Your bag is empty.
The moment long feared and often spoken of has finally arrived.
President Donald Trump said this week he does not answer to Congress or the Courts.
We are now in a Constitutional crisis.
Trump declared he is the sole authority to decide what is legal and what is not. He has set himself above the Constitution by stating that he will not cooperate with a legal impeachment inquiry concerning actions he confessed to, actions he took on national television in front of myself and other reporters and actions he continues to defend.
Donald Trump should not only be impeached and removed from office, but everyone who defies subpoenas from Congress should be slapped in irons, carted off and forced to testify.
I do not say this lightly; I say it as someone who went to jail to protect the freedom and liberty Trump and his compatriots so easily ignore and would just as easily destroy.
Joe Lockhart, press secretary to Bill Clinton during the Clinton impeachment, told me on my podcast that Trump is handling the impeachment inquiry wrong. Lockhart fears the nation cannot survive four more years of Donald Trump. “Our democracy is more tenuous than we knew,” he said.
John Adams, one of our most irascible Founding Fathers, in 1775 wrote to his wife, “Liberty once lost is lost forever.”
While I do not concur in such finality, I do believe that once liberty is lost it cannot be regained easily or without the risk of spilling blood.
Adams also warned that “democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” Each week in the Trump administration brings fresh scandal, deviltry and distaste for the law—along with a renewed sense our own democracy is at risk of suicide. This week, he upped the ante.
The president of the United States invited a foreign power to investigate a political rival. He admitted it. He reiterated it. He defended it. He bathed in it.
Trump started out the week under an impeachment inquiry and then shocked the world (and pissed off much of the GOP) by announcing the United States would abandon the Kurds in Syria and allow Turkey to take action against them. He sentenced the Kurds to death in a tweet. His critics said he did so to take the heat off the impeachment inquiry, which continues to gain support in the House and the Senate.
Wednesday night, after Turkey began bombing Syria and killing the Kurds, Trump brushed off the blood on his hands, saying in effect, “The Kurds? Who are the Kurds?”
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi began the impeachment inquiry two weeks ago, after an anonymous whistleblower came forth to complain about a telephone call between Trump and Ukranian president Volodymyr Zelensky. The whistleblower claimed the President of the United States tried to leverage a foreign country so he could dig dirt on Joe Biden, the current Democratic frontrunner for president. Last week Trump cast doubt on the whistleblower’s claims, but then released a memo of the conversation that backs up what the whistleblower said.
Then Trump stood on the South Lawn last week in one of his episodes of “Chopper Talk” and, while not more than five feet from me, defended his actions as a “perfect phone call” while admitting he’d asked for the help. He then doubled his bet by inviting China—on national television and in front of dozens of reporters—to investigate Biden as well. He ignored my question about inviting Russia to the investigation, but at that point any other foreign intervention was moot.
The president of the United States invited a foreign power to investigate a political rival. He admitted it. He reiterated it. He defended it. He bathed in it.
He placed himself above the Constitution and above every other citizen in doing so. Further, he directed those who work for him to ignore subpoenas from Congress and refused to assist in any investigation of his office. On Tuesday the administration wrote a letter to Nancy Pelosi and the House of Representatives outlining his reasons for not cooperating with the inquiry. The letter claims Congress lacks “any legitimate constitutional foundation” for the inquiry and is violating his civil liberties and the separation of powers, “threatening Executive Branch officials with punishment simply for exercising their constitutional rights and prerogatives.”
If we let Trump avoid the process, should we not then free all prisoners who play the victim despite the evidence against them?
Congressional action is outlined in the Constitution. Congress is the governmental body that checks the executive branch. Congress isn’t violating the separation of powers; congressional action is part of what ensures the separation of powers. These are the checks and balances John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and a host of others we respect set up in order to make sure the executive branch does not exceed its authority.
It is up to the legislature to determine if Donald Trump and others he employs were simply exercising their constitutional rights or—as many believe is shown by Trump’s actions—an abuse of those rights.
Prudence would dictate we do not pronounce Trump guilty before he is investigated, but he must be investigated and he must sit still for it. Were he anyone else, this would not be in contention. You or I could not avoid an investigation merely because we say the investigators appointed by law or elected by the voters had ulterior motives in doing so. We would have our day in court to defend ourselves and force the state to prove its case against us.
We are all innocent until proven guilty, as is the president. His stature as our chief executive does not allow him to avoid prosecution because he doesn’t like it or doesn’t agree with it. We are a nation of laws, as our founding fathers envisioned, set up to guarantee the liberty of all people, but all must be accountable.
As Alexander Hamilton explained, impeachment is “a method of national inquest into the conduct of public men” who are accused of violating the public trust. The House indicts, the senate conducts the trial and the chief justice of the supreme court oversees the matter. Donald Trump’s party owns the senate. He has a conservative Supreme Court that would likely side with him. What exactly does he fear in an investigation? Why does he continue to stonewall efforts to obtain information about him? Why does he continue to defend actions he took in public before reporters, cameras and the nation?
The truth is Donald Trump does not care about the wheels of justice. He does not care about anything or anyone but himself. Those he cajoles into following his every whim do so under the delusion that a victory for their side is all that matters. Or they do so because they have skin in the game. Or they do so because they truly believe in Trump’s cause.
The Constitution says a president can be indicted for “high crimes and misdemeanors,” but since 1789 Congress has argued whether that means only indictable offenses, such as treason and bribery, or includes acts that are merely misconduct. No less than former president Gerald Ford declared, “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”
This brings us back to the tipping point. Donald Trump has declared himself innocent without going through the process because he doesn’t believe he has to follow the process. He has declared himself above the law. He has declared he has the rights of despots and brazenly attacks our guiding principles while pretending to adhere to them.
How many convicted people in prison have begun their argument when confronted by loudly proclaiming their innocence? If we let Trump avoid the process, should we not then free all prisoners who play the victim despite the evidence against them? Should we not turn a citizen loose who claims the state had no authority to arrest them? If the president can claim he does not have to submit to due process, then why should any of us? Trump makes the case for anarchy, not democracy.
Whether we call our representatives and urge them to proceed judiciously or we are those representatives, we must act.
This is our moment. Whether we call our representatives and urge them to proceed judiciously or we are those representatives, we must act. Generations of men and women yet unborn will look back at this period and wonder why we did as we did. They will dissect each move. They will pore over the details. I hope they will find we made cogent and logical decisions, not rash and emotional ones. “Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak,” Adams warned, “and that it is doing God’s service when it is violating all his laws.”
Today our president violates those laws and the spirit behind them. He is a vain man who cares little for facts, throws anyone under the bus who opposes him, tries to silence critics and make deals with our enemies—usually as long as there’s a hotel in it for him. Adams once again: “The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.”
That is why Trump must be investigated. That is why any refusal to do so from this man must be greeted with removal from office—which will not be pretty.
Why do we face this dilemma?
Perhaps the best way to understand Donald Trump isn’t through the words of John Adams, but through another John: John Lennon, who would have turned 79 yesterday.
You can live a lie until you die
One thing you can’t hide
is when you’re crippled inside.
Happy Birthday John.