In this fraught and volatile insurrectionist interregnum, I’ve heard some false choices being built into discussions of whether the president should be impeached, and, a much longer shot, tried and convicted in the Senate. It seems there is almost universal agreement that even if the House impeaches the president (which as of this evening seem imminent), there won’t be enough time to hold a Senate trial — even impeachment supporters are acknowledging this basic fact.
But to then argue that impeachment is pointless and possibly counter-productive for Democrats sets aside the urgency of this moment, and views the remaining days of Trump’s presidency as if matters will remain more or less static, with the coup attempt is over and done with. This is wrong-headed. Democrats are leading an impeachment charge first and foremost because the president presents an immediate threat to the country; the supreme goal so long as Trump stays in office is to deter him from further attacks on the American government. Impeachment at this point is only about punishment insofar as punishment serves to deter the president from getting more people killed. Even if impeachment does not result in removal within his remaining days in office, as the Democratic leadership itself admits, it is obviously a very symbolically potent Congressional weapon that signals to the president, his party, and the public that Donald Trump’s behavior requires removal from office, that the eyes of the nation are upon him, and that the nation will not stand for further attacks. It also sends a message to the armed insurrectionists that the American people are coming for their leader, and that we don’t fear the rage this might provoke.
A brief but important side note: It’s crucial to remember that we are only having a discussion about impeachment and its purported ineffetiveness because sufficiently large numbers of Republicans in the House and Senate have stared into the void of a murderous, deranged president willing to commit violence to stay in office, and yawned. If the GOP had instead done its duty, congressional Republicans could very likely have persuaded Trump’s cabinet to remove him from office via the 25th amendment. Instead, congressional Republicans chose to stand down. Many have now chosen to slur Democratic impeachment efforts as somehow the true destabilizer of the next several days, when if fact its the Republicans’ dereliction of duty that leaves Democrats with no better options. The GOP itself took the best (i.e., quickest) option off the table.
It also seems many people are mistakenly behaving as if a Democratic decision to impeach right now somehow commits them to a Senate trial that will derail the opening weeks of the Biden presidency, in the midst of already-existing public health and economic emergencies. The reality is that, if Trump leaves office without inciting further attacks on America, the Democrats are hardly trapped into continuing with the impeachment effort, which is being driven first and foremost right now by the need to stop Trump right now. After his presidency ends, it will still be important to act against him, both as punishment and to deter similar behavior by future presidents. But at that point, if it makes more sense to do so by means other than conviction in an impeachment trial, then so be it. Nothing is set in stone. For instance, some have pointed out that if the goal is to stop Trump from running for future office, passing a law based on his insurrectionist activities would do as well as an impeachment conviction. And given the choices of a criminal prosecution that delivers Trump some serious jail time and a symbolic conviction that leaves him free, I don’t think I’m alone in preferring the former (it would also be galling if overemphasis on an impeachment trial undermined accountability for the president via the legal system).
Contentions that impeaching Trump will undermine the early Biden administration are also overly rooted in the unstated assumption that as time passes, the collective horror over the Capitol assault will diminish. The opposite is far more likely; it’s much more probable that in the coming days and weeks, we will learn far more horrifying details of the president’s culpability (and coordination with other malevolent actors) that will sharpen mass outrage about January 6. It is also quite likely that by the time he leaves office, we will have witnessed more violence or attempted violence on the part of Trump-supporting insurrectionists. Such information and actions will stoke the fires for punishment. To reiterate: once Trump leaves office, the Democrats and others will be free to focus on his proper punishment, free of existential worries about the damage he can still do as president. Indeed, true justice will require a much fuller accounting of the extent of his coup plot, which will hardly be complete even with the various revelations likely to arrive during the next week.