are supposed to be representing you, but they are really doing is representing their quest for power, no matter what, by any means necessary, take this president i would. that is all the time we have. shannon bream and the "fox news @ night" team take it from here, shannon? ♪ >> shannon: hello and welcome to "fox news @ night," i'm shannon bream in washington. we begin with a fox news alert. this is an extraordinary night by any measure. the democratically led health house of representatives making history by impeaching the president of the united states, who then rallies against the vote as it is happening, in real time. not a single republican voted to impeach the president, but a couple of democrats did cross over and vote no with a unified republican caucus. and we are breaking news right now, speaker pelosi hinting the newly passed articles may not head straight to the senate. senator mike lee standing by, he is a legal scholar and will soon be a juror. mollie hemingway, former advisor to richard goodstein and more. but we start tonight with correspondent kristin fisher

with all of the details from tonight's historic vote. good evening, kristin. >> good evening, shannon. follow the history made today, there were a few surprises during the hours of debate on the house floor and those debates tonight. there were moments, and one moment in particular that really stood out, was the moment that house speaker nancy pelosi announced that the first article of impeachment had passed. >> the and the as are 230, the names are 197, the present 1. article one is adopted. >> watch here as speaker pelosi tries to quiet cheers from house democrats. she wanted them to be solemn, sad, and serious, as they voted to impeach, and here's how those two historic both broke down, almost exactly along party lines. on abuse of power, two democrats defected, as expected. jeff van drew from new jersey, who was already said he is switching parties, and

collin peterson from minnesota. zero republicans broke rank. on obstruction of justice, almost exactly the same, except for democrat jared golden from maine also crossed over and voted no. the only real surprise and either vote was the one democrat who voted president, congresswoman and 2020 contender tulsi gabbard, who said "i could not in good conscience vote against impeachment because i believe president trump is guilty of wrongdoing. i also could not in good conscience vote for impeachment because removal of a sitting president must not be the culmination of a partisan process." the only other surprise came after the votes, during the press conference with democratic leadership, in which speaker pelosi would not say when she would send the articles of impeachment to the senate for a trial. >> we haven't seen anything that looks fair to us, so hopefully it will be fair, and when we see with that is, we will send it. to speak with us for the republicans today, they were on

message and unified in their def president trump, saying he did nothing that rises to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors, and will do everything to put the state behind him. >> when i look out at the abyss, i don't know what i see, but i will tell you what i do see. i see coming off a president will put his head down even through this sham impeachment and will do his job come up with the american first. he will tell them that i care about you. he will still put the economy first, and he will make sure this country stand strong. that's what i see in this abyss. that is where we are going. >> but when will the articles of impeachment be going to the senate? that's really the big question tonight, shannon. speaker pelosi really threw a curve ball here and is now playing hardball with senate majority leader mitch mcconnell. he said he wants a fast trial, and that cannot start until pelosi sends him the articles of impeachment that passed the house tonight. shannon? >> shannon: another standoff. we will wait to see how this

resolves. thank you for your reporting, good to see you. messaging tonight as the house votes to impeach president trump, the president using the vote at his reelection rally in michigan. >> shannon, good to be with you. as expected, and as some would probably say, as planned since the day he took office, democrat did in fact impeach the president tonight, and that sparked a senate trial yet to come, but certainly in the meantime it sparked a relentless record from a president at a rally tonight in michigan. >> i think we have a vote coming, so we've got every single republican voted for us. whoa. [applause] wow. wow. almost 200. we didn't lose one republican vote. and, and three democrats voted for us. >> he waited all day to respond on camera, but when he did react

to tonight democrat led impeachment, president trump really let loose. >> they have been trying to impeach me from before iran. crazy nancy pelosi's house democrats. [boos] have branded themselves with an internal mark of shame, and it really is a disgrace. >> inside kellogg arena and thousands more outside braving sub-freezing temperatures, the presence of all the democrats with see hr in contempt with what he called and tack on the 63 million americans who voted for him in 2016. >> first person to ever get impeached and there is no crime. i feel guilty. you know what they call that? impeachment light. but i know one thing americans will show up by the tens of millions next year to vote pelosi the hell out of office. >> the intense rhetoric aside, they must prepare for a trial in the senate, with a january start most likely. while the president has made no secret his desire to see

witnesses called and accusers cross-examined, majority leader mitch mcconnell will most likely pare down the entire exercise, knowing full well there is no chance of a conviction with the g.o.p. majority. but that doesn't mean the white house counsel's office won't be at the ready. sources tell fox news tonight that while nancy pelosi is expected to take the lead for the president, others including the president outside counsel jay sekulow and even harvard law professor alan dershowitz could assist. >> one of the biggest complaints the white house is expected to lodge against impeachment is the speed with which democrats pushed this all through. just to give a bit of context, the clinton impeachment took almost 1500 days. the trump impeachment just 85 days. shannon? >> shannon: all right, some call that a fast track. kevin corke, thank you. with an impeachment trial no ended their way, g.o.p. senate chairman tonight are requesting interviews and documents from

former obama administration officials for information relating to the ukrainian gas company burisma, and hunter biden. bring enough senator mike lee, republican from utah come on the judiciary committee, soon to be a senate juror. welcome. you decided you are not a voting member of the house, to go and be part of this, at least be in the chamber tonight. why? >> wanted to see it. i wanted to find out exactly what it would feel like, that moment they decided to take this crazy move to impeach the president based on conduct that wasn't impeachable. it wasn't criminal, wasn't even wrong. >> shannon: okay, so now it heads to you. we don't know when, because tonight the speaker is now saying, she took questions about what are you waiting for? want to make sure there is a fair trial in the senate. here's what senate minority leader chuck schumer had to say about the proceedings. >> mr. president, we are offering your due process. due process means the right to be heard. these take it. don't ask for it and then refuse to take advantage of it.

>> shannon: okay, so he does listen, mr. president, we are offering your due process where the witnesses he wants, there is a debate about whether republicans should call other witnesses or not. so what happens now? >> it's curious. first of all, the fact that he is first calling for due process, at a moment when he thinks it will benefit the prosecution. when we talk about due process rights in the context of somebody being accused of something, normally we are referring to the person being accused, not of the government. he is not worried about the governments right right, but the prosecution from the house of representatives being fairly treated. it's really strange that he is bringing this up now. >> shannon: what do you make about the possible delay? speaker talking about the majority leader over there, steny hoyer has well, talking but maybe we will have a delay appeared one g.o.p. senator i talked to said they thought january 6th, this could kick off. if you don't get this from the house officially, you can't begin the trial in the senate get a lot of your colleagues are running for president come out there on the campaign trail. i don't know how much they want

us to drag into drag into late january, critical votes. >> i think this idea of passing articles of impeachment, and then saying oh, but we are going to wait and please set things up exactly the way we want you to, it's odd. some would call it curious. others would call it counterintuitive. i would call it crazy. and look, i don't use that word lightly here, but this is not! they just impeach the president of the united states, and now it's our turn to have a trial. we have to begin a trial starting at 12:30 p.m. the day following their delivery of articles impeachment. if they are now threatening to refuse to deliver them, what does that say about their commitment to actually doing, following through on what they did? it is completely insane. >> shannon: we will see if that plays out. i want to ask about something that got lost in the shuffle today, the fact that the doj inspector general michael horowitz was back on the hill testifying. and the other day, we might have led with that. it kind of got buried. he was pressed again on this idea of the 17 major omissions or errors that the fbi made in

applying for these warrants that they got four surveillance warrants on carter page connected to the trump campaign. here's a little of his back and forth with senator rand paul today. >> if you saw that he was biased, he has obviously made errors that you think actually may have been intentional. why, in that instance, would you not be free to shade there is documentary evidence of not only biased, but that malfeasance? >> that is precisely why we don't say that, as to the errors, the failures in the fisa process. >> shannon: so both are trying to spin this to their advantage. is he saying there was biased or not? or do we have 17 mistakes -- i don't how and email was a mistake, but other errors and omissions? >> if you read the horowitz report and watch as many hours of testimony before various senate committees, what he is saying is he can't conclude that there was bias that affirmatively affected the initial decision to open the investigation. he is not playing much beyond that. to me, it's unmistakable that

bias, in some way or another, affected the investigation. you can't look at the strzok and page lovebird text exchange without concluding that there was bias there. it's inevitable that bias affected all of us. what this shows is ultimately, shannon, is these people are either incompetent -- so incompetent they were able to be manipulated by a form and political operative hear it or they were downright intentionally, deliberately evil. i'm not sure which explanation is worse. i find them both troubling, and that's why you need to repeal fisa or dramatically reform it. >> shannon: i was going to ask where we go from there. a scathing order yesterday, saying this calls into question everything else we've gotten from the fbi. they want to know what is going to be done. some people are saying is getting rid of fisa or make majorly reforming it. other saying the fbi needs to clean up their act. what do you do? >> men are not angels, as james madison warned us in federalist 51. we have dangerously skirted the

need for rules with faisal. that is why we need to either scrap it altogether or majorly overhaul it. i look at that scathing rebuke from the judge, and i say that is such an unusual, extraordinary thing. we ought to be very concerned about our government on the way it handles things, specially ought to not give it unlimited, unfettered, unreviewable power to spy on the american people, which is what fisa does. >> shannon: you've got people all over the spectrum, from the aclu to far right on the hill, saying the same thing, and we should all be very wary of what is going on. we will watch and see what you guys do. we watch on the trial, as well. in the meantime, merry christmas. >> thank you, merry christmas to you. >> shannon: them impeachment of president trump is official. mollie hemingway and more straight ahead. the most accurate analysis you can get tonight. stay with us. ♪ can my side be firm?

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>> shannon: house speaker nancy pelosi not setting a time frame tonight for actually naming impeachment managers or for sending the senate the actual articles of impeachment. the house voting along party lines impeaching president trump on two articles. article one, abuse of power, passing 230-197. article two, obstruction of congress, 228-191. not a single republican crossed over to vote yes. president trump becomes the third president to be impeached adoption of the constitution in 1788. two years ago, the late and revered charles krauthammer issued a warning impeaching president trump could be a huge mistake. >> you've got a political establishment, mostly democratic, but there are some republicans, would like to see him take it out of office. i think that would be a catastrophic mistake. it would cause a rupture in the country where people would say,

when we people, the ones who have been abandoned, elect someone we like, our guys get taken out? i thought we had a stable democracy. if you think the man is unfit, you vote against him, but you don't remove him from office. and that is where i am afraid we are headed. there will be another election, there always are. people can make the choices. that is why i think we are really headed to very choppy and dangerous constitutional waters. >> shannon: for analysis, democratic strategist, former clinton advisor richard goldstein. senior editor at ""the federalist"," mollie hemingway. good to have both of you with us tonight. first of all, your reaction to what charles had to say, let me put up something the present we did a short time ago, goes along with this point, he tweeted this, "in reality, they are not after me, they are after you, and i'm just in the way." mollie?" >> he's been the most extreme constitutional remedy.

if it's an emergency community to decapitate the executive branch and get this president i would, no one thinks that is what the situation is here. what has happened, this cheapening of impeachment for political purposes, not being taken seriously enough by the people who just did it. nancy pelosi says they might not even send these articles of impeachment over to the senate, which is just not something you would do if you felt confident in what you just done, if you really felt you had the goods, that you had an airtight case. you wouldn't be so scared to send them over to the senate. >> shannon: here's what the president said. he was rallying tonight at the same time the vote was going down, and here's what he said about how he thinks this will play for the democrats. >> this law lists, partisan action is a political suicide march. have you seen my polls the last four weeks? [applause] >> shannon: richard, we're going to talk about this coming up, but he is convinced this will be a win for him at the ballot box.

>> so, ask matt bevin, who frankly ran the home stretch of his campaign on impeachment. ask eddie rispoli in louisiana, who did the same thing. how well it worked for him. we are going to get to it, but fox news' own poll has 54% of the public, more than we've seen, really, ever, saying he should be impeached, 60% said he should be impeached and removed, higher than the percentage of the vote he got. he has a lot of people in this country who voted him who want him gone, right? that is with the fox poll says. >> shannon: when you break it down by party, it is overwhelmingly apparent that republicans do not think that should be happening. >> he didn't get 50% of the vote last time, he got 46%. in fox's poll, saying he should be impeached and removed. >> shannon: a bit of an outlier, when you look at the averages of polls. people have moved away from impeachment, and especially in swing states, which is going to

be critical for the president. speak with a real clear average poll shows impeachment is underwater. this is not something that has gained in popularity, particularly looking at swing states, among independent voters, and the most recent polls, even more recently fox poll show, wide margins of people opposing impeachment. this is an extreme remedy, and also, it's something that fits into a pattern, i think. if there is this understanding that there has been a resistance to this president, that it is an ongoing, sort of temper tantrum of hatred that has been going on for years. and they will look for anything, any means to remove him. obviously, the russia hoax was the big attempt, putting together the special counsel, putting together a big investigation with the idea that this would lead to impeachment. the only thing saving president trump in that case was the failure to find any evidence of anybody colluding with russia to steal the 2020 -- >> charles krauthammer could not have imagined in 2017 that there would be evidence showing the pressure put the arm on the head of a foreign government to make

sure that foreign government screwed his political opponent. so when charles said, yes, what did he say? we need to have a stable democracy? i agree. that is why democrats voted for impeachment, because they have zero confidence the donald trump, going forward, won't do that again. we'll go to bibi netanyahu and say, hey, bibi, $3 billion kelly oubre lot of guys can help me? >> shannon: what about the democratic senators to ukraine, within the last year, saying hey, we work with you, but we need to make sure you are working with the mueller investigation if we're going to keep up with this bipartisan support. some people want to say they characterize at the same way. >> well, trying to get the facts out around whatever the ukraine -- whatever ukrainians did -- >> shannon: he released to the call. >> he did, but he basically tried to block every single person he could, and the people who testified did it against the admonition of the white house, so you had gordon sondland. his handpicked ambassador, saying of course it was a quid pro quo.

>> this is the third impeachment of a president in u.s. history. it's the first time you've had an impeachment without an actual crime. even in a previous impeachment that people largely think was unfair with andrew johnson, he did commit a crime, even if that law was viewed as unconstitutional. this is the first time we've actually had an impeachment with nobody alleging that a crime -- >> shannon: during the house proceedings, we heard about bribery, extortion, all kinds of things. they didn't end up in the articles. to speak of the barrier for impeaching trump should have been higher. this gets back to what charles was saying. such an repudiation of the elite comedy establishment, you want to make sure you don't have a leak coming in and saying you people should not voting this way peered the bar should be higher, not lower, no one is above the law, neither is anyboy below the law. to have no crime alleged, democrats saying we're not done with our investigation. your house people saying they

might continue to investigating. senator schumer saying they should investigate continue investigating. >> shannon: any danger of it backfire and? >> of course, would point to the clinton impeachment in a pot 390, picking up house seats. saying i'm going to restore honor and dignity to the white house 1,000 times, and i'i guarantee you, but for the clinton impeachment, everything was going well, that is why he beat al gore, even though he lost by 500,000 votes, of course. but that's why he won. >> shannon: in the electoral college, that's how it works. >> i'm just saying, that was his core message, and a lot of people voted for bush for that exact reason. >> shannon: the rules have changed in ways we wouldn't even recognize from back then. but mollie, stick around. richard, good to see you. the vote is official, but things could get interesting in the

senate. could hunter biden or chairman adam schiff get called to the witness stand? our own in-house expert, chad pergram, outlines what happens now. ♪ ♪ (loud fan noise) (children playing) ♪ (music building)

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♪ >> we have done what we set out to do. we will make our decision as to when we are going to send it when we see -- when the senate side, that is a decision we will make. >> shannon: now the articles of impeachment head to the senate, or do they? chad pergram is here to explain what happens next. you covered this for weeks and months. what happens if the speaker's decides not to send it over to the senate, or to delay it? >> there is no senate trial. the senate can't move until they get the articles. they're supposed to be a resolution that is sent over. 1998 with president clinton, it happened about 10 minutes after the vote that night. it never happened at all tonight. they also sent over the

impeachment -- nancy pelosi has ball control here. a couple of things might be going on here number one, she might be trying to tap the handbrake here and say, wait a minute, maybe impeachment is bad. if the senate is going to have an impeachment trial and they're going to call the bidens and adam schiff, this is really bad for democrats. let's just stop this right now. also, she prevents president trump from saying i was impeached, but i was exonerated in the senate. the other factor here is maybe nancy pelosi turns around and says, all right, we can continue to make this case that the senate playing field is unfair. it's tilted toward the president. they make that case about mitch mcconnell, that he is the grim reaper, doesn't run a fair senate. she can continue to pound that point in the court of public opinion. >> shannon: okay, so is it possible, has it ever happened that the articles are passed and there is not a trial in the senate? >> it happened once with samuel kent, a federal judge impeached about ten years ago. what happened as they impeached him, and then he resigned before they finished the trial, so the senate just had to flush the

articles. that said, you have to take it up in the senate. the only thing the senate has to do is receive the impeachment articles, read them aloud in the senate, and that also here from the impeachment managers. these are the prosecutor in the house would send overcome it again, nancy pelosi has not appointed them because they have not sent that resolution to the senate. >> shannon: its interest income everyone who is a prominent democrat and thinks they want a piece of this fight is going to be one of those managers, but what we have been told is anybody sort of lobbying or campaigning for it, that's not the kind of person she's going to pick. there are big names to have been involved here. if this happens, what a trial in the senate look like? >> nobody really knows, this is why mitch mcconnell and chuck schumer have to get together to form a deal. this is what happened with trent watt and tom daschle, the leaders back in 1999. if you get unanimous consent, you get all 100 senators to agree -- that is in the senate, that's what happened in 1999, they set up the parameters of debate for the senate trial ahead of time.

if you don't have a deal, it's -- that's like and have the bidens and mick mulvaney, this could be the greatest spectacle of all time. it's hard to believe after we've been through this impeachment possibility you could not have a senate trial, if you do not send over those articles, despite all of this conversation, shannon, it might not happen, so long as nancy pelosi controls the ball. and she is always looking for leverage. mitch mcconnell might say, i'm not going to meet with chuck schumer until we have the articles. why should we meet? we don't have anything to discuss yet. >> shannon: again, the thought is the beginning of january, but we will see as it tracks. we will always turn to you, because you seem to know everything going on inside scoop. thank you, chad. >> my pleasure. >> shannon: attorney general bill barr speaks out against impeachment as he faces criticism for his allegiance to the president. that's next. but first, the real news round roundup. supreme court justice ruth bader ginsburg responding to president trump's call the top court to step in on impeachment, saying the

president is not a lawyer. when asked about senators making up their minds before the trial, the justice added, well, if a judge said that, a judge would be disqualified from sitting on the case. a 17-year-old in fresno, california, attempting to steal a plane. the girl hopping over an airfield fence, apparently sneaking onto an unmanned plane, and then crushing it into a nearby building. police have arrested the team, and officials say this was not about terrorism, but we don't know her motive just yet. and joe website, the north full department of christmas affairs, publishing a naughty and nice list today. listen come all the names are on there. scroll through by your first name to see if you made the cut, if you want to change your rating, you can hire a knight coach to find the perfect naughty-nice balance or to "fast track the process," by staying on your best behavior. here we go... ♪ (little santa) somali...alika?

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hour 36 in the stakeout. as soon as the homeowners arrive, we'll inform them that liberty mutual customizes home insurance, so they'll only pay for what they need. your turn to keep watch, limu. wake me up if you see anything. [ snoring ] [ loud squawking and siren blaring ] only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ ♪ >> shannon: the attorney general warning tonight that house democrats could be trivializing impeachment.

chief breaking news correspondent trace gallagher has more for us tonight. hey, trace. >> shannon, good evening. martha maccallum's interview with attorney general bill barr took place while members of the house were debating impeachment, and the ag had his own take on the impeachment of president trump. >> as a general matter, i think we are to be careful of what trivializing the, and they put in a hurdle of high crimes, articles of impeachment here do not allege a violation of the law. >> republicans and legal scholars have also repeatedly argued that abuse of power is not a statutory crime, and when the president asserted privilege in telling witnesses not to testify before congress, democrats could have gone to court. barr also weight in on rudy giuliani continued to investigate in ukraine on the president's behalf. >> i'm responsible for the department of justice, and obviously, i rely on investigations conducted by the department.

i think that is generally the best wa way to go. >> in the meantime, what inspector general michael horowitz said fbi officials misled the fisa court through inaccuracies and omissions during the warrant application process, attorney general barr said those omissions and inaccuracies could infer bad faith. former fbi director jim comey called barr statement "irresponsible," and barr said this about comey. >> one of the things i object to is the tack being taken by comey, which is to suggest that people who are criticizing or trying to get to the bottom of the misconduct are somehow attacking the fbi. i think that's nonsense. >> and on james comey telling chris wallace he was seven layers above the investigation? bill barr said this. >> they pulled the investigation up to the executive floors, and it was run and bird dogged by a very small group of very high

level officials. the idea that this was seven layers below him is simply not true. >> barr went on to say that federal prosecutor john durham is investigating a much broader investigation than that of the ig. and is looking at all of the conduct before and after the 2016 election. shannon? >> shannon: trace gallagher, thank you. and do not forget to tune into the story with martha maccallum tomorrow night, 7:00 p.m., for that full, exclusive interview, you did not want to miss it come of the attorney general bill barr. impeachment going down on party lines, something jerry nadler, house judiciary chair, warned about in the last impeachment in 1998. >> voted impeachment, or impeachment supported by one of our major political party asked, and opposed by the other peers such impeachment would produce n divisiveness and bitterness in our politics for years to come. mr. speaker, this is clearly a

partisan railroad job. >> shannon: during the house impeachment vote for president clinton in a posturing 98, both democrats and republicans crossed party lines. two of the articles past, two failed. generally to talk about this in a historical context, professor robert p george. professor, good to have you with us tonight. >> thank you, shannon. good to be on the show. thank you for inviting me. >> shannon: i want to read something from noah feldman, one of the professors who actually testified in the impeachment hearings over the house a week or so ago. he said william barr is attacking some department, from sessions, barr is managed not to be criticized by trump, but instead of protecting the deferment of justice and its institutional integrity, barr has instead attacked the department he leads by lambasting the fbi, which is part of the doj. what do you make about how the attorney general is playing this out, as we now wait, of course,

the other big report from u.s. attorney john durham? >> you have to remember, bill barr is very smart. he is highly experienced. and he is very shrewd. he understands what he is doing and why he is doing it. of course, we now have the inspector general of hoyt, inspector general report for mr. horowitz does show there was very bad behavior going on at the fbi, and barr's right to point out that the other shoe that we are waiting to have drop is the prosecutor, mr. durham, from connecticut, who has many more tools available to him and is going to be talking to more people, and we are really not going to know what is up here until that other shoe drops and we get a report, and perhaps some indictments from prosecutor durham. so stay tuned. there is a lot of action still going to happen on the stage. >> shannon: what you make of the criticism that the attorney general is too cozy, asked too much as a professional -- personal defender of the president,

rather than his role as leader of the doj? >> well, as leader of the doj, one of the things he is responsible for is the integrity of the fbi. the fbi is under him. he's got a responsibility to correct the kinds of errors, the kinds of wrongdoing, actually, that was identified in the inspector general report, and which we may learn a good deal more about when durham reports. it seems to me that barr there is doing his job. he's got a right to his opinion on impeachment, just as jerry nadler does, just as noah feldman does, shannon bream does, everybody else does. he has no particular responsibility to adopt the posture of neutrality here. he is allowed to have an opinion and allowed to run on the basis of his opinion. >> shannon: and tonight, as this has become official of president trump, we have heard a lot the last few weeks and months about comparisons to previous impeachment scenarios.

president nixon resigning before it came to that for him, although it was in the works. president clinton, of course, being impeached. i want to read something from real clear politics. he says like the blue dress that implicated clinton, the tapes directly implicated nixon. the closest thing to a smoking gun in the current impeachment push is the july 25th phone call between president trump and his ukrainian counterpart. the president made a transcript of that conversation public, and in his estimation, it was perfect. if it is all pinned on that transcript, and of course, the white house on the present suggest the democrats did not aa summary or transcript of the call, where does that leave democrats now, as they have officially done this, and moving to the senate? >> it's very interesting about this phone call, both the transcript. the democrats seem to think -- at least most democrats, there were some dissenters come a couple of people voted against

impeachment, and tulsi gabbard voted present, didn't come down one way or another. most of the democrats think they've got a smoking gun, a knocked down case for impeachment. on the other side, president trump at his most ardent supporters think it was a perfect phone call. but both sides are wrong about this. it's not a knocked down. it's not clear that there was an impeachable offense. there is no possible arguing it should be something short of impeachable, or anything like that. and on the other side, this was not a perfect phone call. if the democrats are behaving in a partisan way, it's also true that president trump largely brought this on himself by going very close to or over the line in the phone call. he did not conduct a perfect phone call there, and i think it's a mistake for his supporters to stand by him when he claims that he did. but both sides are here defending their positions. you have a highly partisan situation. the key thing it seems to me goes back, shannon, to what nadler said back in 1998. you have a breakdown here, strictly on partisan lines.

the democrats, to make this work, needed to make it bipartisan. they needed to get something that republicans could come aboard on, at least some republicans, and it looks like they are not even going to be able to persuade republicans who are hostile to the president, like mitt romney, and that will mean this whole effort will be a failure. >> shannon: all right, professor robert george of princeton, always good to have you with us. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> shannon: in other news, a blow to obamacare tonight. federal appeals court striking down a key aspect of the law is unconstitutional. once again. setting up another possible supreme court showdown in a presidential election year. the court finding the lost key funding mechanism, known as the individual mandate, requiring most americans to purchase health insurance or face a tax penalty, was properly eliminated by congress. so the appeals panel sent the case back to the lower court to decide whether other aspects of the affordable care act must fall, or if they can stand alone peered we will keep tracking that case.

a new gala poll shows a surprising trend among independents and how they feel about impeachment. our panel is on deck to weigh in, next. ♪ let's be honest, quitting smoking is freaking hard. like quitting every monday hard. quitting feels so big. so, try making it smaller. and you'll be surprised at how easily starting small... ...can lead to something big. start stopping with nicorette but he wanted snow for thelace holidays.. so we built a snow globe. i'll get that later. dylan! but the one thing we could both agree on was getting geico to help with homeowners insurance. what? switching and saving was really easy! i love you! what? sweetie! hands off the glass. ugh!!

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>> it's all going to end soon, and it's going to come to a beautiful victory for the republican party. [applause]

[chanting "four more years"] >> shannon: just hours before president trump was impeached by the house of representatives, new polls show his approval rating rising and support for impeachment dropping. let's discuss with ethan bearman and fox news contributor editor -- contributor mollie hemingway. she does it all, she's back for a double header. great to see you both. gallup today, irrespective poll, 's approval rating has risen since the impeachment inquiry opened. he's working it's going to be good for him, and it's true. >> one poll does not set a standard, and molly is talking about being skeptical of these polls. the issue is doing the right thing has nothing to do with polls. in this case, we have so much

evidence about what the president did, his own calls come his own people testifying. we know when he did was wrong, so the articles of impeachment have moved forward. it may not win over the public support, and that is not what impeachment is a file it. it's not a popularity contest. and i am a little concerned, the democrats need to do a better job getting the message out of why it matters to impeach this president. >> shannon: they've had weeks to do it, hearings, witnesses, didn't get all the witnesses they wanted. they've had the time. let's look at it a little more. a couple of polls on independents. the gala poll also showing that where we are going on support from independents for impeachment dropping by seven points since this whole thing has played out. quinnipiac, the same thing, ask should the president be impeached, yes or no, independents' 8:30 6% say yes, 58% said they should end. at least with independents, it looks like they are not convinced at this moment. >> not just independents, also

seeing swing states, the polls are not going the way it democrats would have liked them to have gone. what happens in an impeachment is, if you are dealing with impeachment that has nothing to do with a crime, you are doing it for political reasons. you are doing it so you can tarnish the president. it was a reasonable expectation that once this got going, it would build, they would be credibility to this, it would harm him in some way, that support for impeachment would rise dramatically. not only has support for impeachment not risen, in fact it's gone down, you have seen approval ratings go up. this is kind of a worst-case political scenario for democrats, they expend this political capital -- it's very extreme to do something like this. and it's very negative, and it makes it seem like the criticism they are deranged by their hatred for trump has legitimacy. and to not get any political wind out of it is not what they were hoping for. >> shannon: and he's going to try to capitalize on that. here's what he said at his rally tonight, which was held in real time at the same time he was getting impeached.

>> crazy nancy pelosi's house democrats. [boos] have branded themselves with an internal mark of shame. and it really is, it's a disgrace. democrat lawmakers do not believe you have the right to select their own president. >> shannon: ethan, he's going to fire up the base with that for the next ten months. speak with actually ridiculous. what he should be saying is i finally got more votes than a clinton. he actually got more votes against him in this impeachment than bill clinton did back in the '90s. >> shannon: but he didn't get any republicans voting for him. >> by the way, clinton only got five democrats to vote against him, as well, it's not like it was a major landslide. doing the right thing here is what matters, and mollie distracted from the point here, nothing about impeachment requires a federal crime to be committed peered >> shannon: that's true. >> exactly. i would add to the fact that many law professors, as opposed to political preferences, would say that we are close to bribery, and definitely there

with extortion, so we could have gone there, never address the emoluments question, domestic and foreign, don't know what's going on with russia in all of these cases, remember helsinki, so there is a lot here, and the democrats, by the way, can continue to push forward with additional hearings before turning this over to the senate. this is not done, and there's a lot more room for the democrats to work with here. >> shannon: but mollie, we have been told there is an urgency to getting this done because the president is potentially going to interfere and corrupt 2020. and got to make it quick, almost out of time. speak what they thought they had these cases, they should've tried to make them, and that they didn't suggest there was not much to them. it's interesting that republican state unified. this was something not expected when impeachment first got going, back when donald trump was elected coming on people thought republicans might want to see him impeached. not a single republican straight on this boat, and none are really expected to. really something about republicans gaining some courage, but also the loss of power in mainstream media. they couldn't have pushed harder

for this impeachment, and didn't get it. >> shannon: we got to leave it there. next up, the senate, may be more in the house. thank you both for joining. most watch most trusted most gratefully spent the evening with us. good night from washington. we are back tomorrow. i'm shannon bream

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moment. this is the story. we will see you ♪ >> tucker: this is a fox news alert. of course, you know exactly what it is about. we are monitoring the house imminent house impeachment vote on capitol hill tonight, as well as the president's rally in michigan. both happening this hour. the vice president is on stage to introduce the president and just said this: what's happening in d.c. tonight is a disgrace. right now, meanwhile, on the hill, the final speaker is wrapping up. a lot to get to tonight. hear from the president and get our analysis. first, back to capitol hill. >> in this time of great trial and tribulation, may god bless america. i yield back. [cheers and applause]