Divided Democrats and the politics of impeachment

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Divided Democrats and the politics of impeachment

Democrats debate next steps after the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election; reaction and analysis from the 'Special Report' All-Stars.

This is a rush transcript from "Special Report with Bret Baier," April 22, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, D-MASS.: I have called on the House to initiate impeachment proceedings.

WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY SARAH SANDERS: They still haven't found a message, and so their only option is to attack this president.

HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN JERROLD NADLER, D-N.Y.: If proven, some of this would be impeachable, yes. Obstruction of justice if proven would be impeachable.

KELLYANNE CONWAY, COUNSELOR TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: You can't impeach a Republican president for something the Democrats started.

HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN ADAM SCHIFF, D-CALIF.: It's a very difficult decision, and we're going to have a caucus about this over the next couple of weeks to try to figure out what the best course is.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you worried about impeachment, Mr. President?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Not even a little bit.

(END VIDEO CLIPS)

BRET BAIER, ANCHOR: The Easter egg roll with impeachment questions came after a tweet from the president. "Only high crimes and misdemeanors can lead to impeachment. There were no crimes by me, no collusion, no obstruction, so you can't impeach. It was the Democrats that committed the crimes, not your Republican president. Tables are finally turning on the witch hunt."

You heard Adam Schiff mention that they were going to caucus about the way forward. House Democrats did have a conference call this evening. It just wrapped up moments ago. Two sources are telling us that House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters is pushing for impeachment. She is saying that she is not pushing her colleagues, however, to join her. She is simply saying what she thinks, making her views known. It's the highest profile Democrat urging impeachment, but not really a surprise. She has been urging impeachment even before the Mueller report.

Let's bring in our panel: Chris Stirewalt, politics editor here at Fox News; Susan Page, Washington bureau chief at USA Today and also the author of the new book, "The Matriarch, Barbara Bush and the Making of an American Dynasty," debuted at number three on The New York Times list; and Byron York, chief political correspondent for The Washington Examiner.

OK, Susan, congrats on the book. The meeting, it is a conundrum. I talked to Brit Hume earlier in the show, four Democrats on the way forward, considering what the Mueller report did not find.

SUSAN PAGE, USA TODAY: And Democrats are divided on the question of whether impeachment makes sense. I think Democrats are united in thinking that the president has done things that they don't like, that are at odds with the oath that he took of office. But the leadership of the House Democrats, including Nancy Pelosi clearly do not want to go down the impeachment road.

So what they are going to do is have investigations without impeachment. You look at what the House Judiciary Committee already has lined up testimony by Don McGahn, the former White House counsel, by the Attorney General, Bill Barr, by Robert Mueller, the Special Counsel. All of those are scheduled for May. So they may not call it impeachment. They're going to have investigations.

BAIER: Byron?

BRYON YORK, THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER: They are clearly divided right now, but I think, and they have gotten all excited about all of the details that have come out, especially about alleged obstruction in the Mueller report. But I think the fact is the Mueller report is going to make it more difficult for them.

One, it did not find collusion or conspiracy or coordination, and two, it did not find that the investigation was actually obstructed. It found that the president ordered people to perform obstructive acts, and they said no, and then he backed down and that didn't happen. So Democrats will be accusing the president of trying unsuccessfully to obstruct an investigation into something that did not happen. And I think politically that's a case where the president can make a pretty strong defense.

BAIER: Our friend Jonathan Turley, law professor, wrote a column in "The Hill" saying this, "Despite identifying 10 troubling episodes that could be defined as acts of obstruction, Mueller could not say with confidence that Trump acted with the requisite corrupt intent. Mueller found substantial evidence that Trump wanted to limit the scope of the investigation, but that is not necessarily intent. Even the best grounds for obstructive intent, with Trump seeking to fire Mueller, an order ignored by the White House Counsel, was justified by Trump as based on his fear of a conflict of interesting. Like indictable acts, impeachable acts demand a showing of intent, not simply an array of possible intents."

And what we are getting at here is if House Democrats who move forward, it gets sticky, because you would think that the Senate in Republican control is not going to convict anyway.

CHRIS STIREWALT, FOX NEWS: Right. A simple is all that's needed in the House to bring the charges, that is the indictment, essentially. But you need a super majority, two-thirds in the Senate to convict and remove. The Democrats know that is not going to, and that's not going to not happen any time soon.

Impeachment is a political question, though, not a legal one. And for all of the good work of all of the legal scholars in the world, it comes down to a fundamental political question. And the question here is would the American people countenance an impeachment? And the answer is probably no, because there is nothing that anyone who voted for Donald Trump in 2016 could have read in the Mueller report, scuzzy as much of it was, unsettling as much of it was, that wasn't already baked into their consideration of Donald Trump. He didn't exactly run as Pope Francis in 2016, right. People knew a lot of this kind of stuff about his character before he ran. That's why I think it is a nonstarter.

BAIER: Susan, in the middle of this decision that Democrats will make will be the Inspector General's the report, other investigations into the early parts of this investigation, which could also illuminate some aspects of that.

PAGE: I agree with my colleagues here that the Mueller report makes it less likely, not more likely, that President Trump faces impeachment. But nothing stops the drive toward investigation on all kinds of fronts, into President Trump's tax returns, into the Trump organization's business practices, into what has happened at various agencies around town that have had very little oversight in the first two years of this administration. Nothing is going to stop that.

BAIER: But does impeachment become the litmus test that the Green New Deal or a Medicare for all was for 2020 candidates?

PAGE: So that is the task that Nancy Pelosi is trying to navigate. And you saw her release a dear colleague letter this afternoon in advance of this conference call, making the case, agreeing that Donald Trump has done things that make him unfit for office, agreeing they need to pursue the truth, but saying you can do that with investigations that are short of impeachment.

YORK: One last thing that the leadership is aware of, if they go forward, the timing of this will be crazy. If the Democrats start now, it will take a while to rev up the impeachment regime, and when they get going, we will be smack in the middle of a presidential election campaign where the impeachee is running for reelection. And when Bill Clinton was impeached, he was in 98 and 99 after he had been reelected, and Richard Nixon resigned head of impeachment after he had been reelected in 1972. Doing this in the middle of a campaign would put the whole process on steroids, and it's crazy enough to begin with. And I think the leadership is very worried about just the unpredictable aspects of that.

BAIER: And the counterpuncher in chief who clearly won't hold back. Panel, thank you.

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