Live political reporting continues in Friday’s blog:
The debate could go very late
Today’s markup has gone on for 12 hours at this point.
Lawmakers debated five amendments, including proposals to strike entire articles, to replace Joe Biden’s name with that of his son, Hunter Biden, and Burisma, the Ukrainian company where he worked, to add in that Ukraine did eventually receive aid, and strike references to removing Trump from office. Chairman Jerrold Nadler called that last one “silly”.
The debate was contentious. After Democratic representative, Eric Swalwell asked that a Los Angeles Times article about the deadly impacts of withholding Ukraine aid be entered into the record, the committee’s leading Republican Doug Collins walked away from his seat in the hearing room, agrily countering that the article was “biased” against Trump and accusing the Democrats of seeking to “besmirch the dead”.
House majority leader Steny Hoyer announced earlier today that the timing of a full House vote on the finalized articles of impeachment will be announced after the judiciary committee vote tonight.
It’s unclear when that will happen. Reports indicate that the Democrats are preparing to go late, and not cut off GOP amendments.
We’re winding down the blog, but check the Guardian homepage for an update on the final vote.
Read more:
Updated
Senate leader McConnell: ‘There is no chance the president is going to be removed from office’
Speaking on Fox News, Senate leader Mitch McConnell said he’s “going to coordinate with the president’s lawyers”.
“My hope is that there won’t be a single Republican who votes for either of these articles of impeachment,” he told Fox News’ Sean Hannity.
McConnell will seek not only to dismiss charges against Trump but also acquit him, according to a report from CNN citing two anonymous senators.
And the amendment to strike references to removing Trump from office was voted down, along party lines — just as all the other amendments proposed by Republicans were.
The judiciary committee is now taking a 30 minute recess. This isn’t the end — lawmakers are expected to get back to debate after the break. The final committee vote on the articles is expected to happen tonight, but it’s hard to predict when, exactly that will happen.
Stay tuned for more updates.
The committee is now debating another amendment proposed by Republican representative Jim Jordan to remove language recommending that Trump be removed from office. This could be a long night.
Jordan’s amendment - the fifth GOP amendment of the day - would kill these sections in impeachment resolution pic.twitter.com/SmgodRONNL
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) December 13, 2019
Committee chair Nadler called the amendment “silly”.
The changes proposed “renders the two articles simply a catalog of various bad acts by the president, but takes the force and effect of the articles entirely away,” Nadler said.
Updated
Meanwhile, at the White House...
As the judiciary committee continues debating impeachment articles against him, Donald Trump is attending the congressional ball. “We’re having a very exciting month in Washington DC,” he said, delivering opening remarks.
It doesn’t look like the representatives locked in the debate will be able to attend.
Updated
The Department of Defense's top watchdog will investigate a $400m contract for border wall construction
The House homeland security committee chair called for an investigation into a $400m contract for border wall construction awarded to a North Dakota company, raising concerns that the company “did not meet the operational requirements of US Customs and Border Protection”. The defense department’s watchdog is also broadly investigating military activities at the border.
Trump had lobbied the Army Corps of Engineers to choose the North Dakota company, despite opposition from military officials who raised concerns about the company’s standards, according to one current and one former administration official. The company’s chief executive, Tommy Fisher, has repeatedly gone on Fox News to cheer for the border wall, a public appeal on the president’s favorite news channel that has helped others win senior positions in the Department of Homeland Security.
Yesterday, a second federal judge ruled the Trump administration cannot divert $3.6bn in Pentagon fund to border wall construction.
Meanwhile, the construction of a privately-funded border wall is seemingly continuing, despite a court injunction.
Updated
An appeals court sparred over whether Trump is illegally profiting from his presidency
Judges on the fourth US circuit court of appeals debated a major case alleging Trump has violated the emoluments clause of the constitution by accepting profits from Trump International Hotel in Washington DC, where foreign and domestic officials and lobbyist often choose to stay.
The debate was heated, CNN reports:
At times, judges took over from the arguing attorneys, the Justice Department, Trump’s personal legal team and the DC and Maryland state attorneys general offices to argue for or against the President themselves. “We are winging it. If this isn’t off the rails, then I don’t know what is,” said Judge Harvie Wilkinson III, a Reagan appointee who’s been on the federal appellate bench at least a half decade longer than any other judge in the wood-paneled room Thursday.
“There are, there are other suits involving congressional subpoenas and everything that presents closer questions, but this one’s a lemon,” he added. “It’s the weakest of the cases that are springing up like jimsonweed against the presidency in this environment.”
Maryland and DC, which argued that hotels in their jurisdictions suffer because those hoping to win Trump’s favor are more likely to stay at the president’s hotel. A three-judge panel of Trump appointees directed a judge in Maryland to drop the lawsuit, but the attorneys are asking the appeals court to reconsider.
Updated
Federal judge rules American Samoans are entitled to US citizenship
A federal judge in Utah ruled that people born in American Samoa, a US territory, are entitled to citizenship. American Samoans have been categorized as non-citizen nationals who aren’t allowed to vote or serve on juries. They can apply for full citizenship but have to leave American Samoa for months or more in order to do so.
Today, a judge ruled that American Samoans should be recognized as citizens in part because people in the territory are subjected to US taxes, laws and rights.
Republicans have been arguing that it’s the Democrats, not Trump, who have obstructed justice by refusing to grant the Republicans a minority hearing or allow the president to call his own witnesses.
The majority really should hold themselves in contempt for conducting this one-sided biased impeachment investigation, and then attacking the White House for refusing to participate in such a patently unfair process.
— Rep. Steve Chabot (@RepSteveChabot) December 12, 2019
Democrats did invite Trump’s lawyers to attend the judiciary hearing, present their case, request additional testimony and evidence and cross-examine witnesses. But the White House declined to participate.
What does ‘strike the last word’ mean?
The phrase of the day has been “strike the last word” – if you’ve been following the last 8+ hours of impeachment debate, you’re likely to have heard this sentence repeated a lot. As NBC suggests, “if ‘strike the last word’ were an impeachment drinking game, no one would survive”.
But what does it mean?
It’s basically a parliamentary convention that allows lawmakers to speak a bit longer.
Technically, each amendment is meant to be debated for 10 minutes – five minutes of discussion for the amendment and five minutes against. But other members who want to talk more can offer a “pro forma” amendment.
Here’s an explanation from the Congressional Research Service:
After the proponent and the opponent of an amendment have spoken for their allotted five minutes, another Member who wishes to speak may rise and state: I move to strike the last word. The chair then recognizes that Member for five minutes, technically to speak on the pro forma amendment, but in fact to continue debate on the pending substantive amendment.
Seriously though, please don’t turn this into a drinking game.
Updated
Third GOP amendment is voted down, fourth is under consideration
It’s been more than eight hours since the judiciary committee began debating the articles of impeachment against Donald Trump.
An amendment introduced by the Republican Andy Biggs, which would have added to the articles that US aid was released to Ukraine, was voted down along party line.
The committee is now considering yet another Republican amendment to strike the obstruction of congress article altogether.
Updated
As lawmakers in the US continue their marathon debate over impeaching the president, the polls have closed int he UK, and exit polls suggest a massive conservative victory.
Our colleagues across the pond have live coverage. Follow along here:
Some choice words from judiciary committee Dems:
Democrat Cedric L Richmond compares Republicans to Judas:
Today I’m reminded of Judas – because Judas for 30 pieces of silver betrayed Jesus; for 30 positive tweets for easy reelection, the other side is willing to betray the American people.
Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell compares Republican rhetoric to yoga:
It is incredible to me to see some of my colleagues bend over backward to cover up for the president. My sister is a yoga teacher. She doesn’t contort, the way some of my Republican colleagues distort the facts all to protect this president.
Updated
Afternoon summary
I’m about to hand over this blog to my colleague Maanvi Singh in Oakland.
Here’s a summary of where we’re at today.
- Republicans have entered two failed amendments to the articles of impeachment being debated in the House Judiciary committee. Both have failed on party lines, but have allowed Republicans the opportunity to unleash extended diatribes.
- Republicans have introduced a third amendment, currently being discussed, that is also certain to fail.
- The US is close to signing a new trade deal with China that will slash current tariffs in exchange for Chinese investment in US agriculture and assurances on intellectual property.
- Saudi Arabia has sent its ambassador to the US naval base in Florida that was attacked last week by a Saudi national in a terror assault.
- Donald Trump attacked the 16 year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg who was named Time Magazine’s person of the year.
This hearing began almost six and a half hours ago and we’ve yet to have a meaningful vote.
We’re now on the third amendment, entered by Republican Andy Biggs (Gaetz’s amendment predictably failed on party lines).
Here’s the latest:
Biggs amendment up nexf pic.twitter.com/2z8vtYL65N
— Jeremy Herb (@jeremyherb) December 12, 2019
Of course, this amendment will fail as well. But we’re likely to see more drawn out polemics from both sides.
Trump’s re-election campaign is circulating a video suggesting that Judiciary committee chairman Jerry Nadler dozed off during the hearings.
A quick look at the video reveals though... that’s not true.
NOT AGAIN!
— Trump War Room (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TrumpWarRoom) December 12, 2019
Democrat impeachment "manager" #SleepyJerry Nadler snoozes through evidence exonerating President Trump 😴💤 #JerryRigged #SchiffShow pic.twitter.com/3c0PaVA8p6
Saudi Arabia has sent its US ambassador to the US naval base in Florida following a mass shooting there last week at the hands of a Saudi national.
More from Reuters:
The Saudi ambassador to the United States visited a U.S. naval air station in Florida on Thursday to extend her condolences for a shooting attack by a Saudi Air Force officer that killed three people last week, the Saudi embassy said.
Princess Reema bint Bandar Al Saud met with members of the Pensacola Naval Air Station command “and reiterated her condemnation for this horrific attack,” the statement said.
She pledged to provide “any assistance possible to accelerate the investigation.”
US close to new trade deal with China
The Trump administration has reached a trade deal in principle with China, with reports indicating US negotiators have offered to slash existing tariffs by as much as half on the $360 billion of Chinese products and cancel a new round of charges set to take effect by the end of the week.
Reporting by Bloomberg indicates the deal is awaiting final approval by Trump and could be announced as early as this afternoon.
Trump tweeted earlier in the day, alluding to the potential deal:
Getting VERY close to a BIG DEAL with China. They want it, and so do we!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2019
The Wall Street Journal reports the deal was negotiated roughly within the past five days. The reporting suggest the US has demanded China purchase large quantities of US agricultural products and make steps to better protect intellectual property rights.
Things are about to get started again back at the Judiciary committee hearing. It’s really just a matter of time before the meaningful vote occurs, so we’ll just have to see how many amendments the Republicans attempt to introduce.
The House has passed a major piece on healthcare legislation during the Judiciary committee impeachment hearing break.
The bill, HR 3, passed by 230 votes to 192 mostly along party lines. It would lower the cost of prescription drugs by allowing government to negotiate prices with manufacturers. It makes major changes to the US government’s Medicare program by capping out of pocket drug cost expenses under to the program to $2,000 and creates new dental and vision benefits.
The bill has little to no chance of passing the Republican controlled senate so is unlikely to become law.
Here’s some more from the AP:
Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s bill would cap Medicare recipients’ out-of-pocket costs for medicines at $2,000 a year. It would use about $360 billion of its projected 10-year savings from lower drug costs to establish Medicare coverage for dental care, hearing, and vision, filling major gaps for seniors.
But the legislation has no chance of passing the Republican-controlled Senate, and the White House has issued a veto threat. Still, Democrats saw a victory in the message their bill sends to voters.
I think that it is going to be too hot to handle for the Republicans,” said Pelosi, D-Calif.
She is claiming bragging rights because her bill would deliver on the promise that Donald Trump made as a candidate in 2016, when he said he would “negotiate like crazy” to lower prescription drug prices for Medicare recipients. It’s a pledge that Trump has backed away from as president.
For months, Pelosi’s office and the White House had talked privately about Medicare negotiations. But the sides went their own ways partly because administration officials concluded her approach could never win support among congressional Republicans. Trump now favors a bipartisan compromise in the Senate that would limit drug price increases and cap what seniors pay out-of-pocket, but would not authorize Medicare negotiations.
Negotiations are “the heart of the matter,” Pelosi insisted.
High prescription drug prices consistently register as the public’s top health care concern. But it’s unclear in a capital divided over Trump’s impeachment that any major legislation will pass before next year’s elections.
Warren changes tack, taking aim at rivals with big money donors
Democratic 2020 presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren on Thursday accused her more moderate rivals of failing to stand up to the rich and pledged to fix a “rigged” US economy, as she sought to re-energize her stalled campaign.
Warren delivered pointed criticisms aimed at several others vying to win the Democratic nomination to face Donald Trump in the 2020 election, including former Vice President Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, Reuters writes.
In a speech to the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire, Warren also faulted unnamed Democrats for soft-pedaling their rhetoric for political reasons.
“Unlike some candidates for the Democratic nomination, I’m not betting my agenda on the naive hope that if Democrats adopt Republican critiques of progressive policies or make vague calls for unity that somehow the wealthy and well-connected will stand down,” she said.
The rebukes reflected a recent tactical shift for Warren, whose campaign spent much of the year largely refusing to engage in back-and-forth spats with her rivals.
The speech underscored an effort to return to a key theme that helped lift Warren’s campaign through the summer and early fall: the country’s political and economic systems are corrupted by money and special interests, ensuring the wealthy benefit at everyone else’s expense.
In recent months, Warren’s momentum has slowed in the face of sustained criticism from Buttigieg, Biden and others over her support for the sweeping healthcare restructuring known as Medicare for All.
There are 15 Democrats running for the party’s nomination to challenge Trump in next November’s election. Democratic nominating contests begin in February and the campaign has become increasingly unsettled, with no clear front-runner.
“We will beat the most corrupt president in American history by campaigning on the most aggressive anti-corruption plan since Watergate,” Warren declared.
The next Democratic debate is a week from today, in California.
Andrew Yang qualified earlier this week, with the bar for qualification ramping up with each month’s debate.
At this moment, the December debate candidates joining Yang on stage are Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and, um, Tom Steyer.
Rounds of charged exchanges and fist-pounding rants did little to lift the air inevitability that surrounded Thursday’s hearing. The battle lines were drawn long ago and the outcome was all-but assured.
Before the end of the day, the Democrats on the committee would almost certainly vote to send articles of impeachment against Donald Trump to the House floor. Republicans would almost certainly and uniformly oppose it.
Throughout the morning, lawmakers defaulted to the same, familiar arguments they’ve been making for five weeks. Democrats argued that the case before the committee was crystal clear and that they had a duty to hold the president for his corrupt actions. Republicans argued that Democrats were blinded by their hatred of Trump, who, they contend publicly, did nothing wrong in his dealings with Ukraine.
There was an agreement that “facts matter”. But there wasn’t an agreement on the facts, and they went round and round debating them. Republicans twisted testimony and wrongly asserting that Ukraine was not aware that the US had withheld military aid as Trump pressured the country’s new president to open investigations into his political rivals. Democrats sought to correct the record with little hope of changing their minds.
There were flickers of drama, however. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat who has participated in three modern impeachment investigations, refuted Republicans’ claim that the process had been less fair than the Republican-led impeachment investigations of Bill Clinton.
Rep. Steve Chabot, a Republican, said that the “biggest difference in the Clinton impeachment and this one is that President Clinton committed a crime, perjury.” By contrast, he said, Trump hasn’t committed a crime.
“I would just like to note that the argument that somehow lying about a sexual affair is an abuse of presidential power, but the misuse of presidential power to get a benefit somehow doesn’t matter,” she said. “If it’s lying about sex, we could put Stormy Daniels’s case ahead of us. We don’t believe that’s a high crime and misdemeanor. No. And it is not before us. And it should not be for us, because it’s not an abuse of presidential power.”
Trump’s former personal lawyer has said that he was directed by Trump, then the Republican presidential nominee, to pay the Daniels, a pornographic actor, $130,000 to keep quiet about her 2006 affair with Trump. Trump has denied the affair.
Unsurprisingly, the committee rejected an amendment by Rep. Jim Jordan, one of Trump’s most loyal defenders, to remove the first article of impeachment from the draft resolution. During debate over a separate amendment, Rep. Matt Gaetz introduced a resolution that would change the subject of the impeachment inquiry to focus on Hunter Biden and Burisma, the Ukrainian energy company on which he served while his dad was Vice President.
Gaetz, insisting he did not intend to make fun of someone’s addiction, read aloud a passage from a New Yorker article that described Hunter Biden’s efforts to buy drugs. Rep. Hank Johnson, a Democrat, stared at Gaetz, who was arrested for a DUI: “The pot calling the kettle black is not something we should do.”
The session has broken for lunch. My colleague Lauren Gambino will have a wrap of the day’s activities thus far coming shortly.
Taking a step away from impeachment again.
We have a story today looking at Democratic congressman Cedric Richmond’s record on climate and the environment. Richmond’s district in Louisiana is home to seven on America’s 10 most air polluted census tracts, according to the EPA. But a review of the Congressman’s public statements and speeches in Congress indicates he has not raised the issue at all during his near 10 year tenure in congress.
Still, the financial weight of major polluters in Louisiana politics is substantial. During almost a decade in Congress Richmond has taken over $400,000 in campaign donations from the oil and gas industry and chemical manufacturers, according to an analysis conducted by the non-partisan Centre for Responsive Politics at the request of the Guardian.
In total, Richmond has received $279,050 in oil and gas money, placing him fifth among current House Democrats in career donations, despite 81 members having served longer tenures than him. He has taken $128,750 from chemical manufacturers, placing him sixth in career donations among current House Democrats.
With Representative Jordan’s amendment voted down. Republican Matt Gaetz immediately moves to introduce another amendment. The amendment requests the removal of Joe Biden’s name from the articles and replace them with references to his son, Hunter and the Ukrainian energy company Burisma.
Gaetz introduces this amendment with an extraordinary personal attack on the former vice president’s son and his drug addiction issues.
Rep. Gaetz attacked Hunter Biden's struggle with drug abuse.
— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) December 12, 2019
Rep. Johnson pointedly responds: "The pot calling the kettle black is not something that we should do." He alludes to people who have struggled with substance abuse, "DUIs."
Gaetz had a since-dismissed DUI arrest.
This amendment, like the previous one, will not be carried. But it gives the Republicans more time to run down the clock before the inevitable vote on the articles themselves.
The judiciary committee is now voting on Republican Jim Jordan’s resolution to strike the first article of impeachment.
Unsurprisingly the vote splits on party lines. It fails 23-17.
Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has condemned Fox News and Tucker Carlson, calling the TV host a “white supremacist sympathizer” and saying his show represents an “hour-long production of unmitigated racism”.
The comments came following a segment on Carlson’s show in which he and his guest, City Journal editor Seth Barron, commented on footage of an unremarkable amount of trash on the streets of Ocasio-Cortez’s New York City district and blamed it on immigrants, whom Barron said had “occupied” the district and made it “one of the least American districts in the country”.
Carlson asked: “How can we take seriously anything she says about the environment when this is her congressional district? She should be ashamed of this.”
Pelosi indicates impeachment to be wrapped up next week
Nancy Pelosi told reporters that the House would act next week to wrap up its impeachment inquiry, after the articles of impeachment are voted on by House Judiciary Committee this week.
“Next week we’ll take up something,” Pelosi told reporters as she discussed the timetable for the impeachment inquiry launched by Democrats.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi has started her weekly press conference. She told reporters that the Democrats will not be enforcing a whip on the impeachment vote.
We are not whipping this legislation, nor do we ever whip something like this. People have to come to their own conclusions. They have seen the facts, as presented in the intelligence committee, they’ve seen the constitution - they know it, they take an oath to protect and defend it. They’ve seen the constitutional experts speak about it. They’ll make their own decisions. I don’t say anything.
.@SpeakerPelosi on Articles of Impeachment: "We are not whipping this legislation, nor do we ever whip something like this. People have to come to their own conclusions."
— CSPAN (@cspan) December 12, 2019
Full video here: https://t.co/GKNKX6Jivv pic.twitter.com/hnqOzcvYDr
The Democratic national committee has announced the timetable for the next four presidential primary debates. They occur in each of the first four voting states. The calendar is below:
January 14: CNN, in partnership with the The Des Moines Register, will host the seventh debate at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.
February 7: ABC, in partnership with WMUR-TV and Apple News, will host the eighth Democratic debate at St. Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire.
February 19: NBC News & MSNBC will host the ninth Democratic debate in Las Vegas, Nevada – in partnership with The Nevada Independent.
February 25: CBS News and the Congressional Black Caucus Institute will co-host the tenth Democratic debate at The Gaillard Center in Charleston, South Carolina. Twitter will be a debate partner.
President Trump has weighed in on the hearings. And, as has become a common political tactic during his tenure, has singled out two women of colour to attack on false premises:
Dems Veronica Escobar and Jackson Lee purposely misquoted my call. I said I want you to do us (our Country!) a favor, not me a favor. They know that but decided to LIE in order to make a fraudulent point! Very sad.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2019
Here’s a bit of context on what’s going at the hearing at the moment.
Republican representative Jim Jordan has introduced a resolution seeking to strike the entire first article of impeachment. Given the Democratic majority in the committee there is zero chance of this passing, but it does allow Republicans to continue to debate the merits of the case, with members granted five minutes to speak.
It’s a clear delaying tactic. And, a reminder, there are two articles of impeachment so they may well introduce another resolution against the second article meaning this posturing will drag out for hours.
If you're wondering. Any member can get five minutes here. And then yield to any member. So basically they have hours of talking if they so choose
— Jeremy Herb (@jeremyherb) December 12, 2019
As the back and forth continues there was a brief stand out moment as Democrat Zoe Lofgren, a House Democratic veteran, calls out her Republican colleagues for alleged hypocrisy.
With reference to the Bill Clinton impeachment hearings, Lofgren asks, “lying about a sexual affair is an abuse of presidential power but the misuse of presidential power to get a benefit doesn’t matter?”.
“If it’s lying about sex, we could put Stormy Daniels’ case ahead of us,” she adds, but says Trump’s alleged lies about an extra-marital affair is not an impeachable offense.
Lofgren goes on: "If it’s lying about sex, we could put the Stormy Daniels' case before us. We don’t believe that’s a high crime and misdemeanor. It is not before us and it should not [be] before us because it’s not an abuse of presidential power." https://t.co/eETqZ9Wujm
— Lauren Gambino (@laurenegambino) December 12, 2019
The House Judiciary committee is still at a bit of a deadlock with various members on both sides posturing over the integrity (or alleged lack thereof) of the impeachment hearings.
While that continues, I’ll link out to some more news.
The Daily Beast is reporting that Donald Trump privately branded French president Emmanuel Macron a “pain in the ass” after the now notorious hot mic video of him and other world leaders mocking Trump at the Nato summit in London.
From the report:
During this private airing of grievances, President Trump repeatedly denigrated the Canadian prime minister behind his back and called the French president a “pain in the ass” while referring to him as “short,” according to an individual who was present for the meeting. Trump also bashed the French leader for not doing enough to help in recent Iran negotiations.
While these hyperbolic back and forths continue. I’ll link out to a bit of actual news.
Barack Obama’s former attorney general, Eric Holder, has torn into the current occupant of the job, William Barr, in an op-ed for the Washington Post.
Holder said Barr has lost his reputation as a “respected lawyer” and is “unfit” to serve as AG.
“Virtually since the moment he took office... Barr’s words and actions have been fundamentally inconsistent with his duty to the Constitution,” Holder writes. “Which is why I now fear that his conduct – running political interference for an increasingly lawless president – will wreak lasting damage.”
Updated
Nadler has allowed Collins to introduce his point of order on the Republicans desire for a minority hearing.
There’s a procedural back and forth and a lot of bickering. But it’s clear and obvious that Nadler is not going to let it stand.
Collins appeals Nadler’s ruling and the committee votes to uphold the chairman’s ruling. The Republicans are now demanding a roll call vote, it’s a clear delaying tactic.
My colleague Lauren Gambino is in the committee room and sends these observations from this morning’s session, which is a continuation of last night’s hearing.
The Judiciary Hearing Committee has been gaveled in for a second day. They’re marking up HR 755, impeaching Donald Trump pic.twitter.com/X5RITdqqOP
— Lauren Gambino (@laurenegambino) December 12, 2019
It’s a little quieter in the hearing room today. There are plenty of open seats, fewer reporters and members compared to past hearings - at least so far.
— Lauren Gambino (@laurenegambino) December 12, 2019
The committee will debate and offer amendments to the two articles of impeachment - abuse of power and obstruction of Congress https://t.co/nDWvqCqke4
— Lauren Gambino (@laurenegambino) December 12, 2019
Chairman Jerry Nadler gavels the session to order. Within 20 seconds he’s interrupted by ranking member Doug Collins who attempts to introduce a point of order related to Republicans request for a minority hearing on impeachment.
Nadler brushes off the intervention and says he will come to it after the full impeachment articles are read to the committee.
You can read those for yourself here.
The House Judiciary committee is just about ready to continue its hearing on the markup of impeachment articles. We’ve got live video embedded at the top of this blog now.
Last day for candidates to qualify for December's Democratic debate
Will Cory Booker make it onto the roster for 19 December’s Democratic party debate on the 2020 election, in California? Blog hopes so. The lineup before has been way too large and weird but has of late been feeling almost suffocatingly small and white, with a Harris-shaped hole left by Kamala’s abrupt dropping out last week.
Andrew Yang qualified earlier this week, with the bar for qualification ramping up with each month’s debate.
At this moment, the December debate candidates joining Yang on stage are Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and, um, Tom Steyer.
Updated
US president slams teen on Twitter
As we await the impeachment hearing that starts at 9am ET today, the president has had a manic morning on Twitter so far.
Most of it does not need national and international news coverage. But the blog must pause to note that the President of the United States has just taken a spiteful pop at teen climate crisis activist Greta Thunberg.
So ridiculous. Greta must work on her Anger Management problem, then go to a good old fashioned movie with a friend! Chill Greta, Chill! https://t.co/M8ZtS8okzE
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2019
That really is breathtaking in its meanness. One can only conclude that, apart from Trump being outraged about someone telling him to listen to the science on global heating, it’s about the attention.
Any year that Trump is not Time magazine person of the year, he is shocked and affronted, it seems. So the fact that a kid, the youngest Time person of the year ever, made the cover this year and it’s a darn girl from Sweden telling him what to do, well that’s beyond the pale.
.@GretaThunberg is TIME's 2019 Person of the Year #TIMEPOY https://t.co/YZ7U6Up76v pic.twitter.com/SWALBfeGl6
— TIME (@TIME) December 11, 2019
Remember the outrage from the White House last week after a witness at an impeachment hearing made a mild joke using the name of Donald Trump’s youngest child, Barron Trump? Barron, 13, is much younger than Greta, 16, and is most certainly not in the public eye as long as he can help it, while Thunberg is on the world stage.
But the rage from Republicans and Melania Trump over that seemed disproportionate at the time and even more ridiculous (to use Potus’s word this morning) now.
Time magazine named its Guardians of the Year to be four of the most important, and most damning of Trump’s conduct over Ukraine, witnesses at the intelligence committee hearings on impeachment.
They were Marie Yovanovitch, the former US ambassador to Ukraine; Bill Taylor, the US’s chargé d’affaires in Ukraine; Fiona Hill, the former White House Russia expert; and Lt Col Alexander Vindman, the White House’s top Ukraine expert. That must be galling for the president, too.
The Public Servants are TIME's 2019 Guardians of the Year #TIMEPOY https://t.co/cJrllvPtHV pic.twitter.com/phRuSTNMeG
— TIME (@TIME) December 11, 2019
Time also listed the whistleblower who triggered the impeachment investigation as one of its Guardians of the Year, too, but unlike unscrupulous Republicans and conservative TV blowhards didn’t attempt to name that person.
Updated
UK election happening today
So you thought it was a big day for politics in America? Britons are going to the polls today (again), but this is a huge one. Will they go for Conservative Boris Johnson who boasts of taking the UK out of the European Union as fast as he possibly can, or Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn, who would give the public a second referendum and wants to boost investment in starved public services and take back government ownership of some privatised industries?
You can follow all the action via our separate Guardian live blog from Britain today, here.
Updated
House committee prepares for impeachment vote; fury over naming of alleged whistleblower in hearing
Good morning, US politics watchers, welcome to a huge day on the Hill. We’ll have a live stream of today’s hearing and all the developments from the impeachment inquiry and other political news. Stay tuned.
As the House judiciary committee prepares by the end of this morning for the crucial vote on the articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, fury has erupted over the fact that a Republican member last night named the alleged whistleblower who triggered the congressional investigation by complaining about the president’s pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rivals.
Texas Republican Louie Gohmert last night at the judiciary committee hearing to give initial statements on the articles of impeachment called out the names of several people he would like to see called as witnesses in the expected impeachment trial of Trump in the Senate early next year.
Among those names was that of a man in the US intelligence community, whose name has been floating around as the possible individual who blew the whistle on the president’s allegedly corrupt dealings with Ukraine for personal political gain. The Guardian is not, of course, repeating that name and has no confirmation of who the whistleblower is.
Virginia Democrat Don Beyer tweeted that: “House Republicans just committed an incredible and outrageous breach. The President threatened the whistleblower with violence, and whether the person just named is the whistleblower or not they were just put in real danger. This is unacceptable and there should be consequences.”
House Republicans just committed an incredible and outrageous breach.
— Rep. Don Beyer (@RepDonBeyer) December 12, 2019
The President threatened the whistleblower with violence, and whether the person just named is the whistleblower or not they were just put in real danger. This is unacceptable and there should be consequences. https://t.co/yyzK5KNKGS
