How Many Times Can We Impeach Trump Before Next Wednesday? We're 'Bout To Find Out!
Monday morning, House Democrats formally introduced an article of impeachment against Donald Trump for "incitement of insurrection." Republicans have whined about “unity" for the past few days, but we think impeachment is quite the olive branch in response to Trump's attempted mob hit on January 6.
Trump was impeached by the House once already in 2019, but this asshole racks up impeachments like Meryl Streep collects Oscar nominations. He's advanced beyond common “high crimes and misdemeanors" and has now violated Section Three of the 14th Amendment, which frowns upon anyone engaging in "insurrection and rebellion" against the United States. The impeachment article argues this is what Trump did when he refused to accept his election defeat and spent the past two months trying to overturn Joe Biden's victory while feeding his gullible supporters a steady diet of Kraken-stuffed lies.
Trump repeatedly issued false statements asserting that the Presidential election results were the product of widespread fraud and should not be accepted by the American people or certified by State or Federal officials.
Shortly before the Joint Session commenced, President Trump addressed a crowd at the Ellipse in Washington, DC. There, he reiterated false claims that ''we won this election, and we won it by a landslide''. He also willfully made statements that, in context, encouraged—and foreseeably resulted in—lawless action at the Capitol, such as: ''if you don't fight like hell you're not going to have a country anymore."
Thus incited by President Trump, members of the crowd he had addressed, in an attempt to, among other objectives, interfere with the Joint Session's solemn constitutional duty to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election, unlawfully breached and vandalized the Capitol, injured and killed law enforcement personnel, menaced Members of Congress, the Vice President, and Congressional personnel, and engaged in other violent, deadly, destructive, and seditious acts.
That all happened, and it's all damning. Republicans should've spent the weekend pressuring Trump to resign instead of guilt-tripping Democrats who aren't having that shit. Rep. Ted Lieu from California drew up the resolution with David Cicilline from Rhode Island and Jamie Raskin from Maryland. As of Sunday, 210 members of the House had signed on as co-sponsors.
Impeachment has multiple purposes: -Remove a delusional, dangerous @POTUS -Bar @realDonaldTrump from holding offic… https://t.co/DFEhHyX1Cj— Ted Lieu (@Ted Lieu) 1610129696.0
Republicans admitted that Trump siccing a violent mob on Congress was way rude, but they think it's ruder somehow to remove him from office or hold him accountable in any way for undermining democracy.
The Washington Postreports:
"The violence we saw unfold in our nation's capital last week has no place in our democracy," Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) said in a statement. "It was a disgusting and dangerous spectacle that ultimately cost people their lives."
Emmer served some stale nonsense about “coming together to heal the nation," even though Trump hasn't apologized for the part he played in the attack nor has he told his supporters that Biden's election was legitimate and he's a whiny sack of shit.
"It is a politically-motivated effort by Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats that will fracture our nation even more instead of bringing us together," [Emmer] said.
Republicans aren't allowed to suddenly fret about politically motivated efforts that will “fracture our nation" when they either remained silent or actively enabled Trump's assault on our elections. House Republicans in particular went around claiming the election was rife with fraud that didn't exist while supporting Jim Crow-style attempts to throw out millions of legitimate votes. They can all get fucked.
A violent mob invaded the Capitol in furtherance of Trump's deluded aims. Did Republicans think Democrats would just wake up the next day and they'd all go for tea?
The Capitol assault wasn't a mere “oopsie." It was an inevitable outcome of Trump's escalating efforts to "subvert and obstruct the certification of the results of the 2020 Presidential election." House Democrats mention Trump's corrupt pressure campaign on Georgia GOP Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who Trump demanded “find" enough votes to overturn his loss in the state.
In all this, President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of Government. He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coequal branch of Government. He thereby betrayed his trust as President, to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.
See, Republicans? These are all very bad things.
There's been concern trolling that impeaching Trump could derail the Biden administration. Oh no! Like these motherfuckers weren't refusing to admit a Biden administration would even exist. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy suggested it was no big thing that Trump wouldn't share intelligence briefings with President-elect Biden and otherwise stalled the normal transition process that ensures we don't all die in a terrorist attack.
Senate Republicans had already planned to be assholes about Biden's Cabinet picks, but that was before Trump helped them lose the Senate. Now Democrats can bring home the stimulus bacon and serve Trump's sorry ass up in a pan.
Trump is an active threat, possibly even more so when out of office. You can easily incite mobs from the private sector. We need to impeach Trump, convict him, and bar him from ever holding office again. Then he should rot in jail. But first things first.
[CNN]
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Stephen Robinson is a writer and social kibbitzer based in Portland, Oregon. He writes make believe for Cafe Nordo, an immersive theatre space in Seattle. Once, he wrote a novel called “Mahogany Slade,” which you should read or at least buy. He's also on the board of the Portland Playhouse theatre. His son describes him as a “play typer guy."
