A former Republican senator who voted to convict President Bill Clinton of wrongdoing said that President Trump had committed impeachable offenses.
Slade Gorton, who represented Washington state, told the Seattle Times this week that Trump’s actions merit impeachment.
“I reached the conclusion that there are a dozen actions on this president’s part that warrant a vote of impeachment in the House,” the 91-year-old said.
Gorton highlighted allegations that President Trump unduly pressured and used military aid to leverage Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to launch investigations that would be politically expedient for him and his chances of reelection. The requests for investigations included an inquiry into Trump’s 2020 political rival Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.
Acting Ambassador to Ukraine William Taylor testified this month in a closed congressional hearing that he was told that “everything,” including the military aid, hinged on Zelensky launching inquiries into alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 election and Burisma Holdings, an energy company that employed Hunter Biden in a cushy role as a member of its board.
“That poor president of the Ukraine,” Gorton said. “Trying to keep an independent country … and the president of the United States is holding up his money and his reputation and everything else. Of course, that was not an even negotiation by any stretch of the imagination. It was a pure shakedown.”
Gorton lost office in 2000 when he was beaten by Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell by less than 3,000 votes, making him the last Republican to serve as a senator from Washington. He previously was in office from 1981 to 1987 and then from 1989 to 2001.
Gorton said that despite his view that Trump committed impeachable acts, he was wary about whether the Senate should remove the president from office.
“Whether or not they (the impeachment charges) warrant conviction in the Senate is a different and more subjective question because you have to ask that question: How important is it? Is it enough to overturn the verdict of the voters in 2016?” Gorton said.
During President Bill Clinton’s 1998 impeachment trial, Gorton voted to convict Clinton on a charge of obstructing justice but acquit him on a count of perjury to a grand jury.
“I said perjury, lying about sex — he did it, of course — was not sufficient to overturn the verdict of the voters, but obstruction of justice was. I’m not entirely sure I was right on the second count,” Gorton explained.
He also pointed out that it will be difficult for the Senate to get behind convicting Trump without public support. Americans are split on support for impeachment, with a number of polls showing that support rests largely along partisan lines.
Gorton also said that in order for Democrats to succeed in removing Trump, they would need to make the process more open to Republicans. Republican lawmakers have repeatedly decried Democrats’ impeachment effort as being too secretive and have demanded more transparency in the process.
“If the Democrats want Trump gone, the only way they’ll get there is by persuading Republicans to vote with them. And the only way they’ll do that is first by involving them in the process, and having a process public enough so that public opinion gets up in the 60% range,” Gorton said.
“When public opinion hits 60 or 65% for him to be gone, there will be Republican votes for it, and there will be enough to convict him,” he added.
The Democrat-led House is poised to vote Thursday on formally “affirming” the impeachment process in a vote that will largely be along partisan lines.
