we ran out of time. i could have talked to these friends for another hour. my thanks to all of them and most of all for you for watching. stay up late with us tonight at the debates. "mtp daily with chuck todd" starts now. welcome to tuesday. it's "meet the press daily." good evening, i'm chuck todd here in washington where the white house risks losing control of two presidency-defining battles as administration officials defy the president on

impeachment and republicans defy him on syria. a number of officials are cooperating with the house's impeachment inquiry. we'll have mother re on that in minute. the president's lawyer, rudy giuliani, is not one of them, not a surprise. giuliani's attorney, who we've now learned is stepping down, has told congress giuliani will not comply with their subpoena for documents. another diplomat, assistant secretary of state george kent, did comply, saying he raised the alarm about giuliani's actions. yesterday, the president's former top adviser on russia, fiona hill, dragged the president's former national security adviser into the story, john bolton, testifying that bolton was so disturbed by efforts to get ukraine to investigate trump's political rivals that he called it a, quote, drug deal, and told her to alert national security council's top attorneys.

current and former diplomats are testifying every day this week in the house's impeachment inquiry, despite the president and the secretary of state providing them a supposed cloak of cover if they don't want to cooperate and certainly the president himself has been pressuring folks not to cooperate. but as diplomats buck the president on ukraine, the white house is facing an untenable situation following his unilateral decision to withdraw troops from northern syria, which turned into an event that essentially green lit turkey to do what he's doing, what many warned the president would become a disaster. republicans are livid. president trump said he would sanction turkey. whether it's the president

trying to get ukraine to discredit the mueller robe prob leaving a vacuum in northern syria, we keep coming back to the question why does it that president trump acts to benefit vladimir putin? let's turn to our nbc news correspondents who all have the latest. hans nichols is at the white house, garrett haake is on capitol hill. we'll be checking in with richard engel in a bit. hans, first let's focus on the investigation, then i want to get to turkey. on the investigation front, rudy giuliani. does he have an attorney, does he not have an attorney? is he basically the only person who is not cooperating now? >> reporter: it's clear from the letter sent out last week by the white house counsel that they don't want anyone to cooperate. >> but people are cooperating. >> reporter: in the state department. >> they're saying don't

cooperate, and they're cooperating. >> reporter: they're not taking any action, at least effective action, to prevent state department officials from going before the committee and giving their view of the story. every time we talk about impeachment here, you're always corrected, they'll say "sham impeachment process." you say, will you be cooperating with this impeachment inquiry, it's always "sham impeachment." they're trying to brand it in that way. rudy giuliani specifically tweeted out tonight at this time he doesn't need a lawyer because he's not going to be cooperating with the house committee. so i don't know what that means to the other inquiry. i don't want to call it an investigation. we know that federal authorities are looking at whether or not he violating lobbying disclosure rules as it relates to his work in the ukraine. but the line across the administration, or at least across the white house, is that they will not be cooperating.

the secretary of defense is on record saying they will comply with the law. >> they were technically formers, but they could be asserting executive privilege but they haven't done that. >> reporter: don mcgahn is the operative example, it seems as though don mcgahn he's a deal with the white house for them to assert executive privilege and he has cover not to testify. what we're testing with john bolton is, what happens if a former white house employee does want to testify, under subpoena or not, then what can be done to compel that person not to testify. and that's an open question, chuck. >> let me turn to turkey. the president at the event with the president and saluting the st. louis blues, he announced that mike pence is going to -- well, he didn't say he was going

to turkey, we know he's going to turkey now. to do what, at this point? >> reporter: the goal is to broker a cease-fire. the important news we got out of the white house today is the timing on this. the meeting will happen thursday. crucially, there is a meeting, the white house is on the record saying they think they have a meeting with president erdogan and they'll try to force some sort of cease-fire. remember, that's thursday. >> they think they have a meeting with erdogan? we're sending the vice president of the united states, and they think? >> reporter: i couch it that way because we haven't heard confirmation from the turkish side. the white house is saying they have a meeting. erdogan -- apologies, i don't read turkish, but erdogan has been silent since his oped in the wall street journal last

night. remember, you have not just pence, you have pompeo, a big delegation going to ankara, probably leaving tomorrow to get there by thursday. >> it sounds like deals have been cut before the united states delegation has even gotten there. hans, stick around. fw garrett, on the capitol hill side of things, let's start with turkey and then go to the investigation. today is the first day a lot of lawmakers are back. what's your sense what they think they can do to turn this situation around, or realistically do they think it's too late? >> reporter: the feeling is you can't put the genie back in the bottle. there could be very tough sanctions packages that would get wide bistart s starpartisan both chambers here. there could be exploration of other ways to punish turkey. but you're dealing with this

retro actively. no amount of sanctions will bring back dead kurds or restore america's reputation is an ally. most of the efforts are focused on a sanctions-based response that puts a cap on this, potentially, but you can't turn back the clock on this issue. >> is there anything else, anything that's realistic that anybody is talking about? >> reporter: not that i've heard. >> let me move to the investigation. is george kent still in there? he's been in there a long time. what have we learned, if anything, that's trickled out? >> reporter: kent is still in the room. i don't think kent is anyone's idea of a star witness in this case. he's a career diplomat, he has experience on ukraine and corruption, which gives him some credibility. the way his testimony has been

described is that it essentially bolsters marie yovanovitch's story, how they were taking on corruption in the ukraine and the degree to which red flags were raised about rudy giuliani and company's, you know, shadow operation within that country and back at the white house. he is a supportive witness but not a star witness for the democrats. >> and there's a caucus meeting tonight among house democrats at 6:00. apparently they want to discuss the idea of holding a vote on the inquiry. >> reporter: yeah, this could tell us a ton. we could see a discussion on whether or not to hold a formal vote, which is not required by the constitution or house rules. but doing so would remove a republican talking point, remove the white house's ability to call this a sham investigation as hans pointed out. they also may be discussing what to do with giuliani's refusal to respond to a subpoena, what to do about john bolton being potentially called as a witness.

there's a lot of housekeeping to be done by house democrats. >> and garrett, how the nats secure game four, you may need to weigh in on that as well. oh, wait, the debate. i'm kidding, debaters. hans nichols, garrett haake, thank you both. richard engel is covering this conflict on the ground from northern syria. richard, i know you've been all over this evening, evening-time there. you hear talk of vice president pence and pompeo being sent to negotiate a cease-fire. what would that look like, considering what you're seeing? >> reporter: the u.s. does have some levers to pull with turkey. but right now turkey is saying that it is pushing on. the turkish president said a short while ago, this offensive

continues, he has no intention of stopping. now, that could be for his domestic audience, we'll see what happens when vice president pence arrives. there are still american forces in the country, they are consolidating and in the process of leaving, but if we really wanted to stop this process, they could be protecting our allies. we have an extraordinary situation here. i don't think history will remember it well. you have a campaign that the kurds describe as ethnic cleansing going on right now with turkey continuing its bombardment, with turkey continuing to send in radical militias that include, according to u.s. officials, former members of isis and al qaeda. that is happening now, as we speak. and what is happening also now, as we speak, is that u.s. forces who are not very far away from them are packing up their things, consolidating their bases so they can leave this country.

so you have to consider that fact. there are real assets in play in this country right now that aren't being used. instead we are waiting for a delegation to arrive in ankara and have meetings and use diplomatic levers. by then turkey will have seized more territory, and it will be negotiating over scorched earth. >> richard, are we looking at a situation where the u.s. government, due to all the technology that we have, that we're probably watching this in real time, there are people -- we're getting footage in in real time, satellite coverage in real time. is it possible we're watching in real time what appears to be ethnic cleansing? >> reporter: i think that's very likely, because as u.s. troops consolidate their forces, that is a particularly vulnerable time for them. as you try to pack up and leave with honor, because u.s. troops

do not want this to look like vietnam where you have the last few people rescued off of some rooftop, they want to leave in a dignified way, which means they are watching what is happening here extraordinarily closely. there was an incident earlier where as u.s. troops are pulling back, trying to defend themselves, trying to leave in an honorable way, a kurdish -- excuse me, a turkish militia, one of these radical forces, got too near to them, so u.s. troops had to do a show of force to scare them away, effectively. they are watching the environment, they are seeing what is happening. they are in contact still with the kurdish forces. this is not a situation where they are oblivious to what is going on. a u.s. official told me they are witnessing violations of the law of war. >> very quickly, the kurds had to cut a deal with assad. what does that mean? >> reporter: well, it means that -- and i spoke with the

commander who cut that deal just a short while ago. his name is general kobani. i asked him specifically, i said, you cut this deal with the assad regime, why did you do it? he said, we had no other choice. he said, the kurds are facing either genocide or ethnic cleansing, or the less bad option of aligning with the government of bashar al asad which is aligning with russia. faced with medical-ish shilitia the assad government. it's probably from their perspective the only choice they had. >> all right. richard engel with important reporting on the ground in northern syria, richard, thanks for bringing it, please stay safe out there. with me now is ambassador dennis ross, an expert in both the middle east and russia.

he's a councilor and the author of "be strong and of good courage." ambassador ross, nice to see you. you heard this report from richard engel. the lead today in "the new york times" by david sanger is heartbreaking because every warning everybody had about what would happen if the united states pulled back, it seemed it all happened within days. normally we have to wait months or years for a policy impact. >> not in this case. look, i think the only word you can use is "appalling." what we see here is a combination of things. number one, the very forces that fought and died did the brunt of the fighting and dying in terms of defeating isis but not destroying it, were the kurdish forces that are now the ones under great pressure by turkey. it was a given this was going to happen. it wasn't hard to predict.

in fact this was the reaction that many had all along when there were calls -- when the president decided he would tweet about getting out precipitously from syria. first you had mattis resign over it. now you've seen with the passage of time, when erdogan makes it clear he's going in when we pull out, you have to understand, one of the key things, prior to the time we pulled out, we had worked out a set of understandings which we thought created a security zone. as a result of that understanding, the kurdish forces moved back from where they were, took down some of the hardened positions that they are, and then of course we left as well. and the combination put them in a position where there was really nothing there to stop the turks from moving. and not only do we see the turks taking advantage of it but we see the russians taking advantage of it. you see the kurds having been left with no choice but basically to cut a deal with

bashar al assad which effectively means cutting a deal with bashar al assad, with iran, and the russians. add up the consequences and they're pretty grim not only from a humanitarian at some point but they're grim from the at some point of human interests. >> going back to jim baker's state department in the late '80s, early '90s, through the various state departments we've had up until this one. i'm trying to think back. how many decades of sort of american policy in the middle east has been set back by this one decision? >> a fundamental element of what our policy has been all along was to ensure that the united states was the main outside power who could try to promote stability on the one hand, ensure that the russians didn't become a source of instability and also ensure that the iranians couldn't extend their influence against american friends. what we now have is a posture

that makes the u.s. largely irrelevant. not only are the russians act i have active in syria, but putin is in saudi arabia and the uae, united arab emirates today. >> dennis, don't forget israel. they have felt compelled to go running to putin. >> they have, because of the russian presence in syria. but you can imagine what's going on right now when he visits saudi arabia and the emirates and he says, well, the americans couldn't protect you, in fact the americans aren't prepared to protect their friends. are you going to stick with the americans or i can sell you s-400s, and by the way, because of my leverage on the iranians, i can make sure they don't cause you the kind of problems they might. it's like the mafia don coming in and telling them, you know what, we can provide you protection, of course there's a price. there's a reversal of american

policy for the last 40 years. >> i was just going to say, and what would you do if you were a diplomat today? how do you function? you know, if the rug's getting pulled out from under you, no, we're with you, we're with you, and i brought it up a million times, i feel like we're watching "charlie wilson's war" play out in real time. >> the one thing i haven't said up until now, and this is basically implicit in what you're saying, chuck, who is going to rely upon america's word right now? who is going to go out on a limb and decide to expose themselves because they're counting on us? if the secretary of state says, here is what we're going to do, is our counterpart going to say, oh, yeah, we can count on that? i'm afraid that the next tweet can undercut whatever has been said by anyone who is representing the administration. so you're seeing really a kind of perfect storm right now of

everything that could go wrong. it is undoing, i think, basically, a kind of structure that we have sought to put in place. obviously it's not perfect. obviously there's been a high price for us to pay at times. but when you create vacuums in an area like the middle east, the worst forces are absolutely guaranteed to fill it. and that's what's happening right now. >> can you even begin to think of how you would start, okay, the president admits it, boy, i messed up, forget it, we're going back. how would you even begin to rebuild? >> the one thing i would try to do -- you can't just do it with words because no one is going to accept our words. what i would do right now have us reimpose a no-fly list -- no-fly zone and tell the turks that you're not going to fly there. it would signal we're not going to walk away from our friends and our interests. it would put us in a position

where we can use our diplomacy. diplomacy needs to be backed by something. what we have with the trump administration is a tariff-based diplomacy. in the middle east we've seen the limits of that. >> the no-fly zone idea, perhaps vice president pence and secretary of state pompeo will have that in their arsenal. thank you, you appreciate your expertise, appreciate it. coming up, the journey of gordon sondland. how the businessman turned trump supporter turned diplomat has emerged as a key witness in the impeachment inquiry. it's democratic debate night in ohio. how will joe biden respond to the president's attacks on his and his family? and oh, yeah, hunter biden spoke this week. we'll talk with a top campaign staffer. mpaign staffer.

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-what could be better than being a mo-tour? the real question is... do you mind not being a mo-tour? -i do. for those who were born to ride, there's progressive. welcome back. we just learned that speaker pelosi is planning to speak tonight publicly after she speaks to her caucus on whether to schedule a vote on an impeachment inquiry. we're not sure she would announce it if she didn't have news to announce. joining me is bill kristol, editor at large at the ball washing. heiid -- bulwark.

heidi, you've spoken to some sources who indicate that they are making moves in that direction. >> more vulnerable democrats who may be more nervous about casting this vote. just like nancy pelosi was led to the water on calling for impeachment inquiry in the first place, there is a sense she will ultimately hold a more formal vote which will allow her to make the argument to republicans, to push back and say, this is a formal impeachment inquiry and you don't have an excuse to withhold documents and subpoena requests. >> cornell, what would be your political concern? put the political hat back on. >> i almost don't have a political concern at this moment. if you look at all the polling, the polling keeps moving in the direction where you have a majority, even in our nbc poll, an authority who say impeach now

or are at least open to an inquiry. if you look at where independents are on this, if you're a republican who is in one of these suburban districts that the democrats took back in 2018, especially suburban women, it's a tougher vote for you. >> i was going to say, connor lamb in pennsylvania, who's got the tougher vote? >> they're worried about losing a few democrats from trump districts, making this a tough vote for them to cast now. >> the oklahoma upset, the oklahoma city member, the new democrat there, she's the one that i think they worry the most about. >> it's only a handful. they're not committing to vote for impeachment, it's only an inquiry. and the giuliani letter helps pelosi. giuliani said today this is an

illegitimate impeachment inquiry and i'm not handing over anything. that allows the speaker to say, let's just vote. does it make it easier or harder to put republicans on the record to vote on inquiry? i can argue that one either way, i don't know. >> the pressure that trump is going to put on to have a solid republican showing, right? >> i do think it is harder for house republicans than it is for senate republicans to be critical of this president, because he can bring down almighty pressure on you and target you and primary you. >> and you don't even see what's coming. >> unless you're holding hands, bill and i discussed this before, and do this as a group, it really is harder in the house to resist pressure from this white house. >> but can house republicans legitimately, after the last couple of weeks, after

giuliani's letter today, the administration not complying, say no, there's not even grounds for an inquiry? >> yes. >> they've been complaining, we want a vote. >> i want to merge our stories here, our two gigantic stories that both could end up crippling this presidency. david sanger's lead today in "the new york times" was just staggering. mr. trump ignored months of warnings from his advisers about what calamities would likely ensue if he followed his instincts to pull back from syria and abandon the kurds. the only surprise is how swiftly it all collapsed around the president and his depleted, inexperienced foreign toll tepo team. bill, for some reason, turkey and ukraine are being compartmentalized by members of your former party, i don't know if you consider yourself a republican these days. >> sometimes. >> it seems both have more

similarities than differences. both seem to be a spur of the moment decision on politics. both seem to be based not on the advice of advisers. i think now we need to know the president's phone calls with erdogan in the same way we've seen the president's call with ukraine. if these two issues were combined, how many republican votes would there be? it shouldn't be that complicated. >> here is where your point is very important. the big excuse of reluctant trump supporters, trump acquiescers, people who didn't like him, thought he was bad news, look, he says these things in the oval office but you know what, the country is chugging along, don mcgahn didn't shut down the mueller investigation, jim mattis didn't do what he wanted to do in the defense department. a year ago it was possible to say we still have a mostly functioning administration despite a president who has no

respect for the removal law. you could say it 2 1/2 years ago somewhat credibly. you could say it a year ago, sort of. you can't say it now. in that respect turkey and ukraine are the same. the instruments of the u.s. government are being used for trump's personal political purposes with terrible consequences in the real world. >> and heidi, i want to bring up something here. guys, put up that full screen from january of 2017. this is from the intelligence community, the ic report on russian meddling. pro kremlin proxy. this is in a government report. pro kremlin proxy, vladimir zhirlinovskiy, leader of the nationalivity liberal democratic party of russia, proclaimed just before the election that if president-elect trump won. >> you know what else is in that report? they did drink the champagne and said we made america great again.

true. check out the report. so yeah, to bill's point, i don't even know how republicans can continue to separate this, because now they're back in town, and the number one question from all of us reporters when we confront them in the hallways is going to be, since you were on vacation, the president of the united states has now admitted on camera to saying that he sought help from a foreign power in investigating his political rival, are you okay with that? not is that impeachable, but are you okay with that? because as you know, in the 1998 impeachment of bill clinton, there were at least some democrats who are willing to condemn the behavior while saying it didn't rise to the level of impeachment. >> turn it the other way, cornell, to these republicans, are you comfortable with the fact that twice now, and they both seem to be on issues of importance to russia, both on ukraine and on turkey, the president does not take his own staff's advice. >> right. >> it's uniquely on these two

issues. >> i was going to point out, in that rundown you were talking about, the other part of this is all these things are helpful to vladimir putin. and at some point you have to go, and i'm not a conspiracy theorist, but oh, my god, this man has to have something on trump because he's putting vladimir putin's interests ahead of -- >> i think that's the question, why does the president have vladimir putin's foreign policy on the front of his mind more than american foreign policy? >> and you said he's not taking his staff's advice, it's worse than that, he's got a rogue operation going with his personal lawyer, rudy giuliani, dealing with ukraine, and the ambassador to the eu -- >> who has a connection to turkey with the gold trader that erdogan wanted out. >> the degree to which there could be personal corruption issues and other forms of leverage in the turkey situation with erdogan shouldn't be underestimated. i don't think it's necessarily just putin. but i agree, he has rogue operations going on within the u.s. government, he's using the

instrumentalities of the u.s. government to carry out these policies and the effect is truly disastrous. that's different from a year ago when he did some bad stuff in the campaign and is saying things that are really terrible, but -- >> that was in the abstract, we hadn't seen impact yet. now we're seeing impact from his behavior. look what happens. the kurds. >> we can step back from this, we sometimes laugh at how slapstick the white house seems and how chaotic, they're making decisions, and from a domestic standpoint it's worrisome. but on the international perspective, people die from this slapstick, nonsensical, corrupt behavior that we laugh at internally because we do have checks and balances here in america that sort of keep the president at bay. we have none of that as it stands for him as commander in chief. and we've got to think about that after this president is gone. >> we'll pause this

conversation. that's a heavy thing to think about because you're not wrong, there are some things apparently we have to legislate that we didn't know we had to legislate. coming up, we're on minute 34, and i think it's the first time we've brought up the debate tonight. why is it joe biden's son is the one making headlines today? we'll talk to the biden campaign, next. l talk to the bi campaign, next (truck honks) (wheels screeching) (clapping) (sound of can hitting bag and bowl) (clapping) always there in crunch time. hi, i'm nfl player montez sweat old spice, sweat, is just my last name. i don't represent sweat and won't be a party to this at any time. that's not what we heard. i represent sweat, and it's party time. ♪ i felt i couldn't be at my best for my family. in only 8 weeks with mavyret, i was cured and left those doubts behind. i faced reminders of my hep c every day.

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welcome back. while the democratic presidential candidates are preparing to take the debate stage tonight, they're being overshadowed today at least by a national interview with joe biden's son, hunter biden. president trump's pursuit of political dirt about the bidens in the ukraine triggered the impeachment inquiry. and hunter has become a target personally of president trump. in the interview hunter biden defended his overseas work but also said his involvement in the border of a ukrainian gas

company was, quote, poor judgment. biden did benefit from his father's name and position. >> it's impossible for me to be on any boards without saying i'm the son of the vice president of the united states. >> if your last name wasn't biden, would you have been asked to be on the board of burisma? >> i don't know. probably not. there's a lot of things that wouldn't have happened in my life if my last name wasn't biden. >> kate, nice to see, happy debate day. >> thanks for having me, chuck. >> let me start with, your campaign seemed pretty emphatic that hunter biden shouldn't have to go out there, you guys didn't need to be answering questions about hunter biden, he had nothing to answer for, that the president was playing a conspiracy game, and that you shouldn't give it credibility. that was essentially what i felt like you guys were saying for the last month.

what changed? >> that's exactly right. this is donald trump's game. look, hunter biden has been attacked viciously and personally by donald trump for the last three weeks. he sat down this morning and answered every question that was thrown at him which frankly is a lot more than you can say for donald trump and rudy giuliani and their ilk who are stonewalling and refusing to answer questions in their own impeachment inquiry, by the way. but you had hunter acid dosit d answered questions. he's shown he's not going to be bullied in this campaign. why are we having this conversation? it's because donald trump does not want to face joe biden at the ballot box. that's what this is all about. he's committed impeachable offences. he has sent his personal attorney to dig up dirt on joe biden. he has openly from the south lawn of the white house called on foreign nations to step in and try to influence the election because he's afraid he

will lose to joe biden. democratic voters are looking for somebody who can get donald trump out of office. joe biden is that candidate. donald trump clearly believes he's that candidate. joe biden is the guy that can get donald trump out of the white house. >> not only did hunter biden's lawyer put out a statement but your campaign put out what you would ask for in conflict of interest issues and stuff like that. i guess i'm curious, why wasn't that on day one of the campaign? it does feel like donald trump's campaign is dictating sort of when you guys address these things. that's something that seemed like you could have addressed on day one. >> absolutely not. joe biden got into this race making the case against donald trump. and when you got in, you guys all said, oh, he's making a general election argument, is this really the argument for the moment. he's the one who's been making

the most aggressive case against donald trump since he got into the race. he's talked the damage trump is doing, shredding our constitution, the fact that he's an existential threat to the country. you're absolutely right, we put out a plan over the weekend that gives voters a sense of exactly what kind of ethical administration a president biden would run. biden helped run one of the most ethical white houses in history, eight years of the obama white house without a hint of scandal. folks know what kind of leader he'll be. he put forward a powerful plan to get private money out of politics entirely. he called for a ban on political influence in the department of justice, something that the trump administration seems to find -- >> i get all that. i guess the question i have is,

kate, why on this conflict of interest thing, which frankly on the hunter biden situation was known then, why not throw that out there on day one? it seemed like an obvious thing to do. >> people know joe biden. they know who he is. they have known that he has been in office for four years. he came into the senate as one of the poorest members of the senate and left as one of the poorest members of the senate. anyone who wants to know anything about how joe biden made his money, they know that and they knew that on day one of this race. donald trump, we can't say the same thing for. he's currently sitting in the white house, lining his pockets, we don't know from there, and has refused to put his tax returns out. there's no question voters know who joe biden is and what kind of ethical leadership he would bring to the white house. >> do you view your chief

primary rival as elizabeth warren, and if so, what is your case of why voters should pick joe biden instead of elizabeth warren? >> we're focused, look, we're focused on running our race. i would imagine the other democratic campaigns would say the same thing, we view our opponent as donald trump. the case for joe biden is he is the lone candidate in this race who has the experience, who has the record of progressive action, who knows how to get things done. he doesn't just talk about change. he's done it. his entire life, he's committed to making change in people's lives. that includes the affordable care act, that includes the violence against women act, that includes the recovery act, one of the single biggest investments in clean energy in this country. there's a lot of talk about change in this race. he's the candidate who has actually delivered it. as democratic voters desperately want donald trump out of office, they know that joe biden is the candidate to go toe-to-toe with him and they know he's the

candidate who can deliver real change for their lives because that's what running for president is about, making real change in people's lives. joe biden has delivered on that every single day of his career. >> on debate night outside of columbus, ohio, thank you so much for coming on and sharing your views, we appreciate it. >> thanks for having me. how biden handles questions about the president's attacks on his family is just one of the issues we're looking at tonight, including game four taking place in washington, d.c. we'll be right back. ton, d.c we'll be right back. wednesdays. at outback, they're for steak and beer.

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and talk to your eczema specialist about dupixent. why did you least board in april? >> it's a five-year term. >> and you chose not to -- >> i chose not to, yeah. >> why? >> it's pretty obvious, why. >> this is your opportunity to say why. >> because this is what becomes a distraction, because i have to sit here and answer these questions. that's why i committed i won't serve on nany boards or work on any foreign entities when my dad becomes president. >> heidi przybyla, cornell pritchard, bill kristol are still with us. cornell, this felt like this was hunter's position. >> i get that he's trying to get

out in front of it. i wonder how much news he's making that's not necessarily helpful. i also understand, to your point about why you didn't get front . i tell you, chuck, if you're sitting back and you're looking at the trumps and you think there's no way in heck they're going to come after my children when ivanka has 17 or so patents from china. >> you really thought that logically? >> that's what gets trump every time. >> there's no way they're going to try this, and she did. by the way, big surprise, people in washington use names and proximity to power to make money. shocking. everyone does it across the board. >> this is the part where i don't understand how a democrat hasn't flipped it. there was somebody, a source of mine, who worked actively for trump on behalf of the trump campaign who is livid.

he says i was for trump because he got rid of political dynasties, not replaced him. i think he's a pure believer, and no, we had to burn down the establishment. >> supporters will say people still want change, and the trouble with joe biden as a candidate is it's sort of the old swamp is better than the new swamp, which is true, incidentally. that's not the most inspiring argument. >> so that's what everyone from elizabeth warren down through pete buttigieg would say, with all due respect to joe biden, there is a mood out there for change and reform and i can pull it off. so i think that is a weakness of biden. ironically, biden matches up the best with trump, but the fact of trump is a problem for biden in terms of what democrats are

yearning for. >> the folks womspokeswoman was about change and i think it's interesting. >> i do think that he's going to have to address it and actually i have a different opinion about hunter biden doing this today. he did do something in that interview, which is that he actually acknowledged that he probably wouldn't have gotten any of this if his father weren't who his father is. and to your point, cornell, there is a lot of it going around in washington, d.c. i don't know how joe biden is going to address it tonight. i do think it's critical that people know, if true, that he, himself, didn't do anything specifically to grease those wheels or to set his son up, that this was hunter pursuing these opportunities on his own. which is our understanding, but i think that is one point that needs to be made clear, if true. >> if we're going to go down this road, there's a lot of people sitting in congress who

are sitting in seats that their parents got them. it actually dawned on me this weekend, i had a senator on who was talking about hunter biden whose political career basically got started because he worked for his partner, ron and rand paul. you can go down this road and find yourself in -- >> i've worked for at least one of them. no names. >> what's going to happen tonight that isn't about joe biden that's of interest to this race? >> i think, you know, elizabeth warren has slowly been inching her way up and we've been saying for a while she's got the momentum. she is a couple points, within the margin of error of taking the lead here. but you can see the momentum. you've been watching the momentum for a while and it's real. she's running a really good campaign, but she hasn't taken a punch. >> buttigieg is going i want to punch her. he raised his hand, like hello,

moderators. and it's like, okay. >> i think she takes a punch tonight. >> punch her from the left? >> i think on medicare for all. >> i think if biden is going to fade, which is possible, it means the moderate who replaces biden is the non-elizabeth warren choice. >> that obviously is a position some candidates think exist. i don't know if it does. what do you say? >> how do you do that? i haven't seen anybody do that yet. it's been so popular since bernie rolled it out in 2016. you saw even kamala harris initially jumping on the medicare for all bandwagon. so i think she's vulnerable on it, as bernie is vulnerable on it, but i haven't seen how to do that. >> bernie and health. bernie did something else in this last week in that interview. one of these interviews. he is back to saying -- when he was asked what is the difference between he and elizabeth warren,

he said, well, she calls herself a capitalist. she says that's what makes me different with a smile on her face. does that mean we're going to have another socialist-capitolist nominee? [ laughter ] >> is this not a gift to elizabeth warren? it allows her to suddenly find a way to say i'm not that. i'm not a socialist. >> well, here's the problem. i understand the opening. the opening is, you know, this idea of wall street democrats. that is problematic. if he can tie that around her it's a problem. >> i don't know if anybody is going to believe that when you've got wall street like panicking right now thinking she's about to be the nominee. heidi, cornell, bill, thank you. don't forget to watch msnbc's

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welcome back, as we promised you, we have a little breaking news as we end the show. the e monthly yuments case is going to get a mulligan. the full fourth circuit court of

appeals has agreed to rehear the case. a three-judge panel had ruled in favor of the president and it sort of dismissed it. now the plaintiffs get to argue the case before the full appeals court. we'll see if that changes more minds. that's all for tonight. we'llen back tomorrow with more "meet the press" daily. >> thank you very much. we are covering breaking news this night. at this very moment, i can tell you the house democratic caucus is having a closed-door meeting and we are discussing explicitly the next steps in the impeachment of president donald trump. we've just been briefed that within this hour speaker pelosi will come out and speak. we're going to bring you that. it will be news worthy given everything that's going on. her first remarks here from the congress in two weeks. also breaking, rudy giuliani