Why Won't Democrats Impeach? Or The Coming Third Constitution
Donald Trump is more impeachable than any president, living or dead. In just the last few days Trump and his administration have:
Forced a major media firm to take a critic of the president off the air.
Apparently covered up a bribery case where there was video of one of the key members of his administration taking cash from the FBI in exchange for promises to hand out favors of Trump won.
Publicly castigated his attorney general for not prosecuting his political enemies.
Forcing out. US Attorney who refused to bring charges that were not warranted against a political enemy of Trump.
Ordered the illegal execution of people in a boat without providing any evidence of their alleged crimes.
And that is not even the entire list. In any other Administration, these would have been major, Administration altering scandals. In these cases, though, the press barely pays attention, and the opposition party asks for a meeting to discuss the budget. Why?
Well, the press is largely owned by supporters of the president. But even putting that aside, the press has long treated trump with different rules. He does so much so out in the open, is so brazen about his illegal or corrupt actions, and drives so much attention to news places that they largely long ago sold their souls. What is more distressing is the behavior of the Democratic leadership. They actively discourage attempts to hold Trump to account, often to the anger of their own voters. Why?
There are likely several reasons, but I think the largest is Joe Biden. Now, I am not arguing that Biden himself is doing anything wrong. But I do believe his victory in 2020 has allowed the leadership class’s worst instincts to run rampant. Biden won in 2020 in part because he promised a return to normalcy. he was going to go back to the time before Trump and that would be sufficient. With the consultant class arguing that Harris lost because she ran too outside the mainstream (which there is no evidence for, by the way. Harris likely lost due to some combination of Biden’s unpopularity, inflation, pandering too much to Republicans, and Gaza), it is easy for the Democratic leadership to think that is the route back — whether merely to power or saving the country. It helps that such a focus on purely bread and butter issues is where they are most comfortable. Do what you want to do anyway is a powerful message.
Unfortunately, in this case, it is completely wrong.
The country cannot go back to the way things were. Trump has altered the Presidency in ways that will remain an unexploded bomb unless they are corrected. Congress has essentially lost most of its power — admittedly, this is the result of a bipartisan process spanning the last forty years or so, but it has accelerated under this Congress. The Supreme Court has devolved into a super legislature, substituting its own policy preferences for the plain language if the document itself or using the shadow docket to allow Trump to get away with items that are clearly illegal under existing laws and precedents. Even if Trump’s own unpopularity sweeps Democrats back into control in 2026 and 2028, there is little reason to think that another president won’t simply pick up these tools and use them. And a more competent authoritarian could end the republic with these tools.
Impeachment is obviously not going to be successful. But it has the virtue of building a case not just against Trump but against the tools that Trump is using. By forcefully and consistently calling out Trump’s actions, the case against allowing those actions to be used by any president becomes stronger, more centered in the public’s eyes. Because the next regime is going to have to ensure that said tools are ripped out root and branch if we want our democracy to survive.
Democrats are going to have reform the country. They are going to have to add states, outlaw gerrymandering, enforce proportional representation, put in more protections for civil servants, radically alter the Supreme Court so that it becomes one branch again, not the superior branch, and assert Congress’s rightful place in the democratic order. After the Civil War, the Reconstruction amendments re-shaped the Constitution. It was a necessary corrective to the revealed flaws of the existing Constitution. It should have been followed by a strident enforcement of the new rules. That the Confederacy was allowed to win the peace through terrorism and other political violence has done lasting harm to the country. The Democrats have to ensure a similar little-d democratic renewal.
It will not be easy, of course. Too much of our leadership is too married to the idea that this is still Reagan’s country, or the idea that only Republican votes matter, or that the guardrails can still hold. It is not, they are not, and they absolutely have not. If this terrible time can be said to have a silver lining it is that the weaknesses, the flaws, the failures of the current system have been exposed not by a competent authoritarian but by. collection of losers, has-beens, and never-will-bes. It makes surviving them easier and shows us in stark detail what needs to be changed.
Having to actively make said changes is an unpleasant possibility. it will require work and potential risk. It means admitting that what you believed about the country and your fellow legislators were wrong. Much easier to simply think that once the Orange Bad Man is gone that everything will go back to the way it was before. The desire to tamp down in impeachments is a form of that denial. But it is denial. The Constitution and laws have been exposed as inadequate to prevent modern authoritarianism. They must be changed with we wish government by the people to survive the next century. easy or not pleasant to not, there is work to be done. If you are unwilling to do that work, you should step aside for people who accept the reality and are not scared of the challenge.