Pelosi Slams Trump On Election Security, Then Asks Why McConnell Is an “Accomplice To All That?”
January 14th 2020
Mitch McConnell (Gage Skidmore)
By Marissa Higgins
On ABC’s “This Week,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi deftly called out Donald Trump’s ceaseless projection before confirming she doesn’t regret her decision to hold on the articles of impeachment. Then, she dropped a line that is a pretty big deal. Asked about possible Russian interference in the 2020 election, Pelosi confirmed what most progressives think: Trump, in her words, is in “complete denial.” What’s new and pretty darn intriguing, though, is what she said about Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his support for Trump when it comes to election security.
"Sometimes I wonder about Mitch McConnell, too,” Pelosi continued. “Why is he an accomplice to all of that?" Accomplice! Now that’s a strong word.
First, let’s go over how we got here. Trump started his Sunday morning by tweeting about the impeachment investigation. He opened his tweet by describing Pelosi as “Crazy Nancy” then moved into describing the hearing as the “most unfair & biased in history?” Trump being Trump, he also tagged host George Stephanopoulos and directed him to ask Pelosi this on the show.
Stephanopoulos did, indeed, ask Pelosi to respond to Trump’s tweet. “I don't like to spend too much time on his crazy tweets because everything he says is a projection. When he calls somebody crazy, he knows that he is," she replied. She also noted that she felt Trump was "not worth impeaching” until the Ukraine allegations came about.
That’s smooth, and the lack of reaction is probably enraging to Trump if he ever hears her say it. Of course, not everyone agrees that Trump’s tweets aren’t worthwhile; Sen. Kamala Harris, for example, has argued that Trump should be banned from Twitter. For the Democratic women of color known as the ‘Squad,’ Trump’s tweets go beyond just elementary-grade jabs of “crazy” and deep dive into xenophobia and racism. But when it comes to insults like “crazy,” Pelosi seems unconcerned.
“He has to know that every knock from him is a boost,” she added.
On the articles of impeachment, which Pelosi held for about three weeks, Stephanopoulos asked if she had any second thoughts. In brief, she still doesn’t. “We feel that it has produced a very positive result in terms of additional emails,” she replied, “and unredacted information that has come forward.”
Some people have argued that her holding back on the articles suggested that Trump’s national security risks aren’t actually so serious. Essentially: If he’s such a big threat, how can we possibly wait on sending the articles to the Senate? But as she explained this morning, an end goal has already been achieved.
“Bolton has said that he will testify if subpoenaed by the Senate,” she stated. “More importantly, raising the profile of the fact that we need to have witnesses and documentation, and if we don't, that is a cover-up." Basically, the results were worth the wait in the big picture.
Now, back to that McConnell zing. Here’s that clip.
"It's all a piece with them,” she continued. “And that's why it's really important for the facts to come forward, the witnesses to be heard, the documentation to be reviewed... So that the American people can see, so that no other president in the future could ever think that it's okay to engage in the way that this president has.”
She also slammed McConnell for his support of a new resolution to dismiss the articles of impeachment against Trump. “Dismissing is a cover-up," Pelosi said. "If they want to go that route, again the senators who are thinking now about voting for witnesses or not, they will have to be accountable for not having a fair trial."
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