The Daily Folgen

The whistle-blower complaint at the center of the impeachment inquiry was released on Thursday as the Trump administration official who had declined to turn it over — Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence — testified before Congress. Here’s the latest from Capitol Hill. Guest: Julie Hirschfeld Davis, the congressional editor for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading: The complaint accused President Trump of pressuring Ukraine’s leader to investigate a political rival and alleged that the White House tried to “lock down” the transcript of the call.Here’s what we’ve learned about the whistle-blower.Read a declassified version of the complaint, with annotations, and eight takeaways from the document. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

The White House released a reconstructed transcript of President Trump’s phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky, the leader of Ukraine. In it, Mr. Trump asks for an investigation into Joseph R. Biden Jr., a potential 2020 rival. We consider what that request means for the impeachment inquiry now underway. Guest: Michael S. Schmidt, who covers national security and federal investigations for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading: Different interpretations of the phone call are shaping a debate over whether the president committed high crimes and misdemeanors.Read the full declassified record of the call, with annotations.Here’s what we know so far about the whistle-blower complaint that set off this controversy. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has begun a formal impeachment investigation of President Trump, saying he “must be held accountable.” We spoke to our colleague who was at the announcement and to one of the lawmakers who helped convince Ms. Pelosi that it was time. Guests: Nicholas Fandos, who covers Congress for The New York Times, and Representative Mikie Sherrill, Democrat of New Jersey. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading: Though the outcome is uncertain, the inquiry raises the possibility that Mr. Trump could become only the fourth president in American history to face impeachment.After months of caution from House Democrats, why is this happening now? “They believe the new accusations against Mr. Trump are simple and serious enough to be grasped,” our colleague Carl Hulse writes in a news analysis.Here’s how the impeachment process works. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.