>> jake sherman, i see you shaking your head. i'm guessing your answer -- but then could you also address whether or not bill taylor, this u.s. diplomat who i think went on to write in more texts that were released that he would quit if it turned out that the military aid, taylor, the nightmare is they give the interview and don't get the security assistance. the russians love it, and i quit. this would seem like an important witness for the democrats to have before their committees investigating this. >> you'd have to assume that, yes, if they haven't been in touch with him, and i have no reporting to suggest that they will. i understand you need 20. could we name four that are going to vote against the president at this point? it's news when one comes out. mitt romney came out today and spoke out against the president, and it was big news. i don't see at this point -- we don't know what's going to come out next. i don't see any senate republicans more than -- and i'm not even sure what romney's going to do. so i don't see that

joining us from capitol hill, senior writer for politico jake sherman.ormer republican congressman, now an independent, david jolly. with us at the table, associated press white house reporter john jonathan lemire. and former dnc senior adviser doug thornell. i was going to do this later in the show, but this has become our thing. i have to fact-check that bs, to borrow your word, mr. president, about the whistle-blower complaint. so for everything the president's saying about his july 25th phone call that it's perfect and whatnot that it was a perfect call and anyone who has a problem with it has been misled by adam schiff and the whistle-blower. let's stop with that. that's nonsense. that's the big lie because trump, the white house, and rudy giuliani have now corroborated almost all of the whistle-blower complaint. the whistle-blower and this complaint can disappear because this is what's been corroborated. the president pressured mr. zelensky to initiate or continue an investigation into the activities of former vice president joe biden and his son.

jake sherman, you always have your finger on everything that's going on there. i thank all of you for being with us today. coming up, another day, another revelation about just how far rudy giuliani reportedly went in his efforts to dig up dirt on the president's political rivals. >>> plus new warning signs for the president. polls starting to show he could be losing ground with a key group he eel need to win the white house again, all coming as some house democrats would won in trump districts this year are going back home to tell impeachment to their constituents including congresswoman elise slotkin who attracted a much larger than expected crowd yesterday. >> i did this not lightly, i did this out of judicious and thoughtful reflection and i did it because i believed it was the right thing to do based on my ineggity and oath of office. i appreciate your understanding. . there's a better choice. aleve pm. the only one to combine a safe sleep aid and the 12-hour pain-relieving strength of aleve that dares to last into the morning. so you feel refreshed. aleve

joining me nbc news correspondent, jeff bennett, msnbc political contribute eer, jake sherman, "new york times" chief white house correspondent and msnbc political analyst, peter baker and with me, reuters white house correspondent, jeff mason. jeff bennett, i thought the framing you and garrett had today on what was happening on capitol hill was very insightful. tell me what you're hearing about what george kent is telling lawmakers right now. >> well the members themselves that we've encountered outside the hearing room and capitol happen tight lipped. kent is the state department official responsible for ukraine. the reason why he was even call nd the first place is because he is among those who raised red flags about the smear campaign that rudy giuliani and his associates aimed at folks like marie. she's connected to this because she herself raised red flags about the work giuliani was doing. she was trying to bring his influence campaign into proper state department channels. giuliani according to reported testimony, didn't like that too much and then he target ded her for her even

jake sherman, let me come to you for a moment here. from 30,000 feet here, jake, what do you see here? what are some of the red flags that this raises? >> reporter: in the last two days we've seen two exceedingly damaging stories about rudy giuliani and the president. yesterday bloomberg reported an excellent scoop about how rudy giuliani pressed then secretary of state rex tillerson to intervene on behalf of somebody he was involved with. and then this today. you start asking yourself at what point does the president, recognize that rudy giuliani might not be worth the trouble he's causing this white house. that's what everybody is talking about that i've spoken about this morning. number two, the pete sessions angle is extremely interesting to me. pete sessions, who as you noted, is a member -- was a member of congress who got money from both of these gentlemen who were indicted. pete sessions is no longer in congress, but he's now running for another congressional seat in waco. he was from dallas. he's going to waco to run for an op

all right, also with us senior writer at "politico" and co-author of the play book jake sherman.ibutor. >> it was upstate new york. >> and he's trick or treating tomorrow, and senior adviser at mo moveon.org karine jean-pierre. her new book "moving forward," a story of hope, hard work, and the promise of america is out next week. so excited karine. >> thank you. >> congratulations. we're going to begin with the impeachment probe and the parts of the phone call at the center of the inquiry that the white house apparently omitted from the memo. the revelations come from lieutenant colonel alexander vindman, the top ukraine expert on the national security council who testified for more than ten hours yesterday according to a lawmaker who was present for his testimony and another source familiar with it. vindman told investigators that he tried to edit the white house's reconstructed transcript to reflect president trump's mention of possible recordings of joe biden discussing ukraine corruption and ukrainian president zelensky's specific mention of the gas company burisma, which hir

jake sherman is an msnbc political contributor.that new poll, joe, that, again, again, shows a majority of americans support house democrats impeachment inquiry into president trump. according to this new npr/pbs poll, 52% of americans said they approve of house democrats impeachment inquiry into the president. that's up three points since last month. 43% disapproved. 49% said they support the impeachment of the president, 47% are opposed. americans in this poll are divided 48 to 48 on whether they support the senate voting to remove trump from office. 68% of americans said that it's not acceptable for a president to ask foreign countries to investigate his political rivals. 26% disagreed. and, joe, that's the question that i think -- i think the white house, perhaps, thought they would have a very easy time conflating this, confusing this, muddying it up and making it too hard for people to understand. the answer to this question is basic. the answer is no. it's not okay to shakedown ukraine for dirt on your political rival. ameri

politico's senior writer, jake sherman.shington post's" bureau chief and former senior director at the national security council. gentlemen, welcome. jeff bennett sh first to you. vinman b has been on the hill now for a few hours. what are we hearing about what's going on behind those closed doors? >> well, we expect according to the opening statement that he is telling house investigators that not only did he listen in on the july 25th call in question between president trump and zelensky, but that he was so disturbed and so krped by what he heard that he flag ged the c nfc -- sondland linked. here at all in itself significant. a white house official was sub pea naed, willingly not to come ply and because there would been that republican talking point that the whistleblower complaint was based on here say. well here you have an army officer who appeared in dress blues essentially corroborating the whistleblower complaint. jeff, what's going to happen with sondland? i know he was on the hill yesterday to review his testimon

and jake sherman from politico updated a letter stating that it, too, will not comply with a subpoenaocuments citing the lack of house authorization. let's get into it with our friend and regular contributor, msnbc legal analyst danny cevallos. >> you were pausing a little bit. >> i was adding pizzazz. >> thank you. >> with the trump administration not complying with the impeachment inquiry. >> trump administration's position here because the house has not voted on a formal impeachment inquiry that they don't need to provide these documents or respond to the subpoenas. on the other hand, if the strategy essentially is that the house is going to ask for these documents, then they need to have aformal vote. and those members, especially those members in districts are potentially go on record and potentially expose themselves in future elections. and the house would rather do this without taking that step. so that's the trump administration's point at this point. so they're going to stonewall until either the house votes or this goes to the courts but that's their position. because they

his casket solemnly being carried up the steps of the capitol, i want to bring in geoff bennett, jake sherman, both of them on capitol hill. geoff, obviously this is one of those rare instances where we see both sides coming together. we're going to hear from people, leadership on both sides of the aisle. tell us a little bit about the honors that will be bestowed on elijah cummings over the next 48 hours. >> reporter: chris, today and tomorrow we are going to see a public celebration for a man revered for the deep and abiding passion he brought to public service, a man widely regarded for being a strong, moral force here on capitol hill. house speaker nancy pelosi said el lie j cummings was her north star. adam schiff said he was the heart and soul of the democratic caucus. republican mark meadows said there was never a better advocate and never a better friend. so elijah cummings was one of the last remaining giants on capitol hill. that is why he's being so honored here today lies in state in the u.s. capitol. let's just reflect on that for a minute. as you mentioned, he was the son of sou

also with me, "new york times" chief white house correspondent, peter baker, jake sherman and former u.s. attorney, joyce vance. josh, i'm going to put the two texts up on the screen between sondland and taylor. bill taylor says he thinks it is crazy as he said on the phone, crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign. five hours later in a markedly different tone, much more formal, sondland says bill, i believe you were inkrek about president trump's intentions. the president has been clear, no quid pro quos of any kind. the president is trying to evaluate whether you crane is going to adopt the reforms president zelensky promised. i suggest we stop the back and forth by text if you have still have concerns, i recommend you give lisa kenna a call to discuss them directly. thanks. josh, again, a kimpbt taupe. some different tone. some called this a cya text. your new reporting shows that this ambassador had a phone conversation with the president between those two texts. do you know what they talked about? >> we don't know. but what nbc news is has confir

with me is jake sherman, and karine jean pier. she has a new book.dan buck, and washington examiner senior political correspondent david drugger. david, i want to start with you. unpack this conundrum for us. you have president trump catching it from republicans, catching it from evangelical leaders on the syria issue. the same people he needs to have supporting him as he faces this impeachment issue. >> right. i don't think any one thing is going to have anything to do with the other as far as congressional republicans are concerned. the one area where they have consistently been willing to confront trump and rebuke him is on matters of foreign policy. we saw it going all the way back to 2017 when they passed veto proof legislation in a republican house and republican senate to limit the president's ability to negotiate deals with vladimir putin and russia, among other things. this is not that surprising. i don't think it should be surprising either to voters that the president is doing this in syria. he campaigned as a president who did not believe

senior writer for politico jake sherman.eremy bash, former chief of staff at the cia and department of defense. donna edwards. and deputy chief for the "wall street journal" jean cummings. plus joining us from the "new york times" news room, annie carnie. i have to start with you. so far there have been witnesses that the white house has tried to block. there have been transcripts that the white house for some reason willingly released. all of the evidence paints the same picture. what is the most significant thing to you about ambassador yovanovitch's testimony? >> well, she, after 30 years in the foreign service, really lashed out at the approach of the trump administration, the state department at her tenure and at the tenure of professional diplomats, career diplomats, people who swear an oath to the country and serve in the best interests of the nation. basically what she says is she says when president zelensky came in office, there was an effort underway to pry to utilize him for president trump's personal gain. but t

jake sherman, their answers seem to fly in the face of what we saw in those text messages. >> republicans are focusing var narrowly on this fact, was there an explicit ask -- was there a specific quid pro quo. did the president or any of his aids say do this and i will or won't do this other action. everything the president or any politician does is a quid pro quo in some circumstance. congressmen, members of the administration always have something to give and they want something else. that is not really what's at issue here even though meadows and zelden want to talk about that. what's at issue here and this is what democrats say. democrats say the president has turned the machinery of the government, you read about this in play book this morning into an operation to topple joe biden and his son and dig up dirt on them. in a new kind of probe for corruption we hadn't seen for the first two years of the administration that is suddenly starting right now. and the president in a very revealing comment and almost an aside was asked on the white house lawn this morning, did you ever ask any

joining me from capitol hill, msnbc correspondent garrett hague and political contributor, jake sherman. jeff mason, also with me, former state department senior adviser and former white house senior director, everybody, welcome. garrett, wow. that was quite a statement from that congressman about what he's heard so r far. what are you hearing about ta r ltaylor's testimony? testimony >> someone told not to talk about the specifics of what goes on, but a picture is coming out of a r very disturbing testimony. we are hearing that from a number of members talking about excuse me, we're having some audio problems here. we've been hearing from members about this disturbing testimony. no specific, but they are describing someone who is a meticulous note taker who took significant notes during every call and meeting, that those notes made up the backbone of a thorough opening statement, some 15 pages. again as described by these one member said that taylor is someone who was in ukraine, in the country, through the breadth of the allegations against the president. he was there for the phone ca

jake sherman, i'll let you take it away on these numbers and also on what you've been witnessing overst few days in capitol hill, perhaps because of these numbers. >> yeah. listen, this is the traditional divide of america. half the country supports the president, half doesn't on most days and most presidents. and this is why if you talk to most democrats and many republicans, frankly, they want the -- democrats want the impeachment proceedings or some version of them in public and not behind closed doors. and it's a republican talking point, no doubt, that they are doing this secretly. but the political imperative is, and democrats recognize this, because they said this for months, nancy pelosi said this for months. the political imperative is to make the case to the american people that the president is deserving of impeachment. whatever you think of impeachment, there's definitely some uncertainty about whether the public is fully behind it or not. and i don't know how it will be done. there's a lot of questions right now about what a public face of impeachment would look like, who

senator now an nbc news and msnbc political analysts, claire mccaskill, senior writer of "politico," jake sherman for the washington examiner david drucker. he's also a contributing writer at "vanity fair ". claire, i want to start with you as someone who sat in that body, the united states senate. what would you be thinking if you were not just a democratic senator but a republican senator watching the president yesterday? >> i think i'd be thinking about how the president's team is looking the other way rather than coming to his aid in assistance. you've got the vice president going what, me? no, i didn't know anything about them trying to smear his political opponent on an international stage. you've got pompeo not even admit egg w admiting he was on the call and now we've heard nothing but it was a perfect call there are was nothing wrong. those were to of his go-tos. he's got to be noticing this. so if you're a senator and you watch pence go, i didn't know anything about them trying to go after joe biden through the ukrainian government, and you watch pompeo walking away from cameras and not