On Friday’s Battleground State Report with Michael Patrick Leahy and Doug Kellett – a one-hour radio show from Star News Digital Media in the early stages of national weekend syndication rollout – Leahy and Kellet deliberated the concept of fairness as it pertains to the current impeachment proceedings President Trump.
During the segment, Leahy questioned Kellett on whether or not he thought Tulsi Gabbard made a mistake in voting for the impeachment inquiry and how it will play out going forward from a political vantage point.
Kellet: Mike you left on the last segment the question about fairness. You know I would ask Jesus what is the truth. And I think what is fairness sort of fits the same category right? Is fairness at this point what somebody thinks it is? In other words, the Democrats think they’re being fair if they handle the process the way they want to do the Republicans think the handling is not fair because they’re not in charge of this.
How do we discern that? I do think your point is valid that if the American people don’t see it as a fair process impeachment, it has no chance persuading anyone about anything.
Leahy: Well I think it gets back to the concept in the constitution of due process. Is the President being allowed due process? Can he confront his accusers? Does he have attorneys there? Is he able to present his own witnesses? These are things that the Democrats aren’t allowing. They’re interrupting questions. Not allowing witnesses to answer. I think don’t think it’s playing well.
Kellett: But I don’t ever see Trump as being a defenseless guy. (Chuckles) For example, he’s out there saying whatever he wants to. He’s commenting on the impeachment proceedings and commenting on witnesses via Twitter and in impromptu news conferences. He’s sort of getting his views out there, isn’t he?
Leahy: He is but getting them out into the general public and getting them out into a hearing, those are different things. And I don’t know, I mean I think this just runs against American standards of fair play the way the Democrats are trying to ramrod this through.
Kellett: Well, they’re not doing this as fast as they thought they would. We were told this would be done by Thanksgiving.
Leahy: Not going to happen.
Kellett: And a quicker sort of situation may work to their advantage but it’s not going to happen.
Leahy: So let me ask you a very specific question about a specific individual. And that’s … I’m just kind of curious about this. So, Tulsi Gabbard is running for President. She’s a representative from Hawaii. She said that she will not be running for reelection in Hawaii. I think that’s a good move on her part.
And she’s going to focus on her presidential campaign. She barely made it through this upcoming week. There’s going to be 10 democrats in the debate in Atlanta. She’s going to be one of the 10. But she’s maybe two percent, three percent in the polls. Now she voted when Nancy Pelosi, a couple of weeks ago, decided to hold a vote on a resolution to initiate these impeachment inquiries in public she voted in favor of that impeachment inquiry.
Because all the facts had to be out there she said. Well, when we get through this little ‘shampeachment’ process it’s going to be very clear I think to any fair-minded person, in my view that the Democrats are withholding key evidence that could be exculpatory for the President. And trying to create out of hearsay allegations that aren’t supported by the President.
And yet there will be a bill of impeachment. And I do think that they’ll display pure partisanship by voting to impeach the President. But, the last time only two Democrats did not vote for the inquiry. Gabbard was not one of those. How does she vote on that? How do you think she would respond to that?
Kellett: Well I guess if she’s only looking at politics the Democrat electorate wants Trump impeached and removed. (Chuckles) So, if she’s only doing that based on how it may help her in the democratic primary race, she would vote to impeach him. I think it’s a defensible position myself to say, OK, I’m in favor of looking into this.
There’s enough smoke here. I’ll vote for the inquiry. And then maybe after all the testimony and everything and say no I don’t think it’s impeachable and therefore I vote against impeachment. In her case though there’s a political problem by doing that right?
Leahy: I think that’s how she looked at it, Doug. I think you’re exactly right in terms of how she looked at it.
Kellett: In the Democrat party specifically, there’s really no harm in voting for the inquiry. (Laughs)
Leahy: I think you’re right. Now the problem with it is it didn’t guarantee due process and so it would be a sham. Everybody knew that and she knew that at the time. But I think that nuance Doug, I think you’re exactly right.
Listen to the full show here:
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Tune in every Friday morning and listen to The Battleground State Report with Michael Patrick Leahy, and Doug Kellett.
