Impeachment Power Can Be Abused, Too
By Andrew C. McCarthy
December 3, 2019 6:30 AM
Democrats say Trump exploited his constitutional power for political purposes, but how is that different from what they are doing now?
NRPLUS MEMBER ARTICLE
I t is not a good look for Democrats, in purporting to respond to the president’s abuse of his constitutional power over foreign relations, to abuse the House’s power over impeachment. That, however, is exactly what they are doing in their unseemly zeal to impeach President Trump on a blatantly political deadline.
In a December 1 letter, White House counsel Pat Cipollone notified House Judiciary chairman Jerrold Nadler (D., N.Y.) that the president will not participate in the committee’s first open hearing on Wednesday, December 4. Ordinarily — not that there’s anything “ordinary†about the potential impeachment of an American president — I’d be inclined to assess this as poor judgment.
After all, the lack of due process has been one of the president’s major complaints since late October, when the House belatedly voted to endorse the impeachment inquiry that Democrats have been conducting for months. Among the fundamental elements of due process is the opportunity to be heard. Having denied this opportunity to the president in Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff’s faux grand-jury phase of the proceedings, Democrats are now inviting the president to participate in the Judiciary Committee phase, where articles of impeachment are soon to be drafted and voted on. The president’s complaints are apt to ring hollow if he carps about the witnesses from the Twitter sidelines while forfeiting the right to question them at the formal hearings.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/12/impeachment-power-can-be-abused/
