after the vote, a literal split screen with democrats and republicans holding dueling news conferences and what we heard sounded like lawmakers living in alternate universes. this is a solemn day in the history of our country when the president s misconduct has compelled us to continue to move forward with an impeachment inquiry. it is a sad day, it really is for this country, what the democrats have put our nation through, for now almost four years. so far we ve seen damning evidence that the president abused his power. in all the hearings there s nothing compelling, nothing overwhelming. so, joe, everyone s back with me, i should note. joe, i want to go to you first to get your perspective. zero republicans defected today. what does that tell you? i don t think it means as much as a lot of people are saying. this was in effect, a process vote and it was very easy for republicans who don t control
the rest of his party has been on impeachment. the expectations, particularly in peterson s case, we leave them alone and say we get where you are on this one and they ll likely lose those individuals. so those are the two individuals that won t go along on this one. we ve been talking about it throughout the coast of the last couple of hours. the real possibility not a single republican joins. that doesn t mean all the members of the conference are comfortable with what we ve been seeing coming out of news reports and depositions. but this has very much turned into a red team/blue team type of issue. this isn t the final impeachment vote. this is a process vote. the president is keenly watching this vote and seeing where people are on this. i was talking to a couple last week, was going through the moderate members of the republican conference. there aren t a lot there as of
lawmakers to see where they are on this. any chance a republican votes with democrats? and what about john bolton, if he is subpoenaed. do you expect him to defy that? if any republicans vote with the democrats, it will be in the numbers of one or two. this is not a vote to impeach. this is a process vote. there s a little wiggle room to explain that. if it does not match with the final vote that members take. as far as bolton goes, it s c significant that this letter of invitation has gone out on thursday. but it s an invitation. and based on the way that charles cub kupperman has been responding to a subpoena, his lawyer is the same as bolton s lawyer. we can assume that they will follow the same practice. if that judge orders kupperman to respond to the house subpoena and show up, okay. maybe we may see a friendly subpoena situation with bolton because, remember, most of the
so let me ask you this. as you and i established off the top of the interview, if this was this is a process vote. this just allows and determines the rules. your two democratic colleagues who voted against it, congressman jeff vann drew and collin peterson, what s the rationale for voting against it if this is just the rules. this isn t a statement on whether or not you think the president should be impeached or not. well, in fairness, i think you would probably have to ask both of them. for me, this was a process question. but there s no question that when i go home to rochester, new york, late today, when the other members go to their various home districts, there will be people who will conflate these two things. and it s easy for us here to talk about process and then to talk about the next phase of the inquiry. i certainly understand that the public may not be able to have the sort of surgical precision about what s going on. so some people will take this as a proxy. i thin
the vote to watch will be when we get to that stage of voting for articles of impeachment. democrats did not push as hard as they could at this point knowing that we have such a long road to go before articles of impeachment are actually voted on and that any republican who would have stuck their neck out now to vote for this process will have spend however long that period ends up being, being hammered by the president and the president s allies. not as much a con certaintied effort to get republican votes on the issue. this was a process vote and now we go back to the investigation. how is the president or is he not going to cooperate with the investigation? he tweeted read the transcript. i know they ve been arguing that he hasn t had a voice, that he hasn t been able to defend himself. are they now going to engage?