Jim Geraghty of National Review Online predicts one likely consequence of a Democratic congressional election victory this fall.
Democrats are licking their lips at their prospects in the 2026 midterms, but are a little bit reticent when it comes to discussing a third attempt to impeach President Trump and remove him from office. It’s almost silly; in just about every conversation, Democratic candidates, strategists, and talking heads will lay out how Trump is a dangerous menace who’s an aspiring dictator and breaking laws left and right. And then we’re supposed to believe that they might not make the move they’ve used twice before. …
… Democrats are quite likely to win back control of the U.S. House of Representatives and appear to have a decent shot at winning the Senate. And then, apparently some Democrats fervently believe that finally, this time, for real, they’re going to get him.
The “him,” of course, is Donald Trump, a man who has already survived two impeachments the way a cockroach survives a nuclear test, and who has almost cheerfully dared Democrats to try a third. As the president put it to Will Cain back in January, his Democratic foes will “find something,” because that’s simply what “very nasty people” with “bad policy” do. …
… For as long as there has been a President Donald Trump, there have been Democrats who have wanted to impeach him. I mean this literally: back on January 20, 2017 — Trump’s first day in office, in his first term — two progressive groups, Free Speech for People and RootsAction, launched a campaign calling for Trump’s impeachment. As you likely recall, Trump was impeached twice and acquitted by the Senate twice; more on that in a moment. …
… Removing Trump from office would require 67 Senate votes to convict, a threshold so far beyond partisan reach that it makes the filibuster look like a speed bump.
Trump’s second impeachment trial in 2021 produced the most bipartisan conviction vote in history, and it still only got 57 votes, ten short, with seven Republicans breaking ranks after the January 6 Capitol Hill riot.
