Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) at a press conference about the impeachment inquiry of President Trump, at the Capitol in Washington on Oct. 2, 2019. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

House Democrats Don’t Want to Find the Truth, They Want to Create Their Own Rendition of the Truth

Commentary

House Democrats recently rejected and tabled a Republican resolution aiming to censure House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) over his handling of the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) condemned the resolution and claimed that Republicans fear the truth. In reality, as shown by their recent conduct, House Democrats don’t want to discover the truth; they want to create it to suit their agenda.

Following the vote on the resolution, Pelosi stated:

“What the Republicans fear most is the truth. The President betrayed the oath of office, our national security and the integrity of our elections, and the GOP has not even tried to deny the facts. Instead, Republicans stage confusion, undermine the Constitution and attack the person of whom the President is most afraid. “The American people want the truth. The House will proceed with our impeachment inquiry to find the facts and expose the truth, guided by our Constitution and the facts. This is about patriotism, not politics or partisanship.”

Pelosi’s comments are head-scratching, to say the least. While Pelosi alleges that Republicans fear the truth, it’s the Republicans who have been pleading with Pelosi to hold a formal vote to initiate the impeachment inquiry. In doing so, Republicans would be permitted to participate in the impeachment inquiry in an effort to learn the “truth” and the relevant facts behind the president’s alleged conduct.

To date, Pelosi has refused these requests. Therefore, all that we have so far is a partisan and one-sided investigation by a group that is determined to remove the president from office. This isn’t a search for truth. Rather, it’s a search for information that aligns with the goal of removing the president.

Pelosi’s claim that the GOP has failed to deny that the president has betrayed the oath of office, our national security, and the integrity of our elections also is nonsensical. To date, there has been no proof whatsoever that the president committed any such offenses or engaged in any wrongdoing. If Democrats had compelling proof of such violations, they would have passed and voted on formal articles of impeachment long ago, as opposed to engaging in this one-sided “impeachment inquiry.”

Also, given that Pelosi and House Democrats have prevented House Republicans from participating in the investigation, kept their investigation under wraps, and dictated the narrative from the start, Republicans are in no position to render a “blind” opinion. Pelosi is well aware of this.

Finally, Pelosi miraculously accuses Republicans of staging confusion, undermining the Constitution, and attacking Schiff. In reality, House Democrats are guilty of the exact “misdeeds” that Pelosi tries to pin on Republicans.

From the start of the impeachment inquiry, Democrats in the House, led by Pelosi and Schiff, have prevented Republicans from participating in the investigation, from participating in closed-door interviews of witnesses, obtaining copies of transcripts from private interviews, questioning witnesses, cross-examining witnesses, and issuing subpoenas.

House Democrats have also prevented the president from facing his alleged accusers, defending himself, and having legal counsel present during all relevant aspects of the impeachment inquiry.

In essence, Democrats have tried to paint a damning picture of the president (confusion) without affording the president due process (undermining the Constitution) or House Republicans the opportunity to participate (contrary to well-established precedent) in the inquiry.

Finally, the reasons to question Schiff’s motivation, credibility, or potential bias are self-explanatory and are accurately set forth in the resolution.

Ironically, while Pelosi and Schiff refuse to allow House Republicans to participate in the impeachment inquiry, Schiff took a different tone when the president gave Attorney General William Barr the authority to declassify any documents related to the surveillance of the Trump campaign in 2016.

At the time, Schiff criticized the move and stated on Twitter:

“While Trump stonewalls the public from learning the truth about his obstruction of justice, Trump and Barr conspire to weaponize law enforcement and classified information against their political enemies. The coverup has entered a new and dangerous phase. This is un-American.”

Was Schiff saying that it was un-American to release documents that could reflect poorly on his political allies and/or cast doubt on his so-called conspiracy theories? More importantly, why is the current one-sided and secretive procedure against a duly elected president not un-American? The reason is self-evident: The former had the potential to help the president, while the latter can potentially hurt him.

The fact that House Democrats voted along party lines to table the resolution censuring Schiff isn’t surprising. The majority, led by Pelosi and Schiff, are on a mission to remove the president. Toward that end, they will continue to “search” until they can formulate a set of facts that meet their rendition of the “truth.”

Schiff’s recital of the call between Trump and the president of Ukraine was a perfect example of this method in action. The summary was blatantly false, one-sided, and meant to portray the president in a negative light. Had the transcript not been previously released, House Democrats might have successfully convinced everyone that this false rendition was the “truth,” simply because it fit their narrative.

Republicans can’t allow this to happen, as the risks are simply too high.

Elad Hakim is a writer, commentator, and attorney. His articles have been published in The Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, The Federalist, The Algemeiner, The Western Journal, American Thinker, and other online publications.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.