all been tracking this unfolding story. this special coverage continuing right now with our check nicolle wallace. >> thank you so much, ari and katy. it is another day for the history books. i'm nicolle wallace in new york, picking up our live coverage of the second impeachment of don't -- donald j. trump. >> that the member designated by brendan boyle, i inform the house that congressman boyle will vote yea on the resolution. >> so we are watching the vote count under way in the impeachment of donald j. trump. i'm nicolle wallace picking up our coverage. we are joined by our friend

claire mccaskill. claire? >> good afternoon. i miss you, nicolle. the last impeachment, we had snacks. i'm on my own this time. i'll tell you what irritated me about the debate, nicolle. i am really tired of people who embraced the lie of election fraud lecturing people about unity. what they did was incredibly corrosive to our democracy. they have helped the president convince millions of people that our elections aren't fair or free, and most of them know it's a bold-faced lie. they really do not come to this argument about unity with clean

hands. it's like fingernails on a blackboard. . >> i keep thinking these are the same figures who have menacing words for people who carry out acts in the name of international terrorism, but when they're domestic terrorists who happen to be supported by some members of their own base, they're very, very, very afraid of speaking the truth and being brave, to put it bluntly. also along watching with is is dan goldman, who was instrumental in the first impeachment effort. i think it was exactly a year ago. dan goldman, your thoughts. i feel like so many of the roots in terms of how we got here burrowed down when they decided to let abuse of power go unchecked. >> that's right. certainly we saw an abuse of

power by donald trump as it related to ukraine. in no way did this, you know -- does that match up to this? what we're seeing now is some of the similar arguments, and certainly some hypocritical arguments, some cries that we don't have witnesses from the republican side, when of course there were no witnesses allowed in the senate trial by republicans, and in the last impeachment of donald trump, of course, prohibited a number of key witnesses. but even putting aside some of the political hypocrisy, i think claire hit the nail on the head. it's almost as if you have an arsonist who burns down the building and says, wait a minute, don't charge me. let's work to rebuild the building together. no, we can only have unity and healing once there is an

accountability and return to truth. ultimately what this is all about is the fact the president has been spouting lies and revving up people to protest the government because he lost, and now he -- whether intentionally or unintentionally, the result is we have an outright insurrection, and he's a danger to our country. that's why this was an important vote. one last nick, nicolle, in response to this is the democrats politicizing what happened last week, there's no politicization, donald trump will be out in one way or another in a week, there's no election coming up. the democrats won by georgia by a surprise. this is not political. this is about sending a message to preserve or democratic institutions, to preserve our --

>> we're going to work to bring dan goldman back online. he and claire will be around with us for our coverage. garrett haake calls the capitol building his home away from home. what are your thoughts from this morning? >> it's been interesting to watch the republican party grapple with who they want to be when they grow up, what kind of republican party they'll have. you heard everything from lee zeldin asking for extra time, so he could thank the president for moving the u.s. embassy to jerusalem. what you haven't heard from is the numbers, now up to eight republican members who are going to vote for impeachment, and two of them are fairly junior, gonzalez, and republican tiff meyer, from mesh gan, who won

the grand rapids seat. both of them made the argument that, while we got bogged down on the language, they both made the comment that the president abandoned his post during the riot. during the attack, the president was the one person who could have stopped it, and he was nowhere to be found. that's an argument winning at least these republicans, and could not central when it goes to the senate. mitch mcconnell is essentially saying his vote is up in the air. conviction is really in play here in a way that frankly i don't think it ever was in the first impeachment trial. >> garrett, conviction is on the line, and i think the converse frame on this is we have now got -- there's six republicans who have voted to impeach donald trump. they're not looking at any polls

that look any different from the cowards in the party. donald trump put all of their lives in danger, whether they want to pretend to still, i guess, worship at the altar of his political power or not. i want to ask you about the words they're using. liz cheney, in her announcement about 24 hours ago, in her statement i think represents the most stinging rebuke of donald trump from really anyone in any party. they're not holding back. when the dam breaks, it sort of burst, garrett, with all of the things that have gone unsaid. you've probably heard some of them roaming the has of congress yourself. but it feels like for the eight republicans who have joined the unanimous effort by democrats to impeach donald trump for inciting an insurrection against the government he ostensibly

leads, it's not clear he's functioning at the top of the chain of command right now. what do you make of these things spilling into public that you may have heard behind the cenes over the last four years. >> i think that's the point. there's two different breeds of pro-trump supporters on capitol hill. there are true believers, and then those in the senate who essentially made their bed a long time ago, that they were going to be in it with trump until they weren't anymore, and there was no way they could change that in their own minds, that they were in it until he's gone. he's gone now. his grip is loosening in ways large and small. i don't want we would even see mccarthy give the tepid speech he did today if the president still had his twitter account. that's the short-term thing here. the president now lacks the

ability to publicly and instantly shame these members when they break from him. the other is the long-term thinking here. when you look at the senate, you have mitch mcconnell whose book is called "the long game" who just got six more years and the most unsentimental politics you will ever meet. the calculation for mcconnell and the maybe dozen or so votes that will go whichever way he goes, will be making the determination whether it's just better for them to wash their hands of him entirely and be done, if that's the calculation they can make. if they think they can turn the page, they will. the chen yes piece is even more extraordinary. that was a nonpolitical statement, if that makes any sense. that was a statement of conscious she put out. it was so strong. there was no effort to protect herself in any way from a

republican conference that would be -- that will try to strip her of a leadership position. and she said this is the way it's got to be, and i won't make the point in a weak or wimpy terms. i thought it was a gutsy move. >> i think, garrett, the point she's not making -- the point is she is now, after insurrectionists and white supremacists, armed with zip-ties and weapons carried out violence that led to the death of one capitol police officer, another has lost his life, and everyone in the building was threatened, she decided to speak the truth and do the right thing. i can't not say this part out loud. the bar is so excruciating low for republicans. if they look at the tv and say they see what we see, ready to throw them parades in some corner?

well, i'm not. >> if armed people coming to your workplace and trying to kill you doesn't open your eyes, i can't help you. >> right. i guess, claire, the broader point is they're on their even now, and senior republican said to me this morning, what should stabilize a calculation, which is what they're making, is all the things they don't know. they don't know what the investigation will find out. it is a sure thing that, as they bring in the insurrectionists and start questioning them, they will ask them questions, like, why are you there? >> did the president e-mail you? did he call you? we don't know what the defenses of the insurrectionists will be. they may very well implicate donald trump, his family, hi kids -- we saw what they said in

public. we don't know what a felony like that would look like. >> we don't. we have a pattern of behavior, and a pattern of incitement that predates the rally a january 6th. i mean, there are a lot of things that donald trump has said and done that has sent a signal to his base, that they need to take their country back no matter what. i think the one thing that was missing today -- this is what happens in the house, because everyone gets to speak for like a minute, but in the senate trial, there will be a timeline. i think what really people need to focus on is, what was trump doing for the hours that people were defecating in the capitol, and boughting up police officers, and killing a police

officer? what was he doing during that time? i'm going to set the scene here. i don't know for sure where he was, but i'm betting he was back in his private dining room, which has turned into a tv viewing room -- there didn't used to be tvs in there. the times i was invited to dine with the president in the small dining room just off the oval -- i'll bet he was back there with the tvs, and he was taking it in. the capitol was breached by 1:30. he didn't even tweet until after 2:30. biden finally spoke out at 4:00, and then at 6:00 p.m., the president finally said something about the patriots, you know, and how much he loved them. it is just unbelievable, if you think about the behavior of a president, he was more worried about encouraging these people

to do what they were doing than he was the role of getting a peaceful resolution of what was a violent attack on our nation's capitol. >> it's stunning, and we'll be talking about it as the facts emerge. we are relying on investigative journalism, and at the "the washington post" they wrote a stunning timeline, which had trump paralyzed, their terms. i understand people are now speaking about proxy votes.

>> this is one of the changes that nancy pelosi put in place. that is, you do not have to vote in person on the floor of the house during this covid pandemic. you can have another member vote for you by proxy. it involves you executing a document and designating which members you have vote for you, but because of that, and because of the them limiting the number of people on the floor at one time, these votes now take much longer. they already take too long, because members have a habit of milling around, talking, rather than getting busy and getting their votes cast, but that's what's going on right now. that's why votes are taking an average of about 75 minutes in the house of representatives during the pandemic. >> we have seven republicans who have voted along with the democrat to say impeach donald trump for inciting an insurrection against the capitol, against the government. garrett haake is reporting, we are expected to have at least

eight. what do you think those final moments are like with this vote even? do members sort of call home? what are those final gut checks with their conscience and legacy look like? >> it's usually a lonely time. i found the tough votes i had to cast, i wanted to gather my thoughts. i will say this, the majority of republicans are districts who voted for donald trump. so let's not underestimate the courage. these are votes of principle. these are people who are thinking about their country and not their next election. i give them a lot of credit. i'm mad at all of them for not

standing up to this president sooner and putting up with his lying, but these are votes of courage today, and now we're up to eight. >> claire stay with us, and dan goldman is standing by. i wonder if you can speak from the perspective of an impeachment manager, on what an unexpected vote feels like for those who have made the case. >> yeah, we were sitting on the senate floor while the senators were voting, and standing there in particular, you know, with rapt attention when mitt romney got up to speak. it was certainly rewarding to feel like there is someone who is really objective, in our view, taking a close look at what their duty is, what their oath is to the constitution. there were others who recognized that we proved our case, but

felt like we should let the voters decide. it's somewhat ironic that we're sitting here after the voters did decide, and the president did not accept that decision by the voters, but certainly, you know, you're very focused on it. in the house there were no republicans who voted for impeachment. by that point it was a very hardened, partisan situation. this has moved so quickly that we don't know how it's going to end up. i would add one thing to what claire said before. donald trump's role in the riots last week, i think when it goes to the senate, you're going to want to focus very much on, a, what kind of reporting and intelligence was provided to the white house about what the expectations were for the protests. we know in online forums people

were talking about being violent, and storming the capitol, and the question is, did the white house receive those and tell the dod not to provide the national guard? to tell dhs not to provide anything? what happened in terms of the white house's knowledge of what the expectations were? and after the violence occurred, what happened within the thousands about what directions they were giving? we know governor hogan from maryland said he didn't get authorization for two hours. if you get that timeline together, you'll get a good sense of what the white house knew and what their reaction was, and that is going to go a long way toward determining how much donald trump knew when he incited them to walk on the capitol. did he know they were going to

storm the capitol to disrupt what was going on, which was really his -- the last nail in his coffin. >> that's such an excellent point. i'm thinking, as you're talking about the story that broke yesterday, about 24 hours ago, be "the washington post", about a field memo with haunting echos to the field memo that came out after the attack in 9/11. someone in the norfolk office sent a memo, a notice to headquarters, talking about acts of war being planned online by folks who planned to gather at points outside d.c., travel to the nation's capitol together, and carry out donald trump's specific request to block the counting of the electoral college votes for joe biden. i want to ask you one follow-up question, though, dan goldman. it seems to me -- i just want to

tell folks -- we are watching the house of representatives vote on the single article of impeachment against donald . trump. there's enough votes to pass. he will be impeached today, but we're talking about the evidence that will be presented in the trial. my question, dan goldman, how much access to that evidence will a democratic-controlled senate have, compared to whether the republicans have maintained control? does that make a difference? >> it very well could make a difference. this is a very different scenario than the last impeachment. we had a very brisk investigation, but we had an investigation in the house. so there was -- there was witness testimony, obviously we had minimal documents and text messages, et cetera, but there's been really no meaningful violation, in large part because of the urgency of removing a

very dangerous president. now when it goes to the senate trial, particularly after donald trump is out of office, there is time to have a more meaningful trial, and i would expect there to be different voting along -- for witnesses. it will be important for the house managers to identify the witnesses who are most likely to have the relevant information, because invite senate, unlike last time, they will not know the universe of people that has information about what the president knew and when he knew it. but i would expect there to be voting on witnesses, and there will probably be a few witnesses, and there will be depositions for the witnesses. i wouldn't anticipate this to be a very rapid trial if in fact it doesn't start until after joe biden is inaugurated. let's bring in michael

steele, former chairman of the republican national committee. your thoughts -- i want to read to you a bit of congress madge meijer's statement. he lays it out -- he said this isn't a visibility torrie for my party. this isn't a victory for the democrats. i'm not sure it's a victory for our country, but it is a call to action to seek ways to correct. i wrestled with the press didn't this will establish, and i have concerns with due process. i have wrestled with whether impeachment and inherently political process is a meaningful mechanism, but today my job is to apply my best judgment to the article of impeachment. with the facts at hand, i believe the article of impeachment to be accurate. the president betrayed his oath of office by seeking to undermine our constitutional process, and he bears responsibility for inciting the

violent acts of insurrection last week, with a heavy heart, i will vote to impeach president donald j. trump, congressman meijer. what do you they when you see him wrestling with all of this. >> it's the consolation of a wrestling process that many members have been going through for the last four, five years. they have wrestled at various times back after charlottesville or, during the election process itself, when the president was out there bold-facedly lies about the process and vote by mail. this cathartics moment for them, being hunkered down in the house

while there were mad rioters outside the door is a stark new reality for these folks. they have to reconcile that. we're up to double digit now, ten republican members voting to impeached the president. mitch mcconnell has to reconcile that. don't play the political game, we'll bring it to the floor on the 19th of january. the fact that you have at least ten members who have voted to impeach is a clarion moment, a clarifying moment for these republicans. representative meijer i think crystallized that and articulated that very, very well. it remains to be seen what happens next. the important step is the next step. that for me, nicolle, focuses on

the act, what we know, what we saw, and the results of that. you cannot turn a blind eye to it. you have to respond to it immediately, if not for right now, but for future administrations and politicians to know that in this moment, we stood the ground for the constitutional, so that no other president would ever dare think about doing a little bit of what donald trump did on january 6th. >> michael steele, you're right, through now ten republicans who have voted, with 219 democrats. there are now enough votes to impeach donald trump for a second time. michael steele, i want to ask about coward is. it doesn't get enough attention about the dna, who stood up and

i think gave fraudulent excuses for not voting with liz cheney and nine other much their republican colleagues. we should take it apart here and now. we could impeach him, because it would ainge other the rioters who wanted to overthrow -- these are the same people who would have laughed out of any debate any one of the either political party -- >> right. >> -- who weren't for, frankly waterboarding a terrorist. the people who were enthusiastic backers of the most brutal counter-terrorism policies that really aren't in place anymore, remain a stain on the former administration in which i served, those same people don't want to hurt the feelings of the

insurrectionists who went there on the call of donald trump, many of them chanting "hang mike pence" and sought to do harm to the members of congress. >> so let me get this straight. these members are sensitive to the feelings of the individuals who were incited by the president to go hang his vice president. just so i understand, we're worried they may be upset that the president gets impeached for inciting them to go hang his vice president? and to kidnap, harm or even kill the speaker of the house? that's their rationale. okay, you stay with that, and tell me how your next election works out. you should not be in the united states congress. that is the most bogus, claim

excuse possible, that you're somehow worried about how these folks should react. your only concern you should have is that the united states, meaning us, we the people, react in a way that pushes back against that kind of authoritarian, insurrectionist activity. i don't care who incited them or inspired them. the president, josh hawley, jim jordan, ted crew, some of the other folks running around the has talking about unity, need to be held accountable. i cannot stress it enough. america, do not back off that point. i'm not worried about how these individuals feel. i'm worried that they're held accountable for what occurred last week, and what almost occurred if they were successful -- could have been successful. that's what they should be

worried about. stop this penny ante excuse making that you don't have the backbone. then leave the congress when donald trump leaves the white house, because you are not serving this republic any longer. >> claire, i guess the point is you have to work any way on the impeachment, but don't me your concern is for unity. there's not a single member of the republican party who cared at all about unity when donald trump waved his misogyny flag or his racism flag, or his reporters are the enemy of the people flag. he sought to divide people on an hourly basis on his twitter feed. so the excuse for not doing something, cannot be, most not be, from any republican that unity is now today their priority.

they have maid it clear they don't care that disunity has been their strategy. >> there has never been a president who was more focused on his base as opposed to stitching to -- he never reached out to voters who didn't support him. he absolutely went out of his way to alienate voters who were not for him in 2016, and just spent time with the people who adored hem. this was never a unifying president. none of them ever complained about it. come on, give me a break. by the way, ten votes may not seem like a lot, but this is the most votes from a party of the president in an impeachment in history. i think the previous high number was five. there were five democrats that voted for clinton for several of

the counts of clinton's impeachment. so this is doubling the number that voted against clinton, in terms of voting to impeach a president of your own party. it's notable. all these districts are drawn -- they are not drawn to be swing districts. they are drawn to be one or the other. that's a big number in the house. >> just to underscore claire's point there are now ten republicans who have voted to impeach president trump for inciting insurrection. let me bring folks up to speed what is happening now, what we expect to happen soon. speaker pelosi is back on the floor. she's expected to announce the vote totals. i want to ask our production room if we can play congressman newhouse. let's listen to that, and i'm

going to bring in donna everts on the other side. >> -- not speaking out before the president incited a mob that brutal beat capitol officer. madle speaker, we must all do better. they articles of impeachment are flawed, but i will not use process as an excuse. there's no excuse for president trump's action. the president took an oath to defend the constitution again all enemies, foreign and domestic. last week there was a domestic threat at the door of the capitol. he did nothing to stop it. that is why with a heavy heart and clear resolve, i will vote yet on these articles of impeachment. >> claire, i just want to come to you on that. i mean, i cried when i heard him

say this part of that. includes myself are responsible for not speaking out sooner before the president misinformed and inflamed a mob that tore down and burned the american flag and brutally beat capitol officers. i know good people who believe there was voter fraud. there was no voter fraud. to hear him stand up today and take responsibility was, at a minimum, refreshing. >> it is refreshing, and it remains in stark contrast to his colleagues, who know all of the supposed evidence of fraud was in possession of trump's lawyers. and either because they knew it was unreliable and they didn't want to perjure themselves in court, or because courts told them it was not relevant, it wasn't true, it was misstatemented, over and over and over again, even after case

after case at every level of our courts across this country, trump appointees, all rejected the legal arguments, because there was no evidence. even after that the majority of republicans in the house of representatives voted to overturn the election. >> unbelievable. claire, we're going to listen in. speaker pelosi is at the dais. let's listen in. [ inaudible ] >> claire, we're listening in --

we heard the speaker ask if all the votes are in. et vote count currently stands at 231 votes, 197 again -- go ahead. >> does the network know? >> claire, your mic is open. we heard the speaker ask if every vote was in. it sounds like she's close to announcing the vote total. there we go. claire, you're on the air. >> okay. they said they were --. the ayes are 232, the nays are 197. the resolution is adopted. without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table. [ inaudible ]

>> speaker nancy pelosi announcing the vote in the house, 232 members of congress voting to impeach donald trump. donald trump has been impeached a second time, becoming the first -- >> -- pursuant to section 3-a, the house resolution 40 is hereby adopted. the chair announces the speaker's appointment, pursuant to clause 11 of rule 10, clause 11 of rule 1, in order -- in the order of the following of the house of january 4th, 2021, of the following members of the house to the permanent select committee on intelligence. >> mr. shipp chars, mr. nunes of

california. we're waiting and watching with all of you. in the meantime. >> the how stands -- >> this needed to happen, and it needed to happen now. we could not wait around to see how people thought, what people thought, what will the senate do. our job at the house of representatives was to put this before and vote this man out.

i called him today the white supremacist in chief. that's who he's been, that's been okay with him. we saul it on full display, and we're hearing we'll see even more. so we have to make this decision today. i was proud to cast my vote to be a part of impeaching donald j. trump. what impact does it have, in your view, in terms of preventing anything like this from ever happening again, that ten republicans chose today to stand with you, and stand with their democratic colleagues to impeach donald trump? >> it's about influence, and when you have someone who is in a position of power, who is able to influence others around him, there had to be some type of -- whether it's implicit bias, or some type of prejudice on the

inside the people that donald trump was ability to touch, he was able to touch that in a way that he gave it space, he gave it room. when you take out the king, when the king no longer has a place, then we see that people start to do something different, and people will adapt to the next person. that's what's about to happen. there will be a new sheriff in town who will be making the decision that people will then lean into. what we will see is our country has to become a country where anti-racism is the thing. we have to do the work, the intentional work of that, and we could do it with a person like donald trump. what he was doing is people were connecting that i can do this, too, and we were seeing it all around the country, as well as in the senate and the house. no longer. so now, with my house resolution 25, we're also talking about

those republican members of congress who were working alongside him, who were taking notes and trying to bring that thing into fruition for, you know, in our communities and in the house. no longer. no, we say you cannot bring your guns to the house floor. where he say you will not incite a insurrection and we'll sit back and be quiet. you deserve to be expelled from congress. they're not looking at this as a job that they should be honored to have. they're looking at this like it is their play thing, like donald trump did, like their big daddy did. he treated the presidency like it was his own tv show. you know what? we're bringing you back to reality. this reality show, we are here -- it's not just me, it's the squad and the rest of the members of congress that are working to fight this. we stood um are up today and made our voices clear.

>> i want to ask you something about what i saw on your twitter feed. one of your colleagues i think said in a facebook live meeting with her constituents, that there was a tour given the day before the insurrection by other members. is that under investigation? is there anything else you can tell you about that? >> we're getting more and more information every day. we did hear about more than one tour, and so i am glad that i will, you know -- i'm seated to be able to be a part of an investigation, with the committees i'm on, how judiciary, or even if something later comes by the oversight committee. the sad part is that that was such an inside thing. this is why it's important for us to right now work to expel those members of congress, because when you have people on the inside that are planning to hurt the very people that

they're working with, the lawmakers that were elected by the people -- just people period. let's start with the fact we are regular people, and you actually sought out to hurt us? you planned this. we plan to get rid of you. >> congresswoman cori bush leaving her mark. thank you for spending time with us today. we're going to go back to nbc news capitol hill correspondent garrett haake, because this is the second time, there can be a reflex to say of course he was impeached again, that's how bad he was, but true li historic that ten republicans voted with democrat to say impeach donald trump, just seven

days before he leaves office. what happens next? >> i think the bipartisan nature of it and from where these republican members came, that crossover is historic. nixon didn't have ten votes against him from his own party. it was just extraordinary that we're even talking about it in these terms, but the trial will be a very different animal. in a weird way, the stakes will be lower. we understand now that mitch mcconnell will no use any of the emergency powers available to him to bring the senate back before the biden term starts to begin this. we'll have a weird, dual split-spring moment in the senate, where it would essentially be working to

confirm nominees in the morning and working to convict the former president in the afternoon, knowing that a significant number of republicans have already supported it. i can't get my head around how strange the second half of this month will be in a very different way than the first half, as we try to process these things simultaneously. i think the ten republicans gave permission slips to senators, that if they want to vote to impeach him and bar him from serving ever again, they could do so. the two issues acorn be so different. i want to add to our conversation -- i've tried to do this two or three times, live events have intervened, but

we're joined by donna evers. >> today was extraordinary. i listened to a number of the statements by republican members. i was particularly struck, for example, by jamey -- jamie herrera buetler, it was time to choose, choose over fear of what donald trump might do, fear of what might ensue. i thought that was incredibly powerful. when you add up, in an era when we have very few moments of true bipartisanship in the congress, this is a strong bipartisan vote. it is ten members, but from the third highest-ranking members of

the republican conference to two freshmen members. it's a strong signal to the nation, and it's a strong signal to republicans in the senate. you know, as more and more video and other evidence comes out over these next several days, the pressure is going to mount on senate republicans, because it is not a good look for the republican party to stand on the side of donald trump and the insurrectionists who stormed the capitol on january 6th. >> donna, i want to follow up on something that garrett started sort of sketching out for us, which is what happens next. donald trump impeached today, ten republicans joining that effort. the matter now moves to the senate, but they have to examine the article, and the article is of inciting an insurrection, so to have a fair trial -- and the

senate will be controlled by the democrats. so i think that the willingness to get to the truth may exceed what existed under mitch mcconnell the last time the house voted to impeach donald trump, but getting at the truth into whether or not donald trump is guilty of inciting a deadly insurrection is a serious fact-finding mission. all the evidence that has emerged so far, the videotaped evidence that took place in clear view, will only build on what we start hearing from defendants. there are people, the justice department maid clear that they plan to charge sedition, and conspiring to commit set sedition, those are certificate felonies. the interrogation of those suspects, if they start getting asked why were you here, and the answer is donald trump, donald trump, donald trump, doesn't the evidence become

overwhelming and irrefutable that they'll have to take a serious look at it? >> i think absolutely. add to that, of course, you know, we're seeing increased evidence, if you will, facts, of members of congress having communications with either people in the white house or the president himself over the course of these event, there are now photographs circulating of perhaps members of congress doing tours of the capitol. we don't know, you know, who those people were and what happened the day before january 6th. so there's a lot of evidence gathering that will take place, and the presentation of that, of course, you know, you will recall in the previous hearing, that video evidence was actually played during that process. we will actually have the president's words -- his own words and the actions that

followed for all of the american public to see. here we are as americans sitting back, you know, watching our televisions. we were all witnesses to what happened. that inoverwhelming for who will be the former president of the united states. the second impeachment that he faced, and then the removal and never being able to run for public office again. >> we may all be working from home in the era of zoom cable but i understand that you waved your arms with more reporting than just this. >> well, i'm having impeachment one flashbacks here listening to congresswoman edwards talk and thinking about something i suspect we'll hear from republicans who don't want to vote to convict donald trump because we heard it in the last impeachment trial and i think what you'll hear from some of these. it's not entirely clear who they'll be in a post trump world but they'll exist is that it's

the house's job to conduct these investigations. they will say, as they did during the first impeachment when they were arguing against calling witnesses in the senate trial, that it's the house's job to deliver a complete case to the senate for trial. and i could imagine a situation in a world in which donald trump is no longer president where senate republicans say, look, you guys rushed this impeachment over here. you didn't conduct those interviews. you don't have that background information. you didn't bring those files because you were in a hurry to do this. that was your job, not ours and lacking that will vote to dismiss. i don't know that there's a lot of desire to defend donald trump in the senate republican conference, especially when he's not president, but i do think there will be a lot of desire to not have to relive this over and over again, especially when it will be the work of a new administration to come on. i'm having flashbacks or flash forwards the way that republicans might deal with this in a way that allows them to turn the page from it, without

having to get bogged down and like, what actually happened here. >> let me be the first to accuse you of being hostage to the bigotry of low expectations of the republican party, which is justifiable, but let me just push back gently. if you've got chris christie talking about impeachment, if you can't get impeached for insurrection, what can you be impeached for and you've got a fast-moving investigation at the federal level and the local level and you've got mitch mcconnell who now is doing the one thing mitch mcconnell never ever wanted to do again. he's moving because he's no longer the majority leader of the senate because of donald trump, because of donald trump's lies about the election and because of the burden that that put on the two georgia incumbents who lost their seats. if you got mitch mcconnell now tbd on a vote to convict and you've got a fast-moving law enforcement picture that may

very well result in evidence making its way into the public arena, i don't think we know what the calculation is going to be, and i'm not sure, putting this in the rearview mirror as a political calculation is going to be a good one for any of those republicans and i would say that with liz cheney and ten republicans voting to impeach him, i think the politics are unknowable at this point, garrett. >> no, i think that's true. let me take those one at a time. chris christie, with all due respect to the former governor, he's a former governor with no constituency except the television producers who will book him as a contributor to get on talk about this stuff. while his experience is noteworthy and i don't want to dismiss his analysis here, he's not in the shoes of those senators who are currently elected and will have to vote on this issue when it comes before them. the speed of which federal investigators conduct their work and have evidence submitted during the senate trial is extraordinarily important because that will be the sum

total of the evidence that's available. the house can conduct additional hearings here. there's no committee in charge of this now that has the subpoena power to collect additional information. what the house impeachment managers are able to accept is open source. what the fbi has, what the u.s. attorneys office has. that information, i don't disagree. the speed of which those investigations go could drive this and the mcconnell point goes back to the point i was trying to inarticulately make earlier. the one guiding principle now is how to be majority leader again in two years and the degree he thinks it's useful to back up the truck over trump's post-presidency here in retaining or regaining the majority in two years, he'll do it. if he doesn't think it's useful, he won't. it's that binary, the way that mcconnell will look at this. >> i think you're absolutely right. it will be a political calculation. that's probably all you need to know about mitch mcconnell.

let me add robust debate. ashley parker, i have quoted your reporting already in the context of what we know about what donald trump did while this deadly insurrection that he incited was going down, if you will, largely because of your reporting at this point. what do you make of the fact that the portrait is so damaging as we move from a bipartisan vote to impeach donald j. trump a second time just a week before he leaves the office? >> well, this impeachment as a number of people in trump's orbit have told me is very different than the first impeachment that was just about a year ago. part of it is the president is not facing a reelection. so you saw a much more robust effort that first time around because they understand that something was at stake.

the president's reelection chances, but the other reason i want to be clear that you're seeing, and it's striking, a much less robust effort of lawyers, of lobbying behind the scenes, of outreach to members. remember that first impeachment, donald trump, as a point of pride, wanted it to be purely partisan, is because there is no one there to do this. someone described to me trump's orbit right now is an incredibly small solar system and all of the serious people, the people who were sort of willing or very willing a year ago with impeachment number one to sign on and to do his bidding and to go on the sunday shows and to push his messaging, they're not willing to do it anymore. a large part of that, of course, is there's not a single person, even among his most loyal defenders who are defending the insurrection we saw at the capitol. and there's something about, as much as donald trump hates it, being a loser, right? these people know that in seven

days, whether he likes it or not, and doesn't like it, he will not be president and as someone else put it to me, the idea that they would go out, this is the problem when you have a president who demands that everyone in his circle set themselves on fire. there's suddenly nobody else to burn and offer up, and you have people saying, i set myself on fire for the president for this and for that and for that other thing but i will not do it here. >> these are mark meadows former republican colleagues, the ten republicans who voted to impeach donald trump. i imagine being around donald trump on a day like today when ten republicans have made clear, said the quiet part out loud as you so brilliantly coined it years ago, donald trump is a clear and present danger to the country he leads and his impeachment is not only appropriate, it's urgently needed, so says liz cheney and nine other of her republican

colleagues. >> yeah, there is a newfound sense of urgency. that's the other reason. not sort of, my first answer was true and sort took into account the politic of this, but another thing is that, again, it can't be stated enough just how shocking and startling it was, what we saw last wednesday at the capitol with the president of the united states encouraging and egging on a violent mob against the very government that he leads. a mob that chanted, hang mike pence, about his vice president. for some of these members, in addition to everything else that trump, his power is dwindling, this impeachment, said matters less. it is actually a vote of conscience and something that people who have been able to palate so much cannot truly stomach any longer. >> ashley, is there any reaction from the today white house today

since the vote? >> reporter: well, again, one thing, the question we've been trying to answer all day is just that, but it's striking how much when you ask these people, where is the messaging? there was no briefing, no gaggle in the driveway, no tweets because the president can't tweet. nothing pushed out in terms of talking points. where is the robust response you would expect on a historic day? the answer is that, in certain ways, it doesn't matter. in other ways, there's no one left to respond to have a reaction. the president sitting around three or four aides who he hasn't totally alienated yet and that is sort of where things stand and finally, actually, the president has, i know, again, we always say stunning but not surprising, impeachment being the historic first president to be impeached twice is not actually donald trump's biggest problem right now. he's facing potential legal

vulnerability for inciting the angry mob on the capitol. he has seen businesses cut their dealings with him and his organization, from the pga to what the new york city mayor announced today, and there's a very real possibility that in these trump buildings, in trump org when their leases are up, businesses are simply not going to renew. if you're donald trump, impeachment isn't top of your plate of crises right now as crazy as that is to recognize. >> that's a perfect way to put it. crazy. ashley parker, thank you so much. donna edwards, thank you for joining us this hour. it is 5:00 in new york. we are continuing with our special coverage of the second impeachment of donald trump. the house voting 232 to 197 to impeach donald trump for inciting the charge, the charge of inciting insurrection against the capitol, that tallying includes 10 republicans who

voted their conscience, the most bipartisan impeachment in our country's history. the articles of impeachment now sent to the senate which moments ago affirmed there will be no impeachment trial until after joe biden is sworn in as donald trump's successor. it is impossible to ignore today's proceedings were held at the scene of the crime, the halls of the u.s. capitol, exactly one week ago, were filled with a violent mob of insurrectionists, bent on overthrowing the federal government. today, they were replaced by scores of national guard troops there to protect our country's leaders from the ongoing threat of violence carried out in donald trump's name. it was a reality articulated by democrats today in a set of bracing remarks on the threat trump poses to the homeland each and every day he's allowed to remain in office. >> to the integrity of our elections and our democratic order, he must not remain in power one moment longer. not one moment longer.

the danger is too great. we must impeach. >> this country cannot begin healing in unity without accountability and justice. the president of the united states incited a violent insurrection against congress, you, me, and the vice president of the united states. this cannot be ignored. impeach now. >> i did not come to congress to impeach donald trump, but the constitutional crimes by an out of control president inspired by his hatred and the big lie that he told cannot be ignored. donald trump is a living, breathing impeachable offense. >> we must rise to this moment, not only affirm the virtues we cherish, but reject the vices we abhor. reject deceit.

reject fear mongering. reject sedition, tyranny, and insurrection. >> and the principle defense from the republican side wasn't really a defense of donald trump's conduct at all. but more of a claim that holding trump accountable for the riot that he started might anger the rioters, the domestic terrorists who carried out violence last week and further inflamed divisions in this country. we should also point out one more notable difference between this impeachment and the last one just a year ago, no reaction from the president himself. in large part because we kbt can't hear from him on twitter, the heart of his conduct on impeachment today. congressman maloney in new york. how did this feel different from the first impeachment and the significance of ten republicans voting with you and your democratic colleagues? >> it's a sad and historic day.

it's hard to imagine a more serious betrayal of the oath of office than to incite a violent attack on the capitol, to prevent the peaceful transfer of power to undermine the presidential election. i don't know if any more serious offense a chief executive can commit. it feels different because it's increasingly bipartisan. it feels different because today we are witnesses to what happened. we are the witnesses. we were there. we saw it ourselves and there's, right now, only two sides to this debate. there's the constitution and there's the mob. and i'm proud of my colleagues today for holding the president accountable and for standing up for what's right. >> congressman, what do you make of the republican defense that now, after four years of standing with donald trump after "access hollywood" and people coming from bleep hole nations

and attacks on the squad and chanting send them back, now, now they want unity. >> it rings hollow, of course. i think that it's offensive to those of us who watched what happened to the capitol police. who watched someone bludgeoned to death for doing their job, protecting our lives. it rings hollow now to talk about unity, to talk about further dividing the country. a friend said if you want to heal a wound, you first have to clean the wound, cleanse the infection that threatens to do even more harm. that's the right way to heal, is to clean this wound through reconciliation. but before you can have reconciliation, there needs to be truth and that's the cleaning process that will allow us to unify again and go forward. >> congressman, i worked in the white house on 9/11 and i remember when we went back, the

security was so dramatically different. i'm sure the same pertains to the capitol but how is security different today than a week ago today? >> it's dramatically different. significantly hardened. thousands of pennsylvanian national guard right outside these doors. there are some units from new york, i should add, looking for but haven't found. we're happy to see them. the capitol police needed that support. there's a perimeter fence much more secure. we've taken some steps that should have been taken before the counting of the electoral college vote clearly, but there are still real concerns. there are specific threats to come to washington and commit acts of violence by multiple white supremacists and violent groups and this is not over yet. i've received a briefing in the last few hours about some of these threats. we take it very seriously. >> what can you tell us about the state of the investigation? we heard from one of your democratic colleagues who shared

with her constituents last night that there was a tour the day before for some of the insurrectionists, can you confirm that or what can you tell us about the state of the investigation? >> i can confirm that. i don't have firsthand knowledge of it but i spoke to a member who saw it personally and he described it with some alarm. some of our new colleagues, the same ones, of course, who believe in conspiracy theories and who want to carry guns under the house chamber, who today, the today yelling at capitol police, shove it, who a week ago were risking their lives to save ours. this conduct is beyond the pale and it extends to some of this interaction with the very people who attacked the capitol and that's why the issue of making sure every member of congress now goes through a metal detector, which has never happened before, is so important for the security of the inauguration and for our proceedings and it's a sad

reality that we find ourselves at a place where the enemy is within and we cannot trust our own colleagues. >> so i just want to, into this fact, it's so startling. is it a member or member staff who gave tours to insurrectionists the day before the riot on wednesday? >> again, i don't have all the specifics on that. my understanding is that there was a member showing people around. and that was the reason that when the person who relayed that story to me objected, the answer comes, well, they're with a member of congress. so this issue, right, if a member of congress wants to do it, traditionally, it has been assumed to be safe. that's why i sit on the house intelligence committee. no one does a background check of me. i've been elected by the people. i swear an oath to our nation's secrets and most of american history, we could rely on the fact that people would conduct themselves a certain way. but now we can't be sure a

member of congress won't bring a gun to the inauguration. we can't be sure a member of this body wouldn't be bringing people around the night before who the next day may have been participating in the murder of a capitol police officer. i can't believe i'm saying these things, but this is where we find ourselves and we don't plan to be caught off guard again. some of us are asking tough questions right now to make sure that we aren't caught short at the inauguration. >> can you tell us who the member is? >> i'd rather not disclose it but be happy to send them your way. >> please do. >> if you mean the member giving the tour, again, i want to make sure i know the facts, but i think you'll find that's going to be a real story. >> i want to ask you what the process is for investigating. is the ethics committee the right place to investigate whether one of your colleagues, whether a member was giving a tour and perhaps showing maps

and passage ways to the insurrectionists? >> i think the criminal code is the right place to start. i think we're talking about specific acts of criminal behavior under federal sedition laws. now, look, you've got a few steps in between there, right? it's one thing to be giving a tour to people who are sympathetic to that protest, who may have strong feelings about the election. there's nothing wrong with that and obviously, we're not going to criminalize political disagreement but if people are coordinating in realtime with people who are behind organized efforts to do violence up here, to attack this building, to participate in the beatings and the murder of capitol police officers, then the hell with the ethics committee. these people need to be charged criminally. >> i want to ask you something i asked congresswoman dean yesterday. based on the nature and the specificity of the threats that remain against all of you, do you feel safe? >> yes, i feel safe but i would

feel safer all the time looking at the good guys out here helping us. but i tell you, the country is not safe until the president is separated from the powers of his office. people need to remember, all of the most important national security and military assets are under control of the executive branch. the president sits at the top of the executive branch. so we are not safe, which is why the senate needs to immediately take up the article of impeachment and remove the president. this is about safeguarding our constitution and our public because the violent attack that occurred here one week ago today was about overturning the election, overturning the election and installing a president beyond his term through violence. and that person still sits in the white house and you've worked there. you understand what that means. we are not safe until joe biden's hand is on the bible. >> i agree with you on that, and i think one of the most

disturbing aspects of the last seven days is you can't get a straight answer on who is functioning right now at this hour as the country's commander in chief. it sounds like the vice president was involved in calling the national guard. there's been reporting in multiple news outlets that aids plan to ignore orders from donald trump. do you have any clarity on that question? >> i don't, beyond having a great deal of confidence in the professional military officers and the professionals in the intelligence community. they've been under siege for years, and they have been systemically rooting them out, replacing them with political actors in the justice department, at the defense department, the intelligence community, but they're running out of time and there's still good people there, but yes, i worry a great deal about the conversations going on in moscow how to take advantage of these situations and infiltrate these groups and cause further trouble. i worry about the discussions in tehran and beijing who know the executive branch right now is not focused and let's remember,

4,000 of our fellow citizens losing their lives every day to a pandemic because the administration is more interested in a violent attack on the capitol and inciting that mob than distributing the vaccine. for all these reasons, the president needs to be removed immediately and we will not be safe until he is. >> sean patrick maloney, thank you so much for spending time with us. we're grateful. turning our conversation to pulitzer prize winning columnist and msnbc legal analyst, former general council at the fbi. i have to start with you, andrew, on what the congressman just said there. he's confirming an account we first heard about from democratic member of congress who told her constituents that there was a member giving a tour to some of the people who returned the next day to carry out the insurrection against the capitol.

the congressman there is saying that the ethics committee is not the right place to deal with that, but the criminal justice system is. would bit your hunch that that is under investigation? >> my hunch is that right now, that is not under investigation, but that it will be. it's obviously always tricky to have a criminal investigation that involves congress, but it can be done. and there's two types of crimes. i would say sort of small and big picture ones. one is the simple types of crimes related to trespasses, sort of illegally being on the premises and whether this congressperson was assisting that and assisting the person gaining access inper inpermissa. the wording of sedition, under

the criminal code is to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of the laws of the united states. that is very broad. it will come down to the intent of the congressperson, what they were told, why they were doing this, but you would expect the fbi, as the preeminent law enforcement agency in this country to sit down with the congressman or congresswoman and to hear what the person was thinking and why they did this. >> andrew -- >> that would be part of a thorough investigation. >> i want to ask you what is going on right now with the fbi because the news out of the "washington post" yesterday that there was a memo out of the norfolk office sent up to headquarters that recounted some of what was happening online from these groups, they planned

to come to dc to make war, war was in quotes that these groups had very sophisticated meeting points outside of dc and they were going to travel in together. they planned to attend the rally and then proceed to the capitol. what does it mean to us who read it and say, well, they knew who was coming and they knew what they were going to do. can you just add on, if it's more complicated than that, can you explain that? >> sure. so i think that there was a huge failure of leadership at the fbi yesterday, at the very least, and obviously, there was a failure on wednesday and before that, but this is the most serious national security risk to the united states since 9/11 and the acting attorney general and the director of the fbi have been basically absent. yesterday at the very least, the head of the fbi, chris wray, needed to do three things.

he needed to talk about the failures of the fbi and what he's doing about it and the very least, that should include asking the inspector general to do a complete up and down scrub of what happened and so the norfolk report and those kinds of things need to be examined and chris wray needed to talk to the american people about doing that kind of background federal investigation. second thing is to talk about what they're doing to actually investigate and charge people and then the third is they need to speak to future protesters about what they can do within the first amendment and what the fbi is going to do if they step outside of the first amendment and take the law into their own hands and how they'll be treated. unfortunately, the fbi didn't do number one or number three and chris wray was absent from the discussion of the investigation and prosecutions.

>> can you just clarify that the first amendment is, i mean, no one is mad that people wore maga hats to washington. no one's mad that they like donald trump. i think what people are upset about is that they beat a capitol police officer to death with a fire extinguisher, vandalized the capitol and were carrying zip ties and weapons and planned to do harm to the vice president and the speaker. it seems like there's this chilling sort of cloak of, well, we can't do anything, people can tweet whatever they want. can you just clarify where those lines are for law enforcement? just working in the white house after 9/11, everything, and again, these policies are so controversial, so it's not a perfect parallel but everything pursued is to find out what the terrorists were saying. knowing what they said online is just basic intelligence.

why wasn't a memo from norfolk like that responded to with a show of force with the occasion it came true, it turns out it did but why isn't that the practice of the fbi? >> you're absolutely right. here's the issue. the first amendment in this case is a red herring. there is no issue here about people being able to protest peacefully or to speak. that's, no one is seeking to criminalize that. and the fbi has a policy, a good one, you can't take action solely based on first amendment activity. again, that's not at issue here. that's not what norfolk was complaining about. they weren't saying, oh, people are going to come and express their opinion one way or the other. that's not worth writing that memo. it was the fact that they were going to act on it. that's where the first amendment stops, and there's nothing at all that prevented the fbi from

looking into people who are acting on their beliefs one way or the other. doesn't matter what their beliefs are if they act in a way that violates the law and not just, press their views. >> eugene, anyone who monitors right wing media always knows it was about taking action. it was always about action. it was never about professing love to donald trump. the fundraising drive that resulted in millions being raised by donald trump after he lost the election was all about taking action. that was their mantra. >> exactly. they kept going, stop the steal, stop the steal. we're going to do this. we're going to do something. so it was all, it was totally about action. there was no question of it just being a venting of political fumes and i listen to the whole impeachment debate today, as you did, and sadly, and i think tragically, one thing we did not

hear from the republican side except a little bit from kevin mccarthy was an acknowledgment that at the heart of this whole stop the steal movement is a giant huge lie. it's a damnable lie, it's the lie that there were irregularities in the election, there were allegations of voter fraud, that there was something wrong with the election, and there simply was not. it is not true. it has been demonstrated across the country. yet the republican party will not say that out loud or most republicans will not say that out loud and in the statement that came from president trump today. there was no acknowledgment that i have been lying to you. i have lied and told you i really wanted a landslide but i

did not. that is the truth. that truth is not being told to the people who still about the election and i fear plan to continue this campaign of terror on behalf of donald trump. >> and my colleague rachel maddow said for four years now, watch what they do, not what they say and trump's actions, not showing up at the inauguration, even though biden says he doesn't care if he's there or not, speaks volumes. eugene and andrea, we need much more from you. don't go anywhere. we're joined by steny hoyer of maryland. i was struck by all of your remarks but especially invoking liz cheney and the significance, perhaps inside the republican caucus of her coming out as forcefully as she did for donald trump's impeachment. can you talk about the impact of ten republicans joining with you

and all of your democratic colleagues to impeach donald trump today a week before he leaves office. >> well, i think what it says is, and what liz cheney's comments were so powerful because of who she is, the fact that she's the chair of the republican conference, and she honestly believed that this was the most egregious lack of presidential fidelity to the constitution of any president in history. that's extraordinarily powerful and i tried to appeal to republican members this was not about a donald trump or the house or democrats or republicans. what it was, will we allow conduct which led to an attack on the first article by the congress of the united states, doing its constitutional duty with, as jean said, with the expressed intent of stopping us counting the electoral votes?

to in effect, stop the steal, because they thought that donald trump had told them it was being stolen. he lied, of course, it was not true, of course, and he and his lawyers did scores and scores of cases that judges said it was not the case. it wasn't democrats saying it was. a lot of republicans and of course, the republican secretary of state of georgia and the republican governor of georgia. it was a clear lie, but donald trump to the very end refused to accept the truth and told his supporters, his rabid supporters that the election was being stolen, and then he told them to go down to the capitol and stop it. that's what they tried to do. it was essentially a seditious action to try to take over and set aside the government of the united states in the person at that point in time in the congress of the united states.

so we took the action, we think it was justified by the conduct and liz cheney's very pointed remarks, they bear repeating. if you have the time, when she said the president of the united states summoned the mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack. there has never been a greater betrayal by a president of the united states of his office and his oath to the constitution. what a powerful statement from the daughter of a vice president of the united states and the leader of her party's caucus or conference in the house of representatives. what a powerful statement, and what a courageous statement she made to point out to the american people that this violation was as egregious as it has ever gotten in history and therefore, justified the act of

impeachment even though there is a short period of time in his term left, it was nevertheless important for the congress of the united states to say this is an impeachable offense. so that throughout history, we will have a precedent for this kind of conduct being impeachable. >> congressman, obviously the house has long been the battlefield for very different views, but i wonder what it's like, and i'm thinking of john boehner and what he ultimately pursued which was a strategy of appeasement. he sought to appease the tea party caucus in letting them have their way with the benghazi. do you think tooth paste can be put back in the tube or is it now a forum for qanon and whack jobs? >> i think mccarthy made a

statement and voted not to sustain the votes of the electoral college in pennsylvania and in arizona. astounding, when he knew as has been reported, knew joe biden won this election and the fact they kept sending the message to these rabid trump supporters that they were having this election stolen from them and confirming that, joined the case with about 127 other republicans or maybe 37, but over 100 republicans. he joined the case to set aside the votes of six states. feeding that lie to these almost cult-like followers of donald trump clearly inflamed them as cheney said and clearly led them to believe that they had to defend democracy and defend the honesty of their elections. they were acting on a lie,

compelled by donald trump who refused to accept as every candidate before him has done, refused to accept the outcome. al gore thought he won the election. i think he won the election but five people, the supreme court of the united states said no, the election is over. and al gore to his great credit said, all right, our law, the supreme court, has said the election is over. i may not agree with that, but i will accept those results and when he was vice president of the united states and presiding as pence did and congratulations to pence, pence followed the constitution and did his constitutional duty in a proper way. al gore admonished those who were trying to hold up the counting of the votes and said, no, the election is over. it's sad that this president doesn't have the integrity and concern for our constitution and our democracy to have done that.

>> just going back to the al gore moment, it is an extraordinary moment of someone with everything on the line and everything to gain from one of his allies making that argument, he was the one that shut it down. extraordinary moment. it feels like the country is different now than it was then. congressman stany hoyer. >> hillary clinton, the night after, she got 3 million more votes, notwithstanding that, the electoral college said the election is done. she said the election is over. she called trump and congratulated him on his victory. so it's a sad thing because this president has created this atmosphere of violence and grievance that folks have and tragically on the 6th, on wednesday, that manifested itself as an attack on the congress of the united states.

>> extraordinary, and he does, he leaves so many people at risk of more violence by continuing those lies. congressman, thank you for spending some time with us on a truly historic day in the nation's capitol. heightened security, as we've been discussing. history made today, the wrong kind last week. heightened security all around the capitol as congress began its debate. these stunning images captured by our capitol hill team this morning showed national guards men sleeping in the visitor's center, capitol visitor's center, part of the thousands of troops who have been deployed in the wake of the insurrection last week to mac sure things were safe today and all the way leading up to and through joe biden's inauguration. i want to bring back into the conversation someone who was reporting a week ago so stunning and really brought, i think, into all of our homes how vivid and real the threat was. vaughn hillyard back outside the u.s. capitol. what a difference a week makes.

>> reporter: nicole, i appreciate that. and you asked me one week ago where i could see law enforcement, and i told you standing on the west front at the capitol, there was not a single law enforcement you could see from the naked eye. essentially, the capitol grounds of the united states had been ceded to those insurrectionists. one week later, you're now looking at 9 foot fence here. you're looking at more than 6600 national guards men, according to department of defense official i talked to earlier now here in washington, dc. but it's not just this block here. as of today, a second layer of protection here. to get an idea of where we are in dc, from the capitol, right at the supreme court of the united states. you go another 250 yards down that way to second street, another 9 foot fence to protect it by national guards men as well as u.s. capitol police. i was talking to the d.o.d.

official earlier today who tells me they are expecting to ramp up to 15,000 national guards men from across the region coming into this area. it was one week ago, there was no national guard's presence until after the sun fell. it was more than an hour after individuals had already entered and invaded the u.s. capitol that national guard was eventually finally deployed on to the scene and that is where now, as this impeachment proceedings are going on, it's a much different scene and we should also note that as of yesterday afternoon, and last night the secretary of the army gave his approval to the request to allow these national guards men to be armed. you have seen these guards men here throughout the day come and go here armed. we saw m-4 rifles on these racks, being loaded up on to cargo vehicles here. washington, dc is all but shut down, nicole. unfortunately, it took last week to make that so, but you've been to enough inaugurations to know

this is not what washington, dc in the capitol grounds usually look like a week before inauguration day. nicole? >> no, and i mean to state the obvious, this is supposed to be a celebration of new administration and they are going to be sworn in in the shadow of all of this ugliness from a week ago and under really serious questions about what went wrong. i wonder what the sort of tone and tenor is in your reporting and even with the folks that you see on the street. is there contrition? is there resolve? i mean, what is sort of the public facing posture of law enforcement there? >> you know, i think a week ago, i asked everybody to stop for about 10 seconds just to hear the audio of washington, dc on january 6th felt like and we could do the exact same thing now. just circle around again because this is washington, dc on

january 13th, wednesday january 13th. it's silence yet again and we expect the exact same to be the case. you saw those images, those videos, nicole, that our colleague leeanne shot in the basement of the capitol. these national guards men around the region sleeping just to gain an energy boost there at the basement by literally sleeping on the halls of congress. this is a tough sight to look at here. you've been seeing trucks coming by and going. these are young men and women that came into the scene here to protect the u.s. capitol from individuals who clearly last week demonstrated a willingness to invoke violence and to do whatever it took to gain access to those chambers and to disrupt joe biden's inauguration a week from today. >> vaughn hillyard, thank you so much for spending some time with us. jump back on the air if you have anything else in the next hour and a half, my friend. joining our conversation, eddie

at princeton university. also joining us, robert gibbs, former obama white house press secretary, lucky for us, both msnbc contributors. eugene and andrew still with us as well. let's throw this open. i'm so struck by something eddie, you said to me after the el paso massacre. you said this is who we are and i've been wanting to ask you for a whole long week now if that was your thought when you watched the insurrection last wednesday. >> oh, absolutely. absolutely. it's a result of failure, nicole, to deal with our demons, to really grapple with the horror of white supremacy that in some ways tried to choke the life out of our democracy and i've been thinking, as i was sitting here. why he was impeached.

he was incompetent, a drunkard in some ways, a buffoon but he refused to hold the south accountable. he was going to readmit them into the union. they were going to allow them to establish governments, deny black votes rights and in other words, to reassert white superiority, the white rule in the south and folk in the congress said no and it's because they impeached that we get radical reconstruction. and here we are right now trying to hold the president accountable for inciting, insurrection, sedition. and what i heard today on the floor of the house just, it didn't break my heart, it just reaffirmed the fact that we have a long way to go, as a democracy. >> robert gibbs, i don't have eddie's eloquence or long view on history but i felt a weird mix of relief that finally, ten republicans stood up.

i think democrats felt some of that relief as well. stany hoyer was just on and quoted liz on the broadcast but disgust that there are still republicans who won't say the truth out loud. >> absolutely, nicole and i have thought a lot about recently 139 that voted not to certify the election. if you watch any part of our debate or public discussion since a week ago, you realize that not one of those 139 members of the house have reconsidered their role in this riot. and their role in propagating that the election itself was being stolen, speaking to the people, rushing in to the capitol and essentially telling you, as a member of congress, as somebody in power, i can confirm for you that this election was

fraudulent and being stolen. nobody has walked away from that. we've come out in support of the great police officers. we've castigated some of this violence. we discussed the horror and the mayhem. nobody's walked away from that vote and i get worried how, if the 139 continue to hold those views, how does this representative democracy go forward in a way that it has to in order to govern the country? >> let's unpack that right here. this bothers me every day. not just after they voted but after the insurrection. no one calling their families to say good-bye, perhaps, came back to have a change of heart. a couple of senate republicans.

kelly loeffler who lost ended up abandoning her position of being pro coup. maybe figuring reentry into polite society wouldn't be aided by coming down on the side of the coup after the actual coup but robert gibbs, what is the way, first, let me also say this. the bar is underground for republicans. all you have to do is say you see what we see. i mean, the bar is so low and the moment is now to be, it's almost like a prisoner swap. the bad guys can come back in if they'll just tell truth to their supporters. >> nicole, it's the minimum, that you said, has to happen in order for this to work, in order for our country to function. you already have, you saw this in the exit polls around the georgia special election. three quarters of republicans did not believe that joe biden was the legitimately elected president of the united states. that is simply not sustainable

going forward. that poll number itself should have underscored the possibility of exactly what we saw a week ago. but unless those members start to walk away from this fallacy, nobody is going to, maybe they don't show up at the capitol, but that foments this and that is long-term corrosive damage to democracy. >> and eugene, it puts in place the same cycle that led us into this truly deadly, toxic moment we're in. the trump-led delegit mization of the last democratic president with birtherism and it was a war, it was racist and that was its feature, but it also had at its core delegitimizing him as our leader, as the leader of our country and it became more

fervent the better he did. and when he caught bin laden, it drove all the conspiracy theorists nuts. he'd done something republican people couldn't do and i fear that the effort to delegitimize joe biden is under way and it's not the fault of a single democrat but it is their problem, it is their challenge. >> it's their problem. absolutely right. it's their problem, our problem, the nation's problem. this big lie that is at the heart of what happened wednesday and what's going to continue to happen, frankly, is that the election was illegitimate, therefore, joe biden will not be a legitimate president and what we should have seen today was republican after republican getting in whatever their position on impeachment, getting up and affirming american democracy and affirming the legitimacy of the election.

that's what we should have heard. that's not what we heard. you're right, maybe they don't come to washington. i think they probably don't, given there's going to be 20,000 national guard waiting for them, but what about the state capitol and if not inauguration day, what about the week after? what about the month after? i mean, this, this sort of cult-like behavior and set of attitudes that we see among the most fervent trump supporters is they're not being disabused of that by their elected officials and they're certainly not being disabused of it by president trump. who will never admit the truth. how he lost the election. so this is a huge problem going forward. whatever happens inside the capitol, the problem is what is happening in the country among the millions and millions of

fervent dedicated and fervent trump supporters. that doesn't go away, whatever happens with impeachment, i don't think that goes away. >> on your screen is the article of impeachment. capitol photographers getting pictures of it. this historic document. donald trump, first president ever to be impeached twice, impeached today by the house of representatives. 232 members of congress including ten republicans voting today to impeach donald trump for inciting an insurrection. we are waiting for speaker nancy pelosi expected to sit in the green chair right there and sign the article of impeachment. we are expecting to get a little bit from her about what the impeachment managers will do next as this impeachment of donald trump moves from the house now, officially and

procedurely over to the senate. andrew weissman, we talked to dan goldman how different this trial will be. i asked him and i'll ask you the same question. what's the impact in terms of pursuing the evidence and trying to get to the truth in the senate trial with the senate controlled by democrats as opposed to mitch mcconnell? >> the big difference is the subpoena power. so one of the things that we still don't know but we will certainly know after january 20th is all of the documents that were withheld from the trump administration in connection with the first impeachment but if you are pursuing a senate trial and i actually think this is where delay between the house and the senate could actually hurt former president trump is it gives the administration an

opportunity to see substantially more evidence and for the senate to subpoena that evidence, so that is the main difference and then once trump is out of office, you know, there are going to be lots and lot of questions about the pressure on not just georgia, the united states attorney but the former attorney general barr, acting attorney general of the criminal division on other secretaries of state. i mean, they're going to have a substantial list of questions as to what president trump was up to in terms of sedition and other high crimes and misdemeanors. so completely different ball game. >> so interesting, andrew wiseman. mitch mcconnell, very quick to announce he would not take this up before trump leaves office but he was interested in doing trump a solid.

he would do just that and in some ways are the reporting by jonathan martin yesterday that mcconnell thinks this is a chance to purge trump from the republican party, got out today that mitch mcconnell is tbd whether to convict donald trump. i wonder if you think there might be a head of steam around a very real and meaningful investigation into donald trump's role and talk about the evidence and investigation following the facts. it seems that bill barr left early in part at least because of pressure to pursue investigations that weren't there. >> i have no doubt that we're going hear a lot more once the president is no longer in office, when there isn't that fear factor. there also is a question of, there could be an indictment in the manhattan district attorney's office. the situation does not get

better for president trump in the time delay between today and whenever the senate takes this up. so i think it's really just a question of the political will in the senate and then frankly what it is that merrick garland, assuming he's confirmed, which i'm confident he will be, what he'll be doing in the department of justice and i have to say, my speculation on that is because he comes from the judiciary where judges think about precedent and less about the daily impact and political impact, i think he'll think about the precedent, what if you don't take action to investigate this president? do you want to set that precedent in terms of the presidency? >> precedent and donald trump's unprecedented audacity to not

just play footsie with white supremacists and racists but pull them in, to refuse, while he was a candidate in an interview with jake tapper, to condemn david duke until practically forced to do so by his interviewer, to refuse to ever, i don't want to say to turn down the temperature but to always turn up the flame in every racial division he sought to stoke, and then to end it on the debate stage with joe biden telling the proud boys to stand by. it seems they're watching too. they need to know they'll be held accountable. >> oh, absolutely. that genie is out of the bottle and we can't put him back in. it seems to me that there has to be a converted effort on the part of the biden/harris administration to really root out white supremacy because it threatens to swallow this fragile experiment of democracy whole. we need to have congressional

hearings as we did in 1871, trying to really smoke out the proud boys, the white militias that are camped out in washington state and in oregon and the like. we need to hold people accountable who have given space to these organizations. we need to finally uproot white supremacy from our body politic and let's look at this. i mean, i'm thinking about what he said, nicole, about the congresspersons who supported the big lie, as eugene and others have called it. what did we hear today on the floor? we heard radical left, the far left, we heard false equivalencies between the seditious acts and protests by black lives matter and the like. we heard all of the bells and whistles. we heard all of the fog horns on the floor of the house as we were trying to hold donald trump accountable. and in the backdrop of this, the background of this are americans dying. how many have died of covid today? how many died yesterday? right? and so in many ways, this great

american experiment stands on a knife's edge and we have idiots who hold the reins. we need to hold these people accountable. we need to uproot white supremacy finally and be honest with ourselves and really, reallyreally, really understand the peril that our democracy is in on this day, in this moment as so many of our fellows are grieving because they've lost loved ones. >> it's always hard to go after eddie, even when you're the host. let me try to answer one of those questions. more than 4,400 americans died yesterday from the raging pandemic, one that donald trump has refused to pursue aggressively as something he's responsible for getting under control. i want to say something about the picture on your screen. that lectern there, not the blue table, but the lectern that was in the shot a couple of seconds ago was looted a week ago wednesday. it was one of the items that was

taken and sought by the insurrectionists. so when nancy pelosi speaks, she will speak from that lectern and is expected to make reference to that fact. robert gibbs, to what eddie is talking about, to really seizing the opportunity where ten conservative members of the house have joined the democrats, where 232 house members say today donald trump must be impeached. he represents that grave of a threat that one week before he is expected to leave, he needs to be impeached. how do we make sure this doesn't get washed away by what you and i both know happens in any white house, and that is the churn and the volume of daily crises? >> yeah, well, that will always be a struggle, particularly when you're dealing with as much as we are dealing with right now in this country. i will say this. i think once impeachment started, this was a process that regardless of the intimation

that somehow the senate may not take this up until after the president-elect or president biden's first 100 days were over. i think that was never actually going to work. i think this starts a process that has to end fairly quickly. and i think to what's been said about how this challenge becomes more serious between now and whenever that starts, if it's the 19th, the 20th, the 21st or what not, think back, niolle about this. is there a day since this happened a week ago that we haven't learn in order horrifying things about what went into what happened at the capitol? what led to what happened at the capitol. this is going to age, as it has last week, very, very poorly. and it is likely that in ten days we'll know even more horrific things about what led to and what transpired inside of

the capitol. and i think that in and of itself is going to put tremendous pressure on those hearing this trial in the senate. and there has been a lot of discussion about well, how come mitch mcconnell couldn't control josh hawley and ted cruz. make no mistake about it. there were not a stampede of republicans who voted to not certify this election. there is a big tell and a big watch at what mcconnell does, because where he goes, almost all and certainly a majority of the republicans in the senate will follow. >> such an interesting point. i just want to make sure everyone knows what we're waiting and watching for and what's on your screen. we expect speaker pelosi to begin a news conference at the capitol any moment now. as we wait for the speaker, i want to bring in garrett haake, who has been monitoring all the developments. and i want to pull you in on this conversation of what happens next, because it's one that you and i started. what is -- is the speaker expected to sort of put her special sauce on what happened

today? and it is notable to me that congressman hoyer is stressing and quoting liz cheney's rebuke of donald trump. what do you think we'll hear from pelosi in this conference? >> well, pelosi's task now is to set the table pour the senate trial. i remember it was in this news conference for the last impeachment when i asked about transmitting the articles over quickly, and she said no, she was going to wait to held them. remember there was that long drawn-out negotiation period about setting up the trial. there are still strategic choices pelosi can make as she looks ahead to the trial and makes sure she can get a conviction. i have to tell you, in the last half hour i've been reading through a lot of statements that the 10 republicans made who voted in favor of impeachment here. if there is one through line that pelosi and her impeachment managers want to follow, and they certainly don't need my advice, it's a number of these republicans talk about the president's conduct during the attack, not before, not the comments leading it up to it,

but during and even after as reasons why they voted to impeach. tom rice, a republican from south carolina, a district donald trump won by 19 point, probably the most surprising of those republicans to vote in favor of the impeachment. he supported the electoral challenges. this is a pro-trump guy. the president's refusal to engage during the attack and even his comments yesterday at the wall, saying the way he handled all this was perfect were big parts of the reason why he voted to visit. so i think that's the kind of thing that pelosi and the managers can look at as a blueprint that if you don't want to get bogged down in a debate over incitement of political speech is protected and on and on and on, you can talk about the fact that the president did nothing to lift a finger to save lives during and showed no contrition or willingness to acknowledge the danger afterwards, that is apparently we're learning now a proven way

to get republicans to support this article of impeachment. >> i want to read too examples of that. this is from republican congressman dan newhouse, who said -- well, first, this was notable to me, garrett. others, including myself are responsible for not speaking out sooner before the president misinformed and inflamed a violent mob who tore down the american flag and brutally beat capitol police officers. he says last week there was a domestic threat at the door of the capitol, and he did nothing to stop it. that's speaking to what you were talking about, trump's conduct while it was ongoing. here is congressman meyer. and if i said that wrong, you can correct me. >> no, you gottette. you got it. >> we saw profiles in courage during the assault on the capitol. police officers badly outnumbered, putting their lives on the line. members of congress barricading doors and caring for colleagues. the vice president, who fearlessly remained in the capitol and refused to bow from

the mob there was no such courage from the president who betrayed and misled millions and encouraged loyalists that, quote, if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore, end quote. it seems like the republicans are pointing the senate to the evidence they thought most bolstered their votes today to impeach donald trump. >> i think that's exactly right. and that is one of the huge differences between this senate impeachment trial and the last. you have republicans writing the road book here, writing the directions for how to get this done with a bipartisan impeachment. and again, not shrinking violets here. republicans from heavily pro-trump parts of the country, up to and including liz cheney. i think if you think about it from the perspective of the folks who do this for a living, there may be a bunch of lawmakers who don't want to convict someone based on what they see as political speech which may come perilously close to the way they think they earn

their lives. but failure to act by the commander in chief on the midst of an attack on this country is a lot different from arguing about whether something is protected political speech or not. and that seems to be the direction that these house republicans are pointing their impeachment manager colleagues as this heads over to the senate. >> andrew weissmann, you're one of the people at this network who is responsible for explaining to me during the last impeachment how an impeachment process is different from a criminal trial. i'm just curious. in a criminal context, do those fragments, those quotes from the president cute, or could they be considered by a jury as things that cute incitement? >> sure. what you would look at is not just his statements beforehand. that's sort of the direct evidence is what he was doing beforehand and during, which i think we'll get more evidence on. in other words, what he was doing while he was watching this happen, but his statements

afterwards are what's called circumstantial evidence of his intent at the time when this was going on. because the fact that he is basically saying, just to paraphrase from last impeachment, this was the perfect call, is something that you can really use to say that there is not just no remorse, but this was something he intended, that he isn't in any way racked with guilt or shame. what any normal public servant would feel, which is there more i could have done. that's just not in this president's vocabulary, because it would require him to empathize with people and hear the victims are the people who are going to vote with respect to his impeachment. they were the ones who unlike the pandemic, where we all suffered because of the president's engaging in this lie about science and mask wearing,

here his lie about the election has led to real consequences to the people who are going to actually vote on the impeachment. >> i mean, to your point, this is "the new york times" characterization of how he felt after. "mr. trump was enraged refusing to overturn the election. in a series of meetings, he pressed relentlessly, cajoling and browbeating him. finally before pence headed to call the vote, quote, you can either go down in history as a patriot, mr. trump told him, according to two people briefed on the conversation, or you can go down in history as the word that describes the place he said you can grab women. that's the president who is impeached today for the second time by the house of representatives, ten republicans joining all their democratic colleagues. eddie, robert, eugene, andrew, thank you so much for spending some time with us today on this historic day. it is 6:00 in new york as our special coverage of the second

impeachment of donald trump