American peoples money on this impeachment, theres so many other important things that are going undone. Within this committees own jurisdiction, we should be addressing the opioid epidemic. We could be working together to find a solution to our immigration and asylum challenges on our southern border. We could be protecting americans from having their intellectual property and jobs stolen by chinese companies. And we could be enhancing Election Security just to name a few things. And congress as a whole could be working on rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. Providing additional tax relief to the nations middleclass families and providing additional security to our people here at home and abroad. Instead, here we are spinning our wheels once again on impeachment. What a waste. The American People deserve so much better. I yield back. Gentleman yields back. Mr. Cohen. Thank you, mr. Chair. I take no pleasure in the fact that were here today. As a patriot who loves america, it pain
today. defiant ukrainians celebrated a day of unityan. there had been reports and intelligence warnings that today, february 16thh might be the day of the invasion. of course, that s up toim vladimir putin. will ukraine be ready with vladimir putin? they didn t get it was a joke. u sos it put us in a very weird position where suddenly we were being lectured on humoran by eastern europeans. think about that for a minute. zelensky staff issued a statement explaining that actually he was kiddinghe. so some of these outlets had to update the reporting that they were clearly annoyed with zelensky quote, ukrainian leader makes confusing joke about russian invasion harumph new york magazine. but here s the funniest partew f there was no invasion february 16 . 2020 two was yesterday. nothing happenedd. vladimir putin did not invade ukraine. now joe biden noticed the lackio
constitutional congress settled on these charges. treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors. it s actually simple. it s a crime against the state a crime against the people. you don t need break a law to commit a high crime. the founders expected the process would be partisan. but they probably didn t envision this. president zelensky quote loves your ass. was there a quid pro quo the answer is yes. or this. corrupt witch hunt. perfect call. it s a hoax. what would the founders would think about donald trump? oh boy. i ll plead the fifth. let me answer it this way. tyranny was one of the map things the founders were worried about. demagogue was second one. they have nothing in common.
a crime against the state, the people. you don t fleed need to break the law to commit a high crime. reporter: the founders expected the process would be partisan but they probably didn t envision this. president zelensky quote loves your as. was there a quid pro quo? the answer is yes. it was a perfect call. this is a hoax. reporter: what do you think the founders would think of donald trump? oh, boy. i m going to plead the fifth on that one. let me answer it this way. tyranny was one of the main things the founding generation was worried about. demagoguery was a second one. james madison and donald trump have nothing in common. but the trump character was alive and well at the time of the american revolution. somebody with blarny and salesmanship and a pension for
they knew that a president who couldn t be checked, who could not be supervised by his own justice department and who could not be supervised by congress and could not be impeached would effectively be above the law. and would use his power to get himself re-elected. and that s why they created the impeachment remedy. thank you, professor feldman. i now want to discuss how the framers concerns about abuse of power relate to president trump s misconduct. on july 25th, president trump said to president zelensky quote, i would like you to do us a favor, though. professor feldman, when president trump made use of the words favor though, do you believe that the president was benignly asking for a favor? and how is the answer to that question relevant to whether the president abused his power? it s relevant, sir, because there s nothing wrong with asking for a favor in the interest of the united states of america. the problem is for the president