Read Jerry Nadler’s Opening Statement in the Judiciary Committee’s Impeachment Hearing

The next phase of the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump kicked off today, as the House Judiciary Committee convened its first public hearing on whether the president’s alleged wrongdoing amounts to impeachable offenses. Representative Jerry Nadler of New York, the committee’s chairman, finds himself back in the impeachment spotlight with the unenviable task of trying to maintain a serious hearing amid Republican attempts to derail it.

Below, the full text of Nadler’s opening statement as delivered.

The facts before us are undisputed. On July 25, President Trump called President Zelensky of Ukraine and in President Trump’s words, “asked him for a favor.” That call was part of a concerted effort by the president and his men to solicit a personal advantage in the next election, this time in the form of an investigation of his political adversaries by a foreign government. To obtain that private political