Starts right now. Today was the deadline for Donald Trumps legal team to file their brief with the senate for trumps upcoming Impeachment Trial. And it looks like trumps lawyers will be arguing that the trial is unconstitutional because trump is no longer president. Im going to use this. Im going to use this next time a cop pulls me over. Im going to be like, well, im no longer speeding. I was. I was. Im not now. Therefore this ticket is unconstitutional. Good morning. And welcome to morning joe. It is wednesday, february 3rd, along with joe, will li and me, we have White House Reporter for the Associated Press, jonathan lemire, former u. S. Senator now an nbc news and msnbc political analyst Claire Mccaskill and politics and Journalism Professor at Morgan State University and msnbc political contributor Jason Johnson is with us. So Donald Trumps second Impeachment Trial kicks off next week. And according to the case against him, the former president s role in the capitol hill riot is,
weekend. let s dive right into the week s top stories. the big story, of, course we have two hot wars for the president to navigate on the world stage. the republican-controlled house has voted to formally authorize its impeachment inquiry into president biden despite failing to provide any evidence of wrongdoing by the president. the vote was strictly along party lines with all 221 republicans voting yes, all 212 democrats voting no. republicans say the move will grant them the ability to better enforce their subpoenas in the courts. house oversight chair republican james comer has accused hunter biden and other biden family members of engaging in, quote, shady business practices. but as we said, has yet to reveal any evidence of wrongdoing or influence peddling by the president himself. so here is what several house democrats said ahead of the vote. see the biden impeachment investigation isn t a who done it. it s a what is it? it s like an agatha christy novel where the
jennifer griffin at the pentagon and the latest information about the balloon. good evening, jennifer. good evening, shannon. fox news has learned the chinese spy balloon could exit u.s. continental territory moving off the east coast in the next 60 hours. the spy balloon first flew over alaska on january 28th, exited u.s. airspace and then reemerged to cross into the continental u.s. on january 31st. passing from canada into idaho. the balloon was most recently seen flying over missouri. the balloon has changed its course. right now we assess that it will probably be over the united states for a few days. the pentagon is not buying china s apology and explanation that this was some sort of civilian research balloon that was blown off course. the spy balloon left montana airspace and moving east over the continental u.s. fox is told it was launched from mainland, china. this is a chinese balloon that has the ability to maneuver. the balloon continues to move eastwar
it s a search that the biden white house had not previously revealed. it raises new questions about the biden administration s insistence it is being completely open about the facts here. white house correspondent jacqui heinrich starts us off live tonight from the north lawn. good evening, jacqui. good evening, bret. despite many claims of transparency, the fbi search of the penn biden center did not appear on timelines given to us by the president s personal attorneys and also separately from the white house counsel s office. it s not clear if fbi agents retrieved any documents from the penn biden center when they combed through it some time in mid november. the fbi and doj won t comment but multiple sources confirm biden s team gave consent and there was no search warrant making it the second known instance in which federal investigators checked over a biden property where his team previously found classified material. the other being the wilmington search earlier this