[Bolduan:] For so long, most top Democrats were hesitant to use the word "impeachment." Hesitant no more, it seems. Incoming top Democrats are now openly discussing impeachment and even jail time for President Trump based on the new court filings by the special counsel and federal prosecutors. Listen to this.
[Rep. Jerry Nadler, , New York:] Well, they would be impeachable offenses. Whether they are important enough to justify an impeachment is a different question. But they would be impeachable offenses because even though they were committed before the president became president, they were committed in the service of fraudulently obtaining the office. That would be an impeachable offense.
[Bolduan:] Important statement from who could be the incoming chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. CNN congressional correspondent, Phil Mattingly, is on the Hill for us. Phil, what are you hearing from lawmakers on this?
[Phil Mattingly, Cnn Senior Congressional Correspondent:] Look, Kate, I think there's no question about it. Everybody who is reading through the filing, particularly, the people on the Judiciary Committee, on the Democratic side, took what they saw on Friday and were unsettled by it and thinking about what the next steps were. It was important to also make a clear distinction about what Congressman Nadler, the next chairman of the Judiciary Committee, was saying. He's saying these rise to the level of impeachable offenses but he did not say they were going to immediately pursue impeachment. It's not a straight line. When you talk to Democrats, their leaders, Kate, you made the clear point, leadership has been wary of going too far into this. They recognize that it's not just a purely legal process or a purely committee process based on policy. It's also a political process. Democrats don't want to wander down a path or head down a path when they know Republicans control the Senate. They might not have Republican help in the House. Those are the metrics they're looking for right now. One of the more interesting sound bites of the weekend came from Adam Schiff, incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. He moved past Congress into what could happen if the president doesn't win re-election. Take a listen.
[Rep. Adam Schiff, , California:] My takeaway is there's a very real prospect that on the day Donald Trump leaves office, the Justice Department may indict him. That he may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time.
[Mattingly:] Kate, obviously, keying off the filings that the president directed the payments and, therefore, the southern district of New York may pursue criminal charges after he's no longer in office. That's where Democrats are right now. They're in a similar place to sum it up that a lot of people are. They're trying to figure out where the ground is laid right now, next steps. They're not quite ready to green-light things yet. There's no question about it, they're eyeing what they're seeing and trying to figure out what happens next Kate?
[Bolduan:] Great to see you, Phil. Thank you so much. Joining me to discuss the politics of all this, CNN political commentators, Keith Boykin, a Democratic strategic, and Rob Astorino, a member of Trump's reelection advisory council. Great to see both of you. Sorry for the frog in all of our throats. Keith, let's talk about impeachment here. For the longest time, it has seen top Democrats, Nancy Pelosi, Jerry Nadler, they are careful to talk impeachable, And, yes, Nadler was saying if these things are true, they would be impeachable offenses. He's careful in his language. They were careful before, maybe because of the politics, maybe because they hadn't seen evidence of anything that would be impeachable. Either way, it seems something has changed over the weekend.
[Keith Boykin, Cnn Political Commentator:] Well, two things have changed in the past month. First, the Democrats won control of the House of Representatives, which means next month they'll have the power for accountability. And over the weekend, on Friday, we saw that Robert Mueller's office and the southern district of New York, issued charging statements, essentially sentencing memos that implicate the president of the United States in federal crimes.
[Bolduan:] Then leads to the question of, does a campaign finance violation, does that rise to the level of impeachment of a president?
[Boykin:] There are possibilities here because, you think about the John Edwards case, there was a trial that took place in that case. In this case, we have the president of the United States engaging in a conspiracy to conceal not one but two different affairs that could have had an impact on the outcome of the election. And paying people at the same time to do so. And at the same time, engaging in a fraud to violate the campaign finance laws. And at the same time, engaging in a fraud to collude with Russia in some respect to build the Trump Tower Moscow project and not revealing that to the public. Taken together, you have a reflection of fraud on the part of the president of the United States. This is a guy who two days before he took office paid a 25 million fraud settlement for the Trump university.
[Bolduan:] Rob, Clinton was impeached by the House for perjury, for lying. How does this compare?
[Rob Astorino, Cnn Political Commentator:] And it's a very big difference because Clinton was the president of the United States. He did lie under oath. And he abused his office. If you remember, the Republicans suffered. There was a lot of backlash. And as much as they pushed impeachment and did impeach him, Clinton just got more and more popular. This is something that happened a long time ago. He was the president. Not a single person in America probably thought
[Bolduan:] Payments happened in 2016.
[Astorino:] I'm talking about for Trump, I'm talking about the women, the Stormy Daniels payoffs and everything.
[Boykin:] The legal time took place in 2016.
[Astorino:] We don't know it's illegal and the act itself took place 10 years before that.
[Bolduan:] The act maybe, but the hush payment, which is the thing that matters here, happened in late 2016.
[Astorino:] It does. If they can prove he did it specifically and solely for political purposes. Nobody in America thought he was going to win the race, number one. He had and has a business that has a reputation. He has partners, business partners. He has a family. And I think, logically, most Americans can say, OK, I can see both sides. I can see he did it for private and personal reasons just as much as he did it for political.
[Bolduan:] Let me pose this to you because this might actually get maybe to what you're saying. Former FBI Director Jim Comey was at the 92nd Street Y giving a talk last night. And let me play what he had to say about impeachment. Listen to this.
[Jim Comey, Former Fbi Director:] I hope Donald Trump is not removed from office by impeachment because it would let the country off the hook. And it would drive into the fabric of our nation, a third of the people believing there was a coup, and we need a moment of inflection where we all get off the couch and say that is not who we are. And in a landslide, rid ourselves of this attack on our values.
[Bolduan:] Do you do you agree with Comey on this?
[Boykin:] I understand the political implications of impeachment. I understand Rob's argument about the danger of overreach of impeachment.
[Bolduan:] Yes.
[Boykin:] However, I think that I'm not advocating for impeachment. I think there needs to be accountability, checks and balances and subpoenas and hearings to find out exactly what took place. There needs to be a thorough Robert Mueller investigation from the special counsel's office. And we also need to remember here, this is not 12 angry Democrats doing this from the southern district of New York.
[Astorino:] Thirteen.
[Boykin:] Thirteen, whatever the number is Trump has generated for the day. But my point is, this is Trump's own Justice Department, Trump's own hand-picked U.S. attorneys has implicated him in federal crimes. This is a serious offense. And wherever it leads is where it leads. If it leads to impeachment, let the chips fall where they may.
[Astorino:] If you read the sentencing documents, they trash Michael Cohen. They're sitting there saying he's deceptive.
[Bolduan:] Yes, they do.
[Astorino:] He's a bad witness. He's uncooperative.
[Bolduan:] So what?
[Astorino:] Yet, they're going to hang everything on Michael Cohen?
[Boykin:] Trump picked him as his attorney.
[Bolduan:] Clearly, you weren't listening to the top of the show, because asked the exact question. Renato Mariotti said he's worked with a lot of scumbags that they wouldn't be a witness he would use in court, but they were credible when it comes to their investigation.
[Astorino:] Here's the point that I think Comey was trying to make, and Keith was trying to make, and I agree. If you're going to impeach, and try the president of the United States, you've got to have overwhelming support in the public like, you know what. That was something really bad.
[Bolduan:] You want to base it on polls?
[Astorino:] No, no, no. But honestly, if you're going that far, this is something most Americans would be like, you know, I don't know.
[Bolduan:] I will tell you, no matter what, Donald Trump hopes that's what a lot of Americans are thinking. That's the bottom line.
[Boykin:] The point is the point is the point is you have to have hearings and investigations to see where it leads.
[Bolduan:] OK. I can promise you one thing. The sun is going to rise tomorrow and there will be investigations.
[Boykin:] Absolutely.
[Bolduan:] Great to see you. Thank you so much. Breaking news I want to get to now. The Wall Street roller coaster is continuing right now. Trade tensions with amid trade tensions with China. The Dow down more than 400 points. We're going to go live to the stock exchange to see where this will take us today. We'll be right back.