nothing happened. and when his administration illegally refused to testify nothing happened. now you tell us to wait for the next election? really? really? really? this is why we volunteered, raised money, went door to door and voted in the last election. our founding fathers expected you - congress - to hold a lawless president accountable. and you re doing nothing. nothing. nothing. he broke his oath of office. he s defying you. he s laughing at you. and he s getting away with it. this is our democracy. but congress is part of the system and the system is broken. we have to fix it. need to impeach is responsible for the content of this advertising.
look, if you re not a lawyer at some level you can understand the absurdity of the arguments that were made before this judge. remember i mean, all of four or five weeks ago when the mueller report came out, the mueller report said it showed deference to the office of legal counsel s opinion that the sitting president cannot be indicted. now again, we we can have a long legal debate over that, but let s just assume that they re right. i m not sure they are but let s assume they right. if that is true, if the justice department office of legal counsel is true, then the one other body on the planet that can hold the president accountable and there s no question that our founding fathers in the constitution want to have a mechanism to hold the president accountable. at some level that s kind of what our country is about, it s congress to do that. to say congress does not have the right to the exercise the authorities that create the olc
good evening from new york. i m chris hayes. tonight for the very first time a federal judge has ruled on a key question in the escalating battle between the president and a congress that is attempting to investigate him. the ruling is not good for donald trump at all. you might remember earlier this month the president challenged a house oversight committee subpoena to his accounting firm for financial records relating to the president. his lawyers tried the fairly audacious argument before the judge that congress basically almost has no power to investigate the president. well, today in an expedited ruling, a federal judge laughed their argument out of court, saying, quote, it is simply not fathomable that a constitution that grants congress the power to remove a president for reasons including criminal behavior would deny congress the power to investigate him for unlawful conduct, past or present, even without formally opening an impeachment inquiry. in other words, no, too bad, you
the part of executive offices, tellingly the department s opinion ignores that policy entirely. now chairman nadler s letter goes on to say this about don mcgahn s position now in relation to the president. the president himself has already called your credibility into question. he tweeted less than ten days ago that he was not going to fire bob mueller. denying a sprawl event that you described to special counsel mueller under penalty of felony. in other words, under penalty of perjury. he goes on to say in asking you to make public comments about these events, the president has not only further waived any possible privilege with regard to your testimony, he has also created substantial concerns about acts of witness intimidation and further obstruction of congress s ongoing investigations. and back with us are congressman jim himes and jill wine-banks. congressman, i know you re not a
the judge reminded us of the most historic investigations of presidents that began before impeachment proceedings. twice in the last 50 years, congress has investigate aid sitting president for alleged law violations before initiating impeachment proceedings. it did so in 1973 by establishing the senate select committee on presidential campaign activities and then did so again in 1995 by establishing the special committee to investigate whitewater development corporation and related matters. the former investigation included within its scope potential corruption by president nixon while in office while the latter concerned alleged illegal misconduct by president clinton before his time in office. congress plainly views itself as having sweeping authority to investigate illegal conduct of a president before and after taking office. this court is not prepared to roll back the tide of history. leading off our discussion now is congressman jim hines, a democrat from connecticut and a mem