Now, per reporting on MSNBC, there are some in the House that are thinking they might do “impeach and hold” until the Senate gives some assurances it won’t be some automatic, fast acquittal.
Unrelated: I know our own @tomchick is an Ashley Parker fan, but where’s the love for Annie Karni of the NYT, huh?
Menzo
5151
What kind of leverage do they have? Won’t McConnell just tell them to take their time? He can whip up a fast dismissal of charges whenever he gets them.
Timex
5152
It’s interesting, as it would prevent Trump from saying he’s been found innocent. It’d also hold it over his head and drive him nuts.
I think that’s the plan. rubs hands together diabolically
Me too. Gotta admit I chuckled. 'Course it could just be that I’ve drunk a couple of glasses of Tempranillo and I’m a total lightweight. :-)
Too “dusky” for Trump to acknowledge as such, though.
JoshL
5156
Republicans will pay no price for defending Trump.
magnet
5157
Republicans are already paying a price. Just ask the Republicans who lost their jobs in the last election.
Timex
5158
Yeah, it’s not about them paying the price on their primaries.
Let them win the primary in a dead party all they want.
2008 Trump has at least 30 IQ points over 2019 Trump.
True. I’m just casting around for something positive.
One political party upheld their oath and Constitutional duty. That another is irredeemably corrupt should not mean we just stick our heads in the sand and give up.
I don’t see how Pelosi holding up the process from continuing in the Senate does anything except allow each side to scream at each other indefinitely about playing politics with a sacred procedure.
I don’t think the Dems have any real intention of holding the articles without taking them to the Senate. We’ll see, I guess.
dfs
5166
Not convinced that shutting down discourse is a bad thing.
The dems have to play the other side’s game. There is no compromise. There is no common ground. They are openly being portrayed as traitors on Fox news and in the red state. Red voters wear shirts that say they would rather have Russian rulers than Democrats in office. The time to expect the other side to suddenly become rational is over.
In which case, the thing to do is pass that one to the Senate for (in)action so you can campaign against that corruption, and start another inquiry into Trump corruption. Emoluments ought to be easy, and it is certainly impeachable. Impeach him again, and again.
Well, if you look at it with a McConnell eye, the Dems already have the thing they want - he’s impeached and every republican in the house voted for corruption. Now the GOP wants a sham trial so they can say “acquitted!” No need to give them one unless they give some upside to it for the Dems. We all know “putting them on record” isn’t much upside - perhaps it puts a little pressure on Collins and Gardner and McSally and Ernst and Tillis, though I’m not sure the last 3 care. But as long as there’s ongoing debate about the rules of the Senate trial, that group is going to be on the spot about it.
There are two other potential upsides to holding it: 1) new evidence might come out or he might do new things; holding this over his head certainly has a better chance to keep him “honest” than an acquittal would. 2) if you delay the senate trial until after the primaries, maybe you can get some GOP support for removal.
Balanced against that of course is the potential negative press about them holding it up (which maybe be far less of a penalty than the acquittal press but would continue until closer to the election), and the penalty of delaying the trial until close to the election and therefore having the acquittal still in people’s minds. Maybe that’s a good thing for anger about the senators but probably it’s a bad thing for the presidential election.
The Wolf Blitzer article also linked this 2016 debate clip of Trump attacking Jed. It’s shocking how coherent he seems. Just two years… Maybe he got a mini stroke after he got elected.
