That they are losing something. That tyre being attacked. Rds all this stuff thats, for the reco, not real. Brangham all that and more on tonights pbs newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by Consumer Cellular believes that wireless plans should reflect the amount of talk, text and data that you use. We offer a variety of no contract wireless plans for nsumercellular. Tvong ine a and with the ongoing support of these institutions this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. Urand by contributions to bs thank you. Om viewers like you. Brangham on the record the public phase of thqu impeachment y escalates. Lisa desjardins explains how a clearer picturis emerging of the Trump Administrations approach to ukraine from those at the center of the storm. Desjardins at the capil, the impeachment battle, for now, is on paper. But no less intense as today, committees released transcripts they are Gordon Sondland, the u. S. Ambassador to the European Union and kurt volker,ormer both were lead offls for. Ukraine policy. In the 739 pages released today, among the headlines sondland revised a critical piece of testimony about whether the u. S. Tied nearly 400 million in d money to specific demands from ukraine. Yesterday, sondland filed this, saying he now remembers telling a top ukrainian official that resumption of millions in u. S. Aid would likely not occur until ukraine provided the corruption statement. The u. S. Wanted, saying ukraine would investigate the 2016 election and the Energy Company which hired hunter biden. A second headline sondland insisted the president himself firmly did not want a quid pro e o. And re key point the continued influence of President Trumps attorn Rudy Giuliani whose name appears more than 150 times in sonands testimony. Sondland is a pivomil characte, ted by mr. Trump to be the ambassador to the e. U. In 2017 and has previously owned Boutique Hotel chain on the west coast. And he is a longtime g. O. P. Donor who had given one Million Dollars to mr. Trumps inaugural fund. While ukraine is not in the European Union, sondland has said the president tped him to work on the issue. He says there were three amigos working on that policy, himself, Energy Secretary rick perry, and volker, whose career path sharply contrasts with the other two. He is a threedecade diplomat who has served under democrati and republican president s president george w. Bush named him to be the u. S. Representative to nato. And in 2017, President Trump named him to be the envoy helping lead ukraine policy. He resigned in september. Todays transcripts show volker arguing against a biden investigation and trying to win ruer a president who deeply died ukraine. Former ukraian lawmaker serhii leshenko, who worked with volker for years, said he sees ato diplomat tryintraddle sharp politics and good policy. E wthat kurt volker was ecying to maneuver to be e as the special envoy and at the same time to be e cepted by whuse, and my understanding, he decided to give what trump was looking for desjardins overall, democrats say the transcripts only bolster their ce that mr. Trump withheld military aid and other support for ukraine to pressure president zelenskyy into opening investigations that but republicans haistedally. Democrats have selectively leaked and withheld information, in order to malign the present. What all of us want is a fair process. Desjardins meantime, the today Mick Mulvaney got a request from the investigate wmmittees for testimony later thek. Thus far, cabinet officials have declined these kinds of requests, as did two other trump individuals wh. I will say im pretty sure how it is likely toned. If it were today, i dont think theres any question it would not lead tie removal. One thing mcconell doesnt know is how long any sense of what these transcripts mean for the impeachment inquiry im joined by our ownick schifrin and Lisa Desjardins who have been closely fog the vestigation. Welcome back to you both. Thank you again for 54ing poring through all of these transcripts. Ut lets talk ahe changes sondland made to his testimony. How significant are they . What are they . E let me use a prop to explain. This is full sondlands testimony. Thats your day today. This is our dayoday, part of it. Of this, its really these five pages were talking about, his revisions. It speaks to wis idea ther there was a quid pro quo. Lets look at what he changed aire. First of all, he before today, he did not recall any conversations wheres tying aid to these investigations of the bidens in 2016. His revision, however, now, he says he does remember talking with a leading ukrainian, really the contact point for president zelensky. And he also said now he does remember specifically telling the zelensky aide thaaid was unlikely unless they maidng statement sahat ukraine would investigate 2016 and also the bidens. So this really spaks to t idea of whether the u. S. Was demanding something from ukine in exchange for aid money. Gordon sondlands testimony is he personally did tell them that. Thats a pretty big revision today to see. Nick, zoom out a little bit more. Tell little bit more about sondland. He was a sirpt of the president , as lisa reported, a big g. O. P. Donor. Hes bane defender of the president all along as well. Supportive of the president , defender of the president , and someone who had access to the iresident, really the only one weve been tal about who regularly talked to the president. He testified that he talked ttho president three times specifically about this, and that each of those times, the president did not mention Vice President biden. An osondland was asked at point in this story by another diplomat, hey this seems crazy. Is the president really withholding aid before ukraine investigates biden . So he called the president , aawd we s what he said on that phone call with the president. He said, asked the president an openunderstanded question what do you want from ukraine. I he said, want nothing. No quid pro quo i want zelensky to do the right thing. And said what does that mean . And he said i want him to do what he ran on and that is the end of the conversation. That is what the president was saying tod q. There was id pro quo at all because the president told sondland this, and not only, that the ukrainians didnt know that the president had actually withhel any of this military aid. And thats where the timeline thisa comes in is so important. One month after that phone call, we see sondland now admitted that he did tell theukinians, and thats why that revision and the timeline of that revision is so important. Lisa, about this timeline at nick is talking about, thats Something Else our team stticed in these transcripts, some integ timingrelated issues there. Sondland says very t specificalt for a long geme what, he knew was there a ral corruption investigation. We wanted ukraine to be less corrupt, that that was the push. But he says in his testimony lets look that in fact, something changed, as he knew taround august, and that that thg that changed was the general corruption concern became concern about 2016 and burisma. So this idea of changing how ukraine operates, makin making s corrupt, shifted into a specifi concern abese two investigations. Now, as to timeline that nick is talk about, whats amazing about all this is that that same day that he himself, sondland, says he told the ukrainians, hey, we have to now get these investigations that he says are now front and center proof from you that youre doing them, thats the same day that idvice prt pence was meeting with president zelensky in poland. Now, who know whether mike pence knew anything or not, but this is the reason that conversation happened. And we see h. R. A key aide becoming more and more aware that someone wants these investigations front and center. And he says this to iathe ukra on that day. So interesting. Nick, lets step back again to ambassador volker. He was worklying closith ukrainian officials throughout this process. What did he say about what they were doing with regards to these corruption investigations. He makes the same distinction that lisa was just makg that sondland makes, between vanilla torruption, and lets call i not so vanilla corruption. The vanilla corruption fucialg is what the u. S. Has been going after the last five years. The obama administration, the Trump Administration, all want ukraine to tackle endemic corruption. Under the business that effort waled by Vice President biden but it continued and had the me targets under the Trump Administration. What changed was ry giuliani. Is was not vanilla. Ha wanted an investigation into whether ukraine ed into the d. N. C. In 2016, which the u. S. Intelligence Community Says is tet what happened. And he winvestigation into burisma, this Ukrainian Company where huer biden was on the board. What volker testified today s the ukrainians who were telling juul this, who were kind of whispering into hisar and egging him on, that they werese serving, that they actually were hoping to appear important and telling juuwhat he thought they wanted, what they thought he wanted to hear in order to somehow save their jobs or be ruseen as useful by thep testified vice pre bidenolker was not corrupt. The ukrainians whoorked with dismim hunter bind, the ukrainian corruption, thats what everyone wanted investigated, until juul stepped in. And it ended up tha we had this temporary hold on military aid and were investigating this and talkintalking about this right. Its a pictuy of m outside forces manipulating u. S. Policy, not necessarily not the diplomats in this testimony. Lisa desjardins, nick schifrin, thank you agor getting us up to speed on all of this. Brangham now we want to turn to how the Trump Administration is reacting to this latest release transcripts. Im joined by our White House Correspondent yamiche alcindor. Yamiche, so this is the second day of transcripts that have come out. I know you have been tracking how the from the hasbeen reacting to this. And i also understand you have been in touch with gordonth sondlandgentleman we have been hearing about from these leasa and nick, his attorney as well. What you can tell bus their reactions to all this . The white house is transcripts really prove two President Trump should not be a inquiry. F an impeachment let me read to you what White House Press secretary Stephanie Grisham put out a couple of ipnutes ago. Both trans released today foough there is even lesevidence this illegitimate spoovment sham previous thought. She goes on to say Gordon Sondland, didnt know, Gordon Sondland being the e. U. Ambassador he didnt know the actual details of this military ukraine. Held up by of course, his revisions today Say Something different. They say hwas actual alone an official tuke ukraine officials e out that military aid being tied to vestigation of the bidens or that wanted the investigation of the bidens. White houseve th pointing to kurt volker, who was the u. S. Envoy to ukraine. And they say that essentially he said ukrainians didnt know that this money was being held up, so there couldnt be a quid pro quo. Usw we know that ukraine knew as early as athat this was something that was holding up had money, this investigation of the bidens that President Trump wanted. Its important to also point to kind of somefl conting facts in these transcripts. These transcripts really are about both parties booing able to pick and choose what they want to make their party look good. If you look at kind of what Gordon Sondland said to t investigators im going to tead another exchange, i ified it would be improper to do that thats military aid being connected to the investigation of the biden. And illeg, right . Im not a lawer, but i assume so. Then kurt volker says, i was surprised that was s en he lking about the call between President Trump and the president of ukraine. Were you troubled at all by what you read . Yes. Aslet white house is essentially pointing to the testimony saying they prove our case, democrats s are saying actually it proveids the pret was involved in a quid pro quo, and Gordon Sondlands attorney essentially told me he didnt want to go too far past what Gordon Sondlandut put but he said essentially read into this that gordonle to sondland was really trying to correct himself and was really trying to say he had some sort of ulterior motive. Yamiche, i know you have been track thei presdent since he basement president. These accumulated transcripts do give us a windointo how he runs his Foreign Policy. Iewonder what sense youre getting of the this has of the president s policy and the people enacting that policy. This really shows that President Trump really takes Foreign Policy personally. In both transcripts hes heard as saying that ukr was filled with bad people that tried to thaij down and wre really trying to hurt his 2016 president ial campaign. Democrats say thats a debunked claim. We have a essentially a president saying this country was tryi to go after me and as a result i dont like these people. We know the president has been railing against this. Has he said anything about these hast recent developments . The presidenbeen making his case to the American Public in allies. Just yesterday, he was in kentucky, trying to get people to support governor there who is up fore rlection tonight. Heres what he had to say the bidens got rich whil america was robbed. And let me tell you, the fake news will not put it in. Whats unsubstantiated . He is on tape doinga real dave quiser. There no evidence of joemuch. Biden doing any wrongdoing, but bats pretty much all you can say about that, theres no evidence of what the president was just saying. All right, yamiche alcindor, as always, thank you. Brangham in the days other news, three american women and six of the children have been brutally killed in an ambush in northern mexico. They were members of a Breakaway Group from the church of jesus christ of latterday saints. The attack took place monday on a dirt road between chihuahua and sonora states, about 75 miles south of the u. S. Border. Amateur video showed one of their burned vehicles. Mexican officials are investigating the possibility this was a case of mistaken identity, given the number of violent confrontations among warring drug gangs in that area. President trump spoke to the mexican president by phone today, and offered unspecified u. S. Help to ensure the perpetrators face justice. Gubernatorial and legislative elections are taking place in four states today, and theyre erseen by many as a bellweor 2020. In kentucky, republivernor matt bevin will try to hold off democratic attorney general andy beshear. Mississippis Gubernatorial Race pits republican Lieutenant Governor tate reeves against democratic attorney general jim anod. In virginia, republican control of the state Legislature Ra up for grabs, while dem in new jerseys state legislature are looking to keep their supermajorities. Iran announced plans today to violate yet another aspect of the 2015 nuclear pact. President Hassan Rouhani said gtehran will start inject uranium gas into more than a thousa centrifuges at its fordo nuclear facility. Move would make fordo a active atomic site, rather than the Research Facility iran agreed it would be, as part of the accord with world powers. translated ware aware of their sensitiveness towards the fordo facility and those centrifuges. At the same time, we cannot tolerate unilateral fulfillment of our commitments and no commitment from their side. Brangham president rouhani said the action is reversible if europe offers relief from u. S. Sanctions. The u. Withdrew from the todays announcement came a day twice as many advas running centrifuges as before. That machinery is key to enriching nuclear material. Yemens government and separatist forces signed a powersharing deal today to halt months of infighting in re countrys rn south. Coalition and the tistovernment Southern Transitional council signed theaudibrokered pact during a ceremony in riyadh. The deal would pave the way for a new cabinet low yemens exiled president to return to his country. In southern iraq today, Security Forces shot and killed three antigoverent demonstrators. At least 13 people have died in protestrelated violence across the country since yest in baghdad today, protesters massed on a bridge tblock access to key government stildings. They occupieets and set up barricades, but stressed it was Security Forces inciting the violence. translated they are ceshing demonstrators toward viol the protests are peaceful. They killed protesters last night, offended people and pushed them toward violence. Until the last second our revolution is peaceful, not aimed at violence. Violence generates a violent reaction. Brangham iraqi Security Forces have killed more than 260 antigovernment protesters since october 1. Man is in federal custody forado his role in a bomb plot that targeted a synagog