The answer from Tom Cotton to my email about witnesses and documents [View all]

[Arkansas Granny]

at the Senate trial.

Thank you for contacting me about the impeachment trial of President Trump. It is good to hear from you, as always.

On July 25, 2019, President Trump spoke over the phone with Ukraine’s newly-elected President, Volodymyr Zelensky. After the call, someone within the intelligence community who was not on the call filed a whistleblower complaint against the president. According to reports, the whistleblower coordinated with the staff of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman, Adam Schiff, staff before filing the complaint. After the whistleblower complaint was filed, Democratic Party leaders in the House of Representatives used it to justify opening an impeachment inquiry.

Despite an unprecedented act of transparency by President Trump in releasing the transcript of his call with the Ukrainian leader, the Democratic Party nevertheless plunged headlong into a rushed and partisan impeachment process, the conclusion of which seemed predetermined from the start. They ignored precedent, gave no due process rights to President Trump to defend himself against the accusations, and refused to provide Republicans in Congress with the authority to call their own witnesses. The Democratic Party claimed it was necessary to rush the impeachment because it was an “urgent” matter, yet then they chose not to even send the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate for trial for four long weeks.

The House Democrats then sought to plunge the Senate into a months-long fishing expedition by asking it to finish the House’s work for it and subpoena witnesses that the House never bothered to pursue. It is clear that that the impeachment effort against President Trump has been nothing more than a political exercise by the Democrats in the House, with no regard for truth and with the obvious purpose of leaving a cloud hanging over President Trump while distracting from our work on behalf of the American people. It is a shame that the Democratic Party chose not to dedicate even a fraction of this legislative energy to improving the lives of hardworking Americans instead.

I’m honored to serve as your senator. You, your family, and our state will remain on my mind and close to my heart in my work. Always feel free to call my office at [phone] or visit www.cotton.senate.gov . Be sure to drop by my office and say hello if you ever visit our nation’s capital.

Sincerely,

Tom Cotton
United States Senator