Sen. Lisa Murkowski had a few choice words for Rep. Jerrold Nadler, the Chair of the House Judiciary Committee leading the charge on impeachment.
Nadler had been arguing in favor of having former national security adviser John Bolton testify during the Senate trial.
But Nadler could not resist his impulses — he had take it a step further and accuse all Senate Republicans of conducting a “cover up.”
Nadler had said, “I see a lot of senators voting for a cover-up, voting to deny witnesses, an absolutely indefensible vote, obviously a treacherous vote,” essentially putting Republicans on trial for corruption.
Even Sen. Chuck Schumer accused Republicans of taking part in a cover up.
That didn’t go over so well with Murkowski.
“As one who is listening attentively and working hard to get to a fair process, I was offended,” Murkowski told reporters who asked her to comment on Nadler’s needling.
Murkowski, considered a moderate Republican by most political observers, plays a key role in the proceedings because she is never in lock-step on any issue. People on the far right are often frustrated by her unwillingness to state her position on impeachment.
And now, she is starting to frustrate Democrats, as they continue to put pressure on her to vote to convict the president.
But Murkowski is process-oriented lawmaker, a trait that sometimes drives her conservative critics to distraction.
Murkowski was voting with McConnell and the rest of Republicans, except Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, in favor of taking things in steps. Witnesses could come later and Murkowski wasn’t going to be bullied into pre-judging whether witnesses are warranted.
The pressure is on, however. Murkowski’s office has received thousands of phone calls from around the country from Democrats encouraging her to vote with Democrats in favor of guaranteeing appearances by the Democrats’ witnesses.
Her siding with McConnell has the Left uneasy, so now they have taken to Twitter, a platform dominated by leftwing voices:
“Murkowski can take her righteous indignation and shove it,” one woman wrote.
“I find it ironic that Lisa Murkowski is outraged at Nadler for calling it a cover up! Well, Lisa what would YOU call it when every single republican voted down 3 different amendments to allow witnesses and documents? A COVERUP! Spare the outrage! The House deserves to be outraged,” wrote another.
“Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and the other ‘very serious’ GOP phonies can feel free to go to hell. All these bastards are dragging us closer to totalitarianism, vote by vote,” wrote another angry leftist.
It’s new territory for Murkowski to be criticized by the Left for being too thoughtful and deliberative. These are usually the sentiments of the right wing.
The trial schedule has the issue of witnesses coming up six days after the opening arguments by the House Democrats and the Trump defense lawyers. For Murkowski, it seems to make sense, and appeals to her process-oriented nature.
“I went on to explain more fully what it is that we’re dealing with. And what has been proposed, at that point in time, was the same thing that we have in front of us right now, which is that we should follow this Clinton model …” Murkowski told reporters.
The Left is now as mad at Murkowski as the far right appears to be much of the time.
The “process-oriented senator” who works across the aisle to get bills passed, is not giving the Left the assurances they want, and their talons have come out. The entire scene is reminiscent of the criticism she faced when she refused to be a “yea” vote for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, only back then, the rebuke was coming from the other side.
It’s a reminder that in politics, “there are no permanent enemies, and no permanent friends, only permanent interests.”
A doe in the headlights. Wide-eyed and trusted by ……… Nobody.
Lisa is definitely no statesperson. In other words, she cannot stand up and fight off corruption or disseminate in her mind what is good for the country.
She can’t make up her mind as to whether to be a team player with the Republicans, or to appease her Democrat constituency. She often forgets that all Democrats are team players. She bears no loyalty to anyone except to the Murkowski name, which her daddy pretty much ruined between 2002 and 2006. Lisa was appointed to her position under very suspect circumstances. By playing all sides, she has been able to squeek by, but not to be an icon as was Ted Stevens. Lisa has carved-out nothing for herself. It’s all been handed to her. Her legacy will be remembered as a bench warmer senator, not a stalwart statesperson from Alaska. She is an indecisive politician who has never formulated a well-defined philosophy or aim, except to make it through the next election. Alaska deserves better!
Excellent !
Nailed it!
Whenever you annoy both sides of an issue, you’re probably doing the right thing.
That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Lisa can’t turn on her Republican colleagues this time because Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler insulted the entire Senate body. They even pissed off some dims. So as in a rip current, she’s not going to swim against the tide.
You’re not following the bouncing ball. You’re talking only today.
Lisa give the Democrats what they want, put Obama on the witness stand.
They’ll shut up quick enough.
Lisa and how she votes is much to do about nothing. Unless I am wrong this ” trial” in the Senate will be over within the next two weeks. Following the unsuccessful attempt to remove Trump, the Democrats will be off on another tangent to obstruct the will of the electorate. Thankfully little Lisa and how she votes should not be a deciding factor. Lisa may be process driven but one process she skips is Critical Thinking.
Lisa is a born and raised “politico” who is very good at “walking the line”.
Lisa is feeling the heat from back home. But that one chick that wanted to know why she won’t vote for witnesses ….it’s because the house doesn’t have a case. they had the opportunity to call witnesses during their impeachment hearing and they didn’t do that. what they did was block Republicans from calling witnesses during the house process so that’s like the pot calling the kettle black isn’t it?They wanted to rush it through before the holidays so everybody can just sit on it and stew around for a while, then try to force the Senate to call witnesses. Trust me, they won’t like the kind of witnesses that we would call like Hunter Biden and Joe Biden and Barack Obama. You’ll find that they were in bed with the corrupt organizations over there raking in money Hillary Clinton style. Trump was right to withhold the funding until after an investigation because Ukraine is so corrupt it puts 1930 Chicago to shame. It puts Joseph Kennedy the father of JFK 2 shame for all his illegal booze running during prohibition. Made the family fortune doing. It even puts Hillary to shame for the millions of money that bill stole from the Haitian relief fund and the two billion dollars that went missing out of the state department after she left. So we don’t want to send money to a place that is using it for crime and other illegal activities. On the other hand the witnesses out of the oval office are protected by national security so good luck hearing anything from them. Trump hasn’t done anything that Obama and Clinton and other presidents haven’t done. What Congress did in those cases is go to court and not try to do a partisan hack job on the office of the presidency but that’s the difference between high moral fiber in a party in the Republicans and a party ran by scarecrows. Remember when Obama was caught on that hot Mic telling the Russian guy to tell Putin that he can be all up in his ass after the election to give him more time? Now that was a president colluding with our enemy.
Well, Greg, I hate to say this, but this is just plain stupid or ignorant. The House tried over and over to subpoena witnesses during the impeachment and was denied by the White House on every one of them due to the questionable issue of “executive privilege.” If you think the witnesses the Republicans wanted to call, i.e. mostly someone who’s name was Biden, were germane, I would challenge you to come up with a logical reason why they should be called, since none were accused of engaging in proscribed activity. And why not throw in Hillary, who has been investigated numerous time for various “issues” but against whom no evidence has ever been found to bring charges of any kind.
Unfortunately, Trump has been accused of something that actually endangers the republic, unlike the “trumped up” charges you list in your screed that have no basic in fact.
Sorry to say again, but this is just plain stupid or ignorant. DO YOUR RESEARCH. AND NOT ON FOX. We’re not just fooling around here, democracy and the rule of law could be on the block.
Here’s the thing Hillary has enough money and enough dirt on people in power too easily side step her two-year investigation. She had the FBI covering for her and in fact working for her during the 2016 election. She’s as dirty as they come.The Biden investigation was never done but it will be impeachment or not. You don’t put your son and your son-in-law on the board of a corrupt business in Ukraine, and then you oversee the whole foreign policy of that country because Obama told you to, and then when someone questions why our taxpayers dollars are going to such a corrupt country controlled by these corrupt businesses as they were back then they’re very well does need to be an investigation. And to agree with you no we are not fooling around here. We take this coup d’etat or whatever you want to call it very seriously when we the elected people put somebody in office. The bidens and the clintons and the obamas have a ton of skeletons in their closets and this is what President Trump talked about when he suggested draining the swamp and this is what the swamp rats do to you when you try to expose them. Step up to the plate on Saturday after the president’s legal team gets done shredding these ass rats in the Democrat party and we’ll see how bold you are.
I don’t think you’re sorry at all I think you enjoy saying ignorant and stupid. That’s what I believe.
Gregory, That’s completely false. The House issued requests, and a few subpoenas. The President is perfectly authorized to then claim executive privilege against both requests and subpoenas, that is part of the process. The next step for the House would be to litigate their subpoenas in Court to determine if the claims are valid.
They chose not to do so, instead claiming there was an “existential threat to the Republic” per the Committee report and similar statements by House leadership. An emergency so great that, apparently, Pelosi could then sit on the slipshod Articles for a month.
They then had the temerity and gall to use their deliberate failure to take the time to properly subpoena witnesses and litigate the Exec Privilege claims on a case by case to bootstrap their asinine “obstruction” claim _and_ say the Senate was conducting a “cover up” for not doing their damn job for them.
So spare me.
That is an exact analogy to a prosecutor
The House could have waited for the courts to decide the executive privilege issue (and it’s definitely not “questionable”) but they were in some strange rush because ‘our democracy was in peril’. Then, there was no rush at all. Jerry Nadler said the case for impeachment was overwhelmingly solid and the evidence proved guilt beyond question. So, there is apparently no need for more witnesses or evidence. The D’s said so.
I’m afraid personal self-interest and financial corruption have made such intrusions into our overall leadership in government, industry and finance over the past few decades that the cause for real civic minded leadership that built this country in these areas may be gone forever.
I hope and pray that I am wrong, but it sure doesn’t look that way. There are just too many examples in all the major institutions in our country to ignore.
Fergie this has been going on for over 200 years. This is nothing new I’m sorry to bust your bubble but the Senate was mad at George Washington for invoking executive privilege. Adams had a vice president named Burr , yes the same bear who had the dueling conflict and killed one of our founding fathers. The same bird who likely had Meriwether Louis assassinated and conspired with the Spanish to stop the Lewis and Clark expedition. The same Burr that wanted to be president of West America. It goes on and on and on so the fact that the media gets this all turned up is nothing new but unfortunately most people don’t know our nation’s history.
To Greg:
I agree self interest has been going on for as long as civilization has existed. You can always cherry pick egregious examples out of history.
However, in our country many civil minded men (and women) in industry, goverment and the clergy put civic mindedness for the country right up there with their own personal ambitions, mostly because they wanted to see the USA prosper and be a land of freedom and opportunity for their descendants. All you have to do is look at some of the pioneers right here in Alaska.
My point is that these have become fewer and fewer and fewer as the “me” generation takes over.
Fergie
The Clintons left the White House busted, according to Hillary Clinton, but the only thing busted was them trying to steal the White House China, which they were made to give back. Now look at them with all the pay-for-play foundation money coming from foreign interests.
During Kavanaugh, she reported to me that her “poll” was 47/47. At the time that was going on, Alaska polls were 60% for Kavanaugh. It is pretty obvious to me that the so called 47/47 was a lot of non-Alaskans, whom she listens to over the conservative Alaskan voices.
In this article, she is getting hammered by the non-Alaskan haters of the President.. I was an TV ad calling her to stand with the socialists attacking the President.
Here is my thought and what I’m doing. When she is doing right, we call her and thank her. This adds to her knowledge that we Alaskans are watching. My last call was thanking her but stating that she is not trusted because of her past votes and actions. The idea is to get her to think more about we Alaskans want and tell her to do the better chance we will listen and act.
Lastly, glad to see the socialist attacking her. Maybe she will understand that you sleep with snakes, y
Why didn’t they call for all this in the house?
Because if they would have called witnesses then the Republicans would have been able to call witnesses and what’s Obama and Biden going to say when they’re sworn in yeah I was dirty and took the money? That’s why there was no witnesses.
I await Senator Murkowski’s decision on witnesses six days forward with bated breath.
Why ??? she’s already told you how she’s going to vote. Just listen to what she says.
Don’t hold your breath Gregory. you do realize that certain witnesses can’t be called because of national security and executive privilege granted by the Constitution. You do realize that don’t you? Basically trying to make the case on the evidence that you have or shut up. This is America or someone is innocent and the burden of proof is on the prosecution. Unlike the America that you seem to want to defend where tyranny is overpowering an individual rights are non-existent.
I apologize for referring to you as a liberal. There are no liberals still alive. Liberals believe in civil rights. Your group if you are aware and honest enough to admit is some sort of a totalitarian cult.
Stop eating bait, Gregory.
…and Murky will decide last so she can hang w/the popular kids after each vote.
For sure she won’t hang it out there in case she’s wrong. Libs don’t care anymore about doing what’s right. The Constitution means nothing to the Dems. They are in a scramble to preserve what life they have left and I compliment them for doing that. That’s all about survival. But survival of the fittest and evolution knows that in time everything will die. The Democratic radicals are saying the death throes and are fighting to stay alive. Their willingness to manufacture evidence where none exist is appalling. This is exactly what the founders warned us about. The evil that infests the Democratic party must be eradicated buy vote. It will be our undoing if we fail to cut out the cancer currently infesting our republic
The number of yes votes required for a guilty verdict by the Senate on this faux impeachment by the House of Representatives is 67. We know that all of the Democrats with the possible exception of Joe Manchin will vote guilty, thus requiring 20 Republicans to cross over and vote with the Democrats to remove President Trump. There is little to no chance that this required number of Republicans to cross will be met. However, that number gives Lisa a lot of safe wiggle room, so I will not be surprised when she votes with the Democrats to remove President Trump.
Lisa Murkowski has always been a RINO – Has anyone here ever tried to catch a lizard in the desert, you have not a clue which way it will run.
Why are Democrats from other states contacting her? She doesn’t represent them, she is supposed to represent Alaska 1st and the Republican party 2nd. We don’t care what the lower 48 Democrats want, she needs to do what is right for Alaska and the country and tell them to pound sand.
Any witness to call would have come from the House managers. None came in with the articles so, Lisa is trying to make you all excited….trying to make you think she is so….important. She Romney and Collins are as much idiots as she is. Trying to get noticed…PRETENDING!!!!!
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