I object. Objection noted. Quorum is present. We are conducting this hearing on the impeachment inquiry into president donald j trump. Presentations from the house select midi on intelligence in the House Judiciary Committee pursuant to House Resolution 660 and a special Judiciary Committee procedures that are60 described in section four a of that resolution. Here is how the committee would proceed for this hearing. I will make an Opening Statement and then i will recognize the Ranking Member for an Opening Statement. After that we will hear two sets of presentations. We will hear 30 minuteco opening argument from counsels for the majority and minority [inaudible] order in the room. Order in the committee room. [inaudible] the committee will come to order. Obviously, i should not have to remind everyone present that the audience is here to observe, not to demonstrate and not to indicate agreement or disagreement with any witness or any member of the committee. The audience is here to observe only and we will maintain decorum in the hearing at rooms. Again, i will say here is how the committee will proceed for this hearing. I will make an Opening Statement and then i will recognize the ringing member for an Opening Statement. After that we will hear two sets of a presentations. Thirty minute opening arguments for the council for majority and minority of this committee then we will hear 45 minute presentations of evidence from majority and minority counsel from the Permanent Select Committee on intelligence. Followed by 45 minutes of questioning by the chair and Ranking Member who may yield to counsel for questioning during this time. Finally, hauler members will have the opportunity to question and present this under the five minute rule. I would note that the president s council has given the opportunity to participate today but the white house has declined the invitation. I will not recognize myself for an Opening Statement. No matter his party or politics if the president places his own interest above those of the country he betrays his oath of office. President of the United States, speaker of the house, majority leader of the senate, chief justice of the Supreme Court and the chairman and Ranking Members of the House Committee on the judiciary all have one important thing in common, we have each taken an oath to preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the United States. If the president puts himself before the country he violates the president s most basic responsibility and breaks his oath to the American People. If he puts himself before thehe country in a manner that threatens our democracy than our oath and our promise to the American People requires us to come to the defense of the nation. That stands for when its anlitically inconvenient even when it might bring us under criticism and even when it might cost us our jobs. Even if the president is unwilling to honor his oath, i am compelled to honor mine. As we heard in our last hearing framers of the constitution were careful students of history and clear in their vision with a new nation. They new threat to democracy can take many forms that we must protect against them. They warned us against the dangers of wouldbe monarchs, thick populists, charismatic demagogues and knew the most dangerous threat to our country might come from within in the form of a corrupt executive who put his private interests above the interest of the nation. They also knew they could not anticipate every threat a president might someday pose so they adopted the phrase, treason, bribery and other high crimes and misdemeanors. To capture the full spectrum of possible president ial misconduct. George mason who proposed the standard said it was meant to capture all manner of great and dangerous offenses against the constitution. The debates around the framing tmake clear that the most serios such offenses include abuse of power, trail of the nation through foreign entanglements, corrupting of Public Office. Any one of these violations of the public trust would compel the members of this committee to take action. With combined the single course of action they state the strongest possible case for impeachment and removal from office. President trump put himself before country. Despite the political partisanship that seems to punctuate our hearings at these days i believe there is Common Ground around some of these ideas. Common ground in this hearing room and Common Ground across the country at large. We agree, for example, impeachment is a solemn, serious undertaking. We agree that it is meant to address serious threats to Democratic Institutions like our free and Fair Elections. We agree that when the elections themselves are threatened by enemies, foreign or too mystic, we cannot wait until the next election to address the threats. We surely agree that no public official, including and especially, the president of the United States to use his Public Office for private gain. We agree that no president may put himself before the country. The constitution and his oath of office is promised to american citizens to require the president to put the country first. If we could drop our blinders for one moment i think we would agree on a common set of facts as well. July 25 President Trump called president zelinski of ukraine and asked him for a favor. That call was part of a concerted effort by President Trump to compel the government of ukraine to announce an investigation not corruption at large but an investigation of President Trumps political rivals and only his political rivals. President trump put himself rbefore country. The record shows President Trump withheld military aid and allocated by the United States congress from ukraine. It also shows that he withheld the white house meeting from president zelinski. Multiple witnesses including respected diplomats, National Security professionals and decorated war veterans all testified to the same basic fa fact, President Trump withheld the aid and the meeting in order to pressure a Foreign Government to do him that favor. President trump put himself before country. When the president got caught and when congress discovered the aide had been withheld from ukraine the president took extraordinary and present unprecedented steps to steal evidence from congress and from the American People. These facts are not in dispute. In fact, most of the arguments about these facts appear to be beside the point. As we review the evidence today i expect we will hear much about the whistleblower who brought the concerns about the july 25 call to the expected general of the Intelligence Community. Let me be clear. Every fact alleged by the whistleblower has been substantiated by multiple witnesses again and again. Each of whom has been questioned extensively by democrats and republicans alike. The allegations also match up with the president s own words as released by the white house. Words he still says were perfect. I also expect to hear complaints about the term quid pro quo. As if a person needs to verbally acknowledge the name of a crime while committing it or it to be a crime at all. On this point the record is clear, multiple officials testified that the president demand for investigation into his rivals was a part of his personal, political agenda and not related to the Foreign Policy objectives of the United States. Multiple officials testified that the president intended to withhold the aide until ukraine announced the investigation. Yes, multiple officials testified that they understood this arrangement to be a quid pro quo for the president ss personal political benefit. President trump put himself before country. The president s supporters argue that this whole process is unfair. Directed before us, it is clear we invited the president to participate in the syrian and the question witnesses and present evidence that might explain the charges against him. President trump shows not to show. He may not have much to say in his own defense but cannot claim he did not have an opportunity to be heard. Finally, as we proceed today we will hear a great deal about the speed with which the house is addressing the president s actions to the members of the committee, and members of the house, and two of my fellow citizens i want to be absolutely rsclear, the integrity of our nt election is at stake, nothing could be more urgent. The president welcomed in foreign interference and election in 2016 and demanded it for 2020 and then got caught. If you do not believe he will do it again, let me remind you that the president s personal lawyers spent last week back in ukraine meeting with government officials in an apparent attempt to gin up the same favors that brought us here today and forced congress to consider the impeachment of a sitting president. This pattern of conduct represents a continuing risk to the country. Ce evidence shows donald j trump, president of the United States, has put himself before his country. He has violated his most basic responsibilities to the people and has broken his oath. I will honor mine. If you would honor yours, i would urge you to do your duty. Let us review the record here in full view of the American People and let us move swiftly to defend our country. We promise that we would. I now recognize the Ranking Member of the judiciary. Mr. Gentleman [inaudible conversations] m the gentleman from georgia is recognized. You will not recognize a possible motion before you . Unanimous consent request. The gentleman from georgia is recognized. Point of order,. The gentleman from georgia is recognized. Mr. Chairman, last week you referred us to the proper demand pursuant to clause two jay one of rule 11. A blatant and egregious violation of the rules youre using to schedule that hearing therefore i insist on my point of order unless youre willing to merely schedule a minorityh hearing. That is not a proper point of order in todays hearing. I told the rink member several times now and im considering the minorities request. [inaudible conversations] Ranking Member thanks we violate the rules of house to be considered articles of impeachment before holding the minority hearing in this pointnt of order would be timely in thea meeting where we considered articles of impeachment but that is not the purpose of todays hearing and point order is not timely. E gentleman from georgia. Well, that got it started again. The chairman completely not answering a question. It is timely and frankly, not up to his discretion but again we not cared about that from the start to begin with. My question is to schedule a hearing but thats not what they want out there. Lets start over. Ri now that the chairman is rick nice how we got that point. Given the famous moments in appeasement and famouss moments in impeachment have gone forward and what toom nixon the president know and when did he know it and in the clinton impeachment there was i did not have a sex with that woman. What would be known about this is probably where is the Impeachable Offense . Why are we here . I tell you, this may become known as the focus group impeachment. We dont have ath crime and dono have anything we can and no one understands what the majority is trying to do except interfereod and make sure they believe the president cant win next year if he is impeached. The focus group impeachment takes words and take them to people and says how can we ask when this better because we dont have the fax to match it. Focus group impeachment says we really arent working with good facts but we need a good pr move. That is why we are here today. This is all about as i said last week a clock in a calendar. It really became evident to me this was true because last wednesday after we had a long day of hearings here the next morning before anything else could get started the speaker of the house walked up to the podium and said go right articles of impeachment. She just quit. , she just stopped. Go right articles of impeachment. I appreciate the majority practiced for two days of this weekend on the syrian. I appreciate the fact that you got to try to get a right and clement committed. Of people but your speaker is already undercut you. She took the thrill out of the room. Why could we not just say that time today and if you will write the articles of impeachment go ahead and write them. There is probably a reason for that because as the chairman laid out amazing claims that none of which, i think after this hearing today they market people can honestly look at and see there is overwhelming evidence in a proper reason to abuse this power because as of the speaker another statement she said that to do impeachment you have to be so compelling and overwhelming andec bipartisan, l of which we are not. Why not . Why are we here . I think we can do this. Lets look at the three things that typically are associated with making your case for a lecrime and lets do it against what the majority has said. I think they are motive and means an opportunity. I what is their motive . A november 2020, its been said over and over that the chairman said it again this morning its been said all along that we have to do this because it we dont impeach him he will win again next year. The reason is shown as clearly as last week on the job support in the economy and a man came up to me in the Grocery Store this weekend and said keep doing what youre doing and that ive never seen an economy this good and he said people are working and people are being taken care of and this is a fatal distraction for a president they dont like. Motive is easy. November 2016 they lost. January 27 team of humans and the Washington Post confirmed what every democrat had been talking about that now is the time for impeachment. We seem to eat after tweet andac its amazing they started impeachment and spent two years trying to figure out what are we impeaching him on. Well, the means became what we see now. The means is to always talk about impeachment and say this president has done something wrong and say hes illegitimate and that hes not an eligible president s. Constantly tear down a president who is working on behalf of the American People. The sham impeachment when we go through this i think the chairman said Something Interesting he said the president should not be a love the law and be held accountable for the oath of august and congress ought to be held for their oath of office and not to do right now that is not fitting fairness and decorum and you are having to force the facts against a president you dont like. What was the opportunity . The opportunity came last wanovember. When they got the majority and they began their impeachment run. They began a process even selecting the chairman and chairman said i would be the best person for impeachment and this is november of last year. Before we had any hearings before we had sworn into this congress for anyone, media watching on tv and in this room for anyone to think this was not a big deal is not being honests with themselves. You see, presumption is not becomes the standard instead of proof and it should cause anyoe to begin to question because the entire case was built upon a presumption that inferences are okay and if you just infer thats what they mean then we will take that. Thats an interesting line. They made the whole case built on Gordon Sunderland and youll see that a lot today. He testified he presumed the da was connected tole an investigation butt said nobody ever told him that. He even asked the president directly and said what do you want and he said i want nothing, i want zielinski to do what he sran on, ukraine did nothing and got paid anyway. They note this is a problematic experience and when the chairman of the Intelligence Committee who by the way, is absent todayo guess he cant back up his own reports but started his own hearing by making up the factual call when he made it up and started the fairytale we are having today. If you can put the transcript in the right, read it. Karen chairman shift cannot even read the transit but made it up because if he did not make it up it did not sound as bad. It did not sound as bad but he said lets make up dirt but thats not what was said with the transcript and the chairman misled the American People as an attorney and is a chairman and a member of congress a sworn oath to tell to be honest with the market people and uphold the constitution and that was such a massive malpractice ive never seen because again, they dont care about what actually wasnt the transcript and they donta care what happened and we heard last week from witnesses they dont care that the aide was released. They simply are looking at the facts to make it fit their tnarrative. What else happened . This is also the chairman who said that these collusion is in plain sight and that it was already there before the mullah report came out and this would happen but maybe i might need to just stop commenting on a chairman shift because i may end up on the next phone records