Investigation intopolitical val joe biden. And that he obstructed congre by defying numerous subpoenas for documents and testimony as part of their impeachment i probe. Unittheir opposition, rushing through the impeachment process and using it to rn overtu the results of the 2016 election. President trump has defended his dealings with ukraine and called the investigation a quote witchhunt. Here to discuss this our republican consultant and seniou contd to bulwark tim miller. He is with us. And also ron aldinger who joins us via skype fr washington. Thank you for being here with us. Why just two articles of impeachment for the democrats abuse of porur and obion of congress over President Trumps dealings with ukraine . Why not obstruction of justice in the Mueller Report, there were 10 instances listed. Or bribery that the democrats were exciting even before this began. The democrats made a choice. They couldve reached to n,the shotloaded it up and given the president both girls, as you suggest. There was lots in the Mueller Report are there habeen a number of other subpoena branches of government. There was much else they couldve done that they chose the rifle. They chose what th thought they could make clear to the public in short form and say we looked at all of the other th things and ght we could tolerate them. But now the whistleblower has come forward and made this so imperative so we had to go ahead and concentrate on ukraine. Is here from tim, yourth ghts on these two articles. What do you think . I think the democrats have tried to make a jument that nancy Speaker Pelosi in particular did not want this to drag on, did not want this in impeachment. I thought this was a clean hit a aned to move forward. I think that there is if this was a legitimate attempt to ovy to rthe president , if the goal here was we really believe the president should be removed before the 20 election, i think a longer effort looking into and investigating more of the pridents taxes, investigating his actions in raudi arabia, turkey, e would have been about to go in the hopes that something is uncovered that may be jostled some republicans through. Clearly, no republicans will be jostled by this and i think we will have what is pretty close to a partyline vote in both houses. Is tim says, ju how fast this is moving. I wonder what your thoughts are with the fact that there seem to be o directly been viable cases here. Most people are focused on the holidays and focus on their own lives, asyou would expect. Among those people who are paying a lot of attention, there seems to be a slight break in favor ofimpeachment for those who have formed an opinion. Most people would rather shrug their shlders and concentrate on Everything Else in their life. We will see what happens when we get back after the holidays. They are talking about a fairly short trial. But even in a short trial, many pethle will be getting r first introduction to some of the evidence, some of the facts in the case and what else might be out there about President Trump. Has decided to hear the case in respect to the president s withholding of tax turns. The have lost in a uple of appeals courts and is going to the Supreme Court for review. We will see what they decide to do as far as it comes to the president keeping his tax turns secret when theyare under subpoena from several different sources. Since you mentioned the senate trial, im curious to know what your thoughts are about the Senate Majority leader mcconnell already saying this is going to come under thee White House Co at least as far as hes concerned. They will be directing things. He said he was coordinatiyt evng he did with the White House Counsel. That would not be normal behavior for a juror anall 100 senators are sworn in as jurors to preside in this case. He is going get some criticism for that. But Mitch Mcconnell is used to criticism and used withstanding it and he is more than glad to take the slings and arrows as long as it means he can be the leader of the republicans in the senate and therefore the leader of the es senate and the clally that President Trump has. At least on capitol hill. Tim, let me go back to you. Your thoughts about the strategy of bringing up all th amendments that the republicans did that were obviously going to be shot down as maybe the presidenis going to be tried in the trial and that will be shut down by the democrats. Toi dont want make a predictive tea reading here but the fact is when we look back on that, why . Those amendmen i think this was a quote for them 92 impeachment where they switch side or e republicans accuse the democrats are putting on a clown nose and putting on a circus. Publicans as well. C for th showcasing. Yeah, we will call hunter you want to call Mitch Mulvaney we will call the ukrainian prosecutor. Trying to make the impeachment implicated r the voters, but also seem like a ridiculous ur proc my issue on thdemocratic side, it doesnt seem like they are really working, obviously mcconnell is blkading here. The democrats arent forcing the issue. Forcing john bolton to testify, subpoena some of the higher level officials and the trump administration. That leads me to believe that they are rather happy with the president and then gets blocked in the senate and they can accuse mcconnell of obstruction. We all knowhow it will turn out in terms of witnesses being called for the senate trial. But im interested in finding out from you, you are a repuican consultant but the tr the republicanto talk about the president looking at corruption in ukraine and trying to do things to ameliorate corruption . Where else does trump look for corruption in any nation in the world . R the viewers that dont te follow me on twi am a hostile to the president republican. It is the most absurd argument, the idea that he cares about corruption is absurd in the extreme, he never showed th. Anywhere el but looking specifically at ukraine and that call, he never mentions any corruption in any context aside the prisma issue and hunter biden. Its not as if they onesident his phone call also discussed, mentioned a whole list of oligarchs and hunter them. S bo was just one of it was a very narrow request about bidenand then the second request was on absurd Conspiracy Theory asking the esident to look into thether dnc server was hidden somewhere in ukraine. There are moderate democrats talking about censure and other conservatives in swing states they had strong support of President Trump that they had to buck. The president picked up 40 seats in the election in 2018. When you do that you are g suddenly taker for a lot of districts that voted for donald trump for president and voted for a republican florids congresscently as 2016. Sohat is quite an achievement on one hand, but it also gives you a raer tenuous holdon many of those 40 seats. So a lot of these democrats are taking a sincere risk, a true risk that they are probably going to vote for impeachment anyway, but they are going to take their time announcing it. They will consult with the people back in their district, they will try to think of the very best arguments to put forward for why they are doing this. But they know that many of their voters are going to be uncomfortable with that vote and they know this is going to make life more difficult for them in 2020. Speaking of 2020, following some of the quick quesons. What dyou foresee as far as the possibility and thinking about steve bannon and the former white howhe strategist said there is a real possibility that democrats can lose the house majority. Ron appel for example show against him to some degree and steve banner was worried they se would the white house again and lose the house. That would be Steve Bannons opinion. But i would al say thatif President Trump is reelected, that automatically would mean that the pressure would be on the democrats in their effort to keep control of the house and if the president is rebeing ected, that should mean good news for republican candidates up and down the ballot. Certainly in the senate, certainly in the hous of representatives. Tim, i know you want in cr here, the des have a tough time with their messaging, dont they . uparticularly in impeachment. I thinright beforei came over here i saw that representative arruda in Orange County, this is a prime example of someone in tough spot. He came out and said he would be for impeachment rather than center. He isstrepresenting a ct that has been voting for republicans since the 50s. And so how do you try to rs balance vopeople like me Republican Voters thatt ers are like trump that flipped in 2018 in Orange County and voted for representative arruda. They probably dont want somebody that goes to washington and is just anti republican agenda, and tied republican agenda for impeachment. He will walk the line. On the other hand i think hes stuck with this derecratic caucus you really start to lose support of your democratic donor base and grassroot base if you dont votefor impeachment. I think the Democratic Reps and voters in that are in a tough spot. I do have to say i think the bannon call to the house would actually flip back. As it sestands today, s to be a little bit of a stretch. Think the most likely outcomes are the republicans up pick up baseats in districts like Orange County but also oklahoma city, charleston, places that are very democratic and unfriendly time because of trumps unpopularity that they are likely to give back. Letme think both of our guests for their expert analysis. Tim miller thank you for being with us, ron albee, thank you for being with us. Thank you so much to both of you. Thank you. It released a 13. 5 billion Settlement Agreement with wildfire victims. The deal would resolve claims ctims of the 20 17th northbay wildfires, last yearsd campfires, other recent blazes. It also launched a turning point in pg es efforts to emerge from bankptcy on protec pg s e until june 30 last year to tap into the Wildfire Insurance Fund established by lawmakers to help utities pay for future wildfire claims. Joining me now is kqed politics and government correspondent murrays marissa lagos. Always happy to be with you. Lets talk about the settlement its self. Who is eligible and how are they going to pay it what we are talking abtht sands of wildfire victims and actuly the ghost ship fire from oakland is also part of this settlement. Me past buyers as well. Essentially what will happen is if the government finds off and the judge signs off in the s coming dere will be a 60 day period for wildfire survival to file an additional claim. They had to file a claim by december 31 with the Bankruptcy Court but then they get to te on this fund. They will really have the last decisionmaking power over whether to accept this pr osal. And if thdo, i think you are right, this will be, pg e will be well on its way out of bankruptcy. We will talk more about the victims and so forth, but who is getting rich off of this or makingoney off of is . Monday, 60 stock in pg e went up and that was the most in two ghmonths. Thats stock prices have fluctuated wildly this ock prices fluctuating as an opportunity to make money. People trading on the stock or making money. Offered as half cash, have stock. Victims would own 20 of the company at this go through. This was also a big win for a group of shareholders i rehave ly been struggling, along with pg e management to maintain control of pg e when it exits and pepsi. Theytiave been fi with bondholders who also obviously are part of the pg e infrastructure and they, we have seena lot of money being made on the stock market and also through the legal fees ano thisuptcy. Its happening and i have a big story coming out next week that will kind of detail some of the ways people are making money on wall street. Ia other than gubernat disapproval, what could unsettle the settleme here . What cousrupt it . If victims are not happy with it that could certainly end the settlement and really spell big problems for pg e. As i said, t ey do a vote. But i do think this is the biggest piece of this bankruptcy. Previously therwas a lot of concern over the fact that Insurance Companies had also reachedsettlements with pg e. Therwas a concern that 11 llion settlement would undercut i think what we are seeing here , since this number is bigger, is a pretty good likelihood that it goes forward. What about the likelihood of privatization or municipal station . The governor talked about taking over pg e, mayor san jose has been talking about going on a private path to publicitutdid is the settlement having much impact ou assee it question make i do think that this is, again if everyone at the table agrees that the framework here, it really undercuts e argument of people like mayor locarno who would like to see a ocustomer owned coev San Francisco who wanted to buy pg es infrastructure. Theres a lot of problems with the idea allowing mourban places that are quite frankly Bigger Customer base and easierr to because they dont have the same wildfire liability sort of issues to separate from the rest of the grid. So i do think this is going to make it a little harder fopeople who uld like to see a drastic change in this company. Although, to be fair, we could still sethem looking into a gas and an Electric Company or even into smaller utilitie i think the idea of a public power is not going to be as ttractive if you have wildfire victims lining up with all is on e l. A. Eholders. Times poll . Yeah, people are definitely not pleased with the company but i think they also dont have, there is no consensus among voters or even repairs of what they would like to see happen. I think honestly making something public makes a lot of people nervous for a lot of reasons. Fema is looking for about a 4 billion payoff on all of this in the oes is looking for money. There are a lot of places that are at least trying, to some extent commit to take from the money available to victims and abe victims are upset t this. Yeah, i think again, its not surprising the Government Entities are going to try to pr after ate utility to get back to feel what they are owed. I think when you end up hitting a fema and operation emergencic serv against wildfire victims and becomes more complicated. The truth is, a lot of details of where this 13. 5 billioe goes ill going to be sort of left to a trustee that will be appointed to oversee the fund. So we dont know if the government will be atall successful or if individual victims will see thlion share, i would guess it would be the latter. We will have to wait and see. In the meantime, thare talking about achieving confirmaon in the Organization Plan in advance of the 2020 deadline and they seem i think if erything moves forward, if the government signs off, the judge signs off, victims sign off, they could exit bankruptcy before june. Can you talk about the weaudit . Yeah, saw an audit that said essentially pg e has taken 123 million that they were supposed to use under grounding power lines and ed it for the priorities. You know, i think this is par for the coursethwit company. In some ways it raises bigger questions about the regulators and state oversight than even pg e itself. We know they have always sort of moved around money, we saw that with the san bruno msexplosion and the probwith the gas lines. I think the issue here is does this add more fuel to the fireit for s of pg e to push more oversight, to push the governor exercise mopower over the utility. Back to the victims which i promise we will talk more about to find out who is eligible they are talking about things like mental anguish. I dont know how people prove thatlegitimacy of and paying for vernal funeral expenses can can you prove dying because of the wildfire. Sometimes i can be ambiguous. One man filed a claim for a 200 Million Dollar emerald he said he lost in the campfire. That will be up to the trustee who oversees this Wildfire Fund to sort of sort out. The victims attorneys will have some oversight of that trustee decision. Theres a lot of people i involved andink there will be foan to make sure that the money is spread around as evenly as possible and to the people that need it the deadline for filing is one . Deny the deadline for filing r a claim at all is december and in the new year we will see a 60 day period where the victims who have filed for those claims will be able to essentially exerse right and vote on the settlement. We have a little time left, can you talk about the effects this will have on the Insurance Industry . We are seeing huge thproblem he insurance industries, a lot of areas where they dont they have also been paid out a lot in their claims against pg e and they have reached this 11 million settlement. I think there are open questions about that market and reallyhat the state can do to make it more even moving forward. Likely that pg e, as a ttresult of the ment, will move forward on a lot of things they have been, shall we say, not exactly up . Stop i think that will be a key question for the bankruptcy frankly. Governor right beyonddollars and sense of this bankruptcy, what kind of chges is pg e willin put in place moving forward around their management and the management instructor for the safety structure. Back to regulators, they have been sitting on a lot of these problems and i think there are some real ouy questions what controls they need to exercise moving forward on safety questions, wildfire safety, and quite rfrankly broa safety. Blackouts . I dont think those are have a lot had a lot of rain lately so we e not in that situation right now. But again, if they dont make a lot of significant investmeans and s to the way their business is done, they warn those could go on for a decade. The government doesnt want to see that, no one wants to see that. But its habecause we h