When it’s all over, when the Senate has acquitted former President Donald Trump of the impeachment charge against him, how will Democrats console themselves?
What will they have gained? What will Americans have gained? How will Democrats justify spending time on such an exercise in futility when so many of their fellow citizens are struggling in the midst of a global pandemic? What new pound of flesh will they believe they have extracted from the 45th president? What sort of unity do they imagine will come from what they’ve done?
We have been clear on our thoughts about Trump’s Jan. 6 speech to thousands of people who came to Washington to protest what they believed – and what the former president claimed – was a stolen election. It was inflammatory and unnecessary.
However, we don’t believe that the then-president expected one person, much less hundreds, would attempt to break through barricades surrounding the Capitol and interrupt the joint session of Congress that was underway or about to be underway as he spoke.
After four years of Trumpspeak, everyone in Washington, D.C., and everyone who supported him should have recognized the hyperbole he used in his speech that day.