Ambitious Democrats Eye High-Profile Impeachment Assignment
[guest post by Dana]
It’s a given that any House member selected by Nancy Pelosi to be an impeachment manager will see his or her political career boosted as a result. And while there is some demurring about even thinking about being selected, we all know that politicians love the spotlight and any opportunity to be in it (for a perceived noble cause, that is) and raise their profiles is goal-worthy. And it doesn’t get any more high profile than an impeachment:
Speaker Nancy Pelosi will decide who and how many impeachment managers will travel to the other side of the Capitol to make arguments, present evidence, question witnesses and more in just the third time in U.S. history that a sitting president has been on trial before the Senate.
Her picks can be political as well as legal, some Democratic lawmakers say. The California Democrat would want members with trial experience who understand the Constitution and the case well — particularly because they must fight in a Republican-controlled Senate.
But Pelosi also holds an opportunity to showcase diversity among the Democratic caucus and spotlight rising members who could use the historic Senate trial as a way to boost their national profile or fundraising power…
While some Democrats claim that they “haven’t given it any thought,” others are jockeying for position:
Behind the scenes, some Democratic members have jostled to be included. Others have taken themselves out of the running over campaign conflicts or because they don’t have as much legal or trial experience.
Some potential impeachment managers are largely keeping quiet about any ambitions in public.
Pelosi is not bound to follow any tradition, and if she taps an individual, they have no choice in the matter. And while there are definite benefits to being selected, there is also a possibility of bombing in the spotlight:
The role of impeachment manager could help with the base and make a member an instant figure in the media and speaking circuit, said Virginia Democrat Rep. Gerald E. Connolly. “They’re going to be in the history books,” Connolly said.
But there are downsides too. “It’s a lot of work for a brief moment in the sun, although a brief shiny moment in the sun,” Connolly said. “You could also really flop. All this expectation and you’re not quite what we thought. You bored the hell out of people, or you weren’t very compelling.”
[Ed. My guess is that a whole lot of members are secretly hoping they will be selected, and are artfully draping their subtle signaling in a protest of faux-humility (“Oh surely there are more deserving and qualified…”).]
Note:
Over the weekend, The Washington Post reported that a group of 30 House freshmen led by Minnesota Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips sought to have Rep. Justin Amash as an impeachment manager.
Amash was the first Republican lawmaker to say that Trump committed impeachable offenses, and then left the Republican party and became an independent in July. He tweeted over the weekend that Republicans are “making a concerted effort to mislead” about impeachable wrongdoing.
With Republicans apparently in lockstep in opposition to the articles of impeachment, Pelosi could see an advantage in adding Amash to the managers, Phillips told the Post.
“To the extent that this can be bipartisan, it should, and I think including Representative Amash amongst the impeachment managers is a smart move both for the country, for the substance and for the optics,” Phillips said.
Here is the tweet referenced:
Republicans are making a concerted effort to mislead. “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” is pointedly NOT about statutory crimes. In fact, the Constitution doesn’t provide for impeachment for ordinary crimes; they must be “high.” Impeachable wrongdoing must relate to abuse of office.
— Justin Amash (@justinamash) December 12, 2019
(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)
–Dana
Amash would be the smart choice.
Dana (643cd6) — 12/17/2019 @ 12:03 pm1. I’d even go so far as to say that Amash would be an inspired choice.
Gryph (08c844) — 12/17/2019 @ 12:26 pmAmash and another moderate Democrat or two would work.
Paul Montagu (af70d6) — 12/17/2019 @ 12:45 pmIt’s not about “statutory crimes”, true, but Trump has committed multiple statutory crimes.
3. Trump committed multiple statutory crimes going back to his days as a Manhattan real estate maven. That didn’t prevent him from getting elected, and I don’t think it’s going to lead to his ouster now.
Gryph (08c844) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:05 pmAmash would be a fantastic choice.
aphrael (e0cdc9) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:12 pmamash – his last impotent speech
mg (8cbc69) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:15 pmthis louse will never get elected again.
thank you, Jesus.
I’ve like Justin Amash for a long time. He was one of the founding T-Party members. He’s a principled libertarian leaning conservative and so far as I know hasn’t committed any major ethical lapses. If Pelosi does pick him I’m pretty confident that he’ll be vocal if anything improper is happening. He’d bring some very thin bi-partisanship to this. I hope he uses that to insist on real authority in the proceedings. I think that makes her unlikely to pick him.
Time123 (cd2ff4) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:32 pmDo you think there will be actual witnesses? I’m wondering if the Impeachment trial will even get to the point where the House Managers get to address the Senate.
Xmas (eafb47) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:42 pmAmash’s tweet is itself highly misleading. The question is not whether every crime is impeachable. The question is whether you need a crime at all, or just vague “abuse of power.”
The simply reading of the Constitution, and the correct one, IMO, is it has to be a crime, and one related to the public office.
(On another blog, I saw a discussion of whether Aaron Burr, who shot and killed Alexander Hamilton while Burr was Vice-President, could have been impeached for same.)
Bored Lawyer (998177) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:53 pm
harkin (15bd84) — 12/17/2019 @ 1:56 pmManu Raju
@mkraju
·
Mitt Romney told me he has no issue with McConnell’s rejection of Schumer proposal for live witnesses. “My read of his comments were that he’s looking for the same process that was employed during the Clinton impeachment trial,” adding: “I don’t have any reason to question that”
_
Being an impeachment manager will make their careers? Without looking, can anyone name the House impeachment managers from 1999?
The snarky Dana (d9a693) — 12/17/2019 @ 3:31 pmHenry Hyde, Asa Hutchinson.
nk (dbc370) — 12/17/2019 @ 3:33 pmThere are at least 10 democrats running against her in the primary for being a corporate establishment stooge. Nancy says if trump is impeached it will be very difficult if not impossible for an impeached president to get his nomination for supreme court thru senate.
asset (daac75) — 12/17/2019 @ 3:45 pmIt’s a set-up; Amash would be an even bigger fool to touch it.
This whole thing is radioactive. We know how it’s going to end when it explodes, too– so the smart folks are already in their shelters. The dummies are out and exposed, waiting for the televised blast wave to blow ’em away.
Duck– and cover.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 12/17/2019 @ 3:57 pm13
Cocaine Mitch would disagree.
whembly (c30c83) — 12/17/2019 @ 4:39 pmwhembly (c30c83) — 12/17/2019 @ 4:39 pm
“Asset” is, I am fairly sure, the troll that used to call itself “lany”.
Kishnevi (b58549) — 12/17/2019 @ 4:44 pm11. To be fair, Henry Hyde was the only one I could remember. But I did know one. 😛
Gryph (08c844) — 12/17/2019 @ 4:54 pmAmash would be an excellent choice for impeachment manager. He’s a libertarian-leaning conservative and a constitutionalist. More importantly, he’s principled.
That’s why he left the Freedom Caucus, which he co-founded, and then left the Republican party.
Trump Deification Syndrome has infected the GOP like an inoperable cancer. Chemotherapy and radiation treatment won’t cure it, but Amash might pose as a corrective measure.
The question is, will he accept the assignment? When asked, he said he would consider it.
Trump is clearly discombobulated about being impeached, as evidenced by his ranting letter to Speaker Pelosi. The last thing he wants is to be exposed as the fraud he is, so he’s lashing out.
The Republicans are all falling in line, like some sort of zombie androids. So this trial in the Senate is going nowhere but down hill and into the sewer. McConnell has already declared he won’t be impartial, which is a pre-determined violation of the sworn oath he has to take before the trial.
Perhaps, if he accepts the assignment, Amash can remind the Republicans of what they’ve lost or forgotten, principles.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:00 pmBTW … did anybody notice …? The narrative last week was whether the Senate Trumpablicans would be allowed to call witnesses such as Joe and Hunter Biden and the first half of the Kiev phonebook to show that the orange dindunuffin and the Ukrainians conspired with Deep State to burn his meatloaf and steal his chocolate pie. Today’s narrative is that Schumer asked for witnesses and McConnell said “Nyet!” Who’s playing whom?
nk (dbc370) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:13 pmDifferent set of witnesses. Trump wants to call witnesses who know nothing about the phone call. Schumer wants to call witnesses who actually know about the call.
Notice which set of witnesses Trump, if he thought himself innocent, would be demanding to be called, and which set of witnesses the GOP doesn’t want to be called.
Mysteriously, it’s the same set of witnesses.
Kishnevi (b58549) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:20 pm“if he thought himself innocent“
Innocent of what?
Munroe (dd6b64) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:37 pmOf trying to force Ukraine to do something that benefited himself alone.
If he really thought Biden–Hunter, Joe, or both–acted corruptly, why didn’t he ask Barr to start an investigation? There are US laws that cover what Trump says Biden did. He didn’t need to depend on the Ukrainians.
Kishnevi (b58549) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:43 pm“Of trying to force Ukraine to do something that benefited himself alone.”
If I thought myself innocent of that I’d prefer to put my case before the electorate and let them decide.
Munroe (dd6b64) — 12/17/2019 @ 6:05 pmWhat principles are we crediting Amash with again?
steveg (354706) — 12/17/2019 @ 7:20 pmGood for Amash. He has principles. I think we shine our heroes up with “principles” we attribute to them. My best guess is Amash turns out to be just another craven turd thats been sprayed with Febreze
What does Amash have to lose? He’s no longer a Republican. After Trump has left a massive crater where this party once was, Amash will be there.
Paul Montagu (af70d6) — 12/17/2019 @ 7:32 pmIf I thought myself innocent of that I’d prefer to put my case before the electorate and let them decide.
So far he hasn’t. In fact, he’s blocking the witnesses from testifying.
Kishnevi (30d0bc) — 12/17/2019 @ 8:31 pmIf Nancy picks someone they have to accept but the R’s are in lockstep in violation of their oath.
I was a little concerned when you said she’d need to find a D who understood the constitution but then I felt better when 30 D’s went to find a former R.
frosty (f27e97) — 12/17/2019 @ 8:36 pm22. Kishnevi (b58549) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:43 pm
First, when Barr was appointed he agreed he would not tell Barr to initiate or not initiate investigations. Second this is something that Ukraine would know the truth about. He did need the Ukrainians. They are the people to go to first. They have first hand information. This is one of the more specious and irrelevant impeachment talking points. Third, he did want to involve the Attorney General of the United States:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Unclassified09.2019.pdf
President Trump appears to believe it. He said it again today.
What’s more, he said that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi knows it is true.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Letter-from-President-Trump-final.pdf
There are a few problems with this. The first problem is, although Biden said he pressured Ukraine to fire a prosecutor, he doesn’t say that that prosecutor was digging into Burisma, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone claiming that he was, including even the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, himself, who says he had already stopped it because . Geoffrey Ross Pyatt, the U.S Ambassador in 2015, * had told him an ivestigatin of Burisma needed to be handled with “kid gloves” and he says he took that as a signal to stall it. That may be a lie but we see even he is not claiming that he was actively investigating Burisma when he got left his job.
* Now Ambassador to Greece. He’s Foreign Service.
Second, it wasn’t aid money, but a loan guarantee, which can turn into aid years later, but doesn’t have to. While Biden talks about Ukraine getting money, it’s a loan and one not made by the United States government. Also, what he being accused of is not the dame thing. They are trying too hard to draw a parallel. The only similarity is in the idea of coercion.
Also, the compensation to Hunter Biden probably was millions only of you take the amount paid over several years and add them together.
Another thing, of course, is that Biden would not have been acting alone in calling for the dismissal of that prosecutor (although he makes it almost sound that way).
Most important. though, Joe Biden probably made up the whole story.
This is what Joe Biden said in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations on Tuesday, January 23, 2018:
https://www.cfr.org/event/foreign-affairs-issue-launch-former-vice-president-joe-biden (search fr=r the first use of Donbas)
He was not in Kiev when the prosecutor lost his job. That was in March of 2016 (he was replaced in April) and the last previous visit Biden made was in December, 2015. Biden did not make 12 or 13 trips to Ukraine but only six in total according to George Kent, (who should have been asked about this) and the trip in December 2015 was number five according to press reports. And the loan guarantees were not approved until early June, 2016 after Ukraine passed a package of u.S. backed anti-corruption legislation, and they were announced at a press conference at which the outgoing U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Ross Pyatt, was present, but not Vice President Joe Biden. I think no matter how you slice it that story can’t be true. Donald Trump is not right here about this, but Joe Biden told a tall tale and I don’t know how long he is going to skate on this. Does he think until Election Day, November 3, 2020?
Now Trump has this idea of Biden boasting of firing a prosecutor who was investigating Burisma. This raises the question of why Biden would say such a thing, and indeed Donald Trump was puzzled about this on September 25, the day he released the call record of the July 25, call:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-president-zelensky-ukraine-bilateral-meeting-new-york-ny
Quite puzzling, isn’t it? Because President Trump has an important fact wrong here! There’s no reason to believe that the prosecutor was going to do anything. There are ways to claim this is linked to corruption, but not that way.
Sammy Finkelman (7d0f6e) — 12/17/2019 @ 9:36 pmKishnevi (b58549) — 12/17/2019 @ 5:20 pm
Schumer wants witnesses who might know about the reason for the hold on the aid. We know just about everything about the phone call.
I don’t think Trump can get his witnesses (who are either people through whom he thinks he might prove that his call to Ukraine to do investigations was justified or who might prove Adam Schiff coached witnesses or engineered lies) without the senate agreeing to the Democratic witnesses as well.
(Trump’s lawyers don’t want much witnesses. They are afraid of calling a witness at a trial when they have no idea what they will say.)
Sammy Finkelman (7d0f6e) — 12/17/2019 @ 9:47 pm