Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Democrats were not ready to impeach President Trump even as he said a lot of the president’s behavior met the Constitutional bar of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”
“But in terms of the impeachment process, it’s not mandated by the Constitution. We can avail ourselves of this when the president demonstrates acts that are high crimes or misdemeanors,” the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”
“I think that much of his conduct qualifies for that. But at the same time, we have to recognize that the reality that one party, the Republican party, has turned itself into a cult of the president’s personality and is not likely to act consistent with its constitutional obligations. And, we have to figure out in that context, is this the right thing for the country? I’m just not convinced, not yet, that that’s the case,” Schiff said.
Schiff appeared Saturday in San Francisco at the California Democratic Convention where he advocated voting Trump out of office on Election Day instead of opening an impeachment process.
“But let us not lose sight as we debate the merits of impeachment that, unless the GOP leadership in the Senate finds a backbone it shows no sign of possessing, there is going to be only one way to end this nightmare and to send Mr. Trump packing, and that is to vote the bums out of office — all of them, including the one at 1600 Pennsylvania,” Schiff said.
Schiff’s position is in line with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who was greeted with chants of “impeach” at the California convention. Pelosi has resisted calls to impeach Trump, calling the process a “path.” Less than a quarter of the House Democratic Caucus has come out in support of impeaching the president.
