The Democratic establishment may want to believe that impeaching President Donald Trump is a niche issue that isn’t important to voters outside of D.C., but the public is proving that view wrong at town halls across the country.
“Enough is enough. We should open an impeachment inquiry.”
—Rep. Madeleine Dean
Holding impeachment hearings over the president’s actions during the Mueller investigation—actions that could amount to obstruction—is not a priority for the House Democratic leadership. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) continued to tamp down the possibility of impeachment despite a growing push from members of her party, including a number of 2020 presidential candidates, to hold the president accountable for possible high crimes.
The recent call for impeachment from Rep. Justin Amash, a Republican from Michigan, has only added to the pressure on Democrats.
Trump, in remarks to reporters Thursday, said he was disgusted by even hearing the word “impeach.”
“To me, it’s a dirty word, the word impeach,” said Trump. “It’s a dirty, filthy, disgusting word.”
Conventional wisdom in Washington holds that voters in the U.S. are committed to “kitchen table issues,” shorthand for economic issues like jobs and healthcare. Conveniently, that allows Democrats uninterested in holding impeachment hearings to avoid treating the issue seriously—at least in comments to the press.
“Most polls indicate that 60 percent of the country is opposed to impeachment right now,” freshman Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) said in an interview with Meet the Press on May 24. “We should be paying attention to what most people are talking about.”
Phillips then clarified what he meant by people.
“Now by the way, there’s what cable news is talking about and then there’s what people are talking about in cul-de-sacs,” said Phillips, “and sometimes it’s a little bit different.”
The House Democratic leadership wants to change focus.
“We can’t continue to stay focused on the outrage of the day,” Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.), the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told NPR. “It is wearing people out.”
On the ground, however, things are different. Democratic lawmakers on break have been faced with a growing chorus from constituents to support impeachment, and, with audiences from upstate New York to Hawaii bringing up the topic, all indications are that impeachment is itself a kitchen table issue.
Democrats are reacting to the push from constituents in different ways, with many following the lead of Pelosi and attempting to downplay the issue.
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