Himself to intimidate a witness who has a legal obligation to be here today. This committee will hear mr. Mcgahns testimony even if we have to go to court to secure it. We will not allow the president to prevent the American People from hearing from this witness. Well not allow the president to block congressional issue pea n subpoenas putting himself and his allies above the law. Kelly, where are we at now . Reporter one of the important things we have to be looking for is changes in the force field of democratic reaction. We have known for a long time theres Many Democrats who believe theres been offenses committed by the president that would rise to the level of impeachment. Thats a different calculation than whether there should be an impeachment proceeding that begins which can be a long process. At the moment its leadership of the Democratic House and Committee Chairs who are saying the better route is to go Committee Work by Committee Work. Things we have seen them playing out w
Good evening once again rather from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. Day 851 of this trump administration. A couple of big stories have dropped just in these past few hours. Tonight we learned don mcgahn as we said who is the former white House Counsel, one of the leading voices in the Mueller Report and now a private citizen will ignore a subpoena to testify tomorrow morning before the house Judiciary Committee. The white house apparently told him not to show. Tonight the democrats are threatening what they are calling all Enforcement Mechanisms, more on that later. Another big story late today, federal judge ruled against trump in his fight to keep his financial records that would include tax returns out of the hands of congress. And Michael Cohen is both in prison and in the news. Weve learned he testified that one of the president s attorneys encouraged him to make false statements to congress. But lets go back to former white house lawyer now private citizen don mcgahn
Im Yasmin Vossoughian alongside nbc News White House correspondent jeff bennett. Well start with the fight over the Trump Administrations stonewalling of democratic investigations escalating. The white house has directed former counsel don mcgahn to defy a congressional subpoena to testify before the House Judiciary Committee this morning. In a letter to chairman Jerrold Nadler, white House Counsel said the Justice Department has quote advised me that mr. Mcgahn is absolutely immune from compelled congressional testimony with respect to matters occurring during his service as a Senior Adviser to the president. He went on to say the president has directed mr. Mcgahn not to appear. A lawyer for mcgahn said the former white House Counsel would respect the president s instruction and not appear today. Chairman Jerrold Nadler says the committee will still meet this morning adding mr. Mcgahn is expected to appear as legally require and if he did not testify quote the first thing were going t
Nuts, but its where we are. And because its where weve been for several years now, we have adjusted, and because of that, we talked here about whether its even news anymore when the president lies. But it is. Of course it is. Because it always matters when the president of the United States gets up on the world stage and lies, no matter how big the lie or little. So tonight, keeping them honest, we will be debunking them, but also focusing on how this parade of little lies may be making it tough to take anything the president says seriously, especially those things we really need to take seriously. First, quickly, the little lies, number one, the protests. I did see a small protest today when i came, very small. So a lot of it is fake news, i hate to say. But you saw the people waving the american flag, waving your flag. It was tremendous spirit and love. It was great love. There was an alliance. And i didnt see the protesters until just a little while ago. And it was a very, very smal
Charlottesville, virginia. He said there were, quote, some very fine people on both sides. Very fine people on both sides . Those words, the president of the United States assigned a moral equivalence between those spreading hate and those with the courage to stand against it. And in that moment i knew the threat to this nation was unlike any i had ever seen in my lifetime. I wrote at the time that were in the battle for the soul of this nation. That is even more true today. We are in the battle for the soul of this nation. I believe history will look back on four years of this president and all he embraces as an aberrant moment in time. But if we give donald trump eight years in the white house, he will forever and fundamentally alter the character of this nation. And with that, the former Vice President officially entered the fray and immediately catapulted to the top of the pack. And now that that announcement is out of the way, biden is poised to hit the campaign trail hard. We got