Caroline Brehman/Zuma

The House of Representatives will vote this week on continuing the impeachment investigation and opening proceedings to the public, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Monday.

In a letter addressed “Dear Democratic Colleague,” Pelosi reiterated that the Constitution does not require the House to hold a vote before beginning an impeachment investigation—and noted that a federal court recently agreed with that fact. “Just last week, a federal court confirmed that the House is not required to hold a vote and that imposing such a requirement would be ‘an impermissible intrusion on the House’s constitutional authority,'” she writes. “The Trump Administration has made up this argument—apparently out of whole cloth—in order to justify its unprecedented cover-up, withhold key documents from multiple federal agencies, prevent critical witnesses from cooperating, and defy duly authorized subpoenas.”

“This week, we will bring a resolution to the Floor that affirms the ongoing, existing investigation that is currently being conducted by our committees as part of this impeachment inquiry, including all requests for documents, subpoenas for records and testimony, and any other investigative steps previously taken or to be taken as part of this investigation,” the letter continues. This step will undercut Republicans’ argument and “eliminate any doubt as to whether the Trump Administration may withhold documents, prevent witness testimony, disregard duly authorized subpoenas, or continue obstructing the House of Representatives.”

“Nobody is above the law,” Pelosi concludes.

Read the full letter below:

NEW — Here is Pelosi’s Dear Colleague letter announcing vote on continuing impeachment proceedings and moving them to the public phase pic.twitter.com/OJVWUqR3tQ

— Sam Stein (@samstein) October 28, 2019

Tom Williams/Zuma

Follow me, if you will, on a brief hypothetical journey. Let’s say the House of Representatives draws up and passes articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump. Per the Constitution, Chief Justice John Roberts would preside over Trump’s trial in the Senate. Now, imagine Roberts—a George W. Bush appointee—recusing himself from the trial because he once publicly emphasized judges’ responsibility to act in a non-partisan manner.

That’s how influential Trump supporter and radio host John Cardillo would have it, the conservative Washington Times reported Sunday. Cardillo claims that a statement made by Roberts in November 2018—in response to Trump’s criticism of a federal judge—means that he is biased against the president.

“We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts wrote last year in a statement released by the court’s public information office. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”

For Cardillo, these comments are apparently disqualifying. “There is already a crisis of confidence among the American people that we have a fair system of justice,” he said, according to the Times. “When you have a chief justice of the Supreme Court overtly making comments that are derogatory to the president of the United States, take all speculation out of the process.”

The framing of the article suggests the Times is taking Cardillo’s argument seriously, though the story does make clear that constitutional law experts roundly reject Cardillo’s reasoning. Orin Kerr, a scholar at UC Berkeley, called the argument for recusal “weak” and “hard to square” with the Constitution.

Arguments that the Chief Justice should recuse because of his past spats with Trump seem both weak & hard to square w/ the clear constitutional text: "When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside." Art 1, S. 3, P. 6. https://t.co/wAn1vyS5SA

— Orin Kerr (@OrinKerr) October 28, 2019

In the unlikely event that Roberts did decide to recuse himself, the most senior justice would step in, according to one expert cited by the Times. That’s Clarence Thomas, the most conservative member of the court.

This is not a real thing Trump said. But it doesn't seem like something he wouldn't say, does it?Shutterstock

On Friday, the Pentagon awarded a massive cloud computing contract to Microsoft. People had been expecting the contract to go to Amazon and the switcheroo led many to assume President Trump intervened, given his regular complaining about Jeff Bezos and the “Amazon Washington Post.” Quoth said paper:

Guy Snodgrass, one-time aide to former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, alleged in a book that was published only recently that Trump had indeed attempted to intervene. Here’s Task & Purpose, via Jake Tapper:

Trump called Mattis in the summer of 2018 and directed him to “screw Amazon” out of a chance to bid on a $10 billion cloud networking contract.

[…]

Snodgrass writes: “Relaying the story to us during Small Group, Mattis said, ‘We’re not going to do that. This will be done by the book, both legally and ethically.”

The Department of Defense defended its decision in a statement yesterday, saying that that everything was mad legit:

“The acquisition process was conducted in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.”

and totally cool and stuff:

Keith Srakocic/AP

President Trump made an appearance at a pro-fracking conference in Pittsburgh yesterday, and I went downtown to keep an eye on the protests and demonstrations.

One thing that I’ve been reporting on a bit lately is the crazy Crowdstrike conspiracy theory that President Trump apparently believes. To recap: When the White House released its account of the July 25 call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, people were scratching their heads at Trump’s request that his counterpart “find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike…the server, they say Ukraine has it.”

Crowdstirke, a California-based cybersecurity firm, has been a particular focus of Trump’s since at least early 2017 when, in an interview scheduled to mark his hundredth day in office, he aired thoroughly debunked conspiracy theories suggesting that the company was part of some plot to hide who really hacked the Democratic National Committee. Although the US intelligence community has concluded Russia was responsible, if someone else had done it, it would dispel a cloud hanging over his 2016 election and undermine a key rationale that animated special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. Even though his former senior advisers have told him it’s not true, and his own Department of Justice has said it’s not true, the theory hangs on with the president and his supporters in Congress, two of whom brought it up in an election security hearing this week.

The president cared enough about the theory to include it in the broader push for Ukrainian investigations that now imperils his presidency. But are his supporters anywhere near as interested? While I was downtown, I asked a few Trump supporters demonstrating on the president’s behalf outside the event about Crowdstrike, to find out. And in short, they’re not.

Joe Herman of Pittsburgh told me that “there’s lots of issues concerning the whole horizon of what’s going on in this country politically and socially… I wouldn’t say it’s one of the big, main focal points among Trump supporters that I’ve heard.”

Randy Rodosky, a Trump supporter from Munhall, Pennsylvania, claimed he’d heard about it “on basic news, and I’ve heard it on Fox News.” But when I asked him for details he didn’t have any, and instead performed a familiar pivot. “What Hillary Clinton did was absolutely beyond excuse, and that’s all I can say. I don’t think Trump did anything wrong…Hillary Clinton’s 30,000 deleted emails tell it all.”

“I don’t really know anything about computers,” said one man I spoke to about the Crowdstrike theory. That may have been true, but the next thing he told me illustrated the value of the president’s conspiracies, even if his supporters don’t grasp the details: “I do definitely believe that he wouldn’t have brought it up if there wasn’t something there.”

Ron Sachs/Zuma

While the House of Representatives continues its impeachment inquiry over Donald Trump’s attempts to pressure Ukraine to investigate the Biden family, the White House is refusing to say whether the president used sensitive negotiations with China to push for a similar investigation of the Bidens by that country.

As the Ukraine scandal ramped up several weeks ago, Trump tweeted about Hunter Biden’s business involvement in China. Trump publicly called on China to investigate the matter—just days before the US and China were set to resume high-stakes trade talks. Trump ultimately announced that he’d reached a partial trade deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping. On Thursday, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro declined to tell CNN whether the Trump administration brought up the Bidens during the negotiations.

I just asked WH trade advisor Peter Navarro half a dozen times if Trump would press China to investigate Biden as part of trade talks and he refused to answer citing “confidentiality”. #CITIZENCNN

— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) October 24, 2019

“You don’t have a right to know what happens behind closed doors in the administration,” Navarro told CNN’s Jim Sciutto.

Sciutto followed up, asking, “Did you bring up investigating the Bidens as part of the negotiations?”

“You’re asking me what happens in the White House behind closed doors,” Navarro replied.

Watch a clip of interview below:

Here's video of @jimsciutto asking Peter Navarro if political investigations about the Bidens have come up during China trade talks, and Navarro declining to answer. pic.twitter.com/uaev1O960s

— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) October 24, 2019

If you’re keeping count, which you should be (or leaning on us to count for you), there are now three quid pro quos in President Donald Trump’s orbit of impeachable corruption, or one giant quid pro quo with three distinct parts. We’ve named and itemized them, but is the plural quid pro quos or quids pro quo? Or quae pro quibus? Or quæ with the squished dipthong? Trump’s multiplying misconduct and favor-for-favor political dirt dealing are straining not just credulity and Congress’ enforcement of the Constitution, but copy editors’ enforcement of style guides. What’s an editor to do when the AP Stylebook and Webster’s dictionary appear silent on the most pressing plural question of our time? You appeal to a classics professor.

“I would say quid pro quos, personally,” says Andrew Garrett, professor of linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley, in response to an email I subject-lined “on deadline.” “Nobody would get a Latin plural” like quae pro quibus, which “would entail more than one thing for more than one thing,” he says. “If we’re talking about Ukraine, is it one thing (a visit) for more than one (two investigations? or just one?)—or two things (also aid) for one (one investigation)?”

Let’s rule out quae (nominative plural) pro quibus (ablative plural) and quæ pro quibus. Two down. What about quids pro quo, like attorneys general? I could deep-dive the etymology there, but Professor Garrett was kind enough (and in transit). I’m not going to email agæn. Verdict: quid pro quos.

Lev Parnas, pictured, and Igor Fruman are charged with conspiracy to make illegal contributions to political committees supporting President Donald Trump and other Republicans. Mark Lennihan/AP

An attorney for Lev Parnas, a client of Donald Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani under indictment for allegedly making illegal political contributions, made an unusual claim in court on Wednesday: Some evidence in the investigation could fall under executive privilege.

The legal concept being promulgated here is that executive privilege behaves according to something like the transitive property—that the president’s privilege extends to Giuliani and thus extends to the goons to whom Giuliani had subcontracted the actual ratfucking work. That’s a wild stretch, but the more significant thing about the argument is that it explicitly ties the case to Trump. 

Parnas and his associate Igor Fruman have pleaded not guilty to federal campaign finance charges. As my colleague Dan Friedman has reported, Giuliani, who has represented Parnas and Fruman, has said that his clients “have helped him seek political dirt in Ukraine on former Vice President Joe Biden and other matters,” an effort at the core of House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry.

Via the New York Times:

Edward B. MacMahon Jr., a lawyer for Mr. Parnas, said the potential for the White House to invoke executive privilege stemmed from the fact that Mr. Parnas had used Mr. Giuliani as his own lawyer at the same time Mr. Giuliani was working as Mr. Trump’s lawyer.

Mr. Parnas and Mr. Fruman were charged earlier this month with concealing the source of political donations in order to advance their own business interests and the political interests of Ukrainian government officials. Mr. Trump and Mr. Giuliani were not named in the indictment, although prosecutors are also investigating whether Mr. Giuliani broke lobbying laws in his dealings in Ukraine, according to people familiar with the inquiry.

Prosecutors say they have gathered a large volume of materials as part of the ongoing investigation, pursuant to more than a dozen search warrants. Mr. MacMahon asked that the government use a special team of prosecutors to review the evidence, saying Mr. Parnas’s relationship with Mr. Giuliani indicates some of the materials may be protected by attorney-client privilege or executive privilege.

“These are issues we need to be very sensitive to,” Mr. MacMahon told a federal judge on Wednesday. “I’m not telling you I know how to resolve this.”

He told reporters after Wednesday’s hearing: “I don’t know any more about how to invoke executive privilege than anyone else.”

Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call via ZUMA

When a group of Republican congressmen led by Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz crashed a House impeachment hearing Wednesday, it was hard not to think of a specific historical parallel: The image of several dozen middle-aged white men in suits shutting down a closed-door meeting brought to mind the infamous “Brooks Brothers Riot” of 2000, when a mob of Republican aides—including Trump confidante Roger Stone—stormed a Miami-Dade County canvassing board meeting to physically halt the presidential recount.

But you don’t even have to go back that far to put what happened Wednesday into context. The Gaetz crusade feels familiar because it’s the kind of brazen stunt that Republican state legislators pull off all the time—blowing up the traditions of good governance and betting that the benefits they reap will be worth the backlash. They’re usually correct.

Last month in North Carolina, Republicans managed to override a Democratic governor’s budget veto by lying to Democratic legislators about the day’s vote schedule. In June, Republican senators in Oregon fled to Idaho in order to kill a proposed cap-and-trade bill—days after threats from a sympathetic militia group shut down the state capitol. West Virginia Republicans impeached the entire state supreme court in 2018, just because they could. Arizona Republicans packed their own state supreme court this year, just because they could. When a Democrat was elected governor of North Carolina in 2016, Republicans pushed through legislation in the lame-duck session to strip him of his powers. Wisconsin Republicans did the same thing two years later.

State legislatures are laboratories of democracy where highly trained scientists (OK, a surprisingly high number of them are car salesmen) devise increasingly brazen ways to wield power. The House Republican caucus is filled with former Republican state legislators—like Gaetz—and one lesson Republican state legislators have learned time and again over the last decade is that rules and norms are only as sturdy as the willingness and capacity to enforce them. By noshing on pizza in a secure meeting room while a witness waited to give testimony, Gaetz et al. were operating with the blessing of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)—and sending a clear sign about how the impeachment battle is going to be fought. It’s a play we’ve seen before.

Ron Sachs/ZUMA

In a Wednesday morning tweet, Donald Trump pointed his supporters to a Fox News segment from the night before, during which Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas) denied that the president’s efforts to pressure Ukraine to investigate Democrats didn’t constitute a quid pro quo.

“You can’t have a quid pro quo with no quo,” Ratcliffe had insisted, a sound-bite friendly way of claiming that such a scenario was legally impossible because, according to Trump and his allies, Ukrainian officials had been unaware that Trump had suspended military aid to that country.

But just hours after Trump’s tweet, the New York Times published a report dismantling that very claim:

But in fact, word of the aid freeze had gotten to high-level Ukrainian officials by the first week in August, according to interviews and documents obtained by The New York Times.

[…]

The timing of the communications about the issue, which have not previously been reported, shows that Ukraine was aware the White House was holding up the funds weeks earlier than United States and Ukrainian officials had acknowledged. And it means that the Ukrainian government was aware of the freeze during most of the period in August when Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, and two American diplomats were pressing President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine to make a public commitment to the investigations being sought by Mr. Trump.

The report comes on the heels of testimony by Bill Taylor, the top-ranking US diplomat in Ukraine, in which he said he had been told by a Trump administration official that military aid for Ukraine was indeed contingent on an announcement that Ukrainian officials would launch the investigations Trump demanded.

Yuri Gripas/Zuma

As the impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump grips the nation, his lawyers continue to pursue the argument that he is above the law—and that his immunity from punishment would apply even if he were to shoot someone in the middle of New York’s Fifth Avenue.

🚨 Trump's attorney Consovoy just agreed that Trump could NOT be criminally investigated while in office if he shot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue, when pressed by Judge Chin.

— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) October 23, 2019

At a campaign event in 2016, Trump said, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” On Wednesday morning, William Consovoy, an attorney for Trump, made the case that such an action could not be criminally investigated while Trump was in office at a hearing in the ongoing court battle over the president’s tax returns. 

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. subpoenaed eight years of Trump’s tax returns for his investigation of whether Trump broke any New York State laws when he reimbursed his now-imprisoned personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, for hush fund payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. Trump refused to release his taxes and sued the DA under the argument that a sitting president can’t be prosecuted. His lawyers are now appealing a federal judge’s ruling that called their argument “repugnant to the nation’s governmental structure and constitutional values.”

Listen to audio of the exchange between Consovoy and Judge Denny Chin below:

Here's Donald Trump's lawyer claiming the president cannot even be investigated, let alone prosecuted, for committing a crime while in office, even if he murdered someone in public. pic.twitter.com/h0Rj5AZpPf

— Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog) October 23, 2019