Wants. What my people have to do is just be honest, just tell the truth. And truth or consequences, the president s legal team begins presenting its case in just hours. Why it appears they may mostly talk about joe biden. Get her out tomorrow. I dont care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. Okay. Do it. Excellent. And the explosive new tape reveals the president urging the firing of the u. S. Ambassador to ukraine. Plus, what you didnt see behind the scenes, drawings of what senators did beyond the cameras view. Good morning, welcome to msnbc special saturday impeachment trial coverage, live from capitol hill, im geoff bennett. And good morning, everybody, im Yasmin Vossoughian as well, and geoff, you have been covering this for who knows how long at this point, we have a lot to cover this morning, and im so happy to be anchoring alongside you to have the inside knowledge of what we have been seeing on the senate floor take place. A lot to cover this morning, and were going to start in washington with this historic moment. President trumps defense team getting ready to lay out its case, arguing he had a legal right to investigate the bidens and ukraine to root out corruption. Democratic house managers wrapped up opening arguments last night ending with a sweeping presentation that walked through all of the Critical Evidence focussing on abuse of power and obstruction charges as well. Congressman adam schiff delivering the closing statement with an emotional plea for senators to consider the history of this very moment. Watch this. Sometimes i think about how unforgiving history can be of our conduct. We can do a lifetimes work, draft the most wonderful legislation, help our constituents and yet we may be remembered for none of that. But for a single decision we may be remembered affecting the course of our country. I believe this may be one of those moments. A moment we never thought we would see, a moment when our democracy was gravely threatened and not from without but from within. Jerry nadler was much more pointed in his final remarks, insisting President Trump must be removed from office. Heres his testimony. We kept the leader. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans ended the week the same way they started it, proclaiming they heard nothing new. Basically true with everything that weve heard, its been over and over and over again, repetition of the previous days points, the hour previous points. There is not one new thing other than exaggeration, and you do this in a vacuum, and you keep reepeating the same thing, youre not going to win this by time of possession. You got to start telling us whats different from what weve heard before. What the house managers have done is they made it pretty boring. I mean, its like how many times have i seen the same words come out of ambassador sondlands mouth or fiona hills mouth. In a bold moment from adam schiff, he referenced a cbs news report that President Trump threatened gop senators to keep them loyal. Cbs news reports last night that a trump confidant said that gop senators were warned vote against your president , vote against the president and your head will be on a pike. When were talking about a president who would make himself a monarch, that whoever that was would use the terminology of a penalty that was imposed by a monarch, a head on a pike. Some republican senators said that they were insulted bid that comment, and they left kpcapito hill refuting the reporting. I was visibly upset with it. The whole room was visibly upset on that side, to say thats insulting and demeaning that we somehow live in fear and that the president has threatened all of us to put our head on a pike. Nothing like going through three days of frustration and cap it with an insult on everybody. And as the debate over whether to call witnesses drags on, a new poll shows 66 of americans think new witnesses should be part of this trial. We have a team of reporters and analysts joining us to walk us through what is expected on this very first day of the trump testifies, and to examine the final day of the prosecutions case, were going to get to them in a moment, but first, heres a look at what were expecting to happen today as things get started. The senate trial will resume at 10 00 a. M. Eastern. That is when the white house will take center stage, and they have indicated a strong defense, focussing on joe and hunter biden as we heard from the president s defense team, jay sekulow. Todays session is only expected to last about three hours. A sort of trailer as were seeing it of coming attractions of the defense case since the president reportedly considers saturday Morning Television viewership quote death valley. Yeah. Lets go to Garrett Hague, my colleague on capitol hill. Garrett has been working around the clock. First of all, its good to see you, but set the scene for us this morning. How are you expecting the day to proceed . Reporter remember that the white houses lawyers here are essentially playing a prevent defense. They have republican senators who agree with them so far, who are not inclined to call witnesses, and who up to this point are certainly not inclined to convict this president. So the job for the republican or excuse me, for the white House Attorneys here at this point is to not offend their audience, to make a strong case for someone who likes to watch a lot of saturday Morning Television and thats the president of the United States who will no doubt be turning in to hear how his lawyers defend him and how he has called a perfect phone call, the preview we have gotten from white house lawyers is they will largely echo the remark, that the president s phone call was great and the actions around ukraine and the president did nothing wrong in that case, and it needs to be acquitted and handled quickly. Adam schiff was pushing back on this, particularly on the last point, the idea that the trial needs to be handled expediently, theres no need to call witnesses, things could be dragged on too long. Schiff argued this is too important to rush, too important for senators to let go of in the face of white house push back here in the face of the president s defense team. Heres how he closed out his speech last night. Take a listen. Thomas payne wrote, those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must undergo the fatigue of supporting it. Is it too much fatigue to call witnesses and have a fair trial . Are the blessings of freedom so meager that we will not endure the fatigue of a real trial with witnesses and documents . I implore you, give america a fair trial. Give america a fair trial. Shes worth it. Reporter so geoff and yasmin, you hear schiff trying to appeal to the higher angels, the higher callings of senators. Im not fatigued, i know you all are not fatigued, the question is whether the senators will decide whether calling witnesses, which will be the key vote, tell them enough new they decide its worth it. Expect to hear from the president s attorneys how it wouldnt be worth it and how they need to shut down this impeachment. Guys. Yeah, great points, Garrett Hague kicking us off this morning. Stay with us, we want to introduce our panel, joining us is susan del percio, republican strategist and msnbc political analyst, hayes brown, world news editor and reporter with buzz feed news. Jonathan Allen National political reporter with nbc news. Com. And morgan, nbc legal analyst, glenn kesh ner a former federal prosecutor. Glenn, im going to start with you on this one. Before we look ahead to what were going to be expecting today, there is a lot considering this is day one of the president s defense in all of this. I want to take a look back what we heard overnight, especially from the closing arguments of congressman adam schiff, the lead house manager. What was your take on it overall . So it almost goes without saying that adam schiff is a powerful advocate. 30 years of trying cases and arguing criminal appeals, i dont know that ive seen anybody with a combination of sort of poise, understatement, power and relatability, which is really the big one, i think anybody could tune in and watch adam schiff and whether youre a High School Dropout or scientist, everyone can kind of get what hes saying, and that is sort of a unique characteristic in an oral advocate, and i found one of his most powerful arguments to be that, you know, if we dont have an article ii of the articles of impeachment, article ii being just the complete obstruction of congress, a president and an administration saying you cant investigate us to see whether i committed an impeachable offense, we dont have an article ii, we will never again have an article i, which means there will be no such thing as impeachment moving forward. I thought that was a powerful argument that really should resonate with anybody who cares to think about whats going on. Yeah, and what about that, because adam schiff, it appeared to me had really three audiences, the 100 senators in front of him, the American Public at home, and the four or five republican senators who we like to say matter. Those folks if they are going to be flipped on the question of witnesses and evidence, those would be the folks who would join with the coalition of democrats to get them to the number, 51. Do you think the republicans based on what they heard in the last few days, jonathan days, jonathan zes your Car Insurance so you only pay for what you need. Only pay for what you need. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Introducing oreida potato pay. Where oreida golden crinkles are your crispy currency to pay for bites of this. With this. When kids wont eat dinner, potato pay them to. Oreida. Win at mealtime. Until i found out what itst it actually was. Ed me. Hem to. Dust mite droppings eeeeeww dead skin cells gross so now, i grab my swiffer sweeper and heavyduty dusters. Duster extends to three feet to get all that gross stuff gotcha and for that nasty dust on my floors, my sweepers on it. The textured cloths grab and hold dirt and hair no matter where dust bunnies hide. No more heebie jeebies. Phew. Glad i stopped cleaning and started swiffering. {tires screeching} {truck honking} [alarm beeping] avo life doesnt give you many second chances. But a subaru can. dad you guys ok . You alright . Wow. avo eyesight with precollision braking. Standard on the subaru ascent. The threerow subaru ascent. Love. Its what makes a subaru a subaru. This is a determination by President Trump that he wants to be all powerful, he does not have to respect the congress. He does not have to respect the representatives of the people. Only his will goes. He is a dictator. This must not stand and that is why another reason he must be removed from office. Welcome back to msnbc. Im susan del percio, were dealing with a little technical issue. Stan in washington, d. C. , hopefully well have yasmin and geoff back with us. In the meantime, i would like to bring in editor at buzzfeed hayes browne. What are your take aways after last nights closing. After a long 24 hours, and three days, the house managers made the best case they can with the amount of evidence they were able to get from the white house and the testimony they had. I think that in their closing, they are making the point that, yes, we have all of this evidence that the president committed abuse of power, that the president has obstructed congress, not just the house but the senate now, and that in this appeal that adam schiff had to the various senators in the room to actually take up the mantle of a jury, to actually take up their job, and actually try and get the white house and executive branch writ large to turn over more evidence, was a compelling one. In his closing, adam schiff mentioned a cbs report that said the white house threatened republican senators. They seemed to take offense to that. Given the president s history of bullying and con jajoling membef congress, i dont know why they can be surprised that the president pushed and the white house pushed them to actually have no witnesses, no new documents and that there would be repercussions if they actually acted against him. Yeah, i mean, i heard that too, and one of my take aways is that was really meant for the public. Adam schiff used that report to sway public opinion, because as it was mentioned earlier, we basically are seeing an appeal to the senators in the room and the public at large to really Gain Momentum for that argument of witnesses and documents. We know that theres about five or six senators in play, republican senators that may make that fight. What do you think the chances are of that happening, and will they will todays Opening Statements and next two days of testimony maybe damper that chance of happening . Heres the thing, i think that we have been looking at three key republicans so far, mitt romney of utah, Lisa Murkowski of alaska, Susan Collins of maine, the last two seemed to be offended by schiffs statement, moving forward, i can see them continuing to want the witnesses they suggested they were after. As far as the fourth and fifth votes, Lamar Alexander of tennessee, cory gardner of colorado being the fourth and fifth votes. I think that right now, the president s defense team has one of the easiest jobs in washington, they already have the jury behind them. They just have to not trip up so far. They have to make sure in their defense they actually make not just a case that this is a procedural problem, the house rushed the case, that they dont have enough evidence, they need to put forward a positive defense of the president as well. They put forward a substantiative defense of the president and thats something senator ted cruz has told the president s defense team. They have to make sure they dont trip over their own feet in trying to appease their client, the president. Because we all know that the president has insisted that hes done nothing wrong with ukraine, that his call was perfect, and anything to the contrary is seen as a betrayal, so i think that the defense team has to rye and walk that line between keeping the president happy but not going so far down the rabbit hole as to alienate those key republicans we were just talking about. Thank you, hayes. Were going to take a break now. We have washington back online. When we come back. E come back. 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Com go your own way through the at t network, edgetoedge intelligence gives you the power to see every corner of your growing business. From finding out whats selling best. To managing your fleet. To collaborating remotely with your teams. Giving you a nice big edge over your competition. Thats the power of edgetoedge intelligence. See how to keep people moving, to keep a city moving. With esri location technology, you can see what others cant. Welcome back, everybody. We had a bit of a technical difficulty. It seems as if geoff unplugged something. So we lost power for a moment. I joke. Thats actually not what happened, and were trying to figure out what happened, but we are back up and running and a pretty important day in washington, d. C. As the republicans are beginning their defense aamidst the impeachment in the senate. Lets pick up Jonathan Allen on where you were and when everything got cut off. That is the seat change, the four or five republicans we have been watching through the last three days and if there could be a change from them. Your take on that as you were speaking earlier. The republicans that were being targeted by democrats are getting farther away from the likelihood of voting for witnesses and certainly from voting against the president. But at the same time, i think democratic prosecutors are speaking more to the nation and asking the public basically to stand up for the country. Thats what adam schiff is making his appeal to, i think thats what the other prosecutors are making their appeal to. I think what theyre saying is that the republicans here arent going to stand up to the president , the public is going to have to stand up to the president and the republican senators and house members who didnt, and i think if you pull back one of the things you hear in these charges and in the prosecution thats going on here is something very different in this impeachment, the charges against President Trump are so different in scale and sort of seriousness, graveness than what you saw in the Andrew Johnson impeachment trial and what you saw in the bill clinton impeachment trial. Youre talking about the foreign interference of another country into our elections. I mean, this is so different, and goes so to the heart of the sanctity of the republican, the democracy, and they are making that appeal to the country, to the public, i think thats what you have heard over the last couple of days increasingly from these prosecutors. And morgan, i also heard democrats try to prepare the political arena for after this trial ends in the event that President Trump is acquitted. Setting up the argument that, yes, he was acquitted but its only because the trial was rigged. Did you hear that as well . Yes, thats something weve heard even, you know, we have heard this pretty consistently from democrats ahead of the trial with that appeal to get witnesses saying that it would be a rigged trial if there werent witnesses. So you know, if those witnesses arent brought, which is the expectation that they wont be, thats going to be the con