Michigan Congressman and former Republican Justin Amash said that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosishould have kept her mouth shut about impeaching President Donald Trump if she wasn’t prepared to begin the process.
On Sunday morning;s edition of CNN’s State of the Union with Jake Tapper, host and anchor Jake Tapper asked Amash if Pelosi is bungling the impeachment issue.
“You said there’s no point in formally bringing articles of impeachment right now because Speaker Pelosi doesn’t support it,” Tapper said, and asked “Is she making a mistake, do you think that the Democrats should be starting impeachment proceedings based on the Mueller report, what’s in there about potential obstruction of justice, which is the case you laid out?”
“Yeah, from a principled moral position, she is making a mistake,” Amash said, adding “From a strategic position, she is making a mistake.”
“If she believes, as I do, that there’s impeachable conduct in there, then she should say so, she should tell the American people we’re going to move forward with impeachment hearings and potentially articles of impeachment,” Amash continued. “When she says things like oh, I think that we need to have the strongest case before we go forward, which is telling the American people is she doesn’t think there’s a strong case.”
“If she doesn’t think that, then she shouldn’t have opened her mouth in the first place and say she thinks there’s impeachable conduct,” Amash said. “I do believe it’s a strong case, I believe she believes there’s a strong case, and if so she should move forward, and make sure that the American people understand what’s going on.”
Amash said that ordinary Americans don’t have time to read the entire Mueller report, and that “They want Speaker Pelosi to do the work, they want other members to do the work, and if she doesn’t want to go forward then we’re going to have a big problem.”
Pelosi has waged a campaign of strategic patience with regard to impeachment, but as Amash’s comments indicate, that patience wore thin long ago with many members who favor the measure.
*story by Mediate