captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> wdruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, theea case for iment the u.s. house intelligence committee delivers its report on how president trump subverted national security for personal political gain. then, on the world stage. we are on the ground in london as mr. trump arrives for the nato summit at a contentious moment for the military alliance. plus, "supreme ambition"-- a new book explos how brett kavanaugh's fraught appointment to the u.s. supreme court was just one step in a plan to move the judiciary to the right. all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour.

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>> woodruff: the house intelligence committee today formally accuses president trump of abusing his power to pressure a foreign government for his personal political gain. as lisa desjardins reports, it marks the ofcial launch into the next phase of impeachment proceedings. >> desjardins: for intelligence committee chairmandam schi, a turning point. >> this is not about ukraine; thisbout our democracy about our national security, and right to expect that the presidect is going ton their interest. of public d closrter two months hearings investigating president trump, schiff and democric staff released a 300-page report laying the groundwork for democrats' moves toward impeachment. "solicited the interference of a foreign government, ukraine, to benefit his reelection" by withholding military aid and

other things, including a white house meettil ukraine agreed to political the report accuses the president of obstructing congress by ordering witneifes not to tein the probe. it states the president "publicly attacked and intimidated" congressional witnesses, which they say is a "federal crime." in their own 110-page report released last night, republicans called the impeachment inquiry "an orchestrated campaign to upend our political system." they said presshident trumed "genuine, and reasonable" skepticism about corruption in ukraine. and that witholding aid was "eirely prudent." e langua echoed that of mr. trump himself. ,at a nato summitn lond sitting next to canadian prime minister justin trudeau, he raged agait the democrats. >> i think it's a disgrace. i think the democrats d ould be asha themselves. if you look at impeachment and the word "impeachment" here there was nothing wrong. nothing done wrong. >> desjardins: the president has

also pushed a theory t ukraine meddled in the 2016 election, a clm debunked by the u.s. intelligence community. as recently as tod,un rsecretary of state david hale was asked about alleged ukrainian interferce, at a hearing before the senate foreign relations committee. >> was the kremlin's interference in the 2016 election a hoax? >> no. >> are you aware of any evidenct kraine interfered in the 2016 u.s. election? >> i am not.es >>rdins: but some senate republicans have not been so unequivocal. >> there are articles about ukrainian officials talking to i don't know if that's te or not. d jardins: democrats say their investigation into president trump will continue. the port now goes to the hou judiciary committee, ahead of tomorrow's public hearings on impeachment.tional precedent >> woodruff: and lisa joins me so lisa, to you first. alcindor.

tell us some of the key takeaways from this report today. >> letlook at the big picture, judy. democrats, first of all, arein taabout the call between president trump and ukrainian president zelensky. they see two items of misconduct there, separately the idea that the president used his power for political gain, to get an investion that helped him politilly. cond, the democrs say on that call, the president also did something else wrong, whi was try and get a foreign government, ukraine, to intervene in u.spolitics. if you take an even bigger step back, judy, look even bigger picture, democrats are also alleging in this report that th president risr national security by hurting a vulnerable ally, ukraine, when it needed help, and helalping a poten foe, russia. then one more thing in this repo, judy, that they're leging, they're alleging, democrats,a conspiracy and a cover-up. they're saying it went beyond the president, including other officials such as cabinet secretaries like secretary of

state pompeo. they say that their decisions not to tough amount to a cover-up. these are all thi'lngs be hearing a lot about in the next week and a half. >> woodruff: so yamiche, you have also take an close look at all this. what do you see in herse tha new information? >> well, judy, this is the report.g 's ld it's tedious, but the most important thing andwehe new thinlearned is that there will be call logs in here betwngn rudy giuliani cal white house officials and white house officials calling him back. so we put up on the screen, yo see in august, rudy giuliani is making a number of calls to the white use, and we see him calling the office of manage. and budget. now, that's very importadi, because wenot know that the president's personal attorney was calling that budget office. they are very critically connected to the $391 million that was withheld from ukraine as part of what democrats would say is a quid pro 'so. so iteally important that sident's persona attorney, and we now have physical evidence of him doing that. it's also importantin april 2019, on april 24th, rudy giuliani was again on the one

with lev parnas. he's on the phone with white house officials. that's the same day that the former ambassador to ukraine,ch marie yovanovis recalled from ukraine. so while this is happening, while democrats woulsay thisis critical step in republicans and in the president way and move players like marie yovanovitch out of the way to get this scheme as democrats have said to really pressure ukraine to investigate joe biden and hunter biden. so we no tsee ese call logs rudy giuliani calling on that critical, critical day.oo >>uff: and you were telling us, yamiche, there are report that are interesting.s >> aothermportant part of this is that devin nunes, representative devin nunes, he's committee, he's nkingence member, a republican, he is now connected to lev parnas, which is an associate of rudy giuliani, the president'sy, personal attorho has been indicted for violating campaign finance laws. now, i was on the phowineth lev parnas's attorney. his name is joseph bondy.

he said this proves hs clients's point that he was in contact with the high-ranking republican congressman and that he was part of this, the lawyer told me, this scheme to tryto pressure ukraine to investigate joe biden. this lawyer is not saying that devin nunes was part of the quid pro quo. he stopped short of saying, that but what you have is a sittin congressman now being accused of being part of all of this urge and you now have this physical evidence, and i was told that lev parnas did not know that these call lnds existed that the house intelligence committee had them, so this is really a bombshell that is really, really important in all of this. >> brangham: >> woodruff: now, lisa, yout were accattlely at a press conference today that was held by the intelligence committee chair adam schiff. tell us about that. >> that's right, yamiche waspa callins lawyer. i was asking the same questions of adam schiff, becuse it's his report that's connecting mr. nunez to mr. parnas. i asked chairman schiff whether he thought mr. nunez should

recuse himself remember mr. nunez is voting on is report in which he is depicted. i asked thedecrat schiff should the republican nunez recuse himself. >> it won't surprise you'm going to reserve comment. it is i thk deeply concerning that at a time when the president of the united states was using the power of his office to dig up dirt on a political rival, that there may be evidence that there were members of congress complicit in that activity. >> no so that was a classic, you heard him say i'm going to reserve comment, but then he did matter of serious concern and he recommended that other group, he didn't say who exactly, shouldst inate this. now, as for devin nunes, his office has not responded and watually he did not answer questions as heed into the intelligence committee just a few minutes ago, but his alljiy, jordan, i spoke to him a few minutes ago, and jim jordan, the

republican from ohio, said, "i don't understand what the big everyone makes phols. i see no problem with that," and jord said,many, many people to speak to rudy giuliani. i don't have a problem with that. ." >> woodruff: so we have the intelligence committee report, what happens next. >> what's next i the white house is going to continue to defend itself. i want to point now to a statement that was released by the white house press secretary stephanie grisham. it says, "this reporflects nothing more than their frustration." democrats.inabout the that's the white house digging in saying the democrats are on a ong path here and the president essentially did nothing wrong. the lawyer for lev parnas says d thin nunes should recuse himself, but there are people outside of this saying there needs to be other steps her the other thing note is that the white house is not sending lawyers tomorrow to this aring, this public hearing by the judiciary committee. we're going to hear from

cothtitutional experts some white house as they're defending themselves are saying, we don't want to take part in any of. th >> and you know, judy, let me jump in really quick. we do expect onemore hearing. chairman schiff told me and other reporters that he expects his staff to present the report at the committee. that will be a big hearing to watch. >> woodruff: all eyes on all of this. thank you, yamiche. ank you, li and please do all of you join us tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. easter we will have special live coverage of th u.s. house judiciary committee impeachment hearing. >> woodruff: in the day's other news, president trump's first day at the nato summit was marked by a clash with french president emmanuel macron. he criticized macron for saying the alliance suffers from "brain death."nc but, the freh leader stood by we'll have a detailed report,

after the news summary. as he made his rounds in london, the president lost a round ins gal fight to keep his banking records from congress. a federal appeals court inew york directed deutsche bank and capital one to comply subpoenas from house committees. they're inveigating mr. the white house said it may appeal to the u.s. supreme court. the president roiled financial markets today when he suggested delaying a trade agreement with china until after the 2020 election. new tariffs on chinese imports e could taect december 15th, but mr. trump said there is no deadline for making a deal. >> i think in some ways it's better to wait until after the election with china. i just think that. in some ways i like the idea of waiting 'till after the election for the china deal. but they want to make the dealan

nowe'll see whether or not the deal is going to be right. it's got to be right. >> woodrf: the president'sal remarks sentstreet into a day-long dive. in the end, the dow jones industrial average lost 280 points to close at 27,502. the nasdaq fl 47 points, and the s&p 500 gave up 20. california senator kamala harris droppeout of the 2020 democratic presidential race today. she said her campaign lacks the money to go on.rr was an early standout in the crowded field, but her candidacy has since faded. we'll take a closer look, later in the program. in iran, the government acknowledged, for the first time, that security forces shot crackdown on protests over gas tices. state tv describ protesters as "rioters." amnesty international had said at least 208 people were killed in a crackdown.bu tehran rejected that figure today.

>> ( translated ): i bluntly say that numrs and figures given by hostile groups about deaths in the protests are sheelies. real statistics are seriously different from what they announce and numbers are far less than what they claim. said today that iran is killing thousands of people, and he added, "i think the world has to be watching." a new wave of anti-government protests flared across southern iraq today.nd thouof college students filled streets in basra to demand government reforms.oc some carriedcoffins representing more than 400 k protesteled by security forces since october 1st. back in this country, republican congressman duncan hunter formal admitted diverting campaign funds for personal use. he pled guilty today in federal court in saniego and now faces five years in prison.x- the rm california lawmaker will also resign from congress.

the u.s. supreme court heard arguments today in a high-stakes environmental case on superfund sites.ve it inva former copper smelter site in montana. local landowners wt a more extensive cleanup of arsenic contamination than federal rules call for. atlaic richfield, the site's owner, argues that the federal regulations take precedent. and, back in london, prince andrew fac allegations that he once had sex with a 17-year-old ameran girl, and president trp faced questions about the case. mr. trump offered no opinion, he also said he did not knowan ew, although photos, like this one, from last june, show them at several events over the years. the prince has beeheavily criticized for his ties to jeffrey epstei who committed icide last summer, facing sex- trafficking charges. still to come on the newshour: on the ground for the nato summit as the alliance faces new challenges.

bowing out-- senator kamala harris ends her run for the presidency. plus, on the newshour bookshelf, "supreme ambition: brett kavanaugh and the conservative takeover." >> woodruff: president trumpes shp a gathering of world leaders. special correspondent ryan chilcote reports on how strained relations took center stage. >> reporter: president trump arrived quietly last night in london for a nato summit meant to celebrate the alliance's 70th anniversary thatngllies were hoouldn't descend into chaos. but come this morning, those hopes were dashed. between at least tf nato's

leading countries, at a meeting with nato secretary general jens stoltenberg, president trump defending the allianceristically while lashing out at the ngesident of france for ha labeled nato "brain dead" in a recent interview. >> nobody neednato more than france and frankly the one that benefits really the least is the united states. >> reporter: nato's secretary ganeral listening on, the president railedst what he sees as nato countries freeloadinon the back of u.s. military spending, and repeatedly schooled his french retaliation for a new french tax on american tech companies. >> that is a very, very nasty statement. they're starting to tax other people's products, so therefore we go and tax them, which is taking place right now on technology and we're doing their wines aneverything else. reporter: in early afternoon, the two sat down for a tense idte-a-tete. president macront back

down. >> i know my statementted bit a lot of peopldo standttle by it. and i have to say when you look at what nato is and should be, first of all, this is a burden we share. >> reporter: the french president then took a swipe atrk 's president recep tayyip erdogan, who in the lead up to the meeting called president macron himself "brain dead," >> when i look at turkey, they now are fighting against those who fight with us, who fought with us, shoulder to shoulder against isis. and sometimes they work with isis forces. >> reporter: isis was even a bone of contention between the french and american presidents >> would you like some nice isis fighters? i can give them to you. you can take every one you want. >> reporter: president macron s.sponded sternly: >> let's be seri >> reporter: trump shot back: >> that was one of the greatest non-answers i've ever heard. >> reporter: meantime, to round out the round house punching,

before leaving for london, president erdogan promised to block nato plans if the allianc' dolabel the syrian kurdish militia known as the y.p.g. a terrorist group;t's a u.s. partner in the fight against isis and turkey's enemy in syria: >> ( translated ):f our friends at nato do not recognize as terrorist organizations those against whom we carry out fightg nst terrorism, then excuse me, we will stand against any that will be taken there. >> reporter: while the public spat between other nato leaders is unusual, president trump's unconventional demeanor with allies is not new. two years o, at his first nato meeting, the president appeared to shove the prime minister of montenro. and last year, he told nato spend 2% of their g.d.p. on defense, the u.s. would "go it alone," a comment many interpreted as a threat the u.s. threat he appeared to make today

in a meeting with canadian prime minister justin trudeau, the president suggested the u.s. wouldn't necessarily defend nato allies who don't pay the 2%. >> it's something we'll be talking about. >> reporter: white house officials say the president'siv combapproach to american allies is paying off. in 2016, four of the 29 nato countries met the 2% threshold. today, that number stands at nine. by 2mi4, the trump stration says the number will have risen to 1 at an event on the meeting's sidelines, the nato chief, tasked with wrangling itsng headsteaders, praised the alliance, despite today's circular firing squad: >> i'm a politician and i'm ud to be criticized for having good rhetoric, but bad subsnce. nato is the opposite. >> reporter: at buckingham palace reception hosted by the queen, nato leaders had plenty to chew on. on the allies' plates: disagreement too on china. president trump wants the alliance to take a tou stance on china and refrain from buying its 5g technology, many of the european allies oppose

that idea. for a nightc among squabbling allies, british prime minister boris johnson, facing a bruising reelection fight, hosted leaders at downing street, aleast three of whom did not go gently into that good night. >> woodruf and ryan chilcote joins me now. ryan, how unusual was it for president trump to criticizees ent macron as he did? >> i think it's pretty unusual in any circumstances, and particularly in this case, because afer all, you would kind of expect president trump to calnato braindead. he's been calling the alliancey obsolete for mears. what president macron really meant when he gave that interview a month ago and made that comment about nato being braindead is that european countries need to do more in that eurn nato countries and can't necessarily rely on the united stas to come to thei defense.

well, even today president trutp ted that last point that t nato countries weren't paying their fair sharehe u.s. might not come to their defense, andhe as always said that nato countries, european nat countries should be spending more. i think that was surprising. >> woodruff: and you know, ryan, you obviously have covered a number of nato meetings over the years. how is this one different? >> look, this is president trump's thir natosummit. so if the other nato leaders were surprised by his unconventional approach to diplomacy in the past, they certainly weren't this tome. in fact,e nato officials even told us that this metings signed in a way to kind of keep everything scripted. as you know, obviously president trump went of script but again, not a huge surprise. whatis different, judy, is s time we had a number over leaders squabbling amongst themselves. and i think that if u would

just listeto the rhetoric, m that kind kes you think that maybe nato itself is coming undone at the seams, though when it comes to policato is defitely very united. a >> woodruf finally, ryan, what do you look for tomorrow? >> well, givisen all the divn that we had today, i'll certainly be looking to see if we have any fireworks tomorro more fireworks. the only fireworks that thereul should be be because this meeting is supposed to beat celeg nato's 70 years of unity. beyond that i'll look at burden sharing. president trump was talkingay about it t actually the conversation began many years ago and intensified after prdent putin's annexation of crea. i'm sure we'll hear more about that tomorrow. china, the united states calls chinopa devg threat. not all of the nato countries agree. having, well, what you could say would be his fourth press conference after three today. a press conference tomorrow that will begin just one half hour

after the impeachment hearing begins. so i think tomorrow might be another day when we all have split screen on our tv screens again. judy? >> woodruff: no question about. interesting timing. ryan chilcote reporting from london. thank you, ryan. >> thank you. >> woodruff: three candidates in three days have exited the democratic race for president. with more than a dozen still remaining in the race, john yang reports on how the latest to bow out could shake up the campaign. >> yang: nearly 11 months after launching her campaign to high expectations, california senator kamala harris addresses her supporters in a videmessage and she speaks to some of the challenges her campaign faced with other wealt candidates still in the race. >> i'm not a billionaire. i can't fund my own campaign. and as the campaign has gone on, it has become harder and harder

compete. the money we need to you, my supporterst tell volunteers, that i have a path forward if i don't believe i do. >> yang: to explain what campaign and what thdrawal's does to the race, i'm joined by chelsea janes of the "washington st." ks so much for joining u we began, the democrats began this campaign season with an historically diverse field of candidates. as things stand now, you'll have six candidates onhe stage, all of them white, four white males, two white women. what does that say about what's happening in this race? >> it is certainly striking, and today we've sen a lot of dandidates and pundits an people in that world take to twitter and itint that out. disappointing to a lot of people in these underrepresented groups that look to someone like kamala harris and said, you

know, that's the first person the look like me who is going to have a ot at this. to have it whittle down as it has, i think one hand you have the most divee field inor hi and on the oth, it's not shaping up to remain that way. i think there's a lesson to be learned there, what it is is far it's really disapng to ai think lot of people in an increasingly diverse democratic electorate who hoped they ld see somebody different represented this time aroun >> yang: the other candidates may still qualify for the debate, but that's who has qualified so far. as you say, kamala harris began this race as a rising star in the party, a woman, one of the few women, african american women in the senate, mixed race. she tried to recreate the coalition that elected barack obama.u you were just in south carolina last week talking about herti diffic gaining traction. what happened to her race?

what happened to her campaign? >> you know, i think it really started with bang, as we all know. she had over 20,000 people in oaklan stl one of the biggest events of this entire campaign cycle. but that mask for a lot of people sort of the reality of kamala harris as a relatively unknowfigure nationally. to those of us in the beltway who watch all the hearings and know who she was from that, yeah, she feelslike she's ben around a bit, but nationally, do, and her campaign sort of had broader scale as e were ay on a front-runner. eventually they built out this big opation that whe polling dropped and the money sustain.oming, it was too big to you know, entering a senate race in 2022 in a state ap exensive as california, she can't do go into debt. thwa was a calculation that mostly financial, which is surprising, but i think dultimately theyecided there's no reason to push this. signs of seeing progress.

what was once a really promising campaign just wasn't able tore in its footing. >> yang: in you piece you talked about how she sort of wavered between the -- never really defined as part of e progressives, part of the moderates. talk about the difficulties sher had defining hself. >> yeah, you know, i i think it's interesting. you see biden.j you know whoe biden is. voters say, i know joe. and you know who bnie sanders is and elizabeth with her two cents and her big structural for herself.arved out a brand but kamala harris was never as easy to put on a bumpersticker e as some of thhers and never found that message that really summed up the brand in a word or two and made you know exactly who she was. maybe it's not fair to ask tht of candidates, but i think in her case in this time, people really wanted to snee som with clear intentions and clear priorities. and as she tried to pitch herself as sort of the one who you know, would work on isss and be practical, not

ideological, and she tried to that red the needle between the moderates in the democratic party and sanders and warren for the left, she sorof lost clarity in exactly who she was and why she was running. i thinheone thing we ard from voters everywhere is they want someone we can trust andeo som whose intentions are very clear. you know, they want to know who these people are. i don't think she ever gave peop the answer they were looking for. >> brangham: given that with less than two months go before the first votes are cast, is there a candidate whoould a natural recipient of her supporters now? i haverd a lot of theories. on, that but my understanding is that some of their polling shows that, you know, people that irpported kamala harris, t second choice wasn't a clear-cut thing. it came from a lot of places. i think you'll going to see some of it go to elizabeth warren. there are a lar gentingent of suburban men who harris wasur ng that might find their way to her. she's had overlap, and initially

joe biden is whoer campaign thought she would have to undermine. so maybe he'll be the recipie of some of those voters. but i think it helps a variety of candidates andmaybe isn necessarily a huge push for one over the other. >> woodruff: chelsea janes of hathe "washington post,"s so much. >> thanks for having me. >> woodruff: this year has led to the beginnings of a reckoning for the manufacturers, marketers and distributors of opioids. the epidemic has taken o hundreds of thousands of americans lives over two decades. multibillion dollar settlementse have been anno but there's great anger over those deals and they are not universally accepted. many states and municipalities say there's not enough accountability, consequences ave transparencythe companies' roles. purdue pharma, which created oxycontin and is controlled by

the sackler family, is the biggest target as amna nawaz tells us, there is new information about the rliest days of the crisis that rcould play into that lar battle. >> nawaz: judy, the informion comes from newly unsealed court documents that include richard sackler's emails in the late '90s. sackler was a senior vice president of the company at the time, one year afterntin was launched. by 1999, he was president ofa. purdue pha the documents were part of a court case against purdue pharma in ktucky. as part of that case, richardwa sackledeposed in 2015. stat news has been working to get these documents for fours. ye and casey ross of stat joins me now. casey ross, welcome to the nwshour. help us by understanding what is the new information you haveom learned hese court documents when it comes to purdue pharma, the sachaer familyowns it, and oxycontin. >> well, theese documentslly shed light on the interactions that the sackler family, in d

particul richard sackler, had with executives at the mempany during the key period in which oxycontin was being released into the marketplace. >> nawaz: what is that connection based on you've seen so far? >> the e-mails that wn found these court records discuss riard sackler becoming aware at a very early point in oxycontin's release of concerns that a large pharmacy benefit manager was expressing to doctors about abe potential in the drug. and dr. sackler responded to that concern by calling for a presentation specifically in which he suggested that the presentation could be given to show that controlled released opioids li oxycontin were less subject to abuse addic concerns and diersion than other opioids. at the time and since there isnc no evito support that. >> nawaz: how would you

characterize the response to some of those concer at the time, and also why was it important at this particular point in history? >> well, so this is a time period when oxycontin is just executives at the company based on the concerns were very worried at they were going to get essentially blocked out of the market because merck med co, the pharmacy benefit mnage their raised these concern, controlled a large part of thece to the marketplace. so if mercked do is refusing to cover these drugs out of abuse concern, then purdue pharma is in a situation where products to the extent that it wants. it cannot tap a very lucrative market for chic pain patients. >> nawaz:asey, you mentioned the concerns. merck med co said addiction could be one of their concerns. richard sackler says, "we do consider that addiction may be a convenient way to just say no

and when this objectionis obliterated they will fall back on the question of cost unless we can give a convincing presentation that c.r., that co rolled released product, are less prone to addiction d tential." ba these e-mails that you've seen, casey, is this unusual for a pharmaceutical executive to baspuically be inging to get his product out there and tamp down on concns? >> i think that it's not unusual for pharmaceutical exethtives when ey're launching a product and push it intoe marketplaceion in a way that's going to be beneficiali o the company. ink here the situation is that oxycontin is an opioid. it's a drug which contains a lot of inherent addiction potential, so it's something at' sensitive and i think these documents really shed light on the extent to which despite those potential concerns about addiction, the company was intent on aggressively marketing the product. >> nawaz: casey, the big

there have been a fat? questions about what the sackler family knew and what they didn't know. there is a tentatittlement.. what do these new e-mails tell us, and do th change how things could move forward at all? >> that's going to be a question for authorities across the country who are evaating how this circumstance ought to be resolved in terms of theli financial liaes that the sackler family high face ultimately for the addiction problems that are onoing in communities across the country. so there are attorneys general, states across the country and other jurisdictions that are refusingo sign on to a settlement with the sackler family. right now that would resolve those concerns because they're concerned that the family is not being held acountable enough financially for the harm that has been caused. so i think that's to be a question in light of these records that folks are going to continue to focus on. we'll have to see what the result is. >> nawaz: casey, antyou ned, a lawyer for the

sackler family in response toy your article there was nothing improper in those e-mails. they say the e-mails discuss hoh doctoro bribe oxycontin were upset that insurance companies wanted to avoi payir their patient's medicine. they also say dr. sackler wasng respony asking whether it would be accurate to makea presentation to the insurance comptoies and they deferred purdue's in-house experts. what do you make of the sackler family's response? >> well, they're emphasizing essentially that he did defer to company inexpertsking the question of whether that prn.entation could be give they also pointed to dr. sackler's 2it5 depn in which he said, look, i was just asking a question here as to whether a medically correct presentation cld be given to show the claim that i'd like to make. but i think it's up to the public and ahorities to consider whether or not the presentation that he was calling

for had an effect on marketing oxycontin in a deptive way ultimately. >> nawazi'd also like to know whave offered the sackler family or their representative a chance to join us on the proingm he fute. for now that is casey ross of stat news. thanks for very much for joining us. >> thank you. >> woodruf the nation's capital was riveted during the fall of 2018 after presidentec trump, for hisd nomination to the supreme court, chose a year old federal judge, brett kavanaugh. what was already a bitter partisan fight grew even more so after a california woman, christine blasey ford, charged that kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her in high school. he forcefully rejected the claim and went on to sit on the court.

but the fascinating e story of w he got there is the focus of a new book, "supreme ambition," by "washington post" columnist and editor, ruth marcus, a familiarace here on the newshour. welcome back to the newshour. >> thank you. >> woodruff: ande here. congratulations on the book. so was this a search-and-destroy mission, acalculated effort to take him down as brett kavanaugh ring?ed in his hea or was what christine blasey ford and others said abo him true? i think that what christine vaasey ford anothers said about justice kugh was true, but it's also true thatsi democrats de the senate and in outside groups did want to find a way to take brett kavanaugh down, so when he complained thapeople were out the get him, that was fair. the question is: wht was the evidence against him? was it adequately investigated? and whenesthere was a on in some people's mind about when

ha, and it's hard to determine what happened 35 years earlier, who ets thenefit of the doubt? ut woodruff: i have never seen or never read aba campaign to get someone chosen for the court as orchestrated as this was. i mean, kavanaugh himself was involved. justice anthony kennedy, whose seat, whose vacancy he was filling was involved. give us a sense, ruth, of just how extraordinary the campaign was to pick btt kavanaugh? >> so there were a couple different campaigns. the first phase of tempaign came when brett kavanaugh was not on president trump, then-candidate trump's list to be on the supreme court. you may rember candidate trump did something no candidate had done before, which is to say, here is my list. he put out one. he put out another. there was one name was particularly missing from that list. it was brett kavanaugh. w n president trump surprised all of us and became

became president trump, brett kavanaugh homicide a problem. he wasn't on that list. one of the people i report in "supreme ambition" who went to bat for him was justice anthony kenned he had clerked for justice anthony kennedy. desperate eveto convince justice kennedy that it would be safe to retihe, and wn justice kennedy came to the white house to swear in neil gorch, president trump's first choice to the supreme court, he asked for some time alone with the president, and he suggested that there was a name missing from his list. and lo and behold, a few months later, brett kavanaugh's name turned up on that list. >> woodruff: how unusual for a justice of the supreme court to go personally to the presiunt astice kennedy did? >> it's quite unusual it was a very unusual intervention from a sitting justice. justices can say nicthings about people, but this was particularly effective, and it' an illustration of justice kavanaugh's ability to nd

dextremely influential powerful mentors, in some ways the reason it was is hard for him to get on the list was the president he had worked for, present george w. bush, but president bush, once he was powerful advocates, calling senators on hibehalf, vouching for him, making sure that his library was able ato produ the documents that were necessary in order to get him confirmed. >> woodruff: you paint, as we id, this extraordinary picture of the movement ino essence get him nominated, first of all, and then to get him cnfirmed. and it's a process that it appears the conservatives, the republicans have done a much better job of figuring out than e democrats. is that how you see it? >> it is. the balk is called "supre ambition" for two reasons. one, it reflects brett kanaugh's ambition since really the very early years as a lawyer to get on to the supme cour but it also reflects the

ambition of the conservative movement to finally, after 30 years of tring and getting close but having it elude them to, cement the conservati majority on the supreme court. and the book tells the story of the lengths that republicans in the senate an elsewhere went to to make sure that he was going to get across the finish ne. >> woodruff: there were doubts among some conservatives that he was conservatiugh in their views to begin with, you point out, he was to amuch of bushy, loyal to presidenbush. others, democrats, who said he was far too conservative. who is he at his core? what is his ideology? as we see on the court, and just from knowing him? >> well, th is partly to be determined. we d onerm of brett kavanaugh, justice kavanaugh where he showed himself to be significantly less conservative than justice gsuch. that's not to say he's not conservative. he's a very conservative judge.

but his conservatism is more toward the center, closer to iee justice, who is very close to than it is to the mor extreme conservatives on the court. >> woodruff: finally, ruth marcus, the last few sentences tyin the book are pretelling. i want you to read that and then talk about why you have written this at the end here. where that mark is. >> okay. "the country has lived with the results of badly run or tainted elections. for thsame reason, it has to endure the consequences of a flawedn confirmatocess. but it does not have to excuse what happened. the kavanaugh confirmation discredited the white house and see senate, which is supto play an independent advise and consent role. in the end it disserved both as a result, his tenure will forever have an asterisk attached, oa blotn kavanaugh

and the court that is, to use christine blasey ford's phrase,i elible." >> woodruff: pretty tough. >> i wrote that because one of the things i found most tragic i heres that we did not have anf> woodruff: ruth marcus, the book is "supreme ambition: brett kavanaugh and the conservatives

takeover." thank you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: stay with us, we'll be back shortly with a brief but spectacular take on documenting drms. but first,ake a moment to hearom fr your local pbs station.

>> woodruff: tonight's brief but spectacular feures artist uldus bakhtiozina. the award-winning photographer explains her vision of documentng dreams and gives her this is part of our ongoing canvas series. >> i'm not a documentary photographer in the common sense. but i am a documentary photographer in a different sense. d i documeams. my photograp is widely posing theme of escapism.of als struggle sometimes to escape in order to analyze our reality.

i love complicated personalitiea and actuallylife inspires me to create my images. i choose to work with peop who are survivors, who are fightin everyday routines that are not always full of color what i really find exciting is the ability to make people's dreams of being someone else a reality. sometimes it take months to actually prepare everything for the shoot. this process of getting ready is like 95% of the time. 5% is of just the actual shooting. real life inspires our escape and sometimes that escape is very needed. irony is still the key in what i'm doing because i believe that in our life it's a lot of sadness.

and we need a little bit of irony to art as well.ma digitallpulated photographs is not really true for me it doesn't capture anything stal. that's like d of going travelling you just look at i work with analogues, in spite of the fact that nowadaysgi lly you can create pretty much everything, i don't like this path.e i see auty in authenticity without flaws.that i see the future of photography, 95% is digital and i'm very happy about that because that makes me special. myame is uldus bakhtiozina. this is my brief but spectacular take on documenting dreams. >> wdruff: and you can watch additial brief but spectacular episodes on our web site, pbs.org/newshour/brief. and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online and again here tomorrow starting at 10:00 a.m. eastern for live special

coverage of the u.s. housey judiciaring on impeachment. for all of us at the pbs newsur, thank you and see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> all right. richard. there is a bomb in centennial park.mi you have 30 utes. say it. >> he's not the bomber. my son savlied people's es. >> therebois mb in centennial park. u have 30 minutes. >> the f.b.i. is loing at richard jewell. >> he's getting railroaded. >> your client is guilt owe as hell. >> "richard juul," the clint f eastwoodm, rated r. >> the ford foundation. working with visionaries on the worldwide.social change

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o part by contributions tur pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ gianluca: 10 years ago, we began our journey as il volo. piero: and when we first started, we were just kids. ignazio: we had no idea what we were doing. gianluca: but what we knew s was how much we loved g. ignazio: we've traveled the ,world singing across the living t dream we had since we were children. piero: and through it all, we've been alongside each other. gianluca: and after 10 years, our music and r friendship is stronger than ever. we are very happy to celebrate it with you. (audience cheering) (audience applauding) ♪