President or were going to let some foreign power do it. You know who has the right to elect the american president , the citizens of this country and no one else. Men and women have died on the battlefield to protect our democracy. The least we can do is show the courage to stand up tonight and do our part to protect our democracy. With that i yield back. Gentleman yields back. Does anyone else seek recognition on the amendment . Mr. Armstrong. Gentleman is recognized. And im going to go back to the actual language of the amendment and in particular the removal from office and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States. So at numerous points in times during todays debate have they my friends on other side of the aisle have held up a pocket constitution, waved it around. I think its interesting nobodys read from it yet and i think theres a reason for that. But im going to read from the constitution. You are joining our live coverage here of the House Judiciary Committee markup of the two oarticles of impeachmen. We are in hour 11 right now. We thought this could wrap up midafternoon. Its a process because they can keep offering amendments, speaking time and roll call votes. Theyre in the midst of that. Theyre on article 2 right now. It is quite possible the amendments will end soon, in which case the chair, Jerry Naldler will move things to a vote to vote on the two articles of impeachment, and we are going to be taking this as it goes towards that seemingly inevitable conclusion this evening. More power than the constitution allows. We have heard through the course of this investigation when we have complained about process,
when we have talked about secrecy when weve not been allowed to use minority recognizes, that this is more akin to a special counsel. Adam schiff has referred to himself as a spec counsel. Right now what we are doing is becoming the judge, jury and executioner. The senate has determined issues of removal and disqualification are deviceable from other articles of impeachment. Essentially what happens in the senate is there a two thirds vote and a dissenting majority. While the house has the sole power of impeachment, the senate also provides the constitutional also provides that the senate has the the constitution describes the senates Conviction Power which allows the senate to remove in office an official from office and disqualification that official from holding future office. The democrats house has no Cons Authority to include this language to suggest the president should be removed from office. At best its unnecessary, and at worse its an overbroad description of what the actual pow of this body is. To include the language the president should be disqualified from office is prejudicial to the process the senate will take up. And i agree it really shows the true motives of the senate. Its circular how this has all gone. It started in 2016 and now were back to 2020. In the middle we had, again, collusion, conspiracy, obstruction, quid pro quo, bribery, extortion. All of these other crimes and we have come to the nebulous part of this. Theres been a lot of smart lawyers on my friends side on the other side of this case so i cant imagine this is an omission. And what we are truly doing is taking power away from the
united States Senate which is at their sole discretion. You have the right to proceed with this. We know this. Its been fast tracked and railroaded since day one. And you can equate yourself to a grand jury, a special counsel, an investigation. But you have no right as a u. S. House of representatives to be judge, jury and executioner. So while you may say taking this language out is ridiculous, i think its actually constitutional. And with that i yield back. Gentleman yields back. Does anyone else seek recognition on this amendment . What purposes . Move to strike the last word. Gentleman is recognized. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Theres been much said about motive this evening from my democratic colleagues. They seek to opine us to the president s motives rather than looking at his own words reflecting in the transcript. They seek to opine into his motive rather than listening to the direct statements of president zelensky that he felt
no conditionality and no pressure in communications with the administration. But this amendment this amendment shows the true motive of the democrats balls it is not about some cleansing of the office. Its not about some restoration of National Security. Its about National Security, they would have been all up in arms when President Obama withheld military aid to the ukrainians. But they werent. Its just a show to demonstrate an attack on the president. Four facts never change. President trump and president zelensky both deny conditionality. The transcript shows no quid pro quo. Ukraine was not aware of any delay in military aid at the time of the call, and the aid was ultimately delivered in the absence of the investigations the democrats are talking about. But i do wonder if we had had the opportunity to hear more witnesses, what more would we have been able to learn more
beyond that . Maybe we vd have learned about his offices contact with the whistleblower. Maybe we could have asked Chairman Schiff why he felt it appropriate to engage in some theatrical performance of a transcript that never existed . Maybe we could have asked him why he wasnt fully forthcoming about his offices contact with the whistleblower when he was asked about it on national television. We could have asked Chairman Schiff his reasons for admitting exkulpatory evidence and we would have asked Chairman Schiff whether it was his decision or someone elses decision to publish correspondence and communications between the president s personal lawyer and others, journalists and even members of congress. Wooe we could have learned a lot from the whistleblower, who they spoke to and whether or not the information was accurate or
whether or not it was verifiable. We could have asked the whistleblower why the outreach to Chairman Schiffs staff in this particular way. We could have asked the whistleblower about potential contacts with president ial campaigns. We could have asked nelly orr a lot of questions too. She was on our witness list. We probably would have wanted to know how is it that one of the top people at the Department Of Justice can have a spouse that goes and moonlights for people trying to dig up dirt on a president ial campaign and then see that very dirt shuttled into the Department Of Justice, injected into the blood stream of our Intelligence Community and then used as an illegitimate basis to go and spy on american citizens. We probably would have asked which ukrainians she was talking to dig up dirt on the president . What was on the thumb drive she gave to her husband . Alexander chulupa was the intermediary between the dnc and elements of the Ukrainian Government that working with president trump. We could have asked whose idea at the dnc was it to have a specific operative assigned to the ukraine to impair our elections . Whose idea was it . Who funded it . We could have asked who at the Ukrainian Embassy were you talking to . We already saw ukraine engaging in our elections in plain view when you have the ambassador from ukraine writing an oped about the president. I dont know weve learned a great deal at these hearings other than the fact the democrats have been hellbent on impeachment since they took the majority, theyve been unfair in their process, theyve been unable to evidence accusations against the president with anything other than hearsay and conjecture, but i would have liked to hear a lot more, and thats why the rules of the house know it. You know what, its clear to the American People watching that the president did not do something to justify this impeachment. But i think we could have done a lot more to fulfill the president s promise to drain the swamp if we would have actually followed the rules. Gentleman yields back. For what purpose does mr. Richmond seek recognition . I move to strike the last word. Gentleman is recognized. Mr. Chair, i start by yielding time to my colleague from california. Thank you. Theres a doctrine where if you cant argue the facts, you cant argue the loll, argue a lot. You know . In the constitution it has the very language thats in the article, and id just like to read this. Wherefor William Jefferson clinton by such conduct warns of impeachment from trial and disqualification to hold and enjoy any trust or profit in the United States, the exact same language that is being complained about this evening with mr. Trump was put into the articles by the republicans relative to mr. Clinton, and i yield back with thanks. Thank you to my colleague from california, and i would just remind because it was brought up by my colleague from louisiana this was some extraordinary language designed to go after donald trump. This committee, the Judiciary Committee in the house when an impeached judge thomas porteous
from louisiana which my colleague is very aware of, and it went over to the senate and it was voted on unanimous 960 had the same exact language in it. There is nothing extraordinary about the language in this. What is extraordinary is the gymnastics and hurdles that my colleagues on the other side are going through to make sure that they just throw a whole bunch of stuff at the wall. Hope they confuse the American People, hope that something sticks. My friend on the other side just mentioned that this president wanted to make sure that this new Ukrainian Administration was not corrupt like the last one. Well, he gave the last corrupt administration 5 550 million. Again, what a judge will tell you when youre on a jury is you get to apply common sense and if doesnt make sense, you dont
have to believe it. If you gave 550 million to an administration you knew was corrupt what happens between 2018 and 2019 besides you being scared to death of your next political opponent . But what the judge will also tell you is that you do not have to take everything that everybody says as fact. But New York Daily News lets look at the three witnesses that testified under oath, vindman, Lieutenant Colonel, purple heart. He said it was a meeting in exchange for an investigation into the bidens. Sondland, trump supporter, said it was a quid pro quo. Bill taylor, west point said that it was crazy to with hold military aid for an investigation. All under oath, all with the penalty of perjury. Who do they offer on the other side . President trump. 14,435 lies to date since hes been president. Not under oath, but we should take his word for it. Then it is so absurd because in a call we know the president s vocabulary. We know what he does and what he does not say. He may say bigly, great, he might say winning a lot. But in this ordinary conversation he does not use the words quid pro quo. So when he has the conversation after the whistleblower is known to everybody, he gets a call. First thing out of his mouth, hey, i dont want a quid pro quo. Where did that come from . It came from the fact that you are guilty of the crime that is charged. Just like a kid who just got caught going into the cookie jar with crumbs on his mouth when his mother says what are you
doing . I didnt eat that cookie. Thats what we have. A call Out Of The Blue the first thing he says is i dont want a quid pro quo, i want them to do the right thing. No, you would not have held up their vital military aid you have to understand this is country that is being occupied by his friend putin. And he is holding up the vital aid for them to protect their country. Because he says its about corruption. But we know from the facts in this case, from the three people who testified under oath that all this was about was making sure that he gets an investigation into joe biden. Why was that important . Because when you panic you go back to what worked the first time. And an investigation where he got to run around the country saying lock her up, he figured if he could get another investigation he could run around the country saying lock him up and it might work again. With that mr. Chairman i yield back. Gentleman yields back. Move to strike the last word, mr. Chairman. Gentlemans recognized. Thank you, mr. Chairman. You didnt give us a lot of witnesses in this committee and no fact witnesses, but we did get one Professor Turley who early on in his talk mentioned he didnt vote for the president and none of the other witnesses did either. One thing he did say, the evidence that you have against him that youre bringing these Impeachment Charges on is wafer thin, wafer thin evidence. Whats not wafer thin is the partisan resolve by the democrats at least on this committee to get rid of this president. And theyve been looking for an excuse to impeach this president for a long time, and now they think theyve got one. But we obviously know hes not going to be removed from office. But its embarrassing, and its a mark. And its really unfortunate
because the country really shouldnt be put through this. But i think one of the things we ought to do is look at the things this president has actually accomplished that theyre talking about getting rid of. This is a president thats successfully grown this economy. If you look at the savings accounts and 401k accounts of so Many Americans and so many retirees, theyre up at the stock market now, thats not going to go on forever but its certainly something most americans can be pleased about. There are more americans now employed than ever before in our nations history. Manufacturing jobs, which we really used to be hurting in this country and had been in decline for a long time are now coming back. Manufacturing jobs including by hundreds of thousands. Unemployment as i mentioned, a 50year low. If 4 million americans no longer need to rely upon food stamps. Thats a positive thing. Retail sales are up. Were finally becoming energy independent. In fact, the u. S. Is now a net natural gas exporter for the first time in 60 years. 60 years were now an exporter of natural gas. A right to try i remember the president and im sure my democratic colleagues remember, too, the president was encouraging us to pass a right to try law, which allows people who oftentimes have they dont have a lot of chance. Theyve got a disease thats been considered fatal, and theyd like to try some drug that maybe comes out some years down the road, but theyre willing to try it now. Because of this, its giving some people a hope, and hopefully itll save some lives. That was the president s idea. Our military is stronger than its been in a long, long time. And thank god were actually increasing the pay for our men and women in uniform, and they deserve even more. There are two great judges on the Supreme Court now. Elections have consequences. Theyd have been very, very different had Hillary Clinton been elected last time. Elections have consequences, and there are many Circuit Court judges that theyre filling in the senate. And thank god for that. The president withdrew us from that awful iran deal, which essentially allowed money, billions of dollars to go to terrorists. Its not being used against us by iran. Weve seen the embassy, our u. S. Embassy move to jerusalem. Thank god for that. Weve seen finally were starting to strengthen our southern borders although weve got a Long Way To Go there. Despite all these things, when the democrats took over the house earlier this year in january one of the first things
they did, articles of impeachment were introduced earlier this january in the house, and that very same day one of their members in a profanity filled speech famously said were going to impeach the bleep. She didnt bleep it obviously. And another said if we dont impeach the president he might well get reelected. I mean, is that a reason to impeach a president because he might get reelected . It was to them. It really goes back two years to inauguration the hatred for this president when he got elected. We saw it in the streets here in washington. A lot of people came up to protest and thats fine. We also saw a lot of windows broken, we saw one person saying she was dreaming about blowing up the white house and that sort of thing, so it really did get ugly. The bottom line is here theyve been looking for an excuse for years now to impeach this
president. They are wafer thin. We should not be moving forward on Something Like this. The country deserves a lot better than theyre getting in this impeachment process, and ill be glad when i get beyond this because its bad for the country and very divisive. I yield back. Does anyone else seek recognition of this amendment . Move to strike the last word. The gentleman is recognized. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I hear my colleague from rhode island say that this isnt about Policy Differences. This is about our obligation to protect and defend our constitution. Its about courage. Well, of course its about Policy Differences because you said nothing on your side when President Obama sent his surrogates out to lie about benghazi. You said nothing when president Obamas Administration entered into a Gun Running Deal with mexican cartels and the fast and Furious Program was developed. You said nothing about democrat leaders this is about a policy difference. And its not about courage. I question your judgment. I dont question your courage. A