i'll be back next sunday. i'm richard lui. there is now a second whistleblower confirmed according to nbc news. unlike the first whistleblower, this second one has, quote, first-hand knowledge of president trump's call with ukraine that triggered the impeachment inquiry. >> this is not the meeting. senator johnson, please, can you please answer the question that i asked you instead of trying to make donald trump feel better. >> and an energetic interview on meet the press. one of the president's senate allies pushing unsubstantiated conspiracy theories to defend the administration. this was days after he told the wall street journal i don't want to see those two things combined alluding to what the ambassador told johnson about a potential quid pro quo by the president.

at least two major depositions are scheduled on capitol hill this week that we're watching. it could further solidify the case against the trump presidency and the impeachment inquiry. we're watching that and will have more details this hour. none of this has stopped the presidential campaign. if anything it may be enjuergiig it. joe biden versus donald trump, who benefits more from the impeachment barbs. as you just heard, a second whistleblower is now officially come forward in the trump ukraine scandal. the attorneys for the first intelligence official who blew the whistle on the phone call confirming they are representing multiple whistleblowers. this is not a second formal complaint, but rather connected to the original complaint filed on august 12. sources tell nbc news the second whistleblower offers first-hand knowledge that support the first

whistleblower. it's unclear if this law firm is representing the same whistleblower reported in the "new york times." meanwhile, the president is ramping up his attacks and lashing out at both whistleblowers tweeting this, the first so-called secondhand information whistleblower got my phone conversation almost completely wrong, so now word is they are going to -- democrats contend all the information that has already been verified. >> the evidence of wrong doing by donald trump is hiding in plain sight. the administration without reason, ration without rational justification withheld. the president on a phone call as confirmed by a rough transcript released by the white house pressured a foreign government to target an american citizen. the whistleblower complaint has been corroborated by information

in the public domain every step of the way. >> joining us now, nbc news correspondent at the white house, republican women for hillary founder, former deputy assistant secretary of state, former spokesman for hillary clinton. and political white house correspondent and associate editor. hans, going to kick it off with you here. what has been the reaction so far on our reporting of this second whistleblower? >> reporter: we just heard from stephanie grisham. he is basically making a similar point that it is all out there in the public domain. i'm going to read to you. it doesn't matter how many people decide to call themselves whistleblowers about the same telephone call, a call the president has made public. it doesn't change the fact that he has done nothing wrong. that's an indication that the white house is prepared to have a battle about those call logs about what they think the

president said in that conversation with his ukrainian counter part. this week i suspect will be dominated by the depositions of two of the key figures in this. we have the u.s. ambassador of the european union. then we also have the dismissed ambassador to the ukraine. and i suspect that's on friday. that gives her an opportunity to tell her side of the story. remember all the text messenings that we got last week. they came out after the depositions were on the hill. so we may be in for another trove of text messages back and forth or other communications as officials and diplomats are trying to coordinate their strategy and set up a phone call and/or a visit. >> based on our reporting, a second whistleblower could -- may or may not be associated with the reporting coming from the "new york times." of course, there are reportedly six individuals who had knowledge of this particular back and forth.

we could see yet more whistleblowers or yet more coming forward with information. >> i mean, the president is saying that the first whistleblower doesn't have first-hand knowledge, and it does sound like at least one of the other people has first-hand knowledge. that will cut his story a little bit, cut away from his story a little bit. stephanie grisham is right about one thing. remember, the president admitted the call released much -- some information, somewhat of a transcript of the call. it's out there. when i'm talking to people close to the president and the white house, they're saying the president didn't feel like he did anything wrong. it's really just about a difference of he thinks that he's allowed to do this, and democrats think that he's not. so it's a difference of opinion there. he stands by it which is why we saw him saying to china, maybe china should investigate this. he does not feel like he has done anything wrong. i'm guessing we will continue to hear from him the same talking

points, the same question to other countries, same requests. >> some of the responses so far to the back and forth, left and right here, has been why isn't adam schiff at this point, releasing more information of what happened during the volker testimony. is that going to be relevant here to the argument against moving forward in the impeachment inquiry? and will it stick? >> without knowing what the conversation was and what ambassador volker had to say, it's hard to say that chairman schiff should release it. there are parts that are probably not relevant and parts that are sensitive in terms of deliberative process in u.s. foreign policy. chairman schiff has conducted himself directly. if there is something he thinks the american people need to know, we will see it. one thing to remember, this notion that only that the first whistleblower was not a

first-hand witness to it and now the second whistleblower might be, what donald trump needs to realize is that every single one of us is now a first-hand witness to what happened. we are all seeing what donald trump said, because donald trump told us what he said. this isn't an issue where we are seeing a photo of him and sergey lavrov laughing it up. the white house said this is what donald trump said. we are reacting to it. and it is absurd that they have in any way tried to push back on that. what's funny to the point about they are prepared for battle, they are not prepared for battle. if you look at who was on and you showed us the clip of ron johnson. these guys don't know what to say. none of the usual suspects are on. they don't have their story straight. they are not prepared for what's to come. >> a difficult two sundays if you had to select somebody to

come on to the sundays. one of the questions coming from the white house and those who support this president are saying why isn't the house having a vote to move forward with this impeachment inquiry as has been done in the past? there are two precedents with president nixon as well as president clinton. >> as a republican who has always been against president trump, this is definitely the natural progression for me to the trump presidency ending in impeachment. i think as you talked about, a lot of republicans are still trying to exert influence in trying to slow down the process. i think democrats, also, are trying to be very careful in how they handle this to make sure everything is done above board, making sure all the rules are followed. so i feel like everybody is trying to be careful to make sure this is done well. i think that's really the best course of action. >> also, on today's shows we are

talking about the sunday's meet the press and senator ron johnson, a republican from wisconsin did defend the president. he seemed to be going down the line of logic that this consistent based on what's happening so far in the house by democrats consistent with better ways of saying it, but a conspiracy against the president. i wanted to show you a little bit of that back and forth from meet the press. >> senator, i'm asking you -- >> why president trump is upset and why supporters are upset at the news media. >> this is not about the media. >> senator johnson, please, can we please answer the question that i asked you instead of trying to make donald trump feel better here that you're not criticizing him. i'm just trying to ask you a simple question of what made you wince? i'm asking a simple question

about you clearly were upset that somehow there was an implication that military aid was being frozen because the president wanted an investigation. >> that was ron johnson earlier on meet the press. hans nickels, this started with a reporting coming out of the wall street street journal which we started our segment with. fill us in potentially where senator johnson is trying to make his argument here? >> reporter: he seems back in trump's campaign. when the report came out, it seemed as though he was questioning why the president was with holding aid and questioning the motivations behind why the president was with holding that $391 million in military aid to the ukrainians. he does seem to have changed his tune a little bit. i think to the point and i think he's right to sort of correct me that the white house is prepared for battle on this, there has been back and forth inside the white house in what the best strategy is. i would just make the point that

they seem more comfortable talking about what's in the actual call logs than these other extraneous issues in the additional whistleblower or what the whistleblower may be alleging in terms of the cover up of the cover up in nancy pelosi's words. when you look at the surrogates that they put out this morning, at least republicans, the line from republicans seem to be that what the president said about china wasn't to be taken seriously. it was all just one big joke. he was trying to troll the media. what i saw and listened to the president on the south lawn there, he did not seem like he was joking. he seemed like he was earnestly encouraging calling for china to investigate the biden's relationship and their role in that country. now republicans will have you believe according to sunday shows that it was all just a joke and don't take him so seriously. >> can i jump in for a second? donald trump has used this laughter joking argument once

before. he's not a particularly funny person. second, he in july of 2016 said russia, if you're listening, blah, blah, blah. he said he was joking. he knows from the mueller report what we all learned was that five hours after he made that supposed joke that comment however he meant it, the russians for the first time went after hacking hillary clinton's e-mail. he said this the other day knowing full well that his words carry weight, that china as a result, we will learn that china five hours later started hacking into joe biden's campaign? >> i'll go to you on what fillepe said, what other offramps would the president be considering? some sort of admittance that it was not the best thing to do and would not do it again, but is this impeachable? no. is that one way to have it usable from conservatives?

>> i talk to a lot of people close to the president who have told me that what he did was a mistake. it was naive and stupid even. we have not seen president trump equivocate at all. people are saying to him you maybe didn't do the right thing. maybe you should go that route. we have not seen him say that at all. he is doubling down on this. he is saying over and over again that what he did was right. it was fine. he'll do it again. it might be that people are advising him to do that. it does not sound like he's taking any of that advice. >> i guess if that is what he is doing, not taking advice and concerned about give an inch and take a mile. >> like he always does, he doubles down on these things. this is not the first time he has abused the office of the president. it will be the last. this is obviously the most egregious example we have had. and i don't think he ever listens to the advice of his

koumers. i always think back to the article in the "new york times" about folks in his administration who are trying to push back, but i think we're going to see more of the same from him. we see more pained republicans trying to walk a fine line here. i think we just have to continue with impeachment proceedings because nothingential will stop this president. >> that you cnk you for your re today. at least two more major depositions in the impeachment inquiry. they are set to go down this week on capitol hill. it will be busy there. and the witnesses could be just what the democrats need to try to cement their case against the commander in chief. to cement their case against the commander in chief. it's been a long time since andrew dusted off his dancing shoes. luckily denture breath will be the least of his worries. because he uses polident 4 in 1 cleaning system to kill 99.99% of odor causing bacteria. polident. clean. fresh. and confident.

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aaddiction. how juuline hooked kids and ignited an public health crisis." other news outlets report- juul took $12.8 billion from big tobacco. markets e-cigarettes with kid friendly flavors and uses nicotine to addict them. 5 million kids use

e-cigarettes. juul is "following big tobacco's playbook." and now, juul is pushing prop c to overturn e-cigarette protections. vote no on juul. no on big tobacco. no on prop c. the impeachment probe by house democrats is set to continue with a host of depositions that could uncover

new evidence. tomorrow george kent may testify. on tuesday president trump's ambassador to the european union. he was a part of text messages and exchanges released by house democrats this week that discussed dates and conditions for a white house visit by the ukrainian president. on friday, former u.s. ambassador to ukraine. president trump reportedly told house republicans friday that he was urged by energy secretary rick perry to make the controversial call. perry said friday that his interactions dealt with corruption but that the bidens were never mentioned. >> i never heard not -- i talked to the president about this. i had a conversation, a phone call with rudy giuliani about

it. i have talked to the previous ambassador. i've talked to the current ambassador, the eu ambassador, every name that you've seen out in the media. not once as god is my witness, not once was a biden name ever mentioned. >> joining us now nbc news political reporter josh letterman, political investigations reporter tom hamburger and daniel litman. let's start with you on this, josh. it is a busy week ahead. tell us what you're watching from the three that we mentioned that will be giving testimony. >> two big names to watch this week as the impeachment proceedings gain steam on the hill. the first is eu ambassador who rick perry was just talking about there. his name is all over that whistleblower complaint. and he seems in some of the text

messages that were released to be playing a pretty active role in trying to advance the president's goal of getting ukraine to investigate his political opponents. not only that, but also shutting down in real back on that. i want to show you one of the text messages released in which the top u.s. diplomat says as i said on the phone, i think it is crazy to with hold security assistance. he is the political appointee saying i believe you are incorrect about president trump's intentions. the president has been crystal clear, no quid pro quos of any kind. then he says i suggest we stop the back and forth on text. he is trying to take this offline and limit what they are putting in writing. even though he is saying there is no quid pro quo, democrats on the hill say if it looks like

quid pro quo is basically is. president trump yanked her out of the role in may a few months before she was supposed to be coming home. we know from rudy giuliani that he had been pushing to get rid of her because he felt she was an obstacle to what the president was trying to do in ukraine and she made allegations that she had bias against president trump. >> for democrats, she might be quite the interesting testimony. daniel, there is rick perry out there. there is now vice president pence that's now included in the conversation. what does it mean in terms of trying to formulate a defense here? >> i think with rick perry, what we revealed on saturday kind of showed that he was talking about corruption with the ukrainian government. he met with the ukrainians at least three or four times. he was echoing the white house talking points on corruption. everyone is against corruption,

but it's kind of code word for investigating the bidens. and ukrainens have kind of played ball in opening a new investigation into looking at what happened in 2016 and joe biden. so they have kind of cooperated which that news has kind of been lost in the most recent impeachment inquiry. the crane ukrainians are desperr a good relationship with the president. they're very reliant on american military help which is only released in recent weeks. >> are they trying -- is the president trying to promote more people into the fold so there are more on his side? >> i think he wants to kind of shift the blame. so you saw that he said that rick perry was the one who urged him to make that phone call. so basically kind of throwing him under the bus and saying it's all rick perry's fault.

without him, i would not have made this phone call. i didn't want to deal with the ukrainians. rudy giuliani defendainitely di it has been inveteresting to se the president shift strategy. he doesn't seem to like his own white house in how they are defending him. >> tom, something you know well here. this is not the first nor the second whistleblower in the impeachment inquiry that we're talking about today. there is another separate whistleblower related to the president's taxes. where are we? >> there are three whistleblowers in the headlines just now. and one that we wrote about in the "washington post" the last couple of days is a whistleblower from the internal revenue service, a career employee, who has reported to the inspector general and to the chairs of the house ways and means and the senate finance committee that he believes there

is evidence of political interference in the annual process of auditing the president's tax returns. this is different from the ukraine matter but calls to mind one of the ongoing clashes between capitol hill and the white house seeking information about the president's tax returns and in this case an allegation of political interference. >> what's the worst case scenario in terms of where this will end up? >> it's a little difficult to know. the new development is that two inspector generals in the treasury department we believe are taking a look at this, have opened a review of it. the administration sources have suggested that there is not much to the complaint. the democratic chair of the house ways and means committee has said publically that he views the claims in this whistleblower's report which we believe he has reviewed as serious and that the allegations are true significant. and he added it's urgent that we

look into this. >> josh letterman, tom hamburger, dan litman, thank you for sending your sunday with us. as the impeachment inquiry ramps up, today we saw a preview potentially of how the president's republican allies will fight back. we'll show you more. allies will fight back. we'll owsh you more. it was love at first slice pizza lovers everywhere meet o, that's good! frozen pizza one third of our classic crust is made with cauliflower but that's not stopping anyone

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we're approaching the third week of the impeachment inquiry into president trump. not one person, though, from the

g.o.p. leadership team in congress or from the white house appeared on a sunday show this morning. despite that, we potentially got an inside look at the republican play book, potentially one scenario that is. and that came from a heated conversation between wisconsin senator ron johnson and chuck todd, moderator of meet the press this morning. the question posed here to senator johnson, why did he tell the wall street journal he winced after a diplomat told him the president is with holding military aid to ensure investigations inside ukraine? >> before i start answering the detailed questions, let me talk about why i am sympathetic. i'm 64 years old. i have never in my lifetime seen a president after being elected not having some measure of well wishes from his opponents. i have never seen a presidential administration be sabotaged from the day after the election. i have never seen no measure of honeymoon whatsoever.

so what president trump has had to endure, the false accusation, you have john brennan on. you want to ask director brennan what did peter strzok mean when he -- >> senator -- >> let me finish. >> what does this have to to with ukraine -- >> asking to just confirm are you investigating those leaks that peter strzok talked about? >> i have no idea why a fox news conspiracy propaganda stuff is popping up on here. i have no idea why we are going here. >> senator, i'm asking about -- >> this is why president trump is upset and why supporters are upset at the news media. >> this is not about the media. senator johnson, please, can we please answer the question that i asked you instead of trying to make donald trump feel better here that you're not criticizing him.

i am just trying to ask you a simple question of what made you wince. i'm asking a simple question about you clearly were upset that somehow there was an implication that military aid was being frozen because the president wanted an investigation. why did you wince? >> because i didn't want those connected. and i was -- as is everybody that went to that initial inauguruation. when i asked the president about that, he completely denied it. he adamantly denied it. he said i would never do that. >> i don't know why you just came out here to personally attack the press and avoid answering questions about what's happened here. >> because of your setup piece. >> it's pretty clear, we're only dealing with the facts that we have, not the facts that you wish them to be. >> i can't get the answers. the american people can't get

the answers. something pretty fishy happened during the 2016 campaign in the transition in the early part of the trump presidency. we still don't know. >> we do know the answers. >> you're choosing not to -- you're just making a choice not to believe. you're making a choice not to believe the investigations that have taken place. >> i'm trying to get to the truth. i want to look at the entire truth. >> the truth is only when it benefits when you believe it's politically comfortable. i don't understand what truth you are going for? >> i want the complete truth. >> so do we. i'm sorry you chose to come on this way,ner. >> that was a portion of what was happening on meet the press today. we will be showing the full interview later on here on msnbc. stick around for that. he went on to say here,

jennifer, that he did not have faith in the fbi and the cia. and he was asked several times in that interview. he said no i did not, i do not have faith in our intelligence community. is that a potential idea that he's floating as these whistleblowers come forward? we again do not know whether they are all coming from the intelligence community or not. is this a potential defense here? >> definitely. i think this is something we have seen from the trump administration before. i think that's win one of the most damaging parts of the administration. we are going to keep seeing responses like this from republicans as long as the political realities don't change for them. we have entire voting plauks of

people specifically independent and republican women starting to turn on the republican party because of the impeachment proceedings. >> when i interviewed senator johnson, he can be level headed. i think when you turned on the tv today or seeing some of this here today, you're saying how did he get to this point on this very subject not only in energy, but he's doing a head nod to the conspiracy theory that the president was one of the major communication points over the last 2 1/2 years. >> i'm not a fan of ron johnson. he is typically level headed although what he says isn't something i see is often accurate. you almost feel sorry for him. this is a situation of his own making. to answer your question, the reason that they shift, to give him a little more credit than i should especially on live tv and social media, he seems to have

had the right instinct when he heard about what had happened and called trump and said what's up with this. where he is now is where every republican finds himself now. this is not an excuse, but chuck hit the nail on the head. he put on a clinic when he said what exactly are you going on and on about? if he doesn't want to answer questions and try to explain what he was concerned about, then he should stick to fox and rant and rave about peter strzok. this is someone who is lucky that he's not up for whatever four years because he will not be on another sunday show outside of fox for quite sometime. >> and that may be why he took on the energy because he is not up for another four years. he did say in defense of why he was not answering the question or why he was answering the question as he was, the conspiracy theory fbi cia no good, he said it was because of a setup piece. i wanted to play a part of the

setup piece that was on meet the press that is informative to the very process, the very history of this recent impeachment inquiry. i want to play that for both of you. >> july 19th, kurt volker texts a top trump donor and u.s. ambassador to the european union. had breakfast with rudy this morning. most important is for zelensky to say he will help investigation. july 25, minutes before that phone call, assuming he will investigate, quote, get to the bottom of what happened in 2016. we will nail down a date for visit to washington. after military aid is frozen, bill taylor, the top u.s. diplomat objects texting on september 9, as i said on the phone, i think it's crazy to with hold security assistance for help with a political

campaign. a few hours later responds in a much more formal manner, i breve you are incorrect about president trump's intentions. the president has been crystal clear. no quid pro quos of any kind. >> that was a portion of the reporting and the setup piece that senator johnson was critical of. 30 seconds to you. what do you make of that setup piece? it is clearly laying out a timeline. >> i think it's very helpful. senator johnson got very angry when it seemed to be showing that there was a quid pro quo or that these events were connected in any way. i think part of the problem and part of the resistance that republicans have done is trying to keep things very unclear for the public, trying to fight back against the press. that's all i have at this point. so of course he's upset when the facts are coming out. >> did senator johnson have a point? >> no, not whatsoever.

i mean, what's interesting is why did he go to johnson in the first place? it doesn't make sense. i'll tell you something else. taylor who is making a point of memorializing his concern, he didn't only do it via text message. he is a united states diplomat. he's going to make sure to paper that in several ways. i would be shocked if we don't find out that he didn't memorialize it in a memo, in e-mail or something else. because he had something to say. he was uncomfortable and he wanted to make damn clear that he breved that this was beyond quid pro quo. this was full on subjiigating foreign policy of the united states. >> will the name ron johnson come up? potentially, that is why we are seeing this response today. stick around. we're going to talk to you in just a little bit again. thanks for being with us. it's been almost two weeks

since nancy pelosi announced house democrats' impeachment inquiry. where is this probe heading next? inquiry. where is this probe heading next

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o ooo. after his stamina was questioned last week, joe biden says he is the strongest candidate. penning an op-ed writing to trump and those who facilitate his abuses of power and all the special tropical storm funding attacks against me know i'm not going anywhere. you won't destroy me and my family. come november 2020, i intend to beat you like a drum. new polling showing elizabeth warren edging the front runner and fundraising numbers show biden at number four below warren as you see here as well as sanders and buttigieg. president trump had his sights

set on biden, firing back on twitter calling out the former vp in four separate tweets. joining us now, jonathan allen and political white house correspondent still with us. as we're looking at the biden v trump versus trump and the going back and forth, who is going to get more out of this? can biden go out and fund raise on this? could it hurt him when it comes to polling? >> the big winner is senator elizabeth warren, democrat of massachusetts who is not taking any hits in the middle of the biden trump warfare. i think senator -- vice president biden's team believes that there is an opportunity for him to turn into this to really hammer president trump and to rally the democratic party around him and to show democratic voters that president trump was most concerned about him.

but he's lost some time on that. it's been a couple of weeks that this has been going on and has been at the front of the news. a lot of his staff has been encouraging him to go with the president harder. he has been slow to do that as one source familiar with the discussions told me, the vice president is more measured than a lot of his aides are. >> so the vice president does not seem to be gaining from the situation at least when it comes to the race for the primary. just looking at some of the new polling coming out from fox news, joe biden and elizabeth warren right at the top within the margins of error. in wisconsin. and then also in south carolina, that's a more distant gap. but elizabeth warren picking up seven percentage points. joe biden did not get that same sort of bump in the latest polls. california also showing here that it is neck and neck with warren and biden at the moment. >> right. you were seeing elizabeth warren

already on the ups are. now we have bernie sanders with his health issues. we have issues with joe biden. i have been talking to campaign allies telling me they feel like no matter what happens with president trump right now, that they feel very good that joe biden is not going to be the nominee. that's the one thing they feel confident about and are capitalizing on the impeachment, that there is a lot of energy in republicans and the republican base, conservatives. they note that after the impeachment inquiry was announced after the first three days in the first 72 hours they raised $15 million about what joe biden raised in the third quarter. they got 50,000 new donors in the first two days. so they're feeling very good about it and their chances in 2020. and they think that they will be up against elizabeth warren. >> looking at 2020 and the independent vote, this coming from 538, the numbers that they said on the averages, polling average when it comes to support

for impeachment of independent voters that the numbers have grown. i think we have those numbers to put up on screen right now up to 41% right now. jonathan, it cuts both ways, right? if it's at 41% up from 34, there is the other side not saying they support the impeachment -- support impeachment, excuse me. >> that's right. at this moment, there is not a majority that support impeachment of the president. some of that, a lot of that will be people who support the president on the issue to be impeached. some of that is probably democratic voters who think that impeachment is not helpful to their cause in beating him in 2020 or prefer to see it done at the ballot box. that said, richard, it's unlikely that as more evidence comes out that you will see that number of people who believe he should be impeached recede. it's more likely you will see that grow and i think that's what the white house is concerned about and why president trump's allies want to

see votes on impeachment sooner rather than later. i think it's why you will see house democrats hold off for a little while even though they say they want an ex pedited process. >> does this back and forth here help the democrats running for president of the united states writ large? does it bring more energy to the entire race itself? >> i think it does in some respects. remember, they are all sort of talking about this. before they were the democrats were talking about each other some. they were talking about issues. now they are sort of all united about this impeachment inquiry. joe biden, that was the thing that joe biden was campaigning on from day one. he was talking about president trump where other democrats weren't. i think this is going to obviously take over what they're talking about on the campaign trail. this is what we are going to be hearing for the next few months and into next year depending on how this goes. particularly as we see more and

more people come out with information. we were talking about other whistleblowers coming, other information coming out that we're going to see this continue to be an issue. >> 15 seconds, how can democrats overplay this? >> i think they can certainly go out there and get ahead of the facts. if they are calling for impeachment, if they are saying things that are not supported by the facts that they have overturned and shown to the public, that's a way in which they can overreach and have some blowback. >> fantastic. thank you. up next, it's been almost two weeks since nancy pelosi formally anoupsed house democrats impeachment inquiry. what's been done so far and where the probe is heading next. where the probe is heading next. . but super poligrip gives him a tight seal. to help block out food particles. so he can enjoy the game. super poligrip.

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it's what gives audible there'smembers an edge.ening; it opens our minds, changes our perspective, connects us, and pushes us further. the most inspiring minds, the most compelling stories: audible. and welcome back. it's been 13 busy days, and tomorrow starts another day in the formal impeachment inquiry into president trump. here is how we got here and where we might be going. the impeachment process that started with a member of congress formally asking to begin impeachment proceedings. it was then up to the speaker of the house if she okays this, the request itself, an impeachment inquiry begins. that is where we are right now.

speaker nancy pelosi did exactly that on september 24th. now during this phase, house committees may begin their investigations. their objective sheer to try to determine if charges of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and/or misdemeanors are there. and currently, the six house committees are following the lead of congressman adam schiff. if they find relevant charges at this stage, they then forward it to the judiciary committee. and this is when we reach the impeachment phase. this as the judiciary committee writes up the articles of impeachment. they are then forwarded to the full house for a vote. 218 votes are needed to officially impeach the president. right now 227 democrats, one independent are in support of some type of impeachment action. now if the house does approve those articles, then the president of the united states is officially considered impeached. the next step is to decide here if the president should actually be removed from office based on

the articles of impeachment, and that's the senate's job here. they historically have moved to a trial phase first, this led by the chief supreme court justice. then there is a full senate vote that takes place, and a two-thirds majority, or 12267 senators would need to be removed. the vice president takes his place. this final step has never been reached in our country's history. joining us now, jill wine-banks, msnbc contributor and former assistant watergate prosecutor. she knows a little bit about this history i was alluding to. jill, the question might be if we do reach impeachment, if the president is impeached, it guess over to the senate, what are the options that mitch mcconnell has there? >> mitch mcconnell is expected to have a trial, and we have had a trial. president clinton had a trial,

and it was led by the supreme court chief justice, as it would be here. he presided over that trial. they could make a motion to dismiss the charges immediately, or after the presentation of the prosecution case. and what you would have is members of the house would be selected to make the presentation on behalf of the case for impeachment and the defense against impeachment. and the facts would come out unless mcconnell short circuits it and moves to dismiss the charges or to rote for acquittal before all the evidence is in. we've never been at that point. so we don't know whether the chief justice could say you have to allow this. in a normal case, a judge could say a prima facie case, a case just basically on its face has been made, and therefore we have

to go ahead with the evidence of the defense because there is enough evidence to convict. and i would hope that's at least where we would get to is that the evidence would have to be shown to the american people. and that's what i'm hoping for, is that america will get to see in plain sight what the evidence is, and i think right now, honestly, what's in plain sight already is clear. and prosecutors have to know when enough is there. they could investigate this forever. there is probably many, many more crimes. but we don't need to go to that. we need to say okay, here's what we have now. here's the context of what's going on. and then proceed with that. >> jill, thank you so much. always great to have an expert, someone a watcher of history and your perspective on this process as we look forward. thank you for being here on this sunday. jill wine-banks, msnbc contributor, former assistant watergate special prosecutor. thank you so much. >> thank you. coming up, biden's surrogate

democratic congressman lisa blunt rochester of delaware j n joins reverend al sharpton on why the former vice president is still the best chance to kick donald trump out of office. that's next on "politicsnation" only on msnbc. n msnbc. at the end of a long day, it's the last thing i want to do. well i switched to swiffer wet jet and its awesome. it's an all-in-one so it's ready to go when i am. the cleaning solution actually breaks down dirt and grime. and the pad absorbs it deep inside. so, it prevents streaks and haze better than my old mop. plus, it's safe to use on all my floors, even wood. glad i got that off my chest and the day off my floor. try wet jet with a moneyback guarantee o♪ ozempic®! ♪ oh! oh! (announcer) people with type 2 diabetes are excited about the potential of once-weekly ozempic®. in a study with ozempic®, a majority of adults lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than 7 and maintained it. oh! under 7?

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and that will do it for me this week. join us back here next saturday and sunday at 4:00 p.m. eastern. i look forward to seeing you then. reach out to me on twitter,