Mod: Is there a "two strikes" provision in the Constitution? If not, I think we have a really good opportunity to set a new Guinness World Record for impeachment. Certainly we've got the bigly best right candidate for the job.
Can Trump be impeached again? (
The Washington Postlink): Throughout this impeachment process, I’ve been fielding questions through my newsletter,
The 5-Minute Fix. And many readers had such smart questions for what happens now that it’s over. So let’s round up one last batch of them.
Question: Is the “Double Jeopardy clause” in the Constitution applicable to impeachment — meaning he can’t be impeached again?By far, the most common question I’ve gotten over the past few days is some variation of this one. So what are the
House’s options if, following impeachment, it determines
Trump has done something else that warrants impeachment?
“There is nothing in the
Constitution prohibiting another impeachment trial of
Donald Trump,” said
Sarah Burns, an impeachment expert at the
Rochester Institute of Technology, in an email to me. “They could even retry him for these charges if they so choose. For example, if
John Bolton (
Trump’s former national security adviser) or anyone else can prove that there was a threat to national security, the
House could reopen the case.”
But there is a difference between being able to do something and wanting to do something. I have a very hard time seeing how
Democrats take up impeachment again. The political cost of being seen as relentlessly trying to get the president out of office, especially as the election ticks closer, is just too high.
Democrats are aware that they won the majority of the
House of Representatives last year not by banging on
Trump but by talking about health care. Remember, the races that made the difference for them happened in districts that
Trump also won in.
Finally, impeachment is different from investigations. There is some push from folks like
House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold E. Nadler (D-N.Y.) to keep the
Ukraine investigations going by subpoenaing
Bolton to hear what he knows about
Trump and
Ukraine. “When you have a lawless president, you have to bring that to the fore. You have to spotlight that,”
Nadler told reporters.
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