In the fall of 2007, Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, filed articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney. This was not too surprising — the Democratic Left had been floating the idea for some time, and Kucinich would later file articles against President Bush himself about seven months later. Moreover, Republicans had just impeached President Bill Clinton within recent memory, and the wounds were still open from that experience.
What was unique about Kucinich’s impeachment motion, however, was the House Republican minority’s way of handling it. On Nov. 6, 2007, they were expected to help table (i.e., kill) the impeachment motion in an overwhelming bipartisan vote. Democratic House leaders called the vote, and things started as expected. Then, the Republicans sprang the trap:
At one point there were 290 votes to table. After the turnaround, the final vote was 251-162 against tabling, with 165 Republicans voting against it.
It was brilliant. Thirty-one Democrats (by my count) had to change their votes — nine from “nay” to “yea” and 22 the opposite way, based on whichever posture felt they needed to take in public ahead of the next election. They were all exposed as impeachment posers. Even better, one of the posers was Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, who filed today’s impeachment articles against President Trump. Green initially voted “yea” to table the impeachment of Cheney, in line with the desires of House leadership. He changed his vote to “nay” (in favor of debating impeachment) when it became clear the “nays” were going to win no matter how he voted.
The final vote was overwhelmingly against tabling the impeachment motion, meaning the House still had to deal with it. This left House Democrats feeling like the dog that had caught the car.
Lucky for Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her flock, none of this was enough to save the Republican Party at that point. Bush and Republicans were hugely unpopular and no minor parliamentary victory was going to fix it. The Iraq War was a hopeless disaster, and an already clearly sick economy was about to slip into an official recession less than a month after the vote was taken.
Democrats got out of their parliamentary predicament that day without debating impeachment. They simply voted to refer Kucinich’s impeachment articles to committee, which in the U.S. House is usually as good as tabling anyway.
I would argue that things are different in 2019, and this same tactic could bear some fruit. We have peace and a booming economy, and today’s articles of impeachment are, frankly, risible compared to those filed against Cheney and Bush in 2007 and 2008. (Yeah, I know he’s embarrassing, but really? You’re going to impeach Trump for being an internet troll?)
if Republicans want to win the House back, they should do what they can to force Green’s impeachment articles to a floor vote. Republicans should think back to 2007 and let the Democrats take their own medicine.
The biggest difference this time might be that the woke Left is going to see right through any vote to refer the impeachment articles to committee. That means swing-seat Democrats will have their backs against the wall. Anyone who has voiced support for impeachment at this point had better be ready to vote for it.
What began as a well-intentioned effort to embarrass a president could become even more embarrassing to the Democrats than their sudden abandonment of the Green New Deal when it came up for a vote in the Senate.
