[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 8075-8078]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




        CONGRESSIONAL PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS: DIRECTOR COMEY FIRING

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2017, the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Jayapal) is 
recognized for the remainder of the hour as the designee of the 
minority leader.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California 
(Ms. Lee). She has been such a champion on progressive issues for so 
long. Barbara Lee still speaks for me across the country.
  Ms. LEE. Let me thank Congresswoman Jayapal for yielding and for 
holding this important issue on this existential threat to our 
democracy. Also, I just have to say that she has just hit the ground 
running here on behalf of the American people, on behalf of working men 
and women, on behalf of peace and security in the world, on behalf of 
our democracy. So I thank her for her leadership.
  The constant stream of allegations and scandals springing from 1600 
Pennsylvania Avenue is really quite shocking. I have to admit that, 
after watching President Trump fire the FBI Director who was 
investigating him, I thought things could not get any worse. But just 
days later, President Trump blundered into sharing classified 
intelligence with Russian officials.
  As the Nation and the world grappled with the aftermath of this 
revelation, yet more shocking news was breaking. The New York Times has 
alleged that, before he was fired, Director Comey was pressured by 
President Trump to shut down an ongoing investigation into General 
Michael Flynn's possible collusion with the Russians.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to be very clear with the American people. If The 
New York Times report is true, President Trump's attempts to influence 
a Federal probe can only be described in one way, and that is 
obstruction of justice. And, yes, we all know obstruction of justice is 
an impeachable offense.
  Right now, one thing, though, is crystal clear: The President's abuse 
of power has plunged this Nation into a full-blown constitutional 
crisis. This crisis goes far beyond party interests. Every American, 
Democrat or Republican, should be concerned by these allegations.
  President Trump's actions have threatened national security, the rule 
of law, and the independence of our Nation's justice system. His 
actions dishonor the Office of the Presidency and place this Nation and 
our allies in danger.
  The reports of last week underscore the need to establish a 
bipartisan, independent commission to get to the bottom of Russian 
interference in our elections once and for all. It is vitally important 
that Director Mueller--and I am very pleased that the Department of 
Justice appointed him; this is one step in the right direction--be 
given the resources and the autonomy to conduct an investigation.
  Unfortunately, President Trump said that this investigation is a 
witch hunt. Nothing could be further from the truth. The American 
people deserve to know the facts about possible collusion between 
Russia and the Trump campaign. Our democracy must be defended at all 
costs.

[[Page 8076]]

  I thank Congresswoman Jayapal for giving us a chance to speak tonight 
about this very dangerous moment that we are in, about Presidential 
abuse, and, really, about the preservation of our democracy. The 
Congressional Progressive Caucus continues to lead on so many issues 
that are important to this country and to the world.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, it is my great honor to yield to the 
distinguished gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), who has also 
been a leader in the Progressive Caucus on so many issues, from the 
death penalty to immigration to healthcare.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Congresswoman Jayapal 
and the Congressional Progressive Caucus for convening this 1-hour 
discussion about our democracy at risk.
  I don't think it is really an exaggeration that what we are seeing 
right now is our democracy actually under attack. Unfortunately, it is 
from our own White House.
  I think Americans around the country, regardless of their political 
party or even political persuasion, are kind of shaking their head and 
saying: What the heck is going on?
  Every day, there is some sort of a new and disturbing revelation. We 
found out that the President of the United States just seems to have 
blurted out highly, highly classified information in a meeting with the 
Russian Ambassador and the Russian Foreign Minister--information that 
was passed on, it seems, from the Israelis, but actually could put some 
of the people who are doing the most delicate work on the ground in 
some danger. And then, of course, last week, the President fired the 
FBI Director, James Comey.
  As a Democrat, I certainly have had problems in the past with James 
Comey. I think that he helped influence the outcome of the election. 
But it turns out that on national television the President basically 
admitted, after giving various explanations of the firing, that it came 
down to the Russian investigation.
  Then we find out that James Comey actually took notes of a meeting 
with the President where the President asked him to drop the 
investigation of General Flynn and his connection to the Russians. It 
is a real question of what is going on.
  It was an important step when, yesterday, Deputy Attorney General Rod 
Rosenstein took the important first step of appointing a special 
counsel to investigate the Russia connection and the relationship 
between this administration of President Trump and the Russians.
  I am really happy. I was on the Intelligence Committee when Robert 
Mueller was the FBI Director. I have to tell you that I feel very 
confident in his independence and his integrity. I know that he, 
importantly, would not allow the FBI to work with the CIA when they 
wanted to torture people, essentially, by using enhanced interrogation 
techniques. So I feel good that he is a very good choice.
  But having done that, today I was happy to sign a discharge petition 
to create an independent commission that would also be looking into 
even the larger picture about what was going on with the Russian 
influence campaign involving itself in our elections, and then also, 
what was the connection between the Trump administration, Donald Trump 
himself, did they collude on influencing the election?
  It is important to do both. They are complementary. They don't do the 
same thing.
  I am going to quote from Adam Schiff, who is our ranking Democrat on 
the Intelligence Committee. I think he put it really well: ``The value 
an independent commission adds is you have a body that is truly 
independent of any political consideration and also has all the 
resources it needs and a single focus on the oversight of what Russia 
did, how we need to respond in the future, and it brings that political 
independence and staff and resources on task. So those are two 
different needs, and I think they're complementary, not in competition 
with each other.''
  The other reason I am very much in support not only of the special 
prosecutor, but of the independent commission is because, then, 
Congress has a role here. Congress itself is saying--hopefully, 
Republicans and Democrats. We have two Republicans right now on our 
discharge petition that would force the bill to come to the floor that 
would say that we, together, think that this is worthy, our democracy 
is worthy of this kind of in-depth investigation.
  Finally, let me say we would find out a lot about the relationship of 
the President and Russia, plus other conflicts of interest, if we could 
see his tax returns, like every other President has done. Release his 
tax returns.
  Again, I would hope that this has not devolved into strictly a 
partisan issue. All Americans should say: Let us look at those ties the 
President may have in countries around the world or with companies at 
home.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Again, I am very pleased as the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus to be able host a Special Order every week. We pick 
a different topic every week, for those of you that are just beginning 
to listen. This week we want to focus attention on what we believe are 
some of the most serious and pressing issues facing our country today 
around the Trump administration's ties to Russia, around the firing of 
James Comey, and the many, many issues that have come forward over the 
last several months, but certainly in the last week.
  Since last Tuesday, we have borne witness to a slew of alarming 
events within the White House and the Department of Justice. Last 
Tuesday afternoon, we received word that the President had fired FBI 
Director James Comey from his position.
  That position, by the way, is a 10-year term. Congress designated it 
as a 10-year term specifically to ensure that we could protect any 
administration and the entire country against any conflict of interest 
that may come up. Obviously, that did not convince the President that 
he should keep Director Comey.
  So we heard that he fired him. It seems as if each morning we wake up 
to a barrage of firings, tweets, or untruths that continue to erode the 
public's confidence in our democracy.
  So what do we know today? Certainly, we don't know enough, but we do 
know that the President fired Director Comey under the guise of being 
unsatisfied with how he handled Secretary Hillary Clinton's email 
investigation.

                              {time}  1745

  But if that were the case, then why didn't he fire him months ago? 
Why now? Why did he choose to meet with Russian officials the day after 
firing Mr. Comey?
  Mr. Trump's attempts to use Clinton's emails to divert attention from 
Comey's investigation into the campaign's ties to Russia are, 
unfortunately, very disingenuous, and I think that they are proving to 
be unsuccessful.
  Despite his claims that Mr. Comey was not investigating him, the 
President must have been concerned about what Director Comey would find 
because the firing, interestingly, came just days after Director Comey 
had requested additional resources for the investigation.
  White House officials attempted at first to say that the blame for 
the firing was Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's fault. They 
said it was at his recommendation. Attorney General Jeff Sessions 
weighed in on that decision as well. But, in fact, shortly after, the 
President went on television and said that, no, this was his decision 
regardless of what had been proposed, this is where he was going to be.
  On Wednesday, just 1 day after firing then-Director Comey, the 
President welcomed the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov; and the 
Russian Ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, into the Oval Office for a closed 
press meeting. Let's not forget that Kislyak met with former National 
Security Advisor Michael Flynn during the campaign, a meeting that 
Flynn then lied about. I think this is very important because there 
were a number of Trump administration or Trump campaign officials that 
met with Russian officials over

[[Page 8077]]

the course of many months before the election.
  Those meetings in and of themselves are not a problem. The problem, 
however, is that these individuals continued to lie about those 
meetings, and that makes you wonder: What fire is there where the smoke 
is? Why would they lie about these things?
  We certainly don't know that. We have been unable to get the 
transcripts of that conversation because the President has not been 
willing to release them.
  Russian President Vladimir Putin is more willing to make that 
information public than our own President, but I find it outrageous 
that President Putin would actually propose to be sort of the backup of 
this information for the President. We are not looking to President 
Putin to provide corroboration of these meetings. We actually need an 
independent ability to look at the facts of this case.
  On Monday, the news exploded with reports that the President released 
highly classified information to Lavrov and Kislyak during their 
discussion at the White House. This is extremely alarming. It is true 
that the President has the right to declassify any information, but the 
information that was shared was so sensitive that the United States had 
not even shared it with our allies. The President's decision to divulge 
that information to foreign officials--particularly Russian officials 
with whom our relationship is contentious at best--is dangerous and 
reckless.
  There is no doubt in my mind that this will hinder our ability to 
build international coalitions to actually be able to share information 
with allies who provide that classified information to us with the 
understanding that we are going to protect that and guard that. Should 
any classified information then be declassified for some reason, it is 
done in consultation with the country that provided that information 
and with national security advisors. None of that happened in this 
situation.
  President Trump also tweeted during the campaign that Hillary Clinton 
and her team were extremely careless in their handling of very 
sensitive and highly classified information. So this seems like a 
particular irony. The President claimed that Hillary Clinton's lack of 
ability to handle classified information actually made her unfit to be 
President.
  Speaker Paul Ryan said this: ``It is simple: Individuals who are 
`extremely careless' with classified information should be denied 
further access to it.''
  Reince Priebus, Trump's Chief of Staff, took it one step further, 
saying: ``Those who mishandled classified info have had their sec 
clearances revoked, lost their jobs, faced fines, and even been sent to 
prison.''
  So this is a situation that we have to take extremely seriously.
  Before we could even fully engage and vet that news, however, reports 
then came out that President Trump had actually asked FBI Director 
James Comey to drop the investigation into Michael Flynn. According to 
sources close to Comey, this request came just 1 day after Michael 
Flynn was fired. This is truly a new low. If this is true--and we are 
trying to get to the bottom of this--it would absolutely constitute an 
obstruction of justice. The President has put obstacle after obstacle 
in the way of any real investigation that gives us the information that 
we need to protect our national security and the American people.
  In the 118 days since the Trump Presidency began, it has been scandal 
after scandal. The latest events have escalated this crisis to an even 
higher level. As I mentioned, the FBI Director serves a 10-year term 
specifically in order to be able to carry out these independent 
investigations free of partisanship or political pressure. The firing 
of James Comey and the fact that he was asked by the President for 
loyalty--again, this is apparently in Director Comey's memo, which we 
hope to be able to see--and to abandon the investigation against 
Michael Flynn are extremely serious offenses. They hurt our democracy 
and they hurt our country.
  The President has tried to distract us time and time again, but we 
actually know that the American people deserve better. History smiles 
kindly on those who stand up and put country over party and on those 
who ensure that in the darkest of times and the most difficult of 
times, the times when we face a constitutional crisis, where our Nation 
wonders what direction we are going in, the times when we know that the 
need to preserve the institutions of democracy and justice are most 
necessary, those are the times when we need people to speak out on both 
sides of the aisle for the facts, for the truth, and for democracy.
  This should not be a partisan issue. We are seeing that starting to 
emerge from our colleagues across the aisle. I commend those 
Republicans who have begun to ask for information, documents, and 
hearings; and I hope that more of my colleagues will join us in the 
pursuit of truth and in the pursuit of justice.
  Last night we received news that Robert Mueller, who is the former 
FBI Director, has been appointed as special counsel for the 
investigation into the Trump campaign's ties with Russia. This is an 
extremely distinguished man. He has served the country with tremendous 
success and loyalty, and we are hopeful that Mr. Mueller will 
diligently investigate the allegations against Michael Flynn and other 
members of the Trump campaign with veracity and free from political 
influence. However, we still maintain that an independent commission is 
necessary because a special counsel answers to the Attorney General, 
who can then overrule decisions that they make or even fire them at any 
time. So the appointment of Robert Mueller is a good first step, but it 
cannot be the last.
  Director Mueller will still be in the chain of command under the 
Trump-appointed leadership of the Justice Department. He cannot take 
the place of a truly independent outside commission that is free from 
Trump's meddling.
  I think that is why it is so important that we all join in signing 
the discharge petition that was introduced yesterday by my colleagues, 
Representative Swalwell and Representative Cummings, who is the ranking 
member on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. This discharge 
petition would essentially allow for a bill to move forward that would 
establish an independent commission that we could truly trust to seek 
justice. The commission would interview witnesses, would obtain 
documents, would issue subpoenas, and would receive public testimony in 
order to examine whether or not the Russian Government did, in fact, 
interfere with U.S. elections and how they carried that out.
  This is a really crucial step to take because it is not only about 
the short term and the immediacy of what is in front of us--extremely 
important, the commission would deal with that as well--but it is also 
about how do we ensure that these things don't happen again? What did 
happen, first of all, and how do we make sure that we continue to 
protect our democracy in the face of what 17 independent intelligence 
agencies said, which is that the Russians hacked our election in the 
United States?
  There is a lot we need to understand. We need the special counsel, 
but we also need this independent citizen commission not made up of 
Members of Congress, but appointed by the House and the Senate leaders 
of both parties in equal numbers so that we could actually have people 
who look at this from the perspective of all of America and not tainted 
by even the vestiges or the appearance of party.
  Apparently when President Trump heard that special counsel had been 
named, he laughed out loud, saying that this is ``the greatest witch 
hunt of a politician in American history.''
  No, Mr. President, we are seeking the truth. As the American people 
have shown us, they are not backing down, and we will continue to fight 
for this truth.
  Now, in that vein, I also wanted to mention that my colleague, 
Representative Raskin, and I actually introduced a package of bills 
that we are calling the Trump transparency package. It is because we 
really believe that the

[[Page 8078]]

American people deserve better. We believe that the American people 
deserve from us transparency. So what this package will do is, first, 
it will clearly forbid government officials from accepting anything of 
value from foreign governments in exchange for an official act. It 
would prohibit government employees from using their positions to 
further the financial interests of the President. It would ensure that 
the President's press pool continues to exist so that the American 
people receive honest answers, and it would require the President and 
his family to publicly report any foreign business deals that exceed 
$10,000.
  These are simple steps. They are not egregious and they are not 
outrageous. They would apply to anyone. They are not partisan. They are 
about transparency and accountability so that we know that the 
President of the United States and that others in government are 
actually accountable to the American people--not to their financial 
interests, not to their bank accounts, not to their stock portfolios, 
not to their hotels and golf courses, but to the American people. We 
have to hold every administration--and certainly this one--accountable. 
So now, more than ever, it is our moral duty to defend the 
Constitution, and this bill package goes a step in the right direction.
  So I hope that all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle would 
actually cosponsor the Trump transparency package with us so that we 
can continue to fight for the American people, for democracy, and for 
the notion that America is willing to question itself and for the 
notion that America is willing to always put our hands on that moral 
arc of the universe to push it more quickly towards justice.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Cheney). Members are reminded to refrain 
from engaging in personalities toward the President and are further 
reminded to address their remarks to the Chair.

                          ____________________