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Joel Bossous (CAS ’23), a long term intern, is calling for structural and cultural change to Georgetown University Alumni and Student Federal Credit Union.
ΑTHENS – The Georgetown University Alumni of Athens presented a timely panel discussion titled ‘Implications of the Ukraine Crisis for Greece’ on June 14 in the gardens of the Goulandris Natural History Museum in Kifissia.
Albertos Bourlas, President of the GU Alumni of Greece and Commercial Part
There are no indications of survivors the u.s. Coast Guard said steep terrain low visibility choppy seas and rain had complicated the search operation Kohima So why is 4th largest island known for its sharp mountain peaks Jagat cliffs and tropical rain forests to say up to date on all the news we invite you online to our website v.o.a. News dot com from Washington this is v.o.a. News Russia s defense minister says it s deployed its 1st intercontinental hypersonic nuclear capable missiles President Vladimir Putin has boasted the weapon which can travel 27 times the speed of sound puts Moscow in a weapons class of its own in Hong Kong today police fought with protesters who March through a shopping mall demanding that mainland Chinese traders leave the city in another week out of anti-government tension in the Chinese semi autonomous territory the demonstration was in. Popular among the so-called parallel traders who buy large volumes of duty free goods to sell them on the mainland government broadcaster r c h k reported 14 people were detained the New Year is just days away and tens of millions of people here in the United States will be focused on New York s Times Square for the annual New Year s Eve ball drop police in the city say there are no credible terror threats but they are taking no chances here a bit here s a piece Julie Walker thousands of police officers a 175 blocker vehicles heavy weapons teams bomb sniffing dogs radiation detectors drones helicopters and even boats and y.p. The chief of intelligence and counterterrorism John Miller Time Square is probably going to be the safest place on the planet Earth on New Year s Eve because nobody else puts that kind of effort into an event like this police commissioner Dermot Shea we currently have no specific credible threats directed toward any of our events still I m going to ask that members of the public as always remain vigilant Julie Walker New York as the end of 21000 approaches many Americans are taking time to remember some of the prominent people lost during the year here s a piece said on a few people like Congressman Elijah Cummings who championed for the poor and for immigrants what country it s. This is the United States of America retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens was the leader of its liberal wing and a proponent of abortion rights and consumer protections at the very least I know that learning on the bench has been one of the most important and rewarding aspects of my own experience Lee Iacocca became a folk hero rescuing one of Detroit s big 3 you know when I 1st got that crazy job they were ready to bury Chrysler last year you made up the fastest growing car truck company in America and the leader of the Islamic state group was killed Abu but. Al Baghdadi is dead I m a Donahue the u.n. General Assembly has approved a resolution condemning human rights abuses of Iraq hinge and other minorities and me and Maher the vote was 134 to 9 with 28 extensions the resolution calls on the government and young gone to take urgent measures against the incitement of hatred more news at v.o.a. News dot com Gene Randall v.o.a. News. a columnist for USA Today. Hello thank you for joining us and here are the issues the u.s. Senate gears up for a historic trial of President Trump 5 men have been sentenced to death for their roles in the gruesome murder of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul Turkey tensions between the u.s. And North Korea increase and we ll look back at 2019 and preview the new year 2020 Well let s start Linda and Tom with this impeachment trial of President Trump I think as our global listeners probably know the president has now been impeached by the House of Representatives that of course is the lower chamber of our Congress and he ll be tried at some point in the New Year in the Senate of course the issue is we don t know when this trial will occur we don t know what the trial will look like work if anyone will testifies a lot of things up in the air Linda let s start with you what do you think is going to happen right now over it impasse so Nancy Pelosi has not handed the articles of impeachment to the Senate which would then allow them to announce the terms for the trial so this is all a matter of discussion should be between the majority leader in the Senate Mitch McConnell and the minority leader Chuck Schumer in our last impeachment with Bill Clinton the to Senate leaders were. Able to work together and get a deal together for a trial of Bill Clinton this time it s not happening Nancy Pelosi is using what little leverage she has and withholding the handing over of the articles it might look like she has no leverage the Republicans have the majority in the Senate but what she s done is gotten under Donald Trump s skin he has spent the Christmas holiday in a rage rage tweeting at Nancy Pelosi over the fact that she s not triggering the trial there will be a trial but she s holding off to try to get a better deal in terms of the terms for this trial and one thing that is an issue here is that Mitch McConnell of course the Senate majority leader has already said that he cannot be an impartial juror and that he s cooperating closely with the White House so that hardly seems like a fair process and they ve been complaining about the process and yet that hardly seems fair well the truth of the matter is the way the protocol works Paula is that all senators will have to swear an oath before anything begins to be fair and impartial jurors of the president any president and it s hard to see how McConnell can do that because he s already said I m not impartial so that sets up a bit of a back and forth there that tells you a couple of things it tells you like many Republican senators McConnell who is up for reelection in 2020 should be cruising to victory is scared to death of crossing President Trump getting on President Trump s bad side and so he has a tightrope to walk but it suggests that the Republicans don t care and whether there ll be a backlash at that point somewhere down the road it s too early to tell the procedural problem the Republicans have is Linda said you need 2 thirds of the senators voting to throw out a president meaning 67 as very unlikely that that will happen so nobody really thinks that Trump will be removed from office but you only need 51 votes to prevail on. See general things and so if the Democrats can find for Republicans to say we need to have a witness we need to hear from Joe Biden s son Hunter Biden who was the Republicans think did run and did bad things and when he was on the board of a Ukrainian energy company the Republicans would like to hear from him but Democrats say we have to hear from John Bolton the president s national security adviser who was right in the middle of all the Ukraine stuff and was pushed out in so far he s not been willing to testify so the threshold of 4 votes is not that big so we ll have to see what happens and it looks like there is perhaps at least one Republican Lisa Murkowski the senator from Alaska who has expressed reservations about what McConnell has said in terms of not being impartial who might the other 3 be is that even possible there are 3 others in Islami maybe you know even Romney is a possibility he s so close as you can get to being a never Trumper and it s just day in the Senate there Susan Collins of Maine who s up for reelection and is in of the battle of her political life 3 under her seat Cory Gardner a Republican from Colorado Colorado has become more and more of a democratic right enclave in the last decade or so and he and Collins are considered to be the most vulnerable Republicans running for reelection in November of 2020 so they get you to 4 now will that happen and we don t know but it Republicans are torn I mean and I m sure Linda I mean Linda can speak for herself and I m sure we all know situations where we ve gone up to Capitol Hill and talked to Republicans who say we re really troubled by this president but we have to back him because if we criticize him he will destroy us he will unleash the power of his very formidable conservative base in other words are not troubled enough they re not troubled enough to show any profiles in courage but it s a real Democrats could lose some votes to don t forget you ve got. The senator from West Virginia Joe Manchin who is represents the most Republican state in the country John s Nalbandian and Judge Jones in Alabama has probably had gone or in the next election a Democrat in the deep south kind of won on a fluke so honestly I just don t see the Democrats really getting to 51 well we ll talk more about this I think in the 2nd half of the show when we preview the year to come but let s move on in Saudi Arabia as people perhaps at No 5 men have been sentenced to death and another 3 faced a total of 24 years in prison for their roles in the gruesome killing of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul Turkey last year there are some people who say that this is actually kind of a sham here Tom I mean they were convicted sentenced to death so how would that be a sham what but what s going on well 1st of all the trial was closed to the public and to the media there was no transparency we don t know what kind of a trial they they got the 2 closest advisers in the chain to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Sultan on were cleared of any risk culpability on the grounds of insufficient evidence but there s no record of what the lack of evidence was it s a sham because and this is not a personal opinion this is a fact the u.s. Central Intelligence Agency a year ago had concluded with a very reasonable degree of certainty that Bush August killing in dismemberment was ordered personally by the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Mohammad Vincent salt on better that is not a personal opinion on my part that is the fact that the CIA and other American intelligence agents concluded that Mohammed and sells on was personally responsible and culpable and he had of course as has denied it it s a hint. Crime I had nothing to do with it but he s not very credible and so that is the problem for the Saudis they can t admit that the leader of their country is persistent paid in a criminal act of murder so there there is a giant cover up here there s no no way to sugarcoat that but I think M.B. s will will survive but it ll be interesting to see over the next year or so what what happens on the global stage about this the United States is still in his corner for geo political strategic reasons but again there are very few people in positions of authority in the u.s. Intelligence community who don t who don t agree with the CIA that he is culpable All right well Linda in the remaining minutes we have in this 1st part of the show another thing that I wanted to talk about tensions between the u.s. And North Korea have suddenly begun to rise again the president as you know I spent the last couple of years he s met with Kim Jong un 3 times now he s said that the nuclear arising we know or at least u.s. Intelligence agencies say that has never been the case and continue to work on their nuclear program on their long range rockets and so forth and you know things are kind of deteriorating when the namecalling starts to ratchet up in the president just to recently read used his phrase a rocket man when talking about Kim So this appears to be kind of a going backwards here yeah and Kim promised a Christmas gift for America and so we we sat here on Christmas wondering if something terrible might happen now people are looking to Kim Jong un s birthday which is January 8th because that is for North Korea big important day so we re looking as that might might something happen by then and what the top officer for air operations in the Pacific region is looking at is he s. Doing some type of long range ballistic missile to be the gift a test not a good thing but we were talking about John Bolton a couple of minutes ago Tom and Bolton I think at Twitter which is seems to be everybody s medium of choice these days of Bolton has said well at some point President Trump is going to have to admit that his strategy everything he s done with respect to North Korea from day one has failed is that a reasonable that s what John Bolton again the president s former national security adviser has said is that a reasonable assessment Well it s a reasonable assessment but it s not a reasonable expectation there s nothing in President terms d.n.a. That suggests he can or will admit a mistake has not he s just not wired for that he s always on the attack it s interesting to me that you know the love letters seem to have stopped it s been a long time since the president said I got the most beautiful letter from Kim Jong un he said we fell in love we fell in love. And I think I don t know why this why the show in recent months maybe it s because the president has now understand there s no way North Korea is going to give up its greatest global bargaining chip nuclear weapons it s the only thing they have right and without them without on them they re just a country and starving its people and international pariah but they re international prize with nuclear weapons so this is going south that s for sure let s pause for a short break more issues in the news in just a moment if you didn t David coming to you from the Voice of America in Washington if you would like to download the president made spree on I can just click on the i Tunes tab on our website at v.o.a. Needs dot com While you re there check out our other president rather one for USA Today. Encounter also live it up on Facebook and leave a comment or 2 then like the relative payers with Carol Castillo Now back to i Pad on the feldman Washington bureau chief for The Christian Science Monitor Tom De Frank contributor to The National Journal and our moderator Paul Brandis White House the quarter for West Wing reports and columnist for USA Today Welcome back well this is our final program of 21000 where is the time gone it s just the year has flown by the end of the year in fact the end of a decade and as we look back at this year and ahead to 2021 to talk about 21001st it s almost impossible to think of all the things that have happened this year just happened so quickly but Linda we ll start with you the 2 or 3 things that have stood out in your mind this year so I m I m just struck by the roll of Nancy Pelosi we began the year with her having to fight for the speakership which even people who opposed to rise to that position for the 2nd time of course she was the 1st female speaker a decade ago and then when the Democrats re took the house in the midterms last year she was positioned to retake but face this revolt among some younger more progressive members of Congress and she won the speakership back and has proven herself to be the most skilled politician the most skilled tactician and Washington bar none she gets under Donald Trump s skin he doesn t know what to do with her he s finally giving giving her nicknames but she doesn t care she raised 5 children and any mom knows that when you raise kids you learn to put up with a lot and you can see through the stuff that they re throwing at you and I can t think of anybody better be facing off against him in a way it s almost ironic that trump pulls poorly with women of course and it s not going to do well with women I think we can presume in the 2020 election and here he is. Being undone right so far by a very the most powerful political woman in the country to question and every time he launches on her and he used to he used to say to the aides and friends I respect her toughness Linda s right she s gotten under his skin like no one else has been able to and every time he launches on her and calls her wacky him crazy and I mean she probably loses another 1000 votes from suburban women who didn t like him much anyway I mean her strength please only person in America at the moment who can rattle him throw him off his game and she s just cool as a cucumber 3 just keeps throwing his name callers in Iraq she doesn t he didn t she doesn t care I mean she comes out and she says things and I think it s heartfelt I pray for the president every day well that sends him into orbit and he sends this remarkable very long letter to her right before the impeachment vote and which he s just kind of excoriating her sentence after sentence after sentence that was a came across as a very interpret unpresidential letter and he also accused her of lying when he said she was trying for him that that is going to be a continuing duel in the next year setting aside the election which we ll talk about I mean the Palosi back and forth with Trump is really going to be a duel of the Titans so there was one thing that Linda said could have stuck out for her this year what about you what was sort of the top thing that you who looked to me it was it was the coalition around Trump by a Republican Party that really doesn t quite know what to do with him other than the fact that they have to bite their lip bite their time and support him because of the Republican Party lost the off year elections and 2018 they re worried of many of them are worried about doing poorly in 2020 but they cannot break with Trump because they see what has happened to other politicians who have broken with Ron Most of them are out of office a couple of them were defeated in primaries. When Trump supported somebody else because he was angry with them a congressman from South Carolina is one of them and so what I would call otherwise sane and principle Republicans have said I want to be in the Senate in the house for a long time but I ve got to get through 2020 because if I can get through 2020 without incurring the wrath of Trump I have a chance to be in Congress a long time helping people in my district or my states so coalescing around Trump more moderate conservatives in the Republican Party is one of them more striking political developments of the year for me tell you both giving me kind of a Washington focused sort of answer it s a big country what Beyond the Beltway to use that cliche struck me To me it s sort of a Washington there too I suppose but the thing that stands out in kind of a depressing way is this hyper partisanship which appears to be getting worse it used to be in this country that there were always a big number of people who were in the middle who did not necessarily identify as either Republicans or Democrats or the riot or the left I mean a big group of independents and now that appears to be just shrinking by the day and people are just moving further to one side or another of course which makes cooperation on these big issues even more difficult to me that sort of the big thing the country is basically divided along tribal lines there s 2 giant triumphs the people who adore Trump and the people who detest Trump and there are tens of millions of Americans in both categories and you get the feeling there s about 40 percent of the of the electorate who adore him and about 40 percent of the electorate who just detest him of the number of undecideds You re right Paul continues to shrink in this this lack of comity the lack of being able to work together is amazing I mean I remember I covered Gerald Ford when he was vice president and then president and he was a. Master of getting along I mean it s a cliche but it really is true for years to say I believe we can all disagree without being disagreeable and now everybody is disagreeable I mean there s name calling there is no goodwill and there is precious little goodwill on either side of the political debate or even even in the country and I think I find it really depressing Ford said that compromise in fact is the glue that holds government together that appears to be disappearing rapidly Well it s kind of go beyond Washington and America if we ve got a couple of minutes left here whole bunch of things around the world to talk about quickly let s just started Britain Boris Johnson is going to continue as prime minister a convincing victory couple of weeks ago quickly what does that mean in your view for breakfast at Rex It will happen that s a certainty and his bail action campaign was brilliant basically let s end the misery and get this done and people said yes please stop this endless impasse over Breck s it so they will leave the European Union in January but that s sort of in name only they have an 11 month transition period which experts say will be very difficult to achieve and so Johnson will likely get an extension on that so that will maybe go through a new phase of misery watching the u.k. Extricate itself from the you without being too disruptive to people s lives but there s no doubt that the people within the u.k. Who wanted to stay in are in full panic mode particularly and Scotland and Wales and Ireland question has now been reopened and they ve got to have a kind of a compromise set up on that so that you don t reopen the whole Ireland question but you know the future of the e.u. Is not as gloomy as you might think in fact I recently had hosted a coffee with a key member of the European Parliament Radek Sikorski of Poland who said that in fact Bracks it has strengthened the e.u. He says that the populous in Poland in France and Italy no longer supporting their countries exits from the European Union they saw how awful it s been. For the u.k. And he says the so-called corpse is very lively in Israel with 3 attempts now to have a new leader Benjamin Netanyahu in a dieted for corruption yet he s still hanging on and I think he won kind of a victory just this week that allows him to keep controlling his crude party but the leadership in Israel is far from clear to as we head into the new year this is almost certainly going to be a 3rd election in less than a year in Israel the leading contender is a former Israeli Defense Force chief retired general been a dance and you get the feeling that power is slowly leeching away from Netanyahu I don t know whether he survives the criminal trial on corruption charges or not but it seems like after a decade his hold on power is more tenuous than ever before so I think we re going to see months and maybe longer turmoil there and it s not at all clear who s going to be able to form a government so whoever wins this 3rd election the u.s. Will remain Israel s staunchest global ally and no matter what happens I think President Trump would prefer Netanyahu or survive because Netanyahu has gone out of his way to support trump it remains to be seen and turmoil and chaos in Israel is never a good sign the people those who don t like that proposition are basically the Arabs that would talk about sort of a little politics in Britain and Israel and so forth and what s going to happen with the between of one kind of a more amorphous issue that I wonder about is so you ve got this de globalization trend and yet it s bumping up against international issues that it seems to me can only be solved with international cooperation so it seems to me those are 2 forces that are going to create increasing friction at some point does it make sense to me how do you deal with things like climate change which is not going away appears to be getting worse right places like Australia how do you tackle big problems like that when everybody. It s to go on the road well it s you re right there s no doubt that the u.s. Dropping out of the Paris climate accord is huge problem for global cooperation on this issue but you have other forces you have California which if it were a country would be I think what the 5th biggest g.d.p. In the world they have their own climate policy and they have their own restrictions in place and even a country like Australia which is very dependent on fossil fuels and a big exported to China fossil fuels there are still with the program and they re conservative prime minister acknowledges that climate change is in a general sense a link to these extreme weather events and to the brush fires that caused him some harm politically so I think it is an all gloom and doom we ve got most world leaders believe that climate change is real and our have instituted policies to fight it but give me at our last minute or 2 here 2020 is here to couple of days away at the big event here in the United States obviously is the presidential election next November we are sort of talking before the show that President Trump has a very good chance of winning. What do you think is going to happen in 2020 Well I ve said a 1000000 times from these microphones Paul overnight is a lifetime in politics and we have 10 and a half months worth of lifetimes left to go until early November. Of next year something will happen that we don t expect to happen why because it always does. And so it s it s hard to know the one thing I do believe the president or I m still has going for him other than a ferocious base of about 40 percent of true believers is the economy there were a lot of worries that the economy would start to slump but you know that has not happened still some people who think that that might happen next year remains to be saying but it s that will definitely be the domestic story. Quickly I think there s going to be growing competition from China and Russia challenging the president in the u.s. And in global affairs China and Russia seem to be somewhat in bold and and I think there s going to be more bumps in the relationship between the u.s. And those 2 other superpowers Ok We ll have to end it right there our thanks to 2 of Washington s most prominent journalists Tom De Frank he s contributing editor to Of this kind. Of stuff. Comes. To Think I was born yesterday you have got. To. Get. Bin. Laden. No I don t. He. Cut. Cars which got. Everything to. Cousin James Brown. The memories by. Playing. It with the steps to. Let. The new lead. With Let s zoom in a. Little bit. Closer to coming. Down a bit. Closer to bring back a memory and. Let. Oh. The best thing. Oh. I think she knows it. And say control. have agreed to swap dozens of prisoners tomorrow both sites etc Earlier this month they would carry out such an exchange by the end of the year following Russia and Ukraine peace talks in Paris under the reported deal to separatist territories Donetsk and Lugansk will get $87.00 prisoners while $55.00 rebel held captive will be handed over to the Ukrainian government in Somalia today there was a brutal attack in the capital Mogadishu at least 76 people were killed when a huge vehicle bomb exploded at a busy intersection during the morning rush hour scores were wounded Witnesses say the blast occurred at a security checkpoint near an office where Somali drivers pay their road taxes among the dead a number of students there was no immediate claim of responsibility but the al Qaeda linked terror group al Shabaab has carried out similar attacks in the past United Nations experts say al Shabaab is capable of making its own explosives which have become its Why. As of choice the New Year is just days away and tens of millions of people here in the United States will be focused on New York s Times Square for the annual New Year s Eve ball drop police in the city say there are no credible terror threats but they re taking no chances Here s a piece Julie Walker thousands of police officers a 175 block of vehicles heavy weapons teams bomb sniffing dogs radiation detectors drones helicopters and even boats and y.p. The chief of intelligence and counterterrorism John Miller Time Square is probably going to be the safest place on the planet Earth on New Year s Eve because nobody else puts that kind of effort into an event like this police commissioner Dermot Shea we currently have no specific credible threats directed toward any of our events still I m going to ask that members of the public as always remain vigilant jewel.
And she were do not come to an increment senators can still try to call witnesses once the trial has begun those requests would be subject to a simple majority vote Kelsey smell n.p.r. News Washington the House vote in favor of impeachment is in little doubt but the Senate trial is widely expected to go the other way that s because in the g.o.p. Controlled Senate many lawmakers say they ve already seen all the evidence they need to make up their minds whether in an interview with N.P.R. s All Things Considered today Maine Senator Susan Collins says she won t be project prejudging the case I have not bait up my mind and I think of would be inappropriate for me to have made up my mind before I hear the presentations from both sides Collins is a moderate Republican one of a closely watched few who have broken ranks on key votes in the past in a blistering letter to House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi today drunk and damn the impeachment process calling it a perversion of justice and abuse of power and part of a Democratic effort to remove him from office the House of Representatives has approved a $1.00 trillion dollar spending package to keep the government funded N.P.R. s Claudio Salish reports the measures were approved along a bipartisan vote House lawmakers approved 2 massive spending bills to fund the government through September 2020 the government is operating off a temporary funding measure that runs out of money Friday night the Senate is now poised to vote on the measures later this week President Trump has previously threatened to veto spending measures but White House advisor Kellyanne Conway said the legislation should become law the president is poised to sign in to keep the government open President Trump must sign the measures by Friday at midnight to avert a government shutdown clouding the sadness n.p.r. News the Capitol u.s. Employees were throwing up help wanted signs in October pointing to continued strength in the job market Labor Department reporting today the number of available positions rose by just over 3 percent to 7300000 for almost a year now it s been easier for people to want to job to find one with more job postings than. Unemployed people stocks gain ground today the Dow up 31 points this is n.p.r. And on a Tuesday December 17th this is k.c. Or w. I m Larry Perella Here s what s happening at 4 o 4 p.g. And e. Has removed a requirement that California governor Newsome signed off on its settlement with wildfire victims the company reached an agreement with victims of recent wildfires after Newsome said that the utilities proposed reorganization doesn t comply with state law news and demanded the company make major changes if it wanted to access the billions of dollars in a state wildfire fund to pay claims eliminating the clause for the governor s approval buys p.g. And e. More time to shape a restructuring plan around the settlement with wildfire victims the agreement has become the main obstacle for the company to exit from the biggest utility bankruptcy in u.s. History the settlement scheduled for hearing in u.s. Bankruptcy court today p.g. And E. s bankruptcy is making some people a bit rich while California rate payers pick up the tab Risa law goes with k.q.e.d. In San Francisco reports Wall Street could make a $1000000000.00 if you add up all the work involved in the Chapter 11 case one is the lawyers and consultants hired officially as part of this process they ve got about $217000000.00 in fees and expenses there s a fall there are big New York banks like j.p. Morgan Goldman Sachs that are loaning p.j. Money right now I m teaching these pay them about 114000000 dollars this year to borrow that money and some estimates think that that number could top a 1000000000 dollars by the end of this and then there s some other indirect ways that last investors are making a killing. That includes playing the stock market since be Ginny remains a publicly traded company investors can make money on its fluctuating stock prices an estimated $150.00 people become homeless every day in l.a. County with over 130 of them placed into housing officials have announced they will begin using data to identify and help people who are most likely to end up on House to close that gap. Castle with more the data models were developed by the California policy lab and the University of Chicago poverty line. They pull data from residents who use county services between 201220162 try to find who had the highest risk of becoming homeless researchers found that nearly half of the people identified actually became an housed in 2017 a group of policy makers and stakeholders submitted a homeless prevention plan based on the model to the Board of Supervisors this week they plan to carry out their recommendations next year funded by $3000000.00 of measure each funds if you re to be serous Council support for n.p.r. Comes from the n.p.r. Shop or visitors can browse Public Radio nerd mugs totes and teas and other n.p.r. Gear at n.p.r. Shop dot org. It s All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Audie Cornish and I m Ari Shapiro all of Washington is focused on the expected House vote on impeachment tomorrow President Trump was asked about it earlier today but he really didn t receive the money I want you to have it I ve not seen it looking say hopes the whole impeachment thing is a hoax and we look forward to getting on to the Senate. We re not entitled to lawyers we re not entitled to witnesses we re not entitled to anything in the house it s a total sham while the president had a few more things to say about impeachment he wrote a 6 page letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blasting the proceedings you are declaring open war on American democracy Trump wrote national political correspondent Mara Liasson is at the White House and joins us now to talk about this letter Hi Mara Hi Ari This letter is full of exclamation points and suppose why did the president write it he wrote it I think to get a lot of things off his chest he is hopping mad about impeachment he s very upset about it even though he has said that he s going to benefit politically by it this letter kind of reads like a 6 page tweet but he didn t take to Twitter he wanted to put this in a more formal format any player not a White House that has had horrible record or has a largely record now people can read what if Oh yes and that this shouldn t happen to another president he said more due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem witch trials again he called the impeachment process a coup he said he did nothing wrong he complained about a long laundry dissed of what of what long laundry list of what he called the ranged and radical far left Democrats he named Maxine Waters and Adam Schiff he said the Democrats have never gotten over losing the 2016 election he says they ll pay the price in 2020 he said You are the ones interfering in America s elections you re the one subverting Americans democracy you re the ones obstructing justice you re the ones bringing pain and suffering to our republic for your own selfish personal political and partisan gain it s kind of like I m rubber you re glue this was a fairy long angry screed and some familiar argue. That s one that really stood out is that he criticizes Democrats and Speaker Nancy Pelosi specifically for describing the proceedings as prayerful What do you make out of line of attack this is clearly gotten under his skin he said you are offending Americans of faith by continuing Lisa continually saying I pray for the president of course Nancy Pelosi is a devout Catholic he says when you know the statement is not true unless it s meant in a negative sense it s a terrible thing you re doing but you ll have to live with it not I And later in the letter he also he takes up the same theme he says perhaps most insulting of all is your false display of solemnity you expect the American people to believe that you re approaching this impeachment somberly reservedly and reluctantly and what s so interesting is that Nancy Pelosi has gone about this in a very somber manner there s no reporting that behind the scenes she is gleeful or gloating about impeaching the president and this really really offended him you can almost hear him shouting as you read the letter how does this compare to the way President Clinton handled impeachment some 20 years ago well behind the scenes President Clinton was also hopping mad and he vented plenty but he did have a different model a different plan he showed every day that he was demonstrating he was he would demonstrate that he was working on the country s business he said I m going to not let impeachment distract me I m out here doing what the people sent me here to do so that was his method he didn t want to let the country know that he was really see them about it even though he was quite angry in private and President Trump acts like impeachment is all he has on his mind even though he s on the cusp of getting approval for his u.s.m.c. a Trade deal he got approval for the Space Force the White House has tried to showcase his other work in his victories but he doesn t seem to want to participate there is one paragraph in a letter where he lists all those things in a 6 pages but yes he does setting aside the letter where are we in this process what happens next well the House is meeting today to do. Determine the rules of the debate which will happen tomorrow on the floor there s not a lot of suspense about the votes the Democrats have the votes to impeach the president we don t expect any Republicans to cross over and vote yes the only question is how many Democrats will vote no we have seen a parade of Democrats from districts that voted for Trump in 2016 come out and say they will vote in favor of impeachment and that is a but big political risk it could cost them their jobs and then it moves to the Senate trial is that also a foregone conclusion I think that the president will be acquitted that s a foregone conclusion Majority Leader McConnell rejected Democratic leadership Murs request for witnesses in the past rumor McConnell has said that calling witnesses mutually assured destruction sounds like it ll be odd to approximately to a trial in the Senate with no witnesses and even though the president wanted Hunter Biden and Joe Biden and Adam Schiff to testify he s going to let McConnell make that decision and c.r.s. Mara Liasson at the White House thank you thank you Pope Francis has ordered big changes in how the Catholic Church deals with clerical sex abuse of children he s a string in more transparency by lifting what s known as the rule of pontifical secrecy some churches have invoked that rule in denying victims and law enforcement access to information about their cases N.P.R. s Sylvia Poggioli reports on this and the other announcements Francis made today. Today s announcement was welcomed by many survivors of sex abuse and their advocates Marie Collins abused by a priest as a child in her native Ireland had resigned in 2017 in frustration from a papal commission on abuse because of what she did now nst as Vatican resistance today she held the reform tweeting excellent news at last a real and positive change and Barrett Doyle co-director of the abuse documentation website Bishop Accountability dot org said the pope has taken an overdue and desperately needed step as sex abuse scandals rocked the Catholic Church over the last few decades there has been mounting criticism the pontifical secrecy was used to protect pedophiles silence victims and prevent law enforcement from investigations Meanwhile from Chile to France to the United States and Australia law enforcement officials have begun to convict not only abusive priests but also bishops who failed to report them in accordance with the pope s ruling from now on information on abuse cases must be protected by church leaders to ensure its security and integrity but the high degree of confidentiality imposed by pontifical secrecy no longer applies Archbishop Charles she Clune of the Vatican s top sex abuse investigator hailed the move as an ethical decision in transparency he told Vatican Media that Pope Francis is lifting of the secrecy seal opens up avid use of communication with victims and facilitates collaboration with civilian authorities in another ruling Pope Francis raised from 14 to 18 the age that pictures of individuals can be considered child pornography for purposes of sexual gratification by whatever means or using whatever technology and into 3rd move today the pope accepted the resignation of his ambassador to France who has been accused of sexual misconduct so. People Jolie n.p.r. News Rome black and Hispanic Americans are especially vulnerable to all Simers But these groups are often under-represented in scientific studies of the disease N.P.R. s Jon Hamilton says scientists are trying new ways to diversify their research scientists often look for study volunteers at clinics or medical centers but a team from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland is trying something different . On this Sunday morning they ve come to a fundraising walk organized by the local chapter of the alzheimers association well get everybody out there everybody you know before the walk begins the crowd gets a pep talk from Representative Stephanie Howes she s African-American she also takes care of her mother who has dementia some days have been hard right yeah right but there are we ve been having a lot of great days a lot of good memories a diverse crowd of about 4000 people have shown up and the ones who stopped by the vendor tables are likely to meet Leah Cummings one of 2 Research Associates from the medical school at Case Western So we re looking for a family 9 already in people with early onset it s a genetic that is Cummings explains that the goal is to find genes that contribute to memory loss especially genes that might be different in African-Americans and Hispanics and it gives you some more information about our study Ok and if you rather be so they want to be out there and then feel free to take anything I know you Ok Ok if I m right thank you keep coming says despite the big crowd the study is a tough sell so far no one has signed up and so we re hoping that will get a few names today the recruiting effort in Cleveland is part of a nationwide strategy funded by the National Institute on Aging Jonathan Haynes a professor at Case Western says diversifying research studies is the best way to answer some outstanding questions about race ethnicity and Alzheimers historically we have not been looking at a lot of the diverse populations and so there s some evidence that it s different in different Poppy. But there s a lot that we still need to learn so Haynes and other researchers are asking minority communities for help we actually need to have thousands and thousands of individuals participate in these studies to really understand the genetics of Alzheimer s disease the university is trying to make it easy to participate people who sign up can even ask to have a researcher visit their home to collect blood samples and health information but Haynes says in minority communities it s about more than convenience one of the concerns that we often deal with is an issue of trust trust in doctors and medical institutions and the good intentions of researchers that often requires building a relationship and again says talking to people at an all time is walk is one way to start. Today s walkers include many African-Americans one is Robert Smith whose aunt has all timers I ve been up since 230 this morning and I ran over here to make sure I made the event Smith says he s no fan of doctor visits but would consider signing up Lauren Alzheimers Study Yeah absolutely if they may help find a cure I m all for receipt of Brantley has a grandfather who died with Alzheimers and rarely works in the dementia unit of a retirement home so I ask if she s interested in joining the genetic study at Case Western Well yes because I would want to know if if this is genetic you know it is in my do you know will it be passed down yeah what I would do if I was asked that Case Western researchers were able to sign up for people for their study before the walk was over Jon Hamilton n.p.r. News. With all the news happening every day it can be hard to keep up check out our podcast up 1st you get the day s biggest stories in about 10 minutes it s available every weekday morning and now Saturdays where ever you get your podcasts. You are listening to All Things Considered from n.p.r. News. The sponsors include Universal Pictures presenting us written and directed by Jordan starring Lupita Nyong o now nominated for a Sag award for female actor in a Leading Role watch yourself. Support for n.p.r. Comes from Indeed with that skills test built for employers who want to see a deeper sense of the person behind the resume learn more that indeed dot com slash n.p.r. And Zoom Zoom offers cloud video conferencing online meetings and a video conference room solution in one platform featuring digital video and audio with screen sharing account registration and more zoom dot us. Its give away time the hotel in Palm Springs will host old St stick happening Friday December 20th through Sunday December 22nd enjoy a holiday weekend of music movies and comedy sets by Guy Branom Frankie Billy Wayne Davis and more if you haven t won anything from us in the past 90 days and want to check out. Palm Springs go to k.c. R.w. Dot com slash giveaways for your chance to win Good luck. Josh Barrow 2020 going to be a really big year in American politics you re going to need left right and center and we need you give us a boost for 2020 donate a case before the new year during our season of giving back you ll feel good we ll feel good and we ll be there for you every week of 2020. For 19 year old Casey our dobie thanks so much for being with us on this Tuesday afternoon coming up on All Things Considered a prison official has told his mother that his serious injuries were the result of a suicide attempt an n.p.r. Investigation found that was false Now it s up to his family to care for him coma came home after serving roughly 15 years for armed bank robbery how a victim of prison violence is coping just ahead on the program Also coming up we re going to hear from former Utah Republican Congressman Chris Cannon about his experience as impeachment manager during the Bill Clinton proceedings so what does an impeachment manager do and why do we need them coming up on the program as well we know can explain in just a little bit so check your roads now secular Pasadena 134 and Colorado you spend 134 Colorado overturned vehicle in the center divider carpool 2 left lanes blocked their westbound carpool lane shut down as well also that similar continues in the Sapulpa to pass the southbound 4 or 5 at Skirball Center Drive 2 right lanes and offering closed because of a crash being cleaned up this was from an earlier truck fire that had some hay on it and crews I was driving by earlier this afternoon I was stuck in this as well but hopefully this will be out of the way soon for 20. This is All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Ari Shapiro And I m Audie Cornish there s a common but little known form of solitary confinement called Double selling to men often violent men get placed in a tiny cell together for at least 23 hours a day and 2016 n.p.r. In the Marshall Project examine the violence that results prisoners attack sometimes kill their cell mates today we follow up with one man who had major injuries it s now up to his family to do the hard work of caring for him N.P.R. s Joseph Shapiro reports. When Chuck coma s prison sentence ended last year he came home to his mother s cozy house and Shelton Washington Yeah that s where I want to meet up with you Guy who never have the chuck commas quick to apologize for the way his body is shaking these are tremors that come and go I ve been shaken for the last this fall on one second day he says the tremors started after he was strangled by a cellmate in prison he was left with a serious brain injury and you know I ll shake for a few days there and my goal weight or maybe even farm luck you know go 2 weeks but then I ll shake for nother 2 days straight or more and on this day his whole body is shaking mom stop his arms and hands his legs his shoulders imagine your body. Make an uncontrollable to your uncontrollable jerks it depends on how this is going to go but maybe tomorrow he won t be able to feed in South are nothing that s his mother Donna coma I ll have to be had they think it the public it s probably going to kill me they didn t say that I m saying that Chuck coma he s 51 came home from prison with other disabilities to memory loss an explosive temper his vision is blurry he has difficulty walking coma served time for armed bank robbery he was a prisoner at the federal prison in Lewisburg Pennsylvania in the special management unit set up for prisoners considered dangerous or disruptive prisons often put 2 men into one small solitary confinement cell when we did our stories 3 years ago the Federal Bureau of Prisons justified this double cell solitary confinement suicides go up in regular solitary confinement so putting 2 men together is a way to cut down on suicides and its troop suicides go down but homicides go up there are high rates of violence between prisoners locked together in cells no bigger than a parking space for days weeks and months on end that was the conclusion of N.P.R. s reporting with the Marshall Project which reports on criminal justice it happened the 26th of February in 2016 a Friday afternoon the prison one called Donna across the country until Saturday it was the prison chaplain he got hold of me and he said you have a son named Charles Comey and I said yes I do and he said well the incident happened. And they don t know if he s going to live through the night the chaplain promised someone would call back with more information but then no one called 2 days later died a coma finally reach someone at the prison I said what happened could they would tell of nothing and he said he tried to kill himself if I would I know he game the injuries were life threatening her son couldn t eat he was spent through a tube he couldn t breathe a surgeon cut through his neck to connect another tube to his windpipe Well that s a brave than do when it that s what the scars where for the breathe and keep me keep me breathe and even today the Federal Bureau of Prisons suggests come as injuries are the result of a suicide attempt in its response to a lawsuit filed by the family the government says come up was found hanging in his cell but that s false we know because we have the Bureau of Prisons own internal investigation it concludes come it wasn t found hanging and that wasn t a suicide attempt. We found the report among more than $1000.00 pages documenting inmate on inmate violence that n.p.r. In the Marshall Project up tame by filing Freedom of Information Act requests Originally it was come a some a who said it was a suicide that he and come a clash so come a fake to suicide thinking it would get a move to another cell but the fake suicide went wrong he gets not remember about the incident Donna coma is right her son s memory of what happened is a cost but prison officials investigated and concluded the summit was whining that he had strangled coma come it was found on the floor of a cell he wasn t hanging a bed sheet was tied around his neck but the she was loose in the manner round his neck was one that a person can tie on himself coma had been kicked in hit the summer I was disciplined he was moved to disciplinary segregation which at Louisburg meant he most likely ended up in his own cell that some made by the way it killed another inmate and another prison we asked the Bureau of Prisons to comment on what we found a spokeswoman said they can t talk about it because of the family s pending lawsuit . We ve come to a fence at the water s edge on Puget Sound where police caught Chuck coma after he robbed the bank according to the police report this is where chalk being chased by several members of the Olympia Police Department pulled over in a white 2 door Mercury crashed through a chain link fence that s our reporting partner Christie Thompson of the Marshall Project got out of the car wearing a full scuba suit the newspapers would call it a James Bond plot but mostly it was just delusional he d robbed the bank wearing a long raincoat over a wetsuit he had scuba tanks in his car and his plan was that crashed his car in the Puget Sound and swim away the police would find the submerged car and figured he drowned only the police saw him chase them. Caught him before he could get into the water today coma says he was high on drugs he spent almost 15 years in prison the last 2 and a half years in a prison hospital he came home last year the day after Christmas severely disabled after that attack by his cellmate looking far you ve came for Chuck coma he just wants to get out of his mother s house and live on his own maybe buy a motor home and drive across country but his injuries get in the way there is no doubt in my mind you won t get better because you have he seen me shake in all day Chuck coma is an Army veteran he saw combat in Panama and the Gulf War when he came home with Gulf War Syndrome with p.t.s.d. The Veterans Health Administration was there to care for him when he came home from prison this time with even more significant injuries he went months without medical care I were rather been dead than be in the right now probably so coma is stuck at his mother s home arguing about how much will get better and who will take care of him after his mother dies Ok let me put it this way you know I have bone cancer you know what I go through I do not wish that I would die I want to live beyond for another 50 years if I can. Though I don t think you re in any worse shape than me probably maybe you re stronger. The year Chuck coma was attacked in prison the Marshall Project found there were some $3000.00 inmate on inmate assaults in federal prisons more than 90 percent of prisoners one day will come back home some of them like Chuck comma with lifelong injuries Joseph Shapiro n.p.r. News. This is n.p.r. News. Sponsors include Sun Trust private wealth management whose local advisors strive to help clients navigate life with wealth management experience confidence starts here more information at center half dot com slash reserved for 29 year Casey r w ahead next hour everything we do online is tracked and our information is used by companies to generate millions of dollars but we don t know how much they know about us and when that information gets into the wrong hands it can cause an enormous problems California became the 1st state in the country to adopt a strict data privacy law goes into effect on January 1st but will it actually protect our personal information coming up next hour on t.c.r. W. My interview with Laurel Rosen hall at Cal matters on what the new law means for you. Casey abuse monsters include Netflix presenting the 2 popes now nominated for 2 Critics Choice Awards and 4 Golden Globe Awards including best picture best actor Jonathan Price Best Supporting Actor Anthony Hopkins and Best Screenplay Anthony McCartan. And just ahead on All Things Considered some see some worrisome signs for the international system that grew up after World War 2 It comes after a week that saw an update to NAFTA a preliminary u.s. China deal and a big step toward brags that more on that story coming up on the program later state local news at 432 it is back on again why a Democratic presidential debate hit the skids and then came back talk about that many other stories after this from n.p.r. Stay with us. Law is from n.p.r. News in Culver City California Lisa kowtow the House Rules Committee is currently locked into a marathon session debating on the rules for tomorrow s historic impeachment vote the committee s chairman Jim McGovern a Democrat from Massachusetts says the vote should not be a partisan process moments like this call for more than just reflexive partisanship they require honesty and they require courage. Are any Republicans today willing to muster the strength to say that what this president did was wrong Meanwhile Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says he is not an insurer on the question of whether the president should be removed from office he tells n.p.r. This is a political process there s not anything judicial about it the House made a partisan political decision to impeach he says in New Jersey hundreds of mourners came out for the funeral of a police detective killed last week in connection with an attack on a market that left 5 others dead N.P.R. s Jeff Brady reports police from across the region lined the streets for blocks to pay their respects in the cold rain a procession led by officers on motorcycles lights flashing escorted to tech to have Joseph seals cough and from the funeral home to St. World as the sheriff in Bucks County Pennsylvania he looked down the street to describe the scene blocks beyond what I can possibly see but officers easily in the thousands honor guards a couple 100 different honor guards from different apartments detective Joseph SEALs was 40 years old and a father of 5 praised for his work removing guns from the streets authorities say he was shot in a cemetery shortly before 2 people attacked a kosher market about a mile away Jeff Brady n.p.r. News Jersey City at the close of Wall Street the Dow closed up 31 points you re listening to n.p.r. And this is clean c.r. w On Larry parole on a Tuesday December 17th Here s what s happening at 432 the Democratic National Committee has announced the Democrats next primary debate will happen Thursday in l.a. All 7 of the candidates who qualified threatened to boycott the Ford over a labor dispute a union representing workers on the campus of oil Marymount University said they would continue picketing over their failure to reach a collective bargaining agreement with the food service company candidates had refused to cross the picket line if the debate continued d.n.c. Chairman Tom Perez stepped in to help broker. A deal between the union and the school and we will carry that debate live right here on case your w. On Thursday at 51 of Hollywood s big 4 television sees is undergoing some significant changes i.c.m. Has taken on a private equity firm as an investor and has reportedly cut a handful of jobs as Kerry Glazer explains this comes as talent agencies are wrestling with a long running standoff with the Writers Guild of America i.c.m. Represents a long list of big name stars Jerry Seinfeld Ellen De generous Jon Stewart unlike its rivals i.c.m. Has been owned and operated by its agents for the last several years which the company said allowed it to focus on representing clients but now I see Emma sold a minority stake to a private equity firm called Crespi for about $150000000.00 i.c.m. Says it will still be run by agents and that it will use the money to expand in the u.s. And overseas and to reward employees at all levels the l.a. Times reports i.c.m. Has also cut about half a dozen jobs an unnamed source tells the paper it s part of a bigger realignment of the business including potential changes in how many t.v. And movie writers it might represent that is k.c. Are W. s Cherry Glazer reporting the race for l.a. County district attorney is on and the pool of candidates keeps getting bigger former public defender Rachel Rossi is among the latest to enter the race she s the only candidate to not come from a police are prosecuting real experience she says that makes her the ideal candidate for the position we need a prosecutor who has seen its the other side of the system to seen the impact of the criminal justice system on families and communities and who is willing to change that day to day and to have a vision for l.a. County that is more just Rossi says winning back the trust of l.a. Residents is a priority for her recently she helped draft the 1st step act a bipartisan bill that would reduce some prison sentences Rusty has been critical of officials like Sheriff you know who she says has fallen short of promises a lot of people that voted for Alex you know have a believe that he would bring change and. Believe that he would be a reformer to our justice system and he s not the California primary will happen in March support for n.p.r. Comes from the pajama gram company offering hoodie footy PJ s footed pajamas for warmth and personal style and solid holiday prints in Nordic fleece more at the Java Graham dot com and Trader Joe s real holiday products like Scandinavian tydings and kiddie King Joe Joe s are available in stores and episodes of inside trader joe s are available at Trader Joe s dot com and wherever podcast are found right now it is 63 in Pasadena 64 and retro Cucamonga. It s All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Audie Cornish and I m Ari Shapiro Washington is full of negotiating spinning and finger pointing before the expected House vote on impeachment tomorrow if Democrats have the votes as expected a Senate trial will follow in January today Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rejected Democratic leader Chuck Schumer s request for witnesses in a Senate trial I ll shows this road is their duty to investigate it is their duty to made the very bar for undoing a national election Schumer was hoping to get White House officials that refused to participate in the House to testify in the Senate meanwhile President Trump sent a long letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi objecting to the impeachment process in it he accused Democrats of interfering in America s elections and subverting America s democracy in the Senate a team of House Democrats known as impeachment managers will present the case against President Trump 2 decades ago Chris Cannon was one of the impeachment managers in the case against President Bill Clinton and the former Republican congressman from Utah joins us now welcome Hello what is the job description of an impeachment manager Well it s kind of vague and depends a great deal on the Senate in the rules they set that peach or managers a century a prosecutor a guy resents a criminal case or a litigator who presents a case in the civil situation and how much guidance does the con. Petition actually give about the role of these managers almost 0 Ok there is a requirement that it go to the Senate if the president is impeached for a trial and the House managers are in charge of of how they present the material in the Senate Ok So Congress has a lot of freedom to set the rules here and we re already hearing some rumblings about what this might look like in the New Year in the Senate with President Trump compare that to what you experienced 20 years ago with President Clinton one of the fascinating differences today is that in the case of the impeachment of Bill Clinton the Senate decided to set rules and what that a sense of became was a question answer situation where senators asked questions and the managers answered those questions and then the defense team for the president also answered those questions so there s no presentation of the case you re just kind of a q. And a I personally found it ridiculous you found it ridiculous why it ridiculous because a trial actually has meaning in the American Constitutional System That means that you for zent witnesses that the defendant has the right to confront those witnesses and that you have examination cross examination presentation of evidence and then a decision in this case all you had were random questions from people who were embarrassed about the underlying issues embarrassed because it was sexual in nature yeah right as opposed to the crimes which were alleged and which got very little mention and you could have 3 possible outcomes a trial which is basically a debate and a vote that may result in no presentation of evidence at the other extreme you d have a full trial where you would have witnesses and examination by the managers and then cross-examination by the president and then witnesses called by the president and cross-examined by. The managers and all the issues that of the president is convinced vindicate him would probably come out and that is probably. A risky process and so I suspect that it s going to be something less than that but it s up to the senators to decide several of the people who manage Clinton s impeachment went on to much higher profile roles in politics if a friend asked you for advice on whether or not to take a job like this what would you tell them. I think this is going to be a really miserable experience for a Democrat impeachment manager because they re going to be subject to the regulations of of the Senate and I don t think those are going to be favorable to even the most eloquent and articulate of prosecutors That s former Republican congressman if you talk Chris Cannon he was an impeachment manager in the trial of President Bill Clinton thank you very much a pleasure my friend it took 7 decades after World War 2 to put together a system of free trade around the world that system has been rocked in just the last 7 days the president today announced what he s calling a phase one trade deal with China 2 sides are very close on a deal on u.s.m.c. And you could see that an outdoors Johnson hopes his victory would bring closure to the breadth of debate and let the healing begin on both sides of the Atlantic populous leaders are challenging long established notions of how trade should be conducted President Trump and u.k. Prime minister Porus Johnson are winning praise for their efforts in some quarters but also raising questions about unintended fallout N.P.R. s Scott Horsley reports President Trump nost wins on 2 fronts in his trade war last week congressional Democrats okayed an updated version of a trade pact with Mexico and Canada and China agreed to a preliminary deal of its own trade representative Robert lite hisor told c.b.s. Long months at the negotiating table all came together at once Friday was probably the most momentous day in trade history ever both deals purport to foster cross border trade but they also include protectionist measures and to get their Trump put up road blocks ordering stiff tariffs against Canada Mexico and China those countries retaliated so farmers and manufacturers have paid a price for the trade war but White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted to Fox News it was all worth it it does show that President Trump s example of being a tough. Hardnosed bargainer on trade and economic matters works an ocean away Boris Johnson is pushing his own hard nosed agenda insisting after last week s election that the u.k. Will pull out of the European Union No if buts or maybe economist Matthew Slaughter who served in the George w. Bush White House sees a common thread between Johnson and Trump we have leaders today saying that they want to be connected to the world but only on terms that they dictate and only according to the criteria for what constitutes winning and with a lot of threats that 0 sum approach is it off with the rules based international order that the u.s. Spent decades helping to build Johnson and Sean have little regard for that order while Johnson is bent on withdrawing from the e.u. Trump is kneecapping the World Trade Organization just last week the president blocked the ability to referee trade disputes with no referee Trump is freer to follow his own protectionist instincts slapping tariffs on friends and foes alike former trade representative Carla Hill says when other countries follow that example the global economy suffers if we re all going to go out you know laterally and just impose tariffs it s going to have friction and friction can explode to be sure freer trade hasn t worked equally well for everyone while some industries have thrived with access to global markets others have suffered from overseas competition Slaughter who s now at Dartmouth says populist leaders like Trump and Johnson may be well intentioned in catering to those who feel hurt by globalization but he suggest protectionist trade agreements and to withdraw from Global Engagement are not the answers most people don t want just walls they get the globalization in general is good what they really want our bridges that will build ladders of opportunity at the same time so people would have a chance to thrive and benefit from all the dynamism of innovation and globalization the last 7 days have exposed deep crap. In the global trading system the months to come will show whether those cracks can be repaired or if the system is bound to crumble under populist pressure Scott Horsley n.p.r. News Washington. You re listening to All Things Considered. These days a big city police chief doesn t last long in that job for years if they re lucky that s been the case in Chicago the country s 2nd largest police department the last 2 superintendents each spent less than 5 years as the city s top cop now the city s on the search for a new one and people in Chicago have strong opinions about what they want N.P.R. s Cheryl Corley reports. The 1st public conversations about Chicago s next police superintendent opened in the sanctuary of a church on the city s South Side Thank you good evening. My name is forming on the brand form and as the head of the Chicago Police Board that s a group that will recruit interview and ultimately select 3 finalists to present to Chicago mayor Laurie Lightfoot the board got an earful from regular Chicagoans So what they do we want to make sure is that this process isn t another dog and pony show because the mayor isn t the only one the don t like being lied to our community does not like be allied to Eric Rosser was like many in the city who have strong feelings about the Chicago Police Department mayor Laurie Lightfoot who campaigned on police reform is another she fired former superintendent Eddie Johnson just weeks before he was to retire saying he lied to her about an incident where police found a Muslim but the wheel of a running car 3 years ago like it would lead the police board when former mayor Rahm Emanuel fired Johnson s predecessor he also rejected the police board s recommendation sense elected Johnson as superintendent whoever Lightfoot selects to lead the department next will be the city s 3rd superintendent since 2011 Renee Collins says that person should come from the outside the culture inside the Chicago Police Department is so corrupt at this point I. Cannot change them but glad it s true Anderson a retired law enforcement officer favors the inside track the superintendent 1st of all has to come up to the rights they. No was happening out there the next Chicago police superintendent will have to take on some big challenges and entrenched problems prolific gun violence in some neighborhoods a lack of trust between residents and police plus he or she will have to work under a consent decree designed to overhaul the entire department that came as a result of widespread protest over a police shooting of a black teenager which led to the firing of the police superintendent at the time and a Department of Justice investigation I d like to see a superintendent that has heart Robert Beekman a pastor says honesty and integrity are key for any police superintendent but Hart he says is just as important somebody who can next with community which has been failing in some of our previous superintendents Chuck Wexler is the head of the Police Executive Research Forum it s a police think tank based in Washington that keeps track of the reform efforts here and in other cities Wexler says just like in New Orleans in Baltimore a new Chicago superintendent might find the consent decree is not just a challenge but an opportunity to rebuild the city s police department for example changing use of force policies or require new training new technology all sorts of things that the department might not get and while the Chicago police board continues to ask people what they want in a superintendent the board is also reaching out to potential candidates locally and across the country anyone looking to turn around a big city police department has until mid January to get an application in Cheryl Corley n.p.r. News Chicago. You re listening to All Things Considered from n.p.r. News. The House votes on whether to impeach President Trump no one not even the president is above the law will he be brought to trial for abusing his power and obstructing Congress to use the power of impeachment on this nonsense is an embarrassment to this country I m Mary Louise Kelly join us for live special coverage of the House floor debate and the historic vote from n.p.r. News tomorrow at 6 am right here on. This holiday season give the gift of k.c. I.w. Membership The user friendly sustainable memory making gift you ve been searching for the perks of membership unfold all year round with events all over Southern California and so much more plus give during the season of giving back for access to special seasonal swag at the k.c. Scented candle smells like great radio select your gift membership today at k.c.i. Dot com slash Johnny. That is for $49.00 here at r w coming up next hour on the program a conversation with Ohio Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown he ll be on to talk about why he s voting for the United States Mexico Canada agreement it s his 1st yes vote for a trade deal more than 25 years in Congress you hear why the tables turned for him in France protest and strike actions against the government s plan to restructure the retirement system have continued and they ve done so with much of the anger focused on President a mental McCrone But is there enough pressure to trigger reform we ll talk about more about that coming up in the 5 o clock hour as well right now to talk about your road starting in Irwindale the tent at Vernon black in the car pool in left lane slow from Baldwin Ave signal in Pasadena 134 at Colorado this is an overturned vehicle in the center divider of the eastbound carpool and 2 left lanes closed westbound side carpool lane shut down their traffic stop on the east down side from way to Vista in a secular still continues in the pub it pass. This is All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Ari Shapiro And I m Audie Cornish more than 5000 years ago a woman in Scandinavia chewed on a piece of birch a rudimentary chewing gum of sorts that as N.P.R. s Merrit Kennedy reports has proven to be a remarkable source of ancient d.n.a. This dark little blob of birch hedge would be pretty easy to overlook at an archaeological site essentially it s a black brown substance that was obtained by heating birch bark but Hunnish Schroeder a paleo geneticist at the University of Copenhagen says a student coming from the site brought it to him with a question can we get d.n.a. Out of this and you know you wouldn t know haven t really tried so let s give it a go people in the stone age would chew the substance and use it as a form of glue to put sharp points on to weapons they may have also used it as a kind of medicine so these were clues that it might contain d.n.a. But the researchers expected it to be difficult to extract it s still quite challenging to get you know a complete ancient human genome from human remains the d.n.a. Sequencing went better than they could have ever expected they were able to reconstruct a complete human genome Shorter s has the 1st time that an entire ancient human genome has been extracted from anything other than human bones or teeth the team published their findings in the journal Nature Communications and the d.n.a. Tells us a lot about this woman who lived about 5700 years ago she had this really you know striking combination of stark hair and dark skin and blue eyes Schroeder s has those features were common to other hunter gatherers in this area at the time which is now an island in Denmark he says that even though farmers were beginning to settle in northern Europe the woman s d.n.a. Does not show any traces of Farmer ancestry and even beyond her d.n.a. The scientists were also able to extract ancient microbes from her mouth they were sealed in the ancient gum they found traces of a virus and they also extracted remnants of what could have been the woman s well. Last meal duck and hazelnuts shirt says it s unique to have d.n.a. Traces of microbes and clues about diet all from a single individual it s really you know the rich picture from this kind of conspicuous small lump of birch resin Harvard molecular archaeologist Christina Warner s says she thinks that was incredibly creative to try to recover information from the ancient chewing gum and the finds has a lot about her field right now as our technology that we re using gets stronger we re starting to realize that much more of the past is preserved and we ever thought she recently tried analyzing chewed up stems from a cave in Mexico though unfortunately little information was preserved as technology has dramatically improved mourner says scientists should try to test more objects for d.n.a. That they find on archaeological sites gives me inspiration to go out and start looking for more of these unusual contexts in which we might find interesting information a pretty story legacy for a piece of gum Merrit Kennedy n.p.r. News. After 25 years the number one the song on Billboard s Hot 100 chart is Mariah Carey s All I Want For Christmas Is You . Thousands of new holiday songs have been released since but none has become an enduring standard like this one Chris clinic reports on the challenge of trying to crack the tiny you all tied camera. To. The right Carrie single item wish list was the punctuation mark on half a century in which a new original secular holiday song would become ubiquitous every few years as this was 970000000. Oh. Here s a nice 1. 1984. And 1987. You know that it s not something you can likely say about any You ll tunes written lately but which I mean this century people still write them well this story. Is so far. There s no way that Mrs Santa Claus isn t the most important person in the room up in the North Pole so I thought she deserved to get some Aloe Blacc a Southern California singer songwriter who s been making records since 2003 had 8 new songs on his 2018 out on the Christmas funk it is intimidating to think about trying to write something that will stand the test of time he also wanted to try to expand the emotional palette of holiday music yeah we want to get together and have fun and give hugs and Christmas cheer there s also like some family members you just don t want to see. The Christmas. Tree Dr Demento a pop music historian who specializes in oddities and a farmer likens the contraction of the Christmas playlist to increase your earning for tradition at this time of year I mean most Americans eat pretty much the same big meal every year turkey and all the trimmings if they introduce a new recipe people will comment about it mother what s this. Is. I instead of one of the more traditional Christmas desserts I mentioned peach pie would. That s. A country rock outfit formed in the early nineties so I like the idea of. Christmas cliches but you know you sort of have to. Make quite a few attempts at dodging those cliches writing new songs for the band s 2018 album Love the holidays that s why some people roll their eyes when the Christmas songs start up but he s willing to risk your annoyance to write a song that sees its emotional currency renewed every year when songs have a utility. Mean something in people s lives when they can be a part of people s lives when they can be a touchstone but I don t think there are any songs that are as useful or as fraught with really emotional baggage in a good way as Christmas. Singer songwriter s 3rd full length. To the rafters the way Mariah Carey s. Classic. Would like to have an entry in the canon and he s willing to wait for a new Christmas song is great as it might be. Fantastic but it s going to maybe take an entire generation. If that sounds farfetched consider that Mariah Carey and all I want for christmas is you just hit number 100 for the 1st time it only seems like it s been there forever for n.p.r. News I m. Considered. Support comes from the Macau government tourism office with ancient Chinese temples and elegant Portuguese buildings Macau combines 2 worlds into one modern destination celebrate Chinese New Year 2020 and Macau watch the streets come alive with cultural performances colorful floats and vivid fireworks displays for more information go to visit Macau China dot com That s visit Macau and may see a China dot com. Support for n.p.r. Comes from little passports a monthly subscription service for kids each package includes games souvenirs and activities from a new country designed to spark curiosity in cultures around the globe at little passports dot com slash radio Capital One committed to reimagining banking offering savings and checking accounts that can be opened from anywhere what s in your wallet for Capital One and 3. Software enables organizations to use artificial intelligence at enterprise scale solving previously unsolvable business problems learn more at c 3 a. And you re listening to members supported Santa Monica Los Angeles Santa Barbara . Palm Springs are you. Are a community service of Santa Monica a community service of Santa Monica College news music culture and n.p.r. For southern California Listen worldwide from our app or you can ask your smart speaker to play. Mostly cloudy and windy the sea with lows in the thirty s and forty s definitely on the chilly side when it suits should to subside a little bit later on this evening maybe around 10 or 11 o clock this evening Forecasters say should be mostly cloudy tomorrow morning the Partly cloudy highs in the mid sixty s Thursday sunny and slightly cooler an expanse of rain by the way coming in on Sunday and forecasters say again that better chance Sunday night rain chances to get around next week. Democrat in favor of the u.s. Explains why this is the 1st trade agreement he supported in 25 years or Tuesday December 17th. Considered from n.p.r. News. Discovery. About a massacre of black people that took place. After the winner of this year s Heisman trophy talked about hunger in his hometown. Peer for a kid to go. Hungry. It s. The people now these news headlines. Live from n.p.r. News in Washington I m Jack Speer President Trump on the eve of an anticipated House vote to impeach him is accusing Democrats of pursuing an illegal partisan attempted coup you know a letter sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Trump also making it clear he believes Democrats are using the process improperly N.P.R. s Mara Liasson runs down some of the president s assertions line peaching him they are to quote declaring open war on American democracy he also said that when Nancy Pelosi who is a devout Catholic says she s praying for the president he says quote You know the statement is not true unless it s meant in a negative sense it is a terrible thing you are doing but you will have to live with it not I trump letter comes as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell today dismiss requests from Democrats for new witnesses and documents at a Senate trial expected to take place early next year members of the House Rules Committee Meanwhile met today ahead of what is expected to be tomorrow s a storage house vote to impeach the president a federal judge has sentenced Paul Mann affords former right hand man Rick gates to 45 days in.
Maine Senator Susan Collins says she won t be project prejudging the case I have not bait up my mind and I think of would be inappropriate for me to have made up my mind but for I hear the presentations from both sides Collins is a moderate Republican one of a closely watched few who have broken ranks on key votes in the past in a blistering letter to House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi today Trump condemned the impeachment process calling it a perversion of justice and abuse of power and part of a Democratic effort to remove him from office the House of Representatives has approved a 1.4 trillion dollar spending package to keep the government funded N.P.R. s Claudio go Salish reports the measures were approved along a bipartisan vote House lawmakers approved 2 massive spending bills to fund the government through September 2020 the government is operating off a temporary funding measure that runs out of money Friday night the Senate is now poised to vote on the measures later this week President Trump has previously threatened to veto spending measures but White House advisor Kellyanne Conway said the legislation should become law the president is poised to sign in to keep the government open President Trump must sign the measures by Friday at midnight to avert a government shutdown clouding the Senate s n.p.r. News the Capitol u.s. Employers were throwing up help wanted signs in October pointing to continued strength in the job market Labor Department reporting today the number of available positions rose by just over 3 percent to 7300000 for almost a year now it s been easier for people to want to job to find one with more job postings than unemployed people stocks gain ground today the Dow up 31 points this is n.p.r. . Automaker Ford says it will add $3000.00 jobs at 2 of its Detroit factories the company also saying it will invest $1450000000.00 to build new pickup trucks S.U.V.s and electric and autonomous vehicles Ford says about $750000000.00 will go towards its Michigan assembly plant in the Detroit suburb of Wayne another $700000000.00 be invested in the company s Dearborn Michigan facility. Vice President Joe Biden s campaign today released a summary of his health as N.P.R. s Richard Harris reports his doctor says he is fit to be president the most notable health issue for the 77 year old vice president dates back to more than 30 years ago when he had a burst blood vessel in his brain it was treated successfully and the problem hasn t recurring The report says Biden also has an irregular heartbeat though his doctor says it doesn t require treatment the former vice president does take a blood thinner because his heart condition increases the risk of blood clots he also takes a staten to keep his cholesterol levels low Biden does not use tobacco products or drink any alcohol the report says and the report asserts that he is $3507.00 inch shy of 6 feet tall Richard Harris n.p.r. News and the analysis shows accidental overdoses are responsible for 90 percent of all u.s. Opioid related deaths report out today showing opioid suicides account for far fewer of the deaths and previously thought Researchers blame rising use of heroin in the highly potent drug fentanyl for many of the accidental overdose deaths the opioid death rate has risen 9 fold between $22017.00 the latest year statistics are available I m Jack Speer n.p.r. News support for n.p.r. Comes from n.p.r. Stations other contributors include the n.p.r. Shop where visitors can browse Public Radio nerd mugs totes teas and other n.p.r. Gear at n.p.r. Shop dot org And listeners like you who donate say this is n.p.r. Station. It s All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Audie Cornish and I m Ari Shapiro all of Washington is focused on the expected House vote on impeachment tomorrow President Trump was asked about it earlier today I really appreciate the work you have and I m 19 and looking say I hopes the whole impeachment thing is a hoax and we look forward to getting on to the Senate we re not entitled to lawyers we re not entitled to a witness is we re not entitled to anything in the house it s a totally sham while the president had a few more things to say about impeachment he wrote a 6 page letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blasting the proceedings you are declaring open war on American democracy Trump wrote national political correspondent Mara Liasson is at the White House and joins us now to talk about this letter Hi Mara Hi Ari This letter is full of exclamation points and supposed to vhs Why did the president write it he wrote it I think to get a lot of things off his chest he is hopping mad about impeachment he s very upset about it even though he has said that he s going to benefit politically by it this letter kind of reads like a 6 page tweet but he didn t take to Twitter he wanted to put this in a more formal format and he put you re not a White House that has had horrible record in his or her record now people can read what he said that this shouldn t happen to another president he said more due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem witch trials again he called the impeachment process a coup he said he did nothing wrong he complained about a long laundry dissed of what of what long laundry list of what he called the ranged and radical far left Democrats he named Maxine Waters and Adam Schiff he said the Democrats have never gotten over losing the 2016 election he says they ll pay the price in 2020 he said You are the ones interfering in America s elections you re the one subverting Americans democracy you re the ones obstructing justice you re the ones bringing pain and suffering to our republic for your own selfish personal political and partisan gain it s kind of like I m rubber you re glue this was a fairy long angry scream and some familiar argue. That s one that really stood out is that he criticizes Democrats and Speaker Nancy Pelosi specifically for describing the proceedings as prayerful What do you make out of line of attack this is clearly gotten under his skin he said you are offending Americans of faith by continuing Lisa continually saying I pray for the president of course Nancy Pelosi is a devout Catholic he says when you know the statement is not true unless it s meant in a negative sense it s a terrible thing you re doing but you ll have to live with it not I And later in the letter he also he takes up the same theme he says perhaps most insulting of all is your false display of solemnity you expect the American people to believe that you re approaching this impeachment somberly reservedly and reluctantly and what s so interesting is that Nancy Pelosi has gone about this in a very somber manner there s no reporting that behind the scenes she is gleeful or gloating about impeaching the president and this really really offended him you could almost hear him shouting as you read the letter or how does this compare to the way President Clinton handled impeachment some 20 years ago well behind the scenes President Clinton was also hopping mad and he vented plenty but he did have a different model a different plan he showed every day that he was demonstrating he was he would demonstrate that he was working on the country s business he said I m going to not let impeachment distract me I m out here doing what the people sent me here to do so that was his method he didn t want to let the country know that he was really see them about it even though he was quite angry in private and President Trump acts like impeachment is all he has on his mind even though he s on the cusp of getting approval for his u.s.m.c. a Trade deal he got approval for the Space Force the White House has tried to showcase his other work in his victories but he doesn t seem to want to participate there is one paragraph in the letter where he lists all those things in a 6 pages but yes he does setting aside the letter where are we in this process what happens next well the House is meeting today to do. Determine the rules of the debate which will happen tomorrow on the floor there s not a lot of suspense about the votes the Democrats have the votes to impeach the president we don t expect any Republicans to cross over and vote yes the only question is how many Democrats will vote no we have seen a parade of Democrats from districts that voted for Trump in 2016 come out and say they will vote in favor of impeachment and that is a but big political risk it could cost them their jobs and then it moves to the Senate trial is that also a foregone conclusion I think that the president will be acquitted that s a foregone conclusion Majority Leader McConnell rejected Democratic leadership Murs request for witnesses in the past rumor McConnell has said that calling witnesses mutually assured destruction sounds like it ll be a 2 approximately 2 week trial in the Senate with no witnesses and even though the president wanted Hunter Biden and Joe Biden and Adam Schiff to testify he s going to let McConnell make the decision and P.R. s Mara Liasson at the White House thank you thank you Pope Francis has ordered big changes in how the Catholic Church deals with clerical sex abuse of children he s a string in more transparency by lifting what s known as the rule of pontifical secrecy some churches have invoked that rule in denying victims and law enforcement access to information about their cases N.P.R. s Sylvia Poggioli reports on this and the other announcements Francis made today. Today s announcement was welcomed by many survivors of sex abuse and their advocates Marie Collins abused by a priest as a child in her native Ireland had resigned in 2017 in frustration from a papal commission on abuse because of what she did now nst as Vatican resistance today she held the reform tweeting excellent news at last a real and positive change and Barrett Doyle co-director of the abuse documentation website vision of Accountability dot org said the pope has taken an overdue and desperately needed step as sex abuse scandals rocked the Catholic Church over the last few decades there has been mounting criticism the pontifical secrecy was used to protect pedophiles silence victims and prevent law enforcement from investigations Meanwhile from Chile to France to the United States and Australia law enforcement officials have begun to convict not only abusive priests but also bishops who failed to report them in accordance with the pope s ruling from now on information on abuse cases must be protected by church leaders to ensure its security and integrity but the high degree of confidentiality imposed by pontifical secrecy no longer applies Archbishop Charles she Clune of the Vatican s top sex abuse investigator hailed the move as an ethical decision in transparency he told Vatican Media that Pope Francis is lifting of the secrecy seal opens up avid use of communication with victims and facilitates collaboration with civilian authorities in another ruling Pope Francis raised from 14 to 18 the age that pictures of individuals can be considered child pornography for purposes of sexual gratification by whatever means or using whatever technology and into 3rd move today the pope accepted the resignation of his ambassador to France who has been accused of sexual misconduct so. Jolie n.p.r. News Rome black and Hispanic Americans are especially vulnerable to all timers but these groups are often under-represented in scientific studies of the disease N.P.R. s Jon Hamilton says scientists are trying new ways to diversify their research scientists often look for study volunteers at clinics or medical centers but a team from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland is trying something different . On this Sunday morning they ve come to a fundraising walk organized by the local chapter of the old timers Association well get everybody out there everybody knowing before the walk begins the crowd gets a pep talk from Representative Stephanie Howes she s African-American she also takes care of her mother who has dementia some days had been hard right here right but there are we ve been having a lot of great days a lot of good memories a diverse crowd of about 4000 people have shown up and the ones who stopped by the vendor tables are likely to meet a Cummings one of 2 Research Associates from the medical school at Case Western So when they think their families and I know already them people with early onset it s a genetic that is Cummings explains that the goal is to find genes that contribute to memory loss especially genes that might be different in African-Americans and Hispanics it is just a more information about our study if you are to be so they are funny and then feel free to take anything out on you Ok if I m right thank you for coming says despite the big crowd the study is a tough sell so far no one has signed up for we re hoping that will get a few names today the recruiting effort in Cleveland is part of a nationwide strategy funded by the National Institute on Aging Jonathan Haynes a professor at Case Western says diversifying research studies is the best way to answer some outstanding questions about race ethnicity and Alzheimers historically we have not been looking at a lot of the diverse populations and so there s some evidence that it s different in different Poppy. But there s a lot that we still need to learn so Haynes and other researchers are asking minority communities for help we actually need to have thousands and thousands of individuals participate in these studies to really understand the genetics of Alzheimer s disease the university is trying to make it easy to participate people who sign up can even ask to have a researcher visit their home to collect blood samples and health information but Haynes says in minority communities it s about more than convenience one of the concerns that we often deal with is an issue of trust trust in doctors and medical institutions and the good intentions of researchers that often requires building a relationship and again says talking to people at an all time as well is one way to start. Today s walkers include many African-Americans one is Robert Smith whose aunt has all timers I ve been up since 230 this morning and I ran over here to make sure I made the event Smith says he s no fan of doctor visits but would consider signing up Lauren Alzheimers Study Yeah absolutely if they may help find a cure I m all for receipt of Brantley has a grandfather who died with all timers and family works in the dementia unit of a retirement home so I ask if she s interested in joining the genetic study at Case Western Well yes because I would want to know if if this is genetic you know it is in my do you know will it be passed down again what I would do if I was asked in Case Western researchers were able to sign up for people for their study before the walk was over Jon Hamilton n.p.r. Support for n.p.r. Comes from this station and from t.i.a. Committed to the idea that while most things in life run out from clean shirts in the morning to a favorite dessert at night lifetime income in retirement shouldn t learn more it t.i.a. Dot org slash never run out and from c 3 dot a i c 3 dot a I s software enables organizations to use artificial intelligence at enterprise scale solving previously unsolvable business problems learn more it see 3 dot a I. This is All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Ari Shapiro And I m Audie Cornish there s a common but little known form of solitary confinement called Double selling to men often violent men get placed in a tiny cell together for at least 23 hours a day and 2016 n.p.r. In the Marshall Project examine the violence that results prisoners attack sometimes killed their cell mates today we follow up with one man who had major injuries it s now up to his family to do the hard work of caring for him N.P.R. s Joseph Shapiro reports. That when Chuck almost prison sentence ended last year he came home to his mother s cozy house and Shelton Washington and that s where I went to meet him we do guy who never have. Chuck comas but to apologize for the way his body is shaking these are tremors that come and go I ve been shaken for the last this going on 2nd day he says the tremors started after he was strangled by his cellmate in prison he was left with a serious brain injury and you know I ll shake for a few days then my goal weight or maybe even farm luck you know go 2 weeks but then I ll shake for nother 2 days straight. And on this day his whole body is shaking mom stop his arms and hands his legs his shoulders imagine your body. Make an uncontrollable cure uncontrollable jerks it depends on how this is going to go but maybe tomorrow he will be able to feed in self are nothing that s his mother Donna coma I ll have to be had. It be padding it s probably going to kill me they didn t say that I m saying Chuck coma he s 51 came home from prison with other disabilities to memory loss an explosive temper his vision is blurry he has difficulty walking come a serve time for armed bank robbery he was a prisoner at the federal prison in Lewisburg Pennsylvania in the special management unit set up for prisoners considered dangerous or disruptive prisons often put 2 men into one small solitary confinement cell when we did our stories 3 years ago the Federal Bureau of Prisons justified this double cell solitary confinement suicides go up in regular solitary confinement so putting 2 men together is a way to cut down on suicides and it s troop suicides go down but homicides go up there are high rates of violence between prisoners locked together in cells no bigger than a parking space for days weeks and months on end that was the conclusion of N.P.R. s reporting with the Marshall Project which reports on criminal justice it happened the 26th of February in 2016 a Friday afternoon the prison one called Ana across the country until Saturday it was the prison chaplain he got hold of me and he said you have a son named Charles Comey and I said yes I do and he said well the incident happened. And they don t know if he s going to live through the night the chaplain promised someone would call back with more information but then no one called 2 days later that a coma finally reached someone at the prison I said what happened they would tell of nothing and he said he tried to kill himself. Alan I know he game the injuries were life threatening her son can eat he was sped through a tube he can breathe a surgeon cut through his neck to connect another tube to his windpipe that s a brain you didn t do that s what the scars are that breathe and keep me but keep me breathe and even today the Federal Bureau of Prisons suggests come as injuries are the result of a suicide attempt in its response to a lawsuit filed by the family the government says come up was found hanging in his cell but that s false we know because we have the Bureau of Prisons own internal investigation it concludes come it wasn t found hanging and that wasn t a suicide attempt. We found the report among more than $1000.00 pages documenting inmate on inmate violence that n.p.r. In the Marshall Project up tame by filing Freedom of Information Act requests Originally it was come as some aide who said it was a suicide that he income a class SOCOM a fake the suicide thinking it would get a move to another cell but the fake suicide went wrong he gets not remember about the incident on a coma is right her son s memory of what happened is a cost but prison officials investigated and concluded the summit was whining that he had strangled coma come on was found on the floor of a cell he was in hanging a bed she was tied around his back but the she was loose on the man around his neck was one that a person can tie on himself coming had been kicked in the head the some a was disciplined he was moved to disciplinary segregation which at Louisburg meant he most likely ended up in his own cell that so many By the way had killed another inmate and another prison we asked the Bureau of Prisons to comment on what we found a spokeswoman said they can t talk about it because of the family s pending lawsuit . We ve come to a fence at the water s edge on Puget Sound where police caught shot coma after he robbed a bank according to the police report this is where chalk being chased by several members of the Olympia Police Department pulled over in a white 2 door Mercury crashed through a chain link fence that s our reporting partner Christie Thompson of the Marshall Project got out of the car wearing a full scuba suit the newspapers would call it a James Bond plot but mostly it was just delusional he had robbed the bank wearing a long raincoat over a wetsuit he had scuba tanks in his car and his plan was the crash his car in the Puget Sound and swim away the police would find the submerged car and figured he drowned only the police saw him chased them. Caught him before he could get into the water today coma says he was high on drugs he spent almost 15 years in prison the last 2 and a half years in a prison hospital he came home last year the day after Christmas severely disabled after that attack by his cellmate look up came for Chuck coma he just wants to get out of his mother s house and live on his own maybe buy a motor home and drive across country but his injuries get in the way there is no doubt in my mind you won t get better because you have he s seen me shake in all day Chuck coma is an Army veteran he saw combat in Panama and the Gulf War when he came home with Gulf War Syndrome with p.t.s.d. The Veterans Health Administration was there to care for him when he came home from prison this time with even more significant injuries he went months without medical care I wear rather been dead than be in the man right now probably so coma is stuck at his mother s home arguing about how much will get better and who will take care of him after his mother dies Ok let me put it this way you know I have bone cancer you know what I go through I do not wish that I would die I want to live for another 50 years if I can. So I don t think you re in any worse shape than me probably maybe stronger. The year Chuck coma was attacked in prison the Marshall Project found there were some $3000.00 inmate on inmate assaults in federal prisons more than 90 percent of prisoners one day will come back home some of them like Chuck with lifelong injuries Joseph Shapiro n.p.r. News. This is n.p.r. News. When it comes to your child s prospects neighborhood matters the social fabric of the neighborhood helped us raise our children but a wide racial divide in most urban areas means more opportunity for some kids than others even just a few blocks down the street in one part of Albany New York some residents are trying to change that that s tomorrow on Morning Edition from n.p.r. News. It s All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Audie Cornish and I m Ari Shapiro coming up Mariah Carey s All I Want for Christmas is at last number one on the Billboard chart her 25 year old classic is a rare thing I don t think there are any songs that are as useful or as fraught with really emotional baggage in a good way as Christmas and holiday songs are now the news law is from n.p.r. News in Culver City California and do a nice account tell the House Rules Committee is currently locked into a marathon session debating on the rules for tomorrow s historic impeachment vote the committee s chairman Jim McGovern a Democrat from Massachusetts says the vote should not be a partisan process moments like this call for more than just reflex of partisanship they require honesty and they require courage. Are any Republicans today willing to muster the strength to say that what this president did was wrong Meanwhile Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says he is not unusual on the question of whether the president should be removed from office he tells n.p.r. This is a political process there s not anything judicial about it the House made a partisan political decision to impeach he says in New Jersey hundreds of mourners came out for the funeral of a police detective killed last week in connection with an attack on a market that left 5 others dead N.P.R. s Jeff Brady reports police from across the region lined the streets for blocks to pay their respects in the cold rain a procession led by officers on motorcycles lights flashing escorted detective Joseph seals cough and from the funeral home to St Aiden s church. Built world as the sheriff in Bucks County Pennsylvania he looked down the street to describe the scene blocks beyond what I can possibly see but officers easily in the thousands on our guards a couple 100 different honor guards from different apartments detective Joseph SEALs was 40 years old and a father of 5 praised for his work removing guns from the streets authorities say he was shot in a cemetery shortly before 2 people attacked a kosher market about a mile away Jeff Brady n.p.r. News Jersey City at the close of Wall Street the Dow closed up 31 points you re listening to n.p.r. . Nearly 3000000 cases of dangly fever were reported in Latin America this year the World Health Organization says it s a record high for the tropical disease Here s a ping pong reporting Danny fever hit Latin America hard this year mosquitoes have been spreading the disease from Mexico down to Argentina with huge spikes in Brazil and Central America getting donkey fever can feel like the flu headaches nausea and achy joints but in severe cases it can cause organ failure and south Catholic an epidemiologist at u.c. Berkeley says that high heat and unusual rainfall are partly responsible in the Americas it s definitely been a wet year and so there s almost certainly climate conditions that are driving it more he in standing water encourage the Miskito to breed the species also carries other diseases like yellow fever and its range is expected to grow with climate change paying Wang n.p.r. News across the south east at least 4 people are dead following severe storms and multiple tornadoes National Weather Service teams are still assessing the past of these deadly storms but the Storm Prediction Center says polemic there are reports suggest at least 27 tornadoes touched down in Alabama Mississippi and Louisiana Alabama s governor offered condolences to the victims saying While most of us slept through the storm a family woke up devastated I m like how Tell n.p.r. News. Support for n.p.r. Comes from this station and from American Jewish World Service working together for more than 30 years to build a more just and equitable world learn more at a.j. Ws Dato argy from Trader Joe s where holiday products like Scandinavian tidings and candy cane Joe Joe s are available in stores and episodes of inside trader joe s are available at Trader Joe s dot com and wherever podcasts are found and from listeners like you who donate to this n.p.r. Station. It s All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Audie Cornish and I m Ari Shapiro Washington is full of negotiating spinning and finger pointing before the expected House vote on impeachment tomorrow if Democrats have the votes as expected a Senate trial will follow in January today Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rejected Democratic leader Chuck Schumer s request for witnesses in a Senate trial shows this road is their duty to investigate it is their duty to made the very bar for undoing a national election Schumer was hoping to get White House officials that refused to participate in the House to testify in the Senate meanwhile President Trump sent a long letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi objecting to the impeachment process in it he accused Democrats of interfering in America s elections and subverting America s democracy in the Senate a team of House Democrats known as impeachment managers will present the case against President Trump 2 decades ago Chris Cannon was one of the impeachment managers in the case against President Bill Clinton and the former Republican congressman from Utah joins us now welcome what is the job description of an impeachment manager Well it s kind of vague and depends a great deal on the Senate the rules they say that teacher managers essentially a prosecutor a guy who presents a criminal case or a litigator who presents a case in the civil situation and how much guidance does the Constitution actually give about the role of these managers almost 0 Ok there is a requirement that it go to the Senate if the person is impeached for a trial and the House managers are in charge of how they present the material in the Senate Ok So Congress has a lot of freedom to set the rules here and we re already hearing some rumblings about what this might look like in the New Year in the Senate with President Trump compare that to what you experienced 20 years ago with President Clinton one of the fascinating differences today is that in the case of the impeachment of Bill Clinton. When the Senate decided to set rules and what that says they became was a question answer situation where senators ask questions and the managers answer those questions and then the defense team for the president also answer those questions so there s no presentation of the case you re just kind of a q. And a I personally find it ridiculous you found it ridiculous why it ridiculous because a trial actually has meaning in the American Constitutional System That means that you present witnesses that the defendant has the right to confront those witnesses and that you have examination cross-examination presentation of evidence and then a decision in this case all you had were random questions from people who were embarrassed about the underlying issues embarrassed because it was sexual in nature yeah right as opposed to the crimes which were alleged and which got very little mentions and you could have 3 possible outcomes a trial which is basically a debate and a vote that may result in no presentation of evidence at the other extreme you d have a full trial where you would have witnesses and examination by the managers and then cross-examination by the president and then witnesses called by the president and cross-examined by the managers and all the issues that of the president is convinced vindicate him would probably come out and that is probably. A risky process and so I suspect that it s going to be something less than that but it s up to the senators to decide several of the people who manage Clinton s impeachment went on to much higher profile roles in politics if a friend asked you for advice on whether or not to take a job like this what would you tell them. I think this is going to be a really miserable experience for a Democrat impeachment manager because they re going to be subject to the regulations of of the Senate and I don t think those are going to be favorable to even the most eloquent and articulate of prosecutors That s former Republican congressman if you talk Chris Cannon he was an impeachment manager in the trial of President Bill Clinton thank you very much a pleasure my friend it took 7 decades after World War 2 to put together a system of free trade around the world that system has been rocked in just the last 7 days the president today announced what he s calling a phase one trade deal with China 2 sides are very close on a deal on u.s.m.c. And you could see that analogous Johnson hoped his victory would bring closure to the BRICs that debate and let the healing begin on both sides of the Atlantic populous leaders are challenging long established notions of how trade should be conducted President Trump and u.k. Prime minister Boris Johnson are winning praise for their efforts in some quarters but also raising questions about unintended fallout N.P.R. s Scott Horsley reports President Trump not wins on 2 fronts in his trade war last week congressional Democrats okayed an updated version of a trade backed with Mexico and Canada and China agreed to a preliminary deal of its own trade representative Robert light hisor told c.b.s. Long months at the negotiating table all came together at once Friday was probably the most momentous day in trade history ever both deals purport to foster cross border trade but they also include protectionist measures and to get their Trump put up road blocks ordering stiff tariffs against Canada Mexico and China those countries retaliated so farmers and manufacturers have paid a price for the trade war but White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow insisted to Fox News it was all worth it it does show that President Trump s example of being a tough. Hardnosed bargainer on trade and economic matters works an ocean away Boris Johnson is pushing his own hard nosed agenda insisting after last week s election that the u.k. Will pull out of the European Union No if buts or maybe economist Matthew Slaughter who served in the George w. Bush White House sees a common thread between Johnson and Trump we have leaders today saying that they want to be connected to the world but only on terms that they dictate and only according to the criteria for what constitutes winning and with a lot of threats that 0 sum approach is at off odds with the rules based international order that the u.s. Spent decades helping to build Johnson and Trump have little regard for that order while Johnson is bent on withdrawing from the e.u. Trump is kneecapping the World Trade Organization just last week the president blocked the ability to referee trade disputes with no referee Trump is freer to follow his own protectionist instincts slapping tariffs on friends and foes alike former Trade Representative Carl Hill says when other countries follow that example the global economy suffers therefore are going to go out you know laterally and just impose tariffs it s going to have friction and friction can explode to be sure freer trade hasn t worked equally well for everyone while some industries have thrived with access to global markets others have suffered from overseas competition Slaughter who s now at Dartmouth says populist leaders like Trump and Johnson may be well intentioned in catering to those who feel hurt by globalization but he suggest protectionist trade agreements and a withdrawal from Global Engagement are not the answers most people don t want just wall to get the globalization in general is good what they really want our bridges that will build ladders of opportunity at the same time so people wouldn t have a chance to thrive and benefits from all the dynamism of innovation in globalization the last 7 days have exposed deep crap. X. In the global trading system the months to come will show whether those cracks can be repaired or if the system is bound to crumble under populist pressure Scott Horsley n.p.r. News Washington. You re listening to All Things Considered. These days a big city police chief doesn t last long in that job for years if they re lucky that s been the case in Chicago the country s 2nd largest police department the last 2 superintendents each spent less than 5 years as the city s top cop now the city s on the search for a new one and people in Chicago have strong opinions about what they want N.P.R. s Cheryl Corley reports. The 1st public conversations about Chicago s next police superintendent opened in the sanctuary of a church on the city s South Side Thank you good evening a foreman on the brain and Foreman as the head of the Chicago Police Board that s a group that will recruit interview and ultimately select 3 finalists to present to Chicago mayor Laurie Lightfoot the board got an earful from regular Chicagoans So what they do we want to make sure is that this process isn t another dog and pony show because the mayor isn t the only one the don t like being lied to our community does not like be allied to Eric Rosser was like many in the city who have strong feelings about the Chicago Police Department mayor Laurie like Foot who campaigned on police reform is another she fired former superintendent Eddie Johnson just weeks before he was to retire saying he lied to her about an incident where police found him asleep at the wheel of a running car 3 years ago Lightfoot led the police board when former mayor Rahm Emanuel fired Johnson s predecessor he also rejected the police board s recommendation sense elected Johnson as superintendent whoever Lightfoot selects to lead the department next will be the city s 3rd superintendent since 2011 Renee Collins says that person should come from the outside the culture inside the Chicago Police Department is so corrupt at this point that. Cannot change them but glad it s true Anderson a retired law enforcement officer favors the inside track the superintendent 1st of all has to come up to new rights they. No was happening out there the next Chicago police superintendent will have to take on some big challenges and entrenched problems prolific gun violence in some neighborhoods a lack of trust between residents and police plus he or she will have to work under a consent decree designed to overhaul the entire department that came as a result of widespread protest over a police shooting of a black teenager which led to the firing of the police superintendent at the time and a Department of Justice investigation I d like to see a superintendent that has heart Robert Beekman a pastor says honesty and integrity are key for any police superintendent but Hart he says is just as important somebody who connects with community which has been failing in some of our previous superintendents Chuck Wexler is the head of the Police Executive Research Forum it s a police think tank based in Washington that keeps track of the reform efforts here and in other cities Wexler says just like in New Orleans in Baltimore a new Chicago superintendent might find the consent decree is not just a challenge but an opportunity to rebuild the city s police department for example changing use of force policies all require new training new technology all sorts of things that a department might not get and while the Chicago police board continues to ask people what they want in a superintendent the board is also reaching out to potential candidates locally and across the country anyone looking to turn around a big city police department has until mid January to get an application in Cheryl Corley n.p.r. News Chicago. You re listening to All Things Considered from n.p.r. News. This is All Things Considered from n.p.r. News I m Ari Shapiro And I m Audie Cornish more than 5000 years ago a woman in Scandinavia chewed on a piece of birch a rudimentary chewing gum of sorts that as N.P.R. s Mary Kennedy reports has proven to be a remarkable source of ancient d.n.a. This dark little blob of birch pitch would be pretty easy to overlook at an archaeological site essentially it s a black brown substance that was obtained by heating birch bark but Hunnish Schroeder a paleo geneticist at the University of Copenhagen says a student coming from the site brought it to him with a question can we get the any out of us and you know you well you know we haven t really tried so let s give it a go people of the stone age would choose the substance and use it as a form of glue to put sharp points on to weapons they may have also used it as a kind of medicine so these were clues that it might contain d.n.a. But the researchers expected it to be difficult to extract it s still quite challenging to get you know a complete ancient human genome from human remains the d.n.a. Sequencing went better than they could have ever expected they were able to reconstruct a complete human genome Shorter s has the 1st time at an entire ancient human genome has been extracted from anything other than human bones or teeth the team published their findings in the journal Nature Communications and the d.n.a. Tells us a lot about this woman who lived about 5700 years ago she had this really you know striking combination of stark hair and dark skin and blue eyes Schroeder s has those features were common to other hunter gatherers in this area at the time which is now an island in Denmark he says that even though farmers were beginning to settle in northern Europe the woman s d.n.a. Does not show any traces of Farmer ancestry and even beyond her d.n.a. The scientists were also able to extract ancient microbes from her mouth there were sealed in the ancient gum they found traces of a virus and they also extracted remnants of what could have been the. Woman s last meal duck and hazelnuts shirt says it s unique to have d.n.a. Traces of microbes and clues about diet all from a single individual it s really the you know they were rich pictures from this kind of in conspicuous small lump of birch present Herford molecular archaeologist Christina Warner s says she thinks that was incredibly creative to try to recover information from the ancient chewing gum and the finds has a lot about her field right now as our technology that we re using gets stronger we re starting to realize that much more of the past is preserved and we ever thought she recently tried analyzing chewed up stems from a cave in Mexico though unfortunately little information was preserved as technology has dramatically improved Warrender says scientists should try to test more objects for d.n.a. That they find on archaeological sites gives me inspiration they go start looking for more of these unusual contacts in which we might find interesting information a pretty story legacy for a piece of gum Merrit Kennedy n.p.r. News. After 25 years the number one the song on Billboard s Hot 100 chart is Mariah Carey s All I Want For Christmas Is You . See thousands of new holiday songs have been released since but none has become an enduring standard like this one Chris clinic reports on the challenge of trying to crack the tiny you all type candidate. A. Right Kerry single item wish list was the punctuation mark on half a century in which a new original secular holiday song would be coming because as every few years this was $979.00. Oh. Here s 981. And. Now $984.00. And 987. Of these songs or hate them you know that something you can likely say about any You ll tunes written lately but which I mean this century people still write them about this story. They. Said that there s no way that Mrs Santa Claus isn t the most important person in the room up in the North Pole so I thought she deserved to get some sort of Aloe Blacc a Southern California singer songwriter who s been making records since 2003 had 8 new songs on his 2018 album Christmas funk it is intimidating to think about trying to write something that will stand the test of time he also wanted to try to expand the emotional palette of holiday music yeah we want to get together and have fun and give hugs and Christmas cheer there s also like some family members you just don t want to see politics and the Christmas thank. Goodness. She takes the trip Dr Demento a pop music historian who specializes in oddities and a farmer likens the contraction of the Christmas playlist to increase your earning for tradition at this time of year I mean most Americans eat pretty much the same big meal every year turkey and all the trimmings if they introduce a new recipe people will comment about it mother what s this. A piece of. Peach. Tell you my view is. That time instead of one of the more traditional Christmas desserts I mentioned peach pie. That s. Formed in the early ninety s so I like the idea of. Christmas cliches but you know you sort of have to love them. Quite a few attempts at dodging those cliches writing new songs for the band s 2018 album Love the holidays that s why some people roll their eyes when the Christmas songs start up but he s willing to risk your annoyance to write a song that sees its emotional currency renewed every year. Means something in people s lives when they can be a part of people s lives when they can be a touchstone. Songs that are as useful or as fraught with really emotional baggage in a good way Christmas. Based singer songwriters 3rd full length. Pitch to the rafters the way Mariah Carey s. Classic. Me. Would like to have an entry in the can and. Christmas song is great as it might be. But it s going to maybe take an entire generation. If that sounds farfetched consider that Mariah Carey and all I want for christmas is you just hit number 100 for the 1st time it only seems like it s been there forever. I m Chris Cuomo. Support for n.p.r. Comes from this station and from Subaru with their Subaru share the love event now through January 2nd details on the not for profit organizations that it supports are at Subaru dot com slash share love it s what makes Subaru Subaru from Fidelity wealth management where advisors work with their clients to develop flexible investment strategies that can evolve as their needs change learn more at fidelity dot com slash wealth for Delany brokerage services l.l.c. And from Jones Day and integrated partnership collaboratively providing legal services for more than a century 43 offices 5 continents serving clients as one firm worldwide learn more it Jones Day dot com. Public radio for the north coast of California and the southern coast of Oregon you re listening to cage s u h. H s our Crescent City and k h s g Garberville Su s translators r k 260 b Q Willow Creek and k 204 g. . We for another. Strong. Democrat in favor of the u.s. M.c.a. Explains why this is the 1st trade agreement he s supported in 25 years or Tuesday December 17th this is All Things Considered from n.p.r. News. And I m Audie Cornish coming up a new discovery. About a massacre of black people that took place almost a century ago. Forget something. Even though it was 5 years old donations pour into an Ohio food bank after the winner of this year s Heisman trophy talked about hunger in his hometown. Up here for the kids to go home and don t have a lot of. Hungry. People now these news headlines. Live from n.p.r. News in Washington I m Jack Speer President Trump on the eve of an anticipated House vote to impeach him is accusing Democrats of pursuing an illegal partisan attempted coup you know a letter sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Trump also may.
That Ukraine desperately needed for assistance in his reelection campaign and he leveraged a White House meeting that he had promised to the new president Ukrainian president that president s allies keep desperately needed to show Vladimir Putin that the United States is willing to stand with Ukraine and he leverage that meeting for assistance in his reelection campaign that s abuse of power now my colleagues have suggested that somehow abuse of power is not a serious offense that that we should make light of the president s actions not treat it as the constitutional violation that is in fact abuse of power was a principal concern of the framers of the Constitution and it it was clear what it meant the exercise of official power to obtain improper personal benefit while ignoring or injuring the national interest that s abuse of power it s rooted in the president s duty constitutional duty to faithfully execute the law to put service over self to put the country over his personal interests I know from my colleagues that all 4 of the constitutional scholars who testified including the Republicans own witness have confirmed that abuse of power is an impeachable offense president transactions in fact exemplify the framers fears and the very reason that abuse of power is a high crime and worse worse than President Nixon President Trump pressured a foreign government to aid in his crap scheme that s the abuse of power article but there s a 2nd article. Obstruction of Congress we know that no president in history in history as directed the entire executive branch not to cooperate with an impeachment inquiry has told every member of the executive branch not to speak to any of the impeachment and greet to any of the impeachment inquiry issues now the question is when you look at the abuse of power which is a constitutional violation and then you look at the president s obstruction of Congress leads to some questions I would like my colleagues to think about as we head toward this important vote think about the people who the president has blocked from speaking Think about. Make Mulvaney Now Mick Mulvaney acknowledge acting chief of staff acknowledge a quid pro quo says it happens all the time that s abuse of power then the president wouldn t let him speak that s obstruction of Congress why won t you let him speak what does he have to hide think about Secretary Perry and Bassett or Taylor describe the highly irregular Ukraine policy channel led by Rudy Giuliani that included Simon Volcker and Rick Perry that contributes to the abuse of power it highlights the abuse of power but it also is obstruction of Congress why why won t the president allow him to speak what is he afraid of think about John Bolton Fiona Hill testified the Bolton told her to notify it at the Council about the rogue effort he said that I m not a party I said I m not a part of whatever drug deal little Mulvaney are cooking up bold in fact called Giuliani a hand grenade who s going to blow everybody up. That s the abuse of power obstruction of Congress is clear why won t the president let him testify What s he hiding and finally John Eisenberg Lieutenant Colonel vim and couldn t believe what he heard on the call he reported to Eisenberg now Eisenberg can t speak what is it that the president is afraid you ll say that s obstruction of Congress abuse of power and structure in the Congress together that s what these articles are about we re protecting the Constitution we re protecting the American people and our elections that s why we need to proceed with these articles of impeachment go back generally years back. This direction for our purposes Mr Rush and those secret mission I move to strike the last word Mr Chairman is recognized by you Mr Chairman direction hauler Republican of Pennsylvania prosecutor in Baghdad when I was in the Navy prosecutors actually in the Iraqi court system I was a defense attorney in the Navy actually got to defend a navy seal against trumped up charges by the Obama administration and I had the honor of serving as a district judge in my hometown in the South Hills of Pittsburgh so I ve been on all sides of courtroom and I can tell you that I would defend this case every single day and it s because the facts just aren t there let s go through each article abuse of power or quid pro quo bribery call it would ever your focus group wants a call because the end of the day you don t have the facts to make out the case. You don t have the facts because the other party on your quid pro quo your alleged quid pro quo never felt pressure we have a primary document a primary source of information there is the transcript of the call that shows there is no connection we also have the other party presence Alinsky said it no time for the Ukrainians feel any pressure to have an investigation. We also know that no investigation of Biden ever took place we also know that aid was given to Ukraine aid that they never knew at the time was being under review in aid they came in the form of javelin missiles not what the Obama administration gave which were well wishes and blankets so again no case can be made for abuse of power obstruction of Congress this would what we would describe as right or not right it isn t right because only letters have been sent there s been no subpoena and how this works is is a subpoenas issued the executive branch. Igs exercises their executive privilege just like Obama did in the courts decide the courts have never decided this so where s the obstruction doesn t exist Oh. So I did I would defend this case every single day as a judge I would dismiss this for lack of merit even if the facts are viewed in light most favorable to the Democrats you still again cannot make out what we used as lawyers call a promise they should case this case would be dismissed on day one in a courtroom. But I ll tell you what case I d prosecute I prosecute shift for abuse of power any day of the week why how about the fact the subpoenaed phone records from a member of Congress how about the fact he took he singled out Devon oon as his cell phone number and leaked that how about the fact that he dumped over 8000 pages on the Judiciary Committee 48 hours before we had a hearing in this committee that is the abuse of power and that is what I would prosecute every day of the week obstruction. I prosecute the Democrats for obstruction of Congress to how about the fact that I had a motion to subpoena the whistleblower the whistleblower who by the way you cannot point to any statute. But those stocks are they gives out whistleblower the right to be Anonymous does not exist no matter what you say I had a motion to subpoena the whistleblower 2 weeks ago that motion was denied I never got my subpoena and it was done in a partisan fashion straight down partisan lines so that is the of shock and I would prosecute that every single day folks that s a legal analysis this is nothing more than a political hit job thanks and I yield the ranger my time gentleman yields back. To work purposes misconceived regulation and move to strike the last word in one of these Rick knows. You know I want to reiterate Mary j. Scanlon Democrat of Pennsylvania president s policies are personality or even his tweets were not judging the president himself or judging his actions and I understand that he ran to disrupt the government the problem is he went further by abusing his power he endangered our elections and our national security. He remains an ongoing threat to both He s shown a pattern of inviting foreign interference in our elections and trying to cover it up twice he s threatening to do it again so we ve heard a lot of loose talk about what evidence we have or don t have there is plenty of direct evidence of the president s wrong doing including for example is July 25th call record in which he said to the Ukrainian president I want you to do was a favor though and then proceeded to request investigations into his political rival in a de bunked conspiracy theory that the Senate and all of our national security services have rejected we have the testimony of his appointees ambassador saw and Bowker about the May 23rd meeting in which the president said to them talk to Rudy we have testimony of 3 1st hand witnesses to the July 25th call to from promptly reported the call to their superiors and to legal counsel we have the testimony of David Holmes who overheard the president ask him Bassett or saw online whether presidents Alinsky was going to quote do the investigation we have the president s many public statements including his October 3rd statement that Ukraine and China should investigate his political rival even the minority counsel Mr Castro admitted that there was direct evidence he said quote We had some direct evidence on certain things and we had some direct evidence on the May 23rd meeting and someone gave some direct evidence and quote the 2nd hand accounts are also extensively corroborated for example embassador Taylor and Mr Morrison both testified that during a September 7th phone call with Ambassador Sunline President Trump said there was no quid pro quo but the president s Alinsky had to go to the microphone and announce investigations kind of giving with one hand in taking away with the other . And that s her song Lynn testified he had no reason to dispute ambassador Taylor s and Mr Morrison s testimony about this conversation there s also circumstantial evidence there was no contemporaneous explanation given for the president s decision to withhold the military aid that had bipartisan support from Congress that didn t come until after the Articles of Impeachment were filed and the uniform consensus of the State Department the Defense Department and White House witnesses is that they should have been released given these facts the only logical explanation as embassador someone concluded was that like the White House meeting the aid was being used to leverage pressure on President Selenski at the end of the day the evidence is overwhelming and indisputable. President Trump s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani pushed Ukraine to investigate his political rival and a debunked conspiracy theory his efforts had nothing to do with u.s. Policy and were taken on the president s behalf and with the president s knowledge President Trump directed u.s. Officials and presidents Olinsky himself to work with Mr Giuliani President Trump ordered that critical military aid for Ukraine be withheld Ukrainian officials were informed the aide would not be released unless President Selenski publicly announced an investigation and President Trump refused to release the aide until his pressure campaign on the Ukraine was exposed President Trump refused to arrange a meeting with President Alinsky and President Trump s agents advised Ukrainian officials that the White House meeting would be scheduled only after President Selenski committed investigations President Trump ignored the anti-corruption talking points prepared for his calls President Trump and ask President Selenski directly to investigate President Trump s chief political rival and President Trump stonewalled Congress s Congress s investigation. You know I don t know what more you can ask for here we ve got admissions from the president we ve got corroboration from people he s appointed. The only thing you can do is stick your head in the sand if you re not willing to see what happened here and with that I would yield to my colleague from Florida is she here Ok she s Oh thank you you just seconds away for the next Ok. For purposes with the arms to move to strike the last word. For weeks my Democratic colleagues Kelly Armstrong Republican from North Dakota just bribery. But they had a problem because these things will never change there was no pressure both President Selenski and President Trump said that there was no pressure no end of it no victim. You don t. Know if the aid was released and there was no investigation and you know what else there was no whistleblower there was no Adam shit so we are left with abuse of power and obstruction of justice and impeach them in is either a solemn constitutional affair which this is absolutely not our whatever the majority wants it to be which this absolutely is if you cannot prove any of it I guess you re going to use all of it so why not expand it to all the way back to the where this thing all started. And buried in the bottom of Article 2 of this impeachment is the language these actions were consistent with the president trumps previous efforts to undermine United States government investigations into foreign interference United States elections this is nothing more than a legislative drive by are probably more accurate and more majorities attempt to return to the scene of a non crime but I guess after 2 years 1000 lawyers 40 agents 500 warrants to 2800 subpoenas $30000000.00 There is simply no way they could leave now. So here s just a reminder the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference Sacto to Vaduz Moeller Report page 2 This started the day President Trump won the election this is been the foregone conclusion since the David Democrats won back the majority this was never about facts or fairness so here we are where we were always going to be on a purely partisan impeachment that is destined to fail in the Senate and with that I yield back. General years back for what purpose is a. Great Nation to strike the last word here ladies recognize you know I have listened carefully it s a Zoe Lofgren Democrat from California who as we ve said has been involved in the impeachment inquiry into Nixon Clinton an outright think it s important to look back to the founders in the foundation of what it is that we re doing here the founders knew that the. How or is given to the president needed to have the capacity to be curbed in the case of abuse the framers of the Constitution consciously adopted a particular phrase from the English practice to help define the constitutional grounds for removal the content of the phrase high crimes and misdemeanors for the framers as to be related to what the framers knew on the whole about the English practice the broad sweep of English constitutional history and the vital role in Pietschmann head played in the limitation of royal prerogative and the control of abuses of ministerial and judicial power. Now when you re coming to private affairs in the ordinary criminal law it s possible in advance to define what it is you can t do you can. Steal that money you can t. Hit that person but when you re talking about the abuse of presidential power you can t always specifically define what a bad actor in the White House might do and therefore you have the term high crimes and misdemeanors and you have the abuse of presidential power it s important to note that in the 2nd article of impeachment against Richard Nixon there was an article for abuse of power the article principally addressed President Nixon s use of power including the powers that stood solely in the president to aid his political allies harm his political opponents gain improper personal political advantages he used his power and this is a quote it was undertaken for his personal political advantage and not in furtherance of any valid national political objective his presidential powers and again this is a quote We re seriously incompatible with our system of constitutional government and warranted removal from office we have a situation similar here but I want to address the issue raised by my colleague from Ohio because I do agree that there can be a tendency in the country these days to immediately think well I don t like that let s go to impeachment and that has frankly been prevalent since the Clinton impeachment lying under oath is a crime. Lying about sex is a shame but neither one involves the use of presidential powers and the use of impeachment in that instance really in an improper way it was never the abuse of presidential power I think put in the public mind that this is a tool to be used for disagreements about policy nothing could be further than the truth I was disappointed I voted against the Iraq war but the Congress voted some people thought we should have articles of impeachment about that no that did not undercut the cause to Szell order congress voted it was a mistake but it was the president and the Congress together it was not the president usurping the powers of another branch of government here we have a situation that is so obvious if you look at the facts how come it s just inconceivable of things I ve heard today are just stunning to me that you could reach a conclusion as it really defense counsel here grasping at straws. The president misused his presidential power to gain a personal benefit to the detriment of the interests of the United States it was an abuse of power that harmed us and it is ongoing it is a threat to the constitutional order it meets the definition of high crimes and misdemeanors it is abuse of presidential power and is our responsibility to use the tool that our founders gave us in the Constitution to preserve that constitutional order we must impeach I yield back General 80 years back and we see its recognition for what purposes Mr governs the great struggle ask for and with is recognized and you just accord comment Louie Gohmert Republican of Texas. President Clinton s actions when you lie under oath it s perjury it s a crime. And I understand the comment that he wasn t acting in his official capacity that would set back the maid to movement if they took that position you know having sex with an employee it s that much younger when you re present the United States that s not in his fishing capacity but no matter how long we spin today tonight tomorrow it doesn t make up for the fact that we did not have fact witnesses I mean this this reminds me historically of the trial of salve Socrates you know where he got convicted by the jury of 501 people while because he was arrogant you want to drive Donald Trump for being arrogant. I m sure you have a lot of Republicans vote with you on that yeah he s arrogant he s got a lot to be arrogant about but that is not a crime it is not a high crime for sure and it s certainly not a misdemeanor it s bothersome to people some people like it but that s not what impeachment is supposed to be about and to have had a trial the what few here say gossip mongering witnesses there were coming to a star chamber and so create their testimonies so people can t see them can t hear them but we have Adam Schiff put it together in in a big report and we received the report on how much time to review it but that s all we need we don t even get to hear from the preparer of the report and get to cross-examine him this is a Stalinist top proceeding that s the way it worked under Stalin you didn t get to find out what the fact witness is because usually there weren t any just like here so what do you have you have people come in and give appearance give their impressions and give an appearance and oh gee we re well educated you know great that s fine and if you re ever not sure about being good at rationalizing go to law school you re trying to do that so that when you hate a person like the 3 witnesses obviously do Donald Trump you can come in and just misrepresent facts and use those to base your opinions on them just great but look at what really started this started before Moller it started back. Carter page had worked for this c. a To help them against the Russians and what did they do they pervert that lied to the 5 court and say oh he has worked with Russians misrepresented whoi is what he did it what a patriot he was and then get a warrant. And then as time goes on they lie about it and where did this this all come from it came from Hillary Clinton s campaign the Democratic National Campaign Committee and they hired a fusion g.p.s. They hired up foreigner to affect our election and they worked with Australian. And they actually Chris for Steele admitted you know what those people who gave me that information they may have been Russian they may have been Ukrainians be nice to know but the majority didn t want us to get there and the very week we find out how bad this travesty was that top people in the f.b.i. And the Department of Justice perfervid justice because they didn t like the guy that might get elected they did everything they could they used all these foreign resources to try to change the outcome of the 2016 election and when that didn t work then they came forward with impeachment it was oh let s project what we did on Donald Trump but it turned out he didn t do that in even Mahler and Wiseman as much as they hated drama they couldn t find anything to to use against President Truong so we had to drop the Russian collusion we had to drop the treason all what about obstruction just well it s not obstruction of justice when you know you re innocent and you know the Department of Justice is trying to set you up and you re trying to expose the truth you know it was others who were obstructing the true justice. Then one for heaven s sake you set that up as you were always no hero he was mad because Trump didn t do what he told him for those who believe in prayer for this country pray for mercy we can t afford justice or the country or your book. For purposes. You should move to strike the last word Mr Levy is really worth it your chairman 5 more minutes so I had Garcia Democrat of Texas long long day but when you look at what the other side has presented in defense of the president why do we get. Nothing now that we all will defend the president s actions because quite simply you cannot defend the indefensible you just can t even if you like him his supporters actions you just won t defend what he did it s really quite simple it s not complicated at all he offered official acts in exchange for political favor he is a clear and present danger to do it again he ignored the power that people and he will do it again it s really just that simple Their president is an eminent and eminent threat their president has shown as his pattern of conduct he has made clear that he will continue to abuse his power to corrupt the 2020 elections in this act with a sense of urgency to protect our democracy and defend our Constitution and the Clinton case the House voted to impeach $72.00 days after it authorized an inquiry it has been $94.00 days since Congress launched its investigation into the president s dealings in Ukraine. And Pietschmann is a charging decision like a grand jury or a prosecutor makes it we have seen more than enough evidence here to charge him and move to trial in the Senate it is the president who is abusing his power what is not fear is the president s blanket refusal to participate and this inquiry for the sole purpose of hiding the facts from the American people federal courts have ruled that Congress has a constitutional right to obtain documents and testimony from the trumpet ministration one federal court said that their presence obstructions is a farce and he has openly stonewalling and I agree he is the 1st president to engage in wall to wall stonewalling and in some respects and outright coverup of his own behavior he has refused to comply with all the congressional subpoenas that have been issued to try to uncover the truth about his misconduct and act that no other citizen can do without consequence as has been stated before even President Nixon shared documents in the loud current and former aides to testify as part of the impeachment process and the committee still recommended an article of impeachment against him for obstruction last night I reminded us that all of this is really about preserving and protected our democracy for the little boys and girls across this nation so that they will know about what it means to make a promise to make a pledge and to keep it because democracy is a gift that each generation gives to the next. And that s why we have to take action we have to move forward and we must impeach the president with that Mr Chairman I yield the remainder of my time to my colleague from Florida miss a personal pal Thank you Ms Garcia I just wanted to answer to every Because salt Powell Democrat of Florida and clarify that I along with so many of my colleagues so many of us that you see seize sitting on this day as we did not come here to impeach the president of the United States we came to lower health care costs and that s exactly what we did today we voted on h.r. 3 today to lower prescription drug prices they say let the American people decide Well that is why last week we rolled it on the Voting Rights Amendment Act which many of my Republican colleagues voted against Let American society yes that is exactly why we re here because we don t want Russia Ukraine or China making the decision for us in our American government this president has committed the highest crime by abusing the power of his office inviting foreign interference in our elections and that is why we are here today please don t confuse Americans with false claims and pushing de bunked conspiracy theories we re here to tell the American people the truth about your doing deals back with nation for purposes of history could destroy the last word it was really going to move Mr Jermyn I ve lost track of the Tom McClintock Republican of California record in these proceedings but I think it s a telling commentary on the quality of the case that this committee is relying on to support the exercise of one of the most profound actions we can take or they get underscores Doura look of duty of a judiciary committee drafting articles impeachment without a single fact hearing. Virtually the entire record is the ship report and newspaper clippings as I reminded the committee yesterday this week Mr Schiff s report on Pfizer abuse was categorically and completely contradicted by the inspector general s report is to shift work is not exactly what you can call the gold standard of accuracy or reliability or incisive analysis and newspaper clippings with all due respect are not exactly the solid foundation that can support our wielding such power impeachment should be made of sterner stuff matter so momentous is this should be considered thoroughly and dispassionately and fairly and Mr Chairman to substitute our judgment for that of the American people by nullifying a national election is a very weighty matter if you re going to do that you should have a record of fact that no reasonable person can deny a one sided report from Adam Schiff and a newspaper scrapbook is the foundation of peace meant that I predict will crumble and disintegrate before the Senate finishes its consideration abuse of power is exactly the vague and expansive ground that the Founders considered as maladministration and rejected in favor of the narrow ground of treason bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors the lawful exercise of the president s constitutional authority is not impeachable and the moment that we make it so the president becomes a servant of Congress and the separation of powers which is protected our freedom for nearly 2 and a half centuries will be greatly diminished and similarly the president s assertion of long established boundaries that maintain the separation of powers is also not impeachable and once we make it so we also clearly diminish the separation of powers. The overwrought political hyperbole that we ve heard over and over through these hearings ought to warn us that we re straying into partisan motives which must never animate the impeachment power of Congress public opinion has not coalesced around this act which should also alert us to the danger that by perceiving we would further divide and alienate the American people and royal and agitate the political waters of this nation you failed to find any law that the president has violated if you could you should clearly articulate that you should support it with legally admitted admissible evidence and put it in the articles Otherwise your case is simply a disagreement with decisions the President is authorized to make and again this is a matter that there are costs to should reserved to the voters and not to the Congress and by denying the witnesses requested by the minority you ve blinded the committee to the getting the whole story if you re truly confident of your case you should have nothing to fear from what a full airing of testimony would off the most chilling observation I ve heard is that we can do this because we re not restricted like the Department of Justice is well the same rights of due process and the same fidelity to the Constitution are required of us and the impeachment of Andrew Johnson Congress made many of the same mistakes that we are making tonight I would urge my colleagues to carefully consider how history has judged them and how it will judge us I yield back. The agenda of the years back when purposes of his diet pose a greater good. We ve to strike last word movies regulars. Thank you Mr Chairman we just continue Milos try appalls Democrat of Washington for the president s behavior and this is such a grave moment that we re in we re talking about the highest constitutional crimes abuse of power. An obstruction of Congress and so let me once again just review the facts 1st my Republican colleagues have said that this is about corruption but all of President Trump s agencies all of his advisors everyone unanimously told him that Ukraine had passed all the anti-corruption benchmarks the Department of Defense said that Ukraine had passed their review on anti-corruption benchmarks so no further corruption policies were needed president Trump s administration cut programs designed to fight corruption in Ukraine and President Trump was given talking points by the National Security Council that specifically said if talk to say these things about corruption but guess what happened on those calls in April and July President Trump did not mention corruption he did not use the talking points that he was given the only 2 names that he mentioned on the July 21st call Joe and Hunter Biden 2nd the Republican suggested that this was all about President Trump s concerns with Burden sharing with our allies but that wasn t true that wasn t true Mr Holmes testified that burden sharing was not a problem Europe was actually contributing 4 times as much money as the United States did and Ambassador saw and testified that he was never asked to go to the European Union and ask for more money and remember Mr silent is President Trump s ambassador to the European Union what was. Told to communicate to Ukraine by President Trump he was told to say that resumption of aid would likely not occur unless presidents alone ski announce the investigation specifically he said that quote unless Selenski went to the mike and announced these investigations there would be a stalemate over the 8 and what were those investigations 2016. Election interference and response meaning the Bidens So finally left with nothing else to argue in defense of the president the Republicans have raised one more thing which is that President Trump had a legitimate reason somehow legitimate reason to investigate Vice President Biden but once again that makes no sense it makes no sense because the facts are that that investigation of the of that issue of the Biden. Biden and went back to 2015 and President Trump released aid in 20172800 so he clearly didn t have a problem in 20 with the issues of 2015 because he had 2 opportunities to release aid and he did but something changed in 2019 and the only thing that changed is that Vice President Biden suddenly started beating President Trump in the polls so the evidence is clear President Trump said Do us a favor though and who is the us well he told us he told us that exactly what he meant by us he told President Selenski that us meant deal with Rudy Giuliani President Trump s personal attorney who knows and this is a quote very much knows what s going on President Trump could have gone through official channels if he wanted if this investigation was actually legitimate he could have asked the Department of Justice to initiate an investigation into the buy ins and response but he didn t do that he did not do that. And the Department of Justice said that he didn t do that he never asked them to do an investigation or even talk to you crane Instead President Trump asked his personal journey because us was not about America this wasn t about official policy this wasn t about what was right for our country this was not about putting America 1st every witness testified to that as well this was personal it was all for president Trump s personal political gain this was to benefit Trump s own reelection campaign and that s why he had his personal attorney do this he abused his power he abused the power that the people and trusted to him he abused the office and he placed our safety millions of dollars of taxpayer money all at risk for his own personal political election and that is the $1.00 thing the president can t do he cannot use our money the powers of the office that we entrusted to him we the people not for us but for himself that is the greatest of use of power and this president has left us no choice but to impeach him I yield back. Generally years back when it was as Mr John says a great vision to strike the last word it was ridiculous Thank you Mr Chairman this morning I began by Johnson Republican of Louisiana most of us are attorneys on this committee and in this case we re also called to serve as finders of fact we re supposed to carefully and objectively analyze the claims not against our personal preferences but against the record of evidence and now we ve done that for the past 12 hours and it s time to summarize our case at the end of the day now now literally the end of the day they re just too short articles for this impeachment resolution they brought before us abuse of power and obstruction of justice and let s review both on the 1st the Democrats know there is 0 direct evidence in the record of these proceedings to show that President Trump and gage in any scheme of any kind as they ve alleged or that he intended in his dealings with Ukraine to influence the 2020 election all they ve argued today is based on hearsay speculation and conjecture completely the truth is there s not a single fact witness that could provide testimony to support their paper thin case which is precisely why we ve been given no opportunity for a fact witness or a minority hearing. What the evidence does show is that President Trump holds a deep seated genuine and reasonable skepticism of Ukraine due to its history of pervasive corruption and his administration sought to prove that the newly elected president s Alinsky was a true reformer President Trump wanted to ensure that American taxpayer funded security assistance would not be squandered overseas by what is reported to be the 3rd most corrupt nation in the world the Trump Ukraine discussion discussions were never about what will happen in 2020 but rather about what already happened in 2016 the Democrats 2nd claim is that President Trump obstructed justice by simply doing what virtually every other president in the modern era has also done to assert a legitimate executive privilege and legal immunity to avoid subpoenas issued to various White House officials there is simply no evidence of any impeachable offense here either and if they had not promised an impeachment to their liberal base by Christmas the Democrats could and should have simply gone a few blocks away to the federal court to get a simple order compelling the extra documents and information they subpoenaed but that s what s always been done in the past but they don t have time for that here because they re trying to meet their own arbitrary completely reckless and Machiavellian timeline to take down a president they loathe of the real abuse of power here is on the part of the House Democrats of this feverish we pursued this impeachment 20 times faster than the impeachment investigation of Bill Clinton to reach their pre-determined political outcome along the way they have steamrolled over constitutionally guaranteed due process previously sacrosanct house rules and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure they have ignored or blocked a school Vittori evidence intimidated witnesses restricted Republican lines of questioning denied defense witnesses an involvement of the president s counsel restricted Republican review of evidence denied minority here and violated proper minority notice in fairness at every single stage. The founders of this court country warned against a single party impeachment for good reason they feared that it would bitterly and perhaps a reparable to divide our nation our chairman Mr NAVL or gave a speech about that 20 years ago when he was opposing the impeachment of Bill Clinton the obvious truth is that our liberal colleagues are valid to impeach President Trump since the day of his election their reason of the day changed at least a half a dozen times over the last 3 years but they can never get any traction or any facts to justify those various conspiracy theories as the next election in 2020 has drawn so close now and their candidates for president are so terribly weak they obviously met somewhere at liberal high command about $75.00 days ago and convinced Nancy Pelosi they had to pull the trigger the problem is they ve done that and in all those hearings in the basement they couldn t uncover a single fact to justify their latest conspiracy theory about Ukraine so what to do they left no choice to desperately create a totally fraudulent unprecedented process to try to reel row Donald Trump the results is what our expert witness testified as quote the shortest proceeding with the thinnest evidence for a record and the narrowest grounds ever used to impeach a President I m a constitutional law attorney by profession and I ve actually enjoyed the sparse 4 minutes of real intellectual debate we had today on the actual contours of Article 2 Section 4 but every high school civics student at home can read its plain language and see what is expressly required to impeach a president you need treason bribery or a high crime or misdemeanor none of that exists here and everybody knows that those high school students at home know it our constituents know it and in their heart of hearts even our friends on the other side of the room tonight know it my good friend Mr Cohen said in his closing a few moments ago that he s proud to be a politician but I would say with all sincerity this moment doesn t call for politicians the weight of history is upon us here and this moment calls for statesman this impeachment is going to fail and the Democrats are going to justly pay a heavy political price for what the Pandora s Box they ve opened today will do irreparable damage to our country in the years ahead and that is the real tragedy of the vote we re about to take God help us I yield back General you know the back foot group is dizzy. It was Bessie recognition a move to strike the last word regulars. A little while ago one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who was saying that this is Karen Bass Democrat of California the reason why AIG was withheld was because the president wanted to investigate corruption the idea that the most corrupt president than we have seen in recent history with held military because he was concerned about corruption is ludicrous as my colleagues have pointed out both cause the president trumped had with President Selenski Trump never mentioned corruption that apartment of defense that it giving the aid and said that it was Ok Once upon a time President Trump loved his generals this time he ignored them members of Congress authorized the aid and lobbied the White House to release the staff from the Office of Management and Budget resigned because they were worried about what was going on and why the aid was withheld they were worried about what the president was doing and they believe that withholding the aid was wrong Trump even cut funding for programs to deal with corruption in countries like Ukraine so a man that is so concerned about corruption also has interesting friends he has bromance is with some of the world s most corrupt leaders the leaders from Saudi Arabia Turkey he had the president earlier 1 1 from Turkey just a couple of weeks ago at the White House but we know his number one pow is President Putin so all the president s men all of them in a round him that were indicted arrested incarcerated my mother used to say that if you lay down with dogs don t be surprised if you get up with fleas the man who claimed he wanted to clean up the swamp created his own swamp and he s drowning in it now I do have to say though that I have empathy for my Republican colleagues because I don t believe that they have a choice they have to defend the. Resident and they dare not step out of line because if they do they will suffer the cuts quinces a few of my Republican colleagues earlier did try to say that they didn t believe that the president s conduct was appropriate and they got slapped quickly the president said his conduct he said the call was absolutely perfect and so now you don t hear any of them saying are questioning whether his behavior was appropriate you have to fall in line and not only do you have to fall in line you have to praise him constantly like those famous press conferences we ve seen in the Oval Office where they won by one go around the table and talk about their praise for him it makes me feel like a meeting that would take place in North Korea where you have to praise dear leader so you have to fall in line because the entire reason was corruption but I know that you know better you have to say that he did nothing wrong one of my colleagues said that we are lowering the bar on impeachment I believe that we have lowered the bar on the presidency it is so sad to see my colleagues who I believe know what s better they are not able to say it they know that the man is corrupt when it comes to impeachment there is no higher crime than for the president to use the power of his office to corrupt our elections. We will move to impeach President Trump because of the abuse of power through self dealing the b. Trail of national security in the service of foreign interests and the corruption of our elections that undermine our democratic system so if my colleagues on the other side of the aisle can t bring themselves to do what is right and impeach a president that what that they know is a threat to our election that then we that they know is a threat to our standing in the world then we will have to do it and we will have to move to impeach. Now to Representative Jackson Lee I thank the general 84 year old ng my conclusion Sheila Jackson Lee Democrat of Texas to my friends on the other side to the Americans who listen to the soldiers everywhere who wear uniforms I have no anger I have no dislike of anyone who voted for anyone in 2016 I take issue with insult that one would suggest the work of this committee is about a dislike for those who voted for president or a President Trump is before this committee in articles of impeachment for his own behavior for his desire to do with public money and a public position to do a private matter and a political matter and that is to get dirt on his 2020 potential opponent in altering and defending the Constitution we defend and honor ourselves and for that reason as an indicting body to articles of impeachment we will give the opportunity for the Congress to decide on President Trump s ultimate results but I stand with the Constitution Italy and stand justice are your values time is expired for what purposes miss well as your nation tried to last word it was regulars. Fool me once shame on you Eric Swalwell Democrat of California shame on me if we allow the president the United States to again abuse his office for his own personal gain it shame on all of us shame on our Constitution we know he s going to do that again because on June 12th of this year he told George Stephanopoulos before this phone call with President Alinsky happened that if he could again receive help from a foreign government as he did from Russia he would do it again on July 24 Bob Muller testified to our committee he said that the president to be charged with up to 10 crimes of obstruction of justice but the Department of Justice prevents him from doing that the next day the president did it again every prosecutor when they are signed a case will open up the file in the 1st thing we all do is we look at the rap sheet was this an aberration or is this a pattern of conduct that the person engages in but it s not just prosecutors who look or use a rap sheet we all do it in our everyday lives if you re a small business owner and you re hiring an employee and find out that they have multiple theft of their past from their employer you probably won t hire them if you re a parent looking for a night out and hiring a babysitter and multiple references said the babysitter is always late you wouldn t ask that person to watch your kids if you re going to a restaurant for an anniversary and saw multiple bad Yelp reviews you wouldn t go to that restaurant. The president doesn t just have bad reviews he has. Really bad prior conduct serious priors he s a repeat offender crimes against our Constitution and yes crimes that one day may be prosecuted statutorily he has abused his power in the past he is abusing his power right now he will abuse it tomorrow we have a Department of Justice who will continue to protect him. But fortunately the American people have a Congress who can say that he s not above the law and we re not helpless in holding him accountable and I yield to the gentleman from Rhode Island then the German you know we ve heard a lot of explanation of why we re here tonight that we don t like the policies the president we don t like the president had Sicily any Democrat of Rhode Island real reason we re here tonight is the conduct of the president the grave misconduct and so I just want to recount very quickly again the evidence that was presented in text messages and call records in e-mails and hundreds of press statements and tweeds present from big knowledge and that he d been engaged on a personal basis through his lawyer investigating a Ukraine the president s Alinsky is sensitive about Ukraine being taken seriously not merely as an instrument in Washington domestic reaction politics as ambassador son said the David Holmes test fire of I was surprised the requirement was so specific and concrete there was a demand that President Zelinsky personally commit to a specific investigation of President Trump s political rival on cable news and the evidence goes on and on and on of the president s effort to use the enormous powers of his office to betray the national interest and cheat in the election in 2020 and use hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to attempt to achieve that objective our founders talked about abuse of power because they recognize that the power of the presidency was enormous There was a danger that a president would use that power not for the public good but for his own personal or political or financial advantage and so they created articles of impeachment to give a final check against that abuse of power no one s here because we want to do this we re here because we have no choice we re not acting out of hate. We re acting out of love of our country and love of our democracy and when generations look back on this moment they will ask what did we do to preserve our democracy and the only thing we can do to preserve that is to hold this president accountable because if we don t they will ask us why we failed to preserve the greatest democracy on earth that has been an example to the world and in this moment we have to find the courage to be sure we can answer that question for all future generations and not be part of an effort to undermine the greatest democracy known to man and so I urge my colleagues tonight we must approve these articles of impeachment so we can make it clear that nobody in this country in the greatest country in the world is above the law even the most powerful person the president of the United States and with that I yield back General years back for purposes Mr Jeffrey seek recognition overstrike last more it is recognized the record is clear. You re listening to live special coverage of the impeachment markup from n.p.r. News in the 2020 election and there is Hakeem Jeffries Never mind the integrity of our democracy as well as our national security but my Republican colleagues have spent all day arguing process that s what you do when you can t the fan the end offensive or you argue process Well here s a process concern that you might reflect upon earlier today Mitch McConnell gave some indication as to how a possible trial in the Senate may run. And this is what Senator McConnell said I m going to coordinate with the president s lawyers. So there won t be any difference between us on how to do this in other words the jury this is special coverage of the impeachment markup from n.p.r. News I m Jeremy Hobson in Washington and we have just hit our 14 of this markup that s been going on since 9 o clock Eastern Time this morning N.P.R. s congressional correspondent Kelsey Snell is on Capitol Hill Kelsey just looking at the monitors here of the hearing room and a number of members are asleep no joke. Do we have any sense of what s going to happen when they will actually vote on these articles of impeachment we have heard a number of members start referencing the concept of closing statements and the things that they are saying right now are their closing statements so it s indication that we may be nearing a vote expecting one procedural vote and then to vote on those articles of impeachment obstruction of justice. Being a 2nd do you have a sense by the way that the that the leadership that the chairman of the committee knows how many people are going to be speaking or the ranking member knows how many of his members are going to be speaking or is it just kind of they re just flying by the seat of their pants civically the ranking member would know the number of men.
This is impeachment light that there is no specific crime that s been laid out well that s going to depend on your perspective you know Bill Clinton was impeached for lying to a grand jury to cover up sex Richard Nixon committed several potentially criminal acts to spy on political rivals are still there and in this case Democrats look at what President did and say that he s a threat to the Constitution that he s persisting in the kinds of efforts and pressure campaigns that he s tried to tried to do and that he is willing to do when their words cheat in order to help himself for 2020 and you know we re going to see a vote out of this committee tonight Democrats control this committee this is going to advance to the floor and we re likely to see the president of the United States impeached by the full House by the end of next week let s go back to the hearing. Gentlemen thank you Mr Chairman Mr Chairman I want to start by agreeing with Mr Sensenbrenner it is always the right time to defend the Constitution and that s the very reason that we re here there are 2 articles of impeachment The 1st is abuse of power the president of the United States this is Ted Florida sitting pardon or interference in our elections sheeting the American voters how did he do it he leveraged life saving taxpayer funded military aid to Ukraine desperately needed for assistance in his reelection campaign and he leveraged a White House meeting that he had promised to the new president Ukrainian president . That president s Alinsky desperately needed to show Vladimir Putin that the United States is willing to stand with Ukraine and he leverage that meeting for assistance in his reelection campaign that s abuse of power now my colleagues have suggested that somehow abuse of power is not a serious offense that that we should make light of the president s actions not treat it as the constitutional violation that is in fact abuse of power was a principal concern of the framers of the Constitution and it it was clear what it meant the exercise of official power to obtain improper personal benefit while ignoring or injuring the national interest that s abuse of power it s rooted in the president s duty constitutional duty to faithfully execute the law to put service over self to put the country over his personal interests I note from my colleagues that all 4 of the constitutional scholars who testified including the Republicans own witness have confirmed that abuse of power is an impeachable offense president transactions in fact exemplify the framers fears and the very reason that abuse of power is a high crime and worse worse than President Nixon President Trump pressured a foreign government to aid in his crop scheme that s the abuse of power article but there s a 2nd article obstruction of Congress we know that no president in history in history. As directed the entire executive branch not to cooperate with an impeachment inquiry has told every member of the executive branch not to speak to any of the impeachment and greet to any of the impeachment inquiry issues now the question is when you look at the abuse of power which is a constitutional violation and then you look at the president s obstruction of Congress it leads to some questions I would like my colleagues to think about as we head toward this important vote think about the people who the president has blocked from speaking Think about. Mick Mulvaney Now Mick Mulvaney acknowledged acting chief of staff acknowledge a quid pro quo says it happens all the time that s abuse of power then the president wouldn t let him speak that s obstruction of Congress why won t you let him speak what does he have to hide think about Secretary Perry and Bassett or Taylor describe the highly irregular Ukraine policy channel led by Rudy Giuliani that included Simon Volcker and Rick Perry that contributes to the abuse of power it highlights the abuse of power but it also is obstruction of Congress why why won t the president allow him to speak what is he afraid of think about John Bolton Fiona Hill testified the Bolton told her to notify it as the council about the rogue effort he said I m not a party I said I m not a part of whatever drug deal in a movie any are cooking up bold in fact called Giuliani a hand grenade who s going to blow everybody up that s the abuse of power obstruction of Congress is clear why won t the president let him testify What s he hiding and finally John Eisenberg. Lieutenant Colonel Dimon couldn t believe what he heard on the call he reported to Eisenberg now Eisenberg can t speak what is it that the president is afraid he ll say that s obstruction of Congress abuse of power obstruction the Congress together that s what these articles are about we re protecting the Constitution we re protecting the American people and our elections that s why we need to proceed with these articles of impeachment go back generally years back this direction for our purposes Mr Rush and those seek recognition I move to strike the last word Mr Chairman is recognized by you Mr Chairman guy Russian hauler Republican of Pennsylvania prosecutor in Baghdad when I was in the Navy prosecutors actually in the Iraqi court system I was a defense attorney in the Navy actually got to defend a navy seal against trumped up charges by the Obama administration and I had the honor of serving as a district judge in my hometown in the South Hills of Pittsburgh so I ve been on all sides of a courtroom and I can tell you that I would defend this case every single day and it s because the faxes aren t there let s go through each article abuse of power or quid pro quo bribery call it would ever your focus group wants to call it the end of the day you don t have the facts to make out the case you don t have the facts because the other party on your quid pro quo your alleged quid pro quo never felt pressure we have a primary document a primary source of information there is the transcript of the call that shows there is no connection we also have the other party presence Alinsky who said it no time for the Ukrainians feel any pressure to have an investigation we also know that no investigation Abidin ever took place we also know that aid was given to Ukraine. Aid that they never knew at the time was being under review in aid they came in the form of javelin missiles not what the Obama administration gave which were well wishes and blankets so again no case can be made for abuse of power obstruction of Congress this would what we would describe as right or not right it isn t right because only letters have been sent there s been no subpoena and how this works is a subpoenas issued the executive branch Igs exercises their executive privilege just like Obama did in the courts decide this the courts have never decided this so where s the obstruction doesn t exist. So I d I would defend this case every single day as a judge I would dismiss this for lack of marriage even if the facts are viewed in light most favorable to the Democrats you still again cannot make out what we used as lawyers call a crime if they should case this case would be dismissed on day one in a courtroom and I ll tell you what case I d prosecute I prosecute shift for abuse of power any day of the week why how about the fact the subpoenaed phone records from a member of Congress how about the fact he took a good out deadly Nunez s cell phone number and leaked that how about the fact that he dumped over $8000.00 pages on the Judiciary Committee 48 hours before we had a hearing in this committee that is the abuse of power and that is what I would prosecute every day that week obstruction I prosecute the Democrats for obstruction of Congress still how about the fact that I had a motion to subpoena the whistleblower the whistleblower who by the way you cannot point to any statute there s no statute that gives out was a blower the right to be anonymous. Does not exist no matter what you say I had a motion to subpoena the whistleblower 2 weeks ago that motion was the not I never got my subpoena it was done in a partisan fashion straight down partisan lines so that is the of shocks and I would prosecute that every single day folks as a legal analysis this is nothing more than a political hit job thanks and I yield the ranger my time gentleman years back. Work purposes miscarriage. And move to strike the last word and ladies recognize you know I want to reiterate Mary j. Scanlon Democrat of Pennsylvania president s policies are personality or even his tweets were not judging the president himself or judging his actions and I understand that he ran to disrupt the government the problem is he went further by abusing his power endangered our elections and our national security. He remains an ongoing threat to both He s shown a pattern of inviting foreign interference in our elections and trying to cover it up twice he s threatening to do it again so we ve heard a lot of loose talk about what evidence we have or don t have there is plenty of direct evidence of the president s wrong doing including for example is July 25th call records in which he said to the Ukrainian president I want you to do us a favor though and then proceeded to request investigations into his political rival in a de bunked conspiracy theory that the Senate and all of our national security services have rejected we have the testimony of his appointees ambassador sawmilling and Bowker about the May 23rd meeting in which the president said to them talk to Rudy we have testimony of 3 1st hand witnesses to the July 25th call to whom promptly reported the call to their superiors and to legal counsel we have the testimony of David Holmes who overheard the president ask him Bassett or son Lindh whether President Selenski was going to quote do the investigation we have the president s many public statements including his October 3rd statement that Ukraine and China should investigate his political rival even the minority counsel Mr Castro admitted that there was direct evidence he said quote We had some direct evidence on certain things and we had some direct evidence on the May 23rd meeting and someone gave some direct evidence and quote the 2nd hand accounts are also extensively corroborated for example embassador Taylor and Mr Morrison both testified that during a September 7th phone call with Ambassador sun when President Trump said there was no quid pro quo but the president s Alinsky had to go to the microphone and announce investigations kind of giving with one hand and taking away with the other . Ambassador someone testified he had no reason to dispute ambassador Taylor s and Mr Morrison s testimony about this conversation there s also circumstantial evidence there was no contemporaneous explanation given for the president s decision to withhold the military aid that had bipartisan support from Congress that didn t come until after the Articles of Impeachment were filed and the uniform consensus of the State Department the Defense Department and White House witnesses is that they should have been released given these facts the only logical explanation as embassadors someone concluded was that like the White House meeting the aide was being used to leverage pressure on presidents Alinsky at the end of the day the evidence is overwhelming and indisputable. President Trump s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani pushed Ukraine to investigate his political rival and a debunked conspiracy theory is efforts had nothing to do with u.s. Policy and were taken on the president s behalf and with the president s knowledge President Trump directed u.s. Officials and presidents Olinsky himself to work with Mr Giuliani President Trump ordered that critical military aid for Ukraine be withheld Ukrainian officials were informed the aide would not be released unless President Selenski publicly announce an investigation and President Trump refused to release the aide until his pressure campaign on the Ukraine was exposed President Trump refused to arrange a meeting with President Alinsky and President Trump s agents advised Ukrainian officials that the White House meeting would be scheduled only after President Selenski committed investigations President Trump ignored the anti-corruption talking points prepared for his calls President Trump and asked President Selenski directly to investigate President Trump s chief political rival and President Trump stonewalled Congress is Congress s investigation you know I don t know what more you can ask for here we ve got admissions from the president we ve got corroboration from people he s appointed. The only thing you can do is stick your head in the sand if you re not willing to see what happened here and with that I would yield to my colleague from Florida she here Ok she s Oh thank you seconds I ll wait for the next Ok. For purposes we. Move to strike the last word. For weeks my Democratic colleagues Kelly Armstrong Republican from North Dakota test drive. But they had a problem because these things will never change there was no pressure both presidents a Lenski and President Trump said that there was no pressure no end of it no victim . No. No if the aid was released and there was no investigation and you know what else there was no whistleblower there was no Adam Schiff So we are left with abuse of power and obstruction of justice and impeachment is either a solemn constitutional affair which this is absolutely not our whatever the majority wants it to be which this absolutely is if you cannot prove any of it I guess you re going to use all of it so why not expand it to all the way back to the where this thing all started. And buried in the bottom of Article 2 of this impeachment is the language these actions were consistent with the president terms of previous efforts to undermine United States government investigations into foreign interference United States elections this is nothing more than a legislative drive by are probably more accurate is more majorities attempt to return to the scene of a non crime but I guess after 2 years 1000 lawyers 40 agents 500 warrants to 2800 subpoenas $30000000.00 There is simply no way they could leave it out. So here s just a reminder the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired are coordinated with the Russian government and its election interference act to tease Moeller Report page 2 This started the day President Trump won the election this has been the foregone conclusion since the day the Democrats won back the majority this was never about facts or fairness so here we are where we were always going to be on a purely partisan impeachment that is destined to fail in the Senate and with that I yield back. Generally back for what purpose is a. Well conceived recognition the strike the last word. You know I ve listened carefully it s a Zoe Lofgren Democrat from California who as we said has been involved in the impeachment inquiry into Nixon Clinton and now try think it s important to look back to the founders in the foundation of what it is that we re doing here the founders knew that the. Howard is given to the president needed to have the capacity to be curbed in the case of abuse the framers of the Constitution Honshu Asli adopted a particular phrase from the English practice that helped define the constitutional grounds for removal the content of the phrase high crimes and misdemeanors for the framers as to be related to what the framers knew on the whole about the English practice the broad sweep of English constitutional history and the vital role in Pietschmann had played in the limitation of royal prerogative and the control of abuses of ministerial and judicial power now when you re coming to private affairs in an ordinary criminal law it s possible in advance to define what it is you can t do you can t. Steal that money you can t. Hit that person when you re talking about the abuse of presidential power. You can t always specifically define what a bad actor in the White House might do and therefore you have the term high crimes and misdemeanors and you have the abuse of presidential power it s important to note that in the 2nd article of impeachment against Richard Nixon there was an article for abuse of power the article principally address President Nixon s use of power including the powers that stood solely in the president to aid his political allies harm as political opponents gain improper personal political advantages he used his power and this is a quote it was undertaken for his personal political advantage and not in furtherance of any valid national political objective his presidential powers and again this is a quote were seriously incompatible with our system of constitutional government and warranted removal from office we have a situation similar here but I want to address the issue raised by my colleague from Ohio because I do agree that there can be a tendency in the country these days to immediately think well I don t like that let s go to impeachment and that has frankly been prevalent since the Clinton impeachment lying under oath is a crime lying about sex is a shame but neither one involves the use of presidential powers. And the use of the impeachment in that instance really in an improper way it was never the abuse of presidential power I think put in the public mind that this is a tool to be used for disagreements about policy nothing could be further than the truth I was disappointed I voted against the Iraq war but the Congress voted some people thought we should have articles of impeachment about that no that did not undercut the cost to show order congress voted it was a mistake but it was the president and the Congress together it was not the president usurping the powers of another branch of government here we have a situation that is so obvious if you look at the facts how come it s just inconceivable of things I ve heard today are just stunning to me that you could reach a conclusion as it really defense counsel here grasping at straws the president misused his presidential power to gain a personal benefit to the detriment of the interests of the United States it was an abuse of power that harmed us and it is ongoing it is a threat to the constitutional order it meets the definition of high crimes and misdemeanors it is abuse of presidential power and is our responsibility to use the tool that our founders gave us in the Constitution to preserve that constitutional order we must impeach I yield back generally back. 6 recognition for what purpose is to go it s a great strike the last word in with this regular and yet just a court comment Louie Gohmert Republican of Texas. President Clinton s actions when you laugh under oath it s perjury it s a crime. And I understand the comment that he wasn t acting in his official capacity that would set back the meat to movement if they took that position you know having sex with an employee it s that much younger when you re president the United States that s not in his fishing capacity but no matter how long we spin today tonight tomorrow it doesn t make up for the fact that we did not have fact witnesses I mean this this reminds me historically of the trial of soft Socrates you know where he got convicted by the jury of 501 people why because he was arrogant you want to try to Donald Trump for being arrogant I m sure you have a lot of Republicans vote with you on that yeah he s arrogant he s got a lot to be arrogant about but that is not a crime it is not a high crime for sure and it s certainly not a misdemeanor it s bothersome to people some people like it but that s not what impeachment is supposed to be about and to have had a trial. The what few here say gossip mongering witnesses there were coming to a star chamber and secrete their testimony so people can t see them can t hear them but we have Adam Schiff put it together in in in a big report and we received the report on how much time to review it but that s all we need we don t even get to hear from the preparer of the report and get to cross-examine him this is a Stalin esque chop proceeding that s the way it worked under Stalin you didn t get to find out what the fact witness is because usually there weren t any just like here so what do you have you have people come in and give appearance give their impressions and give an appearance and oh gee we re well educated you know great that s fine and if you re ever not sure about being good at rationalizing go to law school you re trying to do that so that when you hate a person like the 3 witnesses obviously do Donald Trump you can come in and just misrepresent facts and use those to base your opinions on them just great but look at what really started this started before Moller it started back. Carter Paige had worked for the c.i. a To help them against the Russians and what did they do they pervert that lie to the 5 cent court and say oh he has worked with Russians misrepresent who he is what he did and what a patriot he was and then get a warrant and then as time goes on they lie about it and where did this this all come from it came from Hillary Clinton s campaign the Democratic National Campaign Committee and they hired a fusion g.p.s. They hired a foreigner to affect our election and they worked with an Australian an Italian and they actually Christopher Steele admitted you know What 1 those people who gave me that information they may have been Russian they may have been Ukrainians be nice to know but the majority didn t want us to get there and the very week we find out how bad this travesty was that top people in the f.b.i. And the Department of Justice perfervid justice because they didn t like the guy that might get elected they did everything they could they use all these foreign resources to try to change the outcome of the 2016 election and when that didn t work then they came forward with impeachment it was oh let s project what we did on Donald Trump but it turned out he didn t do that and even Mahler and Weissman as much as they hated drama they couldn t find anything to to use against President Truong so we had to drop the Russian collusion we had to drop the treason Oh what about obstruction just will is not obstruction of justice when you know you re innocent and you know the Department of Justice is trying to set you up and you re trying to expose the truth you know it was others who were obstructing the true justice. Then man for heaven s sake you set that up as you were always no hero he was mad because Trump didn t do what he told him for those who believe in praying for this country pray for mercy we can t afford justice or the country. Back. You should move to strike the last word Mr Levy is ready to go Mr Chairman 5 more minutes so I see a Democrat of Texas long long day but when you look at what the other side has presented in defense of the president why do we get. Nothing Not every all will defend the president s actions because quite simply you cannot defend the indefensible you just can t even if you like him his supporters actions you just won t defend what he did it s really quite simple it s not complicated at all he offered official acts in exchange for political favor he s a clear and present danger to do it again he ignored the powers that people and he will do it again it s really just that simple Their president is an eminent and eminent threat their president has showed us his pattern of conduct he has made clear that he will continue to abuse his power to corrupt the 2020 elections in this act with a sense of urgency to protect our democracy and defend our Constitution and their plan in case the House voted to impeach $72.00 days after it authorized an inquiry it has been $94.00 days since Congress launched its investigation into the president s dealings with Ukraine. And Pietschmann is a charging decision like a grand jury or a prosecutor makes it we have seen more than enough evidence here to charge him and move to trial in the Senate it is the president who is abusing his power what is not fair is the president s blanket refusal to participate in this inquiry for the sole purpose of hiding the facts from the American people for our group courts have ruled that Congress has a constitutional right to obtain documents and testimony from the trumpet ministration when federal court said that their presence obstructions is a farce and he is openly stonewalling and I agree he is the 1st president to engage in wall to wall stonewalling and in some respects and outright coverup of his own behavior he has refused to comply with all the congressional subpoenas that have been issued to try to uncover the truth about his misconduct and act that no other citizen can do without consequence as has been stated before even President Nixon shared documents in the loud current and former aides to testify as part of the impeachment process 7 and the committee still recommended an article of impeachment against him for obstruction last night I reminded us that all this is really a protest about preserving and protecting our democracy for the little boys and girls across this nation so that they will know about what it means to make a promise to make a pledge and to keep it because democracy is a gift that each generation gives to the next. And that s why we have to take action we have to move forward and we must impeach the president with that Mr Chairman I yield the remainder of my time to my colleague from Florida this pal Thank you Ms Garcia I just wanted to answer to every Because salt Powell Democratic . And clarify that I along with so many of my colleagues so many of us that you see seize sitting on this day as we did not come here to impeach the president of the United States we came to lower health care costs and that s exactly what we did today we voted on h.r. 3 today to lower prescription drug prices they say let the American people decide Well that is why last week we voted on the Voting Rights Amendment Act which many of my Republican colleagues voted against Let American society yes that is exactly why we re here because we don t want Russia Ukraine or China making the decision for us in our American government this president has committed the highest crime by abusing the power of his office inviting foreign interference in our elections and that is why we are here today please don t confuse Americans with false claims and pushing de bunked conspiracy theories we re here to tell the American people the truth I yelled back. Back and. Destroyed. Mr Jermyn I ve lost track of the Tom McClintock Republican of California record in these proceedings but I think it s a telling commentary on the quality of the case that this committee is relying on to support the exercise of one of the most profound actions we can take or they get underscores endure a look of duty of a judiciary committee drafting articles impeachment without a single fact hearing. Virtually the entire record is the ship report and newspaper clippings as I reminded the committee yesterday this week Mr Schiff s report on Fizer abuse was categorically and completely contradicted by the inspector general s report as to shift work is not exactly what you can call the gold standard of accuracy or reliability or incisive analysis and newspaper clippings with all due respect are not exactly the solid foundation that can support our wielding such power impeachment should be made of sterner stuff matter so momentous is this should be considered thoroughly and dispassionately and fairly and Mr Chairman to substitute our judgment for that of the American people by nullifying a national election is a very weighty matter if you re going to do that you should have a record of fact that no reasonable person can deny a one sided report from Adam Schiff and a newspaper scrapbook is the foundation of peace meant that I predict will crumble and disintegrate before the Senate finishes its consideration abuse of power is exactly the vague and expansive ground that the Founders considered as maladministration and rejected in favor of the narrow ground of treason bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors the lawful exercise of the president s cost to to tional authority is not impeachable and the moment that we make it so the president becomes a servant of Congress and the separation of powers which is protected our freedom for nearly 2 and a half centuries will be greatly diminished and similarly the president s assertion of long established boundaries that maintain the separation of powers is also not impeachable and once we make it so we also clearly diminish the separation of powers. The overwrought political hyperbole that we ve heard over and over through these hearings ought to warn us that we re straying into partisan motives which must never animate the impeachment power of Congress public opinion has not coalesced around this act which should also alert us to the danger that by proceeding we would further divide and alienate the American people and roil in agitate the political waters of this nation you failed to find any law that the president has violated if you could you should clearly articulate that you should support it with legally admitted admissible evidence and put it in the articles Otherwise your case is simply a disagreement with decisions the President is authorized to make and again this is a matter that there are costs to should reserved to the voters and not to the Congress and by denying the witnesses requested by the minority you ve blinded the committee to the getting the whole story if you re truly confident of your case you should have nothing to fear from what a full airing of testimony would offer the most chilling observation I ve heard is that we can do this because we re not restricted like the Department of Justice as well the same rights of due process and the same fidelity to the Constitution are required of us and the impeachment of Andrew Johnson Congress made many of the same mistakes that we are making tonight I would urge my colleagues to carefully consider how history has judged them and how it will judge us I yield back. The jitter of years back where purposes of his diet both agree a good move to strike last word it ladies regular Thank you Mr Chairman we just continue palls that money out of Washington for the president s behavior and this is such a grave moment that we re in we re talking about the highest constitutional crimes abuse of power. An obstruction of Congress and so let me once again just review the facts 1st my Republican colleagues have said that this is about corruption but all of President Trump s agencies all of this advisors everyone unanimously told him that Ukraine had passed all the anti corruption benchmarks the Department of Defense said that Ukraine had passed their review on anti-corruption benchmarks and no further corruption policies were needed president Trump s administration cut programs designed to fight corruption in Ukraine and President was given talking points by the National Security Council that specifically said if talk to say these things about corruption but guess what happened on those calls in April and July President Trump did not mention corruption he did not use the talking points that he was given the only 2 names that he mentioned on the July 21st call were Joe and Hunter Biden 2nd the Republican suggested that this was all about President Trump s concerns with Burden sharing with our allies but that wasn t true that wasn t true Mr Holmes testified that burden sharing was not a problem Europe was actually contributing 4 times as much money as the United States did and Ambassador Solomon testified that he was never asked to go to the European Union and ask for more money and remember Mr Solomon is President Trump s ambassador to the European Union what was. Told to communicate to Ukraine by President Trump he was told to say that resumption of aid would likely not occur unless presidents Olinsky announce the investigation specifically he said that quote unless Selenski went to the mike and announced these investigations there would be a stalemate over the 8 and what were those investigations 2016. Election interference and response meaning the Bidens So finally left with nothing else to argue in defense of the president the Republicans have raised one more thing which is that President Trump had a legitimate reason somehow legitimate reason to investigate Vice President Biden but once again that makes no sense it makes no sense because the facts are that that investigation of the that issue of the Biden. Biden and Arisa went back to 2015. And President Trump released aid in 20172800 so he clearly didn t have a problem in 20 with the issues of 2015 because he had 2 opportunities to release 8 and he did but something changed in 2019 and the only thing that changed is that Vice President Biden suddenly started beating President Trump in the polls so the evidence is clear President Trump said Do us a favor though and who was the us well he told us he told us that exactly what he meant by us he told President Selenski that us meant deal with Rudy Giuliani President Trump s personal attorney who knows and this is a quote very much knows what s going on President Trump could have gone through official channels if he wanted if this investigation was actually legitimate he could have asked the Department of Justice to initiate an investigation into the Bidens and respond but he didn t do that he did not do that and the Department of Justice said that he didn t do that he never asked them to do an investigation or even talk to Ukraine instead President Trump asked his personal attorney because us was not about America this wasn t about official policy this wasn t about what was right for our country this was not about putting America 1st every witness testified to that as well this was personal it was all for president Trump s personal political gain this was to benefit Trump s own reelection campaign and that s why he had his personal attorney do this you abused his power he abused the power that the people and trusted to him he abused the office and he placed our safety millions of dollars of taxpayer money all at risk for his own personal political election and that is the $1.00 thing the president can t do. He cannot use our money the powers of the office that we entrusted to him we the people not for us but for himself that is the greatest abuse of power and this president has left us no choice but to impeach him I yield back generally years back when it was as Mr Johnson. Struck the last word it was ridiculous Thank you Mr Chairman this morning I began by I like Johnson Republican of Louisiana most of us are attorneys on this committee and in this case we re also called the service finders of fact we re supposed to carefully and objectively analyze the claims not against our personal preferences but against the record of evidence and now we ve done that for the past 12 hours and it s time to summarize our case at the end of the day now now literally the end of the day there are just 2 short articles to this impeachment resolution they brought before us abuse of power and obstruction of justice and let s review both on the 1st the Democrats know there is 0 direct evidence in the record of these proceedings to show that President Trump and gage in any scheme of any kind as they ve alleged or that he intended in his dealings with Ukraine to influence the 2020 election all they ve argued today is based on hearsay speculation and conjecture completely the truth is there s not a single fact witness that could provide testimony to support their paper thin case which is precisely why we ve been given no opportunity or for a fact witness or a minority hearing. What the evidence does show is that President Trump holds a deep seated genuine and reasonable skepticism of Ukraine due to its history of pervasive corruption and his administration sought to prove that the newly elected president s Alinsky was a true reformer President Trump wanted to ensure that American taxpayer funded security assistance would not be squandered overseas by what is reported to be the 3rd most corrupt nation in the world the Trump Ukraine discussion discussions were never about what will happen in 2020 but rather about what already happened in 2016 the Democrats 2nd claim is that President Trump obstructed justice by simply doing what virtually every other president in the modern era has also done to assert a legitimate executive privilege and legal immunity to avoid subpoenas issued to various White House officials there is simply no evidence of any impeachable offense here either and if they had not promised an impeachment to their liberal base by Christmas the Democrats could and should have simply gone a few blocks away to the federal court to get a simple order compelling the extra documents and information they subpoenaed but that s what s always been done in the past but they don t have time for that here because they re trying to meet their own arbitrary completely reckless and Machiavellian timeline to take down a president they loathe the real abuse of power here is on the part of the House Democrats of this feverish we pursued this impeachment 20 times faster than the impeachment investigation of Bill Clinton to reach their pre-determined political outcome along the way they have steamrolled over constitutionally guaranteed due process previously sacrosanct house rules and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure they have ignored or blocked Isco Vittori evidence intimidated witnesses restricted Republican lines of questioning denied defense witnesses an involvement of the president s counsel restricted Republican review of evidence denied minority here and violated proper minority notice in fairness at every single stage. The founders of this court country warned against a single party impeachment for good reason they feared that it would bitterly and perhaps a reparable to divide our nation our chairman Mr NAVL or gave a speech about that 20 years ago when he was opposing the impeachment of Bill Clinton the obvious truth is that our liberal colleagues are valid to impeach President Trump since the day of his election their reason of the day changed at least a half a dozen times over the last 3 years but they can never get any traction or any facts to justify those various conspiracy theories as the next election in 2020 has drawn so close now and their candidates for president are so terribly weak the obviously met somewhere at liberal high command about $75.00 days ago and convinced Nancy Pelosi they had to pull the trigger the problem is they ve done that and in all those hearings in the basement they couldn t uncover a single factor justify their latest conspiracy theory about Ukraine so what to do they left no choice to desperately create a totally fraudulent unprecedented process to try to reel row Donald Trump the result is what our expert witness testified as quote the shortest proceeding with the thinnest ever the entry record and the narrowest grounds ever used to impeach a President I m a constitutional law attorney by profession and I ve actually enjoyed the sparse 4 minutes of real intellectual debate we have today on the actual contours of Article 2 Section 4 but every high school civics student at home can read its plain language and see what is expressly required to impeach a president you need treason bribery or a high crime or misdemeanor none of that exists here and everybody knows it those high school students at home know it are constituents know it and in their heart of hearts even our friends on the other side of the room tonight know it my good friend Mr Cohen said in his closing a few moments ago that he s proud to be a politician but I would say with all sincerity this moment doesn t call for politicians the weight of history is upon us here and this moment calls for statesman this impeachment is going to fail and the Democrats are going to justly pay a heavy political price for it but the Pandora s Box they ve opened today will do irreparable damage to our country in the years ahead and that is the real tragedy of the vote we re about to take God help us yield back General you know the back foot group is the. There s the recognition I move to strike the last word regulars . A little while ago one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who was saying that this is Karen Bass Democrat of California the reason why it was withheld was because the president wanted to investigate corruption the idea that the most corrupt president than we have seen in recent history withheld military aid because he was concerned about corruption is ludicrous as my colleagues have pointed out both cost the president had with President Selenski Trump never mentioned corruption but he partment of defense that it giving the aid and said that it was Ok Once upon a time President Trump loved his generals this time he ignored them members of Congress authorized the aid and lobbied the White House to release the staff from the Office of Management and Budget resigned because they were worried about what was going on and why the aid was withheld they were worried about what the president was doing and they believe that withholding the aid was wrong Trump even cut funding for programs to deal with corruption in countries like Ukraine so a man that is so concerned about corruption also has interesting friends he has bromance is with some of the world s most corrupt leaders the leaders from Saudi Arabia Turkey he had the president earlier 1 1 from Turkey just a couple of weeks ago at the White House but we know his number one pow is President Putin so all the president s men all the men around him that were indicted arrested incarcerated my mother used to say that if you lay down with dogs don t be surprised if you get up with fleas the man who claimed he wanted to clean up the swamp created his own swamp and he s drowning in it now I do have to say though that I have empathy for my Republican colleagues because I don t believe that they have a choice they have to defend the. Resident and they dare not step out of line because if they do they will suffer the consequence says a few of my Republican colleagues earlier did try to say that they didn t believe that the president s conduct was appropriate and they got slapped quickly the president said his conduct he said the call was absolutely perfect and so now you don t hear any of them saying are questioning whether his behavior was appropriate you have to fall in line and not only do you have to fall in line you have to praise him constantly like those famous press conferences we ve seen in the Oval Office where they one by one go around the table and talk about their praise for him it makes me feel like a meeting that would take place in North Korea where you have to praise dear leader so you have to fall in line because the entire reason was corruption but I know that you know better you have to say that he did nothing wrong one of my colleagues said that we are lowering the bar on impeachment I believe that we have lowered the bar on the presidency it is so sad to see my colleagues who I believe know what s better they are not able to say it they know that the man is corrupt when it comes to impeachment there is no higher crime than for the president to use the power of his office to corrupt our elections. We will move to impeach President Trump because of the abuse of power through self dealing the the trail of national security in the service of foreign interests and the corruption of our elections that undermine our democratic system so if my colleagues on the other side of the aisle can t bring themselves to do what is right and impeach a president that what that they know is a threat to our election that then we that they know is a threat to our standing in the world then we will have to do it and we will have to move to impeach. Now to Representative Jackson Lee I thank the general 84 year old ng my conclusion Sheila Jackson Lee Democrat of Texas to my friends on the other side to the Americans who listen to the soldiers everywhere who wear uniforms I have no anx I have no dislike of anyone who voted for anyone in 2016 I take issue with insult that one would suggest the work of this committee is about a dislike for those who voted for president or a President Trump is before this committee in articles of impeachment for his own behavior for his desire to do with public money and a public position to do a private matter and a political matter and that is to get the dirt on his 2020 potential opponent in honoring and defending the Constitution we defend and honor ourselves and for that reason as an indicting body to articles of impeachment we will give the opportunity for the Congress to decide on president trumps ultimate results but I stand with the Constitution Italy and stand on justice I feel that it is time has expired what purpose as well as the regulation to strike the last word it was regular for me was. Shame on you Eric Swalwell Democrat of California shame on me we allow the president the United States to again abuse his office for his own personal gain and shame on all of us shame on our Constitution we know he s going to do that again because on June 12th of this year he told George Stephanopoulos before this phone call with President Alinsky happened that if he could again receive help from a foreign government as he did from Russia he would do it again on July 24 hour testified to our committee he said that the president could be charged with up to 10 crimes of obstruction of justice but the Department of Justice prevents him from doing that the next day the president did it again every prosecutor when they are assigned a case will open up the file in the 1st thing we all do is we look at the rap sheet was this an aberration or is this a pattern of conduct that the person engages in but it s not just prosecutors who look or use a rap sheet we all do it in our everyday lives if you re a small business owner and you re hiring an employee and find out that they have multiple thefts of their past from their employer you probably won t hire them if you re a parent looking for a night out and hiring a babysitter and multiple references said the babysitter is always late you wouldn t ask that person to watch your kids if you re going to a restaurant for an anniversary and saw multiple bad Yelp reviews you wouldn t go to that restaurant. The president doesn t just have bad reviews he has really bad prior conduct serious priors he s a repeat offender crimes against our Constitution and yes crimes that one day may be prosecuted statutorily he has abused his power in the past he is abusing his power right now. He will abuse it tomorrow we have a Department of Justice who will continue to protect him but fortunately the American people have a Congress who can say that he s not above the law and we re not helpless in holding him accountable and I yield to the gentleman from Rhode Island I thank the gentleman you know we ve heard a lot of explanation of why we re here tonight that we don t like the policies of the president we don t like the president did Sicily any Democrat of Rhode Island real reason we re here tonight is the conduct of the president grave misconduct and so I just want to recount very quickly again the evidence that was presented in text messages and call records in e-mails in hundreds of press segments and tweets present from big knowledge and that he d been engaged on a personal basis through his lawyer in investigating Ukraine the president s Alinsky is sensitive about Ukraine being taken seriously not really as an instrument in Washington domestic reaction politics as ambassador Simon said the David Holmes test but are over I was surprised the requirement was so specific and concrete there was a demand the presence Alinsky personally commit to a specific investigation of President trumps political rival on cable news and the evidence goes on and on and on of the president s effort to use the enormous powers of his office to betray the national interest and cheat in the election in 2020 and use hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to attempt to achieve that objective our founders talked about abuse of power because they recognize that the power of the presidency was enormous There was a danger that a president would use that power not for the public good but for his own personal or political or financial advantage and so they created articles of impeachment to give a final check against that abuse of power no one s here because we want to do this we re here because we have no choice we re not acting out of hate. We re acting out of love of our country and love of our democracy and when generations look back on this moment they will ask what did we do to preserve our democracy and the only thing we can do to preserve that is to hold this president accountable because if we don t they will ask us why we failed to preserve the greatest democracy on earth that has been an example to the world and in this moment we have to find the courage to be sure we can answer that question for all future generations and not be part of an effort to undermine the greatest democracy known to man and so I urge my colleagues tonight we must approve these articles of impeachment so we can make it clear that nobody in this country in the greatest country in the world is above the law even the most powerful person the president of the United States and with that I yield back General years back for purposes Mr Jeffrey seek recognition overstrike the last word and it is recognized record is clear. You re listening to live special coverage of the impeachment markup from n.p.r. News in the 2020 election and then came Jeffries and I don t mind the integrity of our democracy as well as our national security but my Republican colleagues have spent all day arguing process that s what you do when you can t pay the friend the end offensive or you argue process Well here s a process concern that you might reflect upon earlier today Mitch McConnell gave some indication as to how a possible trial in the Senate may run and this is what Senator McConnell said I m going to coordinate with the president s lawyers. So there won t be any difference between us on how to do this in other words the jury this is special coverage of the impeachment markup from n.p.r. News I m Jeremy Hobson in Washington and we have just hit our 14 of this markup that s been going on since 9 o clock Eastern Time this morning N.P.R. s congressional correspondent Kelsey Snell is on Capitol Hill Kelsey just looking at the monitors here of the hearing room and a number of members are asleep no joke. Do we have any sense of what s going to happen when they will actually vote on these articles of impeachment we have heard a number of members start referencing the concept of closing statements and that the things that they are saying right now are their closing statement so that s an indication that we may be nearing a vote or expecting one procedural vote and then through votes on those articles that each meant obstruction of justice. And do you have a sense by the way that the leadership that the chairman of the committee knows how many people are going to be speaking or the ranking member knows how many of his members are going to be speaking or is it just kind of they re just flying by the seat of their pants and civically the ranking member would know the number of amendments that are are coming and you know it s entirely possible that we had a break not too terribly long ago and it s entirely possible that they had a meeting of the minds and kind of made a decision that this didn t need to continue going on to the next day and that is Kelsey style and let s go back to the hearing here Hakeem Jeffries of New York speaking now as a Democrat when we put democracy over demagoguery.
The goals of impeachment The 1st is abuse of power the president of the United States this is. The sitting foreigner for interference in our elections sheeting the American voters how did he do it Q leveraged life saving tax payer funded military aid that Ukraine desperately needed for assistance in his reelection campaign and he leveraged a White House meeting that he had promised to the new president Ukrainian president that president s allies keep desperately needed to show Vladimir Putin that the United States is willing to stand with Ukraine and he leverage that meeting for assistance in his reelection campaign that s abuse of power now my colleagues have suggested that somehow abuse of power is not a serious offense that. We should make light of the president s actions not treat it as the constitutional violation that is in fact abuse of power was a principal concern of the framers of the Constitution and it it was clear what it meant the exercise of official power to obtain improper personal benefit while ignoring or injuring the national interest that s abuse of power it s rooted in the president s duty constitutional duty to faithfully execute the law to put service over self to put the country over his personal interests I know from my colleagues that all 4 of the constitutional scholars who testified including the Republicans own witness have confirmed that abuse of power is an impeachable offense. President transactions in fact exemplify the framers fears and the very reason that abuse of power is a high crime and worse worse than President Nixon President Trump pressured a foreign government to aid in his crap scheme that s the abuse of power article but there s a 2nd article obstruction of Congress we know that no president in history in history as directed the entire executive branch not to cooperate with an impeachment inquiry has told every member of the executive branch not to speak to any of the impeachment and greet to any of the impeachment inquiry issues now the question is when you look at the abuse of power which is a constitutional violation and then you look at the president s obstruction of Congress it leads to some questions I would like my colleagues to think about as we head toward this important vote think about the people who the president has blocked from speaking Think about. Mick Mulvaney Now Mick Mulvaney acknowledged acting chief of staff acknowledge a quid pro quo says it happens all the time that s abuse of power then the president wouldn t let him speak that s obstruction of Congress why won t he let him speak what does he have to hide think about Secretary Perry and Bassett or Taylor describe the highly irregular Ukraine policy channel led by Rudy Giuliani that included Simon Volcker and Rick Perry that contributes to the abuse of power it highlights the abuse of power but it also is obstruction of Congress why why won t the president allow him to speak what is he afraid of. Think about John Bolton Fiona Hill testified the Bolton told her to notify it at the Council about the rogue effort he said I m not a party I said I m not a part of whatever drug deal little Mulvaney are cooking up bold in fact called Giuliani a hand grenade who s going to blow everybody up that s the abuse of power obstruction of Congress is clear why won t the president let him testify What s he hiding and finally John Eisenberg. Couldn t believe what he heard on the call he reported to us. Now Eisenberg can t speak what is it that the president is afraid he ll say that s obstruction of Congress abuse of power and structure in the Congress together that s what these articles are about we re protecting the Constitution we re protecting the American people and our elections that s why we need to proceed with these articles of impeachment go back generally years back you see resolution for our purposes misdirection throws seek recognition I move to strike the last word Mr Chairman is recognized and you Mr Chairman. Republican of Pennsylvania prosecutor in Baghdad when I was in the Navy prosecutors actually in the Iraqi court system I was a defense attorney in the Navy actually got to defend a navy seal against charges by the Obama administration and I had the honor of serving as a district judge in my hometown in the South Hills of Pittsburgh so I ve been on all sides of courtroom and I can tell you that I would defend this case every single day and it s because the facts just aren t there let s go through each article abuse of power or quid pro quo bribery call it would ever your focus group wants to call it is the end of the day you don t have the facts to make out the case. You don t have the facts because the other party on your quid pro quo quid pro quo never felt pressure we have a primary document a primary source of information there is the transcript of the call that shows there is no connection we also have the other party presence Alinsky said it no time to the Ukrainians feel any pressure to have an investigation we also know that no investigation Abidin ever took place we also know that aid was given to Ukraine aid that they never knew at the time was being under review in aid they came in the form of javelin missiles now would the Obama administration gave which were well wishes and blankets so again no case can be made for abuse of power obstruction of Congress this with what we describe as right or not right it isn t right because only letters have been sent there s been no subpoena and how this works is is a subpoenas issued the executive branch Igs exercises their executive privilege just like Obama did in the courts decide this the courts have never decided this so where s the obstruction doesn t exist. Side I would defend this case every single day as a judge I would dismiss this for lack of merit even if the facts are viewed in light most favorable to the Democrats you still again cannot make out what we used as lawyers call a promise they should case this case would be dismissed on day one in a courtroom. But I ll tell you what case I d prosecute I prosecute shift for abuse of power any day of the week why how about the fact the subpoenaed phone records from a member of Congress how about the fact he took down the Nunez s cell phone number and lead that. How about the fact that he dumped over $8000.00 pages on the Judiciary Committee 48 hours before we had a hearing in this committee that is the abuse of power and that is what I would prosecute every day of the week obstruction I prosecute the Democrats for obstruction of Congress still I love the fact that I had a motion to subpoena the whistleblower the whistleblower who by the way you cannot point to any statute there s no statute that gives out whistleblower the right to be Anonymous does not exist no matter what you say I had the motion to subpoena the whistleblower 2 weeks ago that motion was denied I never got my subpoena and it was done in a partisan fashion straight down partisan lines so that is the of shocks and I would prosecute that every single day folks as a legal analysis this is nothing more than a political hit job thanks and I yield the ranger my time gentleman years back to work purposes nation and move to strike the last word and. You know I want to reiterate. Democrat of Pennsylvania president s policies are personality or even his tweets were not judging the president himself or judging his actions and I understand that he ran to disrupt the government the problem is he went further by abusing his power endangered our elections and our national security. He remains an ongoing threat to both He s shown a pattern of inviting foreign interference in our elections and trying to cover it up twice he s threatening to do it again so we ve heard a lot of loose talk about what evidence we have or don t have there is plenty of direct evidence of the president s wrong doing including for example is July 25th call records in which he said to the Ukrainian president I want you to do was a favor though and then proceeded to request investigations into his political rival in a de bunked conspiracy theory that the Senate and all of our national security services have rejected we have the testimony of his appointees ambassadors Sandland and Bowker about the May 23rd meeting in which the president said to them talk to Rudy we have testimony of 3 1st hand witnesses to the July 25th call to phone promptly reported the call to their superiors and to legal counsel we have the testimony of David Holmes who overheard the president ask him Bassett or son Lindh whether President Selenski was going to quote do the investigation we have the president s many public statements including his October 3rd statement that Ukraine and China should investigate his political rival even the minority counsel Mr Castro admitted that there was direct evidence he said quote We had some direct evidence on certain things and we had some direct evidence on the May 23rd meeting and someone gave some direct evidence and quote the 2nd hand accounts are also extensively corroborated for example embassador Taylor and Mr Morrison both testified that during a September 7th phone call with Ambassador sun President Trump said there was no quid pro quo but the president s Alinsky had to go to the microphone and announce investigations kind of giving with one hand and taking away with the other. Ambassador someone testified he had no reason to dispute ambassador Taylor s and Mr Morrison s testimony about this conversation there s also circumstantial evidence there was no contemporaneous explanation given for the president s decision to withhold the military aid that had bipartisan support from Congress that didn t come until after the Articles of Impeachment were filed and the uniform consensus of the State Department the Defense Department and White House witnesses is that the a should have been released given these facts the only logical explanation as ambassador son concluded was that like the White House meeting the aide was being used to leverage pressure on President Selenski at the end of the day the evidence is overwhelming and indisputable. President Trump s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani pushed Ukraine to investigate his political rival and a de bunked conspiracy theory his efforts had nothing to do with u.s. Policy and were taken on the president s behalf and with the president s knowledge President Trump directed u.s. Officials and presidents Olinsky himself to work with Mr Giuliani President Trump ordered that critical military aid for Ukraine be withheld Ukrainian officials were informed the aide would not be released and must president Selenski publicly announce an investigation and President Trump refused to release the aide until his pressure campaign on the Ukraine was exposed President Trump refused to arrange a meeting with President Alinsky and President Trump s agents advise Ukrainian officials that the White House meeting would be scheduled only after President Selenski committed investigations President Trump ignored the anti-corruption talking points prepared for his calls President Trump and asked President Selenski directly to investigate President Trump s chief political rival and President Trump stonewalled Congress s Congress s investigation. You know I don t know what more you can ask for here we ve got admissions from the president we ve got corroboration from people he s appointed. The only thing you can do is stick your head in the sand if you re not willing to see what happened here and with that I would yield to my colleague from Florida is she here Ok she s. Thank you you re just seconds away for the next year I took a. Gentle lady as if I. Were purpose is to arms to see Greg move to strike the last word it is recognized for weeks my Democratic colleagues Armstrong Republican from North Dakota tested bribery. But they had a problem because these things will never change there was no pressure both President Selenski and President Trump said that there was no pressure no one to be no victim . You don t. Know if the aid was released and there was no investigation and you know what else there was no whistle blower there was no Adam shit so we are left with abuse of power and obstruction of justice and impeach them in is either a solemn constitutional affair which this is absolutely not our whatever the majority wants it to be which this absolutely is if you cannot prove any of it I guess you re going to use all of it so why not expand it to all the way back to the where this thing all started. And buried in the bottom of Article 2 of this impeachment is the language these actions were consistent with the president terms of previous efforts to undermine United States government investigations into foreign interference United States elections this is nothing more than a legislative drive by are probably more accurate of merged majorities attempt to return to the scene of a non crime but I guess after 2 years 1000 lawyers 40 agents 500 warrants 22800 subpoenas $30000000.00 There s simply no way they could leave it out. So here s just a reminder the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference Sacto to Vaduz Moeller Report page 2. This started the day President Trump won new election this has been the foregone conclusion since the day the Democrats won back the majority this was never about facts or fairness so here we are where we were always going to be on a purely partisan impeachment that is destined to fail in the Senate and with that I yield back. General yells back for what purpose is a. Well can see great nation strike the last word tonight is recognized you know I have listened carefully as Zoe Lofgren Democrat from California who as we ve said has been involved in the impeachment inquiry into Nixon Clinton and now try think it s important to look back to the founders in the foundation of what it is that we re doing here the founders knew that the. Howard is given to the president needed to have the capacity to be curbed in the case of abuse the framers of the Constitution consciously adopted a particular phrase from the English practice to help define the constitutional grounds for removal the content of the phrase high crimes and misdemeanors for the framers as to be related to what the framers knew on the whole about the English practice the broad sweep of English cars to show history and the vital role in Pietschmann had played in the limitation of royal prerogative and the control of abuses of ministerial and judicial power now when you re coming to private affairs in an ordinary criminal law it s possible in advance to define what it is you can t do you can t. Steal that money you can t. Have that person when you re talking about the abuse of presidential power. You can t always specifically define what a bad actor in the White House might do and therefore you have the term high crimes and misdemeanors and you have the abuse of presidential power it s important to note and in the 2nd article of impeachment against Richard Nixon there was an article for abuse of power the article principally addressed President Nixon s use of power including the powers that stood solely in the president to aid his political allies harm his political opponents gain improper personal political advantages he used his power and this is a quote it was undertaken for his personal political advantage and not in furtherance of any valid national political objective his presidential powers and again this is a quote We re seriously incompatible with our system of constitutional government and warranted removal from office we have a situation similar here but I want to address the issue raised by my colleague from Ohio because I do agree that there can be a tendency in the country these days to immediately think well I don t like that let s go to impeachment and that has frankly been prevalent send the Clinton impeachment lying under oath is a crime lying about sex is a shame but neither one involves the use of presidential powers. And the use of impeachment in that instance really in an improper way it was never the abuse of presidential power I think put it in the public mind that this is a tool to be used for disagreements about policy nothing could be further than the truth I was disappointed I voted against the Iraq war but the Congress voted some people thought we should have articles of impeachment about that no that did not undercut the cost to Szell order congress voted it was a mistake but it was the president and the Congress together it was not the president usurping the powers of another branch of government here we have a situation that is so obvious if you look at the facts how come it s just inconceivable that things I ve heard today are just stunning to me that you could reach a conclusion as to really defense counsel here grasping at straws. The president misused his presidential power to gain a personal benefit to the detriment of the interests of the United States it was an abuse of power that harmed us and it is ongoing it is a threat to the constitutional order it meets the definition of high crimes and misdemeanors it is abuse of presidential power and is our responsibility to use the tool that our founders gave us in the Constitution to preserve that cause to show order we must impeach I yield back General he yields back 6 recognition for our purposes was to go and see great strides the last war and lose regular us and yet just record comment Louie Gohmert Republican of Texas about President Clinton s actions when you lie under oath it s perjury it s a crime. And I understand the comment that he wasn t acting in his official capacity that would set back the maid to movement if they took that position you know having sex with an employee it s that my juncture when you re present the United States that s not in his fishing capacity but no matter how long we spin today denied tomorrow it doesn t make up for the fact that we did not have fact witnesses I mean this this reminds me historically of the trial of salve Socrates you know where he got convicted by the jury of 501 people while because he was arrogant you want to try Donald Trump for being arrogant. I m sure you d have a lot of Republicans vote with you on that yeah he s arrogant he s got a lot of to be arrogant about but that is not a crime it is not a high crime for sure and it s certainly not a misdemeanor it s bothersome to people some people like it but that s not what impeachment is supposed to be about and to have had a trial the what few here say gossip mongering witnesses there were coming to a star chamber and so create their testimonies so people can t see them can t hear them but we have Adam Schiff put it together in in in a big report and we received the report on how much time to review it but that s all we need we don t even get to hear from the preparer of the report and get to cross-examine him this is a Stalinist top proceeding that s the way it worked under Stalin you didn t get to find out what the fact witness is because usually there weren t any just like here so what do you have you have people come in and give appearance give their impressions and give an appearance and oh gee we re well educated you know great that s fine and if you re ever not sure about being good at rationalizing go to law school you re trying to do that so that when you hate a person like that 3 witnesses obviously do don t drop you can come in and just misrepresent facts and use those to base your opinions on them just great but look at what really started this started before Muller It started back. Carter Paige had worked for the CIA a to help them against the Russians and what did they do they pervert that lied to the court and say oh he has worked with Russians misrepresented who is what he did it what a patriot he was and then get a warrant. And then his time goes on they lie about it and where did this this Al come from it came from Hillary Clinton s campaign the Democratic National Campaign Committee and they hired a fusion g.p.s. They hired a foreigner to affect our election and they worked with an Australian. Man and they actually Christopher Steele admitted you know what those people who gave me that information they may have been Russian they may have been Ukrainians be nice to know but the majority didn t want us to get there and the very week we find out how bad this travesty was that top people in the f.b.i. And the Department of Justice per verted justice because they didn t like the guy that might get elected they did everything they could they used all these foreign resources to try to change the outcome of the 2016 election and when that didn t work then they came forward with impeachment it was oh let s project what we did on Donald Trump but it turned out he didn t do that in even Mahler and Wiseman as much as they hated drop they couldn t find anything to to use against President Trump so we had to drop the Russian collusion we had to drop the treason Oh what about obstruction just will is not obstruction of justice when you know you re innocent and you know the Department of Justice is trying to set you up and you re trying to expose the truth you know it was others who were obstructing the true justice. Then man for heaven s sake you set that up as you were always no hero he was mad because Trump didn t do what he told him for those who believe in prayer for this country pray for mercy we can t afford justice or the country but. For purposes. You should move to strike the last word Mr Lu is really worth it your chairman 5 more minutes so I see a Democrat of Texas long day when you look at what the other side has presented in defense of the president why do we get. Nothing now if we all will defend the president s actions because quite simply you cannot defend the indefensible you just can t even if you like him his supporters actions you just won t defend what he did it s really quite simple it s not complicated at all he offered official acts in exchange for political favor he s a clear and present danger to do it again he ignored the powers that people and he will do it again it s really just that simple Their president is an eminent and eminent threat their president has showed us his pattern of conduct he has made clear that he will continue to abuse his power to corrupt the 2020 elections in this act with a sense of urgency to protect our democracy and defend our Constitution and the Clinton case the House voted to impeach $72.00 days after it authorized an inquiry it has been $94.00 days since Congress launched its investigation into the president s dealings in Ukraine. And Pietschmann is a charging decision I could grand jury or a prosecutor makes it we have seen more than enough evidence here to charge him and move to trial in the Senate it is the president who is abusing his power what is not fear is the president s blanket refusal to participate in this inquiry for the sole purpose of hiding the facts from the American people for a group records have ruled that Congress has a constitutional right to obtain documents and testimony from the trumpet ministration one federal court said that their presence obstructions is a farce and he is openly stonewalling and I agree he is the 1st president to engage in wall to wall stonewalling and in some respects and outright coverup of his own behavior he has refused to comply with all the congressional subpoenas that have been issued to try to uncover the truth about his misconduct and act that no other citizen can do without consequence as has been stated before even President Nixon shared documents in the loud current and former aides to testify as part of the impeachment process and the committee still recommended an article of impeachment against him for obstruction last night I reminded us that all this is really a protest about preserving and protected our democracy for the little boys and girls across this nation so that they will know about what it means to make a promise to make a pledge and to keep it because democracy is a gift that each generation gives to the next. And that s why we have to take action we have to move forward and we must impeach the president with that Mr Chairman I yield the remainder of my time to my colleague from Florida miss a personal pal Thank you Ms Garcia I just wanted to answer to every car so powerful Democratic supporter and clarify that I along with so many of my colleagues so many of us that you see seize sitting on this day as we did not come here to impeach the president of the United States we came to lower health care costs and that s exactly what we did today we voted on h.r. 3 today to lower prescription drug prices they say let the American people decide Well that is why last week we voted on the Voting Rights Amendment Act which many of my Republican colleagues voted against Let American society yes that is exactly why we re here because we don t want Russia Ukraine or China making the decision for us in our American government this president has committed the highest crime by abusing the power of his office inviting foreign interference in our elections and that is why we are here today please don t confuse Americans with false claims and pushing the bunked conspiracy theories we re here to tell the American people the truth ailed back generally years back who seeks regulation for purposes. Destroyed the last word it was regulars. Mr Chairman I ve lost track of the no Tom McClintock Republican of California record in these proceedings but I think it s a telling commentary on the quality of the case that this committee is relying on to support the exercise of one of the most profound actions we can take I think it underscores dereliction of duty of a judiciary committee drafting articles of impeachment without a single fact hearing virtually the entire record is the ship report and newspaper clippings as I reminded the committee yesterday this week Mr shift report on Pfizer abuse was categorically and completely contradicted by the inspector general s report as to shift work is not exactly what you can call the gold standard of accuracy or reliability your incisive analysis and newspaper clippings with all due respect are not exactly this solid foundation that can support our wielding such power impeachment should be made of sterner stuff matter so momentous is this should be considered thoroughly and dispassionately and fairly and Mr Chairman just substitute our judgment for that of the American people by nullifying a national election is a very weighty matter if you re going to do that you should have a record of fact that no reasonable person can deny a one sided report from Adam Schiff and a newspaper scrapbook is the foundation of peace meant that I predict will crumble and disintegrate before the Senate finishes its consideration. Abuse of Power is exactly the vague and expansive ground that the Founders considered as maladministration and rejected in favor of the narrow ground of treason bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors a lawful exercise of the president s constitutional authority is not impeachable and the moment that we make it so the president becomes a servant of Congress and the separation of powers which is protected our freedom for nearly 2 and a half centuries will be greatly diminished and similarly the president s assertion of long established boundaries that maintain the separation of powers is also not impeachable and once we make it so we also clearly diminish the separation of powers the overwrought political hyperbole that we ve heard over and over through these hearings ought to warn us that we re straying into partisan motives which must never animate the impeachment power of Congress public opinion has not coalesced around this act which should also alert us to the danger that by proceeding we would further divide and alienate the American people and royal and agitate the political waters of this nation you failed to find any law that the president has violated if you could you should clearly articulate that you should support it with legal admitted admissible evidence and put it in the articles Otherwise your case is simply a disagreement with decisions the President is authorized to make and again this is a matter that there are costs to some reserves to the voters and not to the Congress and by denying the witnesses requested by the minority you ve blinded the committee to the getting the whole story if you re truly confident of your case you should have nothing to fear from what a full airing of testimony would off. The most chilling observation I ve heard is that we can do this because we re not restricted like the Department of Justice as well the same rights of due process and the same fidelity to the Constitution are required of us and the impeachment of Andrew Johnson Congress made many of the same mistakes that we are making tonight I would urge my colleagues to carefully consider how history has judged them and how it will judge us I yield back. General years back where purposes of his Jaya posi Greg has moved to strike last word and ladies regular. Thank you Mr Chairman we just continue mellow to try appalls I mean out of Washington for the president s behavior and this is such a grave moment that we re in we re talking about the highest constitutional crimes abuse of power and obstruction of Congress and so let me once again just review the facts 1st my Republican colleagues have said that this is about corruption but all of President Trump s agencies all of his advisors everyone unanimously told him that Ukraine had passed all the anti-corruption benchmarks the Department of Defense said that Ukraine had passed their review on anti-corruption benchmarks so no further corruption policies were needed president Trump s administration cut programs designed to fight corruption in Ukraine and President Trump was given talking points by the National Security Council that specifically said if talk to say these things about corruption but guess what happened on those calls in April and July President Trump did not mention corruption he did not use the talking points that he was given the only 2 names that he mentioned on the July 21st call were Joe and Hunter Biden 2nd the Republican suggested that this was all about President from concerns with Burden sharing with our allies but that wasn t true that wasn t true Mr Holmes testified that burden sharing was not a problem Europe was actually contributing 4 times as much money as the United States did and Ambassador Solomon testified that he was never asked to go to the European Union and ask for more money and remember Mr Sutherland is President Trump s ambassador to the European Union what was Ambassador Sunland told to communicate to Ukraine by President Trump he was told to say that resumption of aid would likely not. Occur unless President Selenski announced the investigation specifically he said that quote unless Selenski went to the mike and announced these investigations there would be a stalemate over the 8 and what were those investigations 2016 election interference and response meaning the Bidens So finally left with nothing else to argue in defense of the president the Republicans have raised one more thing which is that President Trump had a legitimate reason somehow legitimate reason to investigate Vice President Biden but once again that makes no sense it makes no sense because the facts are that that investigation of the of that issue of the Biden. Biden and recently went back to 2015. And President Trump released aid in 20172800 so he clearly didn t have a problem in 20 with the issues of 2015 because he had 2 opportunities to release 8 and he did but something changed in 2019 and the only thing that changed is that Vice President Biden suddenly started beating President Trump in the polls so the evidence is clear President Trump said Do us a favor though and who was the us well he told us he told us that exactly what he meant by us he told President Selenski that us meant deal with Rudy Giuliani President Trump s personal attorney who knows and this is a quote very much knows what s going on present Trump could have gone through official channels if he wanted if this investigation was actually legitimate he could have asked the Department of Justice to initiate an investigation into the Bidens and respond but he didn t do that he did not do that and the Department of Justice said that he didn t do that he never asked them to do an investigation or even talk to you crane Instead President Trump asked his personal attorney because us was not about America this wasn t about official policy this wasn t about what was right for our country this was not about putting America 1st every witness testified to that as well this was personal it was all for president Trump s personal political gain this was to benefit Trump s own reelection campaign and that s why he had his personal attorney do this he abused his power he abused the power that the people and trusted to him he abused the office and he placed our safety millions of dollars of taxpayer money all at risk for his own personal political election and that is the $1.00 thing the president can t. To he cannot use our money the powers of the office that we entrusted to him we the people not for us but for himself that is the greatest abuse of power and this president has left us no choice but to impeach him I yield back. Generally years back when it was as Mr Jones says he should move to strike less work it was ridiculous Thank you Mr Chairman this morning I began by I Johnson Republican of Louisiana most of us are attorneys on this committee and in this case were also called to serve as finders of fact we re supposed to carefully and objectively analyze the claims not against our personal preferences but against the record of evidence and now we ve done that for the past 12 hours and it s time to summarize our case at the end of the day now now literally the end of the day they re just too short articles for this impeachment resolution they brought before us abuse of power and obstruction of justice and let s review both on the 1st the Democrats know there is 0 direct evidence in the record of these proceedings to show that President Trump and gage in any scheme of any kind as they ve alleged or that he intended in his dealings with Ukraine to influence the 2020 election all they ve argued today is based on hearsay speculation and conjecture completely the truth is there s not a single fact witness that could provide testimony to support their paper thin case which is precisely why we ve been given no opportunity or for a fact witness or a minority hearing. What the evidence does show is that President Trump holds a deep seated genuine and reasonable skepticism of Ukraine due to its history of pervasive corruption and his administration sought proof that the newly elected president s Alinsky was a true reformer President Trump wanted to ensure that American taxpayer funded security assistance would not be squandered overseas by what is reported to be the 3rd most corrupt nation in the world the Trump Ukraine discussion discussions were never about what will happen in 2020 but rather about what already happened in 2016 the Democrats 2nd claim is that President Trump obstructed justice by simply doing what virtually every other president in the modern era has also done to assert a legitimate executive privilege and legal immunity to avoid subpoenas issued to various White House officials there is simply no evidence of any impeachable offense here either and if they had not promised an impeachment to their liberal base by Christmas the Democrats could and should have simply gone a few blocks away to the federal court to get a simple order compelling the extra documents and information they subpoenaed but that s what s always been done in the past but they don t have time for that here because they re trying to meet their own arbitrary completely reckless and Macchiavelli and timeline to take down a president they loathe the real abuse of power here is on the part of the House Democrats of this feverish we pursued this impeachment 20 times faster than the impeachment investigation of Bill Clinton to reach their pre-determined political outcome along the way they have steamrolled over constitutionally guaranteed due process previously sacrosanct house rules and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure they have ignored or blocked a school Vittori evidence intimidated witnesses restricted Republican lines of questioning denied defense witnesses an involvement of the president s counsel restricted Republican review of evidence denied minority here and violated proper minority notice in fairness at every single stage the founders of this court country warned against a single party impeachment for good reason. They feared that it would bitterly and perhaps irreparably divide our nation our chairman Mr NAVL or gave a speech about that 20 years ago when he was opposing the impeachment of Bill Clinton the obvious truth is that our liberal colleagues are valid to impeach President Trump since the day of his election their reason of the day changed at least a half a dozen times over the last 3 years but they can never get any traction or any facts to justify those various conspiracy theories as the next election in 2020 has drawn so close now and their candidates for president are so terribly weak they obviously met somewhere at liberal high command about 75 days ago and convinced Nancy Pelosi they had to pull the trigger the problem is they ve done that and in all those hearings in the basement they couldn t uncover a single fact to justify their latest conspiracy theory about Ukraine so what to do they left no choice to desperately create a totally fraudulent unprecedented process to try to rewrite Donald Trump the results is what our expert witness testified as quote the shortest proceeding with the thinnest evidence for your record and the narrowest grounds ever used to impeach a President I m a constitutional law attorney by profession and I ve actually enjoyed the sparse 4 minutes of real intellectual debate we had today on the actual contours of Article 2 Section 4 but every high school civics student at home can read its plain language and see what is expressly required to impeach a president you need treason bribery or a high crime or misdemeanor none of that exists here and everybody knows it those high school students at home know it our constituents know it and in their heart of hearts even our friends on the other side of the room tonight know it my good friend Mr Cohen said in his closing a few moments ago that he s proud to be a politician but I would say with all sincerity this moment doesn t call for politicians the weight of history is upon us here and this moment calls for statesman this impeachment is going to fail and the Democrats are going to justly pay a heavy political price for it but the Pandora s Box they ve opened today will do irreparable damage to our country in the years ahead and that is the real tragedy of the vote we re about to take God help us yield back General yields back put his disease is his best mission I m going to strike the last word ladies recognized. A little while. Ago one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who was saying that this is Karen Bass Democrat of California reason why it was withheld was because the president wanted to investigate corruption the idea that the most corrupt president that we have seen in recent history will held military aid because he was concerned about corruption is ludicrous as my colleagues have pointed out both cause the President Trump had with President Selenski Trump never mention corruption but he partment of defense valid giving the aid and said it was Ok Once upon a time President Trump loved his generals this time he ignored them members of Congress authorized the aid and lobbied the White House to release the staff from the Office of Management and Budget resigned because they were worried about what was going on and why the aid was withheld they were worried about what the president was doing and they believe that withholding the aid was wrong from the then cut funding for programs to deal with corruption in countries like Ukraine so a man that is so concerned about corruption also has interesting friends he has bromance with some of the world s most corrupt leaders the leaders from Saudi Arabia Turkey he had the president earlier one from Turkey just a couple of weeks ago at the White House but we know his number one pow is President Putin so all the president s men all the men around him that were indicted arrested incarcerated my mother used to say that if you lay down with dogs don t be surprised if you get up with fleas the man who claimed he wanted to clean up the swamp created his own swamp and he s drowning in it now I do have to say though that I have empathy for my Republican colleagues because I don t believe that they have a choice they have to defend the president and they dare not step out of line because if they do they will see. For the consequences a few of my Republican colleagues earlier did try to say that they didn t believe that the president s conduct was appropriate and they got slapped quickly the president said his conduct he said the call was absolutely perfect and so now you don t hear any of them saying are questioning whether his behavior was appropriate you have to fall in line and not only do you have to fall in line you have to praise him constantly like those famous press conferences we ve seen in the Oval Office where they one by one go around the table and talk about their praise for him it makes me feel like a meeting that would take place in North Korea where you have to praise dear leader so you have to fall in line because the entire reason was corruption but I know that you know better you have to say that he did nothing wrong one of my colleagues said that we are lowering the bar on impeachment I believe that we have lowered the bar on the presidency it is so sad to see my colleagues who I believe know what s better they are not able to say it they know that the man is corrupt when it comes to impeachment there is no higher crime than for the president to use the power of his office to corrupt our elections. We will move to impeach President Trump because of the abuse of power through self dealing the the trail of national security in the service of foreign interests and the corruption of our elections that undermine our democratic system so if my colleagues on the other side of the aisle can t bring themselves to do what is right and impeach a president that what that they know is a threat to our election that then we that they know is a threat to our standing in the world then we will have to do it and we will have to move to impeach. Now to Representative Jackson Lee I thank the journal 84 year old ng my conclusion Jackson Lee Democrat of Texas to my friends on the other side to the Americans who listen to the soldiers everywhere who wear uniforms I have no and so I have no dislike of anyone who voted for anyone in 2016 I take issue with insult that one would suggest the work of this committee is about a dislike for those who voted for President from President Trampas before this committee in articles of impeachment for his own behavior for his desire to do with public money and a public position to do a private matter and a political matter and that is to get dirt on his 2020 potential opponent and altering and defending the Constitution we defend and honor ourselves and for that reason as an indicting body to articles of impeachment we will give the opportunity for the Congress to decide on President Trump s ultimate result but I stand with the Constitution abilities and stand justice are your values time is expired what purpose does Mrs. Try to us were regulars. Fool me once shame on you Eric. California shame on me we allow the president the United States to again abuse his office for his own personal gain and shame on all of us shame on our Constitution we know he s going to do that again because on June 12th of this year he told George Stephanopoulos before this phone call with President Alinsky happened that if he could again receive help from a foreign government as he did from Russia he would do it again on July 24 or testified to our committee he said that the president to be charged with up to 10 crimes of obstruction of justice but the Department of Justice prevents him from doing that the next day the president did it again and every prosecutor when they are assigned a case will open up the file in the 1st thing we all do is we look at the rap sheet was this an aberration or is this a pattern of conduct that the person engages in but it s not just prosecutors who look or use a rap sheet we all do it in our everyday lives if you re a small business owner and you re hiring an employee and find out that they have multiple facets of their past from their employer you probably won t hire them if you re a parent looking for a night out and hiring a babysitter and multiple references said the babysitter is always late you wouldn t ask that person to watch your kids if you re going to a restaurant for an anniversary and saw multiple bad reviews you wouldn t go to that restaurant. The president doesn t just have bad reviews he has. Really bad prior conduct serious priors he s a repeat offender crimes against our Constitution and yes crimes that one day may be prosecuted statutorily he has abused his power in the past he is abusing his power right now he will abuse it tomorrow. We have a Department of Justice who will continue to protect him but fortunately the American people have a Congress who can say that he s not above the law and we re not helpless in holding him accountable and I yield to the gentleman from Rhode Island I think the German you know we ve heard a lot of explanation of why we re here tonight that we don t like the policies the president we we don t like the present. Real reason we re here tonight is the conduct of the president the grave misconduct and so I just want to recount very quickly again the evidence that was presented in text messages and call records in e-mails in hundreds of presidents in tweeds present from big knowledge that he d been engaged on a personal basis through his lawyer investigating a Ukraine the president s Alinsky is sensitive about Ukraine being taken seriously not merely as an instrument in Washington domestic reaction politics as ambassador said the David Holmes test fire of I was surprised the requirement was so specific and concrete there was a demand the presence Alinsky personally commit to a specific investigation of President trumps political rival on cable news and the evidence goes on and on and on of the president s effort to use the enormous powers of his office to betray the national interest and cheat in the election in 2020 and use hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to attempt to achieve that objective our founders talked about abuse of power because they were recognize that the power of the presidency was enormous There was a danger that a president would use that power not for the public good but for his own personal or political or financial advantage and so they created articles of impeachment to give a final check against that abuse of power no one s here because we want to do this we re here because we have no choice we re not acting out of hate We re acting out of love of our country and love of our democracy. When generations look back on this moment they will ask what did we do to preserve our democracy and the only thing we can do to preserve that is to hold this president accountable because if that we don t they will ask us why we failed to preserve the greatest democracy on earth that has been an example to the world and in this moment we have to find the courage to be sure we can answer that question for all future generations and not be part of an effort to undermine the greatest democracy known to man and so I urge my colleagues tonight we must approve these articles of impeachment so we can make it clear that nobody in this country in the greatest country in the world is above the law even the most powerful person the president of the United States and with that I yield back General goes back for purposes Mr Jeffrey seek recognition of the strike last word and it is recognized the record is clear. You re listening. To the impeachment from n.p.r. News 2020 election and Hakeem Jeffries gritty of our democracy as well as on. N.p.r. For Central. Bankers. Along with commentary from n.p.r. Osas Well here s a process concern that you might reflect upon earlier today Mitch McConnell gave some indication as to how a possible trial in the Senate may run and this is what Senator McConnell said I m going to coordinate with the president s lawyers so there won t be any difference between us on how to do this. In other words the jury this is special coverage of the impeachment Mark I m from n.p.r. News I m Chairman Hobson in Washington and we have just hit our 14 of this markup that s been going on since 9 o clock Eastern Time this morning N.P.R. s congressional correspondent Kelsey Snell is on Capitol Hill Kelsey just looking at the monitors here of the hearing room and a number of members are asleep no joke. Do we have any sense of what s going to happen when they will actually vote on these articles of impeachment we have heard a number of members start referencing the concept of closing statements and the things that they are saying right now are their closing statements so that seem to be nearing a vote expecting one procedural vote through vote on those articles that each meant obstruction of justice. And do you have a sense by the way that the leadership that the chairman of the committee knows how many people are going to be speaking or the ranking member knows how many of his members are going to be speaking or is it just kind of they re just flying by the seat of their pants and civically the ranking member would know the number of amendments that are are coming and you know it s entirely possible that we had a break not too terribly long ago and it s entirely possible that they had a meeting of the minds and kind of made a decision that this didn t need to continue going on to the next day that is Kelsey style and let s go back to the hearing here Hakeem Jeffries of New York speaking now as a Democrat when we put democracy over demagoguery what exactly will history say about us. I yield now to my distinguished colleague from the great state of Texas this is Escobar Thank you Mr Chairman I m going to speak directly to the American people were on the casket Democrat of Texas they bypassed the Republican talking points that they ve heard over and over and over again especially for those Americans who have been listening and watching all day and instead go directly to the evidence you are .
That at that point he had not slept for several days driving east on Interstate 10 just beyond Palm Springs he lost control of his car which jumped the median and skidded to a stop on the shoulder of the westbound side he called Hertz which came to collect the damaged car and gave him a 2nd rental. The Hertz Rental officer told me he found a crack pipe in the car and on one of the console s a line of white powder residue both Bidens attorney general badges on the dashboard Hertz called the press got police department and officers filed a narcotics offense report listing items seized in the car including a past plastic bag containing white powdery substance a secret service business card credit cards and $100.00 Biden s driver s license that is what we would call evidence and I don t want to make light of anybody s substance abuse issues I know the president s working hard to solve those throughout the country but it s a little hard to believe the barista hired 100 by a group to resolve their international disputes when he could not resolve his own dispute with Hertz rental car over lien leaving cocaine in a crack pipe in the car it continues hundreds stayed in Los Angeles for about a week he said that he needed to get away and forget soon after his arrival in l.a. He said he asked a homeless man in Pershing Square where he could buy crack under said the man took him to a nearby homeless encampment where a narrow passageway between tents someone put a gun to his head before realizing that he was the buyer you refer he returned to buying more crack a few times that week again not saying you re not casting any judgment on any challenges someone goes through in their personal life but it is just hard to believe that this was the guy wandering through a homeless encampment by a crack that was worth 86000 dollars of birth to very small holdings and that might be one of the reasons why when a.b.c. Asked one of Biden Hey you think you would have gotten this job in the absence of your dad being the vice president well he said Probably not and then I looked to the record evidence and I looked at the testimony of Mr Ken Mr Kant was one of the witnesses they called on the 1st day he said very small was so dirty that our own embassy had to pull out of a joint sponsorship with them when Ambassador Yavanna bitch was being prepped for her Senate confirmation the. Obama administration was so worried about the corruption around Verismo on 100 Biden that they held special prep moments to try to get ready for the inevitable questions about this obvious corruption that the president asked about Mr Ken again one of their witnesses from the 1st day also gave testimony that very small had stood at the head of very small had stolen $23000000.00 in the us in the u.k. And that he paid a bribe to get off the hook so again it s not as if very small as pulling out new plays their playbook is to do dirty stuff and then go and pay bribes and hire the people necessary to make those problems go away. This is why the minority hearing issue is so important by the way you wonder why Republicans are so angry that we didn t have a hearing put on our own witnesses unknown evidence and you may wonder why Wolf they feel so good about their case why did they block our ability to put in evidence it s because we have the ability to show that is corrupt we have the ability to show that 100 Biden is corrupt and that totally exculpates to quote the president because there is no way in the United States of America that honestly pursuing actual corruption is an impeachable offense that s why they offer the amendment 9 courage my colleagues to vote for it. Mr Chairman I was I withdraw my point of order. Mr Chairman. The gentlemen generally deals back weapons this was just a secret a move to strike the last word it was regulars Mr Chairman I rise in opposition to this amendment and I would say that. This is Hank Johnson Democrat of Georgia hot calling the kettle black it s not something that we should do I don t know. I don t know what members if any have had any problems with substance abuse been busted in DUI. I don t know but if I did I wouldn t raise it against. Anyone on this committee I don t think it s proper and and you know I think we ve got to get back down to what is most important here is this is something this is a question that stands out like a big crowd being sort told inside of us shoe that s too small and that is this question Is it ever Ok for a president of the United States of America to invite foreign interference in an upcoming presidential election campaign. The silence is silent when you don t want to be led to the silence it will be those that tell you the silent. People response was and is deafening. And they ll be plenty of time for you to respond to that question and I would invite you to do so I gave you an opportunity of about 10 to 15 seconds. While you could get your story together and nobody came up with a story so I m going to let you move to strike the last word and explain that to the American people it s never proper for a United States president to hold a foreign country over a barrel to make them do that president s personal bidding and holding needed security assistance dangling it. And dangling the fact that I ll give it to you if you do this I mean that s exactly what happened it s like you re American people understand what happened those are the those are the facts the president said it when he released the transcript of the summary of of that phone call on July 25th the summary of the president s own words shows that the president tried to get presidents Olinsky to interfere in the upcoming presidential election that is a stablished by the facts so this is not about Hunter Biden and they ve said that on the other side repeatedly up until they start talking about Hunter Biden having some substance abuse problems you can t have it both ways let s be honest this is about our conscience. The conscience of the nation the conscience my friends on the other side of the aisle do you believe that we should allow this to go unaddressed what the president did because we are a country of president. We are a country of rule of law we are a country of norms and traditions are we going to allow the violation of our norms our traditions our legal precedents because after all bribery was not a crime there was no criminal code when the framers passed the constitution but they said bribery in there and what bribery meant was I m offering you something if you do something for me I ll give you this in other words you give me this I ll give you that that s what we had in this case that s what bribery means it doesn t depend on a statute it depends on what we know was done and so let s not get bogged down in technicalities and in character assassination let s keep our eye on what really happened in this case and whether or not our conscious contents is dictate that we do something about it we can t let it go unaddressed and the way that we deal with this grave abuse of the public trust is with the drastic action that it requires because this is a drastic circumstance the drastic action is impeachment and that s why we re here today and I ask my colleagues to let your conscience be your guide you beg it of years back and said what the reason is Mr Sensenbrenner Sharon I m going to strike the last word it was written to us and Chairman I my mind is blog old I am a gentleman James Sensenbrenner Republican rivalry was Ok until 17 easy 7 when the Constitution was adopted in 2 years later when Congress passed the 1st criminal code 1st of all as a common law definition of bribery. People log the forest $787.00 and realize that bribery was no good but we also had criminal codes and each of the 13 independent states colonies before the Declaration of Independence the gentleman and so my question no I m I m I m sure I didn t interrupt you. Ok The 2nd thing is that. If you on the other side of the aisle believe that you ll buy is a man who tells the truth you ought to support this amendment because Joe Biden ever since Hunter s involvement with ruse has been repeatedly asked whether he made any arrangements to get under this really cushy job and he said no or my son s business involvement surmised and not involved in that so you put Joe Biden name in your articles of impeachment when the real malefactor is 100 by 100 is not running for anything. And if real malefactor really is 100 by I guess your claim that the president was trying to influence the 20 twentieth s election would go out the window but if you think that Joe Biden is a man who tells the truth and I ll give him the benefit of the doubt because I think he deserves it and then let s get rid of Joe Biden in this article of impeachment substitute his son s name in there and proceed I challenge you because every one of you there will vote no on this amendment is going to be saying I think that Joe Biden is a liar if you don t think that Joe Biden is a liar yes I yield the balance of my time to Mr Gates. Thank you Mr Chairman and again it s important to analyze that the Republican of Florida it s the Democrats who are saying any question about the Biden situation Barry sma it could only be an abuse of power and I think this amendment really reflects how the president was using as a power power perfectly entirely appropriately and it also shows how scared they are of the fact if we had the opportunity to call in those who are engaged in work with the Ukrainian embassy folks like Alexander Chalupa if we were able to bring forward 100 Biden were able to demonstrate the bias of the whistleblower the American people would see we are not in this debate and in this discussion because the president do anything wrong or impeachable or criminal we re here fundamentally because they cannot accept the fact that he won the 2016 election and I think all Americans know the president has a different approach but to accept their standard would mean that if someone announces that they re running for office it s kind of like an instant immunity deal for anything that they would ever do I mean they are they really saying that if Joe Biden 100 Biden were engaged in some corrupt act that just because Joe Biden announced for the presidency that that somehow out of auto absolve him of that criminal activity it s a ludicrous position maybe it s informed by the fact that. You all got a little lucky on the Hillary Clinton stuff you know she thought that because she was in a presidential election that her crimes didn t have to be held to account and. In a way that turned out to be the case but you know what it shouldn t be the standard in the United States of America and I m glad that we have a president who is at times skeptical of foreign aid who doesn t put America 1st who understands that in corrupt places the resources we provide don t always make it to an area of need but we concluded this once the meetings happened the demonstrated the president s Alinsky was a true reformer but he wasn t corrupt that he was honest honest from the point of his campaign all the way up and to the point when he said there was no pressure put on him or his government for this say except that proposition it s very clear the president was entirely appropriate in those questions and I got to say in debate in the last 2 men that now we are reached the point in time a President Trump in the only president being attacked in this hearing I heard the gentleman from Tennessee go after Zelinsky as well an actor or a politician and they presume he s a liar when he says there was nothing wrong you know what they can t miss make their case against a president name was car attacking Zelinsky and it shows it just shows you sort of the desert time is expired what purposes is Jackson Lee He s recognition I was asking if I could respond as my name was as I was called You know what services Ms Jackson Lee secret is right to strike the last word Louise regulars I think the chairman Sheila Jackson Lee Democrat of Texas this is about distraction distraction distraction. I ll good friend spent 3 hours saying President did not target the bines now they re saying that he did so which is it now I m holding the classified and classified conversation and let me just clarify a certain point and that point is that I did read the transcript and it did say us but there is nothing in the president s notes that even suggested. That the question that he asked was for the American people in testimony by Mr Goldman who obviously went through every aspect of this I asked the question about whether or not the president said anything from the notes that are given the briefing that is given by those representatives of the United States government the staff of the National Security Council the State Department Defense Department on corruption he didn t speak anything about corruption that he was briefed on and if you go through the call he continues to mention the Bidens and so this again is about Ukraine the president did ask Ukraine the president of Ukraine a vulnerable leader of a country that is fledgling and trying to survive now let me say that I intend to introduce into the wreckage an article that indicated very clearly. That people did die. Froze military aid as Ukrainian soldiers perished in battle l.a. Times I asked him and his consent to submit that into the record but the facts are . The well the facts are President Trump provided 510000000 in aid in 201-7359 1000000 2018 but he wanted to stop in 2019 the year months before the 2020 Alexion In addition president trumps advisors confirm the president trumps investigations 2016 election periods and the Bidens were not u.s. Policy and as well they have debunked any association that there was anything to the impropriety of the former vice president and his service as related to Ukraine. I think it is also important the Department Defense and State Department confirmed that Ukraine it met all anti-corruption benchmarks and the age should be released that s the policy of the United States of America there was no need for this president to in essence try to make up his own policy and his own statement of administrative policy and I ask unanimous consent to ask have those in the record this is from the White House nothing in this set to discuss corruption why because Ukraine had already met the standards of independent executive agencies that they had met that standard of corruption their money should have been released and we well know as the process of the whistleblower in the timing the presence Alinsky desperate for money people dying in the feel was asked to do a c.n.n. . Announcement and he was going to be on one of cnn s well known shows dealing with international politics but it was stopped in its tracks as testified by witnesses under oath because of the whistleblower statement let me be very clear there is some representation crime crime crime 1st of all our scholars indicated that these are impeachable offenses the conduct of the president is an Peach Bowl and there s enough evidence to show but as I indicated yesterday this my friends is a legal document the Constitution it is a legal document you can breach and violate the law of the Constitution there are constitutional crimes and the vastness of the impeachment process does include the excess of power by the president of the United States now I knew Barbara Jordan and my friends wanted to quote her. She also said the framers confided in the Congress the power if need be to remove a president order to strike a delicate balance between a president swollen with power and ground to real gun and preservation of the independence of the executive you can violate the crimes of the Constitution abuse of power includes this amendment should be defeated Surely the time has expired Mr Chair for purposes of this thread to see. Who tried last word to lose regulars and to chair John Wright can of Texas Georgia Mr Johnson s question and he asked before is it ever Ok to invite a foreign government to become involved in an election involving a political opponent. Yes It better be we do it all the time have you that quickly forgotten how the Trump Russia investigation proceeded the Obama administration asked Great Britain and Italy and Australia and other countries to assist in its investigation of a person who was a political opponent from the opposite party I keep hearing over and over again you can t investigate political opponents we have a member of this committee who was as a member of this committee on the Intelligence Committee. Investigating his political opponent Donald Trump at the very moment he was running to replace him as president my colleague on the Intel Committee Mr Castro was investigating President Trump at the very same moment his brother was running to replace President Trump President Trump don t we one with the really legitimate reason to be doing it he is the chief executive. Chief executive were we are in the Judiciary Committee right we do understand the constitution we do understand that the president has the unitary executive is the executive branch and all power in the executive branch derives from the president and the president can and should ask for assistance from foreign governments in ongoing criminal investigations there was an ongoing criminal investigation into what happened in 2016 the attorney general Barr at the time of the July 25th call had long before that appointed u.s. Attorney John Durham to exact to investigate exactly that issue it wasn t just appropriate it was absolutely the president s constitutional duty and Hunter Biden the president has as the chief executive the ability to ask about matters where there is a prime aphasia case of corruption what do we have with respect to 100 Biden tons of money for a position where he has no Ukraine experience where he has no experience with Ukraine or with energy and at the very same time that Ukrainians were deciding the Hunter Biden was the perfect person to get that sweetheart deal the Chinese were deciding that Hunter Biden was the perfect person to get a sweetheart deal to manage $1500000000.00 in financial assets. And when the Ukrainian government wanted to investigate corruption like we all keep talking about they need to well they start investigating breeze man what happens Joe Biden says you better fire that prosecutor investigating corruption. Into breeze or you re not going to get a 1000000000 dollars and 6 hours later that s what happened that s called influence peddling that is a crime. And there is a prime aphasia case of that and it is absolutely appropriate for a president to ask about that. My friend. I think they don t think that Jennifer you know they re going to respond to the comments from of the delay from Texas she said the president during Republican of Ohio well that s how it works in our country you get your name on a ballot you run for office you go talk to the American people they evaluate it all election day this side who they want making the policy that s how it works in our country it s not the unelected people telling the elected individual how we do things because the unelected the people aren t directly accountable to We Are people it s what makes our system the best the greatest And when you turn that on its head that s when you get problems and we saw it happen because we heard Chuck Schumer say on January 3rd 2017 when you mess with the intelligence community they have 6 ways from Sunday at getting back at you now that is a scary statement because that is saying the unelected people can get back at the person who put their name on a ballot and got elected to high office the highest office in this situation. So for someone all in the United States Congress to say the president made up his own policy and somehow that is wrong that that should be a frightening position to take but I guess that s where the Democrats are today in their quest to go after this president making statements like that statements by our colleague and statements by Senator Schumer you hear to back through Chairman what purposes the love you see regulation to strike the last word ladies recognized you know there are issues for the election and then there are issues for this committee the behavior of this is a Democrat of California sun and frankly the behavior of president trumps 2 sons and daughter may be discussed in the election but here we re talking about the abuse of presidential authority that the president must take care that the laws be faithfully executed we know from the e-mails from the State Department to the Department of Defense that the Ukrainians knew that the aid was being withheld that s documentary evidence we also know that whatever was going on that people might not like with the vice president sign in the vice president that was known in 2015201620172018 it wasn t until I suppression and Biden was beating President Trump in the polls at this issue was raised to try and. Force a foreign country to invent investigation to be used politically that is not seeing that the laws are faithfully as executed that is an abuse of presidential authority and I would yield now to the gentleman from Florida Mr doing and I think from my friend from California I said to each Democrat of Florida persons. I made this point I guess it needs to be made from time to time and we just can t simply allow the mischaracterization of the misstatement of the rules the history of the rules and House resolutions to advance political arguments here we can t stand for it and so I want to address again. These statements that there is some right to have to have witnesses come in it is absolutely true that that s the case over 50 years ago when the rule was written when Rule 6 was written it said it s normal procedure for witnesses representing both sides of the issue to give testimony a committee hearings and that s what happened in December 4 at the December 4th meeting and that s what happened in the December 9th meeting let s be honest about the rules and House Resolution $660.00 I would point out again provides an opportunity for the president of the United States to come he could have come on December 4th he could have said any of his witnesses and he didn t but no one should be surprised because that s been the president s approach throughout is to refuse to allow anyone anyone with the kind of information that my colleagues claim they re interested in from coming to testify and coming to answer questions directly and with that I yield to my friend from New York Mr Jeffries I think that is there was gentleman from Florida there with 12 and it s my time I d be happy to yield to the Gentleman thank you this thing was done a lady from Dallas on you know Democrat of New York Jack witnesses who testified during the Intel hearing 12. And we don t hear a thing about those witnesses from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle the thing. Those witnesses were not political operatives they were patriots in fact they were tromped appointees and Bassett Tayla Trump appointee ambassador Sonly Trump appointee Dr Fiona Hill Trump appointee Jennifer Williams Trump appointee lieutenant colonel then men Trump appointee ambassador Volcker Trump appointee they all confirm that Donald Trump pressured a foreign government to target an American citizen for political gain and at the same time withheld without justification $391000000.00 in military aid undermining America s national security let s just look at Ambassador Vocus testimony he testified about the issue of raising the 2016 elections of Vice President Biden all these things that I consider to be conspiracy theories what was his response it was pretty simple quote I think the allegations against Vice President President Biden are self serving and not credible that s what this is all about I yield back. And spare him and. He generally deals back. What services receive go to seek recognition support of the men speaking in general desire to strike the last word and you Mr Chairman. It is regular It s it s amazing Louie Gohmert Republican of Texas and saying people are. Accusing us. Of covering not willing to face the truth they re the same arguments that we ve been hearing for 3 years now 1st it was accusing us of not being willing to face the facts about Russian collusion and the president scheming with Russia and that turned out all to be a lot as we were right and those accusing us of not facing the truth were the ones who were not facing the truth we heard about all kinds of other allegations and we saw a way that that didn t appear to be supported Well we weren t facing the truth and there was a lot of media support for those positions but we still persisted that we were the ones that were right and this week these things are all being borne out we were right they were wrong and now we re not hearing anybody come in and say hey we re really sorry and we accuse ya ll of being crazy and and I m not facing the truth you were right there was no Russia collusion. You were right there was no extortion and my friends across the out keep changing the subject what the call made clear is we re interested in and finding out about if there was Ukrainian collusion our interference in our election now it s amazing how the majority can take 2 positions that counter indicate each other 1st of all they say there was there was no. Effort by Republicans including President trough just stop interference from foreign countries we hear that over and over including yesterday and today. And yet the only way to step up and do what President Obama refused to do if you remember President Obama be little President Trump candidate Trump for saying it was concerned about outside interference and in fact President Obama made a mockery of anybody that was so stupid that they thought somebody like Rush or others might interfere and affect our election they made fun of them he wouldn t do anything about outside interference because apparently he must ve thought the outside interference was going to help Hillary Clinton as we ve heard there are apparently are some people that certainly were accused in Ukraine of doing all they could to help Hillary Clinton in fact it was unheard of to have a foreign ambassador in our country step up and do so come out with support for Hillary Clinton so what we continue to see is projecting somebody on their side engages in illegal or improper conduct and that s what they accuse President Trump or us of doing it and all of this self-righteousness about you know for political purposes I mean this is from. Transcript from December 1st 943 when. President Roosevelt was talking to Marshall Stahl And he s talking with Stalin This is in apparently in Tehran they re meeting but he wanted to talk to him about internal American politics and from just an hour before as they say that President Roosevelt said there was there were in the United States 6 to 7000000 Americans of Polish extraction as a political man he didn t want to lose their vote and he was explaining they couldn t go public he didn t care when basically is Soviet Union to go over Poland he didn t care if they cut down Poland s borders from the east and from the West and he goes on to say. They say jokingly there when the Soviet armies occupied invaded and occupied these areas of Lithuania Latvia Estonia he did not intend to go to war with the Soviet Union on this point but he continues to emphasize you know some of these things he can t go public with these kind of things have gone on by Democrats for many decades and here they come after the one guy he wants to get to the bottom of 2016 foreign interference and what are they Cusick of of getting foreign interference now you can t root out foreign interference until you know what it was so you can t have it both ways well I guess the Democratic Party can t have it both ways but this is got to stop before it goes too much further I do a better job of years back he for purposes of this is this a levy Secret Invasion. It is. You know. What purpose does Mr Chavez see great strike last words you lose regulars Thank you Mr Chairman this is Republican Steve Shabbat of Ohio for this committee that you were investigating the wrong guy that it should have been Biden or Biden s the Ukraine was the 3rd most corrupt nation on earth and that Hunter Biden head just put himself right smack dab in the middle of that corruption and that even though Democrats and many of their friends in the media would have you believe that this the breeze my. Biden corruption that this was all just the vast right wing conspiracy you allegation when in actuality. It was the Obama administration did raise this issue 1st back in 2015 George can t reported his concerns about 100 Biden to the vice president s office and the former ambassador to Ukraine Marie you have on a vote. You have an overage sorry about that said she was coached by the Obama administration on how to answer pesky questions related to Hunter Biden embarrassment that might arise during her Senate confirmation process and nearly every single witness who testified at the intelligence committee impeachment inquiry agreed that Hunter Biden s breeze from a deal created at the very least the appearance of a conflict of interest yet the Democrats on the Intelligence Committee under the chairmanship and now Democrats in this committee are determined to sweep all this under the rug ignore it not let us call witnesses on it instead a rush to him ph this this president. You ve got the vice president Joe Biden in charge of overseeing our Ukrainian policy and his son Hunter Biden are receiving $50000.00 a month even though he had no idea Jennifer viable expertise in energy or in Ukraine yet the Democrats wouldn t let us call witnesses or delve into this and it was interesting that Joe Biden got in an argument with a man that one of his events in Iowa recently called the man a liar and challenge team to push up contest and spouted off a bunch other malarkey. And now it committee this committee is conducting an impeachment investigation against President Trump based on as Professor Turley put it recently wafer thin evidence and they re ignoring evidence of something that truly doesn t smell right wafer thin evidence and this was a professor who acknowledged that he had not of voted for President drop in fact all 4 witnesses who testified none of them had had voted for him but he said wafer thin evidence that s what we re being called to impeach a President on and while we re. Doing that there are so many things that are getting ignored now looks like one thing the u.s. M.c.a. . Trade deal which is very important to replace NAFTA it looks like we might actually get that across the finish line I certainly hope so because it would be good for the country it s bipartisan but I think if there s anything good to come out of this impeachment is probably that that actually will get passed because the Democrats want to show we did something we did something because they haven t done much of anything else very little has passed in the law we had 68000 Americans who died from opioid overdoses last year alone it was 70000 the year before that and even though the numbers gone down a bit it s not necessarily because we re doing a whole lot better it s because we actually because in our can not quite as many people are dying but there are just as many people that are involved with this this scourge these opioids in and other drugs our southern border is still a civil we have far too many people coming across our southern border that s something we ought to be able to work on in a bipartisan manner in this committee to do something about that and our style of laws which need to be reformed we ve got a 22 trillion dollar debt hanging over our head the reason I m mentioning these issues this committee has jurisdiction over all these things and isn t doing a thing because we ve been spending all our time for the last year on impeachment in one form or another but I have a bill a balanced budget amendment which would actually move in the right direction to doing something about that we should ve done it years ago those are all in our in our jurisdiction other things like infrastructure not in our jurisdiction but the United States Congress ought to act on it we have our highways and our bridges are crumbling in this country it s actually something we generally agree on but the Democrats probably don t want the president to take any credit for that so that s not likely to happen it s unfortunate taking up all this time on Pietschmann when there are so many other things that we ought to be working on it for the benefit of the American people. What purpose does Mrs receive Mr Jordan the recognition. You know to the ranking member. Just a quick say it is amazing though do they hear now they get really sensitive about process of the door Collins the ranking member of public opinion a travesty of being a rubber stamp in this committee and Mitch and Jennifer Ford has brought out a couple things but let me just remind is he said just a few minutes ago the White House going to send everything know just like everything else it all goes to the women the Wimber of the chairman in the majority they can send anybody they want it all goes to their majority opinion get back to you know you to the Jennifer Florida thing the gentleman for yielding if Democrats can t prove that the Bidens are clean then President Trump can t be guilty of abusing the net gave. Florida they cannot prove that the questions into the Bidens are unreasonable Now the gentleman from New York said well you just aren t listening to the witnesses I listened very closely to the witnesses what I heard was Mr can t say that they were so concerned about very small we could we had to pull out of a partnership with the embassy so if it s Ok for our embassy to ask the questions why did Ok for the president I listened to him baster you Vonnegut s when she gave testimony she said that she was having to do special preparation to have to answer these sticky questions about why the vice president s son was off moonlighting for some foreign energy company so if it s Ok for you Vonnegut s to ask those questions if it s Ok for the Obama administration as it was questions why did Ok for President Trump to ask those questions here s one thing I know corrupt people they don t just steal once they kind of get into this like cycle and culture of corruption and it s disappointing I go back to this New Yorker article. I m reading directly from it one of Kathleen s motions this is regarding 100 Biden s divorce contains a reference to a large diamond that had come into hundreds possession when I asked him about it he told me he had been given the diamond by Chinese energy tycoon e.j. Men 100 told me that 2 associates accompanied him to his 1st meeting with years in Miami and they surprised him by giving him a rare vintage of Scotch worth thousands of dollars so this got one just taken these weird jobs from the Ukrainians it was taken diamonds and Scotch from the Chinese and I think it is entirely appropriate for the president ited States to figure out why that s the case in America people watching today know that this is an impeachment movement that is losing steam I was watching c.n.n. On the way into the hearing this morning maybe one of the only folks but I was watching and I heard Gloria Borger say the polling on impeachment is bad for Democrats I heard Jim Shooter say that Chairman Nat l or had gone on c.n.n. Center and said well once we have these public hearings we will animate all this public support for impeachment Well now you ve had the hearings you ve called the witnesses and you know what you re losing ground you re losing ground with the media you re losing ground with the voters and you re even losing ground among your own Democrat colleagues I believe the public reporting I ve seen that some of your more moderate members in districts the president trump one are begging you to pursue something other than impeachment this blood lust for impeachment is not going to be visited on us or President Trump it s going to be visited on your own members and they re asking you not to do this. The only standard that Speaker Pelosi chairman Alan chairmanships set was a bipartisan standard they said this has to be bipartisan they said it all throughout the 28000 calendar year but now the only thing that has changed is not a strengthening of the evidence it s that we re going into an election and they have taken a look at the candidates that they have in the Democratic field and they ve realized that they have to create this impeachment platform because their candidates aren t capable of defeating President Trump in a fair fight we know that the American people know that and so the only bipartisan vote that has occurred on impeachment was a bipartisan vote against opening the inquiry and the only possibility for movement from that vote to now and despite wasting all our time despite having all these hearings despite all the damage to our institutions through this very weird and aberrational investigation you ve run the only risk is that you ll lose more votes than you started with you lost to your members the 1st time and like you re not going to lose less than 2 of your members your have a risk of losing more than 2 of your members and you know what Republicans are united we see this for what it is and we know just as my colleague from Ohio Mr Jordan said this is not just an attack on President Trump politically though it is the election that motivates them for this bizarre behavior it s not just an attack on the presidency. It s an attack on us it s an attack on those of us who believe in this president who understand very well who we voted for and he s got some nontraditional ways of doing business but we also see the great success of this country more jobs more opportunity they have no answer for that the upcoming election and it s why we re here. In the studies expired this is to big business to big c. Recognition. To strike the last word it was very nice you Mr Chairman I mentioned before that that any big Republican another sentence I m stunned that my my colleagues on the other side of the aisle perpetually read every inference you can make in the in like most negative to the president. And yet this whole proceedings and that way this is been shaped up indicates that there s an incredible inference against their credibility because of the way they stacked the cards against the president so I will I want to I want to read I you know I support a sport the gentleman s amendment and I want to read this from a Ukrainian. Source who was named and cited in a recent publication says quote by inviting influential foreigners Ukrainian business wants to get a good additional protection p.r. Lobby mechanisms to grasp additional spheres of interest having Hunter Biden on board the owner of reason I wanted to correct the image and to get cover because authorities are scared by the u.s. Embassy in Ukraine under Biden using the political capabilities of his family acted as a rescue buffer between Greaseman Ukraine law enforcement agencies he s worked in the company of a corrupt official smells now so let s take a look at the actual the documents transcript they keep our colleagues keep referring to these for the other thing President Trump says there s a lot of talk about Biden s son that Biden stop the prosecution a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general of the great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it it sounds horrible to me that is the essence of what they want to impeach President front for so it begs the question based on the basic question really do you get a munity is it in the muti granting event to have a relative run for put public office you get immunity for that let s flip it on the 2nd question is does the president have the authority to request an investigation most assuredly images the attorney general here he it is clear that he would like an investigation into the corruption surrounding Ukraine because what this president still has he go on to say he goes on to talk about trying to restore the honesty in his country that s what he s talking about yet the attorney general you ve got the president of both countries acknowledging that there s corruption and let s get it fixed up and it leads you back to this whole question of of the Democrats wanting to impeach President Trump for these amorphous abuse of power issues there s a more fish abuse of Congress or. Issues obstruction Congress it could be it s just bizarre. So on or under Biden as put it placed on the board of bereavement 2014 Joe Biden calls for the removal of the chief prosecutor Victor show can in 2016 in the meantime. Evidence is clear that Greece in his company paid about $3400000.00 to a company called Rosemount Seneca mohair the company of Hunter and his partner Archer. That is really intriguing the investigation surrounding Bree Smith s stop. And the recent his reputation Ukraine is low. And it was dubious even before this impeachment inquiry raised it to new attention Ellis let s face it according to Ukrainian sources very smell is is not. On everybody s front burner in the Ukraine but it is here because we were providing hundreds of millions of dollars to the Ukraine. And foreign aid and this president said we need to stop corruption he mentioned specifically the corruption that he had heard about. Is that impeachable no is asking for an investigation get to the bottom of because you do not get immunity just because your father is running for public office just because anyone related to is running for public office and I will tell you this president has done a remarkable job in spite of 3 years of constant harassment by the Democrats in this body and the media on the left of this country we have a great economy he s trying to bring order to the border we have more people working than ever before this president has restored the military and actually prestige around the world there are no more apology tours on the phone foreign policy side that we saw in the previous administration he has really worked to make America s esteem and greatness reprieves the general s time has expired this is a levy was Services it was moved to strike the last word Mr your regulars I want just begin very quickly and restated Cicely any Democrat of Rhode Island lamenting about the productivity of this Congress and remind my friends on the side of the aisle and the American people that we have passed nearly 400 pieces of legislation since Democrats took the majority $275.00 of those bills are bipartisan They range in legislation to drive down the costs of prescription drugs to break tech coverage for preexisting conditions to provide equal pay for equal work to raise the minimum wage for $33000000.00 Americans the biggest anti corruption bill since Watergate h.r. One legislation to restore net neutrality to respond to the climate crisis universal background checks and we recently completed negotiations on the new trade deal so the list is exhaustive sadly 80 percent of those bills are lying on Mitch McConnell s desk awaiting action so I urge my colleagues maybe instead of trying to mischaracterize what is one of the most productive Congress is in modern history we want to is assert some energy in persuading Mitch McConnell to do his. Jobber bring those bills to the floor now let s get back to the facts of this impeachment hearing 1st and foremost there s this is Ben this effort to really confuse what this is about and what this impeachment about is about the president the United States using the power of his office to smear a political opponent to drag a foreign power into our elections to corrupt the elections and leverage. Hundreds of millions dollars of taxpayer money to accomplish that objective So this is a Memon would like to wish away the motive of the president to engage in this corrupt scheme but you can t wish it away you can t amend it away the facts are the facts the allegations that we re talking about here originated in 2015 there and that s according to the Minority Report as well and then in 20172804 in the system was provided by Ukraine. What happened in 2019 what changed the president is losing in a national poll by double digits to Joe Biden we also says those are the facts her multiple witnesses Trump administration officials testified that Vice President Biden did nothing wrong including Mr Kent investor Yavanna bitch Mr Holmes and that s revoke or. Vice President Biden s firing of the prior prosecutor was done in accordance with official us policy was approved by the Justice Department was the policy of the United States it was supported by the European Union and many countries throughout Europe and a bipartisan coalition in Congress it was a corrupt prosecuted it was official us policy the vice pres it was as it executing I contrast what we have in this case the basis of this impeachment proceeding is exactly the opposite what President Trump was doing was not official u.s. Policy and all the witnesses confirm that it was not done through the Justice Department and it was done against the advice of all of these advisors and so that s what s very different about what we re confronting today and this was work which was not done by the apparatus of the State Department this is an effort that was led by the president s personal attorney would offer Giuliani the scheme was led by this whole apparatus outside the state of our own so let s not confuse these 2 things facts matter the truth matters you cannot continue just to make assertions when the record is completely the opposite and you know I d like to yield to the gentleman from California Mr Ball and I thank the gentleman. If President Trump and my repair explore all Democratic health interested in rooting out corruption in Ukraine there was so much they could do that they never did my Republican colleagues for many years were in the majority for many years the vice president s son was on this board They never investigated this their concern only came about once Vice President Biden became president Trump s chief political opponent on April 21 of this year President Trump called Presidents Alinsky to could congratulate him in his talking points President Trump was told to bring up rooting out corruption in Ukraine President Trump never did it but the White House in their talking points live the American people and said the president had July 25 again National Security Council members worked really hard to tell the president impress upon the Ukrainian president he needs to root out corruption in his country the president never brings up corruption the president wanted to investigate any individual u.s. Citizen there s a formal process we go through the president never asked the attorney general to do this the president was never interested in fighting corruption and Ukraine he was only interested and weaponize in corruption in Ukraine for his own personal benefit and that s why we must hold him accountable for an abuse of power and you ll see if you haven t haven t you you know you now know that request yields back the regulars Jennifer you have said requests Thank you Mr John asked of this article dated February 12th $2900.00 listening to live special coverage of the impeachment markup from n.p.r. News in total Trump asked top political advisors whether he should worry about running against Joe Biden out of Jackson many many years now it is now there are votes on the floor. The votes on the floor committee will stay in the recess until after the votes. To reconvene immediately after the Vosa camisa. Isn t research. Ok the committee is taking a break as they move toward votes on articles of impeachment later today the 1st time a vote like this has happened in decades only the 4th time in American history that will set the stage for a likely vote in the full House of Representatives next week I m Jeremy Hobson This is Special Coverage from n.p.r. News. I m joined by N.P.R. s senior Washington editor and correspondent Ron Elving n.p.r. Congressional correspondent Susan Davis n.p.r. Political reporter to Mack and n.p.r. White House correspondent Franco or don t you has to digest what we have just heard this is special coverage of the impeachment market from n.p.r. News Ron let me start with you you have noticed this morning and they ve been debating these articles of impeachment for about 4 hours or amendments to them you ve noticed a change in strategy from the Republicans on the panel That s right there s been less talk about process in the latter portion of today s hearing today s markup you had in the beginning of the day much as we had heard in the.