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President Trump fired two of the most prominent witnesses in the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/09/12/biden-impeachment-inquiry-meaning/" target="_blank" class="contextual_link">impeachment inquiry</a> within hours of each other Friday evening, moves that amounted to retribution against those he holds responsible for his attempted removal.

Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, said he was informed of Trump’s intention to recall him on Friday. Earlier in the day, Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his twin brother were both removed from their posts at the National Security Council.

Earlier Friday, Trump said his impeachment by the House should be “expunged” because it was a “total political hoax.” Trump continued to target House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Mitt Romney (Utah), the only Republican who voted to convict him in the Senate trial that ended Wednesday with his acquittal.

The crux of the case against Trump was the allegation that he withheld military aid and a White House meeting to pressure Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son. Hunter Biden served on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, while his father was vice president.

●With trial over, Trump <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-lashes-out-at-democrats-in-cheering-his-acquittal-as-pelosi-declares-him-impeached-forever/2020/02/06/2148e47a-48f3-11ea-b4d9-29cc419287eb_story.html?itid=hp_hp-top-table-main_impeachment-821pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans">returns to political maelstrom</a>.

●Trump lambastes his critics as he <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-lambastes-his-critics-as-he-considers-how-else-to-target-his-perceived-enemies-over-impeachment/2020/02/06/571003a0-4924-11ea-9475-535736e48788_story.html?itid=hp_hp-top-table-main_trumpretribution-940pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans">moves to target perceived enemies</a> over impeachment.

●Trump <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-celebrates-end-of-impeachment-with-angry-raw-and-vindictive-62-minute-white-house-rant/2020/02/06/78cd95ee-4914-11ea-b4d9-29cc419287eb_story.html">celebrates end of impeachment</a> with angry, raw and vindictive 62-minute White House rant.

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/politics/senate-impeachment-votes-live-tracking/?itid=hp_hp-bignews4_vote-card-combo%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans">How the Senate voted</a>|<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/politics/key-documents-trump-impeachment/">Key documents from the impeachment process</a>|<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/politics/trump-impeachment-timeline/"> The full Trump-Ukraine timeline</a>

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), chair of the House Intelligence Committee and lead impeachment manager in the Senate trial, accused Republicans of enabling Trump’s retaliatory conduct.

“These are the actions of a man who believes he is above the law — precisely the kind of conduct Congressional Republicans enabled,” Schiff said <a href="https://twitter.com/RepAdamSchiff/status/1225952767803523073?s=19">in a tweet</a>.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) praised Vindman, recipient of a Purple Heart, as “an American patriot.” She also needled Trump, saying he “is impeached forever.”

“The shameful firing of Colonel Vindman was a clear and brazen act of retaliation that showcases the president’s fear of the truth,” Pelosi said in a statement. “The president’s vindictiveness is precisely what led Republican Senators to be accomplices to his cover-up. The firing of this patriotic soldier is a sad and shameless loss for America’s security.”

Reis Thebault

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the firings of Sondland and Vindman were “nothing more than political revenge.”

“President Trump tonight fired two government officials who testified — under subpoena — during his impeachment trial,” Feinstein said. “This is as clear a case of retribution as I’ve seen during my 27 years in the Senate. Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and Ambassador Gordon Sondland should be celebrated for their courage to testify before Congress.”

She also criticized her Republican colleagues in the Senate for voting to acquit Trump.

“The Senate had a chance during the impeachment trial to send a message that no president is above the law,” she said. “Unfortunately, only one Republican had the bravery to stand up to the president and tell him to stop abusing the power of his office.”

Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, took to Twitter on Friday night to thank House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) — suggesting the witnesses he called during the House impeachment proceedings helped identify the officials his father should fire.

“Allow me a moment to thank — and this may be a bit of a surprise — Adam Schiff,” Trump Jr. <a href="https://twitter.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/1225941861765918720?s=20">tweeted</a>. “Were it not for his crack investigation skills, @realDonaldTrump might have had a tougher time unearthing who all needed to be fired. Thanks, Adam!”

John Wagner

As it became clear that Trump was targeting witnesses who testified against him, Democrats started making comparisons to the “Saturday night massacre” during the presidency of Richard M. Nixon, a reference to a series of high-level departures during the Watergate scandal.

“This is the Friday Night massacre,” Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) tweeted. “I’m sure Trump is fuming that he can’t fire Pelosi. We aren’t a dictatorship...yet.”

Rep. David N. Cicilline (D-R.I.), meanwhile, offered a sarcastic take on what was taking place.

“Nothing says you’re innocent like taking revenge against every single person who testified against you,” he <a href="https://twitter.com/davidcicilline/status/1225941481342537728?s=20">tweeted</a>.

President Trump fired Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, on Friday evening — the second time he dismissed a prominent witness in the impeachment inquiry in a matter of hours.

“I was advised today that the president intends to recall me effective immediately as United States Ambassador to the European Union,” Sondland said in a statement. “I am grateful to President Trump for having given me the opportunity to serve.”

That announcement came shortly after Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who was also subpoenaed to testify against Trump in the impeachment inquiry, and his twin brother were removed from their posts at the National Security Council.

Sondland’s testimony to the House was among the most damaging for Trump in the inquiry.

In his Nov. 20 appearance, Sondland explicitly linked Trump, Vice President Pence and other senior officials to what he characterized as a campaign to pressure Ukraine into investigating Trump’s political rivals in exchange for a White House meeting and nearly $400 million in military aid.

It added up, Sondland said, like “two plus two equals four.”

“I know that members of this committee frequently frame these complicated issues in the form of a simple question: Was there a ‘quid pro quo’?” Sondland said. “With regard to the requested White House call and the White House meeting, the answer is yes.”

He said that “everyone was in the loop.”

Trump had once praised Sondland, who gave $1 million to the Trump’s presidential inaugural committee. He called the now-fired ambassador, “a really good man and great American.”

President Trump, who continued to lash out at his political rivals in the days after his acquittal, took aim at one of the rare Democratic senators who has sided with the White House on tough votes in the past: Joe Manchin III (W.Va.).

Manchin, who Trump’s aides <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-wants-a-senate-democrat-to-vote-for-acquittal-in-impeachment-trial-white-house-eyes-joe-manchin/2020/01/25/ef0a912e-3c64-11ea-971f-4ce4f94494b4_story.html?itid=lk_inline_manual_42">had identified </a>as a possible Democratic opponent of impeachment, ultimately voted to convict the president. On Friday evening, Trump tweeted his displeasure.

“I was very surprised & disappointed that Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia voted against me on the Democrat’s totally partisan Impeachment Hoax,” <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1225901400573513728?s=20">Trump wrote</a> in a pair of posts.

“No President has done more for the great people of West Virginia than me (Pensions), and that will always continue,” Trump tweeted, an apparent nod to the president’s high level of support in the state, where he beat Hillary Clinton by 42 percentage points in 2016.

Manchin, however, was reelected in 2018, even after Trump went to his state several times, and told West Virginians that their senator was consistently voting against the president’s agenda.

<a href="https://www.manchin.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/manchin-statement-on-impeachment-decision">In a statement </a>explaining his impeachment vote, Manchin said it was “a truly difficult decision.”

“I take no pleasure in these votes, and am saddened this is the legacy we leave our children and grandchildren,” Manchin said. “I have always wanted this President, and every President to succeed, but I deeply love our country and must do what I think is best for the nation.”

Manchin has voted with the president more than 53 percent of the time, according to the website FiveThirtyEight — more than any other current Democratic senator.

But in his tweets, Trump sought to align him with more liberal Democratic leaders.

“I was told by many that Manchin was just a puppet for Schumer & Pelosi,” Trump wrote. “That’s all he is!”

Democrats swiftly denounced Vindman’s dismissal Friday, criticizing what they saw as Trump’s purely punitive decision.

With Republican leaders initially silent on the move, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement that Trump was acting from a position of weakness.

“As usual, the White House runs away from the truth,” Schumer said in a statement. “Lt. Col. Vindman lived up to his oath to protect and defend our Constitution. This action is not a sign of strength.”

Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) <a href="https://twitter.com/MarkWarner/status/1225907772828667904">said</a> the removal was “just a disgraceful way to treat a man who has spent his life serving his country.”

Hillary Clinton <a href="https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton/status/1225836347140734977?s=20">quoted a passage</a> of Vindman’s Nov. 19 testimony in the House impeachment probe, when the Army officer addressed his father.

“You made the right decision 40 years ago to leave the Soviet Union. Do not worry, I will be fine for telling the truth,” Vindman said then.

To that, Clinton added: “It’s appalling that this administration may prove him wrong.”

<a href="https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1225909245889175553">In a tweet</a>, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) said simply, “Lieutenant Colonel Vindman is a hero. @realDonaldTrump is a coward.”

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council aide who testified against President Trump during the impeachment inquiry, has been removed from his White House job.

Vindman’s twin brother, Yevgeny, who is also a lieutenant colonel in the Army, was also removed from the NSC, where he worked as a lawyer. On Friday afternoon, the two were escorted out of the White House, Alexander Vindman’s attorney said, dismissals that came as Trump continued to rage against the attempt to remove him from office.

“There is no question in the mind of any American why this man’s job is over, why this country now has one less soldier serving it at the White House,” David Pressman, Alexander Vindman’s lawyer, said in a statement. “LTC Vindman was asked to leave for telling the truth. His honor, his commitment to right, frightened the powerful.”

Pressman said Alexander Vindman will return to work at the Defense Department until he reports to the Army War College in July. Yevgeny Vindman, who also goes by Eugene, will return to the Army on Monday, but his assignment is unclear, said his lawyer, Michael Volkov.

Alexander Vindman, who testified during House Democrats’ impeachment hearings, had already informed senior officials at the NSC and the Army that he intended to leave his post by the end of February, months ahead of schedule, according to people familiar with his decision. It appears that wasn’t soon enough for the president, who was eager to make a symbol of the Army officer soon after the Senate acquitted him.

Leaving the White House on Friday for a speech in North Carolina, Trump was asked about Vindman and told reporters: “Well, I’m not happy with him. You think I’m supposed to be happy with him? I’m not.”

“Lieutenant Colonel Vindman and his twin brother — right? — we had some people that — really amazing,” Trump said during a speech at the White House on Thursday in which Trump celebrated his acquittal by the Senate.

During his Nov. 19 testimony, Alexander Vindman, the NSC’s European affairs director, was careful to say he was not a political actor.

He said he considered the president’s demand of the Ukrainian leader “inappropriate,” because it could have “significant national security implications” for the United States.

He called the attacks on those who have appeared before lawmakers “reprehensible” and — addressing his father, who brought the Vindman family to the United States from the Soviet Union decades ago — said: “Do not worry, I will be fine for telling the truth.”

Pressman cast the dismissal as vindictive and punitive, and blasted Trump’s decision.

“He did what any member of our military is charged with doing every day: He followed orders, he obeyed his oath, and he served his country, even when doing so was fraught with danger and personal peril,” Pressman said of his client. “And for that, the most powerful man in the world — buoyed by the silent, the pliable, and the complicit — has decided to exact revenge. LTC Alexander Vindman leaves the White House today. But we must not accept the departure of truth, duty, and loyalty that he represents.”

Tom Hamburger

Greg Miller

Trump wrapped up his remarks in Charlotte, without returning to the subject of his House impeachment or Senate acquittal.

He ticked off a range of programs advanced by his administration, including opportunity zones and prison reform, that he said demonstrated its commitment to helping African Americans and others in disadvantaged communities.

“We’re one American family. We rise together, we thrive together, and we win together,” Trump said.

His remarks also included several references to the coming election, at one point prompting a chant of “four more years” from the crowd.

Trump jokingly suggested chants of “12 more years” or “16 more years.”

Trump brought up his impeachment and acquittal early in his remarks at an event in Charlotte focused on providing economic and job opportunities in low-income neighborhoods, as he introduced Republican members of Congress in the audience.

“These are warriors,” Trump said. “These people have been fighting hard. … You saw what happened. It was the impeachment hoax.”

Trump chided Democrats who pushed for impeachment.

“Now they have the failed impeachment hoax,” Trump said. “Every one of them has to put it right on their résumé.”

Rep. Douglas A. Collins (R-Ga.) sought Friday to highlight political donations by Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) — whose seat he is now seeking — to a super PAC that supported Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) when he was the GOP presidential nominee.

In a new digital ad, Collins compares the more than $1 million that Loeffler, an Atlanta business executive, and her husband donated to the pro-Romney super PAC in 2012 to an absence of contributions to Trump’s campaign in 2016.

“The same Mitt Romney that voted impeach our president,” the ad says.

“Loeffler’s big money talks: but it was silent for Donald Trump,” Collins said in a tweet in which he shared the ad.

Collins is running against Loeffler in a special election in November.

Shortly after landing in North Carolina, Trump touted a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/legal-issues/individual-members-of-congress-barred-from-suing-president-trump-over-business-dealings/2020/02/07/b3d97b3c-3c7e-11ea-baca-eb7ace0a3455_story.html?itid=lk_inline_manual_91">ruling by a federal appeals court in Washington</a> that individual members of Congress cannot sue him to stop his private businesses from accepting payments from foreign governments.

“Another win just in. Nervous Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats in Congress sued me, thrown out,” Trump tweeted. “This one unanimous, in the D.C. Circuit. Witch Hunt!”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit unanimously dismissed a lawsuit filed by more than 200 Democrats in Congress seeking to enforce the Constitution’s anti-corruption emoluments provision.

Pelosi on Friday dismissed a prospect being floated by Republicans of voting to “expunge” Trump’s impeachment if they take back the House next year.

“They can’t do that,” Pelosi said. “First of all they’re not getting the chamber back, but apart from that, there’s no expunging. If they don’t want to honor their oath of office, then they’re going to expunge from their own souls the violation of the Constitution that they made.”

Earlier Friday, Trump endorsed the GOP-backed idea, saying the House should expunge his impeachment because it was a “political hoax.”

The idea has gained traction among Republican lawmakers as Pelosi has repeatedly said Trump has been “impeached forever” despite his Senate acquittal.

Mike DeBonis

Pelosi told reporters Friday that she is “stunned” by reports that Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council staff member who testified during the House impeachment proceedings, will be transferred out of his White House post.

“Oh, my. Oh, my,” Pelosi said. “I’m stunned by it. Stunned. I’ll talk to my colleagues about this because I know they have some concern about the interventions that the president has with our military. That’s such a shame. What a patriotic person. This goes too far.”

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R), who considered a primary challenge to Trump last year, said Friday that the impeachment process was “kind of a sham and a joke.”

Hogan said in an <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4853488/user-clip-governor-hogan-state-solutions-interview">interview with Politico</a> that Republicans should have been allowed to call witnesses during the House phase of the process, and that there should have been witnesses in the Senate.

The popular moderate governor announced in June that he would not challenge Trump for the GOP nomination, dashing the hopes of Trump’s critics in the GOP, who attempted for months to convince Hogan to run.

But Hogan, who chairs the National Governors Association, has not been shy about criticizing Trump since then. He said in October that he was concerned by reports of Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and wanted to get all the facts.

In the interview Friday, he referred to his father, who as a Maryland congressman was the first Republican federal lawmaker to call for the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon. The elder Hogan also consistently called for “a fair and objective hearing,” his son said, in which Nixon had the right to call witnesses and provide a defense.

“I’m very frustrated,” Hogan said. “I don’t think the House process was fair and objective, and I don’t think the Senate was, and I think it’s over. I think most people in America are, after three years, kind of sick and tired of hearing about it, and I don’t think Congress did their job, but the American people will.”

The House Judiciary Committee asked Trump to participate in the process, but he refused.

Rachel Chason

Trump endorsed an idea Friday by House Republicans to “expunge” his impeachment if they take control of the chamber next year.

“They should because it was a hoax,” Trump told reporters as he prepared to leave the White House for North Carolina. “It was a total political hoax.”

Talk of such a move has gained traction in response to repeated assertions by Pelosi that Trump has been “impeached forever” despite his acquittal in the Senate.

In a television appearance Friday morning, Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.) touted the idea.

“Honestly, when we’re back in charge, we can have a vote, we can have a resolution that would seek to expunge the impeachment,” Roy said on Fox News. “I don’t know if it will carry any legal weight, but we can send a loud message that this was a political, partisan effort.”

Trump on Friday falsely accused Pelosi of breaking the law when she tore up a copy of his State of the Union address shortly after he finished addressing the House chamber Tuesday.

“First of all, it’s an official document,” Trump told reporters as he prepared to leave the White House for North Carolina. “You’re not allowed. It’s illegal. She broke the law. … I thought it was terrible, I thought it was very disrespectful to the chamber, to the country.”

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill swiftly responded on Twitter by pointing to a rating by PolitiFact of a similar claim of lawbreaking by Pelosi as “pants-on-fire” false.

According to PolitiFact, the statute in question deals with the “concealment, removal, or mutilation” of records and reports and sets a penalty for anyone who “conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, or destroys” any government record “filed or deposited with any clerk or officer of any court of the United States, or in any public office, or with any judicial or public officer of the United States.”

“The point of the statute is to prevent people from destroying records in official repositories like the National Archives or in courts,” Georgetown Law professor Victoria Nourse told PolitiFact.

Trump told reporters Friday that he is “not happy” with Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council staff member who testified during the House impeachment proceedings, but he would not definitively say whether Vindman would be reassigned in coming days.

“You think I’m supposed to be happy with him?” Trump asked reporters as he prepared to leave the White House for North Carolina. “I’m not.”

“They’ll make a decision,” he added. It was not entirely clear to whom he was referring.

Vindman has already informed senior officials at the NSC that he intends to take an early exit from his assignment at the White House and leave his post by the end of the month, according to people familiar with his decision.

But Trump has appeared eager to make a symbol of the Army officer soon after the Senate acquitted him of the impeachment charges approved by House Democrats.

Vice President Pence on Friday defended Trump’s attacks on Pelosi — including the president calling her a “horrible person” and questioning whether she prays at all — after his acquittal by the Senate.

Pence said that Trump had been subject to misguided investigations since taking office, including the “sham” that led to his “partisan impeachment” by the House related to his conduct toward Ukraine.

“It’s over, and I don’t think any American would begrudge the president strong feelings about those who have spent so much energy in the past three years trying to stop him and this administration from turning this country around,” Pence said on Fox Business Network.

Pence also criticized Pelosi for having torn up a copy of Trump’s prepared remarks at the conclusion of his State of the Union address Tuesday.

The vice president said he did not realize what Pelosi was doing at the time, but felt it was “a new low” for her once he learned what had happened.

“It tells you all you need to know about this radical, leftist Democratic Party,” Pence said, adding that Democrats seek opportunities “to try and distract from the extraordinary progress the American people have made under President Trump.”

Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) criticized “banana Republicans” Friday for not standing up to Trump regarding reports that he is preparing to push out Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council staffer who testified in the House impeachment proceedings.

“The president’s conduct is perfectly consistent with the tin-pot dictator in a banana republic,” Raskin said during an appearance on MSNBC. “The shocking thing is that there are now banana Republicans who will follow him and walk the plank on every one of these outrageous maneuvers. In a democratic society, people who serve in the military or on the civilian side are not subject to retaliation and reprisal because they tell the truth in an official government proceeding.”

Two of the largest Democratic super PACs said they are preparing to target three vulnerable Republican senators days after they each voted to acquit Trump on impeachment charges.

Priorities USA and Senate Majority PAC said they are launching a “multimillion-dollar digital partnership” this spring against Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Martha McSally (Ariz.) and Thom Tillis (N.C.).

Senate Majority PAC, the largest Democratic super PAC solely focused on Senate races, is run by J.B. Poersch, a former executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and has close ties to the party leadership. It raised $164 million for the 2018 midterm cycle.

Priorities USA, which raised more than $190 million in 2016, is expected to focus its energies on the presidential race, but it also raised $44 million for the 2018 midterms, spending most of it on Senate races.

The two groups ran a similar joint $30 million digital campaign targeting eight Senate races in 2018.

“By exonerating President Trump without securing a fair trial, Senate Republicans have ignored the rule of law and the will of the American people,” Poersch said in a statement. “Our new digital partnership with Priorities will allow us to hold Senate Republicans accountable by aggressively targeting voters in battleground states that are key to flipping the Senate.”

“Just winning the White House wouldn’t be enough. If we want to enact real change in this country, we need a Democratic Senate,” said Patrick McHugh, executive director of Priorities USA Action. “We’re proud to once again partner with SMP on this digital campaign to ensure we’re getting our message out to voters wherever they spend their time.”

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman reported for work at the National Security Council on the White House complex Friday, and by 10 a.m. had received no notification that he was being transferred or reassigned, according to a person familiar with his status who requested anonymity to discuss a personnel matter.

Trump is preparing to push out Vindman, who testified during the House impeachment inquiry about concerns he had after hearing a July phone call in which Trump pressed the leader of Ukraine for investigations that could benefit him politically.

Vindman will be informed as early as Friday by administration officials that he is being reassigned to a position at the Defense Department, taking a key figure from the investigation out of the White House, according to two people familiar with the move who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss personnel decisions.

Carol Leonnig

Republicans were quick to credit Trump for Friday’s better-than-expected jobs report, with some seeking to contrast his performance on the economy with the failed effort by Democrats to remove him from office.

“Democrats try to impeach him, corporate media spends all day attacking him, and all President Trump does is keep on fueling the best surging economy in decades,” Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), an ally of the president, tweeted. “It’s really amazing.”


<i>[The economy added 225,000 jobs in January, showing continued strength]</i>


The U.S. economy added 225,000 jobs in January, surpassing analysts’ predictions in a sign of continued growth for the economy. The unemployment rate ticked up slightly to 3.6 percent, remaining near a 50-year low.

Job gains were seen in construction, health care, as well as transportation and warehousing, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“Don’t show the report to Nancy Pelosi, she has a habit of tearing up long lists of good news,” Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Tex.) tweeted after the report’s release, referencing the speaker of the House shredding Trump’s State of the Union address earlier this week.

Eli Rosenberg

Newt Gingrich, a former House speaker, offered some advice Friday to Trump on how to handle the current occupant of that job in the wake of his acquittal.

“My advice to the president would be really simple,” Gingrich said. “Don’t pay any attention to Pelosi, because she’s your mortal enemy … There’s not much point in the president wasting time with her.”

During an appearance on Fox News, Gingrich also chided Pelosi for cutting short Trump’s introduction at the State of the Union, noting that he introduced President Bill Clinton four times during his tenure as speaker, saying each time that it was “my distinct honor and personal privilege” to do so. Cutting those words “was almost like a declaration of war,” Gingrich said.

Gingrich, who served as speaker from January 1995 to January 1999, oversaw Clinton’s 1998 impeachment.

Gingrich was also critical of House Democrats for considering issuing a subpoena to former national security adviser John Bolton, who was not called as a witness in the Senate trail.

“That’s kind of like they want to shoot at Trump as often as they can until they finally get him, and they’d like him to be nice while they’re doing it,” Gringrich said.

An expert on whistleblowers is filing a complaint against Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) with the Senate Ethics Committee, due to the senator publicizing the name of the alleged whistleblower whose complaint sparked the impeachment inquiry.

In a letter to Sens. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.), the chairman and vice chairman of the committee, Tom Mueller, the author of a book on the history of whistleblowing, alleges that Paul “engaged in improper conduct that is unethical and unbecoming of a Senator.”

During the Senate trial last week, Paul submitted a question that included the name of the alleged whistleblower. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. refused to read it, saying, “The presiding officer declines to read the question.”

Paul subsequently publicized the name to the media and later read his question on the Senate floor during a period reserved for speeches on impeachment from senators. Paul said he was not seeking to out the whistleblower but was naming someone whose actions were key to understanding the origins of the inquiry.

“Senator Paul’s conduct was especially corrosive because it occurred during one of the most solemn of the constitutional tasks bestowed upon the upper chamber, a time when the Senate was sitting as a court of presidential impeachment for only the third time in this nation’s history,” Mueller says in his complaint. “But even if this had been an ordinary trial in a conventional court, the behavior would have been contemptuous.”

Paul’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

As he continued to share tweets from political allies, Trump included one in which Tom Fitton, president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, questioned why Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council aide who testified during House impeachment hearings, remained on the job.

Trump is reportedly preparing to push Vindman out of his position at the White House as early as Friday and reassign him to a position at the Defense Department.

In a tweet that Trump retweeted, Fitton included a television clip from last year in which he questioned why Vindman was still working for the NSC.

“I don’t know how we can expect the president to have any trust in this person’s work,” Fitton said during an appearance on “Lou Dobbs Tonight” on the Fox Business Network. “He should be nowhere near any policymaking body for the government.”

Trump fires Gordon Sondland, the second impeachment witness to be removed from his post Friday

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