Transcripts For MSNBCW MSNBC Live With Ali Velshi 20191004

Probes. I dont care if its biden or anybody else. If they can help us, anything they have to do with corruption, i actually feel i have an obligation to do that. The president got a sharb rebuke from mitt romney. He tweeted when the only american citizen, President Trump singles out for chinas investigation is his political opponent in the midst of the democratic nomination process, it is strange kred utility to suggest it is anything other than politically motivated. By all appearances the president s brazen and unprecedented appeal to china and to ukraine to investigate joe biden is wrong and appalling. Now, all of this comes ahead of what is expected to be the latest showdown between the white house and House Democrats. They are expected to subpoena the white house today for documents related to the ukraine call. But the white house is expected to respond with a letter telling House Speaker nancy pelosi that it will not turn over anything unless the house votes to officially authorize an impeachment inquiry. The House Intelligence Committee is hearing from Intelligence Community Inspector General michael atkinson, who received and investigated the whistleblower complaint and found it to be urgent and credible. We expect that briefing to end any moment. We will certainly bring you the news that comes out of it as soon as it does. Lets begin on capitol hill with geoff bennett. Geoff, good to have you. This closeddoor hearing is expected to be wrapping up any minute of we are starting to see some of the representatives trickle out. What, if any, sense have we gone from the Intelligence Communitys Inspector General in terms of what he had to say to lawmakers reporter the closeddoor briefing started at 10 30 eastern. Theyre still getting after it, still doing the q a two floors beneath me in that secure area on the house side. We know adam schiff, house intelligent chairman, says he wants to draw the Intelligence Community Inspector General out on how he handled the whistleblower complaint and how he sought to corroborate details within it. And thats important. Remember, it is michael atkinson, he is the one who deemed the whistle brother complaint to be urgent and credible. Today, just like yesterday, you had members walk in and out of the private room. In some cases they talked to us reporters. Mike quigley, a democrat, said this, and he said it off camera, so i am referring to my notes here. He said the Inspector Generals testimony submits the testimony of how atkinson sought the whistleblower report. What the i. G. Said is he pulled the fire alarm. We have now seen the smoke and the fire. We heard from republican congressman john ratcliffe. He, however, was on camera. Take a look at what he had to say. Chairman schiff should be disqualified from running an investigation where his Committee Members or staff are fact witnesses about contact with the whistleblower and the whistleblower process. Reporter all right. So that is a, what, twodayold republican talking point now. They are trying to make the point because the whistleblower initially approached the House Intelligence Committee with the complaint, that that somehow means adam schiff is compromised. Although if you look at the reporting, first reporting by the New York Times and the statements to include adam schiff himself, he makes clear he had no advanced notice as to the substance of the complaint and that a whistleblower approaching the House Intelligence Committee to figure out how to evlevate Something Like that is a fairly common practice. This is where statements from lawmakers, the spin were getting from lawmakers is not instructive and certainly isnt edifying. So much of the evidence we have in black and white. We have the summary between the call between President Trump and his counterpart, the whistleblower complaint, ig memo, the texts that the democrats released last night, the texts provided by kurt volker. Now we have the Opening Statement from the former u. S. Envoy to ukraine, kurt volker. Yeah. Speaking of kurt volker, lets talk a little bit about that. As you mentioned, we heard from him yesterday. The former u. S. Special representative to ukraine. Today we actually got the Opening Statement from his closed door testimony. What were the top takeaways from that . How does that fit into this puzzle . The full screen you are seeing now, i will get to that in a second. Im going to set it up. In his Opening Statement, there is a link to it on our website right now, he makes clear that he tried to divert Rudy Giuliani, this entire ukrainian influence scheme that Rudy Giuliani was trying to run as he sought to do the president s bidding and trying to push the ukrainian leader to dig up discredited dirt on joe biden. So in his statement, what he essentially says is Rudy Giuliani thought he was getting help and direction from me, kurt volker speak, because he was trying to make him understand that the new leadership in ukraine could be trusted. But heres the part, this is where we can put the graphic back up. This is the part i think that is fairly interesting. He, and this is talking about President Trump. He said ukraine was a corrupt country, full of terrible people. They tried to take me down. In the course of that conversation, he, pwaoepbg President Trump, referenced conversations with phaeurp giuliani. It was clear to me despite the positive news and recommendations being made by this official delegation about the new president , President Trump had a deeply rooted negative view on ukraine rooted in the past. He was clearly receiving other information from other sources, including mayor giuliani that was more negative, causing him to retain this negative view. So that testimony sheds new light on the Text Messages that volker provided the committee, which the committee released last night, which show there was a direct link that the president and Rudy Giuliani were making between having the ukrainian president dig up dirt on joe biden and this facetoface meeting between the ukrainian president and President Trump. That quid pro quo that President Trump and his allies here on the hill say never existed. Geoff bennett, dont go too far arp. Once that briefing is over, we may check back in with you before the hour is up. Lets go from capitol hill to the white house where hans nichols is. Good to have you with us. The president saying he is framing this as all about corruption. It is not about politics. This whole controversy surrounding the phone call concerns the 2020 election, although we heard from mitt romney saying when youre singling out the one politician who is running against the president , it just lacks any kind of credibility. Reporter the president s basic argument is you can have a retrospective investigation about a prospective candidate and its not political in nature. He wants to look back at what biden did either in 2016 or before as his time as Vice President in relation to what his Sons Companies and his sons dealing was in those two countries. But he wants to claim it has nothing to do with 2020. At the same time, he is hinting there will be a investigation from the Justice Department. Have a listen. Is the Justice Department investigating joe biden . Well, that you would have to ask attorney general barr. But i can tell you just as an observer, when i saw biden do with his son, he is pillaging these countries and hes hurting us. This is about corruption. And if you look and you read our constitution and many other things, we i have an on obligation to look at corruption. I have an actual obligation and a duty. Reporter the question is hinting the Justice Department should be doing that. Is the president trying to signal to his toerpblg that he should open an investigation, or is the president aware of an investigation . He just doesnt want to be the one to confirm it. That really stuck out to me as the president spoke to reporters before departing for walter reid on the south lawn earlier today. So, hans, i guess it also raises the question in terms of what we are learning how they plan to handle this impeachment inquiry. What is the overarching strategy here . It is to object fist indicate here . I wouldnt use the term overarching strategy. That means everyone is on the same page, namely the president of the United States on the same page. Officials are trying to calibrate the right response to this. They are aware they can undercut or completely ignore whatever strategy they lay out and he could shift the narratives in new and unique ways as he had done a couple times the past 24 or 48 hours. So there may be an overall strategy. The question is, is it Something Different than just the president in his response . And then you get more into tactics. On a tactical level, they are slow walking, daring House Democrats to go ahead and have a formal impeachment inquiry. They havent sent that letter, but they have every intention to do so. Ayman . Thanks for that, heynckes. Hans. It comes hours after three house committees released Text Messages that corroborate some of the allegations made in the whistleblowers complaint. For example, they include conversations involving the following people. You have President Trumps personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, ambassador kurt volker, ambassador gordon sondland, bill taylor, currently top u. S. Diplomat in ukraine and andriy yermak, a top adviser to involved mere zelensky. July 19th, six days before the president s phone call with ukraines leader, volker said this to sondland after a meeting with giuliani. Most important is for zelensky to say that he will help investigation and address any specific personal issues if there are any. Two days later, taylor texted sondland after a conversation we had with volker that president zelensky is sensitive about ukraine being taken seriously not merely as an instrument in washington domestic reelection politics. To which sondland replied absolutely. Just before the two leaders talked on the phone, volker texted saying heard from the white house. Assuming president z convinces trump he will investigate, get to the bottom of what happened in 2016, we will nail down date for visit to washington. August 28th, yermak texted volker that he needed to talk to him about a political report that the president was holding up military aid to ukraine. Three days later, on september 1st, the same day Vice President mike pence met with president zelensky in poland, taylor texted this to sondland. Are we now saying that Security Assistance and white house meeting are conditioned on investigations . That was a question. Sondland replied, call me. On september 9th, taylor texted sondland saying this time the message to the ukrainians and russians we send with the decision on Security Assistance is key. With the hold, we have already shaken their faith in us. Later that same day he texted sondland, i think it is crazy o to. Then he said no quid pro quo of any kind. Joining us is National Political reporter josh letterman. He dug through all the Text Messages and is here to help put him in context with us. We tried to go through the key points of that exchange. The president pointed to sondlands specific response when asked about the Text Messages. Take a listen to this. The one text message i saw was just about the last text message. Because i dont know i dont even know most of these ambassadors. I didnt even know their names. But the text message the text message that i saw from ambassador sondland, who is highly respected, was theres no quid pro quo. That was the text message that i saw and that nullified everything. All right. So the president there using his line no quid pro quo. Same thing from republican allies. The only person who seemed to express discomfort with what was going on is bill taylor, the top u. S. Diplomat in ukraine. Contextualize this for us. Reporter first of all, just because someone iters the words quid pro quo doesnt make it so. Quid pro quo is ill do a if you do b. That is what is laid out in the Text Messages, even if trump says thats not the case and his ambassador to the eu says, no, no, no, no quid pro quo because trump said so. As far as bill taylor, youre right. The u. S. Ambassador to ukraine, acting ambassador because of trump having recalled the previous ambassador is the only person involved in the texts we have now who is a career diplomat, meaning someone that serves president s of both parties stays in the government. And thats the only person who is really pushing back on this bid to get ukraine to investigate the president s political opponents. The other two ambassadors who are involved in all of this, ambassadors volker and sondland are political appointees, people trump chose to bring into the government. Both of them seem to be working with giuliani to advance the president s goal. To that point, josh, whats interesting about this is volker, as you mentioned appointed by the president so one would assume having a little bit of loyalty to the man who actually appointed him, we saw we at least had a glimpse of ambassador volkers Opening Statements yesterday in which he actually said he was concerned about what Rudy Giuliani, the president s personal attorney, was doing in ukraine and that the narrative that he was pushing as well was also of concern. Does that match what we see from volker in these Text Messages . And if not, how do we explain that or how do we reconcile the two different tones between volker over text message and in a statement to lawmakers investigating this . Reporter no, ayman, it doesnt match at all. When you look at his Opening Statement to the committee, volker was saying he was never aware of any effort by the u. S. To get the ukrainians to investigate joe biden. But in these Text Messages that volker himself turned over to the committee, they discuss having ukraine investigate burisma, the Ukrainian Gas Company that hunter biden was brought into. It has become synonymous in this discussion with investigating the allegations of Biden Corruption in ukraine. So even if he says that, you know, that wasnt they didnt use the word joe biden, hunter biden, they were certainly talking about that. And also having the ukrainians investigate meddling in the 2016 election. Thanks, josh. I want to bring in nancy cook, political white house reporter. Also with us editorinchief of axi axios. I usually see you at 5 00 a. M. In the morning, nancy. Good to see you. Lets begin with taking a closer look at what we just learned there about volker from his Opening Statement. And the interesting thing about it is, this was done behind closed doors and in front of those lawmakers. Volker communicated his knowledge of the call. Heres how he characterized it. I was not on that july 25th phone call. I received the general readout via our charge and my own state Department Staff or. All said it was good, c congratulato congratulatory. They discussed the importance of fighting corruption and promoting reform in ukraine and that President Trump reiterated his invitation to president zelensky to visit the white house. I was not made aware of any reference to Vice President biden or his son which i only learned about when the transcript of the cause was released september 25th. When the point person on ukraine was even in the dark about it. I think thats the real question there. We are starting to learn how the call transcripts, memorandums of the call were treated. After some of these early ones were leaked, we began steps to hide from the broader universe of people who could sort of see these. Now we are seeing point people werent fully read into the calls. Didnt know what was in this writeup of the call, which has been shown as the white house released to it. It shows how the Trump Administration has been struggling with keeping these stories straight, with the various Administration Officials. Who knows what and why did they know those things. What steps were being taken to shield this information from other people. Telling my reporter at axios to try to figure out here. Where was that decision process made to move the calls and narrow the universe of people who could see them, hide them from some of the folks also involved in these policies . Where was that decision made and why specifically was that made will tell us a lot about what was the motivation behind the president on these calls. We keep talking a lot about republican senators and their reaction to all of this. Nancy, i want to get your thoughts about this interesting development. Wall street journal reporting that in fact, back in august republican senator ron johnson of wyoming i believe asked the president about potential quid pro quo of hearing of a potential Pressure Campaign with ukraine. Mr. Johnson, who supports aid to ukraine and is the chairman of a Senate Sub Committee with jurisdiction over the region said, according to the wall street journal, mr. Trump was adamant on the issue. He said expletive deleted, no way. I would never do that. Who told you that . What do you make of that of a republican senator revealing this and this escalation, if you will, of what the president sees as acceptable behavior . Well, i think its very major that senator johnson revealed this to the wall street journal. I think it is a big moment. One thing the white house is watching very closely is how this is playing with republicans on the hill. Its going to be very key for them in order for trump to stay president if the impeachment inquiries really move forward is that they maintain the republican support. Senator johnson coming out and basically letting the public know about the conversation he had with the president and what the president said definitely shows there is a potential crack for senator johnson and perhaps a few thers. This is all while republicans are going very silent on defending trump or trying to cast the call as no big deal. We are showing the more and more time that goes on and more and more information that comes out about this inquiry, the more and moreirense will have to take a side on whether they want to speak out or support the white house. The senator from wisconsin, not wyoming. I apologize. Nancy, let me get your thoughts about those on the House Intelligence Committee echoing demands for adam schiff to step down. What does this tell you about where this party is headed in terms of its defense of the president . What is their strategy in all of this . Well, so far the republicans have really fallen in line with the president and the white house. And theres not really one si single strategy to combat this. The president is throwing a lot of things at the wall to see what will stick. Some of the messages is about this in query is just partisan. It is under about undermining the whistleblowers credibility, undermining schiffs credibility is a huge part of it. If there is a strategy coming out of the white house and there isnt a coordinated one at this point, it is the president just trying to create confusion in the minds of American Voters on what actually happened, whether or not what he asked the president of ukraine to do was illegal. It is definitely trying to muddy the waters. And we saw Rudy Giuliani do this a lot to great effect with t the everything surrounding the mueller investigation. And i see them doing the same playbook here. To that point, the Trump Victory committee holding a retreat this weekend. What does that say about, a, the mentality of the president. Are his supporters unfazed by all of this . It seems the base is still very much sticking by the president. 100 . Theyre raising money off of this issue. We have a general news in box at axios i read every day. I get emails constantly from supporters defending the president saying there is no information here that he did was impeachable, that he was trying to root out corruption. The point nancy made was dead on had. It is trying to spread confusion, all of these different strands of information so at the end of the day people are like who knows what to believe. We believe he was just going after corruption and there was no quid pro quo. It was 100 on that strategy which is fascinating to go see if anyone breaks. Chuck grassley has come to the defense of the whistleblower. Now ron johnson saying the president wasnt truthful to him. The key thing is to see if more republican senators begin to wobble. And marco rubio, totally dismissing what the president had to say about china as well. Right. Great to have both of you with us as always. Thank you. Thanks. And House Democrat weighs in on where the impeachment inquiry stands right now. Waging a battle over witness testimonies. The fight for the union vote. We will hear from the president of the seiu before joe biden takes the stage at the president ial forum. You are watching msnbc. E watchi. So chantix can help you quit slow turkey. Along with support, chantix is proven to help you quit. With chantix you can keep smoking at first and ease into quitting so when the day arrives, youll be more ready to kiss cigarettes goodbye. When you try to quit smoking, with or without chantix, you may have nicotine withdrawal symptoms. Stop chantix and get help right away if you have changes in behavior or thinking, aggression, hostility, depressed mood, suicidal thoughts or actions, seizures, new or worse heart or blood vessel problems, sleepwalking, or lifethreatening allergic and skin reactions. Decrease alcohol use. Use caution driving or operating machinery. Tell your doctor if youve had Mental Health problems. The most common side effect is nausea. Talk to your doctor about chantix. New pasta and grill combos starting at 9. 99. Only at applebees. Hey. Hey. You must be stevens phone. Now you can take control of your home wifi and get a notification the instant someone new joins your network. Only with xfinity xfi. Download the xfi app today. Welcome back, everyone. Today was deadline day for secretary of statement mike pompeo as lawmakers on capitol hill await the state deposits response to the subpoenas asking for documents related to the july 25th phone call with president zelensky. While pompeo slammed requests to hear from Relevant State Department officials, he did indicate he would at least respond somehow to the request for those documents by today, october 4th. But now that we know that the white house will not comply with congresss demands until the house votes on the impeachment inquiry, what does all of this mean for the state of the inquiry and how do democrats charge forward in the face of more resistant from the white house and the administration . Joining me now is congressman from texas. Thank you very much for taking the time to join us. Lets begin with the last point that i just mentioned there. We know House Democrats, they are expecting to hear from a number of state Department Officials next week. They certainly have that on the docket. Given the signals coming out from the white house, including the secretary of state, how optimistic are you, sir, about the ability to move forward if these committees hit more stonewalling . Were going to move forward regardless. The committees have lots of power, obviously. Theyre led by very competent individuals. Were going to lay the process out for the people so we can present facts to them on this. We are learning more and more every day without them releasing very much. We are learning more and more every day. And were going to continue. And i think its incumbent on them to now prove to the American Public that, especially with the polling going against the white house, that they dont have anything to hide. Okay. Let me just get some clarity on that. You said Going Forward we will continue. Certainly the democrats will push forward. Legally speaking, tactically speaking, what do you have at your disposal to go forward that can answer some of the questions that are still lingering without this becoming the delayed drawnout process like the Mueller Report over two years that can see, as we saw from the president , constant confusion and attacks on the Democratic Committee leaders . Exactly. Chairman schiff can talk more about the process, obviously. He chairs the Relevant Committee that be overseeing a lot of this. But theres been information that has obviously been found out. And i think there is going to be more every day. It seems like there is something in the news cycle every day now on this. Something new that is breaking. And, again, there are certainly things that the committee will be able to fiend out through their hearings that they are going to conduct by interviewing certain people. And i believe that, again, this is just the very beginning of this process. But were going to go through this and were going to move forward. There is nothing in the house rules. Theres nothing in the constitution that says that we have to have a vote on this first like the president is suggesting. We are going to continue to have this impeachment inquiry and were going to try to find as much information as we can with whats available to us. As we learn more information, including some of the Text Messages we saw illustrating u. S. Ambassadors working to persuade the ukrainian deposit to publicly commit to investigating the bidens, do you support voting on articles of impeachment . Why not hold the vote today or tomorrow . No. Because my personal opinion is that the American Public wants to see everything laid out before the public so they can see for themselves that this is not a political process, that this is very serious. Thats why we want to have an inquiry so we can present for the people, hey, this is what the president has done. This is what has been presented to us. And you want to have the fullbacking of the American Public behind you. There are obviously going to be people that will always support donald trump. As he said, he can stand in the middle of times square and shoot people and people will still be backing him. Again, its incumbent upon them and a benefit to them to cooperate with the democrats, to cooperate with the house panels, that are looking into this to show that they have nothing to hide. All right. Congressman mark visi of texas, thank you for joining us this hour. Up next, the president of one of the biggest labor unions in america joins me with what her Union Members are looking for in a 2020 candidate. Youre watching msnbc. 0 candida. Youre watching msnbc. announcer people with type 2 diabetes are excited about the potential of onceweekly ozempic®. In a study with ozempic®, a majority of adults lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than 7 and maintained it. 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The seiu is one of americas largest and most politically involved labor unions. In fact, it represents 2 Million Health care workers, janitors, Security Officers and Public Service employees of all walks of life. Joining me now is the president of the seiu mary kay henry. Good to talk to you again. Good to be with you. Thank you. What are you looking forward to hearing from the candidates at the forum . I spoke to you a couple weeks ago and asked you the same question. Im curious to get your thoughts about have the issues changed and what are the pressing issues . Theyve been the same as when we talked about, ayman. This summit shows that 2020 president ial candidates understand they have to answer the demands of working people for unions for all. And that means rewriting the rules in this economy to put more power in the hands of working people so that we can get to a bargaining table and negotiate a better life for ourselves and families and all communities in this country. Because the people i just left down at the westin hotel understand we are facing the worst economic and political crisis in our generation. And weve had it with the level of racial and economic in equality in our lives. So i know that Vice President is expected to take the stage in about half an hour from now. You will hear from total of six democratic candidates. Between today and tomorrow, will you be listening for what they have to say about the topic of impeachment . Do you want them to address the impeachment inquiry into President Trump . You know, our union has been on record supporting the inquiry, ayman. But no worker in our union or in the fight for the union has raised impeachment as a threshold question for evaluating 2020 candidates. We want to know about health care. We want to know about immigration. And we want to understand if theyre going to respond to our call for four big changes to write all workers into labor law so every worker has a chance to form a union. From the points that you have identified, and since we have been speaking about this regularly and the candidates have been making that pitch over and over, have any of the candidates addressed those issues to your satisfaction . Is there a candidate out there that you are willing to say we like what he or she is saying about the topics that you just highlighted . Well, we think candidates have been responding to the demands of working people who have flooded into the streets. Fast food workers, teacher. We have been supporting the gm autoworkers that are on strike. And we think that this Situation Requires a president ial candidate to be clear about bold and aggressive change so that working people can raise wages and create good jobs all across the service and care economy by getting the next president to set a National Bargaining table, every tax dollar creates good union jobs, to make cities and stakes empower working people, and that every basic proposal to fix the economy, health care for all, green new deal, college for all, has to include a way for those workers in those sectors of our economy to be able to join together and take minimum wage poverty job and make them good union familysustaining jobs. Mary kay, you mentioned there are still a lot of issues that need to be addressed. At the same time you have the jobs report that came out today. I believe 136,000 new jobs added. Unemployment down 3. 5 , the lowest it has been in 50 years. How do you reconcile that with what youre stphaeaying . 64 million jobs in this country dont pay enough to support themselves or their family. We have too many people in this nation working two and three jobs and living in poverty while corporations earn record profits and ceo comp is at an alltime high. That level of in equality is not going to create inclusive growth for everybody in this country. That is why we are making a demand at this summit and unions for all workers no matter what job they do. Mary kay henry thank you for taking time to join us with your thoughts. Appreciate it. Thank you. Coming up, maust says hackers link to the iranian government tried to hack a president ial candidate. And reports of a second whistleblower complaint co clouding the Trump Administration. Youre watching msnbc. Youre watching msnbc. Saturdays happen. Pain happens. Aleve it. Aleve is proven better on pain than tylenol. When pain happens, aleve it. All day strong. 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Congressman adam schiff, congressman eliot engel, chairman of the committee on Foreign Affairs and elijah cummi cummins, all sent a letter requesting key documents from Vice President mike pence as part of the impeachment inquiry of president donald trump. We will bring you more information about that request from capitol hill as soon as we get it. This afternoon, maust announced a group of hackers it believes to be linked to the iranian government tried to compromise email accounts associated with the u. S. President ial campaign. The Company Announced in a statement online that, quote, the targeted accounts are associated with the u. S. President ial campaign, current and former u. S. Government officials, journalists covering global politics, and prominent iranians living outside iran. The company noted their Cyber Attacks on the campaign specifically were unsuccessful. Joining me now with more on all of this, tony rahm, contributor and senior tech reporter for the Washington Post. Good to have you with us. Cisa, part of dhs, responded to the incident in a statement. I will put that up on the screen. Cisa is aware of the report from maust about iranian actors targeting u. S. Accounts and we are working with them to assess and mitigate impacts. While much of this activity can likely be attributed to runofthemill Foreign Intelligence Service work, mausts claims that a president ial campaign was targeted is yet more evidence that our adversaries are looking to undermine our democratic institutions. What more do we know about this intent . Right. We certainly know what the department of Homeland Security said. It is broadening influence, security thats that hang over the 2020 president ial election much as they did with 2016. We know the operation is described by microsoft wasnt particularly sophisticated but they did target thousands of accounts. They managed to attack a few hundred of them. They compromised four. And the four they compromised actually werent president ial candidates or sitting government officials. But they certainly had targeted some of those individuals. So it really just shows in the eyes of lawmakers and experts here the need for these folks to be on guard as we get closer to the 2020 election. To that point really quickly, do we know who the president ial candidate might have been . Generally, what is the cybersecurity level of most of the candidates running now from your reporting and others . Right. We dont yet know which campaign had been targeted here. Microsoft isnt saying. And a number of the campaigns arent saying right now. There are currently mixed reports as to what may have happened with the Trump Campaign given the fact that President Trump and iran have been at logger heads over the nuclear deal. To your point with the security of these campaigns after the 2016 election, there has been more investment and interest in kaeug taking care of this data. These folks, especially on the democratic side, know what happened to Hillary Clinton and the emails of her aides and how they ended up on wikileaks. Earlier this week they sent out a security alert to campaigns telling them about this iranian incident and warning them how to safeguard data in the future. So there is certainly more awareness than there used to be. Do we know more about this identified group as phosphorus. It has been around for quite some time now. You can look back to 2014, for example, when we had heard researchers pointing to this group of iranianbacked hackers going after government officials in an earlier sanctions ballttl. We have seen them targeting journalistings, trying to break into accounts. We havent heard of them as we are now. Microsoft has been playing cat and mouse game with phosphorus for quite some time. Finally, do we know what they may be looking for . What kind of information does this group want to go . Obviously its probably related to the elections. Is it compromising them when looking who they are going after y are trying to seek . What they were seeking here. Tly iranianing thatters or any hackers could be after a few things. In some cases, it is about causing damage. In other case, it is coming away with information you can then put online which creates reputational risks. They point out as tensions between the u. S. And iran have worsened, these kinds of things have gone worse too. So you are seeing social Media Companies now talking about iranianbacked disinformation that is proliferating as folks in iran try to push political messages that are sympathetic to the government there. Tony, thank you very much. Appreciate that. Lets cross back to the breaking news story we were telling you about. The house intelligence Foreign Affairs and oversight committees all seeking documents from Vice President mike pence as part of their impeachment inquiry into President Trump and this ukraine scandal. Geoff bennett is back with us on capitol hill. Tell us how significant this is and what we have learned reporter in the last 10 minutes, the chairman of the house intelligence, oversight and Foreign Affairs Committee Want them to turn over any documents that they see material all connected to this ukraine controversy. Im going to read directly from this announcement. Recently public reports raised questions about any role you may have played in conveying or reinforcing the president s stark message to the ukrainian president. The report include significant references to a member of our staff who may have participated directly in the july 25th, 2019 call. Documents you may have reviewed, including records of the call, and your meeting in warsaw during which you reportedly discussed the administrations hold on the u. S. Security assistance in ukraine. So that is the letter from the chairman making clear their request to the Vice President. As early as today, this is our reporting, we expect the white house to send a letter to the House Speaker saying theyre do the position of the administration. Until or unless House Speaker nancy pelosi brings the Impeachment Vote to the full fore. Now pelosi and other leaders have made it clear that nobody else has legal standing to make that argument. They said if there is any more obstruction from the Trump Administration, they will chalk that up to potentially being a new article of impeachment which would be congressional obstruction. Beyond that you have adam schiff. He says they will draw an adverse inference to any more stonewalling which is to suggest that they will assume that the underlying allegation is true. Otherwise why would the Trump Administration be trying to cover it up . So even as the white house by punting some of these reports, democrats are making clear they dont see legal action anymore as a remedy for this. They are moving full steam ahead with this impeachment inquiry. Thank you very much for that update, geoff. Joining me now is barbara mcquaid. Good to have you with us. What do you make of this development now that youve got those three committees of the house, the oversight, the intel and the Foreign Affairs Committee Also bringing the Vice President , his documents alleging that perhaps a member of his staff might have been on the call . What does that say to you . Well, the circle is getting larger of people who might have information. And as an investigator i was always very pleased to have more sources of information if all of your eggs are in one basket of one potential conversation, sometimes people can speak in coded language and its not clear whats going on. But the more participants you have in a scheme, the more likely you are to get to the bottom of what really happened and get to the truth. So i think its a very Good Development in the quest for the truth. What would you want to find out from the Vice President s office . Because hes come out and hes kind of taken the same talking points as the president has. Hes made this about corruption. But given that hes also been pushed forward to be the face of the saying he too has gone to ukraine and has met with zelensky and talked to him about corruption. Is he implicated in this as well to the same degree as the president , or can he also fall back on the argument that, hey, are i was just kind of following orders and all of this . Well, it depends on the facts and following orders is certainly something we expect Vice President s to do but not following illegal orders. And so i think we want to know what the facts are here. If he too is engaging in an abuse of power, he too could be subject to impeachment. I know that people want to frame this as getting to the bottom of corruption, but the key component here that makes it to me so very different from just playing political hardball with another Foreign Government is the withholding of military ai. D. That congress had already approved and wanted to deliver to ukraine because it was in the best interest of the United States to assist ukraine in fending off russia, to withhold that, that is in the best interest of American Foreign policy in exchange for a personal campaign benefit would in my mind be n abuse of power. If Vice President pence is participating in that scheme, then i think he too could have some exposure for impeachment. All right. Barbara mcquade, thank you very much. Up next, another whistleblower. New reporting that an irs official filed a complaint that someone in the Treasury Department might have interfered with the audit of the president or Vice President s tax returns. Youre watching msnbc. Announcer fidelity is redefining value with zero account fees for brokerage accounts. And zero minimums to open an account. At fidelity those zeros really add up. Maybe ill win saved by zero doprevagen is the number oneild mempharmacistrecommendeding . Memory support brand. You can find it in the vitamin aisle in stores everywhere. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. Pain happens. Saturdays happen. Aleve it. Aleve is proven better on pain than tylenol. When pain happens, aleve it. All day strong. Were oscar mayer deli fresh your very first sandwich,m. Your mammoth masterpiece. And. Whatever this was. Because we make our meat with the good of the deli and no artificial preservatives. Make every sandwich count with oscar mayer deli fresh. Work so hard give it everything you got strength of a lioness tough as a knot rocking the stage and we never gonna stop all strength, no sweat. Just in case you forgot all strength. No sweat secret. All strength. No sweat. There areand the best. S. Which egg tastes more farmfresh and delicious . Only egglands best. With more vitamins d and e and 25 less saturated fat . Only egglands best. Better taste, better nutrition, better eggs. There is a second whistleblower complaint thats getting a lot of attention on capitol hill today, believe it or not. The Washington Post reports that an official at the Internal Revenue service has filed a complaint detailing how he was told that a political appointee at the Treasury Department tried to improperly interfere with the tax return audit of President Trump or Vice President mike pence. That is according to multiple people familiar with that document. Joining me now is Washington Post reporter jeff stein whose name appears on the byline of the very latest reporting we have on that story. Jeff, good to have you with us. What more can you tell us about this . Well, we just got breaking news just a few minutes oohing that the treasury Inspector General has opened up an investigation into the Treasury Department and the Trump Administrations handling of congresss demands for President Trumps tax returns. And as part of that investigation from the Inspector General, it seems likely but not definite but likely that they will be looking into this whistleblower complaint, and the question surrounding whether there was potential interference with the audit of the president or Vice President. Similar to the story that weve been following with the Intelligence Community, what, if anything, do we know about the irs whistleblower in terms of the what he or she was able to put together in terms of the evidence and what is their argument or their complaint based on . So its a good question. I have not read the document yet. Ill let you know when i do. But it is our understanding from Administration Officials who are sort of trying to downplay this report to us that this was uncorroborated secondhand information and therefore not as big of a deal. That said, the irs whistleblower who we spoke to, he refused to engage at all in the substance of the complaint, wouldnt tell us who it was about, what it was about, any details about it at all. But he did take the opportunity to tell us that he takes it seriously, that this isnt, in his view, a partisan attempt to embarrass the Trump Administration and that he wants an investigation into this. He also said that, you know, he has concerns about the current political atmosphere in which there have been a number of criticisms of whistleblowers, and the president obviously saying that he wants to speak to the other whistleblower in the Intelligence Community case and that he, you know, this whistleblower is concerned about the potential deterrent effect of those kinds of attacks. All right, jeff stein live for us at the Washington Post in washington d. C. Thank you very much for that important story. Once again another scandal in washington, d. C. That. Wraps up this hour for me. Im going to see you sunday night at 7 00 p. M. Eastern for kasie dc right here on msnbc. Deadline white house with Nicolle Wallace starts right now. Hi, everyone. Its 4 00 in new york. And then there were two, two potential smoking guns, two inside accounts from trump allies, people in touch with both the white house and the ukrainians, people who suspected that military aid for ukraine had become tied to the Ukrainian Government committing to conducting an investigation that would damage Donald Trumps political opponents. The first was u. S. Diplomat bill taylor who wrote this in an encrypted message that was made public by the congressional committees investigating the matter. Quote, are we now saying that Security Assistance and white house meeting are conditioned on investigations . That same career diplomat, bill taylor, also wrote this. Quote, as i said on the phone, i think its crazy