Is there any doubt that many Democrats agree with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi when she says she wants to see President Trump “in prison”? After the Mueller report, House Democrats seem to believe almost unanimously that the president is guilty of obstruction of justice. Their increasingly heated internal debate is whether to impeach Trump now or press for his incarceration after they defeat him next year.

They can impeach the president on their own, of course, any time they want. But putting him in prison is a much heavier lift, requiring Democrats to first win the White House in 2020 — not at all guaranteed — and then hope the justice system would press charges against a former president, and then hope that Trump would actually be convicted of some sort of crime, and then hope he would be sentenced to prison.

That’s a lot of hoping.