Some Republicans on the House panel agreed that the evidence failed to support the intel agencies' conclusions. Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the top Democrat on the panel, said that Democrats had hoped to at least find agreement with Republicans on the fundamentals of Russia's scheme to interfere in the 2016 election. But that hope evaporated, he said, with the GOP's decision to break from the intelligence community.
"It had been our hope for some time that even if there were areas of disagreement with the majority, that we could at least come together on a report that validated the findings of the intelligence community," he said. "This represents to me the completeness of the GOP's capitulation to the White House, and that leaves very little common ground."
There is now a dangerous vein of autocratic thought running through one of America's two parties, and it poses an existential danger to the country. In this we are not alone. All around the world, there is a new competition between autocracy and democracy, and for more than a decade, the autocrats have been on the rise. This trend toward authoritarianism began before Donald Trump and will not have spent its force when he steps off the political stage for good. It will require constant vigilance on our part to ensure it does not gain another foothold in the highest office in our land.
YANG: Well, first, I'd say "I'm sorry I beat your guy." Or not sorry. And, second, I would say the days of meddling in American elections are over and we will take any undermining of our democratic processes as an act of hostility and aggression. The American people would back me on this. We know that they've found an underbelly and they've been clawing at it, and it's made it so that we can't even trust our own democracy. The third thing I would say is that we're going to live up to our international commitments. These are the ways that we'll actually get Russia to the table and make it so they have to join the international community and stop resisting appeals to the world order.
It was Tillis himself who first proposed the bill to protect Mueller in a conversation with Coons last summer, an important bipartisan partnership that's survived tough battles over taxes and health care.
Coons was struck by Tillis' fight for reparations for black victims of a North Carolina eugenics program. And Tillis was impressed that Coons was willing to fend off Democrats who wanted to pile on to the special counsel bill and turn it into a partisan attack on Trump. "He was pretty clear," Coons said, recalling how Tillis threatened to drop his support unless each new Democratic co-sponsor was matched by a Republican.
Rep. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) put it bluntly: "The CIA just got it wrong," Stewart said on CNN, saying he had viewed the raw intelligence the agencies used to reach their determination. "The CIA just got it wrong, just like they did, by the way, in the Gulf War, when they said there were weapons of mass destruction."
Some of his colleagues are concerned. "It's not good politics in the end," said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). "It says you don't trust the president."
Tillis is working with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) on the bill, which would allow a special counsel a 10-day window to fight a potential removal by the Trump administration and could soon see a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The theory was initially propagated by The Federalist website on Sep. 27. The article claims that in "Aug. 2019, the intelligence community secretly eliminated a requirement that whistleblowers provide direct, first-hand knowledge of alleged wrongdoings."
Facts First: This is false. The whistleblower submission form was revised in Aug. 2019, but the revision did not change the rules on who can submit a whistleblower complaint. The inspector general of the intelligence community said that having firsthand knowledge of the event has never been required in order to submit a whistleblower complaint.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said the Postal Service is suspending operational changes, like removing mail processing equipment and collection boxes, until after the November election. The agency won't change retail hours at post offices across the country or close any mail-sorting facilities. Overtime hours will continue to be approved as needed to process mail.
From a statement: "To avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail, I am suspending these initiatives until after the election is concluded." (Aug. 18, PoliticalWire)
Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), ranking member of the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee, requested all documents related to the donation, including a copy of the check or money transfer, in a letter to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, giving him until March 26 to comply. In a separate letter, Cummings also pressed the Trump Organization for details on how the amount was calculated.
"There is no legitimate reason for the Trump Organization to withhold information about these payments from Congress," Cummings wrote. "We have an obligation to determine whether foreign governments are spending money at President Trump's businesses, how much they are spending and whether these payments violate the Emoluments Clause."
I asked everyone who's running for president to join me in that and not a single person has so far. I hope what we saw today during the testimony means lots of people will sign on and say we are not going to give away these ambassador posts to the highest bidder.
Some Republicans on the House's Russia investigation panel agreed that the evidence failed to support the intel agencies' conclusions. "It is my belief that Russia's intent was to influence our elections by having the American people distrust the institutions that serve them," said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) in a statement, when asked whether she supported the report's conclusions. "However, I do not believe this interference swayed the electorate to vote for one candidate or another. "
"I am drawing up Articles of Impeachment," Omar wrote. "Donald J. Trump should be impeached by the House of Representatives & removed from office by the United States Senate. We can't allow him to remain in office, it's a matter of preserving our Republic and we need to fulfill our oath."
There are two questions that are implicated in all this. One, is it OK to solicit foreign interference for your election campaign? Is it OK to use the power of the presidency to coerce a foreign government into helping you in the election, and to subvert the honesty of the election? And secondly, is it OK to order everyone not to testify in order to cover it up? Those are the two articles of impeachment. If the answer to either of those questions is it's OK, we will not have a democracy anymore.
Some of his colleagues are concerned. "It's not good politics in the end," said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). "It says you don't trust the president."
Tillis is working with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) on the bill, which would allow a special counsel a 10-day window to fight a potential removal by the Trump administration and could soon see a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
[TAPE] GRAHAM: If after having been briefed by our intelligence leaders, Donald Trump is still unsure as to what the Russians did, that would be incredibly unnerving to me because the evidence is overwhelming.
[END TAPE] Just yesterday the president referred to the Russia investigation as a hoax. Are you unnerved?
GRAHAM: The president does now finally believe that the Russians stole the emails from the DNC [the Democratic National Committee]. But he believes that collusion is a hoax. All I can say is that it's not a hoax. The Russians stole the emails. They did interfere in our elections. We now know that Trump Junior met with the Russians in Trump Tower & that Bob Mueller is the right guy at the right time. He needs to be allowed to do his job. And whether or not there's collusion--Bob Mueller will tell us. The idea of Jeff Sessions being able to investigate the campaign he was on is unacceptable. Jeff Sessions did the right thing [by recusing himself].
"If there is such chaos, if right now the president can't focus on anything except his own anger," she said, "then how do we assure America that we're safe?"
Republicans who did not repudiate Trump earlier, who did not think it would get this bad, bear some responsibility, she said. She includes herself in that group. "I allowed myself to refrain from speaking my truth," Murkowski said. "And I can't just be quiet right now."
With 12 days left in his term, she said she doesn't think it's practical to attempt to remove the president through impeachment or the 25th Amendment. "The Congress would be consumed with impeachment if we start that now," she said.
"Will we put duty to our oath above partisan politics or will we look away from the danger and the threat, embrace the lies and enable the liar?" Cheney asked. "There is no gray area when it comes to that question, when it comes to this moment. There is no middle ground."
Cheney was one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump on a charge of inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection. Her fierce criticism of Trump and her insistence that Congress investigate the Capitol attack resulted in her being removed from her position as GOP conference chair and led to a serious primary challenge back home.
Some of his colleagues are concerned. "It's not good politics in the end," said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). "It says you don't trust the president."
Tillis is working with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) on the bill, which would allow a special counsel a 10-day window to fight a potential removal by the Trump administration and could soon see a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Tlaib's most recent call for impeachment comes after Trump incited unprecedented violence at the U.S. Capitol building, which found a mob of right-wing rioters injuring police, smashing windows, leaving cryptic and threatening messages on the desks of representatives, trashing offices of public officials, and using the Senate chamber as a psychotic photo opportunity--all in hopes of overthrowing the certification of President-Elect Joe Biden.
"This is on Donald Trump, period. He called folks to D.C. and gave them marching orders. He needs to be impeached and removed immediately," Tlaib wrote on Twitter.
Tillis doesn't think Trump will ultimately fire Mueller even as the president rages over the expanding Russia probe. But he has an impassioned response for his conservative critics nonetheless:
"Courage is when you know you're going to do something that's going to anger your base," Tillis said in an interview. "The same people who would criticize me for filing this bill would be absolutely angry if I wasn't pounding the table for this bill if we were dealing with Hillary Clinton," he argued. "So spare me your righteous indignation."
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| 2016 Presidential contenders on Government Reform: | |||
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Republicans:
Sen.Ted Cruz(TX) Carly Fiorina(CA) Gov.John Kasich(OH) Sen.Marco Rubio(FL) Donald Trump(NY) |
Democrats:
Secy.Hillary Clinton(NY) Sen.Bernie Sanders(VT) 2016 Third Party Candidates: Roseanne Barr(PF-HI) Robert Steele(L-NY) Dr.Jill Stein(G,MA) | ||
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