CNN's Cuomo smacks down pro-Trump lobbyist for lying about impeachment process

On Wednesday's edition of CNN's "Cuomo Prime Time," Chris Cuomo caught pro-Trump lobbyist and American Conservative Union director Matt Schlapp in several falsehoods about impeachment — and held him to account.

The argument began with Schlapp demanding Democrats hold a formal impeachment vote immediately and grant the GOP subpoena power.

"I think Congressman [Al] Green said it the best: if they don't impeach him, he might just win again," said Schlapp. "When it comes to impeachment, let's get it started. You go down to the floor of the House of Representatives, just like Republicans did with Bill Clinton, with some Democrats voting with them, by the way, and they started — why is that vote so important that the Republicans took against Bill Clinton on the floor of the House of Representatives? Because it sets up the process. Because the Constitution tells us this is the legal way that you can take a president and actually put them through a legal process about claims that they violated the law—"

"It's not a legal process," said Cuomo. "The Constitution doesn't say that."

"Yes, it does," said Schlapp.

"It's a political process," said Cuomo. "It is not a legal process."

"The reason why you need the vote on the floor of the House of Representatives, it sets up the process by which the person who's claimed to have broken the law also has rights and has the ability to call witnesses, to subpoena, to call — to subpoena documents," said Schlapp. "So just like Bill Clinton had the ability to have that process, to cross-examine those who were making charges, a legal process is established with that vote. What Nancy Pelosi—"

"Hold on one second. Let's take it a step at a time," said Cuomo. "With Nixon, you had a grand jury in place. With Clinton, you had the Starr investigation. When those were over, they turned to the House. That's more recent with people with Clinton. Once Starr was done, that's when they had their vote and then Starr came in and that's the only person was able to deal with. They didn't call their own witnesses. That was for the Senate, not the House.

"The reason this is different — you just showed a clip of Joe Biden saying the president should be impeached," whined Schlapp.

"I didn't show it, it was Anderson [Cooper]," said Cuomo.

"Nancy Pelosi has said over and over again, the president needs to be impeached," said Schlapp. "These Democrats aren't saying, we need to start a process by which we consider whether the president should be impeached, Nancy Pelosi said that for a year and a half. She's saying he should be impeached. Nobody, nobody in the Democratic caucus is saying, look, my mind is open, I don't know whether he should be impeached, but let's start a process to investigate him. They're not doing that."

"What's holding up the investigation is your side," said Cuomo. "They won't comply."

"That's not true," protested Schlapp.

"It's absolutely true, they won't comply," said Cuomo.

"There's never been a president who's been investigated every minute of his presidency like Donald Trump—"

"Doesn't mean he's complying," cut in Cuomo.

"He's completely complying," said Schlapp.

"They won't give people up, they had Corey Lewandowski claim that he had executive privilege," said Cuomo. "They're not complying."

Watch below: