The U.S. House of Representatives voted this evening to impeach President Donald Trump.
The first Article of Impeachment (abuse of power) passed with Democrats and the chamber’s only Independent voting in favor, while Republicans were joined by two Democrats, Reps. Collin Peterson and Jeff Van Drew, in voting against. One Democrat, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, voted “present.” The second Article of Impeachment (obstruction) passed along the same lines but this time one additional Democrat, Rep. Jared Golden, broke party ranks and joined the Republicans in voting against. Gabbard voted “present” again.
For Virginia, the tally was Republican Reps. Rob Wittman, Denver Riggleman, Ben Cline, and Morgan Griffith voted against impeachment, with Rep. Cline having already voted against both articles in the Judiciary Committee, while Democrat Reps. Elaine Luria, Bobby Scott, Don McEachin, Abigail Spanberger, Don Beyer, Jennifer Wexton, and Gerry Connolly voted in favor. Pure party split over something as big as impeachment is disturbing.
This whole thing is hard-line partisanship at its worst. There is no crime, no impeachable offense, no cause for any of this, but Democrats can’t get over the outcome of the 2016 election. Russian collusion, or obstruction, or emoluments, or taxes, now Ukraine, it never mattered what it was; Democrats want to impeach Trump for being a bad president and that’s not how this works.
Today’s speeches from Democrats ranged from calm to beyond Loony Tunes. Rep. Jan Schakowsky admitted that she made her decision in June (the phone call with Ukraine took place in July), and Rep. Jackie Speier compared Trump to Hitler. Republicans had their clowns too, this is Congress. One member led a moment of silence while another invoked silence in absence of a list of impeachable charges. Sometimes today’s speeches reminded me of one of Marge’s lines from an Halloween episode of The Simpsons; “You’re turning this witch hunt into a circus.”
Now for the trial in the US Senate. Liberals are immediately crazed that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is telling people this whole thing is a sham. It is. Democrats claim they expect the senate’s leader to remain impartial, but they have no problem applauding when Senators Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, and others call for this president to be impeached multiple times. This is not exactly a trial like in a court, elected senators aren’t jurors, and the senate gets to write the rules, that is, this senate, this Republican-led senate. That’s how it works.
It is probably that lunatic in Michigan, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who best articulated this impeachment process when she said, “we’re going to impeach that [expletive deleted].” That was on the night she was first elected in 2018, one year before the phone call that is the alleged reason for the first Article of Impeachment.
Tlaib voted with Virginia Democrats for impeachment today.
