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Impeachment Inquiry Goes Public with Open Hearings This Week; Bloomberg Gears Up for Potential Presidential Run; Trump's Impeachment Anger. Aired 8-9a ET

Aired November 10, 2019 - 08:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[08:00:27]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN KING, CNN HOST (voice-over): The impeachment inquiry goes public.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): Those open hearings will be an opportunity for the American people to learn firsthand about the facts of the president's misconduct.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You know what it is, really? It's a crooked deal.

KING: Plus, the top aides, refusing to testify, for now anyway.

TRUMP: It seems that nobody has any firsthand knowledge. There is no firsthand knowledge. All that matters is one thing, the transcript. And the transcript is perfect.

KING: And the 2020 wild card, Michael Bloomberg plots a late entry, believing the Democrats already running can't beat President Trump.

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Michael is a solid guy. Let's see where it goes. I have no problem with him getting in the race.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't think that big money ought to be able to buy our elections.

KING: INSIDE POLITICS, the biggest stories sourced by the best reporters, now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: Welcome to INSIDE POLITICS. I'm John King. To our viewers in the United States and around the world, thank you for sharing your Sunday.

The Trump impeachment inquiry goes public this week, a new critical and unpredictable chapter of enormous consequence. Partisan tensions are high.

Just late Saturday, the Democratic chairman leading the hearings rejected a Republican request to force testimony from the whistleblower, whose anonymous complaint started all of this.

There is no doubt President Trump directed his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, to run a rogue Ukraine policy that angered, worried and offended the policy experts across the government, and no doubt that rogue policy was born of a conspiracy theory, and personal political vendettas. But the challenge is to prove it was outside of normal lines, but a corrupt abuse of power and so contrary to U.S. national security interest that it warrants the House impeaching the president and then asking the Senate to remove him from office, in an election year no less.

Impeachment is a political test, not a legal trial and the president at the center of it all knows public opinion is a giant factor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I'm not concerned about anything. The testimony has all been fine.

Every one of those people testified absolutely fine for me. They've gone out and they've gone out of their way to find the people that hate Donald Trump, President Trump, the most. They put them up there. Everybody has been absolutely fine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: More proof there in the president's words of his casual relationship with the truth.

The three witnesses on tap to kick off the public hearings paint a picture that is anything but absolutely fine. Veteran diplomats William Taylor, George Kent and Marie Yovanovitch told Congress their efforts to help the government in Ukraine, fight corruption and fight Russian military aggression were stymied, because they were told Ukraine gets nothing until they agreed to two Trump and Giuliani demands, investigate a long debunked conspiracy theory that Ukraine, not Russia interfere in the 2016 election, and investigate Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who served on the board of the Ukrainian energy company.

In private testimony, Taylor, still the top diplomat in Ukraine told Congress, quote, "that was my clear understanding." Security assistance money would not come until the president committed to pursue the investigation.

Kent, a top State Department official put it this way, quote, I had concerns that there was an effort to initiate politically motivated prosecutions that were injurious to the rule of law, both the Ukraine and the U.S. and Yovanovitch who was removed as the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine after a Giuliani smear pain told them, quote, this is not a policy goal, something that is in the interest of all of us, the public good, but it was kind of a partisan game.

With us this Sunday to share their reporting and their insights, Julie Pace of "The Associated Press", Michael Shear of "The New York Times", CNN's Abby Phillip, and Jackie Kucinich of "The Daily Beast". To tee up there, the three witnesses we'll hear from this week, the

challenge for the Democrats is to take this public and to prove this is not just Trump being Trump, this not just Trump being different, this is not just Trump being disruptive. This is corrupt and an abuse of power.

The question is, are they ready to do that?

JULIE PACE, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS: Well, their strategy is basically to put people forward who don't come from a political background and hope that people watching these hearings on television throughout the next couple of weeks look at these people as credible. They see them as beyond politics. They see them as career officials who have the best interests of the nation at heart, and not the interest of the Democrats or Republicans.

I think that there are some challenges in doing that, because you're not just going to have these hearings happening in isolation. You're going to have them happening against the background of president Trump's tweets and his public comments, a really coordinated effort by his allies to try to discredit not just the information, but their backgrounds and their own motivations.

[08:05:09]

So I do think that, you know, while Democrats hope that this is a game-changer, the fact that this will be happening on television and people can judge for themselves, there's going to be a lot of effort under way to try to diminish the credibility of these witnesses.

MICHAEL SHEAR, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: And I think in addition to the credibility of the witnesses, the Republicans believe that the mountain of evidence that the Democrats have assembled, which is, you know, extensive, we've all been reporting about it.

But the Republicans who I've talked to over the course of the last several days, believe it doesn't make the final leap very well. That it doesn't connect the dots directly to the president as well as the Democrats would hope that it would. That it has a lot of information about Rudy Giuliani, a lot of information about some of these other kind of rogue players who were conducting a shadow foreign policy, but there's less well-defined kind of evidence that the president himself did some of this. And the call with the president of Ukraine notwithstanding, there are some pieces of that.

But the Republicans are pretty confident, if you talk to them they were somewhat kind of back on their heels a few weeks ago. They feel much more optimistic now that they can poke enough holes in this that at least in public opinion -- they still assume the Democrats will go ahead and impeach the president, but at least in the court of public opinion that there will be enough doubt that they certainly --

KING: It's an interesting argument that the president is not responsible for the things done by a whole bunch of people working for the president, including his personal attorney. But we'll see. We'll have more on the Republican argument as we move on.

But to your point there, which makes curious, you heard the president at the open of the program, no firsthand knowledge, which makes it curious that his former security adviser and his acting chief of staff are hinting they have important information but they won't testify unless a court tells them to.

This is John Bolton, his attorney sent a letter up to Congress because they decided not to subpoena him. Ambassador Bolton was personally involved in many of the events, meetings and conversations about which you have already received testimony, as well as many relevant meetings and conversations that have not yet been discussed in the testimony so far. Bolton's lawyer teasing that.

Mick Mulvaney trying to join a lawsuit essentially against the president. The president is one of the defendants of the lawsuit. His attorney says both in his capacity as the acting White House chief of staff and as the director of Office of Management and Budget , Mulvaney met with and advised President Obama directly on a frequent and regular basis and implemented President Trump's plans.

Why are they teasing us that they have this information, especially the acting chief of staff who we assume is currently low for the president?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: And you would think that if the information that they had was helpful to the president, they would be eager to go before Congress to put that out there to muddy the waters and make this case more difficult for Democrats to make. But they're not. They're trying to use a case that is moving somewhat slowly through the courts, although it could move a little bit faster depending on the strength of the evidence that it needs to move quickly. But I also think that a lot of these folks are looking for an out, particularly Bolton.

It's not clear to me what Mulvaney's strategy is here, except to kind of be protected by the lawsuit for the time being. But Bolton clearly is looking for a way to kind of not have to be the one -- not have it look like he's so eager to go before Congress to hurt the president, but if he has to do it, making it clear that the information that he has is of value and relevant in this particular case.

He also has a book coming out, so I think that there's a lot of personal interest on Bolton's part to really hype up what he has to share here. And he left that White House not on great terms with the president. So, he's not particularly interested in protecting the president. Even if he might not want to go out of his way to seem like he's trying to damage him.

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST; But Mulvaney, we saw through the transcripts that were released last week, has become more and more central, particularly to the holding up of the aid. He is the one who delivered the message from the president that the aid was going to be -- was being held up.

So he -- I believe it was Kent's deposition, as well as Taylor's, put Mulvaney right in the middle of everything in a way that we didn't have visibility in.

KING: Several witnesses, Kent and Taylor will tee it off. The question is what is the second round of witnesses? Because the president says they went out and found a whole bunch of people who hate Trump. Fiona Hill, a long-time Republican staff, she testified Ambassador Sondland in front of the Ukrainians was talking about how he had an agreement with chief of staff Mulvaney for a meeting with Ukrainians if they were going to go forward with investigation. Right?

John Bolton her boss, Fiona Hill says Bolton says, you go and tell John Eisenberg, who's an attorney in the National Security Council, you go and tell Eisenberg, I am not part of this drug deal that Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up. So, Mulvaney critical to it. Bolton right there.

KUCINICH: Sondland who the president does not know very well at this point.

[08:10:02]

KING: Quote-unquote, says I don't know the gentleman.

KUCINICH: Yes.

KING: There's the tell right there. Who was not with Trump at the beginning of the campaign, donated to the inauguration? He's a political guy, not a career foreign service guy.

Alexander Vindman, a lieutenant colonel, Purple Heart recipient in Iraq, serves in the National Security Council.

Ambassador Sondland relatively quickly went into outlining the deliverable for these investigations. He just said that he had a conversation with Mr. Mulvaney and this was required to get a meeting. It became crystal clear, Colonel Vindman said, when OMB staffers reported the hold came from the chief of staff's office, the hold being on the military assistance passed by Congress.

So the chief of staff, who in his briefing in the White House, public briefing that he tried to take back, said yes, we had a quid pro quo. So what? Get over it.

PACE: This is what makes -- and I know we'll talk more. But this is what makes this argument that the president basically had no idea what was going on, this was sort of an operation happening around him and he had no involvement in it really hard to believe, because why would Mick Mulvaney have, one, been authorizing all of these conversations privately, and then two, have gone into the White House briefing room and said the same thing publicly if this wasn't the line, if this wasn't the White House position on this?

I do think that one of the things that the White House and Republicans are going to have to grapple with, however much they don't want to, is this happened and it appears as though everyone was on board with this plan at high levels. They're going to have to argue that it's OK, essentially.

KING: Right, that it's not impeachable.

PACE: Exactly.

KING: That's where we're going to get, they have not gotten there yet, but the Republican going to get, probably by the end of the week, to point, OK, some bad things happened outside the lines, not the way you should run a railroad, but you're not going to impeach a president about this, especially with election coming. So, again, back to the point that they went out and found a whole bunch of people who hate Trump -- Sondland originally said -- he was asked you never thought there was a precondition for the aid, is that correct? Never, no, I mean, I was dismayed when it was held up but I didn't know why.

Then he amended his testimony after the testimony with the other people involved in this and he said, in the absence for any credible explanation for the suspension of aid, I presumed the aide suspension had become linked to the proposed anti-corruption statement.

He changed his testimony. This is a Trump appointee, this is a political guy, this is not a deep stater.

The question is, how do the Democrats build the case and when is he in the witness chair, right?

PHILLIP: Yes. When does he come forward and does he testify publicly?

KING: Yes.

PHILLIP: I think it's a really important question, because Sondland's motivations are a little up in the air right now. It remind me of a part of his testimony where he's actually being questioned by a Republican and the Republican lawmakers are pushing him to claim that all of this was like perfectly normal and just the way that U.S. foreign policy runs and his response is this is basically Keystone cops, this is not how this works.

So there were definitely points where Sondland himself was aware that something odd was going on. Whether or not he's willing to connect the president, whether he has information actually that does that, is really an open question. Are there more examples like that where he testified to things that he needs to revise, because he wasn't being fully truthful is first time is another big question.

KING: And that's when we'll get to when we come back for a quick break.

But up next, the president's impeachment defense and his defenders.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:15:17]

KING: The president's impeachment defense is, to be polite, constantly evolving. Complaints that it's all behind closed doors are moot now. The public impeachment hearings start Wednesday. Complaints Republicans had no rights in those closed proceedings are now exposed by the transcripts to be lies. Also a lie is the president's claim that Democrats went looking for witnesses who hate him.

All of the witnesses work or worked in the Trump administration. Those who are career officials were put or kept in their roles by Trump loyalists.

And fast fading is the argument, as Julie noted, that there's no there-there. The 2,600-plus pages of transcript testimony released so far make clear that serious policy people in Ukraine, at the State Department and in the West Wing complained the rogue Ukraine policy was wrong, counter to U.S. national security interests, and possibly illegal.

So one big question for the public phase now is how will the president and his allies defend against the corruption case? One piece of the strategy is defiance. A dozen administration officials with knowledge of key he vents are refusing to testify, including the acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I don't want to give credibility to a corrupt witch hunt. I would love to have Mick go up, frankly. I think he would do great.

I would love to have him go up. I like to have the people go up. Except one thing, it validates a corrupt investigation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Another piece of the strategy highlighted in the "Washington post" this past week is to suggest that if anything improper did happen, someone other than the president is responsible.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): You all want to make a big deal out of Mr. Sondland's presumption. He says it was his presumption.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

JORDAN: So, not based on the fact. It was his presumption.

REP. MARK MEADOWS (R-NC): Any private attorney you would assume would make conversations based on that, but I also know Rudy Giuliani well enough to know that there's a whole lot of things that he does that doesn't surprise anybody.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: We touched on this a bit. But is that where we're going? That if the testimony is compelling, that they call it a quid pro quo, some Democrats say we don't want to use that term, call it extortion. Call it what you will. This all happened, but the president's hands

are clean, they were people freelancing.

SHEAR: Well, look, I mean, part of what the Republicans are going to do is just throw up a lot of attempts to kind of muddy the waters, right? There's a wonderful moment in one of the transcripts of the Bill Taylor deposition where he testifies about something that the president said to Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, and Lee Zeldin of New York stops him and says, wait a minute, your testimony is that this person said to that person and that person said to that person -- and isn't that right where your information comes from. And Taylor says that's correct.

And that's the kind of muddying the waters, making it clear that a lot of these conversations that these people are testifying to are second- hand or third-hand and they're going to hope that that clouds the information that we've all seen.

PACE: That's why Trump probably doesn't really want Mulvaney to go up there or John Bolton to testify because --

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Or Mulvaney's chief of staff or deputy at the Office of Management and Budget.

So the president likes to say read the transcript. He's trying to make this about one transcript. It's about months and months and months of work, it's about Rudy Giuliani working behind-the-scenes. But if you take the president's advice, you heard Congressman Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, well, he's that kind of a guy, he might have been free- lancing for his own personal interest.

The president of the United States, his own words, quote, Rudy very much knows what's happening and he's a very capable guy. I will have Rudy give you a call and I'm also going to have Attorney General Barr call. We will get to the bottom of it. I'm sure you will figure it out.

That is the president of the United States on the transcript he says we should read, making it clear to the president of Ukraine, Rudy is his guy.

PHILLIP: This reminds me of how Trump dealt with his former personal attorney Michael Cohen and the hush money payments.

For a long time, the argument was Michael Cohen was just freelancing. He just did this to try to protect the president. He's a loyal soldier, but the president didn't ask him to do any of this. That turned out to be completely untrue the more that we dug into the evidence and then Michael Cohen turned around and testified I did this at the direction of President Trump. He pulled out a check transcript and all kinds of things.

So, it's a very similar strategy that Republicans are leaning on that somehow everybody is doing things to just get ahead of the president's needs and desires. But the other person who is also going to approve this to be untrue is Rudy Giuliani himself, who is embroiled in a separate criminal case and is trying to tie himself to President Trump, trying to say everything that I did. I did on behalf of my client, Donald Trump. And if that is the case, Giuliani is going to have to prove it.

[08:20:02]

He's going to have to show that Trump was in fact his client and that he was doing it in a legal capacity.

And so, I think that's going to start to muck up the case that Republicans are trying to make that the president somehow had absolutely no idea what was going on here.

KUCINICH: And I don't understand how that's even really good for the president, except it might, you know, save him some --

(CROSSTALK)

KUCINICH: -- because he didn't like when the "Wall Street journal" editorialized that he wasn't smart enough to do any of this.

So he doesn't like looking like he's completely out of the loop either. So how long he would allow that narrative to be pushed forward, that all of these things were going on and he just didn't know.

PACE: He actually wants Republicans to defend him on the substance of this.

KUCINICH: Yes.

SHEAR: Yes.

KUCINICH: I mean, he doesn't like this defense of it being a sort of rogue operation. He looks at that transcript and he looks at a lot of these activities that were happening with Rudy and others in the administration and says, hey, guys, what's the problem here, why don't you defend me on this? All I wanted to do was get to the root of what happened in 2016.

PHILLIP: He said it himself. The president said he believes that it is fine to take information like this from foreign governments, right after the Mueller report came out, he gave an interview and he said that on the record. I would look at the information first and then maybe I would report it to the FBI.

This is that idea in action and that's why the president wants the substance to be defended.

KING: And so, as the Republicans try to defend hip, one of the things they did was submit a witness list for the Democrats. The Democrats have to approve it because they're the majority.

On that witness list, Hunter Biden, Devon Archer, who's Hunter Biden's business partner, the whistleblower, and then a number of other, Nellie Ohr and Alexandra Chalupa at the bottom there. That is a, go to the right wing blog, that is a rabbit hole or worse. Those are past people who have nothing to do with this.

Which raises the question -- Chairman Schiff has already said you're not getting the whistleblower. We're not unmasking the whistleblower in these hearings. Is -- are these legitimate witnesses or is this the Republican pig pen strategy, throw up a lot of dust so it's hard to see the clarity?

PACE: And this is where Democrats have to be a little careful. No Democrat wants to have Hunter Biden go testify in public right now or even behind closed doors, and the Democrats, because of the way this process runs, can block that from happening. The Senate trial is a different story.

But I do think that Democrats have to take into consideration, how do they try to make this process not look partisan, not look political? And that actually is quite difficult when we're in a situation where the only votes to move this process forward were Democratic votes.

KING: Right, and to your point, Kurt Volker who's on the Republican list, they did testify. He did not -- he was not aware of a quid pro quo. That's how he put it. He was not aware. He would not use those words.

He also said some damning things about Giuliani. So, in some ways, he helps the president's case, and in other ways, he hurts.

Hold the thought. We'll come back to it.

Next, it's crowded, but yes, Michael Bloomberg looks at the 2020 Democratic field and sees something or someone missing. President Trump has a very different opinion.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: He's not going to do well but I think he's going to hurt Biden actually. Little Michael will fail. He'll spend a lot of money. Nobody I'd rather run against than Little Michael.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:26:40]

KING: Michael Bloomberg says he is ready to run, but he plans to skip the first four 2020 Democratic contests. That's a risky strategy and it's a big bet on a Biden collapse.

Let's take a look at the state of the Democratic race. This is a national poll of polls, averaging out the last five or six national polls. Biden on top and Elizabeth Warren right on his heels. That's within the margin error. Bernie Sanders, you might call that the top tier, anyway, the top three right there. Mayor Buttigieg and Senator Harris rounding out the top five Democrats. These candidates have been on the track for months and months. Bloomberg says the voters maybe don't want them.

If you look at the states, there's some evidence that Democrats haven't warmed completely to this new field. Look at this battleground state polling for "The New York Times" and Siena College. A lot of don't knows. Thirty-one percent in Arizona, 29 percent in Florida, 23 percent in Michigan, 32 percent North Carolina, you see Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Biden, Warren, Sanders at the top of the pack in these key battleground states. But Bloomberg can say they've been running for months and roughly a third of Democrats, maybe three in 10, don't know, they're still looking for somebody else. OK. That's one piece of the scenario.

Could he run in a Democratic field? You think of the party drifting to the left. Well, Bloomberg actually fits if he runs. Democrats were asked this "New York Times" poll, if you want someone who fights for a bold progressive agenda? A third of Democrats say that.

Six in 10 say someone who can find common ground with Republicans. Bloomberg is a former Republican and a former independent.

Do you want someone to be more liberal than most Democrats? Four in ten Democrats say that. More than half say someone who's more moderate than most Democrats.

Now, Bloomberg is progressive on guns, on climate, but he's more moderate in some fiscal issues.

If look at him versus Joe Biden, this is our poll back in Iowa a few months ago, Bloomberg is not going to run in Iowa, but, look, Joe Biden, very well-liked by Democrats, likely caucus goers. Bloomberg, much split opinion. Almost 40 percent said they had an unfavorable view. So, he'd have to get the party to warm to him, if you will.

Fox News in a poll last week asked, do you want another Democratic in the race? And, if so, what do you think of? Fifty percent of Democrats say they'd definitely vote for Michelle Obama if she got in. Only eight percent said never. Twenty-seven percent said they'd definitely vote if Hillary Clinton made another run, 30 percent said never.

Look at this for Bloomberg. Only 6 percent of Democrats said they would definitely vote for Michael Bloomberg and nearly a third said never. So, there's a challenge for Bloomberg as he plans to get into the race. Again, he's betting on a Biden collapse. Joe Biden says, come on in, Mike.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: I think he should jump in the race. I mean, he's a good guy. He's done a lot of good and, let's see what happens.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: And the notion that the current field is not prepared to beat Donald Trump, which is what's motivating him? That's what his top adviser says.

BIDEN: Well, I've noticed that every single poll that's run I've beat him like a drum, as I said, and states in the South and states in the Midwest and states from -- so look, I -- look, if he wants to run, he should just get in and run.

BASH: You're not taking it personally?

BIDEN: No, no, no.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Yes, he is.

But that's -- on the one hand, it's ludicrous, you can skip the first four contests and then you can get in and say, here I am to save the party. On the other hand, all those candidates, especially if you have a split verdict between the four states are going to be draining all their money and Michael Bloomberg can write himself a check as we get into the bigger states where the delegates are actually is stake. Is it ludicrous or is it real?

PHILLIP: I mean it's ludicrous. I mean really. You just showed the numbers -- 6 percent of Democrats said they wanted Michael Bloomberg. They would vote for him versus 32 percent who said never -- never.

I think that that's a clear sign that this is not -- Democratic primary politics, you have to actually win the primary. If we were running sort of like a popular vote election and you just could kind of campaign wherever you wanted and pick up votes wherever you wanted, all the way until you go up against Trump in November. That would be fine.

But you have to win the Democratic primary and it's going to be very difficult to do that. If you don't know which pockets of the Democratic Party you appeal to. Just because Democrats want a moderate doesn't mean that they want a billionaire New Yorker who --

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: -- bad record with black voters to be their nominee.

KING: But fewer than 5 percent of the delegates will be chosen in the first four contests. Then you get into the blur where you have Super Tuesday and then another you call a second Super Tuesday for a ton of delegates. If you can write yourself a check and be on television, you can make a difference.

To the billionaire point, the two progressives in the race, Sanders and Warren say, "Oh Mike, please get in. This is great for us."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't think that big money ought to be able to buy our elections. And that's true whether we're talking about billionaires or corporate executives that fund PACs or big lobbyists.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D-VT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Tonight we say to Michael Bloomberg and other billionaires, sorry, you're not going to buy this election.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: But Donald Trump, who is nowhere near as rich as Michael Bloomberg is president of the United States. They're talking about a Democratic primary electorate. But how big is that slice of the Democratic primary electorate?

Again, Bloomberg for all that, you know, he says money doesn't grow on trees and he's moderate on fiscal issues like that. But he's been ahead of the party on immigration. He's been ahead of the party on climate change. He's been spending a lot of his own money. He just had success in the Virginia elections on gun control.

KUCINICH: You know, Dan Balz had a great column this morning about this. The candidate that bet everything on gun control, Beto O'Rourke is out of the race. The candidate that bet everything on climate change, Jay Inslee, out of the race.

There are moderate candidates. There are people who support what Mike Bloomberg has spent all this money on across the field. So it's unclear what void he is filling in this contest aside -- and even the billionaire lane is kind of full, right?

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: With Tom Steyer.

(CROSSTALK)

PACE: He's making an assumption right now that a lot of Democrats have been talking which is that Joe Biden is going to collapse. Joe Biden has not collapsed thus far. We've been talking about this through the summer, into the fall that Joe Biden is going to have this big stumble.

His poll numbers have gone down a little bit but he's still at the top of the pack with Warren and with Sanders. Money has done down. He had a better last month on digital fundraising. But Bloomberg is basically looking at this and hearing from a lot of people who say if this really does happen, Warren and Sanders are going to fill the void and we don't think that they're electable. That's the bet that he's making.

It works under a couple of big assumptions that again haven't happened yet, but he again is hearing from a lot of people who say Elizabeth Warren candidacy would be a loser against Donald Trump.

KING: So that -- you raise a great point. How much of this is what America wants and what the Democratic Party wants because that's what he's thinking of the Democratic primary. And how much of it is New York and Washington conversations. Now Matt Viser in the "Washington Post" -- just reading the newspaper here. Names being floated as potential candidates include Massachusetts governor -- former Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick, former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, former secretary of state John Kerry -- the party's 2004 nominee has also been mentioned. Although people close to him insist he will not enter the race.

The party's 2016 nominee Hillary Clinton was fielding calls in recent days about whether to get into the race, some close to her said. Huh?

(CROSSTALK)

SHEAR: I'm going to go out on a limb. Hillary Clinton will not be running for president this year at any point.

PACE: There's a difference between those people fielding calls, which is certainly happening, and those people actually taking steps --

SHEAR: And the truth is, you know -- and the truth is, as much as I think the idea of skipping these four states is kind of, as you said, ludicrous, I do think that if all of the things come to pass and what you end up with after those four states is really just Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and the rest of the pack has completely fallen apart, there is a clamoring and an opening for some other ideological alternative to the two of them.

And in that space somebody could fill in. Whether that person at that point could win, whether it's Michael Bloomberg who is that person -- hard to say. But I mean that is not a scenario that is impossible or implausible that that's where we will be and if after those --

KING: Because if he spends the money while the first four contests are playing out, if he's on TV in all those states, even those other candidates -- Clinton, Kerry, Patrick -- maybe they could raise money. But if you're not up and running that takes time. And the Super Tuesday and the second Super Tuesday come like that. So we'll see.

SHEAR: And look, billionaires are always very stingy with their money. That's how they became billionaires. Does he really want to -- does he want to spend it on this lark? I mean how much money -- hundreds of millions of dollars.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But you can't --

(CROSSTALK)

[08:35:01]

KUCINICH: Voters do matter here because I'm old enough to remember when never Trumpers were going to find someone to run against Donald Trump if he was the eventual nominee and here we are.

PHILLIP: There's no substitute for genuine enthusiasm. I think that's what that shows us all.

KING: That's an excellent point. We will watch it. It is interesting.

Our "Sunday Trail Mix" is next, including the squad splitting when it comes to taking a 2020 nominee.

Plus President Trump takes in the Alabama-LSU football game. You see him right there getting some cheers as a one-time ally right there in the Yellow Hammer State hopes to make a big comeback.

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KING: Let's turn now to some "Sunday Trail Mix" for a taste of the 2020 campaign.

Senator Elizabeth Warren scoring not one, but two key endorsements this week. Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley a long-time ally split with other members of the so-called "squad" to endorse Warren.

Plus a group of more than 100 black women activists also throwing their support for Senator Warren -- an important boost as she pushes to diversify her base.

Senator Bernie Sanders touting a squad endorsement of his own hitting the trail this weekend with progressive favorite Alexandria Ocasio- Cortez. The New York congresswoman headed to Iowa to stomp for Sanders, knocking on doors, turning up caucus goers and promoting Sanders as the most progressive choice.

Across the aisle, a one-time member of President Trump's squad, not being so welcomed, at least not yet. The former Attorney General Jeff Sessions making it official this week, announcing a run for his old senate seat home in Alabama. His message, I'm still Team Trump. But at least for now, the President not so sure.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEFF SESSIONS, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Have I said a crossword about our president? Not one time.

The President is doing a great job for America and Alabama, and he has my strong support.

TRUMP: Well, I haven't gotten involved. I saw he said very nice things about me last night. But we'll have to see. I'll have to see.

I haven't made a determination.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Up next, the President's impeachment anger and what to expect as the hearings go public.

[08:39:57]

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KING: Silence is not a page in the Trump crisis playbook.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I'm not concerned about anything. The testimony has all been fine. I mean, for the most part I've never even heard of these people, I have no idea who they are.

It seems that nobody has any firsthand knowledge. There is no firsthand knowledge.

They shouldn't be having public hearings. This is a hoax.

Let me just say I hardly know the gentleman, but this is the man who said there was no quid pro quo.

I'd like to have the people go up, except one thing, it validates a corrupt investigation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Attack and distract are Trump trademarks and his words and tweets in recent days show a president who is angry at the impeachment proceedings and determined to undermine them as they turn to this next phase.

[08:44:58]

KING: When the gavel opens the first public hearing on Wednesday, it will be 42 days from Christmas, 49 from the dawn of 2020, and 356 days from the next presidential election. And just a week removed from 2019 election headlines, look at them there, reminding the President his path to reelection is narrow. And his presidency is exacting a heavy toll on fellow Republicans, especially in America's growing suburbs.

The question is if you look at all the tweets, then if you look at his words, he watches everything. As these hearings play out, what are we going to see from the President when people who work for him say on national television this was wrong?

PACE: I think we are going to see an aggressive, largely Twitter- based strategy from this president. He believes and the people closest to him do believe actually that he's his best defender. That runs counter to the advice that we've seen other presidents in similar situations and in other moments of crisis get from people. But they believe that this president has a special ability to communicate with his core supporters to try to persuade them that everything that is being said about him is politically motivated, it's just aimed at trying to take him down.

I do think though that the bigger question, and you point to this is, is that strategy is right one for him to win reelection? To convince people who are possibly swing voters, who are Republicans who have just been really put off by all of the controversy, all of the crisis over the last couple of years that they should stick with him and do four more years of this. KING: To that point, the President's base, impeachment is not a legal

trial, it's a political argument. The President's number one strategy is keep your base, right.

So in Alabama yesterday we checked in with some Trump voters and they're on board.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He told the President to take a look at Biden, his misdeeds, while he was in office. If he was corrupt, he was corrupt. Put him in jail.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did you vote for Trump in 2016?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Absolutely and I'll vote for him again, even if I've got to go in there in a wheelchair.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Crazy. It's just crazy. There's no basis for it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think he's being treated fairly?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't, no.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What is your understanding of what the impeachment inquiry is about?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Made-up stuff. We have the transcripts. Read the transcripts.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: It is remarkable to be a conversation in Washington, we'll be watching whether Republicans are going to split, whether any Republican senators say ok, maybe we need to start thinking about censure (ph). That's what we'll be watching.

Out in the country his base is loyal. The question is, you know, is it enough?

PHILLIP: Yes, and also I mean, I think that there are times when the President is not his own best defender, when he goes too far and when he's following maybe the Fox News chatter's stratosphere and like with Alexander Vindman, the colonel who came in uniform to testify, starts questioning his patriotism.

There are lines still that exist in politics and some of these Republican lawmakers who represent -- who might still represent red states, but whose constituents are not on board with going too far in a certain way in politics, will speak up. Just like you saw Liz Cheney do.

So these people that we just heard from, they're important, but there are also still quite a few people on the margins in the middle, in purple states that we need to pay attention to. KING: And how does he react when people on his payroll say it was

him. Fiona Hill -- Trump (INAUDIBLE) deputy, now gone to the National Security Council, talking about an argument she was having with Ambassador Sondland. "He told me he was in charge of Ukraine because initially I said to him, you're not. And I said who put you in charge of Ukraine, Gordon. He said the President. Well, that shut me up, because you can't really argue with that."

KUCINICH: Well and again, as we talked about earlier, that takes away the argument that the President had nothing to do with this. But as Abby said, this doesn't have as much to do with the President's base as Republicans who might not be happy with what the President did to the Kurds in Syria. This could be another straw for someone who doesn't like how the President addresses people from day to day. I think those are the folks we should be focusing on.

KING: Watch this busy week ahead.

Our reporters share from their notebooks next, including a reminder lawmakers need to strike a deal to keep the government funded, even as they fight over impeachment.

[08:48:57]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Let's head one last time around the INSIDE POLITICS table ask our great reporters to share a little something from their notebooks, help get you out ahead of the politically news just around the corner.

Julie Pace.

PACE: So there is one little thing that Congress needs to do in the middle of impeachment. And that is keep the government open.

KING: Oh, that.

PACE: Just that small thing. Government spending runs out on November 21st and President Trump has kind of kept open this possibility of having a shutdown but realistically there is very little appetite on Capitol Hill from Republicans or Democrats to have a government shutdown right now.

The big question though is how do they get out of this. They will almost certainly kick the can down the road. And it's sort of a pick your poison situation. Do you do it until the end of the year when we are most likely still dealing with impeachment? Or do you try to push this deeper into next year in the middle of the Presidential election?

KING: Fun.

PACE: Good options.

KING: Your government kind of sort of at work.

Michael. SHEAR: On Tuesday the Supreme Court will have oral arguments in what

could be one of its biggest cases this term -- the President's decision to end the DACA program. That Obama-era program helped protect young undocumented immigrants from deportation and the President ended it saying it was unconstitutional.

The question though for the court is whether the President didn't give a legitimate policy reason, not a legal reason but a policy reason to end the program. Lower courts have said just that and legal experts say that's the big huge weakness at the center of the government's case.

If the Supreme Court justices agree that could be one of the biggest defeats that the President has had -- legal defeats on immigration -- especially in his term. The answer will come in June just at the start of the general election but we may get a hint of where the justices are going at the oral arguments on Tuesday.

KING: Something else to watch this week. Kind of a busy week.

Abby.

PHILLIPS: Well, in the Democratic field, some of the private frustrations that some of the campaigns have been feeling have been spilling out into public view on the issue of whether or not you can be the nominee without getting support from minority voters. That has really been directed at Pete Buttigieg's campaign. He's been polling in the low single-digits among African-American voters in particular.

And I'm told from campaign aides that they're planning to roll out some surrogates from his home town of South Bend. African-American surrogates who can vouch for him among the black community in an effort to get ahead of this line of attack from some of the other campaigns that have been directed at him.

But as we approach this next debate I expect this to be a big issue going forward. Many of these campaigns -- Harris, Booker, Castro -- are really trying to get the attention of the media saying you can't treat certain people like front-runners if they're not doing well among minority voters.

KING: Watch that play out. All politics is local. I read that somewhere.

Jackie.

[08:54:56]

KUCINICH: So after reading various transcripts this week and seeing the effort by Republican lawmakers and the council to try to out the whistleblower, I called the Government Accountability Project to see if this individual has any recourse by the fact that this is happening and the answer was not by the federal whistleblower law. But D.C. is one of the few jurisdictions where they could seek relief from this effort to oust them. And what they would do is they would file a first a First Amendment suit in district court seeking and injunctive relief (ph) including a temporary restraining order against revealing their identity. There is no indication this has happened but it's noteworthy given how high the stakes are.

KING: It would be interesting to watch.

You know, the Republicans want to out the President from time to time. We'll keep an eye on that.

I'll close with two non-impeachment warning signs this past week to the President and to his reelection campaign. The suburban revolt against Trumpism is only growing and if you look at what happened Tuesday in the Philadelphia suburbs it is a reminder Pennsylvania and the 20 electoral votes will be tough for the President to hold in 2020 especially if he also faces stress in rural areas.

In Kaiser polling released this past week, 50 percent of Pennsylvanians said Trump's tariffs were hurting their families; only 13 percent said tariffs are helping. 48 percent in Wisconsin said tariffs hurt; only 14 percent said help. In Michigan it was 14 percent help; 41 percent hurt.

Just yesterday the President said China needs a trade deal more than he does but China doesn't have real elections or an electoral college.

That's it for INSIDE POLITICS. Hope you can catch us week days as well. We're here at noon Eastern. A very busy week ahead.

Stay with us. "STATE OF THE UNION" with Jake Tapper is up next. His guests include presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar and Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.

Thanks again for sharing your Sunday. Have a great day.

[08:56:40]

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