This week, House Democrats are completing their final preparations for a full House vote on formal articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump. That vote is likely to happen next week. In the meantime, Democrats including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) have continued to criticize their Republican colleagues who have refused to waver in their support for the president even after weeks on end of often public evidence-gathering. This Friday morning, she shared a video montage of former Republican House members harshly criticizing Trump’s quid pro quo scheme to get Biden dirt from Ukraine — although current House Republicans remain silent.
The former Republican members of Congress that the Speaker highlighted include Charlie Dent, Joe Scarborough, David Jolly, and Bob Inglis, along with the currently independent and former Republican active Congressman Justin Amash. Pelosi shared:
‘Former Republican House Members know the oaths they took. Why don’t today’s Republicans? #DefendOurDemocracy’
Earlier this month, in the clip that Pelosi shared, Dent insisted:
‘Well what I would say is, as a former chair of the House Ethics Committee, that if any of them had used their office to call a foreign head of government to investigate their campaign opponent, they know the Department of Justice would be crawling up their backside right now.’
At the conclusion of the video montage, it reads:
‘Our oath is to the Constitution, not to President Trump.’
Former Republican House Members know the oaths they took.
Why don’t today’s Republicans? #DefendOurDemocracy pic.twitter.com/6VVnk8VYe9
— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) December 13, 2019
And yet, Republican members of Congress have gone all in with their attempted defenses of President Trump anyway. Perhaps they’re hoping to boost their political careers? For weeks on end, they have repeated, at varying volumes and in varying ways, the same handful of talking points. Those attempted defenses include pointing to Trump’s claim of his own innocence, but duly proceeding judicial investigations aren’t stopped just because the subject pleaded not guilty!
This week, debate at the House Judiciary Committee has dragged on for some fourteen hours, because any member can introduce a not immediately limited number of amendments, and after all those introductions, debate timers reset. Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) eventually abruptly adjourned Thursday’s hearing so members could, you know, sleep — which Republicans were furious over, because apparently they’re simply mad about everything now.
Check out Twitter’s response to Pelosi below…
