House Republicans Vote to Censure Trump Impeachment ...
(Bloomberg) -- House Republicans voted Wednesday to formally rebuke Representative Adam Schiff for alleged misrepresentations in congressional investigations he led of Donald Trump, culminating in the former president’s first impeachment.
Schiff, now a Democratic candidate for Senate in California, defiantly declared on the House floor shortly before the vote that he would wear official censure by the Republican-led chamber as a “badge of honor.”
The vote was 213 to 209. Democrats shouted “Shame!, Shame!,” and then awaited Schiff as he approached the front of the chamber, calling out his name “Adam! Adam!” He was hugged by several colleagues.
Trump allies led by Representative Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, a freshman and member of the hard-right Freedom Caucus, introduced a measure to censure Schiff last week — the same day the former president was arraigned in Miami on federal criminal charges of mishandling classified documents and obstruction of justice.
The initial censure measure, which included a potential $16 million fine being leveled against Schiff, was blocked as some GOP lawmakers expressed qualms about the severe financial penalty. The resolution passed Wednesday doesn’t include a fine but requires Schiff to stand in front of the chamber while the official rebuke is read aloud.
Earlier: Schiff Jumps Into Race for Dianne Feinstein’s Senate Seat
Luna said Schiff had “abused his privileges claiming to know the truth, while leaving Americans in the the dark about his web of lies.”
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said on Twitter that Schiff was responsible for “a national nightmare with the fake Russia collusion narrative.”
Schiff, the former Democratic chair of the House Intelligence Committee, was one of Trump’s most prominent antagonists during his presidency. He led inquiries of the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia leading up to the 2016 presidential election.
Schiff also led the 2019 impeachment investigation of Trump on accusations that the then-president held up American aid to Ukraine in order to pressure that nation’s government to open an investigation of Joe Biden, who was then seeking the Democratic presidential nomination.
Trump was impeached in the House but acquitted in the Senate trial that followed. Schiff was the chief prosecutor in the trial.
Schiff dismissed the censure resolution as a “hollow sop” to Trump supporters and “petty political payback” by the GOP House majority. “I will not yield, not one inch,” he said.
The resolution directs the House Ethics Committee to investigate Schiff’s alleged falsehoods and misrepresentations.
Censure is the House’s most severe punishment against members, short of expulsion. Only 25 members have received such a reprimand in the chamber’s history.
Most recently, Representative Paul Gosar, an Arizona Republican, was censured in 2021 for tweeting a doctored anime video depicting violence against Biden and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat.
(Updates with reaction to vote, in the third paragraph. An earlier version corrected vote count, in the third paragraph.)
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