It seems to be a foregone conclusion that the House will vote for impeachment next week. President Trump is accused of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Neither of these are crimes of any sort. They don't meet the constitutional requirement for impeachment, but the Democrats don't care. Instead, they've decided on a purely political impeachment.
The next stop on the impeachment schedule will be in the Senate. And I have a suggestion to the Senate as to how best to handle this nonsense. I would take break the matter into two pieces:
1. The Senate should first just dismiss the claim of obstruction of Congress. There is no such thing. President after president has refused to allow one or another of his aides to testify in Congress. That has never been considered anything more than something that then needs to be decided by the courts. Indeed, yesterday the Supreme Court took up the issue of whether or not the tax returns of President Trump must be produced for Congress in response to a subpoena. That case will be argued in a few months with a decision coming before July. That means that the Supreme Court accepted (with no dissent) that a subpoena by Congress to the White House should be decided by the courts. Another way to put that is that the Supreme Court accepted that obstruction of Congress does not exist. The senators should not waste their time hearing evidence on this charge; they should dismiss it.
2. The senators should, however, go ahead with a trial on the issue of abuse of power. Let's have the House produce witnesses who will tell the senators just how Trump abused his power. But the Senate should insist that the evidence produced must conform to the Federal Rules. That would mean no speculation, no presumption, no hearsay, or the like. The House Democrats would have to produce a witness who would say that he or she saw or heard President Trump pressure the Ukrainian president to carry out an investigation of Joe Biden. They would have to produce a witness who saw or heard President Trump order that aid to Ukraine be held up until that investigation was announced. Let the House Democrats produce such a witness. Up until now, there has been no such witness. There is no evidence that President Trump did anything wrong.
Assuming that the Dems don't come up with a new surprise witness (maybe like dr. Christine Ford), then the impeachment hearing could end.
The next stop on the impeachment schedule will be in the Senate. And I have a suggestion to the Senate as to how best to handle this nonsense. I would take break the matter into two pieces:
1. The Senate should first just dismiss the claim of obstruction of Congress. There is no such thing. President after president has refused to allow one or another of his aides to testify in Congress. That has never been considered anything more than something that then needs to be decided by the courts. Indeed, yesterday the Supreme Court took up the issue of whether or not the tax returns of President Trump must be produced for Congress in response to a subpoena. That case will be argued in a few months with a decision coming before July. That means that the Supreme Court accepted (with no dissent) that a subpoena by Congress to the White House should be decided by the courts. Another way to put that is that the Supreme Court accepted that obstruction of Congress does not exist. The senators should not waste their time hearing evidence on this charge; they should dismiss it.
2. The senators should, however, go ahead with a trial on the issue of abuse of power. Let's have the House produce witnesses who will tell the senators just how Trump abused his power. But the Senate should insist that the evidence produced must conform to the Federal Rules. That would mean no speculation, no presumption, no hearsay, or the like. The House Democrats would have to produce a witness who would say that he or she saw or heard President Trump pressure the Ukrainian president to carry out an investigation of Joe Biden. They would have to produce a witness who saw or heard President Trump order that aid to Ukraine be held up until that investigation was announced. Let the House Democrats produce such a witness. Up until now, there has been no such witness. There is no evidence that President Trump did anything wrong.
Assuming that the Dems don't come up with a new surprise witness (maybe like dr. Christine Ford), then the impeachment hearing could end.
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