It appears House Democrats are determined to impeach President Donald Trump.
Impeaching a president of the United States is a very serious step, and the country would take it seriously—if it weren’t so blatantly obvious the whole effort is political grandstanding. Here’s how we know.
No one believes the Senate will sustain the House’s impeachment.
Once the House of Representatives votes to impeach a president, the matter goes to the U.S. Senate for a trial. Two-thirds of the senators must vote for impeachment to remove the president from office. No one thinks that will happen.
The Republican-led House impeached President Bill Clinton in December 1997, but Senate Republicans couldn’t get the two-thirds vote they needed, even though they controlled the Senate. The vote wasn’t even close: 50-50.
Independents and Republicans would have to provide 22 votes, along with every Democrat, to reach the two-thirds needed to oust Trump, which almost certainly won’t happen. So why put the country through the process if it is virtually certain to fail—unless the goal is simply to make a statement?
The speaker announces a trade agreement.
After announcing the articles of impeachment at 9:00 AM, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced an agreement on the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade deal at 10:00.
The irony wasn’t lost on many lefties—e.g., New York Times columnist Paul Krugman—who publicly puzzled over the mixed messages. If Trump is so bad he must be impeached, why give him his biggest victory since tax reform passed in December 2017—unless it’s just grandstanding.
Some charges were dropped because of vulnerable Democrats.
The most progressive Democrats wanted the impeachment charges to include every real or perceived Trump infraction, including the Mueller investigation, even though it didn’t find evidence of collusion or obstruction.
But politically vulnerable moderate Democrats wanted to focus solely on the Ukraine issue, which they felt was more defensible to their constituents. And that’s what Pelosi did, demonstrating that politics played a big, if not bigger, role than principle in their decision.
The stock market climbed.
Impeachment can be very disruptive, both politically and economically, something that would normally rattle the stock market—if it took this impeachment process seriously.
But it doesn’t. The market climbed during impeachment press conference—the result of stories suggesting the president might postpone imposing new tariffs on China at the end of the week.
House and Senate members want to be home for Christmas.
Finally, several reports indicate the House is moving quickly on impeachment so members can be home for the holidays. As Politico reports, “Despite bipartisan hopes of not letting impeachment drag on, absolutely no one in the Senate seems to want to sacrifice their Christmas or New Year's.”
In 2009 the Democratic-led Senate stayed in session until Christmas Eve to pass its version of the Affordable Care Act.
The Senate will stay in session during the holidays when it’s important, but not for political grandstanding.
December 10, 2019