Polls show nearly half want Trump removed: Impeachment update

The House Intelligence Committee hasn’t yet said whether it will hold further public hearings in the impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump.

Here are the latest developments:

Polls Show Nearly Half Want Trump Removed (8:43 a.m.)

Two new polls registered little change among the nearly half of Americans who believe Trump should be impeached and removed from office since Congress held public hearings this month.

A CNN poll released Tuesday found that 50% support for impeaching Trump and removing him from office, with 43% opposed. That’s the same split as an earlier CNN poll conducted before the five days of public impeachment inquiry hearings kicked off on Nov. 13.

But, in potentially troublesome news for Trump, the poll showed the share of Republicans saying Trump has improperly used his office to gain political advantage has doubled.

The phone survey of 1,007 adults conducted between Nov. 21 and 24 has a margin of error of plus-or- minus 3.7 percentage points.

A Politico/Morning Consult poll had similar findings, with 48% of 1,988 voters surveyed between Nov. 22 and 24 saying they strongly or somewhat supported the impeachment probe, the exact same result as a poll done a week earlier.

That poll, which had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 2 points, had 43% saying they were strongly or somewhat opposed to the impeachment inquiry, compared to 45% a week earlier.

The two poll results undercut retweets from Trump early Wednesday asserting that impeachment is harming Democrats.

Key Events

Witnesses Fiona Hill and David Holmes testified Thursday that Ukrainian officials understood that they would only get a White House meeting and security aid in exchange for investigations into Joe Biden’s family.

Gordon Sondland’s transcript is here and key excerpts here; Kurt Volker’s transcript is here and key excerpts here. Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch’s transcript is here and key excerpts here; the transcript of Michael McKinley, former senior adviser to the secretary of State, is here. The transcript of David Holmes, a Foreign Service officer in Kyiv, is here. The transcript of William Taylor, the top U.S. envoy to Ukraine, is here and key excerpts here. State Department official George Kent’s testimony is here and key excerpts here. Testimony by Alexander Vindman can be found here, and the Dr. Fiona Hill transcript is here. Laura Cooper’s transcript is here; Christopher Anderson’s is here and Catherine Croft’s is here. Jennifer Williams’ transcript is here and Timothy Morrison’s is here.