Welcome to hardtalk, im shaun ley. Donald trump calls the impeachment inquiry a witch hunt. In recent days, the us president has been accused of trying to intimidate a witness. Now a Us Ambassador central to the allegations, a trump supporter who donated 1 million for his inauguration, has told congress the president did make aid for the ukraine contingent on the ukrainians launching an enquiry into the son ofjoe biden. Mr biden could be trumps democrat challenger in next years president ial election. The media mogul Christopher Ruddy of newsmax has known donald trump well for the last 20 years. Hes accused democrats of playing politics with impeachment. After this week, how much trouble is donald trump actually in . Chris ruddy, welcome to hardtalk. You didnt want this impeachment inquiry, you said it was just political game playing by the democrats. As the enquiry has developed, do you now accept it is a necessary process for american politics to be going through . Well, i think we should respect the process, but we should also call it for what it is which is a bit of a charade. Usually in a case like this you would first gather evidence and decide whether an impeachment process is really proper. Nancy pelosi triggered, pulled the trigger on impeachment without looking at the whistleblower complaint, without interviewing any of the witnesses, without ever seeing the president s transcript with president zelensky. Some of that information has come out since then but i think its been preordained that it is going to be an impeachment and thats, i think, bad for the country, and the public approval polls over here in america show that they have not gotten a majority support yet for this impeachment. You say that, in effect, the democrats have prejudged the evidence. Mitch mcconnell, the Senate Majority leader, said this week that even if an impeachment trial is held in the senate, it would be inconceivable that senators who are in effect the jury would dismiss the president from office. Isnt that, in a sense, too, prejudging the outcome . Well, so far the known evidence suggests that there was no impeachable crime. The constitution is very clear. A president can be impeached and removed for high crimes and misdemeanours. Nobody has yet identified a crime that the president committed or an actual law that he broke. I am one and ive said this publicly, i dont think everything the president did was appropriate. President s make big mistakes. Ronald reagan, im a big admirer of president reagan. Reagan did the whole iran contra thing, he violated the arms embargo, he sold arms to the iranians. He took money from that deal and gave it to the contras in contravention of us law. So all of that was potentially impeachable. He wasnt impeached. I think it was far more serious than whats been alleged against president trump. In a sense, two wrongs dont make a right. Just because reagan, in your view, should probably have gone through some sort of inquiry and possible impeachment. And impeachment, we should be clear for viewers elsewhere in the world, is the process, its not necessarily the outcome, so a president can be impeached, the process can begin, but in the end theyre not forced from office, and that happened with bill clinton, for example. Just to pick up on your point about whether a high crime on misdemeanour has been committed. The constitution is silent on the definition of that, although it did say it didnt think maladministration would be enough, the founders suggested when they were drawing up the documents of the constitution. But the congress has attempted to define this and its attempted to define this at the time of Richard Nixons possible impeachment. And it concluded that improperly exceeding or abusing the powers of office, behaviour incompatible with function and the purpose of the offers, and, misusing the office for an improper purpose or for personal gain, would constitute a high crime. Well, that would be your understanding of the president s intent. Was he actually trying to do it for personal gain . Hes the chief Law Enforcement officer of the nation, he wanted an investigation of two things. One was the 2016 election and the ukrainian role in the hacking and other matters relating to that, and second, of the bidens involvement of firing a prosecutor that was trying to uncover corruption. Alleged involvement. And as you recall, joe biden when he was Vice President , yeah, well, its very clear because biden publicly demanded the removal of the prosecutor and was threatening to withhold us aid over it. The same thing theyre accusing the president of doing. If you look at the transcript, and i encourage your folks all over the world, you can look it up, read that transcript. The president always says go to the transcript. I dont believe the transcripts perfect but i do think its somewhat exculpatory. President trump says id like you to really investigate what happened in the 2016 election. I think thats perfectly within mounds. And actually, he was trying to investigate what happened to the democratic service. Sure, but thats the past election. Were talking about potentially trying to influence the outcome of a forthcoming election in the United States. Right. So at the very end, shaun, at the very end of a ao minute conversation, zelensky raises the issue of investigations again. And the president says, you know, wouldnt be good if you guys looked atjoe biden putting pressure on the government to fire the prosecutor who was trying to look into corruption . Thats all he said. He didnt say i want them criminally investigated. And it was very clear there was no, in that transcript, no quid pro quo. So i think that that again is not a perfect situation. There were problems here. This should have been dealt with with normal congressional oversight. I dont see an impeachable crime and nobody has identified what the crime is and thats why the public is starting to, their eyes glazing over at these congressional hearings. Well see what the public thinks once theyve heard all the evidence actually in public as opposed to the stuff thats been, as you were critical of, selectively leaked from behind closed doors from previous stages of this process. Butjust on your point about there was no explicit quid pro quo, thats even being challenged in the various stages of the investigation and the witnesses this week. But isnt this, a better analogy, in a sense, rather than suggesting there was a bribe involved, rather suggesting its a bit like a protection racket. Something that anyone whos ever operated in new york politics or business would understand, what goes on around the edges of these things. No one explicitly says, give me your money or your business will be torched, but the subject knows that if they refuse, something bad will happen to them. In this case, security aid. Absolutely critical to ukraines future. A country that is threatened with dismemberment by russia, has already experienced some of that over crimea. Your president was apparently saying, or implying according to these witnesses, if you dont do this investigation, not only dont you get to meet me in the oval office, but you dont get that money and that money could be crucial to the countrys future. So much youve said there, some of its factually true some of it isnt, shaun. The president never said, theres no evidence yet that the president said, i want a quid pro quo. In fact, ambassador sondland whos testifying today, has testified, he asked the president is this a quid pro quo . As the president did not say yes. Now, i think its very clear that rudy giuliani, people under the president , were squeezing the ukrainians. Were they doing it on the orders of the president or not . Im not sure. So thats one issue that hasnt been resolved. The president says he did not squeeze them to do that. He did give the aid. In fact, on two or three occasions now, he gave lethal aid to the ukrainians that president 0bama would not give them. So i think hes shown a historical track record of helping the ukraine. Alan dershowitz, one of the most famous liberal democrats, he supported hillary clinton, harvard law professor, he has said what the president did was a political sin, not a political crime. Were criminalising. If senator smith says to senatorjones in the senate, you give me the bridge money, ill give you the highway money for my state, thats a quid pro quo, its not a bribe, its not a crime. Youd have to put half of congress in the jail if thats a crime. In the end, the judgement will be made, it now looks like, by the senators when it comes to it. I wonder what you make of the remarks from a former us senator who only left office injanuary, who says that if there were a public vote, yeah, probably donald trump is home and dry. If it was a private vote, though, this isjeff flake who was saying, ive have heard democrats say, well, wed be lucky to see 30 republicans. He says he thinks actually 35 republicans, if the evidence were there, could vote against the president. I mean, is he in real danger, do you think . I think thats very speculative. How do you know what people would do in a private vote, i dont know. I do think the president right now, its very highly divided senate. I think some of the approaches the white house is taking where theyre criticising some of the witnesses is not a smart thing because it will scare independent voters who will influence these senators that might be on the fence about this issue. Right now, the president is safe. So his tweets when Marie Yovanovitch was giving evidence, the former ambassador to ukraine. You dont think that was helpful, when he said this woman has been a disaster wherever shes gone, actually while she was giving evidence this week. We have a president thats not a politician, for the first time in our history, really. Hes a guy that likes to speak his mind whether it hurts him or helps him, and i think sometimes it hurts him when he does that, but he likes to do it. People forget he tweeted about the bidens before that phone call with zelensky. He actually talked to the press and said some of this needs to be investigated. It wasnt that he was doing it surreptitiously. So in his mind, ive known the man for many years, ive never known him to want to break the law. I cant believe it for a second he would get on a phone call with ten people listening, as was the case with zelensky, and try to imply that somehow he was breaking the law or suggesting that laws should be broken. Maybe he just didnt know what the legal limitations of his office are. Well, i believe, you know, there are so many laws and regulations. I think he has a very expansive view of the presidency. He comes from the Business World where if you have an impulse to do something, you just do it, and if no one thinks its a crime, he probably thinks, well, this happens all the time in politics and international affairs, you ask foreign leaders. I havent spoken to him specifically about whether there was a quid pro quo or not. I have spoken to him and he indicated he did not think he did anything wrong, and i believe he didnt believe a crime, but i also think he didnt have criminal intent here, and i believe thats coming through pretty clearly in these hearings as well. You know, think about this, all these people involved, all these diplomats, ambassador taylor, sondland, volker, we know there were all these nsc aids on. National security council. Nobody filed an official complaint against the president. The whistleblower was not involved at all. He got this second hand, he got very big, important facts wrong. It is very unusual you get a whistleblower who gets it from secondhand knowledge so its sort of like hearsay. We know that colonel vindman reported it to the lawyers. I think thats fine. If he felt the president didnt do something proper, he never said he committed a crime. If he didnt think the president did something proper, go speak to the lawyers and say, you know, i think you should review this, the president did this, that or the other thing. I think that was fine, he didnt go to the Washington Post, he didnt go to congress, he didnt file an official complaint. Now all of this comes out and the congress is saying its impeachment, theyre blowing it up, the publics not buying it. Let me ask you how you think the president s handling this. You say you talk to him, youve obviously been talking to him as this process was initially proposed, its been ongoing. I noticed in an interview you gave last year to the financial times, you said, sometimes during the campaign, the kid from the mean streets of queens came out in the campaign and thought, if im going to survive, ive got to fight. In other words, sometimes he hits back stronger when hes criticised or attacked. Do think thats what were seeing a bit of, that character aspect of donald trump . Laughs well, im glad you dug that quote up. I would say not sometimes, i would say he always hits back and maybe punches down, sometimes. Actually, even though he grew up quite wealthy, he was in and enclave surrounded by very difficult neighbourhoods in queens in new york city. Some areas were very tough. And hes a guy that likes to fight back. If you punch him, he wants to punch you back harder. Its not the typical way in politics that things are done. Its not my approach, but its his approach and its worked for him. The public, i think, ultimately will decide all of this in the upcoming election. We are only 12 months away. Im not sure why the democrats are doing this, they should have just put some of this out in congressional oversight. Again, i think in my conversation with the president , it was just there is a consequence, perhaps, to some of the attacks and let me put you what Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to ukraine, said in her testimony to congress. This is the testimony she gave on camera, she said, the attacks are leading to a crisis in the state department as the policy process is visibly unravelling, leadership vacancies go unfilled and senior and mid level officers ponder an uncertain future and head for the doors. Well, theres a back story to that, too. The democrats have been holding up a lot of trump nominees so they were not able to really put into the government. Well, im not sure the figures back you up on that. Im sorry to interrupt you, forgive me for interrupting you, but just to be specific about this since we have a relatively recent figures from this. The Washington Post on the 18th of november said there are, you are right, 107 formally normally nominated who have not yet actually gone through the process. Those, you could argue, are being held up. 491 confirmed, but there are 139 posts out of the 7111 jobs where there isnt even a nominee, nevermind somebody actually in post. Coming down to january, it will be three quarters of the way through the presidency. The implication is some of these jobs cant be filled because people dont want them. But, shaun, what came first, the chicken or the egg . I mean, this ha been the democratic strategy and they blocked the nominees and create such a backlog, why would anyone, a, want to go into that list . Ive known people that are very highly qualified and they wont even think about it because they know it it would take so long so that is why they are not even nominating people. I think it is a shame, you know, the president came in here, from almost from day one, they were talking about impeachment. I am not saying hes a perfect guy, i think he is a good guy. I think he has done a lot of reform agenda in the United States that doesnt get out to the International Audience criminaljustice reform nobody could do for 20 years, he did it. Veterans reform, he did it. The tax code needed Corporate Tax code 30 years, never reformed he did it. He has a long list of these things and he gets no credit for it, other than the economy is booming over in the United States, and it is one of the real Success Stories in the whole world. As you know, a lot of those things youve mentioned are things he has to do in cooperation with congress, that is the nature of the us political system, the checks and balances system, so he cantjust by executive fiat do policy, he has to negotiate with congress and he has had successes, as you mention. The tax code is one very explicit example where he got his way. He is still arguing with congress over things like the wall and all the rest of it. But is he worried about the reputation of his administration for a lack of candour . Does that bother him at all . No. Right. He is not a guy that worries about what people are going to think about him or the future. He does what, at he moment, he thinks is the right thing to do. Because, according to the Washington Post fact checker, as of 9th of october this year, in his 993 days in office, he has made 13,435 false or misleading claims its quite a record. Well, i dont know, some of them, uh, the Washington Post makes some claims that are false and misleading too. I havent gone through and seen what you know, this president is the first unscripted president we have had in recent memory. Most president s speak almost entirely from a script whenever they re in public. He is the complete opposite way and so so much things are being said hes a salesman. I do think it would be better if he got closer and double checked facts before he went public with them, and it does create some issues of confusion. I do not think it purposefully lies. But i do think he once said in one of his books, he likes to exaggerate to make a point and, if you understand his showbiz background, i think it becomes a little more contextual. As a journalist yourself, you are candid enough to admit that in retrospect some of the things you wrote 20 years ago was a bit over the top, some of your commentary, but you do value facts and youve said you do worry about the environment in which we now live, in which kind of, because of social media and because of the way information can spread fast, that fake news is a genuine problem for the media. Is it one thatjournalists like you in the states are taking seriously enough . Lets go back. Two years, three years, the governments spent 50 million, major congressional investigation, saying that there was collusion between the Trump Campaign and the russians. You folks internationally didnt see this but every night it was Headline News on all the Major Networks here in the us. Nothing came of it. The Mueller Report came out and they said they found no evidence of russian collusion. The president waved executive privilege, he did not obstruct justice, he opened it up 500 witnesses. Everybody was allowed to testify. They still tried to say he was not being cooperative after doing that, but they found no evidence of it so, when you say the president exaggerates, lies and spins, i would say this is a problem endemic now to the whole media political landscape, while media sites like newsmax, if you go there we try to have both sides and not try to force on newsmax. Com we try to not force people to take political positions but give them information that they can make informed decisions. Let me ask you about something that theres been a lot of interest in america in recent days and that is why the president was admitted to walter reed hospital. The white house says it was a routine matter. The trouble is, the white houses credibility on these things is being questioned. Well, the white house has said some things that are not always congruent with the facts but i do think that the president he was only there for a brief visit. He is in his 70s, im sure he has medical exams i had an annual physical and ive had to do two or three follow ups and i have no Health Issues whatsoever. Sure, dont they come to you though, if it is an unscheduled thing. Crosstalk. Dont they come to you if its a routine blood test or something, if you are president if youre president . No, because sometimes you have to do examinations that involved machinery, especially for the heart, orfor the brain orfor other parts of your anatomy. So i am not that surprise. I have seen the president. This man is incredibly. Hes almost superhuman with his energy level. He starts at 6 00 in the morning and goes to midnight everyday, and he has been doing this for many years, he thrives on and it and he does this time and time and time again and im sure the holidays coming up, he will be out golfing and being very engaged. He is doing a couple of rallies. I think were going to see no evidence of this. Again, it is a little bit of a media Conspiracy Theory that he is sick so this type of thing he says things that are not accurate and i think the media is highly speculative here. The road to 2020 is an important one for the president. We are only a couple of months now, from the beginning of the process. He at least can be confident that he is his partys nominee likely to be his partys nominee unless of course the impeachment process should prevent that, so hes looking forward to november 2020. Is there a road to victory . There is a very clear road to victory and i think that is one of the reasons why pelosi did this impeachment. The democrats really do not have any way to stop the president. His poll numbers are amazingly strong. I just looked up even in this impeachment almost every poll an economist magazine poll out yesterday had him at 44 approval that is for registered voters. Likely voters is usually three to four points higher. So hes about 50 . For a guy thats gone through what he has gone through with the media, this is an amazing result, and the democrats have a very weak field and they are putting forwards people that are usually associated with the very far left, with very radical proposals, like abolishing private Health Insurance in america. I dont think they are going to go very far. I think the president is very situated in a very strong position to win re election. He did just go out canvassing for two gubernatorial candidates, in the south, in two states that are strongly republican states, kentucky and louisiana, and they both lost. Yeah, well, each of them have their own story. Governor bevan was not very popular and he came very close to winning. I think with the president s help. And he had his own issues. Every other republican in the state won big there. And then the governor of louisiana was a very popular conservative democrat. Took positions like he was very against abortion, for instance a big issue in the south. And he won and it was closer than people thought it would have been because the president was involved. So i think it is a little overstated to say that somehow that was an indication of public viewing about the president. I suppose the question would be, if he stops being a vote winner, whether that might be the issue which would start some of those senators starting to doubt whether he was worth supporting. If they dont think hes going to be a vote winnerfor them, next november, might they then look to their own interests electorally, and start to distance themselves from this republican president . Well, that is politics, isnt it . I mean, nixon was very strong in the beginning of the impeachment. As the economy faltered, his approval numbers went down. Support for him keeping an office evaporated. Bill clinton, you had the opposite effect. He remained very popular, he conducted the nations business, and he sailed through the impeachment but, in fact, some people say he came out stronger after the impeachment effort that failed against him. Chris ruddy, founder and chief executive of newsmax media, thanks very much for being with us on hardtalk. Well, the weekend is just around the corner and the weather, well, you know, is looking a little mixed. Theres bound to be some rain in the forecast. Of course, there is. It wont be raining all the time. A bit of brightness thrown in there as well but on the whole, you know, its autumn, its what wed expect to see this time of the year. And there is indeed a lot of cloud on the satellite picture. 0ne weather system here, another one sitting on top of us is actually an area of low pressure thats over the uk right now, shrouding our skies. Low grey skies with drizzle, mist and mirk. Drizzle particularly across south of the country and central areas. Towards the early hours of friday, probably showers, so bursts of slightly heavier rain, affecting the south coast, maybe wales too. Here, a little bit milder, butjust a tad. I mean, its hardly a difference really. 6, 7, 8 degrees maybe in the south. A little bit colder and clearer in western and central scotland, maybe around 3 degrees, 2 or 3. So heres the forecast for friday, so weve got some showers there in the south of the country, in the south west, some spots of rain also for central and southern scotland, as well as northern ireland. But the real rain arrives in wales and the south west of england, maybe the midlands, later in the afternoon on friday, so this is going to be the soggy bit. So that was friday, this is saturday now, and a blob of rain, cloud and rain, sitting on top of the uk. I think most of us will get at least a few spots of rain. The driest weather across the north of scotland and actually later on saturday it might dry out in london, the south east, possibly east anglia as well. So thats saturday. Sunday is looking a little bit better, we think, and that is because we are going to be inbetween weather systems, so a low pressure approaches the south west of the uk on sunday, one moves out of the way so we are inbetween. This is that inbetween bit here and there are bound to be some sunny breaks so for places like liverpool, manchester, birmingham, london, i suspect sunday might actually end up being a pretty decent day, whereas in the south west, in wales, with that next low approaching, eventually the rain will reach you. It certainly looks like it might be raining quite early in the day i think in places like cornwall. That sunday low is still over us on monday its very slow moving. Normally lows will woosh across the atlantic. These are very sluggish and it decides to park itself across the uk. I think, looking at next week, its going to be very autumnal, very typical for the time of year next week, very changeable. Temperature of around ten or 11 and at times rain. Thats it, bye bye. This is the briefing, im samantha simmonds. Our top story a 27 year old man is found guilty of murdering the british backpacker Grace Millane in new zealand. The shocking scale of inactivity among children worldwide, as experts warn its damaging their health and their brain development. The embattled israeli Prime Minister says he wont step down, in spite of being charged with corruption. The case of the missing treasure that could potentially rewrite english history. Four men are awaiting sentencing. Plus, guilty of conspiring with the cryptoqueen. A us lawyer is convicted over the multi billion dollar 0necoin scam