We just held two weeks of hearings, after a month of closed door depositions—all of which revealed no evidence to support impeachment—and now we’re holding more hearings. This is fundamentally unserious. – Rep. Mark Meadows on Twitter

FoxNews.com reports that

The White House announced in a fiery letter Sunday night that President Trump and his lawyers won’t participate in the House Judiciary Committee’s first impeachment hearing scheduled for Wednesday — even accusing the panel’s Democratic chairman, Jerry Nadler, of “purposely” scheduling the proceedings when Trump would be attending the NATO Leaders’ Meeting in London.

The five-page letter came as the Democratic majority on the House Intelligence Committee was preparing to approve a report on Tuesday that will outline possible charges of bribery or “high crimes and misdemeanors,” the constitutional standard for impeachment. After receiving the report, the Judiciary Committee would prepare actual charges.

“This baseless and highly partisan inquiry violates all past historical precedent, basic due process rights, and fundamental fairness,” wrote White House counsel Pat Cipollone, continuing the West Wing’s attack on the procedural form of the impeachment proceedings. Cipollone said Nadler provided only “vague” details about the hearing, and that unnamed academics — and not “fact witnesses” — would apparently be attending.

“When the Judiciary Committee scheduled a similar hearing during the Clinton impeachment process, it allowed those questioning the witnesses two-and-a-half weeks’ notice to prepare, and it scheduled the hearing on a date suggested by the president’s attorneys,” Cipollone wrote. “Today, by contrast, you have afforded the president no scheduling input, no meaningful information and so little time to prepare that you have effectively denied the administration a fair opportunity to participate.”

Cipollone’s letter made clear that his response applied only to the Wednesday hearing, at least for now. Cipollone demanded more information from Democrats on how they intended to conduct further hearings before Trump would decide whether to participate in those hearings, amid sagging national support for Democrats’ probe.

Specifically, Cipollone demanded to know whether Republicans would be able to cross-examine and call defense witnesses, as well as whether Republicans could call “fact witnesses” — including House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. (AP)
House-passed rules provide the president and his attorneys the right to cross-examine witnesses and review evidence before the committee, but little ability to bring forward witnesses of their own.

“If [Schiff] chooses not to (testify), then I really question his veracity in what he’s putting in his report,” said Rep. Doug Collins, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee. “It’s easy to hide behind a report,” Collins added. “But it’s going to be another thing to actually get up and have to answer questions.”

Schiff has come under scrutiny from Republicans, in part because of his overtly partisan comments and his previous claim in a televised interview that “we have not spoken directly with the whistleblower.” A Schiff spokesperson later narrowed that claim in October, telling Fox News that Schiff himself “does not know the identity of the whistleblower, and has not met with or spoken with the whistleblower or their counsel” for any reason.

An aide to Schiff insisted that when Schiff mentioned “we” had not spoken to the whistleblower, he was referring to members of the full House intelligence committee, rather than staff. NBC National Security reporter Ken Dilanian flagged Schiff’s explanation as “deceptive” late Wednesday, and Schiff acknowledged he “should have been more clear” concerning whistleblower contacts.

The panel of constitutional scholars who will testify on Wednesday will weigh in on the question of whether the president committed an impeachable offense by allegedly withholding of military aid to Ukraine until it investigated former Vice President Joe Biden.

During impeachment hearings last month, a career State Department official testified that in January or February 2015, he “became aware that [Joe Biden’s son] Hunter Biden was on the board” of Ukrainian company Burisma Holdings while his father Joe Biden was overseeing Ukraine policy as vice president — and that he raised concerns about potential conflicts of interest at the time. Joe Biden has openly bragged about pressuring Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor while he was investigating Burisma, by threatening to withhold critical U.S. aid.

Republicans had urged President Trump not to attend the Democrats’ hearings, arguing that his presence would validate a process they have repeatedly derided as partisan. In his letter, Cipollone repeatedly derided what he called Democrats’ “fundamentally unfair” process.

“Inviting the Administration now to participate in an after-the-fact constitutional law seminar — with yet-to-be-named witnesses — only demonstrates further the countless procedural deficiencies that have infected this inquiry from its inception and shows the lack of seriousness with which you are undertaking these proceedings,” Cipollone wrote.

Nadler had written the president last week announcing a hearing for Dec. 4 at 10 a.m., and notified him of the committee’s intentions to provide him with “certain privileges” while they consider “whether to recommend articles of impeachment to the full House.” Nadler also extended an invitation to the president, asking whether “you and your counsel plan to attend the hearing or make a request to question the witness panel.”

With polls showing support for impeachment flagging, Democrats were aiming for a final House vote by Christmas, which would set the stage for a likely Senate trial in January. Surveys have shown that independents are souring on the idea of impeaching and removing Trump from office, including in critical battleground states like Wisconsin, even as House Democrats aggressively presented their focus-group-tested “bribery” case against the president over the past two weeks.
“I do believe that all evidence certainly will be included in that report so the Judiciary Committee can make the necessary decisions that they need to,” said Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., a member of both the Intelligence and Judiciary committees.

She said Democrats had not yet finalized witnesses for the upcoming Judiciary hearings and were waiting to hear back from Trump on his plans to present a defense.

“If he has not done anything wrong, we’re certainly anxious to hear his explanation of that,” Demings said.

The House Judiciary’s impeachment hearings will follow last month’s hearings by the House Intelligence Committee, which heard from 12 witnesses during five days of testimony.

Trump has previously suggested that he might be willing to offer written testimony under certain conditions, though aides suggested they did not anticipate Democrats would ever agree to them.

“The Democrats are holding the most ridiculous Impeachment hearings in history. Read the Transcripts, NOTHING was done or said wrong!” Trump tweeted Saturday.

Late Sunday, Trump tweeted a link to a Fox News opinion piece written by legal analyst Gregg Jarrett, and quoted the piece as saying the president had done “nothing impeachable.”

Gregg Jarrett is exactly right.

So, why is Rep. Jerry Nadler continuing the Democrats’ Dog and Pony Show which they euphemistically call an “Impeachment Inquiry”?

The answer is simple. Rep. Jerry Nadler is pursuing a vendetta against President Donald J. Trump.

Back on April 9th of this year, FoxNews.com posted about this decades-old dust-up…

“Congressman Jerry Nadler fought me for years on a very large development I built on the West Side of Manhattan. He wanted a Rail Yard built underneath the development or even better, to stop the job. He didn’t get either & the development became VERY successful,” Trump tweeted Tuesday.

“Nevertheless, I got along very well with Jerry during the zoning and building process. Then I changed course (slightly), became President, and now I am dealing with Congressman Nadler again. Some things never end, but hopefully it will all go well for everyone. Only time will tell!” he added.

The president’s tweets come after The Washington Post reported on the history of their feud. The Post reported that it began in 1985, when Nadler was a New York State assemblyman. The Post reported that Trump, at the time, purchased property in Nadler’s district and wanted to build a development, which he reportedly wanted to call “Television City.” But Nadler wanted the property, which was a former railroad yard, to be upgraded instead. Nadler reportedly blocked Trump from public funds and mortgage insurance.

Trump ultimately began construction on the property and worked to develop residential buildings, but in 2005, after construction delays and pushback from lawmakers, Trump reportedly sold the property for $1.8 billion.

Nadler and the rest of the House Democrats are allowing their least experienced members, “The Squad” and the rest of the wannabe Marxists to control their actions.

The president is under no obligation to attend these partisan hearings.

The House of Representatives was established by our Founding Fathers to be like the British House of Commons, that is, the LOWER House of Congress with the Senate being patterned after the House of Lords, or, the UPPER House.

The president does not answer to Congress. He can act on his own accord concerning matters of national security and foreign policy. And, the Judicial Branch has the ability to overturn legislation passed by Congress.

So, basically, the White House’s letter to Congress told them to go take a long walk on a short pier.

In their horrible grief over the disappointing outcomes of both the 2016 President Election and the Special Counsel’s Investigation, the Democratic Party, as evidenced by these Soviet-style Tribunals which they have been holding, has been experiencing a psychotic break for quite a while now.

They cannot and will not accept the reality in front of them.

With the majority of Americans still saying that they do not want President Trump to be impeached, the Democrats evidently are determined to destroy their party’s chance of winning the 2020 Presidential Election, if they even have one.

To be truthful, I believe that the chance of building a snowman in hell has better odds that the out-of-control Marxist Democrats have of winning the Presidency in 2020.

What are Nadler and the rest of the Democrats going to do when IG Horowitz’ and Attorney General Barr’s investigations both report the nefarious details of a silent coup to destroy both the Trump Presidential Campaign and his Presidency?

And, what happens when they lose control of the House of Representatives while Trump gets reelected in 2020?

Stay tuned, Deplorables.

..And, get your popcorn ready.

The Democrat Meltdown should be glorious.

Until He Comes,

KJ