Progressives plot 11th-hour Trump impeachment over Georgia call
05 January 2021
President Trump may have little more than two weeks left in office, but House Democrats are talking about impeaching him — again.
Why it matters: The party is split over how to respond to his phone call asking the Georgia secretary of state to change his state’s vote totals. Progressives including Ilhan Omar are talking another impeachment, while others such as Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) favor a lesser move like censure. The ticking clock factors into both approaches.
Driving the news: Omar (D-Minn.) said Monday night she wants to impeach the president because he and his allies have become “more emboldened” by not being held accountable.
- “The Constitution does not make exceptions for the amount of time the president has left in office, or the popular support they have,” Omar wrote in a statement. “And we cannot either.”
- Fellow progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) told reporters today: “If it was up to me, there would be articles on the floor quite quickly.”
Johnson plans on Tuesday to introduce a resolution censuring the president, saying the call is “a violation of state and federal law.”
- Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) told Axios it was “borderline criminal,” but there’s not enough time for an impeachment hearing. “We’re not happy, but we’ll leave it to other officials,” he said.
- Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) said “any other president” would be impeached but, “we’ve got the virus and public health to take care of.”
The bottom line: Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), head of the House Democratic Caucus, said: “We’re not looking backward; we’re looking forward.”
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.