On Monday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) said the upcoming public testimony before the House Intelligence Committee’s so-called impeachment inquiry would be a “game-changer.”

On Wednesday, the committee will hear from Ambassador William Taylor and Deputy Assistant Secretary George Kent. On Friday, former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch will testify.

Himes said, “I think this is a game-changer. It’s a huge problem for the Republican defense of trying to smear anybody who testifies against the president. And this doesn’t come out in the transcripts. The tone of these hearings, I think, is going to startle the American people. The three individuals we’re talking about here, Bill Taylor, George Kent, and Marie Yovanovitch, they are the definition of Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts.”

“You know, military combat veterans, people who have devoted their lives to serving Democratic and Republican presidents,” he continued. “Speak in beautiful, you know, thoughtful, impartial paragraphs. And so, you know, while you’ve got people like my Republican colleagues and the president supporters clearly throwing mud, clearly trying to distract, mounting defenses that don’t make any sense, you are going to hear from some of the most startling competent and virtuous people that you can imagine. I think that will change the weather against the Republican attempts to damage anybody who believes that the president’s actions were wrong. ”

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