meaningful step in the right direction in terms of the war on terror. the military should be commended. the intelligence committee should be commended. the men and women of the delta force who carried out this operation should be commended. i am pleased that it's been completed in a very substantial way. and that they have returned home safely and no american lives have been lost. >> are you pleased that the president green lit this mission and you think it's been an appropriate mission to green light? >> it was certainly inappropriate mission to green light and so in that regard, the president made the right decision. now we need him to continue to

make appropriate decisions moving forward. >> what does that mean? >> well, the war on terror continues and we can't cede american leadership in the middle east, which remains a dangerous part of the world to entities like russia or turkey or syria and iran. >> what does that mean, it's interesting you use the phrase the war on terror continues. you don't, i take it you don't approve of the shrinking of the american footprint in syria? >> that was an erratic decision that has been widely condemned just this week. chuck you know the house in a strongly bipartisan way denounced the decision by president trump to abandon our allies, the kurds if northern syria, individuals who have fought with us closely who have died fighting on behalf of their land and on behalf of the safety and security of the american people. that was an inappropriate decision and in terms of international relations, our

credibility is the ultimate currency that we have. and so betraying our allies is wrong. it has consequences. and, hopefully, we'll see a continuing american presence as appropriate moving forward, because we know that isis will still try to reconstitute itself notwithstanding the death of its top leader. >> do you still, does this at all, though, make you feel better about the idea of shrinking foot prints but having these smaller, the president seemed to describe perhaps our military being stationed more in iraq and then being able to do these sort of precision strikes when necessary? and is that a model for afghanistan? >> well, certainly, i think a smaller strategic force is the ultimate objective. we had been involved in the middle east now particularly afghanistan for the better part of 18 years. and i think the american people

in a broadly bipartisan way understand the need to withdraw and extract ourselves from that situation. but it has to be done in a responsible fashion. >> let me move to the other big story that is the focus in the house of representatives. >> that is the impeachment inquiry involving the president and his decisions around ukraine. i want to show you -- i'm going to -- a few quotes here from members of your caucus, gerry connolly. i think what you have in the public do main already is more sufficient for an article of impeachment. ted leeu. think the most damming everyday basically already came out. >> and jackie spooer. i think we have enough. >> speaker pelosi is doing a phenomenal job made clear we are going to continue to proceed in a serious and solemn fashion to

undertake our constitutional responsibility. we're going to follow the facts. we're going to apply the law, be guided by the constitution, present the truth to the american people no matter where that leads because nobody is above the law. chairman adam schiff will make the ultimate decision from the committee standpoint in terms of when we transition from the accumulation of information which has been coming in, in a rapid way, to the public presentation and we'll see when that occurs. >> well, i only ask it this way. many compared this to sort of a grand jury. and you can seek an indictment from a grand jury even before you've got all the information you are going to use in your trial. so, do you view this the same way that you may have enough to get your indictment but that doesn't mean you stopped your investigation? >> well, let's be clear, the evidence of wrong doing as many of my colleagues have suggested, is hiding in plain sight. we have the rough transcript of the july 25th call where donald

trump pressured a foreign government to target an american citizen for political gain and thereby solicit foreign interference in the 2020 election. >> that undermines our national security and his textbook abuse of power. we have the whistleblower complaint that has been validated by the witness was have come forward. we have a confession that was made by nick mulvaney, the acting white house chief of staff who acknowledged there was an ongoing pressure campaign to withhold $391 million and aid that had been allocated in a bipartisan way in order to solicit foreign interference in the 2020 election. we have ambassador bill taylor come forward. he is a trump appointee. he is a west point graduate. he is a vietnam war veteran and acknowledged there was a scheme that was under way essentially to elevate president trump's personal political interests and undermine our national security interests. >> let me -- you got sa lot of

deadlines you guy versus to meet perhaps between now and say the start of the iowa caucuses, when it comes to impeachment. but there is one that comes up on november 21st and it's funding the government. what are you and your colleagues and house leadership doing to try to avoid a government shutdown? >> well, we continue to be in dialogue with the senate. it's important to note the house has done its job. we have passed the appropriations bill according to time line that has set forth led by stan my hoyer in partnership with the entire caucus. the senate has failed to act. >> that said, we expect that we will actually come to an agreement to fund the government sooner rather than later in light of the reckless 35-day government shutdown that took place earlier this year where president trump was effectively forced into an unconditional surrender. i don't think mitch mcconnell wants to shut down. we certainly don't want to shut down. we need to find common ground to fund the government and do it

soon. >> do you believe you do need to be wrapped up with what you will do for impeachment before the end of the calendar year? >> no, we're not going to put a time line on this investigation, other than as speaker pelosi has said, we will proceed expeditiously, of course, we will proceed comprehensively and fairly in order to get things done. this is a matter of urgent national security concern. the president betrayed hess oath of office. he's under mined our national security, of course, and the integrity of our elections. this is abuse of power and fundamentally about the national constitution. >> that is the time line when we wrap things up. >> congressman hakeem jeffries in the house democratic what i love most about being a scientist at 3m is that i'm part of a community of problem solvers. we make ideas grow. from an everyday solution... to one that can take on a bigger challenge. from packaging tape... to tape that can bond materials to buildings... and planes.

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in affordable housing. the difference between words and actions matters. that's a lesson politicians in washington could use right now. i'm tom steyer, and i approve this message. the one thing you learn pretty quickly, is that there's a lot to learn. grow with google is here to help you with turning ideas into action. putting your business on the map, connecting with customers, and getting the skills to use new tools. so, in case you're looking, we've put all the ways we can help in one place. free training, tools, and small business resources are now available at google.com/grow welcome back. panel is here, former secretary jay johnson, new national editor

of the cook political report. our own chief foreign affairs joni mitchell and lahnee mitchell. we had this planned and it's perfect. -and-ia, the president, it's a big deal. the president wants to make it the biggest deal of all time, obviously, as well. but put this in some perspective for us. >> it's a very big deal to get baghdadi. it's arguably how operational he was. he was on the run clearly moving around. it's a tribute to u.s. intelligence and obviously the special forces. i think he could have praised them more vigorously before he thanked russia and vlad simir putin moving impede ltd.. it tells you you the syrian kurds are allies and the ground intelligence we are losing by

withdrawing from the sector in syria is concerned. there are a lot of questions whether or not we will have that ground intelligent. i don't understand the securing of the oil and why the president makes such a big deal out of that. we went overboard in the '90s saying we didn't go in and help free kuwait after desert storm for the oil. it wasn't about the oil. it was about you know international global interests. so. for us to make it an economic argument is only going to fuel other counternarratives. i thought it extraordinary he had not after the operation was over spoken to the speaker of the house. >> that we are so broken down, the speaker of the house, the big eight or the big four, those are the leaders that as far as we know he had not notified any democrats. >> jay johnson, before you were at homeland, you were also a counsel at the defense department, too. you -- a lot of teams you are being asked is this legal type of things. so you know a lot about

operational details. you kept expressing surprise to how much detail the president was sharing. explai explain. >> well, first, there is a risk in the first 24 hours after operation a lot of what we hear is inaccurate. >> he seemed to be watching it. how often was he watching? >> well, we do have very good technology in the basement of the pentagon in the situation room, you can see all of that. normally it wasn't just president obama it was his predecessors to, a presidential level of address announceing a strategic success like this is on my orders, we conducted an operation, we took out the leader of isis. we brought justice to him, thank you to our men and women in uniform who put themselves in harm's way, god bless america. over to the pentagon for the operational details and the briefing from the secretary and the chairman and perhaps somebody in the intelligence community. so i thought that was

extraordinary. but i do have to say, i was in the pentagon on may 1st, 2011, the day we got bin ladin and at i think 3:23 whenever we heard geronimo, we got him, my first thought was the courage and the dedication and the professionalism of many men and women in uniform who did put themselves in harm's way just like today. i think that's where the credit belongs. mr. o'brien refers to this as a win for the president. this is a reminder of the excellence of our military, our special forces and it is a win for the country. but as you had pointed out, you can kill an enemy, you don't defeat an enemy. there is more to do here. >> jackpot with al baghdadi. the president is going to use this to vindicate his point of view on syria policy versus, frankly, most of his advisers, not just republicans in capitol

hill. >> what this sets up as the president wants this to be his single defeigning presidency and had many moments, let's not forget, he went to singapore to meet with king jong eun the leader of korea, now you got him center stage. >> he needed a big victory. >> this is the biggest argument for him going into an election year, quite frankly. in terms of going forward, i think the argument a lot of republicans will made is what made this possible is u.s. presence on the ground. what made this possible is our strategic alliance with the kurds. what made this possible is automatic great relationships we had int region. this was an operation by the president's admission five months of making, intelligence gathering, much more than that obviously, certainly working with forces on the ground. what's going to happen going forward if we reduce that footprint? are we going to restrain isis? they have aspirations going forward. >> amy, i remember after the bin ladin capture and kill, there

were plenty of police, great, okay. >> the election is over. >> meaning no, we got him, now we can start pulling back. then you would have these fights. my point is the april world or the average voter is going to side with the president on this. great, you got him. let's go, pull back. we don't need as many troops over there. it becomes a harder argument lanhee is making to keep troops on the ground. >> i think that's the distinction this is not about thousands and thousands of troops in this region. this is about a very specialized group of smart, intelligence officers and leaders who are there getting this for us. it is a smaller investment to do this rather than let it fall apart and then have to make a serious investment if literalin literally putting american lives on the line in syria. >> the fact is right now vladimir putin is the commander of syria.

he has -- >> that's a big statement. >> well, that you feel he has now the most influence over the largest portion of syria than anybody else. >> over turkey, even though he's a nato ally and he has obvious influence with iran and assad. he has the political influence. we can no longer be the brokers at the table negotiating any kind of solution if there ever were going to be one politically for syria. putin will have his say. >> i think unquestionable, it's hard to argue as the president does that somehow the u.s. pulling back is something the russians don't like. i think the russians like the hedgeomonnic control they have in the area. certainly our withdrawal, even if we leave some small presence there is still a win for the russian, it's still a win for the iranian, i have a hard time seeing that isn't the case as the president would argue. >> you is it possible a year

from now we do an operation as we pull back as we may be pulling back? >> yes, it could become exceedingly difficult. what type of presence we have in syria, iraq, or afghanistan is not actually a political judgment. it's a fact-based analysis of what you need in that region to deal with the threat that exists in that region. that's a fact-based analysis that our chiefs, our joint chiefs should be delivering to the civilian leadership. >> that shouldn't be a political debate necessarily. fact is, every insurance company hopes you drive safely.

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back now with end game, in the past few weeks everyday has

mounted concerning president trump in ukraine. rather than question the evidence, they have taken process, plus aably saying they are denied to testimony and president trump is using the same attack game plan he used to undermine mueller before mueller's report was released. >> and i have my own experience, you know that, you see what's going on with the witch hunt. >> reporter: president trump on friday comparing impeachment by the injustice by african-americans at a historically black college in north carolina. mr. trump increasingly frustrated he has not been able to stop the impeachment inquiry. >> the picture coming out of it based on the reporting that we've seen is, yeah, i would say is not a good one. >> does the white house need to do a better job of communicating on impeachment? >> yes. >> nine key figures have testified so far, including the top u.s. diplomat to ukraine bill taylor who contradicted the president's assertions there was

no quid pro quo with ukraine in explosive testimony on tuesday. taylor testifying that gordon sondland, the u.s. ambassador to the european union told him everything was dependent, including security assistance, on ukrainian president zelensky announcing he would investigate the bidens in the 2016 election. >> he's a never trumper and his lawyer is a never trumper. >> actually taylor was hired by secretary of state pompeo to take on the ukraine role. now, mr. trump is scrambling to reconstitute his legal team and white house officials are assembling a war room. >> i talked to the chief staff mulvaney. i think they're working on getting a messaging team together. >> i don't have teams, everyone is talking about teams. i'm the team. >> without facts to contradict the testimony of the current and former trump aids, president trump's allies on capitol hill are, instead, condition condemning the process, on wednesday barging into a secure

room where impeachment demonstrators were deposing their latest witness. >> we're going to go and see if we can get inside. >> 45 republicans, including his brother having a says which republican versus also held in the past. >> the private ones always produce better results. >> in the senate, republican lindsey graham was forced to water down a resolution condemning impeachment to gain public support, also having to focus on process. three republican holdouts remain, senators mitt romney, liss sokol listen and murkowski. >> we can't ask foreign countries to provide something of political value that is after all against the law. >> the panel is back. amy, look, sometimes it's hard and we try to pack in everything to try to figure out in our space time continues to go all over the place, but the bill taylor testimony was singularly i think impactful, so impactful

that it caused i think all of this sort of crazy response in the next 48 hours. >> there is no doubt about that. because it was a very hard thing and the testimony, itself, to push back on. so as you pointed out, then you go to process, this is closed door. there is no transparency. the democrats are trying to run out the clock. all of that is the most effective argument they've made. one thing, though, that i think we learned there this week that is effective for the president is a couple of, well, actually a couple of things. the first is as you pointed out, lindsey graham puts this resolution out. at first not all republican senators joined. now it's all but three, which tells you where this is going in the senate, which is absolutely nowhere. there is an impeachment in the house, it's not going through the senate. the second is if you look at the overall polling how americans feel about impeachment. nationally, the number versus inwered up a little bit. going into these battleground

state, a state like wisconsin, a new poll under water if terms of approval rating of impeachment. >> the minute we reported that we got a win in minnesota and similar numbers we had seen again. >> jay johnson, where are you on all of this and what you would hope how the democrats should handle this impeachment inquiry going forward? i want to show you something. iowa caucuses are 99 days from today. if they do focus on impeachment, this is all, everything that's got to happen in the next 99 days. we first of all have to avoid a government shutdown. have you to have hearings public. we have to have the trial, by the way, it took a month. there is going to be three, maybe four debates by the way between now. i also slipped into here, nafta 2.0 is spoised to be passed now or forever hold your peace and i think people want to celebrate holiday, members of congress do. there is a time crunch to win. americans will see the campaign begin.

impeachment is about the president. what would you like to see? >> well, you're right. there is a lot on the table here and congress typically does not perform ahead of schedule. the very last minute and i think it's important for americans -- and i suspect it's going to play out exactly the way amy said. it's important for americans to not forget that there the an election in aer 8 election in a year. if voters go to the polls and don't like what is happening with ukraine, with the mueller report and all the other things, that is the opportunity for change. it's up for the voters to turn up and bring that about if that's where we are. >> one thing that happened this week that should not be overlooked is that a federal judge and this could be overturned perhaps at the supreme court level, a federal judge validated the house democrat's approach in every regard and they're right. congress is right, the separation of powers to the -- all of the information, the

grand jury information. the fact is that these very same people mike pompeo when he was on the benghazi committee were refusing to let state lawyers in. >> that whole process is exactly the process that they were performing and in those two previous impeachment exercises, the ones leading up to water gate also the clinton impeachment, there were special prosecutors or independent councils, so they are doing the work of an independent council, it is more analogous to a grand jury probe. i think they have the exact right to be having these witnesses in private. taylor should not be underestimated. this was the critical testimony. now what will happen with john bolton, is he angry enough that he is going to come in? because he knows everything. >> i keep painting this picture of the next 99 days. i don't think people have totally absorbed all of this happening. >> how much has to happen in 99 days? >> yeah. i think the reality is that for republicans, this process argument was always going to hit

a wall and the question was not if but when and so that really the problem i think for republicans is how to pivot then into the substance of this. is there a way to pivot in the substance to seven if there wasa quid pro quo, i tend to say this process is divorceed from the reality of what voters are facing on a day-to-day basis. that seems to be the reason you are seeing this disconnect, swing state versus national. democrats are so no kutsd focus impeachment. not jobs, not the economy. that's where it should go. >> or some form of threat voters decide. they have, this window i think is closing fast, by the way. oh, what a morning. thank you all for watching. much appreciated. let's see if the nats win game three, big one tonight, let's go nats, get this world series into our control. we'll be back next week, because if it's sunday, it's "meet the press."

this morning new details surrounding the military mission to take out isis leader abu bakr al-baghdadi. we'll take you inside the white house situation room breaking news in california where hurricane-force winds are causing out of control wildfires to intensity as hadn't of thousands are forced to evacuate >> this morning we'll remember john conyers, the founder of a civil rights movement. tiger woods captures his 82nd pga title th