The Democrat-led House Judiciary Committee indicated on Monday that it might recommend additional articles of impeachment against President Trump if more evidence of “presidential misconduct” is uncovered in future witness testimony.
“The House Judiciary Committee held open the possibility Monday of recommending additional articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump as it pressed anew for the testimony of former White House counsel Don McGahn,” The Associated Press reported Monday.
McGahn’s testimony would involve how Trump handled Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, which found no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia and made no recommendation on obstruction of justice by the president.
In a court filing Monday, lawyers for the Democrat-controlled committee petitioned a federal appeals court to force McGahn to testify, maintaining that his testimony could provide them with evidence that Trump had obstructed justice during the Mueller investigation.
“If McGahn’s testimony produces new evidence supporting the conclusion that President Trump committed impeachable offenses that are not covered by the Articles approved by the House, the Committee will proceed accordingly — including, if necessary, by considering whether to recommend new articles of impeachment,” the filing reads.
McGahn’s testimony could also help the committee determine whether the FBI and Justice Department “are operating free from improper political interference,” lawyers for the committee wrote in the appeal.
The Democratic Judiciary Committee members subpoenaed McGahn long before the impeachment inquiry began. The Justice Department has requested that the appeals court dismiss the case, which it says comes down to a political dispute, while the Democrats insist that McGahn’s testimony “is critical both to a Senate trial and to the Committee’s ongoing impeachment investigations to determine whether additional Presidential misconduct warrants further action by the Committee.”
Trump responded to the news early Tuesday morning, posting a series tweets slamming the Democrats for trying to fortify their weak case for impeachment after the fact.
Citing Fox News political analyst Brit Hume, Trump tweeted: “Everything we’re seeing from Speaker Pelosi and Senator Schumer suggests that they’re in real doubt about the evidence they’ve brought forth so far not being good enough, and are very, very urgently seeking a way to find some more evidence. The only way to make this work is to mount some kind of public pressure to demand witnesses, but McConnell has the votes and he can run this trial anyway he wants to.”
Trump then tweeted out a quote from another Fox personality, “Fox and Friends” co-anchor Brian Kilmeade, who slammed the “tone deaf” Democrats for making their impeachment effort appear even more unfocused.
“The Dems are complicating matters again. Keeping Mueller out of it was the focus. Keeping it crisp [and] simple was the key, and now all of a sudden they are saying maybe we’ll go back and visit the Mueller probe, which is absolutely unbelievable, and shows they don’t care about the American public’s tone deafness — [and] it should be intolerable, because the American people have had it with this,” Trump tweeted, quoting Kilmeade.
“The Radical Left, Do Nothing Democrats have gone CRAZY,” Trump added. “They want to make it as hard as possible for me to properly run our Country!”
….mount some kind of public pressure to demand witnesses, but McConnell has the votes and he can run this trial anyway he wants to. @brithume @foxandfriends
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 24, 2019
….the American public’s tone deafness – & it should be intolerable, because the American people have had it with this.” @kilmeade @foxandfriends The Radical Left, Do Nothing Democrats have gone CRAZY. They want to make it as hard as possible for me to properly run our Country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 24, 2019