Impeaching President Trump wasn’t among the topics House Democrats discussed in their first in-person gathering since the Mueller report was released.
Lawmakers who met in the Capitol basement early Tuesday morning talked about a House agenda that would tackle climate change as well as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s meeting with Trump Tuesday to open talks about a potential infrastructure deal.
Nobody brought up impeaching Trump.
“It just wasn’t that kind of forum,” Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., said as he left the closed-door meeting.
Last week, Pelosi, D-Calif., threw cold water on impeaching Trump during a caucus conference call following the release of the Mueller report.
Pelosi said Democrats should instead focus on an agenda that can help the party win Congress and defeat Trump in 2020.
Democrats appear willing to go along with the plan, at least for now.
Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., pushed for impeachment on last week’s conference call, but on Tuesday said she doesn’t oppose Pelosi’s plan.
“I have every ounce of respect for our current leadership,” Demings said. “I think the leadership has to be like a good quarterback. They have to have the ability to see the entire field.”
Demings, Connolly and others, however, said in the absence of an impeachment inquiry, they would step up aggressive oversight of the president, including an effort to obtain his tax returns, bank records, and the public release of the unredacted Mueller report into alleged Russian collusion with the Trump campaign and the president’s possible role in obstructing the investigation.
“We will use every available legal means to make sure the administration complies with our constitutional responsibility to conduct oversight on behalf of the American people,” House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries, N.Y., told reporters Tuesday morning.
Demings said impeachment would remain “the other option,” if the president obstructs the oversight efforts of House Democrats.
So far, Trump has largely resisted committee inquiries.
He is poised to deny the Ways and Means Committee access to his tax returns, which they have requested from the Treasury Department. Trump filed a lawsuit Monday to block two House committees from obtaining his bank records and his attorney general, William Barr, is refusing to sit for public questioning by House Judiciary Committee lawyers.
“The president has now blatantly shown disregard to the U.S. constitution and the equal branches of government,” Demings, a member of the Judiciary Committee, said.
House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters, D-Calif., has subpoenaed Trump’s bank records and frequently calls for his impeachment.
Despite her enthusiasm for ousting Trump, she’s not fighting Pelosi’s effort to keep impeachment proceedings off the table.
“The speaker has an awesome responsibility to act in the best interest of the entire caucus,” Waters said. “And she’s doing that. I get that. And those of us who chair committees have the responsibility to do the work the Constitution mandates us to do.”
Connolly said Democrats are not willing to “roll over and play dead,” on oversight.
He said the Mueller report, which Democrats believe shows evidence of obstruction, and the “act of defiance,” by the Trump administration to resist oversight, “makes it harder” for him to support Pelosi’s effort to squelch an impeachment inquiry.
“I’m not unaffected by these develops and it has forced me to re-examine my position,” Connolly said.
But Connolly stopped short of endorsing an immediate impeachment inquiry.
Several lawmakers have sponsored impeachment resolutions since Trump took office.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., introduced the most recent impeachment inquiry measure in March and she is pushing for a vote. The resolution has only six co-sponsors so far, including freshmen Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass.
“There are impeachable offenses that need to be investigated after he took the oath of office,” Tlaib told the Washington Examiner. “It’s my responsibility as a member of Congress to hold him accountable.”
