Schiff Says Democrats Should Prioritize Costs Over Impeachment

Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Democrats should put "overriding emphasis" on lowering costs and investigating corruption rather than on impeachment, in an interview with NBC's Meet the Press that aired Oct. 25, 2026.

What did Schiff say about Democratic oversight priorities?

Schiff said any Democratic oversight agenda should start with cost-of-living issues and alleged corruption, not with an impeachment push, according to the interview posted by Meet the Press. He framed the choice as one of sequencing, not exclusion: costs and corruption first, with impeachment treated as a possible outcome rather than a stated goal.

Could the oversight push still lead to impeachment?

Yes, according to Meet the Press's own characterization of the segment. The network's summary of the interview says Schiff's preferred focus on costs and corruption "could potentially lead to impeachment," meaning he did not take the option off the table. He simply declined to make impeachment the headline objective of any Democratic oversight effort.

What else did Schiff tell Meet the Press?

In a separate clip posted on the same Meet the Press page, Schiff said Democrats would "win both" the House and Senate if the election were held immediately. In another clip from the program, Schiff responded to a Justice Department threat involving Alaska's elections, saying it is "Alaska's business" how the state runs its own voting. Both remarks appear alongside the costs-versus-impeachment interview in NBC's published lineup but were not detailed further in the source material beyond those short video summaries.

Why is Schiff weighing in now?

The interview arrived amid a run of Meet the Press segments on midterm positioning, including coverage of where Democrats see Senate openings in heavily Republican states and House races in Arizona and Ohio that Democrats are contesting. Schiff's comments landed inside that broader midterm coverage window. The network's page does not specify additional reasoning behind his sequencing of priorities beyond what appears in the clip itself.

What is the practical difference between "costs first" and "impeachment first"?

Schiff's framing separates the message Democrats lead with from the legal tools they might eventually use. Under his approach, oversight committees would open with economic and corruption inquiries rather than announcing impeachment as the objective. Any impeachment referral, if one emerged, would follow from what investigators actually found rather than from a pre-set target. The Meet the Press clip does not specify which cost issues or corruption allegations Schiff wants investigated first, and no full transcript beyond the video summary was published alongside it.