This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Monday, October 14th, 2019.

I'm Caleb Brown.

It's debatable whether an announcement from the Speaker of the House

marks the official

beginning of an official impeachment inquiry but it appears to be moving

along nonetheless. The president for his part in all this has declined to

participate.

Given the oversight functions Congress has over the executive branch,

can he actually decline?

Cato's Gene Healy comments.

In an eight-page letter, the White House Council, Pat Cipollone, basically said that the White House

was going to decline participation in the House's inquiry.

What were the reasons that he gave?

Yeah, they're not playing along.

The White House cancelled, they gave a number of reasons, is quite a fiery letter.

The impeachment inquiry for which they use scare quotes,

it's unconstitutional, it's invalid, it violates due process and it's basically a

partisan attempt by angry Democrats to overturn the 2016 election, which is not exactly a legal objection.

Yeah, so the letter as you noted is very fiery.

They refer to the proceedings as constitutionally illegitimate.

He makes claims about what the president is entitled to in impeachment inquiries. How much water do those claims hold about what a

president is due in an impeachment inquiry?

...