The whistleblower made falseht statements, the whistleblower got caught with chairman schiff. Remember chairman schiff, the person that the democrats instead of the House Judicial Committee which has spent a full week on this, thats not who has been in charge. They put in charge was the person that got caught with the whistleblower. Have you spoken directly with the whistleblower . No, we have not. Wed like to. That wasnt true. The person that said he had evidence of the first fake impeachment scam, collusion with russia, had evidence of that collusion and didnt have it. The person who in the course of that read into the record the steele dossier because the people needed to know what happened about the truth of what happened. We heard about the truth of what happened with the steele dossier this week when the Inspector General said it was all garbage, rubbish, all made up. Yeah, thatad chairman schiff. And now he got caught not being truthful about a whistleblower who, as i told you the other day, didnt Tell The TruthVerbally Andll in writing, and thats in a transcript. You know what we didnt get in this oneweek impeachment summary in the House Judicial Committee . We didnt get that transcript. Chairman schiff didnt send that one over. Only if you were on the Intelligence Committee have you seen that eetranscript. Ive seen it. Id like everyone to see that. With that, i yield to my good friend congressman jordan. I want to go back to where mr. Buck was referencing the gentleman from Rhode Island Wheh he mentioned mr. Sondland, mentioned 611 times in the report, assumed there was a quid pro rtquo, the guy who had to fe an addendum in his deposition testimony. In that addendum he has a sentence where ambassador taylor recalls thatas i told mr. Morrin i conveyed this message to mr. Yermak in kweks Vice President pences visit to warsaw and a meeting with president zelensky. Six people having four conversations in one sentence. Yermak talks with sondland, sondland takes with morrison, Morrison Talks With Taylor and we have the democrats saying theres a quid pro quo and need to impeach the president. What they t forget is what mr. Gates brought up, yermak talks with sondland, sondland talks with morrison, Morrison Talks With Taylor. Two days ago, the guy who started it, yermak said it didnt yehappen. Thats their guy, mr. Sondland, had to file the addendum to his testimony, hado to write this sentence to clarify i think this is amazing. This is the clarification. Ambassador taylor recalls mr. On september 21st, 2019. Yermak is the key here and it didnt happen. He just told us that. Time magazine justth reported it, the very same day mr. Gates pointed out you all filed your articles of impeachment. Holy cow. This is what it comes down to. I yield back. Mr. Chairman. The gentlemanr. Yields back. I havean unanimous consent, move to strikeun the last word. For what purpose does ms. Demings seek recognition . Mr. Chairman, i move to strike the last word. The lady is recognized. Let me just say, ive been pretty shocked and disappointed with my colleagues on the other side. There have been so many things that have been said like the president never used the word demand. I can tell you this. When a robber points a gun at you to take your money, they usually donton walk up and say im robbing you right now. The other argument that weve heardnt this morning is, well, e aid was released. It was eventually released. There was no investigation, there was no announcement of an investigation. But you know the aid was released because the president got caught. It was released after the whistleblowers complaint. It was released after public reports that the aid was being held because ukraine was being coerced into doing an investigation and congress had initiated congressional investigations into why the aid was being released. We can talk about alternative facts all day long, but the facts are pretty clear. That the president abused his power, the precious power of his office to coerce a country that was dependent on us, a country who is fighting russian
aggression because when ukraine fights russian aggression, theyre helping us fight russian aggression, and he did it for personal gain and he should be held accountable. Mr. Chair, i yield back. Gentle lady yields back. I have unanimous consent. The gentleman is recognized. Thank you, mr. Chairman. The first is the record of the kpons and subpoena served on Executive Branch by chairman schiff. We have concerns because three were served prior to the passage of 660. Well take a look at that. Another one, mr. Chairman. It is two letters sent by the office of the Vice President dated october 15 and december 11, the first explains the scope of the Document Request from chairman schiff, advance legitimate oversightan authorities. The second pointsmaht out an inaccuracy in chairman schiffs report. Contrary to an assertion are these public correspondence . Without objection. Thank you, mr. Chairman. For what purpose does ms. Roby seek recognition. I move the strike the last word. I yield to my friend mr. Russian thauler. You have to remember the abuse of power is coming from the quid pro quo charge which then morphed into bribery. The problem is, is that my colleaguest across the aisle cant make out the prima facie case, meaning the elements are not supported by the facts. Lets go back and look at the federal statute for bribery. The elements are as follows. Whoever being a public official corruptly demands or seeks personally anything of value in returnal for being influenced i the performance of an official act,n and we could tear apart each one of these elements, but
let me just focus on corruptly, the president didnt have corrupt intent. Thats where the Democrats Cannot T make out a prima facie case. Contrary to schiffs parity version of the july 25th call, the president wasnt asking ukraine to, quote, unquote, make up dirt about my opponent. That quote came from a parity from chairman schiff. The president didnt say it in the phone t call. For whatever reason, that is being missed. There was also significant reason to believe that the bidens were involved in corruption, anded theres also evidence ukrainian officials colluded with democrats in the 2016 atcampaign. Theres been a lot of talk about this being a Conspiracy Theory. Its not c a Conspiracy Theory. The hill, politico, Financial Times reported on this. For whatever reason its being labeled a Conspiracy Theory. Also, thecy president was not seeking to help with the 2020 campaign. Rather he was seeking accountability regarding Ukraine Democratic Collusion in 2016 and also potential corruption in the obama administrations dealing with ukraine as well. We have to remember what Professor Turley said. Remember, Professor Turley voted for hillary clinton. He is not a trump supporter. He was very impartial. He said, quote, trump does not state a quid pro quo in the call. Hes using his influence to prompt the ukrainians to investigate and to cooperate with the justice department. If President Trump honestly believed there was a corrupt agreement withre hunter biden, that was not fully investigated by the obama administration, the request for an investigation is not corrupt. Again, i was quoting Professor Turley. Id also like to quote the mueller report. Just an aside, we have to remember months ago Robert Mueller came in and said there was no evidence of collusion, no evidence of obstruction. But again were back here. Let me go back to the mueller report. There was discussion of
corruptly in that report. As pertains to Obstruction Of Justice it was stated, quote, corruptly means acting with an improper motive or with intent to obtain an improper advantage for himself or someone else inconsistent with the official duty and the rights of others. By that standard, by muellers own standard, the president s behavior is entirely inconsistent with the definition of the underlying statute. With that i yield back to my friend and colleague from alabama. I yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from texas. Thank you, ms. Roby, so much. First of all i was astounded, having been a prosecutor, ive defended some cases. Ive been a judge. Ive sent a lot of people to prison, but ive never sent someone to prison where the victim didnt know our figure out that they were a victim. Thats extraordinary to hear that you can commit a crime like bribery or theft. The victim never knows, never figures out theres a victim. Iveim never sent anybody to prison where the victim didnt know they were a victim. Ms. Roby i yield to mr. Collins. Let it go. Also, theres probably nobody on this committee that has followed what happened over time in ukraine more than i have. Theres no question that putin wants the old soviet empire back. Ir what happened when President Trump was in office, putin had russia invade georgia. President bush reacted strongly and he put sanctions in place. So what happened when president Obama Took Office and secretary clinton was in office . They went over there with a red
plastic reset button, and the message was clear to putin. Look, bush overreacted when you invaded georgia, so you can invade ukraine and were okay. That may not be what they intended, but thats exactly what putin heard. Thats why they invaded ukraine, crimea and europe said, trump . For heaven sake. Time is expired. What purposes, mr. Raskin seek recognition. Move to strike the last word. The gentleman is recognized. Our colleagues reprove mr. Cicilli cicilline, ambassador sondland. Itsmb fascinating to me becaus thats President Trumps pick. He contributed a Million Dollars to the trump campaign, he became the bams door to the eu. They dont like him now because he clarified his testimony to
say, yes, there was definitely a quid pro quos at the heart of this whole thing. Now, of course, they turn on the president s own ambassador. We dont have to rely on his word. I started to mention this before because he had a lunch with david holmes who was the Senior State Department official at the u. S. Embassy in kiev. They went to a restaurant and ambassador sondland got President Trump on the phone and afterward holmes could hear the conversation. Thiser is all uncontradicted by other witnesses who were there. And essentially ambassador sondland said to him, zelensky loves your ass and youll get exactly what you want from him. Afterwards holmes says, well, what is it we can get from him . Well, its the big stuff. Holmes says the big stuff, you mean like the war, dealing with russia . No, the big stuff, what President Trump cares about. Im not quoting very bay tim because i dont have it in fron of me. The substance is very clear. What does he care about . What can benefit him like the bidens. Its very clear from multiple witnessesom exactly what Presidt Trump wanted to get from president zelensky. He wanted a statement on television that ukraine was investigating and was going to investigate Vice President joe biden, and he wanted a statement contradicting the 2016 understanding by our Intelligence Committee and by Special Counsel Mueller there had been a sweeping and S Systematicin campaign by russia and saying it was ukraine that interfered in our campaign. Thats what he wanted. That wast the big stuff. He didnt care about the russian war on the people of ukraine. He didnt care about corruption. They invite us to believe that donald trump is an Anti Corruption crusader who was shaking down president zelensky about corruption when he doesnt raise any corruption on that call except for what he believed was going on with the bidens, except that he reduced Anti Corruption funding for ukraine, except he doesnt raise it anywhere else that we can find. What do you know . You pick up the New York Times yesterday. President trump had to pay 2 million to charities because he rippedau off his own charity fo millions of fdollars. This is the Anti Corruption crusader they want us to believe in. The guy who had to pay 25 million to students at the phony Trump University which the Attorney General of new york called a classic bait and switch operation. This is thed guy they want us believe was shaking down the
president of ukraine because he had some secret Anti Corruption agenda that actually wasnt related to the bidens, that wasnt related to rehabilitating the totally discredited russian Conspiracy Theory that it was ukraine and not russia that interfered in our campaign in 2016. Come on. Get real. Be serious. We know exactly what happened here. 17 witnesses. Its uncontradicted. Theres no rival story, no rival story at all. Our colleagues will not even tell us whether in theory they think it would be wrong for the president of the United States to shake down Foreign Governments, to come and get involved in our president ial campaigns in order to harm the president s political opponents. They wontpo even tell us in principle whether they think thats wrong because they think its too dangerous at that point. We know they dont accept the facts, we know they dont accept
the evidence. They dont like the fact that thet depositions took place in the basement. Where should they have been . On the first floor, the second floor . Would they f accept the facts i we found some other room . Would that be all right . Their people were there. I was in that room. There were democrats, there were republicans. The democratic counsel got an hour. The republican counsel got an hour. It was even on both sides. Enough of these phony process objections. Lets get back to the facts of what happened. The president of the united foreign ook down a power to come get involved in our election. Thats wrong. I yield back. Mr. Chairman. The gentleman yields back. Mr. Chairman. For what purposes does the gentleman seek recognition . Move to strike the last word. No, no. Mr. Armstrong is recognized. For what purpose . Move to strike the last word. The gentleman is recognized. First, i think it bears mentioning that theres a lot about david holmes i would say,
but what i would say first is for a guy who heard part of onehalf of a threeminute phone call, he had a 40minute Opening Statement. Sondland testified that biden was never linkedin his mind until the transcript was released at the end of august. The democratic report, not the republican report, the democratic report does not establish any language between the announcement or understanding of investigations for his personal political benefit. The only testimony democrats rely on to prove that allegation is ambassador sondlands testimony. They conveniently leave out the most crucial aspect of the ambassadors testimony. He only presumed the linkage. He admitted in his public testimony that nobody told him there was linkage. This is the basis for the democrats article one. I want to go to a broader reason why we should accept mr. Jordans amendment. A democratic senator was quoted, never in my view had a democratic been led by such a dangerous head of state, a reckless and arrogant president. That was senator robert byrd fromat West Virginia describing george w. Bush. Ronald reagan was accused of abuse of power for pushing a growthbased economic agenda. For committing troops to lebanon or turning back the sand nistas in nicaragunicaragua. Clinton was accused of abuse for an asia fundraising, four dozen donors were arrested. Aides getting sweetheart opponents, useg of the fbi to g up dirt on political employees, waco and a swedish slush fund. George w. Bushsh was accused of abuse of power for domestic spying and Energy Task Force controversy, president ial records act, steel tariffs, the iraq war and nsa overreach. Obamas irs engaged in politically motivated targeting of chart t charity lk groups. Fast and furious gun running scandal collected Telephone Surveillance on a. P. Journalists without a warrant. The seizure of private property under the guise p of environmenl protection. The problem were running into, which is going to last far longer than today and far longer than this congress is this will become the new normal. Every one of those things i mentioned have t reports writte about them. They probably have election consequences. There were hearings held. You know what Theye Didnt Hav . A nebulous, ambiguous charge of abuse of power. If you cannot prove an underlying crime, you dont get to useri all the evidence your presenting. This will continue, this will move forward in the history of our country, the party who is notho in the white house has accused the white house of abuse of power. Started 200 years ago. It will continue into the future except now, congratulations, it
will be impeachment every single time one Party Controls the Ho