night right here on the beat at 6:00 p.m. eastern. ho i hope you mark your calendar. hardball with chris matthews is up next. 20 years of hardball. let's play. good evening. ooze i said, on the week of the 20th anniversary of hardball on msnbc. today we're learning what happens to anyone who gets in the cway of president trump's sha shakedown of a foreign government. democrats released over 500 page of testimony from the former u.s. ambassador to ukraine and former state department senior adviser michael mckinley. those transcripts paint a

horrific portrait of a president and his allies who waged war against a career diplomat who got in their way. ambassador was pushed out and told she was under threat. in her testimony, she explains how the director general of foreign service called her at 1:00 a.m. in the foreign quote, she said that there was a lot of concern for me. that i needed to be on the next plane home to washington. this is about your security. you need to come home immediately. you need to come home on the next plane. she goes on the say her removal was the result of a smear campaign orchestrated by rudy giuliani and his business associates. parnus is willing to comply with the congressional subpoena. we will honor and not avoid the

request that they are proper. yovanovithch said she was told that quote, i really needed to watch my back. yovanovitch said they raised concerns. the official told her, it was dangerous to get involved because it would appear ukraine would be getting into u.s. politics. she also testified she felt threatened by president trump. she said she was shocked the president would speak about me or any am baskbassador that way foreign counterpart. i'm joined by peter baker.

thank you. this is ominous because it talks about what happens to someone especially a public servant, a foreign service officer if you get in the way of this. >> we have seen from the beginning of trump presidency is this basically war with the government that the president presides over. from the very start he didn't trust them and expressed that. he compared them to nazis. he's used other phrases to describe civil servants and foreign service diplomats. i think this is sort of the ultimate culmination of that struggle that this has been going on for three years. they have served for decades. i think for three decades their job is to serve who ever happened to be president. when you get in the way of rudy

giuliani and his campaign to pressure ukraine ambassador yovanovitch yovanovitch paid a price and that was stunning to a lot of people who worked for the state department over the last few months how that played out. >> there's no perfect parallels to watergate. they began to be a government of their own breaking into houses, breaking into brookings institution, democratic headquarters, the whole works. these case seem to be break sboing into the state department. they did seem to have the authority of the president behind them. >> any president is within his rights or her rights to remove an ambassador for not supporting

their policies. that's traditional. that's happened before. he seems to have gotten in the way of what's going on outside. outside of the structure and the state department and the national security apparatus. that's where she got in trouble. she was smeared not just a matter of the president saying that ambassador is not serving my agenda, they went after her on fox television. the president's son went after her accusing her of disloyalty publicly. it was something different than the traditional way a president enforces his policy through the civil service. that's one of the things that stood out for other people who worked for years and years in this government and in this foreign service. >> how did she stand as an obstacle to shake down, if you

will, the ukrainian government for dirt on biden's son. how did she stand in the way of that as they saw it to the point they had to get rid of her and scare her out of a job? >> she didn't buy into the theory. the theory was the ukrainians, not the russians hacked the election in 2016 in favor of the democrats. she thought this was nonsensical and there was no evidence for it. even president trump's own homeland security adviser told the president repeatedly this has been a completely debunked theory. in that vain they saw her as somebody who was not going to help get the ukrainians on board to find information that would be helpful in discrediting the mueller report and discrediting the investigation and the whole idea that russia was involved in the 2016 campaign to begin with. >> now we have her transcript and all day in the papers you'll be reading a lot about what

yovanovitch had come forward with. she testified that ambassador gordon sondland told her to could wanter the smear campaign by tweeting her support for the president. that was the plan. say something sweet about him on tweet. she claimed he told her you need to tweet out there that you support the president and all these are lies and everything else. back to this idea of the smallness of the trump space. if you say something nice about him, then you'll be okay with him. it's as simple as that. >> we know flattery works with this president. loyalty matters to him as he perceives it. i can't think of an instance where a career ambassador was expected to go public with that kind of praise of a president in order to kind of keep her job. that's not something that

normally happens. that's very unusual circumstance. that tells you what ambassador sondsland was the key to keeping her job. that's the kind of thing that does work in trump environment. a typical president as we have said, he's not. that goes against the grain of the career of the foreign service servant who doesn't see their job reenforcing a president's ego in that sense. that's where things really fell apart. she wasn't able to sort of adapt to that kind of environment in the way she had been told to do it. >> thank you so much. great having you on. i want to bring in jerry connolly. how did this strike you to hear this woman's story? now that we have the transcript you can talk about how she was threatened. >> very disturbing that the

professional foreign service would be subject to this kind of political corruption, frankly and to smear her because they couldn't get her cooperation in the parallel process of corrupting ukrainian government to get political dirt on a perspective political opponent. they had to smear her to get her removed. they enlisted the help of congressman or former congressman like robert livingston. >> almost speaker. >> and pete sessions of texas, apparently. pete session was chairman of the rules committee. he had no foreign policy responsibility. what is he doing calling and urging the firing of ambassador yovanovitch and here is an honorable, patriot yachtic american being smeared and even the president pursuing that narrative with the president of ukraine. >> the president of the united states behind it all. what did you read into the idea that she gets to call at 1:00 in

the morning, i guess local time where she is in kiev, get home. your safety is involved. how did that hit you when you heard that? >> reallyw horrifying because im old enough to remember u.s. ambassadors who were killed in line of duty. to tell her that is using the ultimate threat to any foreign service diplomat but especially the ambassador in ukraine. >> the president wanting dirt on his political rival, joe biden and doing anything he can including scaring this ambassador out of kiev. michael mckinley, the other transcript that came out today. he spoke three times with secretary of state mike pompeo

about a public show of support for ambassador yovanovitch. he said he never heard anything from mckinley. let's watch. >> from the time that ambassador yovanovitch departed till the time he came to tell me he was departing, i never heard him say a single thing about his concerns with respect to the decision. not once, george did ambassador mckinley say something to me. >> congressman, somebody is lying here. mckinley testified he -- >> under oath. >> is this some sort of administration thing where you cover up for the president no matter what. >> i would say it's a very convenient memory by secretary pompeo. it's a shameful moment that one of your sacred duties is to protect the foreign services of the united states. we have done that for over 200 years.

even if mckin lley talked to pompeo, why from the slander. >> why not? >> he's a coward and enabler and his disqualified himself from continued service as secretary of state. >> you wonder how pricey public office is at the top now, what people will do. the price they will pay in terms of character. >> and for what. >> for what? for whales? >> great to have you on. coming up, the president's weak impeachment defense. trump says there was no quid pro quo but if there was, there's nothing wrong with it. he's demanding the outing of the whistle-blower. he's looking for another peter s struzk. we have much more to get to tonight. stick with us. o

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house democrats are moving up the impeachment inquiry even as president trump's defense grows increasingly more frenzied. as the republican defense on impeachment is showing cracks right now. house intelligence share adam schiff said the four administration sno shno shows c only add to the case against president trump. watch this. >> this will only further add to the body of evidence on a potential obstruction of congress charge against the president. >> the washington post reported a growing number of senate republicans are ready to

acknowledge president trump used military aid as leverage to investigate the bidens. in this shift in strategy they are insisting the president's action was not illegal and does not rise to the level of impeachable offense. these senate republicans conflict with the argument president trump tweeted last night. false stories are being reported that a few republican senators are saying that president trump may have done a quid pro quo. it doesn't matter. there's nothing wrong with that. it's not an event. perhaps so. read the transcript. there's no quid pro quo. that's all trump's argument. it conflicts with top house republicans that there was no quid pro quo with ukraine. >> look at anybody they brought forth. there's no quid pro quo. there's nothing this president has done wrong. >> you're saying you believe it didn't happen? >> it wasn't about the 2020 election.

it was about what had happened prior in 2016, corruption in ukraine. >> i don't think there was a kwur quid pro quo. the aid is there and the investigations didn't happen. if there was a quid pro quo, it wasn't effective. >> that guy is so much smarter than those guys. i would like to slam a lie detector on him right now. i didn't believe a word he said on "meet the press" yesterday. barbara, can you tell if somebody is lying through their teeth? did you watch him yesterday? his eyes were all over the place. he couldn't look at chuck todd. he couldn't answer directly. there was all this quibbling and gee whiz. your thoughts. >> shifting stories are something that raises a red flag for investigators that somebody may not be telling the truth, discomfort, shifting, all of those physical signs of discomfort.

i think one of the reasons president trump is adamant about this mantre of no quid pro quo is he's a salesman. you don't shoplift tift the sto. you stick with one story. in same way the mueller investigation about no collusion, no obstruction. his mantre is no quid pro quo. read a transcript. it's a diversionary tactic to draw attention away from what he did which is, in my view, imp f impeachab impeachable. he was selling the nation's national security. both of those whether they were part of a quid pro quo is an abuse of power that's impeachable. >> let me tell you something, this would be a challenge. the transcript or the summary, which he will make available, he said he will recite on fdr,

fireside chat style. is he going to say the words i want a favor from you though. is he going to say that? >> the summary is a distortion already. he will say that and won't mention say the words biden in the original. the difference between the house and senate republican s the house republicans are willing to look like morons for the cause. >> because they represent republican districts. >> and the senate republicans are -- >> because they represent states. a lot of democrats. >> they don't want the look like total idiots. here is the answer to this question about is attempted extortion a problem. today, the fbi annoyanced and thank god for this, they have apprehended a man that planned to blow up a synagogue in colorado over the weekend. fbi was about to apprehends him and the question is that a crime. >> but he's guilty. >> the bomb never went off. no one was hurt.

no crime, no foul that's the logic of the president. >> the truth of that and the relevance. let me give you another one. barbara here is another one. richard nixon tells his chief of staff, tell the fbi to get off the case investigating watergate because it's a cia matter. the cia never did that. they never followed through. they never told the fbi to get off the case. nixon was impeached for that conversation where he tried to do something that wasn't followed through with just like now. your thoughts. >> yeah. it makes perfect sense as david was explaining. attempt is a crime. the person is just as morally blameworthy and just as dangerous as just as in need of criminal punishment when they attempt and fail as when they succeed through no effort of their own sometimes people are successful and sometimes they fail because other people

intervene before they can skds. what president trump did was expose our nation to danger, withholding military aid and inviting a foreign government to interfere with our election. >> they did withhold military aid. they did hold back on the missiles. they did do that. >> when they used the language of attempt, there's the suggestion that no harm was done. a dozen -- >> there was harm done. >> a dozen ukrainian soldiers died in the month of august. 50 ukrainian soldiers were killed or wounded in september because they held it up. the aid was released on september 11th of this year. the whistle-blower report went to the intelligence committee on september 9th. what cause the aid to be released is he knew the cops were at his door. at that point he let the you kran y -- ukrainians have their money. >> kellyanne conway said she doesn't know if president trump held up aid to ukraine.

>> was there a time when military aid was held up because the president wanted y eed ukra look into their biden? >> i don't know. i know they got their aid. >> it's possible in. >> here is what is absolutely unimpeachablely true. ukraine has the aids. they have more aid than in the previous administration. >> you won't say yes or no. quid pro quo, yes or no? >> i don't know whether aid was being held up. >> she's a bit conflicted there because she said i don't know whether the aid was held up but she said it was not held up but then she said it was held up. she wouldn't admit whether it was a quid pro quo deal that she doesn't know because she doesn't want to ask. that's the smart role, don't ask the boss what happened because it did happen. barbara. >> as david points out there there was a day. that alone means it happened.

even if it didn't happen, if you took the military aids piece out and you focus where president trump is asking ukraine to interfere with our election, that alone is an abuse of power that's impeachable. either one of these occurring alone regardless of whether one was tied to the other. the other within president trump wants to focus on this transcript and talk about no quid pro quo is he want to divert attention from the other illegal activity from rudy giuliani. we know he traveled to ukraine and france and poland and met with ukrainians in new york to talk about this. he was intimidating the ambassador in ukraine because he was an anti-corruption crusader. it's the whole opepisode that matters. >> i don't know how republicans in their conservative thinking how they can say it's okay for a president to hold up military aid to an ally who is under duress to get dirt on his

political opponent. if fdr said to churchill, if he had been told first you have to get some dirt on my political opponent. is there a single republican in the country that wouldn't have found that impeachable? a single republican. in this case which is identical they won't admit it. thank you. up next, president trump and his alt lies are ramping up their attempts to learn the identity. they want to go after the little whistle-blower with an eye on discrediting that person. they want another peter strzok. it's irrelevant because the facts are out. irrelevant becau facts are out. i am the twisting thundercloud.

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scandal. th that's because an avalanche of hard evidence and eyewitness testimony have corroborated the stunning details. with the facts aligned firmly against him, the president continues to target the whistle-blower with smears and disinformation and he remains fixated on the whistle-blower's identity which is protected by laws. >> the whistle-blower should be revealed because the whistle-blower gave false stories. some people would call it a fraud. i won't go that far but when i read it closely, i probably would. the whistle-blower should be revealed. >> trump's obsession with the whistle-blower reveals the absurdity of his thinking that he believes he can erase the direct evidence of his wrong doing by outing the person who first exposed him.

this comes as the whistle-blower's attorney said yesterday his client is willing to answer questions from republican lawmakers under oath in writing. trump responded this morning saying he must be brought forward to testify. written answers are not acceptable but a little memory as nbc news points out written answers are what trump provided to the special counsel during the russian probe. written answers. he insisted on only giving written answers. i'm joined by democratic u.s. senator chris murphy of connecticut. the contradictions here are unending, senator. your thoughts about the whistle-blower. why is trump, i'll play dumb here? why is he going after a guy, probably not sure, man or woman, the whistle-blower told us what to look for. the congress investigated and got 13 witnesses to point out the truth. why does it matter who first gave us the tip? >> it doesn't matter add all as others have pointed out. if somebody calls in a fire and the fire department arrives and

sees a burning buildings, they don't care who call because what he reported was true and as you said, you have over a dozen witness who is have corroborated everything the whistle-blower said and then some. what he wants to do is try to change the story -- >> for who? who is his audience? >> he's in the business of base protection right now. he knows that the story is out. he knows there are enough people in the house of representatives, i think, that are likely going to move forward on impeachment. he's trying to hold his republicans together to survivor what is the biggest corruption scandal that the country has seen in many of our political lifetimes. >> i think he devilishly projects the low information voter. there's a guy in the bar somewhere, route 40 on a friday night that will say you know, he actually, you can't trust that whistle-blower.

>> right. >> that's only once. even though that doesn't matter. that guy will say that to the guy sitting next to him. and the guy say that's true. that's only once. >> it will create an agenda for this whistle-blower and he'll focus all of his energies on the whistle-blower -- >> because he gave 50 bucks to hillary four years ago or something like that. >> we're spending a lot of time talking about this. folks out in america, this is not the top of mind right issue for them. they are still talking about health care. >> depends which bar you goes to. i think some places they are talking about. a guy wearing a maga hat at the baseball team. there are people out there. nbc news reporting that trump's allies are still seeking dirt from ukraine, as we speak, despite the impeachment inquiry. while congress heard closed door testimony last week, rudy giuliani was holding his own private ukraine meeting in his manhattan office.

specifically, he met with a former ukrainian dip lolomat wh allegations they con fired with the democratic committee to hurt trump. he's out there trying to build case that ukraine got involved in the 2016 election to the advantage of hillary clinton. somehow they got the server from the dnc over to kiev. >> this is totally bananas. you don't have to move two or three steps before you come to a dead end. there is no server. nobody has it. the information is in something called the cloud that is beyond the realm of understanding by the president. because right now he is getting almost complete protection from republicans because he likely believes he's going to be able the survivor this. >> do they believe this? do you think mitch mcconnell believes any of this crap they are putting out? they are smart.

i do believe we need lie detector tests. they stated stuff like tom, i've watched that guy for years. why is he out there selling this stuff? >> why have they put up with any of it going back if for the las two and a half years. they still have primaries to get through and they are scared of this guy. they are trying to look out for themselves. the liability, the victim here is the country. >> well said. following the house impeachment vote last week republican congressman gohmert is one of the biters carthers called the cou coup. >> it's about o push this country to a civil war if they were to get their wishes. if there's one thing i don't want to see in my lifetime, i don't ever want to have participation in is a civil war.

some historian, i don't remember who, said guns are only involved in the last phase of a civil war. >> you got stone wall gohmert trying to start it again but he's talking it up. >> republicans weren't worried about civil conflict during the clinton impeachment. this debate will be red hot on both sides. this president has committed offenses that frankly make those committed by richard nixon appear as child's play and in the 1970s it was republicans that went to the president and convinced him it was time to step down. it's up to republicans to convince them whether we want to go through with this all the way to the end or have a similar conversation with the president. >> maybe mitt romney. maybe. thank you. up next, we're 364 days from the presidential election with some new polls on battleground

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according to several polls

more americans want you to be impeached. >> you're reading the wrong polls. >> i have the real polls. i have the real polls. the cnn polls are fake. the fox polls have always been louse lousy. the real polls, if you look at the polls. >> 50% of american pps. >> you look at the polls that came out this morning, people don't want anything to do with impeachment. it's a phony scam. a it's a hoax. >> that was president trump yesterday down playing a series of recent polls showing a plurality of americans think the president should be impeached and removed from office. the new nbc wall street journal poll shows 49% of adults say they want trump, out, period. 49% don't. that's a nine point swing from early october. he's losing on the trend line here. in the midst of the impeachment inquiry, he's trailing most of the leading democratic rivals.

the nbc wall street journal poll shows joe biden and elizabeth warren leading the president by high single digits. in a fox news poll, shows biden is leading larger at 12 points. both senators warren and bernie sanders are also ahead in that poll. mayor pete buttigieg runs even with the president. the election will be won or lost in a bhandful of states. polls show six of those states, battleground states that paint a picture of where this contest really stands. stick around. that's coming up next. you're watching hardball. next. you're watching hardball as soon as the homeowners arrive, we'll inform them that liberty mutual customizes home insurance, so they'll only pay for what they need. your turn to keep watch, limu. wake me up if you see anything. [ snoring ]

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so, give that just saw a puppy look. and whatever that look is. look like you... with fewer lines. see results at botoxcosmetic.com welcome back to hardball. one year for the 2020 election. new polling today from six battleground states that president trump won in 2016 shows the president still highly competitive in those states most likely to decide his re-election. the new york times looked at michigan, pennsylvania, wisconsin, florida, arizona and north carolina and found former vice president joe biden with small lead in fooiive of those states. bernie sanders the president is leading or even in all but michigan. again senator elizabeth warren the president is leading her in

every single of those six states except arizona where they are even. she doesn't win anywhere. all these matchups remain within the margin of error which is critical. kimber kimberly, what do you make of that in it was a shocker that he is quite within striking distance of winning all the states he's need. >> it's not that shocking to me if you look at the support he's had among his base. it's remain steady for four years. if you look at how many republicans support him, it's dipped a bit but it's still well over 80%. he has basically created this wall, i hate to use that term of support that's remained elastic over this time. the difference has to be what the democrat does in this race. it's the same issues he's pushing are the ones from 2016

that brought people around. the economy is still fairly good as of now. there are signs that could change. that makes him strong. what you have to have is the democrat who democrats believe can beat him and i think at this point, joe biden is the known commodity and we see him doing a little better. we see elizabeth warren slipping a bit. she's the second choice of a lot of voters. there's room for her to move up but the fact that the race is this close in these battleground states and donald trump is winning against some of these candidates, i don't think, is surprising. >> what's your reaction to these numbers? he's not in command but very much in the game. i think these should be sobering for democrats. how much more water could the president be taking on than at this moment where he's on the verge of being impeached for easy to understand scandal and his supporters are still with him. you see at the rallies how energized they are.

>> what happens to the well educated voters that know. they may have voted for him last time because they are tired of the two party establish ments bt they know who he is. they teach their kids not to use that language and tell the kids don't this, and grand kids. how can they vote for this guy? >> there are energized on the other side to be sure but what about voters, maybe soft republicans who are terrified of medicare for all or very concerned about not making immigration, coming across the border illegally a crime anymore. these are issues that puts some of those swing voters in peril and those are issues that elizabeth warren -- >> what do you make of that 17%? people waiting to see who the democrat is. >> there's a lot of the candidate who is are not named joe biden are having a tough time to breakthrough a and introduce themselves nationally

to voters. >> do you think they will like him when they breakthrough in. >> we'll have to wait and see. there's more debates up ahead. i don't think it's that surprising at all. two-thirds of voters who voted for trump but voted for democrat in the midterm say they are likely to vote for trump again. i don't think this is black and white. there's a lot of people who can move around. when you can't point directly to the mid terms to say there's a sea change, there's a blue wave. presidential elections are different than congressional ones. >> >> that's why we call it a battleground because they go back and forth. president trump is speaking right now at a rally in lexington, kentucky. it's his fifth rally since nancy pelosi announced the impeachment inquiry. he just talked about impeachment. let's watch. >> the media and the democrats have launched an even more brazen assault on our nation with a deranged hyperpartisan impeachment witch hunt. they have been plotting to overthrow the election since the

first hour that we won, and actually before we won. with last week's vote, the far left has declared war on american democracy itself. >> so those shirts worn by the people who were put up behind him, everybody does this, they place them there, say read the transcript. so people believe, first of all, that it's a transcript and not a summary, and they believe it exonerates this president. >> it's the reverse. you read the transcript and you're convinced that there's a quid pro quo. how can you come to any other conclusion. >> if you read the transcript. >> if you read the transcript. but the president has a narrative that's pretty consistent. the challenge is will democrats have an easy to understand convincing -- >> who's going to do it? >> i think adam schiff leading the committee hopes to do this in the public hearings. >> do you think there's a democrat you could put on television for 15 minutes, that's all you need, to explain

why this president should be impeached for the american people to an southeastebsorb it them accept it? is there such a person? >> it would have to be the speaker i think would probably be the best person of all of them. i think trump has already labeled adam schiff. adam schiff is already a villain among trump world. >> he made a mistake, one mistake. thank you, susan page, kimberly atkins. up next, 20 years of "hardball" on msnbc. >> chris matthews, 20 years. how do you do it? you're an inspiration, you're a joy, you're a pleasure and one of my favorites to be on the air with. congratulations, my friend. >> congratulations on 20 years. this is nautica reaot career, b this is tweng20 years of one position. on behalf of this loyal viewer, thanks my friend for always asking the questions that matter every night of the week. congratulations. every night of the week. congratulations.

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should the woman be punished for having an abortion? >> look -- >> this is not something you can

dodge. if you say abortion is a crime or abortion is murder, you have to deal with it under the law. should abortion be punished? >> well, people in certain parts of the republican party and conservative republicans would say yes, they should be punished. >> how about you? >> i would say that it's a very serious problem. >> do you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no, as a principle? >> the answer is that there has to be some form of punishment. >> for the woman? >> yeah, there has to be some form. >> yeah. welcome back to "hardball." that was my interview with then candidate donald trump back in 2016, my last interview with him obviously. over the past two decades i've had the honor of interviewing many presidents, from gerald ford and jimmy carter to barack obama. >> what are you going to do in that first debate when al gore tries to knock your teeth out with one chop after the other, you're going to scare the old ladies. what are you going to do with this guy? >> i don't know if i can stay on the same stage with him. >> you've made it a statement that you're standing by the decision that you made, the

momentous decision to pardon your predecessor in the white house. just talk about your feelings about that decision after all these -- well, it's a quarter century ago. >> i feel more strongly today, chris, than i did when i actually signed the pardon document. and i'm pleased to see that the public are now supportive of what i did in that very tough decision. >> has a woman president, has that time arrived, obviously talking about secretary clinton. >> i think it's always been here. we should have considered that women were equal to men in public office. i'm not taking a position in this election but just to show america lags behind in women holding public office and women getting equal pay. >> it's worth reminding americans that every election is a choice. if you have to run against the ideal, if it's a referendum, every one of us would get beat. nobody would get elected.

we'd have nobody in office because there's no such thing as the perfect public servant. >> how many kids here want to go into politics? >> that's a pretty good number. >> are they right? >> it continues to be a way to serve that i think can be noble. it's hard. it can be frustrating. you've got to have a thick skin. but i tell you, the satisfaction you get when you've passed a law or you've taken an executive action and somebody comes up to you and says, you know what, my kid's alive because you passed that health care bill, because he was uninsured. he got insurance, got a checkup and we caught a tumor in time. or you see somebody that says, you know, you helped me save my house. i can't tell you what that means.

it's pretty hard to get greater satisfaction than that. >> tune in all week to catch more exciting moments of the past two decades. be sure to follow "hardball" on twitter and enter to win exclusive "hardball" 20th am verse commemorative prizes. i'm not kidding you, some prizes out there. that's "hardball" for now. "all in with chris hayes" starts right now. tonight on "all in" -- >> why not release the transcripts? >> release the darn transcripts. >> we want to know what's going on. >> here come the transcripts. >> yeah, they're going to release the real transcripts. >> the first impeachment inquiry transcripts have been released. >> mr. president, was marie yovanovitch the target of a smear campaign by your allies? >> tonight what we learned from marie yovanovitch with igor and lev and hannity? as the white house blocks more key witnesses. >> we have seen a series of shifting,