Ron Johnson spars with Chuck Todd over Trump impeachment inquiry: 'Tormented from the day after his election'

President Trump has been constantly bombarded by rival Democrats and an angry media since his first day in the White House and is worthy of defending, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said in a Sunday television interview.
Johnson told "Meet the Press" host Chuck Todd of NBC News that he's sympathized with Trump throughout the impeachment process, after seeing him treated unfairly for purely partisan reasons following his election victory.
"I'm sympathetic with President Trump as he has been tormented from the day after his election," he said.
Johnson then read a 2017 tweet from the Ukraine whistleblower's attorney, Mark Zaid, in which he wrote of a coup to remove Trump from office.
"This is ten days after [Trump's] inauguration -- 'Coup has started. First of many steps, rebellion, impeachment will follow ultimately.'" Now. if this whistleblower... is to be lionized by the Washington Post, maybe we ought to take a look at who he hired," Johnson said.
"He could have hired an unbiased officer of the court. Instead, he hired Mark Zaid... That's not an unbiased officer of the court," Johnson continued. "So, there's something going on here... it's dividing this country."
Todd pressed Johnson on his outspoken criticism of Hillary Clinton's mishandling of her private email server in 2016 and said his rhetoric leading up to the election was identical to what he's accused Democrats of doing in recent months.
"We've been investigating the whole Hillary Clinton email scandal, the exoneration of her, that was not an investigation to really dig out the truth," Johnson replied.
"I was just pointing out what Hillary Clinton had done and I was hoping that people would not elect her and they didn’t and that's, I think, one of the main reasons that she was not elected -- is what she did with that private server," he continued, "which was completely intentional. It baffles me that she was not indicted, quite honestly... That's a part of the problem."

Customs and Border Protection announces 70% drop in apprehensions since May

Acting Customs and Border Protection director Mark Morgan speaks with reporters in the briefing room at the White House, Thursday, Nov. 14, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

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The White House is praising Customs and Border Protection officers for regaining control of U.S. borders. In a Saturday tweet, acting CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan highlighted some of the agency’s accomplishments — including a 70 percent drop in apprehensions since May.

Ever since President @realDonaldTrump took action in the face of Congress’ neglect, border apprehensions have plummeted by 70% (!) since the peak of the crisis.

THANK YOU to our brave @CBP officers! pic.twitter.com/TYaPToUdBX
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) November 17, 2019

He said with President Trump’s aid to border officials, October marked the fifth month in a row agents saw a drop in detainments. May was the peak of the border crisis, which resulted in 140,000 apprehensions.
“We’ve all but ended catch and release,” stated Morgan. “Migrants are no longer allowed to come to the interior of the United States based on fraudulent claims and the cartels are no longer able to profit on the backs of these migrants.”

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During a Thursday press conference, the CBP commissioner noted that the Trump administration’s strategies are successfully sending a message to Mexico’s drug cartels and other criminal organizations contributing to the national security crisis at the border. He reported that the U.S. is continuing to see an overall decline in migrant apprehensions and an increase in drug seizures.
“The month of October has continued with that trend, reaching a 14 percent decline compared to September — with just over 42,000 apprehensions,” stated Morgan. “Last month on the southwest border, CBP seized more than 47,000 pounds of drugs — a 50 percent increase from this time last year.”
He added though there is progress, there still needs to be more wall constructed in order to put the cartels permanently out of business. He is urging Congress to pass legislation to assist the ongoing border crisis.

GOP lawmakers say Democrats’ evidence against President Trump is ‘crumbling’

President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally at the CenturyLink Center, Thursday, Nov. 14, 2019, in Bossier City, La. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)

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UPDATED 8:10 PM PT — Sunday, November 17, 2019

GOP congressmen are coming to the president’s defense amid the ongoing impeachment inquiry. Representative Chris Stewart is saying evidence the Democrats are looking to find against President Trump is “crumbling.” During a Sunday interview, Stewart said there was no evidence building through ongoing impeachment hearings.
He pointed to Marie Yovanovitch’s testimony last week, where she told lawmakers she had no knowledge of criminal activity related to the Trump administration.
The representative accused Democrats of reaching for reasons to impeach President Trump. He added the longer the public hearings go on, the less Americans will support impeachment — because the evidence just doesn’t support it.
“I think the Democrats know they’re in trouble on this — which is why we keep moving the goal post,” stated Stewart. “We went from some supposed quid pro quo, and as you said, tying these investigations to withholding military aid — but we know that didn’t happen.”

Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, holds up the transcript summary of the call between President Donald Trump and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky as he questions top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine William Taylor, and career Foreign Service officer George Kent, at the House Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2019. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

GOP representative Jim Jordan also came to the president’s defense, saying there was never a quid pro quo. On Sunday, Jordan pointed out Ukraine’s president met with U.S. senior officials multiple times before the security aid was released. He said aid was never talked about being linked to investigations in those meetings.
Jordan suggested the funding was released after officials became convinced Ukraine’s president was the “real deal” and not corrupt. He also noted the aid was provided before it actually had to be.
“The Ukrainians did nothing to…get the aid released,” stated Jordan. “There was never this quid pro quo — that the Democrats all promised existed — before President Trump released the phone call.”

Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, questions former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch as she testifies before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, Nov. 15, 2019, during the second public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump’s efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Trump has been accused of withholding aid from Ukraine to pressure the foreign country to investigate 2020 hopeful and former Vice President Joe Biden. In regards to the alleged quid pro quo, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise slammed claims the commander-in-chief cared more about investigating the Bidens than Ukraine policy.
Scalise pointed out that in the original phone call transcript that was released, President Zelensky thanked President Trump for all he’s done to help Ukraine. He stressed this included when the White House sold javelin missiles to Ukraine to help the country stand up to Russia. He also noted the Obama administration had refused to sell Ukraine those missiles.
Scalise also pointed out the law required President Trump to ensure Ukraine is rooting out corruption before any taxpayer money went to the nation.

FILE – In this Aug. 27, 2018 file photo, House Majority Whip U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., recalls the prayers he received after getting shot during a congressional baseball practice in Virginia in 2017, during a press availability in Jackson, Miss. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)

Despite these comments, it appears Democrats have little interest in listening to their Republican colleagues.
During a Sunday interview, main spokesperson for the impeachment inquiry House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she has no interest in responding to her Republican colleagues about their impeachment concerns. She rejected opening a dialogue with the GOP, calling it “a waste of time.”
Pelosi went on to say she has a “real level of discomfort” in regards to hearing out issues brought forward by those on the other side of the aisle.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., talks to reporters on the morning after the first public hearing in the impeachment probe of President Donald Trump on his effort to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 14, 2019. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Americans tired of Impeachment Cartoons

Trump admin. ousts Obama-era Homelessness Council official

Executive Director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, courtesy of USICH online.

The Trump administration is ousting an Obama-era official who oversaw efforts to combat homelessness. On Friday, Matthew Doherty announced his departure from his role as the Executive Director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.
In an email to coworkers, Doherty said administration “no longer wishes” to have him in the position, which he had held since April 2015. He also took to Twitter with a similar message, saying it was the administration’s request he resign.

As Tweets from faster fingers than mine have been hinting, today was my last day in service as Executive Director at @USICHgov, at the administration’s request (as is their right.) Incredibly honored to have had the opportunity to serve in this role, and, as importantly … (1/4)

— Matthew Doherty (@m_j_doherty) November 15, 2019

Doherty’s ousting comes as the White House continues its efforts to solve the country’s homelessness crisis.
“The people of San Francisco are fed up, and the people of Los Angeles are fed up,” President Trump said last month. “We’re looking at it and we’ll be doing something about it.”

Senate confirms Trump appeals court nominee Steven Menashi over Dem objections

The Senate on Thursday voted to confirm Trump nominee Steven Menashi to a federal appeals court despite fierce opposition from Democrats.
Menashi, who will be seated on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, was confirmed by a 51-41 vote. He had been criticized by liberals in Congress and in the media over accusations of a lack of professionalism and bias, though Menashi has said the attacks mischaracterize him and his writings.
"Mr. Menashi is one of the most contemptible nominees to come before the Senate in all my time in this body," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on the Senate floor Thursday. "He would be a disgrace, a disgrace to the seat once held by the great Thurgood Marshall. Sitting before the Judiciary Committee, he refused to answer simple questions. He showed a breathtaking contempt for senators on both sides of the aisle. His record on race, women's equality, LGBTQ rights and the rights of immigrants should be disqualifying."
Menashi was grilled during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing over his past writings and his work with the White House counsel’s office. A segment on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show discussed a law journal article Menashi wrote in 2010, titled "Ethnonationalism and Liberal Democracy." Maddow cited Menashi’s use of the term “ethnonationalism” to suggest he is aligned with white nationalists, alleging he's on the “fringe of racial thinking.”
During questioning, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said that Menashi had faced “unusually personal” and “vicious” attacks.
Menashi denied the white nationalism allegations, saying, “It’s hurtful and I think it misrepresents what I’ve written.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has steadily advanced nearly 50 Trump picks to circuit court posts while also shepherding two Supreme Court nominees and dozens of district court nominees through confirmations, complimented Menashi's credentials on the Senate floor this week.
"Mr. Menashi is a graduate of Dartmouth College and Stanford University Law School, he's accrued an impressive record in private practice and earned clerkships on the D.C. Circuit and with Justice [Samuel] Alito," McConnell said of Menashi this week. "I hope my colleagues will join me in advancing each of these nominations."
Conservatives, including Judicial Crisis Network policy director Carrie Severino, who co-authored "Justice on Trial," a book chronicling the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh, have stepped up to defend Menashi's record.
Severino wrote in the Washington Examiner last month that the criticism levied by Maddow is unfair because Menashi's take on Israel as a Jewish state that is also a democracy, "has roots in his family history. The nominee’s grandparents suffered anti-Semitism in Iraq and the former Soviet Union — his grandmother survived a pogrom in Baghdad — before emigrating to the United States, as did his in-laws, who were Soviet refugees."
Severino also wrote that other liberal attacks on Menashi for his college writings were baseless.
"Most people would be embarrassed to reread their musings from their teen and early adult years," she wrote. "But even as a young college student and recent graduate, Menashi managed to address divisive topics thoughtfully, respectfully, and fairly.
"It is merely because some of those arguments took conservative positions that he has been subjected to unrelenting and misleading attacks from biased news media."
The American Bar Association (ABA), which evaluates federal judicial nominees, rated Menashi as “Well Qualified,” its highest mark. That has not been the case for some other Trump judges confirmed by the Senate, like Judge Justin Walker, who was confirmed to the Western District of Kentucky last month.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., bashed Republicans for the pick.
"I find it hard to believe there's a shortage of experienced conservative attorneys and state court judges in Kentucky," he said.
Even as the Senate voted to confirm Menashi Thursday, Democrats continued to rail against the pick.
"The Senate is voting right NOW on Steven Menashi, one of the MOST extreme and LEAST forthcoming judicial nominees I have seen in my 45 years in the Senate," Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., tweeted. "His refusal to answer even basic Qs from both parties made a mockery of our constitutional duty to provide advice & consent."
Fox News' Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report. 

Elise Stefanik emerges as main Schiff antagonist in fiery impeachment hearings

Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., emerged this week as a central figure on the Republican side of the House Intelligence Committee in the public impeachment hearings -- and a top antagonist of Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif.
The 35-year-old lawmaker featured prominently as tensions boiled over between lawmakers on Friday during the questioning of former Ukraine Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. Ranking Member Devin Nunes, R-Calif., attempted to give up the remainder of his time to her. But as Stefanik spoke, Schiff slammed down the gavel, arguing that it was not allowed under committee rules: "The gentlewoman will suspend."
"What is the interruption for now?" she shot back.
What followed was a debate between Nunes and Schiff as to whether the Republican could offer his time to a fellow member of Congress, rather than minority counsel. Stefanik repeatedly tried to speak, only for Schiff to bang his gavel again.
"You're gagging the young lady from New York?" Nunes laughed at one point.
"This is the fifth time you have interrupted a duly-elected member of Congress," Stefanik told Schiff, who repeatedly told her she was "not recognized" to speak.
Before the testimony began Friday, Schiff shut down Stefanik for the first time after Stefanik asked if he would “continue to prohibit witnesses from answering Republican questions.” Schiff said it wasn’t a “proper” point of order, and then declined to recognize her colleague Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, who also tried to raise a parliamentary question.
“We know clearly you're going to interrupt us throughout this hearing,” Stefanik complained within minutes of the gavel.
Tensions and spats between Republicans and Democrats were expected amid the partisan impeachment hearing, but eyes were generally on Nunes and Jordan -- who normally play the roles of attack dog at hearings. But instead, it was Stefanik who generated significant buzz, as well as viral clips that quickly zipped around conservatives and Republicans on Twitter.
Another moment came later in the hearing when Stefanik read out comments from Schiff about how the whistleblower was going to testify “very soon” -- comments that he had not allowed to be submitted for the record. As she did so, Schiff sat emotionless with his arms folded.
In this case, the fact that we are getting criticized by [Schiff] for statements he himself made early on in this process shows the duplicity and the abuse of power we are continuing to see," she said.
She also scored some key narrative points for the Republican side too. In the questioning of Yovanovitch, she asked the ex-ambassador whether it was accurate that “defensive lethal aid” that she had pushed for was provided to Ukraine not by the Obama administration, but by the Trump administration.
“That’s correct,” Yovanovitch responded.
Her performance in the hearings drew praise from fellow Republicans.
“She’s effective. She’s a great spokesperson,” said Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, another member of the Intelligence committee, to The Associated Press. “And these issues are in her wheelhouse.”
It was for Republicans, something of a mirror of another viral 2017 moment when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., shut down remarks from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. When McConnell subsequently complained that he warned her she was breaking Senate rules, he added that “nevertheless, she persisted.” Those words formed a slogan for Democrats -- and sympathetic media outlets -- that carries on to this day.
Some of those media outlets appeared less sympathetic to Stefanik, however, The Washington Post, which had once called Warren’s moment a “battle cry” called Stefanik’s a "transparently" "manufactured"  moment and a "gender-centric stunt." It also accused her of making "political hay."
Stefanik has indeed used the Friday moment, as well as the controversy it generated, to follow up with a fundraising push.
“Since I’ve exposed Adam Schiff, radical liberals & never-Trumpers are launching disgusting attacks against me in an attempt to silence me,” she said.
But so has her Democratic opponent Tedra Cobb, tweeting that “partisan political theatre is beneath the dignity of her office.”
"She skipped several important private hearings— now with the cameras on, she has repeatedly attempted to derail the public hearings," Cobb tweeted. "Stefanik should take her oath to the Constitution seriously."
Hearings continue next week on Tuesday, and it will remain to be seen the role that Stefanik plays during those hearings as well.
Fox News’ Joseph A. Wulfsohn and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

New documents allege millions went to Biden’s and Kerry’s firm

FILE – In this Jan. 15, 2017 file photo, former U.S Secretary of State John Kerry speaks with the media after attending the Mideast peace conference in Paris. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool, File)

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UPDATED 8:18 PM PT — Saturday, November 16, 2019

Corrupt actions by the former Obama-era vice president and secretary of state are coming to light after new leaked documents surfaced. In a bombshell tweet, activist and entrepreneur Michael Coodrey released a series of leaked documents from the Ukrainian General Prosecutor’s Office, which allegedly detail a so-called ‘slushfund’ collecting large sums of money from foreign sources.

Leaked transaction and bank records indicate an influx of large payments from Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings Limited to Rosemont Seneca Bohai LLC, in what appears to be monthly payments of $83,333.33. pic.twitter.com/BZXi61NnOO

— Michael Coudrey (@MichaelCoudrey) November 14, 2019

The report claimed this fund is owned and operated by former Secretary of State John Kerry and Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden.
In 2014, Hunter Biden was appointed to the board of directors of Ukrainian oil company Burisma. GOP senators are calling on the State Department to release records of business dealings within the company. This comes after $1.8 billion in U.S. and IMF funds to Ukraine allegedly disappeared.

Career Foreign Service officer George Kent and top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine William Taylor, right, are sworn in to testify during the first public impeachment hearing of the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill, Wednesday Nov. 13, 2019, in Washington. (Joshua Roberts/Pool via AP)

State Department official George Kent claimed he has no idea what qualified Hunter Biden to serve on the board of a Ukrainian gas company. Kent testified on Capitol Hill this week, saying he doesn’t know anything about Biden’s background or how he could be tied to Burisma.
“I heard nothing about prior experience,” stated Kent. “Do you know if he possesses any other element — other than the fact that he is the son of, at the time, the sitting vice president?”
This comes after Ukrainian investigators alleged the only reason Biden was on the company’s board was to protect Burisma from anti-corruption scrutiny — which eventually happened when Joe Biden forced Ukraine’s top prosecutor to resign in 2016.

FILE – In this Jan. 30, 2010, file photo, former Vice President Joe Biden, left, with his son Hunter, right, at the Duke Georgetown NCAA college basketball game in Washington. (AP Photo/Nick Wass, File)

At the same time, Ukraine’s foreign minister released a statement saying the U.S. envoy was never linked to probes into the Bidens’ alleged corruption. The minister added the Bidens were mentioned during U.S.-Ukrainian talks, but were not conditionally attached to the investigation.
The president weighed in on that statement during a ‘Keep America Great’ rally in Louisiana.
“Here it is — Ukrainian Foreign Minister said on Thursday that the United States ambassador did not link financial military assistance to a request for Ukraine to open up an investigation into former Vice President and current Democratic presidential (candidate Joe Biden),” stated President Trump.

#NEW: Pres. Trump reads a statement from the Ukrainian official who said the U.S. Ambassador to the European Union did not attempt to link a military aide freeze to Kiev investigating Joe Biden and his son Hunter. pic.twitter.com/uXJwQwi1Dm

— Alex Salvi (@alexsalvinews) November 15, 2019