Republicans Behaving Badly: Impeachment Edition

Desperation is making itself felt loud and clear in the halls of the Capitol. Today a group of Republicans forced their way into an impeachment inquiry hearing room which resulted in a delay in the hearings. And of course President Trump was aware of the tactic and approved of it.

A group of Republicans disrupted a hearing of the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry Wednesday by storming into a secure room at the Capitol in a protest carried out with the blessing of President Donald Trump.

The two dozen or so GOP House members are among some of Trump’s staunchest defenders in Congress, and at least some of them met with the president Tuesday where they outlined a plan to crash the hearing, according to several people familiar with the matter. Trump supported the action, saying he wanted the transcripts of the hearings released because they will exonerate him, the people said.

The Republicans said they were protesting because lawmakers who aren’t part of the three committees leading the inquiry are being blocked from access to the closed-door testimony or transcripts. The probe is now focused on whether Trump improperly pressured Ukraine to help with a politically motivated investigation.

But it was the second time that Republicans have acted to disrupt a hearing by committees conducting the impeachment inquiry.

But of course it gets worse…including some selective whining:

Florida Representative Matt Gaetz, one of the leaders of the demonstration, accused the Democrats of orchestrating “secret interviews” and “selective leaks” about the testimony of current and former Trump administration officials.

Now…let’s keep in mind that there are Republican members on ALL House committees…it’s the rule. And those Republican Congresspeople were assigned to those committees by GOP House leadership so I assume they have some expertise in the subject by now. And I can’t imagine that any of the Republicans are skipping the meetings. So they can certainly report to their leadership on what is going on ‘in the room’.

So suggesting that these are ‘secret interviews’ is utter rubbish. And ‘selective leaks’ could be coming from Republican members as easily as from Democratic members. And if there truly is evidence from these meetings that exonerates the president, you’d be damn sure that the GOP would have some ‘selective leaks’ forth with. But instead crickets…and disruption.

sigh – and then ‘they’ complain that nothing is getting done:

The standoff, which ended after more than five hours, marks an escalation of the effort by Trump and his allies to counter the Democratic-run investigation that is almost certain to lead to the president’s impeachment in the House. During a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Trump said, “Republicans have to get tougher and fight.”