[Anderson Cooper, Cnn:] Good evening. There is news just breaking now at the end of an already historic day. The White House appears to have just now blinked in the standoff that today that left President Trump facing the specter of impeachment. He's certainly not there yet, not by any means. But only two presidents have been impeached, Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton, and Richard Nixon resigned before the House could act. So, President Trump is in rare company. Today's action by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, along with the president's own statements and actions over the past days and weeks, have now put the White House and Congress on a path rarely traveled in the 243 years of this country's existence. Whether you agree with what Speaker Pelosi announced today or not, today is significant. It was just after 5:00 Eastern Time that Speaker Pelosi in a rising wave pro-impeachment sentiment in her caucus made the day historic.
[Rep. Nancy Pelosi:] The actions of the Trump presidency revealed the dishonorable fact of the president's betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security and betrayal of the integrity of our elections. Therefore, today, I'm announcing the House of Representatives moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. I'm directing our six committees to proceed with their investigations under that umbrella of impeachment inquiry. The president must be held accountable. No one is above the law.
[Cooper:] Well, at immediate issue is the intelligence the whistleblower complaint which the White House has, so far, been keeping from Congress and the president's phone conversation with the president of the Ukraine allegedly to get Ukrainian help in damaging his leading opponent, Joe Biden. Now, the White House is now promising to release a transcript of the phone call tomorrow morning, which is not enough for House Democrats, who will soon get a chance to question the acting director of national intelligence who stopped the complaint from being forwarded to Congress, and the whistleblower. Nor is it enough for the Senate which took rare bipartisan action late today on the whistleblower's complaint. And as we mentioned at the very top, that is not even half of it. Let's begin with Jim Acosta with the breaking news. So, what are learning about the possible release of the whistleblower complaint itself?
[Jim Acosta, Cnn Chief White House Correspondent:] Yes, Anderson, we understand White House officials are looking at this right now. It could come out as soon as tomorrow. My colleagues are reporting that the president weighed in on this and decided ultimately on his own that he wanted to see this whistleblower complaint released. We're not sure what form it will come in, whether we will see all of it. But there's a curious change of events. The White House essentially blinked in all of this. If we do see all of it, we're not sure if we will see all of it. But recall last week when the superior general for the intelligence community went on Capitol Hill talked to the House Intelligence Committee and essentially told the lawmakers we can't show you what's in this complaint. And so, this is a major reversal for the White House. No question about it, Anderson.
[Cooper:] What about the release of the transcript of the president's call with the Ukrainian president? And I'm not I mean, were there multiple calls? Do we know? Because the reporting for "The Wall Street Journal" initially was that there were at least eight mentions of or eight efforts of mentioning focusing on Biden. Do we know if that was all in one call?
[Acosta:] Right. I think that's one of the key questions in the whistleblower complaint. Remember, the whistleblower complaint dealt with multiple interactions and so that may get us to that answer, and whether or not we see all of the whistleblower complaint, that remains to be seen. But, Anderson, the president did authorize the release of that call transcript. He tweeted as much earlier this afternoon. He says Secretary of State Mike Pompeo got permission from the Ukrainian side to go ahead and release this information. But very important for our viewers to understand at this point, Anderson, the White House is starting to downplay expectations as to what is going to be in that call transcript. I talked to two White House officials this evening who said prepare to be underwhelm, prepare to see the contents of that transcript and find those contents to be underwhelming at this point. That puts a lot of pressure on what is in that whistleblower complaint and, Anderson, as you know, as we've all been following this, the White House mass gone to great lengths, including the president, to call into question the credibility of the whistleblower. In the words of one White House official I spoke with this evening, they refer to the whistleblower as the so-called whistleblower. So, they're not putting a lot of stock in what that employee has to say at this point. But, Anderson, put all of that to the side. Keep in mind what happened when the president walked in the United Nations earlier this morning before he gave the speech to the United Nations General Assembly. He admitted to reporter that is he held up aid to Ukraine. This after he admitted to reporters that he pressured the Ukrainian president in a phone call to try to get dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden. That is what Democrats are focusing on at this point. And the president all day long was saying there was no quid pro quo. Democrats were saying you don't need a quid pro quo because the president was pressuring the Ukrainian president to try to get dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden Anderson.
[Cooper:] It's interesting, Jim, because President Trump and others in the White House have been saying well this was about overall concern about corruption in Ukraine. And what's odd about that is there are plenty of countries in the world that the U.S. has dealings with and sells military aid to and gives military aid to, which have widespread corruption. We haven't heard the president really talk about corruption
[Acosta:] Absolutely.
[Cooper:] in Saudi Arabia or anywhere else. And also, if he's very concerned about corruption in Ukraine, if the only example he is talking about and again it's totally an alleged example. There's no evidence if he is focusing only on the Bidens or Joe Biden's son, it's hard to imagine that that's the prime example of alleged corruption in Ukraine.
[Acosta:] That's right, Anderson. And it's interesting, over the last 48 hours, we have seen the president shift in his rationale as to why, you know, he isn't in any hot water in all of this. He was saying earlier that they were holding up the money to Ukraine because of his concerns about corruption. As you said, the United States has dealt with many countries around the globe that have corruption issues. Keep in mind, Saudi Arabia executed a journalist it appears in Jamal Khashoggi last year. We're coming up on the one year anniversary of that. That appears to be not a problem for the White House when comes to dealings with Saudi Arabia, and yet there's a concern about corruption when it comes to Ukraine. The other thing that the president was talking about was, well, the Europeans aren't donating enough money. They're not contributing enough money to help the Ukrainians in dealing with Russian aggression. That also was not the case. Europeans have been at the table contributing money to help Ukraine deal with Russian aggression. So, the president has been shifting this rationale. He's been dancing around all this issue all this week. The question is whether or not this is one of the episodes, Anderson, we have seen this movie before, whether the events and the facts and what the president said will eventually catch up with him Anderson.
[Cooper:] Yes. Jim Acosta, thanks very much. We have just heard from the whistleblower's attorney a brief statement which reads, quote, we applaud the decision to release the whistleblower complaint as it establishes that ultimately, the lawful whistleblower disclosure process can work. We await the release of the complaint in its totality. With that, let's go to CNN's Manu Raju at the Capital. Manu, do we know how the release of this complaint is going to affect the decision to move forward by Democrats?
[Manu Raju, Cnn Senior Congressional Correspondent:] We don't know yet, because what the Democrats announced today was impeachment inquiry. What they didn't was actually voting to impeach the president. That would be presumably the next step. So, if the complaint doesn't show any wrongdoing or if the president the transcript that he eventually releases doesn't show the president doing anything wrong in the eyes of Democrats or if there is no evidence the president sought to hold up military aid to Ukraine in exchange for investigating the Bidens, perhaps they'll have a different tactic. But if there are significant concerns, red flags, a smoking gun in there, that could, of course, expedite the push to impeach this president because the Democrats have been demanding the information. But, Anderson, one of the reasons they were considering impeaching the president is because of the refusal to turn over this information. They say it would be obstruction of Congress. At least if that is provided perhaps that will be one less count to add to their impeachment inquiry, in putting articles of impeachment, Anderson.
[Cooper:] Yes. What Speaker Pelosi was saying today was that, you know, this is now under the umbrella of an impeachment inquiry and that the six investigations that are already underway will proceed under that umbrella. Does that actually really change anything? I mean, is this just you know, there was a lot of debate among Democrats well, it doesn't matter what you call it, it's an inquiry, it's investigation, whatever. Does that is anything really new here other than Speaker Pelosi is now calling it an investigation an inquiry?
[Raju:] In a sense, no. It's a essentially a continuation what have the Democrats have been doing. There are six committees that are investigating this president. There are including the House Judiciary Committee House Intelligence Committee, looking at all aspects of the president, his businesses and his past. And what they have said in the last several weeks, particularly the House Judiciary Committee, is that this investigation will ultimately decide whether or not to impeach the president. Democrats have been saying it's been impeachment inquiry because at the end of the day, they're going to make that decision. So what Pelosi said was the investigations will simply just continue, and ultimately, we will decide whether to impeach this president, which is the same thing essentially as what they have been doing. So, there is not a whole lot of change. But the significant thing of her announcing her support of actually calling it an impeachment inquiry, a lot of Democrats interpret that to mean that she is ready to move forward when the time comes to eventually impeach the president. Of course, that would be a historic move. Only the third president in American history to get impeached even if ultimately unsuccessful in the Republican-led Senate where two thirds majority would be needed to remove the president from office. But the Democrats are pushing to go forward in the speaker's blessing today makes it more likely that we could see articles of impeachment in the coming months, Anderson.
[Cooper:] So, what is the process in that inquiry from here on out?
[Raju:] Well, expect these committees to continue their investigations. And afterwards, if they do believe it's time to impeach the president, then the articles of impeachment will be drafted, then the House Judiciary committee will actually vote on those articles of impeachment. The full house then would vote soon thereafter. And then, it would go to the Senate where they would have the trial and presumably would acquit the votes at least on the votes they have right now, the president would not be convicted. But it's unclear exactly how long this will take. Speaker Pelosi behind closed doors, Anderson, I'm told, told Democrats she wants to be done, quote, expeditiously and Jerry Nadler has said that he wants this done by the end of the year. So, the question is, can they do that and then if it runs into the election year, how much does it impact things? Anderson?
[Cooper:] Yes. Manu Raju, a lot going on. Thank you, Manu. One of the Democrats who came to this reluctantly is Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey. She's a former Navy helicopter pilot, a federal prosecutor. She's one of seven members with national security background who wrote an op-ed in "The Washington Post". It includes the sentence: These allegations are a threat to all we have sworn to protect. Congresswoman Sherrill joins me now. Thanks very much for being with us. What is your reaction, A, to the breaking news that according to CNN the White House may allow the whistleblower complaint to be turned over to Congress and according to "The New York Times", the White House think they may also have to let the whistleblower talk to congressional investigators?
[Rep. Mikie Sherrill:] Anderson, the fact that we have gotten here, that we still don't have the whistleblower report shows that this was needed, this step was needed. We needed to pressure the president to turn that over. He should not have involvement in the whistleblower complaint. The statute is very clear. We did this to protect whistleblowers. He is undermining that. But we need the full report. We need the I.G.'s report, and then we need to keep pressure on the president, because we know he said in the past that he would turn over certain documents or do certain things and has not followed through.
[Coope:] So, if you know, there is Jim Acosta's reporting some people in the White House are sort of saying this is going to be underwhelming when this transcript is released, there's not really any "there" there. Others on Capitol Hill, Republicans are saying this whistleblower may not actually, you know, have direct knowledge. And are sort of questioning the White House is saying you know, calling a person a so-called whistleblower. If, in fact, the transcript is underwhelming and the whistleblower doesn't have firsthand information, does that end this inquiry? Or assuming something happened here, we know Rudy Giuliani, the president's attorney was going around the Ukraine, talked to Ukrainian officials, I think meetings you know, arrange through the State Department. There must be other people involved. With this continue then?
[Sherrill:] Well, Anderson, I think we know that the I.G. had- the ICIG had serious concerns. And that's why he felt it was so important that this whistle complaint go forward and Congress see it. So, even if it's underwhelming and it's drama, I think there are some concerns that relate to national security. That's what the ICIG said. And but we will go forward because we now know that the president held up support for one of our strategic one of our strategic partners Ukraine, as they were trying to deter Russian aggression, something we wanted them to do because we are concerned our national defense strategy cites problems with Russian aggression. So, we were supporting them, Congress was supporting them in a bipartisan move. The president withheld that much-needed support. We also know the president talked to shortly after withholding the support, talked to the Ukrainian president about investigating corruption related to Biden, the president said this. So, yes, certainly, there are grave concerns that need to be investigated.
[Cooper:] Are you worried that the president is set to meet with the Ukrainian president tomorrow at you know as part of the U.N. General Assembly. Are you concerned if the president meets alone with the Ukrainian president would just maybe a translator present?
[Sherrill:] Certainly, I would want to know what is going on in the meeting. I think we have seen already the president's conversations with the Ukrainian president have been incredibly concerning. I don't think the country wants to see him going forward continuing the threatening conversations.
[Cooper:] You were not publicly onboard with impeachment until yesterday as I understand it, when the you and some of your colleagues as I mentioned published the op-ed in "The Washington Post". Is the hold up for support of Ukraine, you just mentioned, what changed your mind to support impeachment? Or was there a particular something else in particular that changed your mind.
[Sherrill:] I think particularly the threat to our national security, the threat to our Democratic elections. We have seen now for 2020 going forward, a forward looking threat with the president withholding support for a strategic partner. We see the president then threatening another foreign power with that with the withholding support, and then trying to affect the elections, trying to get dirt on his opponent. That was simply a line that was crossed for many of us in the national security sphere. We have served all over the world. I'm a Navy helicopter pilot, former Russian policy officer. I have served all over the world, as have my fellow Democrats who wrote the op-ed with me. We know how important the replaces with the allies are. We know what it's like to be at war and to need support and to know that Congress gave that support to our strategic partner, to know the president withheld that at a critical moment when they're hot war in eastern Ukraine was unacceptable to us.
[Cooper:] It is extraordinary just the timing of that phone conversation, the one that the transcript will be released of, the day after Mueller testifies. The idea that the president feels he is cleared of any collusion on Russia and then if, again, if all of this bears out, this is essentially asking it's an attempt to collude with Ukraine and get them to collude to affect the next election.
[Sherrill:] Anderson, I think we see the president's behavior as we haven't as we have seen just getting worse and worse, more and more chaotic and reckless. And that's why we welt felt like it was time to step in, to operate as congress, as that check on a reckless presidency. We you know, we see him now really thinking that he is empowered not to turn anything over to Congress, to act in a way that really undermines our national security. And that's something that we saw as a real threat.
[Cooper:] Congresswoman Sherrill, appreciate your time. Thank you.
[Sherrill:] Thank you.
[Cooper:] Coming up next, our team of political and legal professionals here to put this in perspective. Also, late reaction from the acting director of national intelligence who's due before Congress on Thursday. And later tonight on this program, we'll talk to the former director of national intelligence, James Clapper. Certainly got plenty to talk about tonight.