Twenty-some Republican Congressmen (and a few women) are staging a repeat Brooks Brother riot to stall the ongoing impeachment proceeding. I’ll post a picture if I find an open source one, but the riot is being led by Matt Gaetz and includes, among others:
- Minority Whip Steve Scalise
- Steve King
- Louie Gohmert
- Andy Biggs
- Bradley Byrne
- Mark Walker
- Mo Brooks
- Debbie Lesko
- Alex Mooney
- Michael Waltz
Some of the members stormed into the House SCIF with their cell phones, which is a violation of strict rules and may degrade the effectiveness of the SCIF. Reportedly, Republican Mike Conaway of Texas has started collecting the electronics of his colleagues.
The riot has delayed the testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Laura Cooper.
That’s significant–symbolic even. That’s because Cooper is expected to testify on DOD’s response to Trump’s illegal refusal to withhold funds duly appropriated by Congress.
House panels leading the impeachment inquiry are set to hear Wednesday from a Pentagon official responsible for policy toward Ukraine, who is expected to testify about the delay in nearly $400 million in security assistance to the country.
Laura Cooper, deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia, will be the first Defense Department official to testify before investigators, who have largely heard from State Department officials so far in the investigation. Ms. Cooper arrived at the Capitol on Wednesday morning.
The hold on the aid to Ukraine is at the center of the House’s impeachment inquiry into whether President Trump conditioned the funding for Ukraine on his request to Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky that Ukraine investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, and his son, Hunter Biden, as well as alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.
The White House’s hold on military aid to Ukraine this summer set off alarms at the Pentagon, according to people familiar with the matter. Ms. Cooper’s exact role in the Defense Department’s effort to push back on the hold on the money, which was ultimately released in mid-September, isn’t known.
After the White House communicated the hold to the Defense and State Departments in July, the Pentagon conducted an internal review of the legality of the hold, according to three people familiar with the matter. Pentagon officials argued that the administration couldn’t block money approved by Congress, delivering their analysis to career White House budget office officials at a July meeting, according to two of the people and another person familiar with the matter.
In short, a bunch of Republican Congressmen (and a handful of women) are staging a faux riot in order to prevent DOD from telling Congress how the White House prevented them from following the law that prohibits the White House from withholding funds without a good reason that they share with Congress.
As I’ve said, even these people’s former colleague, Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, has admitted this is a crime.
I know this entire inquiry has stirred up a lot of partisan bickering. But it is stunning that Republicans in Congress, including Minority Whip Steve Scalise, are so desperate to protect Trump that they are trying to prevent Congress from asserting its power of the purse.
There could be no more symbolic self-emasculation than this faux riot. And yet, these members of Congress apparently are willing to trade away their own power like this.
Update: According to a press release released yesterday, here’s who was part of the Brooks Brothers The Farce. Those marked with asterisks are on committees conducting the inquiry, so they’re basically complaining about a process they’re a part of. Those marked with checks were around in 2017 and voted for a rule holding that such protests on the House floor (to say nothing of inside HPSCI’s SCIF) were a violation of House Rules.
- Matt Gaetz√
- Steve Scalise√
- Brian Babin√
- Andy Biggs√
- Mo Brooks√
- Ken Buck√*
- Bradley Byrne
- Buddy Carter√
- Ben Cline
- Jeff Duncan√
- Drew Ferguson√
- Russ Fulcher
- Louie Gohmert√
- Paul Gosar√*
- Mark Green*
- Vicky Hartzler√
- Kevin Hern
- Jody Hice√*
- Duncan Hunter√
- Bill Johnson√
- Jim Jordan√*
- Fred Keller*
- Steve King√
- Debbie Lesko
- Carol Miller*
- Alex Mooney√
- Markwayne Mullin√
- Ralph Norman*
- Mark Walker√
- Mark Meadows√*
- Greg Murphy
- Peter Olson√
- Gary Palmer√
- Scott Perry√*
- David Rouzer√
- Ross Spano
- Michael Waltz
- Steve Watkins
- Randy Weber√
- Ron Wright*
- Lee Zeldin√*
Also note that the rules Adam Schiff is using for this inquiry are similar to the rules that Mark Meadows used for the investigation of the Russian investigation that he, Gaetz, Jordan, and Gowdy did last year.
Update: Fixed the gender references as there are a few women who participated.