The most recent Washington Post — ABC Polling conducted April 22-25, 2019 is shown below:
It gives 3 main options; Should begin Impeachment, Should not begin Impeachment, No Opinion. What’s missing is a “Impeach Later” choice.
I’m strongly in favor of impeachment but I think we need more time before starting the process. Would I have selected “Should not begin Impeachment”?
From my own unscientific poll in a previous diary, the majority of respondents agreed with me that we need more time. So this WaPo-ABC poll might be under-representing support for impeachment.
Timeline
We have 18 months to work with before the November 2020 elections. I’m in favor of 6 more months of investigation prior to starting impeachment hearings that could last as long as 12 months. For comparison, the Nixon impeachment process lasted 15 months.
Why wait? Why not Impeach now?
The Mueller Report only looks at Russian Conspiracy charges, and Obstruction of Justice. Any Financial Crimes he came across were referred to other lower courts such as the SDNY, or were not investigated at all. Were we to begin impeachment right away, the Financial crimes would not be ready to include in articles of impeachment. We currently have 6 House Committees looking into these crimes but they will need more time to catch up to the level of understanding presented in the Mueller Report.
If we to start impeachment hearings right away, the work these 6 committee’s are pursuing would all be combined into the House Judiciary Committee. I’m not sure that’s a smart move just for efficiency and speed.
The House committees need to catch up on:
- money laundering,
- tax evasion,
- asset amount manipulation in order to defraud banks and insurers,
- emoluments clause violations,
- inaugural money from unknown sources used for unknown purposes,
- sketchy Trump Tower deals,
- NRA-Russia money.
- Hush money to influence an election
- Foreign Government Leverage over Trump
Impeach Now!
I’ll concede that if the Trump Administration continues to stonewall on witnesses and documents, there is benefit to starting the impeachment process right away. My understanding is that the Courts will be more likely to side with Congress if impeachment is underway. I still say give it 6 more months for investigations but wouldn’t mind if they decided to impeach now.
Why Impeach at All
Our forefathers fought to be out from underneath a King. Alexander Hamilton was in favor of a strong president, but was also keenly aware that with that power came responsibility and accountability. From an article in the Washington Post:
Hamilton was one of the leading architects of an energetic presidency and was also the person who was therefore most obliged to explain to the public how the country could be assured that such energy would not be misused. A key difference between the British crown and the new American president, he twice insisted in the Federalist Papers, was that the “person of the king of Great Britain is sacred and inviolable; there is no constitutional tribunal to which he is amenable.” In contrast, the president was “at all times liable to impeachment, trial, dismission from office, incapacity to serve in any other, and to forfeiture of life and estate by subsequent prosecution in the common course of law.”
The Constitution deliberately includes language for removing a President that fails to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed”. We need to follow the remedy the founding fathers laid out for us.
To understand the original meaning of “faithfully,” Mueller’s team cites a 1755 dictionary written by Samuel Johnson, which defines the term as “strict adherence to duty and allegiance.”
It’s clear Trump has violated his Oath of Office and has trampled over the Constitution and the Rule of Law. Democrats were given the House in part to hold Trump accountable for these crimes. The majority of Democrats support impeachment.
Democrats need to do their duty and defend the Constitution. If Republican Senators want to defend the indefensible actions of Trump so be it. Let’s take them down along with Trump. There should be several competitive Senate seats up in 2020 including NC, Colorado, Maine, Arizona, Iowa and maybe Georgia.
History will record Democrats put a permanent mark next to Trumps presidency that says *Impeached.