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Lansing is more than 300 miles from Washington, DC, and everyone has an opinion about President Donald Trump's impeachment in the House of Representatives, and the Senate trial that is currently under way.  Congressman Tom Reed (R-NY), who represents the 23rd district, which includes Tompkins County, unsurprisingly voted against impeachment with his party December 18th, when the vote was 230 to 197 for two articles of impeachment: 'abuse of power', and 229 to 198 to impeach on 'obstruction of congress'.  Reed took a moment to discuss the impeachment and trial yesterday while visiting the newly expanded Ithaca-Tompkins International Airport.

"When they started down this path in the House, I was greatly concerned that this would turn into what it has become," Reed said. "And that's a political exercise. And when you deal with such an important tool as impeachment, which is that last resort nuclear option, going down partisan politics it can do long term damage to the country. I just hope we get through this chapter. And if you have a problem with the president of United States, the best way to answer this question is not what a hundred sitting members of the U S Senate. It's with the 300 plus million people in America and let the American voters make this determination."

Senate Republicans under Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) defeated efforts by Democrats to subpoena key Trump administration witnesses and documents in the Senate impeachment trial.  The Senate may choose to see more documents and hear witnesses at the end of the trial, but that is probably unlikely given the partisan makeup of the Senate.  Reed says that more time should have been spent in the House of Representatives to collect all the evidence before sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate.

"Obviously there's nothing wrong with that, other than what should have occurred in my opinion," Reed said. "All of these issues should have been ferreted out in the House. The House had the opportunity to investigate this. They had the opportunity to subpoena witnesses. They had the opportunity to go through the judicial process. There are serious constitutional issues of executive privilege, separation of powers, that have to be discussed.  To rush it through the House and then put it in the Senate and go through this process is problematic. So the Senate is going to deal with whether or not to call witnesses, have witnesses deposed, but I will say if that's the path they pursue, there are witnesses on both sides of this issue, be it corruption and Hunter, Biden and Ukraine's corruption that the president clearly, in my opinion, had an executive right to investigate and ask about and make sure that our taxpayer dollars weren't going there. And if they want to call witnesses on their side, you know, that's obviously up to the Senate to make the determination."

Reed said that calling witnesses and subpoenaing documents that the White House has been reluctant to release would amount to a 'fishing expedition' on Democrats' part, saying that there were miscalculations and a 'rush to judgement' in the House.

"I think there was this idea in DC when this was all going down in the beginning that the transcript of the call would not be released, that traditional DC models would be deployed, of just shut it down and bunker down the hatches," Reed said. "And you saw the complete opposite from the president United States. (Trump) said, 'I want that transcript released and there's really no dispute as to what occurred, what happened here'. And at the end of the day, that to me, speaks volumes.  An impeachable offense? We're talking high crimes, treason, bribery, and clearly they don't have it here. And if we start removing presidents of the United States elected by millions of Americans, it's problematic if this is what the standard becomes."

People on both sides of the controversy agree that the impeachment and the events leading to it are harming the United States' reputation and credibility on the world stage, and the ability of our government to be effective in international negotiations.

"Domestic and foreign threats -- this is having an impact," Reed said. "World partners are looking at America," Reed said. "Is this destabilizing? Is this what America is going to become? Is this truly partisan polarized country that can't unite. I think it was Churchill who said, at the end of the day, we can count in America because they may not be there upfront, but they'll be there at the end, or something to that effect. And you know, that's what America's all about. But you know, this is also bigger than that too, because if you go down this weaponization of the impeachment tool,  it causes people to lose faith in election process. It causes people in say, why do I participate?"

Nevertheless Reed is optimistic that American values will eventually win the day.

"The bottom line is the right thing will be done," he said. "And at the end of the day, democracy will win out because an election will make the ultimate call."

Trump is one of three presidents who have been impeached by the House of Representatives.  It is likely that, like Presidents Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton, he will be acquitted by the Republican majority in the Senate.

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