Volume II: Senate GOP Condemns House of Representatives' Closed Door Impeachment Process

Statement

Last week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) introduced a Senate Resolution condemning the House of Representatives' closed door impeachment inquiry. The measure is sponsored by 50 Republican Senators.

-U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tennessee): "I have co-sponsored the Graham resolution because in an impeachment process the American people above all expect it to be fair. House Democrats might want to stop and take a look at how the House Democratic majority bent over backwards to include Republicans and the President's representatives in the 1974 Nixon impeachment, and compare that with the one-sided, largely secret inquiry they are conducting today."
-U.S. Senator James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma): "…House Democrats have tried to keep Americans in the dark about their impeachment inquiry by holding hearings behind closed doors and denying the President his right to due process. Worse, they are ignoring the established, bipartisan precedent followed during the Clinton and Nixon impeachments… The double standard shows that this isn't about anything President Trump did or didn't do -- this is about trying yet again to overturn the results of the 2016 election."
-U.S. Senator Mike Crapo (R-Idaho): "This unprecedented impeachment process House Democrats have undertaken lacks transparency and due process… Republicans and Democrats should both have the ability to participate fully in all proceedings. Selective leaks must stop."
-U.S. Senator Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi): "Due process, rights for the accused, and the presumption of innocence are foundational principles of the American judicial system because they ensure fairness and give legitimacy to verdicts and sentences… If House Democrats continue to conduct this process as a partisan exercise with a predetermined outcome, then the findings cannot be taken seriously."
-U.S. Shelley Moore Capito (R-West Virginia): "During this impeachment investigation, President Trump is not being afforded basic due process rights that were provided during other presidential impeachment investigations, such as the right to have counsel present during hearings & depositions & the right to examine witnesses."
- U.S. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Mississippi): "It's hard not to be skeptical of the unfair, secretive, and strictly partisan effort against President Trump... I cosponsored this resolution to be on the record as supporting the President's right to defend himself using the same rights due to anyone facing such serious accusations."