The second day of the televised hearings of the House Dems’ impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump started out with House Intel Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) quashing legitimate GOP parliamentary points of order — and leading former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch in questions that targeted presidential attorney Rudy Giuliani and, indirectly, President Trump.
After Schiff’s opening statement during which he put out partisan Dem talking points against the president, Ranking Member Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) responded by pointing out that all the testimony so far, and the testimony expected from Ambassador Yovanovitch, was secondhand and hearsay.
Nunes also stated that the entire impeachment inquiry was designed by the Dems to distract attention from their own corruption and efforts by Ukraine officials to work against the Trump campaign of 2016.
Nunes then read from a released White House transcript of the first phone call between President Trump and then-newly elected Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky.
During that call, according to the transcript, there was no mention at all of military aid, a quid pro quo — or Hunter Biden.
As Schiff then began to issue his edicts for the conduct of the hearing, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) called for a parliamentary point of order.
So did Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.).
Points of order are customarily always answered.
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Schiff ruled them out of order — and refused to recognize either Jordan or Stefanik in clear violation of House rules and procedures.
No doubt after the damage Schiff and Dem witnesses took from GOP cross-examination this past Wednesday, Schiff has been advised to go harder and more ruthlessly against GOP questioning.
Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch then took the stand — and recited her background and resume.
She was not modest in her self-estimation. She repeatedly accused “foreign corrupt interests” of working in a “smear campaign” with Rudy Giuliani to remove her from office. She did not, however, reference any firsthand knowledge of the supposed campaign against her.
This is a continuation of the Dem strategy of Wednesday to hit the president through his lawyer.
Related: Second Day of Hearings: Fireworks or Forget About It?
She denied what she called “baseless allegations” against her. Specifically, she denied telling fellow diplomats “to ignore” the president “because he is going to be impeached.”
She also denied that she issued a “do not prosecute list” to Ukrainian law enforcement in an effort to protect Hunter Biden and his Ukrainian associates.
Yovanovitch went on to criticize State Department leadership and compare the U.S. military unfavorably with the State Department, awkwardly calling the State Department “the pointy end of the spear.”
The former ambassador, likely heavily coached by Dem Intel Committee staffers, concluded her opening statement by ironically invoking the name of murdered U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.
Stevens and fellow U.S. personnel in Libya were killed in 2012 when the Democratic Obama administration and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton refused to deploy security forces to rescue them from an attack by Islamist radical terrorists.
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