In this impeachment, the House has decided to go forward on the narrowest articles with the thinnest record of a presidential impeachment in history. However, many senators may be legitimately leery of buying what the White House is selling with its categorical approach. There is a vast array of harmful and corrupt acts that a president can commit outside of the criminal code.

While I believe that articles of impeachment are ideally based on well-defined criminal conduct, I do not believe that the criminal code is the effective limit or scope of possible impeachable offenses. If some of the president’s critics are adopting a far too broad understanding of impeachable offenses, the White House is adopting a far too narrow one…

The developing defense by the White House is also a mistake. It would again “expand the space for executive conduct” by reducing the definition of impeachable conduct to the criminal code. It is an argument that is as politically unwise as it is constitutionally shortsighted. There are a number of Democrats who might be willing to vote for acquittal, particularly on the highly flawed abuse of Congress article. Yet, the narrow White House definition of what is impeachable could well push them back into the Democratic fold while further pulling away a couple of moderate Republican senators.