Only 5
The Republicans are so shameless.
All but five Senate Republicans voted in favor of an effort to dismiss Donald Trump’s historic second impeachment trial on Tuesday, making clear a conviction of the former president for “incitement of insurrection” after the deadly Capitol siege on Jan. 6 is unlikely.
Just utterly shameless. Trump is a horror, and what he did before during and after the election was horrifying, including in terms that Republicans would normally sign up to (precedent, law, rule-following, respect, civility, tradition, truth-telling, Constitutionality), yet they’re still defending him.
What seemed for some Democrats like an open-and-shut case that played out for the world on live television is running into a Republican Party that feels very different. Not only do senators say they have legal concerns, but they are wary of crossing the former president and his legions of followers.
Meaning they’re afraid of him? If that’s the case he still has power, and that’s a very bad thing.
Democrats rejected the argument that the trial is illegitimate or unconstitutional because Trump is no longer in office, pointing to an 1876 impeachment of a secretary of war who had already resigned and to the opinions of many legal scholars.
Democrats also say that a reckoning of the first invasion of the Capitol since the War of 1812, perpetrated by rioters egged on by a president as Electoral College votes were being tallied, is necessary.
“It makes no sense whatsoever that a president, or any official, could commit a heinous crime against our country and then defeat Congress’ impeachment powers — and avoid a vote on disqualification — by simply resigning, or by waiting to commit that offense until their last few weeks in office,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.
You’d think.
So much for that. If it’s anyway doomed, I hope they get it over quickly, and go back to the business of getting the country out of the mud.
Damn those Republicans, AND the hypocrisy they rode in on.
And so much for Mcconnell’s being “open to convicting the president”. It was nice while it lasted.
But you know what? Half glass full. It was the first bi-partisan impeachment in the House ever, and here, too, five Republicans voted along with the Democrats, again a bipartisan vote. We’ll see if all five vote* to convict, as well.
(*Haha, plural here, so you can’t see what mood! Sneaky, eh?)
They could kill his power and influence in one stroke. How can they be afraid of someone that they have the power to eviscerate for good?
Ah, but they can’t.
Trump’s power isn’t his office (past, present, or future). Trump’s power is his ability to direct his followers against his enemies. There were two (or more?) Republicans who defied Trump while he was President. Trump denounced them, and they all lost their next primary election.
That’s the power that keeps Republicans in line.
Of course he still has power. He gets it from the rest of the republicans (which everyone who is saying that there are some that have changed their tune need to stoop saying that. They haven’t) and from his base who are plentiful and dangerous. PERIOD! This is not a complicated situation.
Power to do what, though?
He still has influence, but direct power – that’s more complicated. All-caps period notwithstanding.
OB, I agree with Steven. Trump has the power to support a primary challenger to any GOP member of Congress, and failing that, to tell his supporters to stay home in the general election. The number of members who don’t fear at least one of those things is pretty small.
Look at what’s happening already: the AZ GOP is passing resolutions of censure against Ducey for failing to support a coup, the GOP House caucus is threatening Lynne Cheney’s leadership position over her impeachment vote, all of the GOP House members who supported impeachment are getting primary challenges. Marco Rubio is terrified of an Ivanka Trump primary challenge.
The only GOP members of Congress I can think of who don’t have much to fear from Trump are Romney (who probably has a strong enough following in Utah to fight off any primary challenge, and isn’t going to lose to a Democrat), Murkowski (who already lost a primary challenge and then won her seat as a write-in candidate before Trump, and Alaska’s new election method will make that even easier), and maybe Collins (who’s got six years before another election, has that weird appeal to Maine voters that I don’t understand, and they have ranked choice voting there, too). Probably a few others, especially among the newly elected, that I can’t think of offhand.
Even the ones who aren’t seeking re-election, like Toomey or Portman, may not necessarily be profiles in courage. Former TN senator Lamar Alexander continued to lick Trump’s boots over the last couple of years even after announcing his retirement, reportedly because he was afraid of his family being harassed by angry Trumpalos.
Influence is more complicated, but it’s also much harder to eliminate. It’s also pretty much only effective against Republicans, since he can’t turn Democratic voters that way. This is why AOC is still around, but Flake isn’t.
This is really yet another way that Trumpism resembles a cult. In the religious mindset, the heretic is almost always more hated than the heathen; someone who is supposed to be on your side, but breaks ranks, is much more of a threat to your identity than someone outside the faith entirely.
I am not American, but my greatest wish for your country is for Trump to start his own party.
In 1955 The Australian Labor Party was split after a rugged anti-Communist campaign, led mostly by Roman Catholics. Whilst there was some communist influence in the ALP and its supporter Trade Unions, the threat was overwrought and based on ideology, not fact.
This split kept the ALP in almost permanent opposition, not winning a federal election until 1972.
@ Roj Blake, I’m picturing basically the Palmer United Party? All dedicated to patriotism, “greatness”, and Clive Palmer’s bank balance?