On the recordFebruary 5, 2020
Mr. President, I rise today to officially declare that I will vote against both Articles of Impeachment brought against President Trump by the very partisan and, quite frankly, ridiculous House of Representatives. I know my position is hardly a surprise, but it is almost as unsurprising as the House impeaching the President, to begin with. Since the moment he was sworn into office, Democrats have schemed to remove Donald Trump from office. It is not my opinion. I take them at their word. Their fixation on his removal was a conclusion in search of a justification, which they manufactured from a phone conversation between world leaders leaked--leaked--by one of the many career bureaucrats who seem to have forgotten that they work for the elected leaders in this country, not the other way around. So the two Articles of Impeachment before this body today, in my view, are without merit. They are an affront, in fact, to this institution and to our Constitution, representing the very same partisan derangement that worried our Founding Fathers so much that they made the threshold for impeachment this high. The Senate exists exactly for moments like this. I didn't arrive at my conclusion to support acquittal hastily or flippantly, and I don't believe any of my colleagues did either, including those who come to a different conclusion from mine. Despite being sent such flawed Articles by the House, the Senate did in fact dutifully and solemnly follow its constitutional obligation.…





