did this person at omb legal tell you they were leaving or resigning from omb at least in part because of their concerns or frustrations about the hold on ukraine security assistance? answer, yes. in terms of how -- yes. in terms of process. and there's some back and forth with the lawyer who's there with mark sandy, this omb official. but eventually sandy comes back to the point and says this. he says, quote, the individual who resigned from the legal office at omb did note a disagreement on this topic. question, and this topic being the hold on ukraine security assistance? answer, correct. question, okay, just to be clear, what was the disagreement with? was the disagreement with the fact that omb was implementing the hold? was the disagreement with how the general counsel's office was handling it? what was the disagreement? answer, i think the best way to characterize it would be a dissenting opinion vis-a-vis the impoundment control act provisions. meaning a dissenting opinion over whether what the president had ordered here was illegal or not. and impoundment control act is not so

transcripts we're just starting to get a look at the 181-page transcript from mark sandy the career omb official and one thing is made clear, one, the concerns that officials had at omb about the illegality of holding the aid and going against the impoundment control act by holding aid allocated by congress for longer than they were supposed to. that is a concern they had. but also the idea that mark sandy signed off on the initial letter holding the aid but did not sign off on future letters. his portfolio was taken over by a political appointee and that is a concern from lawmakers. one thing democrats who released the summary document today said is there was an egregious abuse of power by the omb to implement the hold. one of the open questions throughout the course of the process, wolf, how much and who knew about what was going on at the omb and we're getting fleshing out of that that because of the official but those involved from mick mulvaney, russ vote, michael duffy and who signed off on the other hold documents, all declined to come in, declined to comply with subpoenas. so th

but mark sandy is a career official at the omb.the agency that handles disbursing this nearly $400 million in military aid that was supposed to go to ukraine. we know that was delayed until september 11th even though republicans and democrats on capitol hill had agreed o release that money. what democrats want to hear? they want to understand how this process was supposed to work and what might have gone off the rails, what was happening behind the scenes, and why was this money so delayed? remember, republicans and democrats, everyone was asking questions on capitol hill because no one could figure out this

he works for omb. let's remained everyone that his boss is mick mulvaney as acting white house chief of staff as well and who has refused to testify himself. what is mark sandy expected to add to testimony that's already been given? >> well, an nau, i can tell what you democrats hope he will wad which is a fecknickal description of how this process would typically work. one of the keys problems with this whole impeachment inquiry for democrats has been, why was this nearly $400 million in u.s. military assistance being withheld? there was bipartisan support on capitol hill from republicans and democrats who had agreed to appropriate this money. the president signed it into law. then this money is stalled. democrats trying to understand why exactly that happened and why this process might have been different than others in the past. so that's what they're going to be asking mark sandy, a career official, about today. where did this go-off the rails? >> i want to turn to rene marsh, a source close to him

the omb, mick mulvaney, they're saying the order came from the president. but the white house successfully b blocked mulvaney and bolton from testifying. i wonder is a sombering take away that the obstruction worked. >> the white house is in a strong position because we should be hearing from mike pompeo, we should be hearing from the vice president, we should be hearing from mull van. david holmes told the truth. the code word investigate burisma, that was kocode for investigating biden. david holmes said he didn't have access to his notes so he wasn't as clear as he could have been. that left an opening for the republicans. >> the timing throughout this story is interesting and notable. the call to the ukrainian president, the famous july phone call happened within 24 hours of robert mueller finishing his testimony on the hill. the general view on the hill was it was not as much as expected.

"the washington post" reports the office of budget management official is about to become the first omb official to testify in the impeachment inquiry this weekend. the omb testified it was the agency -- tomorrow we'll hear from former ambassador to ukraine marie yovanovitch. removed from her post after a smear campaign ran by rudy giuliani. and there's every reason to expect we'll hear testimony about the scheme to remove her from her post. joining me now, congresswoman val demings of florida. the speaker used the word bribery today. do you think that's an accurate characterization of what the

because he is the acting omb director.he really does understand this budget stuff. and, you know, this was the leverage that trump had to extract the commitment that he wanted from zelensky, the president of ukraine. so for those reasons mulvaney is an important witness but omb has been put in an impossible position, particularly rank and file career people who are just trying to follow the law here. >> peter nicholas, thank you very much. >>> still to come, the republicans have tried out so many arguments against impeachment, you might think you've already heard the worst one yet. that said, senator ron johnson came out with a pretty good contender. we'll play it for you, next. d contender. we'll play it for you, next. we present limu emu & doug with this key to the city. [ applause ] it's an honor to tell you that liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. and now we need to get back to work. [ applause and band playing ] only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. libert

i confused june 21st, when state first sent cn up to omb for clearance. it was only after about july 18th and the 21 is when i heard that there was a potential hold. >> thank you for that clarification. did you attend the july 26th deputies meeting, deputies committee meeting that occurred? >> yes, i did. >> was it also your understanding that the president directed the hold? >> we were told in that meeting by the omb representative that they were objecting to proceeding with the assistance because the president had so directed through his acting chief of staff. >> what was the state department's position regarding the hold? >> the state department advocated, as i did in that meeting, consistent with our policies and interests in ukraine. >> you believed what you said? you believed in the release of the hold? >> yes, i did. >> did anyone at the interagency meeting at the end of july support the hold? did anybody want the hold to remain? if so, who? what agency? >> the only agency represented in the meeting that indicated that they supported the hold was o

omb controls the money. who at omb did what and what and at whose direction?s critical to the investigation. >> what does it mean that someone is willing to defy and break ranks? >> it's like the career foreign service people. this is someone who is putting his country ahead of his allegiance to a political figure and just to underscore that, this really puts mick mulvaney in a box because he was very clear in his press conference that what he did was at the direction of the president, and for all of the republicans who were talking about, we need direct linkage. we need direct linkage. this could be direct linkage to mick mull vaughny to the mechanics of moving the money and that would move unless someone intervened and congress appropriated it, it was ready to go and somebody stopped it and this gentleman is likely to say it's mick mulvaney at the direction of the president. >> and i think it also potentially answers some questions about why the money was actually released and this has become part of the republican talking points that the money was eventuall

so i'd be asking for all the details from the omb about the withholding of the release of it. i'd also be trying to let the american people know about the budget act that made it illegal to with hold money that had been appropriated for a specific purpose within the fiscal year and what was wrong with doing that. and then you just have a time line that has become more and more and more convincing that there's no conclusion but that donald trump acted for his own personal interests and against the interests of the american public. and that's where we're at is that he has committed an impeachable offense, although that needs to be defined, and that's what the hearings in december are for is to define -- and that's very much what happened in watergate. the first part of the judiciary committee was defining what is a high crime and misdemeanor, what is an impeachable act, so that's an important starting point. >> bill, this has been a republican defense, it's been the president's defense that they release the aid, there can't be a quid pro quo because there was no quid here, there

p.m., they received an e-mail from the state department saying the cm is currently being blocked by omb, currently referring to the state investigation the state would send for mff. on november 25th, a member of my staff got a question about what was going on with ukraine security assistance. at that time, we did not know what the guidance was on usai. the apportionment arrived that day but this staff member did not find out about it until later. i was informed the staff member told the ukrainian official we were moving forward on usai but recommended that the ukraine embassy check in with state regarding the fms. sometime during the week actuate 6-10, a ukraine officer told a member of my staff a ukrainian official might raise concerns about security assistance in an upcoming meeting. my understanding was that the issue was in fact not raised. again, i have no further information about what concerns about the security assistance ukraine may have had at that time. m staff also recalls thinking ukrainians were aware of the hold on security assistance during august but they cannot pinpoin

we did request information from omb. we got some, but not all. and when the intelligence committee subpoenaed omb, they made a determination they could not comply with our request any further. so we have information about that. of course, it is now public knowledge that the process was taken out of the hands of the career civil service people in the omb/and turned over to political appointees to take the funds away, withhold the funds from ukraine. we also know that the pentagon had signed off, saying that the funds should have been disbursed, that ukraine complied with the terms that they thought important. so, we had that kind of information. but again, i think there are far more serious offenses that our caucus would want to concentrate on. -one follow -- >> one follow-up. your colleague jim jordan of ohio insists the whistleblower needs to testify. senator lindsey graham says he would not proceed with a senate trial until that person testifies. but whoever this person is has admitted that it is secondhand information that he received regardin

cooper why did omb put a hold on the funds? >> the only information from omb they were operating at the direction of the president and they reported he had concerns about corruption. >> you put that in your testimony. >> to hold the funds because of his concerns about corruption in ukraine that's a legitimate reason. do you agree? >> that is a statement the presidentt reportedly made as reported to me by omb. >> you say in your testimony from the advisors that department of defense with department of statec certified they had taken the steps necessary and you certified the release. is that accurate. >> that is correct. >> there was a small change in ukraine spring 2019? >> yes sir. >> can you elaborate that change quick. >> the government ambassador yovanovitch was elected. >> yes but you have a brand-new guy coming in. in fact i just believe he was sworn in the day you approve the dollarsco. was it may 23rd? which i guess is a couple days before but there is a change of circumstances that seem to me would warrant at least mayb

i will add another reading and it says, quote, the government accountability office had warned omb it not following the law how to disperse and uphold congressionally approved funds. that's a two-part question. the president's disdain for the federal records app. every record is an executive branch employee is part of a record that's supposed to be retained so it can be search about in a setting like this and trump hasn't done that. he's taken it a step further. you might expect there would be some accommodation in the obama white house after they turned over tens of thousands of documents in the fast and curious crisis. they said enough and wanted to negotiate on further turnovers. trump said he won't turn over anything. i think now that strategy will begin to come into focus and schiff will have this problem going forward of how do you write a complete report on impeachment and propose articles of impeachment when it's clear the white house is keeping from you getting information that you need. so i'll go out on a limb, richard, and make this suggestion. it's not impossible the inte

omb denies that. it's my understanding you know mark sandy. michael, can you tell me about him? >> sure. yeah. i mean, mark -- i've worked -- we didn't overlap at omb but he came right over and i've worked with mark. she a dedicated career official. one of the highest level career officials at omb. you have to understand they're 92%, 93% career. look, he was trying to do the right thing. i think there are questions about -- it's odd that he was asked to execute this portion or this hold on the ukraine aid but not given any explanation of why. >> hmm. >> and, look. i think that's -- that is -- you know, it raises questions about the whole process. >> sure. sure. and you know, looking at your resume, you have crazy extensive experience when it comes to congressional investigations. you know, the white house is weighing not as jeremy reported, weighing not participating in the first impeachment hearing with the judiciary committee next week. would you advise that? >> look, i think that the american people and congress want to hear from the president's team, and want to hear their p

"the post" writes he would be the first omb employee to testify in the inquiry after omb acting director russell t. vought and two other political appointees at the agency defied. some $400 million in military and security aid to ukraine was held up. they go onto add he was among the career staffers who raised questions about the hold-up on the aid. this comes ahead of the public hearing of this investigation of course which begins in less than 12 hours now. tomorrow at 9:00 a.m. the former ambassador to ukraine marie yovanovitch will appear before the house intel committee. she was abruptly removed from her post earlier this year. while it is not unusual in that line of work for ambassadors to be recalled, in her closed door testimony, she told investigation investigators there was quote "a certain campaign against me and that the department had been under pressure from the president to remove me since the summer of 2018." she receive a senior ukrainian official said i needed to watch my back and she testified having powerful adversaries working against her in ukraine, trump lawyer rudy

and state, omb and the pentagon. all these witnesses testify they couldn't figure out why it was being held up. fiona hill told it was being held up for donald trump's domestic political errand. >> reporter: aid to ukraine which is the united states has been providing is appropriated by congress. that was the concern that administration officials had about withholding it with a violation of law. it's a standard part of american foreign policy that rpredates te trump administration. it's become increasingly aggressive. you're right about the effort inside the administration. it's not just the acting chief of staff mick mulvaney but officials throughout the omb which is the budge et cetera office of the administration as well as the state department trying to figure out sort of what their story would be, what the explanation for withholding that aid might by and trying to determine what they were legally able to do given the guidance they had been provided from elsewhere in the government. >> it's not the only devastat

and that's why we don't have the head of omb or the deputy of omb. that's why we have the highest we've been able to go has been the witness that -- whose transcript we now have. so it's a really interesting tension between trying to distance one self from rudy but then have to explain all these instances where people were directed to rudy. but he certainly does have a lot of information. he certainly was the go-between between the scheme of trying to get dirt on the bidens and donald trump, who was getting this. this was rudy. this was rudy driving the train. >> and, natasha, to that point, lots and lots of people testified about rudy, including fiona hill, who said bolton said that he was running a drug deal and somebody said he's a bomb -- hand grenade that's about to go off. but need look no further than the memo of the phone call of july 25th in which the white house released this. it says rudy very much knows what's happening and he is a very capable guy. if you could speak to him, that would be great. that sort of flies right in the face of th

cooper, why did omb put a hold on the funds?he only information i received was from omb they were operating at the direction of the president and reported he had concerns about corruption. >> you put that in your testimony he directed omb to hold the funds because of concerns of corruption in ukraine. that is a legitimate reason. do you agree? but that is a statement the president reported the maid as reported to me by omb. >> you said based on those recommendations that the department of defense with the state certified may 2019 ukraine had taken the steps necessary and you certified the release. is that accurate. >> that is correct. >> but there was a small change in ukraine. >> but there was a small change in ukraine. > can you elaborate. >> president zelensky was elected. >> yes. you have a brand-new guy cominggo in. he was just sworn in the day that you are approved the dollars. may 23rd? maybe a couple days before but there is a change that it seems would warrant at least maybe a second look and that's exactly what played

the omb notice of apportionment arrived that day but the staff member did not find out about it until later. i was informed that the staff member told the ukrainian official that we were moving forward on usai but recommended that the ukraine embassy check in with state regarding the fmf. sometime during the week of august 6-10, an officer told a member of my staff that a ukrainian official might raise concerns about security assistance in an upcoming meeting. my understanding is that the issue was not raised. i have no further information about what concerns about the security assistance ukraine may have had at that time. my staff recall thinking that ukrainians were aware of the hold on security assistance during august but they cannot pinpoint any specific conversations where it came up. i staff told me they are aware of additional meetings where they saw officials from the ukrainian embassy in august and they believe that the question of the hold came up at some point. they told me they did not find any corresponding email or any record of those meetings. consequently neither they

several other officials from omb have refused to come and talk. so, he's an important missing piece for democrats as they've tried to circle this entire impeachment inquiry. he, you know, could help them close the loop on one piece of this that they have not yet been able to obtain. >> okay. so, we have that. and once again, i just want to clarify, garrett, that he's the one who says green light, let's put this money through, but he would also be the person through whom a stop light would be issued, right? >> reporter: that's our understanding here, absolutely. you know, congress appropriated this money. it was set to go. it's really the action of stopping it that becomes news worthy here. we know from other depositions that there were discussions at different levels of the government, was it even legal to stop the spending of this money once it had been sort of moved along in the process. sandy can tell these lawmakers much more about what happened behind the scenes in the real machinery of government to make this happen. >> all right. clearly im

omb was reviewing with the aligned with the administration's priorities. i attended meetings of the policy coordination committee where the hold was discussed. meetings, representatives of the state and defense department advocated that the hold should be lifted and omb representatives reported that the white house chief of staff had directed that the hold should remain in place. theeptember 11 i learned hold on security assistance for ukraine had been released. i have never learned what prompted that decision. on july 25 along with several of my colleagues i listened to a call between president trump and president zelinski. the content of which has since been publicly reported. hadr to july 25 i participated in roughly a dozen other presidential phone calls. my closed-door deposition members of the committee asked about my personal views and whether i had any concerns about the july 25 call. unusualthe phone call because in contrast to other presidential calls i had observed, it involved a of what appeared to be a domestic political matter. call ihe july

but first, a closed door deposition with omb official mark sandy just finishing. sandy is a career employee who has worked under both republican and democratic presidents. his remarks are filling in gaps about nearly half a billion dollars of military aid to ukraine that was held up. a process in which the organization, the department he worked for, the omb played a critical role. in fact, mark sandy's signature appears on the very document that stopped and paused the aid to ukraine. this is why he is so important if you are a democrat on the house intelligence committee. now, let's backpedal just a little bit to find out what we've learned this week. wednesday, ukraine ambassador bill taylor and top state department official george kent both sat in front of the lights. they provided details into the president's back channel foreign policy in ukraine. >> i wrote that withholding security assistance in exchange for help with a domestic political campaign in the united states would be crazy. i believed that then and i believe it now. >> in mid august it became clear

have scheduled depositions where the top lawyer from the national security council mister blair from omb and someone working closely with mulvaney both of them defied congressional subpoenas and refused to appear for scheduled depositions as has been the case with other witnesses who have done the same thing. this will be further evidence of an effort by the administration to obstruct the lawful and constitutional duties of congress. we expect the witnesses who have been subpoenaed also to be no-shows. this will only further add to the body of evidence on a potential of obstruction of congress charge against the president. indeed with the nixon impeachment there was an article based on the obstruction of congress that itemize each of the subpoenas that the white house had defied. today we have four additional subpoenas to add to the list with a potential charge involving the president of the united states and his obstruction of our constitutional duties. these witnesses understand they are significant based on testimony the committee has already received we know they were in the law offi

it's external with agencies nsc, and the office of omb. so i think it's highly likely, and certainly now that this is out there, i'm imagining there's already a request in. >> let me turn the page and ask you about, we're waiting for this decision, which could come as we mentioned off the top, in the next couple hours, on this judge ruling, particularly in the democrat's favor with regard to don mcgann. and so, obviously it's news, depending on which way the judge decides. how would -- depending on how it goes, might this impact future testimony of a john bolton or a mike pompeo or mick mulvaney? >> i think it will have an enormous impact? >> why? >> because there are witnesses out there who -- at least many of the democrats in the house think will provide information that would support impeachment. i think it's important that such people as bolton and mccann and others testify. >> this will be a ruling as to whether executive privilege applies, whether there's an attorney client privilege or there's been a waiver. even if you have these p

mulvaney is acting chief of staff but still the current director of the omb. take us through what these emails tell us. >> reporter: what this internal review led by the white house counsel's office reportedly turned up was evidence that mulvaney was conducting an of a tes after the fact search for a legal justification for the president's decision to do with hold the assistance to ukraine. i want to walk you through the time line because it is important. in mid-july, cnn has reported that the president decided to techlg rare temporarily succespend that military assistance. and a week later he had that call with the ukrainian presidet and it wasn't until legal august where mulvaney had the conversations trying to come up with this rationale. and the search for an explanation came days after there was notice that there had been concerns raised within the intelligence community about the president's phone call with vels a couple weeks earlier. so this was an after the fact search. and they say that they weren't briefed behind that "washington post" story popped

offer this general characterization that whenever there is a hold on aid that gets placed on the by omb, the reason for that hold is not always known. yet, the reason was ultimately shared in general terms behind consistents, it was with other reasons that we have heard from the president of the united states. would you say the answers were good? for the president? i am leavinguntry, here and getting on a plane and going back to my district this evening. playughters have a school tonight and hopefully, we're able to make it. constituents those like her and her generation relying on members of congress to be here improving our country or it is others who want to see usmca past, they want to see prescription drug prices lower, there are important priorities that the american public have right now. we want to see those priorities advance. instead, everything has come to a grinding halt. it is embarrassing. it is an epic grinding halt right here in this country and history is not going to be kind to adam schiff and all of the people who are pushing this. day for the president? about todayit

mark sandy, as you mentioned, is the first omb employee to testify behind closed doors.ve of all the other high-level trump appointees at omb who have ignored house democrats' request to testify. so that is why sandy's testimony today is so significant for that reason. now, he is a long-time career employee. he's worked under administrations of both parties. and so far we have very little visibility on the inner workings for how all of this played out. of course democratic investigators are hoping that sandy will shed some light on the internal conversations when the administration took this really unusual step of freezing that $400 million in aid, which by the way was already approved by congress. he will likely be asked whether the freeze raised alarm for him, whether he expressed those concerns, was he told why it was happening, how involved was he in the process, was he cut out of the process at some point. we spoke with former omb officials who told us that freezing funds, that's usually a task for career officials. but in this case we know political appointees sign

as an official he worked inside the omb rising to a senior position.urity programs. in that role he would have insight into this process. it's worth noting, we've reported before that career officials inside the omb were uneasy with the process that was taking place to the point they were cut out because the political appointees had come in to push this directive out. so it is unclear how much mark sandy knows and how much visibility he had into the actual directive, to the chief of staff and the acting omb director, but the difference here is that he is the first omb official to break ranks and he's a career official and now democrats will get a first-person witness and testimony into what was seen at least by this individual, wolf? >> it could be very, very significant. phil mattingly, thanks for the breaking news. we appreciate it. we'll take a quick break and much more of our special coverage right after this. we're a reliable partner. we keep companies ready for what's next. (man) we weave security into their business. virtualize their operations.

getting your reaction to the latest report from "the washington post" showing that officials from the omb and mick mulvaney were trying to justify withholding that aid. >> well, it's more corroboration of what the hearings i think clearly established, president trump used the -- he dangled the white house meeting and withheld the aid in order to get ukraine to agree to do his dirty work on vice president biden. and everything that we've seen just corroborates what the president said in his phone call, and now it appears there's a paper trail that shows the machinations that the white house went through to try to keep that congressionally authorized aid, bipartisan vote, strong bipartisan vote, to keep that at bay so ukraine didn't get it until the president got what he wanted. >> and adam schiff over the weekend seemed to suggest that we won't be hearing from any more witnesses. does this new report give that a

an attorney for the omb says that he'll testify behind closed doors on saturday if he is subpoenaed. breaking ranks with the acting director and two others who have refused to testify. this is all new information. and this is a big deal. let me tell you why, because omb is responsible for releasing that $400 million in aid for ukraine. aid that multiple officials say was held up to pressure ukraine into giving the president investigations that would benefit him politically here at home. that as he is holding a rally in alabama tonight. you can almost set your watch by it. he feels threatened then he holds a rallied. the president's republican defenders grasping at some pretty flimsy straws right now. they would have you believe that there is no there, there. there's senator lindsey graham who in a previous life was clinton impeachment manager, but now says the whole thing is over and done with for him after just one day of hearings. >> i'm really over with this. this whole thing is a joke. it's over. it's done for me. >> over and done for me. he says it's secondhand information and i

he also told lawmakers that re-asked repeatedly why the aid was being with held and warned omb lawyers and leadership that doing so could be against the law. >>> with the president's defenses crumbling, you might wonder when he may look to unload it all on someone else, perhaps his personal attorney who has been at the center of it all? >> no. i didn't direct him, but he -- he is a warrior. rudy is a warrior. >> what was rudy giuliani doing in ukraine on your behalf? >> well, you have to ask that to rudy, but i don't know -- i know he was going to go to ukraine and i think he cancelled the trip. but you know, rudy has other clients other than me. i'm one person. >> you didn't direct him to go there on your behalf? >> no. no. but you have to understand, rudy is a great corruption fighter. >> so the problem with that is the president's attempt to publicly separate himself from rudy giuliani doesn't really make sense because in that july 25th phone call, you remember you read this, president trump tells president zelensky, quote, rudy very much knows what's happening and he is a very capa

omb has been the white house's fire wall in terms of this impeachment inquiry. democrats have struggled to get witnesses from omb in front of investigators to answer these critical questions, one being why was the hold placed in the first place and, secondly, how was that actually implemented and mark sandy will be able to speak to both of those. >> susan page, here is another career official doing what he thinks is right, going forward and doing this despite the fact that the white house is telling hip not to do it. we have mick mulvaney not doing it, pursuing legal avenues not to do it. put that in the broader scope of what we saw over the course of the week. >> it's really the revenge of the career bureaucrat, public servant. we've seen political employees at the white house and omb refuse to come forward. but we see career people in the u.s. government stepping forward, sometimes at great risk to their careers despite the protections we have for civil servants o talk about what they saw. i think it's pretty powerful. i think the ambassador' testimony yesterd

, representatives of the state and defense departments advocated that the hold should be lifted and omb representatives reported that the white house chief of staff had directed that the hold should remain in place. on september 11th, i learned that the hold on security assistance for ukraine had been released. i have never learned what prompted that decision. on july 25th, along with several of my colleagues, i listened to a call between president trump and president zelensky. the content of which has since been publicly reported. prior to july 25th, i had participated in roughly a dozen other presidential phone calls. during my closed-door deposition, members of the committee asked about my personal views and whether i had any concerns about the july 25th call. as i testified then, i found the july 25th phone call unusual because in contrast to other presidential calls i had observed, it involved discussion of what appeared to be a domestic political matter. after the july 25th call, i provided an update in the vice president's daily briefing bo bookibook indicating that there was a c

frrks the state departme department, from nsc and omb. house still did not take action and placed a political appointee in the place of a normally career official for an oversight matter like the aid issue. >> it's important to note a lot of the objections were raised by career people. most of those career people were kept in their job or put in their jobs by the trump administration. they weren't just holding around for the last 20 years popping up to object to this president. before we go the break, a bit of a flashback to 1998. it was on this day 21 years ago that president clinton released his responses to 81 questions posed by the house intelligence committee. >> these answers now will be used by the house judiciary committee as it draws up proposed articles of impeachment against the president. that a process now entering a critical two-week period, by mid december the committee to decide whether to vote articles of impeachment. applebee's new sizzlin' entrées. now starting at $9.99. if you're on medicare, remember, the annual enrol

i showed up at omb i told my team any industry can come in with a problem but nothing on tobacco. and i got hit all the time. tobacco. tobacco. tobacco. they want to come in and explain we are getting screwed by the fda. we do understand the standards. i'm getting burned up by members of congress and on and on and on. is a huge waste of time for regulatory agency the fda should come up with the next wave of cures to spend time on this all the time. the unintended consequences are mind-boggling if you think all the time spent on this issue it sucks. [laughter] >> who should regulate tobacco quick. >> i don't know. this is not policy is my personal opinion. and those that should regulate tobacco but it has no redeeming qualities. what the hell are we doing with fda with this? it is just awful. >> there is a tendency however do you get around that cracks. >> with the drug prices and out-of-pocket and the frustration on the part of employers and health plans that is more front and center. the top healthcare issue and this is an issue that republicans and democrats should come together

to omb. in an instant i realized ukraine was threatened. the president spoke with president zelensky and said what he wanted. on the 1st of september sondland with yermak and said no political favors, no u.s. aid. the ambassador was told about it by the national security official tim morrison. something committee chairman schiff questioned him about. quoting, chairman schiff said at that point did you understand that unless the ukrainians did this for president trump, committed to these investigations they wouldn't get that military assistance or that meeting? he responded what i know for sure is what mr. morrison told me he must have held the anti-tell yermak. the first time i heard those two connected. schiff, when you say that, this was the first time i heard the security assistance not just the white house meeting was conditioned on the investigation talking about condition, did you mean if they didn't do this the investigations, they weren't going to get that, the meeting and the militar

he testified he told omb lawyers and leadership that the can call may very well have violated the lawand two budget staffers left the agency after expressing frustrations on the hold over ukrainian aid. and josh spent the last several hours combing through these transcripts. i think there were 400 pages. speetd reader. >> a lot of reading to go through tonight but it was worth it because we have new information we did not have before, despite all of othese hours off testimony that we've all watched and read through. the new information being we now know there was not one, but two officials, within the white house budget office who resigned, at least in part, because they were so concerned about what was hanning wi -- ha with the suspension of ukraine aid. and a legal advisor, someone who was an attorney in the white house budget office. he was asked in his deposition are you aware of any zindividua in the legal division leaving omb at least in part because of ukraine security assistance? and he said yes, i am. he expressed concerns to me about his actions. this is the impoundment cont

omb plays a central role in releasing funds appropriated by congress. one unusual thing that happened here is ordinarily the final person when signs off on the funds is a career official. someone not a political appointee. in this particular case, apparently only this case, omb changed the procedure on how to political appointee initially refuse to sign off and eventually signed off on the release of the aide. having this career official come forward and talk about what was happening at omb, why the ordinary procedures weren't followed. that will be really critical. members of congress are and republicans should be as well really concerned about the extent to which there particular abuse of power was the president of the united states reaching out and misusing and abusing constitutional functions that are designed to a different branch of congress. government. namely congress. >> nick, the former republican now independent. amash. tweeted this today. this is simple. keep it simple. white house leased security assistance to ukraine only after congress st

house democrats say this is evidence that omb abused their power and omb, a spokesperson said this is just the same old spin from democrats. >> sara murray with the latest. thank you. >>> well as we look at all of this and specifically this letter from chairman nadler, the president has complained about not being a part of the process, and now he has an open invitation. come on in, come with your counsel. in fact, here we go, from chairman nadler as part of the letter, at base the president has to choice to make. he can take this opportunity represented in the impeachment hearings or he can stop complaining about the process. what do you think the white house will do? >> my guess is they'll take option c. not participate and continue complaining about the process. >> that is my gut too, actually. and if it is option c, they don't participate, continue to complain, could that end up hurting democrats? >> no. no. you never win by taking the fifth. he's talking about future presidents. the country is looking at should future presidents be able to get away without accountability. i worked

what does mark sandy bring to the conversation, remind the omb role in this story? >> mark sandy is as career official at the office of management and budget. he's not as political appointee of president trump. he decided to defy the order, trying to present all of these lawyers testifying. it was the omb that was involved and stopping the $400 million aid from flowing into ukraine. the aid went to ukraine but there was a delay, it was ordered according to reporting by the president, sets forth by mulvaney and the omb director and mr. sandy should shed much more light and details in the process inside. and what the system was for documenting that. >> we should repeat these witnesses that have come forward are about to appear in these hearings. they are not limited in their testimony to what's on the deposition indeed, mr. taylor, gave us new details we did not know. what is yovanovitch likely able to add to the story tomorrow? >> well, what she does not know a lot about is what happened after she left. so she does not have a lot of visibility on july 5th phone call.

let's start with the testimony of mark sandy of the omb office. >> that's right, fred.e is what we know. she a career official at the office of management and budget, the omb, and here is why that division of the white house is so important. let's take a look at what this impeachment inquiry is all about from the very beginning. the question is whether or not president trump and his allies withheld funding to get dirt on his political rivals. the organization, the part of the white house that would

at the first meeting on july 18th an omb representative relayed that, quote, the white house chief of staff has conveyed that the president has concerns about ukraine and ukraine's security assistance, end quote and that a hold had been ordered by the president. no explanation was provided. all of the agencies responsible for ukraine policy supported security assistance and advocated for lifting of the hold. the only dissenting voice was the office of management and budget which was following the orders of president trump and still no good explanation of the hold was provided. while the aid suspension had not been made public, word was getting out. katherine kroft, special adviser for ukraine at a deposition received two separate calls in july or august from officials at the ukrainian embassy who, quote, approached me quietly and in confidence to ask me about an omb hold on ukraine security assistance. kroft was, quote, very surprised at the effectiveness of my ukrainian counter part's trade craft. as if to say they found out very early on, much earlier than i expected them to. the uk

he responded, well, omb said that when asked by someone, perhaps charles kupperman, who was the deputy national security adviser, they said they had guidance from the president and from acting chief of staff mulvaney to freeze the assistance. so i went back to the office and sent a note to the secretary, secretary pompeo, through staff reporting this, and saying that it seemed to me this was going to have to be resolved at the principal level and that it was unlikely that the omb would be willing -- shifting their position at the principal level given what we had just heard. and therefore it would have to be resolved, if he wished to have it resolved, directly with the president. so i left it at that, and time passed. let me explain what that actually means here. the office of management and budget has made clear to several different agencies that the president himself ordered the acting white house chief of staff mick mulvaney to tell the omb to freeze the assistance. this has been corroborated by several witnesses, making clear there is a direct line from the freeze from the presiden

officials, national security officials, folks on the nsc who said we're not sure if this is legal and omb pushing back. what these documents at their core show, the president who makes this decision in july, orders the aid held, and the bureaucracy trying to catch up with him and figure out, can we do this, if so, how long. >> sounds like there are a lot of documents here which could shed a whole lot of light on some of the subjects being looked at in this impeachment inquiry, so what are the chances that congress ever gets its hands on the e-mails? >> the white house are not going to comply with any of the requests and not put the e-mails out there and not showing the documents but the white house's counsel's office and lawyers are looking across agencies at omb at various national security agencies inside the white house to understand for themselves what's going on. they've been interviewing folks of who been involved part of the e-mails, called in to be interviewed. the white house is preparing its own report. how much of that ever sees the light of day, i don't know, but as you can im

ear "t" omb have said they have followed all the laws.omment from the office of management and budget but we're learning more about the behind-the-scenes deliberations and the potentially tie to the july 25th call. >> details that both answer some questions and yet raise many others. manu raju, appreciate you coming from the hill. it tells you there was a week before this was verbally ordered and somebody put it in writing. that's where congress will get its backup saying we passed a law. you can't just do this on the fly and say "no." what else are we learning. >> i agree that it's more details on the time line. when it comes to raising more questions, i mean, it's just another reminder of the fact that democrats still don't have first-hand knowledge from mulvaney or from the omb director who actually made that direction to hold the aid and why he did so. we know that it was unusual and unorthodox and testimony has shown that omb took this decision out of the hands of a career employee, put it in the hands of a political person. but we h