U.S. Rep. John Rutherford of Jacksonville was one of six GOP congressmen who did not vote for censuring Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., one of the chief architects of the Russian hoax that was used to hound President Trump throughout his term.
In all, six members voted “present” as Schiff was censured by a vote of 213-209.
Rutherford told Eye on Jacksonville his vote simply was for procedural reasons.
He and four of the others who voted present are on the House Ethics Committee, which is tasked with investigating the charges against Schiff.
“Preceding the vote to censure, there was a motion to table the resolution. Since that was a procedural issue, I felt free to vote. I voted to send it to the floor for a vote,” Rutherford said.
“The reason we voted present on the resolution was we are going to be called upon to investigate, we didn’t want to run into recusal problems later.”
He said Democrats on the committee also were supposed to vote present, but instead voted no on the resolution.
Rutherford said the GOP members on the committee waited until they knew it would pass before making the non-committal vote on censure.
After the matter is investigated, the House could vote to censure Schiff, take him off committees or there even could be a motion to remove him from Congress, Rutherford said.
The resolution to censure Schiff was introduced by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fl.
“Adam Schiff lied to the American people,” Luna said. “He used his position on House Intelligence to push a lie that cost American taxpayers millions of dollars and abused the trust placed in him as chairman. He is a dishonor to the House of Representatives. The Durham Report makes clear that the Russian Collusion was a lie from day one and Schiff knowingly used his position in an attempt to divide our country.”
Schiff said he was proud of his lies and he is using the censure as part of his campaign for a seat in the Senate.
Durham’s report confirmed that the allegation of Trump colluding with the Russians to get elected was a hoax from the outset, hatched and financed by Democrats and led by Hillary Clinton, who ultimately was defeated by Trump in 2016. The Deep State and media allies of the Democrats also played a large part in the fraud.
Only 25 House members ever have been censured. Eight senators have been censured.
Democrats, who attempted several times to censure Trump over trivial matters, called the Schiff censure “partisan.” House Democrats impeached Trump twice – once after he no longer was in office — but both measures died in the Senate.
