House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff accused Vice President Mike Pence of refusing to declassify information “directly relevant” to the impeachment inquiry in order to conceal his role in the quid pro quo scheme for which President Trump is being impeached.
Pence’s Russia adviser Jennifer Williams testified last month about the vice president’s September 18 phone call with Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Schiff requested ten days later that Pence declassify her testimony, contained in a November 26 letter from her lawyer, but Pence last week declined to do so in a letter to Schiff.
The testimony “raises profound questions about your knowledge of the President’s scheme to solicit Ukraine’s interference in the 2020 U.S. presidential election,” Schiff wrote in a Tuesday letter to Pence, adding that Pence’s letter refusing to classify Williams’s testimony is “deeply troubling.”
“Without prompting, the letter volunteers that ‘the Vice President never raised the Bidens, Burisma, or Crowdstrike in his conversations with President Zelensky,’” Schiff wrote, referring to Pence’s letter. “The Committee neither asserted that, nor asked whether, you specifically used those words.”
2 Colombian nationals arrested in stolen Mercedes linked to violent California carjacking
NORAD F-16s intercept multiple aircraft violating temporary flight restrictions over New Jersey
Platner ally Troy Jackson locks down delegates as top rivals for Democratic Senate nomination drop out
Young airman killed in heavy equipment accident at California Space Force base
Mass shooting rocks crowded downtown Tucson district, leaving 10 wounded
JD Vance and wife Usha welcome fourth child, reveal baby boy’s name
AOC accused of putting on new accent during Memphis rally: ‘Going full Kamala’
Tipster charged with murder after police say anonymous call helped solve 30-year disappearance
‘Let’s brew it in the United States’: Teamsters target Modelo and Corona in push for Mexican beer tariffs
Six dead as Kyiv hit by largest ballistic missile attack of war with interceptor stock low
Jarring Video: South African Reveals What’s Actually Believed About Whites, And It Is Horrific
Muhammad Is The Top Baby Name For Boys In England And Wales For Third Year In A Row
James Carville, Dem With Deteriorating Mental State, Says CNN Should Have Aired Presidential Speech to Show Trump’s Deteriorating Mental State
‘Keep a low profile’: State Department warns Americans overseas they could be targeted
Authorities Identify Source of Nationwide Cyclospora Outbreak: Salad Distributer Used By Taco Bell
Williams’s testimony directly conflicts with Pence’s statements, Schiff said, raising concerns that Pence could have been “purposefully misleading” the Intelligence Committee about his conversation with Zelensky.
“Your unwillingness to declassify the Supplemental Submission raises the serious question of whether your continuing efforts to obstruct the House’s impeachment inquiry are intended not just to protect President Trump, but yourself as well,” Schiff stated in his letter.
Pence’s office has declined to comment.
The House is set to hold a full House vote to impeach President Trump on two articles of impeachment, abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
The nearly three-month impeachment inquiry investigated whether Trump engaged in a quid pro quo with Ukraine by temporarily delaying U.S. military aid to the NATO ally while pressuring the country to announce an investigation into his political rival, former vice president Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.
Story cited here.
