. >> m.j. leeho has been doing tremendous reporting on this issue from capitol hill just caught up with the democratic senator from california, cam ma la harris who is one of those who came out this morning saying that her colleague al franken should resign. let's listen to what she said. >> senator, can i. >> thank you. >>. >> sorry about that. it looks like we have a little bit of a problem with the tape. as soon as we get that fixed we'll get back to you and get back to the tape. i'm told what senator harris told mj lee was it was a difficult situation and she wasn't sure how to deal with that. we're waiting to see if we can get m.j. lee to give us a report on that. not surprising it was a difficult decision. >> yes, and no, i guess. yes, i can imagine why it would be difficult. this is your colleague, someone you've worked alongside. at the same time, this has been such a steady stream of accusations against the senator. he has admitted some role in these, not fully denied all the accusations.

let's bring in cnn's m.j. lee. she's joining us from capitol hill. are you what are you learning? >> reporter: the house ethics committee has opened an investigation into congressman trent frames and he sent out a statement, a lengthy statement saying that he's going to resign effective january 31st. and as a part of this lengthy statement, he sort of got into the backstory of what had happened and basically says that he and his wife had struggled with fertility issues, they wanted to have more children and, as a result, it sounds like according to a statement, he has had conversations with members of the staff about this issue and he said that he regrets if those conversations were uncomfortable for them. the ethics committee did say that they are looking into the issue of sexual harassment and whether he engaged in acts of sexual harassment. as you know, wolf, if a member resigns from office, then the house ethics committee no longer has jurisdiction over that member so this might explain why congressman franks decided to resign so abruptly, that h

he wants staffers on capitol hill to know that they are not alone. >> m.j. leeont," next, omarosa is out and the secret service is weighing in. cannot live without it. so if you can't live without it... why aren't you using this guy? it makes your wifi awesomely fast. no... still nope. now we're talking! it gets you wifi here, here, and here. it even lets you take a time out. no! no! yes! yes, indeed. amazing speed, coverage and control. all with an xfi gateway. find your awesome, and change the way you wifi. >>> just in tonight, omarosa is out and in an unusual move, the u.s. secret service is taking to twitter to say they did not physically remove her from the white house. tom foreman is "outfront." ♪ >> reporter: on the president's former tv show, she was the player people loved to hate. confrontational, controversial and finally canned. >> omarosa, go out and sell paintings or whatever the hell you're doing. you're fired. >> reporter: now it's happened again. just months after she married and led her 39-person wedding party on the tour of the white house des

>> m.j. lee on capitol hill. we are waiting to see paul ryan, whether he faces questions about whether or not there will be any kind of investigation. i would not expect it but waiting to hear from paul ryan very shortly. we'll keep our eye on that. within the hour, roy moore expected to cast a ballot in the alabama senate race. this candidate accused of molesting a 14-year-old girl. he's expected to show up on horseback. seriously. >>> president trump going after his accusers. he says he doesn't know or has never met them, but this includes a woman he was a business partner with. a reporter who interviewed him three beauty pageant contestants and an "apprentice" contestant. >> the suspect behind the new york city terror attack faces charges and the attacker was not on the radar of authorities at all. we're live with the latest. stay with us. g guy in place. the ford year end sales event is here. i can guide you in. no, thanks , santa. i got this. santa: uh, it looks a little tight. perfect fit. santa needs an f-

m.j. lee learned he's facing new accusations. the ethics committee expanding their investigation into him. why? >> what we are learning is that according to a source, farenthold's aide told the ethics committee that she sometimes received campaign-related requests on house e-mail and used a house computer to do campaign work and on at least one occasion his chief of staff yelled at her to help with campaign efforts and she tried to express her discomfort but felt pressure from farenthold's chief of staff. there are strict rules prohibiting the use of congressional equipment for campaigns. >> we have learned this morning the senate has paid out in the last 20 odd years some $600,000 in money for settlements. what kind of cases were they settling? >> this kind of new information about harassment settlements on capitol hill, it's slowly starting to trickle in. yesterday we saw new data from the office of compliance, the ooc, there were 13 work settlements in the senate over a span of 20 years. get this, the settlements cost taxpayer

our m.j. lee is on cal. let's start with franks. what happened? >> reporter: he put out a lengthy explanation last night, and he said he and his wife were having infertility problems and they were looking for somebody to have their child, and he insists i have never physically intimidated, coerced or have or attempted to have any sexual contact with any member of my congressional staff, but he does acknowledge due to my experience with the process of surrogate sea i became insensitive of how the topic might affect others. he's currently under the house ethics investigation, and he said this is part of the reason he is resigning, he believes because of the current climate he is not convinced he can get a fair trial. that's not what house speaker, paul ryan said, he said he had misconduct allegations, and one member of paul ryan is not calling on to resign, blake farenthold, and he settled with the accuser and the accuser was paid $84,000 set up from a fund used for this money. >> you have been at the forefront in all of this reporting. thank you fo

m.j. lee is on capitol hill. it's notable it's the opposition to this has grown in every group, democrats, republicans and independents from a month ago but this thing is going through, it looks like? >> reporter: that's the reality here, and the bigger reality for today and tomorrow is this is about to be a major legislative victory for republicans. i want to talk about timing. the house is expected to take up their bill sometime this afternoon and as quickly as possible the senate will take up its bill and have it's votes on the senate, and the ultimate goal is to have something on president trump's desk by tomorrow. this is a big deal for two big reasons, one, of course, is simply this is going to be a major overhaul of the tax code and will affect everybody across the board regardless of where you live or how much income you make, and politically speaking, republicans want a political win right now. remember for the first half of the year they tried and failed to repeal obamacare. it's not something they were

cnn's m.j. lee on capitol hill. >> reporter: john and poppy, this is about to be a hectic couple of days, and republicans trying to get the tax bill across the finish line. how quickly do they want to move? they want to see the bill on president trump's desk by wednesday. the senate is the place wherever vote counts right now, and because republicans can only afford to lose two votes, they are preparing for a couple potential complications and the first is that senator john mccain is now at walter reed hospital being treated for brain cancer and we don't know when he's going to be back. his office said yesterday he will try to be back as soon as possible. the second member we are watching is senator thad cochran, and he has also had a set of health issues and has been on and off absent from the senate, and we don't know if he will be back in time or here at all is sort of the issue here. and then senator susan collins, and senator jeff flake and bob corker, these are some of the names you hear and l

m.j. lee hill, thanks so much. >>> joining us now cnn political commentators hilary rosen and alice stewart and political analyst ron brownstein. poppy showed me cnn reporting from jeff zeleny, tina smith, the democratic lieutenant governor of minnesota who has been tapped to be the next senator is apparently in washington today. >> for an event that the other senator from minnesota clo ba cher is throwing for her. >> it would seem odd for anyone to discuss an unresignation process. does this discussion by joe manchin, article in politico that has other democratic senators raising the possibility as well what's going on and does this hurt the argument most democrats have been making? >> al franken, by all reports, has said he's going forward with this resignation, welcoming tina smith to come and be the senator and apologized for his behavior, something we've not seen president trump do, by the way. so i think the real problem that many democrats are facing is that, you know, it's come to ligh

let me get over to m.j. lee who has led much of our reporting on capitol hill with regard to this.e you hearing there? >> well, kate, this is certainly big news as you said, our jake tapper confirming that franken will announce on the senate floor that he will, in fact, resign. not surprising to a lot of the folks we've been speaking to in the building and, in fact, it would have been shocking to a lot of folks here if he had decided to do anything other than to announce he was resigning and this comes after a really painful 24 hours for senator franken. most of his senate diplomatic colleagues announced over the last 24 hours or so he needs to resign, a thing they believe should happen and even as of last night, his office was saying that he was still deliberating and talking to family, he was consulting with some of his colleagues including senate minority leader chuck schumer. he visited chuck schumer at his apartment at one point as he thought through this and thought what he would say today. the speech on the senate floor is expected around 11:45 in the morning and if, in fact

. >> he's been defiant, but this comes after this new claim that our m.j. leed from a former male staffer who said he made these sexually lewd remarks and made him so uncomfortable by screaming, et cetera, he was vomiting daily so he's not resigning but he's not going to run again. >> not resigning yet. retiring. we'll see what happens next. >>> senator john mccain is in the hospital being treated at walter reed. dr. sanjay gupta has the latest on his condition. that's next. (vo) the best gifts come with a special box. purchase $999 or more at helzberg diamonds and get an xbox one s, with 3 months of xbox game pass and xbox live gold. at helzberg diamonds. while supplies last. this this this is my body of proof. proof of less joint pain and clearer skin. this is my body of proof that i can take on psoriatic arthritis with humira. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to both joint and skin symptoms. it's proven to help relieve pain, stop further joint damage, and clear skin in many adults. humira is th

politics reporter m.j. lee following all this on capitol hill.ing on this friday after what has been an astonishing week? >> kate, let's start with trent franks. the story is a bit of a doozy. he said in a long statement released last night he and his wife have had a fertility problems and thanks to a surrogate they were able to have twins a couple years ago. now they were interested in having a third child and so they were looking into finding another sur low roe gait. as a part of that congressman franks admits he had conversations with at least two female subordinates about the issue of surrogacy and may have been insensitive and made them uncomfortable but as a part of the statement, franks insisted that i have absolutely never physically intimidated, coerced or had or attempted to have any sexual contact with any member of my congressional staff. the house ethics committee is looking into congressman franks and whether he engaged in sexual harassment and said that this is a part of the reason why he decided to resign because he believes he c

. >> our m.j. lee on capitol hill. what are you learning?le bit of new information about this very secretive process in which sexual harassment complaints can be settled on capitol hill. the chairman greg harper says he just received new information from the office of compliance about some of these cases going back some years. now the office of compliance, the ooc, is the office that a member staffer, somebody on capitol hill, would turn to if they had a complaint to lodge that was workplace related. the new information is this, from 2008 to 2012, in a span of five years, there were three sexual harassment related settlements. they were totalling respectively $85,000, $10,000 and $20,000, so for a total of $115,000 over a period of five years. now what we knew previous to today was that from 2013 and onwards there was one sexual harassment-related claim settled through the ooc for a total of $84,000. we, of course, subsequently learned that this case was related to congressman blake farenthold of texas accused of sexual harassment by a forme

i want to bring in cnn national politics reporter m.j. leer david chalian and political reporter rebecca berg. mcconnell says they're ready to vote. they need something to vote on. we're hearing from a lot of folks they're going to get there, but david, exactly how they plan to get there, that is not clear. obviously both can't be true. so do we even know, david, at this point what the sticking points are? >> well, we certainly know some of the sticking points. certainly the extension of the children's health insurance program is expected to be included for a short-term extension through march. that has been a sticking point around this. it seems that they're getting ready to deal with the hurricane relief aid separately, so that was part of the conversation initially. and then, of course, the real sticking point here is the whip count, how many votes of democrats they might need, if they bleed some republican votes. this is why you haven't seen an actual schedule for a vote to occur because they don't have those votes lined up. >> a lot of t

lee. she has more reporting on this news coming out about kirstin gillibrand and al franken. m.j.?reporter: kate, this is a pretty remarkable moment. we have seen now a number of democratic senators almost simultaneously putting out statements, either through social media or through their offices, basically saying that al franken should resign. kirsten gillibrand became the first democratic senator to actually call on franken to resign. and then a number of others followed. i just want to read a couple of what these senators said. and i just want to, you know, put this in perspective, which is that up until this point, even though there have been multiple women either named or unnamed who have come out to say that over the years senator franken had touched them inappropriately, up until this point, we did not have a single senator actually say that he should leave office. now that has changed. here's a little bit of what kirsten gillibrand wrote on facebook. she said, while senator franken is entitled to have the ethics committee conclude its review, i believe it would be better fo