House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff is setting himself up for a dramatic scene straight out of A Few Good Men in the upcoming pubic impeachment hearings, says Republican strategist Karl Rove.
The House passed a resolution last week setting up public impeachment hearings conducted by the intelligence panel, a move that Rove said paves the way for yet another theatrical performance by Schiff at the expense of President Trump.
In an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, Rove referred to a recent Washington Post profile about Schiff when he was an assistant U.S. attorney living in Los Angeles and wanted to become a screenwriter. “Can he give the Trump presidency a Hollywood ending?” read part of the headline.
He referenced the 1992 film A Few Good Men, which features the famous scene in which Tom Cruise plays Lt. Daniel Kaffee, a lawyer who clashes in a court martial case over the murder of a Marine with Marine Col. Nathan Jessup, portrayed by Jack Nicholson.
“Now Mr. Schiff probably hopes the public impeachment hearings will allow him to reprise Tom Cruise’s role in ‘A Few Good Men’ as Lt. Daniel Kaffee — ‘I want the truth!’ But I know from experience that Mr. Schiff isn’t much interested in the truth. He’s more interested in drama, fiction and fame. His calm demeanor masks the heart of a fierce, untrustworthy partisan,” Rove wrote.
Rove, a onetime adviser to President George W. Bush, said Schiff has not always been so polished. He said Schiff “hadn’t even prepared” when he testified to the House Judiciary Committee more than a decade ago about the controversial dismissal of seven U.S. attorneys and the prosecution of former Democratic Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, who was convicted in 2006 of bribery and fraud and sentenced to seven years.
Afterward, however, Rove said Schiff got “his moment in the cable-news sun” in the interviews that followed to raise the specter of partisan politics by the Bush White House.
Fast-forward 10 years, Rove said, and Schiff’s flair for the dramatic has reached a crescendo. He listed Schiff’s “collusion in plain sight” attacks on Trump and his “parody” reading of Trump’s July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as examples.
“Now the would-be dramatist is staging a new production: ‘Impeaching the President,’” Rove wrote. “His script features secret sessions in the Capitol basement, anonymous whistleblowers, constant and selective leaks of testimony, and, of course, a brilliant performance by the heroic lead.”
