that is not a mick mulvaney creation. now by the way, in the coming days people will try to make it sound like it was a mick mulvaney creation and colonel vindman creation and that whole story, but mccould tell us exactly what was said which is a big reason why we won't here from mick mulvaney. >> alexander vindman the top ukraine expert said he was aware that money for ukraine was being withheld by early july. july 3rd specifically. what do you make of that timeline? >> well, hard to say when the idea first german ated because in april when zelensky wins the election there is a positive and congr congratulatory phone call and in order to fill in the blanks it requires speaking with rudy giuliani but in may and june the president reverts to form around this fantastical conspiracy theory that ukraine meddled in the 2016 election. forget about the work done by the president's own intelligence agency. he reverts to that. we know rudy giuliani is applying all kind of pressure in the ukraine and we don't know upon whom and wha

i served with mick mulvaney. i know mic. there is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that he never would have implemented this had it not been at the direction of the president. secondly i have a bit of a unique perspective. i am a former chief of staff myself. i guarantee you no chief of staff is going to implement anything of that importance without direction from their principle in this case the president of the united states. let's be clear and correct in our terminology john, he's the acting chief of staff and frankly i'm not very sure or confident he's going to be the acting chief of staff much longer, because i think what's about to happen here is that he and ambassador sondlond and perhaps rudy giuliani are all about to get thrown under the bus. >> you bring up the washington post report which does suggest they might be treated as fall guys from some supporters. in your mind you said this that doesn't hold any water. why? >> because again, it defies credibility that the president's personal lawyer, a large donor who had

there were already questions about mick mulvaney's role in all this. democrats wanted to talk to him, requested for him to come to capitol hill something he declined to do and this is only going to fuel further questions about his role in all of this. also given that briefing he gave where he made clear he did not think it was a problem and essentially admitted this quid pro quo agreement and now they're going to be other questions about exactly the role he had navigating this policy. >> what was your reaction? you're a former white house official in the bush/quail ayle administration? >> speaking for the principal, are to the president, the vice president, unless it's trivial to resolve on his own, which is not the case here. mick mulvaney tells a foreign government that, ah, or tells a foreign government, you have to do this. it has to be the president of united states. mulvaney has no authority to intervene in sending aid to ukraine unless the president told him to stop it. it is striking. >> and change the subject to a different problem for the whi

want to hear what mick mulvaney has to say. remember what fiona hill testified and others have testified throughout this impeachment inquiry, that john bolton and the national securitier and much of this weighs on whether john bolton will be compelled to compel in this impeachment inquiry but it is john bolton according to noo feeina hill said they were coming up a dirt for dollar scheme going on inside of the trump administration with respect to the president's phone call with ukraine. and so there are some far-reaching implications in all of this and if mick mulvaney is implicated in any way in a potential impeachment inquiry, that is why mick mulvaney needs outside counsel in addition to the white house counsel weighing in. we saw the same thing playing out during the russia investigation when white house officials needed outside counsel, wolf. >> the president keeps tweeting about this, almost nonstop and over the weekend and i understand he's just tweeted a few minutes ago. >> reporter: that is right, wolf. even on this ve

and mick mulvaney is, i thinking the weakest chief of staff in modern history. you know, he's still acting. both of his predecessors were fired. the president makes it clear on many occasions that he makes all the decisions. everybody reports to him. it really doesn't matter to him that a number of vacancies occur in government because he is the government. and so i think that mick mulvaney is in a situation where he would never go outside his lane. he would only -- he would act at the behest of the president. even strong chiefs of staff go to the president with a big issue. an al haig who had enormous power during the closing months of the nixon administration, when the president essentially was sort of off keel and he had to hold things together, he would still go to the president. jim baker, who was i think the most successful chief of staff in modern history working for ronald reagan, he would never go and act independently of reagan. he would always go to the boss. he would also explore things with others. one more thing, john. this decision about holding b

mick mulvaney alone held up that process, the rationale concerned how the russians will react. you see policy here from the person closest to the president, mick mulvaney with a real large role throughout the ukrainian story and back to 2017 and weapons assistance to ukraine involved in that as well. >> thank you. i want to bring in our senior national correspondent, alex. this impeachment comes two days before the first public televised hearing. >> that's exactly right. those are surely to be blockbuster televised events. the three officials phil was just talking about, cooper, ross and anderson have not been invited to testify on tv. i want to zero in on one thing we learned from laura cooper. she was talking about the confusion and unease and serious concern for this holdup of $400 million of aid for ukraine. she was at the pentagon and unclear even dealing with her ukrainian counterparts how that money would be released. one important point she did make was all the agencies at the federal government were united in this desire for ukraine to get that military aid, they had d

mick mulvaney tried to join a lawsuit brought by john bolton. and another subpoenaed witness to the impeachment investigation. the bolton lawsuit is unnecessary and it's trying to ask the judge whether john bolton should answer to a subpoena or should he take donald trump's advice not to testify. he is beyond the control of the president of the united states and there is no legal reason for him to evade that subpoena. mick mulvaney dropped his legal attempt today to join the bolton lawsuit after bolton objected to mick mulvaney joining his lawsuit. mick mulvaney will now have his own lawsuit asking the same question of the judge. in both cases these are delaying tactics designed to slow down the impeachment investigation, but chairman adam schiff says the committee will not engage in a months-long legal pursuit to enforce the congressional subpoenas of these witnesses. but the investigation will take a negative inference from mick mulvaney's refusal to testify on the assumption that if mick mulvaney had something helpful to say about donald trum

there referencing mick mulvaney again. "he mentioned mr. giuliani but then i cut him off because i didn't want to get further into this discussion at all." so fiona hill describing there she was extremely alarmed when ambassador gordon sondland was talking about the elements of what would be a quid pro quo. they would not have a meeting with zelensky until they announced the investigations into 2016, and biden, and she did not want that discussion to be happening at the white house, because it was her understanding that her boss, then national security adviser john bolton, didn't want that to ever be a part of ukraine policy. the problem, of course, is that rudy giuliani had been in discussions with other officials who were working for the trump administration on ukraine policy, one of them being gordon sondland, and he was pushing for those investigations. so it's very confusing here. there's a lot of dynamic, but at the end of the day, fiona hill is demonstrating that mick mulvaney, the person who had discussions with president trump abou

katherine kroft was told in a special budget by mick mulvaney was put on hold to ukraine because mick mulvaney expressed concerns that, quote, russia would react negatively. that is exactly why those missiles were authorized to be transferred to ukraine, so that the missiles would have a negative impact on russia's policy in the region. catherine croft testified that the office of the budget was to transfer aid to ukraine and that all the departments, including the security council, supported the transfer. mick mulvaney surrendered to all that pressure and ukraine finally received the missiles. christopher anderson's deposition was released today. christopher anderson, a service officer who had been involved in ukraine, said john bolton made a joke about every time ukraine is mentioned, giuliani pops up and that the president is listening to giuliani about ukraine. turns out that wasn't a joke. william taylor, quote, repeatedly expressed his concern that giuliani would make his job difficult. christopher anderson testified that he agreed, quote, that if giuliani's narrative took hold

she really didn't have any choice at that point because it was clear that sondland and mick mulvaney, the chief of staff, were running the ukraine policy at that point. john? >> remarkable testimony. our special coverage will continue as we go through these transcripts. have a great afternoon. >>> hello on this friday afternoon. i'm i'm ana cabrera. there is news on several fronts. we are now getting a first look at the testimony of the top russia adviser of the national security council, fiona hill, and national staffer lieutenant colonel alex vindman, both testifying about everything from the president's infamous phone call with ukraine to the shadow of the president, rudy giuliani, the president's personal attorney. let's go to manu raju on capitol hill. i know you've been looking over vindman's transcript right now. what are you learning so far? >> reporter: it's a significant transcript because this is a person who was on that july phone call, someone who serves on the national council and is involved with the ukranian policy but someone who has serious concerns about the directi

same thing with mick mulvaney. >> congressman, appreciate your time. thank you. >> thank you. >>> still ahead tonight, we're going to examine president trump's own defense. his latest unfounded, untrou. excerpts from "anonymous." president trump said he withheld military from the ukraine to battle corruption. where we all want more energy. but with less carbon footprint. can we have both? at bp, we're working every day to make energy that's cleaner and better. and we see possibilities everywhere. to make energy that's cleaner and better. t-mobile's newest most powerful signal is here. experience it with the amazing, new iphone 11. and right now, t-mobile has the best deal on iphone. get 4 lines of unlimited with 4 iphone 11 included for only $35 a line. all on a signal that goes farther than ever before. that's right. get 4 unlimited lines and 4 iphone 11 for $35 a line. only at t-mobile. at bayer, we're more than we help farmers like john. by developing digital tools, so he can use less water to grow crops. at bayer, this is why we science. we know a

. >> and doesn't it concern you that mick mulvaney has been asserted by gordon sondland that mick mulvaney was saying they can't get this military aid or a white house meeting unless they publicly announced these corruption investigations which are about burisma and the bidens? that doesn't concern you at all? >> well, from my standpoint, i understand that most of president trump's advisers wanted the military aid released. and they were trying to figure out in some way, shape or form to convince president trump to approve that release. what i was trying to do in my phone call to him on august 31st. so i don't have a problem with advisers trying to figure out some way, shape or form to convince the boss to do this. but the relevant question is -- >> even if it's for political investigation into his opponents? >> when i raised the issue he vehemently and angrily denied there was any kind of condition to release that. he was concerned about corruption and the fact that europe doesn't step up to the plate and provide as much support as they should because it is in their backyard. >> that is n

the omb, mick mulvaney, they're saying the order came from the president. but the white house successfully b blocked mulvaney and bolton from testifying. i wonder is a sombering take away that the obstruction worked. >> the white house is in a strong position because we should be hearing from mike pompeo, we should be hearing from the vice president, we should be hearing from mull van. david holmes told the truth. the code word investigate burisma, that was kocode for investigating biden. david holmes said he didn't have access to his notes so he wasn't as clear as he could have been. that left an opening for the republicans. >> the timing throughout this story is interesting and notable. the call to the ukrainian president, the famous july phone call happened within 24 hours of robert mueller finishing his testimony on the hill. the general view on the hill was it was not as much as expected.

how does this implicate, in particular, mick mulvaney? >> well, he's the one as you pointed out last hour who said before the press corps yeah, there is -- there was a quid pro quo and then tried to walk that back a couple of days later or less than that after he had inadvertently told the truth. what's striking about this entire investigation and this proceedings is that it began with the president saying, of course i did it. yes, i did it, what was wrong with it, that i asked ukraine for a favor in that july 25th phone call. but what's also striking is that the president has said look, we're going to strongarm ukraine, this what i want how do we justify this and once the heat comes on from the whistleblower, how do we look for justifications for holding up that aid. so, you know, the question is, we know this phase of the impeachment proceedings do we end up hearing from these additional people who know down the road if we actually get to a trial. >> you know, perhaps you don't need the documents to incriminate mick mulvaney. he's perfe

is there any way mick mulvaney wasn't acting on behalf of the president? and john bolton says he has information relative to the impeachment probe according to his attorney. so when will he testify? >>> as the biden, warren battle gets uglier, warren is going after loyal biden voters. let's go "outfront." i am pamela brown, in for erin burnett this friday. tonight, the president's chief of staff orchestrated the quid pro quo, according to two white house officials whose closed door depositions were released today. fiona hill, president trump's former adviser on russia and the top ukraine expert on the national security council both testified under oath in the impeachment inquiry, and both said it all came back to mick mulvaney. the president's right-hand man. a man you would be hard pressed to imagine was acting on his own. according to hill and vinman that testified separately behind closed doors, they were told mulvaney was directing quid pro quo in coordination with the ambassador of the eu, gordon sundland. gordon was asked how he came to believe this

we also know that mick mulvaney and sondland were talking a lot. fiona hill -- >> let's just pause for a second and think about this. rudy giuliani is a weird character and he's outside -- it's a weird thing to be the president's fixer essentially. gordon sondland's not a guy anybody knew about. mick mulvaney is the acting chief of staff to the president of the united states. if there is a theory out there that the plan is to throw him under the bus, there is something very, very wrong with the idea that the acting chief of staff to the president, still the acting chief of staff, not a guy who's been fired, could be a fall guy. >> well, mick mulvaney was expected to come testify today. of course, he didn't. he didn't listen to that subpoena, which we've seen a pattern of. but in testimony that was revealed today by fiona hill, who worked in the white house, she talked about her direct connections with mulvaney. she said that she was talking to ambassador sondland and how he had an agreement with chief of staff mulvaney for a meeting with the ukrain

same thing with mick mulvaney. they owe the american people an explanation. >> congressman ro khanna, i appreciate your time. thank you. >> thank you. >>> still ahead tonight, we're going to examine president trump's own defense ahead of the public hearings. his latest unfounded, untrue explanation for why practically all the witness testimony so far has gone against him. >>> also exclusive excerpts from the white house initial known only as anonymous. what this person says was the reaction inside the white house to president trump saying he only withheld military aid to ukraine to battle corruption. power over pain, hag so the whole world looks different. the unbeatable strength and speed of advil liqui-gels. what pain? ♪ at progressive park! insurance themed fun ♪ children: yeah! announcer: ride the totally realistic traffic jam. ♪ beep, beep, beep, beep children: traffic jam! announcer: and the world's first never bump bumper cars. children: never bump! announcer: it's a real savings hootenanny with option

answer, so i heard him say, sondland, this is coordinated with mick mulvaney. and question what did sondland say about that. answer, he said he had a conversation with mr. mulvaney and this is what was required in order for the ukrainians to get a meeting. question, did he explain what the investigations were that were needed and vind mand and he talked about the investigations and the 2016 election and the investigation into the bidens and burisma. mulvaney defied the subpoenas today to come in and talk to the impeachment inquiry. your committee is not challenging his defense to the subpoena and not taking it to court. why not? isn't mulvaney's testimony essential? >> thank you, jake, for that question. all of these witnesses that we have seen corroborate the exact same narrative which is that donald trump solicited foreign interference in our election at the dispense of u.s. national security. we would love to have mick mulvaney but we don't need him because we have colonel vindman saying what happened and fiona hill and george kent and ambassador taylor have

mick mulvaney, ambassador to the e.u. gordon sondland, and the president's personal attorney, rudy giuliani, under the bus saying they were acting on their own, not on the orders of the president. and it looks like trump is already using that tactic. here's what he said about one of those men just this morning. >> let me just say i hardly know the gentleman. but this is the man who said there was no quid pro quo. and he still says that. >> i hardly know the gentleman. joining the table now reverend al sharpton, host of "politicsnation" here on msnbc. and the president of the national action network aaron and the table are still with me as well. rev, to you first. i barely knew this guy, he used it on paul manafort. he used it on michael cohen who he knew for years basically saying he was mostly a pr guy, not really a lawyer of mine. used it on george papadopoulos. and now on gordon sondland. he spoke to multiple times over the last couple of years. this is a guy who donated a million dollars to his inauguration, and he is

mick mulvaney is someone everyone wants to talk to. no expectation he will come in and talk, but they are moving forward on this and they are moving in quickly in the next few weeks, john. >> appreciate the dual track reporting there today. mick mulvaney is key because, number one, two of his deputies were among those who refused to testify this week who were supposed to go up there. did the president tell you to put the military aid on hold? did the president tell you why he wanted an exchange for releasing the military aid? and if you watched his television briefing a few weeks ago, he probably said, yeah, there's a quid pro quo, get over it, and then tried to take it back. >> the democrats feel they have that public admission of the quid pro quo already. i could be wrong, the deposition is scheduled for a saturday, which makes it more unlikely mick mulvaney comes in. he could show up, but odds are he's not going to. this is to set up the congress charge. unless mulvaney is on his way out of the administration or something, he has no

then there's the president's own acting chief of staff mick mu mulvaney. he was supposed to testify yesterday. he was subpoenaed, but mulvaney did not show up, he told investigators he has immunity, even though witnesses put him at the center of orchestrating the quid pro quo with sondland. let's bring in former federal prosecutor gene rossy. "the washington post" has reporting that giuliani, sondland and mulvaney may end up being fall guys for the gop, to shift blame away from the president. how successful would they be in making this argument, but all those people were perhaps going rogue without the president's knowledge. >> their chances of being successful with that argument are probably as low as the red skins winning the super bowl. and i got to say this, watching the president deny that he knows sondland and watching the president say that the testimony that he is hearing from these depositions, it reminds me of a baghdad bob when we were innovating our rock, it's totally dluelusional, here's wh we have, congressman, jerry donnelly, he mentioned ex

mick mulvaney. i mean, bolton's allies have made very clear that bolton seems mulvaney as complicit in what took place in this aid and being withheld from ukraine, and he didn't want to give him that cover to say he was trying to be compliant with house democrats and not testify. mick mulvaney doesn't get his own lawyer and go outside of white house counsel if he trusts the white house counsel, and we have -- you've reported, we've reported for months now that mick mulvaney and pat cipollone, the white house counsel have been at odds on any nucmber of fronts but impeachment has thrown accelerant on it. >> mick mulvaney thinks pat cipollone is trying to take his job as chief of staff. he also thinks he's being left out of legal matters that feels he should be briefed on. they're essentially going around him because they don't think he needs to be briefed on all of those matters because he's not an attorney serving the white house. it really has created this ugly feud. that's a great point about mulva

he said mick mulvaney had coordinated that ask. later on he also said he heard gordon sondland tell ukrain directly that there needed to be these investigations, there is no kbi -- ambi gui ty. on that phone call, the president asked president zelensky to arrange those investigations and also look into the 2016 elections. he did not include that ask for those investigation, and as we know, the president brought it up, anyway. john? >> so vindman said it was a demand in the allegations. fiona hill also served on the national security council. kylie, what did she say about the same meeting? >> fiona hill describes that july 10 meeting we've put so much focus on, and she describes what was said by ambassador sondland to the ukranians. she said, quote, as i came in, ambassador sondland was saying, quote, how he had an agreement with chief of staff mulvaney for a meeting with the ukranians if they were going to go forward with investigations. she was frustrated by that. we now have reports that she went to the white house lawyers and di

mick mulvaney against path s eerks palone. >> this is something we're hearing from the very beginning. these two are supposed to come together and help present the president on how to encounter this. as chief of staff, he wants to be the one driving the chip on this. they argue this is a league issue that should be run out of his shop. the prop is both of these officials have full-time jobs. and the white house council's office is a massive operation on it's own. a lot of the president's add vie vors to what quarterback for the president, and be singularly focused and the white house of the president has yet to do that, they're bringing out a couple officials, pam bondi being one of those, but part of the reason some people think the white house has not been able to inflict it more, that is something that has been a hallmark of this white house. the factions, the infighting, that we continue to see. >> we know that if they had something to say, wouldn't he be jumping at the jump to testify. >>. >> they had a chance to jump at the witnesses. they did not present mick mulvaney, mike pen

they're in a different position than mick mulvaney. first of all, all the witnesses are suggesting that they at least john bolton, were raising the red flags that this was appropriate behavior. mick mulvaney -- >> further implicated today. >> up to his eyeballs. not only by virtue of saying nothing wrong here and yes, absolutely donald trump was going backwards to the origins of what essentially became the mueller probe, but that he himself has been implicated in both stopping military aid approved by congress. we've heard evidence now that lawyers were raising questions of whether the omb could even do that legally. think about that. that's essentially the argument they're making. they are really in different positions. but they said forget that, the don mcgahn case is going much more quickly. we want this to go fast and want a ruling from a court that says this entire line of obstruction of congress is a problem and witnesses have to start testifying. >> as you know, courtroom lawyers have to engage in a little performance art. are y

nobody expected mick mulvaney to sow up this morning. yet still, nick mulvaney's outside council informed democratic investigators that he would not be showing up because the white house believes, as is stated with other top officials, that he has absolute immunity. let me explain why mulvaney is not that important. first and foremost, his not showing up doesn't mean he's out of the game on this one. his name will likely appear in an article of impeachment. anybody who doesn't show up will be in an article of impeachment. there is a hole in the investigation in the sense that nobody has been able to tie the president to the alleged quid pro quo. and the reason why is there is such a small number of people around the president delivering these orders. why did that happen? how did that happen? it's still unclear. that is why mulvaney's testimony, if it ever comes, and that seems unlikely right now, is important. george each testimony yesterday, a career diplomate largely lining up with what we've heard from a lot of other career diplomates

they're not hearing from mick mulvaney or john bolton. is there a concern for the party and for the country that there is long-term damage done to not waiting and utilizing the power that congress has to compel and waiting for the courts to decide about the documents and witnesses being compelled to testify? >> we don't know when that's going to happen. democrats have political concerns. there's a belief the closer we get to the 2020 election this could become more problematic. that's assuming that public opinion stays at 50/50. we'll wait and see next week how the public is viewing this. with the majority makers, the democrats from the districts president trump won, they're looking at the process nervously and want to get it over with as fast as possible. >> ladies, thank you very much. it's been quite a week. have a nice weekend and nice ho holiday. >>> still to come adam schiff compared this investigation to watergate. he said the comparison is between this congress and that one. we'll speak to someone who was a member of congress duri

mick mulvaney told his staff to have that done. it was mentioned on a conference call across the government. all of them were stunned. none said they got any reason why the aid would be withhold. not had it been approved by congress but the relevant agency said, yes, it meets the criteria. the idea that they should go ahead with it without explanation raised alarm bells. you can see that the email seemed to be suggesting in the aftermath of that they were looking for a post-facto way to justify it. the white house is saying look there's a request for legal opinion once we freeze money and that that's simply routine. either way, i think that's one more reason why congress would like to hear from mick mulvaney if in fact they could. >> absolutely, let's put up that john bolton tweet of a moment ago, he said regarding speaking up, since resigning as national security adviser the white house refused to return access to my personal twitter account. out of fear of what i might say? to those who speculated i went into hiding, i'm sorry to

mick mulvaney admitted it. his lawyer giuliani admitted it. we already know where we stand with this because the truth is out there. we're just digging in to make sure to connect the dots. >> this is where we disagree and the testimony -- there is no testimony and, jake, you said this earlier in your earlier segment, senator johnson said this as well, the testimony from all of the officials say we're talking about a meeting, a potential meeting between president zelensky and that is the only firsthand knowledge that anybody has to talk about. you'll see whether it is tim morrison who said -- >> the national security staffer. >> he was first on the call and so vindman was too. the only two people who were participants in the call said -- morrison said i didn't like it but i don't think it is illegal and nobody talks about there was no discussion of aid during any of the -- >> yeah, vindsman was so upset about this. this is a leent colonel, a decorated veteran and a purple heart recipient that he went to his boss and john bolton didn't want to b

they may not be good news obviously for acting chief of staff mick mulvaney. what are you hearing this morning, kristin, and good morning. >> good morning, christie and martin. you're right. this is not good news. this comes the same day as he defied the house to show up and testify and then you get this document dump that comes from two important testimonies here. were from white house expert fiona hill and the white house national ukrainian expert lieutenant colonel alexander vindman. they paint mulvaney as being at the center of all of this. i want to read to you from fiona hill's testimony here because she lays it out well. she said sondland in front of ukrainians as i came in was talking about how he had an agreement with chief of staff mulvaney with a meeting with ukrainians if they were going to go forward with investigation. so clearly here, laying out this blatant quid pro quo with mulvaney at the center. so what happens now? we learned late last night that mulvaney has actually tried to join a lawsuit saying that he wants a federal court to decide wh

and someone who work closely with mick mulvaney. both of them defied congressional subpoenas and refused to appear for their scheduled depositions, as has been the case with other witnesses who have done the same thing. this will be further evidence of an effort by the administration to obstruct the lawful and constitutional duties of congress. i would also say and we expect the witnesses who have been subpoenaed to come in this afternoon also to be no-shows, this will only further add to the body of evidence on a potential obstruction of congress charge against the president. indeed, in the nixon impeachment, there was an article impeachment based on the obstruction of congress that itemized each of the subpoenas that the white house had defied. well, today we have four additional subpoenas to add to that list of a potential charge involving the president of the united states and his obstruction of our constitutional duties. these witnesses are significant and the white house understands their significance. based on testimony the c

had that been put to rest have those words not come out of mick mulvaney's mouth? the administration and certainly republicans on capitol hill who try to defend the president would've felt they were on the former turf. that is the problem, but that goes to the essence of this because had they not tilted in that direction, that keeps the issue of quid pro quo alive and again, looking at who was on the phone call. the other thing here to watch it sometime between now and saturday morning specifically 11:20 saturday morning, republicans supposedly are going to have to submit their list of witnesses to adam schiff, the chair of the judiciary committee as to who they want at those two hearings next week, wednesday and friday. under the agreement they have 72 hours from the announcement of those hearings yesterday. so they get to provide witnesses i spoke with, one republican sourced earlier today who said they were still going through the list. one person they might want to have is kurt volker of the special envoy to ukraine. some people have said they might try to ques

mick mulvaney, watch your back. and while we're taking questions of loyalty, we're definitely going to talk about jeff sessions and anonymous. one is backing the president despite one indignity after t another. the other is slamming him in a tell-all book sort of. that's ahead. m in a tell-all book sort of. that's ahead of active psoriatic arthritis. it even helps stop further joint damage. don't use if you're allergic to cosentyx. before starting, get checked for tuberculosis. an increased risk of infections and lowered ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor about an infection or symptoms, if your inflammatory bowel disease symptoms develop or worsen, or if you've had a vaccine or plan to. serious allergic reactions may occur. get real relief, with cosentyx. (woman) you have the support of a probiotic and the gastroenterologists who developed it. (vo) align helps to soothe your occasional digestive upsets 24/7 with a strain of bacteria you can't get anywhere else. (woman) you could say align puts the "pr

i'm talking about mick mulvaney, one of the president's top aides. and to gordon sondland as well, the u.s. ambassador for the european union. both testifying that sondland told ukrainian officials at a meeting at the white house -- this was on july 10th -- that they would have to open an investigation into biden in order to secure a meeting between president trump and ukraine's president. fiona hill telling investigators ambassador sondland, in front of the ukrainians as i came in, was talking about how he had an agreement with chief of staff mulvaney for a meeting with the ukrainians if they were going to go forward with investigations. and vindman testifying there was, quote, no ambiguity what sondland was asking of the ukrainians. on the 10th of july, it became completely apparent that what the deliverable would be in order to get a white house meeting. that deliverable was reinforced by the president. the demand was in order to get the white house meeting, they had to deliver on investigation. so here are a couple of things here, okay, to look a

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why mick mulvaney is trying

and mick mulvaney is at the center of this. as natasha said, we really would like to understand his role in this better. he's the one who conveyed the order from the president to suspend the aid. he's the one who came out and told us in a briefing room news conference that, in fact, the aid suspension was tied directly to whether or not ukraine investigated this conspiracy theory about 2016, then later tried to take it back. he's still defying a subpoena from the house. he went to court trying to get out of testifying and then had to back off. but so far, he's not giving his testimony in the house, is sort of looking for other ways of getting at that information. >> what are you hearing, sarah, in terms of the expectations, what democrats want to hear from him? >> what they're looking for from mark sandy is, as natasha said, this blind spot, that this is really the only part of this months-long saga between president trump and the ukrainian president that they don't have completely figured out. democrats feel that they have so

mick mulvaney subpoenaed to testify this morning. but no surprise here, he is not expected to appear. also a lawyer for the whistle-blower sending a cease and desist letter to the white house demanding that president trump stop attacking his client saying that it's putting his client in danger. >> september when crucial military aid was being held up by the administration, ukraine's president was preparing to bow to the president's demands and announce an investigation into biden in an interview with fareed zakaria. george kent testified he saw president trump's demands for ukraine to initiate politically motivated prosecutions as corrupt. that's big. >>> we're going to begin with the democratic race for president and what david axelrod described as the thunder clap. michael bloomberg getting in. >> no surprise that michael bloomberg wants to be president. but what is somewhat surprising is he may jump in this late. now that biden is struggling, bloomberg sees a potential path for another centrist. former businessman michael bloomber

let's go back to mick mulvaney. >> he said there was a quid pro quo. he then also said everything that i did as far as ukraine i did at the direction of the president. that is a direct linkage. he admits there is a quid pro quo and i did it at the direction of the president. >> john, let me ask you this. in what universe does gordon sondland and you're not going to get this money and unless you announce an investigation into the bidens if he didn't get that directly from the president or if he's confident that that's exactly what the president wanted? >> it's not certainly clear from his testimony because he says in his testimony he had no direct conversations with the president that he was the pointman of ukraine and it comes down to the secretary of state and bolton at the time and he's never contact with the president and he's smart enough to know that he shouldn't be talking about what he does and did not do with the president and that's exactly one of the gaps in his testimony is that they're just incomprehensible that he can do one thing and say

his name is mick mulvaney. he's trying to get his name added to this federal lawsuit that would force the courts to decide whether mulvaney should listen to congress or his boss when it comes to answering a subpoena for his testimony. he may have his answer as a judge hears arguments about mulvaney's request. mulvaney's decision comes as his name is popped up multiple times now, in these depositions about president trump to investigate joe biden for that military aide. the white house says that any suggestion mulvaney is working against trump, there's any distance between the two men is absolutely incorrect. what can you tell us. >> we're hearing from the white house now the judge will decide this hearing at 5:00 p.m. can mick mulvaney join this already on going lawsuit. we're learning the person who brought this lawsuit doesn't even want mulvaney added on. charles copper man, the original plaintiff here who asked the court to decide whose orders he should be following, the white house who claimed he had absolu

there is also new reporting about acting white house chief of staff mick mulvaney's role in the ukraine affair. that and a subpoena linking rudy giuliani to a new and broad federal investigation of his associates and apparently now his company. plus what the lawyer for one of those associates says that could implicate congressman devin nunes, top republican on the intelligence committee, and universities y r -- and the president fires his navy secretary, and the secretary fires back. we begin with the court ruling and cnn's jim acosta live for us at the white house. what has the white house reaction been so far? >> john, this ruling applies to the former white house counsel don mcgahn, but it might as well apply to the acting chief of staff mick mulvaney. it might as well apply to the former national security adviser john bolton. but the white house is saying not so fast. stephanie grisham just put out a statement saying essentially this decision contradicts long-standing precedent established by administrations on both political parties. we will appeal and are confident that the import

it was rudy giuliani, ambassador sondland, and also mick mulvaney, right? here's the quote from that. as republicans argue most of the testimony is based on faulty second hand information, they're so in doubt about what they were actually representing the president or freelancing to pursue their own agendas. the gop's offering up the three to be fall guys. >> right. >> you think that'll be effective? >> i think it could be, honestly. i think it worked for donald trump during the mueller probe to basically say that was all these people. it wasn't tied to me. you don't have anything directly tied to me. the difficulty with that is there's a transcript of a phone call between president trump and president zelensky. so it's harder to move it away from him. that's the big picture here. but i do think if republicans can confuse people and muddy this up enough, that's the best bet. i'm not sure how many people, voters are tuning into this the way we are. >> all three of these men all have tied this back to the president working on his behalf as well. if i could ju

obviously mick mulvaney is another. that we'd like to hear from. but i don't think it should derail the other track of proceeding with the evidence we have which is compelling. i will say, you pointed out earlier in the report, that we're likely to name people who refuse to cooperate with subpoenas. i think those people are putting themselves in grave legal jeopardy because whatever happens with impeachment, the defiant of the legislative branch with legitimately issued subpoenas is a matter for continued prosecution and i think puts a lot of people in legal jeopardy and hopefully we won't let that go. >> we're getting new reporting, congressman. and don't want to read to you what we're learning right now and get your reaction from our reporters kara scannell and vicki ward and carl a black. associates of rudy giuliani they say have launched a broad investigation that could include criminal charges ranging from conspiracy, obstruction of justice, campaign finance violations and money laundering according to a subpoena sent to at least one witness a

>> mick mulvaney is the missing link. he was involved in a lot of activities under investigation and what we don't know is whether he was acting at the president's direction or not because he won't appear for testimony. let's start with the white house visit. the chief of staff is a ga gatekeeper of the president's schedule. he reviewed all the requests for white house meetings and makes a recommendation. in the case to the ukrainians, mick mulvaney discounted the nsc's concerns about scheduling a meeting. hill did not think it was a good time to schedule a meeting. and instead coordinated directly with sondland. he undercut his own team, coordinated directly with sondland and set the price of the meeting as investigating the bidens. that's a big risk because it signals to the world that in order to get a meeting with the president, you have to agree to do his political bidding. mick mulvaney would also have been in charge of ambassadorship. he gave the order for security assistance to be put on hold, again, against his o

given this new information, are you going to want to hear now from mick mulvaney? we know that the request is out there, but are you willing to wa wait through you what could be months of a court long process to haesh from h hear from him? >> we've been wanting to hear him speak for a long time. of course he's essentially admitted to the shakedown, the coerced quid pro quo as the m.o. of the white house. that is basically their way of doing business. he told everybody to accept it, to get over that. so we know basically what they were up to. he should come forward and speak forthrightly to the committee, but that is obviously going to be tough do. the point is that we understand all of the material elements of. the point is that we understand all of the material elements of this plot. the president developed a plan to shakedown the ukranian government to company eskocoerc participate in his plans. >> and we know the intelligence committee is wrapping up its report and will be passing it along to your committee. and you of course will be using that as reference for

mick mulvaney believes in executive privilege. it's a genuine concern that the president's confidence would be violated. it needs to be adjudicated. the way that they've decided not to pursue john bolton is odd. we've seen so much evidence that suggests that the sequence of ee vens as we understood them is what happened. the president wanted this aid held as part of a quid pro quo as sondland said. we do not have an order from the president in writing, verbal, otherwise suggesting why this aid was withheld. if you can't put a definitive period on the end of the sentence, you'll have a lot of people saying, listen, we don't know the whole story, and they wouldn't be wrong. >> kimberly, here's an interesting thread. we talked about john bolton. the other person is mike pompeo. he's a central figure. as we heard carol's reporting, the state department was involved in this. he had communications with rudy giuliani shortly before the ouster of marie yovanovich. parnas is willing to testify that congressman devin nunes met with the top

you have mick mulvaney saying he talked to the president and the president wanted mick mulvaney to hold the money for ukraine unless they investigated the dnc server. you have gordon sondland who tells bill taylor that the president said the ukrainians must investigate and exonerate russia for their role in the election in 2016 to get the money. also kurt volker said that rudy giuliani is his point person on ukraine. you have multiple people who tie this directly to the top. >> we'll be watching together with you tomorrow morning. thanks so much for joining us. >> my pleasure. >>> tlthere's more breaking new just ahead on house daems aemoc and republicans holding duelling meetings before impeachment hearings begin in washington. tailored recommendations, tax-efficient investing strategies, and a dedicated advisor to help you grow and protect your wealth. fidelity wealth management. woi felt completely helpless.hed and proonline.ur wealth. my entire career and business were in jeopardy. i called reputation defender. vo: take control of your online reputation. get your free reputation rep

it would be great to have mick mulvaney. >> he's been in the middle of this. he was putting a freeze on aid to ukraine. >>> this is "new day," with alisyn camerota and john berman. >> welcome to our viewers in the united states and all around the world. this is "new day." it's friday, november 8th. 6:00 here in new york. alisyn is away. bian bianna golodryga is here this morning. the michael bloomberg is preparing to join the democratic race for president. now in november. this after declining to jump in several months ago. cnn has learned he spoke with the dnc last night. so what moved the 77-year-old to reconsider? what does it say about joe biden and the current faeield of contenders? >> and what does the president think about this too? >>