[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 37 (Tuesday, February 25, 2020)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E212-E213]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





 FURTHER REFLECTIONS ON SENATE JUDGMENT NOT TO CONVICT AND REMOVE THE 
   IMPEACHED PRESIDENT FOR ABUSE OF POWER AND OBSTRUCTION OF CONGRESS

                                  _____
                                 

                        HON. SHEILA JACKSON LEE

                                of texas

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, February 25, 2020

  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Madam Speaker, on Wednesday, February 5, 2020, the 
United States Senate determined not to convict and remove from office 
Donald John Trump, President of the United States, who was impeached by 
the House for high crimes and misdemeanors; a decision I firmly believe 
will be judged harshly by history for all time.
  Madam Speaker it is important to understand the seriousness of a 
determination by the House to exercise the power of impeachment, which 
under Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 of the Constitution is vested 
solely in the House of Representatives.
  The purpose of impeachment is not to punish the person but to protect 
the people by removing from office an individual whose misconduct and 
behavior is so dangerous that it imperils the liberty of the people, 
the security of the nation, or the vitality of the governmental system.
  In short, impeachment is the passionate outcry (crie de coeur) of a 
people alarmed at a pattern of abuses and usurpations that evidence a 
desire to reduce them to accept absolute despotism or establish 
tyrannical rule.
  The impeachment power is vested in the House of Representatives 
because it is the body designed by the Framers to be the physical, 
direct, and immediate representatives of the People, reflecting all of 
their passions and hopes and fears and concerns.
  So, when `The People' who established the Constitution are acting to 
preserve and protect their governmental system and their security, 
there is no higher or countervailing authority to which they must 
yield.
  A refusal by any authority subordinate to `The People,' including the 
President of the United States, to cooperate with, or honor a request 
for information from the House of Representatives when it is exercising 
its sole power of impeachment is simply another way of saying that the 
person in question is exalting his or her interests over the sovereign 
interests of the people, the ultimate repository of all political power 
in a democratic republic such as the United States.
  The impeachment inquiry initiated pursuant to H. Res. 660 by the 
House of Representatives systematically and methodically revealed the 
manner in which the President misused the power and authority of his 
office to extort a beleaguered and besieged ally to conspire with him 
to sabotage the 2016 presidential election so that he could retain the 
office he holds and continue to abuse its powers.
  Every material allegation set forth in the whistleblower's complaint 
has been verified, corroborated, or affirmed by a host of witnesses who 
overcame opposition and threats by the White House and courageously 
testified from which three unassailable conclusions can be drawn.
  First, the President violated his oath of office by placing his 
personal and political interest above the national interest by scheming 
to get Ukraine to announce a phony investigation against a potential 
election opponent.
  Second, the President betrayed the national interest by withholding 
vital, congressionally appropriated security assistance to a 
beleaguered and besieged ally facing armed aggression from Russia, 
America's implacable foe.
  Third, the essential purpose of the scheme concocted by the President 
was to enlist a foreign country to help him fix the 2020 presidential 
election in his favor, the very type of interference most feared by the 
Framers.
  The evidence showed that the President of the United States abused 
the powers vested in him in the way the Framers most feared and worked 
hardest to protect against.
  What this means in short is that the evidence showed that the 
President committed the trifecta of the most cardinal political sins 
that can be committed in a democratic republic.
  If American elections are not free, fair, and uninfluenced by foreign 
actors, then the democracy is extinguished and citizens are reduced to 
subjects ruled by an authority dependent not on the consent of the 
governed, but on the assistance and beneficence of unaccountable 
foreign actors.
  The testimony and evidence led to and supported a conclusion that the 
President abused his power to extort a foreign nation to conspire with 
him to sabotage an American election and undermine democracy so he 
could retain his office to abuse his powers.
  Madam Speaker, Ukraine is not just another country but a bulwark for 
the West against Russia, its imperialism, its autocratic tendencies; 
Ukraine is an ally on the frontline of the United States' containment 
policy toward Russian expansion that has been in place since 1947.
  Thus, withholding desperately needed security assistance to Ukraine 
not only harms that nation but endangers the security of more than 325 
million Americans.
  The conduct of the President adduced by the evidence illustrates the 
reason for the doomsday clause in Article I, section 2, clause 5 as the 
ultimate protector of a people and system of government in which 
America is to be ruled by American leaders selected by American voters 
without the assistance of non-Americans.
  Madam Speaker, the hallmarks of a democratic system of government 
are: (1) an independent judiciary; (2) civilian control of the 
military; (3) free and independent political parties; (4) fealty to the 
rule of law; (5) freedom of speech and of assembly; and (6) a free and 
independent press.
  But the lynchpin of a functioning and real democracy is free and fair 
elections.
  As I stated earlier, if American elections are not free, fair, and 
uninfluenced by foreign actors, then the democracy is extinguished and 
citizens are reduced to subjects ruled by an authority dependent not on 
the consent of the governed, but on the assistance and beneficence of 
unaccountable foreign actors.
  The Framers wanted to ensure that the President's allegiance would 
always be to the nation, which is why the text of the presidential oath 
is the only one specified in the Constitution and why the Emoluments 
Clause (Article 1, Section 9, clause 8) prohibits the President from 
accepting any title of nobility or thing of value from any King, 
Prince, or foreign state without the consent of Congress.
  The first President of the United States, George Washington, 
counseling in his famous 1796 Farewell Address to beware of foreign 
entanglements, said the government sometimes acts to make ``the nation 
subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and 
other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes 
perhaps the liberty, of nations, has been the victim.''
  President Washington also pointed out the pernicious influence of 
foreign involvement in American elections:
  And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote 
themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the 
interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with 
popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of 
obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable 
zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, 
corruption, or infatuation.
  As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments 
are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent 
patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic 
factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, 
to influence or awe the public councils. Such an attachment of a small 
or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the 
satellite of the latter.
  Madam Speaker, if we are to have government of the people, by the 
people, for the people, then elections must be decided by Americans, 
and only Americans, without the influence of foreign leaders or 
nations.
  The only legitimate way political authority is conveyed voluntarily 
and consensually from the governed to the governors is through free and 
fair elections uncorrupted by foreign involvement.
  In seeking to entangle Ukraine directly in the 2020 presidential 
election, the actions proved by the House Impeachment Managers showed 
that the President acted to further his own personal political 
interests and disregarded his oath registered in Heaven to ``preserve, 
protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.''
  Instead of advancing America's interests, Russia, America's 
implacable foe since 1945, has been emboldened and is benefitting from 
every action that weakens or jeopardizes Ukraine's ability to defend 
itself from aggression, beginning with the lukewarm embrace of this 
Administration of NATO, and especially Article 5 of the NATO Treaty, 
which deems an attack on any NATO member country as an attack on all, a 
commitment that has kept the peace in Europe since the end of World War 
II.
  The Framers understood that abuse of power is the gravest offense 
that can be committed in a democratic republic.
  Criminal offenses, the Framers understood, could be adjudicated in 
the judicial system, policy disagreements could be worked out in the 
political system, and concerns over maladministration could be 
addressed and decided or corrected in the electoral system.
  But acts that by their nature injure the very system of government 
itself are different, or sui generis, and require a different and more 
immediate remedy, and that is the removal

[[Page E213]]

from the office entrusted to the person or persons causing the injury.
  This is done to protect the people and the republic, not to inflict 
punishment on the person.
  The Framers were well aware that some of the most dangerous abuses of 
power were not violations of the criminal code but the actions of a 
tyrant who ruled under the divine right of kings and they pledged their 
lives, honor, and sacred fortunes never to countenance such abuses or 
usurpations in their new country.
  Consider if you will a small sample of the legal acts of abuse and 
suffering inflicted on Americans in the time of the Framers by their 
rulers, Great Britain's King George III and the British Parliament, 
which they documented in the Declaration of Independence:
  He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his 
Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
  He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of 
their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
  He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the 
Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military 
independent of and superior to the Civil power.

  He has combined with [Parliament] to subject us to a jurisdiction 
foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his 
Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
  For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us;
  For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders 
which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States;
  For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent; For depriving us in 
many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury;
  For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
  The principle the Framers were asserting is that removal of the King 
and Parliament was justified not because they had committed criminal 
violations of the statute book, but because they had and were 
exercising their power in a manner that threatened the liberty and 
security of the people.
  In short, the Framers were declaring to the world that their 
governors had so abused their powers that it ``revealed the character 
of a tyrant who was unfit to be the ruler of a free people.''
  And to ensure that did not happen again in the new nation, the 
Framers wisely included Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 vesting the sole 
power of impeachment in the House of Representatives and Article II, 
Section 4 subjecting the President and Vice President to removal from 
Office ``on Impeachment for and Conviction of Treason, Bribery, or 
other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.''
  The actions alleged in H. Res. 755, the impeachment resolution, and 
proved to a certainty by the House Managers bespeak a stunning 
disregard for the values that sustain our country and a contempt for 
the institutions that protect our liberties and national security.
  As alarming is the fact there has been from the President no 
expression of regret, no remorse, no contrition, no apology, no 
atonement, no request for forgiveness, no admission of wrongdoing or 
even erroneous judgment, and no attempt at reconciliation.
  Instead, the President continues to double-down on his previous 
actions, still claiming, despite all evidence to the contrary, that his 
telephone call with President Zelensky was ``perfect'' and inviting 
other countries, such as China, to become involved in our nation's 2020 
presidential election.
  This means the clear and present threat to our democracy that moved 
the House to act is a continuing one, which the Senate should have 
acted to remove.
  Given the disappointing failure to convict and remove by the Senate, 
it is incumbent on each Member of this body, and all citizens of our 
great nation, to vigilantly be on guard to safeguard our democratic 
institutions, values, and principles against further attack.
  That is what this moment in history demands of us and we dare not I 
falter or fail in this moment of crisis so as was said in another 
perilous time, ``sail on oh ship of state, sail on oh union great; 
humanity with all its fears, with all it hopes of future years, is 
hanging breathlessly on thy fate.''
  I extend my deepest thanks to thank Speaker Pelosi for the 
extraordinary leadership she has displayed on behalf of this House, the 
Congress, and the nation during the present crisis.
  I also want to acknowledge and thank Judiciary Committee Chairman 
Jerrold Nadler and Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff for the 
meticulous and thoroughly professional manner in which their committees 
discharged the responsibilities entrusted to them by H. Res. 660, the 
impeachment inquiry resolution.
  I thank all of the members of the Committees on the Judiciary and on 
Intelligence for the tremendous contributions they made in compiling 
such a powerful and overwhelming evidentiary record for impeachment.
  I especially wish to recognize the extraordinary advocacy of the 
House Impeachment Managers in presenting such a persuasive and 
compelling case for impeachment to the Senate sitting as a Court of 
Impeachment.
  Of course, an enterprise of this magnitude could not be carried out 
successfully without the assistance, support, and commitment of 
extremely talented professional staff members of the Judiciary and 
Intelligence Committees and I thank them for the invaluable service 
they rendered to our nation.
  Finally, I wish to express my deep appreciation and gratitude to 
members of my personal staff, Gregory Berry, Chief Counsel; Robin 
Chand, Senior Counsel; and Glenn Rushing, Chief of Staff, for their 
expertise and tireless efforts in researching and analyzing the 
unprecedented factual background, legal issues, and constitutional 
precedents involved in these proceedings.
  Madam Speaker, it has been said that what we do in life echoes in 
history, and Scripture tells us in Psalms 30:5 that ``weeping may 
endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.''
  I am confident that if we hold fast and honor the values and 
principles that we know to be right and true and good, then 
constitutional government will be preserved and passed on to future 
generations just as it was to us.
  So, it is with love and reverence for this country and its people, 
that I stood with the Constitution and supported the resolution 
impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, for high 
crimes and misdemeanors and it is why I disagree with the conclusion of 
the Senate not to convict and remove the President from office.