Exclusive — GOP Rep. Jim Banks on Democrat Impeachment Push: ‘So Much About This that’s Fishy’

Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN), who represents northeastern Indiana in the U.S. House of Representatives, said in an exclusive interview on Breitbart News Saturday this weekend that he thinks the Democrats’ impeachment push against President Donald Trump has not moved any supporters away from the president.

“There is so much about this that’s fishy,” Banks said in the interview that aired on SiriusXM 125 the Patriot Channel. “That’s why when I hear from constituents back in northeast Indiana, they’re so skeptical of all of this. I haven’t heard from a single constituent or friend in the last few days that gives this any credibility except for those who are already part of the leftwing anti-Trump resistance to begin with. That’s a sense to me that the American people have long dismissed these sort of swamp-created narratives like this one that they don’t give it any credibility. If the Democrats had waged some sort of attempt over the past two and a half years to oppose the president on policy, and then this was the first time they talked about impeachment, then maybe people back home would take it more seriously, even if the facts don’t add up. But at this point most of my constituents—at least most of the ones I’ve heard from that aren’t a part of the resistance—aren’t giving it very much credibility at all.”

Banks added that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seems to have structured the impeachment investigation in a way that is designed to give out free publicity to many of her committee chairs, since there are a number of committees involved that probably should not be engaging in impeachment matters.

“It’s still hard to understand exactly what this process looks like. It’s not a normal process,” Banks said. “You have six different committees that will take up impeachment proceedings, including committees you might think of like the Judiciary Committee, but then you have committees that have no business getting into the impeachment business, like the Financial Services committee. What does that have to do with the impeachment proceedings? But here’s what it has to do—you have six different longtime Democrat figures like Maxine Waters on the Financial Services committee who wants her day in the sun, she wants to be on the evening news having had an impeachment hearing. You have all the Democrats clamoring for that. That’s what this is all about. The Democrats are playing to their base, placating the far-left wing component of the Democrat base who want to go after this president and have kept going after him since he was inaugurated,and that’s what’s led us to where we are today.”

Banks pointed to Pelosi’s interview on Morning Joe on MSNBC last week and noted that Pelosi seems to have given up on the possibility of a Democrat beating President Trump in 2020 and now is just going to try to smear him the best she can.

“She said she was against impeachment because she didn’t think he was worth it, but now that he might actually get re-elected, we need to go down the impeachment path—which sort of echoes the words of a lot of other Democrats who have been on the impeachment train for a long time,” Banks said. “The reason they’re going after impeachment now is their premiere inevitable candidate isn’t so inevitable anymore. You can’t talk about the phone call between President Trump and the president of Ukraine without talking about the corruption of the Bidens and a $50,000 per month contract for Hunter Biden to sell influence and peddle access to his father, who was the vice president at the time, and overall to the Obama administration. So, there is a lot of irony here and the timing is suspect—that deserves a lot more scrutiny.”

Banks added that Hunter Biden’s arrangement with Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma is on its face “corruption” because there was no other reason for Hunter Biden to be working for the company other than to sell access to and influence over his father then-Vice President Joe Biden.

“If that’s not corruption, I don’t know what corruption is,” Banks said. “Peddling access to your father and to the Obama administration because your last name is Biden—I mean, he had no qualifications or any background at all in energy, he had no qualifications or any background at all in Ukraine or relationships in Ukraine or business in Ukraine. He had a $50,000 per month contract to be on the board of a company in Ukraine peddling access to his father who was the Vice President. Inherently, that is corruption and it deserves scrutiny.”

Banks also said he read the transcript of Trump’s call with Ukraine’s president multiple times and has found nothing wrong with President Trump’s conversation. in fact, he said he thinks what President Trump was doing was “very well-intentioned” and part of a broader effort by the president to lift the “dark cloud” of the fake Russia collusion hoax that has hung over the country since the beginning of his presidency.

“I’ve got to tell you, I’ve read the transcript over and over and over again and there’s something that strikes me about it—I haven’t heard anyone else talk about it. Maybe you can unpack this with me. It’s almost like the president is suggesting if you have information that helps get to the bottom of how all of this Russian collusion hoax began with, started out with—and maybe it included the Bidens, maybe it included Hillary Clinton, maybe it included Obama administration officials, then do me a favor and help us put it to bed so that our country can move on. It struck me, ever since I was sworn in as a new congressman at the same time that President Trump came to office, a couple of weeks later was inaugurated, our country has been hung up with a dark cloud over us of the Russian collusion hoax that has prevented us from fulfilling a mandate and an agenda that this president was elected to. Even in spite of that, this president has gotten great things done for our country, but there’s so much more that we could have done if we wouldn’t have been hung up in this day-by-day controversy of hoaxes brought out by Democrats who want to overturn the 2016 election. I don’t know if that makes any sense, but as I read the transcript, it seems as though the president is very well-intentioned in what he is asking for.”
LISTEN TO GOP REP. JIM BANKS ON BREITBART NEWS SATURDAY: