of the vanderbilt university jon meacham. and kurt bardella is with us this morning. and nbc news and msnbc law analyst and editor and chief of law fair, benjamin wittes. donald trump likes to frame his presidency in historic terms, and that s exactly how it s playing out in washington right now. for only the fourth time in history, congress is considering removing the commander and chief from office. it s a process that s likely to have the 45th president impeached by next week. the house judiciary committee will reconvene in just a few hours to continue debating the two articles of impeachment. the committee is expected to vote later today to sent measure to the full house. each measure delivered in an opening statement yesterday, the session lasting for hours.
security analyst, michael schmidt who will be with us in just a moment. we re miccing him up. nbc news and name law analyst and editor and chief of law fair benjamin wittes is with us this morning, as well as julia ainslie. at 9:00 a.m. this morning, house democrats are expected to hold a news conference to announce articles of impeachment against the president. five sources familiar with the discussions tell nbc news democrats will bring two charges, abuse of power and obstruction of congress. two people familiar with the matter tell the washington post that under the current plan, the judiciary committee would vote on the articles on thursday setting up a floor vote next week. this comes a day after the release of the 434-page ig report that found the fbi was justified in opening the 2016
james comey in the just released inspector general s report. he should be ashamed of himself. and there was an official statement that called comey quote a proven liar and leaker words often used by the president himself. you almost want to laugh, joe. you almost want to laugh. actually, i couldn t stop from laughing. what an overstatement especially considering the source. let s bring in nbc news and msnbc law analyst and editor-in-chief of lawfare, ben wittes. he s out with a new piece diving into what the report says. what a fascinating report, about 80, 90% of it is jack webb, just the facts, ma am, then the last 10% of the report reads like a talk radio script. the two don t go together. i guess though a lot of people
he called the hearing, quote, rigged on twitter this morning. so our big question today is, what could congress learn from trump s former right-hand woman? joining me now, nbc news correspondent kelly o donnell. she is live across capitol hill from here. daily beast politics reporter and msnbc contributor betsy woodruff and law fair editor in chief and msnbc law analyst, ben witt wittes. thank you all for being here. kelly, let s start with what we know so far about how today has gone. it sounds like democrats are pretty incredulous about the questions that the white house has refused to allow her to answer, apparently even intervening when they asked her to simply say where her office was in the white house. yes, one of the congressmen we talked to said that was a real question and of course, that would lead to the proximity she had to the president and that was among the many questions where white house lawyers raised the objection and she did not answer that. we do know that we re
facts of the case and the investigation he did or was it based on the guidance that governs and these decisions which is to say you can t indict a sitting president. he was telling us if he says that, if he says they made a decision not to prosecute that makes it more important to get full access to the report and underlying documents. the justice department would be saying she above the rule of law and they need to hold him accountable here. mike, we ll be checking in with you as we get anymore details i want to bring in our panel now to join this conversation. joining me onset is kimberly. ben, editor and chief of law fair at msnbc law analyst. nice to be with you guys all today. we thought we might have new