Democrats release Judiciary report: Trump “betrayed the nation.”
WASHINGTON » The House Judiciary Committee formally presented its case for impeaching President Donald Trump in a 658-page report published online early Monday, arguing just days before a final vote in the House that he “betrayed the nation by abusing his high office.”
The report, which echoes similar documents produced after the committee’s approval of impeachment articles for Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Bill
Clinton, contains no new allegations or evidence against Trump.
But it offers a detailed road map for the two articles of impeachment the committee approved, charging that Trump abused the power of the presidency to enlist Ukraine in tarnishing his political rivals and obstructing Congress by blocking witnesses from testifying and refusing to provide documents.
The House is expected to vote Wednesday on whether to impeach the sitting president for only the third time in the nation’s history, setting in motion a trial in the Senate early next year that could lead to Trump’s removal from office.
“President Trump has placed his personal, political interests above our national security, our free and fair elections, and our system of checks and balances,” the report states. “He has engaged in a pattern of misconduct that will continue if left unchecked. Accordingly, President Trump should be impeached and removed from office.”
The report argues that the House should charge Trump with abuse of power for holding up nearly $400 million worth of security aid and the promise of a White House meeting until Ukraine agreed to announce investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden and 2016 election interference.
It also urges the House to approve an article of impeachment charging the president with obstruction of Congress, saying that “President Trump’s obstruction of Congress does not befit the leader of a democratic society. It calls to mind the very claims of royal privilege against which our founders rebelled.”
The report includes a scathing 20-page dissent from Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, who accuses Democrats on the panel of conducting an unfair process in a partisan attempt to drive Trump from office because of their dislike of him and his policies.
Collins concludes: “Before the House are two articles of impeachment against the president of the United States, Donald John Trump. To these articles, the minority dissents.”