{"id":1380,"date":"2019-12-11T11:23:27","date_gmt":"2019-12-11T16:23:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/?p=1380"},"modified":"2020-01-09T09:04:46","modified_gmt":"2020-01-09T14:04:46","slug":"don-beyer-holds-town-hall-at-tc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/don-beyer-holds-town-hall-at-tc\/","title":{"rendered":"Don Beyer Holds Town Hall at TC"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Alexandria Largely Voices Support of Impeachment at the Event<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Nikki Harris<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va.) held a town hall on the impeachment inquiry on November 21 in the auditorium. The inquiry deals with a July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in which Trump asked Zelensky to investigate his political rivals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyer was joined by a bipartisan panel of three national security and legal experts, including Mieke Eoyang, Vice President of Third Way\u2019s National Security Program and a frequent commentator on MSNBC; Paul Rozenweig, a senior fellow at the R Street Institute and a Department of Homeland Security Consultant; and Scott Anderson, a senior fellow at the National Security Law Program. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyer does not think that the impeachment vote is \u201cpredetermined.\u201d \u201cThe idea that Democrats have wanted to impeach the President all along, no matter what, is not true,\u201d said Beyer. \u201cYes, I am sure there are a couple that did, but most of us did not run for office to impeach the President.\u201d Beyer, for example, decided to support an impeachment investigation \u201cafter reading all 500 pages of the Mueller Report.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn fact, many of the Democrats who came out in favor of an impeachment investigation will probably lose their seats because they did,\u201d he said. \u201cPeople like Abigail Spanberger and Elaine Luria of Virginia realize that they could be one-term members, but they also believe deeply that they first have an obligation to honor their oath of office.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of the other premises out there is that we are not doing anything except impeachment,\u201d Beyer said. Congress is continuing to work on other legislation, including the cost of prescription drugs and health care, energy tax credits, prevention of gun violence, trade deals, and the prevention of a government shutdown this month, as it also investigates Trump, he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of Beyer\u2019s main messages at the Town Hall was for people from both sides to be considerate of each other\u2019s views.\u201cThere are red hats and blue hats here. So I plead for all of us to treat everyone with respect and tolerance.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mike Webb, a Republican who ran against Beyer in 2018, asked how a quid-pro-quo, a favor done in return for something, allows for impeachment \u201csince a crime is a central component to an impeachment investigation.\u201d One of the inquiry\u2019s critical elements is whether nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine was a condition for Ukraine to investigate the Bidens and the 2016 election. In response, Rozenweig said that 70 percent of impeachments in American history have not involved criminal behavior. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One woman at the Town Hall said that the country seems to have forgotten that Trump solicited foreign interference in an election, quid-pro-quo or no quid-pro-quo, and that this is an impeachable offense in and of itself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eoyang agreed, saying, \u201cLet me remind everyone that the Governor of Illinois is in jail for far less impeachable offenses [soliciting bribes for political appointments] than what Trump did.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\tAnother woman asked Beyer for insight into how his Republican colleagues are responding in private to Trump\u2019s actions. Beyer responded, \u201cLet me just say that 40 percent of the Republicans who were in office when Trump was inaugurated will be gone next year.\u201d Republicans face swift consequences when they speak out against Trump, he said, specifically Francis Rooney (R-Fl.), who expressed openness to impeachment and then chose to retire, facing severe backlash from the GOP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One man asked why Democrats have not used power of contempt, a way in which Congress can respond to a perceived obstruction of the legislative process, to hold the Trump administration accountable for not complying with House subpoenas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cContempt comes in three flavors,\u201d Rozenweig said. \u201cA civil contempt, where the House votes to hold somebody in contempt\u2026criminal contempt, which involves criminal prosecution for violation of a Congressional subpoena to show up. The problem with that is that it goes to the executive branch to get approved\u2026and the third flavor…is sending out the Sergeant at Arms to arrest somebody and bring them in.\u201d The crowd erupted in applause. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyer said in response to the applause, \u201cTo be accurate as possible, Speaker Pelosi and the Democratic leadership have been doing our best to make this non-incendiary. Before we had the vote on the impeachment process–which Republicans had been arguing for for weeks–my Democratic friends said, \u2018shhh\u2019 because they did not want people applauding or cheering. This is something serious and solemn that we do not celebrate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One woman asked why the Bidens have been \u201coff limits\u201d in the investigation. \u201cThere is reason to believe that Burisma (the Ukranian gas company Joe Biden\u2019s son, Hunter, served on) and its founder are a valid target for investigation,\u201d Eoyang said in response. \u201cHowever, neither Burisma nor Hunter Biden has done anything that would be a violation of American law. In this country, we prefer to prosecute Americans in American courts and we do not have foreign countries do it for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat will the tactics to be to explain the situation Trump has gotten himself into, since I imagine most Americans do not know what the term \u2018quid pro quo\u2019 means,\u201d one man asked. Beyer responded, \u201cIf <\/em>the house votes to impeach, there will be a trial in the Senate that will air on television.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One woman asked how this impeachment is different from Watergate and the impeachment of Bill Clinton. \u201cFirst, the Twitterverse we live in makes things happen on a 24 hour news cycle, whereas the Nixon investigation took several months.\u201d Rozenweig said in response. \u201cThe Clinton investigation was all covered by an independent counsel, so Kenneth Starr was the only witness called by Republicans. It is similar to Watergate in that new facts are coming out every day, like when we found out the Nixon White House had a taping system.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One man asked if constituents would change his vote. \u201cNo, it would not change my vote,\u201d Beyer said. \u201cAlthough we do track everything, and write down why people are calling.\u201d Beyer\u2019s chief of staff said that 75 percent of his constituents favor impeachment and the other 25 percent oppose it. \u201cIf you don\u2019t like how I vote, vote me out,\u201d Beyer said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another man asked how Beyer is ensuring there are bipartisan efforts to get all the potential witnesses in the investigation, including Hunter Biden. Beyer said, \u201cIf Hunter somehow becomes a relevant witness, we would love to have him testify, though it is hard to imagine that happening.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another man asked how impeachment proceedings will lower the divisiveness of the country. Beyer acknowledged the man who shot Steve Scalise (R-La.) at Simpson Stadium in 2017 for political reasons. \u201cWe live in a dangerous world, but we will do everything we can not to use violent language while also protecting the law.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy are Democrats ignoring Republican defenses and repeating lies?\u201d one woman asked, referencing the debunked conspiracy theory propagated by the Russians that the cybersecurity company Crowdstrike concealed a hacked server of the Democratic National Committee to help Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Eoyang responded, \u201cToday\u2019s witness, Fiona Hill, said that repeating conspiracies founded by Russians (1) benefits the Russians, (2) drives a wedge between the US and Ukraine, and (3) undermines credibility in the presidency itself.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPresident Obama did not authorize weapons we are now giving Ukraine, which is outrageous to me, but the fact that Trump is now using those weapons for political purpose is more outrageous to me,\u201d one man said. \u201cYou can both oppose US policy for promoting war with Russia, but also be outraged that Trump withheld those weapons for political purposes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One man asked if impeachment is a good idea given that an election is 11 months away. \u201cAre we going to fulfill our oath of office is a more important question to me,\u201d Beyer said. \u201cUnlike Mitch McConnell, who said in 2009, \u2018we will do everything we can to make Obama a failed president,\u2019 we will work with Trump if we can, even when it is a win for him,\u201d citing USMCA, the trade deal Congress is currently on track to pass before 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow do you feel impeachment will affect this coming election,\u201d another man asked. \u201cAs a politician, I have no idea,\u201d Beyer said. \u201cBill Clinton\u2019s approval rating hit an all time high the day he was impeached. So we are not doing this to destroy Donald Trump.\u201d Rozenweig said, \u201cOn the other hand, Al Gore still blames Clinton for the 3,000 votes he lost in Florida.\u201d (Bush led Florida by 537 votes.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyer said he will have another town hall in January and a telephone town hall in December.
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va.) held a town hall on the impeachment inquiry on November 21 in the auditorium. The inquiry deals with a July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in which Trump asked Zelensky to investigate his political rivals. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":1381,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/Screen-Shot-2019-12-11-at-11.21.35-AM.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1380"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1400,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380\/revisions\/1400"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.acpsk12.org\/theogony\/2019-2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}