admin
At the start of 2019, for the second time in her life, Nancy Pelosi was sworn in as Speaker of the House of Representatives.
While I knew this would mean a dramatic shift left for the policies advanced in your Congress, I at least had a brief moment of optimism during her opening remarks when Speaker Pelosi said that she was going to work “in a bipartisan way for the good of our country.”
Surely, she understood that with Donald Trump in the White House and Republicans still in control of the U.S. Senate, working together would be the only way to get positive things done for our country, right?
Unfortunately, her blatantly partisan actions after immediately taking the Speakership told a much different story.
Speaker Pelosi began her second stint as Speaker by taking our country through the longest government shutdown in our nation’s history.
Instead of working with President Trump in good faith to end the standoff by striking a long-term deal to secure our borders and open up the government, she resisted and obstructed.
The shutdown was so long that I even had time to hold town halls back in Missouri to solicit feedback on what folks wanted to see in a deal to reopen their government.
As if an over month-long government shutdown wasn’t enough, in the middle of it all, the Speaker decided to disinvite President Trump from providing an update on the State of the Union to the American people.
Petty politics at its worst.
From that point on, it became clear that Speaker Pelosi’s trivial tantrums were taking the House of Representatives to a new, unprecedented low.
The situation only got worse once the government reopened.
Taxpayer-funded political campaigns, the Green New Deal, allowing illegal immigrants to vote, trying to bring back the terrible Waters of the United States (WOTUS) regulation, and limiting second amendment rights; the Speaker led the House of Representatives through vote after vote after vote to pass policies to try and appease her radical liberal, socialist base.
All of this while they failed to do the basic tenants of governing: passing a budget to keep the government running for the long term.
But their leftist base still wasn’t satisfied.
Scared that her speakership was on the line, Speaker Pelosi put all of her eggs in the basket of waiting for the fabled Mueller Report to provide her with the evidence to move forward with the impeachment her base wanted even before President Trump was sworn in as our 45th President.
But when the Mueller Report proved President Trump did not collude with the Russian government or obstruct justice, the Speaker began to realize she needed to find something else and quick to appease her liberal mob.
Enter Adam Schiff, the “whistleblower” and Ukraine.
When the Adam Schiff-directed “whistleblower” accused the President of breaking the law, the Speaker took her shot.
She quickly launched the impeachment investigation into President Trump and appointed Adam Schiff to serve as judge, jury, and executioner.
Moving at a record pace, she had the House of Representatives vote to impeach President Trump just days before Christmas. It was the fastest moving and only entirely partisan vote to impeach a President in our nation’s history.
Her work was so sloppy and negatively received that Senate Democrats are now asking her not to send the Articles of Impeachment over to the Senate because they lack any evidence and it is not something they want to vote on.
As 2019 comes to a close, we stand at an impasse of what 2020 will bring.
We already know the year begins with a continuation of the impeachment charade from the last several months.
One-sided, limited witnesses, closed doors, and secrecy was how the Speaker ran her investigation in the U.S. House, and it is how she is now trying to force the Senate to run their trial.
Fortunately, that is not how our framers set up our Republic to work, and the system of checks and balances is exposing her fraud of an impeachment investigation for what it was.
I am hopeful that once this circus is behind us, we can finally get to the point in her speakership where we actually get things done to better the lives of the American people.
But with the socialist, out-of-touch leaders of the now-defunct Democratic Party on full display during each Presidential debate — I fear we will get much of the same in 2020, a politically charged Congress where decisions are made not by what is best for our country, but what is best for the left’s political agenda of removing President Trump from office.
A failed year indeed.
Congressman Jason Smith, R-Mo., represents Missouri’s Eighth Congressional District, which includes Perryville, West Plains, Rolla, Farmington, Cape Girardeau and Poplar Bluff. As a member of the House of Representatives, Congressman Smith serves on the House Committee on Ways and Means and the House Budget Committee.
