>> nixon. >> richard nixon. >> nixon. >> yeah, nixon. >> nixon. >> is anybody else running but nixon?e president was a political animal. the president was phenomenally skilled. he was able to handle virtually anything. >> five men wearing white gloves and carrying cameras were caught early today in the headquarters of the democratic national committee in washington. they were caught by a night watchman, and they did not resist arrest when the police came. they were apparently unarmed, and no one knows yet why they were there. the film in the camera hadn't been exposed. in any case, they're being held. >> the democratic national committee is housed in the fashionable watergate complex. the break-in prepared well in advance. files were ransacked and papers removed. also in this area, ceiling tiles had been removed for the suspected planting of bugging devices. >> it was saturday morning, june 17th. the phone rang, it was about 6:30. a colleague of mine, chuck work, was on the phone. he said, hello, it's chuck. we have a hot one. we have a burglary at the democratic national committee he

that's president nixon. i was standing just across the street from the court when the case was handed down. i remember seeing their reporters running down those marble steps clutching the court's unanimous decision. the decision forced the release of key oval office tapes that president nixon had tried to cover up by invoking executive privilege. in short order it led to the resignation of president nixon. the plaintiff in that case was actually the special prosecutor leon jaworski who was appointed to investigate the watergate are great and to issue subpoenas for the nixon tapes. the supreme court upheld the subpoenas against president nixon's claim of executive privilege. it reasoned that is asserted interest in confidentiality could not overcome the constitutionally grounded interest in the fair administration of criminal justice justice in reaching that conclusion the court said this. quote the end to criminal justice would be seeded if judgments were to be found on a partial or speculative presentation

nixon didn't block him. not only did nixon allow his staff to testify before congress he publicly directed them without demanding a subpoena. actually with the senate watergate investigatio investigation, president nixonsa said, quote all members of the white house staff will appear voluntarily when requested by the committee to testify under oath and will answer fully. now compare that to president trump who publicly attacked the house of impeachment inquiry calling it constitutionally invalid and single person working in the executive oubranch to defy the house impeachment inquiry. as just t discussed to the letter of the speaker of the house the white house counsel said that president trump , quote cannot prevent his administration to participate. no president ever use the official power of his office to prevent witnesses from giving testimony in such an indiscriminate manner. there's no telling how many government officials would come forward if the president had not issued this order. let's look at some

that's president nixon. i was standing just across the street from the court when the case was handed down. i remember seeing their reporters running down those marble steps clutching the court's unanimous decision. the decision forced the release of key oval office tapes that president nixon had tried to cover up by invoking executive privilege. in short order it led to the resignation of president nixon. the plaintiff in that case was actually the special prosecutor leon jaworski who was appointed to investigate the watergate are great and to issue subpoenas for the nixon tapes. the supreme court upheld the subpoenas against president nixon's claim of executive privilege. it reasoned that is asserted interest in confidentiality could not overcome the constitutionally grounded interest in the fair administration of criminal justice justice in reaching that conclusion the court said this. quote the end to criminal justice would be seeded if judgments were to be found on a partial or speculative presentation

nixon won reelection by a historic landslide. >> i, richard nixon, solemnly swear. the watergate story was still growing. weeks after the election inside the oval office, richard nixon declared war on the press. >> the press is the enemy. the press is the enemy. >> nixon hated the press because it was digging into the very story he was desperate to hide. that the white house was deeply involved in the watergate cover up. his campaign seemed to work, early in his second term, nixon's approval rating sorinin but then came the first crack in if white house defense. in the summer of 1973, all of america was riveted by the watergate hearing. what did the president know and when did he know it? as the country watched white house counsel john dean turned on his president. >> i began by telling the president that there was a cancer growing on the presidency. >> dean testified that the watergate burglars were blackmailing white house aides. >> i told him that i could make it an estimate. he told me that was no problem. >> it was john dean's word against the president of the

richard nixon. richard nixon was vice president.so he is in the united states, and eisenhower, eisenhower was not totally sure exactly what to think about castro at that point. so this idea that eisenhower, in particular, right or the , administration at that time was pushing castro toward the soviets -- not eisenhower, at the very least not eisenhower. he is not exactly sure. you can look online and watch eisenhower interviewed about this. there was an old series done by abc television in the 1960's called the eagle and the bear where eisenhower is talking about, some people thought that castro might be the new liberator of cuba, especially after the years of batista, right? they were optimistic. castro spoke to the national press club in washington, april 17, 1959. his cia director, allen dulles, was not exactly sure how to respond to this either. eisenhower, eisenhower was bothered by the fact that he had read about how castro and che in particular dealt with opponents. and you guys are reading this in your articles on che guevar

nixon's current counsel. he had a habit of having different councils when they wouldn't obey what he said to do , he would fire them and get another one at various times. leonard and i did this little sneaky thing. i had one of those baby size, in the, that back of my pocket, and i whipped that boy out, and i said, i heard you all need one of these down here, too. so, not only did i just deliver a subpoena, i delivered a constitution. just a little impish thing for a barefoot boy in the mountains to do when it is fun. sam: could you explain what the impeachment process is, and do many americans understand how it works? rufus: when you say impeachment, most people think that includes removing the president. the impeachment process is sort of like a grand jury. a grand jury -- when you are arrested for a crime, you go before a grand jury to see if there is a probable cause to arrest you or not and charge you with a crime. it is not the same thing, but almost the same thing. impeachment prefers charges against t

nixon from office voluntarily. he saw his own words convicted him. >> what was your role during the watergate situation? guest: my job was what i describe as the chief operating officer. i was there to serve as the right-hand man. to see things that work well and the train kept running. i would coordinate who the witnesses would be, how they were handled, and it was a big job to run a committee with competing personalities, a lot of competing staff, and it was my job to see that things worked well. i was not that old, i was 31 years old which nobody should have a job like that 31 years old. i said that when i was elected general attorney, nobody should have a job like that at 32 years old. it sort of worked out. was an experienced person on capitol hill. i had been there almost 10 years because i began with senator urban --senator senator ervin in 1964. i knew the procedures and what you needed to do. things like getting office space when you have a committee that has over 100 staff members we put together. can you

, and the nixon/agnew ticket ascended to the white house for the first time, nixon's campaign chairman in that election was a man named john mitchell. in a somewhat unusual move after he was sworn in as the 37th president of the united states, nixon then named his campaign manager john mitchell to be the next attorney general. that's not a natural evolution in terms of political jobs going from campaign chairman to attorney general. but nixon went ahead and did it and installed john mitchell at the top of the u.s. justice department which turned out to be one of nixon's many disastrous early decisions as president. john mitchell, of course, would end up being up to his neck in the watergate scandal, specifically in the cover up as well. ultimately, john mitchell would go down in history as the first u.s. attorney general to ever be convicted of multiple felonies and imprisoned. but at the height of the watergate scandal, at the height of the inquiry, the nixon administration thought mitchell gave them an ace in the hole when it came to the watergate investigation because before he ever

nixon from office voluntarily. he saw that his own words convicted him. >> what was your role during watergate? >> i was the deputy chief counsel. was the chief operating officer. i was there to serve as the right-hand man to see that things were working well, the train kept running. coordinate the hearings, who the witnesses would be, how they would be handled. it was a big job to run a committee with competing personalities and a lot of computing staff. it was my job to just see that things work well. i was not that old. i was 31 years old, which nobody should have a job like that at 31 years old. said when they were going to make me a attorney general at 32, no one should have a job like that at 32. it sort of worked out. person onxperienced capitol hill when watergate came along. i had been there almost 10 years. i began with senator urban in 1964. when the committee was set up, i knew the ropes, the procedures, what you needed to do. just a simple thing like getting office space when you have a committee that

i will start with nixon. erictherine olmsted and note in "presidential misconduct ," nixon broke the law. he promised government favor for campaign donations. he oversaw burglaries like the break-in to the watergate headquarters. and, he was part of the cover-up that included using campaign funds to buy silence. these were clear violations of the law. other actions were not so clearly defined. legalere not framed as a at that time. and it included the secret bombing of cambodia, wiretapping of journalists, and a massive surveillance program on american citizens. in the aftermath of the watergate investigation that exposed all of these abuses of presidential power, when it came to the surface, congress decided that they would take action. they passed a were -- a variety of reforms to clearly set legal limits on presidential behavior. that is the flurry of reforms that jeremi spoke on. campaign-finance reforms, the war powers act of 1973. 1978 ethics in government act, and the foreign surveillance intelligence

told nixon, you do not have my support or the leadership of this party. you will be convicted in the senate of the united states. and that's the difference. >> yeah, no moment like that here certainly. carl bernstein, always good to draw on your experience. thanks very much. poppy? >> such important perspective he has. >>> when impeachment is said and done, whichever way this goes, who is going to pay the bigger political price? republicans for saving the president or democrats for trying to remove him?

so it wasn't something nixon's guys were doing on speck, nixon ordered it. and he was caught on tape admitting to it and sort of bragging about it in the oval office. >> he cut a deal with itt. now this is very, very hush-hush and it has to be engineered very delicately and it'll take six months to do properly. but -- >> does itt have any money? >> oh, god, yes, does he ever. >> does he have any money? oh, god, yes, that's part of this ball game but that part is hush-hush. you know there's a taping system in this room, right, which you installed? did that slip your -- it's just wild to look back on this. here's the sitting president of the united states ordering his justice department to drop an ongoing investigation into this big company in exchange for that same company giving a whole bunch of money to benefit the president's re-election campaign. it's just wildly corrupt, almost unbelievably explicitly corrupt for a sitting president to step on his own justice department to score that cash in that way for his own re-election effort. and getting caught for

nixon, they fly into manchester, buchanan and nixon, for a campaign visit.aide runs up to the plane, and nixon says to buchanan, how come you cannot write like that? host: that is a funny story. [laughter] we will fast-forward to 1972. vietnam still raging. nixon reelected. this is the year when mr. loeb became nationally known. we have video from this. we will watch and have you tell the story. [video clip] >> attacking me, attacking my wife. he has proved himself to be a gutless coward. >> i will find a way to say that they don't like his kind of journalism here in new hampshire, and they say it in a way that they can make it stick. that is the only way that he can understand that in northern new england, we respect each other. that is something i don't expect of him. guest: wow. i think it has been two hours on that whole thing. -- i could spend two hours on that whole thing. very briefly, i think what muskie was attempting to do, and failed colossally at, was something another candidate in 1960 successfully did, attacking william loeb in front of his pap

so it wasn't just something that nixon's guys were doing on speck, nixon ordered it and he was caught on tape admitting to it and sort of dragging about it in the oval office. cut a deal with i.t.t. >> this is very, very hush hush and it has to be engineered very delicately and it will take six months to do properly. but -- >> does i.t.t. have any money. >> geneen. >> oh, god yes, does he ever. that's part of this ball game. >> does he have any money? oh, god, yes, that's part of this ball game but that part is hush hush. that part comes later. you know there's a taping system in this room which you installed? did that just slip your mind? just wild to look back on this right. heres the sitting president of the united states ordering his justice department to drop an on going investigation into this big company in exchange for that same company giving the republican party a whole bunch of money to benefit the president's re-election campaign. it's just wildly corrupt. almost unbelievably explicitly corrupt for a sitting president to step on his own justice department to score that cas

nixon --twice to get nixon to get loeb on his side. he sends up two guys.lein is the communications director for the white house, klaussen is his assistant. loeb is in town for this one. they have lunch at the manchester country club. i am there, my father is there, a couple of the other editors. on their way out, loeb says to these guys, i think you will be interested in what is in the paper tomorrow. the dailynvolved in paper, and my father, who was, didn't know either. the next day, there was a front page by william loeb. "muskie insults franco americans." and it is an editorial about how muskie has been in florida at a drug rehabilitation house and two people who were there, young to mr. william loeb at the manchester guardian in this scrawl, and i am paraphrasing, but they say they went to see candidate muskie at the drug rehab house, and they asked him if he had a problem in s.ine with knenegroe muskie said, no, we have a problem with canucks. can you tell us what a canuck is? signed paul something, florida. loeb got hundreds of letters a week. in tho

nixon ashley resigned before he was impeached. epstein's forthcoming book is titled "reaganland: america's right turn, 1976-80." he joins us from chicago. and in washington, kristen clarke with us, president and executive director of the lawyers' committee for civil rights under law. rick epstein, let's begin with you. , i'mr, rick perlstein sorry, forgetting that wrong. can you talk about what we are about to see? close a show trial. i am really struck by the fact the guy running this, mitch mcconnell, comes out of this tradition of southern politics, that all of us should go back and study. the fact of the matter is, for most of the 20th century, the south was basically an authoritarian society. it w wasn't really a democracy. it used all kinds of strategies democratic accountability. when they said, african-americans can't vote, the loss did not say african americans can't vote -- they used literacy tests, things like property qualififications, intimidation. seeuch the same way now, we the republicans running the senate manipul

the nixon trial would have had a tv camera if it had taken place.-span was in business during the clinton trial. host: will the senate chamber look different during the trial? mr. ritchie: much more crowded. two big tables. instead of the open well in front of the presiding officer. there will be one for house managers and one for president's lawyers. galleries will be packed. including the press gallery. whenever i go into the senate chamber i look at the press gallery. there might be two or three people sitting there because people can watch proceedings on television. they don't have to be there. when you go into an impeachment trial, every seat is taken and the press gallery is standing room only. people are packed in. in the clinton trial, we had a whole new group of reporters show up. internet reporters. many had never been in the u.s. capitol building before even though they covered congress. so the press gallery asked me to take them on a tour through the building. i had 20 internet reporters that i took around and showed various places. they

nixon -- they fly into manchester, buchanan and nixon, for a campaign visit.n aide rushes up to the plane, with the knife editorial and , nixon says to buchanan, how come you cannot write like that? host: that is a funny story. [laughter] host: we will fast-forward to 1972. vietnam still raging. this is the year when mr. loeb became nationally known. we have a bit of video from this. we will watch and have you tell the story. [video clip] by attacking me, attacking my wife, he has proved himself to be a gutless coward. will findthe people a way to say that they don't like his kind of journalism here in new hampshire, and they say it in a way that they can make it stick. that is the only way that he can understand that in northern new england, we respect each other. that is something i don't expect of him. guest: wow. i could spend two hours on that whole thing. very briefly, i think what muskie was attempting to do, and failed colossally at, was something another candidate in 1960 successfully did, attacking william loeb in front of his paper. this is the nigh

richard nixon resigned. one of the lessons from these numbers? mr.itchie: during the clinton impeachment, senator byrd described impeachment as a damocles that holds over each president. each president needs to know they are not above the law. there is a constitutional method for removing them from office. even a federal judge with a lifetime appointment can be removed, and certainly the president of the united states, if they have committed a crime that convinces the majority of the house and two thirds of the senate they are guilty. host: we will look back in history because precedent guides us so much. give us a quick primer on the three presidential impeachments. we will use a video from the first one from a c-span special on the congress. it is the 1868 impeachment of andrew johnson. >> the impeachment trial of andrew johnson was an absolute sensation. it was for that trial that they first issued gallery tickets for the senate chamber. this was the first really public trial that took place. if you look at publications of the day, they are full o

nixon had a lot of opposition rom liberal from liberal republicans. he got a support from curve scarf democrats. so it was unclear what his status would be. as the house was voting, the judiciary committee is considering voting, the supreme court ruling said the nixon tapes had to be opened. one of the tapes made it pretty clear to anyone who listened that nixon was part of the cover-up to hide the crime committed. so it was not so much the crime committed, the breaking into the democratic conference headquarters, but the fact that the president had authorized payment of hush money to the burglars and had done everything possible to obstruct justice after that. so even some of his strongest supporters in the house backed away and said they would support impeachment. ventually, a group of senators went up to the white house led by barry goldwater who was a can kate in 1964 and advised nixon he did not have the votes in the u.s. senate to sustain himself in an impeachment trial. so the president chose to resign rather than face trial. senate did not kno

it puts even president nixon to shame. taken together, the articles and the evidence conclusively established that president trump has placed his own personal, political interest first. he has placed them above our national security, above our free and fair elections, and about our system of checks and balances. this conduct is not america first, it is donald trump first. donald trump swore an oath to faithfully execute the laws. that means putting the nation's interests about his own. the president has repeatedly, flagrantly violated his oath. >> i just want to stress that if this -- if what we are talking about is not impeachable, then nothing is impeachable. this is precisely the misconduct the framers created constitution, including impeachment, to protect against. >> all of the legal experts who testified before the house judiciary committee, those invited by the democrats, and those invited by the republicans, all agree that the conduct we have charged constitutes high crimes and misdemeanors. professor michael gerha

when president nixon when the impeachment proceedings were moving forward with president nixon, it was a democratic congress. that negotiated with the nixon administration, with the nixon white house, to determine fair set of rules. and the house adopted those rules. that was a democrat conference. then you fast forward to the clinton impeachment. where you had a democrat president and a republican house. and the house negotiated with the white house to come up with fair rules and ultimately they adopted the nixon standard, because everybody agreed that was a fair process. whether or not you liked the outcome is one thing, but it was a fair process. that never happened here. this house didn't make an effort to try to negotiate a fair set of rules with us in the minority or with the white house. and again, house rules actually require a minority day of hearings and that was broken. not allowed. we didn't get that minority day of hearings. we've requested it multiple times. to try to get some fairness, to elicit facts from all sides. but we weren't given that opportunity. the senate now

nixon foundation, nixon library come to everyone, thank you because that's is precisely what we need. allowing just one quick second because my daughter has asked me today, daddy where are you going? i need to the admiral. why? he's talked about character. that's what i told my daughters. what i'd like to ask you, without getting into politics but at a desperate time when our nation so needs character, at a point we are in holograms can rest in peace president nixon, rest in peace president eisenhower, rest in peace president roosevelt. so my question is would you consider running? i mean that with complete seriousness. >> so i was vetted for vice president by hillary clinton and i subsequently was invited to trump tower to discuss a cabinet post with donald trump are i think of that as two bullets whizzing by my head. [laughing] my answer is, my answer is, i would be honored to serve the nation again, and how that unfolds i don't know, but just as surely as asked these young cadets, and her daughter and my daughters and others to embrace the idea of serving the country in whatever fo

nixon's triangular diplomacy. the slew of russian and chinese and much less vietnamese evidence that has emerged is that while there might have been pressure to moderate terms, it was with the understanding that this was just to get the americans out, and allow the process of leading to hanoi's eventual unification of vietnam under its eventual control, would civilly play with simply take place later. the history of the war still being written, and from a u.s. perspective, very much rewritten. i urge you all to consult some of that literature. i'll be glad to talk with you and thank you ray much. thank you very much. >> thank you. we have had a very rich set of presentations. david has told us about the critical role that soldiers have played in the movement for peace, even engaging in sabotage efforts to lay off close to the u.s. military effort to lay obstacles to the u.s. military effort. john explained why the war was not inevitable and focused on the play cult constraints on the leadership the political const

nixon, mr. civil rights, or rufus lewis, who was another political and businessman in the city would have been the person to serve in that capacity. but what we were afraid of, joanne and i, if we used either nixon or lewis, we may lose some of the other ones, supporters, so let's get somebody else. she said i tell you who. i said who? my pastor, martin luther king jr. i said, well, i met dr. king, i don't know him like you do, but that's fine. i said let me give you two good positions for these other two men. let's make e.d nixon the treasurer, because he knows a. philip randolph, who is the founder of a pullman car porters union and mr. nixon was a pullman car porter. the other man was rufus lewis, who was a former coach at alabama state. he was in the political aspect. he wanted to get people registered to vote. he had a club named the citizens club. in order for you to get in that club, you had to be a registered voter. i said let's make nixon the treasurer, maybe rufus lewis the chairman of

the supreme court correctly noted in nixon versus fitzgerald and that not richard nixon, sxwr judge nixonrsight of congress is necessary to make relevant the threat of impeachment. the president should not be treated with criminal immunity because he is subject to impeachment, and then be allowed to sabotage the impeachment process that places him dangerously above the law and beyond the separation of powers. presidents can't be above the law. presidents like everyone else must obey subpoenas served in an impeachment itchingry. in 1880 the supreme court explained, quote, were the question of such impeachment is before either house of congress, acting in its appropriate sphere on that subject, we see no reason to doubt the right to compel the attendance of witnesses and their answer to proper questions in the same manner and by the use of the same means that courts of justice can in like cases. almost a century later, judge john surricas' influential opinion on the watergate roadmap in 1974 emphasized the special weight assigned to congress in an impeachment. he wrote, it should not be for

president nixon didn't block him.ot only did president nixon allow his staff to testify before congress, he publicly directed them to testify and without demanding a subpoena. actually, with the senate sergeant investigation, president nixon said, and this is a quote, all members of the white house staff will appear voluntarily when requested by the committee. they will testify under oath and they will answer fully all proper questions. now, compare to president trump. he publicly attacked the house's impeachment inquiry calling it, quote, constitutionally invalid. and he ordered every single person working in the executive branch to defy the house impeachment inquiry. as just discussed in the letter to the speaker of the house, the white house counsel said that president trump, quote, cannot permit his administration to participate. no president ever used the official power of his office to prevent witnesses from giving testimony to congress in such a blanket and indiscriminate manner. there's no telling how many gov

he has valid arguments to make. >> what the court said in nixon is a balancing test. that there is a privilege but that it's outweighed sometimes by the public's need to have important information bearing on national security, bearing on potential criminality in the white house. but this is one place where jonathan and i are in agreement. i think immunity argument was frivolous. the courts would have consistently backed up the congress on this, and i think it would have had another benefit which is to convey to the american people we're serious about the constitution. >> o'donnell: you would have two branches. the supreme court and the congress saying that the white house is overstepped themselves that this power is not absolute that they must comply with the appropriate oversight as is the founders set up the three branches of government and check on power. >> i think you hear from democrats something different. which is that perhaps the president is very good at manipulating the rules and using our norms and conventions to his benefit when they help him then disrega

nixon, mr.hts, and another political and businessman in the senate, would have been the person to serve in that capacity, but what we were afraid of, joanne and i, if we used either nixon or louis, we may lose some of the other ones, so let's get somebody else, she said. i will tell you who. i said who? she said my pastor, martin luther king, jr. i said, well i met dr. king. i do not know him like you do. but that is fine. but i said let me give you two good positions for these other two men. michelle: [laughter] fred: let's make e.d. nixon the treasurer, because he knows a philip randolph, who is the founder of a pullman car union, and the other man was a former coach at alabama state. he had been, he was in the political aspect. he wanted to get people registered to vote. he had a club, the name the citizens club. in order to get to the club, you had to be a registered voter. i said let's make nixon the treasurer, make rufus lewis the chairman of the transportation committee, because if it las

nixon basically said, oh, congress appropriated money, i'm not spending it. you want to spend money on poverty programs? you want to spend money on job creations? i don't agree. even if i signed the bill, i'm not spending the money. that was almost part of the articles of impeachment against nixon because it was an abuse of power. but instead of impeaching nixon for that, congress decided that it was going to pass a law, they thought if we pass a law that's going to send a message to future presidents that they can't do what nixon did. they can't take all the power into their hands. and guess what? because it wasn't part of the articles of impeachment, donald trump says, oh, that law, that doesn't apply to me. article 2 says i can do whatever i want to do. and i think the other point here is very clear, that congress understood that abuses of power by the president threaten the democracy and are impeachable offenses. and the arguments you're going to hear, and they will make it over and over again, is you need a crime and the house judiciary committee decided

nixon, nixon had had a lot of battles with hoover. they were very good friends.ey want to the fbi to do things that the fbi did not want to do, and hoover did not want to do, many which were political, so when hoover died, he appointed an outsider of the fbi, and the fbi essentially rebelled against this outsider, a person they saw as a political operative, who was when hoover died the number three met at the fbi and quickly thought he should become the fbi director, mark phelps. and he really went after nixon, famously became "deep throat," helped to bring down the nixon presidency, so watergate was in part a rebellion against the bureaucracy, working in cahoots with "the washington post," just as nixon would have feared they would, and that is something to take seriously. throatought of the "deep "-"deep state" analogy. i do not think that language around "deep throat," deep , should be overlooked. that is part of the point i am making in my paper, that trump takes this notion seriously, as did nixon, and that is part of the reason why i think people who wish t

him because it credited nixon with giving him his seat and getting him electe elected. he did it because after seeing all the evidence it's something we had to do because the evidence was there he was eulogized to say he felt an obligation to the constitution to do what is right. soon members of the body will face the most momentous of these decisions. not at the outset of guilt or innocence but a far more foundational issue. should there be a fair trial? with the use of subpoenas of every impeachment trial the president's lawyers have been making their case outside this chamber are threatening to stall the proceedings with false claims of privilege having persuaded the body with some consideration of witnesses and documents, they now appear to say it's too late to consider them next week. but consider this the hundreds of documents we have subpoena there is no claim and none has been asserted. to the degree to make a claim to the degree even superficially it does not conceal misconduct. what is more to the degree there is a dispute whether the privileges applied we hav

in the nixon case, as we know, the nixon case -- >> it's also -- it's also exceptional the house is seeking this type of remedy from the courts. both branches have kind of stayed out of the courts and allowed us to be out of the fray in the impeachment matters. >> seeking grand jury material in the various cases, hastings, porteous, other impeachments, nixon, clinton, the madison -- >> none involve compulsory process by this court. >> i know. that's my point. it didn't because the justice department now has chosen to go against a couple hundred years of precedent. as we point -- the amicus brief points out, 1811 was the first time grand jury material was turned over to congress, there hasn't been a need for compulsion because in the past the justice department knew what it was supposed to do. >> in a number of the cases cited, the materials were not in the possession necessary of the department of justice. congress received those materials through a variety of different means. it's not often clear from the record. none of them involved a court ordering a disclosure by the executive branch o

matt miller's reference to richard nixon is interesting because richard nixon said that to david frost that they are above the law and now you are hearing alan dershowitz saying this in the united states senate and having senators sort of nod in agreement or at least hope they do. >> represents a pivotal way away from the defense argument. this did not happen. gradually shifted to where if it did happen, it is okay. alan dershowitz is now making the argument that as long as he has a mixed motive essentially. as long as it was somewhat for himself but also in the country's interest it is lawful. we have a number of federal criminal statutes. they speak clearly of any benefit. any benefit is broadly interpreted by the courts. i know i defended these cases. they don't require an exchange of a bag of money as long as the government official acted with criminal interest and that is the stretch that alan dershowitz is making. by limiting impeachable offenses to only those of a personal, financial interest he is creating too narrow of a definition of an impeachable defense and abuse of power.

and matt miller's reference to richard nixon is interesting, because richard nixon said that to david law, they both made the case they are above the law. and now, you are having derschowitz saying it on the floor. >> the original argument was it did not happen. now, if it did happen, it's okay. now, the argument is made as long as he has a mixed motive, essentially, as long as it was somewhat for himself but also somewhat for the -- >> the country's interest. >> then it's lawful. i think it's a stretch. we have a number of federal criminal statutes that don't require a financial exchange in the form of a bag of money to violate our federal extortion statutes and any benefit is broadly interpreted by the courts. i have defended these cases, they are difficult to defend, it can be any benefit as long as the government official acted with corrupt interest. and that is exactly the stretch that alan derschowitz is making. by limit willing impeachable offenses to those that are a personal financial interest. he is creating too narrow an abuse of power. if that were the definition, the oper

by dershowitz's logic president nixon did nothing wrong in the watergate. he was just breaking into the dnc to help his reelection which of course is in the public interest. according to dershowitzian logic. this argument would unleash a monster. it would unleash a monarch. think about this. according to dershowitz impeachment is only for criminal offenses, donald trump's justice department argues a sitting president can't be indicted for criminal conduct, can't impeach for noncriminal conduct. the president could blackmail a foreign country into poisoning our election and get away with murder literally so long as he is in office. republicans have gone from denying the president what the president did, to normalizing it by claiming every president did it to now saying there is nothing wrong with it even if he did. it is incredible. the lengths they will go to justify something most of them, not all but most know is wrong. the president's counsel is asking us to confer two new rights on the presidency. the right to investigate their political opponents and t

he was a huge fan of richard nixon. but they couldn't turn away from the evidence that there president had committed abuse of power, cheated in the election, and that they had to vote to impeach him. when it came to the clinton impeachment, that was, again, started out among very partisan lines, and it ended along partisan lines. and i believe the reason why, as i said a short while earlier, was that we never had a high crime in misdemeanor. that was the problem. with nixon, we had clear abuse of presidential authority to up and a constitutional scheme, to cheat in an election and members of both parties voted to impeach. with clinton, we had private misconduct. yes, i think probably a crime because he lied about that under oath. but it wasn't misuse of presidential authority. as i said, any husband caught in an affair could've lied about it and it didn't involve the use of presidential authority. so we never got beyond our partisan divisions on that, and many of us, and i will include myself, believe that it was being

the presence teammate very clearly that unlike president nixon and president clinton, president trump's lawyers or law out of this process for the first 71 days. he was deprived of due process completely, wasn't allowed to participate. no witness can change that. no witness testimony can change the fact this president was deprived of due process and that this impeachment fails actually. it fails legally. it fails constitutionally. the president defense today is going to stay on target. it's going to continue to unravel what the democrats put forward over three days. and with that will open things up for questions. >> republicans have said the evidence given by the witnesses is hearsay. now you have report of first-hand witness saying aid was contingent on these investigation so doesn't that undercut your argument? >> it doesn't because what you just said is there's a report, a report of an unpublished transcript about that unpublished transcript the president said it's not true. the attorney general has come up today as it specifically it's not true. this is why he do fulsome investigat

one of the things we did was to keep nixon and kissinger from doing what they had planned.ger who said, ellsberg is the most dangerous man in america. for what he knew. the most dangerous man in america today is in the white house. roger stone was convicted of all seven counts this morning. [applause] apist, i call him agent orange. everything he touches, he kills. anyhow, it is ellsberg. i will read what he wrote to you. for many years, when i spoke about the vietnam war, i would ask an audience, how many have participated in demonstrations, orches on october 15 november 15, 1969? thoseaudiences, most of over college age would raise their hands. a number who were clearly under that age would also have raised those hands. i would pick out one of the youngest and asked, how old were you then? i would hear seven or two. i asked how they got to the rally and they would say, in stroller or backpack. they did not remember it but their parents told them. i said, you are doing exactly the same things your parents were, being counted in big cities. you were preventing imminent nucl