The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Biden: No ‘legal basis’ for Senate to subpoena me
Ex-VP stops short of vowing to fight any such Senate push.
TIPTON, IOWA — Democratic presidential candidate Joseph Biden, expanding on his remarks a day earlier that he would not comply with a subpoena to testify in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate, wrote Saturday on Twitter that there would not be “any legal basis” for such a subpoena.
But speaking with reporters Saturday, Biden stopped short of vowing to fight a subpoena if one were ultimately issued. “I would honor whatever the Congress in fact legitimately asked me to do,” he said after a town-hall-style event in Tipton, Iowa.
Asked if he would challenge a subpoena in court if he believed he had no facts to provide that would be relevant, he responded: “The answer is, I don’t think that’s going to happen to begin with. Let’s cross that bridge when it comes.” He added that he would abide by “whatever was legally required of me.”
The result was a sometimes confusing attempt to address a hypothetical situation that Biden criticized himself for drawing attention to in the first place, despite his own pleas to the news media to focus on Trump and his behavior in office.
Biden wrote on Twitter that over the course of his decadeslong political career, he had “always complied with a lawful order,” and that in his two terms as vice president, his office had “cooperated with legitimate congressional oversight requests.” Biden’s further explanation Saturday began with a series of tweets in which he wrote that he wanted to “clarify” comments he had made Friday, when he met with the editorial board of The Des Moines Register.
Biden was asked by the newspaper whether he stood by previous comments that he would not comply with a subpoena to testify in the impeachment trial. He said he did, and explained that complying with a subpoena and testifying would effectively allow Trump to shift attention onto Biden and away from the president’s own conduct. “The issue is not what I did,” Biden said.
On Saturday, Biden elaborated on Twitter: “I am just not going to pretend that there is any legal basis for Republican subpoenas for my testimony in the impeachment trial. That is the point I was making yesterday and I reiterate: this impeachment is about Trump’s conduct, not mine.” Speaking to reporters in Tipton, Biden said he had “no firsthand knowledge” about the accusations against Trump, so there would be no rationale for calling him as a witness.
The House impeached Trump this month over his campaign to pressure Ukraine to investigate Biden and his son Hunter Biden. In the aftermath of Trump’s impeachment, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and the minority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer of New York, have been at odds over proceedings for a trial, in part because of Schumer’s request to call Trump administration officials for testimony at an impeachment trial. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said she will not formally send the articles of impeachment to the upper chamber until she has assurances the trial will be conducted fairly.
Asked if he would challenge a subpoena in court if he believed he had no facts to provide that would be relevant, he responded: ‘The answer is, I don’t think that’s going to happen to begin with. Let’s cross that bridge when it comes.’