Congressional Record, Volume 166 Issue 37 (Tuesday, February 25, 2020)

[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 37 (Tuesday, February 25, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1144-S1152]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

IMPEACHMENT

Mr. LANKFORD. Madam President, the country is deeply divided on
multiple issues right now. The impeachment trial is both a symptom of
our times and another example of our division. At the beginning of our
Nation, we did not have an impeachment inquiry of a President for
almost 100 years with the partisan impeachment of Andrew Johnson. After
more than 100 years, another impeachment inquiry was conducted when the
House began a formal impeachment inquiry into President Nixon in an
overwhelmingly bipartisan vote of 410-4. Within a period of weeks,
President Nixon resigned before he was formally impeached. Then, just
over two decades later, President Clinton was impeached by the House,
on another mostly partisan vote leading to a partisan acquittal in the
Senate.
This season of our history has been referred to as the Age of
Investigations and the Age of Impeachment. We have had multiple special
counsels since 1974 over multiple topics. This is more than just
oversight; it has been a unique time in American history when the
politics of the moment have driven rapid calls for investigation and
impeachment. Over the past 3 years, the House of Representatives has
voted four times to open an impeachment inquiry: once in 2017, once in
2018, and twice in 2019. Only the second vote in 2019 actually passed
and began a formal inquiry.
The Mueller investigation that consumed most of 2018 and 2019
answered many questions about Russian attacks on our voting systems--
although no votes were changed--but it was also a $32 million
investigation that took more than 2 years of America's attention. For
the last 4 months the country has been consumed with impeachment
hearings and investigations. The first rumors of issues with Ukraine
arose August 28 when POLITICO published a story about U.S. foreign aid
being slow-walked for Ukraine, and then on September 18 when the
Washington Post published a story about a whistleblower report that
claimed President Trump pressured an unnamed foreign head of state to
do an investigation for his campaign.
Within days of the Washington Post story on September 24, Speaker
Pelosi announced that the House would begin hearings to impeach the
President, which led to the formal House vote to open the impeachment
inquiry on October 31 and then a vote to impeach the President on
December 18. But after the partisan vote to impeach the President,
Speaker Pelosi held the Articles of Impeachment for a month before
turning them over to the Senate, which began the formal trial of the
President of the United States on January 16, 2020. After hearing hours
of arguments from both House managers and the President's legal defense
team and Senators asking 180 questions to both sides, the trial
concluded February 5, 2020.
There are key dates to know:
April 21, 2019, President Zelensky is elected President of Ukraine.
May 21, President Zelensky sworn in. After the ceremony, President
Zelensky abolishes Parliament and calls for quick snap elections on
July 21.
July 21, Ukrainian Parliamentary elections. President Zelensky's
party wins a huge majority.
July 25, President Trump calls President Zelensky to congratulate him
and his party.
August 12, An unnamed whistleblower working in the U.S. intelligence

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community filed a complaint that he had heard from others that the
President of the United States had tried to pressure President Zelensky
of Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden on an
official phone call July 25, 2019.
August 26, the Inspector General for the Intelligence Community
declares the whistleblower report ``an urgent matter'' and asks for its
release within 7 days. The Justice Department looks over the report and
notes that although it was written by a person in the intelligence
community, it is not related to intelligence matters, so it does not
fall within the Inspector General's jurisdiction and it is forwarded on
to the Department of Justice for review.
August 28, POLITICO publishes a story that the annual military aid
for Ukraine is currently being slow-walked.
September 9, the Inspector General contacts the House Intelligence
Committee to let them know that he has not been able to release the
whistleblower report to their committee.
September 13, the House Intelligence Committee subpoenas the
whistleblower report.
September 18, the Washington Post prints a story with ``unnamed
sources'' that there is a whistleblower report about the President
talking with a foreign leader about a campaign matter.
September 24, the House began an informal impeachment inquiry after
Speaker Pelosi announced it at a press conference in the U.S. Capitol.
September 25, President Trump released the official unredacted ``read
out'' of the phone call with President Zelensky from July 25.
September 26, the whistleblower report is declassified and released
publicly.
October 31, the House formally votes along party lines for an
impeachment inquiry.
December 18, the House votes to impeach the President with two
articles--abuse of Power and obstruction of congress
January 15, Speaker Pelosi releases the Articles of Impeachment to
the Senate.
January 16, Senate trial on impeachment begins.
February 5, Senate trial concludes with acquittal on both articles.
Ukraine became independent in 1991 when it broke away from the Soviet
Union, but the Ukrainians have faced constant pressure from Russia ever
since. In 2014 Ukraine forced out its pro-Russia President, and Moscow
retaliated by taking over Crimea--and stealing the Ukrainian Navy--then
rolling tanks into eastern Ukraine and taking all of eastern Ukraine by
force. Russian and Ukrainian troops continue to fight every day in
eastern Ukraine.
The people of Ukraine face an aggressive Russia on the east and
pervasive Soviet era corruption throughout the government and the
business community. President Trump met the previous President of
Ukraine in 2017 to talk about other countries helping Ukraine with
greater military support funds and to ask how Ukraine could address
corruption on a wider scale. The two Presidents also spoke about lethal
aid--allowing the Ukrainians to buy sniper rifles, anti-tank Javelin
missiles, and other lethal supplies--to help them fight the invading
Russians. The United States also started sending a couple hundred
American troops to train Ukrainian soldiers in the far west of Ukraine.
On April 21, 2019, President Zelensky was overwhelmingly elected as
the new President of Ukraine. He was a sitcom actor/comedian who had no
political experience but was well known for his television show in
which he played the part of a corruption-fighting teacher who was
elected as President of Ukraine. His television popularity helped him
win the election, but when he was sworn in on May 21, he was relatively
unknown to most of the world.
On the same day as his inauguration, May 21, President Zelensky
abolished Parliament and called for snap elections to put his party in
power. With a new President in place and parliamentary elections in
Ukraine coming, starting in June of 2019, the President ordered foreign
aid to Ukraine to be held until the end of the fiscal year, but
agencies were informed that they should do all the preliminary work
needed before the aid was sent, so it would be ready to release at a
moment's notice. The leadership in Ukraine was not notified that there
was a hold on their foreign aid.
The new Parliament was elected on July 21, and President Zelensky's
party won by a landslide. By mid-August, the new Parliament was working
on anti-corruption efforts and trying to establish a high court on
corruption, which they put in place September 5, 2019. There was a
tremendous amount of uncertainty in the early days of the new
administration, but by mid-August there was clear evidence of actual
change in a country that desperately needed a new direction from its
corrupt past.
On July 25, when President Trump called President Zelensky, the
President congratulated President Zelensky for the big win in
Parliament and talked about ``burden-sharing''--other nations also
paying their share of support for Ukraine. The two Presidents talked
about their disapproval of the previous mbassadors to each other's
countries. But instead of following all the staff preparation notes
written by Lieutenant Colonel Vindman, the National Security Council
staffer assigned to Ukraine, and just talking about ``corruption'' in
general, the President brought up a question about Ukraine and the 2016
election interference, which I will note below. President Zelensky also
brought up to President Trump that his staff was planning to meet with
Rudy Giuliani, President Trump's personal attorney, in the coming days,
which led to a conversation about Joe Biden and the firing of the
previous prosecutor in Ukraine.
After the call, Lieutenant Colonel Vindman contacted an attorney at
the National Security Council to express his ``policy concerns'' about
the call. It is interesting to note that Lieutenant Colonel Vindman's
boss, Tim Morrison, was also on the call, but he did not see any
problems or concerns with the call according to his own testimony in
the House impeachment inquiry. Within a month, a whistleblower filed a
report about the call, saying he heard about the call secondhand and
was concerned about the implications of a conversation about elections
on a head-of-state call. To keep the July 25th call in context with
other news, the day before it took place July 24 Robert Mueller had
testified before Congress as the last official act to close down the
2\1/2\ year Mueller investigation and clear the President and his
campaign team of any further accusation of election interference.
During the impeachment trial in the Senate, the House managers
repeated over and over that the President was planning to cheat
``again'' on the next election, but the final conclusion of the Mueller
report was that ``ultimately, the investigation did not establish that
the (Trump) Campaign coordinated or conspired with the Russian
government in its election-interference activities.''
This is especially notable because for years a rumor circulated that
Ukraine was part of the 2016 election interference and that someone in
Ukraine was hiding the Democratic National Committee, DNC, server that
was hacked by the Russians in 2016. As the conspiracy theory goes, it
was actually the Ukrainians who hacked the DNC, not the Russians. This
is the ``Crowdstrike'' theory that President Trump asked President
Zelensky to help solve during the call.
Agencies of the U.S. intelligence community have stated over and over
that they did not believe that Ukraine was involved in the Russian
election interference from 2016. I personally agree with the
intelligence community assessment but Rudy Giuliani and multiple others
around President Trump believed there was a secret plan in 2016 to hurt
President Trump's election from Ukraine. This accusation was amplified
by bits of truth, including that the Ukrainian Ambassador to the United
States wrote an editorial in support of Hillary Clinton in 2016 right
before the election, and several other Ukrainian officials publicly
spoke out against Candidate Trump in 2016.
There is nothing illegal about a foreign nation speaking out for or
against a Presidential candidate, whether Hillary Clinton or Donald
Trump in 2016 or anyone else in the future. It may not be wise to take
sides before an election, but it is not illegal. Just because some
Ukrainian officials took sides

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does not mean that the whole Ukrainian Government worked on a cyber
attack on our elections. But since this rumor had persisted, and it was
a new administration now in Ukraine, President Trump asked President
Zelensky to help clear up the facts if he could. That is certainly not
illegal or improper, and it is certainly not something that could help
the President in the 2020 election, especially since the 2016 Russian
election accusation had just been closed the day before.
The 2016 ``Crowdstrike'' theory is the issue that President Trump
asked President Zelensky to ``do us a favor'' about, not the Bidens or
Burisma. During the July 25 call after the question about
``Crowdstrike,'' President Zelensky mentioned to President Trump that
one of his advisers would be meeting with Rudy Giuliani soon. Then,
President Trump affirmed that meeting and encouraged them to talk about
the Biden investigation and the firing of the Ukrainian prosecutor.
That may seem out of the blue, but in Washington, D.C., that week,
the city was buzzing about a Washington Post article that had been
written 3 days before July 22, 2019--detailing Hunter Biden's giant
salary--$83,000 per month--for doing essentially nothing for a corrupt
Ukrainian natural gas company and how it undercut Vice President
Biden's message on corruption.
It is important to get the context of that week to understand the
context of the phone call that day. I have no doubt that the story was
just as big of news in Kiev, Ukraine, as it was in Washington, D.C.,
that week. President Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, had been
in and out of Ukraine since November 2018, meeting with government
officials and trying to find out more about the ``Crowdstrike'' theory
or any other Ukrainian connection to the 2016 election. During that
time, Rudy Giuliani met several former prosecutors from Ukraine who
blamed their departure on Vice President Biden. It is clear that Rudy
Giuliani was working to gain information about both of these issues in
his capacity as President Trump's private attorney.
It is not criminal for Rudy Giuliani to work on opposition research
for a Presidential campaign or to work on behalf of his client to clear
his name from any issues related to the 2016 campaign, which he had
done since November 2018. Some have stated that since this was
``foreign information,'' it is illegal. That is absolutely not true. In
fact, Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee in 2016
paid a British citizen, Christopher Steele, to work his contacts in
Russia to create the now debunked ``Steele Dossier,'' which the FBI
used to open its investigation into President Trump, leading directly
to the appointment of Special Counsel Mueller. That dossier was
opposition research done in Russia by a British citizen, paid for by
the Clinton campaign team. Their opposition research was not illegal,
but the use and abuse of that document by the FBI to start an
investigation was certainly inappropriate and is most likely illegal.
But the FBI warrant issue is still being investigated by the ongoing
Durham probe.
During the July 25, 2019, call, President Zelensky brought up the
issue of Rudy Giuliani, and President Trump replied to his statement.
You can argue that President Trump should not have discussed the issue
with President Zelensky when he brought it up, but it is certainly not
illegal or impeachable to talk about it, especially when there are
serious questions about Hunter Biden's work with Burisma. That is not a
conservative conspiracy theory; the issue of Hunter Biden's employment
in Ukraine was a problem for years at the State Department. It had been
raised to Vice President Biden when he was still in office. Every State
Department official interviewed for the Trump impeachment investigation
noted that at best it was a clear conflict of interest, and it was the
center of a huge story on corruption in the Washington Post on July 22,
2019. It had the appearance of high-level corruption by using a well-
placed family member on the board of a known corrupt gas company in
Ukraine to shelter it from prosecutors. Hunter Biden had only resigned
from the Burisma board a few months before the July 25 phone call, just
prior to when his dad announced his run for the Presidency in 2019.
After the July 25 phone call, Attorney General Barr did not have any
followup meetings or calls with Ukrainian officials. Rudy Giuliani did
have additional conversations with Ukrainian officials, which are legal
to do since he is a private attorney representing the President.

Text of July 25, 2019 Phone Call Between Presidents Trump and Zelensky

The President: Congratulations on a great victory. We all
watched from the United States and you did a terrific job.
The way you came from behind, somebody who wasn't given much
of a chance, and you ended up winning easily. It's a
fantastic achievement. Congratulations.
President Zelensky: You are absolutely right Mr. President.
We did win big and we worked hard for this. We worked a lot
but I would like to confess to you that I had an opportunity
to learn from you. We used quite a few of your skills and
knowledge and were able to use it as an example for our
elections and yes it is true that these were unique
elections. We were in a unique situation that we were able to
achieve a unique success. I'm able to tell you the following;
the first time you called me to congratulate me when I won my
presidential election, and the second time you are now
calling me when my party won the parliamentary election. I
think I should run more often so you can call me more often
and we can talk over the phone more often.
The President: (laughter) That's a very good idea. I think
your country is very happy about that.
President Zelensky: Well yes, to tell you the truth, we are
trying to work hard because we wanted to drain the swamp here
in our country. We brought in many many new people. Not the
old politicians, not the typical politicians, because we want
to have a new format and a new type of government. You are a
great teacher for us and in that.
The President: Well it is very nice of you to say that. I
will say that we do a lot for Ukraine. We spend a lot of
effort and a lot of time. Much more than the European
countries are doing and they should be helping you more than
they are. Germany does almost nothing for you. All they do is
talk and I think it's something that you should really ask
them about. When I was speaking to Angela Merkel she talks
Ukraine, but she doesn't do anything. A lot of the European
countries are the same way so I think it's something you want
to look at but the United States has been very very good to
Ukraine. I wouldn't say that it's reciprocal necessarily
because things are happening that are not good but the United
States has been very very good to Ukraine.
President Zelensky: Yes you are absolutely right. Not only
100%, but actually 1000% and I can tell you the following; I
did talk to Angela Merkel and I did meet with her I also met
and talked with Macron and I told them that they are not
doing quite as much as they need to be doing on the issues
with the sanctions. They are not enforcing the sanctions.
They are not working as much as they should work for Ukraine.
It turns out that even though logically, the European Union
should be our biggest partner but technically the United
States is a much bigger partner than the European Union and
I'm very grateful to you for that because the United States
is doing quite a lot for Ukraine. Much more than the European
Union especially when we are talking about sanctions against
the Russian Federation. I would also like to thank you for
your great support in the area of defense. We are ready to
continue to cooperate for the next steps specifically we are
almost. ready to buy more Javelins from the United States for
defense purposes.
The President: I would like you to do us a favor though
because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows
a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened
with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike.
I guess you have one of your wealthy people . . . The server,
they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went
on, the whole situation. I think you're surrounding yourself
with some of the same people. I would like to have the
Attorney General call you or your people and I would like you
to get to the bottom of it. As you saw yesterday, that whole
nonsense ended with a very poor performance by a man named
Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a
lot of it started with Ukraine. Whatever you can do, it's
very important that you do it if that's possible.
President Zelensky: Yes it is very important for me and
everything that you just mentioned earlier. For me as a
President, it is very important and we are open for any
future cooperation. We are ready to open a new page on
cooperation in relations between the United States and
Ukraine. For that purpose, I just recalled our ambassador
from United States and he will be replaced by a very
competent and very experienced ambassador who will work
hard on making sure that our two nations are getting
closer. I would also like and hope to see him having your
trust and your confidence and have personal relations with
you so we can cooperate even more so. I will personally
tell you that one of my assistants spoke with Mr. Giuliani
just recently and we are hoping very much that Mr.
Giuliani will be able to travel to Ukraine and we will
meet once he comes to Ukraine. I just wanted to assure you
once again that you have nobody but friends

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around us. I will make sure that I surround myself with
the best and most experienced people. I also wanted to
tell you that we are friends. We are great friends and you
Mr. President have friends in our country so we can
continue our strategic partnership. I also plan to
surround myself with great people and in addition to that
investigation, I guarantee as the President of Ukraine
that all the investigations will be done openly and
candidly. That I can assure you.
The President: Good because I heard you had a prosecutor
who was very good and he was shut down and that's really
unfair. A lot of people are talking about that, the way they
shut your very good prosecutor down and you had some very bad
people involved. Mr. Giuliani is a highly respected man. He
was the mayor of New York City, a great mayor, and I would
like him to call you. I will ask him to call you along with
the Attorney General. Rudy very much knows what's happening
and he is a very capable guy. If you could speak to him that
would be great. The former ambassador from the United States,
the woman, was bad news and the people she was dealing with
in the Ukraine were bad news so I just want to let you know
that. The other thing, There's a lot of talk about Biden's
son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people
want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the
Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging
that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it .
. . It sounds horrible to me.
President Zelensky: I wanted to tell you about the
prosecutor. First of all, I understand and I'm knowledgeable
about the situation. Since we have won the absolute majority
in our Parliament, the next prosecutor general will be 100%
my person, my candidate, who will be approved, by the
parliament and will start as a new prosecutor in September.
He or she will look into the situation, specifically to the
company that you mentioned in this issue. The issue of the
investigation of the case is actually the issue of making
sure to restore the honesty so we will take care of that and
will work on the investigation of the case. On top of that, I
would kindly ask you if you have any additional information
that you can provide to us, it would be very helpful for the
investigation to make sure that we administer justice in our
country with regard to the Ambassador to the United States
from Ukraine as far as I recall her name was Ivanovich. It
was great that you were the first one who told me that she
was a bad ambassador because I agree with you 100%. Her
attitude towards me was far from the best as she admired the
previous President and she was on his side. She would not
accept me as a new President well enough.
The President: Well, she's going to go through some things.
I will have Mr. Giuliani give you a call and I am also going
to have Attorney General Barr call and we will get to the
bottom of it. I'm sure you will figure it out. I heard the
prosecutor was treated very badly and he was a very fair
prosecutor so good luck with everything. Your economy is
going to get better and better I predict. You have a lot of
assets. It's a great country. I have many Ukrainian friends,
they're incredible people.
President Zelensky: I would like to tell you that I also
have quite a few Ukrainian friends that live in the United
States. Actually last time I traveled to the United States, I
stayed in New York near Central Park and I stayed at the
Trump Tower. I will talk to them and I hope to see them again
in the future. I also wanted to thank you for your invitation
to visit the United States, specifically Washington DC. On
the other hand, I also want to ensure you that we will be
very serious about the case and will work on the
investigation. As to the economy, there is much potential for
our two countries and one of the issues that is very
important for Ukraine is energy independence. I believe we
can be very successful and cooperating on energy independence
with United States. We are already working on cooperation. We
are buying American oil but I am very hopeful for a future
meeting. We will have more time and more opportunities to
discuss these opportunities and get to know each other
better. I would like to thank you very much for your support.
The President: Good. Well, thank you very much and I
appreciate that. I will tell Rudy and Attorney General Barr
to call. Thank you. Whenever you would like to come to the
White House, feel free to call. Give us a date and we'll work
that out. I look forward to seeing you. President Zelensky:
Thank you very much. I would be very happy to come and would
be happy to meet with you personally and get to know you
better. I am looking forward to our meeting and I also would
like to invite you to visit Ukraine and come to the city of
Kyiv which is a beautiful city. We have a beautiful country
which would welcome you. On the other hand, I believe that on
September 1 we will be in Poland and we can meet in Poland
hopefully. After that, it might be a very good idea for you
to travel to Ukraine. We can either take my plane and go to
Ukraine or we can take your plane, which is probably much
better than mine.
The President: Okay, we can work that out. I look forward
to seeing you in Washington and maybe in Poland because I
think we are going to be there at that time. President
Zelensky: Thank you very much Mr. President.
The President: Congratulations on a fantastic job you've
done. The whole world was watching. I'm not sure it was so
much of an upset but congratulations.
President Zelensky: Thank you Mr. President bye-bye.

Based on a whistleblower report about the July 25 call, the House
Intelligence Committee subpoenaed the report on September 13 and
started its impeachment inquiry on September 24.
In the Senate impeachment trial, House managers stated their belief
that the President had carried out a ``scheme to cheat in the 2020
election'' by withholding financial aid to Ukraine and withholding a
White House meeting with the new President of Ukraine in exchange for
Ukraine announcing it would investigate Joe Biden, Burisma, and 2016
election interference.
Let's discuss the facts of both.

White House Meeting

There is no question that President Trump had offered a White House
meeting to President Zelensky three times: once in May on a phone call
after President Zelensky won his election, once in June in a letter,
and finally in the July 25 call after President Zelensky's party won
the parliamentary elections. But Tim Morrison--State Department
official called as a witness by the House--also testified that they
were working on heads-of-state meetings with 12 other heads of state
during that same time period. Many nations were trying to line up
meetings in the White House during the summer of 2019.
During the July 25 call, President Zelensky offered to instead move
their meeting from a White House meeting to a face-to-face meeting in
Warsaw, Poland, when they would both be there on September 1, 2019. The
Presidents agreed, and planning began on the meeting in August. By
August 22, the meeting planning was in full swing, as noted by emails
in the House hearing's evidence. However, Hurricane Dorian slammed into
the United States in the hours leading up to the September 1 meeting,
causing a last-minute shift to the Vice President traveling to Poland
so the President could stay in the United States to monitor hurricane
relief.
We know that Vice President Pence met face-to-face with President
Zelensky, and they spoke about other nations paying their fair share to
help Ukraine and the issue of corruption across Ukraine. We know from
the preparation materials and the meeting notes themselves that during
the meeting the Vice President did not bring up or discuss the issue of
Burisma, Joe Biden, or any other campaign conversation with President
Zelensky.
The White House found the next available time when President Trump
and President Zelensky would both be in the same place at the same time
to set up a face-to-face meeting: September 25 at the U.N. Assembly in
New York. That meeting was set up, and it took place as scheduled.
In the Senate impeachment trial, the House managers maintained that
only a White House meeting was sufficient and that it was being
withheld, but the facts show that President Zelensky himself floated
the idea of a meeting in Poland and that the meeting was not barred or
withheld.
In the early months of President Zelensky's term, there was a great
deal of concern about him, his staff, and his plans because he was an
unknown political figure. Until more was known about him, it was
entirely appropriate to show caution in coordinating a meeting, but
once his nationwide anti-corruption efforts began in August, it was
clear that face-to-face meetings were planned and carried out.
There was no withholding of a face-to-face meeting with President
Trump and President Zelensky. There cannot be a quid pro quo if the
meeting was not withheld from Ukrainian officials.
The House managers claimed that there was a secret plot to ``extort''
or ``bribe'' the leadership of Ukraine to investigate Hunter Biden in
exchange for around $400 million of U.S. aid. The aid was State
Department and foreign military aid that had been provided for the past
4 years, since Ukraine had been in a war with Russia.

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 and its occupation of
Crimea and the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, the United States
started sending aid to help the Ukrainian Government. Congress allowed
lethal and non-lethal aid to support Ukraine, but during the previous
administration, only non-lethal aid was sent. Under

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President Trump's administration, it was determined that the United
States would give the leadership of Ukraine lethal aid to help them
fight off Russian tanks, which was President Zelensky's reference to
``javelins'' in the July 25 phone call and his gratitude to President
Trump for allowing those tank killing rockets to flow to Ukraine.
To be clear, the theory of funds being withheld from Ukraine in
exchange for an investigation does not originate from the July 25 call
read-out. There is nothing in the text of the call that threatens the
withholding of funds in exchange for an investigation.
The theory originates from the fact that aid was held back by the
Office of Management and Budget, headed by the President's Acting Chief
of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, and the ``presumption'' of U.S. Ambassador to
the European Union, Gordon Sondland, that the aid must have been held
because of the President's desire to get the Biden investigation done,
since the President's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, was working to find out
more about the Biden investigation.
Ambassador Sondland told multiple people about his theory, but when
he finally called President Trump and asked him directly about it, the
President responded that he did not have any quid pro quo; he just
wanted the President of Ukraine to do what he ran on and ``do the right
thing.'' Obviously, people who assume the worst about President Trump
take this as a secret message that there actually was a quid pro quo,
but the most important fact is that Ambassador Sondland did not read it
that way after his call with the President. Ambassador Sondland
believed that the President was serious. Unfortunately, the White House
Counsel was never allowed to cross examine Ambassador Sondland during
the House investigation to get the facts about who he talked to and why
he came to believe for a while that there was an effort to push for
investigations in exchange for money.
During the Senate trial, I listened closely to the facts surrounding
the withholding of aid money to Ukraine. This was by far the most
serious charge against the President. Two key questions had to be
answered for me: Why was the aid held, and why was the aid released?
There was no question the aid was held for a of couple months. The
question was why?
Statements from the House witnesses during the House impeachment
inquiry answered the two key questions: The aid was held because there
was a legitimate concern about the new President of Ukraine and his
administration in the early days of his Presidency and the aid was
released on time when the new Ukrainian Parliament starting passing
anti-corruption laws in August and after Vice President Pence sat down
face to face with President Zelensky on September 1 in Poland to
discuss their progress on corruption.
We should not lose track of what was happening in Ukraine in 2019. A
new President was elected who was a TV actor with no political
experience and no record on how he would handle Russia or the issue of
widespread national corruption in Ukraine. He ran on a platform of
anti-corruption at all levels, but no one knew how he would govern. His
campaign was funded by a Ukrainian oligarch who owned a major media
outlet, and one of his first advisers was the former attorney for that
oligarch.
I personally spoke to many of the State Department officials in
Ukraine in May of 2019 and heard their concerns about the new
government. Then, newly elected President Zelensky used his power to
dissolve their Parliament the day he was sworn in and called for ``snap
elections'' in which the vast majority of the newly elected leaders
were from his newly formed party. To our State Department and the White
House, this was either a really a good sign or a really bad sign.
Either Ukraine was about to take a major change for the better with new
leadership, or this new young leader was about to assume real
centralized power. No one knew for certain in May, June, and July of
2019. Within a few weeks in August, the new Parliament got to work
passing anti-corruption laws and making significant changes in their
accountability and for the country. This was a very good sign.
When Vice President Pence met face to face with President Zelensky
September 1, both sides had confidence the country was taking a new
direction. On September 10 Vice President Pence and Senator Rob Portman
met with President Trump to tell him about the progress that had been
made, and both advised lifting the hold on aid. The aid was lifted the
next day, September 11. No investigation into Hunter Biden or Burisma
was ever done by Ukraine, and no part of the U.S. Department of Justice
was ever involved in any investigation of Hunter Biden or Burisma.
Although the aid was frozen in June, there was no public announcement
of the hold, as explained by the White House Counsel, to keep this from
becoming a public issue while the White House monitored the progress
and status of the transition in Ukraine.
On August 27, POLITICO published an article that noted that the
foreign aid had been held by the United States. This caused President
Zelensky's office to reach out to the State Department and ask why.
During the House impeachment proceedings, four of the House witnesses--
Ambassador Voelker, Ambassador Sondland, Ambassador Taylor, and Tim
Morrison--all testified that the Ukrainian leadership learned about the
temporary hold in aid after the POLITICO article was published.
The issue of the hold was also the first question from President
Zelensky to Vice President Pence when they met on September 1 in
Poland. The idea that the leadership in Ukraine had pressure placed on
them to do an investigation fails the most essential test. Did the
leadership of Ukraine even know that the aid was being held? The answer
from multiple American and Ukrainian leaders was no, they did not know
there was a hold on the aid from the White House. You cannot have
pressure to act on an investigation if they did not even know the aid
was being held.
It is interesting to note, when I researched the records of past
foreign aid payment dates and times to Ukraine, I found the 2019 aid
was in line with the date the 2016, 2017, and 2018 aid was sent. The
vast majority of the military aid to Ukraine was obligated in August or
September for the past 4 years. Although the aid was ready to go out
the door a couple months earlier in 2019, it was certainly not late,
based on the record of the previous 3 years. In fact, the State
Department aid was obligated September 30 in 2019, but it was obligated
September 28 in 2018. As quoted by the Ukrainian Minister of Defense,
``The aid was held such a short time, we did not even notice.''
During the 2 days of question-and-answer time, I asked a specific
question related to this issue because I felt it was important to get
the context of the aid, since there had been so much made of the issue
during the trial. Here is the full text of my question to the White
House Counsel:

House Managers have described any delay in military aid and
state department funds to Ukraine in 2019 as a cause to
believe there was a secret scheme or quid pro quo by the
President. In 2019, 86% of the DOD funds were obligated to
Ukraine in September, but in 2018, 67% of the funds were
obligated in September and in 2017, 73% of the funds were
obligated in September. In the State Department, the funds
were obligated September 30 in 2019, but they were obligated
September 28 in 2018. Each year, the vast majority of the
funds were obligated in the final month or days of the fiscal
year. Question: Was there a national security risk to Ukraine
or the United States from the funds going out late in
September in the two previous years? Did it weaken our
relationship with Ukraine because the vast majority of our
aid was released in September each of the last three years?

In response to my question, White House Counsel detailed the fact
that military aid from the United States was not for immediate use. It
was designed to help the Ukrainian military buy materials for the next
year, so it was common for the aid to be obligated at the end of the
fiscal year--September 30--and it was also common for some money to be
left unobligated and carried over into the next fiscal year, as it was
in 2019.
While it is easy to create an intricate story on the hold placed on
foreign aid to Ukraine, it is also clear that President Trump has
temporarily held foreign aid from multiple countries over the past 2
years, including: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Honduras, Guatemala, El
Salvador, Lebanon, and others. There is no question that a President
can withhold aid for a short period of

[[Page S1149]]

time, but it must be released by September 30, the end of the fiscal
year, which it was in this instance.
Article I, section 2 of the U.S. Constitution grants the U.S. House
of Representatives ``the sole power of impeachment,'' while article I,
section 3 states that ``the Senate shall have the sole power to try all
impeachments.''
The Constitution is clear that the House does not control the Senate
process and the Senate does not control the House process; however,
during the impeachment trial of President Trump, the House tried
repeatedly to dictate to the Senate how it should conduct its trial.
The ``sole power to try'' means laying out rules for the trial,
including when and if to call additional witnesses or request more
documents.
In addition to laying out roles and responsibilities for impeachment,
our Constitution also provides basic rights for the accused. The Fifth
Amendment ensures due process. However, the receipt of due process is
not contingent upon waiving another right, like immunity or executive
privilege. But that is exactly what the House tried to force President
Trump to do.
The President is not above the law, but neither is the House of
Representatives. If there was a question as to the scope and proper use
of the President's right to assert immunity or executive privilege
regarding conversations he had with his closest advisers, that question
is proper for a court to determine, not Congress, and surely not the
House on its own accord. To put this in constitutional terms, the
legislative branch cannot prevent the executive branch from having
access to the judicial branch. The House wanted to move quickly and
prevent the President from ever going to court to resolve any issue.
That has never been done for a good reason, the separation of powers.
In previous legal battles with the President, it has taken months to
resolve critical issues, like Bush v. Gore in 2000 or even in the
Clinton impeachment trial, when the House took 2 months to resolve an
issue with witnesses in court. It does not have to drag on for years.
The House also wanted the Chief Justice of the United States to
``rule on'' any issue quickly instead of allowing the President to go
through the courts. This would have created a new judicial executive
branch by putting all the judicial power of the nation in one person,
not in the judicial branch, as is stated in the Constitution. It would
have also ignored the text of the Constitution where it notes that the
Chief Justice ``presides'' in the court of impeachment, not
``decides.'' The sole power of impeachment is in the Senate, not the
Senate plus the one Justice. The Chief Justice keeps the trial moving
along, based on the rules of the trial, but he or she is not a decider
of fact; that is reserved to the Senate. The House managers wanted to
ignore that part of the Constitution to move the trial faster for
expedience. We cannot ignore the Constitution or create bad precedent,
no matter which party is being tried for impeachment.
Further, the Sixth Amendment guarantees that the accused has the
ability to both confront the witnesses against him and to have the
assistance of counsel. The majority of the impeachment inquiry in the
House was done without a meaningful opportunity for the President to
participate, and administration witnesses were denied the ability to
have counsel present for depositions.
The Constitution lays out a clear separation of powers but
importantly also provides a system of checks and balances. For
something as important as impeachment, it is imperative that the
process be one that is squarely within the bounds of the Constitution
and is one that the American people can trust. Unfortunately, the
process undertaken by the House to impeach President Trump falls wildly
short of the standards put in place by our Founders.
Article II, section 4 of the Constitution states that ``the
President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States,
shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of,
treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.''
During the trial of President Trump, there was a lot of conversation
about what constitutes a ``high crime'' or ``misdemeanor.'' Notably,
the House did not charge the President with any crimes; rather, the
House chose to impeach the President for ``abuse of power'' and
``obstruction of Congress.''
The House theoretically could have chosen to file Articles of
Impeachment for crimes such as bribery, extortion, solicitation of
interference in an election, or violations of the Impoundments Clause
Act. For any of these crimes, the House would have had to prove
specific elements of each. Since they couldn't prove any of those
crimes, they chose to charge the President with abuse of power. As was
noted in the trial, 40 Presidents have faced accusation of abuse of
power, going back as far as George Washington.
The abuse of power charge for President Trump was based on
allegations that he improperly withheld aid to Ukraine and conditioned
a meeting with President Zelensky at the White House in exchange for an
investigation into former Vice President Biden and his son Hunter. Over
the course of the last 4 months, we heard the term ``quid pro quo''
used over and over again, but the facts do not show criminal quid pro
quo. As previously mentioned, President Zelensky asked to meet with
President Trump in Poland, and that meeting was set up. Further, while
the aid to Ukraine was delayed, it wasn't delayed more than it had been
the previous 2 years, and the aid was released without an
investigation--or even an announcement of one--into the Biden's.
The second Article of Impeachment, obstruction of Congress, had an
even weaker constitutional foundation. The investigation was announced
September 24 did not officially begin until October 31. The impeachment
vote in the House was December 18. This very short time table and the
accusation that the President refused to follow the law, honor the
courts, and that he acted like a ``King'' did not meet even the most
basic constitutional standards for justice.
For example, during the Mueller investigation, the President's team
fully cooperated with the investigation that included over 2,000
subpoenas and 500 witnesses, including the President's Chief of Staff,
multiple Cabinet officials, and many lower level officials who were all
made available. It was clear throughout the investigation that the
President did not like or agree with the Mueller investigation, but he
also fully cooperated with every subpoena, each witness, and every
document. In fact, they released over a million pages of documents to
the Mueller team.
President Trump also made his disagreement with the courts very clear
on issues like the census, whether travel restrictions can be put in
place to ensure national security, or whether particular funds can be
used to secure our southern border. But each time the President lost in
court, his administration complied with orders from the judiciary. That
is how our system of government is supposed to work.
When disagreements happen between the legislative branch and the
judicial branch, they usually lead to resolution, not impeachment. The
Fast and Furious investigation, which lasted more than 3 years in the
Obama administration, led to a vote in the House to hold then-Attorney
General Eric Holder in contempt, but it never led to an impeachment
inquiry, even though there was a clear and consistent refusal to
cooperate with Congress or turn over key documents for 3 years.
In this case, the accusation that President Trump ignored subpoenas
or refused to follow the law is not correct. The President's team made
it very clear that they would cooperate during the impeachment inquiry
with properly authorized and issued subpoenas, but the House refused to
issue subpoenas that were consistent with the law to seek resolution
for documents and witnesses. The House was focused on speed, not legal
process.
The House, in a rush to impeachment last fall, issued multiple
subpoenas for documents and testimony before the House had given
authority to the committees to issue subpoenas for an impeachment
inquiry, which happened October 31. Since there was no authority to
issue the subpoenas, they were not duly authorized. The House also
demanded testimony from the President's inner circle without working
through the legal questions, and the House demanded executive agency
witnesses appear without allowing them to bring agency counsel with
them. All of those

[[Page S1150]]

issues created very real legal and constitutional problems. Agency
individuals have always been allowed to have legal counsel with them
when they are deposed, except this time.
As a Member of Congress, I cannot demand the President turn over
documents or give testimony in any fashion that I would prefer just
because I have oversight responsibilities. In the same way, the
President or other executive branch officials cannot demand I turn over
my notes or provide my staff for testimony without going through the
courts and gaining a legal subpoena. Congress has vigorously and
rightfully protected its rights from unwarranted investigations from
any President and Presidents have done the same. But in all cases, the
law must be followed and the proper process must be pursued to get the
information in a legal way.
From the very first moments of the Senate trial, the House managers
fought for additional witnesses and documents from the President. Their
argument and justification for the second Article of Impeachment
centered on the White House's refusal to turn over documents and make
every witness available without going through the normal legal process.
Per the resolution adopted by the Senate, the House record was part
of the trial record. The Senate had the testimony of the witnesses the
House chose to question as part of the overall information of the
trial. The House already had 28,000 pages of documents that were part
of the evidence they submitted to the Senate, although, the House
managers admitted during the Senate impeachment trial that they still
have not released all of the documents and witness testimony that they
had gathered in their investigation to the White House Counsel or to
the Senate. We do not fully know why the House held back some of its
witness testimony and released others.
The House witness testimony was used extensively in the Senate trial.
These are the witnesses who testified live or via video in the House
and Senate Impeachment: David Holmes, Political Counselor, U.S. Embassy
Ukraine, State Department; Dr. Fiona Hill, White House Advisor,
National Security Council; David Hale, Under Secretary for Political
Affairs, State Department; Laura Cooper, Deputy Assistant Secretary of
Defense; Gordon Sondland, U.S. Ambassador to the European Union; Tim
Morison, Former White House Adviser; Kurt Voelker, Former Special Envoy
for Ukraine; LTC Alexander Vindman, National Security Council; Jennifer
Williams, aide to the Vice President; Marie Yovanovitch, Former
Ambassador to Ukraine; George Kent, Deputy Assistant Secretary of
State; Bill Taylor, Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine.

The House managers repeated over and over that additional witnesses
would only take a week to depose, which is a clearly false statement.
New witnesses took longer than a week to depose in the House inquiry;
clearly it would take just as long or longer in a Senate trial. The
remaining ``wish list'' of witnesses all had clear issues that needed
to be resolved in the courts, which would take a couple of months to
resolve, which is why the House managers did not push for their
testimony in the House impeachment process. They valued speed more than
legal process.
House managers repeatedly stated that witnesses only took a week to
depose in the Clinton Senate impeachment trial, but they know that
during the Clinton Senate trial, all three called witnesses previously
deposed in the House inquiry or in the grand jury investigation, and
all issues of executive privilege had already been decided through the
courts. There were no new witnesses in the Senate trial of President
Clinton. Also, the Clinton White House had already had the opportunity
to cross-examine witnesses or the investigators in the Clinton
impeachment inquiry. This time, the Trump White House had been denied
that right. So, if new witnesses would be added for the Senate trial,
the White House should have the right to also cross-examine the
previous House witnesses they had been denied the right to cross
examine in the past. This would all take much longer than a week, and
the House managers knew that.
During the Clinton impeachment trial in the Senate, there were no
additional documents requested, only previously deposed witnesses. The
House managers did not go through the legal process to get documents,
like the Mueller investigation had done, so all of the new document
requests from the House managers would take at least 3 to 5 weeks to
complete, once a legal subpoena is delivered. It takes time to search
all databases, review the documents for classified materials, determine
any legal issues, and release them to the investigation. Once the
documents are turned over, both legal teams need time to review the
documents. Again, the House managers knew these facts, but they
continued to repeat over and over that it would only take a week to get
all the documents.
The first question for the Senate trial was, do we have enough
evidence and testimony to answer the questions the House presented in
their Articles of Impeachment? If the answer is yes, then we do not
need additional witnesses or documents. If the answer is no, then we do
need additional information. There were many leaks and newspaper
stories during the trial designed to push the Senate to vote to ask for
more testimony, but that did not change the primary question. We
already knew from evidence that there was no quid pro quo, no Ukrainian
investigations, and no withholding of a public meeting with President
Trump.
The New York Times story on January 26 and again on January 31 are
clear examples of an attempt to bring doubt on the information and
witness testimony. Both stories stated that someone had read the
pending John Bolton book manuscript and that in the book, Bolton stated
that President Trump had talked about investigations in exchange for
aid funding for Ukraine. The New York Times also wrote that the book
would state that Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and White House
Counsel Pat Cipollone were also a part of the scheme. I looked at both
stories closely and noticed that the reporters had not read the
manuscripts or quoted the manuscripts; they were reports from someone
who stated that they had read the manuscripts. Both stories took
significant liberties to describe the intent in the manuscripts, but
the reporter had apparently also not spoken to John Bolton.
On January 23, 2020, the National Security Council lawyers sent a
letter to the legal team handling the book publishing for John Bolton
to inform him that the manuscript contained some classified information
and it would need have some edits before publication in March. Then, on
January 26, the New York Times published a story that someone had
leaked some of the details of the book, but they had not released the
actual manuscript. While I am interested in seeing the actual
manuscript, I am also very aware that this selective leak was designed
by the New York Times and whoever leaked the information to influence
the ongoing trial.
It was clear from the earliest days of the trial that the House had a
clear political strategy as well as a courtroom strategy. During the
trial. I had the responsibility to hear the facts but also to separate
the politics from the facts. Politically, it was best for the House to
move as quickly as possible through impeachment so that vulnerable
Democratic Members could vote for impeachment and then move quickly to
other topics. But since the Presidential election is in full swing, it
was politically better for Democrats to make the Senate trial move as
slow as possible to hurt the President during the campaign. That
explains why the House did not take the time to formally request
documents or testimony from many individuals; they needed to move fast
and try to force the Senate to move slowly. It also explained why the
House passed impeachment on a party line vote, then held the Articles
of Impeachment for a month before delivering them to the Senate to
start the trial. The House managers said repeatedly that the evidence
was clear and that they had proved their case, but if that was true,
why would the Senate need to call additional witnesses? I think the
reason is that the witness process was about delay, more than facts.
The facts do not support the accusation in the Trump impeachment, and
it certainly did not need to come to this moment of national division.
While it was clear that the House managers

[[Page S1151]]

wanted to drag the trial on for months in the Senate, through the
primary election season, their case consisted of hypothetical story
lines and ``presumptions'' more than facts that warrant the removal of
a President. This does not meet what Alexander Hamilton in Federalist
65 described as the ``due weight'' for the arguments.
But impeachment has certainly created the division in our society
that Alexander Hamilton predicted. Over 200 years ago he wrote, ``The
prosecution [of impeachments], will seldom fail to agitate the passions
of the whole community, and to divide it into parties more or less
friendly or inimical to the accused.'' This has been an incredibly
divisive season in our Nation. It is not about one person; it is about
all of us. We individually choose how we handle disagreements with
family, friends, and people on the other side of particular issues. Our
government represents us, so it is up to us to model for our government
how to handle disagreements.
We are now past impeachment, and it is time to work on the issues
that matter most to the American people. As we move forward, every
American should speak out on the issues that are important to them and
the voices that speak for their point of view. But we should remember
that we have much more in common than we have that divides us. It is my
hope that our Nation does not go through a season like this again for a
very long time and that we can move past this age of impeachment to an
age of oversight and accountability.
I appreciate all the engagement with our office during the
impeachment proceedings. We had thousands of calls and emails over the
past month. We had hundreds of thousands of views on the nightly
Facebook Live updates each day during the trial. While not every
Oklahoman agrees with every decision I make on behalf of our State, I
am grateful most choose to be respectful in expressing their points of
view. At the end of the day, we are Oklahomans. We may not all agree on
each issue, but we can be respectful of each other in our disagreement.
I am honored to serve our State and Nation. We have many important
issues to address in the coming days I pray we can work on them
together for the future of our State and Nation.
Mr. TILLIS. Madam President, during the impeachment trial, this
Chamber considered the evidence and heard the arguments presented by
the House managers and White House Counsel. During the 12 days of the
impeachment trial, the Senate heard from the House managers for nearly
22 hours, and we heard from the White House Counsel for nearly 12
hours. This was followed by 180 questions asked and answered over 2
days, concluding with closing arguments by the House managers and White
House Counsel.
Ultimately, there were two questions the Senate had to answer when
considering the Articles of Impeachment.
The first question, for the near-term, is should the President be
removed from office?
The second question, for the long-term health of our Nation, is
whether we should allow the impeachment process to be weaponized and
used by a majority in the House to settle partisan political scores?
My answers to both questions are a resounding no.
That is why I voted against both Articles of Impeachment.
While my Democratic colleagues operated under the presumption of
guilt, even if one is to assume the worst, the reality is the
allegations against President Trump were neither criminal nor
impeachable. They did not come close to meeting the standard of
treason, bribery, or high crimes or misdemeanors set by our Founding
Fathers.
It is remarkable to read the Federalist Papers and appreciate their
clairvoyance. Federalist 65, written by Alexander Hamilton, was
frequently quoted throughout these proceedings, and for good reason.
Hamilton's warnings to this body of using impeachment as a partisan
device were borne out. Hamilton wrote that impeachment:

[W]ill seldom fail to agitate the passions of the whole
community, and to divide it into parties more or less
friendly or inimical to the accused. In many cases it will
connect itself with the pre-existing factions . . . and in
such cases there will always be the greatest danger that the
decision will be regulated more by the comparative strength
of parties, than by the real demonstrations of innocence or
guilt.

By placing the impeachment power within the House and Senate,
Hamilton acknowledged that power may wind up in the hands of ``the
leaders or tools of the most cunning or the most numerous faction,''
which may ``hardly be expected to possess the requisite neutrality
towards those whose conduct may be the subject of scrutiny.'' It is
because of this remarkable power that Hamilton argued the Senate had
been granted the power to try impeachments because the Senate is more
likely to preserve ``the necessary impartiality between the INDIVIDUAL
accused, and the REPRESENTATIVES OF THE PEOPLE, HIS ACCUSERS?''
It is important to note that the Speaker of the House previously
warned about the dangers of a politically motivated impeachment effort,
stating in March 2019 that ``impeachment is so divisive to the country
that unless there's something so compelling and overwhelming and
bipartisan, I don't think we should go down that path, because it
divides the country.''
History has proven that warning to be true. One only needs to compare
the dramatically different outcomes between the Nixon impeachment
inquiry, which resulted in resignation, and the Clinton impeachment
process, which resulted in acquittal.
The Speaker's warning rings as true today as it did when she said it
nearly 1 year ago. Unfortunately, the House majority ignored this
warning, electing to lead a distinctly partisan process from beginning
to end, based on a political timeline.
It began when the House majority refused to provide the President
with basic due process rights for 71 of the 78 days of the formal House
impeachment inquiry. The House majority also refused to provide proper
rights to the minority, whose requests for an equal number of witnesses
was denied.
It is no wonder why House Resolution 660, which permitted an
impeachment inquiry, and House Resolution 755, the Articles of
Impeachment against President Trump, failed to receive a single vote
from the minority. In fact, the only thing that was bipartisan was the
opposition to the articles.
The House majority presented a weak and completely partisan case for
impeachment to the Senate. This is why the House managers attempted to
convince the Senate to endorse its particular views of separation of
powers, essentially asking the Senate to do the House's job where it
failed: to make a compelling case for the President's removal.
This is yet another area Hamilton addressed. In Federalist 66,
Hamilton outlined the differing roles and responsibilities between the
House and Senate on impeachment, casting the House as the accusers and
the Senate as the judges:

The division of them between the two branches of the
legislature, assigning to one the right of accusing, to the
other the right of judging, avoids the inconvenience of
making the same persons both accusers and judges; and guards
against the danger of persecution, from the prevalency of a
factious spirit in either of those branches. As the
concurrence of two thirds of the Senate will be requisite to
a condemnation, the security to innocence, from this
additional circumstance, will be as complete as itself can
desire.

By dividing the power to accuse and the power to judge, the Founding
Founders further recognized the procedural nature of this process.
Appropriate procedure would serve to protect the Executive from the
designs of a partisan faction in the House and would ensure that
removal was not just desirable, but truly necessary.
In this instance, removal was absolutely unnecessary, even if it was
desirable to the whims of some in the House majority since the day the
President was inaugurated in 2017.
This addresses the answer to the second question I posed on whether
the Senate will allow the impeachment process to become the new normal.
It would create a dangerous precedent in which the House actively
seeks opportunities to open impeachment inquires to politically weaken
and potentially remove the President of the opposing party.
Impeachment is the most powerful tool the Founding Fathers gave to us
to defend against Executive misconduct, but it should never be abused.
It should never be used to settle political scores, and it should never
be used

[[Page S1152]]

as an effort to deny the American people the right to decide the
President's fate at the ballot box.
To transform impeachment into a partisan political weapon is to
diminish and undermine its critical constitutional role.
Despite the factions which formed during this impeachment trial, I
remain optimistic about the direction of our Nation. For all the bitter
partisan emotions this impeachment process has enflamed, this Congress
now has the opportunity to move on and focus on forging consensus to
conduct the business of the American people. Congress has recently
demonstrated this ability--enacting historic criminal justice reform,
agreeing on reforms to improve the delivery of healthcare to our brave
veterans, and approving a fair and free trade deal with America's two
largest economic partners, producing a win for American workers and
consumers.
I hope, when the record is written of this impeachment, that history
will say that the Senate ultimately retained the high bar which must be
met to remove a President, that the Senate rejected the temptation to
normalize the impeachment process for partisan political gain, and that
Congress turned the page following the President's acquittal to
prioritize the needs of the American people and, in turn, solve the
most pressing challenges facing our great Nation.

____________________