House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff asserted it would be an “abuse” of President Trump’s Senate impeachment trial if Republicans call Hunter Biden to testify.
“It would certainly be fair for the president and his team to be able to call witnesses that can provide material information on the charges. It would not be appropriate for the president to seek to call witnesses merely to try to perpetuate the same smear campaign that was foiled when his plot was discovered,” Schiff, who is one of the impeachment managers, told CBS Evening News.
“Hunter Biden, for example, can’t tell us anything about whether the president withheld military aid, whether he withheld that aid to coerce Ukraine to conduct political investigations,” he continued saying in a clip from the interview, which is set to air Tuesday evening. “Or why he wouldn’t meet with the president of Ukraine.”
The California Democrat said Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, who is presiding over the Senate trial, may have to settle the issue of whether certain witnesses are heard.
“The only purpose in putting him on their list is they wish to trade material witnesses, like Mr. Bolton and Mulvaney and others, for immaterial ones that will allow them to continue to attack a political opponent,” Schiff said. “That’s an illegitimate abuse of the trial. And the chief justice, who may have an opportunity to rule on materiality of witnesses, as well as the senators, should not permit that kind of abuse.”
WATCH: @CBSEveningNews anchor @NorahODonnell spoke exclusively with four of the seven Democratic House impeachment managers.
O’Donnell asked Adam Schiff, Val Demings, Zoe Lofgren, and Jason Crow how they will make their case for the president’s removal. https://t.co/rHCy01Iq23 pic.twitter.com/KpN0cGAtIx
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) January 21, 2020
Democrats have requested testimony from at least four witnesses, including acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, former national security adviser John Bolton, senior adviser to the acting White House chief of staff Robert Blair, and Office of Management and Budget official Michael Duffey.
Republicans have floated bringing in 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter, who was on the board of a Ukrainian energy company while his father was vice president, as a witness after Trump asked Ukraine to investigate the father and son during a July phone call that sparked his impeachment.
