♪[music] m ukraine to iran. the president's handling ofn foreolicy has washington on edge. i'm robert costa. welcome to "washington week." questions and a confrontation with congress over whistle-blower complaint. what did president trump say in a hone call with a foreign leader? >> i had conversations with many leaders that are alway it's just another political hack job. >> the complaint is reportedly about ukraine, which hassh claed with russia, and sought u.s. aid. frustrated democrats speak out. >> we can't get a answer because the department of justice and the director of national intelligence will not authorize the i.g. to tell u >> and president trump considers his options on iralo fng ann attack o saudi oi oil fields,

next. >> this is "washington week." funding is provided by... [cheering] >> ah. ♪[music] >> oh! >> whatever the t wentough, they went through together. life well planned. see what a raymond james financial advisor can do for you. >> additional funding is provided by... the yuen foundation. committed t bridging cultural differences in our communities. the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like y. thank you!

>> once again from washington, moderator robert costa. >> a whistle-blower complaint made by a member of the intelligce community is raisingis sharp questions about president trump's conduct with foreign leaders. and tonight, i'll open my own nobook to start o discussion. two weeks ago, i stood in a andowless conference roo a hotel in warsaw. i was the pool reporterpr for ve ident pence's meeting with the new ukrainian president, volodymyr zelensky, a 41-year-old former feaomedian ad actor. the atmosphere was tense. zelensky was bouncing his knees and national security advisor john bolton, looked o stone-faced. zelensky was eager for pence to lease $250 million in military aid that president trump had held up. funds ukraine said iteeded to deal with russian aggression. but the v.p. d not make any concrete promises. instead, he echoed trump and

said ukraine must take steps to address corruption in its couny before the u.s. hands over the cash. that meeting was a snapshot of an uneasy standoff that had i i lingered for months with 2020 politics swirling. according to reporting by both the washington post and the new york times, president trump's handling of ukraine this summer, including a phone call with a foreign leader, raidse a red flagith at least one unnamed intelligence official, who filed a formal complaint. eventually released, the trump administration is now under yntense scrutiny about whether it pressured ukrainein to stigate former vice president joe biden's son hunter, who once worked for a ukrainian company. president trump's lawyer, rudy giiani has calle repeatedl i for aestigation of the biden family. but the looming question is this. what did president trump say in private? the wall street journal reported late friday that trump, quote,

repeatedly pressured zelensky about eht times to work with giuliani. but the source did not believe the president offered any quid pro quo. here's what he said friday at aa conference. >> it doesn't matter what i discussed. i will say this. somebody ought to look into joe biden's statement because it was disgraceful where he talked about billions of dollars that he's not giving to a certain country unless a certain prosecutor is taken off theak case. so somebody ought to look into ecat. and you wouldn't,se he's a democrat. >> joining me tonight, kayla tausche, washington correspondentor cnbc. michael crowley, white house correspondent for the new york times. lisa desjardins, correspondent for the p newshour. and vivian lama, white house reporter for the wall street journal. michael, you're a national security reporter, white house treporter at the new yores. what else have we learned about this complaint? >> well, we know that it involves a conversation the president had with a foreign

eleader. andnow it also involves ukraine. and tonight the new york times is also reporting that president trump did pressureai u's president zelensky to investigate whether joe biden's son might have, you know, done something inappropriate in ukraine and whetherid joe ght have intervened. really the underlying facts thereon't bear out the president's theoryhat there was something sinister going on. but we still h don'te the full contours of what this whistle-blower complaint consisted of. intelligenche community filed a complaint and it has multiple comnents to it. ukraine is one part ofert. s a cl to a foreign leader. we don't know if that'w the same thing as the ukraine complaint. congress by law ought to be seeing this complaint by b n is not. so another aspect that is happening here is an of executive authority by the trump administration to keep this complaint away from congress. still, a l of unanswered questions.

but there's a funny sme to it, that's for sure. >> why does it matter that president trump urged ukraine to deal with corruption and potentially to investigate joe biden and his family? >> well, it's very troubling for any leader of the united states to go and ask a foreign countryh forp, especially when that help involves any kind of interference with a u.s. election or any of the government process in general. so for the president t have gone and requested to them to investigate or requested for them to get involved somehow in any kind of investigation that would involve h potential rival in the 2020 election, that could be a serious, serious incident that would raise a lot of hair on capitol hill and potentially start, you know, rallying a lot of people who have maybe been sitngut with the impeachment battles to this point, to really get involved. >> in a sense -- since trump took office, we've had thi phrase, constitutional crisis, bu f not theing of an f.b.i.

director, not the moving of congressly appropriated funds er a national emergency. that hasn't done it. but this honestly, robert, it seems on capitol hill this is in a no man's zone in the law, because it's complicated. but essentially while the law says tt this kind of complaint shall be submitted to the inlligence committees, itays that the director of national telligence is supposed to do that. but there's not a clarity in the law if the director of intelligence thinks that it's inappropriate. so it's a real jum ball. i think this is headed to cou and it could be very complicated. just the fact that there was even a whistle-blower complaint filedormallybo this call. i spoke to an official who frequently haso access t these calls. he says there has been some sort of deszation. a l of these transipts were leaked. there was some shock value about the caslty with which the president was conducting himself on some of these calls.

that went away over time as tyle a got to know his little more. but this official said the fact that there even was a compl when the wall street journal reported that he mentioned this investigation ght times, that it would have to be something that glaring to lead an official to actuallyaise their han and say, i'm going to go to the this.tor general about here itio president trump, was he seeking a quid pro quo or not? was he using his executive power in an improper way? >> exactly. i'm not sure you have tat demonsthere was a quid pro quo to feel that what theid prt was doing was inappropriate. one possibility is the president is hectoring theeader of a foreign country to connect an investigation that could damage on of president's political opponents. that inne and of itself seems inappropriate. >> would that be considered election interference? >> i thinkt couldu be. know, joe biden is a democratic candidate. if ukraine were to come up with information that hurt his candidacy, why not? i mean, absoluty.

it would have a real impact on the race if something were to come out. the oth piece of it, though, is president trump manipulating the levers of american foreign policy? this military assistance to ukrae, which has a kind of geostrategic rational to help eck russian aggression, for his own kind of petty political puoses, that takes it to a whole new level. even the better case scenario is pretty bad. the worst case scenario, you uld see a strong argument for high crimes and misdemeanors. >> the democrats on capitol hill are going to have to make a decision about how to proceed. poshousepeaker nancy p has vowed to push congress to review theomplnt. she said the episode raised grave concerns about national concern. adam schiff said that his committee was exploring a legal options but admitted the situation could takou weeks, evt mont move through the courts. and while campaigning in iowa, former vice president biden said this, i have no comment except the president shoul start to president. he then issued a statement,

really criticizing president trump's possible conduct on this call. what kind of strain does this cause with congress? you already have a white house on the brink of a major confrontation on aange of issues. what does this do to the relationship between thend white houseapitol hill? >> well, you've had congress very splirkts even within the -i even within the democratic party, in terms of whether or notmpeachment is the right path forward. speaker pelosi has been very reluctant to go down that route. when you have evidence like this, whher or not there was a quid pro quo, whether or not the president said, hypothetically speaking, i will reinstate any aid cut that ioas going to d for your administration, any kind of quid proiguond it notatter at this point, because just the idea of the president allegedly trying to tell them, you y know, we want o investigate my competitor, that by itself maybenough to get some of those democrats who are on the fence to really rally behind the impeachment clause.

it's the republicans who ae going to the question. >> the phone call with zelensky was the day after robert mueller testified on capitol hill, completing his report involvi election meddling by a foreign power. feelsthis a president who like he can shatter almost any norm regardless of what he exac hho said in a call with a foreign leader? >> it's certainly one of t that if he is emboldened, he is prone to these unforced errors. he clearly felt like he was on his backk feet here and needed o something about it. so that's one of the frustrations. i will sayoito the about capitol hill a the relationship between the white house, i do think thathe white house has public opinion on its de here, even internal democratic polling s that only one in 10 voters thinks ths that congress should be spending timing investigating president trump. the new cycle, the wheelsf justice turn slowly, and we -- >> lisa was in the room when corey lewandowski came to the

use judiciary committee. do you see speaker pelosi and chairman nadler, are they on the they process what happened with the president wit ukraine, with corey lewandowski and the what's their next step? >> they're on a totally same page! no, not at all. [laughter] >> they're behind the scenes. nadler is much more aggressive. he wants to mov to impeachment. i think that nadler and those around him, meaning hstore f, which is probably as key as anyone in ihese decisions, they're ready toove to impeachment. i think it looks likely that this could happen thos year. ver, something to ring into this whole conversation about this whistle-blower complaint, pleas a lot of -- there's a lot of talk about the actual substance of the phone call. democrats are looking at this in two layers, even withay lewandowski.ws the lewan hearing, they knew he was gonna try and outsmart tthm. knew it was going to be sort of a rope-a-do. the democrats arrae auilding a case that right knew the

president is obstruction of justice by not allowing their official to testify and that was part of the original articles of hment against president nixon. they're making a case that obstruction is happening now because of their t investigatio. >> what can democrats do or what can the congress do to learn more, to t to find out if that's audio, will the whistlblower testify? e there any options here? >> i would defer d to my colleagues. but my quick response isui that congress can makeot of demands, as it has been doing for months, and the trump administration will say, that's nice, we'll thinkbout, no, we're not going to give that to you. this is going to wind its way rough the courts and take forever, probably not until after the outcome of the electiit. >> doe matter that rudy giuliani, the president's personal lawyer, was working on a foreign policy project, perhaps with the suggestion of president trump, the encouragement or not, b he was t there? >> of course. it's his personal lawyer,cting on behalf of the psident. that's obviously very troubling. he's not reallyeh hidden the fat

that he was in some capacity goingeut thereo perhaps make thiseal on behalf of the enesident. he hases spoken pretty h abt it, definitely to the wall street journal and others. it's really a question of maybe they'd require him to testify, to some -- you know, to some excellent, but transcris, wrihout a recording, it's going to be difficult. it's not just that the white hous has public opini on their side. they have the senate on their side too. ian't really see the senate entertaining any idea o af impeachment or anything else with e thelection 14 months away. the republican party? is this a breaking point or not for them? >>hich one, the ukrainian whistle-blower? >> yes. does theresident's conduct ordu possible c -- when you talked to sources today, in the republican party, arehey aghast at wha possibly happened here or a they standing firm with pre?dent tru >> i think they wisht hadn't happened, i think they wishhee knew confines of the office a little better or at least observed them a little bit

i think there is a repeated frustration with incidents maybe not to ts extent but that are similar. but they understand that he is the candidate. he has extremely well-lined pockets at this point. he is gunning full swing into the election next year. and i think they are choosing to get in line. >> it's tou, especially for members of the senate intelligence comttee, whi by the way, we talk about the house so much and adam schiff.el the senate igence committee is also hsing a hearing nexteek where they expect to talk to the inspector general and the dni. >> will the white house let the dni -- >> they're going to ask. certainly at least the inspector general. eeu're going to have republicans that have uncomfortable and have had a difficult time with this president having to deal face-to-face. >> this i that president trump is confronting this week. following attacks on saudi oil facilities last weekend, the u.s. now says iran i those attacks and announced new sanctions today on t iranian central bank.

iran denies responsibility. on friday, later, just before the show went toir defense secretary mark esper announced that the president has approved the deployment of u.s. forces to saudi arabia to provide defeive support. according to the associated press, that w among thees options pentagon officials presented the president for how the others were military strikes inside iran. cyber alyacks. and en the day, the president said he would exercise restraint. in my opinion, i, shows strength, because theth easiest g i could do, go ahead, knock out 15 different maj things in iran. i think it shows far more strength to do it the way we're doing it. the thing thatw does s strength would be showing a little bit of restraint. >> kayla, wepn you'reting at cnbc on the marketar and business and you're following these sanions, it' already been maxum pressure from the u.s. on iran. dot are these new -- what these new sanctions mean for tha

ir economy and leadership? >> essentially the u.s., to exert a more pressure tn it already has, would essentially have to barny country from doing any business with iran. we're not there yet.ee clearly there to not quite be a coalition behind president trump here. this is going to really come up ne week at the u.n. general assembly. european countries are trying to extend a financial lifeline to iran. presidentrump is between a rot and a hard place. he doesn't really have a military option here. gas prices would sk skyrocket. you'd have a recession goingn into election yearea and he ran in 2016 on o ending military conflict, not increasing military conflict.fl so he's really in a difficult position. it appnrs that i with these various strikes is trying to call his bluff. >> you've been a bureau chief in baghdad. saudi arabia and the crown, prinlman have a spotty

record on human rietion, -- humn rights, including the death of jamal khashoggi. why is -- >> money. that the briefxplanation behind it. president trump said it bluntly thishe week. said the saudis pay cash. that is literally how he looks at it. he says,isten, we can overlook some of that human rights stuff, because at the e o the day, they're gonna buy american products, they're gonna pump money into our economy and that's going to be our priority. even as all the stuff was going on, he was saying, the saudis pay cash. we nee to stay connected with them. but when asked, have you promised saudi arabia tt you're going to defend the if it comes to war? he said, i never promisedan ody anything. that's the thing. even with that relationship, he's reluctant to g involved a war. >> before he was president, donald trump had this long record of kaying, yw, saudi arabia is ripping us off. we defend them.

they don't pay enoh money. it's n t our jobo defend saudi arabia. now he sees we do a lot of business with saudi arabia.'s got good relationships. his son, jared kushner, is verye close torown prince. and then, you know, i was struck by what kayla was sayini which think is exactly right. he doesn't have good military options hernk i t he very much does not want a military conflict that could rattle the global economies. but at the same time, he loves the power of the presidency. what a display at the white house today whe he's signaling i'm gonna be patient, i'm gonna show restraint, but he can't resist talking about we modernized our nuclear forces. who is talking about nuclear weapons right now? why is he saying this? >> if i wanted to, yeah. >> he said, i could order a strike. in fact, i could do it in one minute, with all of you right here, almost like he wase fantasizing about starting a war in front of the press corps. but i don't think he'll do it.>> et, he's not interventionist to this point and he's not listening to some of his top

allies on capitol hill, like senator lindsay graham. is tha because even though he sometimes hires people like john bolton and plays golf with graham, is he a non-in trventionist? t how republicans see him? >> i think so far, h has shown himself in action to be ani nonintervent. but i think republicans don't know the answer to that. the other person he plays golf with is rand paul, who isde dey a non interventioerst. this was a right where rand pau came out -- it's really interesting. in this whole saudi arabia area, it's fascinati to me because this is the area where the president has the greatest divide with republicans and congress. they do not trust saudi arabia. they do not want us involved in yemen. the president has pushed forward. they voted four tryes to to override his saudi arabia poism. his veto --oly. his veto power allows it to continue. it's a veryri pres area for him politically. >> what has this done, the u.s.

is on the brink of war with iran, meant for the global economyhis week? has that been a factor for the administration as they fought through this decision tonight? >> sure. when you see major correspondents for the nightly newscast, talking aboutke skyrng prices for u.s. consumers, that's exactly the scenario that the presidento wants avoid. he's talked abo energy deregulation, how prices are l gettiner for people. clearly we saw the saudi economy able t jump back very quickly. they really got their production evvels, i think back in record time. yone was surprised that all of a sudden, everything was ok. i do think itais real questions what, w what does the u.s. do with this strategicpe oleum reserve? the administration was going to sell off a bunch of that to raise cash, to t try plug paro of the deficit. now maybe they're reconsidering, do we need that just i case this gets worse? >>hat about the new national security advisor, robert o'brien? what is his involvement in these discussions mean for u.sn

foreolicy and the discussion with iran? >> it's more a question of wha john bolton's absence from these conversations does. obviously his predecessor was very hawkish on iran, probably more so than most. he was very much viewed an aggressiven approach to i as the right approach. what little we know about robert o'brien's global vw is he is also -- in his book, he said iran isrn the s enemy of the united states. but he's probably much more moderate than john bolton was. and so it will be interesting to see what he does. the question is, where does president trump go from here? in termsin of we're going to the u.n. next wee he wants to form a coalition. he's been skeptical about the u.n. he's condemned the e.u. and he's not meeting with any gcc leaders. the russians are not there, the israelis are not there. the french are noteeng with him. who is left? >> the architect of his previous iran strateg n is also there. >> he is meeting with the

ukrainian president, zelensky. >> and boris, who has his own problems. >> the question i heard is not whw do we k about o'brien but who is he going to choose for his staff. that will send theat clearest signal about t direction of this recalibration, if we should call it that, on iran and who he chooses to essentially signal where his policy is>> going. s part of it, the rest of the world is enging with iran. china has its own relationship with iran. europe wants to see the iraom deal back. >> china in particular haseen moving forward with some really mar investments involving iran. and, you know, one risk heres that trump isolate the united r states and tt of the world kind of moves in. trump is in this show dn with china economically. but it's n clear that we can prevent the iranian and potentially the russians andri other cou from kind of taking advantage of this opportunity and building our

relationship.la if there comes a point that iran's oil comes backnline, that's very profitable on that side of the world and the u.s. is left out ofe it. resident is playing a dangerous and risky game here. robert o'brien is really personally well liked. the new natiol security advisor. he does not have deep, shall wea strategic credentials and experience within feder bureaucracy. so the president, there's a lot going on, andsn he d have necessarily the most experiencer team you'd wt. >> final thought. congress, if there is action push,ill there be a pressure to t have authorization on capitol hill? >> oh, absolutely. not from everyone. but from many members. they're very uncomfortle -- >> republicans? an i think there will be a few republicans but i to see how they vote. in the past, we saweplicans, like maybe a bob corker, say thing, then sort of vot with the from the, get cowed owwn. there's not a tremendousmot

of bravery in the public. wt certainly senator cain from virginia -- thel be others. congress is supposed to declare war. if there is military action, we'll hear about h it. >> we must leave it there. we'lleep our eyesn congress. coming up on the "washington week extra," we will discuss the president's battle with califoeia. the sts n the epicenter of a showdown over federal and but before weor go, we rememberb cokiets. one of the founding mothers of npr, who died september 17 at age 7 cokie was a trail-blang journalist there and a writer.ic her books on american women brought hisry toif she appeared on programs over the years, along with her husband, steve roberts. we willll miss her crackling smile, probing mind and endearing spirit. m robert costa. good night. ♪[music]

>> corporate funding for "washington week" is provided by... financial servicesic firm raymod james. additional funding is provided by the yuen foundation.d commit bridging cultural differences in our communities. the corporation for public broadcasting. and by b contributrns to y pbs station from viewers like you. thank you! >> you're watching pbs.

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