[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 55 (Wednesday, March 29, 2017)]
[House]
[Pages H2550-H2557]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
QUESTIONING THE RUSSIAN CONNECTION
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 3, 2017, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Raskin) is recognized
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
General Leave
Mr. RASKIN. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
[[Page H2551]]
have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and
include extraneous materials on the subject of my Special Order.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Maryland?
There was no objection.
Mr. RASKIN. Madam Speaker, with my colleague Pramila Jayapal, from
the State of Washington, on behalf of the Progressive Caucus, we are
taking this Special Order hour to focus on the question of the Russian
connection.
This is a matter of utmost seriousness and urgency to the American
people because it goes to the question of our national security and the
political sovereignty of the American people to engage in democracy on
our own without foreign interference, subversion, and sabotage.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Maxine
Waters), the distinguished Congresswoman.
Ms. MAXINE WATERS of California. Madam Speaker, I would like to thank
Congressman Raskin for organizing this time, for helping to keep this
Congress focused on this extraordinary chain of events that is taking
place in our country, and for drawing attention to what should be a
credible investigation about the ties between this President and
Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin.
Why is this President so focused on complimenting Putin?
Why has he wrapped his arms around him?
Why has he said he is a great President?
Why does he refuse to even talk about the fact that Putin has invaded
Crimea?
Why does he refuse to understand what is being said when Putin is
charged to be a killer and all of the deaths that are taking place from
opponents of his, from people who criticize him?
Well, I think the more we learn about the connections that this
President and his allies have, the more these questions are going to
become very serious, and it is going to lead us to have to make some
big decisions about whether or not this President is fit to lead the
United States of America.
I have been deeply concerned about these issues for months. President
Trump, throughout his campaign and since his election, has chosen to
surround himself with people who have close ties with Russia.
When our intelligence agencies announced their conclusion that Russia
interfered in our elections, I called for an investigation focusing on
the possibility of collusion between Trump's ``Kremlin Klan,'' that I
have dubbed them, and the Russian Government. I introduced H. Con. Res.
15, urging Congress to investigate the possibility of collusion between
Russia and the Trump campaign. Investigations should focus on the
Kremlin Klan.
Let's talk about some of those allies and folks who are aligned with
Trump and with Russia:
Michael Flynn, who was fired from the NSC after lying about
discussing sanctions with Russian Ambassador Kislyak.
Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign manager, was a paid lobbyist
for Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Russian politician in Ukraine who fled
to Russia in 2014. AP reports Manafort signed a $10 million contract in
2006, with Russian billionaire and Putin ally Oleg Deripaska, to
advance Putin's interest in the United States. The New York Times also
reports Manafort tried to hide $750,000 in payments from a pro-Russian
party in Ukraine.
Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser, is a consultant to and
investor in the Kremlin state-run gas company, Gazprom, and has a
direct financial interest in ending American sanctions against the
company. He recently revealed that he met with Russian Ambassador
Sergey Kislyak, during the 2016 RNC.
And then there is Roger Stone, who has worked in Ukraine. Stone
announced, in a speech last summer, that he had spoken to WikiLeaks
founder Julian Assange. Stone also disclosed to the press that he had
been exchanging messages with Guccifer 2.0, the Russian hacker that
hacked the DNC last summer.
And then-Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross was a business partner of
Viktor Vekselberg, a Russian oligarch and Putin ally, in a major
financial project involving the Bank of Cyprus.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson signed a multibillion-dollar
agreement with Russia in 2011, on behalf of Exxon, for an oil drilling
project in the Arctic and is focused on lifting the sanctions.
The New York Times reported that, prior to his resignation, Mike
Flynn was delivered a proposal outlining a way for President Trump to
lift the Russian sanctions and broker a deal between Russia and Ukraine
that also included the public smearing of Ukraine's current President
Poroshenko. The deal is being pushed by his opposition in Ukraine.
Although Mike Flynn is gone, the proposal remains, along with those
pushing it.
Then there is Michael Cohen, the President's personal lawyer, who was
involved in developing the document, and who delivered the document.
Then there is Felix H. Sater, a business associate and a former
criminal who served time, who reportedly had ties with the Mafia, who
helped Mr. Trump scout deals in Russia.
And then there is Andriy Artemenko, a Ukrainian lawmaker trying to
rise in a political opposition movement, shaped in part by Mr. Trump's
former campaign manager, Paul Manafort.
And of course, there is our Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who was
forced to recuse himself from investigations related to the 2016
Presidential campaign, after it was revealed that he met with Russian
Ambassador Sergey Kislyak on two separate occasions during the campaign
cycle, information which he failed to disclose during his confirmation
hearings. Kislyak is the same Ambassador with whom Mike Flynn discussed
U.S. sanctions, and, by the way, he lied about it.
It has now been revealed that Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak met
with the following Trump associates: Carter Page, Jeff Sessions, Mike
Flynn, and Jared Kushner, in December 2016, in Trump Tower, during the
transition. None of these meetings were made public and were only
discovered after the press released reports.
Before the press reporting on the meetings above, the Trump
administration had repeatedly denied its campaign had contact and
communication with Russian officials. The press has noted that the
meetings are not unusual but that public concern is heightened because
they have all lied about or failed to disclose the meetings.
Deutsche Bank was ordered to pay more than $600 million in fines,
including a $425 million fine to New York's Department of Financial
Services and a $204 million fine to the U.K.'s Financial Conduct
Authority for failing to have adequate money laundering controls in
place to prevent a group of corrupt traders from improperly and
secretly transferring more than $10 billion out of Russia. Press
reports indicate that the Department of Justice is investigating this
matter. Deutsche Bank is Trump's largest lender, lending his companies
an estimated $360 million.
As to oil and gas, President Trump signed last month a bill striking
section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act which required
Big Oil companies to disclose the money they pay to foreign governments
to drill on their lands. Striking section 1504 will allow Big Oil
companies like ExxonMobil to conduct secretive dealings with corrupt
parties, such as Vladimir Putin and Russia.
The White House attempted to enlist the FBI, the CIA Director Pompeo,
and top Republicans on the House and Senate intel committees to help
push back against The New York Times reporting on Trump's ties to
Russia.
There is Devin Nunes--I don't need to talk about him. He issued a
joint statement with Adam Schiff, a joint statement in January
announcing that the scope of their investigation would include links
between Russia and individuals associated with political campaigns.
FBI Director James Comey announced on March 20, during testimony
before the House Intelligence Committee, that the FBI is investigating
whether members of President Trump's campaign colluded with Russia to
influence the 2016 election.
Devin Nunes announced to the press that members of Trump's transition
team were under incidental surveillance by U.S. intelligence agencies
[[Page H2552]]
after the election and briefed President Trump on March 22. However, he
did not brief Adam Schiff or other House Intelligence Committee
members, and he never revealed his source. Devin Nunes has clearly
compromised the investigation and can no longer be trusted to lead it.
In conclusion, Congress must create a comprehensive, independent,
bipartisan commission to expose the full truth of Trump's ties to
Russia. I believe that, once we have fully investigated Trump's Kremlin
Klan, we will find that there was collusion between President Trump and
Russia to violate the integrity of our elections.
At that point, the Republicans in Congress will have no choice but to
put country ahead of party. I say impeach Donald Trump.
I thank you so much, as we witness what attempts to be a coverup now
about all of this.
Mr. RASKIN. Madam Speaker, I want to thank Ms. Waters for her zealous
work on behalf of her constituents and all Americans.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Nadler),
our distinguished colleague, who is a leading member of the House
Judiciary Committee.
Mr. NADLER. Madam Speaker, there is an obvious cancer at the heart of
the credibility, perhaps even of the legitimacy, of the Trump
administration. That cancer consists of questions pertaining to the
relationship of this administration with Russia.
We know that the Russians intervened in the last election with the
goal of advantaging Trump's campaign over Hillary Clinton. We know that
there were numerous Trump campaign transition team and administration
officials in contact with the Russians--prior to, during, and after the
campaign.
We know that there is a pattern of these individuals at first denying
such contacts but later, after being forced to come clean, admitting
them.
Examples to date include: former National Security Adviser Michael
Flynn, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and Roger Stone, who admitted
that he was in contact with Guccifer 2.0, the hacker that the CIA says
is a Russian front for military intelligence.
We know that the Attorney General gave false testimony, deliberate or
otherwise, to the Senate regarding meetings with Russian officials.
We know that President Trump has financial ties with Russia. Although
he denies it, we now know that there are large Russian investments in
The Trump Organization. The President's son, Donald Trump, Jr., said a
few years ago that money was ``flowing in'' from Russia. That obviously
can have a major influence on the President and on the decisions of his
administration.
We know that there was a change in the Republican platform dealing
with Ukraine to favor Russia, a change that was engineered by the Trump
campaign.
We even know who in the Trump campaign gave the instruction to make
this change.
We know that there is an ongoing criminal investigation by the FBI of
possible collusion by the Trump campaign in the admitted Russian
intervention in the attempt by Russia to subvert the 2016 Presidential
campaign.
Knowing all this, it is impossible to ignore or to dismiss questions
concerning the credibility of the administration, and, certainly, we
must ask questions regarding its legitimacy as well, if there is
persuasive evidence that crimes were committed in colluding with Russia
to subvert the election.
{time} 1730
We have a duty to resolve this question, to get answers, to pursue
the truth, and to remove any cancer that we may find.
A few weeks ago, the Judiciary Committee considered a resolution of
inquiry that I introduced dealing with a number of issues, including
the President's conflicts of interests, his possible violations of the
Constitution's Emoluments Clause, and any information about possible
criminal or counterintelligence investigations related to the President
and/or his associates. Yet, to date, the Republicans have opposed our
amendments and voted down our resolutions of inquiry, in effect,
abdicating their constitutional obligation to provide oversight and
enforce the law.
Now we have the spectacle of the chairman of the House Intelligence
Committee conducting an obvious coverup, failing to share important
information with members of the committee--information, I would add,
that revealed President Trump's allegations against former President
Obama as completely false--while inappropriately briefing people at the
White House on the committee's investigation, the very same people who
are the subjects of the investigation.
This is so absurd, so inappropriate, and beyond belief that it is
tough to accept the reality of the situation. Sadly, this isn't a
television drama we can turn off or walk away from. The integrity of
our democratic system of government is at stake.
What we need is honesty. The American people must have faith in the
integrity of our government, and it is our job to ensure it. It is time
for answers.
If there is no evidence of misconduct, then we should move on. But if
the truth reveals a conspiracy, if there is proof of criminal conduct,
Donald Trump must be held accountable, and the people around him must
be held accountable, and we must act.
There is no superior way to get at the truth and to fulfill our duty
to the people of this country than to have an independent investigatory
commission established beyond any partisan control. So I urge that that
be done so that the people of this country can have confidence once
again in their government.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my colleague from Washington
State (Ms. Jayapal), who is the co-convener of the Progressive Caucus
Special Order along with me.
Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, Mr. Raskin of
Maryland, for his incredible leadership and for the opportunity to
continue to lead the Special Order hour for the Progressive Caucus here
every week. And every week we do try to pick a different topic.
For those of you in the audience, we pick a different topic, and this
evening that topic is the ties to Russia of this administration.
Yesterday, Sean Spicer told veteran White House correspondent April
Ryan that she was ``going to have to take `no' for an answer'' when she
asked him about the President's collusion with Russia.
Well, Mr. Spicer, we are here to tell you that we will not just take
``no'' for an answer. We are not going to sit back and believe
everything that is coming out from the White House when there is
mounting evidence that President Trump's campaign may have colluded
with Russia to tip the election in his favor.
And for those of you who saw the Judiciary Committee today, we had a
resolution of inquiry from Representative Hakeem Jeffries and Ted Lieu
about this very issue in relation to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and
his ties to Russia.
Let's not forget that President Trump's former national security
adviser and campaign adviser only lasted a record-setting 24 days in
the role because he blatantly lied about meeting with Russia's
Ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, during the campaign.
So what other ties to Russia have been confirmed?
There are so many of these ties that I thought it might be helpful to
have a diagram and to really show exactly what the connections have
been between top Trump officials during the campaign who are now the
same officials that are serving in the White House and are the
President's close and personal confidants. The fact that a diagram is
even necessary tells us something.
Let's start at the top with the President himself.
President Trump has a long history with Russia. His first trip to
Moscow was actually 30 years ago. He went to explore potential real
estate opportunities. His relationship with the country has clearly
grown.
In the late 1990s, Trump started banking with Deutsche Bank, which
has since been investigated for funneling Russian money offshore.
Soon after that, he linked up with a Russian company called the
Bayrock Group, which has ties to the Mafia and to criminal interests in
Russia. Their partnership was integral to helping to
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expand The Trump Organization to new heights, with properties springing
up across the country.
His ties to Russia only grew deeper. In the late 2000s, several
Russian businessmen bought properties from The Trump Organization,
netting them hundreds of millions of dollars in profit.
Now, let's fast-forward to 2016 when then-candidate Trump was
building his team. He brought on Carter Page, who is now under
investigation for communicating with Russian officials. And, in fact,
it was the Trump campaign's former manager, Corey Lewandowski, who gave
Carter Page the green light to visit Moscow just last July. A couple of
weeks later, Mr. Page met with Sergey Kislyak, but he said that he will
not reveal the details of that conversation to the public.
This is a very important, consistent fact that we see. Our resolution
of inquiry today that we debated in the Judiciary Committee was about
the release of information so that we understand what is going on.
Without any accusations, what we are trying to say is let us
investigate what these ties are, what the conversations were, and let
us determine, in an independent, bipartisan way, let us determine that
there has not been collusion, and let us make sure that there is no
foreign government that is affecting our democracy.
So various members of Trump's team met with Russian officials during
the campaign. But Attorney General Jeff Sessions didn't just meet with
officials, he lied about meeting with officials during his confirmation
hearing.
And again, the top prosecutor in the United States of America lied
under oath during a confirmation hearing. This cannot be ignored.
Once again, we are not saying don't have conversations, but don't lie
about them. Don't make us wonder what happened during those
conversations. How do we trust the Attorney General of the United
States of America to fairly and impartially preside if he has shown
that he is willing to make false statements just to get the job?
He is not the only high-level Trump official who has been blatantly
dishonest with the American people. Michael Flynn, the former national
security adviser, was put in place by President Trump and resigned due
to the shady backdoor dealings that put him in the pocket of Russian
officials. He was paid $45,000 to attend a state-sponsored gala dinner
and sit at the table of Vladimir Putin.
These connections are more than just mere coincidence.
And in addition to Flynn, Page, and Sessions, there are several
others who have been implicated: Trump's former campaign manager, Paul
Manafort; former campaign adviser, Roger Stone; his personal lawyer--
all of these folks are up here--his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, are
all under investigation for their connections to Russia. And now
President Trump's son-in-law, who has become one of his top advisers,
is under investigation as well for his actions during the campaign.
Not only did Jared Kushner meet with Ambassador Kislyak, he met with
the Russian bankers as well. And the White House has claimed that the
meetings were ``diplomatic,'' but it is deeply troubling that one of
the bankers that he met with was Sergey Gorkov.
I want to be clear about who this person is. He is a graduate of the
Russian Academy of the Federal Security Service, which is an academy
that is tasked with training individuals to become members of Russia's
security and intelligence forces. He is now the chairman of the
Vnesheconombank, and he was appointed by Putin, himself. This is not a
mom-and-pop bank. This is a state-owned corporation that has been under
sanctions by the United States for the past 3 years. And that is a big
deal.
Jared Kushner, whose family is worth nearly $2 billion, has real
estate interests around the world, sat down, allegedly under the
auspices of his role with the President, to chat with this owner of the
bank. A spokesperson for the Kremlin has alleged that this meeting was
``absolutely the bank's prerogative'' and that the Russian Government
was unaware of the meeting.
We need more information to know what happened in that meeting
because, otherwise, where there is smoke, we think there is fire. So we
need to have the information so that we can actually determine what is
happening with these connections because, if somebody from the Trump
campaign and the Trump administration is meeting with Russian officials
and they don't want to tell us why or what is discussed, then we have
to start wondering whether the conversations are in the interest of the
American people or in the interest of the Russian Government.
We also have Rex Tillerson, President Trump's Secretary of State, who
has strong business ties to Russia and was awarded the Order of
Friendship from Vladimir Putin in 2013. This is the highest honor that
Russia can bestow on noncitizens. Just 2 years prior, Tillerson had
struck a massive $500 billion oil deal with the Russian Government.
Now, we could go on and on with this, but what is important for the
American people to understand is that we have expectations that the
President of the United States and that his Cabinet are working in the
interests of the American people.
We have expectations that, if a deal is struck, it is not for the
benefit of some other country or for the personal benefit of any
individual in office, but that it is for the public's benefit. And if a
deal is struck that takes benefit away from the public in order to give
it to a foreign government or to an individual personal interest of our
government, then that is an enormous disservice to our democracy, and,
of course, there are constitutional ramifications for all of this.
This administration has tried to tell us that the conversations
between Trump's advisers and high-level Russian businessmen and
officials were about diplomacy. Yet this shroud of secrecy that
continues every time we try to get information, every time we try to
make sure that there is an independent, bipartisan investigation, the
shroud of secrecy continues, and it begs the question: If this is
really about advocating for the interests of the American people and
not the Russian Government or the pocketbooks of Cabinet members,
then why the secrecy? What is there to hide?
We don't understand that. If there is nothing to hide, then let us
have the information. There have been plenty of requests to do that in
a classified way in case there is some information that is classified.
But why are the President's campaign advisers and officials denying
under oath that they have communicated with Russia only then to be
forced to walk back their statements or recuse themselves, as Jeff
Sessions had to do, or to even resign?
Foreign policy is key to American interests, but these backroom
conversations and subsequent lies are doing nothing to make the
American people feel confident in an administration that is supposed to
represent them. It is clear that there is a strong tie here that was
only strengthened during the campaign.
But let's be very clear about what is the connective tissue in all of
this, in all of these lines that go back and forth. What is the
connective tissue that connects all of this? It is money.
How did we get to this point?
Of course, we remember the hacking of the election that occurred last
year. It is in the process of being investigated, even though the
chairman of the Intelligence Committee feels that his first duty is to
the President and not to the members of the committee.
But last year, President Trump defended Vladimir Putin by placing the
blame on the Democratic National Committee to distract the American
people; and then, in July, he outright urged Russia to hack Hillary
Clinton's emails, saying: ``Russia, if you are listening, I hope you
are able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing.''
In December, a CIA assessment concluded that Russia was trying to
help then-candidate Trump win the election. Why? Because they know that
they have an ally in President Trump. They have someone who is willing
to do business with them, even if it may not be in the best interests
of the American people. They know that they are well connected at every
level of his administration.
And let's be clear about who we are talking about with Mr. Putin.
This is a
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dictator, a human rights abuser, somebody whom Republicans and
Democrats, alike, have said we cannot be associated with.
{time} 1745
You have heard of ``The Manchurian Candidate.'' In the most recent
election, we may have ended up with the Kremlin candidate, and the
script truly writes itself.
We were hoping to have a chance to get to the bottom of this, as I
said. We were hoping to have a chance to get to the bottom of this in a
hearing in the House Intelligence Committee, but we never got the
chance.
Last Tuesday, Representative Nunes went to the secret briefing in a
National Security Council facility, and what he found apparently wasn't
good for the President because he ran over there to tell the President.
Instead of doing his duty and reporting the information to the House
Intelligence Committee, he went straight to the White House with his
findings. And he is supposed to be chairing an investigation into what
happened, not being the runner for information to the President.
After briefing President Trump, Representative Nunes canceled the
hearing, denying Americans the opportunity to hear from former Acting
Attorney General Sally Yates. And Ranking Member Jim Himes was right
when he said that ``the Monday hearing last week was, I'm sure, not to
the White House's liking.''
He went on to say: ``Since Monday, I'm sorry to say, the chairman,''
Chairman Nunes, ``has ceased to be the chairman of an investigative
committee and has been running interference for the Trump White
House.''
This is absolutely unacceptable. The fact that we are questioning
whether or not several members of the President's Cabinet--not just
one, not even just two, but several members of the President's Cabinet,
including the President, himself--are guilty of collusion with a
foreign government is a downright outrage.
In my home district, the Seventh District of Washington State, I have
been receiving numerous calls, hundreds of calls from constituents
since day one, saying: How can this be happening in this democracy? How
is this possible in America? How do we make sure that our government is
representing us and not a foreign entity?
Why is it that somebody would lie about whether or not they had a
conversation with the Russian Government if there was nothing to hide?
People are losing faith in the United States Government. It is a
crisis of democracy when people can't trust that their government is
actually trying to get to the bottom of what is going on and actually
representing the interests of the American people.
The White House may have a friend in Representative Nunes, but I want
the American people to know that they have a friend in us. We won't
back down on our demands. Representative Nunes should recuse himself
from this investigation. There is no way we can expect a full and
impartial investigation after what has just occurred.
This should not be a partisan issue. Every Member of Congress,
Republican and Democrat, should be demanding to know the facts. We are
not making judgments. We want to know the facts. If there are facts
that we don't know that say, no, there were very legitimate
conversations, there was no collusion, then we are done. Why tie up the
airwaves with this?
So tonight, as we think about where we are in this debate and we
think about the fact that, for 3 months, this administration has been
under the shadow of secrecy, under the shadow of mistrust from the
American people, there is a very easy way to clear all of the names of
the people who are on this list, including the President of the United
States, and that is to ensure that we have an independent
investigation; to ensure that Representative Nunes recuses himself and
steps down as the chair of the Intelligence Committee, given what has
happened; and to ensure that, at the end of the day, we remember that
the Government of the United States of America, the President of the
United States of America, the Congress of the United States of America,
our one duty is to represent the people of the United States of
America.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Raskin) for his
leadership.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Jayapal for her
fantastic leadership for the people of Washington in the city of
Washington and her zealous advocacy for all of the American people.
Mr. Speaker, let me try to recap some of the themes that we have
brought up this evening and talk about what is really at stake here.
But I want to start with some good news, because there was really some
great news out of Russia on Sunday, where more than 75,000 people
across the country braved the tyranny and despotism of their government
to go out into the streets to express their commitment to democracy,
human rights, and against corruption.
They were focused very specifically on some of the oligarchs who
surround Vladimir Putin. One of them, Prime Minister Medvedev, it has
just been learned, has amassed more than $1 billion, as a public
servant, in mansions, in vineyards in Italy, in fancy cars, in
jewelry--$1 billion. And the people of Russia are up in arms about the
corruption, the kleptocracy, the stealing from the Russian people,
which is increasingly impoverished by the imperial designs and the
corrupt practices of Putin and his team.
So tens of thousands of people went into the streets to protest.
These are brave people, because you are talking about an authoritarian
government there, a dictator, a despot, someone who orders out for the
assassination of his political enemies. Many of them were arrested.
Hundreds of them were arrested in Moscow, and some of them are still in
jail right now.
Mr. Speaker, we should be on the side of the protesters in Russia.
That is who we are as America. We are a nation conceived in
revolutionary insurgency against corruption, against monarchy, against
dictators and autocrats and theocrats and kleptocrats who steal from
the people. That is who we are.
We should be meeting with them. We should be meeting with the human
rights activists. We should be meeting with the anticorruption marchers
who are putting themselves on the front lines of history. We should be
meeting with the dissenters and the critics of Vladimir Putin and the
oligarchs and big business kleptocrats who surround him. But, instead,
our government has aligned with Putin himself, with the insiders in
Russia. That is totally antithetical to the design of America, when you
think about it.
Mr. Speaker, we have the great good fortune to go to work every day
surrounded by portraits of people who built this country, like George
Washington, who is right over there. We have got portraits of Thomas
Jefferson. We have got portraits of Frederick Douglass. We have got
portraits of Abraham Lincoln, who actually served in this body and,
when he was here, spent a lot of his time railing about a war that was
concocted with lies by President James Polk, the Mexican War.
But Lincoln knew how delicate and precious and precarious an
enterprise democracy is. In the Gettysburg Address, he posed the
question of how long government of the people, by the people, and for
the people can last. Will it perish from the Earth? And he put the
question to the people because, he said, it is up to us.
Democracy is a rarity in human history. Democracy is not the norm.
That is why America is a miraculous experiment on Earth. If you don't
do anything, you are going to end up with dictators and despots and
kleptocrats who steal from their own people, like Vladimir Putin.
But America started a different way. The first three words of our
Constitution are ``We, the people.'' We, the people; we flipped the
whole design. Before that, the whole theory was that the king had the
power, and the king got power directly from God; and everybody was a
subject of the king, and everybody served the king.
Our Founders had the vision, in that outburst of enlightenment and
enthusiasm, to say, no, we are going to try something different:
We are going to start a government based on we, the people, and we
are going to separate church and state; and we are not going to dictate
to people their religious worship, and we are not
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going to dictate to people their political beliefs. There is going to
be freedom of thought and freedom of speech.
We don't trust the collapse of all powers into one, which Madison
said was the very definition of tyranny. We are going to separate
powers. The legislature, Congress, will come first, Article I. It will
represent the people. But then we are going to have someone else
execute the laws of the people, faithfully execute the laws of the
people. That will be the President. And when there are disputes, they
will be adjudicated in a third branch of government, by the Supreme
Court, to figure it out.
But we are going to separate the powers, because when one guy has got
all the power, it endangers the freedoms and the liberties of everybody
else. We even said, even though our President is limited by the
separation of powers, we are going to make sure that the President and
also the Members of Congress will have an undivided, zealous loyalty
only to the American people.
Article I, section 9 says we cannot accept presents, emoluments,
which are any kind of payments, offices, or titles from foreign
princes, foreign kings, or foreign states, period. We can't accept them
without the approval of Congress. It doesn't go.
There were all kinds of powers that were sending spies and saboteurs
to Washington, when the country first began, to try to pay off elected
officials, but our Founders had the vision to say: No, we are not going
to accept that. We are not going to allow payments and bribes and fancy
presents being given to our elected officials.
So one government, separated powers, based on public integrity,
honesty, and devotion to the people. That is the model here.
Now, we should be on the side of democratic movements all over the
Earth, like the people who assembled in Moscow on Sunday, who assembled
in Siberia on Sunday. There were marchers even there. It was like our
Women's March. It took place all over the country. Those are our
people. We should be on the side of the people who are trying to
overthrow the despotism in Russia.
But look what is happening. Tyranny and authoritarianism are on the
march all over the world. Russia is the headquarters of it, but you can
find it everywhere you look:
Philippines, a madman dictator who thinks he has the power to send
his agents out to go and shoot people on the street because they look
like they are a drug dealer and brags about it, Duterte;
Hungary, another favorite of Vladimir Putin, Mr. Orban, who is
cracking down on press freedom, on human rights in his country;
Iran, authoritarian, theocratic state; people being thrown in jail
for blasphemy, for heresy, for apostasy, for religious offenses;
Saudi Arabia, fomenting racist, anti-Semitic propaganda and sending
it out, oppressing people based on religion, not even allowing women to
drive in their society.
Everywhere you turn, tyranny, despotism on the march.
And Mr. Putin has a plan. How do we know it? Do we know it from the
Democratic Caucus or the Republican Conference? No. We know it from our
intelligence agencies, from the FBI, the CIA, the National Security
Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Seventeen of America's intelligence agencies came back with a report,
and they said Vladimir Putin has a plan to continue to destabilize and
undermine liberal democracy all over the world.
Brexit was part of it. The intervention in our election was part of
it. They are going after France, where they want the rightwing, ultra
nationalist, anti-immigrant campaign of Marine Le Pen to triumph in
France. They are trying to do it in Germany, which is now the strongest
outpost of liberal democracy left on Earth, as of yet, uncontaminated
by the penetration of Russian intelligence and Putin's agents.
But what did they do to us? What is this all about?
Well, we had an election in 2016. The sovereign people of America had
an election. Now, unfortunately, we are still using the electoral
college, which is antiquated and obsolescent. There is a movement to
change it afoot to the national popular vote. But be that as it may,
that is our system. We haven't reformed it yet. It is our system. It is
our elections here in America. But the electoral college makes it more
vulnerable because you just have to intervene in a handful of States in
order to sway the vote.
What did Putin do? Again, we know this. I am not making this up. We
know this from our intelligence agencies. If you don't believe me, you
go to your computer and you just look up the intelligence agency report
on Russian interference and espionage and sabotage in our 2016
election.
And what did they do?
They spied on different Democratic institutions, like the Democratic
National Committee, and they spied on particular people.
They engaged in not just cyber espionage, but cyber sabotage.
They orchestrated a series of leaks which dominated election coverage
in the United States for several weeks.
They orchestrated a campaign of fake news and propaganda in order to
undermine Hillary Clinton, who was reviled--and is reviled,
presumably--by Vladimir Putin because she challenged him, and she
challenged the human rights situation in Russia and the involvement of
Russia with various dictators in other parts of the world. So they
interfered in our election.
When I first got to Congress, that was still being disputed. When we
tried to talk about this, it was being said, well, there is no evidence
that Russia did this. Well, guess what? The evidence is replete. It is
decisive. It is determinative.
{time} 1800
Now we are not hearing from our friends on the other side: Well,
Russia didn't do this.
Now they are saying something different: Well, Russia may have done
that. It may have been this massive, orchestrated campaign to undermine
and subvert our elections, but there is no proof that that was actual
collusion by the Trump campaign.
About that, I want to say two things. Number one, it shouldn't make
any difference. Let's say nobody in the Trump campaign knew anybody in
Russia and never heard of Vladimir Putin. It would make no difference
because we should still view this as a radical threat to the political
sovereignty of the American people.
But the second answer is even more important. As all of my colleagues
were pointing out before, every day we get more evidence not just of
contacts and connections, but actual collaboration and cooperation
between people in the Trump campaign, the Trump family, and the Trump
universe with Vladimir Putin and his closest agents and assets
throughout Russia and around the world.
Let's just recap a few of those: former national security adviser
Michael Flynn was forced to resign, or I guess he was fired by
President Trump after he failed to disclose the scope of his contacts
with Russians, including Ambassador Kislyak. He was paid more than
$33,000 in 2015 by Russian-funded propaganda media, and the full extent
of his relationship to the Russians is still being investigated.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions was forced to recuse himself from this
whole matter because he met several times with Ambassador Kislyak, who
has been described as Russia's top spy in America during the 2016
election. Then--I will speak charitably here--he misled his own
colleagues in the Senate about it at his Senate confirmation hearing
raising the issue and then denying that he had had any contact with the
Russians at all.
Senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner met with the Russian
Ambassador at Trump Tower a few months ago in December of 2016. We have
got former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser Carter Page, who has
admitted that he met with the Russian Ambassador and other Russians in
Cleveland at the Republican National Convention and met with managers
from Rosneft, the Russian-owned oil company. He himself owns shares of
a Russian energy company called Gazprom.
Roger Stone, Trump's longtime buddy and political adviser, was
working with WikiLeaks, which published documents during the election
based on information divulged because of Russian interference and
espionage that
[[Page H2556]]
tilted the scales again in favor of Trump in the campaign, and he
hosted a series on the Russian propaganda network.
Paul Manafort, Trump's campaign manager for 6 months, was an adviser
to Ukrainian oligarchs who got sweetheart business deals from Putin's
associates. He was also a business partner of Russian oligarchs close
to Putin. He resigned in August of last year after reports surfaced
that suggested that he had received $12.7 million from Ukraine's pro-
Russia former president Viktor Yanukovych. He was on the payroll for
$10 million, it has just come out, in order to promote the Russian
perspective and Putin's propaganda in Washington, D.C., and throughout
the United States in order to change the course of U.S. politics.
Now, I am sorry to put these out there as a bunch of clues. I wish we
had a coherent story to tell. We don't, because what we need is a
comprehensive 9/11-style independent investigation to figure out what
precisely happened. In America you are presumed innocent until proven
guilty. Nobody is putting any of these people in jail, but it has come
out, despite their best efforts in some cases, that they are up to
their necks in the Russian connection.
What does that mean for American democracy?
What we know is there was a massive independent expenditure in 2006.
That is what we call it under our FEC law when you go out and spend
money to try to destroy one candidate and help another. There was a
massive foreign independent expenditure orchestrated by Vladimir Putin.
The question is: Was it, in FEC terms, a coordinated expenditure?
That is, did the Trump team actively work with them?
As we are saying, there are lots of clues that suggest it is so. I am
not willing to say that they were definitely in cahoots with them. I am
not willing to say that they were necessarily collaborating the
election. But the evidence accumulates every single day that points in
that direction.
Now every day in Washington, D.C., what we are doing is running
around because there is a coverup that has been unfolding. Today, of
course, we are dealing with a resolution in the House Judiciary
Committee to try to get to the bottom of what Chairman Nunes of the
House Intelligence Committee actually did when he ran over to the White
House with some information that he had about Trump apparently being
picked up incidentally in conversations that were being tapped by the
American intelligence community with foreign operatives. Again, it is
shadowy because we don't know the whole thing. But what we do know is
that Chairman Nunes went to the White House to tell President Trump or
his deputies before he told anybody here in Congress.
Now, we have been saying from the beginning we want an independent,
objective 9/11-style commission--no Democratic politicians, no
Republican politicians, and no elected officials. Let's agree on gifted
statesmen and stateswomen who can really get to the bottom of this if
we care about the truth. Their answer has been: No, we have got the
Intelligence Committee to do it instead.
But now what we have got is the Intelligence Committee chair
traveling back and forth to the White House, spilling the beans, which
undermines everybody's confidence in the integrity of the investigation
that is taking place into the Russian connection and what actually
happened in the 2016 election.
Mr. Speaker, in the American system of government, elected officials
have to have undivided loyalty to the American people. That is why we
have got the Emoluments Clause: no presents, no emoluments, no offices,
and no titles from foreign governments. That is why we swear an oath to
the Constitution of the United States of America. Each one of us who
has the great honor and privilege of coming to Washington, D.C., to
represent the people swear an oath to our Constitution and to our
people.
We are not a country, like so many, that are defined by one religion.
We are not defined by one race. We are not defined by one ethnicity. We
are not defined by one political party. We are not defined by one
political ideology. We are defined by one Constitution. That is what
unifies us as Americans. We must be constitutional patriots here and
insist upon our constitutional values and the rule of law for democracy
to be meaningful in the 21st century.
There is a new model of tyrannical government traveling all over the
world, and all the bullies and despots have found each other. They are
in league together. They want government as a moneymaking operation.
They want government as a moneymaking operation for private elites in
their country, whether it is in Russia or the Philippines or Saudi
Arabia. Sad to say, we are starting to see the development of that
right here in the United States of America.
So we have the opportunity and we have the responsibility to exercise
our rights as citizens under the First Amendment and to exercise our
privileges as Members of Congress under the speech or debate clause to
speak up against the march of tyranny all over the Earth. We have got
an obligation to resist the corruption--the same corruption that the
people in Russia were marching against on Sunday. We must demand real
answers about what took place in our Presidential election in 2016. The
intelligence agencies warned us that what happened in 2016 was a dress
rehearsal for what is going to happen the next time and the time after
that.
I want to say something about the geopolitics of this. Think about it
for a second:
Who has got the strongest economy on Earth?
We do, the freest, the original democracy. We have got the strongest
economy.
Who has got the strongest military?
We do.
Russia can't come close. But the way I understand what happened in
2016 was that Vladimir Putin--who is not an honest man, but he is a
clever man--decided that this was a moment of opportunity for Russia.
He is the former chief of the KGB. Let's not forget that. He is the guy
who said that the greatest catastrophe of the 20th century was the
collapse of the Soviet Union. He is an irredentist imperialist who
wants to go back and reconstruct the Russian empire.
But what he saw was an opportunity, which is that today the whole
world is linked, and it is linked by the internet. He created something
that I think of as a Manhattan Project for military conquest and defeat
of the liberal democracies in the 21st century.
He set about to figure out this question: How can we undermine and
subvert the liberal democracies?
These are open societies. America is an open society. We pride
ourselves on the First Amendment, on freedom of speech, and on free
dialogue and discussion.
So he said to himself: How can I subvert and undermine that?
The answer became very clear: to create--really on the cheap, because
compared to military might, this is pennies on the dollar--he was going
to create an internet army, in effect, to try to undermine and subvert
our democracy with fake news, with propaganda, and with paid trolls to
get information out to try to destroy the reputations of opposition
politicians and to try to promote the parties that he viewed as
``within his camp.''
Guess what?
It still is going on today. It is still happening. We are not talking
about ancient history. We are talking about an ongoing project. That is
why I am proud to be a member of the minority caucus here, the
Democratic Party caucus, which is insisting that we create an
independent, objective, neutral, 9/11-style commission to investigate
the Russian connection and what happened with the attack on American
democracy in 2016.
We have got to get to the bottom of it. Two-thirds of the American
people in public opinion polls say that they support such a commission.
There is nobody who would oppose it except for somebody who has got
something to hide. But for the rest of us, we have every reason to get
to the bottom of this plot to destroy our election in 2016, and we have
every reason to defend this great constitutional democracy with
everything we have got.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Arrington). Members are reminded to
[[Page H2557]]
refrain from engaging in personalities toward the President.
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