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READ Lamar Alexander’s Statement: Trump Did It, He Said He Did It on TV, but Removing Him Would Be ‘Frivolous’

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U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, just announced he will vote against allowing the Senate to call witnesses. His decision likely means President Donald Trump will be acquitted on Friday.

“There is no need for more evidence to prove that the president asked Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter; he said this on television on October 3, 2019, and during his July 25, 2019, telephone call with the president of Ukraine. There is no need for more evidence to conclude that the president withheld United States aid, at least in part, to pressure Ukraine to investigate the Bidens,” Alexander says.

He adds there’s “no need to consider further the frivolous second article of impeachment that would remove the president for asserting his constitutional prerogative to protect confidential conversations with his close advisers.”

Read Senator Alexander’s full statement below.

United States Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today released the following statement on his vote regarding additional evidence in the impeachment proceedings:

“I worked with other senators to make sure that we have the right to ask for more documents and witnesses, but there is no need for more evidence to prove something that has already been proven and that does not meet the United States Constitution’s high bar for an impeachable offense. 

“There is no need for more evidence to prove that the president asked Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter; he said this on television on October 3, 2019, and during his July 25, 2019, telephone call with the president of Ukraine. There is no need for more evidence to conclude that the president withheld United States aid, at least in part, to pressure Ukraine to investigate the Bidens; the House managers have proved this with what they call a ‘mountain of overwhelming evidence.’ There is no need to consider further the frivolous second article of impeachment that would remove the president for asserting his constitutional prerogative to protect confidential conversations with his close advisers. 

“It was inappropriate for the president to ask a foreign leader to investigate his political opponent and to withhold United States aid to encourage that investigation. When elected officials inappropriately interfere with such investigations, it undermines the principle of equal justice under the law. But the Constitution does not give the Senate the power to remove the president from office and ban him from this year’s ballot simply for actions that are inappropriate.

“The question then is not whether the president did it, but whether the United States Senate or the American people should decide what to do about what he did. I believe that the Constitution provides that the people should make that decision in the presidential election that begins in Iowa on Monday.

“The Senate has spent nine long days considering this ‘mountain’ of evidence, the arguments of the House managers and the president’s lawyers, their answers to senators’ questions and the House record. Even if the House charges were true, they do not meet the Constitution’s ‘treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors’ standard for an impeachable offense.

“The framers believed that there should never, ever be a partisan impeachment. That is why the Constitution requires a 2/3 vote of the Senate for conviction. Yet not one House Republican voted for these articles. If this shallow, hurried and wholly partisan impeachment were to succeed, it would rip the country apart, pouring gasoline on the fire of cultural divisions that already exist. It would create the weapon of perpetual impeachment to be used against future presidents whenever the House of Representatives is of a different political party.

“Our founding documents provide for duly elected presidents who serve with ‘the consent of the governed,’ not at the pleasure of the United States Congress. Let the people decide.”   

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Dozens of House Republicans Refusing to Wear Masks March to Senate Side for ‘Taste of Freedom’

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July 29, 2021

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After falsely blaming Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the newly-announced mask mandate on the House side of Congress, dozens of Republicans Thursday afternoon engaged in a performative protest, not against the coronavirus but against efforts to end the pandemic. What appeared to be 50 or so House GOP  lawmakers marched over to the Senate side of the Capitol Hill building for what one called a “taste of freedom.”

The Attending Physician of the United States Congress, following updated CDC guidance this week ordered anyone on the House side of the Capitol to wear a mask if in a group, regardless of vaccination status, but did not make the same order for the Senate side.

While Dr. Brian Monahan did not explain why the rules were different, at last cxount only about half of the Republicans on the House side have said they are vaccinated. Almost every Republican on the Senate side is. All Democrats on both sides are fully vaccinated. Dr. Monahan’s office announced fines and possible removal for repeat offenders.

Among those in the maskless pack making their way to the Senate side were Reps. Madison Cawthorn, Lauren Boebert, Louie Gohmert, Paul Gosar, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Chip Roy.

Roll Call’s Chris Cioffi and The Hill’s Scott Wong posted video:

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Watch Live: Day One of the Historic January 6 House Select Committee Hearing

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July 27, 2021

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It’s been 202 days since Donald Trump, then the President, incited the attack on the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to overturn a free and fair election. The January 6 insurrection, an act of domestic terrorism, an attempted coup, is one of the darkest days in American history.

At 9:30 AM Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-MS) will gavel in day one of the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack, a bipartisan investigation into that dark day.

You can watch live below. The proceedings will also be carried and streamed on most major networks, including ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN. Fox News is expected to have a degree of coverage.

Today’s hearing will feature testimony from four officers who defended members of Congress and the Capitol on January 6, or, as Chairman Thompson said, “frontline heroes who put their lives on the line to protect our democracy.”

Here are several feeds for you to watch live:

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‘It’s What Stupid People Do’: MSNBC’s Morning Joe Burns Kevin McCarthy for ‘Childish’ Games

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July 27, 2021

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MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough ripped House minority leader Kevin McCarthy for making up “stupid” nicknames for a pair of Republicans who refuse to go along with Donald Trump’s election lies.

Reps. Liz Cheney (R-WY) and Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) were among 10 GOP lawmakers who voted to impeach Trump for his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection, and they will sit on the House panel investigating that assault on democracy — and McCarthy mocked them as “Pelosi Republicans.”

“It’s what stupid people do,” Scarborough said. “If you look at the facts, which Kevin McCarthy doesn’t ever do, Liz Cheney has like a 95 percent [American Conservative Union] rating, 95 percent conservative rating over the course of her career, which is actually my conservative rating, but what I found out a long time ago and Liz certainly has known for some time now, obviously, by saying what’s going on, this Republican Party, Donald Trump’s Republican Party doesn’t care about ideas, doesn’t care about ideology, doesn’t care about conservatism, it is disconnected from conservatism.”

“It’s all tribal,” he continued, “it’s all about voodoo in medicine, violence on Jan. 6, it’s all about covering up actually what Donald Trump is doing, and so Kevin McCarthy resorts to childish name calling for, again, I don’t know what Adam’s lifetime conservative rating is, but Liz’s is 95 percent, one of the more conservative members in the United States Congress, by the way, and so, that’s what they resort to. Why? Because that’s all they have. They don’t have the facts on their side, they don’t have history on their side, so all he can do is act like act like a 3-year-old, or Donald Trump, same thing, and just throw names around. So lots of luck with that.”

“It’s not going to change the fact that four police officers are going to talk about how they were brutalized and almost killed by Donald Trump supporters on Jan. 6, as they were trying to actually overthrow the government and commit sedition against the United States of America and stop the voting, which is constitutionally mandated, of the Electoral College voting,” Scarborough concluded. “But that’s the party that Kevin McCarthy will always be associated with. Lots of luck with that, buddy, lots of luck with that.”

 

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