[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 19 (Wednesday, January 29, 2020)]
[House]
[Pages H704-H708]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1945
                     REVIEWING IMPEACHMENT PROCESS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Slotkin). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 3, 2019, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, it has been an interesting day.
  I was down in the Senate earlier today. We have reciprocity with the 
Senate, so we can go onto the Senate floor. It is a very interesting 
experience, seeing a President who committed no crime, not even 
perjury, like President Clinton, having an attempt to remove him from 
office.
  An article today by Brent Bozell says: ``One favorite tactic of our 
`objective' media during the impeachment of President Donald Trump is 
to find a clip of the President's legal experts such as Ken Starr and 
Alan Dershowitz expressing an opinion during the 1998-99 impeachment of 
Bill Clinton and then show a contrast with the present day. But this is 
just as easily demonstrated with the press.
  ``It is not surprising that Democrats and Republicans favor or oppose 
impeachment based on the party of the President in the dock. It should 
be surprising that our supposedly nonpartisan journalists flip to 
whichever talking points are in use by the Democrats. That makes the 
press a gaggle of hypocrites.
  ``Back in 1998, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift spoke for the vast majority 
of the press from her chair on `The McLaughlin Group.' Before the House 
voted to impeach Clinton, she warned, `If the Republicans want to go 
ahead and do this, I think they disgrace themselves in a more profound 
way than President Clinton has by abusing the machinery of impeachment, 
knowing full well that the Senate will hold a sham trial and they will 
be, in effect, delivered of this ridiculous conclusion.'
  ``Over and over again, these network `news' stars lamented that the 
House impeachment vote and the Senate impeachment trial of President 
Clinton were a `sham' and a horrible `distraction' from the people's 
business. They said small-minded Republican Clinton haters were 
obsessed with sex, and never mind the actual charges of perjury and 
obstruction of justice.''
  Obstruction of justice, of course, being a crime and perjury being a 
crime, whereas obstruction of Congress is more in the nature of 
maladministration, which the Founders made

[[Page H705]]

clear should not be a basis for impeachment.
  ``Then there was NBC's Matt Lauer, who brought on former House 
Speaker Jim Wright, who resigned in disgrace in 1989 over a corrupt 
scheme of selling crates of his books to lobbying groups.''
  As I recall, there were restrictions on getting paid for speeches, so 
groups would buy thousands of his books that would sit in crates and go 
nowhere, in many cases, from what was said back then, as a way of 
getting around that. But he spoke with moral authority in response to 
Lauer.
  ``Lauer said: `Speaker Wright, let me start with you. When you 
resigned 9 years ago, you had been battered by the right. You called 
for an end to what you called `mindless cannibalism.' Nine years later, 
we are hearing terms like that again and others swirling around the 
impeachment of Bill Clinton. Have we learned nothing in 9 years?' ''
  As the article says, one thing we all do know is Matt Lauer learned 
absolutely nothing from Bill Clinton about sexual harassment in the 
workplace. Rather interesting.
  There was an article a week ago from Paul Sperry.
  Like I say, I was down at the Senate earlier today, and I know the 
President's lawyers were asking people and their staff, Republicans, 
not to use the name people have referred to as being the whistleblower.
  I have never named the whistleblower. I have named people who I 
believed were critical fact witnesses, and some in the media lambasted 
me and said: You named the whistleblower.
  Well, I thought we didn't know who the whistleblower was. How do you 
know who the whistleblower was when I named him if we don't know who 
the whistleblower is, if you don't know who the whistleblower is?
  Anyway, hypocrisy knows no bounds when it comes to some in the 
Washington media and some here in Congress. But in any event, the 
request is not to mention the name of the person, the leftwing activist 
who has been undermining and trying to destroy the Trump Presidency 
since President Trump got elected, commonly referred to as the 
whistleblower.
  But the article by Paul Sperry says: ``Sources told 
RealClearInvestigations the staffer with whom'' this leftwing activist 
trying to destroy the Trump Presidency, also called the whistleblower, 
``was speaking was Sean Misko. Both were Obama administration holdovers 
working in the Trump White House on foreign policy and national 
security issues. And both expressed anger over Trump's new `America 
First' foreign policy, a sea change from President Obama's approach to 
international affairs.
  `` `Just days after he was sworn in, they were already talking about 
trying to get rid of him,' said a White House colleague who overheard 
their conversation. `They weren't just bent on subverting his agenda,' 
the former official added. `They were plotting to actually have him 
removed from office.' ''
  Sean Misko ``left the White House last summer to join House 
impeachment manager Adam Schiff's committee, where sources say he 
offered `guidance' to the whistleblower, who has been officially 
identified only as an intelligence officer in a complaint against Trump 
filed under whistleblower laws. Misko then helped run the impeachment 
inquiry based on that complaint as a top investigator for congressional 
Democrats.''
  That is in the Democrats' part of the Intelligence Committee.
  The probe culminated in Trump's impeachment last month, and ``Schiff 
and other House Democrats last week delivered the Articles of 
Impeachment to the Senate and are now pressing the case for his removal 
during the trial, which began last Tuesday'' of last week.
  ``The coordination between the official believed to be the 
whistleblower and a key Democratic staffer, details of which are 
disclosed here for the first time, undercuts the narrative that 
impeachment developed spontaneously out of what Trump's Democratic 
antagonists call the `patriotism' of an `apolitical civil servant.'
  ``Two former coworkers said they overheard'' the leftwing activist 
trying to destroy Trump, sometimes called the whistleblower, ``and 
Misko, close friends and Democrats, discussing how to `take out,' or 
remove, the new President from office within days of Trump's 
inauguration. These coworkers said the President's controversial 
Ukraine phone call in July 2019 provided the pretext they and their 
Democratic allies had been looking for.
  `` `They didn't like his policies,' another former White House 
official said. `They had a political vendetta against him from day 
one.'
  ``Their efforts were part of a larger pattern of coordination to 
build a case for impeachment, involving Democratic leaders as well as 
anti-Trump figures both inside and outside of government.
  ``All unnamed sources for this article spoke only on condition that 
they not be further identified or described. Although strong evidence 
points to'' the leftwing activist trying to destroy President Trump, 
also known as the whistleblower, ``as the government employee who 
lodged the whistleblower complaint, he has not been officially 
identified as such. As a result, this article makes a distinction 
between public information released about the unnamed whistleblower/CIA 
analyst and specific information about'' the leftwing activist trying 
to destroy President Trump, also known as the whistleblower.
  ``Democrats based their impeachment case on the whistleblower 
complaint, which alleges that President Trump sought to help his 
reelection campaign by demanding that Ukraine's leader investigate 
former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter in exchange for 
military aid.''
  The article goes on: ``The whistleblower's candor is also being 
called into question. It turns out that the CIA operative failed to 
report his contacts with Schiff's office to the intelligence 
community's inspector general who fielded this whistleblower complaint. 
He withheld the information both in interviews with the inspector 
general, Michael Atkinson, and in writing, according to impeachment 
committee investigators. The whistleblower form he filled out required 
him to disclose whether he had `contacted other entities'--including 
`Members of Congress.' But he left that section blank on the disclosure 
form he signed.
  ``The investigators say that details about how the whistleblower 
consulted with Schiff's staff and perhaps misled Atkinson about those 
interactions are contained in the transcript of a closed-door briefing 
Atkinson gave to the House Intelligence Committee last October. 
However, Schiff has sealed the transcript from public view. It is the 
only impeachment witness transcript out of 18 that he has not 
released.''
  I think I will pause here at this point. I have continually heard 
down in the Senate the House managers referring to what is basically a 
travesty to have a trial without any witnesses. No. Here is the real 
travesty.
  The real travesty was the violation of House rules, not allowing 
Republicans to have the witnesses we requested. When those weren't 
agreed to, then under the rules--and, of course, the Democrats are in 
the majority. They could have changed the rules. They didn't, so we 
were entitled to a minority day of witnesses to testify, and that was 
refused as well.
  That was the real travesty, when there was no allowance for 
Republicans to get down to real facts, get down to the bottom of the 
allegations against the President. That was truly a travesty.
  But in the committee of jurisdiction, the Judiciary Committee, we 
were only allowed to have some law school professors come in and give 
us their opinions. Two were quite clearly hateful of President Trump. 
One tried to sound as if he was reluctant to talk about impeachment 
when he had been busy twittering about impeachment since President 
Trump had first been elected and sworn in.
  It was a very disingenuous hearing, but we had to sit there and 
listen to the pontificating from people who clearly adjusted their 
opinions to address their disdain for President Trump. But that was the 
only live witnesses we were allowed to have.
  Instead, we took in all these depositions, all the transcribed 
depositions. That is what we took in. Those were our witnesses. That is 
what the House Judiciary Committee and this House Chamber was supposed 
to have considered in voting on impeachment.

[[Page H706]]

  We were told, no, we have all this testimony, lots of witnesses, 
before the Judiciary Committee vote. We have all these transcripts if 
you want to read them.

                              {time}  2000

  We had all of these transcripts, lots of witnesses. You want to read 
them. And then people had the gall to go down the hall to the Senate 
and say: They are not allowing any witnesses.
  Well, either there were no witnesses that the Judiciary Committee was 
able to consider, other than professors--and I thought Professor Turley 
was outstanding. He and Alan Dershowitz are normally quite liberal, but 
they care deeply about civil rights, and they care deeply about the 
Constitution, and they don't let their political persuasions affect 
what they believe about the Constitution. I admire that in them, even 
though, like I say, we have some strong disagreements on other things.
  But there in the Senate, down the hall, they have all that mass of, 
what we were told here, was overwhelming evidence. They have got all of 
those transcripts down there. It is part of the evidence in the Senate, 
part of it, so either there was no evidence, no witnesses in the House, 
or there is plenty of evidence from which the Senate can consider and 
vote down this travesty called an effort to remove President Trump.
  In this article it says: ``The investigators say that details about 
how the whistleblower consulted with Schiff's staff and perhaps misled 
Atkinson about those interactions are contained in the transcript,'' as 
I mentioned.
  ``Schiff has classified the document `secret,' preventing Republicans 
who attended the Atkinson briefing from quoting from it. Even 
impeachment investigators cannot view it outside a highly secured 
room.''
  Anyway, it goes on. It is pretty ridiculous. The article says further 
on: ``At the time, the CIA operative worked on loan to the White 
House,'' and they are talking about the leftwing activist trying to 
destroy President Trump, also known as the whistleblower. He was ``. . 
. on loan to the White House as a top Ukrainian analyst in the National 
Security Council, where he had previously served as an adviser on 
Ukraine to Vice President Biden. The whistleblower complaint cites 
Biden, alleging that Trump demanded Ukraine's newly elected leader 
investigate him and his son `to help the President's 2020 reelection 
bid.' ''
  The thing is, there is no such thing. What basically the House 
managers are saying is, if somebody is running for President, it 
doesn't matter how corrupt they have been. It doesn't matter how 
corrupt they and their family have been, you can't question them if 
they are running for President because that might be considered 
political.
  Well, if there was corruption--and everybody knew there was plenty of 
corruption in Ukraine--and, apparently, no entity more corrupt than 
Burisma, the natural gas company that made Hunter Biden a member of the 
board, it is kind of important to find out what was at the heart of all 
this.
  It is interesting, the leftwing activist that was trying to destroy 
President Trump, also known as the whistleblower, and Sean Misko and 
Abigail Grace, they reportedly have been quite close to the National 
Security Council. And it was Misko and this leftwing activist trying to 
destroy the President, also known as the whistleblower, who had been, 
as the article points out, overheard in the early days of the Trump 
administration trying to conspire on ways to take him out and get rid 
of him as President.
  But the truth is, it had to--these three, Misko, Abigail Grace, and 
the leftwing activist that was trying to destroy Trump known as the 
whistleblower, they had dealings with Ukraine. They had dealings with 
Biden, and it is certainly worth noting that even in the inspector 
general's report, there was mention of the name, by name, of this 
leftwing activist trying to destroy Trump, also known as the 
whistleblower, as being a guest, being associated with Vice President 
Biden.
  So if Vice President Biden, say, hypothetically, were involved in any 
bribery or plot to enrich family, then there is a good chance they 
would at least be witnesses, if not complicit.
  So there are plenty of reasons besides disagreeing with President 
Trump's America First policy to try to stop any investigation into 
corruption by Vice President Biden because it may implicate them or at 
least make them witnesses to some of the stuff.
  I still was blown away when I got to a Natural Resources Committee 
hearing one day and the person in charge of the tens of millions, 
hundreds of millions--whatever it was--dollars that the U.S. was 
providing to Puerto Rico for hurricane assistance, and the person in 
charge of doling out this money in Puerto Rico was the same person who 
had been finance minister in Ukraine when they had all of this money--a 
billion or whatever it was--that they were dealing with from the Obama 
administration.
  It was amazing. And I asked: ``How do you do that?'' I mean, didn't 
Ukrainians want--it wasn't the defense minister but finance minister--
``Didn't Ukrainians want a finance minister who was Ukrainian?''
  ``Yes,'' she says. In essence, she said: They swore me in as a 
citizen of Ukraine the same way they swore me in as finance minister.
  How do you get jobs like that? You hear that the United States is 
going to send a billion, or hundreds of millions of dollars somewhere, 
and you run and get in front of that so you can get a job making sure 
the right people get all of that money. How does that happen?
  You can get a job handing out that money in Ukraine. You can get a 
job, same person, run over to Puerto Rico, ``I want to be in charge of 
the money here in Puerto Rico.'' That is amazing.
  I am sure there were other people who would have loved to have had 
those jobs. How does this same person get that job in Puerto Rico and 
Ukraine? Maybe it is kind of like Strzok and Page.
  We saw in the Horowitz inspector general report from the Department 
of Justice--another great Obama holdover--he pointed out in his 60-or-
so page report about Comey: Yeah, he says, you know, Comey, he took 
home material that was a violation to take home. He leaked it, got it 
into the press.

  Of course, he was trying, as he said, to get a special counsel 
appointed, which his conspiracy worked out well. He got a special 
counsel appointed, his running buddy, Bob Mueller, whom he had said in 
an article some years back something like: It is great knowing that if 
he were on a railroad track and a train were coming, that Bob Mueller 
would be right there with him.
  Yeah, well, that is interesting, but nonetheless, Horowitz pointed 
out that the reason that Comey probably wouldn't be prosecuted, 
shouldn't be--you know, we referred it--was because the information he 
leaked and that he took--some would say stole--but he took was 
classified at such a low level, it was really more of a violation of 
his employment agreement and the policy manual.
  Well, how did it get classified at such a very low level? Well, on 
page 1 and 2 of the Horowitz report, he is talking about the FBI did 
this. They reviewed this. The FBI did this and that. Well, you don't 
know until you get over to page 42 or 43 of this 60-or-so page report 
when he finally reveals--when he says the FBI on pages 1 and 2, he is 
talking about two people, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.
  He has the gall to put in there that, in essence, the reason they 
were so good at doing this classification of the Comey stuff--if they 
classified it at a higher level, Comey would be prosecuted and go to 
jail, so classify it at a low level so he wouldn't--but they were so 
good at classifying the emails of Hillary Clinton, that is why they 
were so qualified to do this for the Comey material that was withheld, 
taken home, stolen, whatever you want to call it and leaked.
  So it is kind of the same thing here. Gee, these folks are experts. 
Why? Because they told us they were. That is what Strzok and Page said. 
You know, we are the best at reviewing and classifying.
  But this article from Paul Sperry goes on, and says about this that: 
``Two NSC coworkers told RCI''--and I guess that is RealClear 
Investigations, doing this article--``that they overheard'' the 
leftwing activist trying to destroy President Trump, also known as the 
whistleblower, ``and Misko--who was also working at the NSC as an 
analyst--making anti-Trump remarks to

[[Page H707]]

each other while attending a staff-wide NSC meeting called by then-
National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, where they sat together in the 
south auditorium of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, part of 
the White House complex.
  ``The `all hands' meeting, held about two weeks into the new 
administration, was attended by hundreds of NSC employees.''
  That has got to change. The President has got to dramatically cut the 
number of people who are part of the National Security Council. You 
can't have security with that many people part of the National Security 
Council.
  The article points out: ``They were popping off about how they were 
going to remove Trump from office.''
  This is back right after Trump took office. And this is a quote from 
the person that disclosed this to Paul Sperry. ``No joke,'' he said, or 
she, whoever it was.
  ``A military staffer detailed to the NSC, who was seated directly in 
front of'' the leftwing activist trying to destroy Trump, also known as 
the whistleblower, ``and Misko during the meeting, confirmed hearing 
them talk about toppling Trump during their private conversation, which 
the source said lasted about one minute. The crowd was preparing to get 
up to leave the room at the time.
  ``After Flynn briefed the staff about what `America First' foreign 
policy means,'' the leftwing activist trying to destroy President 
Trump, also known as the whistleblower, ``turned to Misko and 
commented, `We need to take him out.' And Misko replied, `Yeah, we need 
to do everything we can to take out the President.'
  ``Added the military detailee, who spoke on condition of anonymity: 
`By ``taking him out,'' they meant removing him from office by any 
means necessary.' ''
  Of course, that's this person's impression. Maybe they meant 
something else by ``taking him out.'' That was his impression, or her 
impression.
  ``They were triggered by Trump's and Flynn's vision for the world. 
This was the first `all hands' staff meeting where they got to see 
Trump's national security team, and they were huffing and puffing 
throughout the briefing any time Flynn said something they didn't like 
about `America First'.
  ``He said he also overheard'' the leftwing activist trying to destroy 
President Trump, also known as the whistleblower, ``telling Misko, 
referring to Trump `We can't let him enact this foreign policy.' ''
  And I have got to say, that sounds remarkably like colonel, 
lieutenant colonel--I gave him a promotion there for a moment--
Lieutenant Colonel Vindman.
  Reviewing his testimony, as I am going through, I am going: Holy 
smoke, this guy is more loyal to Ukraine and the Ukrainian President 
than he is to the UCMJ, to his own Constitution, to his Commander in 
Chief.
  So I was not at all surprised when I found out the President of 
Ukraine, he noticed the same thing I did, and offered Lieutenant 
Colonel Vindman--three times he offered him the job of Minister of 
Defense in Ukraine.

                              {time}  2015

  This is just amazing. This guy clearly did not like President Trump, 
and you could tell he was really offended. He was the expert on 
Ukraine, he knew what American foreign policy was supposed to be, but 
he was totally ignorant of the Constitution that basically allows every 
President--as President Obama said, elections have consequences. When 
President Trump got elected, he was the new foreign policy, and anyone 
in the administration who didn't like President Trump's foreign policy 
needed to leave. If they couldn't follow it, if they couldn't work with 
it and implement it, then they needed to be honest and honorable, 
instead of being destructive to our Constitution and our country and 
resign or ask for reassignment somewhere else. Or in Vindman's case, go 
ahead and take the job of defense minister of Ukraine.
  But, of course, if he had done that, then he wouldn't have looked 
very good when he came to testify because he wouldn't have been wearing 
a uniform like he doesn't wear to work, but he needed to hang around to 
try to destroy President Trump. Of course, there are articles about him 
potentially being the one who leaked the conversation to the leftwing 
activist trying to destroy President Trump also known as the 
whistleblower.
  In any event, this article says: ``Alarmed by their conversation, the 
military staffer immediately reported what he heard to his superiors.
  `` `It was so shocking that they were so blatant and outspoken about 
their opinion. They weren't shouting it, but they didn't seem to feel 
the need to hide it.'
  ``The coworkers didn't think much more about the incident.
  `` `We just thought they were wacky,' the first source said. `Little 
did we know.' ''
  ``A CIA alumnus, Misko had previously assisted Biden's top national 
security aide Jake Sullivan. Former NSC staffers said Misko was,'' the 
leftwing activist trying to destroy President Trump, also known as the 
whistleblower ``closest and most trusted ally in the Trump White 
House.''
  They were `` `very tight and spent nearly 2 years together at the 
NSC. . . . Both of them were paranoid about Trump.'
  `` `They were thick as thieves,' added the first NSC source. `They 
sat next to each other and complained about Trump all the time. They 
were buddies. They weren't just colleagues. They were buddies outside 
the White House.'
  ``The February 2017 incident wasn't the only time the pair exhibited 
open hostility toward the President. During the following months, both 
were accused internally of leaking negative information about Trump to 
the media.
  ``But Trump's controversial call to the new president of Ukraine this 
past summer--in which he asked the foreign leader for help with 
domestic investigations involving the Obama administration, including 
Biden--gave them the opening they were looking for.''
  I would humbly submit, though, that if they were involved in any of 
the corruption that was going on over there with Burisma and Ukraine--
and though many in the media want to take the talking points from our 
Democratic folks across the aisle, and one accused me of regurgitating 
Russian propaganda, when the truth is what the Russians have wanted, 
what Putin has wanted more than anything else was to divide the United 
States, because he knew dividing this country pretty much closely in 
the middle would help do what he has wanted to do since the Soviet 
Union fell and he was a KGB agent, and that is divide America so that 
it falls. That is exactly what he wants.
  We have heard--people don't want to talk about it--but the truth is, 
there were some Russian efforts to help Hillary Clinton in that 
election, which I think makes clear they wanted to divide America and 
they have been totally successful in dividing America. They have got to 
feel good about what they do as they watch the impeachment proceedings.
  But anyone who would sit here and say I was quoting Russian 
propaganda, actually, that person would end up being the tool of the 
Russians because he is dividing America which is what Russia and Putin 
have wanted to do. He is doing the handiwork of Putin, not me.
  So I would still submit, as I have numerous times, that critical fact 
witnesses don't necessarily need to be heard at this impeachment sham 
down the hall, but there do need to be witnesses in very rigorous 
hearings in the Senate. They would be Alexandra Chalupa who worked with 
Ukraine, Biden, and others, the leftwing activist trying to destroy 
President Trump also known as the whistleblower, Abigail Grace, and the 
guy who Chairman Schiff hired on July 26, the day after President 
Trump's good call with the President of Ukraine, Zelensky, the guy who 
ran on the basis that he was going to stop corruption. That was a great 
thing.
  He said: Why didn't President Trump talk to the Ukrainians sooner 
about anti-corruption?
  It wasn't until 2019 that they elected a new president who said he is 
going to do something about corruption.
  Why would he talk to the previous president who was in corruption up 
to his eyeballs?
  It wouldn't do any good.
  But President Trump had hope. Whether it is a Republican or a 
Democrat in the White House, I hope they

[[Page H708]]

will seek help from any country in which there is corruption that 
involves American high officials. I hope that happens.
  But in the meantime, the impeachment proceeding goes on down the 
hall, and it is dividing America. It is bad for America. We really need 
to come together and stop doing Russia's handiwork for them. They want 
us divided, and the people pushing this stuff are doing their handiwork 
for them. I am not saying intentionally. They are happy to do it to try 
to hurt Republicans, especially to hurt President Trump, but this is 
serious. It is dividing America.
  Again, my friends across the aisle, I love that they are quoting the 
Founders these days, but we should hang together or we will most 
assuredly hang separately. We need to hang together as a country. We 
can have our disagreements, but this wanting to criminalize 
disagreements as they have done with President Trump's America First 
policy needs to stop. We need to come back together and get some things 
done.
  Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________