The panel’s report, which comes on the heels of a House Intelligence Committee-led investigation that formed the basis of the articles of impeachment, contends that Trump’s most acute abuse of his power occurred during a July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, when Trump asked his counterpart to launch investigations targeting former Vice President Joe Biden and other Democrats.

Though the Judiciary Committee report indicates this evidence alone is enough to warrant Trump’s impeachment, the report cites as an “aggravating factor” that Trump — through Giuliani and other allies — repeatedly dangled and withheld an Oval Office visit from Zelensky that the Ukrainian leader desperately wanted as a show of support amid his country’s ongoing war with Russia.

The report also notes that Trump ordered a freeze of $391 million in military aid to Ukraine over the objections of advisers at the State Department, Pentagon and National Security Council, which he only lifted after Democrats began investigating the matter.

Democrats argue that Trump crossed the threshold into criminal behavior with his posture toward Zelensky, writing in the report that his request for the announcement of politically motivated investigations constituted the solicitation of a bribe under federal law.

Those investigations were valuable to Trump personally, and he used his official power to schedule a state visit and withhold military aid to obtain them, the panel says.

These actions are a “corrupt” use of Trump’s authority that satisfies the final element of a bribery crime, Democrats argue.

The committee also alleges that Trump violated the honest services wire fraud statute during the July 25 phone call, as well as during a separate phone call a day later with Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union. Those “foreign wire communications” were done “in furtherance of an ongoing bribery scheme,” according to the report.

“Fundamentally, the president has deprived the American people of the honorable stewardship that the nation expects and demands of its chief executive," the panel alleges, noting that the federal wire fraud statute imposes a 20-year imprisonment.

In an accompanying 18-page dissent, Judiciary Committee Republicans, led by Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.), assail Democrats’ evidence as “paltry” and an “affront to the constitutional process of impeachment.”

“If President Nixon’s impeachment proceedings are the ‘gold standard’ for presidential impeachment inquiries, these proceedings, in stark contrast, will go down in history as the quintessential example of how such proceedings should not be conducted,” Collins writes.

Collins rejects Democrats’ articles of impeachment as “vague,” “hyperbolic” and “misleading,” particularly as they describe fear of future presidential misconduct. He also blasts Democrats for declining to offer any articles of impeachment that specifically allege criminal violations.

“While individual articles of impeachment have been passed against prior presidents that do not allege criminality, no president has been impeached solely on non-criminal accusations,” Collins writes. He adds that Democrats have failed to exhaust their legal avenues to obtain information they claim Trump is obstructing.

Among Democrats’ other conclusions was a contention that waiting for the federal courts to resolve fights with the White House over witnesses and documents — as Collins urged — would be “unnecessary and impractical.” Rather, they argue, Trump has abused the court process to delay Democrats’ impeachment proceedings, and waiting for a judicial ruling would render the House “subservient” to courts in a process meant to be entirely controlled by Congress.

“[T]he House has never before relied on litigation to compel witness testimony or the production of documents in a presidential impeachment proceeding,” the committee concludes. “Some members of the minority have suggested otherwise, but there is no law or practice to support such a theory.”

The committee’s report also marks a return of sorts for the evidence unearthed by special counsel Robert Mueller. Democrats claim the Ukraine allegations against Trump are part of a “pattern” of misconduct that began with Trump’s alleged solicitation of Russian assistance in the 2016 election — a matter probed by Mueller for nearly two years. Mueller also found that Trump made multiple attempts to hinder or end his investigation.

“The pattern is as unmistakable as it is unnerving,” the Judiciary Committee argues.

