In an impressive mid-afternoon rant, Deadline White House's panelist gifts us with his insight about why the Democrats in Congress are hesitating to impeach Trump.
May 20, 2019

John Heilemann is mad as hell and he's not gonna take it anymore! And his epic rant on Deadline White House today makes clear he thinks the Congressional Democrats should be, too. If Heilemann had his way, they'd all be at their windows at the Capitol building, sticking their heads out and screaming "We're impeaching and we don't care who knows it!" And honestly, he is not the only one. For weeks (has it been months, already?) since the Mueller report came out, it has been beyond obvious Trump's behavior meets the threshold for impeachment.

There's not one Democrat that doesn't believe the president hasn't committed impeachable offenses in the mueller report. The reason the Democrats are losing, someone pointed out while I was off in an undisclosed location...Democrats basically say "Well, the president is a bad guy, the president may have broken the law, the president maybe has committed impeachable offenses but we have to get to the bottom of it, we've gotta do more investigation, maybe we should impeach, maybe later we should impeach." The president says, "No collusion, no obstruction." The president's winning the argument because he's strong and wrong. But he's strong and clear. Democrats are all over the place. I have heard a dozen, maybe MORE than a dozen Democrats say, "I believe the president has committed impeachable acts but we need to investigate it further in order to..." -- what? Guys? Y'all think the president broke the law. You all think these 700 or 900 former federal prosecutors, Democrat and Republican alike, you think he obstructed justice. Who doesn't really think that, among Democrats? If you all go home, and you sit with your families, and you go to a bar with your friends and say, "Obviously the president obstructed justice," it's time to get the impeachment ball rolling. Go and do it. Even if there's political risk, strong and wrong beats weak and right. I don't think they're wrong about this, they don't think they're wrong either. All they're doing is vacillating, and prevaricating, mollifying, and they're stalling for time because they are afraid of what will happen if they lead. They're afraid of what will happen if they just speak their truth which is they think he obstructed justice, think he broke the law. If you think that guys, it's time to go. Either that, or just stand up and go, "We're too weak and too sad and too afraid to do this," and shut up about it. But the middle ground place they are now is not a winning position politically for them, and it's not the right place for them to be morally in terms of how history is going to judge them.

Hell, simply the fact that he is instructing his employees, and PRIVATE CITIZENS, no less, to disobey Congressional subpoenas is valid enough reason to impeach a president.

Put the damn politics aside and do the thing. Sh*t or get off the pot. Impeach or admit you're too terrified to take this schoolyard bully on, even though you have the full strength of our nation's Constitution behind you. So says John Heilemann.

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