we've been watching what is happening with phillip reeker. and you've seen one republican so far that has gone for this deposition. do we expect this to finish soon? >> we do think that it's actually winding down. that it should finish at least in the next couple hours. but we're getting a few details that are emerging from what is being said behind closed doors. what we know is that phillip reeker did talk about the ouster of the well-respected ukrainian ambassador, marie yovanovitch. that's according to a source very close with his testimony. we're also hearing that he also discussed about the role of mike pompeo. and that he also talked about the three amigos and those are energy secretary rick perry, eu ambassador sondland, and special envoy volker. these are the three people that were put in place from the -- by the administration -- after yovanovitch was ousted and recalled back to the united states. and they are the shadow state department that was starting to run ukraine policy for the united states. so as we are hearing a little bit

phillip reeker testifying in front of the three house committees. are we learning anything more about this subpoena, the circumstances? was he originally just invited, refused or sent a signal that he might not come and they had to then subpoena? explain the sequence of events. >> reporter: yeah, so phillip reeker received a subpoena as part of his deposition today. this is the same procedure that we have seen for all of the current administration officials who have testified so far. the committees are interested in talking to reeker because he could potentially help corroborate some of the previous testimony they've had. reeker worked with george kent and kurt volker, two of the witnesses that have already testified on ukraine policy and he was part of the effort to try to shield former u.s. ambassador to ukraine, marie yovanovitch in terms of who was fired back in april. he was trying to stop her from the campaign being led by rudy giuliani to smear her and so he's part of their emails that he was sending to kent and volker to protect her from tha

phillip reeker, a top state department official who oversees u.s. policy in europe and eurasia, this as house democrats welcome a legal victory in the impeachment inquiry. nbc's hans nichols has more. a major setback for the white house. >> you have the court ruling an indication that the president may get some legal challenges, basically you have a federal judge rejecting the republican complaint that impeachment is basically illegitimate because there hasn't been a full vote. all this comes as the president compares his impeachment ordeal to historic injustices faced by african-americans. >> president trump received a political blow on friday when a federal judge ruled the impeachment process was legal. a house resolution has never in fact been required to begin an impeachment inquiry. judge barrel howell wrote giving the juddishry committee the right to review the secret grand jury evidence from robert mueller's investigation. before the ruling the president insisting he didn't need a dedicated strategist to coordinate his impeachment message. >>

this time it's phillip reeker's turn. >> they say he can shed special light.mer state didn't official says reeker was kept in the loop on u.s./ukrainian relations. let's talk about everything here. scott jennings, cnn political commentator, columnist for "usa today" and thank you so much for joining us. >> good morning. >> i want to start with the impeachment inquiry and the federal judge who's ordered that they turn over redacted portions from the mueller report. senator lindsey graham, we know, already has a resolution condemning the house impeachment inquiry, and there are now 50 republicans who have cosponsored that. scott, this federal ruling -- this federal judge seems to legitimate the proceedings of this inquiry. what is the republican strategy at this point? >> well, the republican strategy is to call attention to what they believe is a secretive process in the house that's not being done out in public for everyone to see. it's being done behind closed doors and they're using selective leaks to painted a picture where we don't have the full context of

. >> and right now, ambassador phillip reeker is on capitol hill. a rare deposition being taken on a saturday. he's the latest to testify from the state department so far. there have been nine officials related to this administration, or the state department to be interviewed by these three committees. what is the expectation from reeker's testimony, and how does this set up next week's planned roster of testimony? >> yeah. i think what we've seen so far is largely everybody, you've mentioned the nine people have pretty much done exactly what the whistleblower has said. what the president said when he released the partial transcript. they are creating this story line that the president did have rudolph giuliani, his personal attorney, and others, sort of take over the ukraine foreign policy and these were things that he was looking for. he was looking for them on crack down on corruption, yes, but also the bidens. so almost every person who has testified we see building on that same story line. it was significant that the attorney said, the whistleb

first up, who is phillip reeker and why is his testimony so important right now? >> phillip reeker is the latest to be brought in before congressional investigators to continue to paint the timeline. who is he specifically? he was the person who oversaw ukraine policy for the united states, and we know that way back in march he started to raise reservations up the chain at the state department about the smear campaign that was happening that we now know is run by rudy giuliani and spread in conservative media about then ambassador marie yovanovitch. we keep hearing about marie yovanovitch over and over again throughout this inquiry, this impeachment inquiry. we know that a couple months later in may yovanovitch was ousted. she was recalled from that position by the president. so what's philip reeker expected to say? well, we know that he is talking behind closed doors and congressional democrats especially, these investigators are going to want to know what secretary of state mike pompeo knew. what he knew about the complaints that reeker brought to him, or were b

acting secretary of state for affairs phillip reeker saying he was disappointed for the lack of support yovanovitch. gar garrett haake is on capitol hill for us this morning. >> the working assumption is that he will not be showing. he filed a lawsuit on friday night asking a federal judge to weigh in on where his constitutional prerogatives are. if he needs to follow this congressional subpoena or guidance from the white house. all signs are that he will not be testifying this morning and disappointing he would be the first witness deposed that was on the phone call that started all of this. now if he does not, it could go to someone else on that phone call, tim morrison is expected to testify. that apple later in the week, and one other interesting thing is the impeachment picture here. he was a close advisor to -- a close ally of, john bolten. the two men share the same lawyer if would not be unreasonable to look at this court filing as a proxi fight here. i suspect that whatever this judge says with him, if he does have to come testify, it could go a long way to deciding if john bol

working on the impeachment inquiry tell nbc news that another state department official, ambassador phillip reeker, is expected to testify in a closed session this coming saturday. one thing democrats won't get is a response to a subpoena issued to omb, the office of management and budget, acting director russell vought declared this morning, quote, as the white house letter made clear two weeks ago, omb officials, myself, and mike duffy will not be complying with deposition requests this week. one more note from the hill. tonight the house voted along party lines to table or kill a republican resolution to censure adam schiff for how he has handled the impeachment inquiry as chair of the intel committee. we'll have more on that later on in the broadcast. trump's impeachment battles have been compounded by the uproar over his bid to hold the next g7 summit at his doral golf resort near miami. he abruptly reversed the decision over the weekend. nbc news reports that during a conference call with house republicans saturday, they were actually urging him to move the summit to another location. that d

we have now learned that ambassador phillip reeker was issued a subpoena to testify before he appearedl this morning. this rare saturday hearing is happening right now as part of the house's impeachment inquiry into president trump. reeker is one of secretary of state mike pompeo's

sources tell cnn that acting secretary of state phillip reeker testified on saturday that he did notut there was a push in the trump administration for ukraine to publicly announce investigations into joe biden and his son until the whistleblower complaint went public. some republicans are downplaying reeker's testimony. >> well, it's the same old situation, quite honestly. i haven't heard anything that has been earth shattering or anything different than what we've heard over and over again. so we're just through it methodically and see if there is anything different. but there is no difference in properties and there's been no earth-shattering testimony that i've seen today. >> according to reeker's testimony, all these depositions have been behind closed doors, and without an open-ending statement, we have very little knowledge of what's being said, but how might his testimony impact the overall approach to this impeachment inquiry? >> i think what's important about this testimony is it's indicating that they've been kept in the dark. there is a very deliberate cover-up, and not e

and, yes, a rare saturday session acting assistant secretary of european and eurasian affairs phillip reeker will be depieced. this follows the most eventful testimony yet from ambassador bill taylor, a 50-year public servant who is the one guy who tied trump to the ukrainian pressure campaign. there is also some odd news today concerning this man, rudy giuliani. there is no elegant way to put this, but he butt-dialed an nbc news reporter last week inadvertently leaving a voicemail message that no one was supposed to hear where he was discussing the need for a large amount of cash. >> tomorrow i got to get you to get on bahrain. you've got to call -- >> hold on. >> you've got to call robert again tomorrow. is robert around? the problem is we need some money. we need a few hundred thousand. >> the context of the entire conversation is not clear. other portions of the call, giuliani can be heard criticizing the bidens. meanwhile, "the washington post" reports president trump is not happy as the white house struggles to fight this inquiry. our next guest has co-authored a piece in the paper tha

. >>> a first saturday deposition questioning phillip reeker. it went on eight hours.lligence chair adam schiff said he believed they were making progress. republican scott perry sounded unimpressed with the testimony. take a listen. . >> well, it's the same old situation. honestly, i haven't heard anything that has been earth shattering or really anything different than what we have heard over and over again. so we're just going through it methodically and see if there's anything different. but there is no difference in process. and there's been no earth-shattering revelations or otherwise as far as i can tell so far today. . >> and we want to check back in with cnn's kristen holmes covering the white house. the white house has been pushing pack against john kelly's claims that we were talking about a moment ago. >> that's right, martin. no surprise the white house doesn't want to be able to say if he pushed back more on the president he wouldn't be going through this. i want to play this clip, an interview during a forum. take a listen to john kelly. >> whatever you

that was phillip reeker. what did he have to say in his testimony on saturday? >> his job was to oversees the ukraine policy for the united states, he was stationed overseas. his first week on the job was back in job of a smeared campaign being run by rudy giuliani in conservative media about the ambassador yovanovitch. he said that he went to his superiors try to get them to put out a public statement of support of yovanovitch. they denied to do that and they would not do that. he was extremely disappointed according to a source familiar with his testimony and also he told congressional investigators that he knew that aid was being withheld from ukraine. he did not know why. let me get your thoughts here. you got his number two at the center of this. you got john bolton reportedly said he thought it was a drug deal going down like a drug deal if impa am paraphrasing there. have we gotten any sense as to where john bolton is at the moment, i am talking about in impeachment inquiry and whether investigators will be able to speak to him? >>> that's the big questio

starting with phillip reeker, acting assistant secretary of european and eurasian affairs at the state department. new report from "bloomberg" news says though reeker had been initially set to testify wednesday, now his deposition is expected this week on saturdend saturday. several depositions were rescheduled because of memorials for elijah cummings this week. this is the first report the house impeachment proceedings intend to start stretching through the weekend. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell had alerted the republicans in the senate that they could ultimately end up working six days a week on impeachment after the house gives them articles to vote on, but it sounds like the house is going to weekend work already. watch this space. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow. now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. that explains nancy pelosi and mitch mcconnell both talking about the possibility of this moving to the senate around thanksgiving. >> uh-huh. yes. because the calendar doesn't mak

laura cooper and two officials tell nbc news that another state department official, ambassador phillip reekers expected to testify in a closed door session this coming saturday. one thing house democrats won't get, however, is a response to a subpoena issued to acting director of the office of management and budget russell he wrote i saw some fake news over the weekend to correct. as the white house letter made clear two weeks h ago, omb officials, myself and mike duffey will not be complying with deposition requests this week. senior writer at roll call, neels leneils nez lieu ski. what are house investigators keen on listen to this weekend? what are they looking for? >> there are sort of two audiences for ultimately what comes out of the testimony and these depositions. on one hand, the investigators are going to be looking for any sort of additional evidence that both could make the case to the public and the case, frankly, to someone like mitt romney. what they need is evidence that could eventually cause republican senators to want to the vote to convict to remove donald trump from offic

starting with phillip reeker, acting assistant secretary of european and eurasian affairs at the statet from "bloomberg" news says though reeker had been initially set to testify wednesday, now his deposition is expected this week on saturdend saturday. several depositions were rescheduled because of memorials for elijah cummings this week. this is the first report the house impeachment proceedings intend to start stretching through the weekend. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell had alerted the republicans in the senate that they could ultimately end up working six days a week on impeachment after the house gives them articles to vote on, but it sounds like the house is going to weekend work already. watch this space. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow. now it's time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell." good evening, lawrence. >> good evening, rachel. that explains nancy pelosi and mitch mcconnell both talking

phillip reeker and office of michael duffy, those two were set to be deposed. let's header for you.we have deputy assistant secretary of defense, laura cooper whose testimony was posted from friday along with national security council director of european union affairs, alexander vindman. and then on friday for you, october 25th, foreign service officer in kiev and the top russia adviser for the national security council, timothy morrisson, both of them. 12 subpoenas issued so far, eight have not been complied to. those include secretary of state mike pompeo and president trump's personally lawyer, rudy giuliani. joining us now, msnbc contributor charlie savage. counselor to the house judiciary committee, attorney michael conway. democratic strategist and form executive director of the new york state democratic party, basil smikle, and noelle nick pour. take your pick of all those coming to the hill to be deposed. who do you think will be the one that democrats will be looking forward to hear from? >> i'd like to hear what bill taylor has to say because that is question at hand, is

wednesday will bring the deposition of another career diplomat, phillip reeker. he pushed back on the fake anywhe narrati narrative. josh, what are we watching for in ambassador taylor's deposition this week? of course josh is politico senior affairs writer. thank you very much for being here. what can we expect this week? >> well, jonathan, i think what the house is going to be trying to figure out, and members of this committee, the intelligence committee are trying to figure out is to find the consistencies and inconsistencies in the different accounts. you mentioned the text messages. they were basically traded among three officials. so you had taylor, along with kurt volker and gordon sondland going back and forth. it seems like sonde lalasondlann is the one most favorable to the president, though not entirely favorable to him. it seems like taylor was the one most suspicious that there was a dirty political deal being done. so you're going to have them trying to figure out what went down here and did people say to each other verbally perhaps something that'

wednesday, a top state rtment official also deals with ukraine, phillip reeker, and friday laura cooper who heads up ukraine policy at the pentagon. >>> not to the latest on the crisis in syria and that cease-fire. the clock is running out with both sides, the turks and the kurds, accusing each other of violating the deal. i want to show you images just coming in this morning. the kurds seen here in the streets throwing objects at u.s. troops as they withdraw. chief global affairs correspondent martha raddatz has more. she's there in washington for us. good morning, martha. >> reporter: good morning, robin. the pentagon now preparing options for president trump on whether to leave several hundred american troops in syria as the bulk of those u.s. forces are being redeployed to iraq and the criticism of the president's actions intensifies. overnight, reports of clashes between kurdish and turkish troops in northern syria as just hours rema but just moments ago, the secretary of defense confirming they are considering leaving more u.s. troops in the country. >> we have troops in towns in

the state department phillip reeker was telling investigators he was in the dark for eight-hour closedstimony. in his testimony, reeker is said to have told house members his efforts to defend the ukraine were overruled by top state leadership. >> the testimony was, in broad terms, was a good day for the president, a good day for the american people. >> what we have is one continuous stream of criminal conduct by the president of the united states. >> for mark meadows, it's always sunny. >> any day that doesn't include an impeachable offense is a good day. i think he is talking about something important. eo january sreufp sent in an unidentified package to the white house, and later slammed by the president of the united states based on this. it will be interesting to see if we can figure out who sent that package and why was the package sent. >> it's all part of the giuliani show. >> we don't know who sent it. we need to know that. >> the two indicted earlier going around capitol hill, part of the indictment is they were giving money to one republican member of congress to try to get