[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 9 (Wednesday, January 15, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S206-S207]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              IMPEACHMENT

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, today is a momentous, historic, and 
solemn day in the history of the U.S. Senate and in the history of our 
Republic. The House of Representatives will send Articles of 
Impeachment against President Trump to the Senate, and the Speaker will 
appoint the House managers of the impeachment case.
  Two articles will be delivered. The first charges the President with 
abuse of power--of coercing a foreign leader into interfering in our 
elections and of using the powers of the Presidency, the most powerful 
public office in the Nation, to benefit himself. The second charges the 
President with obstruction of Congress for an unprecedented blockade of 
the legislature's authority to oversee and investigate the executive 
branch.
  Let's put it a different way.
  The House of Representatives has accused the President of trying to 
shake down a foreign leader for personal gain to help him in his 
campaign, and he has done everything possible to cover it up. This 
administration is unprecedented in its not being open, in its desire 
for secrecy, in its desire to prevent the public from knowing what it 
is doing, and it is worst of all when it comes in an impeachment trial.
  The two offenses are the types of offenses the Founders had in mind 
when they designed the impeachment powers of Congress. Americans and 
the Founding Fathers, in particular, from the very founding day of the 
Republic, have feared the ability of a foreign power to interfere in 
our elections. Americans have never wanted a foreign power to have sway 
over our elections, but that is what President Trump is accused of 
doing--of soliciting--in these articles.
  I would ask my colleagues, and I would ask the American people: Do we 
want a foreign power determining who our President is or do we want the 
American voters to determine it? It is that serious. That is the 
central question: Who should determine who our President and our other 
elected officials are?
  From the early days of the Republic, foreigners have tried to 
interfere, and from the early days of the Republic, we have resisted. 
Yet, according to these articles and other things he has done, 
President Trump seems to aid and abet it. His view is, if it is good 
for him, then, that is good enough. That is not America. We are a 
nation of laws--of the rule of law, not of the rule of one man.
  So now the Senate's job is to try the case--to conduct a fair trial 
on these very severe charges of letting, aiding, abetting, and 
encouraging a foreign power to interfere in our elections and of 
threatening them with the cutoff of aid--and to determine if the 
President's offenses merit, if they are proven, the most severe 
punishment our Constitution imagines.
  The House has made a very strong case, but, clearly, the Senators 
have to see that case and watch it firsthand. A fair trial means the 
prosecutors who make the case and the President's counsel who provide 
the defense have all of the evidence available. It means that Senators 
have all of the facts to make an informed decision. That means relevant 
witnesses, and that means relevant documents. We all know that. We all 
know--every Member of this body, Democrat or Republican--that you can't 
have a fair, open trial, particularly on something as weighty as 
impeachment, when we don't have the evidence and the facts.

  The precedents of the Senate are clear. Leader McConnell is 
constantly citing precedent. Here is one: The Senate has always heard 
from witnesses in impeachment trials. There have been 15 completed 
impeachment trials in the history of this country. In every single one 
of them, the Senate has heard from witnesses. Let me repeat that for 
Leader McConnell's benefit since he is always citing the precedent of 
1999. There have been 15 completed impeachment trials, including the 
one in 1999. In the history of this country, in every single one of 
them, the Senate has heard from witnesses. It would be unprecedented 
not to. President Johnson's impeachment trial had witnesses--41 of 
them. President Clinton's

[[Page S207]]

trial had witnesses. Several of my colleagues, including the Republican 
leader, voted for them. Conducting an impeachment trial of the 
President of the United States and having no witnesses would be without 
precedent and, frankly, a new low for the majority in this body that 
history will not look kindly on.
  Each day that goes by, the case for witnesses and documents gains 
force and gains momentum. Last night, a new cache of documents, 
including dozens of pages of notes, text messages, and other records, 
shed light on the activities of the President's associates in Ukraine. 
The documents paint a sordid picture of the efforts by the President's 
personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and his associate, Lev Parnas, to 
remove a sitting U.S. Ambassador and to pressure Ukraine President 
Zelensky to announce an investigation of one of the President's 
political rivals. Part of the plot to remove Ambassador Yovanovitch 
involved hiring a cheap Republican operative to follow her around and 
monitor her movements. How low can they go?
  Just when you think that President Trump and his network couldn't 
possibly get any more into the muck, reports suggest they are even 
dirtier than you could imagine. I saw a novelist on TV this morning. He 
said: If I had brought this plot to my publisher, he would have 
rejected it. He would have said it was absurd, that it could never 
happen, and that people will not believe it.
  Well, here it is, led by President Trump, who, again, cares not for 
the morals, ethics, and honor of this country as much as he cares about 
himself.
  To allegedly have some cut-rate political operative stalk an American 
Ambassador at the direction of the President's lawyer, potentially with 
the President's ``knowledge and consent''--that is what one of the 
emails read--I mean, how much more can America take in the decline of 
our morals, our values, and our standing in the world?
  I don't care who you are--Democrat, Republican, liberal, 
conservative. Doesn't this kind of thing bother you if anyone does it, 
let alone the President of the United States?
  I don't know how any Member of this body could pick up the newspaper 
this morning, read this new revelation, and not conclude that the 
Senate needs access to relevant documents like these in the trial of 
President Trump. The release of this new information dramatically 
underscores the need for witnesses and for documents.
  The Republican leader has, so far, opposed Democratic requests to 
call for factfinding witnesses and to subpoena three specific sets of 
relevant documents. Despite their having no argument against them, the 
Republicans' position at the moment is to punt the question of 
witnesses and documents until after both sides finish their 
presentations. Then, they say they will consider documents and 
witnesses with an open mind.
  The Democrats have requested four fact witnesses. They are the 
President's top advisers, like Mr. Mulvaney. They are not the 
Democrats' men. They are the President's men. They are not Democratic 
witnesses. They are not our witnesses. They are just witnesses, plain 
and simple. Each of them has firsthand information about the charges 
against the President.
  So, as the House prepares to send the articles to the Senate today, 
it is time for us--all of us--to turn to the serious job of conducting 
a fair trial, one that the American people will accept as fair, not as 
a coverup and not as something that has hidden the evidence. The focus 
of Senators on both sides must fall on the question of witnesses and 
documents.

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