Shift in impeachment strategy

Republicans eye shift in impeachment strategy as Trump demands new attacks

A pivot from the inquiry's process to its substance stems from a growing desire to build a merit-based case for defending the president.

By MELANIE ZANONA

House Republicans want to start beefing up their defense of President Donald Trump by focusing on the substance of the Ukraine allegations against him, a shift in strategy that comes as Democrats try to undermine the GOP’s crusade on the impeachment process.

Republican leaders invited some of Trump’s top allies to their weekly Monday meeting with the party’s committee leaders to discuss their efforts to protect Trump from impeachment. Among the members who attended the planning session were Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina, one of Trump’s closest confidants on Capitol Hill; Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the ranking member on the Oversight Committee; and Rep. Lee Zeldin of New York, who has emerged as one of Trump’s loudest defenders in the impeachment fight.

There is a growing desire among Republicans to start building a more merit-based case to defend Trump in the Ukraine scandal, according to a source familiar with the GOP’s thinking. And the president echoed a similar sentiment earlier in the day, urging Republicans to focus less on the Democrats’ impeachment process.

But that could be a difficult ask of the GOP conference, which has been confronted with a steady drip of revelations that have left many members guessing about what might be next.

“I’d rather go into the details of the case rather than process,” Trump told reporters Monday. “Process is good, but I think you ought to look at the case.”

House Democrats are investigating whether Trump made aid to Ukraine contingent upon the country opening a probe into the Biden family. Last week, a top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine testified that the two issues were directly linked. And on Tuesday, a senior White House official plans to tell House impeachment investigators that he thought Trump undermined national security with his Ukraine pressure campaign.

Republicans have been hammering Democrats over what they view as an unfair impeachment process, seizing on the fact that all the depositions have so far taken place behind closed doors. But Democrats will soon start holding public hearings with impeachment witnesses and releasing transcripts from their closed-door interviews, complicating the GOP’s strategy.

In fact, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced on Monday that the House would vote this week to formalize the next phase of the impeachment probe, a step the California Democrat argued was necessary “to eliminate any doubt as to whether the Trump Administration may withhold documents, prevent witness testimony, disregard duly authorized subpoenas, or continue obstructing” House investigators.

And a federal judge ruled last week that the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry is valid even without a formal vote to open it, blowing up one of Trump and the GOP’s chief arguments.

Republicans, however, still think they are on solid ground when it comes to their process argument and aren’t ready to drop that crusade entirely. Just last week, dozens of Republicans stormed the secure facility in the Capitol where the closed-door depositions are held. And the GOP painted Pelosi’s surprise announcement about the impeachment resolution as an admission that the probe has been invalid all along.

“You can’t fix this process at this point, where they’ve done so much in secret,” said Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the GOP conference chairwoman. “But the fact that they now feel like they’ve got to move and do something in public shows you it’s an admission of guilt.”

But there is a growing feeling among some in the party that they can’t rely on process arguments alone. Republicans want to get out ahead of whatever allegations might be coming down the pike when Democrats take their impeachment inquiry public.

“I believe that both are important to talk about,” Zeldin said. “The process goes to the legitimacy, the credibility, the fairness of what House Democrats are pursuing. The substance is incredibly important as well.”

Meadows fired off a tweet Monday morning that laid out his case for why he thinks Trump is innocent in the Ukraine scandal, likely offering a preview of the more substantive argument he and his allies will make in the coming days and weeks.

“While Democrats continue to leak false narratives,” he wrote, “here’s what the actual witness interviews would show you: No aid was ever traded for any political investigations. Ukraine aid continued to flow WITHOUT new investigations. There is zero basis for impeachment.”

Yet some members acknowledge it will be difficult for everyone in the conference to defend Trump on substance because not all of them sit on one of the three committees that have been deposing impeachment witnesses.

“I can’t imagine how frustrating it would be to not be in the room and to be unable to read the transcript,” Zeldin said. “So most members are receiving substantive questions back home, and because they are not in the room, they can’t answer.”

Further complicating the the party’s strategy: Some of Trump’s fiercest attack dogs will be sidelined when Democrats take their impeachment inquiry public: The Democrats’ resolution is expected to put the House Intelligence Committee in charge of the public impeachment hearings, as opposed to the other panels that have been involved in the depositions.

That means Meadows, Jordan and Zeldin, who have participated in the vast majority of the depositions and have often led news conferences with reporters afterward, will be shut out from the high-profile public hearings that they have been gearing up for.

Instead, Trump’s public defense will be left in the hands of the nine Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee — the fewest number of GOP lawmakers to push back against the impeachment inquiry.

However, there are other key Trump allies on the committee, including ranking member Devin Nunes of California and Rep. John Ratcliffe ofTexas, a former prosecutor. But some of the other Republican members on the committee, like Reps. Mike Turner of Ohio and Will Hurd of Texas, may be less staunch defenders: Both have expressed concern over Trump’s communications with Ukraine.