thank you. >> thank you for watching. our live coverage continues with "white house in crisis: the impeachment inquiry" with laura coates. >> we'll try to actually answer some of the questions that people are wanting to know about what is all this mean, where are e we today and the why notes. like why can't you have somebody testify in front of the hill today. why was the person not allowed to do so. why can't there be a full vote. people want to understand what it moo means and where we are in the important moment in history. >> it's good. i love what you are doing. you break it down. you had jeffrey on and you were breaking down what happens. it seems every single day there's something new. many more new things. and it's sometimes difficult for the public to understand. it comes at us like a fire hose. drinking news from a fire house. >> whiplash. by the time we get to 11:00 p.m. we have this. the idea of all the developments during the day.

what happened at 5:00 p.m. vs. 6:00 and 7:00. so much happens in a minute. you might history in the making. we were here twice before in american history. and modern times. here we are again in 2019. we have to understand what's going on. even though a little whiplash is happening. >> break it down. take it away. >> let's get straight to the news. this is the cnn special hour "white house in crisis: the impeachment inquiry." i'm laura coates. tonight i'm going to take you through the top headlines and late breaking news on the impeachment inquiry into donald trump. our headlines the white house sending letters to speerk nancy pelosi. refusing to cooperate. democrats fighting back with subpoenas. a millionaire trump donor to turn over documents on the ukraine call by monday.

and to appear in person by wednesday. and now a source telling cnn the ukraine whistleblower wrote a memo describing the reaction of a white house official who actually listened to that now infamous call. calling the conversation quote crazy and frightening. we'll get into it tonight. first, cnn alex takes us through the big developments. we have a lot of fast moving developments tonight. tell us how are democrats responding to to this really scathing letter from the white house? >> so much going on throughout the course of the day. the battle lines quickly being drawn in this impeachment. the white house for its part tonight making it clear they have no intention of playing nice of making it easy for the democrats in congress.

one of the first examples of that we saw earlier today the white house shut down and blocked testimony by a key player at the center of the ukraine scandal. >> reporter: tonight the white house declaring war with congressional democrats over impeachment. a letter from the trump administration to congressional leadership accusing them of a proceeding that violates the constitution. the rule of law and every past precedent. seeking to over turn the results of the 2016 election. the president lawyer writing your unprecedented actions left the president with no choice. president trump and his administration cannot participate in your partisan and unconstitutional inquiry under the circumstances. the letter coming at the end of a dramatic day that saw the white house block the testimony of one of the president's point men on ukraine. u.s. ambassador to the european union. house democrats firing back with

the subpoena demanding his presence and documents. >> by preventing us from hearing from the witness and obtaining documents the president and secretary of state are taking actions that prevent us from getting the facts needed to protect the nations security. >> he was supposed to be deposed this morning ant what he knows about the president's request to ukraine investigate joe biden skm his son. just after midnight, the state department after consulting with the white house sent word to the lawyer he wasn't allowed to go to the hill. three house committees planned to grill him. zeroing in on texts in which he clearly understood the president wanted ukraine to investigate the bidens. >> not only is the congress being deprived of his testimony the american people deprived of the testimony today. we are also aware that the ambassador has text messages or e-mails on a personal device.

which have been provided to the state department. >> his lawyer said the ambassador was profoundly disappointed to not be allowed to appear and stands ready to testify. the president's allies in congress pounced. >> this whole thing is a fairy tale. schiff is misleading you. you are playing along with it. and the american public is getting deceived. >> tonight sources tell cnn that before the president agreed to meet with his new ukrainian counter part, zelensky. he told top ukraine aids including energy secretary they would have to convince his personal attorney rudy giuliani. who is his man on the conspiracy theer are against the bidens. >> if they can satisfy rudy. they can satisfy the president. a person familiar with the meeting set and indication of how intertwined u.s. policy towards ukraine was with trumps personal agenda. and clear official channels.

>> that meeting was on may 23. two months before the call with president zelensky. made clear that the president wanted ukraine to investigate the bidens. cnn has also learned that after the president's phone call with ukraine president in july, officials scrambled at least one national security official alerting white house lawyers who put the transcript of the call in to a highly classified and restricted server. that call was so disturbing to a white house official, that they called it crazy and frightening. to the whistleblower who reported it. adding the white house aid was shaken. >> now, despite the white house insisting they will not cooperate with the impeachment inquiry, they are gearing up for it. the white house is hiring the former south carolina congressman as a lawyer. he's not expected to join the

administration officially but will be advising from the outside. he met with the chief of staff mick mulvaney. >> i want to bring in cnn legal analyst. and cnn senior political analyst. to talk about all of this. crazy and frightening and tray gowdy made an entrance. president's reprieve we had. stone walling is done, full stop. that seems to be over. is that going to stop the bleeding now? >> i don't think so. they're trying to to do two things. one to prevent the democrats from having any additional facts because they do realize that the facts they did release the read out of the phone call, not a full transcript. and the whistleblower complaint

really did open up -- they thought it might stop impeachment from going forward. of course quite the opposite happened. new people came forward, enormous amount of facts were available for the democrats to investigate. and this letter tonight which i have read as many smart legal commentators on it as i could find. it doesn't sound legally sound to argue the house doesn't have somehow unconstitutional to go forward with the inquiry. and i assume this is headed towards the supreme court. in the meantime, i don't think it's going to stop the democrats in any way from going forward with the investigation. although it makes it difficult without any cooperation whatsoever. >> it didn't all of a sudden become a legal document when they use the word constitution

50 times. you're the expert. the white house claims house democrats are abusing power. they are violating the constitution. they're violating the rule of law. and every past precedent of impeachment. did you find any legal basis for any of that? >> no. it's just the opposite. this is easy. i think the letter is what i would describe as fake law. it's a very weak document. it makes mostly political points. the legal points are actually crazy and frightening. to quote from earlier. the letter is the president can dictate how impeachment is done. he can dictate the procedure. he can decide what information he shares and doesn't share with anyone. he's not accountable to the law and the criminal process. that sounds like the president saying he's above the law. and that's inconsistent with the constitution in american law. >> we went from fake news to now to fake law.

but for the american people who aren't as intimately a ware of what impeachment looks like, what's next? are we in stalemate? how should the impeachment inquiry actually work. it can't be just spout out fake law and that's it. >> no, you're right. the ball is in the houses court. and so the house will proceed as you have been seeing it. you're seeing the process unfold in front of you. and so the house will continue to try to investigate and get facts. keep in mind that the president direction that nobody share information that all his aids defie subpoenas and he is defying a subpoena. that can be construed as obstruction of justice. or attempt to under mine the impeachment process. that's an attack on the house. they have the sole power to impeach. the president doesn't get a say

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so the white house now in a total stand off with house democrats over the impeachment inquiry. remember that phrase constitutional crisis. it's swirling again. in my case tonight i want to look at both sides some of the key arguments in this really rapidly developing story. both parties have now retreated to their corners of the ring. everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face. after today, both parties have a

black eye. a key witness refused to appear for congressional hearings and the white house is fighting really for some legal leg to stand on in the letter to congress. so, what's their plan now? let's break it down by asking and answering the right questions. we already know the why. why is there an impeachment inquiry? because of the potential of abuse of power related to that ukraine call. why doesn't trump want it impeachment inquiry? because he wants to stay president of the united states. we got that. the better question is why not? three key questions for tonight. first, why doesn't nancy pelosi ask for a full vote on whether to have an impeachment inquiry, after all they did that before the impeachment proceedings of in addition son and clinton. nixon and clinton. >> first of all, there's no requirement there be a vote.

>> hope we're not back on the are we in the impeachment or not discussion. so called what are we. to be fair, look, congress has held a full vote before beginning impeachment inquiry. they did it before nixon. did it before clinton. now democrats they don't want to have a vote for political and practical reasons. first of all, nancy pelosi is right. according to the constitution they don't have to. in their mind why subject the representatives to more votes than necessary. especially if you're a congressman who is politically vulnerable. now, second, the precedent of nixon and clinton that happened. the house rules had changed since both of those inquiries. before, they needed to get a vote in order to get subpoena power. now with the new rules the majority already has it. that's the democrats. now the republicans minority want that power. but the democrats don't have to

give it to them. why don't they want to? there's a very real chance the republicans might just try to use the subpoena power to investigate the issue of the bidens. or even just use that authority to call witnesses that may make a mockery of the proceedings rather than to constructively counter any of the arguments. and speaking of witnesses, question number two. why not let ambassador testify? especially if your refusal to do so could give democrats more ammunition to say you are obstructing congress. >> the failure to produce this witness, to produce the documents, we consider yet additional strong evidence of obstruction of congress.

a coequal branch of legislation. >> didn't lessons of nixon tell you that? there's a risk here. if your congress you want to hear what he knew about the president's motive. with holding congressional aid to ukraine. you want to know why he wanted communications to be off text messages. call me, he said. and why did he call the president before responding to his fellow diplomat about the quid pro quo? if you're the president, you want a muzzle on anyone who can potentially implicate you and try to explain your intentions. one of the president's chief defenders says look, there's no need for anyone to testify at all. particularly sond land. >> there's no wrong doing. that's where volker was clear. >> why not release the transcript. so you can see what he told us. there's no wrong doing. he was completely as clear as could be. no quid pro quo.

>> if that's the case, why not just let him testify? say that very thing and prove your case. finally, today, senate judiciary committee chairman graham invited the president's personal lawyer and one man show rudy giuliani to say his piece before his senate judiciary committee. which by the way brings me to my final why not. why not let giuliani testify? let me pause for a second and say that question was actually not meant to be rhetorical. trust me, we all know what a giuliani hearing might look like. >> i know what happened. you are repeating spin. the prosecutor -- you want to cover some ridiculous charge that i urge the ukrainian government to investigate corruption. i did. i'm proud of it. >> it's not a ridiculous

allegation. >> if what is reported is true, it doesn't make a dam. it doesn't make a difference. if the president of the united states said to the president of ukraine, investigate the corruption in your country. that has a baring on the 2016 election. isn't that what he's supposed to do? >> so, it wasn't rhetorical. if you're a democrat, giuliani could turn the proceedings into a circus. or what he did there. the conspiracy theory he's been peddling about biden and try to make them stick against the wall. here's the thing, if you're the president here, giuliani could also implicate you with reckless admissions. the letter also by the way introduces a third party interest. not often talked about here. future presidents. if giuliani testifies he potentially risk the court of law setting harsh parameters on the attorney client privilege protection.

he says he's the president's attorney. and also perhaps for the first time, the court could definitely rule on the limits of executive privilege. the bell for the next rounds about to sound and both side better be ready for the fight. we'll be watching. back again right now with michael and ryan. i want to bring you in here. you have heard my why not here. what do you see as downside for speak speaker nancy pelosi on holding the vote. >> you nailed it. it's about giving the minority in the house the right to issue subpoenas. and i assume that the democrats in the house don't want the minority on the three main committees to turn it into a r

circus. with peripheral witnesses. the way it would work is committees would vote on the subpoenas anyway. so they would in the end be able to with if there the mashlgty held to vote down any frivolous subpoenas or felt were outside of the investigation. but i think that's the main issue. now it's a matter of principle the white house doesn't get to dictate how the house of representatives goes about its business of impeachment inquiry. the president it's not his role. and i don't think they think there's any -- if they do a full vote, there's a sense that trump's not he's going to move the goal post after that. they won't actually have benefit. >> that's a great point about moving the goal post. is this fair? on the flip side doesn't holding a formal vote strengthen

democrats hand trying to get documents and testimony? and takes away the talking point that impeachment is illegitimate. >> i don't think so. your transcription of the issues was excellent. i agree with ryan and everything he said. you point out earlier that the rules have changed in the house. and that is a difference. we have a statute now. which allows power to chairs to issue subpoenas. the rules and procedures are different now than they were previously. the house is following them. there's nothing illegitimate about bha the house is doing. the focus of the white house letter on process is intended in part to shift our attention from what really might be more embarrassing for the president. that's the facts. notice anybody in possession of the facts the president tries to keep them from testifying or appearing. and that raises suspicion

further. which is why you see the polling and interesting having an inquiry increase. >> ryan and michael, thank you. obviously you're both mike tyson fans. cnn is learning tonight a white house official who listened to the ukraine call says it was crazy and frightening. what former dni james clapper has to say about it. that's up next. i can't believe it. what? that our new house is haunted by casper the friendly ghost? hey jill! hey kurt! movies? i'll get snacks! no, i can't believe how easy it was to save hundreds of dollars on our car insurance with geico. i got snacks! ohhh, i got popcorn, i got caramel corn, i got kettle corn. am i chewing too loud? believe it! geico could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.

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about the time line of events in the immediate after math of president trumps call with ukrainian president zelensky. the call it took place on july 25. according to the "new york times" the whistleblower at the center of the this wrote a memo about the conversation with the white house official the very next day. cnn is reporting that the whistleblower wrote that the white house official appeared to be shaken. and described the call between trump and zelensky as crazy. and frightening. cnn is also reporting that in the hours and days after the call, word began to spread among the national security aids about what was discussed on the call. three sources telling cnn that at least one official on the national security counsel alerted the white houses national security lawyers about the concern. those same lawyers would go onto order that the transcript of the

call be moved to the highly classified code word level server to keep it hush hush. we're learning about what happened in almost five hour gap between senior diplomat taylors text questioning with holding security assistance for help with a political campaign. and ambassador sondland actual answer. in a source telling cnn that sondland the u.s. ambassador to the eu and million dollar trump donor actually spoke to the president about the situation. that led to sondland reply of bill, i believe you are incorrect about the intentions. the president has been crystal clear no quid pro quo of any kind. a lot to discuss here. we have the perfect man for the job. james clapper. the former direct tr of national intelligence joins me now. can't think of a better person than you. on this segment.

when you hear that the white house official that helped inform the whistleblower's report was shaken. and describe the call as crazy and frightening, what's your gut reaction? >> well, i couldn't help by hark back to the memos of phone calls that president obama engaged with. which i never sat in on any calls that the president made live. but i did get summaries. officials where it was relevant of the calls and come to me some weeks later. and i found them uniformly pore boring. it was good to know the policy call. for me as intelligence guy, it wasn't all that important to me. and now when i'm just trying to

imagine what it would be like to be privy to a phone call involving the president of the united states where there is -- which is certainly inappropriate if not illegality. and what a shock that had to be. that had to have created a stir among staffers in the white house and specifically the national security counsel. so, of course this would add further corroboration and at least in my mind, to the original whistleblower complaint. there seems to be a consistent pattern here. the last segment and your case, it seems to me the democrats already have a lot of facts already. the whistleblower complaint, the memorandum of the phone call itself which surprised me that

the white house would issue that. and now we're seeing more and more corroboration. of course the curious sequence of events involving the ambassador to the european union. one might ask why is he involved? rhetorical question obviously he's a political appointee ambassador opposed to taylor who is a professional foreign service officer. >> not to mention the fact that the european union ambassador having ties to ukraine. which last i checked not a part of the eu. first of all. you wonder about that. on the issue one source told us it was possible that the top lawyer on the national security council ordered the transcript to be placed in the code word server to what they say preserve the record. since it could be a legal issue. what do you make of that? was there an adult in the room or trying to hide it?

>> i think that was just an effort that to hoister the record of the phone call. i can't read it any other way. in other words to make some attempt at restricting access and exposure. >> is it a misuse of the classified system that you would have been using as well? >> well, some have said that. i suppose technically you can make that case. storing items of lesser classification on a system that's capable of accommodating is common practice. the important thing is what was the motive. that's really critical. not so much was this a technical violation of the rule on use of the computer storage system. >> that's an important the motive. thank you for your time.

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the white house declaring war on the democrats impeachment inquiry refusing to cooperate and claiming in a letter tonight that democrats quote have denied the president the right to cross examine witnesses. to call witnesses. to receive transcripts of testimony. to have access to evidence. to have council president and other rights guaranteed to all americans. >> joining me now. congressman a member of the house oversight committee. glad to have you with us. the white house is saying they will not cooperate as you know. i have to ask the question, what are democrats going to do about it? >> we're going to move forward. and lindsey graham clip in the clinton impeachment hearing is worth watching. he stood up and said that in nixons case one of the articles of impeachment was the white house refusing to cooperate with congress. that that was uncalled for and

unconstitutional. and where's the out ranl from people like graham today? we'll move forward. the judiciary committee will move forward and as speaker pelosi said the president is doing himself no favors by this kind of obstruction. >> what does it mean move forward? is there a time line in place, in mind? witnesses you're looking to hear from? and subpoenas that have already been issued. >> we'll try to get@bottom of this by interviewing the ambassador involved in the president's abuse of office and trying to get ukraine to investigate vice president biden. we're going to continue to ask who at the state department knew. ultimately this will go to the judiciary committee. jerry nadler will draw up articles. the major it u of the country favors impeachment and i expect the house before the end of the year will have a vote on impeachment. >> are you limiting it to the ukrainian call or talking about more expansive as evidence comes

in. >> it will be expansive. documenting obstruction of justice and other abuses of the administration. i think what has tipped the scale of what has been the final straw is the president admitting on national tv he's asking foreign leaders to investigate his political rivals. and people are asking we don't do something now, are we setting a precedent that any politician can ask foreign leaders to intervene and dig up dirt against the rivals. >> speaking of the precedent that was set. the president did fight the mueller investigation every step of the way. and he saw the out come in miz mind as a win. and said he was exonerated. have you learned any lessons from the president handling of that? >> he hasn't learned any lessons because the whole mueller investigation was about interference and now we know he's continuing to try to get foreign countries to interfere. i guess the lesson we have learned is we have to act as a

house. we tried every way bending over back ward to have the white house cooperate. they haven't. i expect that the judiciary committee will act on articles of impeachment. it's not a positive thing for the country. impeachment is a process that is very divisive. he's left the judiciary committee and the speaker with no choice. >> one of the choices that she seems to be exercising is not to exercise and hold a full house vote on the impeachment inquiry. she's telling on friday if we want to do it, we'll do it. if we don't, we don't. we're not doing it because of the president. what's the downside in why not hold the vote and take away one of the president's newest excuses for stone walling? >> the president would just have a different excuse. it has nothing to do with whether we have a vote or not. this president has been -- in

not cooperating. he hasn't allowed people to cooperate with subpoena. the pres tent is leer in the house. the judiciary chair has the power with the speaker to open impeachment inquiry. they have done that in the case of judges and numerous other instances and when it comes to actual impeachment we are going to have a vote. the speaker wants us to have that vote once we made the case. so then members can cast the vote after we had a chance to make the case to the public. >> one of the draw backs the reason the house is not holding a vote because it might open up the opportunity for republicans to have subpoena power. is that part of the calculation for anyone here? >> it really isn't. that is not the calculation. the calculation is the speaker wants members to go on the record once after a full case has been made. after we have collected whatever evidence we can. and i think that's very reasonable. members of congress will go opt.

that's what the speaker is saying. we're not going to do prematurely and on the president's time line. especially when the house rules are very clear that the chair of the judiciary can start this inquiry. >> thank you for your time. >> thank you for having me. president trump potentially getting help in his impeachment battle. from a familiar face. how former republican congressman tray gowdy maybe getting involved in his defense. next. biopharmaceutical researchers.

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so president trump is getting some outside help in his impeachment battle. former congressman and current fox news contributor trey gowdy. now, he is going to work with the white house expectedly as outside counsel. here to discuss, alice stewart and keith boykin. glad to have both of you here. alice, let me start with you because trey gowdy oversaw the house's multiple benghazi investigations, which we know lasted over 2 1/2 years and ended in no convictions. in fact, back in 2015, here's gowdy. >> our country is strong enough to handle the truth, and our fellow citizens expect us to pursue the truth wherever the facts take us. so this committee is going to do what we pledged to do and what should have been done frankly a long time ago, which is

interview all relevant witnesses, examine all relevant evidence, and access all relevant documents. and we're going to pursue the truth in a manner worthy of the memory of the four people who lost their lives and worthy of the respect of our fellow citizens. >> so, alice, it's hard to hear that and say he's going to be the guy who helps the white house potentially stonewall congress? >> i expect him to come in and do exactly what he talked about there, pursuing the truth, pursuing the letter of the law, and making sure we get to the answer. and, laura, you being an attorney and an expert on law, let me submit to you for my argument here is that i do think that what the president has done here in this case is inappropriate. i do think it's ill advised. >> which aspect of it? the stonewalling or the -- which part are you saying is ill advised, alice? >> i'm talking about the conversation he had with the president of ukraine in which he

talked about doing a favor with regard to past election interference. >> okay. >> and that is something that i do think does need to be investigated and looked into. but that being said, let's do it the right process. let's go about it the right way. if you want to do an impeachment inquiry, put it on the floor. let's have a vote, and let's make sure and do this the right way. one thing that trey gowdy did also say in the benghazi hearings was there is no statute of limitations on the truth, and that should be held here. there's no rush here. there's no reason to try this in the court of public opinion. let's do it the right way. >> alice -- >> this has nothing to do with democrats having fear that republicans are going to gain subpoena power and get a leg up here. this has everything to do with democrats do not want to go on the line and vote for something that will not result in impeachment ultimately. >> keith, i want to hear you. >> alice, i mean realistically, what you said is illogical in

the fact that first you didn't really address the trey gowdy issue. the hypocrisy of trey gowdy, who was the main leader, the architect of the benghazi hearings for 2 1/2 years, $8 million, hearing after hearing in which the obama administration fully cooperated. hillary clinton testified for 11 hours, and now he's helping the white house not to cooperate but to stonewall the investigation. the president of the united states today announced, through his attorneys, that he will not be cooperating with a lawful impeachment inquiry that is taking place under the constitution because he thinks it's unconstitutional. he's declared war on the constitution. how else is the president supposed to be investigated if the congress does not have the oversight powers to do so? and trey gowdy, of all people, knows that. that's the inconsistency of it. it also shows you the hypocrisy of the republicans going way back even before donald trump became in office. they were never apparently concerned about good government. they were only concerned about getting back at democrats and

allowing republicans like donald trump to run over the constitution without any regard for how -- for the respect that it's due. >> i hear you, keith. i hear you, alice. i'm not going to give either of you the last word. i'm going to give congress the last word because they're going to have it tomorrow as this investigation continues. we'll wait and see what happens next. fine points on both sides. thanks for watching. our coverage continues. 've got , and private clouds, and hybrid clouds- things can get a bit cloudy for you. but now, there's the dell technologies cloud, powered by vmware. a single hub for a consistent operating experience across all your clouds. that should clear things up. leave no man behind. or child. or other child.

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good evening. tonight a stone wall goes up. lawyers for president trump tell congress there will be no cooperation with the house impeachment inquiry. also public opinion coming into focus with new polling on impeachment. it shows republican support rising for the impeachment inquiry, now at 28%. it's up 21 points since july. perhaps most importantly the story itself, what happened, is coming into focus. we have extensive new reporting tonight about how problematic the people close to the president thought his phone call with ukraine's president was. multiple sources detailing the scramble just moments after the president hung up to assess and contain the damage. new reporting as well on a memo written by the whistle-blower who first raised