[see poll at bottom]
While Trump has not demonstrated much prowess in deal making while President, his last deal in politics could be a whopper. There have already been rumblings of Trump trying to work with House Speaker Pelosi on a deal in which he’d leave office ahead of schedule if he got the right things in return. And judging by his narcissistic personality and his lack of empathy for anyone not family, he might be willing to sell the farm - or sell out his friends - to skip jail, save his cash, and escape having his dastardly deeds paraded as a daily spectacle in the national spotlight. He’d want a resignation with as few residual effects as possible.
If current momentum plays itself out, Trump’s unassisted fall could pull down many GOP leaders with it. The party could be rendered insignificant for a generation or more. No doubt party leadership is already studying which #Trexit schemes would be the least damaging; which issue to finally get on their high horse about. The Ukraine scandal could be that, but the collateral damage may be far too high. Trump tossing the Kurds into the jaws of Turkey has generated some rare dissent within the party, but the window for labeling this act as the last straw has already passed.
Republicans now sense that they need an easy way out without further festering. They have reason to want to negotiate a Trump resignation on their terms, although Pence might have to be thrown under the bus too to get a deal that would satisfy The Donald.
Oddly enough, Democratic control of the White House soon could be the best way for the GOP to regain party strength in the shortest amount of time. The economy is poised for its own collapse, and if that happens while Democrats run things, the low-information GOP base is likely to blame them. And with a different candidate for 2020, they may have a shot at taking back the White House then rather than waiting another eight or 12 years.
For Trump the focus is nowhere near that far ahead. He’s thinking in terms of only weeks now as the inevitable closes in. Soon his taxes are likely to be released, and any hope for bargaining will be lost. So right now he’s only looking at what he can salvage. His soon-to-be former friends and business partners might be bargaining chips he could offer to reduce what he’d have to give up if he were allowed to bail gracefully and quickly. He needs to preserve his brand in whatever manner is possible since his post-presidential plans are likely to include launching Trump TV to allow for continuing direct adoration.
Democrats would need a lot on the table to give Trump these “outs” and keep him from paying dearly for his scores of impeachable offenses. But expediency is also in their best interests. The same can be said of Republicans who need to minimize the long-term damage to their party. The common ground starts there.
To those three entities add Vice President Mike Pence into the mix. Each player has something to offer or give up, something to expect, and something to gain. Let’s put all the cards on the table.
What Trump wants:
- No impeachment vote in the House
- Preserve all or most of his money without further risk of forfeiture
- Keep his lease on the D.C. Trump hotel
- No jail time for him or his extended family
- Some little exoneration that he can blow out of proportion and claim victory
- The least catastrophic reason for resigning
- A complete pardon
What Trump wants to avoid:
- The threat of jail after office
- Extensive continuing investigation
- Monetary penalties or paying back some of his graft involving tax dollars
What Trump may be willing to offer:
- To vacate his presidency
- Evidence of conspiracy among his GOP enablers, AG Barr, Rudy Giuliani, and perhaps Mitch McConnell
- Paying back a token amount of Emoluments or other monetary gains while President
- Evidence of how he was compromised by foreign leaders
That last one he’ll hope to spin as being over a barrel, not a willing participant trying to make money out of opportunity. That could be as simple as acknowledging the existence of the pee tape.
For Pence, there is a likely path to impeachment as well, particularly in obstruction and presenting knowingly false information such as his hollow denial of quid pro quo in the Ukraine call. If impeachment for Trump comes from that direction, a twofer including Pence might promote Speaker Pelosi to President before the end of the year.
But if there’s a gap between Trump and Pence getting the boot, the latter could nominate a VP to jump ahead of Pelosi in line. So the leverage Pence has to get his best deal and avoid jail himself is to agree to leave office at or near the same time as Trump. That’s what Democrats would likely demand to even consider letting Trump skirt almost all of his misdeeds. And while Pence has one hundredth of the wrongdoing hanging over him, the Trump coattails Pence has been riding on are now wrapped around his neck.
Pence knows that he can inspire about a tenth of what Trump can as a candidate for reelection. He’s looking at a presidency that lasts about a year at best. With his Christian facade coming from a more straight-laced place, he wouldn’t be able to attract that portion of the Trump base a year from now that is violent and openly racist. Only the homophobes would climb onboard.
And a Trump impeachment and removal would mean the fuse would be lit on the Pence presidency anyway. But Pence doesn’t possess the same skills and disregard for the law that would enable him to run out the clock the way his boss has tried to do.
So resignation might be palatable if perhaps he could fashion his own short stint in the Oval Office with limitations as part of the overall agreement to save his legacy.
What Pence wants:
- No impeachment or risk of prosecution after office
- A brief stint as POTUS 46 with at least one positive achievement
What Pence wants to avoid:
- Extensive direct investigation into his collusion and lies
- A legacy that includes impeachment
What Pence may be willing to offer:
- To vacate the vice-presidency
- Give up the presidency shortly thereafter to leave succession to the Speaker of the House
- Offer a narrow scope of evidence to secure other White House or Trump administration indictments
As for the Republican leadership, they are by far in the worst bargaining position. Their strategy in this is primarily damage control, knowing that public support for impeachment is growing weekly. If they do nothing and let the party implode under the weight of this damning impeachment, many of Trump’s vocal supporters in Congress will drown in the whirlpool of lies and false equivalencies that they can no longer spin their way out of.
The GOP may have to offer a few sacrificial lambs in order to give the impression that they are trying to reform their ranks. If they ever want to be valued for integrity again, those without it will have to be ousted by their next primaries. While the appearance of a complete overhaul is necessary, the billionaires that have held the marionette strings for a generation will still want to control party policy.
But with all the figureheads out or banished from leadership, there may even be room for honorable behavior to take the spotlight. Any politician who wants to be the new face of the party will have to do so with disgust in what the Trump era has wrought.
Otherwise, If they stay on their current course, the party reputation will be in tatters. And that means that their cash cow contributors will abandon them with no potential return for future investment. This is GOP leadership’s greatest long-term fear.
What Republican leadership wants:
- An effective way to distance themselves from Trump without completely alienating his base
- Limiting the scope and visibility of investigations
- Some kind of “wins” for what will remain of its base
What Republican leadership wants to avoid:
- Extensive indictments in the White House that provide evidence that reaches the floors of Congress
- Losses in Nov. 2020 that eliminate any avenue to power - including the filibuster - so that their corporate and billionaire donors will bail on them
- Being so tarnished as a brand that universal disgust with the GOP turns red states purple or even blue
What Republican leadership may be willing to offer:
- Yielding the presidency into Democratic hands
- Singling out “fall guys” to take the heat without bringing down the whole party
- Making a show of bipartisanship on a few issues to temper the extremist hole that they’ve dug for themselves
The Democratic leadership has most of the power, in that all three other entities are on their back foot with so very much to lose. But still Dem leaders must negotiate fairly to insure that they don’t miss this chance to drastically change the course of America’s future.
The can of worms they most want to pry open is how Russian money was spread through the NRA to Republican candidates, because that would have the widest impact across the political spectrum in forcing GOP incumbents out. But that is independent of a Trump/Pence impeachment, and thus a few moves ahead in the long game.
The first step for Democrats is to restore faith in democracy itself, the electoral process, and reclaim the role of being a purveyor of justice. And having to wait until January 20, 2021 to pass scores of bills currently sitting on McConnell’s desk means not only time wasted, but also the party would lose its chance to pass H.R. 1 to take away private financing of campaigns, mandate hand-counted paper ballots, and end Citizens United before the 2020 general election.
What Democratic leadership wants:
- Nearly simultaneous resignations from Trump and Pence to promote the House Speaker to the presidency
- Full documentary evidence of the Mueller Report
- Some acknowledgement of guilt by Trump
- Continuing investigations into the full scope of Russian interference
- Full freedom in investigating corruption through foreign campaign money
- To end inhumane immigration detention at the border and beyond
What Democratic leadership wants to avoid:
- Wasting time on the impeachment process, letting Trump run out the clock
- Giving Trump the lead story every day when Democratic candidates need airtime to spread progressive ideas and solutions
- Allowing Trump to nominate another Supreme Court Justice
- Losing the impeachment removal trial in the Senate
- Trump handing out pardons like confetti just before his fall
What Democratic leadership may be willing to offer:
- Keep investigations of Trump and his family, Pence, behind closed doors with focus primarily on other enablers, conspirators
- Letting the GOP help with the timing of resignations to minimize the calamity to their party
- Giving Pence a brief stint as President, even if his only real role is to grant preselected pardons to Trump and perhaps his family
- Pardoning Pence after he too resigns
- Showing true bipartisanship on GOP-favored issues to allow the GOP to hold onto at least a splinter of relevance
Democrats will have to demonstrate that their primary goal is not to stomp the Republican Party into the ground and pave over the debris. While permanent comeuppance may feel wonderful, that’s still putting party over country. That’s not how healing from all these horrors should begin.
With all the above parameters in mind, let’s see what everybody ends up with in a deal made to minimize the damage not only to the GOP, but to our nation as a whole as we look to salvage the reputation of our style of democracy. The Democrats need to be decisive, while allowing for the GOP’s survival. Republicans out of power will no longer be able to do the Lucy and the football gambit, so they will have to find common ground issues like climate and outlawing high-capacity magazines to go bipartisan on as their new foundation. They can’t base conservatism on fear, division, racism, misogyny, and xenophobia anymore and expect to be relevant. Their best bet is to be the champions of fiscal responsibility or another issue similarly benign.
So here is how the deal of this century can be structured:
Trump resigns, but gets to choose what impeachable offense he’ll cite as the reason. Ukraine is way too messy and pulls in too many others. A better exit story would be admitting wrongdoing in the conspiracy with Michael Cohen in paying off Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, a clear campaign violation. He can also claim health issues if he needs a little extra sympathy from his base.
Trump will agree to use all remaining money left in his inaugural fund towards paying back money earned in violation of the emoluments clause. If any money is still owed, that can come from his current campaign fund. He will issue no pardons before leaving office to anyone connected to his misdeeds. And he will offer closed-door, sealed testimony of his co-conspirators after leaving office. That way he can’t expect to be pardoned for perjury.
Pence is sworn in, but the deal requires that he is only President for two days. In those two days he’s only allowed to do three things of importance. Since Trump wouldn’t do this deal without a blanket pardon, Pence will give him one. Trump’s family, however, won’t get off completely. Don Jr. and Jared Kushner will have to plead guilty of obstruction of justice and conspiracy for different acts, but each will receive a suspended sentence and serve no jail time if they implicate co-conspirators. No pardons on Trump extend forward, however, so any future crimes can be prosecuted.
The second win for Pence will be signing significant legislation that has bipartisan support. This can be something like a comprehensive firearm background check bill that will have already made it through Congress. The third accomplishment for Pence will be to fire the ICE leadership for allowing private contractors to willfully house refugees in cruel conditions. If there is any true Christianity in Pence’s veins, this nod to the Golden Rule will be what he’s able to cherish from his short legacy as POTUS 46.
That same day, change will come to the House. Nancy Pelosi will step down as Speaker, and Hillary Clinton will be voted in as new Speaker of the House. This position does not require currently holding office in that chamber. Then the following day, Pence will also resign, again citing a reason of his own choosing.
Clinton will become the 47th US President, and the first woman. And she will pardon Pence on her first day. She will name Stacey Abrams as her VP. Abrams, already stung by voter suppression tactics in her governor’s race in Georgia, will immediately take the lead in pushing for election and campaign finance reforms. Pelosi will return to Speaker and add Abrams’ input to a re-write of H.R. 1, the House bill focusing on campaign finance and election reforms.
Clinton, however, will not seek re-election and today’s candidates will be able to continue their bids for the White House. Whomever wins, Abrams will be their running mate.
There will be hidden aspects in this deal as well. Democrats will provide space for the GOP to reinvent itself. With impeachment no longer being the goal of Congressional inquiries, further testimony and evidence can be given behind closed doors, away from the public’s eye, rather than in open hearings. The sordid details of further revelations will no longer be front page news.
And instead of searching for the conspiracy ties that would bring down Senate Majority Leader McConnell, Dems will let the Republican Party force Mitch to resign for his blind support of Trump as his chief enabler on Capitol Hill. For a party that wants to remake itself, the low hanging fruit will be McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Chuck Grassley, Kevin McCarthy, and Devin Nunes. They, along with a host of others, will be plucked and tossed into the basket of bad apples.
So let’s see how everybody wins:
Trump gets to leave office with the bare minimum of bad press, keeping most of his money, and salvaging most of his reputation within his predictable base. He’ll be able to start Trump TV and cash in, but his political influence will end outside of that narrow demographic. His kids will get their slap on the wrist, but some element of justice will have been served.
Pence will live on in the history books, and be the answer to a trivia question later in this century. By dodging most of his complicity and doing a very Christian thing as President, he’ll probably still be able to rake it in on the speaking circuit.
Republicans will also minimize their losses. If they take advantage of this relatively turnkey rebirth opportunity, particularly by claiming a moral uprising within their ranks, they can hang onto the possibility of retaking at least some power before the tangible improvements that Democrats will deliver will have had a chance to kick in.
Without this deal, an inglorious fall by their propped up hero would not only cost them Congress, it would sever the link to their corporate and billionaire donors. Although H.R. 1 would likely be passed in 2021, there will always be a way for dark money to seep into things, particularly at the state level. But if the Republican brand is in the dumpster, that spigot is welded shut.
While Democrats may have come away with more if they’d let Trump and the GOP crash and burn, the costs of that slow option pile up daily. One needs to look no further than Syria to see what future tragedies might lay ahead otherwise.
Clearly, this won’t feel like justice being served on Trump to any satisfying level after three years of pulling our hair out over all the abuses of power, lies, corruption, graft, disrespect, hatred, division, and general nastiness. But much like hitting our heads against the walls, it will feel so good after it stops that sheer relief will offset years of acute frustration.
Good things will once again be possible. Democrats will have the White House, and from Day 1 the restoration of the faith in government can begin. Clinton and Abrams will expose every aspect of election theft, from #Crosscheck and voter purges to closing precincts in African American neighborhoods to create long wait times to vote. The EPA and other regulatory agencies will get their science back. And finally our government can again be fully staffed and focused on the good of all Americans, not just influential GOP donors.
The progressive wing of the Democratic Party will campaign on the likelihood of a Democratically-controlled Senate which will promise the reversal of at least some of the harm Trump and the GOP have wrought. America will rejoin the Paris Accord, try to reinstate the Iran Nuclear Agreement, and clamp down on Russian oligarchs on these shores. By these and many other acts, as well as by having a wise and just leader at the helm for a year, the reputation of America will start to be regained.
And by NOT wiping out the GOP, Democrats show goodwill that may yield actual bipartisanship in the future if the old GOP playbook is tossed out the window. Addressing the global climate crisis might not have to wait until 2021. Institutionalized racism may be purged from police forces and the courts. And the old-guard, #CORPservative GOP loopholes that give tax incentives for moving jobs overseas will be gone for good.
Most important of all, America wins. We demonstrate some semblance of justice; how a strong democracy can prevail over a corrupt man with no conscience at all. We can restore our credibility by once again showing consideration of our allies and well-earned skepticism of our enemies. We will also signal to other nations that the rise of tyrants and authoritarians worldwide can be turned back by the will of the people and the rule of law. This aberration will be only a blip in world history, when fascism nearly brought us down as a species but there was enough good in enough people to insure that integrity prevailed.
Yes, the late-night talkshow hosts will have far less material without daily Trump meltdowns and astonishing injustices throughout his administration. But if they are the only true losers in all of this, it’s worth it, right?