& ukraine: impeachment crisis." and tomorrow morning you can catch me in live interviews with 2020 democrat senator corey booker and pete buttigieg on morning joe. for now good night from new york. good evening to you this sunday. i'm ari melber. and welcome back to our msnbc special "trump & ukraine: impeachment crisis." we're joining you tonight with a new report, the first in this series. all of this coming after a series of bombshells and testimony by trump's own administration officials. the congress now on record with the exact plans for how any trump impeachment will proceed. investigators preparing for these public hearings. and an extra panel joins me at top of our show to walk-through everything that has just changed. later tonight, we have exclusive reporting on how congress approaching the impeachment and

trial of a president. lessons democrats are eyeing. plus potential new cracks in donald trump's fire wall. later tonight a guest debuting on this series for the first time with new reporting on the people who could make or break donald trump's presidency now his lawyers. all of that in our special starting now. those in favor, please say "i". >> we take no joy in having to move down this road. >> this is the moment that history will write. >> it's a real big scam, just like the impeachment of your president is a scam. >> what dois at stake in our democracy. >> the house and the american public will see all the evidence for themselves. >> it's quick. >> the resolution is adopted.

president donald trump is now reeling from what was clearly his worst week as president, which is quite a low point for a man that's lived through a steady march of indictments of people around him. this week marked a rebuke by the majority. a full house teeing up impeachment. one reason is the evidence. unlike allegations of self-dealing or hush payments or obstruction in the mueller probe, the simple facts at the center of this ukraine bribery plot are not in dispute. trump demanded a foreign government go after joe biden. trump admitted it. trump released notes proving it. trump said he'd do it again. publically suggesting other countries go after biden. as the evidence mounted several other trump officials corroborated everything i just said. that's confirmation from the people who work for him. that is the evidence that got congress to this point, teeing

up impiechment with these new rules that will bring some of those same witnesses into the public. these will now be open hearings as mandated in the resolution. that's the very thing republicans claimed they wanted. >> by, golly, if they're going to do it, do it in public. >> they're trying to impeach a president in secret behind closed doors. >> we're going to go and see if we can get inside. let's see if we can get in. >> let's see if we can get in. spoiler alert, you can get in. republicans that you saw on screen there were actually authorized under the old rules to get into those hearings. the new impeachment rules will also let the president in to object to evidence, to cross examine witnesses. speaker pelosi says it is the fairest process any house has ever presented for impeachment. >> these rules are fairer than anything that had gone before in terms of an impeachment proceeding. >> we turn now to experts who can go in depth kicking off our

sunday night special. ny's melissa murray. and from the new york times magazine emily, an author and fellow at yale law school. thank you to all of you for being a part of us. i want to start here at the table. emily, what does it mean procedurally now that you have had the house go forward? >> it means that we have this new set of rules. and the most important part of these rules is that we will have these public hearings. we will all get to hear and assess for ourselves what these witnesses have to say, what their credibility is like and the president will have lawyers present whoever he wants who can cross examine those witnesses. and this is the classic way in which we try to establish the truth in a dispute in court in this country. >> that's exactly right. and i think again the key question here is this is a set of proceedings for the people. so the people will now have the

opportunity to hear this evidence. i think one of the things that's really going to be important here is when they hear this evidence they're going to understand that a lot of the procedures that were used in this white house were serious deviations from what has come before. these were career people who were alarmed by some of the actions this white house took with regard to this foreign power. that will bring home what the democrats are trying to hammer down right now. >> jennifer, when you look at this in the criminal context of things that are alleged, that the house is looking at that would be potentially high crimes by the president, sooner or later he has to speak to that. this week seemed to shift his emphasis because he said, well, we have to get off process and defend what i did. of course, that might be harder than it looks. here is how he has been defending that. take a listen. >> there was no quid pro quo. there was nothing. >> that call was perfect. it couldn't have been nicer. >> well, i would think that if they were honest about it they'd start a major investigation into the bidens.

likewise china should start an investigation into the bidens. >> you have to ask rudy those questions. don't ask me. >> i answered everything. do you know who is playing into the hoax? people like you. >> jennifer, does the house impeachment hearing stage of this process push him and his team past what he's been doing, which are those vague redirects? >> you know, i hope so. what we just heard there was clearly impeachable conduct as well as a commission to, you know, criminal offense of bribery. but i just want to address what you asked, which is what is his team going to do? and the problem we're facing here is unfortunately house republicans are mistaking their role. they're acting like they are trump's team, like they're his criminal defense attorneys. and instead they took an oath to the constitution of the united

states to defend and uphold it against enemies both foreign and domestic. and, so, trump needs a real team and we need the house republicans to meet the moment and find their courage here because when the facts come out before the american people, they are not going to look very good. one more thing to say is those who have worked as the president's personal lawyers before have not faired that well, as we know. michael cohen right now is serving out his sentence in federal prison. >> sure. >> we have not heard much from rudy giuliani who seems to be involved in a criminal conspiracy around this ukraine quid pro quo. >> does giuliani look more like a codefendant than someone who could wage an actual legal defense. given your work in white collar crime and your expertise in these areas where things could get complicated, how do you explain to a jury the

senate would become the jury and the republic who votes, what do you see as the simplest case against the president? >> i think the clearest case is this. he sought or demanded from a foreign government help to win the election. that help would be what he was seeking and it's very clear from bill taylor and gordon's testimony that donald trump was seeking the president of ukraine to make a public announcement on television that he was investigating corruption by joe biden. in exchange for that, he was danger dangling support in military assistance and a face to face at the white house. that's a quid pro quo. that is incredibly corrupt to seek foreign assistance to help you win a presidential election.

and it is incredibly corrupt to condition the receipt of money congress had already allocated to help this country, to condition that upon beginning up a face corruption scandal that you announce to hurt your opponent. it is pretty clear. if it sounds familiar, ari, it sounds a lot like the allegations in the mueller report, what he did previously. the difference here is when he was seeking russia's assistance to help him win the 2016 election, he was merely a candidate, not a public official. so previously what we were looking at is simply campaign finance law violations and then obstruction. now added to that we'rebribery. the constitution doesn't require a criminal case. >> right. >> but it just so happens, as you also know, that bribery is one of the -- one of the specific words mentioned as a

grounds for impeachment, treason, bribery. >> that goes to what you are talking from the criminal per spect, can you point to simple things and say this is corrupt, this is a bribe, this is a high crime. jennifer, thank you so much for joining us. we continue here onset and turning to how this house vote tees up a different kind of lawyering on capitol hill. for that we welcome a former congressional senior counsel, tom rogers, who has been on both sides of high stakes hearings on washington, having served as a senior executive at tivo and nbc. he's also at the sports betting company where he's executive chairman. thanks for being here. >> thank you. >> the congress is not always credited for doing great, clear hearings. true? >> absolutely true. >> you have been there as a senior counsel. what is key in your view now that the whole country has been put on notice they will do televised hearings? >> you have to remember who you are playing to and who the ultimate jurors are here.

in some sense, of course, the ultimate jurors will be the senate. but you're not going to get conviction. at best what you are going to get and what the democrats have to hope for is that they can pull four or five republican senators over. and if they can do that, they have a majority of the senate and a bipartisan vote on the donald trump did something for which he should be removed from office. >> that's interesting. let me take this to melissa. tom is saying something different from the conventional wisdom. you either remove him or you don't. tom is saying it is significant constitutionally. and obviously politically for the country if republican senators come along and put down a marker, this is a marker. this is corrupt. >> this is exactly right, tom. we're playing to the people here. this is a process where they will be laying out evidence for the senators but really for the senators constituency. if there are senators in these purple districts, districts that

might flip, it will be important for them to play to the people so those constituencies can turn to their senators and say, listen, i need you to step in. i need you to do something or i'm going to actually play this out at the ballot box in november. that's something they're looking for. if they can show there is some republican support, republicans that are willing to put country before party, that will be a huge victory because i think everyone agrees there is zero chance we are going to get a super majority to remove the president. >> you said zero. i heard from some well connected republicans, including those that don't always want to say this on air by name, a different word. i heard nonzero. which is striking because there are people who say actually there is more concern there than you know. tom, i want to put up on the screen something we have discussed, which is the actual clues to how this is going to work. speaker pelosi says, and we'll

put this up, in contrast to past impeachments, when you look at the copy of the documents, when you look at can you attend evidence in the proceedings, can you ask questions there, which nixon's counsel was not allowed to do. they say straight flush for trump. let him in if he wants. >> the process arguments the republicans raise will fade away. up against that they cannot hold up as a basis for trying to undo what the house is going to do here. the real issue is going to be not the democrats presenting their affirmative case, their initial case. it will how they handle the rebuttal because it will come down to the rebuttal. it's not process, but he may have done it. some may say, okay, he did do it, but it is not impeachable. how do you come back at that? they will basically say, look, ultimately ukraine got the aid. look, ultimately the president got his meeting. look, ultimately he released the transcript, so where is the

cover-up and they will take it from that position. how the democrats come back and rebut that is going to be key. it can't come down to solely this phone call, as bad as this phone call was, but it has to be shown to be a long attempt to put campaign personal issues ahead of the national security of the united states. and in doing so, it comes down to something much broader, much deeper than the simple rebuttal that the republicans will come back with. >> well, emily, isn't that the wildest part about everyone who had said, well, just wade for the next election to deal with donald trump. they were more conservative democrats that said you don't need to have impeachment running into the iowa caucus. there were a lot of people who, like donald trump up to a point said, look, if you hate him so much, wait for the election. what donald trump did was cancel out that own defense for himself by so blatantly and publically

confessing his goal here is to get foreign help so there isn't a fair election. >> right. one huge difference between this impeachment inquiry and the mueller investigation, the mueller investigation was looking backwards at the 2016 election. this is looking forward at an effort to influence the 2020 election. and, so, you know, to say, well, it was really just okay or it doesn't rise to the level of impeachment, and i agree. i think that is where we're going to wind up in the republican's defense, the american public will have to decide whether they think that's good enough and whether they think the kind of trade jennifer outlining earlier, aid for helping dig up dirt on your presidential potential to boopp. not just now but in the future. we're talking about the standards going forward for presidents in both parties. >> we're also talking about how the rest of the nation and culture understands this. is it, quote, unquote, one more washington set of bickering which does not move people?

or is it a type of overwhelming evidence that makes people stop, even people that aren't following every piece of the story and say is the president a crook? think back to the nixon example. there was a whole period of time where republicans in a lot of country said, i'm not sure. leave it alone and then it shifted and it shifted in the culture. sometimes we dip into the culture here in our reporting. but there was a band the honey drippers that had a song that remains their most famous song. i will play a little bit for you. they were singing impeach the president ♪ some people say that he's guilty ♪ that he's guilty ♪ some say i don't know ♪ i don't know ♪ impeach the president ♪ impeach the president ♪ impeach the president. >> impeach the president, at what point does this go beyond hearings and evidence and become

a cultural movement that's plus 50% of americans saying, let's do something? >> well, the nixon years are very instructive here because john dean, although his major testimony was on the senate investigative hearings before it went over to the house, was able to talk to something very broad. he interacted regularly with nixon. he was able to talk about his conversations with nixon regularly. when you're talking about the witnesses here who have all corroborated what actually happened on this phone call, these are not people that interacted broadly with the president. john bolton is, and john bolton, if he's going to testify, has that john dean capability. >> right. to be, hey, you were the president's guy. where are you now? >> melissa, any comment on the honey drippers. >> words fail me. i can't believe you brought that up. >> we'll ask the viewers if

people prefer "by the sea". >> the question is going to be is this conduct that's impeachable. we saw that play out in the clinton context where no one thought that was really impeachable, that it was about partisan bickering, but this seems demonstratively different. >> we are learned a lot here at this table, as well as jennifer walking us through some of this. for years and now tonight we are upon these issues as a nation, so i want to thank tom rogers and melissa murry. we have a lot more ahead. new pressure on republicans as impeachment witnesses are revealing trump's wrongdoing. does that change the calculus? >> we will look back at some times when people had lost races over tough votes. we have two of them on the show tonight. also growing questions of why giuliani is doing trump's legal work for free. i have a special guest that will show how that could create more problems for the president.

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welcome back to our sunday night msnbc special on impeachment which is hitting a critical new phase. also bringing america close tore a trial in the senate. one independent did back thursday's vote, congressman justice mash who recently left the gop over this issue. >> i think it's really important that we do our job as a congress, that we not allow misconduct to go undeterred, that we not just say someone can violate the public trust and that there are no consequences to it. >> discussing consequences for trump. but republicans who even

criticized the president and faced their own consequences. another republican congressman described as being open to the process of impeachment drew such heat that he quickly walked it back. but when members of the president's party do turn, it can change everything. nixon had a fire wall republican support for years. many thought it would hold. but when they turned, it was devastating. >> the misuse of power is the very essence of tyranny. but the evidence is clear and direct and convincing to me. but there will be no joy in it for me. >> i cannot in good conscious turn away from the evidence of evil that is, to me, so clear and compelling. >> impeachment is of course a yes or no vote. but there is also a spectrum between, say, total defense, criticism and then impeaching.

bill clinton found his own party was very publically critical of his conduct even as most did not say it was an impeachable high crime. he was rebuked, condemned and some pushed a shameful tenure. >> the transgressions the president has admitted to are too consequential for us to walk away. it is immoral. and it is harmful. >> we do not condone the shame that he has brought on the white house. >> although stained and tainted and, if you will, rebuked which will be forever with his legacy, it will be memorialized in history. >> these actions weren't condemnation. >> those were democrats on the president's political team and the impeachment process moved many to draw a line against that conduct, even as most did not endorse impeachment. that was a political climate that ultimately drew more public admissions from president

clinton. >> indeed i did have a relationship with mrs. lewinski that was not appropriate. in fact, it was wrong. i must put it right and i am prepared to do whatever it takes to do so. nothing is more important to me personally, but it is private. and i intend to reclaim my family life for my family. it's nobody's business but ours. >> the senate acquitted clinton by a wide march fwgimargin. 28 democrats in the senate also backed sen sure. today republicans remain more united around trump. the question is whether public hearings will change that as they did for nixon. and partisan ship is not the only driver here. some republicans say their vote for impeachment was ultimately a mistake and the more serious evidence against trump nowadays puts the contrast from the clinton era in relief.

>> in retrospect, it was a mistake to impeach bill clinton because the substance of the matter really wasn't all that essential to the nation. the allegations against president trump are really far more serious. they involve abuse of power, abuse of the office. >> experts agree the constitution treats abuse of the office rather than other perhaps serious transgressions as the strongest rational to impeach. you remove from office the person abusing the office. and someone has to go first if you are ever going to make that argument against your own party, against the powerful person in office. so we want to tell you tonight as we dig in here, the first republican to do that against nixon, do you remember who it was? congressman larry hogan sr. he was punished for it. hogan started the fire but then hogan's political career ended just a month later. not in a general election where most people agreed with him but in a partisan republican

primary. so it is notable all these years later it is hogan's son carrying on the tradition. one of the few elected republicans backing the impeachment probe, one of just three republican governors. >> i think we do need an inquiry because we have to get to the bottom of it. i'm not ready to say i support impeachment and the removal of the president, but i do think we have to have an impeachment inquiry. >> what do today's republicans think of the facts that are known? senator jeff flake served in the senate in the time of trump era as the republican. he says his colleagues already do want to impeach if they could do so without the public blowback we have just been documenting. >> somebody mentioned yesterday that if there were a private vote there would be 30 republican votes. that's not true. there would be at least 35. or maybe more if it were a private vote, but that's not possible.

and so they have to come out and many of them are up for re-election in tough seats. and i know that feeling. >> where is the point where those re-election politics might change, if they do change? we take that question, which could now decide the fate of the trump presidency with some guests that have cast these kind of votes when we come right back.

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now, abbott technology can target those exact neurons. restoring control and harmony, once thought to belost forever. the most personal technology is technology with the power to change your life. welcome back. as promised we turn to two very special guests who cast votes in congress. dom congressman one of the freshman democrats in a swing district who backed obamacare. harry won his virginia seat by half a point. many worried that vote could cost his seat. he says it did but he's never regretted it. both former representatives are from virginia. the other is tom davis who led his party's election strategy as chair of the house republicans campaign arm. thanks to both of you for joining us. >> thanks.

>> thanks for having us. >> congressman, what does it mean when people go to the house floor as you say you did really knowing it is a big, important vote but it also might literally end their house career. >> well, this is a very, very serious event. any time you are talking about impeachment it is serious because this involves national security and the abuse of power. this is something i think members on both sides will live with the rest of their life and i hope they all take it with that level of seriousness. when you think about the lev ralk a president has, leverage we have seen presidents of both parties use to protect our troops, to get human rights prisoners out of jail, to choose to use that leverage in the way he did has enormous national security implications. >> just drilling down on the situation, you must have given extra thought to a vote that might end your political career as opposed to other votes. >> well, what i can say to president electives out there,

if you are thinking about spending the rest of your life living with whether you stood up for the constitution and the country and did your duty, i think that's one people will be really happy to live with. i know a lot of the republican senators, particularly those under the age of 50 are not excited about having to take this vote and answer for it for a lot of years, but we're still at the trial stage, so i think it will be important to present the evidence for people to take that with the seriousness that it deserves and then cast a vote they can live with. >> what are the less sons learned from your view? >> i was advised against bringing impeachment up against president clinton. we suffered setbacks in the 1998 mid-term elections because we raised impeachment and basically begined the democratic base out in an off year. at that point only the second time in history, the president's party picked up seats. i thought it was not a good political strategy. but once faced with it, to me, i was very late in deciding. my district was overwhelmingly

against impeachment. i felt that lying under oath was a standard that whether you are a ceo, a janitor, a baseball player, that this is a standard that we needed to make our mark. >> just to be clear, both of you in sort of what might be called swing districts in virginia. so you are making the point that what everyone thinks of the underlying issue, it wasn't an easy vote for you either. >> i don't think this is an easy vote for anybody. removing a president is a very, very serious thing. it's never pleasant having to face that. i give democrats on that -- i don't think it's come easy. their base may like it, but for members this is a tough vote. >> interesting. what do you see then for republicans in the senate? >> well, let's, first of all, you had jeff flake on earlier. you saw what happened to jeff flake when he spoke out against the president. >> yep. >> the republican base hasn't moved. right now the house vote resembles more of a no confidence vote. even the clinton vote at the end

of the day, five democrats voted for articles of impeachment and three voted against it. to be successful in a divided country, you need to bring part of the other country over. that has not happened here today. >> you know, 100% of the independents in the house voted to proceed. it is a tough vote for everybody. i think a lot of americans started to tune out the noise months ago. i think they will tune back in understanding this is something serious, whether you agree with it or not. and i think you will. some of it is going to actually depend on facts and depend on the evidence presented, whether people see this as an abuse of power or do they see this as partisan bickering. i think with the way it's proceeding so far, which has been with a great deal of seriousness and professionalism, i think we will see that case play out. the american people certainly are more inclined in that direction than they were a few weeks ago, but we got a few weeks ahead. >> congressman davis, what do you see is important having been in most of those rooms most of us never go into when the house

does present these hearings? both sides can go into corners and say, treat him like he's guilty or there is nothing to see here and no evidence is going to be treated seriously on the right. what do you recommend they do? >> once you go out front it changes a little bit. you have everybody watching. most of these members are from safe partisan districts and their biggest fear is the primary election and not the general election. and i think that colors it on both sides a little bit. if you are a democrat at this point and you are not rapid about removing donald trump, you are going to have a tough primary. if you are a republican as we saw with justin demosh, he couldn't win re-election after he came out of it. i think that's in the back of everybody's mind. >> in the senate in particular with all the senators have to run site-wide, you really are going to have a choice in some cases between where the base may be and moderate and independent

voters may be. but this has only happened a few times in history for a reason. that's because it's serious. we've seen you have to meet a high threshold. it appears that's been met to proceed with the inquiry. these are serious charges. obstruction of justice is a serious charge. we don't know what the articles will be. again, when you are talking about loosing the leverage of the presidency in national security situations, as a former diplomat, i can tell you that's what presidents use on a daily basis. >> yes or no, do each of you expect any republican senators to convict, zero or do you see any convicting? >> we're a long way from there. i would guess yes. >> yes? davis? >> i think we're just too far away. >> too hard to say. >> facts matter, but there is a long way to go. >> you are both former politicia politicians. not a full answer to that question. but you answered a lot of the other ones thoughtfully which we really appreciate given your experience. thank you for joining us on your

special tonight. >> up next there are these growing questions about the lawyers caught up in the impeachment probe, new reporting on giuliani's pro bono problem. we have a special report for you ahead on our msnbc special, "trump & ukraine: impeachment crisis". ".

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so i feel lighter. try metamucil, and begin to feel what lighter feels like. now we turn to something special for you, the kind of reporting we don't always have time for honestly during the week when it is breaking news and one bombshell after another. but now we will dig into the legal relationships in this impeachment probe. president trump famously went through many lawyers during the mueller probe. some are gone. one went to prison. we'll get to him in a moment. we begin with two key lawyers who represented trump in the mueller probe. you see them right in the middle there. both back in the ukraine story, giuliani driving the entire plot working more like a shadow diplomat than lobbyist.

he was paid half a million dollars by the two men you see beneath the photograph. they have been indicted and they are represented by giuliani's co-counsel from the mueller probe john dowd. what does that mean? the defendants claim their proximity here gives them presidential protections. they want to invoke executive privilege claims because they say giuliani also works for trump. that's not how privilege really works. for this web, those ukrainians are the client. now look here at this much richer client on top. this ukrainian oligarch, one of the most important figures now. federal prosecutors allege he's linked to the russian mob and hired these two fox news analysts who trump also tried to hire as his lawyers. they are legally representing a conservative writer who was pushing the ukraine scandal before there was one, before the trump call, before the funding, before the calls for a biden

probe. take a look back in april. this man was writing headlines like this in the dc paper "the hill." joe biden's 2020 ukrainian might mare: a closed probe is revived. interesting prediction there because that is the outcome ta donald trump was looking for and giuliani was pushing and furtash who is linked through these lawyers to the person that wrote this headline has other reasons for seeking influence. he's fighting extradition to the u.s. on corruption charges and hired, guess who, lanny davis as his lawyer for that. that's something davis was doing until last year. he's typically closer to democrats in the u.s. and he represents another former trump lawyer, michael cohen who is currently in jail. put it altogether here and you see he's key and has been funding efforts to dig up this ukrainian dirt, including some of those very documents that giuliani waived around where?

on fox news, where there are lawyers who work for furtash. i want to clear, everyone has a right to a lawyer and lawyers sometimes innocently represent several people in a similar case and they have common facts so it could save time. but these webs could spell trouble for trump's impeachment argument because they raise other questions about nonlegal matters like whether people are hiding behind lawyers to do other dirty work or whether foreign actors are throwing money around to influence u.s. foreign policy and whether donald trump's pension for people to donate their work for him from paul manafort to giuliani creates new risks. it is one thing for someone to volunteer and another if people volunteer for one client in order to sell access and make money from other clients. >> and i think i offer to this is something unique. i'm a lawyer who knows the

criminal justice system as well as anybody in america. i'm also a very good friend of donald trump. >> oh, he's a very good friend of donald trump. factor that in how you want. then there is a recording giuliani did not mean to release, this accidental voice mail to reporter where he speaks about foreign business and giuliani's stated problem, getting more money. >> the problem is we need some money. we need a few thousand. >> this is about a lot more than lawyers billable hours. giuliani is spending thousands of dollars traveling around the world on these ukraine missions. do people think he's donating that spending out-of-pocket, too? giuliani has assisted this is work for the president, which could make it worse according to anti-corruption experts. take trevor potter who ran the federal election commission, was the top lawyer for the 2008 mccain campaign running against obama. he sounded the alarm saying we have no idea who is paying rudy

giuliani. he went on to explain how this arrangement sidesteps ethics obligations that would require transparency behind the domestic interests who are paying him, giuliani. remember, foreign money cannot go to u.s. campaigns or political projects or the president. that's a felony. when foreign money creeps into the defense fund-raising for a different president, it was a bombshell that ultimately led to indictments. >> we have more on the money trail tonight. hundreds of thousands of dollars reported in the democratic national committee and the president's defense fund from foreign sources. >> $640,000, much of it money was brought to the clinton defense money by charlie tree. >> it is illegal. now if you are hearing this all laid out you might be thinking about the problem here. trump's facing potential impeachment for demanding porn help for his political goals. now his most visible criminal defense attorney is under fire

for getting foreign help for his political goals. and giuliani won't say who pays him, which is impeachment probe is now asking. he's also under criminal investigation under foreign influence laws among other things. it is not good when your defense lawyer's problems sound like your own problems and with all these lawyers there add to your problems. all these lawyers there add to your problems you got? a lot. how many problem a ot mr. savage addresses a once loyal witness who spoke out against him saying, gang versus the world -- me and my dog, it was us you went and wrote a statement and that really messed me up lots of lawyers, lot we have a journalist with exclusive reporting on all of this, when we come back.

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now we take a look at all the lawyers in this, questions about rudy giuliani's pro bono work for donald trump, unusual arrangement. in the 1990s there were lawyers for bill clinton who asked the government ethics office if he could use a similar pro bono approach, they said no, not ethical. we have that detail thanks to brand-new reporting by hunter walker, white house correspondent for yahoo! news. his piece is about who pays for the president's lawyers and why working for free can be so problematic. another legal expert, melissa murray back at the table. good evening, everyone. hunter, what did you find? >> so i worked on the story with my colleague lupe loupe pin. basically we started by trying to ask a fundamental question, who is paying the president's legal team? and what we found out is that we don't really know. rudy giuliani had two words when i asked if he's working pro bono. yes, sir. jay sekulow would not comment at

all on his payment structure. and this raises a lot of questions, because as you pointed out, in the clinton impeachment, which is really the only prior example of this, because there were new ethical -- a new landscape of ethical regulations that came up after watergate so clinton is all we can compare this to. they went to the office of government ethics for consultation on their saidup. jay sec ow low told me, i don't deal with that, i'm not a government employee. he didn't get this consultation. and so we don't have any of the safeguards the clinton team put in place. it raises a lot of questions for legal experts because the worry here is that in giving free legal services to the president, which rudy guiliani says he's doing, you could potentially be giving him a valuable gift. that exposes him to undue influence. then in the case of jay sekulow where we don't understand his income streams, other people,

outside interests, could be coming in, trying to influence these people who are close to the president and providing him with services. >> as you reported out this story did paul manafort's name come up or loom large, given he oddly worked for free during the campaign, which again, in and of itself was not illegal, but he ultimately was convicted of many crimes that relate to the same kind of corruption that made people question why someone who was in debt and worked so hard to travel around the world trying to make money was suddenly interested in working for free? >> i think you're absolutely right, that paul manafort is a good example of sort of the risks and questions we should be asking when someone's trying to work for the president. bill clinton's story also provided an example of evidence that outside interests and unsavory figures might use the legal team to try to get close to the president. in his case, with the consultation of the oge, they set up a trust. this banned foreign donations,

it capped donations at a maximum, and only individuals, corporations and other groups -- >> and they still had influence with foreign interests getting in there. melissa? >> again, the question, and this is the question the office of government ethics will have, the question of undue influence, whether or not you can actually track all the money coming in. that was the issue for the clintons, they had to put everything in the legal trust capped at $1,000 contributions, and they still had problems with chinese investors, whether or not there was improper influence. that's the question here. the question with rudy giuliani i think is even more complicated. right now rudy giuliani is going through an acrimonious divorce with his third wife. there have been suggestions from media outlets part of this pro bono free structure is to perhaps make a claim he doesn't have the same income he might have had that would be available either for alimony or property distribution in that divorce. so there are different areas of law that are being fielded.

the question with regard to presidential authority and the legal profession and ethical question, then this question about the family law portion of this. they're overlapping in this case. >> hunter, ultimately did you find anyone that didn't want to get into this at all with you, or everyone was responsive even if the response was, i'm not telling you where i get my money? >> well, yeah, as you said, jay sekulow would not give us any details on that. rudy giuliani did not respond to a lot of detailed questions about the ethical issues surrounding his pro bono thing. but i think a really important point is this is not necessarily illegal. the oge has nonbinding rules. we saw the trump team brush this off when they reprimanded kellyanne conway for violating the hatch act. >> attempted collusion isn't always indictable either, but we're way past those distinctions and people are asking, what's the conspiracy that people don't want being hatched in the oval office? >> clearly very deep in a murky gray area, i'll say that.

>> hunter walker, melissa murray, thanks to both of you. thanks for watching our msnbc special. find me on weeknights. it's "the beet," 6:00 p.m. eastern. it started as a 30-minute phone call between two presidents. it erupted into a full-scale scandal that now threatens to bring down donald trump. >> today i'm announcing the house of representatives is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. >> our president sacrificed our national security and our constitution for his personal political benefit. >> they've been trying to impeach me from the day i got elected. and you know what? they failed. >> you've seen the head