bolton and more j importantly that is extraordinary of itself the chief of staff believes john bolton in that implication does not believe the president of the united d states that he worked closely with for such a long time but he also recognizes the importance of calling john bolton as a witness to swear him in and that senators hear from him themselvesst that very relevant testimony. the president's lawyers today and in prior presentations cannot defend the president on fax instead they went through a list of grievances which i'm sure the president was delighted to hear but not relevant to the charges against the president here today to use their time to smear the bidens with the whole ukraine scheme to attack the managers but as far as the facts themselves although at their disposal any agency officials who worked with the president this whole period of time did they choose to rely on any of them to support the president's position and the answer is a not a single one because they can't and now the one that has offered to come forward they are determined to try to prevent it we ca

so, that's what john kelly says. if john bolton says that in the book, i believe john bolton. do you believe john bolton? >> whether you do or don't, even if all those things are true, i know professor dershowitz is coming up to be your next guest, these do not raise to the level of impeachable offenses. this impeachment is partisan and political and impeachment wasn't supposed to be done that way. we are at a point where they're starting to vote in iowa on monday. we are in an election year. let the american people decide who they want to be their president. 100 members of the united states senate should not make that decision. and this doesn't just try to overturn the election of 2016. this removes president trump from the ballot in 2020. >> they would have to move to do that obviously in addition to what they've done. can i just ask you the question about alan dershowitz? that is a point. there are some senators in your caucus saying he did it but it's not impeachable. they seize on alan dershowitz's testimony to make that argument. the other constitutional law expert who h

do they want to cross-examination john bolton. john bolton, according to the president, is not telling the truth. let's put john bolton to the test. he's willing to do it. the question is, are the senators willing to her the truth. >> let me hear the tweet, this is on the president's minds, the democratic controlled house never even asked john bolton to testify. it is up to them, not up to the senate! . as you point out, that's not right. you did ask john bolton to testify but you didn't subpoena him. do you now regret not subpoenaing john bolton? >> no. we subpoenaed his deputy and they are represented by the same lawyer. the deputy sued us. the counsel said if you subpoena john bolton, he'll sue you also. basically they would tie us up in court endlessly. when we did subpoena another witness, don mcgahn, we are still in court nine months later. so here is the situation, and this is the reason john bolton has offered to testify in the senate, he's got a book coming out in march. he also does not want to be in a position of withho

john bolton is a complicated witness. i certainly don't think he's a slam-dunk witness for the democrats even though he was in the room. they've certainly had disagreements. but they should be able to say, if he thinks the president is doing something wrong, wouldn't you want john bolton to come forward and say something to you? i did nothing wrong. here's somebody who can prove that. >> remember this, too. there's gambling in the casino and politics in washington. mitch mcconnell is on the ballot this year. mitch mcconnell held the obama administration for more than a year until we had a presidential election. mitch mcconnell is not afraid to play hardball. however, one of his key deputies, fiona hill, did testify in the house impeachment inquiry. they said, this is trump being trump. sure, he brought up joe biden, maybe he wasn't articulate, but it wasn't an abuse of power. fiona hill said she and her boss thought it was. >> john bolton told me that i am not part of this whatever drug deal that mulvaney and sondland are

john bolton or president trump? >> i am inclined to believe the president says a lot of things that the president never follows through with. so that's -- it would not surprise me that at some point the president in a moment of frustration said that. >> when the president says he never -- when the president said that to john bolton or says he didn't say that to john bolton, he is now lying? and i do think that's important. paul, senator santorum said he found john bolton to be a man of enormous credibility. what have you felt about john bolton? >> i think he warred us into war in iraq. but we have a way to resolve this. swear under oath. why is rudy going on fox news instead of going into a deposition under oath with pain of perjury? why don't we have the documents? we've been doingis in in anglo american jurisprudence for hundreds of years. you get all the evidence, the facts, the documents, the testimony and that gets you to the truth. all we have now is a sham and a farce and a cover-up. and i know the deal is ri

bolton, we could have subpoenaed john bolton, but we subpoenaed his deputy first and his deputy sued us and it was very clear that john bolton would tie us up in court for months or years, and his lawyer made that crystal clear, so little to be gained. we had made it clear at that point with respect to other witnesses we had subpoenaed and refused to come in we were not going to play in game of rope-a-dope endlessly in the courts and allow the president to obstruct the congress with impunity which is what he said he was going to attempt to do by fighting all subpoenas. the fact that in the case we did bring against don mcgahn, they're arguing, you don't have standing to sue in court to enforce subpoenas, shows just how disingenuous the president and his lawyers are. so that didn't make much sense. in terms of impartiality, in the house of representatives we allow the minority to suggest witnesses and they did. we called witnesses in the open hearings that were proposed by the minority. in the-- in those super secret depositions they keep complaining about. there were as many members

bolton. the house should have taken the two years to force john bolton to testify. and what donald trump's lawyers in the justice department are saying not in the senate but before the court of appeals on the subject on the committee of judiciary it lacks article three standing to sue demanding testimony from individuals on matters related to the executive branch official. here they are the president's layers are this duplicitou duplicitous, they come into the senate which they refer to as a court of the house should have sued in court to force subpoenas like witnesses on john bolton they go to court they must not sue in court to compel the witness to testify. if that is the legal duplicity of the president's team. so will we get a fair trial or not? will the senate here as a key and important witness on egregious conduct or are we not? i don't see how the oath of impartiality can be interpreted in any other way to demand a fair trial with witnesses and documents. >>. >> are you confident enough the senate will follow? >> or are you prepared quick. >> we have a lot

but john bolton doesn't do coincidence. john bolton does calculation. and john bolton calculated that the worst thing he could possibly do to donald trump today is say, i am prepared to testify, and john bolton did that. no one has dreamed of war with iran and regime change in iran more fervently, and the reward that john bolton gave the president today who has brought us closer to that war than any previous president was the announcement, i am prepared to testify in the impeachment trial of that president. does that mean now that war with iran is simmering, john bolton wants the steadier hand of mike pence at the controls? john bolton doesn't want a rerun of the time when president trump called off an attack on iran ten minutes before it was scheduled to take place. john bolton doesn't want a president tweeting that he will commit war crimes by bombing non-military sites in iran, including cultural sites. john bolton wants war with iran done right if it's going to be done. he wants it done pompeo and pence style. in the obama white house, susan rice wa

but john bolton doesn't do coincidence. john bolton does calculation. and john bolton calculated that the worst thing he could possibly do to donald trump today is say, i am prepared to testify, and john bolton did that. no one has dreamed of war with iran and regime change in iran more fervently than bolton, and the reward that john bolton gave the president today, who has brought us closer to that war than any previous president was the announcement, i am prepared to testify in the impeachment trial of that president. does that mean now that war with iran is simmering, john bolton wants the steadier hand of mike pence at the controls? john bolton doesn't want a rerun of the time when president trump called off an attack on iran ten minutes before it was scheduled to take place. john bolton doesn't want a president tweeting that he will commit war crimes by bombing non-military sites in iran, including cultural sites. john bolton wants war with iran done right if it's going to be done. he wants it done pompeo and pence style. in the obama white house,

ambassador to the u.n., john bolton. who better to bring in than american enterprise's ambassador john bolton. >> ambassador bolton, always good to see you. >> ambassador, good morning to you. >> good evening, ambassador, merry christmas. >> we love seeing you each and every day. >> ambassador john bolton is being walked into the studio by steve ducey. >> come on! >> he wants to see if you're in shape. he's watching! >> yay! ♪ ♪ >> trevor: whoa! oh, man! if shakira's hips don't lie, then those hips are pathological liars because look at that. look at that. it looks like his legs are fused directly to his shoulders. it's like warping cp30 trying to twerk. that's what that look likes. and you can tell, you can tell how much people at fox cared for john bolton. you know. he was like the goofy uncle to just wants to have fun and wipe iran off the planet. but now that bolton's allegations could hurt president trump, fox news has made it very clear that he is no longer invited to the family cookout. >> we heard from other

here's john bolton saying, hello. do they want to be the ground ostrich party and stick their head in the ground and hope they can run out the clock? that is their choice. >> dana, you have a special guest now. >> that's right. i'm here with senator amy klobuchar. she is back from iowa, just off the plane. we won't show your footwear. >> it's just tennis shoes. >> tell me what your thoughts are and if you've had a chance, more porchtimportantly, to spea your colleagues as things have been scrambled up here when it comes to witnesses. >> i think this is a game changer, because i sat there and listened to the president's lawyers this weekend, and their whole case was, oh, this didn't happen, basically. this didn't happen. look at the readout of the call. that's not what he said. and now you have the national security adviser, the gatekeeper to all the information basically saying it did happen. so, rega regardless of how they going to vote on impeachment, i don't know how they deny the american public the truth, how the

ally themselves with john bolton. good luck with that considering the president's history on this or they can say, yes, there the a smoking gun here. there is now a clear link between ukraine aid and investigation and the bidens, but we don't care that a shooting was committed. which is to sayoc it all happened, it all happened, every last bit of it, but we still don't think that it's bad enough. even to hear witnesses at this point, tim, you know you have your ear to the pavement more than anyone in terms of republican sentiment. how do you think things will move over the next two days? >> so i think you dade nice job of laying out sort of the two paths we can potentially go down here. recognizing this, putting it in the broadest context possible. we have spent the last three years of this presidency wondering if there was anything or anyone that could serve as effectively a wedge between the president of the united states and his republican defenders on capitol hill and when i say republican defenders, i don't just

john bolton, now we revert back to this question about witness witnesses. i don't think there's any problem here. the aide was released, the aide was increased, legal aid, what the president said or didn't say it, what he used in a conversation with an eta, doesn't matter. if adam schiff thought john bolton was so set to impeachment, he would've subpoenaed him, fought to keep that subpoena. just so everybody listening understands, when you are not senate confirmed, congress can't take a white house advisor and say you must come talk to us. because he's not senate confirmed, you have to go to court or go through protracted negotiations to get that collate to testify. you know what adam schiff said? it's not that important to the case. they thought they already had a case. now that they realize they don't have a very good, strong case, they don't the votes, they are about to lose democrats on this question of acquittal. of course they want to bring you more witnesses, they are not trying to find the case. >> melissa: how much do you think it would change thin

or john bolton when he's under oath? >> republican senator lindsey graham tweeted a short time ago, "if there is a decision to call democratic witnesses, at a minimum the senate should allow the president to call all relevant witnesses he has requested." another key g.o.p. senator does not sound too alarmed by the former national security advisor's manuscript. >> it's a bunch of hearsay. clearly it's an attempt to try and influence the course of the trial. i would go back to saying that if we call witnesses, if my colleagues and others decide we have to have witnesses, let's call everybody who is going to be relevant. this isn't just about john bolton, this should be about the whistle-blower, adam schiff, hunter biden. let's hear from them all. >> republican senator sounded quite confident after the president's team began laying out its case on saturday. it's not entirely clear if this new book revelation as change things. >> ed: mike emanuel live on the hill, appreciate that. let's bring in the 18. david avella, mary an

john bolton has something to say. john bolton, come out and say it. nobody is stopping him. >> well, there's a lot of hysteria about mr. bolton's testimony. >> sean: not here. >> frankly i think his testimony will be redundant. i speak just for me, sean, but i'm willing to stipulate that mr. bolton will likely testify that the president paused aid to ukraine while asking ukraine to investigate vice president biden. my response to that is, your point is what? that doesn't tell us anything. why do the president asked for an investigation of joe biden? he didn't ask for investigation of elizabeth warren. or bernie sanders or amy klobuchar. he didn't get joe biden's name out of a phone book. he asked for an investigation of vice president biden because he was investigating corruption. how do we know that? four words: hunter biden and burisma. now, we know for a fact -- i'm not accusing anyone of anything, sean, but the ukrainian government is historically and organically corrupt. vice -- rather, president obama placed vice president biden in charge of the

he said we had our shot with john bolton and john bolton totally blew it. >> trish, you and i had a lot of phone calls discussing the issue and we said exactly that. your point about the democrats trying to strip away the votes of the people who ejected -- elected our president, i think john bolton on his own was trying to run his own show. we say the in a number of instances where he thought he knew better. who was elected president of the if united states? why? sso he could create more busines opportunities. he wasn't object the same page as the president. and the president's instincts on things like venezuela were spot-on. trish: so john bolton was in the way. >> the u.s. general assembly in september of 2018, donald trump said i will talk to nicolas maduro. when the u.s. is in a country doing business, that country does better. john bolton stopped that conversation. trish: why would he do that? he thinks he knows better than anybody else. if you talk to anybody who worked with bowl stop, they will tell you he thinks it's his show. trish: you are work for the president. so as far as

. >> john bolton is central to the conversation right now. the president tweets about john bolton helped or hurt him? >> listen, i mean, the media each and every day will critique every single tweet the president puts out and tried to have, be the jury on whether it helps or not. here's what i can say is, is the fact we're having to talk about john bolton at the 11th hour, the fact that we will continue to see leaks, we have a count that a 17 to zero. the democrats have called 17 witnesses. the republicans have called zero. why do we think 18 to zero, 19 to zero will stop my democrat colleagues from making any other assertions? here's what i will say. when we look at the president and his ability to actually conduct the affairs of this nation, it is critically important that those conversations whether it be with the nsc advisor or the chief of staff or anyone else that those need to be protected and they have to be protected for the national security of our country. so as i look at that, the tweets have very little effect what's going to hap

i welcome john bolton to come on this show. i reached out to his representative and did not hear back. john bolton could do so in a very vocal way on any platform he choose. but instead it's this cloak and dagger behind the scenes and he wants to testify. they had their chance. we know what their motives are. the principle of this stuff. they are messed up. if you want to do an investigation toi -- into ukraie and biden inc, that's worth entertaining. but task at hand, i don't see why anybody would give john bolton the time of day. >> you said it best. the american people are smart. you can make fun of half the country if you want. but the american people are smart. when you get up in front of the camera and say my witnesses are relevant. i have got to call all these witnesses and the other side's witnesses have no relevancy and have nothing do with the trial, the american people see that for what it is. they do. and i have got to tell you, dershowitz, here is a liberal left-wing law professor from harvard who voted for hillary

why john bolton would say this. we have some sense of what john bolton knows. but how would you think about this as a prosecutor? bolton if you had to divide it up is still team trump more than he's team democrats and impeachment. so what does this mean that he seems to be so interested in testifying all of a sudden? >> well, i think he's mostly team bolton. the cynic in he says this is a pr move. he has a book deal. he wants to be able to sell his books in it. at the moment he's in a tight spot because he refused to tell his story publicly to the nation, but he wants to sell books with that story. and so i think this is an effort to make it look like he was willing to testify if the senate served him with a subpoena. he likely knows that's unlikely. >> if you're adam schiff, why not subpoena john bolton right now? if john bolton is willing to testify to the senate, wouldn't he be willing to testify before the house? >> i think that's a shrewd move. i think it's a key question. there's this idea that impeachment is over and now we're onto removal trial in the s

if john bolton said this, it was only to sell a book. at the end of december, bolton submitted a draft manuscript to the national security council to be vetted for possible classified information. "the new york times" report came out just as advance sales of the book opened up. bolton and his advisors said there was no coordination between "the new york times" and anyone else about appearance of his book, "the room where it happened" to online sellers. any assertion to the contrary is unfounded speculation. spec election also swirled how the menu script was linked, the twin brother of benjamin sources toldfox news that vindmt involved in the review, there appears to be a close hold on t, insisting that no white house personnel outside and this he had reviewed the manuscript. and in aid to bolton disputed claims by "the new york times" that bolton had shared the manuscript with others, telling fox news he didn't give copies to anyone else and the times reporting that he shared the main strip with others is false. >> given what is called t

john bolton knows it and everybody knows it. lou: john bolton of all people should know all of the successes of this president, and many of those successes coming over the objection of none other than john bolton. thanks for being with us. stay with us. we are coming right back. ♪i believe, i believe ♪believe we're still worth the fight♪ ♪you'll see there's hope for this world tonight♪ ♪i believe, i believe ♪yeah ♪rock guitar [♪] lou: tomorrow tonight u.s. special representative for iran, brian hook, a member of the president's legal team, congressman lee zeldin among our guests. we hope you will joins. thanks for being with us. see you here tomorrow. good night from new york. lauren: it is 5:00 a.m. a. here are your top stories at this hour. right now, the u.s. is evacuating americans from china as the coronavirus spreads. the death toll rising to 106. what americans here at home need to know about the deadly virus. cheryl: well, could house democrats be getting an impeachment do-over. why they say john bolton

john kelly, who said i believe john bolton, and he is on his others. i don't think it is the truth at -- >> harris: lindsey graham said that yesterday. if you pick on john bolton, you will get to the point where everyone wants to hear from that witness. >> melissa: the point lindsey graham was making was let's stipulate that what john bolton is going to say is that he wanted to investigate the bidens. and he made a very good case, lindsey graham did, of why anyone with half of a brain would want to investigate what happened with them when you have joe biden controlling money to the ukrainians, saying the day for correction is over at the exact same second that his son is getting $3 million. that's coming you know, undercutting american interests at the entrance of your family. >> lisa: he said that the president had deep-rooted concerns about corruption in ukraine, which is consistent with what we had heard from the legal defense team. look, we have heard from witnesses. they spent 17 witnesses, over 100 hours and testimony appeared we don't need to he

he said, if john bolton said that in the book, i believe john bolton. he said any time he was in the room with john bolton, he gave the president the unvarnished truth. he's a good guy, and he said some of the conversations to me seemed inappropriate, but i wasn't there. he believes the people who were there should come forward and say what they have to say. the senate gets the full story, which is not the position of the white house. >> thank you, kaitlan collins. we're waiting for the president to speak, but until he does, we can go to this news. when asked about the claims the president told bolton he would not release aid until there was a biden investigation, or at least the announcement of one, giuliani told cnn, quote, i am convinced that is not true. giuliani went on to say, quote, i feel bad that john -- he is a friend for ten years -- stabbed me in the back. here's the president. let's listen. >> we need to take a step toward peace. young people across the middle east are ready for a more hopeful future, and governments throughout the region a

bolton or whether general kelly believes john bolton but whether you will believe john bolton and whether you will have the opportunity to evaluate his credibility for yourself. this will be the first impeachment trial in history that involves no witnesses if you decide you don't want to hear from any. you want to rely on what was investigated in the house. that would be unprecedented. >> leading off our discussion today danny sovales. abigail tracy who recently authored a piece interviewing all seven democratic house managers. susan is a republican strategist and msnbc political analyst and david jolly of florida who left the gop and is an msnbc political analyst and from washington, matt miller, a former spokesman from eric holder and msnbc contributor. welcome to all of you. thank you for joining us and helping us out. matt, i want to start with you. there were a couple of arguments that were made today by alan dershowitz and by one of the trump trial attorneys in the house and in the senate. both seeming to suggest that what president trump did was not impeachable. not only wasn't imp

john kelly saying he believes john bolton. john kelly has been through the winger, and president trump loved the fact john kelly had been in the military and his ordererness and, well, he got sick of him and turned on him, too. i worked with john kelly and he was totally unequipped to handle the genius of our great president. stephanie grisham, the press secretary. these are not isolated incidents. this is a few. rex tillerson said the crown jewel of his initial cabinet of secretary of state, dumb as a rock and lazy as hell. steve bannon one of the architects of trump's victory. sloppy. and one of his biggest advocates, he should be attorney general general. and michael cohen, bad lawyer and fraudster. not only does he turn on everyone, we're talking not about small jobs, we're talking about secretary of state, secretary of defense. national security advisor. he trusted these people with some of our nation's most important tasks and now suddenly saying they were always bad. back to you, guys. >> thank you very much. >> i'm wol

that's the big danger. >> and of course, john bolton once again, if what john bolton says is true, that the president told him that aid to ukraine was linked to investigating the bidens, then the president is lying about this. john kelly, the president's former chief of staff, we now learned said quote if john bolton says that in the book, i believe john bolton. in other words, the president's former chief of staff thinks the president is lying. that should always be of note. that should always be curious to any senator of any party. also curious is the president's statement overnight where the argument he makes against john bolton testifying is frankly dishonest, right, the president tweeted quote, why didn't john bolton complain about this nonsense a long time ago when he was very publicly terminated. he said not that it matters. nothing. that's a lie. john bolton did complain about this repeatedly for months. >> according to sworn testimony from witnesses. >> according to sworn testimony under oath have testified, fiona hill, the drug deal, john bolton called this a drug deal. he bro

security advisor. >> i can tell you that nothing was said to john bolton. i have not seen him. i guess she's writing a book. >> reporter: bolton writes in his upcoming book that the helped with investigations and to democrats including the bidens. >> we do not deal was speculation. we do not deal with allegations that are not based on evidentiary standards at all . >> reporter: democrats insisted that bolton be called as a witness. >> we have a witness with first- hand evidence and how can senate republicans not vote to call that witness? >> reporter: four republicans would have to break ranks and at least one of them seems open to it. >> i think it is fair to say that john bolton has a relevant testimony to provide to those of us sitting in impartial justice . >> reporter: bolton has told lawmakers he is willing to testify. >>> senator kamala harris says it is imperative that the teimy bolton. >> if it wasn't clear before it is clear today that there is. t reality is that john bolton wants to testify and he has direct evidence about the matter at hand and

that's john bolton. once that happens, we're going to see, i think, additional questions that are opened up and additional witnesses that may have to be called. so ultimately, the decision as for how people vote will be based upon all that evidence. if the evidence is denied to the american people and to the senate, then it will not have been a real trial. a real trial is a search for the truth. the truth requires witnesses. it requires documents. and no one should prejudge the outcome until we know whether or not a full and fair trial was conducted. right now the republicans still don't have enough votes to give us the witnesses, which we need to put all of the information out there in front of the american people. >> senator markey, let's end on this. you saw it yesterday sitting at a juror in the trial. pat cipollone used you back a few years ago in 1998 during -- and '99 during the clinton impeachment trial. you look exactly the same, sir. making the argument that this is not worthy of impeachment. t

john bolton -- i have disagreed with most of john bolton's policy as agents for the last 30 years. no one would question his solid conservative credentials and bone evita why wouldn't we have him since he was in the room. i know the president's lawyer said that the manuscript hearsay or whatever. let's bring him in the room. if the president also wants to bring in his chief of staff, mick mulvaney n, and he will take an oath and swear to tell the truth, he can clear their president. let's hear from him or other political appointees that still work for this president. i don't understand when we all realize how serious this is. we don't want to do this lightly or quickly. we want to do it with the whole truth out there. >> neil: isn't it weird, senator, for republicans, mr. bolton has turned into a pariah. for democrats, a rock star. >> it was to be 11 months ago or three months ago or two weeks ago. there is this pattern. you would acknowledge as well, this president -- this part i will give him credit for. he is not partisan at all in terms of, when he gets angry at you, if you sta

bolton and went to court to fight to bring john bolton forward. they are saying it is not the senate's job. one republican, including marco rubio of florida told me today he would vote against a subpoena from john bolton. something that was echoed by a number of republicans i spoke to today. >> would you vote to subpoena john bolton? >> i won't because i think in my view the -- our inquiry should be on the articles of impeachment and we should be constrained by the information that those articles were based on. >> reporter: but, erin, the key is whether or not there are four republicans who will break ranks. some of those vulnerable republicans in difficult races who are not answering questions tonight, including cory gardner of colorado who told me that we have to wait for the articles to be sent over before we decide and martha mcsally of arizona in a difficult race and would not answer whether or not she wants to subpoena john bolton saying that we'll work through this and decided to -- declined to kblent -- to comment further. >> thank you ver

former national security advisor john bolton. never mind what senators might want or majority leader mcconnell might agree to, when it comes to bolton, president trump made it clear he wants him nowhere near the witness stand. that's what he told laura ingraham during an interview. she said why not call bolton, allow him to testify? this thing is bogus, why not allow him to testify? the president says no problem other than one thing. you can't be in the white house as president, future, and have a security advisor, anybody having to do with security, legal and other things. ingraham interjekts are you going to invoke executive privilege? the president says i think you have to for the sake of the office. in a moment our legal and political team weigh in on that. first from our jim acosta, including some late new reporting that he's got. what more do you know about the president's move to block bolton from testifying? >> reporter: well, it's sounding more and more that the white house is moving in that direction. i talked to a sour

john bolton knows it and everybody knows it. lou: john bolton of all people should know all of the successes of this president, and many of those successes coming over the objection of none other than john bolton. thanks for being with us. stay with us. we are coming right back. introducing schwab intelligent income. a simple, modern way to pay yourself from your portfolio. tell us how much you have, and how long you need it to last. we'll estimate how much you could spend. then you can decide how you'll spend it. schwab manages the complexity with automated, tax-smart withdrawals. that you can start, stop or adjust at any time with no penalties. and you pay no advisory fee. schwab intelligent income. schwab. a modern approach to wealth management. most people think as a reliable phone company. but to businesses, we're a reliable partner. we keep companies ready for what's next. (man) we weave security into their business. (second man) virtualize their operations. (woman) and build ai customer experiences. (second woman) we also

that's who john bolton is. that's who john bolton has always been. that's what john bolton does.. and not to brag, but we called it long ago.as yesterday "the new york times" reported that bolton's new book contains sections designed to help the democratic case for impeachment. walton accuses the president of delaying military aid to ukraine in order to pressure his government into investigating hunter biden. again, people in washington seem stunned by this or claim to be.t if bolton dislike trump so much, why did he join the administration? the answer is simple. bolton wanted war with iran, he has always wanted war with iran, he is obsessed with it. here he is gleefully looking at ki regime change there long before he became national security advisor. watch. >> i have said for over ten years since coming to these events that the declared policy of the united states of america should be the overthrow of the regime in tehran. [cheers and applause] and that's why before 2019, we hear will celebrate in tehran, thank you very much. >> tucker: in tehran! but iran wasn't bolton's only t

if john bolton says that in the book, i believe john bolton. i think some of the conversations seem to be very inappropriate, but i wasn't there, but there are people that were there that ought to be heard from. he also spoke to reporters and said this about john bolton's character. >> you may disagree with his politics or what he wants to -- what he wants to do with -- under certain circumstances, but john's a stand-up guy, and we'll see what happens. >> let's go back to dana bash, who's getting more reaction on capitol hill. what are you learning, dana? >> reporter: thank you, wolf, i am with the senator from indiana, senator mike braun. thank you for joining us. i was starting to tell you that john kelly who was the president's chief of staff for 18 months, he said very bluntly, that, a, he believes john bolton, and b, he believes john bolton should come and testify before the senate as a fellow republican, somebody who you know, you know, john kelly spent a lot of time with the president, spent a lot of time with all these players. does tha

it's not a question for john bolton. why he wasn't willing to testify when we invited him to testify in the house. >> why didn't he? >> i don't know but i think you should answer that question but is whatever reason he was unwilling to come before the the house. he is willing to come before the senate. the senators should not turn away from this very relevant evidence. >> have your staff any conversation with bolton or -- >> i want to give others a chance. >> has he given a reason -- [inaudible] >> it's not a question of whether i trust john bolton or the republican senators or the democratic senators. he should be placed under oath, and this is why we think the testimony should be public. it should be live. let the american people along with the senators evaluate john bones credibility when he testifies and make their own judgment. but to say that we apply ourselves from a witness who are so clearly relevant testimony to one of the central most serious allegations against the president, i don't see how you could have a

bolton or they should have subpoena john bolton that's what they're telling you but let me show you what they're telling the court in the mcgann litigation if we could pull up slide number 39 this is the president's lawyers in court in the mcgann litigation in the court of appeals right now quote that committee meeting our committee lacks article 3 standing to sue to enforce a congressional subpoena demanding testimony from an individual on matters related to duties as an executive branch official i mean it takes your breath away the duplicity of that argument there before you saying they should have tried harder to get these witnesses they should subpoenaed they should have litigated for years and down the street in the federal courthouse there arguing judge you need to throw them out they have no standing to sue to force a witness to testify are we really prepared to accept that now counsel says think about the precedent that we would be setting if you allow a house to impeach a president and you permit them to call witnesses well i would submit think about the precedent you will

. >> jay sekulow, meet john bolton. the "new york times" is reporting that trump told bolton last august that he wanted to continue freezing critical military aid to ukraine until government officials there helped with investigations targeting joe biden, his son hunter, and other democrats. >>> and good morning, and welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, january 28th. along with joe, willie and me we have pulitzer prize winning columnist and associate editor of the "washington post" eugene robinson. and nbc news and msnbc law analyst and editor-in-chief of "law fair" ben minh wittes co-author of the new book "unmaking the presidency." donald trump's war on the world's most powerful office. so a lot going on. we heard jay sekulow's approach to defending the president. namely, pretending john bolton doesn't exist. there was ken starr, who lamented the acrimony involved in presidential impeachments. >> hmm. >> i know. and then alan dershowitz, even if every single thing is true, the president should still remain in offic

bolton, a reality of being john bolton over decades now is that john bolton is his own man. a lot of it for his own doing. his policy positions don't change whether they're popular or not, whether they contradict the president. he believes in what he believes. but i think the more that the trump white house isolates him and smears him, the more incentive he has to tell his story. >> really important figure there. in a moment we're going -- kasie hunt was able to talk to mitt romney at her camera location. garrett haake also standing by for us on capitol hill. garrett, what a day. one more time up there. >> reporter: i think that's right. if john bolton wants to testify in the senate, he's probably going to have to release some new information in the next 24 hours to get a chance to do that. i don't want to step on what i think kasie is going to report which is our witness whip count at this moment, but it does not appear to be moving in the direction of calling john bolton or anybody else. in the meantime we're going to have this question-and-answer session on the floor toda

hunter biden and now john bolton. john bolton has not objected in any way nobody's cashing million dollar checks. to have schumer come up and say out of the blue, "maybe the president's kids are making money," with no evidence at all, that's defamation and they ought to sue him. >> ed: i hear the anger in your voice. you think this is a misstep for senator schumer to bring the president's children into this? >> it's a transference. we've been talking all along about -- the president asked that corruption be investigated in ukraine and the evidence is out there that hunter biden is getting a million dollars while his dad was busy firing the prosecutor that was going after hunter biden's company. that is all in the record. there is nothing in the record about the president's kids. schumer has just created this whole thing out of -- "when we go after the president's kids yet? we don't know whether the dealings have something to do with the trumps making money." he completely made up. that's defamation of character and he

bolton, quote, i believe john bolton. and on the day it is only 4:25 has been so far. >> well, i mean, i think on the one hand i don't think anyone from the trump white house was surprised at this point to see that from john kelly. it is sort of a bombshell and it is unhelpful. but one thing that bolton's book has kind of revealed is that there are people who are in the white house, when they are in the white house, this is a president who demands absolute loyalty ty, sort of mafia calib caliber loyalty but doesn't return it in kind and when people leave the white house they don't return it in kind. and john bolton writing on the long legal pad memos and just four and a half months after leaving the white house he has a book ready to go, complete with an amazon page and general kelly backing him up. i don't think general kelly is backing him up to spite the president. i think what he said is true. if he has to choose between president trump and john bolton he believes john bolton b. you have people whener that freed from

john bolton showing he's not im

heard plenty from john bolton, the reports are out. we have heard on tape from hunter biden. what i want to do is say i believe the american people and this is what i hear at home in wyoming, people have heard enough, people of lost interest in this process, they realize it is political monday realize it's about removing a president. i have heard enough, i read the transcript of the call so i am very comfortable with what i know to make that decision without hearing additional witnesses, additional documents at this point. >> bill: nonetheless, if you do not get your wish, does that legal fight follow the trail of 21 years ago where there is a quick expedited case that goes up to the u.s. supreme court? how do you play out the scenarios today? and how could that affect this trial? >> i think you could drag the trial on indefinitely, it could end up in what people call the twilight zone of a trial, a circus atmosphere. i don't think we need to go down that route. i am looking forward to voting this week on friday to say i have heard eno