WTF Just Happened Today

Wednesday, December 4, 2019

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1/ Trump committed impeachable offenses, according to three constitutional scholars who testified during the House Judiciary Committee's first impeachment hearing into Trump's efforts to pressure Ukraine for political gain. Noah Feldman, a professor at Harvard, Michael Gerhardt, a professor at the University of North Carolina, and Pamela Karlan, a Stanford law professor, all agreed that Trump was guilty of "high crimes and misdemeanors" for soliciting foreign assistance and withholding a White House meeting and military assistance from Ukraine as leverage for political favors. Gerhardt added that Trump's actions toward Ukraine were worse than Richard Nixon's misconduct during Watergate. Karlan also told lawmakers that Trump's attempt to "strong arm a foreign leader" would not be considered politics as usual. Feldman, Gerhardt, and Karlan were invited to testify by the Democrats. Republicans also tapped their own law professor, Jonathan Turley, to testify, who suggested that the impeachment case is "slipshod" and premature. Turley also disagreed that Trump conditioning a White House meeting and releasing military aid on whether Ukraine would announce the investigations he wanted amounted to a bribe. (New York Times / Washington Post / NBC News)

• ???? Quotable: "The very idea that a president might seek the aid of a foreign government in his re-election campaign would have horrified" America's Founding Fathers. –Pamela Karlan

• ???? Quotable: "On the basis of the testimony and evidence before the House, President Trump has committed impeachable high crimes and misdemeanors by corruptly abusing the office of the presidency." –Noah Feldman

• ???? Quotable: "The record compiled thus far shows that the president has committed several impeachable offenses, including bribery, abuse of power in soliciting a personal favor from a foreign leader to benefit his political campaign, obstructing Congress and obstructing justice." –Michael Gerhardt

• "Are you ready?" House Speaker Nancy Pelosi asked fellow Democrats during a closed-door Capitol meeting before the Judiciary Committee's proceedings began. While Pelosi didn't announce a firm decision or timeline for voting on Trump's impeachment, Democrats responded with a standing ovation, indicating they wanted to continue to press the inquiry. (Washington Post / Associated Press)

• Takeaways from the Judiciary Committee's first impeachment hearing. (Washington Post / CNN)

• Live blogs: New York Times / ABC News / The Gua...

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