Rep. Steve King: “You’re Accusing Trump of Doing What Biden Has Confessed to Doing”

Here's the transcript of King's comments from his website:

“I thank you Madame Speaker and I thank the Gentleman for yielding. I start off first that this is the largest and most massive cover-up of such a list of crimes against our country, and it goes so far as to bring impeachment hearings to try to cover all of this up. And I would take you back to October of 2015 when Barack Obama said, ‘Hillary Clinton would never intend to jeopardize our national security.’ Again, the following April, the next month, Peter Strzok wrote the statement that was delivered by James Comey. And they’ve spent Democrat money and Hillary Clinton money in Russia to pick up dirt on Donald Trump!  And, then, Joe Biden goes to Ukraine and makes a statement ‘Here’s a billion dollars, but you must do what I tell you to do!’ You’re accusing Donald Trump of doing that which Joe Biden has confessed to doing!

And, by the way, Joe Biden was not the opponent of Donald Trump. He’s in a 21-way primary for Democrats; he’s running third in that race. His [Biden’s] opponents are the other 20 Democrats. How would anybody dig in to that mess of 21 people and decide he’s going to go overseas and pull some maneuver like this? You have to assign him a motive. You assign him a motive, then you create the dots, then you go dot to dot. But the reality is that it was Biden that was doing the extortion of the power play in order to protect his own son, and it was Donald Trump that was following the law that said you have to ensure that there is not corruption here before this money is handed over.

And, by the way, there was a violent war going on in Ukraine and that’s when we sent blankets and MRE’s over there under Barack Obama. But when I hear this from the Gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Johnson, ‘he doesn’t think he can win the election fair and square, so he would cheat.’ And, I’ve heard that here on this floor. No, it’s the other way around. Your number one proponent of impeachment is Al Green of Texas, and he said those very same things and they brought this case November 9th, the day after Trump was elected.

Sioux City Journal added:

As the U.S. House moved toward a historic impeachment vote Wednesday, Rep. Steve King rushed to President Donald Trump's defense, accusing Democrats of bringing impeachment charges to cover up "the largest and most massive cover-up of such a list of crimes against our country."

The House impeachment resolution accused Trump of abusing the power of his office by pressuring Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate Democrats and his 2020 political rival Joe Biden, and then tried to obstruct the investigation in Congress like “no other'' president in history. 

During Wednesday's debate, King took to the House floor to insist Democrats had it all backwards. 

"And I would take you back to in October of 2015 when Barack Obama said, ‘Hillary Clinton would never intend to jeopardize our national security.’ Again, the following April, the next month, (former FBI agent) Peter Strzok wrote the statement that was delivered by (former FBI director) James Comey. And they’ve spent Democrat money and Hillary Clinton money in Russia to pick up dirt on Donald Trump! " King told the House.

"And, then, Joe Biden goes to Ukraine and makes a statement ‘Here’s a billion dollars, but you must do what I tell you to do!’ You’re accusing Donald Trump of doing that which Joe Biden has confessed to doing!' ''

King also disputed that Biden was a political opponent of Trump's, noting the former vice president is one of 21 Democrats running for president.

Radio Iowa also said:

King defended Trump’s decision to withhold U.S. military assistance from Ukraine.

“I was Donald Trump that was following the law that said you have to ensure that there’s not corruption here before this money is handed over,” King said.

King began his 90-second speech by accusing Democrats of using impeachment to obscure the actions of Hillary Clinton and President Obama.

“This is the largest, most massive cover-up of such a list of crimes against our country,” King said.

King also mentioned Trump’s phone call with Ukraine’s president and Trump’s reference to having Ukraine announce an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden.

“Joe Biden was not the opponent of Donald Trump,” King said. “He’s in a 21-way primary for Democrats and he’s running third (in Iowa) in that race. (Biden’s) opponents are the other 20 Democrats. How would anybody dig into that mess of 21 people and decide he’s going to go overseas and pull something like this? You have to assign him a motive.”