whistleblower campaign, this was someone outside the white house that was taking such a risk to file a complaint, to get this information to congress in the hopes that something would happen. and that s just a different thing. a different sort of aspect that we re dealing with. what do we know as of tonight about the committee s contact level with the first whistleblower? have they been able to come to an agreement about any testimony from that whistleblower? so we know that the committee wanted as early as last week to speaker view the whistleblower. and that still has not happened. and it is unclear why they ve struggled to do that. they still have not interviewed the whistleblower. there are a lot of complications around. this it is someone whose who have is anonymous, whose identity needs to be protected according to the whistleblower statutes. and interviewing them is not as sim many as just the
back up the whistleblower whose accusations about president trump s phone call with the president of ukraine now form the basis of the fourth impeachment investigation of a president in the history of the united states of america. the new york times headline tonight, second official is weighing whether to blow the whistle on trump s ukraine dealings. the new york times reports, a second intelligence official who was larnlgd by president trump s dealings is weighing whether to file his own formal whistleblower complaint and testify to congress, according to two people briefed on the matter. the official has more direct information about the events than the first whistleblower. the second official is among those interviewed by the intelligence committee inspector general to corroborate the investigations of the original whistleblower. the inspector general, michael atkinson, briefed lawmakers privately on friday about how he substantiated the whistleblower s account. it was not clear
about. it is also very much related to this week s news. and later in the hour, we will look at the ray of hope sent by mitt romney today indicating that at least one republican senator is capable of speaking the truth about the president s conduct this week. and the last word tonight. the last word of this program this week will go to the woman who warned president trump not to do what he did on that phone call with the president of ukraine. and she warned him not to do what did he publicly this week when he requested help in his re-election campaign from china. he was warned. he got a legal warning. not to do that. that warning cape from ellen winetraut. the president did it anyway. she will get tonight s last word. the breaking news of this hour is that there could be a second whistleblower ready to emerge to
whistleblower driving up to congress and going in and sitting down. and for whatever reason, that has still not happened yet. and i m pretty sure the committee wants that to happen. and i ve heard they want that to happen but it still has not gone forward. in your reporting, you mentioned the president and his comments about the whistleblower that that he sinned out the whistleblower s sources. and calling them close to a spy. is this any indication that what the president said about those sources has something to do with provoking this possible second whistleblower to come forward? i don t think so. the president is someone that has been obsessed with leaks, obsessed with loyalty since long before he came to office. and being president has just brought that more to the forefront for him. he wants loyalty from the people around him. and he wants them to keep things
closely held. and that rarely happens and things often spill out. but it is a pre occupation that he has. he wanted jeff sessions, his first attorney general, to go after leakers. leakers were a problem. they needed to be investigated and gone after. and you know, it is a recurring issue that he has had throughout his entire presidency. please stay with us. we re joined now in the conversation by ned price, a former cia analyst and director and spokesperson for the national security council in the obama administration. an msnbc contributor. and hal rains is with us, the executive editor of the new york times and an msnbc contributor. and ned price, i wanted to get your reaction to the reporting that there could be a second whistleblower coming forward to back up the first whistleblower, and that this whistleblower would have more direct knowledge