Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, is carving out a niche for himself in the Democratic Party by indulging in the base’s most absurd pro-impeachment fantasies. He even introduced articles of impeachment against President Trump in December. They failed.
On Thursday, just hours after House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., once again tried to tamp down such talk, Green told the celebrity news group TMZ that he thinks Trump should be impeached now because of “perfidy” and “insidious behavior.”
The reporter asked him if Democrats would move to impeach the president should they win the House in the upcoming midterm elections.
Green responded, saying, “what I actually said is there’s a likelihood that there would be impeachment articles filed.”
He added [emphases added], “And this president has committed impeachable offenses. I take great offense at the notion that he can have perfidy perpetrated, that he can engage in invidious discrimination, and I think we ought to be on the record showing that we disapprove of it.”
The TMZ reporter (correctly) noted that the impeachment talk actually works in the GOP’s favor, as they’re using such rhetoric to rally voters around the president and his current and would-be allies in Congress.
“It’s not about Republicans, it’s about the republic and whether or not we’re going to maintain a republic or we’re going to have a president who disregards most of the rules and who seems to think he’s above the law,” the Texas congressman said. “He’s not. Nobody is above the law, not even the president.”
Green continued, arguing that he doesn’t see why he should hold off with filing articles of impeachment until after special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation has concluded. The way he sees it, Trump should be impeached now for his “perfidy” and “insidious behavior.”
“All of this bigotry that he’s enshrined in policy is what this is all about. If he makes another racial slur, he knows I’m waiting for him,” Green said.
Sure you will, congressman. Sure you will.
What’s more likely is that Rep. Pelosi, who sure sounds like she has had it up to here with the impeachment talk, is going to be waiting for Green at some point to have some very choice words with him.
Then again, maybe not. After all, Green is the same congressman who openly criticized Pelosi for her attempts to downplay the impeachment fantasies.
“President Donald Trump can be impeached, and should be impeached, for his hateful, hurtful and bigoted policies,” Green said earlier this month during a news conference in his district. “Trivializing his bigotry also allows Trump supporters to hypothesize that while Trump may be an objectionable jerk, he is not an impeachable bigot, which is not true.”
So who knows? Maybe this impeachment business, coupled with Pelosi’s efforts to refocus her team amid their amazing decline in generic ballots ahead of the midterms, spills out into all-out intra-party fighting.
For once, it’ll be a friendly fire story not involving Republicans.
