Democrat on Impeachment: Republicans Have Had Enough ‘Public Time’

Democrats are tired of public hearings in the impeachment inquiry and plan to proceed regardless of what happens in the House Judiciary Committee, according to a Democrat interviewed by Politico.

In an article published Friday, “Dems see one last chance to boost public support for impeachment,” Politico reported that “a slate of hearings in the House Judiciary Committee beginning next week” could be the last chance to change the minds of American voters, whose opinions of impeachment remain largely unchanged.

But Democrats are already weary of the idea of convincing the public. After starting an unauthorized impeachment inquiry in closed-door hearings in the House Intelligence Committee, Democrats continued their secretive process after passing a House resolution setting one-sided rules that bar the president from any meaningful legal representation.

The resolution provided for limited public hearings, but Democrats see those as a “Republican” concern, according to Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA):

Just weeks from a likely impeachment vote, some Democrats acknowledge they may never convert the core group of supporters who have weathered crisis after crisis by Trump’s side.

“We’d all love to see it change, however we don’t expect it to,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) said Tuesday.

…

“Most of us feel there is enough developed in the couple of weeks with the Intel Committee to go forward with articles of impeachment,” Beyer said. “We’ve given the Republicans plenty of public time.”

…

“Everyone else, I think, is ready to vote for it when the articles are finally prepared,” he said.

As Breitbart News’ John Nolte noted earlier this week, Democrats manipulated the few public hearings that have already been held by withholding exculpatory evidence until the hearings were over.

Republicans mounted a strong defense of the president, pointing out that none of the Democrats’ witnesses had direct knowledge of anything relevant that the president had said or done. They also evoked testimony that supported Trump’s contention that there is a strong public interest in investigating Ukraine’s involement in the 2016 election, and the Biden family’s conflict of interest involving a Ukrainian gas firm, Burisma.

Given Democrats’ majority in the House, and the strength of the party’s left wing, an impeachment resolution is considered likely to pass, regardless of the merits — and regardless of public opinion.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He earned an A.B. in Social Studies and Environmental Science and Public Policy from Harvard College, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. He is also the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, which is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.