The Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee released its impeachment report after a few weeks of hearings. It comes a day before more hearings will take place in the House Judiciary Committee.
Chairman Adam Schiff attempted to make the case against President Donald Trump, insisting the hearings uncovered evidence to impeach him over alleged threats to withhold aid to Ukraine.
The Republicans published their own report on Monday, which stated Trump did nothing wrong.
According to Schiff, the committee’s investigation “uncovered a months-long effort by President Trump to use the powers of his office to solicit foreign interference on his behalf in the 2020 election.”
Schiff maintained that Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky included a threat to withhold aid if the Ukrainian government did not investigate 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Vice President Joe Biden:
As described in this executive summary and the report that follows, President Trump’s scheme subverted U.S. foreign policy toward Ukraine and undermined our national security in favor of two politically motivated investigations that would help his presidential reelection campaign. The President demanded that the newly-elected Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, publicly announce investigations into a political rival that he apparently feared the most, former Vice President Joe Biden, and into a discredited theory that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that interfered in the 2016 presidential election. To compel the Ukrainian President to do his political bidding, President Trump conditioned two official acts on the public announcement of the investigations: a coveted White House visit and critical U.S. military assistance Ukraine needed to fight its Russian adversary.
Schiff wrote:
At the center of this investigation is the memorandum prepared following President Trump’s July 25, 2019, phone call with Ukraine’s President, which the White House declassified and released under significant public pressure. The call record alone is stark evidence of misconduct; a demonstration of the President’s prioritization of his personal political benefit over the national interest. In response to President Zelensky’s appreciation for vital U.S. military assistance, which President Trump froze without explanation, President Trump asked for “a favor though”: two specific investigations designed to assist his reelection efforts.Our investigation determined that this telephone call was neither the start nor the end of President Trump’s efforts to bend U.S. foreign policy for his personal gain. Rather, it was a dramatic crescendo within a months-long campaign driven by President Trump in which senior U.S. officials, including the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Acting Chief of Staff, the Secretary of Energy, and others were either knowledgeable of or active participants in an effort to extract from a foreign nation the personal political benefits sought by the President.The investigation revealed the nature and extent of the President’s misconduct, notwithstanding an unprecedented campaign of obstruction by the President and his Administration to prevent the Committees from obtaining documentary evidence and testimony. A dozen witnesses followed President Trump’s orders, defying voluntary requests and lawful subpoenas, and refusing to testify. The White House, Department of State, Department of Defense, Office of Management and Budget, and Department of Energy refused to produce a single document in response to our subpoenas.
However, the transcript of the phone call does not show any threats. Zelensky has said many times Trump and his administration never applied any pressure to him or his government.
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The Republicans on the committee wrote in their own report that the Democrats’ case comes up short to impeach Trump.
The minority wrote the Democrats have not proven their case as witnesses have not brought forth any “evidence of bribery, extortion, or any high crime or misdemeanor.”
They also warned that the “impeachment inquiry and the manner in which the Democrats are pursuing it sets a dangerous precedent” especially since the evidence is based mostly on hearsay.
Yet the Republicans also defended Trump’s supposed threat:
Republicans made the case that Trump had every reason to question Ukraine’s ability to end pervasive government corruption before handing over $391 million in security aid.“Understood in this proper context, the President’s initial hesitation to meet with President Zelensky or to provide U.S. taxpayer-funded security assistance to Ukraine without thoughtful review is entirely prudent,” Republicans wrote Monday.
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