president zelensky: thank you very much. >> have you felt any pressure from president trump to investigate joe biden? president zelensky: i think you read everything. so i think you read text. i am sorry, but i don't want to be involved to democratic elections of usa. we had, i think good phone call. it was normal. we spoke about many things. i think, and you read it. nobody pushed me. president trump: in other words, no pressure. there was no pressure. by the way, you know there was no pressure. all you have to do is see what went on the call. you know that. you could ask the questions. >> to do more on joe biden and -- president trump: no, i want him to do whatever he can. this was not his fault. he wasn't there. he's just been here recently. whatever can he do in terms of corruption because the corruption's massive. when biden's son walks away with millions of dollars from ukraine and he knows nothing and they pay him millions of dollars, that is corruption. when biden's son walks out of china with $1.5 million in the fun

zelensky ran against corruption. that's only appropriate in a conversation about that election victory they would discuss and reference what are obviously mutual goals between the united states and the ukraine to have the world safer for democratcy. the president also mentions mayor rudy giuliani. let me be clear about that. mayor giuliani has every trite to go to the ukraine and try to ascertain whether or not activities in that country were harming his client as a result of the corrupt connections which may have existed between the d.n.c. and some elements in ukraine. i feel like we have been here before. house democrats told us it was all about collusion. we had to wait for the mueller report. when the mueller report falls flat on collusion. it's all about obstruction of justice until robber mueller comes and testifies and that falls flat. then it's all about abuse of power until the democrats go to court and are unable to make the case in court there has been an abuse of power. lo and behold it's all about the uk

zelensky is asking for aid and they're getting together. let's hope a note taker is in that room in three hours. >> sam, can you gut check me on this. the dot, dot, dot, kind of that important place -- >> the ellipses. >> i call them dot, dot, dot. if you can look into it, dot, dot, dot, it sounds horrible to me. do you question the completeness and the accuracy of what you see here? >> i think we have to be a it careful. you know, i think the white house released the transcript not only because they want us to focus on the ellipses, the commas, pauses, whatever. they are often used if there's a pause in conversation in these transcripts. taking out aspects of the transcript purposefully would violate the presidential records act. i know it is a minor offense in light of the other things we are discussing, but there are explanations for these ellipses. we have to keep these transcripts in perspective. if we spend so much time focusing on dot, dot, dot rather than on the full transcript or the whistle-blower complaint, we will fall into the

zelensky's victory, mr.ced a congratulatory car as he was en route from his mar-a-lago row sort in florida to washington. he urged mr. zelensky in that call to coordinate with rudy giuliani and to pursue investigations of corruption. this is according to people familiar with the call. the details have not previously been reported. all of this in the "new york times." when asked about the april call between trump and zelensky, giuliani told nbc news, quote, i don't have any recollection of anyone reaching out to me in reference to that call. giuliani added, the ukrainian people were calling me all the time. let's bring in national political reporter for nbc news josh letterman with new reporting on giuliani and another person who played a role in all of this. i guess the first question is why were people from ukraine calling rudy giuliani all the time. but you also in your new reporting introduce a new character into this story. who is mr. volker? >> we're learning more about ambassador kurt volker who was th

trump repeatedly urged the president zelensky to investigate joe biden. the acting national intelligence, thrust before into the spotlight by this controversy goes before lawmakers. cnn's sunlen serfaty has more from capitol hill. >> reporter: good morning. joseph mcgwire set to testify before the house judiciary committee. this follows the release of the white house rough transcript of the phone call between president trump and the ukrainian president. they released that on capitol hill, as well as the classified whistleblower complaint. that was released last night to the senate and house committee. the lawmakers couldn't discuss the substance of what was in the report. but more broadly speaking, democrats emerged and said they are more concerned than they were before the complaint. >> i found the allegations disturbing and credible. >> the complaint itself is a five-alarm concern. >> there's other witnesses that need to be talked to or interviewed or brought before our committee to understand the full extent of the misconduct here. >> reporter: one not

zelensky was asked if he felt pressured. >> president zelensky: it was normal, we spoke about many things and i, so i think, and you read it that nobody push it- pushed me. >> president trump: in other words no pressure. you know what? there was no pressure and, by the way, you know there was no pressure, all you have to do is see it-- what went on in the call. >> pelley: but it's not just the call. investigators believe white house pressure began months before. vice president pence cancelled plans to attend zelensky's inauguration. then, president trump suspended nearly $400 million in aid toond authorized. against this backdrop, the president asked for "the favor." >> president trump: i didn't threaten anybody. >> pelley: the impeachment inquiry began while mr. trump was meeting world leaders in new york. >> president trump: it's all a hoax folks. it's all a big hoax. and the witch hunt continues, but they're getting hit hard in this witch hunt because when they look at the information, it's a joke. impeachment? for that? >> pelley: when mr. trump visited america's u.n. staff, it appear

zelensky ran against corruption. t's appropriate in a conversation about that election victory they would discuss and eference what are obviously mutual goals between the united states and the ukraine to have the world safer for democracy. now, the president also mentions mayor rudy giuliani. be clear about this. mayor giuliani has every right try to the ukraine and ascertain whether or not activities in that country were harming his client as a result corrupt connections, which may have existed between in d.n.c. and some elements ukraine. i feel like we've been here before. it was mocrats told us all about conclusion. we had to wait for the mueller report. falls he mueller report on conclusion, then it's all about obstruction of justice until robert mueller comes and and that falls flat. then, it's all about abusive go to ntil the democrats court and are unable to make the case in court that there's been abuse of power. lo and behold, it's all about the ukraine. i saw this movie as it was related to russia. i didn't

was he in fact pushing zelensky to step up? president zelensky tells trump we're almost ready to buy more javelins from the united states for defense purposes. javelins are shoulder fired missiles. the $400 million aid package to ukraine included $250 million in military aid. the president responds to that by saying, i would like you to do us a favor. then he mentions the firm cloud strike. cloud strike investigated a data breach of the dnc during the 2016 election and concluded that the russians were behind the hack. cloud strike is also at the center of rudy giuliani's investigation into how former trump campaign chairman paul manafort was implicated for the work he did in ukraine. president trump goes onto say i would like to have the attorney general call you or your people, and i would like you to get to the bottom of it. zelensky responds by saying, we are open to any future cooperation. he doesn't say no to trump's request for this favor. zelensky goesoon to say i will personally tell you one of my assistants spoke with

he was pressing president zelensky in an inaccurate and fraudulent way. then, the president went after the person who gave the whistleblower the information. was the person spying on the president of the united states? big consequences. chairman schiff there's a tentative agreement for the whistleblower to testify to his committee. he says the president's threats have heightened security concerns for the whistleblower. >> the president went after who we gave information to the whistleblower. was this person spying on the president of the united states? big consequences. chairman schiff there's a tentative agreement for the whistleblower to testify to his committee. he says the president's threats have heightened security concerns for the whistleblower. >> all that needs to be done at this point is to make sure that the attorneys that represent the whistleblower get the clearances they need to be able to accompany the whistleblower testimony. and we figure out the logistics to figure out that we protect the identity of the whistleblower. that's our paramou

he investigated biden and zelensky even said do you have anything else for us and zelensky brings it up. he says right away, we met with rudy giuliani. so there are so much more to the story and he brings it up immediately. this is an ongoing story that we need to hear about and how it begins and how many phone calls it went on with rudy giuliani. have rudy giuliani have been doing some pressuring. so you have a situation where there is more to the story and there is absolute linkage to the system and the president demanding badgering and he keeps on bringing it up in different ways. he wants zelensky to investigate biden and that's what's going to cause him. >> we have 212 house democrats supporting some sort of impeachment action. at 218, they could take a vote on article of impeachment. if you are a lawyer in congress trying to figure out article of impeachment, what would you include based on this memo. what part of this do you feel is relevant. some of it is just on towards and non traditional and some of them may be illegal and some of them may be impeachable. >> right. >> you

president zelensky: thank you very much, mr. president. now we need to -- i want to tell i'm sorry, now -- but we don't need help, but we need real support. and we thank everybody, we thank all of the european countries that help us. t we also want to have more, more, but i understand. so only together, america and e.u., only together, we can stop the war and that, yeah. you know, we already, we just want to tell them remember we are the biggest country in europe but we want to be the richest one. it's true. it's in my heart. president trump: but you have great people in ukraine and you have very talented people in terms of manufacturing, in terms of some of the things that they do and we're doing, creating already but we should be doing a lot more trading with ukraine. but you're very talented people. they make great things. they're at the top of the line, really. and the other thing is i've heard you actually have over the last fairly short period of time, you've really made some progress with russia. i hear a lot of progress has been ma

at the time i didn't know the president himself had made thesa s of zelensky.w at the time that giuliani had made certain demands. the president with my meeting zeth him, presidenensky, said he had no interest in getting involved in a s. election. i think you can perhaps understand that a novice politician, a new pr esident whor has nene this before, is attempting to, you know, set a good relationship with a u.s. president who is clearly making requests that are out of bounds. and so, yes, you read that transcript, d it looks as if zelensky ht s an interin doing business with trump. it's possible he was trying to get out of that phone callou wia confrontation. we don't have any evidence that lensky actually went ad ordered that prosecution. ind fact, it appears that he did not, that the new prosecutor that he brought in has made asi de that there's no merit to pursuing this. >> woodruff: senator, we know that you and oteremocrats have been calling on the whistleblower in this case, others in the intelligence community, to step forward to testify before congress

putin a few days after the zelensky call on july 25th. the timing of the departures of the united states ambassador to university crane and t yu krien a ukraine and the former deputy must be investigated as well as the movements of trump's personal attorney, rudy guilliani, the correspondence between him and the white house and his interest actions with foreign governments. we must learn what actions president trump or his aides took to withhold congressionally-directed security aid to ukraine and why, and more besides. the answers to these questions and others can be pursued by the house committees involved in the impeachment inquiry, and that is precisely what the inquiry is for, the release of the transcript of one of president trump's calls with president zelensky which just came out will not assuage our concerns or the public's concerns. based on early reports, it may heighten them. we must remember the president was reported to have several calls with president zelensky over the summer, and his reputation -- and his administration h

zelensky brings up america's great support in the area of defense. that's when trump tells zelensky i would like you to do us a favor, saying our country has been through a lot and ukraine knows a lot about it. i would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with ukraine. trump references crowd strike, a cyber security firm the tra democratic national committee hired to investigate. the cloud strike public apply blamed the russian government as was confirmed by robert mueller's investigation. trump and giuliani have floated another conspiracy theory, that ukraine invented the idea that russia was meddling in the 2016 election. >> several people in ukraine knew about a tremendous amount of collusion between ukrainian officials and hillary clinton and the democratic national committee. >> on the july call, zelensky says the issue is an important one, and trump resolves to have barr and giuliani follow up with zelensky. the justice department says trump never asked barr to contact ukraine, and barr has not communicated with ukraine

does zelensky know what that is? a discredited theory that ukraine is in possession of the secret -- >> why would the president of the united states think they would be in possession? >> because that's the -- the, that right winger. you know? the conspiracy theorist who says ukraine has a secret server of hillary clinton. that was that he even brought up. >> the first thing the president brought up after talking about the military aid. the president brought it up and said i need you to do me a favor. brought ut the cyber security former hired after the hacker of the emails when the reporter said do you think that hillary clinton's emails are on a server in ukraine? the president essentially said, yes. something he's argued before. you could see how clearly uncomfortable the ukraine president was whk asking did you feel pressure by president trump. he said noble pushed me but essentially you've read how this call went downed and can see what was said there and he wants to stay out of american politics. >> add gloria b

president zelensky says, "we are almost ready to buy more javelins from the united states for defense purposes." and president trump replies, "i would like you to do us a favor though." >> mccarthy: you just added another word. >> pelley: no, it's in the transcript. >> mccarthy: he said, "i'd like you to do a favor though"? >> pelley: yes, it's in the white house transcript. >> mccarthy: when i read the transcript, president zelensky brings up a javelin is a protection for anti-tank, something that president obama would not sell that president trump did to protect the ukraine. >> pelley: how do you expect the president's defense to roll out going forward? >> mccarthy: the defense of what? >> pelley: well, there's an impeachment inquiry. >> mccarthy: yeah. there's an impeach inquiry going forward. it probably never would move forward, had the speaker waited 48 hours to have the transcript. we vote on important things every day. but there are certain votes that are different than others. sending men and women off to war is the most difficult vote any member of congress would ever make.

number two, trump is going to be meeting with zelensky tomorrow. i think that president zelensky is understandably going to feel boxed in in the meeting with trump. there will be both in the public face and when they shut the media out, there's going to be real limits how much zelensky can have in terms of meaningful discussion with donald trump about honest to goodness problems they're having in ukraine. there's still fighting going on today in eastern ukraine. he is going to be limited and constrained what he can get in terms of cooperation and assistance from the united states because of this now domestic -- >> talk about being in a bad situation. i mean, how would you behave if you were president zelensky. >> and you're depending on u.s. support. >> and having a meeting with donald trump tomorrow, what do you do, what do you say coming out to the media after your conversation about that phone call? i mean, this is putting a foreign leader in a very difficult situation. i want to say one thing about the politics of all this. it is clear to me wh

you-- you've met with president zelensky. >> i have met with president zelensky, and i raised this general at the time i didn't knw the president himself had made these demands of zelensky. i did know at the time that giuliani had made certaince demands. the president with my meeting t with him, presidlensky, said he had no interest in getting involved in au.s. election. i think you can perhaps understand that a novice politician, a new president whve has done this before, is attempting to, you know, set tia good relationship with a u.s. president who is clarly making requests that are out of bounds. and so,, yesyou read that transcript, and it looks as if zelenskyesas an intin doing business with trump. it's possible he was trying to get out of that phone callth t a confrontation. we don't have any evidence that nzelensky actually wentd ordered that prosecution. not, that the new prosecutordid thate brought in has made a decision that there's no meritth to pursuinis. >> woodruff: senator, we know that you and other democrats have been callingn the whistleblower in this case, others in the

saying they should work things out and perhaps zelensky could get a white house invitation. yesterday he sort of joked about that and said we don't have a date yet. so, you see the extra pressure put on this very vulnerable country. the final thing i will say is bill barr and his role in all of this. if you go back to the mueller investigation when the report came out, bill barr himself came out and editorialized why he believed that the president, quote, could have at least looked like he obstructed justice and that was because he was in an unprecedented situation, entering office and thought this would impact his presidency with an investigation like this. okay, maybe he gave him the benefit of the doubt there. what does the president do the day after mueller's testimony? he picks up the phone and has this conversation with zelensky. that excuse can't fly twice now. i would be very curious to hear what bill barr has to say about this. >> all of us are curious about that. chris cillizza, what stands out to you from the alleged misconduct, this list we've been reporting? >>

zelensky was bouncing his knees and national security advisor john bolton, looked b on, stone-faced.ensky was eager for pence to release $250 million in military aid that president trump had held up. funds ukraine said iteeded to deal with russian aggression. but thebu v.p. did not make any concrete promises. krstead, he echoed trump and saidne must take steps to address corruption in its country before t u.s. hands over the cash. that meeting was af snapshot o an uneasy standoff that had i i lingered for months with 2020 politics swirling. according to reporting by both the washington post and the new yorkpr timesident trump's hendling of ukraine this summer, including a phone call with a foreign leader, raisedsea red flagith at least one unnamed intelligence official, who filed a formal complaint. eventually released, the trump administration is now intense scrutiny about whether it pressured ukraine to investigate former vice president joe biden's son hunter, who once worked for a ukrainian company. president trump's lawyer, rudy giuliani has calle repeatedly for an investigatif t

everything he had to say with zelensky is going to come out. and then, of course, as you say, the transcript, if you read it, is maybe 50% of the call. there are el lip sis in the transcript. there's much more color and nuance that make it a lot worse. as matt says, boy, if they thought this was the way to staunch the blood, what underlies it and what will come out next. >> do we know, harry, why there seems to be this narrow focus on campaign finance reform violation? >> yeah. well, that was just what the referral was. intelligence officials happened to see this. the conversation is the 25th. around mid august intelligence officials see this and refer it -- you refer it for a specific violation. that's what they refer. as you know from the stormy daniels affair, you need to be trading for something of value. if you know the nuance here, of course, he was. it's a value to his campaign to get dirt, especially bogus dirt on hunter biden and joe biden. but the conclusion was, we look at it and they're not asking for something of value, just for as

the desire to enlist zelensky in the re-election effort personally on that phone call. >> why did zelenskyhe aid was being cut off? >> well, zelensky asked us why the aid was being cut off. and senator johnson had recently spoken to the president about this. senator johnson relaid that as far as he understood, it had to do with corruption in ukraine and the belief on behalf of president trump that other european countries should be footing the bill for military assistance in ukraine. at the time, i didn't necessarily know what the corruption concern was and i'm not sure senator johnson did. we now know that president trump was talking about only one issue. he was talking simply about his desire to get the se less than ski government in the business of serving his political ends. whether or not there was a quid pro quo stated by the president on that phone call or other communications, it didn't really matter. when you have a new ukrainian president hearing from the united states that his aid is being cut off and he has an outstanding request to do the president's political bidding, it is c

eric: the critics say that president zelenski is afraid, he doesn't want his aid cut off. >> his aid wasn't cut off to the best of my knowledge it's continuing. postponement is not cutting off aid and there was no quid pro quo whatsoever. you read the transcript carefully. >> how about those who say that there was a quid pro quo because the aide was stopped by the president himself saying in the phone call that how well america treated ukraine. >> the president used same ladies and -- language about aid. that's hardly a threat. >> do you think in some way the way he's bringing his private business experience to a public office and that he may or may not be used to some of those? >> well, first of all, rudy giuliani, his attorney has said over and over that the president did nothing inappropriate either in connection with rudy giuliani or on that phone call, giuliani is a very well-qualified lawyer, his opinions and not the media's opinions. eric: critics would disagree with that, mr. secretary, doesn't fit the narrative that we've heard, it's always been said that, certainly the vice

president zelensky and president trump agreed there was no pressure on zelensky to conduct any kind of investigation. president zelensky says that he is investigating corruption in his country because he wants to get out of the long history of corruption that ukraine has become infamous for. president trump also defending rudy guliani's role in going to speak with ukrainian officials in madrid earlier this year. saying he's investigating the genesis of the election interference in 2016 on behalf of hillary clinton that came out of ukraine. the president said that rudy guliani is absolutely allowed to investigate something like that. what the problem for the president though remains, whether or not he can be seen as trading off military support, other support for the ukraine for this idea of investigating joe biden's son. initially we had heard yesterday that there were potential ties between the president putting a hold on some $400 million in aid to ukraine unless zelensky undertook some sort of investigation. according to the transcript, that conversation never happened. there was so

that's why zelensky got elected with a mandate to clean up corruption. he and president trump are talking about that in the conversation. things that both of them are doing to clean up corruption and drain the swamp. look, all of this stuff with this whistle-blower report, there were a lot of things if you read the whistle-blower report that are concerning in terms of allegations that were very partisan. in fact the justice department or the inspector general determined that the whistle-blower does have a political bias. you know, again, let him go forward and make accusations, but a lot of these accusations have turned out not to be true. >> every time i've asked you if you're concerned about the actions the president took, you've avoided answering this specific question and instead focused on -- >> don't try to infer. >> i'm not. i'm just asking. you seem to be uncomfortable -- let me put it this way. you seem uncomfortable defending the president's actions. >> don't put words in my mouth. >> okay, i'll let you finish but let me finish my statement. >>

we're going to see president zelensky this week. i do hope that if vice president biden engaged in conduct inappropriate, had an interest that allowed something to take place in the crew crane, i do hope that we get to the bottom of that. john: mr. secretary, you said you have not seen the complaint, not many people have. i assume, though, that you have seen a transcript of the telephone call that the president had with zelensky. should a transcript be released to clear the air? >> i'll leave that to white house. as you know, john, those are private conversations between world leaders, and it's not often that those are released, and when they're done, when the white house deems it appropriate. and i'll leave whether that should be released to them. john: again, i assume that you've seen the transcript. is it as described in the "wall street journal"? [laughter] >> i haven't seen "the wall street journal" piece, john. there's a lot going on in the world. john: right. the whistleblower complaint reportedly alleges a quid pro quo or a

this is the president speaking to president zelensky. i'll have mr. giuliani give you a call and i'm also going to have attorney general barr call and we will get to the bottom of it. the bottom of all of the conspiracy theories the president is leveling against the bidens, leveling against hillary clinton and the democrats. so make the case, why do you think the attorney general right now needs to recuse himself from this current investigation? >> because the heart of the accusation against donald trump from -- that has arisen in the last week is that he has had an improper, unconstitutional relationship, effort in terms of his interactions with the government of ukraine. a key part of his effort to get dirt from the government of ukraine on his political opponent joe biden is to get the government of ukraine to talk to his attorney general. to provide that information to the attorney general. how can the attorney general possibly supervise an investigation in which he's clearly a witness? >> he said he wasn't informed about it. he said he didn't kno

so pence has this meeting with zelensky. he comes out and says we didn't discuss biden but we talked about corruption. democrats are going to want to know whether or not that discussion got a little bit closer to that quid pro quo that many democrats say was evident in the president's call. maybe not explicit but whether or not pence was involved in anything like that in telling zelensky if you want to get this money that we need to see x, y, z from your government in terms of investigating joe biden. pence is going to have to be able to show that he did not do that because right now the democrats are saying that the u.s. government led by president trump with vice president pence as the mouth pete was putting pressure on the ukrainians to investigate joe biden or else not get the money that was going to be influential in their defense against the russians on their border. >> we've heard a lot from the president the last couple days. he is frustrated. i think that may be an under statement. he has been pushing back on these

zelensky until he saw how zelensky chose to act in office. that was a new allegation.e didn't know that perry led that delegation but apparently that was a message, ironically i believe rt, the kremlin's propaganda arm noted the snub in their reporting at the time which other people had labeled as fake news. anyway, andrea, explain that. >> well, this is part of a time line that came out in this complaint. there was an april call by the president to zelensky. we don't know -- we don't have notes or a transcript or any kind of reconstruction of that. that has been requested by congress. we don't know if we'll get that. call has not been explained. four days after that call and he had just won the runoff election. four days later, the president went on fox news and was talking very favorably about a former prosecutor who had been talking to giuliani and had been meeting with him and about evidence against the bidens and that it was evidence against hunter biden. it was big. it was incredible. so he was following this narrative which was all over fox and the president was

zelensky had a career in television.: wonderful -- >> spent -- and our president has spent tom -- some time on television himself with great success. and when i met with president zelensky in poland, we sat down and talked about that. and i know that in their meeting today they'll make that very same connection. they're both non-convention alleyeders who are willing to lead from the front and drive for real progress. and i think, you know, at the end of the day i'd say that again, lou. present company accepted, most to to have media spends their time focusing whatever the latest criticism of this president or this administration is instead of focusing on an aamazing record that in the midst of reckless accusations over the last two and a half years we've rebuilt our military, we've revived the american economy through tax cuts, rolling back regulation, an energy revolution. we've seen more than 50 conservatives a appointed -- 150 conservatives appointed to our courts at every level. it's thanks all to the leadership of p

he saw how zelensky, quote, chose to act, close quote, in office. i also do not know whether this action was connected with the broader understanding described in the unclassified letter that a meeting or phone call with the president and president zelensky would depend on whether zelensky showed the willingness to play ball. do you know whether mr. pence, vice president pence's trip was pulled because of an effort to find out first whether ukraine was willing to play ball? >> chairman schiff, no, i do not. i have no knowledge of any of that until this information came to me from the icig. i have absolutely no situational awareness, no knowledge of any of those facts. >> would you agree that if the vice president's trip was canceled in order to put further pressure on ukraine to manufacture dirt on mr. biden, that that would be unethical, n unpatriotic, and potentially a crime? >> i do not know why the vice president of the united states did not do that. i do know what the allegation was within the whistle-blower complaint and i don't know whether t

zelensky did bring up the idea of buying javelin missiles. lucas tomlinson, over the pentagon for fox news, says those javelin missiles were not included in the $250 million in lethal military aid that the president put on hold. all of that, though, did not seem to matter much the democrats. listen to what adam schiff said a short time ago. >> the president of ukraine brought up his country's need for military assistance. immediately thereafter, the president of the united states said, "i have a favor i want to ask of you." i'm not concerned whether it's a quid pro quo or not. ukraine understood with this president wanted. he made it abundantly clear. he made it redundantly clear. he had his emissaries making it clear. and ukraine knew what it needed to do if it wanted to get military assistance. >> the release of the transcript did nothing to slow the freight train of impeachment that the democrats have now jumped on. nancy pelosi saying this morning that she had not seen the transcript, but is happy to weigh in on it. listen here. >> the fa

of ukraine and bianna, imagine the pressure that president zelensky is under at this point.eeds the united states, he needs nato, he needs the protection that he gets against russia which is invading his country and has occupied parts of his country, so it's very awkward for him to say or do anything that would offend the president of the united states. this has to be an enormously difficult position to be in. >> difficult indeed. the one thing these presidents share is they're very familiar with the camera. zelensky is the political neophyte but he was an actor, comedian, very familiar with public audiences and how perception comes across. that being said, he is a political neophyte so this having been the first interaction he's had with the u.s. president is pretty stunning and unprecedented. there is a difference between breaking norms and breaking the laws. we will see if that's, in fact, what the president of the united states did. but you're absolutely right, ukraine is in a very tough position right now. you have zelensky who ran and won in part on wanting to simmer d

, corrupt on the president's part, not on zelensky's part. the day after the mueller hearing, the lesson this president appears to have received is that he can do whatever he wants, he can violate his oath of office, he can refuse to defend our constitution, he can invite further foreign interference in our affairs, try to cover it up and there will be no consequence, no accountability, and that's simply too dangerous to be left that way. and so yes, i certainly think that the gravity of the situation demands that we move forward with the inquiry. >> okay. >> and we'll have to determine whether thatologi also means re of articles. >> are we expecting to see rudy giuliani testify? >> i don't want to commit myself to that at this point. we certainly need to do a lot of work to find out what glun has been doing in ukraine. it appears from that conversation that the ukraine president understood what was going to be asked of him on that call. and that very likely was the result of work that rudy giuliani and some of his minions were doing in ukrai

what i told zelensky was pretty simple. it was common sense.t get involved in the 2020 election. when you're dealing with the united states of america, deal with the state department. talk to our ambassador. don't talk to the president's personal political representatives and i guess i was potentially frustrating trump's attempts at corrupting the ukrainian president. that may make him angry. but ultimately, this country needs to make clear that you can't use the foreign policy and the foreign power of the united states of america in order to try to get foreign countries to enter into our political fray. >> had you -- had you heard -- you said that you had heard that giuliani and perhaps others from the trump campaign had been around trying to get them involved and pressure them for things. had you heard that anything about the phone conversation that had taken place, i know you said you hadn't seen the transcript, did you know a phone conversation took place? did anyone on the ukraine side from the president's office or the president himself a

earlier, zelensky backed that up. >> i think you read everything. sorry, but i don't want to be involved to democratic elections of u.s.a. nobody pushed me. dy pushed me. >> iother words, no pressure. >> reporter: the summary of their july 25 phone call reveals that the president repeatedly asked zelensky to investigate joe biden and his son, hunter, who is on the board of a ukrainian oil company, even suggesting he work with u.s. attorney general william barr. the summary is not a verbatim transcript, but a memo, based on the notes and recollections of those listening in. mr. trump said, "there's a lot of talk about biden's son, and a lot of people want to find out about that, so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great." in a statement, barr said the president has never asked him to contact ukraine. president trump also told zelensky to speak to his personal attorney, rudy giuliani. "i will have mr. giuliani give you a call, and i am also going call, and we will get to the bottom of it." cbs news legal analyst jonathan turley:

as presidents of ukraine zelensky has special authority in the justice system.on the courts and on the procreate her general's office. they are his impact could be direct he doesn't have to go through a lot. i need to look into it so i can say. >> i saw someone with her hand up. right here. >> ambassador hurst, i raise the issue a few months ago at the morgan williams group. before the election. what effect has the maneuvering between russia and ukraine has or had on russian belarusian relations? both on the put level and on the street if it's applicable. what's the future of belarus's sovereignty. looking to the prison with what's going on in ukraine today. >> ukraine has been a complicating factor in the midst moscow relationship lukashenko understands it in his interest that ukraine not knuckle under to the kremlin. therefore, lukashenko has not been as receptive to kremlin ideas such as seeing more troops along ukraine's northern border. there is also been what i would call indirect impact, which is this. for sure since the rose revolution in november of 200

don't forget zelensky used to be a comedian. listen to the way he opened up the bilateral meeting. >> thank you very much. it's a great pleasure to me to be here and it's better to be on tv than by phone i think. [laughter] mr. president, thank you very much. >> one thing we should point out, shep, is that the phone call on july 25th between the presidents was the second time that they had spoken. they spoke earlier in the year after zelensky won the office of the presidency which has now led to calls from some circles that if we saw the transcript of the july 25 call, couldn't we also see the transcript of the first call because that may have been a precursor to the conversation that took place between them. as you pointed out at the top, both leaders saying there was no pressure that was put on zelensky to do -- conduct any kind of investigation. there are really two investigations that are going on here. one is that it's an investigation into the genesis of the 2016 hacking of the dnc computers and what president trump believ

july 25th phone call between trump and zelensky. september 9th, whistle-blower complaint revealed to congress. september 11th, military aid released to ukraine. how does the white house explain that timeline? >> reporter: well, the president's explanation, obviously, as you've seen evolved over the course of the last 24 to 48 hours, initially at the time, according to administration officials the reason that money was with held is because they wanted to make sure there wasn't any wasteful spending being delivered to an ally in advance of the g7 summit. from the president we initially heard him saying that he wanted to make sure that there was proper vetting of ukrainian bureaucratic corruption and then 24 hours later just yesterday we heard from the president effectively saying that they sat on that money because he wanted to make sure that other european allies were doing their fair. for the record, the european union had spent more than $15 billion in aid to ukraine since 2014. why that money was ultimately given out on september

he tells zelensky, quote, i would say we do a lot for ukraine. i wouldn't say it's reciprocal necessarily, but the united states has been very, very good to ukraine. zelensky responds, i'm very grateful for that because the united states is doing a lot for ukraine. i would also like to thank you for your great support in the area of defense. these are the president's very next words. quote, i would like you to do us a favor, though, because our country has been through a lot and ukraine knows a lot about it. i would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with ukraine. they say crowd strike. there are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. crowd strike is the american internet security company that initially investigated the russian hack of the dnc in 2016 that led to the release of embarrassing e-mails for democrats. the president says, quote, i would like to have the attorney general call you or your people and i would like you to get to the bottom of it. as you saw yesterday, that whole nonsense ended with a ve

what kind of conversations giuliani, andrudy president zelensky and other ukrainian officials occurred? did they speak to each other? what did they say? what promises or requests were made? president involve his personal lawyer, mr. giuliani, in what president trump claims was official government business? done to get around in theficial channels state department and elsewhere? there are many other questions, and those are just the ones that come from the document we were given. this white house has a history of doctoring public disclosures to save the president from embarrassment. if they do it for small things, like when they changed the transcript of the white house communications director, saying sinks three foot putts" into saying the president there's0 foot putts," no saying what they would do with this one. even though there is a possibility that the administration doctored or left out major sections, this document demonstrates that president trump made it abundantly and redundantly clear to the president of the ukraine that he wanted him to investigate his political opponent. f