Impeachment Hearings Open, Nunes Tears Into Democrats ‘Low Rent Sequel to RussiaGate’

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, used the first lines of his opening statement to portray the Democratic impeachment inquiry as the evolution of a failed effort to remove Trump for unproved allegations of Russian collusion.

A July hearing with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, Nunes said, was “the pitiful finale of a three-year long operation by the Democrats, the corrupt media, and partisan bureaucrats to overturn the results of the 2016 election.”

“They turned on a dime, and now claim the real malfeasance is Republicans’ dealings with Ukraine,” Nunes said.

He went on to accuse Democrats of abuses including “trying to obtain nude pictures of Trump from Russian pranksters pretended to be Ukrainian officials” and “countless other deceptions large and small that make them the last people on earth with the credibility to hurl more preposterous accusations at their political opponents.”

Later, Nunes named one of the officials he said Democrats redacted from interview transcripts released last week: Alexandra Chalupa, a political operative who was affiliated with the Democratic National Committee in 2016 who, Nunes said, “worked with Ukrainian officials to collect dirt on the Trump campaign.”

“Anyone familiar with the Democrats’ scorched-earth war against President Trump would not be surprised to see all the typical signs that this is a carefully orchestrated media smear campaign,” he said.