Donald Trump’s Impeachment Now Supported By Over Half Of House Democrats
A majority of Democrats in the House of Representatives now support impeaching Donald Trump, Buzzfeed News reports. The number has been growing since Robert Mueller’s testimony last week before the House Judiciary Committee.
California’s Pete Aguilar is the most recent House Democrat to come out in favor of impeachment, detailing in a statement Thursday evening that the time has come.
“Despite attempts in Congress to investigate the president’s actions, the administration has chosen to hinder investigations, withhold documents, and ignore congressional subpoenas. No American is above the law. After careful consideration and conversations with members of my community, I believe it is time for the House to begin proceedings to determine whether the president’s conduct meets the standards of impeachment,” he said.
Aguilar is now the 118th House Democrat to favor impeachment, meaning that over half of the 235 Democrats in the House now support impeachment. According to the House of Representatives’ website, there are 235 Democrats, 197 Republicans, one Independent, and two vacant seats in the chamber.
As reported earlier this week by The Inquisitr, the number of House Democrats who openly support impeaching Donald Trump has grown considerably since Robert Mueller’s testimony before the House Judiciary Committee. Democrats who were previously opposed to impeachment, or who were on the fence about it, but who have since been vocally supporting impeachment, include Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, Chris Pappas of New Hampshire, Danny Heck of Washington, and multiple others. All have said that it was Mueller’s testimony that changed their minds.
Inland Rep. Pete Aguilar supports Donald Trump impeachment inquiry https://t.co/mEjqkxLBKN pic.twitter.com/M86dCYU7M1
— Jeff Horseman (@JeffHorseman) August 1, 2019
Those Democrats who have come out in favor of impeachment join a handful of other House Democrats who supported impeaching Trump even before Mueller’s testimony, including one who has been attempting to have Trump impeached for over a year. Texas Democrat Al Green has read articles of impeachment on the House floor three times, and three times the vote has failed — even in the Democrat-controlled House.
The House’s Democratic leadership has been reluctant to move forward with impeachment since the party took over control of the House of Representatives following the 2018 midterm elections. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, for example, has consistently said that she believes Democrats should focus on their own agenda for the American people, rather than on impeachment. That, and she wants all of the investigations into possible impeachable offenses by Trump — there are currently several ongoing — to play out before considering moving forward with it.
Similarly, the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, New York Democrat Jerry Nadler, has said that he believes Trump deserves to be impeached. However, he doesn’t want to move forward with impeachment until all of the evidence has been compiled and presented.
