For months, congressional Republicans have complained that the impeachment of Donald Trump was delaying important policy, repeating the mantra “get back to work.” Now that the impeachment process is over, they are instead pushing for new investigations in retaliation.
White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham essentially admitted this plan on Fox News on Thursday, previewing Trump’s remarks set for the afternoon. “I think he’s gonna also talk about how just horribly he was treated and that maybe people should pay for that,” she said.
Here is what Republicans have already announced:
Investigation of Hillary Clinton
Hillary Clinton has not held public office since 2013 and has not been a candidate since 2016.
Still, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), Homeland Security & Government Affairs chair, wrote to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday to request “additional information” about a September 2019 State Department report on “security violations” related to a private email server she used during her tenure in Barack Obama’s cabinet.
Investigations of Joe and Hunter Biden
The origin of Trump’s impeachment was his explicit request that Ukraine’s president investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter. On Sunday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Fox Business that the Senate Foreign Relations would soon investigate the Bidens.
On Wednesday, Johnson and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) announced that they would investigate Hunter Biden.
On Thursday, the Trump administration began providing documents related to Hunter Biden, including financial records, to Johnson and Grassley, according to Yahoo! News.
Investigation of the anonymous whistleblower
In the same Fox Business interview, Graham also announced that “in the coming weeks” the Senate Intelligence Committee “will call the whistleblower” who first alerted Congress to Trump’s Ukraine quid pro quo.
“Why is it important? I want to find out how this crap started. If the whistleblower is a former employee of, associate of, Joe Biden, I think that would be important. If the whistleblower was working with people on [House Intelligence Chair Adam] Schiff’s staff that wanted to take Trump down a year and a half ago, I think that would be important,” Graham explained, suggesting multiple unsubstantiated conspiracy theories.
“If the Schiff staff people helped write the complaint, that would be important. We’re going to get to the bottom of all of this to make sure this never happens again,” Graham added.
Investigation of House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff
Donald Trump has repeatedly blamed Schiff (D-CA) for his impeachment. Last month, he said, “Shifty Adam Schiff is a CORRUPT POLITICIAN, and probably a very sick man.”
Trump warned, “He has not paid the price, yet, for what he has done to our Country!”
On Tuesday, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced that House Republicans would seek an investigation into Schiff. “After President Trump is acquitted, let’s get to the bottom of how this nightmare started,” he wrote on Twitter.
In remarks on a right-wing radio show, he demanded a probe to “get to the bottom of the lies of Adam Schiff that put this country through the nightmare.”
Punishing Nancy Pelosi
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi received a great deal of GOP ire after she tore up a copy of Donald Trump’s State of the Union address on national television on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) announced he was filing an ethics complaint against her, accusing the California Democrat of conduct “beneath the dignity of the House.”
Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) also filed a resolution of disapproval, aimed at forcing a House vote to condemn the Speaker. She called Pelosi’s conduct “a breach of decorum and degraded the proceedings of the joint session, to the discredit of the House.”
Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.
