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Impeachment: Trump will 'strongly consider' testifying Impeachment: Lawmakers investigating if Trump lied to Mueller
(about 7 hours later)
President Donald Trump has said he likes "the idea" of testifying in the impeachment inquiry against him. House of Representatives investigators are looking into whether President Donald Trump lied to special counsel Robert Mueller during the Russia probe.
In a tweet on Monday Mr Trump said he would "strongly consider" the move after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested it over the weekend. "Did the president lie?" a House lawyer said in court as he requested files from the special counsel's inquiry.
The Democrat-led inquiry is establishing whether Mr Trump withheld aid to Ukraine in return for an inquiry into ex-Vice President Joe Biden. Congressional impeachment lawmakers are reportedly scrutinising the president's statements to Mr Mueller on WikiLeaks.
The Republican president has dismissed it as a "witch hunt". The main thrust of the Democratic-led inquiry is on alleged abuse of power by Mr Trump in US-Ukraine relations.
On Sunday, Ms Pelosi said the president was welcome to "speak all the truth that he wants if he wants" before investigators. Lawmakers first requested classified grand jury materials from the report in July.
"If he has information that is exculpatory, that means ex, taking away, culpable, blame, then we look forward to seeing it," she told the CBS News programme Face the Nation. A judge in October granted this access, though the Department of Justice appealed. Monday's hearing was to determine whether the appeal should temporarily block the previous grant of access.
In his tweets, Mr Trump attacked Ms Pelosi as "Our Crazy, Do Nothing" speaker, but said he would consider testifying "in order to get Congress focused again". Congress has seen most of the Mueller report - including some redacted parts - but certain grand jury material has remained secret.
The president has recently faced renewed criticism for his use of Twitter. Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, told reporters that if Mr Trump "doesn't like what he's hearing, he shouldn't tweet", but instead "testify under oath". Doug Letter, representing the House Judiciary Committee - which would eventually be responsible for filing articles of impeachment against the president - spoke to the federal appeals court on Monday.
His comments came after Mr Trump tweeted attacks on a witness - Marie Yovanovitch, the former US ambassador to Ukraine - while she was testifying to Congress on Friday. He said the impeachment inquiry was looking into the Ukraine matter but revealed lawmakers were also investigating whether Mr Trump lied to Mr Mueller during the course of the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Ms Yovanovitch said it was "very intimidating", which Mr Trump denied. Mr Letter has requested the redacted parts of the Mueller report and the full transcripts related to those portions.
Ms Yovanovitch was removed as ambassador to Kyiv in May, two months before a controversial phone call between Mr Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, which is now key to the inquiry. Mr Trump did not testify in the Mueller investigation, but he did submit written responses to some questions from the Mueller team.
A rough transcript of the call revealed that Mr Trump had urged President Zelensky to investigate unsubstantiated allegations against Mr Biden and his son Hunter, who sat on the board of a Ukrainian gas company. During Mr Mueller's testimony before Congress in July, he was asked whether Mr Trump's incomplete written responses showed he was not always telling the truth. Mr Mueller replied: "I would say, generally."
In the latest development, state department official David Holmes told investigators in closed door testimony on Saturday that he had overheard a US diplomat telling Mr Trump that Ukraine would carry out investigations the president had asked for. It is unclear what exactly Mr Mueller meant by his response, but Mr Letter told the court on Monday he believed it meant the president "had been untruthful in some of his answers".
US media report Mr Letter may have been referring to whether Mr Trump lied about contacts with WikiLeaks and knowledge that they were going to publish hacked Democratic emails.
Mr Letter added that evidence from the recent trial of Trump adviser Roger Stone strengthened lawmakers' argument for obtaining the secret material.
Stone, who was convicted last week of lying to Congress about his work with WikiLeaks, had several calls with Mr Trump during the 2016 election.
The president has said he did not know of any contact between his campaign and WikiLeaks and that he did not discuss WikiLeaks with Stone.
A lawyer for the justice department argued that the impeachment inquiry was not a judicial proceeding and thus it was not legal for lawmakers to view classified grand jury material.
But the precedent exists: during the impeachment proceedings against President Richard Nixon, a federal judge granted the House access to grand jury materials.
Following Monday's oral arguments, the appeals panel is considering the matter.
Ahead of the news of this additional thread in the inquiry, Mr Trump tweeted that he would "strongly consider" testifying to the impeachment inquiry "in order to get Congress focused again".
As he did with the Mueller report, the president has dismissed the impeachment probe as a "witch hunt".
This week, eight individuals are due to testify before House lawmakers as a part of the impeachment proceedings.
On Tuesday, Lt Col Alexander Vindman, a Ukraine expert on the National Security Council who listened in on Mr Trump's July call with Ukraine's President Zelensky, will testify.
The July call sparked a whistleblower complaint that eventually led to the start of the impeachment inquiry.