>> i am told by a senior doj official he never will. the. >> it seems to me that the ethics honchos at doj. >> who i am sure have been sent on sabbatical. the. >> they need to be answering this question with this information now in the public space. and if in fact this file goes back over for reconsideration, which it should, and barr is told by the ethics folks, hey, you can't be on this one. i mean, trump will lose it because that's his whole thing. he wants a guy to fix it for him. and he's got his inside guy barr and his outside guy rudy. dumb, dumb, dumber, three. >> what could go wrong? >> so the thing is, is it's alarming bill barr has proven himself. he's shown us who he is in the mueller episode, all of that. but this is not going to get any traction with republicans. so what democrats want to do to keep this narrowly focused in an impeachment investigation is try to push this national security funny bone among republicans and these constitutional questions. they have just had money for military installation, some of which have

they want the doj to explain what they're up to. quote, we strongly urge you to request the grand jury to submit a report to the court. we believe it serves the interest of transparency, and they say, look, there's no reason not to do so. now, anything could happen. there could be a sealed indictment. there could be a later indictment. but the reporting has actually been going the other way. the "washington post's" new article basically saying the grand jury investigating mccabe was recalled this week, they were gone for months, and they were released yesterday. and tonight, and it is the end of the work week as of 6:26 p.m. on the east coast. there is no public indictment, that's for sure. i want to break all of this down because it's such an important story, and we are thrilled to be joined by a long-time doj veteran, a former federal prosecutor, dean rossi. good evening to you. >> good evening, ari. >> let's start with why this is such a big deal. if anyone is going, ari is a lawyer, he brought in another lawyer. it's a lot of la

we know the doj lawyers went to the white house to review the transcript of this call since the white house, as you mentioned, was also aware of the allegations. those lawyers then alerted officials at doj's criminal division and deputy attorney general's office, that attorney general bill barr was mentioned on this phone call. we know it wasn't until more than a week later that the inspector general officially referred the matter to the doj. the justice department has previously said that the attorney general was informed when the criminal referred was deliver to doj in late august, and that, in their words, barr was minute male involved in the issue. so we know the doj also ultimately decided not to open a full-blown criminal investigation into the potential campaign finance violations stemming from the july 25thth phone call, but really all these new details about and did the doj's early awareness in early to mid august before that formal referral to the doj the last week of august, does raise these questions about the extent of the attorney general as involvement, what we knew and

attorneys in the doj deliberated on how to handle the matter. it's unclear when the attorney general was made aware of the situation, but he was made aware. >> the inspector general in consultation with my office referred this matter to the department of justice for investigation. i think the whistle-blower did the right thing. i think he followed the law every step of the way. >> reporter: and there is also major scrutiny tonight, the doj's decision not to open a full-blown criminal investigation of potential campaign finance violations stemming from that july 25th call. the doj came to its conclusion despite the fact that the intelligence community's inspector general did find the whistle-blower's complaint credible, wolf. >> jessica schneider, thank you. joining us now, democratic senator mazie hirono. she serves on the judiciary and armed services committees in the senate. senator, thank you for coming in. >> good evening. >> how concerned are you by the allegations that have been laid out in this whistle-blower complaint? >> very concerned.

katie, who normally gets these awards at doj? >> so normally a prosecutor would get these awards, an fbi agent, somebody who has really helped with a case that has been a landmark case for the justice department. and these awards are extremely revered. i think what's interesting here and a way too tie what's happening with this award ceremony next month and what we're seeing with the andrew mccabe case is people have been worrying that the justice department has become skpleemly politicized. that the justice department is working in order to please president trump. whether or not that's true, neither of these things do a very good job of dissuading people from that notion. >> cynthia, as a doj veteran, is this just another norm to fall? >> you know what? it just makes you sick to your stomach. i don't know what to say. i love the justice department, and it's just not the justice department that i love anymore. and katie is so much nicer than i am. people are worried it becoming politicized. it is completely politicized. this andr

you know, you know bill barr, head of doj. doj overseeing this whistle-blower. do you think there's a conflict of interest here and should he recuse himself? >> i think there are so many conflicts here. so many complicating factors. the fact if there is some sort of criminal concern why would doj not be the point person? why would doj not bring any concerns to the fbi, the fact that the president would be bringing up a political foe and asking for help in investigating him? none of it is appropriate, and certainly not bringing up the attorney general. and part and parcel bringing up the attorney general right there with the president's personal attorney. >> correct. >> there seem to be many conflicts andble confusing factors to this transcript. i think it's important from a national security perspective to also question how confusing is this for the president of a foreign country to get these sort of messages from the president of the united states. >> right. again, we will see these two leaders any moment now. congresswoman abigail st stenburger, thank you very

i haven't read the document from doj. this white house is very, very careful at threading fine needles. we saw that with their response to the i.g. report justifying turning over the whistleblower complaint. i think that's a very weak argument. but this probably isn't the first or last time we'll see this legally. >> i want to go back and listen to something that bill barr said during the may hearing. this is his response about receiving dirt on a competitor. >> just so you understand, it's the single greatest witch hunt northbound american history, probably in history, but in american history. it's a disgraceful thing. the letter was a great letter, meaning the letter revealing the call. that was done at the insistence of myself and other people that read it. it was a friendly letter. there was no pressure. the way you had that built up, that call, it was going to be the call from hell. it turned out to be a nothing call other than a lot of people said i never knew you could be so nice. >> that is not bill barr. that is

pelosi says he's gone rog, adam schiff has little confidence the doj will be able to investigate barr or giuliani. schiff told them he expects subpoenas and working through the recess. what are you expecting from the administration? >> one natural process of things might be that the attorney general might recuse himself from something like this. we know how the president feels about recusals of the attorney general into these matters. that's unlikely. the fact barr is mentioned directly by the whistle-blower does then raise concerns about, or questions, about just the extent that the justice department would look into it. remember, the justice department has also, barr ordered an inquiry into this whole matter involving the election in 2016 that is currently being handled by an attorney, a u.s. attorney in connecticut, john durham. there's always this ongoing doj investigation, and so it's, it appears, you know, certainly congress will try to get information from the doj, and you can see why democrats in congress would not think that barr is an honest broker in this but not expect tha

the fact we're learning the white house and doj stepped in here. there is a federal law that dictates what the process is for these complaints. the next step in that process should be the dni doesn't necessarily go to the white house or the doj but the dni forward that to congressional intelligence committee? >> suspicious a lot of questions we have no answers to. wondering, is this another weekly scandal kind of in the era of trump? this feels different. this is, appears to be stress testing the system that is in place. you mentioned, not just a norm, a guardrail but a law. if we now have, appears to be, the administration, executive branch trying to block this information to getting where it needs to know that is troubling. we all know about the historical abuses of the intelligence community going back to the 1970s. i talk about it in this bus. real abuses. people in power needed constrained that led to congressional oversight committees including the one shared by congressman adam schiff and others able to now oversee the work of the executive

because the doj and the fbi? remember, the fbi falls under the doj banner. are they going to be willing to apply the laws to their own. that's the question tonight? >> well, we're not even sure that mccabe is going to be indicted. i hope he is. now, he'll be indicted not on spygate, but lying about frankly the clinton -- his leaks about the clinton foundation noninvestigation they were doing. comey went over to the president-e8 elect with that fraudulent dossier after meeting with barack obama and joe biden, susan rice, talked to his senior fbi guys, talked to his colleagues in the intelligence community and all said they were going to go in there and confront him with it with the idea of getting a response as a witness and a target. they weren't trying to destroy trump from the beginning. that's outlined in the ig report. the justice department couldn't manage to figure out if that's a violation of the president's rights and a fraud on the united states. it doesn't suggest to me whether an fisa investigation or frauds on the fisa court will be prosecuted ei

the doj basically reaches in and kills it. to make sure that congress never sees it. every lever of the white house and the trump administration, the classification system, the state department, the doj, the office of legal counsel within the doj, all teaming up together to cover up wrongdoing by the president that they knew was wrong. that is what the whistle-blower complaint lays bare. they all went to work to cover up for the president doing a thing they knew was wrong, that they knew was an egregious abuse of his power. and this is just the beginning. the who knew what, when questions hang over everyone in the white house legal counsel's office. everyone at the olc, everyone in the just department, national security counsel. they knew what they were doing was wrong, and that in and of itself is devastating. but perhaps the most explosive new detail in this complaint comes at the very end. it's in the classified appendix and the whistle-blower writes this. according to the white house officials i spoke with this was not the first time under this administration that

the classification system, the state department, the doj, the office of legal counsel within the doj, all teaming up together to cover up wrongdoing by the president that they knew was wrong. that is what the whistle-blower -- they all went to work to cover up for the president doing a thing they knew was wrong, that they knew was an edpreejgregious abuse of power. and this is just the beginning. everyone at the olc, everyone in the just department, national security counsel. they knew what they were doing was wrong, and that in and of itself is devastating. but perhaps the most explosive new detail in this complaint comes at the very end. it's in the classified appendix and the whistle-blower writes this. according to the white house officials i spoke with this was not the first time under this administration it was put into the system for solely -- think about that for a second, with democrats in a full on impeachment inquiry today democrats thin house intelligence committee grilled acting director of national intelligence joseph maguire why it was he took the complaint about the wh

much more about how the white house and the doj operate? >> well, you actually highlighted a key question that i asked in the hearing when i said, did you talk to the president about this complaint and he wouldn't answer. what's interesting about that for the benefit of the normal humans out there who didn't watch three hours of testimony is that elsewhere in the testimony, and your people can find the tape, when he was asked did the president ask you for the identity of the whistleblower, he said well, i don't ordinary talk about my conversation but i can say unequivocally no. you don't get to pick and choose where you protect a conversation with the. you do it or you don't. to me the fact that he wouldn't answer my question about whether he talked to the president about this, i'm tloefleft to assume h. he otherwise denied things in other parts of the hearing. i want to know what sort of pressure the president put on him. we know from the mueller report that president is not one bit shy about pressuring attorneys general, pressuring people

katie, who normally gets these awards at doj? >> normally a prosecutor would get these awards, an fbi agent, someone who's helped with a case that has been a landmark case for the justice department. and these awards are extremely revered. what's interesting here and a way to tie what's happening with this awards ceremony next month and with the andrew mccabe case is people have been worrying that the justice department has become extremely politicized, that the justice department is working in order to please president trump. now, whether or not that's a true, neither of these things do a very good job of dissuading people from that notion. >> cynthia, as a doj veteran, is this just another norm to fall? >> you know what? it just makes you sick to your stomach. i don't know what to say. i love the justice department and it's just not the justice department that i love anymore. and katie is so much nicer than i am. people are worried about it becoming politicized. it is completely politicized. this andrew mccabe prosecution is co

a doj says they used their legal council officer to review what to do. but they won't say whether mr. barr, who runs it all, was personally involved. the attorney general, who said this was a credible complaint, went in and this is a sign of how serious this thing is, they went in and had two briefs. the house committee members in a controversial session. they in that session didn't learn the substance of the entire complaint. which, of course, continues to raise what are increasingly alarming request es i.. >> we do know that the department of justice has been involved in the decision to withhold that information from congress. we do not know because we cannot get an answer to the question about whether the white house is also involved. >> i want to bring in our experts tonight, congresswoman jackie speier and michael mcfall, former u.s. ambassador to russia and experienced diplomat. jason johnson, politics editor for "the root." thank you all. congress womg, i take it pains in our reporting to distinguish all that we don't know from the little that has

should maguire have not asked the doj or did the doj come to the wrong decision? >> so to be entire fair to maguire, i think he was stuck between a rock and a hard place. he had to seek guidance. this was an unprecedented situation. there was never before a scenario the president with whom the complaint was filed, so he had to seek some kind of guidance to find out what he was supposed to do here. looking over doj's assessment, it's a rather thin layer of jurisdictional hitch they are hanging their hats on claim the statute doesn't apply to the president. i get where they're coming from. it is certainly not a frivolous argument. it may be this is a gap in the statute with respect to this one particular portion deciding whether the dni is mandated to forward the complaint on. if that's truly where this goes, it may be something for congress to fix going forward. >> i guess the question a lot of people have, will we ever hear from the whistle-blower. >> quite candidly, the public should never know who the whistle-blower is and they should never hear from the whistle

pushed the doj one way and they are considering charging mccabe. horowitz does have to answer tough questions on procedure between mccabe and comey. heather: we will have to have you back to discuss what we find out and what we do not. for more on the timeline as well. some other headlines. a woman charged in connection with a missing connecticut mom is doing court today, the girlfriend of fotis dulos his wife jennifer has not seen since may. a truck after jennifer went missing because her body was inside of it. they both pleaded not guilty to evidence tampering. prosecution in this case. jennifer dulos's body has never been found. canadian mom charged in a massive college admission scandal is arrested in spain accused of paying $400,000 to get her son into ucla as a soccer recruit even if he didn't play competitively. the us attorney's office in massachusetts trying to extradite her, the 35th parent charged in this scam. felicity huffman was sentenced to 14 days in prison for her role in the scandal. today we will find out if interest rates are go

now the doj is saying can you help us out here. this is where the border fights are. >> i agree, and i commend the attorney general for taking this own. local district judges shouldn't set immigration policy. liz: there was hardy any mention of radical islam at the senate security hearing in new york city just days before the anniversary of 9/11. here is former homeland security secretary under obama, janet napolitano. she said the border is not the biggest threat within instead climate change is. >> we as a nation fail to address climate change in a who- in a holistic way, we'll be ignoring the greatest national security risks. i do not believe the u.s. border with mexico is the threat. >> if you ask the people in tijuana or people who live near there, they know the border is a threat. that's why we have to secure the homeland by having a secure border. >> we have had officials from border patrol on say every state in this country is effectively a border state. texas arrested migrants from 52 countries. authorities seized fentanyl

long awaited report investigating the investigators, the attorney general is reviewing a draft of the doj watchdog report on allegations of fisa abuse by federal investigators during the russia investigation. stay tuned for late breaking news. fevered speculation over the state of lori laughlin role in a college admissions bribery scandal. felicity huffman is on her way to prison. night court convenes later. the gun control debate reignited thanks to beto o'rourke, doubling down on his ar 15 confiscation plan. republicans are pouncing. mark walker is on deck. we have fox coverage on the inspector general report, trace gallagher standing by with the latest move, let's start with david fund and late breaking news. >> we can confirm the justice department inspector general michael horowitz putting the finishing touches on his investigation into the alleged abuse of sensitive surveillance power by the fbi. horwitz completed a review on whether the fbi followed the law while applying for a warrant to survey a former trump campaign aide carter page during the 2016 election. page was investigate

>> i'm going to defer that question to my colleague auto the doj. he is better suited for those questions. >> sir? >> i think i mentioned earlier there can be fourth amendment issues in that area and to answer that question i prefer to answer that in a classified session. >> thank you. with that, i would yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from arizona? >> thank you, mr. chairman. so i know this has been discussed this morning to some extent, so i want to approach this maybe from a slightly different angle, but in light of carpenter, do you believe you have the authority under 215 to obtain cell site location information from providers? >> i prefer to get into that. i'm happy to give you that information, congressman, i would just like to do that in a classified briefing. >> okay. then, so and this may give me -- elicit the same response, has doj interpreted guidance in section 215 in light of carpenter? >> no. >> no guidance? nsa? >> not to my knowledge. >> okay. >> has doj ever notified a criminal defendant that his information

it was a bit surprising because a few months ago, there was a lot of discussion that the ftc and doj had divvied up the tech industry, and each of them taking two of the big tech giants as potential antitrust reasons so that they were not duplicate efforts. and the ftc got facebook. the doj, it sounds like, kind of felt like they were being may be left out of the fun a little bit, and now they are getting in on this. so it will be interesting to see what they each kind of look into and if they will be looking into different parts of facebook's business or if they will be stepping on each other's toes. taylor: david, should and how should facebook be broken up, given these 4, 5, 6 investigations? david: i'm not so sure breaking up the company is the answer. finding a good answer is hard. i don't necessarily think they should be allowed to knit it together even more tightly, which is what they are currently doing. but when it comes to regulation, i think the company has erred in its strategy in that it sort of signaled that the only way it will be responsive to the public needs is if i

this comes as we have headlines they are now looking -- the doj looks like they are launching another investigation. how is it different from the ftc, which has a parallel investigation? >> in the state attorneys general have an investigation. there are i believe 4 separate distinct antitrust investigations into facebook, including the one bloomberg reported on yesterday. it was a bit surprising because a few months ago, there was a lot of discussion that the ftc and doj had divvied up the tech industry, each of them taking two of the big tech giants so that they were not duplicating efforts, and the ftc got facebook. the doj, it sounds like, kind of felt like they were being may be left out of the fun a little bit, and now they are getting in on this, so it will be interesting to see what they each kind of look into and if they will be looking into different parts of facebook's business or if they will be stepping on each other's toes. how shoulduld and facebook be broken up, given these 4, 5, 6 investigations? >> i'm not so sure breaking up the company is the answer. finding a good

how does the doj opinion determine what opinions are able to be published? >> here is how we decide. the way i think about it is there are plenty of opinions that will only be applying ordinary legal principles to the fact. deciding whether a particular individual qualifies. there is nothing particularly novel about that exercise that is very fact intensive. not much would be released. if we were to release the opinion because it would only be an application of facts, there is not much benefit to the public. that is the type of case we would not consider it significant or novel. if it was, instead an interpretation of the act or something about how the law applies more broadly we would consider that to be significant and novel and those are the opinions we provide to this committee and we have a obligation under the freedom act to review for declassification. >> do you know how many opinions have remained secret because of the definitions you are using? >> there are certainly opinions that we would not consider nd >> there are certainly opinions we would not

and what we're left with is a doj that says, you know, doj, bob mueller, can't indict a sitting president but now they're telling congress, well, you can't have the fruits of that investigation, you can't have those grand jury materials. and the kicker here is that it's only congress that can carry this forward. doj has said that it will not. so at some point this will have to break. congress is entitled to these materials. >> you talk about carrying it forward and that it's a distinction without a difference. so lynn, the lack of clarity from the democrats has really gone from a political problem now to a legal one. what happens next? how does leadership actually solve this? >> well, i want to underscore what joyce said. this is not -- it isn't important what you call it. jerry nadler said he doesn't want to argue about nomenclature anymore yet he goes on and has to take questions about it. so what happens now is that democrats are trying to build popular support. over the august break you had some more, even some from republican-leaning districts, say they're for an impeachment inquiry,

>> i want to defer that question over to my colleague at doj. he's better suited to answer legal and authority questions. >> yes, sir. >> as i think i mentioned earlier, there are some -- there can be some fourth amendment issues in that area. and i think i would prefer to answer your question in classified session. >> with that, i will yield back. >> gentleman yields back. the gentleman from arizona. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i know this has been discussed this morning to some extent, so i want to approach this may be from a slightly different angle. in light of carpenter, do you believe you have the authority to obtain cell site information from providers. >> i would prefer -- i'm happy to give you that information. i would like to do that in a classified briefing. >> okay. and so -- this may give me this same response, has the doj issued any guidance in light of carpenter? >> no. >> no guidance, nsa? >> not to my knowledge. >> okay. has doj ever notified a criminal defendant that information was obtained through a section 215 order. >> no,

mccarthy's thoughts on the republican victory in the north carolina special election and a draft of the doj ig report in the hands of william barr. also ahead, kevin mc alinin and the terrorist attacks of 9/1118 years ago. on twitter, maria bartiroma one

and ask doj to enforce it. but because attorney general barr appears to be involved in some of the events here, there is a question of whether he might be conflicted out, there might be a question of whether they would, you know, a fairly consid consider -- so congress may not feel that doj is not a very good partner there. i think that the other thing that congress might do is just try to civilly enforce the subpoena. but the risk there of course is they have already tried that in a number of other investigations. and that has taken quite a number of months so far with not a lot of things to show for it. >> how do the democrats move forward with this? on the one hand, nancy pelosi says that she wants to do this expeditiously, i guess understanding that she might only have the public's attention for a short period of time before it gets too muddy. on the other hand, people like rudy giuliani or those around the president might end up stonewalling the congress. so how do they move forward with their impeachment

i found it interesting the agencies who investigated the doj and fbi were the ones doing the vetting. >> that's how it works. it has to be turned into them and the attorney general. the inspector general says once they have gone through that process and looked at it, then he will proceed with releasing it publicly and making the final dotting the is and going through what they have to go through before it is released. my suspicion is the fact that he has informed congressional committees about it it's an indication it won't be long. rick: they reviewed a million records, conducted 100 interviews, and focused on the fisa application and three renewals to surveil former trump campaign advisor carter page. christopher steele was hired to compile his report by fusion gps and the democrats. the republicans want to found out if there was abuse here. >> for sure. it's going to be watched closely and studied closely. there are discussions about holding hearings. i think both sides will be looking to see what the conclusions end up being. it does bring the story further into the next step of t

but i've worked with doj and fbi a lot in my private career. and i appreciate everything you all do. and what i've always found is the very best agents, the very best lawyers are very cognizant of where the line is and what they can do and can't do. also the best and most aggressive ones, particularly i'm assuming in this area are -- will push the envelope in order to do something because that's your job. i don't discount that. i think that is actually appropriate. i think that's why it's our job and the court's job to set where that wall is, so you can -- you can keep running into brick walls and doing what you're doing to keep our country safe. i do want to go back to something mr. ratcliff was talking about. we were doing the context between this gathering -- or these type -- this type of information in criminal cases. one of the things that was stated was that this happens a lot in criminal cases, ex parte wiretaps and all of that. i think one of the fundamental differences we have is eventually i get it all, as the defense, in hey straight

. >> president trump weighing in tonight from the doj inspector general's scathing report on fired fbi director james comey saying it proves the report was an illegal scam or chief intelligence correspondent is looking at the evidence for us tonight. catherine? to get the inspector general's report revealed more evidence that traditional briefings used to ease the transition between administrations were also leveraged to gather information on the president-elect and his team for the fbi russia broke. inspector general concluded the in va director james comey and his top hippies went to great links to can trump confront mister trump on a january 6, 2017 briefing at trump tower. this wasn't unverified allegations contained in the democrat funded dossier. the january briefing had two parts the first dealt with the intelligence community assessment or ica into russian election interference and then director of national intelligence that decided he should do the dossier briefing alone or in a small group praye after he revealed the dossier claims to the president-elect, he quickly documente

while we do know that kavalac issued a warning to the doj, this is not verified. he has a deadline about glaring inaccuracies in the steele dossier and intelligence. a lot of questions surrounding steele's meet-up with the state department. john solomon is with us, investigative reporter. this is huge. you broke the kavalec story. she was telling them, don't do this, don't trust them. this is an agenda. this isn't verified. >> yeah, absolutely. we broke the story on "the hill," and back in may. right after that, the inspector general, the other state department inspector general, he got involved and started looking at this. here's what we have been told they uncovered. they have evidence surrounding the conduct of bringing steele to the state department, there was anti-trump conduct going on it may have violated the hatch act. there was something political about why they brought a steele the state department. they have now been referred to the office of special counsel. in the office that investigates hatch act violations. the second thing we have learned, the peo

while we do know that he issued a warning to the doj, this is not verified. he has a deadline about glaring inaccuracies in the steele dossier and intelligence. a lot of questions surrounding his meet up with the state department. john solomon is with us, investigative reporter. this is huge. you broke the story. she was telling them, don't do this, don't trust them. this is an agenda. this isn't verified. >> absolutely. we broke the story on "the hill," and back in may. the inspector general, the other state department inspector general, he got involved and started looking at this. here's what we have been told they uncovered. they have evidence surrounding the conduct of steele, there was anti-trump conduct going on. there was something political about why they brought a steele the state department. they have now been referred to the office of special counsel. that the second thing we have learned, the people responding to christopher steele at the state department were inappropriately using private emails. does that sound familiar customer a guy named john

so actually i think from doj's perspective they think they handled this right. >> what do you think, neil? >> i think there were two revelations, not one. they're focussing on this call readout which says the ukrainian president says, hey, i want to have these missiles and the president says i need a favor first, though. that everyone is focussed on destroys what the president said last week, oh, i did nothing wrong. everyone was listening in on the call and so on. it's damning evidence. the second thing that people haven't focussed on is the revelation today that the justice department, the trump justice department, investigated the president and tried to hide it from the american people. we didn't know about it until this whistle-blower came forward and really until today that there was a criminal investigation and even bill barr launched that investigation and then as he is want to do with his minions there, they concluded that, well, there's not a campaign finance violation on a technical ground, but the point is, there's a criminal investigation going on on the president we're o

>> erin, so much of this is shrouded in secrecy and we have learned that the white house and doj have revised the nation's top intelligence agency that this whistle-blower complaint involving president trump isn't protected under laws governing whistle blowers and they shouldn't turn over the complaint to congress. that view is directly at odds with what the dni ig has said and what he told congress today. officials in the white house and doj have also raised privilege concerns, we are told, because this does involve the communication between the president and the foreign leader according to a source. in the past the white house has blocked information from being turned over to congress involving foreign leader conversations with putin and trump, for example, but what makes this different is this involves a whistle-blower complaint to dni protect under the law so this really is unprecedented. president trump for his part, he has tweeted that he would never say anything inappropriate to a foreign leader and we know from officials that the president is often informal and spontaneous in

that is the danger of the doj's misinterpretation of the law. so that is where we are right now. next week we will have an open hearing with the director of national intelligence where he can explain to the country why he believes this urgent concern should not be shared with the congress. but that's where we are. and we'll be happy to respond to a few questions. >> do you believe that the white house or the president himself are pressuring the acting director of national intelligence not to hand this information over to you? >> all i do know is this. i don't know whether the white house is directly involved because we can't get an answer to that question, but we do know they are making some claim that a privilege may apply. well, that narrows the category who may be intervening here. we also know that there are other institutions involved that are preventing us from getting the complaint. and whether this is pressure brought by the white house, whether this is the director of national intelligence feeling that he is straitjacketed by this opinion of the department of justice, wh

for at least the next ten days, the doj deliberated about how to handle the matter. it is unclear how much the attorney general learned during that it time or on which day. but he was made generally aware of the situation. >> the inspector general in consultation with my office referred this matter to the department of justice for investigation. i think the whistleblower did the right thing. i think that he followed the law everybody step of the way. >> reporter: and there is major scrutiny over the doj's decision not to open a full-fledged criminal investigation into potential campaign finance violations stemming from that july 25th phone call. the doj came to its conclusion despite the in-13ek tospector g concluding that the whistleblower's complaint was in fact credible. jessica schneider, cnn, washington. >> and now let's bring in evan perez and also phil mudd. evan, you have more reporting thousand about when the whistleblower first raised concerns and where that went, fill us in. >> right. and look, just in the last day, we've gotten a few more items for this t

but it gives it a little bit more muscle to say doj was consulted. >> the doj intel intermingling contamination i think some of the intelligence community might call it is one of the most frightening sort of trumpian new norms, a.b. >> this is the most alarming story. it sounds, you know, harry said it was opaque. you said it was crazy. everyone needs to learn about this story. and i hope there are more whistleblowers out there. this is incredibly alarming. adam schiff knows there is no reason -- schiff said this has never happened before. no one has ever, ever turned down a request like this from the congress, with oversight over the executive branch. the idea that they could get protection like donald trump wants from the justice department for supreme court justice brett kavanaugh from the doj to try to cover up their mess and help them out is unbelievable. i mean, maybe it will buy them time. but this is wrong. the congress's role of the intelligence community is to be involved in matters like this where something has gone wrong and someone has exposed something important or someone. and, a

doj. they are the ones he called -- i mean, they gave it to dni, and then dni called doj and donl said no -- doj said no. >> shot it down. so what's going to have to happen here is the courts are going to have to begin weighing in on a wide variety of subjects. and i think legally they are in a worse position on this matter than they are on almost anything else that congress is taking them to court on. because this statute is pretty clear. what you would have to decide is the statute protects the president even if he's behaving with criminal behavior. >> joe biden called late friday for the transcripts, all the transcripts to be released of donald trump's conversations with the ukrainians, which we know to be from annie karni's colleagues' reporting at the center of the whistleblower complaint. that which caused as claire said, urgent concern from the trump-appointed i.c. intelligence community, i.g., inspector general. what else can biden do? does biden still have bipartisan relationships

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want to talk about also the doj inspector general horowitz. a number of reports have come, are coming from him. even on the hill today and there was a little back-and-forth with a couple of your former colleagues, g.o.p. house members. there is what they had to say about more they would like to be done potentially with respect to fired fbi director james comey. >> i'm finding just a number of irregularities, so would it be appropriate if ranking member jordan and i were to refer those inconsistencies to the ig and if we did that, what the ig look at those inconsistencies? >> it certainly appropriate for us to get a referral. >> shannon: is very busy, looks like you potentially could get busier. what you make of the potential where that could go? >> yeah, he's the busiest guy in the world. just think of five years ago nobody knew his name and now it's coming and the clinton investigation, fisa, it's comey, borowitz -- i don't know his ideation. enemy was approved by the senate with unanimous vote. it was a former prosecutor in the southern dist

they have the doj. so what could happen here according to dow jones is that any money that they reach in a settlement with the dodge could die beaut loout what goes to the cities and states and already, the states are saying 10 to 12 billion or whatever you're offering isn't enough to settle these claims against you >> why they think it would dilute that amount of money. >> probably because the family which owns purdue and purdue say 10 to 12 billion is is all we've got and all we can offer you i'm hearing the 10 to 12 billion is the valuation the company is putting on the offer in interpreters of the value of drugs, the value of sale of the company. the doj is not going after the family money unlike the states and knew nis palties >> doesn't appear that way because of this report in 2007, the doj reached a deal, did get some executives from purdue to plead guilty, but we've heard that doj has beenup set that didn't do it. >> thank you >> coming up, we're going to talk about how wework is reportedly cut

for at least the next ten days the doj deliberated how to handle the matter. it's unclear how much the attorney general learned at this time or during the day, but he was made aware of the situation. >> the inspector attorney general with my office referred the matter to the department of justice for an investigation. i think the whistle-blower did the right thing. think he followed the law every step of the way. >> and there's major scrutiny over the doj not to open a full-fledged criminal investigation into potential campaign violations stemming from the phone call. the doj came to its conclusion despite the attorney general concluding that the whistle-blower's complaint was, in fact, credible. jessica schneider, cnn, washington. >> jessica, thank you. >>> reaction to the impeachment inquiry has largely been split among partisan lines. here's what some democratic and republican lawmakers are saying about it. >> we have the president of the united states perversing and corrupting the use of his power to get a foreign government involved once again in our elec

in this case the doj said feel free to ignore that law. we have congress made a law appropriating funds to the ukraine. the president said i'll hold on to the funds. the constitution says foreign government shall not enteer fear with our intersections. the president said let's ignore that one too. when congress fails to use the constitutionally mandated oversight to even address the president behavior, well, it sure sound like he's above the law to me. so now, what form that oversight takes is up to congress. no one wants to engage in an exercise in futility. the question before them now is whether or not to impeach the president. impeach the president. whether to do so. it's a momentous decision that should be made frankly outside of the narrow constraints of partisan politics. since when is the separation of powers or one branch laughing at congress's power. since when is that a partisan issue? every member of congress, republican or democrat or independent, they should take it seriously when the president tells you your power is imagina

the doj used the radical himms confusion against them. the justice attorneys wrote most of prominently the speaker of the house has been emphatic the investigation is not a true impeachment proceeding. it's nice to see a little fire being returned against if you will, the resistance. >> the justice department needs to defend the rule of law here. the democratic party is out of control in terms of pretending they are impeaching to justify a press don't attempts to gain access to information that they otherwise would never be entitled to. we are otherwise not be entitled to even if they were trying to impeach the president. it's so bad now they moved from impeaching or not impeaching. whatever word they are trying to use, to smearing, using the impeachment abuse to target mr. kavanaugh. it's like the old adage about the prosecutors. they would impeach a ham sarnd witch at this point. as long as it's republican or conservative. lou: i think they are far more vile and vicious than all that. this is a concerted attack on the presidency of the

mccabe undercutting the doj ig and a big fight and the hearing in congress over the fisa probe report you won't believe which top democrat is now trying to undercut that. basically saying that there's no problem with using u.s. intelligence to spy on an opposition campaign. thanks for joining us i'm elizabeth macdonald, the evening edit starts right now. welcome to the show you're watching the fox business network. let's begin with president trump today with news on the trade war with china, and the showdown with iran while meeting with the australian prime minister. blake burman has the latest from the white house. blake? >> just a couple hours ago at the white house president trump was set to meet with his national security team on iran, as potential military strike options were expected to be updated. the briefing comes as the president, and the treasury secretary this morning, unveiled new sanctions against iran, targeting the country's central bank and its national development fund. the president says iran is spiraling into financial distress. president trump: it's too bad what's