Finally, Impeachment
Congressman Mark Meadows, Republican from North Carolina and the current Chairman of the “Freedom Caucus” introduced a Bill of Impeachment yesterday to the House of Representatives. It is not the impeachment the Resistance has been waiting for: Meadows, Ohio’s Jim Jordan and nine other Congressmen are trying to impeach Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
A technical note: impeachment is the legislative process of bringing charges against a member of the executive branch. Impeachment begins in the House of Representatives, with a majority of the House having to vote to Impeach. The removal “trial” is then held in the Senate, with Senators acting as the jury. Two thirds of the Senate must agree to remove the executive branch member.
The Freedom Caucus has been the leading defender of President Trump. Ohio’s Congressman Jim Jordan, despite being under a cloud himself, has made it his “cause” to try to shift the focus of the Russia Investigation away from the President, and onto the investigators. His interrogation of Rosenstein in the House Judiciary Committee a few weeks ago showed how far Jordan would go. He charged Rosenstein with threatening the Committee staff by subpoenaing their phone calls.
The Freedom Caucus has demanded millions of documents from the Department of Justice regarding the Russia investigation. The Department has provided over 800,000; but has refused to give the “scope and sequence” documents laying out the path and progress of the Mueller Investigation. The Caucus has used the released material to attack the investigation, putting them in the public domain, and forced the Department to make public documents that show most secret practices and methods.
The latest example of this is the FISA warrant for the surveillance of former Trump advisor Carter Page. While significant portions of the public warrant were redacted, it shows, contrary to the Caucus talking point, that the Steele Dossier was not the sole foundation of the Russia investigation. It also revealed more about the FISA process than the intelligence community deemed safe.
Speaker Ryan has not shown support for the impeachment resolution. However, Ryan’s imminent departure (he has chosen not to run for re-election) has weakened his hold on the Republican caucus. Congressman Trey Gowdy, Chairman of the Government Oversight Committee and best known for the interminable Benghazi investigation of Hillary Clinton, also has noted his disapproval of the resolution. He too has chosen not to run again, but in all likelihood; if the resolution reaches the floor of the House for a vote it would fail dramatically.
But that’s not the point.
Two weeks ago, the Mueller team indicted twelve Russian intelligence officers for hacking emails and other electronic interference in the 2016 election. It is clear that the next set of indictments from Mueller will include Americans who conspired in some way with Russian intelligence to alter the election outcome. Those Americans likely will be associated in some way with the Trump Campaign.
This week, President Trump’s personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen has made it clear that he will “flip” and cooperate with Federal Prosecutors in their investigation of the actions of the Trump Campaign. It has also been revealed that he has over one hundred tapes of conversations he had, some with the President (then candidate) himself. Even the Fox News lawyers are saying the President is facing legal jeopardy in a possible conspiracy to evade campaign finance laws.
Next week the trial of Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort begins. And while Manafort isn’t charged with any violations from the Trump Campaign itself, the greater the risk of Manafort going to jail for an extended time, the greater the risk that he will cooperate with Federal investigations into the Trump Campaign. In addition, the intriguing charges against a Russian woman, who seemingly was sent by Russian Intelligence to infiltrate and compromise the NRA and through them, the Republican Party, is just beginning to come to light.
The President has had a rough week in the news, with the fallout from the Helsinki meeting with Putin, followed by the failed invitation to Putin to meet again, followed by the US Government having to bailout farmers as the result of the new tariff policies. And all of this is under the specter of the November elections, the results of which may put the Democrats in power in at least the House of Representatives.
The clock is ticking, and the pressure is growing on the President. The mission of the President’s defenders has been to undercut the investigators; the FBI, the intelligence community and the Department of Justice. Attacking Rosenstein, the ultimate “boss” of the Mueller investigation, is just one more step in the process.
Buckle up – things will get worse before they get better.
