>> i know you think i'm going to come down on you. no, i actually thought it was a substantive interview. not that you really care what i think, right? >> of course why, i love you, i respect you. >> here's what i think. i thought it was substantive. i thought that he was, and i think that i'm right, trying to pull a corey lewandowski what corey did the other day in congress. distract, deflect, don't answer questions, talk about, what do you think, what do you think, keep deflecting. but in that, just as what happened with corey lewandowski, there was actually substantive admissions in there. he admitted that he asked the ukraine government to investigate joe biden in that interview. he didn't realize he did, just as corey lewandowski probably didn't realize he was going to admit that he lies to the media, or that the president committed obstruction of justice or asked him to do something that he was,

you know -- that was not lawful. >> yeah. >> i think that it was -- but i think that that was -- it was important, the admissions that he -- his performance was important, and also what he ended up admitting, very important as well. >> yeah, i -- >> it's a tactic. it's a tactic. >> there's no question. i call those "attack-tics." they've become the new normal. people say, how do you keep your cool? i know what it is. this one was a little different than others because i've known rudy giuliani most of my life. i have always respected him. i have a lot of questions about what he's decided to do for this president and what it will cost him ultimately. but the kinds of personal insults, i didn't really expect that from him. not to me. at the beginning he was saying, no, i'm just talking about the institution, i'm talking about the cnn, the media. but it wasn't, it was personal. >> but you know what that is, that's an audience of one. >> look, that's -- that's fine. i know what the president has told his followers to feel about me and what it's okay to do.

and i forgive all of that because i know how to do the job. and you're not going to get to me by coming at me personally, as long as my kids aren't around. >> right. >> and i want people to see it, don. i want people to see that when faced with questions that any capable lawyer could deal with pretty easily, do you know what the president said to the guy? no. if he was saying anything about cleaning up your country, you're fine. what about that 250 they released too soon? you're going to have to show me more than that. the president didn't know what you were doing? no, not until afterwards. there are easier ways to get around it but they're using the attack mechanism because they think it works for them and i want people to see that. that's what this election is about. it's about what you accept and what you reject. >> he admitted he asked ukraine to investigate joe biden and said even if the president did it, it's allowed, in that interview. that's what he said to you. >> if the president did what? i think he was saying, if the president said clean up your

country and corruption or you're not getting money from us, that's okay. >> yeah. >> if he tied it to a more personal interest, it could be a little suspicious, especially when we don't get any readouts of any of these things. obviously if it were so benign, unless this complainer, this whistle-blower, is completely incredible, which is hard to believe, because the ig had to assess it in order to find their own threshold finding, which rudy giuliani was way off about, denigrating the ig, who by the way was picked by this president. so that becomes relevant. why did the person get so upset? why did the ig believe the claim? why did they think this rose to that level? that's all relevant in the assessment. >> let's talk about what he said about joe biden. i know you did the fact check. i'm going to have you for a little bit. >> i have it right here. >> 20 minutes -- just a couple. then you can talk. i want to read part of it from cnn. it says, giuliani's story is littered with holes. the ukraine's government's case

against baresma had been dormant. two years before joe biden successfully pushed to remove the prosecutor general, biden was also joined in his anti-corruption push against the prosecutor by numerous leaders in europe as well as the international monetary fund, none of whom had any family ties to baresma, which was the company -- >> hunter biden was on the board, and that did create a conflict of interest for joe, no question about it. >> and should be investigated. they did investigate it. >> they did. let me read from the "washington post." joe biden traveled to the ukraine, as you said. it was not a demand to stop baresma prosecution and there's no evidence the prosecutor was after hunter biden, the current prosecutor general in ukraine said he had no evidence of wrongdoing by either biden. politifact. we found no evidence to support the idea that joe biden advocated with his son's

interests in mind, as the message suggests. it's not even clear that the company was actually under investigation or that a change in prosecutors benefited it. that's three. there are probably 20 more, but go on. you read one as well. >> the missing piece of the analysis for mr. giuliani is that he makes it sound like joe biden was acting on his own, when he was acting as an agent of the united states as its vice president. so that would mean that the whole government was trying to protect hunter biden. and again, hunter biden was in a position -- >> the european government as well. >> that's right, that people were moving on this prosecutor, the timing doesn't set up just right. but this is the problem with a conflict of interest, and this is the problem with a conspiricist. conflict of evidence makes everything look stinky, so the standard is smells bad, people think it's bad.

you only need a little bit. instead of dealing with what this president is going through, what this whistle-blower said, what the dni is being told by someone to hold on to, is of no interest to mr. giuliani, he knows nothing about it. he's heard nothing about it. the president doesn't understand what he would have been saying to the president of ukraine. what are the chances that you're representing somebody, going through all this effort to do all these things in the ukraine, you tell them nothing about it until you do it and tell them after? boy is that convenient. mr. giuliani has vehicle soiled everything that's happened with this president in the light that's best to him even when the facts don't support it. he was right about one thing, he didn't vindicate him but he kept him out of the chair across from mueller, and that made all the difference. >> i just kept saying to him, wait. is this -- this isn't what -- that's not even the question that you asked. that's not why he came on. >> coming from a place of intense anger. >> yeah. >> i know that place. i just wasn't in it during that interview. because i don't need to be there

when we're trying to swap facts and understand a situation. i don't need to go at him personally. >> you made my crew laugh in here. i know that place too, i've seen it. i'm with you. >> i just -- i'm just happy people saw it. >> you kept your cool. >> the state of play on and off camera now. anything that happens that the administration doesn't like, they will say anything about you, your family, personally, to try to show where it's coming from, sad statement. >> they attacked the network and whatever, hey. truth matters. thank you, sir. good to see you, great interview. >> always a pleasure. >> you as well. thank you, sir. this is "cnn tonight." breaking news tonight, new revelations about the president's communication with a foreign leader. the communication that prompted a whistle-blower complaint and a showdown with congress. here's what "the washington post" is reporting tonight that the whistle-blower's complaint involves ukraine. we know that the president spoke with ukraine's leader on july 25th, 2 1/2 weeks before the

complaint was filed. a call already being investigated by house democrats who want to know whether the president and rudy giuliani pressured ukraine into pursuing politically motivated investigations to help the president's re-election effort. rudy giuliani, who frankly, let's just be honest, he sounded unhinged. bobbing, weaving, insulting, going on tangents, trying to distract with wild and free -- evidence-free claims about joe biden and saying this to chris tonight. >> will you finally answer my question now that we're 12 minutes in? >> do we really believe he didn't know his son was under investigation? >> why don't you answer the sghe. >> what's the question? >> did the president talk to the ukrainian president about what he wanted done with joe biden and what he wanted done with

paul manafort? >> i have no idea, i never asked him that, i don't know and i wouldn't care if he did, he had every right to do it as president. he had every right to say to the ukrainian president, we have two outstanding allegations of massive corruption -- >> he asked you to do what you were doing? >> no, i did what i did on my own -- >> really? >> i told him about it afterwards because i'm his lawyer. >> believe me, we've got a whole lot more on the breaking news tonight. all of this is an example of the way the president uses power when he believes his word is law. he's using his power to try to bury that whistle-blower's urgent complaint. the white house and the doj advising the nation's top intelligence agency not to share that urgent complaint with congress. democrats are furious. intel committee chairman adam schiff saying the system is broken. >> if in a matter within the

jurisdiction of the director of national intelligence you have an employee of that community who follows the law and makes a complaint, and it is possible for the subject of that complaint to essentially quash the complaint or keep it from congress, then this system is badly broken. >> congressman mike quigley, a democrat on the committee, blasting the doj and the attorney general, bill barr. >> mr. barr and the department of justice's job, in their mind, is to protect the president. and it doesn't matter, that violates the laws. >> that gentleman right there, congressman quigley, is going to be here in just a moment. i'm going to speak with him. the president tweeting this this morning, that virtually anything he speaks on the phone to a foreign leader he understands there may be many people listening from agencies in this country and the other country.

going on to tweet, knowing all of this, is anybody dumb enough to believe that i would say something inappropriate with a foreign leader while on such a potentially heavily populated call? i would only do what is right anyway and only do good for the usa. and going on to claim presidential harassment. hm. the. >> asking whether anyone is, his words, dumb enough to believe that he would say something inappropriate to a foreign leader. okay. let's review, shall we? this is the president who gave classified information to the russian ambassador and foreign

minister in the oval office the day after he fired james comey in part for not stopping the russia investigation, leading to a secret mission to extract one of the highest-level covert sources from inside the russian government. that mission driven by fears over that oval office meeting. this is the president who stood next to vladimir putin in helsinki and took his word over our own intelligence committee, saying he did not see any reason to believe russia was behind interference in our 2016 election. >> my people came to me, dan coats came to me and some others, they said they think it's russia. i have president putin, he just said it's not russia. i will say this, i don't see any reason why it would be. >> this is the president who has

gone to great lengths to hide details of what he's discussed in private talks with putin and even shared a joke about russia's continuing election meddling with the russian president. this is how the president uses his power when he believes his word is law. is anybody dumb enough? a lot more for you tonight on our breaking news. new revelations about that explosive whistle-blower complaint, about the president's communication with a foreign leader, now reportedly involving ukraine. we're going to dig into all the latest details with shane harris who broke the story for "the washington post" and cnn's evan perez next. apture proof of the ivory billed woodpecker.

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we're back and here's our breaking news tonight. "the washington post" reporting the whistle-blower complaint at the center of the showdown between congress and the executive branch involves ukraine. joining me is shane harris who broke the story for the "post." cnn's evan perez with us as well. shane, your reporting says the whistle-blower complaint involves ukraine. what can you tell us? >> right now what we know is building on our reporting from yesterday, that there is an allegation of some kind of promise that the president made to a foreign leader. it would appear that does involve the country of ukraine. we don't know precisely the allegation that the whistle-blower is making in terms of what it was that he saw with regards to the president's contacts or interactions with people in that country that led him to file this complaint with the inspector general. but we do know some interesting things about the timing. this complaint was filed about 2 1/2 weeks, so not very long after the president had a phone call with the president of

ukraine. and there was a lot of activity going on in that period as well that eventually came to light about the administration's efforts to slow roll funding to ukraine as part of a military aid package then the issue around the biden investigation. there are a lot of dots lining up with this story. >> all of this is happening, shane, as the house democrats are looking into whether president trump and rudy giuliani were attempting to get the ukrainian government looking into the president's election campaign -- could that be connected into the promise the president made to a foreign government? >> we don't know but i think that's an important question to ask and certainly one -- >> alleged promise but go on. >> when the question is a promise made to somebody in the context of president trump or any president for that matter what -- you're promising something in return for something we might speculate. there's a question around is there some kind of negotiation or contact, conversation going

on? but these are some of the -- these events that appear to be at least happening around the same time, whether they're coincidental, that's a lot of what's driving questions for us and members of congress as well. >> okay, evan, let's bring you in here. did you see the rudy giuliani interview? >> we saw it. >> let's review. rudy giuliani admitted to chris that he did ask ukraine's government to investigate biden. listen to the heated exchange, then we'll talk. >> did you ask the ukraine to investigate joe biden? >> no, actually, i didn't. i asked the ukraine to investigate the allegations that there was interference in the election of 2016 by the ukrainians for the benefit of hillary clinton for which there already -- >> you never asked anything about hunter biden, you never asked anything about joe biden -- >> the only thing i asked about joe biden is to get to the bottom of how it was that

witsenko, who was appointed -- >> you did ask ukraine to look into joe biden -- >> of course i did. >> you said you didn't. >> he denied it, then he admitted it. >> right, i mean -- that's how it goes with rudy. rudy has publicly said he thought this was something the ukrainians needed to look into. the idea that there was some kind of quid pro quo that happened on behalf -- on the part of joe biden, you know, during the time that he was vice president, that he was pushing to fire a prosecutor as some kind of a favor to try to essentially help his son and his own business dealings in ukraine. so we've heard this, some of these public statements from rudy. it was kind of interesting to see him sort of try to navigate that tonight. but he ended up exactly where he has before. >> so -- >> no, i know. honestly, it reminds me of the -- it's weird but it does,

this phony phone call on the howard stern show, the person will say to the radio person, whoever they're calling, you know your show is terrible but i love it, i get a lot out of it. you know you're a liar but you're telling the truth. the person goes along with it. it's just -- it's unbelievable. rudy giuliani will say one thing in one sentence, in one breath, and then completely contradict what he says in the very next sentence, in the very next breath. i want you to take a listen to rudy giuliani's answer with chris when he asked if the president spoke with ukraine's president about joe biden and paul manafort, watch this. >> will you finally answer my question? >> do we really believe he didn't know -- >> why won't you answer the question this. >> what is the question? >> thank you. did the president talk to the ukrainian president about what he wanted done with joe biden and what he wanted done with paul manafort? >> i have no idea, i never asked him that, i don't know what he

did, i wouldn't care if he did, he had every right to do it as president of the united states. he had every right to say to the ukrainian president, we have two outstanding allegations of massive corruption -- >> did he ask you to do what you were doing? >> no, i did what i did on my own and i told him about it afterwards because i'm his lawyer. >> well, there was a lawyer who said something similar and we know what happened. but listen. evan, is that true? i mean, does he have the right to do that as president? >> well, he does have the right to tell the ukrainians, if we're going to give you money, we want to make sure you are doing everything you can to fight corruption. what i think is the question you're asking is whether it's abuse of power by the president if he's essentially holding aid hostage, if he's using the purse of the u.s. government and taxpayers to get political gain from this foreign country. i think that is where i think voters are going to have to make that decision, perhaps members of congress, who can investigate it and determine whether the

president is abusing his power. i'm not sure that rudy really is inviting that, but i think that's where this will go if this is indeed what the allegation is. >> shane? thank you, we appreciate you and the reporting. thank you for joining us and we'll see you next time. evan, we'll see you at the top of the next hour, appreciate it. the house intel committee briefed behind closed doors today on this whistle-blower complaint. i'm going to speak to a member of that committee about what he heard and didn't hear, congressman quoomike quigley ne. the relaxing feeling of knowing you're getting the best price. these'll work. the utter delight of free wi-fi... . oh man this is the best part. isn't that you? yeah. and the magic power of unlocking your room with your phone. i can read minds too. really? book at hilton.com. if you find a lower rate, we match it and give you 25% off that stay.

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so here's our breaking news tonight. "washington post" is reporting that the whistle-blower complaint about president trump made by an intelligence official involves ukraine. i want to bring in congressman mike quigley, illinois democrat, member of the intelligence committee. good to see you as always, thank you for coming in. >> thank you. >> i want your reaction to the "washington post's" reporting that the whistle-blower's complaint involves ukraine. is this new to you? did any suggestion of this come up in today's meeting with the intel ig? >> not at all. i think the ig, while a trump appointee, is a very straight arrow. he was on point and stressed other things that are extreatmently important. but the issue of subject matter was not brought up or discussed. >> what you discussed -- what's your concern level about what you heard? >> well, let's say this. he talked about the fact that it was urgent and credible, that it

was corroborated, and it involved one of the most important functions that the dni carries out, its responsibilities to the american people. that's scary enough. and he stressed the fact that -- i guess i'd put it this way in a democracy, we have an intelligence community that operates in secret. and that's necessary. but that system only works in a democracy when there is a functioning oversight by the congress. and when there is the opportunity for whistle blowing. what the ig stressed today is all that is at risk with the dni's action blocking the law, blocking this complaint going to congress as is prescribed. >> so then why would the president -- you saw him, i don't know if you saw him on twitter today, downplayed, called it fake news, also his acolytes as well, his

apologized, i.e., rudy giuliani, others, conservative media -- why would they downplay this if his own ig is saying it is credible and corroborated? >> the president doesn't care about the truth. the president has never in his life been held accountable for any of his actions. and one of the reasons he's successful is he's a bully and he can lie with an incredibly straight face, and his base will back him up no matter what he says. and if a law is allowed to be violated in this manner, he'll get away with it again. >> do you think the white house and the justice department are trying to cover up wrongdoing on the part of the president? >> i think that the attorney general applied for this office by writing a memo attacking the special counsel's investigation of the president. he's done nothing since then but be the lap dog of this president, protecting him, holding press conferences on his behalf. i think that in the end what the russians did to this country, i think mike morrell described as

the political equivalent of 9/11. i think what we're continuing to witness is the fact that the president's reaction to what the russians did will have a longer-term, more negative impact on our democracy, the independence and the integrity of the justice department and the intelligence community, it will take years to recover. >> let me ask you this. you mentioned rudy giuliani. the "post" reports that democrats are already examining whether trump and rudy giuliani sought to manipulate ukrainian government into helping trump's re-election campaign. giuliani just told chris that he did ask ukraine to investigate joe biden after first denying that. what's your reaction? >> my reaction is, what is rudy's role? he says he does something and then tells the president. as an attorney for ten years i absolutely never did that. is he acting in his official capacity or unofficial capacity? obviously he isn't in any official position where he had

to be approved by the senate. what acts are he carrying out? how much of it is for his personal gain? how much of it is to broke the president of the united states? carry out methods that can only be described as byzantine and bizarre. >> congressman, the acting dni, joseph mcguire, will appear before your committee next week. how do you get him to change his mind and release this complaint to you? >> i don't know that we will. i think we can educate and inform the american public that the law is being violated, pointing out that the statutes say he shall turn this information over, pointing out the attack on the democratic process, why it matters to the integrity of the intelligence community and the work that it does. the fact that it really challenges our national security. so i don't know that we're going to convince him. i think it begins with the justice department, changing their opinion about the law. an opinion which is obviously in violation of that same law.

>> congressman quigley, it's always a pleasure to have you on, we appreciate you joining us, thank you so much. >> any time, thank you. >> much more on our breaking news tonight, the whistle-blower complaint about president trump reportedly involves ukraine. that as rudy giuliani tries to distract and defend his boss tonight on cnn. morning. what are you doing? isn't it obvious? nah. we're delivering live market coverage and offering expert analysis completely free. we're helping you make sense of the markets without cable or a subscription from anywhere you are. i get that. but what are you doing here? nice pajamas. really? i say pajamas. pajamas, pajamas, whichever. good. yahoo finance live. stream free anywhere. welcome to the show. let's make finance make sense.

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the explosive whistle-blower complaint about president trump's communication with a foreign leader reportedly involves ukraine. that has a very, very, very combative rudy giuliani tries to defend his boss, the president, right here on cnn. so let's discuss. samantha vinegrad, biden institute, part of university of delaware. also mr. evan mcmullin and sean turner. sam, i've got to ask, you heard

rudy giuliani with chris earlier. first rudy giuliani denied asking ukraine to investigate biden, then admitted he did. give me -- well, do we want to play this? okay. give me your reaction. >> my reaction is that i feel like we're watching vladimir putin's best fantasy play out in realtime. we have the president of the united states sending his personal lawyer to do business that's personal in nature, it does not represent the interests of the united states. what we're seeing is some kind of quid pro quo potentially play out whereby the president is trying to solicit help in the 2020 campaign by getting dirt on a political opponent, and at the same time, don, the president put very significant security assistance to ukraine on hold while rudy giuliani was on this political smear campaign. so the interests of the united states are a secondary priority, seemingly, to president trump's desire to get dirt on a

political opponent. that impacts every american's national security. if the president's personal or political agenda represented by rudy giuliani comes first, and we're withholding security assistance to ukraine, which is used to deter russian aggression, that means that the best interests of the united states come after the president's personal needs. >> sean, a few things here. first, when he says that the president has every right to do it, does he? >> well, it depends, don. look, the challenge we find ourselves in is one in which the president's staunchest supporters, people like rudy giuliani, truly believe that there's absolutely nothing that the president can do to violate the law. but that's not true, as we all know now, because the president -- we've seen the mueller report. look, the president has wide authority when it comes to national security, when it comes to national security information. as we know, he can -- if he

utters classified information, it is declassified simply by his utterance. however, in this case, we may not be talking about a matter of whether or not this is elor illegal. look, if the president, is, as the reporting suggests, saying to the ukrainian president if he helps out with this biden investigation, that he may, as sam was pointing out, that he may release funds to support their fight against -- the push in the fight against russia, then what the president is doing is using that, his position, using his authority to basically circumvent our national security interests. now is there a law that says that the president can't do that? no, it's open to interpretation. but certainly the president is behaving in a way that's inconsistent with his most important responsibility, and that is to safeguard and protect u.s. national security. >> so evan, chris dcuomo tried o ask about "the washington post's" reporting.

>> i can tell you is if what is reported is true, it doesn't make a damn -- it doesn't make any difference. if the president of the united states said to the president of ukraine, investigate the corruption in your country that has a bearing on our 2016 election, isn't that what he's supposed to do? what if -- unless you assume that the president's guilty, as opposed to the fact that those people in the ukraine were trying to frame the president, which is exactly what they were doing. >> what if he said, i have $250 million that you want -- >> if he said that? >> why don't you investigate what's happening with joe biden? >> chris tried to get what the promise in the "washington post" may have been, but giuliani dodged, what do you make of it? >> i think what he's dodging is what could have been a quid pro quo here, which is that the

president may have been pursuing foreign assistant to help his re-election, and at the same time, offering this aid, money, or other help that he is able to offer by leveraging u.s. power, which he has a great deal of control over. and i think he may want to -- may have wanted to avoid talking about that promise, if that's what it was. but in the question about whether the president has done something here that is actually illegal, if that's what happened, look, to me this sounds like the pursuit of a foreign campaign contribution. it's pursuing foreign assistance for your campaign. and just as sam was saying, using federal resources, tral power, in order to secure that campaign contribution. and that's illegal. you can't get foreign help like that. and if the president is so concerned that joe biden and his son committed some kind of crime, he could easily go to the authorities, to the fbi, and

say, look, i think there may be something here, let's look into it. you don't go to the ukrainian government with your personal attorney to do that. if you think something was wrong, go to the fbi. >> would he be criticized for that as well, do you think? >> he might and be he should be. there's such an opportunity for corruption in that area, he should be criticized or scrutinized. the point is if you're going to do that, we have mechanisms for the investigation of criminal activities. these facts have been looked into and checked and i think there probably was a conflict of interest there, but it doesn't mean a crime was committed. but that's what the president will do and giuliani will do. they will look for any crack or sign of malfeasance and try to tour it into something that it isn't. >> watching rudy giuliani, you were shaking your head, because? >> rudy giuliani is the president's personal lawyer. we have established legal mechanisms if there is an issue between the united states, a legal one, an official one,

between the united states and ukraine. rudy giuliani does not work for the u.s. government, he works for president trump. the hypocrisy of president trump and rudy giuliani talking about a familial conflict of interest is overwhelming at this point. that's the elephant in the room. not to mention the policy and legal implications. >> stay with me. i want to talk about just what sort of promise the president could have made to a foreign leader that would alarm the intelligence community so much. ♪ award winning interface. ♪ ♪ award winning design. ♪ ♪ award winning engine. ♪ ♪ the volvo xc90. our most awarded luxury suv. ♪ ♪

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tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection or your asthma worsens. headache and sore throat may occur. haven't you missed enough? ask an asthma specialist about fasenra. if you can't afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. thanks to priceline working with top airlines to turn their unsold seats into amazing deals, family reunion attendance is up. we're all related! yeah, i see it. and because priceline offers great deals by comparing thousands of prices in real time, sports fans are seeing more away games. various: yeah-h-h! is that safe? oh, y... ahh! not at all. no, ma'am. nope. and more people than ever are enjoying romantic getaways. (romantic music) that's gross priceline. every trip is a big deal. we're back now with sam. and sean turner. so, listen, i want to read part of the intel inspector general

letter to the house intelligence committee. responding to the dni saying the complaint is not in our jurisdiction. he writes i never the less respectfully disagree with the determination. that the disclosure need not be transmitted to the committee. what he's saying, this does concern intelligence activity. he disagrees with the doj. and the dni. what you think about how this is handled? >> well a couple things, it doesn't matter that he disagrees -- that the acting dni thinks this is not urgent. this doesn't matter. the statute gives him the authority and responsibility to pass information onto members of congress. the problem is that there's only half of the question being answered here.

if this information doesn't fall in the jurisdiction of the inspector general, theb it has to full under a different jurisdiction if there was violation of law. and be referred to the appropriate authority. if on the other hand this doesn't fall under the jurisdiction and also not legal, there's no reason to with hold the information from members of congress and the american public. so in this case, what the acting dni needs to be and the justice department needs to answer the rest of the question. who does this belong to? if it belongs to no one and not illegal then why not share the information. >> evan perez reporting the concerns arise in part from learning information not obtained during the course of their work. they didn't have direct knowledge of the communication. so who is the pool of people we are talking about? >> who could have known about the conversation? it could have been somebody at

the national security counsel. somebody at the white house who saw a read out of the call. if it was a call. we don't know for sure. if that happened on which phone it happened. a personal phone or a official phone. other people have access potentially to the calls. even if the president uses an unexpected phone. collecting on a foreign leader and the president calls that foreign leader. we may collect the call. the don'ts of the call. some gene yor people at the agency might see that. more senior officials than might also see that. in either case it's a very limited group of people. and i personally am worried about this whistle blower. there aren't that many people who would likely have access to the information. and i worry and i hope this person maybe isn't watching

right now. because i worry over time that they could be discovered. their identity could be learned publicly. >> what do you think about the dan coats and his deputy the involvement or lack of this time? >> sue gordon? she's gone now. she was passed over -- >> they left around the time this -- >> she was passed over. for the acting director of national intelligence job. one thing we know separate from this complaint that's been bolstered. is that the president likes to install people in acting positions and senior positions that serve his personal interest. so at this point based upon the history that bef with president trump, and really choosing lieutenants to implement his personal agenda, the status of the acting director of national intelligence is in question. based upon the letter you just read the inspector general is saying the acting director of

director of national intelligence actions don't follow past precedence. there are questions as why he's taking this course of action. rather than listening to his inspector general. there maybe valid legal arguments. we haven't seen them yet. >> it's like well, why not transparency. i just want to read this tweet. from national security analyst. it's important to know it would not be a crime for either the whistle blower to communicate the sub tans of the complaint to a gang of 8 member in a security space. they wouldn't be prosecuted. just fired. >> interesting. okay. thank you all. i appreciate it. we'll be right back. biopharmaceutical researchers.

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misleading health claims. now juul is pushing prop c, to overturn san francisco's e-cigarette protections. say no to juul, no to big tobacco, no to prop c. this is "cnn tonight." i'm don lemon. we have five big headlines in the hour ahead. we begin with the breaking news. that whistle blower complaint about president trump communication with a foreign leader reportedly involves ukraine. all the new reflations coming up. the president's lawyer rudy giuliani admitting tonight on

cnn that he did ask ukraine to investigate joe biden. after first denying that he did. and attorney general bill barr under fire. for advising the acting dni not to share the whistle blowers complaint. is he acting like the president's personal attorney instead of the chief law enforcement of the united states? growing black face scandal. the canada prime minister saying he doesn't know how many times he's worn black face in his life. ed buck facing a federal charge for providing meth to a young man who died of over dose. breaking news right now. good evening to you. there are a lot of new developments tonight on this whistle blower story. take us through the latest reporting. >> the biggest new information comes from the "washington post." which is rep