GOP Report Finds No Impeachable Acts, Just ‘Disagreements’

(Bloomberg) -- A report from GOP lawmakers concludes the Democratic-led House investigation of Donald Trump failed to establish any impeachable offenses and instead paints a picture of “unelected bureaucrats” disagreeing with the president's style, world view and foreign policy decisions.

Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee released their conclusions Monday as the panel's Democrats are letting members review the majority report after two months of gathering evidence and interviewing witnesses to understand Trump's actions regarding Ukraine. Democrats are expected to release their findings this week before the Judiciary Committee's first public hearing on Wednesday.

The Republican lawmakers say evidence gathered during the inquiry doesn't establish that Trump withheld U.S. security assistance to pressure Ukraine to investigate the president's political rivals for the purpose of benefiting him in the 2020 election campaign, or that he sought to obstruct the House's investigation of those charges.

The GOP findings will be sent along with the Democratic report to the Judiciary Committee, which will begin hearings this week to determine whether to bring articles of impeachment against Trump. The Republican document asserts the Democrats' impeachment case rests “almost entirely on hearsay, presumption and emotion” to arrive at a “predetermined outcome.”

Read More: Four Impeachment Scholars to Open Judiciary Impeachment Hearing

The report says Trump's request that Ukraine announce an investigation of Joe Biden and his son's involvement with a Ukrainian energy company was not part of a quid pro quo, bribery or extortion. Republicans also argue that Trump was justified in citing corruption as a reason to delay meeting with Ukraine's president and to withhold security assistance that had already been approved by Congress.

“Where there are ambiguous facts, the Democrats interpret them in a light most unfavorable to the president,” Republicans wrote. “The Democrats also flatly disregard any perception of potential wrongdoing with respect to Hunter Biden's presence on the board of Burisma Holdings or Ukrainian influence in the 2016 election.”

House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff said in an emailed statement that the Republican report “ignores voluminous evidence” that Trump withheld military aid and a White House meeting while pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political rival.

“In so doing, the president undermined our national security and the integrity of our election” and violated his oath of office, Schiff said.

Trump on Monday tweeted his support for the GOP findings, repeating his plea for people to read the memo the White House released in September of his phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Trump often describes the call as “perfect,” even though administration officials testified that they were troubled by Trump's mention of domestic politics and a whistle-blower raised concerns that the president acted illegally.

The GOP document also defends the role that Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, played in what State Department witnesses described as back-channel diplomacy at odds with official U.S. foreign policy goals.

”There is nothing inherently improper with Mayor Giuliani's involvement,” the report says, “because the Ukrainians knew that he was a conduit to convince President Trump that President Zelenskiy was serious about reform.”

Read More: Democrats Set Course for Impeachment as Trump Stays on Sidelines

Republicans in the document criticize the Democrats' impeachment inquiry as relying heavily on career public servants who they describe as opposing Trump's approach to foreign policy. The document also criticizes the whistle-blower complaint that kicked off the impeachment inquiry in September, even though White House officials, impeachment witnesses and Trump himself have since corroborated the fundamental facts in that complaint.

“Their disagreements with President Trump's policies and their discomfort with President Trump's actions set in motion the anonymous, secondhand whistle-blower complaint,” the report says. “For Democrats, impeachment is a tool for settling political scores and re-litigating election results with which they disagreed.”

The report was put out by the ranking Republicans on the three committees leading the impeachment inquiry: Devin Nunes, of the Intelligence Committee; Jim Jordan, of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee; and Michael McCaul, of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

To contact the reporter on this story: Billy House in Washington at bhouse5@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kevin Whitelaw at kwhitelaw@bloomberg.net, Laurie Asséo, Anna Edgerton

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