The Daily - The Impeachment of President Donald J. Trump

Episode Date: December 19, 2019

The House of Representatives has impeached President Trump, charging him with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. We traveled to Michigan to understand how a fractious Democratic Party ultimately united around impeachment, having started the year divided over the issue. Guests: Representative Elissa Slotkin and Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrats of Michigan. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background reading:Mr. Trump became only the third president in American history to be impeached, as the House charged him with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The votes were largely along party lines.Moderate Democrats encouraged their party to begin the impeachment inquiry. Now, those representatives face a reckoning with that decision.Are you confused by the impeachment process? Here’s how it works.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Bavaro. This is The Daily. Today, the United States House of Representatives has impeached President Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. My colleague Lisa Chow and I, on the story of how a fractious Democratic Party, which started the year divided on impeachment, ultimately united around it. It's Thursday, December 19th. And how far are we from Holly?

35 miles from the home. Okay. So yeah, we will get there in time. Yeah. You want to describe what you're seeing outside the window? So, we're driving by a strip mall about 45 minutes outside Detroit. There's a Best Buy, a Michael's, a PetSmart, a Lowe's,

a Chipotle, and a DSW. This is a solid, solid, solid strip mall. Yeah. So, Michael, why are we driving through the strip malls of Detroit? So, we are headed to the home of Congresswoman Elisa Slotkin.

Elisa Slotkin has a lead of more than 2,000 votes against Republican incumbent Mike Bishop. She is a moderate Democrat who won her seat. I mean, I won in a district that was a Republican district, so the only way. She flipped a red district and turned it blue in 2018. And in doing so, she helped the Democrats win back the House. The blue wave. The blue wave that swept Democrats into power in the House. But the moment she gets into office...

Because we're going to go in there and we're going to impeach the motherfucker. People like Rashida Tlaib, the congresswoman who represents a district just to the south here that we just drove through, they're saying that the findings of the Russia inquiry merit impeachment. And Slotkin is not having any of it. This is from Congresswoman Slotkin of Michigan. Impeachment is not what people are coming up to me in the grocery store and talking to me about. They want to know...

She is skeptical of that. She's opposed to it. It's not part of her political brand to want to impeach the president. And then all of a sudden the whistleblower report comes out and she reads it and she's very troubled. And she and a handful of her moderate swing district Democratic House colleagues write an op-ed in The Washington Post calling for an impeachment inquiry. They write, we have devoted our lives to the service and security of our country.

Now we join as a unified group to uphold that. And their voice carries a tremendous amount of weight because they are moderates, because they help win back the House for Democrats. And shortly afterwards, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opens an impeachment inquiry. And shortly afterwards, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opens an impeachment inquiry. I'm announcing the House of Representatives moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. The president must be held accountable. No one is above the wall. And right away it's clear that there are political consequences for Slotkin.

I'm going to wait for the facts. I'm going to look at them judiciously. I'm going to do what I was trained to do, which is to look at the facts. I'm going to look at them judiciously. I'm going to do what I was trained to do, which is to look at the investment. We went to three town halls in her district and just listened as constituents pelted her with questions about why she was doing this. Two months go by, the impeachment inquiry unfolds, hearings happen, a report is filed, and now she has to make a decision. Is she going to vote to impeach the president, or is she going to vote not to impeach the president? Oh, whoa, we're going into her driveway. We're doing it. I think it's okay. I mean, we're a little early. What are you going to do?

We are arriving at Slotkin's house in the middle of these final hours of deliberation for her on impeachment. She has told her constituents that she's going to announce her decision on Monday morning. We are talking to her on Sunday night. How do you feel? I feel good. I mean, I feel dehydrated. Did you actually eat your granola bar? I did not eat my granola bar.

It's hard to eat and hold a microphone. You're going to regret it when you're in the middle of this interview and you're starving. Hi, guys. Come on in. Hey, I'm Melissa. Congresswoman, it's so nice to see you. So nice to meet you. Hi. Thank you for letting us. Come on in. come on in. Hi. I'm Melissa. Congresswoman, it's so nice to meet you. So nice to meet you.

Hi. Thank you for letting us. Lisa. Come on in. Come on in. This is a truly... Oh yeah, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I think of you guys as audio and so I'm not doing a very nice job. But this is 1895 farmhouse. My family bought it in the 50s. We held off lighting a fire because we didn't know if the noise would be annoying. But we can definitely light a fire. And this, I should just say, this desk, for whatever it's worth, is sort of one of the big heirlooms in my family. This was my great-grandfather's desk. And if you see on the plate here.

It's kind of like a resolute desk. Yes. So it was used by Lindley Garrison, Secretary of War, 1913 to 1916. During the presidency of Woodrow Wilson. Yeah. Jeez. So that was a gift to my great-grandfather, Sam Slotkin, and it's been passed down. Is this where you go to make big decisions? This is where I make my big decisions. Is this that, this three-wing binder looks like it's been passed down. Is this where you go to make big decisions? This is where I make

my big decisions. Is this that, this three-wing binder looks like it's the House Intelligence Report? Yes, this is, well, it's a lot, I guess, more than that. It is, let's see, my team has diligently tabbed it out for me. So this is the impeachment documents that came down, I guess, what now? Yeah, but from the Judiciary Committee. Yes, from the Judiciary Committee. This is the HPSI report, the House Intelligence Report. Let me see this. You're welcome. Clinton articles of impeachment, Nixon articles of impeachment.

And I see you've done a bunch of underlining. Yeah. For me, this is frankly a very standard way that I look at things which just comes from my training as a CIA officer, which is sequester yourself away, get all the original base documents, and then you do some historical research and then make an objective decision, not based on what you see in the news or what someone's telling you. Thanks for letting us interrupt it. Where would you guys like to set up? Would you like to be...

Where would you like us to set up? Take the dining room. All right, we'll go set ourselves up. Sure. Okay. Check, check, check, check. How am I sounding? Okay.

So, Congressman, thank you for letting us into your home. Of course. During a really important moment for you. Yeah. The last time we talked to you, you had just made a decision to support an impeachment inquiry, which ended up being a very consequential decision. Yeah. Tell me what the last couple of months have been like for you as that inquiry has unfolded. What's that experience been like? Well, I would say it's probably been some of the most intense months I've had

as a working professional, that's for sure. The principal reason why I decided to come out back in September in support of an inquiry after many, many months of not supporting impeachment or an inquiry was this very basic idea that the President of the United States reached out to a foreign party and solicited help in influencing an American election. And confirming or denying that very basic idea was pretty important to me in this process. That fact pattern. That fact pattern. And I was in national security for a long time. We are in the business of pressuring governments to do things that we want. That happens all the time. And anyone who gets to a senior enough level has been in that position.

The difference here was that the president was doing it for his own personal political gain, not for the national security interests of the United States. own personal political gain, not for the national security interests of the United States. So for me, the central idea was whether the president asked for foreigners to get involved in the American political process. So did the inquiry and did the hearings establish that? Well, that's what I've been trying to parse through. What became clearer and clearer through what I read and what the reporting produced was that you have a lot of people who were aware that, for instance, that it was held up because they were waiting for the Ukrainians to live up to their end of the bargain. To conduct these investigations.

Yes, to announce investigations. That's the hardest thing for me about my peers who may decide not to vote on these articles is that do they accept that it's okay to invite foreign help into the American political process? I think I just watched Lindsey Graham say that he's okay with it in an interview. Well, I'm sorry, and I think that history will show them to be misguided. And maybe it's because I was a CIA officer, but I am comfortable making hard decisions that aren't popular because I know that they're the right thing for the security of the country. I was asked to do that over and over and over again in my prior life. And that's the same approach I take to these decisions. I hear you hinting that a hard decision that you're capable of making may be heading in one direction.

Well, listen, I mean, no offense, but I'm not going to tell the New York Times before I tell my own constituents. It's why we're having a big town hall tomorrow. My hope and my responsibility is to be transparent with the constituents of the 8th district, to be available, to listen to their current concerns and answer them, and to be honest with them. So understanding that you're not going to be disclosing your intentions just now at this table in your house, I want to talk about your constituents for just a moment. Sure. Based on my understanding of your district, which voted for Trump by a healthy margin, and according to you, does not seem to support impeachment as a whole. You could find yourself very much at odds with your own constituents.

Are you comfortable with that? This is what it means to be an elected leader. You have to make tough calls. And in a district like this, I'm never going to make everyone happy. If I lose my seat because I stood up for my principles, that's okay. I, of course, want to be reelected, and I want to maintain the House majority. I think it's an important check and balance. But I'm not going to compromise my principles just to keep that job.

I'm just not. And I hope that people want that kind of an elected representative. I do have to ask you the kind of political version of this question, which is mathematically your vote isn't required to impeach the president. And so there are kind of two ways to look at this. On the one hand, if you vote yes, that would be very politically risky. The other way to look at this is that if you vote no, that's its own set of risks. Because as a moderate, you would be sending a message that the people in the middle who started all this, who said there should be an inquiry, don't think there's enough there to actually impeach.

And that would be a very complicated message to send in 2020 when the president's running for elections. Essentially, that impeachment was a project of the far left. And so there's basically a ton of risk no matter what you do. And I wonder how you weigh those risks. Well, I mean, listen, voting on articles of impeachment is right up there with Congress's role in declaring war. I mean, it's got to be one of the top two things that a member of Congress will ever vote on in their career, most important things. that a member of Congress will ever vote on in their career, most important things. So when you have a vote like that, it's beyond that political calculus.

I think it should be. It certainly is for me. And I've certainly had people propose to me, you know, just vote no, save your seat. Your vote isn't needed anyway. I've had people say that to me. And what do you say? I have to look at myself in the mirror. Like, I have to come away from this experience with a sense that I haven't done

what so many people here in Michigan think of elected officials. I cannot just become that cynical, political person who just orients their major decisions around what would save their seat. Or even their party. You know, we have the president admitting that he reached out to a foreigner to ask for help in an American political election. If you think about that outside the normal insanity that we

have right now on TV and all the events that are happening, if you think about that, which I've been trying to do today here quietly at my farm, that is wrong. And I think that sending a signal in the most clear terms we can is important enough even to risk the majority. So it's 7.30 on Sunday night. Yeah.

And you're planning to make an announcement tomorrow morning in front of your constituents. How are you doing inside? How are you feeling? I actually feel pretty clear. I've done the work. I've kept an open mind. And I've sat with the documents. I've sat with the transcripts. And I've made my best assessment. So I'm going to try and be as present and available as I can. I trust my voters. I do. And I think... Trust them to do what? I trust them as Michiganders to give me a chance to explain and for them to give me the benefit of the doubt. I wish you the best of luck tomorrow. Thank you. Thanks very much. Thank you.

We'll be right back. Hey, hey! Ho, ho! Slotkin's got to go! Hey, hey! Ho, ho! He's got to go! Hey, hey! Ho, ho!

So, Lisa, I headed back to New York to host the show. You stayed in Michigan. So what happens the next day after we had talked to Alyssa Slotkin? So the next day I arrive very early and already there are people there. Ho, ho, Alyssa Slotkin's gotta go. And they're upset, they're pissed. And that's because Slotkin had already announced her decision in the local paper that morning. Of course, we had both understood from the interview where this was going.

Yes, but she hadn't yet told her constituents. And so in this op-ed, she says very clearly that she is voting yes on both articles of impeachment. She must go now. Country over party. Impeach and remove Trump. So people are lining up to get inside the auditorium where the town hall meeting will be held. And outside there is a bunch of protesters with big signs saying, Impeach Slotkin. Keep Trump. In bright red letters. And some of them are carrying much smaller signs that say,

We have your back. Which is a message to Slavkin. Exactly. Do you understand that? You're yelling. Do you like Russia? I mean, very quickly, people start yelling at each other. Because I have to talk over your people.

Do you like Russia? Do you like Russia? Because I'm a veteran and I do not support Russia. Have a discussion. You walked up to me and you asked me about Ukraine, which is a Russian... The one exchange that I found particularly memorable was this veteran. You're standing here as an American, as an American, talking Russian... A pro-Slovakian person who got very emotional.

And she basically said, you're spouting Russian talking points to me to say that Ukraine interfered in our election. Our flag is red, white, and blue, not red and blue. It is red, white, and blue. Put your country first for once, okay? I am. What would you like to discuss? And so people are really challenging each other's patriotism. What? What? You can't do what? Are you going to listen?

What did Ukraine do? Tell me what Ukraine did. I bragged about bribing Ukraine with a billion dollars. Do you want to hear it? They're just looking at the facts in a totally different way. What crime? Name one. Name one crime. You jumped in. I'm listening. Name one crime. Abuse of power. Okay, what exactly did he do to abuse power? Say one. Having a foreign country medal in the election, that's

one. The Democrats did. You really are insane, aren't you? Open your eyes. Okay, so, finally we head into the auditorium and it's a large room. People are registering and then walking into the auditorium and it's a large room. People are registering and then walking

into the auditorium. The room's packed. How many chairs are here? 418. So we set up for about 400 people. Okay. It's filling up. Yeah. There are tons of media, national and local press covering this event. Can you tell me where you're from? The Flint Journal and MLive.com. MERS News. I'm here for NPR today. Simone from Roll Call. The Detroit Free Press. The Oakland Press. Detroit News. The New York Times.

Huffington Post. Washington Post. Associated Press. The Michigan Advance. CNN. And it's clear that this is the story, which is moderate Democrats and their vulnerability in this vote that they're taking. Let's please welcome to the stage Congresswoman Slotkin.

So what happens next? She's introduced by one of her staffers and she takes the stage. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you guys. Okay. Okay. And immediately the crowd erupts in both cheers and boos.

Okay, guys. Okay. All right, everybody. Thank you. Okay. Well, I'm thrilled to see such a great turnout today. Please, please let her speak. Okay. And she basically can't get a word in let's please respect the people around you who are here to listen there is a very loud group in the corner of the room that is making it almost impossible

for her to be heard by the rest of the room so in an attempt to be transparent, I'm going to walk you through my logic. And I know it's clear that we don't all agree. I thought we needed to let the election of 2020 United States came out and his lawyer came out and said very specifically. And they're screaming all sorts of things. Like what? And asked for an investigation. Liar. Shame on you.

And that is very different than how presidents typically wield their power. Right. To be honest with you, I worked at the National Security Council under George Bush. I worked under the National Security Council under Barack Obama. And presidents regularly wield their power. So the Michiganders don't quite give her the chance to explain herself that she told us she'd been hoping for. Not really.

They regularly leverage their position to influence other countries. That's a normal part of what a president does. But what was fundamentally different for me is that the president. And there's one guy in particular in the back. The Democrats are run by the squad. Who screams. The Democrats are run by the squad. You're part of the squad. Democrats are a party of the squad. The squad runs the Democrats. Right. The four best-known House freshman liberals.

Exactly. And at one point, he even gets up and yells, You belong to Rashida. You belong to Rashida. And what's so fascinating about this moment is that when we started reporting at the beginning of this year on the freshman class of Democrats, it was exactly that conflation that people like Alyssa Slotkin were trying to avoid. Right. Because they knew the Republicans would try to lump all the Democrats together as Trump-hating left-wing progressives. Right. They would try to make a Slotkin and a Tlaib indistinguishable.

Exactly. Even though they're very different. Exactly. And Slotkin has been so cautious in this process. She's been thorough. She has had careful reasoning. But none of that matters

in this moment. She is Rashida Tlaib, according to those protesters. Do you stand for your party or do you stand for your constitution? Then let her say that. Let her say that, that she is not a part of the squad. She did. No, she did not. She has to say. She said.

Let her say that. I think that's exactly what gets under Slotkin's skin. This feeling of not being understood in the way that she understands herself. That no matter what she says, no matter what she believes, a significant number of her constituents are just going to see her as this kind of caricature of a Democrat. And they're never going to agree with her, and she's not going to be able to get through to them. You could tell from her voice that maybe, you know, she expected this. Maybe this scene didn't surprise her.

But it's still hard. All right, everyone. Thank you very much for coming out today. Please leave safely. Thank you. Thank you for listening. Appreciate it. Thank you for being good citizens. So the auditorium is cleared out. Now that's over. And I guess next we're headed to Washington to cover the actual vote. We'll be right back. Did you bring water or did did I just, like, idiotically left my water on the other side of the Capitol?

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. Okay. So, Michael, where are we right now? So we're in the U.S. Capitol, standing just outside the House chamber. You can kind of see it through these double doors. And inside that chamber... House will be in order. There's about six more hours of debate happening.

A lot of it very predictable. Democrats are saying that after great care and lots of prayer, they're taking a principled vote to impeach the president. Republicans are saying Democrats have this president. Democrats have made something out of absolutely nothing and that this is a sham. They think Hillary Clinton should be the president and they want to fix that. And I'm kind of imagining Alyssa Slotkin in there preparing for a monumental vote that a lot of people in her district have just said they don't want her to take. But there's actually somebody else that I have been thinking about. Congresswoman.

Oh, hey, Michael. How's it going? And that's Rashida Tlaib. Because she has been talking about impeachment from the beginning. Hi. Hi. How are you? I'm good. Good. You look well. Yeah. Today is, you know, something that I've been talking to my 14-year-old about, Adam. He's so funny. Before he went to school, I had a conversation with him. What did you say? Oh, just, you know, told you mommy's going to follow through on making sure the bully is not going to remain using the most powerful position in the world to his personal gain and personal profit. I want him to still believe that people have the power and that the truth always prevails.

And so I feel like this gets us closer to that. So a lot of the focus in this impeachment vote has been on the moderates who are putting themselves at political risk in taking this vote. I'm mindful that it was in January of this year that you came into office and pretty much immediately generated a little bit of news by calling for the impeachment of the president long before Speaker Pelosi and many of the moderate Democrats were ready to take that action. I think I was actually here with you in the Capitol when that happened.

And we had talked at that point about the fear that you and other progressive freshmen in the House might push the party to the left in a way that could jeopardize those moderate colleagues. And now here we are, right? So I wonder what you make of that journey of the whole House Democratic delegation. You know, I don't like it when people say we're moving folks to the left, or moving folks to the right. We're moving folks towards the truth. To me, that's nonpartisan. The fact of the matter is, is something was wrong here. Children were being caged at the right. We're moving folks towards the truth. To me, that's nonpartisan. The fact of the matter is, is something was wrong here. Children were being caged at the border. He was profiting off of being a sitting CEO in the White House. There was a number of impeachable offenses before I even got here. And these are things that I was hearing from my residents all the time. But that's not what today's news is about.

Oh, of course not. You know, one of the things I said after this happened, after, you know, the Ukraine call happened, is that that's what got us to 218. I mean, look, I'm not a person that pushed this opinion of what was happening from the White House onto my colleagues. That was not my intention. My intention was to serve the residents of the 13th District. They elected me out of a number of candidates saying that this is also about electing the jury that will hold this president accountable. And that's exactly what I did from day one. For many of my colleagues, they didn't run on this issue, right? But, I mean, the time has found us, as Speaker Pelosi kept saying.

And it's very true. I think many were very hesitant. But the Ukraine call took them over the edge for many of these folks. So let me talk about one of those districts. Because earlier this week, Lisa and I went to Michigan, your state. We drove through your district on the way to the district of one of your colleagues, Alyssa Slotkin, who flipped her seat from Republican to Democrat. And the threat to her seat and the anger of constituents who now know she's going to be voting for impeachment, it was really apparent right away. There was a lot of fury directed at her. Yeah, I mean, I think, Michael, it's really important for folks to know, you know, Congresswoman Alyssa Slotkin's district is so different from mine. Right. And she has to

represent her district. I think for my residents and I, there's a sense of liberation. They've been calling with excitement of finally some sense of accountability. I think when we see injustices, we see things that just don't make any sense. We feel like it's hurting the country, hurting people, that people are actually in true, real emotional pain from things around the racist, abusive power to even threats to our national security. It creates so much anxiety around a country. And for folks, they just want to feel like somebody's fighting for them, that somebody here has their back. This feels like a moment of that for them. Yes. I think they want people to speak up. It's like, why aren't they saying anything? Why aren't people doing anything about it?

Isn't that illegal? Shouldn't those folks be in jail? You know, these are the kinds of things I hear from my residents all the time. So for today, it is very much an incredible moment that they finally feel a sense that they are believed. And so, yeah, that's the one thing I respect that she has a different district than mine. I don't impose my opinion onto her district, and I think she doesn't do the same to mine. Let me create a picture for you, and I want to know what you think of it. The House flips. Democrats lose it. The president is impeached, but just in the House, not in the Senate. Is it worth it? Is it worth it?

But yes. Why isn't it worth it? It is protecting our future. Do you know, if we always decided to function from political strategy, we wouldn't get things done. Would Affordable Care Act pass? It wasn't perfect. But you know what? We actually saved lives. And some people couldn't come back because they voted for that. But if we went to go back, do we want to do it all over again? Yeah, we would. We would to save people's lives. And for us, this is about saving our democracy. And sometimes that means putting our neck out. And yes, they're going to use this against us and try to vilify what we tried to do, which is put our country first.

Is that easier to say when you're from a new district? Absolutely it is. But don't think about my life hasn't been threatened. Don't think that the first actual coffee hour I had, I didn't have the same protesters that Alyssa Slotkin had that said impeach Rashida Tlaib. I have three people now getting prosecuted for threatening my life. You know, I feel like in many ways my life has completely been transformed because I will not stand down. I will not allow this corrupt president to abuse his power, nor put people in the pain that they are going through right now because he decided to obstruct Congress, that he decided that he doesn't really care about the process and the rules and

the laws. You don't take over the United States of America. You get elected and you serve it. And so we're going to serve the United States of America today by holding this president accountable and setting a very clear message that we won't allow this danger precedent in our history to continue because it could be a Democrat or Republican down the line that will do the same and get away with it. And that to me is what is at stake more than being in the majority or winning an election. I know you have to go. I want to thank you for spending the last year with us. Yes, of course. Thank you so much. It's been an incredible journey. Tell your story.

Thank you. Thank you, Michael. I'm speaking on the floor. Good luck with your speech. Yeah, thank you. Bye. Good luck with your speech. Thank you. I appreciate it. Madam Speaker, I now yield one minute to the gentlelady from Michigan, Ms. Tlaib. Gentlelady is recognized for one minute.

Thank you. I rise today in support of impeachment. I learn so much every single day from my residents at home. Their common sense and understanding of what is right and wrong is centered on why they oppose any person using the most powerful position in the world for personal gain. Doing nothing here, Madam Speaker, is not an option. Looking away from these crimes against our country is not an option. Looking away from these crimes against our country is not an option. This is about protecting the future of our nation and our democracy from corruption, abuse of power, criminal cover-ups, and bribery. And this, Madam Speaker, this vote is also for my sons and the future of so many generations.

So I urge my colleagues to please vote yes on these articles of impeachment. With that, Madam Speaker, I yield. Gentleman from Georgia. Thank you, Madam Speaker. At this time, I yield a minute and a half. Shortly after 8 p.m. on Wednesday night, the House voted on the first article of impeachment against President Trump,

abuse of power. On this vote, the yeas are 230, the nays are 197, present is one, Article 1 is adopted. Soon after, a vote was held on the second article of impeachment, obstruction of Congress. On this vote, the yeas are 229, the nays are 198, present is one. Article two is adopted. With that, Donald J. Trump became the third president in American history to be impeached by the House of Representatives. With today's illegal, unconstitutional, and partisan impeachment, the do-nothing Democrats, and they are do-nothing, all they want to do is focus on this, what they could be doing, are declaring their deep hatred and disdain for the American voter.

During a rally in Michigan, as the House voted, President Trump described the impeachment vote as an attack on his supporters and predicted that it would backfire on Democrats at the polls. This lawless partisan impeachment is a political suicide march for the Democrat Party. Have you seen my polls in the last four weeks? It's crazy. That's it for The Daily.

I'm Michael Bavaro. See you tomorrow.