The committee will come to order. Without objection, the chair reserve the right to reset the hearing at any time. The president ial oath of office requires the president of the United States to do two things. Faithfully execute his or her office, and protect and defend the constitution. That old, of course, cannot be honored if the president does not first defend the country. Our National Security is jeopardized, in our country is then thefended, ability to faithfully execute the office becomes smooth. The duty to defend the nations foundational to the responsibilities. But what of the second responsibility to defend the constitution . What does that really mean . The founders were not speaking of course of a piece of parchment, rather they were expressing the obligation of the president to defend the. Nstitution to defend the rule of law, a principle on which the idea of america was born that we are a nation of laws, not men. If we do not defend the nation, there is no constitution.
Committee will come to order. Without objection, the chair reserves the right to recess the hearing at any time. The president ial oath of office requires the president of the United States to do two things, faithfully execute his or her office and protect and defend the constitution. That oath cannot be honored if the president does not first defend the country. If our National Security is jeopardized, if our country is left undefended, the necessity to faithfully execute the office becomes moot. Where there is no country, there is no office to execute. And so the duty to defend the nation is foundational to the president s responsibilities. But the second responsibility to defend the constitution, what does that really mean . The founders were not speaking, of course, of a piece of parchment, they were speaking of the president to defend our system of checks and balances that the constitution enshrines, to defend the rule of law, a principle on which the idea of america was born that
So to another point, you know, one of the issues that arose out of the russia investigation last congress was a question over the latitude provided to the u. S. President to conduct foreign affairs. In 2017, i asked then cia director brennan how he viewed statements made by president obama to russian president medvedev regarding more flexibility to negotiate after his 2012 election. And president medvedev replied he would transmit the information to vladimir and that medvedev stood with president obama. That was in an open hearing. Director brennan wouldnt entertain my question and insisted on not answering, due to the fact that the conversation was between the heads of government. Thats what he said. He further claimed he was avoiding getting involved in political partisan issues, which brings me to a similar question related to this whistleblower complaint. One, you said this executive privilege is unwaverable. I think thats consistent with cia director brennan. Congressman, only the
Told very specifically that the whistleblower did not want to get any of this information out, they didnt want it to leak out. So there were only a few potential groups of people that would have known about this complaint, you and your people within your office. Yes, sir. The people within the Inspector Generals Office and the whistleblower and whoever that whistleblower gave this information to. So what im trying to ascertain is how would it run in the all the Mainstream Media outlets . Even though they got a lot of it wrong but they had the basics of it that it involved the president of the United States talking to a foreign leader. Did you or anybody in your office leak this to the Washington Post or nbc news . Ranking member, i lead the Intelligence Community. We know how to keep a secret. As far as how that got into the press, i really do not know, sir. I just know that its all over the place and as you said its been reported by different media over the past several weeks. Where t
Here you and i are a competitive disadvantage because neither one of us are lawyers and that may be a badge of honor for some of us. You have lawyers on your staff. Sir i do congressman and your lawyers have looked at this large concern definition thoroughly and if given you advice yes congressman if the black letter law was so clear and black letter how is it that weve got different attorneys given as you in the united different opinions. Thats rhetorical question. That that with respect to this issue. Just to clarify my caucus and was in our group in front of us last week did a very good job of telling us what he did what he didnt do we now know for sure what it is that he was able to do as part of his investigation he did not request records of the call from the president and the reason he did as he did the difficulty working through all of that would have probably meant that he couldnt comply with a 14 day timeframe so even he did not try to. Overrun the white houses executive priv