Trump impeachment: The issue Democrats can’t quite pick up — or put down

Rep. Jasmine Crockett isn’t shy about it — she wants to impeach President Trump.

But her main rival in the Texas Democratic Senate primary, state Rep. James Talarico, isn’t so sure. Like most of his party’s leaders, he’s been keeping that particular conversation at arm’s length.

Mr. Talarico has instead zeroed in on Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem as his impeachment target — a position that’s found a lot of traction in the party since ICE agents shot civilians in Minneapolis.

The different strategies point to a bigger tension inside the Democratic Party. Some members think pushing Trump impeachment talk could blow up the party’s chances in races they really need to win. Others say that going after Mr. Trump publicly is exactly what the base needs to hear — and could actually reshape the political map in Democrats’ favor.

For now, impeachment is an academic exercise. But if Democrats capture the majority in November, it becomes a very real possibility — and, Ms. Crocket argues, a necessity.

“I think that there is more than enough to impeach Donald Trump,” she said at a debate with Mr. Talarico at the Texas AFL-CIO convention last month.

She’s got company.

Zelda Briarwood, a Democrat running in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District, told a recent candidate forum that she supports impeaching the president on “day one.”

“Right now, y’all, we are speedrunning 1930s Germany. That is the reality. If we don’t nip this in the bud right now, fascism is coming to every single person’s door. We are already seeing it in Minnesota,” she said.

For Kat Abughazaleh, running in Illinois’ 9th Congressional District, Mr. Trump’s ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro without seeking congressional approval was the crucial moment.

“This man needs to be impeached, convicted and removed as soon as humanly possible,” she said in a video post.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, the New York Democrat in line for speaker if his party flips the chamber, has been trying to change the subject — steering Democrats back to kitchen-table issues, such as the cost of living, housing and health care, and rallying behind the Noem impeachment calls.

The thinking is straightforward: Even if most Democratic voters are on board with impeachment, making it a centerpiece could cost the party the competitive seats it needs to retake the House — and might sink the broader wave they’re counting on to flip the Senate, too.

Mr. Talarico has tried to thread that needle, leaving the door open to impeachment without actually walking through it.

Republicans, Mr. Trump included, have been happy to fan the talk, figuring it makes Democrats look extreme to be talking about impeachment right now.

“The only voters who want to waste time on another fake, political impeachment are the most deranged, radical Democrats,” said Trump pollster John McLaughlin. “It’s a diversion from the Democrats’ agenda of raising taxes, increasing wasteful spending, returning to high inflation, more illegal immigration and allowing illegal immigrants to vote.”

Mr. Trump was impeached twice, once in 2019 and again in 2021, after he’d left office. He walked away with Senate acquittals both times.

Few of the Republicans who backed those impeachments are still in Congress, and the ones that are, such as Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, still suffer some blowback from MAGA voters.

It’s unlikely that a new impeachment effort would fare any better than the earlier ones.

Polling has shown a vast majority of Democrats, and in some cases a majority of independents, support impeaching Mr. Trump.

Rep. Al Green, a Texas Democrat who pushed impeachment in the first Trump term, forced a vote on the matter again last year.

Some 140 House Democrats — including Ms. Crockett and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — backed him.

But 23 others — many of them in swing districts — sided with Republicans to kill the effort. Another 47, including Mr. Jeffries, refused to take a stand, voting “present.”

In the meantime, Ms. Noem has become the Democrats’ preferred impeachment target, with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. getting a distant honorable mention.

So far, 187 Democrats have signed onto Illinois Rep. Robin Kelly’s push to impeach Ms. Noem over obstruction of Congress, violations of public trust, and self-dealing.

Ms. Kelly, for her part, is running to replace retiring Sen. Richard J. Durbin, and several co-sponsors are in competitive races of their own.

Rep. Haley Stevens, who is running for the Senate in Michigan, has found a single co-sponsor for her resolution calling for impeachment against Mr. Kennedy.

That co-sponsor is Rep. Eric Swalwell, who is running for governor of California.