House Judiciary panel to set rules for Impeachment investigation - vote on Thursday
From NewsdayBy The Associated Press
Updated September 9, 2019 5:21 PM
In response to:
WASHINGTON — The House Judiciary Committee will vote Thursday to establish rules for hearings on impeachment, escalating the panel's investigations of President Donald Trump even as many Democrats remain wary of the effort.
The resolution is a technical step, and the panel would still have to introduce impeachment articles against Trump and win approval from the House to bring charges against Trump. It's unclear if that will ever happen, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has urged caution on the issue, saying the public still isn't yet supportive of taking those steps.
Even if the House did recommend impeachment charges against the president, the Republican-led Senate is unlikely to convict him and remove him from office.
Still, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler has said that the committee will move forward with impeachment hearings this fall, bolstered by lawmakers on the panel who roundly support moving forward. The vote on Thursday will set rules for those hearings, empowering staff to question witnesses, allowing some evidence to remain private and permitting the president's counsel to respond to testimony.
The committee says that the resolution is similar to procedural votes taken at the beginning of the impeachment investigations into Presidents Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.
"The adoption of these additional procedures is the next step in that process and will help ensure our impeachment hearings are informative to Congress and the public, while providing the president with the ability to respond to evidence presented against him," Nadler said in a statement. "We will not allow Trump's continued obstruction to stop us from delivering the truth to the American people."
The committee has also filed two lawsuits against the administration after the White House repeatedly blocked the panel from obtaining documents and testimony.
Pelosi has said she wants to see what happens in court before making any decisions on impeachment. She said Monday evening that she had signed off on the Judiciary vote, and "that's a logical thing for a committee to establish its rules of procedure."
The first hearing under the new impeachment rules would be with Corey Lewandowski on Sept. 17, the panel also announced Monday. Lewandowski was frequently mentioned in former special counsel Robert Mueller's report, which the committee has been investigating. According to Mueller's report, Trump asked Lewandowski to deliver a message to then- Attorney General Jeff Sessions asking him to limit Mueller's probe.
The committee has also invited two other witnesses mentioned in the report, former White House aides Rick Dearborn and Rob Porter. The White House has previously blocked former employees from testifying, but Lewandowski never officially worked for the White House.
The resolution that the committee will consider Thursday would set parameters for the panel's impeachment hearings in an attempt to give lawmakers more powers to investigate the president. It would allow committee lawyers to question witnesses for an additional hour — 30 minutes for each side — beyond the five minutes allowed for committee lawmakers. Evidence would be allowed in private session to protect the confidentiality of sensitive materials, and any full committee or subcommittee hearing could be designated by Nadler as part of the committee's probe into whether to recommend articles of impeachment.
The procedural vote comes as the panel broadens its impeachment probe beyond Mueller's report, which has consumed most of the committee's energy since it was released in April.
WASHINGTON — The House Judiciary Committee will vote Thursday to establish rules for hearings on impeachment, escalating the panel's investigations of President Donald Trump even as many Democrats remain wary of the effort.
The resolution is a technical step, and the panel would still have to introduce impeachment articles against Trump and win approval from the House to bring charges against Trump. It's unclear if that will ever happen, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has urged caution on the issue, saying the public still isn't yet supportive of taking those steps.
Even if the House did recommend impeachment charges against the president, the Republican-led Senate is unlikely to convict him and remove him from office.
Still, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler has said that the committee will move forward with impeachment hearings this fall, bolstered by lawmakers on the panel who roundly support moving forward. The vote on Thursday will set rules for those hearings, empowering staff to question witnesses, allowing some evidence to remain private and permitting the president's counsel to respond to testimony.
The committee says that the resolution is similar to procedural votes taken at the beginning of the impeachment investigations into Presidents Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.
"The adoption of these additional procedures is the next step in that process and will help ensure our impeachment hearings are informative to Congress and the public, while providing the president with the ability to respond to evidence presented against him," Nadler said in a statement. "We will not allow Trump's continued obstruction to stop us from delivering the truth to the American people."
The committee has also filed two lawsuits against the administration after the White House repeatedly blocked the panel from obtaining documents and testimony.
Pelosi has said she wants to see what happens in court before making any decisions on impeachment. She said Monday evening that she had signed off on the Judiciary vote, and "that's a logical thing for a committee to establish its rules of procedure."
The first hearing under the new impeachment rules would be with Corey Lewandowski on Sept. 17, the panel also announced Monday. Lewandowski was frequently mentioned in former special counsel Robert Mueller's report, which the committee has been investigating. According to Mueller's report, Trump asked Lewandowski to deliver a message to then- Attorney General Jeff Sessions asking him to limit Mueller's probe.
The committee has also invited two other witnesses mentioned in the report, former White House aides Rick Dearborn and Rob Porter. The White House has previously blocked former employees from testifying, but Lewandowski never officially worked for the White House.
The resolution that the committee will consider Thursday would set parameters for the panel's impeachment hearings in an attempt to give lawmakers more powers to investigate the president. It would allow committee lawyers to question witnesses for an additional hour — 30 minutes for each side — beyond the five minutes allowed for committee lawmakers. Evidence would be allowed in private session to protect the confidentiality of sensitive materials, and any full committee or subcommittee hearing could be designated by Nadler as part of the committee's probe into whether to recommend articles of impeachment.
The procedural vote comes as the panel broadens its impeachment probe beyond Mueller's report, which has consumed most of the committee's energy since it was released in April.
(Continued in my first comment below)
Comments (18)
The Judiciary panel, along with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, announced Friday that they are demanding information about the spending of taxpayer money at the president's hotels and properties, partly to inform the impeachment investigation.
The committees said there have been "multiple efforts" by Trump and administration officials to spend federal money at his properties, including Vice President Mike Pence's stay last week at a Trump resort in Doonbeg, Ireland.
Aside from reviewing his use of Trump's properties, the Judiciary panel is also expected to investigate hush money payments Trump made to kill potentially embarrassing stories, and has subpoenaed the Department of Homeland Security to explore whether the president offered pre-emptive pardons for lawbreaking. More subpoenas are likely.
Meanwhile, several other committees are also investigating the president — though not under the auspices of impeachment, which is the jurisdiction of the Judiciary panel.
In one of those probes, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff wrote former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and demanded that he appear for testimony on Sept. 25. In the letter, released Monday and dated Friday, Schiff said that Flynn had failed to comply with the panel's June subpoena or "cooperate with the committee's efforts to secure your compliance."
Flynn admitted lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador to the United States and awaits sentencing.
The intelligence panel said also Monday that it will investigate possible efforts by Trump and his personal lawyer, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, to pressure the government of Ukraine to assist Trump's 2020 presidential campaign.
The intelligence panel, along with the House Foreign Relations Committee and the Oversight committee, is demanding records related to those efforts. The committees said in a joint release that the record request is a "first step in a broad investigation into this matter." ....
If the evidence is overwhelming and senators (Republican, Democrat, or Independent)
do not vote to remove Trump from office, they risk their seat when their term is up.
How much more overwhelming can you get, than shutting down the federal government under a highly-specious "emergency" over highly-questionable legislation?
If the evidence is overwhelming and senators (Republican, Democrat, or Independent) do not vote to remove Trump from office, they risk their seat when their term is up.
That is presuming that Duh Peepelz even remember that little fit of sedition. There have been so many others, before and since, that keeping score is a chore. Who wants a chore?
I believe testimony by witnesses that previously testified in private to yield Mueller's findings will add impact to the report, that many did not read. The report itself was overwhelming for many and an excuse not to read it for others. As the public is presented easy to understand video of testimonies, more viewers will be in favor of impeachment. That should sway undecided legislators.
They know will be nos impechment going on. It stupid game for dummies. Make think happen but will no happen. They like to fool silly peoples with this talk. But not so many silly people left still except a few dummies.
We aren't as dumb as you may think.
75% needed to pass the house to even get the idea of impeachment to the senate.
As the truths begin to surface, demonrats are quickly losing even more support.
Only the true sheep like yourself are still sick enough to support the group that promises nothing but the sell out of the nation and citizens. They will bury us in short order. Even quicker than during the obozo years, of which started during the clinton years.
They need at least 66% in the house to try getting it to the senate. A huge majority needed there too.
They have zero evidence
You know. The Republican, Bob Mueller, special prosecutor.
Have you even read the report ?
From the Associated Press (AP);
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler tried to clear up confusion within his caucus about impeachment on Thursday as the committee approved guidelines for impeachment hearings on President Donald Trump .
Nadler says there's no uncertainty about what his committee is doing: It's an impeachment investigation, no matter how you want to phrase it.
True justice is the fact that the whole investigation was fabricated and illegally carried out. It is the demonrats themselves that should be facing charges including obozo itself.
They have nothing including the lack of support for their erroneous actions.
And people complain about China's leadership, it's laughable if it wasn't so frightening.
Whoever their standard bearer will be...
The prospect of taking on an incumbent Prez with a good economy, "...a re-election machine like we've never seen before" & an unprecedented war chest can't be an optimistic undertaking.
Odd.
I post the "war chest" comment & then this ad pops up on an unrelated YouTube vid
This blog isn't about money, nor about who has money, nor how much they have, or don't have.
It is about the crimes of Donald Trump and the progressive movement
towards the impeachment of Donald Trump. The blog is not about anything else.
It is about the wheels of justice.
IF the evidence was SO overwhelming after making The Don the most investigated person in the history of the Republic...don'tcha think they would've impeached his àss sometime in the past 2 1/2 years?!
Nonetheless, it is following a similar timeline as Nixon and he resigned before being impeached.