The weaponization of impeachment

Quite clearly, then, impeachment has once again been politicized—one might almost say weaponized—during the past two or three decades. But the more troubling question is whether Democrats and Republicans in this hyperpartisan age are simply more willing than their predecessors to use impeachment as a political weapon, or whether they are, in fact, living in two different worlds that make their narratives so different that they genuinely can’t understand each other, at least regarding what constitutes a threat to the American system of government. In 1998, Republicans in the House impeached Clinton, knowing that they almost certainly wouldn’t get a conviction in the Senate. Why do such a thing? Was it truly a matter of principle, as they maintained, or merely a strategy to energize their base for the upcoming elections? At any rate, their stated reason was that the nation’s top law-enforcement officer, himself a lawyer, had intentionally lied under oath, and for that reason he had to go. The Democratic narrative was that this was about nothing more than a private sexual escapade—a consensual tryst—that had no effect on the public interest.

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Fast-forward to 2019. The Democrats argue that if Trump offered a quid pro quo to Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate the son of his potential 2020 presidential opponent, it represents an existential threat to the integrity of the American electoral process. They suggest further that Trump’s refusal to cooperate with their investigation may in itself be an impeachable offense, a menace to the very notion of constitutional government. The Republican position is that . . . well, who knows exactly what their position is, but it certainly differs from the Democrats’. Either no quid pro quo took place, or Trump didn’t intend one, or, if he did, that he was acting squarely within his foreign-policy prerogatives, or it’s in America’s interests to make sure that the country is not funding a corrupt regime and any personal benefit to Trump is purely incidental. “Does not the U.S. have a right to put conditions on its foreign aid and to seek guarantees that our money will not be used as graft to grifters?” Pat Buchanan recently asked in a column he wrote for Chronicles, a conservative magazine published by the Rockford Institute. The Republican administration further argues that the principle of separation of powers means that the president need not cooperate with a coequal branch in its attempts to remove him.

The point is that these radically differing narratives seem to be about more than just politics. They seem to reflect the new reality of two Americas, so far apart from one another in worldview that they can’t even understand each other. This will result in major fallout and help turn impeachment into just another disruptive and partisan weapon. It also brings to mind Abraham Lincoln’s dire warning about a house divided.

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