House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler told CNN this week his panel is conducting “formal impeachment proceedings” against President Trump and could be ready to file articles of impeachment this fall.
The New York Democrat’s announcement blew up social media and thrilled the Democratic base, which has been clamoring for the House to take formal steps to oust the president.
But Nadler’s claim defies House rules and the way the chamber has processed impeachment actions against past presidents.
The top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, called out Nadler’s CNN claim almost as soon as he uttered it on the CNN set.
“Chairman Nadler is either uninformed about what a formal impeachment inquiry is or he is deliberately misleading the American public to score cheap political points,” Collins tweeted Thursday. “Which is it, Chairman?”
House Democrats have struggled with an intraparty divide over impeachment. More than half of the caucus is now calling for an impeachment inquiry and the demand is particularly fervent among the more liberal lawmakers.
But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and dozens of other lawmakers are opposed to holding a House vote on an impeachment inquiry out of fear it will dominate the agenda in a critical election year and could turn off voters in key swing districts.
She is pushing Nadler and other pro-impeachment lawmakers to pursue their investigation into President Trump without the “I” word but rather with hearings and court battles for witnesses and documents.
Nadler last month battled with Pelosi privately, urging unsuccessfully for a House vote authorizing an impeachment inquiry.
Soon after, Nadler began telling reporters something new. He said there is no need for a formal vote on an impeachment inquiry because the panel was already conducting one, beginning with a court filing seeking undisclosed documents from the Mueller report.
“We are telling the court that what we are doing is not just part of normal oversight but part of our Article 1 authority and responsibility to consider all remedies, including the possibility of articles of impeachment,” Nadler said last month.
The Democrat-led committee last week went to court to force former White House counsel Don McGahn to testify about whether Trump tried to obstruct former special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into alleged collusion between the Trump 2016 campaign and the Russians.
Democrats said in the filing, it is “now determining whether to recommend articles of impeachment against the President based on the obstructive conduct described by the Special Counsel.”
Nadler, however, doesn’t appear to have the authority to launch a formal impeachment inquiry regardless of the case he makes to the court, Republicans said.
That power rests with the House, which must approve a formal Judiciary Committee impeachment probe by simple majority.
Collins, a GOP aide told the Washington Examiner, “does dispute Nadler’s assertion that the committee is currently conducting “formal impeachment proceedings. The House rules do require a formal vote in order for the committee to begin conducting a formal impeachment inquiry.”
Nadler’s claim that he is moving ahead without permission from House lawmakers also defies history.
The House on Oct. 8, 1998, passed a resolution “Authorizing and directing the Committee on the Judiciary to investigate whether sufficient grounds exist for the impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States.”
The vote was 258-176, and it launched weeks of hearings that ultimately concluded with the Judiciary Committee recommending articles of impeachment against Clinton, which the House passed on Dec. 19, 1998.
House lawmakers voted on Feb. 6, 1974, to approve a resolution mandating the Judiciary Committee investigate whether the House should impeach President Richard Nixon. The vote was 410-4. Nixon resigned before a House vote on the impeachment articles.
According to the Congressional Research Service, which produces research and reports for Congress, there are three formal stages of congressional action related to impeachment.
“First, an impeachment inquiry is authorized, and this is most often accomplished through the adoption of a simple resolution directing the Judiciary Committee to investigate an official,” the CRS reported this year.
“Second, the committee conducts its investigation, prepares articles of impeachment, and reports them to the House. Third, the full House considers the articles of impeachment and, if they are adopted, appoints managers from the committee to present the articles in the Senate.”
But there are other ways to impeach federal officials, including the president.
Nadler, or any member, could go straight to the floor and offer a resolution containing articles of impeachment as a “question of the privileges of the House.”
The House could then refer it to the Judiciary Committee or kill it by tabling it. The House has three times voted to table impeachment resolutions against President Trump.
During the CNN interview, Nadler cautioned host Erin Burnett “not to get hung up on semantics” when it comes to impeachment.
“The fact is, we are doing an investigation,” Nadler said.
Nadler told Burnett he was no longer waiting for approval from Pelosi, who has said repeatedly there is currently not enough evidence yet to launch an impeachment inquiry.
“We are going into court to get witnesses, all with a view toward deciding and recommending to the House whether to impeach the president,” Nadler told CNN. “We have the power to vote articles of impeachment. And we are investigating now to get the evidence to decide whether to do so.”
Pelosi’s press team did not respond to an inquiry about whether the Judiciary Committee is conducting a formal impeachment inquiry but she appears to approve Nadler’s assessment.
Earlier this week, she issued a memo to fellow Democrats on the party’s legislative efforts as well as Nadler’s effort to win McGahn’s testimony in court.
Pelosi quoted from the court filing in which Nadler said for the House to “have access to all the relevant facts and consider whether to exercise its full Article I powers, including a constitutional power of the utmost gravity — approval of articles of impeachment.”
