Yes, that is basically it. I dont know if he wanted to be there while trump was making his speech about the change of staff. Phil rucker, as condensed as they are, all of our Print Colleagues at the white house are writing the Lookback Piece about the Reince Priebus era, all six months of it. And i know you contend he was something less than a Chief Of Staff in full always . You know, yeah, i think that is exactly right. Look, this is an establishment republican who became close to donald trump over the course of the campaign. Tried to help integrate the party in the trump world. Tried to do it in washington to help trump govern and pass his agenda on capitol hill. But he was beset time and time again by the kind of chaos and disorder that has really defined all of trumps enterprises,
including this white house. It was so remarkable, that Reince Priebus was so belittled and demeaned at work, the backbiting was so intense and vicious. I talked to one staffer, the president said that Rei
fiona hill to tell white house lawyers according to the testimony. phil, you have reported on the frenzy that followed the first word of the whistle-blower. it seems to me it has nowhere to go now but to continue as this is all ukraine all the time. yeah. i think that s right, brian. this is incredible reporting tonight by the new york times, and congratulations to them because it takes you right to the belly of the beast. we re not talking about intelligence officials or national security councilmembers whose names we do not know. we re talking about giuliani, bolton, mulvaney. these are the key figures in president trump s orbit. there have been a lot of questions of late about john bolton, the national security adviser who departed only a month or so ago very abruptly and on bad terms with president trump. there have been questions about what he might know, what he might have witnessed, what he might have been aware of regarding the conduct and the relationship with ukraine, bot
we ll see what this explosive testimony does, though, to their opinions about this. they ve done their level best to stay quiet, but as phil points out, the idea that obviously john bolton has known all along about the way these decisions were made, who was involved from mike pompeo to mike pence, from mick mulvaney to rick perry, people at the highest level of the government, if not conspiring, knowing exactly what was going on. and it s making republicans incredibly nervous because they have no idea from day to day what revelations will come next. wow. michael steele, what she just said. exactly. a.b. just laid it out. she laid out the indictment of the situation as it stands right now in such a way that, yeah, there are a lot of nervous republicans coming back to washington this week. lindsey graham can be on point all day long. it doesn t matter. the vice president can go to turkey. he can go to the moon at this point. it doesn t matter because the
he often changes his mind. we ll see what this explosive testimony does, though, to their opinions about this. they ve done their level best to stay quiet. but as phil points out, the idea that obviously john bolton has known all along about the way these decisions were made, who was involved, from mike pompeo to mike pence, to mick mulvaney, rick perry. people at the highest level of government, if not conspiring, knowing exactly what was going on. it s making republicans he incredibly nervous. they have no idea from day-to-day, what revelations will come next. wow. michael steele, what she just said. exactly. a.b. just laid it out. she laid out the indictment of the situation as it stands right
good evening and welcome to you all. mr. rucker, i would like to begin with you. i have to begin with your cross-town competition over at the times. in the last few minutes they ve moved this story. the headline is bolton objected to ukraine pressure campaign, calling giuliani a hand grenade. this is by our friends, peter baker and nick fandos and reads in part, the effort to pressure ukraine for political help provoked a heated confrontation inside the white house last summer that so alarmed john bolton, then national security adviser, that he told an aide to alert white house lawyers, house investigators were told monday. quote, i am not part of whatever drug deal rudy and mulvaney are cooking up, mr. bolton told fiona hill to tell white house lawyers, according to the testimony. phil, you have reported on the frenzy that followed the first word of the whistle-blower. it seems to me it has nowhere to