GOP on impeachment facts: If it looks, quacks like a duck, get outraged and call it a hog

Rekha Basu | The Des Moines Register

Show Caption Hide Caption House Judiciary Chair Jerry Nadler interrupted at impeachment hearing House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler shut down interruptions as the committee's impeachment hearing went to recess.

From the moment some man stormed into Monday’s just-getting-started House Judiciary Committee hearing yelling, “Americans are done with this! Americans are sick of this!,” you had a pretty good sense of which way the day was going. It was America at war with itself across the great partisan divide.

Faced with damning evidence against their president, Republicans were on the offensive, accusing the Democratic-led House of trying to oust the President through impeachment because they can't at the polls.

"It's all political, a show," fumed ranking Republican Judiciary Committee member Doug Collins, charging, "They don't have a candidate they think can win."

Others invoked McCarthyism. Wisconsin Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner blamed an out- of- control “surveillance state” — even as he took credit for authoring the surveillance-oriented Patriot Act to spy on Americans after 9/11.

“I’m scared for my country,” declared Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas.

That posture rang hollow, though. The committee is seeking two articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. If the allegations are true — and members of the president's White House staff have testified they are — Trump tried to bribe his Ukrainian counterpart, President Volodymyr Zelensky, to dig up dirt against Trump's political rival, Joe Biden.

He allegedly did so in direct phone calls and through surrogates, with the knowledge of the White House chief of staff, the vice president and the secretary of state. But when Trump’s actions were discovered, the case for impeachment goes, he released the money, then withheld documents from investigators on the case. He also didn't make any White House officials available to testify Monday.

The Republicans have (not inappropriately) questioned why Hunter Biden was paid some $50,000 a month to sit on the board of a Ukrainian gas company, Burisma Holdings, though he lacked energy experience or language skills. But they've offered no evidence that Biden used his power in the Obama administration to set that up.

Trump, however, is accused of planning to withhold $391 million in military aid to Ukraine and an Oval Office meeting with Zelensky unless he investigated Hunter Biden. Transcripts of Trump's July 25 call to Zelensky have him suggesting Joe Biden improperly stopped prosecution of his son, and asking Zelensky to team up with the U.S. attorney general to “find out what happened with this whole situation." Zelensky responded, telling Trump, “we will be very serious about the case and will work on the investigation.”

The 300-page investigation report relies on testimony from past and present government officials and evidence presented to three House committees. Among the sources were Ambassador William Taylor, who took over the Ukraine post after Trump had Marie Yovanovitch removed from it, apparently because of her anti-corruption efforts. Taylor told the committee he heard from White House aides, national security officials and U.S. administration officials of a concerted effort to force Ukraine into a quid pro quo.

One telephone transcript has Taylor saying to Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, and Kurt Volker, former special envoy for Ukraine negotiations, “As I said on the phone, I think it’s crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign.” He also testified to the investigating committee that he'd heard Zelensky "did not want to be used as a pawn in a U.S. election."

For their part, the Democrats, no doubt gleeful at finally getting what look to be damning goods on Trump, struck a high-minded tone Monday. “He has broken his oath,” declared Chairman Jerry Nadler of Trump. “I will honor mine.”

One of several painful ironies here is that Zelensky had been elected on an anti-corruption platform two months before Trump's July 25 call to him. So when the House Republicans’ lawyer tried to cast Trump’s actions as anti-corruption, saying, “He is deeply skeptical of sending U.S. taxpayer dollars into an environment that is corrupt," you didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Republican staff attorney Steve Castor charged that the impeachment effort was over a mere "eight lines in a call transcript." Collins seemed to be having a hard time controlling himself, interrupting, scoffing and demanding Democratic staff attorney Daniel Goldman reveal who on the Intelligence committee decided what should be in the report, and who leaked information from it. "Oh nonono," he chided when Goldman refused. "You’re not gonna play that game."

Frankly, that bullying stance is the opposite of what was warranted in light of the serious allegations of a sitting president trying to involve another country in investigating a domestic political rival. How did we get to this point?

And how can members of the president's party simply bury their heads in the sand and cover their ears? Congress, after all, is supposed to function as a separate branch of government. Shouldn't members at least pretend to hear the whole case before attacking?

In those nine hours Monday, the nation felt as divided as if it were in a civil war. This would be the moment for a true leader to step up to try to bridge the divide that threatens to tear the nation apart, and to try to reassure the people that truth and justice will prevail.

Instead America's 45th president was busy tweeting of House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff: "Shifty Schiff, a totally corrupt politician."