Graham: We need the whistleblower's name, we need to cross-examine

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Graham: We need the whistleblower's name, we need to cross-examine

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham on impeachment inquiry of President Trump on 'The Ingraham Angle.'

This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," November 4, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

LAURA INGRAHAM, HOST: The stars are out on Monday night. Senator Lindsey Graham is here, he is going to tell us how the Senate GOP intends to attack this impeachment fights.

Alan Dershowitz will explain why two White House lawyers they refused to appear in front of Congress today show its game on. Trump 2020 Senior Campaign Advisor Lara Trump, she's never been on the show before, it's hard to believe. She has exclusive reaction to a new battleground poll that has Democrats in total panic mode.

And as I was talking about with Hannity, the very important John Solomon has exclusive new reporting and he will bring it to us tonight concerning Hunter Biden and pressure that Ukrainian - Ukrainian company Burisma put on the Obama State Department but first, President pragmatic versus Democrat fanatic. That is the focus of tonight's Angle.

Last week we saw Democrats finally vote on that sham investigation they had been pursuing in secret for weeks. Now this impeachment inquiry - thinks about it, it would knock the wind out of any other President, but not Trump. In fact the dramatic effect of their cheesy impeachment prequel was blunted days before the vote when Trump announced a successful and daring Special Force's mission to take out the ISIS leader Al-Baghdadi. Then it was six days later, the week ended with blockbuster economic numbers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Non-fine pay rolls rose by 128,000 jobs in October, solidly beating expectations.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Black unemployment rate another historic low at 5.4 percent.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is potentially game changing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: And today the stock market meaning your 401(k) and pensions kept climbing, heading records across all industries excellent news. Even pockets of pop culture seem to be coming around of Trump. Now for years the President has gotten the stiff arm from a lot of celebrity athletes, but today when he hosted the World Series Champions the Washington Nationals, it was all smiles.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Kurt Suzuki.

(APPLAUSE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I love you all.

TRUMP: I didn't know that was going to happen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you for keeping everyone here safe and continuing to make America the greatest country in the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Of course leftists swore they would never cheer for the Nats again, all over social media. I'm sure the team is just crushed to hear that. And as all this good news is piling up, what are the Democrats up to?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SCHIFF, D-CALIF.: We expect the witnesses who have been subpoenaed to come in this afternoon to be no-shows. This will only further add to the body of evidence on a potential obstruction of Congress charge against the President.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Now speaking as a Former White-Collar Criminal Defense Attorney, this is insane. A President exercising his right to invoke executive privilege is now tantamount to obstruction? It is going to end up in an article of impeachment? What a joke, but it is a question that a federal court, perhaps the highest court in the land may ultimately have to decide.

But the Democrats tunnel vision on impeachment it has them in the dark about the way regular people feel about all of this I think. The latest "New York Times" Sienna Poll showing that the top two rising Democrat candidate Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are losing to Trump in most swing states.

Who could have guessed that Middle America wouldn't be thrilled to pieces with a socialist from Vermont or full Native American who pretend she is not a socialist? I have to say at least Bernie Sanders is backing him up - all the best endorsements.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ILHAN OMAR, D-MINN. We must build a mass movement of the working class that transcends faith, age, gender and background. That is the only way we are going to defeat Donald Trump. I'm beyond honored and excited for a President who will fight against western imperialism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Was she reading a dog-eared old copy of Howard Zin's people of history? What this woman doing in her free time? What does she talking about imperialism? What country has Trump tried to occupy? She is truly the gift that keeps on giving so I don't want to give her any advice. Smart Democrat leaders do see the danger is lurking here for the party.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT: This idea of purity and you're never compromised and you're always politically waked and all that stuff. You should get over that quickly. The world is messy. There are ambiguities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: We have all those imperialists running around. I'm sure the hit squad when they really listen to what Obama said wasn't all that amused, but Nancy Pelosi seems to advance Obama's point on Friday. She said what works in San Francisco does not necessarily work in Michigan.

Remember, November, you must win the Electoral College. I'm kind of thinking this is too little, too late on Nancy's part. Giving the fanatic so much running room and propping up their credibility may have been Pelosi's greatest political blunder ever. She should have seen this train wreck coming.

Meanwhile the candidate was the best chance of beating Trump in the swing states is the lamest horse in the Democrat primary. Joe Biden is now in fourth place in Iowa and third in New Hampshire. Maybe that is because he seems to live in a constant state of self-contradiction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I did not know he was on the board of that company.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Your dad said I hope you know what you are doing.

HUNTER BIDEN, JOE BIDEN'S SON: And I said I do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Which is it? This takes us back to this inescapable reality. While the party's energy is clearly with the left-wing radicals, their message doesn't connect in the swing state. This is New York magazines big liberal magazine's latest anxiety filled headline. Check it out. And then there was this attempt at a wake-up call from an old liberal, Former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown.

He wrote if the goal was to damage President Trump by formalizing the impeachment inquiry, its mission accomplished, unaccomplished for House Democrats. If anything the vote solidifies Trump's hold on power. Come next year Trump will have an impeachment victory and quite possibly a solid economy.

The Democrats will have what? Back in January folks kind of thought it was odd when I said in another angle that I took Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez seriously. It wasn't that I agreed with her views, but that I saw her quickly becoming the fought leader of the party. The Democrats have gone in the direction I predicted and it is slowly but surely backfiring on them.

The never-Trumpers, Liberals, they're forever accusing us Republicans of selling are sold to Trump. How many times we read that tired old line? That is blatantly false. Trump and the GOP on a variety of issues have compromised. Issue is like a number of troops that should be deployed overseas. Trade deals that at one point he wanted to do pull completely out of like NAFTA.

The woman who sold her soul is the woman with the gavel. She cannot go to her voters next November and brag about all of her accomplishments because she will have none. Impeachment isn't going to do anything to make America's lives better and she knows that. Passing the USMCA, infrastructure, prescription drugs, that would have but she refuses to do it.

This frantic rush to satisfy the people on the left, to impeach Trump has only empowered the crazy and it swamped any other agenda they could have had or platform. Wait a second, Bernie didn't interrupt the cheers. I thought they were all against that chant. Of course that feigned outrage on their part when Trump folks chanted that about Hillary. It was another lie.

All in all, this week was a very good one for our pragmatic President. No wonder Trump is in such a good mood tonight in Kentucky.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Today a record 158 million Americans are now employed the highest level of employment in our country's history. We have added nearly 10,000 new factories. We slashed the record number of job killing regulations. We ended the war on American energy. We are now the largest producer of energy anywhere in the world by far.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: A year from now voters will choose between that stellar record, peace and prosperity for a record of dysfunction and demonization on the part of the Democrats. It's going to be a very easy choice. That's The Angle.

Here now to respond is Alan Dershowitz, Harvard Law Professor at Emeritus and the Author of the upcoming a new book, "Guilt by Association" and John Eastman Constitutional Scholar Senior Fellow at "The Claremont Institute".

Alan, the President didn't look all that worried about impeachment at tonight's rally, but is there anything now with the posture of this case as it moves forward in this inquiry. Is there anything he should be worried about?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, HAVARD PROFESSOR OF LAW EMERITUS: Well, first thank you and the name of my book is "Guilt by Accusation" not by "Association" 
because it's about being falsely accused and having the accusation becoming the determination of guilt.

I don't think the President really has very much to worry about. They're focusing on obstruction of Congress and there is no such thing. It's not a crime. Obstruction of justice might be crime, at certain circumstances but obstruction of Congress that's called checks and balances. That's called separation of powers.

When Congress tells you, you have to do something and you think that the Executive Authority tells you can't do it, you go to court. If the court decides you have to do it, then obviously if you fail to comply with the order of the highest court after all review is done, then you are obstructing but to refuse to comply with a congressional subpoena when there is a plausible claim of executive privilege is simply an exercise in checks and balances and good for the constitution.

INGRAHAM: John Eastman, this is a question that we have been talking about now for a few weeks as it became clear that when the White House said no, we're not going to allow a member of the White House Counsel's office Mr. 
Eisenberg to testify. There was another individual Mr. Ellis not going to testify that they were going to go after them for obstruction what Alan was talking about.

They're trotting out a lot of kind of more liberal, legal scholars like Michael Gerhardt at UNC who says tonight, there is no provision on the constitution that protects anyone, including the President or anyone in the Executive Branch from disclosing criminal activities or abuses of power. 
The President's efforts to impede that are really - they are really an attack on the House your reaction to that tonight?

JOHN EASTMAN, SENIOR FELLOW, CLAREMONT INSTITUTE: First of all we don't have any evidence of any criminal conduct and normally the prosecution or investigation of criminal conduct doesn't get done by a partisan political branch like the Congress is that Congress has power over impeachment is for extraordinary things. We don't remotely have that here.

Third, the President's advisors and his conduct of foreign affairs and the internal communication and advice from his advisors are particularly in the White House Counsel's Office. Those are things that clearly protected by Executive Privilege and the notion that Congress can demand people to release or reveal the President's foreign policy, internal deliberation that is just insane.

It's a direct threat on the independence of the Executive from Congress and it's an attempt ultimately to change our system of government from one where the President was elected by the people to one where he is merely accountable and chosen by the House of Representatives. That's a parliamentary system that's not what we have.

DERSHOWITZ: None of us is safe from this. Stephen Cohen, the Congressman from Tennessee actually accused us, on your show of being coconspirators. 
They said we are in on it. He called me a quisling which is another term for Nazi because of that interview you had with John Yoo which I did not interrupt.

But the idea that a Congressman would say that we are coconspirators because we have a different view of the constitution shows you how far some extremist radical Democrats will go.

INGRAHAM: Well, let me say I don't take any of these people seriously. They do not believe in free expression. Fundamentally they are shrinking the first amendment and they don't believe apparently a President has an ability to invoke his own privilege. If he does they're going to accuse him up obstruction.

This is like becoming sadly because I have respect for a lot of Democrats this is becoming the anti-freedom party across the board whether it's college campuses or this. John, Congressman Meadows said this in response to the whistleblower not yet having to testify in person. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MARK MEADOWS, R-N.C.: Why should Adam Schiff get to call his witnesses and have them come in and testify in a in a back-and-forth dialogue and yet the whistleblower is supposedly only going to answer questions in a written format?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: John Eastman, I have Lindsey Graham coming up I'm going to ask on the same thing. That is how the lawyers for this whistleblower, I don't know if it is a whistleblower that really qualifies. But will submit written answers, is that enough?

EASTMAN: Well, here's the problem, the statute protects whistleblowers and anonymity. Unless they've made false statements, knowingly false or reckless disregarding--

INGRAHAM: Not from the media. No. There's nothing protected from the media. Where does it protect from Congress? It doesn't protect it from Congress. It is protected inside the intelligence - no. I don't think so.

EASTMAN: But my point is, even if that statute applied here it doesn't apply when he's made knowingly false statements or reckless disregard to the truth and his complaint has several knowingly false statements. For example he signed on the form that he was a firsthand witness of this and yet in the complaint he acknowledges that he had no firsthand knowledge of the conversation.

There's other things that we need to go to the bottom of what this guy. Who illegally leaked the information to him? He falsely complained in his complaint that he gathered this information in pursuit of his job duties. 
I'm sorry the CIA's job does not involve spying on the President of the United States inside the White House. So there are several blatantly false and illegal things admitted and that ought to be investigated.

INGRAHAM: Well, that's why they don't want the whistleblower up on Capitol Hill. Right, I mean, as if they like two seconds in that three questions Alan Dershowitz or John Eastman, the whistleblower would probably not have too much credibility. But you do have the transcripts and people would agree to that.

DERSHOWITZ: Apparently everybody knows who he is and eventually he is going to be revealed and eventually he will be cross-examined I'm sure.

INGRAHAM: So there is conflicting reports about whether John Bolton is going to testify on Thursday. Originally reported that he was behind closed doors then it was reported it's not clear that he is. So we don't know, but we do have reporting tonight that Lev Parnas who was the Ukrainian business man who had the association with Rudy Giuliani in all this has "Flipped on the President", whatever that means.

The President said he had never met him or didn't remember him and that offended him apparently, Alan any thoughts on that tonight?

DERSHOWITZ: Well, they have him and of course they've indicted him in there putting pressure on him. That's what happens. People flip when there is pressure. But the idea that there is conflict between whether he knew the President or didn't. Any of us who were in the public life know that people take pictures with us, shake hands with us.

They think they know us but we don't know them. We don't know who they are? And I'm sure in the end it will turn out that there was not a close relationship. Remember, to be able to hurt the President it has to be testimony about him and against him. I don't see that forthcoming from this source.

INGRAHAM: Gentlemen, thank you tonight. Great to see both of you and in moments Democrats are facing voter backlash over impeachment. Thanks to Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff. Will that mean a red wave in 2020? Lara Trump thinks so she joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Now corrupt politicians, Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff have launched an even more brazen assault on our nation with a deranged type of partisan impeachment witch hunt.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: The 2020 election is a year away from today. Can you believe it? Now despite weeks of impeachment insanity, check this out. I love this, a new poll showing that President Trump in a dead heat with leading Democrats and battleground states. The left of course is freaking out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Alert from Democrats, a new poll shows President Trump could very well again win key battleground states.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Democrats have not made as much progress for the white working class voters as they thought they had.

VAN JONES, CNN HOST: It's a huge wake-up call the progressive wing of our party needs to recognize this as a much tougher fight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald Trump is formidable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Now on top of that the RNC is spending a lot of money targeting swing district Democrats who voted yes on that impeachment resolution. 
Joining me now is Lara Trump she is the President's daughter in law and Senior Advisor to the Trump 2020 Campaign. Lara, it's great to see you tonight. What is the Trump Campaign doing right now to capitalize on voter's unease skepticism of impeachment?

LARA TRUMP, SENIOR ADVISER, TRUMP 2020 CAMPAIGN: First of all, everybody knows exactly what this is Laura? This is such a nonsensical sham impeachment, a coup against the President. I think that becomes clearer and clearer every single day and people understand that Democrats are so desperate because what are they going to run on?

Look at what this President has done Laura 6.7 million new jobs created under Donald Trump. You saw that the October jobs report just came out,
223,000 new jobs added. You just saw tonight, I mean look at his rally. How can you compete against that? They can't do it so they're trying to throw impeachment at him, but at the Trump Campaign we are welcoming that because internally we have seen the numbers for President Trump go up.

Thanks to Nancy Pelosi calling for impeachment. Three-point since she called for this impeachment nonsense. Voters aren't buying it. They're feeling every single day the results of Donald Trump in office and so we're just capitalizing on that. You know we have the ability to have the President out there around the country like you saw tonight talking about the great things he's done.

Americans feel it, they're not dumb and those polls you mentioned by the way, The New York Times poll the numbers are probably even better than that, Laura.

INGRAHAM: I want to share with you something that Bloomberg is reporting tonight looking at various financial models. Like think included Moody's. 
Here's the headline from "Bloomberg". "Trump's reelection likely if economy stays on course" they are examining various economic indicators saying that during U.S. expansion puts Donald Trump on course to win reelection in 2020.

These are all the economic models that show a track record, a really good one of predicting who wins the White House. The forecast from Yale, Ray Fehr, Oxford Economics, Moody's Analytics are based on Trump being boosted at the ballot box by steady economic growth historically tight labor market and limited inflation.

So my question to you is why aren't his numbers higher? With this economy you would want his numbers up at 55 percent. Do the numbers matter? Are they skewed? I mean, some polls are good some polls aren't what do you think?

TRUMP: I mean, listen Laura, if we believe the polls than Hillary Clinton would be our President right? Because they all said back in 2016, even days away from that election that she was going to be elected President and Donald Trump had no shot. When it comes to this President I think even more so now than in 2016, people are scared to voice their support for Donald Trump.

They're scared to post on social media. They are scared to wear a hat or a shirt supporting him out there. They're also scared to talk to pollsters and they're not being honest with them. To us those numbers don't mean a whole lot. Whenever we go out across this country and we see the love that this President receives like you saw at the rally tonight, like we all see travelling through airports around airplanes.

The number of people that come up to us is shocking. Even here in New York Laura it happens to me on the street. People love this President even in a liberal bashing the Manhattan. Those kinds of feelings and the numbers we internally have mean a lot more to us than those polls.

INGRAHAM: So the concern that - expressed Lara is about female voters. The President did very well among female voters in the 2016 race, better than any of the projections expected. The concern by the professionals, I put this in "The expert" is that women don't like him. He's rough tone, a little curse word every now and then thrown out there.

It's a little too rough and tumble women want everything to calm down. Is that legitimate concerns are you concerned at all about female suburban voters in some of these key states?

TRUMP: I actually think that women like a fighter. I think they are more women out there that support Donald Trump again that will ever tell anyone. 
That is why the Trump Campaign, we actually launched a coalition over the summer, "Women for Trump Coalition".

We just want to encourage women all across this country to talk to your friends and to post on social media and talk to the parents of your kids, classmates and stuffs because the reality is that so many more people out there support Donald Trump, they're just scared to say it. We of course are looking at women and making sure that we are doing everything we can to win women's votes, but I actually think his numbers are going to be even higher with women in 2020 than 2016.

INGRAHAM: So you think he is going to build on it, that's fascinating. I think African-American's support Latino support also will see an uptick. 
Lara, this is an interesting scenario developing, the Democrats are freaking out. I don't care what they're trying to say on the surface everything is good. They're freaking out.

Now Buttigieg he is only at about 9 percent in the polls, but he's got a lot of money from a lot big wigs out in left coast and so forth. He said this to "The Washington Post" on his campaign bus on Saturday about running as kind of a midway point between Warren and Bernie Sanders or even Biden.

He said the way we think the shapes up is, if you want the most ideological far out candidate possible you have got your answer. If you want the most Washington candidate possible, you've got your answer, everybody else I think can come our way I think that's almost everybody. He's clearly trying to go into that space that he thinks is not being properly I guess occupied by Biden that he is more of a middle of the road kind of guy. Does that concern the Trump Campaign Pete Buttigieg?

TRUMP: No not at all. I mean, I've always said that it doesn't matter who this President runs against he is going to beat them handily. We are not worried about Pete Buttigieg what so ever. And I think if anybody watched those debates if you were able to stay awake for them, because they were so boring.

Then you saw that he is very radical he is very far left on many of his policies. So I don't think people are going to be fooled by that very much. 
I'm telling about the debates I am looking forward to be whoever Donald Trump debates because those are going to be fireworks we shall all get our popcorn ready for that.

INGRAHAM: You bet. Lara, good to see you. Thank you so much for being with us.

TRUMP: Thank you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I have a word and it sort of became old fashion. It's called a nationalist and I say really we're not supposed to use that word? Do you know what I am, I'm a nationalist. Okay.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Now, the idea of nationalism, it used to be kind of a bipartisan philosophy, one that needs to be put forward as an American citizen's first idea. They're the people, by the way, who vote you into office. Past presidents like FDR and Reagan had totally different beliefs and policies, yet their goal was to make Americans' lives better. But to today's Democrat Party and the lemmings in the media, "nationalism" is a dirty word.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: "Nationalist," use that word. It is a favorite of the alt-right and is loaded with nativist and racial undertones.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is wrapped up in these connotations of assertiveness, of aggressiveness, of dominance of one race and one country over another.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He is a white man who is a nationalist, and there are people who are concerned.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Here with me now, Rich Lowry, the editor of "National Review" 
and author of the new book out tomorrow, "The Case for Nationalism." All right, Rich, congrats on the book.

RICH LOWRY, AUTHOR, "THE CASE FOR NATIONALISM": Thanks so much. Thank you.

INGRAHAM: Everybody get out and get it, learn something about where we are in politics today. Here is what Jeff Bezos' personal newspaper, "The Washington Post" said, that your book is, quote, "part of a larger effort on the right to create an after-the-fact framework for Trumpism, to contort the president's utterances and impulses to a coherent worldview that can outlast him -- a sort of rescue mission for the conservative movement. 
Your response, Rich?

LOWRY: I don't think I contort anything. And the Democrats, FDR, JFK, they all had nationalist tendencies, but the Democrats turn their backs on nationalists and went in the more cosmopolitan direction. And the Republican Party, too, lost touch with nationalism. So that's why this force was there for Donald Trump to pick up. And it's a natural force. 
It's a powerful force. It's a very old force. Efforts to eradicate it throughout history have always failed.

And that last clip you showed right before I came on about, oh, he's white and he's a nationalist. So was Alexander Hamilton, so was Abraham Lincoln, so was Teddy Roosevelt. And it's really disgusting, Laura, to have encountered this in the earlier reaction to my book that there are a lot of people on the left, as you know, if they're not accusing someone else of bigotry, they'd be rendered practically mute.

INGRAHAM: But Rich, people in your own magazine, "National Review" have written about nationalism in a very negative way. You are a very openminded editor because you put all sort of points of view on the conservative spectrum, which is fine, even though some of it is a very small spectrum. Nevertheless, you put that out there.

So they, along with people on the left, try to blanket, make a blanket statements, oh, this is giving aid and comfort to the worst of the worst, the racists, the nativists, the people who don't like immigrants. Your reaction to that?

LOWRY: Yes, I think that's completely wrong. Nationalism is the doctrine that a distinct people united by culture and history should govern a distinct territory. That's it. In more practical terms, as you're alluding to, you put your own people's interest first and you put your nation's interests first. And true nationalism, it's a loyalty above tribe and ethnicity and any sort of subnational divisions. And you look throughout our history, it's the nationalists who are pushing for greater civil rights, whether it was Lincoln or nationalists in the 20th century.

So this is a smear and a misunderstanding, and one reason I wrote the book, I want Trump supporters to understand why all the arguments are wrong, and I want people who are skeptical or opposed to Trump also to read the book and realize they're wrong about this.

INGRAHAM: Rich, this is all playing out according to how you wrote your book, you frame this, in Europe, too, is it not? Angela Merkel a couple of weeks ago said that she was sad to report that multiculturalism is failing
-- has failed in Germany. You're seeing big protests today in Greece over the influx of more refugees into Greece. Sweden is in turmoil, political turmoil because of refugees. So are they all horrible, awful, rotten people because they want to preserve their country?

LOWRY: If you read a little further into that "Washington Post" review, they actually suggest that I'm somehow bigoted or the book is bigoted because I say we dealt in the early 20th century with a large influx of immigrants by having a robust culture and machinery of assimilation. And we need that now today, and that is said somehow to constitute some supposed hostility to all immigration.

INGRAHAM: It's ridiculous.

LOWRY: It's completely ridiculous.

INGRAHAM: And assimilation is good for us who are already here in our country. It's also good for the immigrants. Ultimately, it's welcoming. 
It's assuming that they can actually become fully American, which they should want to do.

INGRAHAM: Come on in, come on in. Absolutely. Rich, I'm really glad you wrote this book. It's very important coming up in this election year. And thank you so much for being with us. Congrats.

LOWRY: Appreciate it. See you soon.

INGRAHAM: And coming up, is the Senate GOP really caving to the left's quid pro quo narrative? Senator Lindsey Graham joins us next on that and the Republicans plan to fight this impeachment inquiry, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

INGRAHAM: Last week in a series of Angles, I warned Senate Republicans that if they don't step up and vociferously defend this president against this ongoing farce, guess what, Democrats would exact revenge on them if they, heaven forbid, went on to win big in 2020. As if on cue, "The Washington Post" reported over the weekend that a, quote, growing number of GOP senators consider acknowledging Trump's quid pro quo on Ukraine. And of course, the media, they are running wild with it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Some Republicans in the Senate are on the brink of publicly admitting that there was a you Ukraine quid pro quo, and that directly contradicts what the president has been saying.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Some Senate Republicans are arguing for a shift in strategy, acknowledging the quid pro quo, but insisting it is not an impeachable offense.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Republican Party, and it's those close to the president realizing that they have nowhere else to go other than acknowledging that there was, in fact, a quid pro quo.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Hold on there, counselor. Joining me now is Lindsey Graham, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator, is this true, and is this just a rhetorical argument? Just assuming all your facts, Adam, Nancy and company, assuming everything you say is true, we deny it, but assuming it's true, it's still not impeachable. Is that what is going on here?

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C., SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE: I think maybe a little bit of that. Here is what you can take from this whole discussion. There's not one vote impeachment, removal from office based on the phone call in the U.S. Senate. I don't believe Mitt Romney would vote to remove the president over the phone call, because, one, he did nothing wrong. If that's an impeachable offense, you won't have any presidents left.

INGRAHAM: In Kentucky tonight, a lot of kids behind him had "Read the Transcript" t-shirts. I really want one of those.

GRAHAM: Have you read the transcript?

INGRAHAM: Of course I read a transcript. You don't respect me. Of course I've read it, many times.

GRAHAM: It was just to get you going. There was nothing wrong with that phone call. Did he say, unless to investigate my opponent, Joe Biden, I will cut off your military aid? Did he say that? No. Has anyone said the president said that? What did the president of the Ukraine say? No, I didn't take this as a quid pro quo. We didn't cut off aid and Joe Biden wasn't investigated.

INGRAHAM: Tonight, Rand Paul, it was a Kentucky fest for Bevin's big thing, Rand Paul was at this rally, and he was pushing the Senate to be really strong. Watch.

GRAHAM: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RAND PAUL, R-KY.: President Trump has great courage. He faces down the fake media every day. But Congress needs to step up and have equal courage to defend the president. If shifty Schiff will not let Hunter Biden come, and if he will not bring the whistleblower forward, every Republican in Congress should take a walk and say this is a farce.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: He said walk out. If you don't have these types of witness, walk out. What are your thoughts on that?

GRAHAM: I really believe the whistleblower statute has become a dangerous tool in the wrong hands. The whistleblower statute is designed to keep somebody from being fired if they report corruption. It was never designed to keep somebody anonymous.

INGRAHAM: It's not in the statute itself.

GRAHAM: So I like Senator Grassley, but all due respect, you can't prosecute somebody -- impeachment is the political death penalty -- based on an anonymous source. So yes, Rand is right. We need the whistleblower's name, we need who they are, and they need to be cross- examined under oath about any biases they may have.

Number two, we need to look at whether or not Hunter Biden corruptly engaged in lobbying. Did Joe Biden asked the prosecutor to be fired because he was investigating his son? And John Solomon, one your guests coming up, has given us plenty to look at. So I hope Chairman Risch, the foreign intelligence chairman, will open up an investigation about the role of the State Department in all this.

INGRAHAM: The State Department going back to the Reagan years, Lindsey, Senator Graham --

GRAHAM: Lindsey.

INGRAHAM: -- have been, it's always a thorn in the side of conservatives. 
It just is, because they have a different worldview. They do, and they're burrowed in, and they're in for the long haul.

GRAHAM: So just what John has found is some communications where --

INGRAHAM: We're going to get into this in just a moment.

GRAHAM: OK, but the bottom line is the company that Hunter Biden was serving as a board member, they went to the State Department and said if the prosecutor doesn't leave Hunter Biden alone, it's going to hurt us.

INGRAHAM: Lay off.

GRAHAM: Now, that to me is a bombshell of all bombshells, which should lead to a Senate investigation.

INGRAHAM: How could Risch not call him and call members of the Burisma board? How could he not?

GRAHAM: So the member of the board actually met with John Kerry.

INGRAHAM: Let's move on, though, to what's happening on this whistleblower front, because the whistleblower's attorney said we will submit written answers, Senator Graham. So what could be wrong with written answers? 
Come on, let him or her write it.

GRAHAM: If you're charged with the crime and the person accusing you of wrongdoing, they don't have the ability to say I will take written questions. You have a constitutional right to confront your accuser. And this idea of saying they will take written questions violates every norm of due process. Can you imagine if a Republican had done this to a Democrat, that we had a whistleblower that we would keep anonymous accusing a Democratic president of wrongdoing, and they said they will take questions? 
The whole town would blow up.

INGRAHAM: But didn't Trump submit written questions when he was -- to Mueller?

GRAHAM: Yes. He is the president of United States, right? He's the target of an investigation, and they agreed upon written questions. When you accuse somebody of a crime you can't do it anonymously. You can't get a parking ticket based on an anonymous source.

INGRAHAM: A lot of people forgot that Senator Graham was an impeachment manager --

GRAHAM: I've been down this road.

INGRAHAM: -- in the Clinton impeachment, so you've been down this road. Any other advice for the senators? You were an impeachment manager, you can put on a case in the Senate. You go and present your position. The senators don't get to ask questions.

GRAHAM: Right.

INGRAHAM: They just have to sit and listen.

GRAHAM: But you can ask written questions.

INGRAHAM: Yes, but you can't interrupt the impeachment manager from putting on --

GRAHAM: Here is what I would tell my fellow senators. Every impeachment except this one was conducted by outside counsel. I'm the one guy that said Mueller wasn't on a witch hunt. A lot of people, but I took a lot of heat.

INGRAHAM: I think from me, as a matter of fact.

GRAHAM: Yes, from you.

(LAUGHTER)

GRAHAM: But here's what I said. I trust the guy to do his job. I introduced legislation saying he couldn't be fired without cause. Adam Schiff is not looking for the truth. Jerry Nadler is not looking for the truth. What is going on in the House is a bunch of partisan B.S. Every Republican senator that signed on my resolution saying the process wasn't fair, we should continue to prosecute the people prosecuting the president.

We should let every American know this is the first time in history anybody has ever been impeached by a partisan, that if you think Adam Schiff is out to get the truth, you shouldn't be in the United States Senate. All of us should be throwing the B.S. flag on this process in the House.

INGRAHAM: Lindsey Graham, great to see you tonight, thanks for coming on, we really appreciate it.

And coming up, as the senator mentioned, a bombshell new report details troubling contacts between Burisma, Hunter Biden, and the Obama administration. John Solomon has all the exclusive reporting tonight. 
Stay there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

INGRAHAM: Breaking tonight, Hunter Biden and the Ukrainian gas company pressured the Obama administration in 2016 to end corruption allegations against them, that according to new reporting from investigative journalist and FOX News contributor John Solomon who joins us now, along with Dan Bongino, FOX News contributor, author of the book "Exonerated," which has a chapter dedicated to the Bidens and Ukraine. All right, John, what else can you tell us tonight? This is blockbuster.

JOHN SOLOMON, INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST: Yes, it's a real simple story right. Hunter Biden gets his job in Ukraine while his dad is overseeing Ukraine policy. He starts working his dad's contacts at the State Department, Tony Blinken, one of the closest advisors to Joe Biden in their entire lifetime. He has a few meetings with him in 2015, something big happens in Ukraine, 2016. The Ukraine prosecutors raid Hunter Biden's boss's home. February, 2016, a few weeks later, Hunter Biden's lobbyists are at the State Department saying you need to stop these corruption allegations, Hunter Biden is on the board. We need your help. A couple of days after that, Hunter Biden's business partner meets with John Kerry, and then not too long after that, Joe Biden fires the Ukraine prosecutor that he knows was investigating his son's company. That's it in a nutshell.

INGRAHAM: Wow. Dan, Biden said I didn't know anything about this. This is all a big conspiracy theory. They have all these friends in the media who are out there trashing Solomon's reporting, and he reminded me, he had
100 front page stories for "The Washington Post" when he worked for "The Washington Post." They loved him then, but now he's looking into something else, and suddenly you can't trust this. What are your thoughts?

DAN BONGINO, FORMER SECRET SERVICE AGENT: It's fascinating. They can call it a conspiracy theory all they want. It's certainly a conspiracy, but it's not a theory. Listen, I follow John's work and admire it, and I've been following it for a long time. John has government documents from Ukraine. Legal teams for Burisma, their own document indicating that everything that Democrats are telling you, and by Democrats I mean the media, too, about this case is not true.

Think about it, one of the myths he debunked last week in one of his stories which I read -- John, well done -- was that the Burisma case was closed down. So don't worry, Joe Biden couldn't have been influencing the case because the case wasn't open. That's just not true. That's not backed up by actual facts, Laura. And the media which previously was interested in this case, "Politico" and even "The Washington Post" at one point before Biden became a candidate, now mysteriously that Biden is a threat to Trump, or they perceive him to be a threat to Trump, has backed off their coverage.

INGRAHAM: It's a stunner. There aren't many reporters left who don't have a severe political bias one way or another. And also not pointing out the obvious. Adam Schiff today complaining that the Trump administration deep sixed Marie Yovanovitch, the Ukraine ambassador. Wash.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SCHIFF, D-CALIF., CHAIRMAN, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Ambassador Yovanovitch had a well-earned reputation as a fighter of corruption. What does this irregular backchannel sanctioned by the president do? It seeks to remove someone fighting corruption in Ukraine by employing a vicious smear campaign in which the State Department at the highest level acknowledged had no merit whatsoever.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: John, Marie Yovanovitch, Trump had no right apparently, put his own person in.

SOLOMON: Apparently the president doesn't have the power to appoint his own people anymore if you believe that soundbite.

Let me tell you what I know. March of this year, I'm sitting, I pick up a phone call. It's a career diplomat, someone who has been a career diplomat their entire life. He said you won't believe what the Ukraine ambassador just did. There is an election in Ukraine in three week and she just gave a speech calling for the removal of an official in Ukraine. That's against the foreign affairs manual.

So I start digging into Marie Yovanovitch. Who is this person? It is kind of interesting she did this. I find out in 2018, Pete Sessions, the chairman of the House Committee writes a letter to Mike Pompeo, she's badmouthing Donald Trump. I look, and her embassy is funding George Soros' 
groups in Ukraine. George Soros is sort of an ideologue. You go through all these things, there is a big body of record that shows she is not allying with the president. The president didn't need any reason at all to fire her. It's a contrived argument.

INGRAHAM: Dan, we hear this time and again, people burrowed into the deep state at the State Department, or in the intel community, still working against this president's interests. That's not a conspiracy. John knows it, I know it. Your thoughts? Close it out.

BONGINO: I was given credible information, I'm sure from some of the same people John maybe talked to a while ago, that Yovanovitch was, in fact, was doing that, was badmouthing the president elected by the people, and that they do not prosecute list, there may be some merit to that. And it's certainly worth entertaining. If Marie Yovanovitch and George Kent had anything to do with a list of people who should not be touched by the local Justice Department, then it's worth looking into. But again, it's always a conspiracy theory if it affects Donald Trump in a negative way. So it's not real reporting.

INGRAHAM: Absolutely. All right, guys, thank you so much.

And up next, a football moment you will never have wanted to miss. Stay tuned.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This should be the final play of the ball game. Kyler gets three, throws, endzone, tipped. Caught! Dartmouth touchdown! And the Big Green win it! A miracle, Dartmouth stays undefeated!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: OK. That was my alma mater, Dartmouth, taking down Harvard on a last-second Hail Mary pass. It was awesome, six seconds to go. Playing Princeton this weekend. Both undefeated.

That's all the time we have tonight, Shannon Bream and the "Fox News @ Night" team take it all from here. Shannon.

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