Behind Closed Doors – The New York Times

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Yesterday, Republicans on Capitol Hill faced difficult questions about President Trump’s actions, after explosive testimony by the top American diplomat in Ukraine provided the most damning account to date in the impeachment inquiry.

Today, they came up with an answer.

Storm the SCIF! Storm the SCIF!

“Let us in! Let us in!” shouted dozens of House Republicans, as they pushed past the doors of the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, a basement room in the Capitol where a Defense Department official had arrived Wednesday morning to testify in the inquiry.

Once inside, nearly 30 conservatives yelled, tweeted and ordered pizzas.

The frustrated Republicans, led by Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida, one of Mr. Trump’s most loyal allies, were demanding that the Democrats open the closed-door sessions.

But closed hearings are common in sensitive congressional investigations, so it’s hard to see today’s insurrection as anything more than a political stunt. Republicans, after all, limited attendance at hearings into the 2012 attack on the United States Embassy in Benghazi, Libya.

Yet, today’s protest tells us something fairly significant about the Republican strategy on impeachment moving forward.

As it becomes harder for Republicans to argue that a quid pro quo between Mr. Trump and the Ukrainians never happened — given that the American diplomat who testified yesterday, William B. Taylor Jr., described just such an arrangement — they are going to focus their fight on the process of the inquiry instead.

“Through those hidden closed doors over there, Adam Schiff is trying to impeach a president,” said Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, referring to the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. “Maybe in the Soviet Union this kind of thing is commonplace. This shouldn’t be happening in the United States of America.”

“Show your face where we can all see the travesty that you are trying to foist on America and the degradation of our Republic that you’re engaged in,” said Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama.

Note what Mr. Scalise and Mr. Brooks left out: discussion of the substance of the inquiry.

(Mr. Trump, for his part, went after Mr. Taylor on Twitter, calling him a “Never Trumper,” before complaining that the Democrats were providing “Zero Transparency.”)

The Republicans who entered the SCIF surely knew they’d eventually be kicked out. Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Mr. Schiff have limited the hearings to members of the Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Oversight and Reform committees, which have jurisdiction over the impeachment investigations.

Scores of Republicans who sit on those committees have participated in the questioning so far. And scores of Democrats who are not on those committees have been kept out. Democrats are likely to hold public hearings later this fall.

But it was a stunt that showed a surprising lack of concern for security. The now-infamous SCIF is a secure room used for discussing classified information. As in all secure areas of the White House and of other government buildings, electronics are left in boxes outside the room.

The Republicans brought their cellphones, a significant breach given that security experts have long warned that phones can be turned into covert listening devices — even when they’re off.

The Republicans’ tweets from inside the room set off a flurry of criticism. That might be just fine with them, since they may prefer to spend more time defending their own actions than those of the president.


On Monday, we talked about how some Democrats were wondering whether Hillary Clinton should enter the 2020 race. The next day, my colleague Jonathan Martin wrote in more detail about some of the anxiety Democrats feel about their primary choices.

We’d love to hear from you. Are you having your own political Maalox moment? Whom would you like to see run for president? Or is the current field just fine, thank you very much?

Let us know and we might feature your comments in a future newsletter.

Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. (Please include your name and hometown if you’d like them to be included!)


While you’re thinking about your ideal presidential candidate, here’s a report from Nick Corasaniti on one man who thinks he fits the bill.

It didn’t take long for Jonathan’s article to prompt discussion about possible saviors for the Democrats: Sherrod Brown? Michelle Obama? Mike Bloomberg?

Today, Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, polling in the low single digits nationwide, raised his hand in a speech in Washington, saying: “Look no further.”

Mr. Booker, who entered the Democratic primary in February but has struggled to break through in polling and fund-raising, used a speech at the National Press Club to make his case to be the alternative to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Pitching himself as a great unifier, Mr. Booker also made clear that he believes a strategy of recapturing the Midwest by appealing to white working-class voters would risk ignoring a more central constituency for Democrats: black voters.

“That’s how we won as Democrats in 2008, 2012 and most recently in 2018,” Mr. Booker said. “I hear a lot of Democrats talking about winning the Midwest. Yes, I believe we as a party have to reach out to those voters who took a chance on Trump in the 2016 election. But we also win back the Midwest by turning out black voters in Milwaukee, in Detroit, in Philadelphia, who didn’t vote at all.”

Though he was more blunt about it today, Mr. Booker has already been making this case to voters in those very cities, traveling to all three over the summer.

In Washington, he pointed to his victories in elections for mayor of Newark in 2006 and 2010, and the 2013 special election for a Senate seat, as evidence of his ability to attract support from all corners of the party.

“I can and have excited a diverse coalition of voters,” Mr. Booker said. “I can and have united progressives and moderates. And I will not divide this party and drag others down in personal attacks for the sake of winning a short-term polling boost.”

Of course, he hasn’t yet attracted that diverse coalition to his presidential cause — at least at a scale to register higher in the polls or rake in cash to compete more effectively against his leading rivals. (He raised $6 million last quarter, ranking seventh in the field.)

Mr. Booker dismissed his low polling numbers as unimportant, noting that in his lifetime no Democratic candidate leading in the polls at this point in the calendar ever went on to capture the presidency.

The cash, however, he admitted was a challenge.

“The money often follows the polls,” he said.

  • A new CNN national poll shows Mr. Biden with a commanding lead in the Democratic primary, with the support of 34 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning registered voters, followed by Senator Elizabeth Warren at 19 percent and Senator Bernie Sanders at 16 percent. It is Mr. Biden’s widest lead in the CNN survey since shortly after he announced his bid for president.

  • The Washington Post has a report on how Brad Parscale, President Trump’s 2016 digital director and 2020 campaign manager, has teamed up with a Washington power couple to thrive financially in the Trump era.


Can pigs fly? Meet Hamlet, a 70-pound, potbellied emotional support pig.

If I have to pay for an airplane seat for my children, who are half Hamlet’s weight, someone better be buying that pig his own chair. But does he get frequent flier miles? What if he has to use the bathroom?

So many questions ….


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Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com.



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