Supreme court arguments, next week, he will argue his 40th case at Supreme Court. He says the acting listener general of the u. S. And president obama, paul and patricia pounders of the security lock. Hes a partner. He played himself in an episode of past cards. Theres an even more littleknown fact, he can come up with lyrics on demand. Now hes been a remarkable book, making the case of the impeachment of donald trump. He will be joined by michael, president of the center. Hes a lawyer and writer, expert on the tote presidency and american democracy. Michael served in the Clinton White house from 93 to 99. Working for the last american president who faced impeachment. Will make time for your questions tonight. You should have cards and pencils on your seat. We will make time for as many questions as we can. [applause] good evening everybody. Welcome to this important conversation, a critical issue, a critical moment in our countrys history. We are being listened to, thats good. [laughter] trust me, theyve got the wrong one. [laughter] its a big moment for the country and a big moment hello again. Nothing has changed. [laughter] its a big moment. Did i mention that . They have only been three other serious attempts to have a president ial impeachment. Its a core constitutional function, a core way our system over two plus centuries has envisioned checking and balancing and curbing essential power of the chief executive. Its a moment when we are all learning together at the same time. We are really fortunate and privileged here tonight to be hearing from and taught by, as youve heard one of the countries top constitutional scholars whose written and important book called impeached. The case against donald trump. We are all ready to learn be students tonight. The most basic of questions, i suppose is, why did you write this book . How did you write this book . First of all, i want to thank you, michael because what they do is so near and dear to my heart. Your work at the center was so important and i thought about it and justly last week, i was looking at the report you put out. Another thing i spent a lot of time litigating and thinking about and you are at the forefront of trying to make this country a better place. Its such a privilege to be here. So the book began because it is october 4, the book didnt even exist as an idea until october 4. Two months ago, basically. I was at dinner with a bunch of my friends and i had just written a piece on september 20, hours after the ukraine allegations broke. Saying that i thought it was very significant and it would lead to impeachment. My coauthor was a notorious i named george. When we wrote the piece, a bunch of people, including those who claim to be a nations impeachment expert, thats ridiculous. You dont know anything, nothing will happen. As events unfolded, it is clear something was happening. This was a very serious thing. So i asked my friends around the table, what should i do . Should i call for a tv show, podcast, this that or the other . I wanted to ask them what would work because i thought this was simple and incredibly serious in what i was so worried about, we would have the same thing in what happened in the Mueller Investigation which is been off the shaft and everybody is getting so confused but the truth falls by the wayside. I naively thought, im like a Supreme Court lawyer, im not a person on tv. I naively thought a year ago, maybe if i did that, if i talked about on tv and talked about two big audiences, people would understand mistakes and the truth is, everything overwhelmed. So thats what i was asking them. What is there to do . One of my friends said well, you will hate this but i think you need to write a book. I said, i cant write a book. I have like five Supreme Court cases this year end Everything Else going on and hes like no, you need to do it. I said i cant do it. He said you can do it in two weeks. I said thats impossible. He said yes, you have a great collaborator, a great coauthor and you taught impeachment 20 times, you can do it. I said no way, i have like four more glasses of wine and went home, went to sleep in at 2 00 a. M. I woke up, im like, i can do it. So i got up at 2 00 a. M. And wrote out the proposal. By 7 00 a. M. Or so, a proposal draft was done and i made one phone call, a decent hour, probably 9 00 a. M. So sam is the most Brilliant Writer i know. I knew this because i was invited, i had a speech that completely freaked me out. My alma mater asked me to give a commencement speech so i was totally freaked out. This was in may and i did like 48 or something so i showed it to my friend brian who said, what you really need to do is have my son, sam read it. Hes the best writer i know. I showed it to sam and he made it beautiful. So on that morning, october 5, i called sam and i said hey, i got this crazy idea, you want to do it with me . Hes like yeah. [laughter] so thats how we did it. He wrote it in two weeks, basically. We went to the publishers and said you know, who can write this the fastest . The first book i ever did, im not a book person. Its so crazy, theres a tree shortage and some of the publishers use paper from china and so ultimately, the folks here tonight, they said book, if you can give us a final on october 25, we guarantee it will be and stores on shelves november 26. So we did. So a week ago today, the book came out. How fast do type . [laughter] i type 130 words a minute. I learned on mechanical so yet. For your second book, so lets take a spoke back to philadelphia. When the founders were, we know a lot about, the notes that were not released at the time, they didnt give that much thought overall to the presidency. Why did they put impeachment in the constitution . Where did they get it from . One of the reasons i wrote this book was to tell this story and other stories because the neat thing about this, i know post hamilton and stuff, it can be interesting, this is really interesting, simple and fun. The story about philadelphia is that a lot of founders didnt actually think we needed impeachment in the constitution like gary, you know, we have the election, the president will run for reelection and this was before the constitutional amendment that limited president s to two terms. Why dont we just basically use that to police and executive or an evil executive. And others said madison and hamilton in particular said, wait a minute, what if you have a president who is beholden to a foreign power . Or if you have a president on the reelection . That leaves even gary to say zero no, we need an impeachment clause in the constitution. So those remarkable things about this, if hamilton and madison and gary and others were here and you ask what the case for impeachment was, this is literally it. Theres a big debate in philadelphia about what should be the standard for an Impeachable Offense. Ultimately, they settled on the phrase treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors. It was an initial proposal that the administration would be encompassed. That was rejected because it would weaken the executive too much. Thats something i deeply believe. As we think about impeachment, i get so much hate mail about this from the left every day, with why is it child separation and there is an article of impeachment and so on . Theres no one, i am as torn up about child separation as anyone and i think it is evil and grotesque. I dont think that is what our founders thought as a high crime misdemeanor. I dont think it was meant for policy differences. What they really meant it for, when you go back and study buildup you, if present is putting his personal interest over those of the American People . Last why the word high is in there. High crimes and misdemeanors, it doesnt actually mean a crime, it means an offense against the state. Youre doing something thats up a trail of your on. One of the terms we use is judiciary responsibility. Youve got to put your interests behind others. You got to do that. Thats really what i think the word high means here. So thats why the president , the founders settled on that formulation. Its a high standard, its not something that had policy differences but it doesnt always mean the has to be a crime. We know a crime is not necessary or sufficient. We learned this very early on in our history when we had a guy who shot and killed hamilton. He was the sitting Vice President of the time. The book tells the story and hopefully a lively way and basically, there wasnt a call for impeachment. He committed a crime but it wasnt a high crime. It wasnt a crime against the state. Therefore it was not an Impeachable Offense. He didnt shoot somebody on fifth avenue. [laughter] no. [laughter] they were very worried about abuse of power and they talked a lot about we they knew George Washington was going to be the president they reassured themselves while we dont have a crime well but they were quite aware that the president would be the head of state and removal of the head of state was something that had not really been done before. Ben franklin said the other remedy is assassination. Why did they design the way they did with the house voting for impeachment and the senate trial . Take one step back and understand a little about the constitutional design. This is my view and i think of many scholars but not all, the founders really did establish a strong presidency, what i believe is true unitary executive, not the way cheney and others perverted it to me basically the president can do whatever he wants but it is a strong presidency. Hamilton said and 68, a president that can act with secrecy and has powers. You want that because oftentim oftentimes, i know this is a shock, congress cant get stuff done. You need a president sometimes to come in and do and act to do so. Step one of the founders thinking was, we want to have a very robust presidency. Then is the discussion which is okay, if you have a strong presidency, what you do when the president airs . What you do when the president does something gravely wrong . Beholden to a foreign power. As michael said, ben franklin said if we dont have impeachment in the constitution, the alternative be assassination. Obviously not a great result. So impeachment is put in as a way within the legal system to try and remove a president but again, they wanted to do so only with a serious fire, high crime misdemeanor and then the process, which is in general how are constitutional works. The house and senate to pass it, two to tango. Single house can do Something Like the senate can vote to confirm nominee or whatever or ratify a treaty. In general, the architecture is house and senate because they represent the interest. One foreign state, one more popular. Thats the way in which they compromised and developed into impeachment because it self, a single majority vote in the house is enough to impeach. A two thirds vote in the senate is necessary to convict and remove a president. That two thirds vote is also required for treaties. Lets look at how that system has played out over the centuries since, since weve never gone to the point of having a two thirds vote to remove a president. One broad question, looking at the Andrew Johnson impeachment, the bill clinton impeachment and when congress chose not to impeach. They developed a notion that you needed abuse of trust but they needed to be an actual crime also. Is not necessary or is not a political look way . Where you see that argument . I dont see it at all. I dont think either scholars or the president of these impeachment is really about a standard that you need a crime. I do think crimes were committed here so if thats your standard, that easily meet it but i dont think that is the lesson from those impeachments. There are so many things that arent crimes or werent crimes in 1787 are undoubtedly bribery which is in the constitutional isa Impeachable Offense was not a crime in 1787. So i dont think that is the standard. It would mean for example, the president undoubtedly has powers to wake up and say, i hate justin trudeau, i will nuke him. Hopefully hypothetical but that would be absolutely and Impeachable Offense, it would be hard to pin it to a crime, theres nothing in the u. S. Code that would be violated. I dont think thats the standard but i do think each of the impeachment does teach us a lesson. Andrew johnson was a terrible president. Kind of got there by accident. He was impeached but he was impeached not because of what he was really guilty of, which is selling Racial Division and trying to undo the results of the civil war and reconstruction but he was impeached for the violation of the tenure of office act which was a technical violation that when you can fire officials 75 years later, the Supreme Court said the president has the power to do what Andrew Johnson was doing. That seemed to capture the complaint against president johnson. To me, the lesson that is taken from johnson is not there must be a crime. In fact, it was a criminal statute as well as a civil one but rather the articles really have to the cant be articles that are just like we found you on this or that and its a slamdunk. It has to be the heart of what the complaint is against the president. So here, the heart to me is the president cheating or attempting to cheat on the 2020 election with the help of a foreign government. Yes, theres other stuff that can come in but thats the heart of the complaint. Is a former speechwriter, one of my favorite things about the Andrew Johnson impeachment is that one of the articles was that he went on a speaking tour and spoke in a cloud voice. And abused congress and this was considered a breach of the norms of the time. The nixon impeachment of course was, and for those of you who dont remember, after a year of congressional hearings and a year of criminal investigation by special prosecutors, when it was voted out in a bipartisan basis by the House Judiciary Committee in the summer of 1974 and i think most people regard that as having all the ingredients of what we looked for. What you draw as analogies in the trump situation and how that played out . I think one really important lesson as we think about nixon is the underlying breakin, heres the cheating on the election but what the president s reaction is to the investigation, ive had the privilege for working for two president s. I didnt work closely with clinton, i did work far more closely in the other administration. Obamas instincts would be less about selfpreservation and more about the preservation of the institution of the presidency. Thats how he generally filtered stuff. I feel like nixon was our first president in a long time always through the lens of himself so when the watergate investigation started to unfold, what did he do . He said none of my executive branches can go and testify in congress. Im not going to turn over any information. What did the senate do in response . And it said okay, we will start jailing executive branch employees. That led nixon to back down, not because he was principle to believe the American People should find out the truth but because he didnt want his folks jailed so march 12, 1973, he backs down and allows his witnesses and employees to get that in congress but then later, as i discovered, they said they wont turn those over. Those are my personal private executive privilege in all sorts of stuff. The investigators subpoenaed and goes to court in the District Court rules quickly that things have to be turned over. The Nixon Justice Department filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court and skipped over the court of appeals and Supreme Court of the u. S. Within two months, april to july 15, they say nixon, you have to turn over the tapes. Unanimous decision, three of those justices appointed by none other than president nixon. That is the rule of law at the best. If theres anything ive tried to say in the book, its this. The idea is it doesnt matter if youre rich or poor or republican or democrat, man or woman, African American or white, whatever. You should get the same basic standard. The book i ask, i say, this is how i teach from day one. If you have corporation, pretend the parties are reversed and think about it from the other side. So with this, i think any impeachment, i thought this was true with clinton as well, you think about if the shoe were on the other foot, if the president was obama and did all of this, how would you feel . If he tried to cheat on his Reelection Campaign by going and getting information from another government, and now i think the question has to be asked. With over 100 pages detailing the obstruction that trump is engaged in, how would you feel if a president , clinton, obama, Elizabeth Warren whoever says oh, this impeachment inquiry against me, its not legitimate. I wont bother complying. Im going to prevent every document and email from trying to be turned over. Thats the end of our constitutional democracy. The nixon impeachment, his obstruction of the impeachment investigation was one of the principal obstruction of justice involving the legitimate function that was part of it. Its pretty clear one of the challenges they faced before this is the difficulty of enforcing subpoenas and document requests and enforcing checks and balances. The very first discussion, as i understand, along George Washingtons aides, when they were talking about the jay treaty or something, they said of course if there is impeachment, we would turn over everything. This is congresses strongest moment. Is that right . One 100 . Whether or not its executive privilege, if its an ordinary investigation, but some think that this Trump Administration has been litigating in d. C. It something other administration are far more. They invoked privilege want. Thousands of pages of documents. I think 12 different hearings on the hill with witnesses. As opposed to the absolute one 100 dont fall you have today but thats all about ordinary investigations. When it comes to impeachment, the rules are very different. Starting with, you got the washington example, 1846, it details in a long way, i believe in executive privilege, theres all sorts of reasons why president s need to have the information that secret but the one exception is impeachment. In the constitution, its part of our key safeguard for separation of powers. Just make this relevant today, the white House Counsel was supposed to be the lawyer for the presidency, not the president but this one i think abused his job is one thing. He wrote a letter on sunday and this is an eight page letter he wrote before the crown letter. This one, illegitimate, we are not going to participate, we are not going to send lawyers to it after they complained their lawyers werent allowed to come to it. It says that we are doing what past president s have done including nixon and clinton. I want to talk about engine in your experience in a moment but no president has ever invoked executive privilege on the impeachment. They do ordinary investigations but neither nixon nor clinton did so when it came to the actual stuff about impeachment. Was in fact your experience . In both the nixon and clinton cases, the nixon case there was a criminal investigation and congressional hearings. In the clinton case, it was entirely an investigation over the course of a year done through the special prosecutor. When this is in production of testimony could see the Service Agent be compelled to testify about what they heard or saw while protecting the president in the white house and the last time a productive privilege. These are a lot of things but they were in the cost of the criminal investigation. In 1974 when the grand jury turned over its material to the congress and in 1998, when starr issued his report and turned that over to the congress, the original work of investigation had been done by a grand jury or somebody else. Whats so striking now is that they are building the cars and rolling down the road and taking these testimonies not and grand jury but depositions and public hearings. Its the case that clinton resisted as much as he could, cooperating but he did coopera cooperate, he had to. He didnt say it illegitimate, he started investigating the matter but he didnt feel he had either constitutional ability or public ability to just say well, i think its a fraud and hoax and im not going to do it. So much of our constitution is built on some goodfaith by the president and actors in congress. Even though madison and said men arent angels and checks and balances but i dont think they envisioned this level of constitutional shamelessness that we are seeing. You have a president who just doesnt care, he doesnt care about the legacy hes creating. All he cares about is right now and himself. I want to turn to the current impeachment. They were both a little worried about their own party and their own party might turn on them or enough return on them to cross that. One of the things that is playing out is the impeachment have played out in a world of fox news and the internet and twitter and Everything Else that creates the environment we are in now. Lets turn to this impeachment we are all scene unfold in real time. We all know that up until recently, nancy pelosi was very reluctant for impeachment and even before i knew the propeller knew what the Mueller Report would say but when vince came down, theres very little hesitation. You embraced that as well. Why ukraine and not russia . The obstruction of justice that seems to fit in place on earth the russia investigation and Everything Else . I think this one was different for three reasons. One is, this one involves the president s action as president. So mueller was really about a good chunk of mueller was about what trump and the Trump Campaign did in 2016 as a candidate. The allegations here are, remember i talked about that optimized, strong presidency but also impeachment. Here are the allegations, the president was using his strong president ial powers over foreign affairs, things like holding up aides, when you can have a white house, commanderinchief power but to do so for its personal end. Its different if your idea. For something distinctly wrong when you have a person who is sitting president using powers that way because if this president , then every president does it. Even the one check in the constitution, ceases to be a check because of the awesome powers of the presidency to seek information, assistance from government to help your Reelection Campaign. The second is velocity matter here. So mueller gets bogged down in the 22 month, its a serious investigation, resilient facts and all this stuff in russia has to be translated in all these figures that have to be indicted in russia and other places so this takes a long time and because of that, the public starts to get numb to it. By contrast, ukraine is really simple and clean. Here you got a smoking gun. Its the president himself, released. He called it a beautiful and perfect transcript its not beautiful msu seek to remove him from office in which case is pretty good. He testified at least, he left the word biden. Exactly. So the transcript wasnt even complete. Theres definitely stuff thats missing in it including stuff that may be highly damaging to the president. Its kind of unusual. The whole thing seems a little weird. Magically certain words appeared but the guy whos testifying against you from your own Administration Says those words happen to implicate biden. Everything here seems a bit shady but even based on what they released, it is. The reason i wrote the book is because i thought trump was going to drop a lot of calf as he did before with mueller. All i want people to do is focus on the july 25 transcript. Thats all you need to understand that the president should be impeached because in that july phone call about the president of ukraine says i really want these javelin missiles and then trump says okay, but i need a favor from you. Then he goes into wanting to investigate the bidens and the transcripts. So to a public in defense, so much so that the House Minority leader, mccarthy was on television. Is on one of the sunday shows and he was asked about a quid pro quo and he said there was no quid pro quo. The media person says to him, i need a favor from you fell. Mccarthy says its not in there. Hes like, yet it is. This is like Lindsey Graham when it was released, theres definitely no quid pro quo. Then absolutely we would have to look at it. Then of course theres totally a quid pro quo and now i dont know what hes doing. Hes hiding under the bed or Something Like that. I went to go over whats happening next but i want to ask one more question. Putting aside the throwing of the dirt that has been the Defense Strategy up until now, if you were hired to be Donald Trumps lawyer here god forbid. [laughter] what would you you decline to answer . [laughter] what argument would you make . I think we are seeing the arguments play out in real time. First, the president said well, there are no firsthand witnesses to this. Its all hearsay. Then the firsthand witnesses that defy the president order and came and heard the phone call. So that crumbled and also crumbled with firsthand witnesses because he was gagging them off. He said they are not allowed to and he took the bravery of people to just defy that. So that has fallen apart. He then says well, this is about fighting corruption. Which is a weird argument because trump actually, right before he cuts the budget for ukraine and when asked, was there any other place in the entire room, in which you cared about corruption . 194 countries, nowhere else in the entire world. Its the one magical place he appeared to care about corruption was a place in which his chief political rival son had an intern. Finally, the new one which is being put on in yesterdays house report is that ukraine was a really corrupt country and we couldnt get the aid to ukraine because it was so corrupt. There are two problems with this. Number one, the Trump Administration, just before the eight cut off had certified ukraine was not corrupt and could receive the eight. I was an official determination by the administration as opposed to determination by rudy giuliani. Number two, if they know ukraine is a corrupt country, why do you pick up the phone and call that corrupt country and ask them to launch an investigation into the u. S. Citizens . The fact that it was corrupt was part of the attraction, think they were trying to avoid. Thats why they were doing it. So that one is falling. Now we have the other one, impeachment processes on the fair. Trump doesnt have due process rights. So that one is a tough one for him to make. Its tough because the way in which the architecture works, the house of representatives is really like the grand jury phase in a criminal investigation. Trump is complaining my lawyers dont get to participate although now theyve been invited to but he saying i dont get all those productions. Thats true also on a criminal side. You get them in, you have a right to be president in the criminal trial and testify and crossexamine witnesses and tell your story. Thats on the senate side. They dont have all the process, it just occurs then. Last night he tweeted the process, the Supreme Court to stop it. Thats not a thing. The Supreme Court cant stop and impeachment as much as you would like them to. There is a recent case in 1993, involved walter nixon, a federal judge. The unfortunate last name of nixon. Anyway, nixon claims similar stuff that the impeachment process was unfair and the Supreme Court unanimously said we dont have any role and impeachment. Thats something for congress to do, not us. Lets fast forward a few weeks. We have a number of questions from the audience. We know the House Judiciary Committee is getting with law professors as one of terms lawyers said, over educated law professors as being the problem. We know chairman schiff i thought extraordinarily skilled job at keeping his dignity, even as the shenanigans was attempting to corrupt around her. We know the chief counsel of the Intelligence Committee was there until earlier this year. [applause] i would love to take we trained him well but thats not entirely true. Soon there will be, there may not be witnesses before the House Judiciary Committee. It has not been other impeachment. They will fall on the floor. Lets assume that the house actually does vote to impeach. Then we are really off to that. Folks i think are beginning to understand, unlike what most of us are used to, what happens then . First, before answering that, or to begin with the caveat because theres a wrinkle injected into everything yesterday. I dont think weve fully had those implications yet but theres a case in d. C. Before judge jackson and it involves don mcgann and whether or not information in the Mueller Report, a particular rent during material can be turned over to congress. In the lawsuit, the house general counsel said we need this information because we want to determine whether trump lied to mueller. This lawyer is an extraordinary guy. I did train him. [laughter] no, but hes a 35 year justice. Hes a very careful lawyer. Chosen with care. There must be something going on there. The judge last week rolled inside the information has got to be turned over to congress, that there has been a valid subpoena in the context of impeachment. Trump fought on an emergency basis to prevent a subpoena from coming about. She projected it in the strongest language i think ive ever seen. Against the justice department. It causes disingenuous trumps position. So that is to the d. C. Circuit and ultimately to the Supreme Court but i think the trump arguments here are. And i dont supreme expect the Supreme Court to hear the case. I think that subpoena will stand. The question is then, what does it do to the other witnesses were in the shadows . People like john bolton, mike pompeo. All those folks. Will they now have to testify in subpoenas . If so, that scrambles the impeachment calendar. Weve been looking at something very fast with a vote in the house of representatives to impeach by the end of this month or by the holidays, december 18 or so. But if that unfolds, it could, the house might say hey, we want to wait and get more information. Ultimately, some things will go to the senate. Whether it comes with all of the information or with mueller allegations or just limit it to ukraine remains to be seen. When that happens, there will be a time, Mitch Mcconnell has said he will follow senate rules which require this. If at that time, Public Opinion will start to shift. I think right now, this is often the fact and gathering stage but you will see the president on trial in solemn proceeding in the senate and the question will be asked, do you think the president can really do this . Do you want that in our system . Does it matter . Thats the legacy you will be leaving for our country. I think we will see a real change the way in which people in congress will think about this. Let me read a question from our audience relating to the trial and it relates to the fascinating role of the chief justice in this process. The only time i believe, the only time the chief justice with specific response ability is to preside over impeachment trials. I think thats right. By statute, he has other ones. The things you learned but this is a question. Do you believe cheese Justice Roberts when conducting the trial before senate actively pursued justice or just acted as an administrator . Is a compelling testimony in that sort of thing, how much will be thought out between schumer and the other senators . I think it remains to be seen a little bit. The chief justice has argued 39 cases before and hes a remarkable man and someone who is with fairness in his dna. Ive never thought they werent based on anything but the law. The law can be different and i think the question was fundamental justice. The question was justice. Sometimes the law and justice are two Different Things and i think he is someone who does follow the law. I dont thank you will get a presiding official here who will say whats the just thing to do . I think the question is what is more the legal thing to do . I think it means two things. Number one, i think they are caught in some ways from the same. Currently in terms of the chief justices institutional loan, i think this one takes a lot from his former boss and ill throw this to you because you were there during clinton. My sense for the impeachment proceedings was that he basically got out of the way. People talked about that but he didnt really do much. So much so at the very end he commented i did very little and i did it well. [laughter] was not your impression . He cared a great deal about this role even in way of receiving things are too obtrusive. He wrote about impeachment. He had special robe with stripes that he burned. He understood, he had a senate there was less polarized than the Current Senate but he stayed out of the way by and large. The big fights for example in the clinton trial was overwhelmingly with live witnesses. In the end, there were three witnesses in front of the senate videotaped. So one of the questions of course, especially if the testimony has not happened in the house, whether there will be an attempt to compel to testify and of course nobody knows what they will say and thats really everybody working without a net. It is at least a clinton president that is followed. Theres other results in their, day in and day out for days on end, theres a whole set of rules, as soon as the houseboat impeachment, the chief justices sort in dust and soda Vice President cant. These are things that go back a long way and it could turn into something that is taken a lot more seriously than the kind of food fight that we sometimes see going on. I do think the proceedings is going to be different. Its not just because jim jordan in the senate, though i think some of his aspiring, i think its because the senate does have a rulebook, it hasnt really changed. It will be the rulebook used here. To pick up on some thank you are saying, the second feature i think that this chief justice will have, hes going to err on the side of giving more information to the American People. Thats consistent with not doing too much, but the people decide. Dont try and let this happen. Its a strategic choice for the house managers here. There are people like bolton and mulvaney who undoubtedly have information but they already have the prosecution already has the smoking gun in the transcript. So the rest is gravy. Do they seek the gravy or not . Thats a complicated question but i do think if they decide we want this testimony, in the senate, i do not see this chief justice standing in the way and saying zero no, the president can get away with gagging these people. I always thought why would he receive what he thought was his duty . It seems as though his task is pretty straightforward. Hes certainly not going to approach it as somebody is getting the house manager is a easier day. He will approach on whats the right thing to do under the law and when it comes to impeachment the whole design of impeachment is a public decision about whether or not the president is effectively violated. Youve got to get the information to the public without determination to be made. This statement in 801846, its by no president has challenged it. I will tell you the perspective of the equipment white house, it was quite surreal and one of the things that did happen, which we may see, the president has the right to appear in the senate. Clinton did not avail himself of that he appeared in the grand jury. It depends on what the definition is. [laughter] but he did give his state of the Union Address in the middle of the trial. His Approval Rating was close to 70 at that time. The public resoundingly as a political matter in the senators how to return the trial and grudgingly trudged over the House Chamber and give a big speech and go back to the trial. We see a trump state of the union in the middle if the house invites him to do it in the middle of the trial. But we knew it was very unlikely he would be removed. They even got a majority. They are looking the other way and looks like they will not vote to impeach. But what do you expect from senators of his own party . And whether they will take it seriously or will they just act as partisan . I think the republican talking. Is basically this is in the back for us. Weve got our party and the house. I dont think it will be true in the senate as we start to focus on this. When this investigation is moving with such velocity, its been just two months and already we are seeing popular opinion change. I dont have the bigotry looks for the American People or the republican party, i think our country is built on the idea of beating these expectations. Whether it 17761787 or 1863 or the civil rights movement, we heard this before. This one is not hard. Moeller was hard. This is not hard. This is easy. I think if people pay attention, i dont care about fox news, twitter and fragmentation and so on. I do believe there still a court in this country that believes in the rule of law indecency and a basic principle from not electing people who put themselves first but the country first. So i am not one to say the towel has been here. But if it is, its the end of the republican party. If you believe this guy in office, after knowing what you know, you dont stand for anything without power. That will be a very sad day for this country when theres no principal on the left side of the aisle at all. Maybe you all think we are there yet. I dont. I think the democrats have been weak and not afraid or calling republicans out on it. Try want that in the senate and if they are really going to say this is okay, its in their party. This is an interesting question even the solemn playing out of this, three impeachment and relatively few years, nixon, clinton and trump, indicates the decay of our democratic system . The first almost 200 years in the country, it was regarded basically as illegitimate. Its now been free. Does that suggest a normalization, weaponization of impeachment . Is it a bad thing . Doesnt suggest the president s are misbehaving. I didnt see any facts about these particular individuals. I dont think there was any serious thought, whatsoever to impeach obama, im sure people might have set it on talk radio or something but really, there was no threat, youll well press. Nobody i know in the Obama Administration hired a lawyer. The Trump Administration, doctor lawyers who defend the lawyers who defend the Trump Administration. This is the greatest job around. But so no, i do think in general, we are seeing society that might be less guided by a moral compass in general. But there are any number of transgressions, too. But sure, i think we can elect people on both sides that are not like this. After a scandal, you talk about this in your concluding chapter of the book. Its often the case that theres a. A brief. Not always but often. That was true in the progressive era but not with impeachment but political scandal and it was certainly true after watergate. There was a wide range of responses including the Campaign Finance laws and special prosecutor patrick, the ethics in government, the creation of the fisa court and intelligence communities, all these things were a wide ranging season of reform that followed in the election of a bunch of watergate babies, where they called it. They were very focus on this. This idea that the shoe is going to be on the other foot. I called the yardstick principles on the other party is empowered you dont switch things up and say now i believe something else. The attorney general is the best example in this. He believes in executive power in the Republican Administration and thinks the president can do nothing but if obama or clinton is in power you never hear anything about it. That is not a way to think about or grand document the constitution or the great system in america and i am so worried i will tell you the thing im most worried about is a democrat wins and then they just take what trump did and do it again to help them. Some of the policy preferences will be ones that i agree with on tax and the environment and things like that but that is the legacy you can throw out the rulebook, do what you want, supporters will be there you just dont think some of the other side and if you are funny enough they just let you get away with it. Democrats are perfectly capable of doing all those things. So, to be the bigges me the big, and there are reforms in the quick changing the special counsel regulations and requiring that tax returns be made public before someone runs in the federal law. Things like that to me the most important thing is to regenerate the conversation. Here we are at Nyu Law School were tested for these ideas in almost every lawyer gets this for example and most High School Kids that is what the system is based on you can be as partisan or republican or democrat as the water thayouwant but that is thf the country. Im sure many of you have similar stories. That is the thing i think. On that note i would say first if i were before the Supreme Court i would certainly want you arguing my case. We are fortunate to have your moral clarity and explanatory ability and we want to thank you for what you have done with this book and we are grateful that youve come tyou have come to tl of law. And again this is for those listening at home im the president of the Brennan Center for justice and on behalf of the Brennan Center for justice at the end by school of law we want to thank everybody for coming here. Please keep up with our work at the Brennan Center. Org or by following us on social media. It has some very positive aspects. Following us as one of them and neil will be signing books. The books are for sale in the lobby and he will be planted over here at the signing table. We want to thank you again for coming and thank you all for being part of this. [applause] served over 30 years as the director of operations in the cia. Currently at the bush school of Government Public Service this is his latest book. How is the u. S. Doing in the intelligence war . We are not doing very well. I wrote the book because i think that we are losing our secrets and technology to the foreign intelligence service. Im very concerned about the. Who are the main competitors . China number one, the chinese are conducting an assault. The russians are still there
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