Rep. Steube: Iraqi Terrorists Had More Rights Than Dems Gave Trump - I Know Because I Served There
What does it say when accused terrorists have more rights in court than a sitting president has during an impeachment inquiry?
That question, among others, came up during Wednesday’s Constitution-a-thon in the House Judiciary Committee where several legal scholars were all selected by the parties involved because they had strong predetermined views on the matter.
There was angry Benedict Cumberbatch, an angry person who thought it was OK to bring in a bad joke about Barron Trump, a guy nobody cared about who pitched his presentation at the level of a community college professor and a guy who made a bit of sense but also brought in a lame joke about his goldendoodle getting angry.
So what did this all prove, other than the fact that dad jokes and impeachment don’t mix? Well, for Rep. Greg Steube of Florida, it was more proof that the process was broken.
Steube, a Republican, used the hearing to again highlight how little due process was being afforded to the Trump administration and the Republicans. The GOP can’t call its own witnesses without the Democrats approving them and the administration couldn’t cross-examine witnesses — you know, as you’d normally be able to do in an impeachment inquiry.
Rep. Steube, a GOP freshman, noted the problems with the process.
Steube began by noting another freshman representative’s stated desire to impeach the president on the day she took office and the fact that said representative — Rashida Tlaib of Michigan — used somewhat more colorful language to do it. However, he also railed against the process.
“What are you afraid of? Let the minority call witnesses,” Steube said.
“Let the president call witnesses. Clinton alone called 14 witnesses to testify. Let the president’s counsel cross-examine the whistleblower. Let the president’s counsel cross-examine the intel staff who colluded with the whistleblower.
“In your own words, those are the rights that should be afforded to the president,” he continued.
”Rights every criminal defendant is afforded, even terrorists in Iraq were afforded more due process than you and the Democratic majority have afforded the president. I know because I served in Iraq and I prosecuted terrorists in Iraq and we provided terrorists in Iraq more rights and due process in the Central Criminal Court of Iraq than you and Chairman Schiff have afforded the president of the United States.”
That’s a pretty dramatic statement, especially coming from a guy who served in Iraq and was a prosecutor there.
The thing is that it’s a) true and b) unfortunately irrelevant.
What catches the eye of the American people when it comes to politics isn’t necessarily what happens to be important. That’s especially accurate, unfortunately, when it comes to the way these hearings have been conducted.
When Adam Schiff was running his portion of the kangaroo court over at the Intelligence Committee, no one outside of conservative media took a serious look at how the game was being rigged, either behind closed doors or out in the open.
Things will be different in the Senate, where the Republicans make the rules. That’s when the media is going to get furious over process, because — as we hear not infrequently in other contexts — to people who have had an advantage, fairness sounds like discrimination.
However, let it be remembered that in the House of Representatives when the impeachment inquiry was going on, the Republicans had fewer rights than accused terrorists in Iraq.
That fact alone should be all America needs to know about the nature of these hearings and the impeachment that will almost certainly spring from them.
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