[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 178 (Thursday, November 7, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6463-S6464]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                              Impeachment

  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I rise today to discuss the impeachment 
inquiry currently underway in the House.
  First, I want to recognize the courageous public servants who have 
testified in the House in recent weeks in defense of U.S. national 
security and in defense of the rule of law and our democratic 
institutions. I will cite just four: Lieutenant Colonel Vindman, 
Ambassador Yovanovitch, Ambassador Taylor, and Ambassador McKinley.
  Despite the two decades of military service by Lieutenant Colonel 
Vindman and the Purple Heart he earned for his sacrifice for our 
country in Iraq, his character has faced brutal attacks from cable news 
and from some current and former Members of Congress.
  As former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul put it in a 
Washington Post column last week, ``Such smear tactics are revolting 
and un-American. [Lt. Col.] Vindman has served our country with honor 
and distinction, both on and off the battlefield. . . . And he is a 
patriot--as you would expect from someone with his outstanding 
resume.''
  So said former Ambassador McFaul, and I agree with him. I think most 
Americans would agree with him.
  Lieutenant Colonel Vindman is just one of the many brave patriots who 
have testified as part of this impeachment inquiry.
  Ambassador Yovanovitch has dedicated over 30 years to U.S. foreign 
service. She has rightfully earned the respect and credibility that she 
has within the U.S. national security community for her anti-corruption 
efforts in Ukraine and for her unwavering commitment to U.S. national 
security interests.
  Ambassador McKinley has served this country as Senior Advisor to the 
Secretary of State and Ambassador to Brazil, Afghanistan, Colombia, and 
Peru. He has demonstrated fierce loyalty to his colleagues in the State 
Department and to the United States itself.
  Ambassador Taylor's life has been marked by his service to our 
Nation, from West Point to the 101st Airborne in Vietnam, to his work 
as Ambassador to Ukraine and other significant foreign policy roles.
  We should all be inspired by these and countless other public 
servants who work to protect and serve the United States every day. 
When I reflect upon their service to our country and their integrity, I 
am reminded of one of the lines from ``America the Beautiful": ``Oh, 
beautiful for patriot dream That sees beyond the years.'' That is what 
these patriots are doing--trying to understand and deliberate about 
what their actions should be now that will help America over time, to 
see beyond the years. That is part of the dream of a patriot, and these 
individuals have demonstrated that. They have a care and a concern 
about our institutions, our government, our democracy, our 
Constitution, and, of course, a concern about what their actions mean 
for the future.
  Over the past week, the House committees leading the impeachment 
inquiry regarding President Trump's, in my judgment, abuse of power 
have publicly released the first full transcripts from several of their 
interviews with State officials and diplomats. The transcripts explain 
in rich detail how the President employed Rudy Giuliani, his personal 
attorney, to manage a shadow diplomacy agenda focused on personal 
vendettas and unfounded--and that is an understatement--conspiracy 
theories in Ukraine.
  Ambassador Yovanovitch testified that there was a ``concerted 
campaign'' to have her removed as Ambassador to Ukraine and repeatedly 
discussed the threatening and bullying behavior of the President and 
Mr. Giuliani because of her disagreements with Mr. Giuliani. The 
Ambassador explained that a senior Ukrainian official expressed 
significant concerns regarding Mr. Giuliani's behavior and told the 
Ambassador that she ``really needed to watch her back.''
  When asked whether she felt threatened after President Trump told the 
Ukrainian President that she was ``going to go through some things,'' 
Ambassador Yovanovitch responded unequivocally ``yes,'' meaning yes, 
she felt threatened.
  And she indicated some of her friends were ``very concerned'' about 
her personal safety.
  Just imagine that. Imagine that. A U.S. Ambassador concerned about 
what would happen to her next. Even those around her were concerned 
about her personal safety because of what a President was saying and 
doing--and those around him.
  Later in her testimony, Ambassador Yovanovitch discussed the 
influence of Rudy Giuliani in Ukraine. When asked whether anyone at the 
State Department tried to stop Giuliani's efforts, she explained as 
follows:

       I don't think so. I don't think they felt they could.

  Now, let's turn to Ambassador Taylor. He described similar concerns 
about Mr. Giuliani. Referencing the investigations President Trump 
wanted Ukraine to pursue into his political opponent--in this case, 
former Vice President Joe Biden--Ambassador Taylor described that the 
``irregular channel'' of Ukraine policy directed by Mr. Giuliani was 
focused on ``one or two specific cases, irrespective of whether it 
helped solve the corruption problem'' in Ukraine.
  Ambassador Taylor further explained that it was his ``clear 
understanding'' that ``security assistance money'' for Ukraine would 
not be delivered until President Zelensky ``committed to pursue the 
investigation.''
  Ambassador McKinley, a former senior adviser to Secretary of State 
Pompeo, confirmed that he resigned because of his concerns about the 
President's shadow diplomacy efforts

[[Page S6464]]

with Mr. Giuliani. When the chairman asked Mr. McKinley whether he 
resigned in part because of efforts to use the State Department to dig 
up dirt on a political opponent, Mr. McKinley responded:

       That is fair. And if I can underscore, in 37 years in the 
     Foreign Service and different parts of the globe and working 
     on many controversial issues, working 10 years back in 
     Washington, I had never seen that.

  As the Washington Post reported on September 21, the President's 
behavior related to this Ukraine matter has revealed--in the opinion of 
this journalist at the Post, a reporter who has covered the President 
very closely--No. 1, ``a President convinced of his own invincibility--
apparently willing and even eager to wield the vast powers of the 
United States to taint a political foe and confident that no one could 
hold him back.''
  Let me move to the whistleblower protections. Armed with this sense 
of invincibility, the President has directed some of his most pointed 
criticisms at the brave whistleblower who came forward to expose the 
President's call with the Ukrainian President.
  On Twitter, the President has demanded to meet the whistleblower 
face-to-face, despite laws that clearly protect the whistleblower's 
right to anonymity.
  Just the other day, the whistleblower's attorney confirmed that his 
client offered to answer written questions under oath from House 
Republicans as long as the questions did not compromise the 
individual's identity.
  House Republicans immediately denounced the offer, and the President 
tweeted that ``[w]ritten answers are not acceptable,'' despite the fact 
that President Trump refused--refused to be interviewed by Special 
Counsel Mueller's team and only answered written questions during the 
special counsel's investigation into election interference.
  Despite his own unwillingness to answer live questioning, the 
President has persisted in his desire to ``out'' the whistleblower by 
tweeting that ``we must determine the Whistleblower's identity'' and 
arguing that the press would be ``doing the public a service'' if it 
outed the whistleblower.
  Nothing--nothing the President has done or said in his more than 2\1/
2\ years as President convinces me that he has any understanding of 
public service or doing the public a service, depending on how you look 
at it.
  President Trump has even demanded to know who provided the 
information to the whistleblower and suggested that the source was ``a 
spy'' who would have been executed ``in the old days.''
  These comments follow the testimony of Acting Director of National 
Intelligence Joseph Maguire--a former Navy SEAL with 36 years of 
military experience and a Presidential Appointee--before the House of 
Representatives in September.
  Mr. Maguire said the following:

       [W]e must protect those who demonstrate courage to report 
     alleged wrongdoing. . . . The Inspector General is properly 
     protecting the complainant's identity and will not permit the 
     complainant to be subject to any retaliation or adverse 
     consequences for communicating the complaint to the Inspector 
     General.

  Yesterday, in floor remarks, the junior Senator from Kentucky 
compared the whistleblower to Edward Snowden and argued that the 
current concerns about the safety of the whistleblower are nothing more 
than ``selective outrage.''
  To be clear, Edward Snowden broke the law. He abused his security 
clearance and position of trust to leak classified information to the 
press. He sought safe haven in Russia, and we are unaware of any other 
information he may have shared that could further jeopardize national 
security.
  The current whistleblower has strictly followed the appropriate 
channels of reporting, as confirmed by Director Maguire, and the 
individual deserves the full protection under the law.
  The Senator from Kentucky referenced Edward Snowden in a conversation 
about blowing the whistle on President Trump's abuse of power. I hope 
that anyone would not make a comparison between the two cases. 
Threatening a witness or retaliating against a whistleblower is 
illegal. We know that. The President's public attacks on the 
whistleblower only add to the record of impeachable conduct.
  His careless and extreme rhetoric not only places the whistleblower's 
personal safety in jeopardy, it undermines the entire whistleblower 
program of the intelligence community and across the government.
  The intelligence community and Congress must continue to do all we 
can to protect the current whistleblower's identity and personal 
safety. The current legal protections for whistleblowers are 
insufficient to fully protect those who are courageous enough to come 
forward and report wrongdoing.
  Of course, the reason we need the additional protections is the 
President's conduct in threatening the whistleblower. No other 
President has ever done this.
  Congress must consider more ways to protect whistleblowers, including 
criminalizing the disclosure of the whistleblower's identity. It should 
be clear that should be a crime, if the statutes do not provide for it 
now.
  We must use this experience to ensure that whistleblowers will be 
protected from threatening rhetoric and from actions by a President or 
any other public official meant to intimidate whistleblowers. If you 
are threatening a whistleblower, if you are trying to ``out'' them, 
that is always--always wrong. We do not have to worry about whether a 
specific statutory provision made it a crime. It is always wrong. Until 
this President, that was well understood by people in both parties, 
both Houses, and both branches.
  This inquiry is not simply about President Trump's clear abuse of 
power. This inquiry is about our democracy and the values our Founders 
agreed should guide our Nation.
  We owe the whistleblower, Lt. Col. Vindman, Ambassadors Yovanovitch, 
Taylor, and McKinley, as well as others, our deepest gratitude and our 
appreciation for their integrity and commitment to American values. 
They are real American heroes who, despite the President's bullying and 
harassment, have stood up in defense of our democratic institutions and 
the values the Founders fought to guide our Nation.
  I yield the floor.
  Ms. COLLINS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote 
scheduled for 1:45 p.m. start at this time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.