House lawmakers held a vote to determine the fate of Rep. Al Green’s (D-TX) effort to impeach President Donald Trump for a third time due to his and his leftist colleagues’ vehement disagreement with the administration’s aggressive deportation agenda. The articles of impeachment were voted down, meaning the Democrats have once again failed to oust the president from the Oval Office.
Green’s resolution accused President Trump of abusing executive powers by launching an immigration crackdown that led to the deaths of two civilians earlier in the year. Those civilians, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, were both shot and killed by federal immigration authorities after they assaulted officers attempting to detain criminal illegal aliens from the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The vote was 232-147, with a total of 18 Democrats joining almost every Republican in voting to shelve the resolution, including Reps. Henry Cuellar (Texas), Jared Golden (Maine), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), Jared Moskowitz (Fla.), Kathy Castor (Fla.) and Emanuel Cleaver (Mo.). A total of 47 lawmakers decided to simply vote “present” during the call.
That number included several top Democratic leaders: Reps. Hakeem Jeffries (NY), Katherine Clark (MA) and Pete Aguilar (CA). According to a report from The Hill, Democratic leaders stated they opted to vote this way because the impeachment articles were brought to the floor without any sort of formal investigations, hearings, or examination of the charges.
“None of that serious work has been done, with the Republican majority focused solely on rubber stamping Donald Trump’s extreme agenda,” the Democratic leaders went on to say in a joint statement. However, there were several other reasons for the cautious approach. Democrats are fully convinced they have a legitimate chance at taking control of the House in the November elections.
Due to that belief, they want to keep their focus on economic issues and the high cost of living under the current administration, which is what they see as the best message to put forward for achieving their goal. While impeachment is supported by most liberals, pursuing that road would also risk distracting from the economic message.
Democrats feel that message resonates with moderate and independent voters who they feel want a check on the president, but aren’t in favor of him being removed from office. However, other Democrats are concerned that impeaching Trump would only light a fire under the president’s base and inspire more of them to turn up at the polls, making it difficult for the left to flip the House.
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Just before the vote took place, Rep. Pete Aguilar (CA), who serves as the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, put distance between party leaders and the resolution. “This is something oftentimes I think the right-wing media wants us to talk about,” Aguilar remarked. “But it’s not anything that’s top of the agenda for House Democrats.”
Green, on the other hand, is undeterred in his efforts to impeach President Trump. The Texas congressman said that Trump’s actions have left him with no choice but to continue his pursuit of impeachment. He then said that a failure to take that action would send the message to future commander-in-chiefs that Trump’s actions did not rise to the level of impeachment.
Featured Image: screenshot from embedded video