Tom McClintock asks impeachment witnesses whether they voted for Trump
Rep. Tom McClintock triggered a quick, tense firestorm Wednesday when he asked witnesses at the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearing if they had voted for President Donald Trump in 2016.
They wouldn’t say.
“I don’t think we’re obligated to say anything about how we cast our ballots,” said Pamela Karlan, a Stanford University law professor.
“Just a show of hands,” McClintock urged.
Karlan fired back, “I don’t think we’re obligated to say anything about how we cast our ballots.”
McClintock, the only California Republican on the committee, told Karlan: “I think you’ve made your positions, Professor Karlan, very, very clear.”
She was one of three witnesses invited to testify by Democrats, along with a Republican-invited witness, at the House Judiciary Committee’s opening impeachment hearing Wednesday.
Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-New York, jumped into the verbal brawl, telling the witnesses they didn’t have to answer.
McClintock tried again, asking for a show of hands from those who supported Trump in 2016.
No one raised a hand, and Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law professor invited by Democrats, noted that “Not raising one’s hands is not an indication of an answer, sir.”
McClintock has been been adamant that the impeachment inquiry is a misguided Democratic obsession — and he used his time at Wednesday’s hearing trying to prove his point.
McClintock asked Jonathan Turley, the George Washington University law professor invited by Republicans, about what the congressman regards as flimsy evidence and questionable reasons for impeachment.
“Are we in danger of abusing our own power of doing enormous violence to our Constitution by proceeding…. My Democratic colleagues have been searching for a pretext for this impeachment since before the president was sworn in,” McClintock said.
“Are we in danger of succumbing to the maxim of Lewis Carroll’s red queen — sentence first, verdict afterwards?” he asked.
Truley replied, “This is part of the problem of how you view the president can affect your assumptions, your inferences, your view of circumstantial evidence.”
Later, Turley noted, “I don’t begrudge the investigation of the Ukraine controversy. What I begrudge is how it has been conducted.”
He noted, “we often confuse what is inappropriate with what is impeachable. Many people feel what the president has done is obnoxious, contemptible.”
But, Turley added, “contemptible is not synonymous with impeachment.”
This story was originally published December 4, 2019 at 3:21 PM with the headline "Tom McClintock asks impeachment witnesses whether they voted for Trump."
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