On Friday, in a blistering attack on House Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, Georgia Rep. Doug Collins ripped the Committee for holding hearings on whether Congress has the capacity to impeach President Trump rather than doing genuinely helpful legislative work, snapping, “Did you ever have a dream that you wake up and you’re back in your school, you’re back in high school?”
Collins started, “For a moment I was — you ever have one of those dreams? Did you ever have a dream that you wake up and you’re back in your school, you’re back in high school? For me, it was back in Miss McCall’s class in North Hall High school, government, American government class, and ‘It’s the proper role of government and the different checks and balances and what is Congress’ role and what’s the president’s role and what’s the judiciary’s role?’ We could stop this hearing right now because the chairman’s just laid out all the congressional routes and avenues that Congress has to it.”
He continued:
And we’re gonna have a time —I’m glad the panel’s here, y’all are great folks, you’ve got scholarly work, we’re gonna hear some wonderful things — but we’ve stopped right here. The problem is we’re just dragging this on. It’s not that you want to come to impeachment; the chairman talked about impeachment, if that’s what you want to do, then that’s the part, we don’t need to discuss “Is this the constitutional right of Congress to do impeachment?” That is exactly what Congress’ right to do. The Constitutional processes are very well addressed in the Constitution and in our processes.
But instead we come here today to have another “almost-impeachment” hearing, but “not-an-impeachment” hearing, “we want to get facts” “we want to do this.” No, we’re just waiting on and on.
Collins blasted, “I’m trapped back in 9th grade. Miss McCall was a wonderful teacher but I don’t want to go back through it again. This is black and white: we know this problem here. So what are we not doing?”
Collins then mentioned the work the committee was doing regarding first responders to the 9/11 attacks, and asked why the committee did not spend time focusing on real problems, such as immigration. He stated, “Let’s actually get to solving real issues instead of having theoretical college discussions on what is Congress’ power? If we don’t know what Congress’ power is now, this hearing is not gonna help us. In fact, it’s ridiculous.”
Collins spoke of the House Democrats’ efforts to target Trump simply because they were bitter over losing in 2016: “In all due respect, we know what the Constitutional process is here; we just want to dance around it so we can keep another round of stories going that ‘the Judiciary Committee is pursuing and harassment and doing what it needs to do to make sure this administration’s held accountable’ because we don’t like him. The economy’s good; life’s going better, but we don’t like it because we don’t like the November 2016 election. That’s all this is about. “
He concluded:
So, for everybody who didn’t get to the wonderful ability to be in Miss McCall’s 9th grade American government class at North hall high School, this may be your opportunity. Get your horn books out; get your study books out; this is going to be a Constitutional process of what we already know is our process, but we’re gonna have some experts tell us what those processes are.
Mr. Chairman, there’s a lot of things you could be calling today; this isn’t one of them. Why don’t we actually take up real legislation to fix the border crisis, to fix the issues that we all talk about up here. Instead, we have hearings. Our body is to actually legislate; you and I have legislated before. Lets start legislating and stop the show, but as again, the popcorn’s cooking, it’s time, as I’ve always said, let the show begin.
Video below:
H/T Twitchy
