The whole town is alive. Its going to be even better when we win a world series here. Dont jinx it. Thank you. We will celebrate. Good day, im Andrea Mitchell in washington, which is celebrating. But were awaiting the president s Press Conference with italys president on a day when mr. Trump is already refusing to accept blame for turkeys incursion into syria despite the call with turkeys president , saying its not our problem, we are not a policing agent, his words. I wish them a lot of luck. If russia wants to get involved with syria, thats really up to them. They have a problem with turkey, they have a problem at the border, its not our border. We shouldnt be losing lives over it. The president will meet later today with Speaker Pelosi and other bipartisan leaders at the white house about the crisis in syria which now has russia taking the upper hand and americas allies, syrian kurds,
fleeing for safety. Even as the president repeatedly today attacks pelosi for the expanding Impeachment Inquiry. Paul ryan would never have issued a subpoena. I dont say right or wrong. He have wouldnt have done it. He has too much respect for the country. Nancy pelosi hands them out like cook cookies. Shes created a phony witch hunt. This is an open and shut simple days. Theyre desperate because they know theyre going to lose the election. Nbcs Kelly Odonnell is at the white house. And we have two experts on Foreign Policy and on the Inner Workings of washington, bob corker, former tennessee senator, former Foreign Relations committee chairman, and leon panetta, former Secretary Of Defense, cia director, and former white house Chief Of Staff to president clinton. Senator corker, as the foreimer
Foreign Relations chairman, we have ambassadors confirmed from your committee post, and they are saying the politics that has infected the State Department has now become so per vasive that several of them have resigned and are now testifying. Now we have a situation where the president is saying we have no responsibility for what is happening in Northern Syria to our allies. What is your reaction . Andrea, its a totally unavoidable humanitarian crisis. Its hard to believe that the president would engage in such a precipitous, i would call sloppy telephone conversation with another head of a country and create the catastrophe that is there now. In essence, he gave them the green light, and now through some modest sanctions is pushing back. Im sure even the turkish people are wondering what he was thinking. And so here we have a situation where allies, the kurds, who
have lost 11,000 lives, are now in the process of being slaughtered. We have Hundreds Of Thousands of people that are being displaced. We have villages without water. All of this was totally unavoidable. Now we have pompeo and pence going to turkey. They have no bargaining chips. Weve given up control of a third of the country that has hydrocarbons. We had the kurds working with us, now theyre not. We would have been a much better place to negotiate a political resolution that would have been satisfactory, that would have been avoiding we would have avoided the killing of kurds who have been working with us for five years. And again, threw it out on the ground with a sloppy, precipitous phone call that is going to end up killing a lot of people. And can you understand why the president is under such influence from president erdogan who now says, hes been quoted
both ways but he at least initially said to press people today that he would not even meet with the Vice President , pence, and the Secretary Of State is also going, supposedly going this afternoon, this major delegation going to try to persuade him for a ceasefire. Hes saying no ceasefire, he wouldnt even meet with the Vice President. If he does end up doing that, it does seem as though there is an incredible amount of arrogance on the part of turkey right now. Well, i think, again, i dont have a lot of respect for erdogan. I cant imagine how President Trump has much faith in what he would do. What is happening here has been told to the president by Secretary Mattis and so many others, this is exactly what would happen if we left precipitously. It is happening, people are dying. And i guess theyre in an arrogant place, if you will, because they felt like they were given a green light by our president when he received
pushback in our country by letting down the partners that weve had for many years. Hes gotten political blowback. So this is a feelgood mission. I hope something good comes out of it. It leaves us in a place where the only thing we have left is to really counter strongly a nato ally. But i still dont think i still do not think, now that the genie is out of the bottle, much good is going to come of this. So im disappointed for our country, it diminishes the character of our country. Its also a tremendous strategic error after years of working to get to this place. Andrea, we never anticipated being there photographforever. There was a way down the road of leaving but leaving in such a way that we didnt create such chaos and harm to people who have been our friends for so many years. In addition to that chaos, what about the isis fighters who are now not being guarded, some have escaped already from prison, and the president saying, some would say cavalierly, let them go back to europe . Its hard for me to understand how a president could have such disregard for things that over time will come back to haunt us. In idlib, we still have al qaeda there. Theres still isis to be dealt with. Again, were so close to that being finished. But even that aside, the chaos weve left behind, its just hard to explain. And not caring about the relationships that weve had, not caring what happens to other parts of world. We have to remember that we do these things and memoriand memories are short, but we have involvement
overseas to protect people back home, to prevent isis from doing things to us like they did in september 2001. Sometimes people forget that, we have short memories, but thats why we do things on the ground. It was at such low cost to us, a huge cost to the kurds, that weve thrown under the bus. And very difficult to explain. And i dont know how any leader could have made this type of decision, especially over a phone call, an undisciplined phone call that has now wreaked havoc, has caused havoc to occur in that part of the world. By the way, by cleaning out a swath of Northern Syria the way that they are, the way turkey says they are, this is basically genocide. Its Ethnic Cleansing. This is the home of the kurds. And then forcibly putting 2
million syrians back in that place, again, its Ethnic Cleansing that is taking place. Senator, i want to ask you about ambassador yovanovitch, ambassador kent, or Assistant Secretary kent, and others who have now testified about Smear Campaigns against the ambassador, about political interference, a Shadow Campaign and diplomacy by Rudy Giuliani, and another phone call, the phone call with ukraines president. Does inviting another country to interfere in our election, not just him but also then the president inviting china to do the same, should that be an Impeachable Offense . So andrea, im not a senator anymore and i realize that, but i think that all senators and i realize im not one should realize theyre going to end up being the jury if there is an impeachment trial. And if i were a senator, i certainly would not be saying
anything, i would be observing closely. Obviously the president does many inappropriate things. But since youre not a senator im sorry, andrea since youre not a senator i dont know, andrea, im going to still have that code of conduct myself. There may be a point where i Say Something that might make some small difference. But right now im watching. Obviously some of the hearings, many of the hearings, all the hearings right now are closed, so im only hearing leaked comments that are being made. But obviously, like everyone else in our country, im paying attention. There may be some point when i want to Say Something. But right now im observing. In terms of what has happened to the State Department from the president s own acknowledgement, he asked Rudy Giuliani to intervene. What about the pressure to remove a Sitting Ambassador who was confirmed by the senate, by your former committee, you were one of the people confirming her, and leading that
confirmation, what about taking people out like that, recalling them under pressure from the president and the Secretary Of State, to permit Rudy Giuliani and these associates of his who are now under indictment . Well, you know again, you know, i havent heard the testimony directly. Im reading what has happened. Obviously if someone was pressured to be taken out for some nefarious reason, that obviously is something thats incredibly inappropriate and shouldnt be taking place. But andrea, i want to hear all this, i want to see the facts. And at some point i may be more willing to make a forthcoming comment. Understood. If you will. But i just dont want to do that right now. I want to be a little more thoughtful than responding on a daily basis. But i can understand why you would ask. And of course the notes, the notes, the rough transcript of the president s confidentiversa
himself was that he said the ambassador was a bad person. But well leave it there. Thank you so much for leaving it there. And hope to hear more from you in the feature. Thank you, sir. And now turning to former Defense Secretary leon panetta, as a former Secretary Of Defense and cia director, your reactions to the situation were now in with the syrian kurds being removed or running or under attack, being killed, and what Senator Corker himself said is amounting to genocide. I think that this is the single most disastrous Foreign Policy blunder by a president of the United States in recent history. With one decision, he has betrayed our allies, the kurds, who fought and died alongside of us. He has given a green light to
turkey to invade syria. He has withdrawn our forces from syria and basically given syria to russia, to iran, and to assad. And at the same time, opened up the opportunity for isis to reorganize itself and again become a threat to the United States and to europe. Every part of this decision has weakened the United States. But most importantly, it has undercut our credibility in the world. There isnt an ally that weve around the world that doesnt as a result of what the president did now distrust us and worry about whether or not we will stand by our word. Turkey is a nato ally. And there is no mechanism that i am aware of for reducing somebody from nato. A country can quit nato. But they have at least 50
tactical nukes at the nato base on turkish land. Do we have any ability to control or protect those Nuclear Weapons, or does erdogan have control over whether we try to remove them . No, were the ones that the United States is defending that supply of Nuclear Weapons that are located in turkey. And im sure we will continue to do so. I think the bigger issue is going to be, as the situation deteriorates, and as turkey continues the aggression into syria and goes after the kurds, how long are we going to maintain our presence in turkey . I think that has to be a serious question that the United States is going to have to face. There are jordanian troops there, there were french and british troops in that area as well. There was no warning to them when the president made his decision on the phone call that day, as well as the people next door in jordan and israel, who is concerned about iran, the saudis are concerned about iran. Basically he has empowered iran and russia in that region and is asking for a ceasefire which would leave them in control of what was a kurdish area. The president of the United States, you know, just this morning again has said that somehow this is not the United States business. And yesterday talked about the fact that somehow were 7,000 miles away from that area. Thats what the isolationists used to argue priori to world wr ii, that somehow the oceans would protect us from nazi germany. The reality is that al qaeda, even though they were 7,000 miles away, found a way to attack us on 9 11. The president ought to be aware
of that fact. And as a result that have, i think its incredibly important that the United States recognize that we are if were going to be leaders in the world, we have to be able to take a stand with regard to russia. What were doing now is handing syria to russia, to establish a base in that area. Russian soldiers are making fun of the United States having pulled out yesterday. Thats a disgrace. We ought to be ashamed of having pulled out and allowed the russians to go into that area. And now allowing iran to establish a base in syria. Weve taken the position, this president has taken the position that iran should be prevented from extending its influence in the middle east. And yet we are handing syria to iran. And they are trying to expand
the Persian Empire from beirut to damascus to tehran. And weve just given them a license to be able to do that. The president also does not seem to be talking about the fact that the turkishbacked militias went after u. S. Positions as recently as yesterday. We had to scramble apaches and some fighter jets to try to give them some air cover. What is the availability of other u. S. Forces in the region . Ive never ive never in my over 50 years of public life seen a president who does not speak out to the need to protect our forces abroad. This president hasnt said a word about the importance of protecting american lives in that region. He pulled back a few of these
troops. The rest have kind of been in many ways abandoned there. We still have to be able to successfully withdraw them frlgt ar from that area. But they are now in harms way. Obviously the turks almost bombed near those positions a few days ago, so theyre vulnerable. And this president ought to be taking every step necessary to make sure that our Men And Women In Uniform are protected. And he is not speaking to that, and that concerns me. And one of your successors, the Secretary Of Defense, is saying that hes not going to comply with subpoenas or with requests, i should say, from the house investigating committee, the Impeachment Inquiry. The acting Chief Of Staff Mick Mulvaney and other top officials. What do you think their obligation should be with this ongoing committee . Well, you know, there is an Impeachment Inquiry going on. And thats important. It is a power thats provided by the constitution of the United States, to hold the president of the United States accountable. And it is important for people to cooperate with that inquiry. Whether youre a democrat or republican, we ought to be able to find the truth. Thats what an Impeachment Inquiry is all about. But when they resist cooperating, when they resist subpoenas, all theyre doing is sending a message to the country that theres something to hide and they dont want to be truthful with the congress in this inquiry. That in and of itself can become an article of impeachment. Leon panetta, thank you very much, on a very tough day in washington. Thank you for joining us. Lets go to nbcs Kelly Odonnell. Were awaiting from the joint news conference, but we certainly heard from the president today. Now theres more and more testimony, Mike Mckinley, former top adviser to mike pompeo, an ambassador to three different countries, is up there testifying. We understand that the politics of the State Department have now become something that he could not continue to participate in, or at least observe, so he quit on friday. Reporter andrea, i would imagine that the impeachment issues related to things like that, where you have firsthand accounts from people who have served this administration, some of the president s closest allies, in the case of secretary pompeo, or inside the white house, with the former nsc official who have all given testimony behind closed doors, that paints a picture of a white house that does use influence with political agenda items that are important to the president
in places where official government lanes should have been open and free of that. Expect questions on that today. And certainly picking up on your conversation with Senator Corker and former Chief Of Staff and secretary leon panetta about all the complexities of the u. S. Position with respect to turkey and syria and how fraught this is for a president who has campaigned and trumpetted bringing u. S. Servicemembers home. Yet he is not embracing the responsibility, based on the questions put to him a short time ago with italys president in the oval office, an extended question and answer. The president was defensive, saying that, for example, u. S. Nuclear material that is stored in turkey is safe, not going into detail about the potential ongoing threat to that, given the change in circumstances there. Also saying that turkey and
syria are handling their own business and that it is not the concern of the United States. And at the same time emphasizing that turkey is a nato ally. So what is the importance to this president about the power of those relationships when in one breath he strengthens the notion of this Nato Alliance and in another talks about the economic harm he could bring to turkey, andrea. Kelly odonnell at the white house. Joining me, nbc White House Correspondent geoff bennett. Geoff, the testimony so far this week and last has been devastating as reported in all your interviews with those who have been present at these hearings. What are you expecting now today . Reporter well, we know, andrea, Michael Mckinley is testifying behind closed doors. He was the former top adviser to Secretary Of State mike pompeo, his Chief Of Staff until his abrupt resignation last friday. Im told by a source familiar
that mckinley is painting a picture for House Investigators of the political pressure that was applied and in some cases is still being applied to Career Officials in the State Department, apolitical folks, in particular as it relates to this ukraine controversy. Im told mckinley was particularly outraged by, galled by the unceremonious and some might say unwarranted ouster of Marie Yovanovitch, former ambassador to ukraine. He had a 37year in the State Department before he worked side by side with Secretary Of State mike pompeo. He had a number of posts in central and south america, also in afghanistan. So his departure raised a lot of eye brows, his abrupt resignation raised a lot of questions. We expect hes giving House Investigators more insight on what was happening in and around the state Department Around the time Rudy Giuliani and his associates were running this influence campaign. Whats so interesting about this record testimony is you can
start to see how democrats, andrea, are stitching together the story. They have this tapestry now of evidence and testimony, not just about this call, but everything that lead ted up to it and everything that came after it. What were hearing is the way Marie Yovanovitch was targeted by this Smear Campaign led by Rudy Giuliani and his associates. Why . Because she was one of those people who didnt necessarily know what Rudy Giuliani was up to and she was raising concerns about this influence campaign. She was making the point that if anyone is going to have contacts with ukrainian officials about american interests, it should be her given her role as the u. S. Ambassador. Of course that did not happen. She was targeted and unceremoniously ousted from her position. Shes back here at georgetown, still a member of the foreign service, andrea. Geoff bennett, of course and i know from covering these people just how important their roles are or used to be in other administrations, as ambassadors. And speaking of ambassadors,
joining us now, former u. S. Ambassador to russia and Nbc International Affairs Analyst michael mcfaul. Michael, you know better than anyone the importance of an ambassador with the knowledge of yovanovitch about russia, ukraine, and the relationships there. George kent, who was also a witness in the Impeachment Inquiry, was in charge after being the number two at the embassy. He came back to be the Deputy Assistant secretary for europe and in charge of the anticorruption efforts and knows very well who the bad actors were in ukraine. It turns out the bad actors were some of the Guys Giuliani was dealing with. Exactly. You just summed it up, andrea, thats exactly right. And what you see here in addition to that is a clear cleavage between the professional diplomats, ambassador mckinley, ambassador yovanovitch, and others who have testified, versus the outsiders. The biggest outsider is someone who has nothing to do with diplomacy, mr. Giuliani, but also ambassador sondland who paid for the position. He was the Eu Ambassador with no experience in ukraine. Never has the European Union ambassador been involved in this. And you see a clash. On the one hand, people trying to advance Americas National interests and on the other hand, the throw amigos, as they call themselves, trying to advance President Trumps personal reelection efforts. How do you think this should play out now that they are assembling step by step insider accounts with people who are bravely stepping forward, some giving up their careers, Mike Mckinley and others having had to quit over this. How do you think this plays out legally or in terms of the politics of impeachment . Well, legally, ill defer to others who are more expert. I think what it does underscore is how grossly inept and just
broken down the trump Foreign Policy making process is. By the way, this is not just a ukraine story. I think you see the exact same thing happening with respect to this decision on syria, where instead of having an Interagency Process where the president sits in the White House Situation Room next to a Secretary Of Defense, next to a Secretary Of State and the entire members of the nsc, hes sitting in his residence on the phone, based on his intuition or personal interests is a way to conduct Foreign Policy. I think its a complete disaster for American National security interests. Whether its illegal or not, ill leave to other people to judge. But in this case, in both cases but especially the ukrainian case, you know, what were seeking to achieve in terms of our National Security is being undermined by the personal interests of the president and these lieutenants hes hired to help him in the process. In the last 24 hours, erdogan
in turkey has said he will immediate in a number of days with Vladimir Putin but has indicated he does not want to meet with Vice President pence and Secretary Of State pompeo who are headed to the region. Extraordinary. What does it tell you . It tells me the breakdown in bilateral relations between turkey and the United States are at the lowest point than i can ever remember. By the way, thats just another example of how we have not been practicing diplomacy in the trump years, that engagement. Number two, yes, Vladimir Putin is the big winner here. They are joyous in moscow. You should watch the television these days. After an impasse, they were disappointed with what President Trump did for them after he won election. But now they are seeing the returns on that investment, where they tried to help President Trump win in 2016, in the two domains, andrea, that
were the most confrontational when i was in the government, ukraine and syria. We spent more time arguing with Vladimir Putin about those two different portfolios. And on both now you see capitulation from President Trump. These are big, giant victories for Vladimir Putin. Michael mcfaul, ambassador mcfaul, thank you very much, joining us from stanford today. And at any moment we expect that Press Conference from President Trump and the president of italy. You see the east room but i dont believe the reports are in there yet, a lot of empty seats. Well bring that to you as soon as it starts. Up next, Elizabeth Warren fending off attacks from all sides at last nights debate. Stay with us. At least bernie is being honest here and saying how hes going to pay for this and that taxes are going up. Im sorry, elizabeth, you have not said that. 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While taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily. And it may take longer than usual for bleeding to stop. Seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding like unusual bruising. Eliquis may increase your bleeding risk if you take certain medicines. Tell your doctor about all planed medical or dental procedures. Whats around the corner could be your moment. Ask your doctor about eliquis. Hey. Hey. You must be stevens phone. Now you can take control of your home wifi and get a notification the instant someone new joins your network. Only with xfinity xfi. Download the xfi app today. It certainly looked as though the democratic contenders had decided there was a new frontrunner on the debate stage last night as they gave joe biden a pass, peretty much, and instead all piled on Elizabeth Warren. Your signature, senator, is to have a plan for everything except this. I went on the floor and got you votes. I got votes for that bill. I convinced people to vote for it. When i called on twitter to suspend Donald Trumps account that you did not agree, and i would urge you to join me. I want to give a Reality Check here to elizabeth because no one on this stage wants to protect billionaires, not even the billionaire wants to protect billionaires. Your idea is not the only idea. Joining me now, nbc news correspondent mike memoli. Jim messina, former Deputy White House Chief Of Staff to president obama. And jonathan capehart, columnivity for the Washington Post and an msnbc contributor. Welcome, all. Mike memoli, you are in columbus, ohio, i think, expecting to see joe biden pretty soon. Thats right. He had a pretty good night. Whats your take . Youre closer to it. First of all, andrea, this has become something of a tradition in your hour on the days after a debate. We expect the Vice President to be pulling up literally any moment behind me. Hes about to tour a Union Facility here. Youre right, after five months in which joe biden has been the center of the conversation in this democratic primary, especially in these debates, he had a good night. He had some strong moments. Not flawless moments, of course. But there were some other candidates who probably had stronger moments, including candidates who are really increasingly making an overt play for the kind of voters joe biden has been trying to appeal to in this primary. So it will be interesting, as weve heard from Biden Advisers now in terms of the road ahead, they feel there was an opening given to him by the cofron
cofrontrunner, Elizabeth Warren warren, on Foreign Policy. He plans to give a speech today on Foreign Policy and President Trumps abdication of responsibility in the middle east. This is an opportunity for him to bring back the conversation to what is an area of strength for him, of course, and that is Foreign Policy. And jim messina, what about Elizabeth Warren and the efforts by Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg as well to try to come at her and put out a more centrist vision, sort of a nonbiden position . Yeah, welcome to the general election, or the frontrunner status for Elizabeth Warren. She got flack from all sides and i think she handled it pretty well, with one exception, andrea. This is the first time youve seen her sort of do the frontrunner dance of not wanting to get pinned down. She wasnt able to answer about her Health Care Plan and taxes when the other candidates were. This is a problem for her brand. Her brand is honest, truth
teller willing to fight power. Last night she wouldnt talk about whether she would raise taxes. She wouldnt talk about how her plan would deal with obamacare. Theres a problem, shes looking toward the general election, shes saying, if i win, and i could, i dont want to take positions that could hurt me in a general election against joe biden. Thats a real problem when youre trying to win the primary. That was the one weak moment where she started to seem like she was dancing like a typical politician. Besides that, i thought she had a very good night, pushed hard, stayed on message and parised te blows coming at her from every side. And joe biden addressed his son hunter. Lets take a look at that. My sons statement speaks for itself. I did my job. I never discussed a single thing
with my son about anything to do with ukraine. No one has indicated i have. My son made a judgment. Im proud of the judgment he made. Im proud of what he had to say. And lets focus on this. The fact of the matter is, that this is about trumps corruption. Thats what we should be focusing on. Jonathan capehart. How do you think he did . How do you think he handled that . I think he handled it well. He knew the question was coming. Obviously also because hunter biden did that interview that landed that morning. I think the Vice President benefitted from two things. One, his opponents by and large dont want to get into that fight. They dont want to hammer him over that. One, because the democratic electorate has shown through all of these debates that when the democrats fight each other,
they the person who does the attacking bears the brunt of the responsibility from the folks who are watching. But the other thing is, looking at Vice President biden, compared to President Trump and President Trumps children, i think also makes it possible for the Vice President to say, look, im taking responsibility, ive put out thissethi ethics plan er today, Lets Focus On Corruption and the corruption is right there in the building behind you in the white house. I know theres a lot of debate about whether the Vice President wants to be on this ground talking about these things. But i do think it sets up a nice, nice in the sense of a clear contrast, between whats actually happening in the white house and what never happened when it comes to Vice President biden and his son. The only question i would have about that is, jim messina,
the president has this twitter following, he has the mega phone, and he is going to keep going after all of his opponents, but particularly joe biden, about hunter biden. Yeah, look, i think thats not great ground for the president to go on, right . I want to talk a little bit about the Vice President s decision to put his kid on tv the day of the debate. Im not sure why hunter biden is doing interviews on the day your dad is trying to move a separate message, im not sure he did his dad any favors on that. But going forward, i agree with jonathan, this is good ground for the democrats to say lets be very clear about the differences here. Weve laid out a plan that says ethically the kids cant have any deals with foreign governments. And meanwhile, the president s children are doing things that are insane politically and the president will have to defend
these in a general Election Debate with whoever the nominee is. Jonathan is right, this is not great ground for trump and its going to continue to be brought back to trump. If he wants a fight about this, its going to go right back to his kids. And mike memoli, youre in the best position to tell us, why did they decide to try to inoculate against this on the day of the debate . Well, andrea, its interesting, in my conversations with the campaign and those close to the family about how this all went down, it would be wrong to say that the campaign orchestrated the interview and the timing of the interview. But it would be wrong to say as well that they were unaware of it. I think what this is about is hunter biden seeing that not only is he under attack by the president and his allies but his father is, and he wanted to do something to step up, after his campaign frankly said he didnt need to come forward and do that. It did help the former Vice President in this respect, it gave him an opportunity, when the questions were posed to him,
to simply defelect and say this has been asked and answered. There are still questions, but it was interesting, of course, to see especially cory booker to come to the defense of the former Vice President. In the spin room, i was talking to other candidates last night, they were very much treading carefully but leaning in the direction of echoing cory booker and saying they feel the Vice President has done enough to address this for now. Jonathan capehart, what about Bernie Sanders . He looked vigorous and people were very affected by his thank you, his acknowledgement for all the good wishes from the other candidates as well as the larger public. At the same time, hes now getting some big endorsements, everyone but presley in the squad, starting with aoc, endorsing him yesterday. He looked vibrant, vigorous, as loud as ever, as he always is
in those debates. Those endorsements are coming out this weekend, its just another sign that between those endorsements and his fundraising in this last quarter, hes not going anywhere. His poll numbers might be coming down, but his campaign is still chugging along vigorously. And jonathan, what about those fundraising numbers . We see a much higher burn rate now for buttigieg. These had an extraordinary success in fund raising and hes now beginning to spend it on infrastructure in the early voting states. Right. I talked to folks in his Campaign Early on, when he had that breakout moment in march. And they knew they were caught flatfoot flatfooted. Their assumption was the first debate in june would be where he got the breakout moment and instead it came two or three months earlier. So they not only didnt have the
infrastructure in place but they didnt have enough money to create the infrastructure. Now theyve got the money, now theyve got not the time, but they know what they need to do now. And so it does make sense that mayor Pete Buttigieg is spending the money that he has to put in place the infrastructure that will make it possible, they hope, to last beyond iowa, beyond new hampshire, nevada, south carolina, and into super tuesday. Super tuesday being key, of course, with midwestern states playing a role as well. Jim messina, we understand joe biden may be appearing very shortly. Well turn to mike memoli for that. But how is biden holding up under this onslaught that continues from the white house . I think he did pretty well last night. I think he showed a little fight when answering the question about his son. Hes trying very hard to stick to his economic message. And speaking i think hes doing okay. Speaking of that, hes speaking right now. Lets listen. You all have copies of it before it was delivered. But im ready to take your questions. Reporter mr. Vice president , on Foreign Policy, are you concerned that when Elizabeth Warren says pulling out of the middle east is the same kind of America First policy that im frankly surprised, ive never heard anyone say with any serious background in Foreign Policy that we pull all troops out of the middle east. And im not sure exactly what she meant by it, if she meant pulling our fleet out of the Eastern Mediterranean or the persian gulf, i think it would be an absolute disaster for American Security and american Foreign Policy. We have already significantly undermined the confidence of our allies in our reliabiliti. After world war ii our fathers and mothers put together a Security Apparatus that were not just designed to keep russia, then the soviet union, from invading europe. They were to keep europe from fighting with one another. They were to keep us together so no one nation could abuse power. And i hope she didnt mean in a literal sense, because i think it would be a disaster for American Security and american Foreign Policy. Reporter sir, we are a little over three months away from the Iowa Caucuses and your campaign is burning through a lot of cash, your rivals have more than you, Bernie Sanders has more than three times the amount you have in his bank account. Are you confident that youre
going to have the resources if this primary carries all the way til june . I am. I am confident. Reporter are you changing anything operationally . Remember, we got started later than anybody at all in this campaign, number one. Number two, we did not start off by dropping 10 million from a senate campaign, wherever that money was raised from, into a race. Number three, weve been in the process of having about a third of the time that many people have had. And were doing fine. Our fundraising is building. Weve raised a lot of money online and weve raised money offline as well. So we feel confident were going to be ready. Reporter it felt last night like it was somebody else with the target on their back that is the center of the conversation. Do you still feel like the
frontrunner or is it a good thing to see the attacks going in other directions . Its about time other people get questioned. I havent seen any Polling Showing that nationally on average that anybody else is the frontrunner. You guys keep talking about that. I think Elizabeth Warren has done very well, shes moved. But now that she has moved and is taken more seriously, people are going to ask her about, you know, a little candor here, tell us how youre going to do what you say youre going to do. What i found interesting last night is two things. If you notice, all my colleagues in the past on the stage talked about biden is naive. Did you hear the Closing Statements . They all had an epiphany, guess what, were going to work with republicans. We have to do it. The second thing i observed was that all of a sudden everybody likes the biden Health Care Plan. Its the same plan. And thats a good thing. Theres a focus. Public opinion is changing across the board based on recent polling data and stuff thats come out today. So im feeling awfully good about last nights debate. Reporter you said from the beginning on impeachment that the president should be impeached if he does not comply with congress. But now were seeing that with Vice President mike pence and secretary pompeo. Do you think they should be removed from office as well . Look, lets do one thing at a time. This will be a giant undertaking, impeaching a president who deserves to be impeached because hes indicted himself. This is a good thing fdifficult the nation to go through. We talk about, lets have all these impeachment parties. Ive been through two of them, two president s being impeached, and its deadly, deadly earnest. Look, this is a constitutional issue. Focus on the constitution. The irony is the very day the
constitution was signed, when Benjamin Franklin came out and said, what are you giving us, mr. Franklin, and he said, a republican, if you can keep it. When washington was sworn in, he talked about the greatest concern a new republic has is influence from foreign powers. Its ironic that we learned about mr. Trump asking for foreign powers to intervene on the same day. This is a constitutional issue that should be taken as a deadly serious matter. This should be done one at a time. Other people like Rudy Giuliani and others may end up in jail, they dont have to be impeached, at least the two thugs he had with him have been indicted. And theyve been totally discredited. I think we should just be this is a very serious undertaking. Reporter how do you convince
primary voters that youre a better choice than Bernie Sanders when alexandria ocasiocortez Just Announced that he is her guy . Thats how i do it. Did yo that your son is taken up your job and maybe hes not doing this or fend off this whole situation. My sons comment and i am very proud of my son. My sons comment speaks for itself. Lets keep the focus here. The president of the United States says he wants to talk about corruption. Well, lets talk about corruption. Hes the most corrupt government in the history of United States of america. Number one. Number two, hes in a position where as he talks about corruption, hes engaged in practices that in fact everyone
around the world, how in gods name this man can be doing that while hes president. Mr. President , you want to talk about corruption, i released 21 years of my tax returns. I made no money while i was in there other than my salary. Mr. President , even Richard Nixon released his tax returns. Mr. President , release your tax returns or shut up. No, i dont. I never discuss with my son and having anything to do with whats going on in ukraine. Here is a look, guys, lets focus on the problem here. The corrupt president engaging the reason why hes
running after him because he knows i will beat him like a drum. He understands that. Have you heard anybody going out and getting the special interests all of whom i have beaten, the nra, The Gun Manufactures and the healthcare people across the board, have you ever heard any time they spent millions of dollars going into a primary or another party to try to eliminate a candidate from trying to beat a candidate before they can get a chance to beat them. Come on. This is so obvious. As i said Rudy Giuliani and the hench men and trumps lawyers. How many of these folks are in jail . These are the president s people for gods sake. This is a thoroughly corrupt t outl outlet. If i am not mistaken and i did not coordinate any of this with my son. I didnt know he was having this long discussion for some time with abc. I guess it is abc, was it abc . I believe it is abc. He pointed out the reason why he regretted it is because he did not anticipate like thug like Rudy Giuliani would use to in fact try to embarrass his father. Theyre thugs. The reason why i set up the idea that i laid out had nothing to do with hunter. As we hear the former Vice President saying release your taxes mr. President or shut up about the conflict of interest. Here is the president with the president of italy. Today is my honor to welcome president sergio of italy to the white house. We have known each other for a while and we had some really great conversations. We had a productive discussion throughout the day with our staffs and representatives that
i look forward to hosting our president and his daughter laura. I look forward to it very much. We are bound together dating back to thousands of years to ancient rome. The italian people have blessed our scivilization with magnificent works of arts. We paid tribute to our italian explore who led a voyage of discovery to the new world, christopher columbus. To me it will always be called columbus day. Some people dont like that. I do. Today the United States and italy draws a strength from our heritage as we Work Together to safe guard our people and
promote prosperity as nato allies our countries cooperate closely defense issues including the protection of our nations against radical islamic terrorism. The problem is that italy is only paying 1. 1 instead of the mandated 2 which is a low number. It should be 4 . Anywhere from 4 to 5 . Only eight of the 28 nato countries are paying the 2 meaning 20 of the country are delinquent of the payment to nato and they have been for many years. Germany is at 1. 3 at most depending on calculations. Spain is atless than 1 . I want to just thank Secretary General sultonburg because hes
going around saying President Trump was able to raise over 100 billion last year which was true. It is still only a large fraction. A large fraction of the amount of money thats owed by many of the countries that are not paying their dues. We hope that italy will boost its Offense Spending in order to meet natos minimum 2 of gdp. I will say they have just purchased and we learned about it today, 90 brand new beautiful f 35s. The straight fighter, the program is doing phenomenaly well. One of our challenges facing nato is instability and the mediterranean north africa areas and much of the volatility region stems from the violence in libya which is close to italy border. The president and i were talking about that at a great lengt length big problem. The ongoing Libya Conflict led
to a Migration Crisis and unfair burden on italy in familiar. I asked the European Union to get more involved. If they are not involved enough, thats a problem with the European Union. They do well with us on trade. They had a Trade Surplus with the United States over the last five or six years about 150 billion a year. They have to get more involved to help italy. The Italian Government has stepped up as a leader to fight this illegal immigration. We urge also nato and our european partner to uphold sovereign borders. Immigration control is critical to National Security and essential to the wellbeing of our citizens, nations must be able to vet screen and manage. The legislation that we have passed, we had no help from the
democrats, the closure of loopholes which would be easy to do and they refused do. They want open borders and italy does not want open borders and we are not going to have open borders. I want to thank the president of mexico for the great help they have given us. They helped us much more than a democrats. Here in the United States we taken dramatic action to secure our borders, speed the removal of illegal immigrants. We are moving the ms 13 gang members out literally by the thousands. Theyre getting out, we are dropping them out of our country and they cant come back. What we have done with guatemala and honduras and el salvador. The agreement that we have signed, they accept them back and they keep them back. It is a much different relationships than we have had with those three countries. I want to thank the leadership of those three countries. We have been working well together. Our message is clear. If you enter illegally, the United States, you will be promptly returned home. Theyre all returning home. Takes a long time because we had years of people coming and staying and thats the end of that. President mattarella also discuss the steps of our two countries. We invest billions of dollars in each others economies. Without the burdens as unfair as they are imposed by the European Union, we would have a much higher number than 70 billion between italy and the United States. However, we can do more and we can achieve fairness and reciprocity which we dont have now. Americas trade deficit with italy accounts 150 to
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