again, nancy pelosi has made it clear they want to make a case that is clear and simple and convincing. having said that, if you believe that you don t just have to convince the american people who will then put pressure on members of congress to vote for impeachment, that you might actually have to win over some of those members of congress themselves, what is the strongest national security argument in all of this that might possibly have some people sit up and take notice? anything out there that we haven t thought of or they haven t already heard? i m not sure if it is anything that hasn t been said already, but just to reinforce the fact that the sort of machinations with ukraine was always about trying to get to the national security interests with russia. because of russian aggression in ukraine and certainly influence in other parts of the world that are diametrically opposed to our national interests. so this is also a story about combatting russian aggression
also given that in the past bill barr has been willing to make statements in public to serve is the president s political needs. so it is inappropriate to make the request because the department of justice has to maintain its independence from the white house to be able to do its work effectively and with independence and integrity. whether bill barr if he actually had made the statement, would it have made a difference, it might have made a difference politically because impeachment as you said is a political process. it is not a criminal law matter. so maybe it would have helped the president with the public who in turn could have put pressure on their members in congress if bill barr had been willing to make a statement saying that it wasn t illegal, backing up the president s view that this was totally fine. so it might have made a difference politically. legally it would not have made a difference and in terms of whether or not this could be deemed an impeachable offense, it also
congress as well. so he was left in this awful position where if he gave that interview, he would be seen as interfering in the political investigations of the united states elections, something he didn t want to do. in the meantime, rudy giuliani who tweeted maybe what he thought was a kind of self-defense last night against criticism that he was involved where he shouldn t have been, here is the tweet. the investigation i conducted concerning 2016 ukranian including and corruption was done solely as a defense attorney to defend my client against false charges that kept changing as one after another were disproven. but help us break this down? because is rudy giuliani admitting that there was this foreign shadow, foreign policy, in ukraine on behalf of the president personally? yes, he seems to be admitting that he was there engaged in coordination with ukranian officials and other people there doing the president s personal business. and that is the most damning
communications. and so his defense, when he is contradicting mihis testimony before congress, in his emails, his defense is going to have to be, yes, i m a liar, but i was lying in my emails to my friends and my associates, i wasn t lying to congress. it is never an appealing defense in a perjury case when your defense is, well, yeah, i m a great big liar, but i was lying on other occasions. this is a strong case for the prosecution. glenn kirschner, ken delanian, thanks. u.s. prosecutors say the saudis were using twitter to silence their critics. the latest twist in the game mu of risk with social media next. sometimes, the pressures of today s world can make it tough
difference. we talk about a lot of different things, peter baker, in the context of this ongoing investigation and we know that the democrats have been very clear publicly and behind closed doors saying listen, we have to have one clear concise and consistent charge against the president, we have to be able to make this understandable to the american people in a way that the mueller report clearly was not. having said this, there is something so fascinating in your paper i had to bring it up. it suggests that maybe we could be in a very different place right now. times is reporting that president zelensky was going to give an interview on the bidens but quoting the story, word of the freeze in military aid had leaked out and congress was in an uproar two days before the scheduled interview, the trump administration released the assistance and mr. zelensky s office quickly canceled the interview. what more can you tell us about