It is becoming apparent that the impeachment was done with no respect for the rule of law or even the political process. On the first point, RNLA Vice President for Communications Audrey Perry Martin writes:
While an impeachment proceeding is not a court of law, these fundamental concepts of due process and fairness need to be respected for Americans to have any confidence in the integrity of the proceeding.
In their rush to impeach President Trump, House Democrats turned back the clock and embraced the non-existent due process protections of medieval courts.
Audrey continues in her excellent op-ed to make another key process point. It is not that Democrats had to have a proceeding that followed court procedures but they should have at least followed past political practices:
Democrats presented fabricated evidence and the evidence they did have has been shown to be nothing more than their anti-Trump interpretation of what we would call “hearsay” in court. Yet they presented it as proven, unquestionable fact. In both the Clinton and Nixon impeachments, facts were established by independent evidence and by eyewitnesses who gave statements to independent investigators. . . .
Disregarding our shared norms and traditional practices harms our country and tears us farther apart. If Americans cannot trust the process, they surely cannot trust that the Democrats’ desired outcome — the removal of President Trump — is right.
But Speaker Pelosi has not stopped her unfair process efforts. She wants the “jury”--the U.S. Senate--to somehow continue the Democrats' impeachment process or she won’t formally send them the articles of impeachment. Keep in mind that she could have gone slower and done more work. She could have afforded President Trump “due process.” Instead she forced the House to vote on a rushed, flawed product. As Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell stated on the Senate Floor:
‘And it was made even more clear last night, when Speaker Pelosi suggested that House Democrats may be too afraid to even transmit their work product to the Senate.
‘The prosecutors are getting cold feet in front of the entire country and second-guessing whether they even want to go to trial.
‘They said impeachment was so urgent that it could not even wait for due process but now they’re content to sit on their hands. It is comical.
This would be comical if it was not so troubling for the future of the country:
‘Let me say that again: If the Senate blesses this historically low bar, we will invite the impeachment of every future president.
House Democrats want to create new rules for this president because they feel uniquely enraged. But long after the partisan fever of this moment has broken, the institutional damage will remain.
Please read Audrey’s full op-ed here. RNLA also had a members-only conference call with Joe Biden supporter and Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz today. Members who missed the call can request a recorded copy.