Rep. Chris Stewart said Wednesday that the first public impeachment hearings in the House Intelligence Committee did not reveal any dramatic information.
“There is not a single person that watched this and said to themselves, holy cow. There weren’t any surprises or any bombshells,” said Stewart to Fox News’ Laura Ingraham. “I think the Democrats set this up like Watergate. They expected John Dean to appear and have this dramatic moment where people listen and say this is a real problem. It’s not going to materialize. There are no surprises coming.”
The House Intelligence Committee heard testimony from Ambassador William Taylor and deputy assistant secretary of state George Kent about whether President Donald Trump improperly withheld military aid to Ukraine in order to pressure the newly-elected president of that country to dig up dirt on his political rivals.
Ambassador Taylor offered new testimony on Wednesday that he had only recently learned of a telephone call in July overheard by one of his aides where President Trump seemed preoccupied with convincing Ukraine to dig up political dirt on Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. Taylor also shocked several committee members when he said that same aide was told President Trump cared more about “investigations of Biden” than he did about Ukraine.
Despite the dramatic revelation from Taylor, Stewart predicted the public hearings will have little to no impact.
“I think one week from now after about a half a dozen of these, most Americans are going to say, is that all? You’re going to remove the president of the United States less than a year from the election, over this? I just don’t think it’s going to sell,” he said.
Stewart also cast doubt on the motives of Ambassador Taylor and secretary Kent in regards to their views toward Ukraine.
“I had a couple of people text me and they said, they seemed disproportionately concerned with the Ukrainian interest versus America’s interest. I’m not saying they actually feel that way but they certainly had that as a priority for them. They are individuals whose responsibility is to carry out the policies of the duly elected president of the United States. Regardless of who that is, they don’t get to say I disagree. And I think that’s what they were concerned about as much as anything. It wasn’t necessarily that they love it Ukraine more than the U.S. But they were offended that the president’s policies were different than they thought it should be,” said Stewart.
Watch the clip below via Fox News:
