As the full import of even the redacted Mueller report sinks in, it's becoming clear to the rule-of-law contingent of lawmakers and presidential candidates that the impeachment process must begin. Add to them Sen. Kamala Harris. The California Democrat said in a CNN forum Monday night that "Congress should take the steps toward impeachment."
She added that she's "also a realist," and that it's highly unlikely Mitch McConnell's Republican Senate would vote to remove Trump. "I've not seen any evidence to suggest that [Senate Republicans] will weigh on the facts instead of on partisan adherence to being protective of this president," she added. "And that's what concerns me and what will be the eventual outcome. So we have to be realistic about what might be the end result, but that doesn't mean the process should not take hold."
Harris joins Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren in that call. On Friday, the 2020 contender released a statement on Twitter, calling for the process to begin. "Mueller put the next step in the hands of Congress," she wrote, quoting the report, in which Mueller clearly passed the ball to Congress when he wrote that it has the "authority to prohibit a President's corrupt use of his authority in order to protect the integrity of the administration of justice." Warren added, "The correct process for exercising that authority is impeachment." The "severity" of Trump's misconduct, Warren wrote, "demands that elected officials in both parties set aside political considerations and do their constitutional duty. That means the House should initiate impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States."
Other candidates who've called for the impeachment process to begin are former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, with Inslee less definitively saying that the investigations in Congress must begin and "impeachment should not be off the table."