Good evening. We start with breaking news. Tonight, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, this afternoon,

announced the impeachment inquiry is about to enter new, more public phase, trying to at

least, uh, impart undercut a key Republican talking point in the process. The speaker

informed her colleagues in a letter that the House will hold a vote on Thursday on rules

that establish the rights of the public to see the information collected from witnesses

during closed-door testimony and how that information will be transferred to the Judiciary Committee,

which is responsible for recommending articles of impeachment. It'll also establish the

rights of the president and his counsel as the lower chamber heads toward a final impeachment

vote. Much of her letter was not about the process ahead, though, is rather why they're

holding the vote in the first place. Quoting, she says, we are talking, we are taking this

step to eliminate any doubt as to whether the Trump administration may withhold documents,

prevent witness testimony, disregard or julie authorize subpoenas, or continue obstructing

the House of Representatives. Nobody is above the law.

Well, tomorrow will mark five weeks since Speaker Pelosi publicly announced the inquiry,

and in that time, the White House's top lawyer said administration officials, quote, cannot

participate in your partisan and unconstitutional inquiry. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has

said his employees cannot testify. Rudy Giuliani has refused as well. Today, Democrats

threatened contempt after a witness refused to appear. One reason the president's allies

have given for a lack of cooperation has to do with process that there needed to be

a single house vote to establish the inquiry. But that is not actually true. A federal judge

on Friday called those arguments, quote, cherry pit and incomplete, with, quote, no textual

support in the U.S. Constitution. Then today, in a bit of a surprise, the president seemed

...