i mean, one of them is what congressman schiff explains in this letter tonight, that decision by the justice department is what has led in part to this format we are now seeing for the impeachment investigation in the house. schiff explains in this letter tonight that they would not have to do all the impeachment inquiry depositions and interviews in secret behind closed doors if this inquiry was being carried out following an fbi inquestiiry or grand jury investigation. because those things didn t happen they have to do the initial investigation by themselves and means it has to happen in secret, has too hap h out of the public eye. the special counsels in the nixon and clinton impeachments conducted their investigations in private and we must initially do the same. it is of paramount importance to ensure that witnesses cannot coordinate their testimony with one another to match their description of events or potentially conceal the truth. that, of course, is why grand jury testimon
and that maybe felt like a good idea in the first place, but it has now led to a whole bunch of different consequences which appear to be very much spinning outside of bill barr and the white house s control. i mean, one of them is what congressman schiff explains in this letter tonight, that decision by the justice department is what has led in part to this format we are now seeing for the impeachment investigation in the house. schiff explains in this letter tonight that they would not have to do all the impeachment inquiry depositions and interviews in secret behind closed doors if this inquiry was being carried out following an fbi inquiry or grand jury investigation. because those things didn t happen they have to do the initial investigation by themselves and means it has to happen in secret, has to happen out of the public eye. he explains why. the special counsels in the nixon and clinton impeachments conducted their investigations in private and we must initially do the same.
first whistleblower complaint, a new complaint would give congress more ammunition as they fight the white house over documents in this subpoena showdown. the white house said without a vote to open impeachment inquiry, they will not comply with the democratic subpoenas. we have no rights. the way they re doing it, they ve taken away the rights. just after the declaration, documents were asked for the vice president s contact with the ukraine. it does not appear to be a serious request wrote back pence s spokesperson, katie waldman. we ll issue a letter. we ve been treated very unfairly, different than anybody else. that would demand a house vote on impeachment, similar to the nixon and clinton impeachments where the full house voted to give them broad ranging subpoena powers recognized by the courts. but house speaker nancy pelosi didn t do that. she simply called a press
nancy pelosi and maybe is just listening to her caucus here. several months ago there weren t as many many democrats calling for impeachment. now they are. those numbers have ticked up. public poll has also shown an increase in support in the general public. paul: it s still not over 50%. it s not over 50 but it s measurably gotten higher, that support. and we ve seen that even in the past week. paul: it s riskier now to not go ahead with impeachment for her. she could say i m listening, i m listening to my caucus. kim s right. they ve been looking for reasons to do this. they are flailing out there. they wanted to impeach trump over his tax rushes, over stormy daniels, over russia. this is the latest excuse to move forward on it and she couldn t hold out any longer. paul: let me ask a process question. in the nixon and clinton impeachments the house of representatives voted with imagers to go ahead with a impeachment inquiry.
there is still enormous risk to her moderate members of putting them on the record for this. paul: you and i are old enough to remember the nixon and clinton impeachments. the nixon impeachment was much more bipartisan and it ultimately pushed the president from office. the clinton was more partisan in the end and it did not. and there was a backlash. can a partisan impeachment succeed in ousting a president? it s a question of the politics and how much ground swell you can build around it and to be sure, the democrats have the media working full-time. unless you re new york or washington, you have no idea the volume of stuff that s being thrown at the trump presidency over this. but bear in mind, nixon and clinton both involved large casts of characters. the nixon impeachment was about watergate. there were a lot of people involved. the clinton impeachment involved a whole cast of characters. this is about one thing t