There are observers, including critics of President Donald Trump, who are skeptical of the push for impeachment. Not because he hasn’t earned the contempt and sanction of Congress, but because the politics are too risky. Will the public support an impeachment investigation in an election year, or will it turn away in disgust over “dysfunction” in Washington? Does Trump, who thrives on attention and chaos, want impeachment? Does he want his opponents to devote their time and energy to something that can only divide and polarize the public?
Before tackling those questions, let’s look at what has happened since House Democrats committed to an impeachment inquiry.
In a frantic attempt to avoid it, Trump released a reconstruction of his conversation with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. But instead of vindicating his claim to innocence, the transcript revealed an explicit attempt to coerce the Ukrainian government to meddle in the 2020 election by investigating Joe Biden, the former vice president and current Democratic front-runner.
The result was an even louder call for impeachment, which was itself amplified by the public release of an official whistleblower complaint describing in greater detail impeachable offenses by the president, with help from his personal lawyer and the attorney general. “In the course of my official duties,” the complaint reads, “I have received information from multiple U.S. Government officials that the President of the United States is using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 U.S. election.”
The president’s staunchest allies have tried to defend him. “As to the whistleblower complaint — the transcript speaks for itself — no quid pro quo,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina on Twitter. “The Democrats bought a pig in a poke.”
“Once again, the Democrats, their media mouthpieces and a cabal of leakers are ginning up a fake story, with no regard to the monumental damage they’re causing to our public institutions and to trust in government,” Rep. Devin Nunes of California said during a House Intelligence Committee hearing on Thursday.
But other Republicans have taken a “wait and see” approach. Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah pronounced himself “deeply troubled” by the revelations. Likewise, Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska pointed out that “Republicans ought not to be rushing to circle the wagons to say there’s no there there when there’s obviously lots that’s very troubling there.”
Public opinion has also moved away from the president. For months, impeachment opposition polled above support.
Now, the trend is heading the other way. According to a recent NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist Poll, registered voters support a formal impeachment inquiry, 49% to 48%. Politico/Morning Consult shows a tie, 43% to 43%. But that represents a major swing: just a week earlier, voters opposed impeachment, 49% to 36%. And in the latest YouGov survey, 55% of Americans said they would “strongly” or “somewhat” support an impeachment inquiry if Trump pushed Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden in exchange for military aid.
This gets back to our original questions about the risks of impeachment. The idea that Trump thrives in chaos — that controversy is an asset to his presidency — just isn’t true. Despite his constant bluster, the president can’t take a punch. As soon as it was clear that the House would go after Trump for his actions regarding Ukraine, he panicked — even trying to implicate his vice president in the scandal. “I think you should ask for Vice President Pence’s conversation, because he had a couple of conversations also,” Trump said at a news conference during the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York on Wednesday.
Since then, he (along with personal lawyer and co-conspirator, Rudy Giuliani) has done little more than lash out, using Twitter to send angry messages about his political opponents. “IT WAS A PERFECT CONVERSATION WITH UKRAINE PRESIDENT!” Trump shouted in a Friday morning tweet. “The Democrats,” he added a few minutes later, “are now to be known as the DO NOTHING PARTY!” Noted.
Trump is at his weakest when he’s in this mood — erratic and angry, consumed by striking back at his political opponents. You can see this in the polling. His job approval is at its worst when he’s mired in controversy. If you are a Democrat, and if you are thinking strategically, you should see impeachment as a valuable advantage for the upcoming election, since it pushes Trump into the kind of behavior that has kept him from reaping the benefits of relative prosperity. It keeps him off balance at exactly the moment — a reelection campaign — that he needs to be steady.
Democrats should also heed the shift in public sentiment: not as a warning, but as encouragement. Given evidence of wrongdoing, voters can be moved. Further investigation may push even more Americans to back an impeachment trial in the Senate. And if that’s true, then the narrow inquiry apparently favored by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and some Democratic moderates might be the wrong idea. A broad, wide-ranging investigation — a series of methodical, Watergate-style open hearings — keeps the president’s corruption and wrongdoing in view, while putting pressure on an already struggling White House.
Few people who support impeachment believe Donald Trump will be removed from office. If, after inquiry and investigation, the House of Representatives votes to impeach the president, there’s no guarantee that the Senate will even hold a trial of the kind we’ve seen in the past. But Romney and Sasse are instructive. They are hedging their bets. They understand the simple fact that it does not help the Republican Party to defend impeachable activity by the president, and it may even undermine its ability to hold the Senate for another cycle. Democrats will have to fight hard for a Senate majority in 2021; tying the party to a lawless president might be the boost it needs to close the gap.