Impeachment Resolution Cites Trump’s ‘Incitement’ Of Capitol Insurrection

Speaker 1: 00:00 House Democrats today took the first steps in the effort to remove Donald Trump from office. An article of impeachment was introduced charging Trump with incitement of insurrection in connection with the storming of the Capitol, by a mob of his supporters. Last Wednesday, the Democrats also tried to have a resolution passed by unanimous consent, urging vice president Pence and the cabinet to remove Trump from office. Joining me with more information about today's dramatic events in the house is San Diego Congressman Scott Peters and congressmen Peters. Speaker 2: 00:32 Welcome. Thank you, Maureen. Thanks for having me Speaker 1: 00:35 This session in the house went by so quickly today. It was easy to miss. What happened? Can you explain why unanimous consent was asked for in the 25th amendment resolution? Speaker 2: 00:46 Sure. In order to speed things up. Um, one of the, one of the options that Congress has is to dispense with the rules. Typically that would take you, you have to go through to get, to get something on the floor. Um, you do that by unanimous consent, but only takes one person to object. So I think that she expected that there would be an objection. There was an objection. So today the rules committee, uh, Congress will take the steps needed formally to put it on the Florida Memorial for a vote. Speaker 1: 01:13 And, okay, so it's, they're going to ask for a vote tomorrow on the resolution. Uh, even if it were passed though, it wouldn't force the vice-president of the cabinet to invoke the 25th amendment, would it? Speaker 2: 01:26 No, but I think it's, I think this is the most important message to the center. Uh, we have a president who, uh, incited an insurrection, a coup against the United States. Uh, I believe he's gotta be out of office now. Obviously he could resign. We know he's not going to do that. The next best thing is to ask Republicans to take responsibility for, uh, this president and help us, um, lead an effort to get him out of office. And the cleanest way to do that is through the 25th amendment, which is a job of the cabinet and the vice president. Speaker 1: 01:55 Okay. Also today, an article of impeachment was introduced against president Trump. What is the timeframe on moving forward with that? Speaker 2: 02:04 Well, as you can imagine, it's very problematic. I think that what I've heard, we have a caucus meeting coming up later today is that the, if nothing happens with regard to the 25th amendment, uh, that speaker Pelosi will bring to the floor, um, this article of impeachment, uh, I think probably Thursday, a house would pass that. I think we may even have some Republican votes, but then obviously it goes to the Senate and we already know that the Senate doesn't reconvene until the 19th and probably this trial wouldn't get started in the Senate until literally the hour after president Binus sworn in on the 20th. So it didn't, it didn't achieve the objective of getting rid of president Trump, didn't get them out of office and it starts to get in the way of what we really want to do, which is move on and fix this country deal with coronavirus, uh, to take care of the economy, all the other things. So that's why I think, um, the impeachment may be of important, important as a statement, but it doesn't get us what we want, which is the movement of president Trump, Speaker 1: 02:57 You know, and let me, let me ask a few more questions about that because the last, uh, impeachment of the president last year went through the house with no Republican votes. It was a complete, complete partisan sort of a vote. And you say this time around, you think that some Republican members in the house may vote for impeachment. Speaker 2: 03:18 Yeah. So we've seen it a couple people. Um, Adam Kinzinger is one of my colleagues from Illinois. A couple of people really express outrage the same as any Democrat has about the president's role in inciting this violence. So I think we'll probably get a few, but not, not, not 30 or 40 or 50, I'm thinking more like five or 10. Speaker 1: 03:36 So you've outlined, uh, the timeframe that Mitch McConnell has set for the earliest, they could take up this impeachment trial, which is, you know, uh, as you say that the hour after Joe Biden is inaugurated as president, considering that, is there really any point in pursuing impeachment proceedings? Speaker 2: 03:53 Well, that's an excellent question. It's a little bit like firing a missile at a building that will be the empty, empty by the time the missile hits. I believe that the argument for it, that people make is that there has to be some accountability for this, and this is the gun that Congress has the fire's impeachment. And so even if it ends up just being in the nature of a center, uh, we will have declared that president Trump is the only president to have been impeached twice. You know, we'd really like to hear from president Biden about whether this is really how he wants to spend the first month of his presidency or any part of his presidency is talking about Donald Trump. I kind of think that attention is what Donald Trump wants and then having that trial about him almost in the nature of a reward than a punishment, we'll vote for it if it comes to the house floor. But I think your question is, or is a really good one Speaker 1: 04:40 When the mob stormed the capital last Wednesday, what did you and your staff experienced during those hours? Speaker 2: 04:48 Well, because of COVID, we don't have a full staff in the office, so actually it was just me and my, uh, DC chief, Dan [inaudible]. He was in my, uh, my office. I went to, I went down to hear the argument personally. So I was one of the people in the house chamber who, um, was there when leadership was whisked off the floor. Uh, suddenly, uh, we were told that the Capitol had been breached told to prepare our gas masks at one point, told to get hit, hit the, hit the ground. And we witnessed the people at the, at the door being against which there was a barricade, uh, trying to get through. And it was very harrowing kind of situation. Ultimately the Capitol police were able to get us to safety and we, we quarantine for some time, but, um, it's not something I would wish on anybody. Speaker 1: 05:32 I understand you're back in San Diego now, are you going back to Washington for the inauguration? Speaker 2: 05:38 Go back for the inauguration? Yeah. I, um, will want a security briefing on it in this, the most fortified building that I know of, or at least one of them. And certainly one of the top terrorist targets in the world, uh, how it was that, uh, a mob of civilians were able to overrun our force. Uh, that's a question that's got to be answered. I think that's gotta be answered, not just for me, but the president vice president elect and for the country. Speaker 1: 06:00 Okay. Then I've been speaking with San Diego Congressman Scott Peters, Congressman Peters. Thanks a lot. Speaker 2: 06:05 Thanks, Maureen. You're well,