Elise Stefanik Batters Schiff with His Own Words on the ‘Whistleblower’

Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) brought House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s (D-CA) past remarks on the so-called “whistleblower” to the forefront during Friday’s public impeachment hearing, reading excerpts of reports of his previous comments aloud in order to demonstrate the “duplicity and just the abuse of power of that we are continuing to see.”

Stefanik used part of her time to list off the remarks Schiff made regarding the “whistleblower” in September – remarks that she and her GOP colleagues have gotten their hands slapped for.

“Since the Chairman has gaveled out all of my colleagues with their unanimous consent, I am going to read for the record many of the chairman’s comments in September of the importance of hearing from the whistleblower,” she began.

“Again Ambassador, thank you for your patience, thank you for your service. But since we haven’t been able to conduct ourselves in normal procedures, I’m just going to use the five minutes for this,” she continued.

“September 29 in the Wall Street Journal: ‘The whistleblower at the center of the impeachment investigation of President Trump will testify in the House very soon.’ This is a quote by the chairman,” Stefanik noted.

“USA Today September 29: ‘Talking with ABC News This Week, Schiff, the Democrat who chairs the House Intelligence Committee, said the whistleblower would testify very soon and the only thing standing in the way was getting security clearances for the attorney representing the whistleblower so they could attend the testimony,” she continued.

“From Vox September 29: ‘Rep. Adam Schiff said Sunday the whistleblower at the center of a growing scandal surrounding President Donald Trump will testify before the House Intelligence Committee very soon,'” she added, continuing to read reports from outlets like CNN, the Washington Post, Huff Post, New York Post, and Washington Times.

“These are all quotes from chairman Adam Schiff,” Stefanik reminded the room.

“I can keep going, but again. The chairman refused to allow us to put these into the record with unanimous consent, so I read those out,” she said, noting the importance of protecting whistleblowers from retaliation and firing.

“We want to make sure whistleblowers are able to come forward, but in this case, the fact that we are getting criticized by Chairman Adam Schiff for statements that he himself had made early on in this process shows the duplicity and just the abuse of power of that we are continuing to see,” she concluded.