lisa desjardi an yamiche alcindor are here to help us so to both of yo, hello.tand it.s has all happened just in the last couple of hours. fact, one of these sets of transscripts, lisa, has come just within the hour. >> that's right. >> woodruff: so the two of you have been scrambling to catch up, to read the trnscrypt. >> that's right. >> woodruff: so let's talk about these former, these are former former defense department officials. >> that's right. let's starred with laura cooper, a defense department official usually you have been hearing. from the diplomat. she is the deputy assistant defensesecretary, specializes in russia where she says she spends most of her time but also works on long-term strategy for russia and for ukraine. she has been with thse def department since 2001 but she says this year at one poialnt st all of her time was spent on ukraine because of what washa ening, in her transcrypt which you say we just got, we learned that there was high aid money to ukraine was being froze en. se is onetment of def of the last to sign off on that. they did sig

yamiche alcindor is back and sat down dowruwith to talk about his new work for our "bookshelf." >> alcindorvon martin, michael brown, boham jean. all unarmed young black men killed in high profile, racially charged incidents. each one of their families turned to the same civil rights attorney to call out what they believed was a deadly pattern of injustice. his name is ben crump. in 2012, crump gained national prominence when he took on the case of trayvon martin. the 17 year old was killed in sanford, floridaafter his death in the fall and the 2014 the black lives matter movement was born. now crump has written a new book, "open season:ized genocide of colored people." many are part of a racistgs of criminal justice system. thanks so much for joining me. ben, you use t word genocide to describe what's happening to african-american men and women across this country. why use that word? >> because it is very intentional that we bring attention to the way black and own people are being killed, high profile police shootings,se but more poignantly how they are killing our people, especially our

>> alcindor: let's drill down on some key dates. in may, president trump has the ambassador to ukraine, marie yovanovitch, abruptly removed from that job. this happens just two weeks before massive chang ukraine. on may 20, volodomyr zelensky,an ctor and comedian, is inaugurated as president of ukraine. he pledges to fight couption in his country. but zelensky has another problem: a continued, costly war with russia over large swaths of land. zelensky needs u.s. military backing. also clear u.s. >> desjardins: on july 10, a key event. at whi house meeting wit the ukrainians, gordon sondland, the u.s. ambsador to the european union, states that ukrainians need to reopen some investigations, cording to multiple witnesses. sondland, here on the right in a picture after that meeting, testifies he does not remember saying that. but then-national security adviser john bolton erupts, according to other witnesses, calling the idea a 'drug deal' and flagging it for white house lawyers. right around that time in mid- july, the united states f

analysis nbc news white house correspondent halle jackson, hugh hewitt, yamiche alcindor and washington post columnist david. welcome to sunday, it's "meet the press." >>> good sunday morning. president trump finds himself facing pressure on two fronts. on impeachment, a growing number of witnesses testifying before congress have confirmed that military aid was being with held until ukraine agreed to announce investigations into president trump's rivals and confirmation that yes, the ukrainians did know a quid pro quo existed and testifying will happen behind closed doors. they hope to refocus the public hearings on joe biden's son and perhaps the whistle blower and tuesday night's political

. >> alcindor: on cbs's "face the nation" sunday, house speaker nancy pelosi invited president trumpappear. >> if he has information that is exculpatory, that means ex, taking away, culpable, blame, then we look forrd to seeing it. the president could come right before the committee and talk, speak all the truth that he wants. if he wants to take the oath of office or he could do it in writing. >> alcindor: today, president trump responded on twitter. he wrote, "i like the idea [and] will, in order to get congress focused again, strongly consider it!" president trump is accused of witholding almost $400 million ne military aid from ukrain exchange for probes into his political opponents.ee over thend, republicans continued to defend the president. the house intelligencesits on committee, said democrats don't have a case because uk never followed through on the investigations. he also appeared on "face the nation". >> the ukrainians did nothing to, as f as investigations goes, to get the aid released. so there was never this quid pro quo that the democrats all promise existed before p

yamiche alcindor is at the white house. ck schifrin is with me at the table.isa, those first witnesses we heard from today were both on that call in july between president trump and president zelensky that prompted the whistleblower's report. let's take a quick listen to what those witnesses, alexander of inman and jennifer williams, had to say. >> i was concerned by the call. what i heard was inappropriate. i forwarded my concerns to mr. eisenberg. it is improper for the president government investioreign political opponent. i was also clear that if ukraine pursued an investigation -- it was clear that if ukraine pursued an investigation, it would be interpreted as a partisan play. t is would undoubtedly res ukraine losing bipartisan support, undermining u.s. national security. i want to emphasize to the mmtee that when i reported my concerns on july 10 and july 25, i did so out of a sense of duty. >> approximately how many cls between the president of the united states and foreign leaders had you listened to? >> roughly a dozen. >> had you ever heard a calll

. >> back with us now, bill critici kristol and yamiche alcindor, political correspondent for "the pbsttacking thanksgiving. christmas that was pushed by the network and the president when he was running by the president. who does not like thanksgiving? >> there is this real discussion of christopher columbus and the founding of this country. >> is that what they were talking? >> this is president trump's sweet spot. he likes to be in culture wars and remind people that he's someone that wants the traditional sense that everyone around him is about a war on christmas and christopher columbus of a great guy and people questioning whether or not christopher columbus was not some way murdered or killing native americans. no one is saying thanksgiving is a bad thing. the president is backed against the wall with the impeachment inquiry. he's going back to what he feels comfortable with. >> suddenly trying to under cut america appreciation. i think what yamiche said is right. >> impeachment is getting to him. he's going to be impeached and i think he'll be. it is not quite as certain as eve

yamiche alcindor, nick schifrin, lisa desjardins. thank you.e turn now to influential memberof the u.s. house for their assessment of today's hearing. firsup, representative doug collins of georgia. he's the highest ranking republicann the house judiciary committee. congressman, welcome. rep. collins: great to be back. hear a lot, if notf whatable to was said today. what did you come away with? rep. collins: the big take away nothing new. this, the hearing was just a heard in the closed-door we saw the transcripts on both these witnesses. what we heard today was simply a public airing of what we have already read. it is a tv movie made out of a transcript. the takeaway was, there is nothing new. we go back to the basics and if there is nothing new in the testimony, what do we know? we know the call, there is no quid pro quo. there was no linka, ambassador taylor kept saying there was no linkage. he had conversatio with zielinski -- zelensky where it never came up. i want to ask, i heard all these comments about how amazing the day was. but ther

nick schifrin, yamiche alcindor, and lisa desjardins, thank you.we have been discussing, the trump administratio quick today to push back on ambassador sondland's claim that vic president mi pence, secretary of state mike pompeo, and white hoe acting chief of staff mick mulney were all aware of the ambassador's efforts to get ukraine to open an investigation into the biden an inquiry sondland acknowledged would ultimately benefit president trump. kellyanne conway is he counselor toresident and she joins us now from the white house. so many questions to ask you about today. my first question is this. we heard the president say this afternoon he was asking nothing of ukraine. h's the case, why was the aid held up for several months? why was a meeting with the president held up? t>> the one thit the president was asking was for president zelensky to deliver on successfullrun on which is to root out corruption. we already july 25 calltr script. both presidents are discussing draining the swamp in their respective countries. they are discussing rooting

for more, amiche alcindor joins me from washington. yamiche, pretty strong words from the speaker of the house. how does this fit in to the democrats' strategy at this point? and what is the wouse saying? >> speaker nancy pelosi is trying to put the simplest terms possible what shebe descas president trump's ukraine in exchar anxtort investigation into joe biden and hunter biden. so democrats want to mae that point simply because they think that americans who are just tuning in might not understand the latin term qd pro quo which is what a lot of people in washington, d.c., including some democrats, he been saying in describing president trump's alleged actions. so she's really trying to get democrats, as well as the american public to use-- starte using erm "bribery" because she wants that to be what people think of as they think about th impeachment intaers. the white house is pushing back on that. the president didn't speak publicly about it but he wasy tweeting, g the democrats are going down this unfair path of impeachment, of thi

the president and his allies are reacting to all of this, our white house correspondent yamiche alcindorns us. she's been reporting on both sides of the border and is in on assignment.re she is yamiche, good to see you there. i want to asyou about we heard the president just a little while ago react to some of the news of the day. to ake a listenhat he had to say. >> was marie yovanovitch the target of a smear campaign by -- >> i really if you look at the transcripts, the president of ukraine was not a fan of hearse either. he did not exactly say glowing things. e'm sure she's a very fin woman, i just don't know much about her. >> she told lawmakers she had concerns about ru giuliani. >> you have to look at the president of ukraine because the president of ukraineas not favorably inclined. >> nawaz: what o you make of what he had to say today. >> well, president trump with us fiercely defending himself on the whn e house ling a largely misleading claim. in f you look at the july 25 call memo released by the white house, the presidentof ukraine vladimir putin -- sails thanks for telling m

i'm joined by our white hot e correspondmiche alcindor. yamiche, so this is the second y of transcripts that have come out. i know you have been tracking how the fromhe has been reacting to this. and i also understand you have been in touch with gordonnd nd, the gentleman we have been hearing about from these leasa and nick, his aorney as well. what you can tell bus their reactions to all this? >> the white house is essentially saying these two transcripts really prove president trump shoua not be target of an impeantch inquiry. let me read to you what white house press sephretary sanie grisham put out a couple of minutes ago. "both transcripts released today though there is even lesevidence for this illegitimate spoovment sham previous thought." she goes on to say gordon sondla sondland being the e.u. ambassador-- he didn't know the actual details of t military aid being held up by ukraine. say something different. today they say he was actual alone an official tuke ukraine officials about thattary aid being tied to the investigation of t

yamiche alcindor is back, and sat down down with crump to talk "bookshelf".r our yamiche: trayvon martin. michael brown. boham jean. all unarmed, young black men, killed in high-profile, racially-charged incidents. each one of their families turn to the same civil right attorney to call out what they believed was a deadly pattern of injustice.s his namen crump. in 2012, crump gained national prominence when he took on the case of trayvon martin.17 thear-old was killed in after his death and the 2014 protests in ferguson, missouri, the black lives matter movement was born. now, crump has written a new book, "open season: leganozed de of colored people." he argues that the killings of many are part of a racistti criminal j system. thanks so much for joining me. y be use the word genocide to describe what's happening to african-american men and women across this country. why use that word? mr. crump:au b it is very intentional that we bring attention to the way black and brown peoplere being killed, not just by the bullets in these high-profile police shootings,

yamiche alcindor at the white house. nick schifrin is here at thewi tabl me. hello 12 you.ot tok here, but let's start with listening to one of today's two witnesses. he's a diplomat, david holmes. he came to talk about his first-hand sighting, what he saw in a moment at has received so much attention in these hearings. let's listen to part of what david holmes had to say. mr. holmes: thfour of us went to a nearby restaurant and sat on an outdoor terrace. i sat direly across from ambassador sondland ad the two staffers sat off to the sides. at first, the lunch was largely social. ambassador sondland selected a bottle of wine that he shared among the four of us and we discussed topics like working f strategi his hotel business. during the lunch, ambassd or sondland s would call president trump to give an update. ambassador sondland placed a call on his mobile phoi eard him announce himself several times along the lines of "gordon sondland holding for the president." it appeared he was being transferred through severalf layersitchboards and assistants. i then noticed ambassad

yamiche alcindor, aong day for you. thank you all. get ready.udy: in other news today, roger stone, former aide and long-time confidte of president trump today was found guilty in art federal cn seven felony counts. among them, obstructing a contressional investigation russia's interference in the 2016 election. stone was also convicted of lying to investigators and tampering with a witness. prosecutors said tha stone committed these crimes to protect the president. amna: the panel that stone lied to is the same congressional committee conducting the impeachment hearings. as the lastictment brought by former special counsel robert mueller and the trial revealed new detai about the trump campaign's interest in emails ha,ked by rus published by wikileaks. stone is the latest in a strg of former trump aides and officials who have been convicted including michael cohen, paul manafort, rick gates, george papadopoulos and michael flynn. the pwesidented "so they and want to jail him for manying years to come." the president referenced hillary clinton,

here to unpack the latest, our white house correspondent, yamiche alcindor. hello, yamiche. a lot to catch up with here. just in the last house transcripts released, these are the last witnesses to appear before the house intelligence committee. tell us who thesei indivduals were and what are we learning from their testimony. >> well, our was combing through hundreds of pages of transcripts in the last hour. the's so much to unp. the first person whose transcript was released was ambassador philip reeker. secretary for european and your asian affairs. and republican admrations.ratic he did not appear many public hearings. what's important acted him is he e sentially confirms a lot of the thingsow were happening when it comes to gordon sondland, the e.u. ambassador being seen an irregular actor when it came to pressuring ukraine to joe biden and hunter biden in exchange for military aid. he also talks aboutin ag chief of staff mick mulvaney possibly being involved. he also says that rudy giuliani, the president's personal ertorney was politician a role but i also want to know

yamiche alcindor is at the white house. and nick schifrin is at theth table e now. lisa, i want to turneco you first,se those first witnesses we heard from today were both on that call in july between president trump and president zelensky. itprompted the whistleblower's report in the first place. let's take quick listen to wha those witness, lieutenant colonel alexander vindman andd williams o say about that call. >> i was concerned by the call. what i heard waste inappropr and i reported my concerns to mr. eisenberg. it is impro pr for theresident of the united states to demand a foreign government investigate a u.s. citizen and a political opponent. i was also clear that if ukraine pursued an investigation, i it was also clear that if ukraine pursued an investigation into the 2016 election, the bidens and brisma it would be interpreted a partisan mood. this would result in ukraine losing bipartisan support and objectn the region.strategic i want to emphasize to the committee when i reported my concerns on july 10th related to ambassador sondland and july 25th rel

yamiche alcindor is at the white house. and nick schifrin is with me at the table.much to talk about all three of you, but let's start by hearing just ait gordon sondland's opening testimony. first, secretary perry, ambassador volker and i worked with mr. rudy giuliani on ukraine matters at the express direction of the president of the united states. we did not want to work with mr. giuliani. simply put, we played the hand we were dealt.er we all uood that if we refused to work with mr. giuliani, we would lose a very important opportunity to cement relations between the united states and ukraine. so we followed the president's orders. second, although we disagreed with the need to involve mr. giuliani, at the time we did not believe that his role was improper. third, let me say: precisely because we did not think that we were engaging in imprope behavior, we made every effort to ensure that the relevant decision makers at the nationalu securityil and state department knew the importantof detailur efforts. t the suggestit we were engaged in some irregular or false.ac

yamiche alcindor is at the white house. and nick schifrin ist the table with me. hello to all of you, a le. to unpack h let's start by listening to one of today's two witnesses, he is a diplomatvi, holmes. he came to talk about his firsthand sighting, what heaw at a moment that has received so much attention in these hearings, and let's listen to part of what david holmes had to say. the four of us went to a nearby restaurant and sat on an outdoor terrace. i st. sat directly across from ambassador sondland, and the two staffers sat off to our sides. at first, the lunch was largely social. ambassador sondland sected a wot of wine that he shared among the four of us and discussed marketing strategies for his hotel business. during the lunch, ambassador sondland said he was going to call frump to give him anda . sarmdz sondland placed a call on his mobile phone. i heard him announce himself several times along the lines of gordon sondland holding for the president. it appeared he was transferred through several layers of switch boards and assistants. ticed ambassador

yamiche alcindor, a long day pore you.rd lisa desjas here at the table with me, nick schifrin, thankll. i saw that stretch. get ready. >> woodruff: in other news today, roger stone, the former aide and long-time confidant of guilty in a federal court onound seven felony counts. among them, obstructing a congressional investigatn into russia's interference in the 2016 election. stone was also convicted of lying to investigators and tampering with a witness. prosecutors said that stone committed these crimes to protect the president. amna nawaz has the details. >> nawaz: that's right, in factu , the panel that stone lied to is the same congressional impeachment hearings.the now, stone's indictment was the last brought by former specialun sel robert mueller, and the trial revealed new details about the trump campaign's interest in emails hacked by russia and stone is the latest in a string of former trump aides and officials who have now convicted. they include michael cohen, paul manafort, rick gates, george papadopoulos and michael flynn. moments after thverdict, the president tweeted

yamich alcindor, white house correspondent for the "pbs nehour," dan balz of "the washington post," heather caygle with "politico" andicel crowley, white house correspondent for "the new york times". the focal point of this house inquiry remains the seasonedvo witness, civil servants who o spokf rattled diplomatic ranks and alliances andrida former ambassador to ukraine, marie yovanovitch, and president trump tweeted as she spoke. >> as we sit here testifying, the presi ynt is attacking on twitter and i'd like to give you a chance to respond. i'll read part of one o his tweets. "everywhere marie yovanovitch she started off in somalia, how did thato? would you like to respond to tht president'sk that everywhere you went turned bad? >> wl, i mean -- i don't think i have such powers, not in mogadishu, somalia, and not in other places. i actually think that where i've served over the years, i and others, have demonstrably made things better. >> what effect do you think that has onther witnesses' willingness to come forward and expose wrongdoing? >> well, it'sery intimidating. robert: as michael

yamiche alcindor. chief white house correspondent, hallie jackson, for us here at nbc news, and "washington post" columnist david ignatius. trying to figure out how republicans want to defend the president is, continues, to be a bit of a mystery. let me put up an array of attempts. the varurous ways various defenders of the president have attempted to defend the president. >> get over it. there's going to be political influence in foreign policy. >> i look at it this way. the aid is there. and the investigations didn't happen. soy if there was a quid pro quo, it certainly wasn't a very effective one. >> nobody has testifies that there's a quid pro quo ordered by the president of the united states. >> i think we can add rand paul, i'm against all foreign aid and i don't even know why they're arguing about that. there is not an agreement among congressional republicans on what to do here. >> no, and they're not getting any messaging from the white house on what strategy the white house would like them to

betsy woodruff swan, jake and yamiche alcindor. >> he's obviously making the calculation that the currentsomeone with his platform to enter the race. so he's looking at this as saying, okay, i'm not going to fight for the first early states but i can do something in the states that are more diverse. the key here, of course, is that michael bloomberg for african-americans, people of color and many voters across the country think of stop and frisk. hispanics were being stopped and african-americans were being stopped all over new york city because police were essentially racially profiling them. even when it was found unconstitutional, he angrily said that nothing would change. he just reversed course saying he apologizes for that. i think a lot of candidates will be, one, focusing on that tactic in particular. a democratic primary still runs right through african-american communities. the second thing, of course, is that no one has been able to touch joe biden when it comes to his support among african-americans. i've talked to voters, especially in south carolina, who see joe biden as not

question, to look back and bring it all into focus, our lisa desjardins and yamiche alcindor.: more an a dozen witnesses, thousands of pages of testimony, and a whistleblowert complaat we learned about only in september. lisa: it all led democratic house speaker nancy pelosi to do this. >> i'm announcing the house of representatives moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. lisa: this has all happened quickly, almost too quickly to process. so we want to want to step back d look at how we got her yamiche: let's start where this investigation began, that letteu from an anons whistleblower. the whistleblower writes thatle mult.s. officials told them that president trump pressured the president of ukline for his own politica gain. he wanted ukraine to open an investigation into former vice hunter biden. biden and his so the younger biden served on the board of a ukrainian energy company. the whistleblower says that president trump was soliciting interference from a foreign country, a sought to pressure president's 2020 re-election bid. lisa: this is the core charge bd

for insight and analysis nbc news white house correspondent halle jackson, hugh hewitt, yamiche alcindornd washington post columnist david. welcome to sunday, it's "meet the press." >>> good sunday morning. president trump finds himself facing pressure on two fronts. on impeachment, a growing number of witnesses testifying before congress have confirmed that military aid was being with held until ukraine agreed to announce investigations into president trump's rivals and confirmation that yes, the ukrainians did know a quid pro quo existed and testifying will happen behind closed doors. they hope to refocus the public hearings on joe biden's son and perhaps the whistle blower and tuesday night's political fallout, president trump made a special trip to kentucky to support republican governor matt beven. democrats took control, though, of both houses of the virginia legislature for the first time in a generation and also swept local elections from missouri to pennsylvania. the large take away, there is no ebbing the democratic tide among suburban college-educated voters. that should be a

. >> yamiche alcindor, always great to have you, my friend. reporter: thank you. >>> one historian who has correctly predicted 30 years of presidential elections. gotten them all right. his surprising take on where the impeachment inquiry could be headed. impeachment inquiry could be headed you can scan? with the freestyle libre 14 day system just scan the sensor with your reader, iphone or android and manage your diabetes. with the freestyle libre 14 day system, a continuous glucose monitor, you can check your glucose levels any time, without fingersticks. ask your doctor to write a prescription for the freestyle libre 14 day system. you can do it without fingersticks. learn more at freestylelibre.us you can do it without fingersticks. ♪ ♪ experience the power of sanctuary at the lincoln wish list sales event. sign and drive off in a new lincoln with zero down, zero due at signing, and a complimentary first month's payment. >>> we are following some breaking news here at msnbc. we are getting reports of a shooting at a walmart in oklahoma. we

joining me now, yamiche alcindor and jeremy peters, both msnbc contributors.my, this is getting a lot more active on the campaign trail, both biden and warren. but mayor pete still holding a really lead in iowa and other places, just not connecting at all with african-american voters. he was asked about that during the debate the other night, and not clearly doing well in south carolina where so much of the vote in the primaries are african-americans. >> that's absolutely right, he's been creeping up in iowa, now new hampshire where he looks like he's gaining a lot of strength. what happens after that? the south carolina primary where 60% of the electorate are african-americans. last time i looked testifies zero percent in the polls among african-americans in south carolina. it's a big problem. it's a danger for his campaign on another level because the narrative has become so much about that, that he can't get over this hurdle, and that's self-reinforcing, it's a tailspin he can't get out of. they're working to shore up that support. i talked to al sharpton a

here with me to walk through yet another day of developments is our own yamiche alcindor. ch to follow, as always. so we did learn more today about rudy giuliani'sinvolvement, alings in ukraine. what are we learning? often say you need to follow the money and in this case both "the wawington post" and the " york times" say they followed rudy giuliani's money to show that he was trying to really negotiate a lucrative consulting deal with the government of ukraine while he was, at the same tiinme, urgthe top prosecutor there to look into joe biden and hunter biden so what we know is that through wasments, rudy giulia negotiating up to at least $200,000 to be paid by the wukrainian government to rk that would have essentially been him looking into whether or not ukraine had stolen money that somehow ended up overseas. rudy giuliani said he looke at this deal, but he said this was a conflict of interest, i thought it would look baand i never made a penny off of this. why this is importan is we see rudy giuliani pressuring or making uainian officials look into this claim joe bi

a very full day yamiche alcindor at the white house, lisa desjardins at the capitol, nick schifrin herek you. s. >> woodruff: we turn now to influential members of the u.s. house for their assessment of today's hearing. first up, representative doug collins of georgia. he is the highest ranking republican on the house judiciary committee. congressman, welcome back to the newshour. >> great to be back with you, judy. >> woodruff: so i assume you were able to hear a lot if not all of what was said today.e what did you cay with? keaway for today is nothing new. the hearing was just a regurgitation of what we heard was leaked outo frm adam schiff in the closed door hearings. we've seen the transcripts from both witnesses. what we've heard is a public airing of what we read, making f tv kinovie out of a transcript already there. the big takeay at the end of the dais there's nothing new here. we go back to the basics, if there's noing new in the trnlings what do we know? we know the call itself, no quid pro quo. we know coming ouom today, no linkage. mr. ambassadoraylor said no linkage he had

hopeful that he does alcindor: ronald reagan once described orange county as the place good republicans die. that makes this placeagan ground zero for democrats.unty desjardins: are you questioning whether there is a movement of people in this country who are white nationalists? stewart: what i'm, what i'm saying is, i haven't seen it. " myers: he was like, "i'm glad you're on the crew because you're sexy, and you have a nice ass." branam: this is your boss? myers: yes. van tilberg: each time we would go back and revist one of the statues we would find that it had changed. brown: how do you prioritxe these versus those? yang: zinnerman's house is part of the studio's 20k project. zonnerman: after all these years something i have always wanted was a house. schifrin: today, western governments accuse the fnd of waging a f hybrid war against their enemies, with a new kind of soldier, hackers. ferguson: the frontline is just up here,'s where the river tigris is and isis fighters are trying to push the iraqi army back. solman: so for you, to hear that somebody spent 10 hours on the phone wit

david, thank you, yamiche alcindor, what are you looking at today?going to be waiting for more transcripts. i think what we're seeing is a steady stream of democrats really trying to stage these transcripts in a way to really highlight what they think is unfair and unethical behavior by president trump and the people around him. now, i've talked to a number of republicans who are very upset about the way that these transcripts are being released. they think they should all be released at the same time. that's them adjusting their message. just a few days ago, they were all saying where are these transcripts? now it's that these transcripts aren't coming out fast enough. before that it was that all of these depositions weren't unfair. i'm still also looking at how republicans are going to continue to adjust their message, especially after all these elections that happened last night where democrats had some really big wins. >> all right, yamiche. >> thank you, yamiche. >> thank you so much. we really appreciate it. mike barnicle, i want to go to you f

first of all, your assessment of mark morgan's answer there to my colleague, yamiche alcindor. >> hi,u.s. has responsibility for individuals that are being harmed when they're sent back to mexico. this program is violating numerous domestic and international laws by sending people back and causing this harm. >> so, wait, are they just pu punting? was mark morgan punting there by saying, look, mexico says they're going to do all they can to protect these people? is he essentially trying to wash the u.s.'s hands of that in terms of protecting these folks that the united states turns away? >> i mean, that's what it sounds like to me. under international law, there's this rule that's basic international law akin of not committing genocide or not acts like committing slavery. and this idea of not sending someone back to a place where it's more likely than not that they will be harmed, that is basic international law. that's something that we are violating every time that we send someone back without really assessing whether or not they would be harmed in mexico. >> so, look, douglas, your

richard haass, and joining the conversation, white house correspondent for pbs news hour, yamiche alcindorl correspondent for "the washington examiner" and a contributing writer at ""vanity fair" david drucker and carol lee joins us this morning. the first televised public impeachment hearings get jurpdway this morning into president trump. donald trump is the fourth president to face impeachment proceedings by the house of representatives, the third in recent times. polling this month showed 49% of americans say president trump should be impeached and removed from office. 47% say he should not. today's hearing will open with testimony from acting u.s. ambassador to ukraine, bill taylor and deputy assistant secretary george kent. taylor is the one who texted ambassador gordon sondland that it would be, quote, crazy to make ukraine military aid contingent on investigations aimed at helping the president's re-election. taylor testified that this was his, quote, clear understanding that ukraine wouldn't receive its military aid unless ukraine's president committed to pursue the investigations