tomorrow i will. >> okay. enjoy your weekend off. meantime, there's a whole lot going on. hello, i'm chris jansing in for andrea mitchell. blocker in chief. the president says he will release the transcript from yet another call with the ukraine president as he blocks his chief of staff from testifying to the impeachment committees. here is his reasoning. >> i don't want to give credibility to a corrupt witch hunt. i would love to have mick go up, except one thing. it validates a corrupt investigation. late bloomer. billionaire businessman mike bloomberg takes steps to declare a run for the presidential nomination. could he unite the democrats and beat president trump? >> i have reservations about the people running and the way they're campaigning and the promises they're making that they can't fulfill. >> i don't think democracy should be about people coming in

and buying elections. black voters for trump? african-americans in atlanta weigh in as president trump launches an effort to win black support. >> unemployment is the lowest on record. it is off the charts. i would say that's good for black people. >> i don't agree with his policies or the way he conducts himself, the way he represents the united states of america. good day. i am chris jansing in for andrea. president trump arriving in georgia this hour after a sprawling white house south lawn performance this morning, tackling some of the major political obstacles facing his administration. first, dismissing the details within those damning transcripts of key impeachment inquiry depositions. >> in some cases they really turned out to be very much honest and fair. but in no cases that i've heard, in in cases that i see, have i been heard. this is just a continuation of

the hoax. it's a disgraceful thing. >> then the president again taking issue with reporting, first from "the washington post." he urged white house officials into asking bill barr to have a press conference defending his phone call. >> i never asked him to have a press conference. you know why i wouldn't do it? because the phone call was perfect. >> and new comments on acting chief of staff mick mulvaney's refusal to appear and give his own deposition to house democrats, defying a subpoena issued on thursday. >> i would love to have him go up, i would love to have almost every person go up when they know me. what i don't like is when they put all these people that i never met before. the people that i know, i would love to have them go up. the rest is up to the lawyers, i have to do what the lawyers say to a certain extent. >> joining me now, nbc white house correspondent kristen welker. nbc's geoff bennett on capitol

hill. nick burns, former u.s. ambassador to nato. matt mclarty, former white house chief of staff to president clinton. and msnbc political analyst phil rucker and "washington post" bureau chief. take us through the key points when it comes to the impeachment inquiry and the trump inner circle. it was, chris, what you saw from president trump, it was defiance before he departed for atlanta, not surprising. you played some of the key takeaways. i thought it was notable that president trump said i don't think we should have these public hearings, i think it's a hoax. of course the public hearings set to begin next week. the white house ramping up its communications team ahead of that and clearly the president ramping up his messaging. that stood out to me, of course, because he's been slamming this entire process because it's been behind closed doors, almost egging democrats on to hold the hearings in public. now he's going to get his wish and that's what's going to

happen next week. clearly some concerns inside trump world, chris, about how that is going to play out when you have these transcripts, this testimony that so far has been in written form out in the open for the public to see and hear for themselves. the impact could be quite different. you also have president trump signaling that he is open to releasing his first phone call with the president of ukraine. that took place on april 21st. this is something that president trump has said before but he really leaned into that today. and you have him taking new aim at the whistle-blower, again signaling he's pushing for the whistle-blower's name to be revealed, and going back to the talking point of the whole impeachment inquiry being a hoax. this is a playbook from the past, he's taking it out once again as the impeachment inquiry continues to ramp up. >> another page from his playbook, geoff, is president trump saying he's not afraid of the details we're seeing from these transcripts.

but next week we will get that public testimony that democrats believe will be a game changer. the president said a short time ago they shouldn't even be having public hearings. are republicans on the hill worried that these public hearings could move the dial with voters? >> publicly they say they aren't, chris. but it's hard to tell what to make of it because for weeks republicans have been calling on adam schiff to open up the impeachment proceedings, yet today president trump says there shouldn't be public hearings at all. i would like to clear up something that i think could be confusing for people, because president trump again is talking about this phone call. he says the july 25th call was perfect, he now says he might introduce the transcript or the summary of another call he seems to think would be exculpatory. democrats debate that point, though, because on the july 25th call, when president zelensky, if you go back and read it, when he brought up this ukrainian aid specifically, he talks about the purchase of american antitank

missiles, president trump's response is, "i would like you to do us a favor, though." democrats point to that as fairly damning. the other point they make is that the case they're building, chris, is not about any one or perhaps any two phone calls. they say that what is clear from the evidence and the testimony that they've been taking for the last three weeks behind closed doors, what is clear is that the phone calls existed as part of a coordinated campaign that started in the spring and carried out into the late summer. that is what we expect the testimonies from fiona hill and lieutenant colonel alexander vindman, when we get those today, based on our previous reporting, we expect those two witnesses to speak to that effect, that it was rudy giuliani who was deputized and under giuliani, you had gordon sondland, rick perry, kurt volker, all working with this shadow foreign policy in ukraine to get the ukrainian officials to open investigations that would be politically beneficial to president trump. >> and in fact we're just hearing from our producer,

frank, on the hill with you, that those transcripts could be released any time now, so people can stand by for those. phil, let's talk about mick mulvaney. it's been a rough few weeks for him at the white house. now he's waving off a subpoena. on the one hand, maybe that's one way to get back in the president's good graces. on the other hand, we're hearing he was told to ignore it. >> he's following the directive that president trump and white house counsel said, which is for everybody in the white house not to participate in this inquiry. obviously a number of administration officials have defied that directive from the president to go up to capitol hill, but not the white house chief of staff. he could be a key witness if he were to participate with his testimony because of all the meetings and conversations he's been a part of with the president, because of his role as the chief of staff, and as the omb director in the foreign aid and the decision that the president made to withhold or delay that foreign aid to ukrai

ukraine. so there's a lot, i think, that congress wants to ask of him. he had that rocky press conference a few weeks ago when he acknowledged a quid pro quo, then backed away from it after the fact. the president has been frustrated with him at times here but he remains the acting chief of staff and under a heap of scrutiny at the moment. >> matt, you were chief of staff. can you imagine defying a congressional subpoena? >> i certainly can remember testifying before congress as well as grand juries during that period. that's part of today's political landscape. and the chief of staff can be the chief javelin catcher and mick mulvaney probably feels that way. but i think president trump was warming up this morning before he headed south again to continue his tour. but i think, you know, you noted, and phil and others have noted a vulnerability there, an unease. the fact that chief of stuff mulvaney was apparently not included in the al baghdadi

situation room i think is a point to be noted here. so i think there is some unease. >> and i'm always asking you about how normal white houses operate, and we know that this is not that. but publicly, mac, this white house says there's not an impeachment war room, although we know, kristen has reported on this, they've created this sort of de facto war room, among other things, to keep a whip count, to solidify republican senate support for acquittal at least in that sense. does the white house seem to be getting prepared for whatever comes their way? >> i think that's to be determined. i think certainly president trump has said i am the war room, i am the spokesman here, he said that about a week ago, and he's now brought in two skilled and experienced political operatives to play some of that role. speaker gingrich really gave the same counsel i did about a week ago when i was asked about it. president clinton really took a very different approach.

he took an approach, let's deal with the inquiries and the controversy but i want to focus on doing the people's business. and that seemed to be perhaps the best strategy under a difficult situation. that seemed to be a pretty effective strategy for president clinton. president trump is not following that. >> it was a lot about impeachment but not all about impeachment, nick burns. one of the more eyebrow-raising comments came from the president when he was asked about russian president putin, inviting him to the may day parade. take a listen. >> i'm thinking about it. it's right in the middle of our campaign season. i would certainly think about it. president putin invited me to -- it's a very big -- it's a very big deal, uh, celebrating the end of the war, et cetera, et cetera. so i appreciate the invitation. it is right in the middle of political season so i'll see if i can do it. i would love to go if i could. >> i would love to go if i could, nick burns, your thoughts

on that. >> i actually think it's something the president has to consider. i mean, this would be the 75th anniversary of the end of world war ii. we were allied with the soviets to defeat hitler. we have sanctioned russia appropriately, president obama, and now the trump administration, over crimea. we have to contain russian power in eastern europe but at the same time neither president obama nor president trump, obviously, have cut off relations with president putin. this is a highly symbolic event that's important in the history of the united states. i think actually any president would have to consider this. >> not to disagree, but it's a highly symbolic event that many presidents would consider, but this is a president who has been obviously criticized for being in the pocket of vladimir putin. this is somebody who has been an apologist or at least excused what we know to have happened, that the russians were

interfering in our election, and that they are likely to be interfering in our election even as we speak. do those things not factor into it? >> i have been a vocal critic of president trump for his weakness towards president putin, for not standing up for nato, for what happened in the 2016 election. but in you're in the white house, in a way you're representing our veterans that fought in the second world war. there are few, unfortunately, that are left given the time that has passed. if i were advising the president i would say, don't make a decision now, see what happens in the u.s./russia relationship, but certainly it has to be considered. i would just say, chris, next week you'll see three nonpartisan, professional, foreign service officers, bill

taylor, masha yovanovitch, and george kent. george kent, if you read his transcript that was just released, he's talking about the morality of president trump trying to push the ukrainians to investigate the bidens, how immoral that was. he's also talking about the fact, this links back to your question about putin, that for 30 years now since the end of the cold war, every president has tried very hard to counsel the east europeans to act like democracies. the trump administration, rudy giuliani, was asking the ukrainians to act like thugs and actually to act like authoritarians. this testimony this week, next week, george kent, could be very powerful. i think he's a vital figure here. >> ambassador, a lot is hanging on that, as you know. what the democrats are arguing is already out there. the evidence is already out there. and so a lot of what they're talking about is, these folks are so credible, and what they

have to say in their own words is so stunning, we believe it will move the american people. high, high bar, i think, especially in this polarized time. but you seem to think that could indeed happen. >> i would hope that republicans would have an open mind next week, particularly republicans in the senate and house. these are three foreign service officers, i'm so proud of them, all of us are who are retired foreign service. they've lived a nonpartisan life. they've taken an oath to the constitution. you read the transcripts now released on each of these three people, including a fourth, mike mckinley, these people have always wanted what's best for the united states. they're not political. they saw a series of events that deeply disturbed them and they thought that things happened that were clearly wrong for our country. they're going to be compelling witnesses, highly credible, in my judgment next week. >> phil, in your story in "the post," you read the book coming

out next month from anonymous. nbc news has not been able to confirm the contents of the book but needless to say, it's very rough on the president. here is one of the excerpts on how president trump allegedly speaks about women. quote, he comments on makeup. he makes jokes about weight. he critiques clothing. he questions the toughness of women in and around his orbit. he uses words like sweetie and honey to address accomplished professionals. this is precisely the way a boss shouldn't act in the work environment. this confirms what a lot of people already think, what they've heard and known about this president, they've even heard him on tape. >> right. >> i think it's just one example of many, many examples that confirm what a lot of critics of the president already know about his work ethic, but his behavior inside the white house, about the disorganization inside the white house. having said that, and you having read the whole book, is there anything in there that's surprising, that could move the needle? >> you know, chris, what's

surprising is just how completely sort of damning and chilling this portrait is of the president and the fact that it's authored by somebody who is identified as having worked as a senior official in the administration. so it's not an outside observer making these judgments, it's not a scorned person like omarosa making these judgments, but somebody, said to be a senior level in the white house assessing the president in this way. clearly this author hopes to move the needle with public opinion. the call is essentially a call to action for the american people in the 2020 election to not reelect this president because of the litany of misconduct that is alleged in the book. >> phil rucker, great to have you here. kristen welker, geoff bennett, mack mclarty, nick burns, great to talk to all of you today, thank you so much. coming up, room more bloom? michael bloomberg considering a

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we must unite around the candidate who can defeat a dangerous demagogue. i built a business, and i didn't start it with a million dollar check from my father. trump says he wants to run the nation like he's running his business? god help us. [ cheers and applause ] i'm a new yorker. and i know a con when i see one. >> former new york city mayor michael bloomberg sounding quite a bit like a candidate at the 2016 democratic convention. but now it might just be for real. the billionaire businessman appears ready to jump into the

already crowded 2020 field. he is preparing to file the paperwork in atlanta to meet the filing deadline. today the president reacted to a possible bloomberg run. >> i know michael bloomberg fairly well, not too well, fairly well, well enough. he will not do very well. if he did, i would be happy. there's nobody i would rather run against than little michael. >> joining me now is eleanor randolph, author of "the many lives of michael bloomberg," and bill kristol, director of defending democracy, together with joel payne, former director of media for hillary clinton's 2016 campaign. eleanor, you literally wrote the book on michael bloomberg. >> hi, chris. >> why is he doing this? >> he's 77. he doesn't want to regret not running. and he's looked at it, this is the fourth time he's looked at this race.

now it looks like he's going to run. what do you do, you have 53, 54, who's counting, billion dollars, and he can spend it on himself. and he can run for -- really for super tuesday which is in march, and sort of figure out whether or not he can go forward. >> are you suggesting he might? are you hearing something that he might skip the early primaries? >> i'm not sure he's going to skip them. i don't know whether you can do that, really. i mean, you remember, giuliani tried that, it didn't work so well. but i think he's going to -- if he runs, you know, all of this is up in the air now, i think, but if he runs, he's going to focus on super tuesday, which is march 3rd. and there are 16 states, and it's a really big ton of delegates. and so if he does well, he'll go

forward. if he doesn't, he'll just get involved in other ways. >> bill, you heard him, meaning donald trump, there is nobody he would rather run against. what do you say? >> i don't believe trump. bloomberg will have trouble getting the democratic nomination but if he got it, if he won it in actually democratic primaries, he would be an extremely formidable opponent to trump. he would get all the democrats at that point, and he would get independents and moderate, swing republicans who are anti-trump. bloomberg actually is well-qualified to be president, you may not like him much, you may not like some of his policies, but he was an incredibly successful private sector executive and a successful public sector executive, mayor of a large city. i take eleanor's point that he's 77 and so forth. he really thinks a second term

for donald trump would be bad for the country and he's doubtful that the democrats in the field can beat trump. of course he has ambition, i don't mean to minimize that, and vanity and so forth, but i went he's partly doing this for genuinely public spirited reasons. >> i think, joel, the other thing is, and it's been talked about a lot, there's always a point in the race when democrats have their democratic angst, oh, my god, we don't have a candidate, what are we going to do. but i don't think michael bloomberg or even eric holder who we hear from yuj eveven euge robinson may also be considering. bernie sanders is tweeting, the billionaire class is scared and should be scared. this is what elizabeth warren told nbc's harry smith.

>> i don't think democracy should be about people coming in and buying elections. i think what it ought to be about -- >> is this pointed at michael bloomberg? >> it's pointed at everybody who thinks the way to run this democracy is through the billionaires, the corporate executives, the pacs. it's about how we think democracy works. >> the bottom line is, is he somebody who could unite moderate and progressive voters. >> you know, it's an interesting thing about the democratic party. i'm an expert on this, i'm a democrat, and democrats tend to like to vote for democrats to be president. mike bloomberg, as you guys know, was mayor for most of his term as a republican and then as an independent. i think his alleged run supposes dissatisfaction with the field of democratic candidates

currently out there, which is nonexistent. >> oh, you really think it's nonexistent? >> yeah, i do. >> because i talk to voters who are very worried and it's interesting, they can tick through the concerns they have with all the top candidates. >> i can find you a voter that thinks kanye west will be donald trump's running mate. i think far and wide democratic voters are happy. i saw a poll that said over 80% were happy with this field of democrats. >> okay, we have the poll. here it is. no, here it is, because you mentioned it, 31% are very satisfied, 54% are fairly satisfied. the numbers for not at all or not barely are barely in double digits. does fairly satisfied suggest to you they're open to something else? >> i'm sure all of these voters are still looking at the field of candidates. you have very popular, very successful democratic candidates like elizabeth warren, bernie sanders, pete buttigieg, kamala

harris, who are all, by the way, polling very favorably against president trump nationally and in several battleground states. look, i get that mike bloomberg has a lot of money and time on his hands but i think there's some progressive issues that a lot of progressives would rather he continue focusing on rather than disrupting the democratic primary. >> he'll also have some things to answer for from his time as president. eleanor, we can already see the headlines, battle of the billionaires, assuming he gets in and that he wins this race. as somebody who knows him really well, how would you care them, beyond a couple of new york businessmen? >> i think they're very different businessmen. bloomberg often says that trump is a real estate dealer. and it's a way to sort of -- it's a putdown. what bloomberg -- if he runs, and i now think he is running,

what he's going to say is that he can manage the country. and, you know, that he's a manager, he's a desired, to use george w.'s term, that he can make things work. there would be days when we wouldn't even look at twitter, maybe twitter would go out of business as a result, but, you know, he often says, you know, i'm not a writer, i'm not a baseball player, i'm not anything else, i'm a person who makes decisions, some good, some balance bad, but that's what i do. and you can -- if you look at how he was mayor, i mean, he was a really good manager. he made mistakes, he made a couple of really big mistakes that we'll hear about over the next a couple of weeks, i'm sure. but he tried to hire the best people. in fact, donald trump called him

right after he was elected, trump was elected, and so bloomberg said that he said to trump, you know, the thing you should do is hire people who are smarter than you are, and of course listen to them. i'm not sure he took that advice in some cases, and i know he didn't listen to a lot of them. >> let me go back to one of your points, because i think it's critical, i sort of alluded to it, bill, things like stop and frisk which will be brought up and will be a problem for him. we're already getting an early look at the trump response on something maybe less consequential, white house press secretary stephanie grisham said this morning, hold on to your sodas, america, which of course is a reference to bloomberg's ban on soda larger than 16 ounces.

>> bloomberg won three elections in new york city, which is not -- he was helped hugely by his resources, he'll be helped by that again this time. he got a lot of votes from people not billionaires and he got some votes from communities who will be represented as hostile to him. some of them will be hostile and there are legitimate issues there, and criticisms from the right about the nanny state aspects of his managerial style. having said that, i think a good chunk of voters, including democratic primary voters, might decide, competent, middle of the road, no drama. new york city works, people visit new york and think, somebody's been doing something right over the last a couple of decades because it's in a lot better shape than it was in the 1990s.

>> thanks to all. coming up, the next step, public impeachment hearings are kicking off next week on capitol hill. will there be a shift as the american people get to watch testimony unfold for the first time? democratic congresswoman jennifer wexton joins us next. jennifer wexton joins us next. could lead to way cleaner teeth. she said, get the one inspired by dentists, with a round brush head. go pro with oral-b. oral-b's gentle rounded brush head removes more plaque along the gum line. for cleaner teeth and healthier gums. and unlike sonicare, oral-b is the first electric toothbrush brand accepted by the ada for its effectiveness and safety. what an amazing clean! i'll only use an oral-b! oral-b. brush like a pro.

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we are back with "andrea mitchell reports." we had been anticipating that two of the transcripts we had been waiting for of behind closed doors interviews in the house to come out. we're told we just got them, fiona hill was the one who testified that john bolton was so disturbed by efforts to get the ukrainians to investigate on behalf of president trump, that he called it a drug deal, and he told her over the summer he wanted no part of the effort. the second part of that, alexander vindman's transcript also coming out even as we speak. he was so alarmed, he listened to the july 25th call between the president and the president of ukraine, he was so alarmed by what he heard trump say, he alerted his superiors and then

the legal counsel at the national security council. we have a team of folks who are looking at these. again, they just came out. we will get to them in a second. but in the meantime, joining me is democratic congressman jennifer wexton of virginia. if i can, congresswoman, we were talking about this earlier. those of you who are democrats have a hill to climb. we already know what the argument is going to be on the democratic side. we already know a lot about what is in some of this behind closed doors testimony. so how do you today that, transfer it to a public hearing, and turn it into something that will change minds of voters and republicans? >> well, we already have a majority of the american public who favors these impeachment inquiries. what we'll need to do is build that story and build that narrative and bring out the evidence that's already been presented behind closed doors and bring it out into the open.

>> so one of the things that we've been talking about is what happened in your state, in virginia. the legislature flipped, it's the first time in a quarter century. all the major offices, the entire state government, is headed by democrats. i was a little surprised. i went out on the weekend before the election and watched people go door to door. quite the contrary from a year ago or two years ago when people seemed not engaged about impeachment. there was a lot of conversation about it. it's not that they weren't talking about wages, it's not that they weren't talking about health care. but especially among democratic voters and in some of the swing suburban districts there was a lot of conversation about impeachment. how does this fit into the big picture, as you see it? >> well, it's something that motivates some people. my district is a suburban district. i have a lot of federal workers here, i have the cia in my district, the nro.

they really take this whole issue very seriously, the attacks on federal workers, the attacks on the intelligence community. so it's something that motivates people. but the main thing that i heard on the doors was about things like gun violence prevention. it was about making sure our public schools are as strong as they can be. it's about the environment and protecting our environment. those are the things that were really motivating voters in my part of virginia. >> jennifer wexton, congresswoman, thank you very much, i'm sorry we're cutting you short but we do have this breaking news that the transcripts from fiona hill and alexander mindmvindman have bee released. let's go to capitol hill. geoff bennett has had a couple of minutes to look at them. anything that stands out, geoff? >> reporter: a lot. >> really? >> reporter: yes. to refresh people's memories, fiona hill was the russia director at the national security council. the reason why her testimony was important is because she is the one that told congress that rudy giuliani and gordon sondland

circumvented the national security council and the normal white house process to pursue this shadow foreign policy on ukraine. she also says that the two of them sidestepped john bolton who at the time, as you well know, was the national security adviser. we've reported that. the transcript adds in a number of crucial details. so she says here in her testimony that there was a meeting on july 10th. i'll come back to why july 10th is important, but she says this. ambassador bolton, john bolton, immediately ended this july 10th meeting with ukrainian officials after ambassador sondland blurted out that we have an agreement with the chief of staff, in this case that would be mick mulvaney, that we have an agreement with mick mulvaney for a meeting if these investigations in the energy sector start. i'll put this all into context. our reporting is that alexander vindman, the lieutenant colonel whose transcript was also released today, he alerted his superiors not once but twice

about this entire ukrainian gambit. once after the phone call on july 25th. but prior to that, after this meeting that fiona hill testifies about on july 10th, because in his view, these comments from gordon sondland were so deeply concerning. fiona hill testifies to that as well and says that bolton was so concerned about it that he immediately ended the meeting. she goes on to say, in a follow-on meeting on the same day, ambassador sondland again researched an agreement with chief of staff mulvaney for a meeting with the ukrainians if they were going to go forward with investigations and he specifically mentioned burisma. so this speaks to that quid pro quo, to that bribery plot, to the shakedown, insert your chosen phrase of reference here. you have fiona hill speaking to this favor that president trump wanted ukrainian officials to do for him. that speaks directly to the case

that democrats are building, that president trump was using his public office for personal gain. one of the reasons why fiona hill is so crucial now is because democrats likely won't get john bolton to come and testify, either behind closed doors or in public, we now know. so if fiona hill agrees to tell what she knows publicly, her testimony could be key and could be damning. we have reported that lieutenant colonel alexander vindman is willing to come testify publicly if house investigators call on him to do so, chris. >> geoff, i'm going to let you go back and look at this a little further. i also want to bring in jeremy peters, "new york times" reporter, and maya wiley, msnbc legal analyst. maya, there are a couple of things to unpack in what geoff just had to say. in the context of the president being asked about this earlier today, he was kind of dismissive, he doesn't even know who a lot of these people are, we know he doesn't believe what a lot of them had to say.

having said that, a couple of things we just heard from geoff, corroboration. both these folks are saying the same thing. and it's not just they who are disturbed, and again, you have alexander vindman alerting his superiors not once but twice, but when bolton -- bolton knows what's going on, he is escalating this even more to a higher level. we know already that he had said he was so alarmed by what he heard, that he called it a drug deal. >> yes. so this is critically important to unpack. there are two key dates that have emerged out of the witness testimony. one is may 23rd, because that's where we start to hear, you want me to meet with the ukrainians from president trump, and then we know that there's a communication. gordon sondland brought this forward when he revised this testimony to congress, that

makes clear that they need to get a public statement out about their willingness to open up these investigations, the ukrainians, in order to have a phone call and meeting with donald trump. the july 10th date is the second really critical date because that's when gordon sondland in revising his testimony said, yes, i had a conversation with the president. it became clear, in other words, that there was a quid pro quo. we knew we had to deliver this for the meeting. he then starts to get to work on it. so when we are getting that's details both from fiona hill and from lieutenant colonel vindman, what we're getting is more details surrounding these critical dates that make it very clear that donald trump was directly engaged, that he was making clear his wishes to get these investigations open, and that it was for his personal benefit, because remember, one of the lines of defense we're starting to hear is, this was

just about corruption, corruption in general. it's not just about corruption if it's about his political campaign. and that's what the details in these transcripts sound like they're telling us, although i haven't read them yet. >> the other thing, jeremy peters, today, and we've heard this consistently from the president, consistently from his supporters, when they're asked about details they sort of pivot to the whistle-blower and they have negative things to say, obviously, about the whistle-blower, about the process. vindman says in these transcripts that are released, that "i am not the whistle-blower." these are corroborating statements made by people supporting what the whistle-blower initially had to say. >> that's exactly right, chris. this is why republicans i talk to are so worried about the way this process has unfolded so far. number one, you have a president of the united states and a white house that doesn't really have an effective message to push back on this to the democrats.

number two, what you have are transcripts essentially validating what the democrats have been saying all along and undercutting the remarks that the republicans have been saying all the time, like oh, there's not anything here to see, this is all fake news, nothing happening. well, we have the transcripts. so now we can see that that's not actually the case. to put this into further context, look at what a bad week this has been for president trump, 100% negative information flow, as one republican described it to me. he lost the race for the kentucky governor. on top of that you have this book coming out by this anonymous former senior administration official who has basically portrayed the administration as paralyzed by dysfunction and chaos. so not a great week here. >> and more to come, obviously, coming out of these transcripts. geoff bennett, you've had a few more minutes to look at them,

what else do you see? >> chris, as i'm reading through the transcript of lieutenant colonel alexander vindman, he says at one point, there was no doubt what president trump was asking president zelensky for on this july 25th call. the question says, you were listening in real time to this call along with president zelensky when president trump was speaking? the answer vindman provides is, correct. question: and there was no doubt in your mind as to what our president was asking for as a deliverable? vindman applireplies, there was doubt. he goes on to say there was a prerequisite in order for president zelensky to get the highly coveted white house meeting between presidents trump and zelensky, in addition to the delivery of $400 million in aid that was meant to counter

russian aggression. if you go back to the memo of that call, when zelensky brings up the purchase of these american antitank missiles, the response that he got from president trump was, "i would like you to do us a favor, though." chris? >> and on the same topic, as i'm going through fiona hill's testimony, ambassador bolton had said repeatedly that nobody should be meeting with giuliani, maya, and he was closely monitoring what mr. giuliani was doing and the messaging that he was sending out. well, based on what happened, this is the answer, based on what happened in the july 10th meeting, and ambassador sondland blurting out that he had already had an agreement to have a meeting at the white house for zelensky if these investigations were started up again, clearly ambassador bolton was referring to those. and ambassador bolton had said repeatedly, nobody should be meeting with giuliani. and you may recall before that i said he described giuliani as a bit of a hand grenade which would blow up, which we had

heard. >> and this is really critical because as congress is trying to fill out the story here with the evidence to determine that this was really about donald trump's personal interests, not about the nation's interests, this is really going to the heart of going around the official process that diplomats go through, george kent, who we know we're going to hear from next week, made it very clear, he was one of the ukrainian experts. he was sidelined, he was told to lay low, is what we're hearing. all of this goes to, if it's really about the national security interests of the united states, if it's really largely about corruption, and remember, we already heard that the experts said, no, ukraine has made sufficient progress on corruption to release these funds that congress proofapprovf it's really about that and not the president's personal interests, why would you go to the personal lawyer and not the experts, and why would you

sideline the experts and career diplomats? that's why this is so relevant to the impeachment inquiry, because it goes directly to the defense that might be mounted that this wasn't about his personal interests. >> to the defense, jeremy peters, that the president has mounted and one of the things he's said repeatedly is this is a bunch of anti-trumpers as if they had some sort of coordinated plan, deep state plan to get together and get him out of office, it's interesting to me, apart from the critical facts of those meetings, the demeanor, right? because the american people are going to be watching this and they'll be judging how credible these people are, are they indeed out to get donald trump. dr. hill says she was very shocked and very saddened to read the record of the july 25th call between president trump and president zelensky. and she called the call really kind of my worst fears and nightmares in terms of being an effort to subvert the national

security process and basically turning a white house meeting into some kind of asset. that doesn't sound like somebody who wanted to get the president. it sounds like somebody who was deeply concerned about the impact on national security. >> mm-hmm. that's exactly right, chris. and this is a play we've seen from this president and his allies time and time again. ime n the importance of this hearing next week really -- you need to put them into context of what happens after the house votes, right? will these hearings have any impact on the republicans? will these hearings have any impact on voters in the states like michigan, wisconsin and pennsylvania and florida. really these hearings aimed, you

are trying to set this politically, you are thinking about the people, the very small number of voters on this side of voters in those states who mayor may not be watching it. i think given how next week unfolds. we may not have the answers we are looking for. >> this is happening across vindman's transcripts. he says vindman says in his his testimony, the white house officials did not follow the

normal process to edit the memo and they placed in a different type of secure system. i am going to read this q&a. that's more in strustructiveins. what was different? it went into a different type, a different more secure system. and in this particular system more like did not have an account.t it did not functioned properly. i had to get a hard copy. i guess it went through a paper process. in the editing process that you do, that was done in a different way, vindman says declaratively, yes. question. it was on a different system and you had to put in your edits. there is a q&a that goes back and forth. this would have been the first time where this would have been done outside of what i

understood it to be the normal format.wh another dynamic here, too. as we have said when vindman raised red flags about president trump's interactions and the way he saw it under national security. he reported it to the national security council, johni eisen eisenberg. mulvaney and eisenberg appear several times in the transcript. so this is key testimony and again vindman said he's willing to appear to provide public testimony if so called upon, chris. >> much more to talk about in terms of details of all of this. i want to get a couple of quick questions in though before we

go. maya wiley, along the folks who have beenth following this closely. we can understand how these things stood in. it is not necessarily though easy if you have not been following it. my question to you is how do democrats need to approach this. it becomes clear simple and understand how to make the point they wanted to make. >> public hearings where the public adhere directly from experts exactly what the normal process is. what did not happen here in terms of normal process and what was so deeply concerning to national security and so clearly about the president's personal interest. that's essentially the story of if there was nothing wrong here, if this was really about the country and aroundbo national security,l why were the typica

protocols not followed and experts not engaged. why were people being told to lay low? why were attorneys deep sticking and bearing summary that's not national security materials. people like john bolton and mick mulvaneyd would have a hard ti with so many direct fact witnesses. people who weret there and hea and saw, if they were called to testify under oath to disagree unless it was absolutely true. they had evidence to show these witnesses were not telling the truth. so the fact that gordon sondland was saying yes this was what i was told and heard in the room. bolton and mulvaney say we'll not testify. the testimony has to show that's

also hiding something. >> geoff bennett and jeremy peters and maya wiley. >> much more about this in our "velshi & ruhle" hour, stay tuned. tuned. option that finds 92% of colon cancers. you just get the kit in the mail, go to the bathroom, collect your sample, then ship it to the lab. there's no excuse for waiting. get screened. ask your doctor if cologuard is right for you. covered by medicare and most major insurers. whyou should be mad that airports are complicated... he's my emotional support snake. ...but you're not, because you have e*trade, whose tech isn't complicated. it helps you understand the risk and reward potential on an options trade. don't get mad. get e*trade. i didn't have to shout out for i didn't have to get you a lift. and i didn't have to call your wife to meet you at the doctor.

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go beyond the expected. to do the extraordinary. take your business beyond. that's going to do it for me, i am chris jansing in for andrea mitchell. here is ali velshi. >> that's what happens when you wake up at 4:00 in the morning. >> it does not happen much.

i will take it any time. that's a first for me. >> a few things going on. >> we'll pick it up from here. coming up at this hour, new transcripts of the inquiries have just dropped. fiona hill and alexander vindman of what we learned. michael bloomberg is close to stepping into the 2020 race. how it divides the democratic rival. jeff sessions is looking to return to capitol hill and take back his senate seat, how the president feels about that run. coming up. we have just received the transcripts i got them here from two key witnesses. they are packed with insights. vindman and fiona hill. we'll dig