Words matter, except to Democrats, when it involves impeaching Trump
By Jonathan Turley, opinion contributor — 09/14/19 10:00 AM EDT
Before abruptly ending a press conference this week, an annoyed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi snapped, “Why is it that you are hung up with a word over here when lives are at stake over there?†The word, of course, was “impeachment,†and reporters kept asking about it because the House Judiciary Committee approved something that may or may not be the start of an impeachment investigation. When reporters persisted in asking what the vote meant, Pelosi feigned shock and dismissed them as “the only ones who are so into this.†But that is not quite the case.
Just down the street from Capitol Hill, lawyers could not stop talking about impeachment, and the words of Pelosi were being submitted to Chief Judge Beryl Howell in the District of Columbia in an ironic twist. Two years ago, tweets by Donald Trump were submitted to courts to undermine Justice Department claims in support of his controversial immigration orders. The conflicting statements of the House leadership, including Pelosi, are being submitted by the Justice Department as its principal evidence against the demands of the House, which has been seeking judicial orders to compel disclosure of grand jury evidence, on the basis of this being an impeachment proceeding at long last.
Months ago, I testified before the House Judiciary Committee on its demands for evidence from the White House. I believed some of those demands should prevail. Yet, as the last lead counsel in an impeachment trial, I stressed that the failure to formally declare an impeachment would undermine its position in federal court. For more than two years, I have written about the conspicuous failure of the House to take the obvious steps needed for an impeachment and, most importantly, to do so before time ran out on any real opportunity to impeach President Trump.
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https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/461404-words-matter-except-to-democrats-when-it-involves-impeaching-trump
