coward. >> chuck rosenberg talking about mike pompeo who famously graduated first in his class from the u.s. military akacadem west .in 1986. that is our broadcast. thank you so much for being here with us. have a good weekend and good night from nbc headquarters here in new york. thanks to you at home for joining us at home on this friday night. there are a bunch of moving parts right now, and we're going to take it one piece at a time, one step at a time with the full and full hearted expectation that more news will break over the course of this hour. you know it will, right? i mean, that has generally been our experience on friday nights over the course of the trump administration. but today and tonight already it has just been relentless. so let's just jump in. we've got a whole show prepared. i'm sure it's all about to go out the window.

obviously today was the second public hearing of the impeachment proceedings against president trump. we're going to talk about that in detail tonight. in terms of the latest news, though, i do need to mention as soon as the public hearing wrapped up today with u.s. ambassador ma yrie yovanovitch, immediately thereafter the impeachment committees started taking a closed door deposition from another new witness. the public hearings like the ones we saw with ambassador yovanovitch today, those are supposed to be the sort of second phase of the impeachment proceedings. but apparently as more of this story is becoming known to the public and to the investigators, and as more witnesses are coming forward, you know, the impeachment committees are having to sort of figure out what to do with new folks who are relevant to the investigation that they're still proceeding with. so they're discovering new witnesses, they're then arranging testimony from these new witnesses. and in order to do that, they're

basically going back behind closed doors to take initial closed door depositions from these new witnesses before deciding whether they too will go onto be part of any public proceedings. so, yovanovitch wrapped today at this public hearing. but immediately after the committees, foreign affairs and oversight, they went behind closed doors at the secure room at the capitol to take a closed door deposition from david holmes. now, david holmes is a career foreign service officer. we heard about him for the first time though not by name at the first public impeachment hearing that happened this week when ambassador bill taylor broke this surprise news. >> last friday a member of my staff told me of events that occurred on july 26th in the presence of my staff at a restaurant, ambassador sondland called president trump and told him of his meetings in kyiv.

the member of my staff could hear president trump on the phone asking ambassador sondland about the investigations. ambassador sondland told president trump that ukrainians were ready to move forward. following the call with president trump, the member of my staff asked ambassador sondland what president trump thought about ukraine. ambassador sondland responded that president trump cares more about the investigations of biden, which giuliani was pressing for. at the time i gave my deposition on october 22nd, i was not aware of this information. i am including it here for completeness. >> so we learn of that story just a couple of days ago, and ambassador bill taylor's testimony at the first impeachment hearing. right? it's kind of dramatic reveal. a member of his staff coming forward to tell him of something that the ambassador didn't know about before, which is that there had been a phone call between president trump personally and ambassador gordon sondland who called the president from a restaurant in ukraine on his cellphone on july 26th, the day after president trump had that call with the ukrainian president. that's the call that has basically led to these

impeachment proceedings. in that call on july 26th, taylor's staff member says he was able to hear the president on that phone inquiring personally about those investigations that he was pressing ukraine for. well, there's been a quick turn around in terms of running that story to ground. so, now today that staffer that was referenced in bill taylor's testimony two days ago, that staffer has now been brought to capitol hill and today he gave his closed door deposition. and credit to cnn's excellent congressional correspondent manu raju who was first to obtain a copy of the opening statement that david holmes gave in that closed door deposition today. you can see it here. it's obviously a photo copy of a folded sheet that contained his opening statement. ma manu raju obtained it. cnn posted it.

and it's a doozy. there's a couple of swear words. i'm not going to say the swear words, but you should know they're coming. first let me read you what david holmes says is basically his explanation as to why he's coming forward at this late point in the process. he says, quote, as the current impeachment inquiry has progressed i've followed press reports and reviewed statements of ambassador taylor and ambassador yovanovitch. my recollection is generally consistent with their testimony and i believe the relevant facts were therefore being laid out for the american people. however, in the last week or so i read press reports expressing for the first time that certain senior officials may have been acting without the president's knowledge in their dealing and suggesting that the only evidence being elicited at the hearings was hearsay. i came to realize, holmes says, that i had first-hand knowledge regarding certain events on july 26th that had otherwise not been reported and that those events potentially bore on the question of whether the president in fact had knowledge that those officials were using the levers of our diplomatic power to

induce the new ukrainian president to announce the opening of a particular criminal investigation. it is at that point i made the observation to ambassador taylor that the incident i had witnessed had acquired greater significance, which is what he reported in his testimony earlier this week. so that's why holmes is saying this is why i'm coming forward. i realized that what i know i thought was just consistent with what you've already heard but then i realized i actually know something other people don't and that other people are saying isn't the way this all went down. you need to know about this thing that i know. as for this july 26th phone call, the way bill taylor described it in his testimony a few days ago i think underplays it compared to what david holmes described to the impeachment committee as far as his opening statement. we've got that now. and again what he's describing here in time, this is late july. july 25th president trump makes that call to the ukrainian

president. we've all seen the call notes from that. it led to the impeachment inquiry. the day after that a delegation of u.s. officials including ambassador gordon sondland, the trump donor guy who was assigned to be ambassador to the eu and then the president inexplicably reassigned him to go work on ukraine instead. ambassador gordon sondland and this witness who testified today, david holmes, that went into a high level meeting with the ukrainian government including a meeting with president zelenski just one day after president zelenski had had that call with president trump. and at that point he said he hadn't had a read out to what happened between trump and zelensky, but he said he said president trump had, quote, three times raised some very sensitive issues and he'd have to follow up on those issues when they met in person. holmes says, quote, not having received a read out of the july 25th call, i did not know what those sensitive issues were. holmes says, quote, as i was

leaving the meeting with president zelenski, i was told to join another meeting with ambassador sondland. when that meeting ended the two staffers and i accompanied him out of the administration building and into the embassy vehicle. ambassador sondland said he wanted to go to lunch. i told ambassador sondland i'd be happy to join if he wanted to brief me on his meetings or discuss other issues. ambassador sondland said that i should join. the two staffers joined for lunch as well. the four of us went to a nearby restaurant and sat on an outdoor terrace. i sat directly across from ambassador sondland and the two staffers sat off to our sides. at first the lunch was largely social. ambassador sondland selected a bottle of wine that he shared among the four of us and we discussed topics such as marketing strategies for his hotel business. at which point i interject with narrator voice, your taxpayer dollars at work. right? this ambassador talking about marketing strategies for his hotel business with all these foreign service officers and embassy staffers.

but then here's the part that bill taylor brought to the attention of the impeachment committees. quote, during the lunch ambassador sondland said that he was going to call president trump to give him an update. ambassador sondland placed the call on his mobile phone, and i heard him announce himself several times along the lines of gordon sondland holding for the president. it appeared he was being transferred through several layers of switch boards and assistants. i then noticed ambassador sondland's demeanor change and i understood that he had been connected to president trump. while ambassador sondland's phone was not on speakerphone, i could hear the president's voice through the earpiece of the phone. the president's voice was very loud and recognizable, and ambassador sondland held the phone away from his ear for a period of time presumably because of the loud volume. i heard ambassador sondland greet the president and explain he was calling from kiev. i heard president trump then clarify that ambassador sondland was in ukraine. ambassador sondland replied, yes, he was in ukraine and went

on to state that president zelenski -- forgive me here -- went on to state president zelenski, quote, loves your ass. i said i wasn't going to say the swearword and then i just did, i'm sorry. holmes continues, i then heard president trump ask, so he's going to do the investigation? ambassador sondland replied that he's going to do it, adding that president zelensky, quote, will do anything you ask him to. even though i did not take notes on these statements i have a clear recollection that these statements were made. i believe my colleagues who were sitting at the table also knew that ambassador sondland was speaking with the president. which would mean there are two more witnesses who can attest to the fact that this happened. david holmes then describes some of the other things that happened on that conversation he could overhear between gordon sondland and president trump including naturally a reference to the kardashians. long story. we'll talk about that some other time. but then there's this. he says, quote, after the call

ended ambassador sondland remarked that the president was in a bad mood as ambassador sondland stated is often the case early in the morning. i then took the opportunity to ask ambassador sondland for his candid impression of the president's views on ukraine. in particular i asked ambassador sondland if it was true the president did not give a -- that the president did not -- that the president did not give a shoot about ukraine. he didn't say shoot. ambassador sondland agreed that the president did not give a shoot about ukraine. i asked why not, and ambassador sondland stated that the president only cares about, quote, big stuff. i noted that there was big stuff going on in ukraine like a war with russia. ambassador sondland replied that he meant big stuff that benefits the president like the biden investigation that mr. giuliani was pushing. the conversation then moved onto other topics. again, that's from the opening statement from foreign service

officer david holmes which was obtained and first published tonight by cnn. that witness both corroborating the testimony we've heard thus far from witnesses like ambassadors bill taylor and marie yovanovitch, but also directly quoting the president in a conversation in which the president appears to have been checking up on his man in ukraine to inquire as to the progress of these investigations into the bidens, that he was leaning on that foreign government to provide him. the president pressuring that foreign government to do those investigations, of course, because of the domestic political benefit he thought they would provide him here at home. and that of course is the core issue for which the president is now being impeached. david holmes' testimony and presumably any further corroborating testimony on this matter we may get from those other two alleged witnesses who were sitting there listening to that call as well or maybe even from ambassador gordon sondland

himself scheduled to testify next week, that testimony, i mean, it all puts the president squarely and personally in the role of not only running this operation for which he's being impeached but personally checking in on its progress as the pressure campaign was at its apex. so that's all happened. that's all come out tonight since the yovanovitch testimony at this dramatic hours long hearing today. i should also tell you that tomorrow there's going to be another closed door deposition. for the first time an official from the office of management and budget is going to be testifying. from good reporting from "the wall street journal" and also "the washington post," we believe the official testifying tomorrow from omb will be able to tribe what appears to be a strange process inside the white house in which somebody decided that the career expert officials in charge of tracking something

like military aid to ukraine, those career officials were taken out of the process of taking or withholding the aid to ukraine. those career officials were replaced instead with a trump political appointee who had been the executive director of the wisconsin republican party. until now there has been no public reporting -- excuse me, until now there has been public reporting but no testimony to the impeachment inquiry that the reason the white house may have had to do that, the reason they may have had to take those career technocratic officials out of that process and instead install their appointee is because of the belief that the president putting this hold on the military aid was something that was actually illegal. that is why the white house apparently had to take out of the loop these career officials because those career officials knew and expressed the view that that would be illegal, so they had to take those people out of the mix and instead stick a political appointee in there who apparently would be happy to do it. so that career omb staffer is

going to testify in a closed door deposition tomorrow. i don't know if we're going to get an opening statement from that official the way we did from david holmes tonight, but stay tuned. impeachment is not stopping for the weekend. it's not even stopping for tonight. but we're starting to recognize consistent sort of dynamics at work in the way the president tried to pull off this scheme, the way public officials, public servants who would have -- who wouldn't go along with it had to be taken off the job or had to be otherwise side lined so this scheme to pressure ukraine for the president's benefit could go ahead. >> i don't know if you had a chance to watch george kent's testimony yesterday, but would you agree with his rather frank assessment that if you fight corruption you're going to piss off some corrupt people? >> yes. >> and in your efforts fighting corruption to advance u.s. policy interests did you anger some of the corrupt leaders in ukraine? >> yes.

>> was one of those corrupt people prosecutor general urie lutsenko? >> yes, i believe so. >> and wasn't he among others who coordinated with mr. lutsenko who coordinated with mr. giuliani to peddle false accusations against you as well as the bidens? >> yes, that is my understanding. >> and were these smears also amplified by the president's son as well as hosts on fox? >> yes. yes, that is the case. >> in the face of this smear campaign did colleagues at the state department try to get a statement of support for you from secretary pompeo? >> yes. >> were they successful? >> no. >> did you come to learn they couldn't issue such a statement because they feared it would be undercut by the president? >> yes. >> and then were you told that though you did nothing wrong you did not enjoy the confidence of the president and could no longer serve as ambassador?

>> yes, that is correct. >> in fact, you flew home from kiev on the same day as the inauguration of ukraine's new president? >> that's true. >> that inauguration was attended by three who have become known as the three amigos, ambassador sondland, volker and perry, was it? >> yes. >> and three days after that inauguration in a meeting with president trump, are you aware that the president designated these three amigos to coordinate ukraine policy with rudy giuliani? >> since then i have become aware of that. >> this is the same rudy giuliani who orchestrated the smear campaign against you? >> yes. >> and the same rudy giuliani who now during the infamous july 25th phone call the president recommended to zelensky in the context of the two investigations the president wanted into the 2016 election and the bidens? >> yes. >> yes.

so, yeah, they needed the career official at the white house budget office who realizes they're going to do -- they're trying to do an illegal hold on military aid to ukraine. they need that official out of there, instead put in a political appointee. he'll do it. similarly they need ambassador marie yovanovitch, 33-year foreign service veteran, serious person, right? once she's out of there, they instead install the president's guys to move in and make sure that ukraine gets the full brunt of the pressure campaign. they've got to get trump those investigations to help him for 2020. and there's the president on the phone to one of those guys, am i getting my investigations, yes, sir, mr. president, they're going to give you anything you want. all right.

that's what he wants to know because that's the big stuff. that's the big stuff that benefits him, and that's what he's using ukraine for. so, yeah, of course you've got to get somebody like marie yovanovitch out of there. she's not going to play these reindeer games. you've got get the real ambassador out of there. you've got to get her out of the way so you guys can take the situation over in order to pull off the scheme to up end everything the united states is doing in accordance with u.s. policy and u.s. interests in that policy to instead turn it all to the president's domestic political benefit. >> the last time you were in ukraine was may 20th of this year, right? >> yes. >> in his opening statement, ambassador taylor said he took charge in ukraine on june 17th. >> yes. >> therefore, there was almost a one-month gap between the time you departed and when taylor took over, right? >> yes. yes. >> during that time on may 20th,

ambassador sondland, rick perry, and others came to the inauguration of president zelenski, right? >> yes. >> and during that gap in time, ambassador sondland visited the white house along with others and got directions from president trump to talk to rudy. those were his words, talk to rudy about what to do in ukraine, right? >> that's my understanding. >> in other words, isn't it the case that your departure and the one month gap between the time you left and ambassador taylor arrived provided the perfect opportunity for another group of people to basically take over ukraine policy, isn't that right? >> yeah. >> ambassador, you're going to

have speak a little louder into the mike. >> yes, yes. >> yeah, they had to get her out of there. they had to run this smear campaign against her, get her yanked out of there so that the trump guys who are willing to take direction from rudy giuliani and take direction from the president about getting those investigations and in the case of gordon sondland by his own admission, the guys willing to tell ukraine they weren't going to get their military aid unless they cough that stuff up, those guys had to get in there which meant ambassador marie yovanovitch had to get out. >> if you had remained ambassador to ukraine, would you have recommended to the president of the united states that he asked the new ukrainian president to investigate -- and i'm quoting from the transcript here -- crowdstrike or the server? >> no. i would repeat once again that the u.s. intelligence community has concluded that it was the russians who interfered. >> okay, so ambassador if you had remained as ambassador and not been summarily dismissed, would you have supported a

three-month delay in congressionally mandated military aid to ukraine? >> no. >> ambassador, if you had remained as ambassador of ukraine, would you have recommended to the president that he ask a new president of ukraine to, quote, find out about biden's son? >> no. >> i have no more questions. i yield back the balance of my time. >> yeah, she wouldn't have done any of those things. she wouldn't have stood for any of those things, so they had to get her out of there. which would have worked perfectly except for the fact that people like that, people who have been run rough shot like that, people who have had to be ejected from the normal course so that the president's men could come in and do what needed to be done regardless of whether it was illegal, the people who got ejected from that

process whether they're the career staffers or the career ambassador at the embassy, those people are real people who are alive and who will respond to subpoenas when lawfully subjected to compulsory process by an impeachment proceeding. there were a couple of other things either brand new at this hearing today or that intruded on the hearing from outside. they were both big surprises. in one of these cases it made me get off my couch and jump up and down and call everybody i know. both of those instances coming up. stay with us. lots to come. power over pain, so the whole world looks different. the unbeatable strength and speed of advil liqui-gels. what pain? more exciting than than getting a lexus... giving one. this is unbelievable! >>it really is. the lexus december to rembember sales event lease the 2020 rx 350 all wheel drive for $419 a month for 27 months. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

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about an hour into today's dramatic impeachment hearing an external event intruded upon the hearing. it was about 10:00 a.m. eastern time when the president himself made a statement online attacking ambassador marie yovanovitch even as she testified. and that of course is sort of the president's m.o., right? this is one of his favorite ways to derail the news when things are not going his way. he just grabs the nearest third rail and says something so outrageous, deliberately outrageous people in good faith and good conscience can't ignore it. and people stop talking about whatever was going on in the news he was trying to distract from and instead they turn to the president's latest outrageous statement to talk about that. if this president was a pony and he had to be reduced to one trick, that would be his one pony trick. like that's the closest thing he has to a super power.

but when president trump tried that standard one trick pony trick today in the middle of marie yovanovitch's testimony it went wrong for him in a couple of important ways. >> ambassador, you've shown the courage to come forward today and testify. notwithstanding the fact you were urged by the white house or state department not to, notwithstanding the fact that as you testified earlier the president implicitly threatened you in that call record. and now the president in realtime is attacking you. what effect do you think that has on other witness' willingness to come forward and expose wrongdoing? >> well, it's very intimidating. >> it's designed to intimidate, is it not?

>> i mean, i can't speak to what the president is trying to do, but i think the effect is to be intimidating. >> well, i want to let you know, ambassador, that some of us here take witness intimidation very, very seriously. >> part of the reason this standard trump attention trick of saying something outrageous and diverting everybody's attention from what was going on to instead pay attention to whatever latest or outrageous thing he has said or done, part of the reason i think this went a little pear shaped for the president today is number one because an impeachment hearing is not a news cycle. it's a real thing. and the president may have just earned himself a new stand alone article of impeachment today for witness intimidation by having the gall to do this in the middle of public testimony that was in part about the way the president has mistreated and used this distinguished career foreign service officer who had never done anything wrong. that's one of -- i think the president's not used to like,

you know, accountability. so that was hard. the other reason it went wrong for the president today, though, is just karmic bad timing. because wp within the hour of that happening in that jury room, a jury sitting in the federal court in washington finished up their deliberations, filed back into the courtroom, and handed to the judge this verdict, this verdict against the president's long standing political adviser roger stone. as you can see, the jury was asked to consider seven felony counts against mr. stone. the decision was guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty. and in some ways this verdict, it's sort of tempting to see it as yet another trump campaign figure going to prison or at least another one of them awaiting sentencing after being

convicted or pleading guilty to felony charges. there's a lot of them now, right? they're going to name a wing after them at some point. everybody from his campaign chairman to his deputy cam pair chairman to his foreign policy adviser to his lawyer and now to this guy too. it is tempting to just add this new 7-count felony conviction today to the pile. but it was also impossible to avoid the fact today that the felony from which roger stone is now facing the most jail time, of these seven felony the one he's looking at a potential 20-year maximum prison sentence is the crime of witness tampering. it was count seven today against roger stone, a violation of u.s. code 1812 b subsection one, we the members of the jury unanimously find mr. stone guilty. the most damning evidence in the mueller report, in volume to the mueller report was evidence the president had tried to tamper with witnesses in the russia case including michael cohen and paul manafort and others. and the special counsel said he couldn't bring criminal charges

against the president for that behavior or anything else. but the impeachment inquiry is not constrained in the same way. so within the hour that the president is hearing from the head of the impeachment inquiry about how seriously, how very, very seriously those committees take the crime of witness intimidation, here's his long-standing political advisor being convicted in a criminal court of witness intimidation. so that all being spat out of the volcano by the news gods at the same time today was a dramatic thing. but immediately after that happened in the hearing, while the hearing was still buzzing with what had just happened there in front of their eyes, with then got a brand-new piece of information about the president's behavior here and the president's motivation here that had never been voiced before. this is thing that made me get up off the couch and start calling everybody i know. that's next. we've got a lot to get to tonight. stay with us. th wayfair, you spend less and get way more.

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so this was new today, new today and fascinating to me. last night on the show you might remember we talked about how this pressure campaign against ukraine for which president trump is being impeached, this campaign was designed to get the government in ukraine to announce some kind of investigation into democratic presidential front-runner joe biden. and because you can't put too fine a point on it with these guys even if you try, the specific demand was ukraine needed to announce this biden investigation publicly. they didn't need to just start an investigation, they needed to

announce they were doing so so of course it would have maximum damaging or embarrassing political effect. actually put that quote back up there on the screen again from bill taylor's testimony because it wasn't just an investigation of joe biden that he -- that the president wanted announced by ukraine, right? it was also that he wanted an announced investigation from ukraine of 2016 election interference. 2016 election interference by ukraine. he wanted an investigation announced into that, too. 2016 election interference by ukraine is not a thing. it did not happen. it was russia that interfered in the 2016 election to benefit donald trump. it wasn't ukraine. so last night on the show we tried to find in the wild, some trace, some explanation for where that weird sort of backwards theory about the 2016 election might have come from. the whole u.s. intelligence community says it was russia. bipartisan intelligence committee just a few weeks ago

said it was russia. more than a dozen russian intelligence officers are currently indicted by the justice department because it was russia. it was russia. so where's this weird thing coming from that trump is pursuing in this pressure campaign in ukraine, this insistence by him it wasn't russia that interfered in 2016, it was ukraine that did it? well, as of last night as i mentioned on the show last night, the incidents we know of in the wild where that strange thing might have come from was documented in this fbi report from trump's deputy campaign chair rick gates. rick gates explaining to the fbi under penalty of perjury that it wasn't russia, it was ukraine, that argument was spread in the first instance in this country by donald trump's now imprisoned campaign chairman paul manafort. and where did he get that theory he started spreading in this country? well, what gates told the fbi is that he was parroting it from a guy named kilimnik, that manafort had worked with in ukraine for years. kilimnik is somebody who the fbi

says is affiliated with russian intelligence agencies. so this theory that trump was demanding that ukraine needed to provide him an announced investigation about, right, he wanted the biden investigation announced. but he wanted this other investigation announced, too. best as we can tell this other thing he wanted an announced ukrainian investigation into this weird claim that it wasn't russia, it was ukraine that interfered in our last election, that claim appears to have originated with russian intelligence. russian intelligence gets fed to trump's former campaign chairs, had lots of dealings with pro-putin elements in the world, right? he's now in prison. it goes from russian intelligence to manafort, manafort is the one who spreads it. giuliani admits he's been talking to manafort on strategy on this whole campaign he's been running for the president in ukraine. but that whole chain of command makes sense, right? russia wants to muddy the waters. russia doesn't want to be held to account what they did. that's what we knew as of last night.

then knock me over with a feather, this happened today. >> now, are you familiar with these allegations of ukrainian interference in the 2016 election? >> i mean, there have been rumors out there about things like that. but, you know, there was nothing hard at least nothing that i was aware of. >> there's nothing based in fact to support these allegations? >> yes. >> and, in fact, who was responsible for interfering and meddling in the 2016 election? >> well, the u.s. intelligence community has concluded that it was russia. >> ambassador yovanovitch, are you aware that in february of 2017 vladimir putin himself promoted this theory of ukrainian interference in the

2016 election? >> you know, maybe i knew that once and have forgotten, but i'm not familiar with it now. >> well, let me show you a press statement that president putin made in a joint press conference with victor orban of hungary february 2nd, 2017, where he he says second as we all know during the presidential campaign in the united states the ukrainian government adopted a unilateral position in favor of one candidate. more than that, certain oligarchs certainly with the approval of the political leadership funded this candidate or female candidate to be more precise. now, how would this theory of ukraine interference in the 2016 election be in vladimir putin's interest? >> well, i mean, president putin must have been aware that there were concerns in the u.s. about

russian meddling in the 2016 elections and what the potential was for russian meddling in the future. so, you know, classic for an intelligence officer to try to throw off the scent and create an alternative narrative that maybe might get picked up and get some credence. >> an alternative narrative that would absolve his own wrongdoing? >> yeah. >> yeah. turns out this thing that trump has been spinning, this weird thing about ukraine interfering in the election, i want you to announce an investigation into that, he's spinning that exactly the way vladimir putin has been spinning it and the way that russian intelligence was feeding it to his now imprison ed campaign chairman who was talking to rudy giuliani about strategy in this campaign. i mean, and that was just like an interstitial thing that came up at a quiet moment today. what's next? have power over pai, so the whole world looks different.

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joining us now here on set is congressman jim himes, a member of the intelligence committee. sir, i know it's been a big, long, exhausting day. i'm just talking about working at 30 rock today, not what you've been doing. let me ask you about your impressions today at this second hearing with ambassador yovanovitch? >> it's sort of hard to summarize in ten seconds. it was just a stunning hearing. first and foremost, the ambassador, what a stunning profile in courage. this leads to the second thing that was pretty amazing is that just as the republicans were falling all over themselves not to attack her, you know, to thank her for her service, boom out comes the presidential tweet where he says everywhere she went things screwed up, blame somalia -- you just can't make this stuff up. but really the story told today is the story of this isn't just a bad phone call. this is a three, four-month effort with a very clear goal to get an investigation into the bidens going. it started with her -- before

her firing, right? because these second rate gangsters in ukraine and rudy giuliani were spreading these rumors in ukraine well before she ultimately was told to come home. >> in terms of what we learned that was new and new perspectives that we got today that we the public couldn't get without hearing from these witnesses, i was really struck today when she said basically i understand why they wanted me out of there now. i didn't understand at the time, but i could now see the larger scheme at work. what i don't understand is why they didn't just remove me for no reason. why they had to try to destroy me, why they had to smear me and levy all these false accusations against me. and her even to this day bewilderment and sadness over that is something i found very effecting. but i also, i don't know if you have the answer or if the committee has an answer as to why she had to be humiliated and destroyed instead of just taken out of the way?

>> today really put into relief that line and chairman schiff brought it out that line about in the transcript where the president says liushenko who's a very dirty guy, he's talking him up the transcript saying -- and then of course about the ambassador yovanovitch says she's a bad woman and things are going to happen her. it's a complete inversion of any recognizable moral code, and that's the inside of donald trump's head. >> in terms of what happens next here, obviously the inquiry appears to still be expanding. the closed door deposition that happened today with david holmes, a person who overheard this conversation in which the president was inquiring about these investigations, tomorrow there's going to be another investigation, office of career management, career saffir, who we think we know from open source reporting was sort of taken out of the loop on military aid once omb staffers decided it might be illegal to do that hold. it seems however fast you want

to go you're getting more witnesses as the story comes out. >> that's right. today was important with this new witness and the new deposition because the facts here aren't in dispute. the long campaign to get an investigation of the bidens done that involved withholding military aid, that involved dangling, we've known -- no one's denying it. the republicans aren't denying it. they're just saying it's okay. but the piece that was missing that began to fall into place today to sort of riff on the watergate thing, what did the president say and when did he say it? we haven't actually known who the president talked to other than zelensky. so, today we learn about this phone call where donald trump is inquirying about his investigation and sondland is saying going great, it's going to happen, and by the way, they'll do anything you want. and remember ambassador sondland is coming before the committee next week, so that direct connection to the president, that's what's developing now. >> can you tell us about any time on the horizon in terms of how long public hearings will go on for? >> well, our hope was we might begin to wind them up towards

the end of next week or around there. >> wow. >> because if you think about it, i'm pretty sure the speaker is committed to getting this process done hopefully by the end of yearish. if you sort of work through the end of testimony and what judiciary needs to do, you're already struggling to make that timetable. but again you just don't know what's going to happen. the other big piece here of course is rudy giuliani. rudy giuliani is the other half of this thing. he's running around ukraine smearing an ambassador. god only knows what sort of business deals he was pursuing. and because he won't appear in contempt of congress, and we'll deal with that down the road, it's going to take some time to know that other half of the story here. >> congressman jim hines. great to have you here. stay with us. great to have you e stay with us there's a company that's talked to even more real people

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joining us now is somebody who i am honored to have here on set, somebody who i should mention has deep knowledge of presidents and impeachment. tom brokaw covered richard nixon's final year in the white house. he later anchored ""nbc nightly news"" during the impeachment of president clinton. tom is now a senior correspondent for nbc news and also author of a new book called "the fall of richard nixon a reporter remembers watergate." talk about good timing, sir, it's great to have you here. >> i would like to say i saw this coming. in fact it was not due to come out later in november but we

thought maybe we ought to get it out right now because it has applications to now. but there's been a lot of change as well. >> do you feel we over extrapolate from the watergate example to understand impeachment -- >> there's separate and unequal ones in many ways. richard nixon was in office for a full year. we have the tapes, looking at it, and yet they couldn't quite get the apparatus going. but they were very meticulous about it. when they finally got around to the supreme court saying you've got to give up the tapes, by then a bilateral position was on the hill and ready to initiate impeachment. but he, in fact, resigned before all of that happened. the other thing is different then. we're on the air two or three times a day. we're not now 24/7. it wasn't that kind of constant thing going on. watching today for what it's worth i thought the most dramatic moment was that cheap shot the president made about her and her experience in somalia. i've been in somalia. it's one of the most dangerous places in the world. it was the home of black hawk down.

for him to kind of throw that off, here's a guy who goes home to mar-a-lago at night, and she was out there in really tough places. but at the same time you have to remember that impeachment is a procedure that the rest of the country also has a voice in. and i think that this situation now, it's hard for a lot of people to kind of parse it, you know, what was going on there, isn't that how they always do business? so my own judgment is i think there has to be one more hand in the cookie jar coming out with something or visible to everyone else, and they know he's done something just dramatically wrong but something against the best interest of this country. >> and in terms of the way it's playing out, obviously it's early in the process although we don't know how early. we heard the congressman saying the aim to is to finish it by the end of the year. we're already pretty deep in november. so, we don't know how long this process is going to go on for. but we at least on this point

have the republicans not really defending the president on the substance of what he did but instead complaining about adam schiff, complaining about the means by which the inquiry is being conducted. are their parallels there in terms of watergate, or is this a new approach that the republicans are taking? >> i think every time you have impeachment it's a new approach because situations are different. look at the bill clinton case, for example, president nixon was going to be found guilty. there's no question about it, but it lasted a full year which is a reminder that i keep making to people that he was able to hang in there because a country doesn't give up their presidents easily. and this guy for whatever we think about him still has a loyal core out there that will show up for these rallies. and the big, big change is what we're doing right here. >> in terms of the frequency -- >> 24/7, everybody's got something to say and everybody however inconsequential they may be has a place on that big, big billboard and people have to listen to it.

so, there's always a lot of sorting out to do here. but i always believe in the ufo theory, the unforeseeable will occur. and i don't know quite what that's going to be, but we're in for a long tumultuous time about what they have in mind for our future and for our system of governing. and i think everybody has to think about that first. >> tom brokaw is the author most recently of "the fall of richard nixon." stay with us. with this key to the city. [ applause ] it's an honor to tell you that liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. and now we need to get back to work. [ applause and band playing ] only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪

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how was your day? that's going to do it for us tonight. we will see you again on monday when i'm sure i'll be just as overwhelmed. but now it's time for the "last word" with lawrence o'donnell. good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. and don't worry about monday. roger stone cannot be found guilty again. and did you ever imagine that on the day roger stone's verdict would come in and it would come in guilty on all counts, that it would be in my hour, anyway, literally the last story i'm going to be able to get to? >> exactly. you have to like squeeze it in among everything else that not only happened over the course of the day but that's been happening over the course of the night. this is crazy. at least a two-way tie for the most oimportant story of the night on a day when the president tweeted his way into his own impeachment hearing with a tweet that some say might be worthy of its own article of impeachment.