Listening and watching the news media, you would think that there is a steady, inevitable march toward impeachment, that impeachment was a certainty, and that the only thing that might save Trump are evil Republican Senators who would thwart the will of the people.
The fact is, impeachment is far from a certainty. First, the Democrats have yet to agree — and might never agree — on what, exactly, they want to impeach Trump for. Second, there are still huge political risks for the Democratic Party in trying to impeach Trump. No Republicans have come out to support impeachment, which makes this a wholly partisan endeavor — more typical anti-Trump hysteria, many Trump supporters believe.
Whether it is or not is yet to be seen. Any Republican who wants to dismiss the Ukraine fiasco as a “joke” or a “witch hunt” better recalibrate their thinking. The Democrats are going to the mattresses on this and if the best the Republicans can do is hunker down and hide, Trump will certainly be impeached by the House of Representatives.
That is, if the Democrats can get their act together.
Divisions in the Democratic Party may prevent that. The radicals want to set up a guillotine on the National Mall and begin lopping off the heads of Republicans, beginning with Trump. Democrats like Pelosi want to manage impeachment to keep the party from looking like the bunch of wild-eyed radical extremists that they are.
Then there are a few Democrats who have weighed the political risks and don’t think the gamble is worth it.
Democratic presidential hopeful Tulsi Gabbard on Wednesday said the release of a transcript of a July call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky didn’t change the calculus for her on whether Mr. Trump should be impeached.
“I’m not a lawyer, but I think most people reading through that transcript are not going to find that extremely compelling cause to throw out a president that won an election in 2016,” Ms. Gabbard said on Hill TV.
Gabbard is no friend of the president, but she recognizes the extreme danger for her party — and for the country — if Democrats try to remove a sitting president.
“And instead what I think most people will see is, hey, this is another move by Democrats to get rid of Donald Trump, further deepening the already hyperpartisan divides that we have in this country. And that’s really where I’m coming from,” she said.
Ms. Gabbard, who has said impeaching the president would be too divisive for the country, went on to call Mr. Trump “corrupt” and “unfit” to serve as president.
“I’m running for president to defeat him. I just think it’s so important for our country to be able to move forward, to bridge these divides, that it be the American people that make this decision,” she said.
There are 17 Democrats still undecided on whether to impeach the president. How many of those 217 Democrats who have come out in support of impeachment would refuse to endorse some of the potential charges against Trump is unclear. And as more information comes to light, other Democrats might have second thoughts.
Democrats and their allies in the media who are gleefully celebrating the imminent demise of Donald Trump could do with a cold dose of reality right about now.
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