THE WHITE HOUSE — supremely confident until two weeks ago that the House of Representatives would not impeach the president — is suddenly on the defensive. Lawyers for President Clinton, reversed themselves last week and decided to appear at the House Judiciary Committee hearing scheduled for December 8. This after White House officials had derided the entire impeachment inquiry as illegitimate. In another astonishing flip-flop, Clinton spokesman Joe Lockhart and House democratic leader Richard Gephardt called last week for newt Gingrich to become more involved in the impeachment process. For weeks, Gephardt and Clinton aides had loudly complained that Gingrich’s involvement was excessive.
There is a simple explanation for these shifts: Administration officials are now terrified the president might actually be impeached. Last month’s election returns were supposed to have laid the issue to rest; there were though to be enough Republican defectors to defeat impeachment. Lately, though, the number of House Republicans breaking ranks has apparently been shrinking, and with at least three House Democrats saying they’ll vote to impeach, the once-prevailing wisdom is in doubt. According to a Clinton aide, this change persuaded White House officials to adopt new tactics — including the lawyers’ appearance before the committee.
The goal of their testimony is simple: to win over the few House members — Democrats and Republicans — who are wavering between censure and impeachment. According to the Clinton aide, the testimony is likely to be a point-by-point response to the allegations facing the president. Expect the lawyers to be more forthright than they were in answering the 81 questions from Henry Hyde, the Judiciary chairman, and to tone down their criticism of independent counsel Kenneth Starr.
For Republicans, another indication the impeachment pendulum had swung in their direction was the White House’s insistence last week that it be given access to reams of documents related to Starr’s impeachment referral, Kathleen Willey, and campaign-finance abuses. Hyde immediately questioned this eleventh-hour request, saying in a statement, “I hope this last request by the White House is not intended to delay the committee’s proceedings.” But all of a sudden, delay makes sense for the White House. After complaining for weeks that the impeachment inquiry was proceeding too slowly, administration officials would be happy to drag it out just enough to postpone an impeachment vote until January, when the Republicans’ House majority will be smaller by five. But don’t expect this strategy to succeed: Any move to delay an impeachment vote will meet massive protest from House Republicans. Even speaker designate Bob Livingston, who’s been loath to express an opinion on the impeachment inquiry, admitted last week that he hopes the committee will finish its work this year.
The most desperate plea of all last week was the request from Gephardt and the White House for Gingrich to effectively take over the impeachment inquiry. “I believe it is incumbent on you,” said Gephardt, addressing the speaker, “to provide the leadership necessary to move this process forward.” The call fell on deaf ears. N The same day, the committee Republicans voted to subpoena materials related to the investigation of Clinton fund-raising abuses.
The first problem was that Republicans saw the request as ludicrous, coming as it did after shrieks from Gephardt and the White House a few months back that Gingrich was controlling the committee. Even has the request been less blatantly political, however, it wouldn’t have flown. Gingrich has checked out of Washington. He’s spending his time in Georgia and Florida, and his staff says he has handed the impeachment issue over to Livingston. Livingston, meanwhile, declines to interfere with the work of the Judiciary Committee: “Until they complete their business or make a report to Congress, I can’t weigh in one way or another, and I won’t,” he told the Wall Street Fournal.
The sudden show of vulnerability from the White House makes it all the less likely Livingston will give the Democrats the thing they want: a vote on censure this year. The White House figures a censure vote would take the pressure off some Hose members — mostly Republicans — to vote for impeachment. But senior House GOP sources say they’d be surprised if a censure vote occurred this year.
Instead, here’s what is likely to happen: When the impeachment resolution is introduced in the Judiciary Committee, a committee Democrat will move that a censure resolution also be considered. Hyde will then do one of two things: rule the censure resolution out of order, at which point it will be dead, or allow a vote on the resolution, at which point it was easily be voted down by committee Republicans.
But the Democrats won’t stop there. With the support of a few Republicans, they will then try to introduce a censure resolution on the House floor. This too will fail. According to the House’s parliamentary procedures, a special resolution, such as one proposing to censure the president, can only be considered if it has the blessing of the Rules Committee. This means the resolution would, in effect, need the support of Livingston, as Rules traditionally follows the speaker. But no one expects Livingston, in his first act as speaker, to push the committee to allow a censure vote. Indeed, he would pay a price if he did. When Tom Delay, the House whip, spoke with an ideologically diverse group of over 40 House Republicans last week, not one of them favored allowing a censure vote.
The climate, in other words, is bad and getting worse for Clinton. Through all the wrangling last week, Republican aides to the Judiciary Committee, led by Thomas Mooney, the general counsel, and Jon Dudas, the staff director, quietly toiled in their Rayburn building offices, drafting the articles of impeachment the committee will consider at the end of the week. The White House and committee Democrats can scream and yell about one procedural matter of another, but they reality is that the impeachment train is chugging right along. And as one Clinton aide grimly admits, “We don’t have any leverage to affect this.”
Matthew Rees is a staff writer at THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
