Pelosi ‘Not Worried’ About Alienating Trump Supporters With Impeachment – Dropping Trial Is ‘Not How You Unify’

Posted on January 22, 2021 by LifeZette

During her weekly press conference on Thursday, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) spoke out to say that she is “not worried” about alienating those who supported Donald Trump by moving forward with his impeachment trial, saying that dropping it would not be “how you unify.”

Pelosi Discusses Impeachment

Pelosi said this after she was asked by a reporter if a Trump impeachment trial would “undercut” President Joe Biden’s call for unity that he made at his inauguration speech the day before.

“No, I’m not worried about that,” Pelosi said. “The fact is the president of the United States committed an act of incitement of insurrection. I don’t think it’s very unifying to say, ‘Oh, let’s just forget it and move on.’”

The House impeached Trump for a second time last week for “incitement of insurrection” in last week’s Capitol riot. Pelosi is set to send the article of impeachment to the Senate for a trial, and she claims that dropping it would be the opposite of unifying.

“That’s not how you unify. Joe Biden said it beautifully. If we’re going to unite, you must remember that we must, we must bring this— look, that’s our responsibility to uphold the integrity of the Congress of the United States,” Pelosi said. “That’s our responsibility, to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. And that is what we will do.”

“Just because he’s now gone — thank God — you don’t say to a president, ‘Do whatever you want in the last months of your administration. You’re gonna get a get-out-of-jail card free,’ because people think we should make nice-nice and forget that people died here on January 6, that the attempt to undermine our election, to undermine our democracy, to dishonor our Constitution— no, I don’t see that at all. I think that would be harmful to unity,” she added.

McCarthy Fires Back

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has said that while Trump “bears responsibility” for the Capitol riots, he does not support impeachment because he feels that it goes against a message of unity.

“I think impeachment was totally wrong. It was purely politically driven. … Now President Trump is a private citizen. Why would you spend your time on this?” McCarthy told Fox News on Thursday. “This is where I think President Joe Biden could have shown the nation he really was uniting. Let’s not do impeachment. Let’s dismiss this. Let’s unite this nation.”

This piece was written by James Samson on January 22, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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Trump Gets Bad News As Screen Actors Guild Finds ‘Probable Cause’ To Expel Him

Posted on January 21, 2021 by LifeZette

The Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), which is the actor’s union, has announced that it has found “probable cause” that Donald Trump has “violated the union’s Constitution.” The former president has been a member of the union for over thirty years.

Trump Gets Bad News From SAG-Aftra

This matter is set to be heard by the union’s Disciplinary Committee, and if found guilty, Trump will be reprimanded in some way. He could be censured, fined, suspended, or even expelled from the actor’s union, according to Deadline.

The report cites Article XIV of the union’s Constitution, which states that members could be expelled for “engaging in actions antagonistic to the interests or integrity of the union.”

The complaint against Trump is in relation to the Capitol riots earlier this month, claiming that the ex-president supported “a reckless campaign of misinformation aimed at discrediting and ultimately threatening the safety of journalists, many of whom are SAG-AFTRA members.”

Union President Speaks Out

“Donald Trump attacked the values that this union holds most sacred — democracy, truth, respect for our fellow Americans of all races and faiths, and the sanctity of the free press,” said SAG-AFTRA president Gabrielle Carteris. “There’s a straight line from his wanton disregard for the truth to the attacks on journalists perpetrated by his followers.”

The union’s national executive director David White spoke out about this situation as well.

“Our most important role as a union is the protection of our members,” he said. “The unfortunate truth is, this individual’s words and actions over the past four years have presented actual harm to our broadcast journalist members.”

“The board’s resolution addresses this effort to undermine freedom of the press and reaffirms the principles on which our democratic society rests, and which we must all work to protect and preserve,” White continued.

The union sent a letter to Trump this week to let him know about the charges that have been made against him. A vote of two-thirds of the SAG-AFTRA board is needed to expel Trump.

Given how radically liberal and hateful towards Trump Hollywood has become, it would be no surprise if the union does indeed end up expelling him.

This piece was written by James Samson on January 21, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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Senate Republicans push to let Trump off the hook for inciting Capitol attack

Posted on January 21, 2021 by Laura Clawson

Republicans want to move along and forget that whole thing where a mob of Trump supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol, threatening the lives of lawmakers and killing one police officer and wounding others. Donald Trump isn’t in office anymore, the senators who would have to vote in his impeachment trial say, so there’s nothing to talk about anymore.

We should move on from the 15 police officers hospitalized and more than 100 injured as Trump-supporting domestic terrorists beat them with fire extinguishers and American flags and fists and whatever else was available, shot bear spray at them, massed in the hundreds if not thousands to force their way through doors and beat down windows, and in one case Tasered an officer in the neck until he had a heart attack.

Rep. John Katko, the top Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee and one of the 10 House Republicans who voted for impeachment, said after classified briefings on the attack, “I was left with a profound sense that it was much worse than people realized.”

But Senate Republicans are strenuously looking for excuses not to hold Trump accountable. Sen. John Cornyn spent Thursday morning quoting former Trump impeachment lawyer Alan Dershowitz to suggest that holding Trump to account for his significant role in whipping up the mob that attacked the Capitol would be merely “seek[ing] revenge” and would “distract from President Biden’s agenda, and make it hard to heal the country.”

”What good comes from impeaching a guy in Florida?” Sen. Lindsey Graham asked. But he made clear to CNN that his concern was not about “what good” but about what’s good for the Republican Party, saying: “There's no way to be a successful Republican Party without having President Trump working with all of us and all of us working with him. That's just a fact. And I think we got a decent chance of coming back in 2022. But we can't do it without the President.”

Trump told these people to come to Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6, the day Congress met to count the electoral votes that made Joe Biden the president. “Will be wild,” he tweeted. That day, he told the crowd “we’re going to have to fight much harder,” and, “You will have an illegitimate president. That is what you will have, and we can’t let that happen.” Then, “We fight like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” And he told them he would be with them as they marched on the Capitol.

What good would come from impeaching him now that he’s a private citizen in Florida? You put a marker down that inciting violence against Congress specifically as it attempts to carry out the process of democracy is not acceptable. Do Cornyn or Graham treat a dirt-filled wound by slapping a bandage on it and pretending it’s not there? Because that’s a recipe for festering infection, just as refusing to address what happened at the Capitol, and Trump’s role in it, would worsen the already festering infection in U.S. politics.

Republicans like Cornyn and Graham, though, don’t care about what’s good for the nation. They care about what’s good for the Republican Party.

Hillary Clinton, Pelosi Push Conspiracy Theory Suggesting Trump Updated Putin About The Capitol Riots, Demand 9/11-Style Investigation

Posted on January 19, 2021 by Rusty Weiss

Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi, speaking in a podcast hosted by the former First Lady, promoted a wild theory that President Trump updated Russian President Vladimir Putin during the Capitol riots, and would like to see a 9/11-style commission investigating the events.

“I would love to see his phone records to see if he was talking to Putin the day the insurgents invaded our Capitol,” Clinton told the House Speaker.

Russian collusion conspiracies dominated President Trump’s entire term, as Democrats baselessly claimed his campaign had conspired with Putin to steal the election in 2016.

Clinton’s accusation is offered without proof and is so wild that had somebody on the right offered up such conjecture without evidence they would have been banned from social media.

Clinton would also add that President Trump had “other agendas” while in the White House, and hoped that one day it will become clear who he was “beholden to” and who “pulls his strings.”

.@SpeakerPelosi and I agree:

Congress needs to establish an investigative body like the 9/11 Commission to determine Trump’s ties to Putin so we can repair the damage to our national security and prevent a puppet from occupying the presidency ever again. pic.twitter.com/yR7LQmXm5Z

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) January 18, 2021

Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi Want 9/11-Style Commission Into Capitol Riots

Asked by Hillary Clinton whether a 9/11-style commission would be necessary to investigate the riots at the Capitol, Nancy Pelosi responded in the affirmative.

Pelosi claimed she once told Trump, “With you, Mr. President, all roads lead to Putin.”

“I don’t know what Putin has on him politically, financially or personally, but what happened last week was a gift to Putin because Putin wants to undermine democracy in our country and throughout the world,” she said.

Ironically, most of the peaceful protesters at the Capitol were there because they believed there was election fraud and that Democrats had undermined democracy.

Also worth noting – no two individuals did more to undermine the 2016 election and the will of the American people by pushing false allegations against the President than these two.

“So yes, we should have a 9/11 commission and there is strong support in the Congress to do that,” Pelosi added.

There was a special counsel with the full power of the FBI and DOJ that looked into this for years and found nothing…

This is now just harassment of a political opponent and antagonizing of his supporters.

— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) January 18, 2021

Moving Forward as a Country

Hard to believe, but Clinton actually posted a clip of the interview with Pelosi and labeled it in-part, “a conversation” about “moving forward as a country.”

Unity doesn’t quite entail harassing your political opponent with baseless claims and conspiracy theories.

Fox News contributor Byron York tweeted a clip of the podcast and added: “There was a House investigation. A Senate investigation. A special prosecutor investigation with the full powers of law enforcement. Obsessive media inquiries. None found what Hillary Clinton wanted to find. So she wants another…”

So I guess we’re all the way back to “Russia, Russia, Russia “. Seems so 2017.

— Fist Bump Frank (@FWO2011) January 18, 2021

It’s interesting, isn’t it, that Twitter chose not to add a disclaimer to Clinton’s podcast clip which clearly states a conspiracy theory backed by little to no proof.

Had Trump done this – well, we all know what happened to the President on Twitter.

Both of you belong in a psychiatric facility.

— Dan Gainor, I’m Spartacus (@dangainor) January 19, 2021

Hillary Clinton, in an op-ed last week, called the riots at the Capitol “the tragically predictable result of white-supremacist grievances fueled by President Trump” and supported calls for his impeachment.

“Removing Trump from office is essential, and I believe he should be impeached,” she wrote.

“Members of Congress who joined him in subverting our democracy should resign, and those who conspired with the domestic terrorists should be expelled immediately,” Clinton added.

There is no evidence that the Capitol protests were about race. There is no evidence that Republican members of Congress helped the rioters. And there is no evidence that Putin was somehow connected.

These are just the meandering thoughts of a pair of geriatrics bitter that President Trump ascended to the White House in a role they’ll never play.

The post Hillary Clinton, Pelosi Push Conspiracy Theory Suggesting Trump Updated Putin About The Capitol Riots, Demand 9/11-Style Investigation appeared first on The Political Insider.

Freshman GOP Rep Admits Voting To Impeach Trump May Have Destroyed His Career

Posted on January 18, 2021 by LifeZette

Freshman Rep. Peter Meijer (R-MI) spoke out on Sunday to admit that voting in favor of impeaching President Donald Trump last week may have destroyed his political career.

Meijer Votes To Impeach Trump

The House voted to impeach Trump for a second time last week over the Capitol riots earlier this month, with the article of impeachment charging Trump with “incitement of insurrection.” The impeachment was approved by a vote of 232-197, with every Democrat and ten Republicans in the House voting in favor of it.

Meijer was one of the ten Republicans to vote in favor of impeaching Trump in a move that he himself admitted one day later that “may have been an act of political suicide.”

While appearing on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, Meijer was asked by host George Stephanopolous, “Are you concerned you ended your career with that vote?”

“Oh, I may very well have,” Meijer responded. “But I think it’s also important that we have elected leaders who are not thinking solely about what’s in their individual self-interest, not what is going to be politically expedient, but what we actually need for country.”

Meijer Explains His Reason For Voting To Impeach Trump

Earlier in the interview, the freshman Republican congressman explained his reasoning behind voting to impeach Trump.

“Impeaching a president, especially a president of my own party, was nothing that we ever hoped to do. Many of us deliberated deeply,” Meijer said.

“This was not as easy as just saying what is in our best political interest, but, frankly, looking at the evidence, looking at the facts of the case, reading the article and asking, ‘Is this true by our own experience, by our lived experience?’ And it was,” he continued.

“You know, I think this is a time for reflection, but it’s also a time for accountability. And that’s something that I am deeply committed to,” he added.

“You know, I’m calling on my party to restore trust, to restore the trust of the voting public and to ensure that we never allow the actions that led up to Jan. 6 and what happened on Jan. 6, we never allow that outburst of political violence to occur in our name again,” Meijer said.

A Senate impeachment trial against Trump is expected to take place after Joe Biden is inaugurated later this week.

This piece was written by James Samson on January 18, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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He went viral for saving the Senate, but Army vet Eugene Goodman ‘was a hero long before’

Posted on January 16, 2021 by Aysha Qamar

The Black police officer who went viral for his bravery in distracting the angry Donald Trump mob that took over the Capitol is being rightfully called a hero, not just by Americans nationwide but representatives in Congress. Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman lured a group of rioters away from the Senate chamber’s entrance to protect members of Congress on Jan. 6. As a result, Reps. Charlie Crist of Florida, Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri, and Nancy Mace of South Carolina introduced a bill Thursday to award Goodman the Congressional Gold Medal for “bravery and quick thinking during last week’s insurrection at the United States Capitol."

Since the horrific Capitol riots, many have criticized the lack of security in the building and Capitol Police leadership for its lack of preparation, resulting in the resignation of the Capitol Police’s chief. But amid all the criticisms for Capitol Police comes praise for Goodman and his quick thinking. The award several lawmakers hope to give Goodman is considered one of the highest civilian awards in the country.

"The United States Capitol was under attack by armed, violent extremists, and Officer Eugene Goodman was the only thing standing between the mob and the United States Senate," Crist said in a statement, according to Business Insider.

"I shudder to think what might have happened had it not been for Officer Goodman's fast thinking and commitment to his duty and his country," he continued. "While some will remember last Wednesday for the very worst in our country, the patriotism and heroics of Officer Eugene Goodman renew my faith and remind us all what truly makes the United States great."

The footage of Goodman’s selfless bravery went viral after being shared by HuffPost reporter Igor Bobic on Twitter. Daily Kos shared the footage and reported that the incident happened at 2:14 PM. The Senate was closed mere seconds later at 2:15 PM “Just now realizing how much of a close call it was in the Senate,” Bobic tweeted.

Here’s the scary moment when protesters initially got into the building from the first floor and made their way outside Senate chamber. pic.twitter.com/CfVIBsgywK
— Igor Bobic (@igorbobic) January 6, 2021

This moment in ⁦@igorbobic⁩ stunning footage. In front of the officer, coming up the stairs, is a mass of rioters. The USCP officer glances to his left. Between those two chairs is the entrance to the senate floor. He lured them to his right, away from their targets. pic.twitter.com/knjQQ4GZ0d
— Kristin Wilson (@kristin__wilson) January 10, 2021

Bobic told Good Morning America on Thursday he was covering Congress as they were certifying electoral votes from the presidential election when he heard “a commotion.”

"I ran downstairs to the first floor of the Senate building, where I encountered this lone police officer courageously making a stand against the mob of 20 or so Trump supporters who breached the capitol itself and were trying to get upstairs,” Bobic said.

In the footage Bobic shared, Goodman wasn’t wearing tactical gear nor did he have his gun out. Yet he shoved the mob leader, identified as Doug Jenson of Iowa, before running to grab a baton. At least 20 or more people can then be seen chasing the lone officer, who diverted them away from the Senate chamber. “They were yelling ‘Traitors. We want justice. This is our America. If we don’t stop this now, we won’t get justice. Trump won,’” Bobic told Good Morning America.

“These folks had zip ties,” Kirk D. Burkhalter, a professor at New York Law School and a former New York City police officer, told The Washington Post, referring to photos of rioters with zip tie handcuffs. “It’s not unreasonable to say that they were ready to take hostages ... Officer Goodman really helped to avoid a tremendous tragedy.”

After the footage went viral, colleagues and friends identified Goodman. "He'd do the same thing again,” a friend told The Washington Post, noting that Goodman is "not looking for any accolades."

Officials from the 101st Airborne Division also took to Twitter to praise Goodman, noting that he was a hero to the country years before last week.

According to the Military Times, Goodman served in the Army from 2002 and 2006 and deployed to Iraq for one year with the 101st Airborne Division. His awards include a combat infantryman badge.

Capitol police officer Eugene Goodman is rightfully being hailed as a hero after singlehandedly holding back rioters from entering the Senate chambers last week. An Iraq combat vet and member of this Corps, Eugene was a hero long before last Wednesday. We celebrate his valor. pic.twitter.com/CLWlLG3bIW
— XVIII Airborne Corps (@18airbornecorps) January 14, 2021

Other friends of Goodman told the Post that his decision to lead the rioters away instead of engaging with them reflects his military experience.

“He was diverting people from getting on the Senate floor and getting hostages. It was the smartest thing that he could have ever done,” a colleague said. “I don’t know that many people who can think on their feet like that ... His quick thinking enabled those senators to get to safety.”

Goodman’s ability to not only lead the rioters away from the Senate Chambers but call for backup and show restraint to prevent injury or loss of life pays tribute to his dedication to service and his heroic qualities. Despite his newfound fame, Goodman has remained humble and maintained the same positive attitude, his colleagues told the Post.

Goodman’s attitude toward his job has remained the same despite his newfound fame.

“My job is to protect and serve,” Goodman told co-workers after the video of him went viral. “And on that day, I was protecting.”

Friday, Jan 15, 2021 · 2:52:43 PM +00:00 · Aysha Qamar

Newly shared terrifying footage from the other side:

Wow. First time I’m seeing video *taken by one of the first rioters* to breach the Capitol and storm up the Senate steps. I actually recorded him as he was recording me on the first floor. “Where are they counting the votes?” one is heard shouting https://t.co/6uvvBznma0
— Igor Bobic (@igorbobic) January 15, 2021

Ex-FBI Director James Comey Calls On Biden To ‘Consider’ Pardoning Trump

Posted on January 15, 2021 by LifeZette

Former FBI Director James Comey spoke out this week to surprisingly say that Joe Biden should “consider” pardoning Donald Trump when he takes office next week as Democrats continue their efforts to impeach the current president for a second time.

Comey Says Biden May Want To Pardon Trump

“I obviously think he belongs in jail, but I don’t think pursuing that is in the best interests of the entire nation, so I think the wiser decision would be not to pursue him,” said Comey, who has long been no fan of Trump’s. He added that it is crucial that whatever Biden’s decision on this is, that he explain it to the American people.

“Be transparent about why you’re doing what you’re doing,” he continued.

When Comey was asked if Biden should pardon Trump like “Ford did Nixon,” he said that he did not know, but that Biden “should at least consider it.”

“Now I don’t know whether Donald Trump, he’s not a genius, but he might figure out that [if] he accepts a pardon, that’s an omission of guilt, the United States Supreme Court has said,” he continued, going on to say that he doesn’t even know if Trump would accept the pardon if offered it.

“But as part of healing the country and getting us to a place where we can focus on things that are going to matter over the next four years, I think Joe Biden is going to have to at least think about that,” Comey said.

“Donald Trump belongs in jail.”

Ex-FBI Director @Comey says while he “obviously believes” the president should be in jail, he doesn’t think “pursuing that is in the best interests of the American people”, adding Joe Biden should "consider" pardoning Donald Trump#Newsnight pic.twitter.com/RUghKyq5nW

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) January 13, 2021

Possibility Of Trump Being Prosecuted

The House voted on Wednesday to impeach Trump for a second time for allegedly inciting the Capitol riots last week. Some have even called for him to be prosecuted for the riots, but legal experts have said that this will be difficult to do.

“Legal experts have said it could be difficult to charge Trump with a crime related to last week’s deadly rioting at the Capitol by his supporters that led to the president’s second impeachment on Wednesday,” The Hill reported. “But the president and his company could face scrutiny for possible financial crimes in the Southern District of New York, they have noted.”

This piece was written by James Samson on January 14, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

The post Ex-FBI Director James Comey Calls On Biden To ‘Consider’ Pardoning Trump appeared first on The Political Insider.

Top GOP Senator Says Trump May Be Criminally Prosecuted Over Capitol Riots

Posted on January 14, 2021 by LifeZette

South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds (R) spoke out this week to say that President Donald Trump may be criminally prosecuted for inciting the riots at the U.S. Capitol building last week. However, he stopped short of saying that he would support Trump’s impeachment.

Rounds Discusses Capitol Riots

“In my opinion, what we had was an insurrection,” he told the Forum News Service. “We had violence. We had people killed. We had a mob that ignored direct commands. They attacked law enforcement officers. They damaged federal property. They clearly intended to stop us from performing our duties in the recognition of the electoral vote count.

“If there are (impeachment) proceedings brought against him (Trump),” he continued, “and even if the article of impeachment is not followed through in the Senate, if the article of impeachment to incitement of a riot or incitement of an insurrection are followed through in a criminal proceeding, that by itself would … stop him (Trump) for running for election to a public office again.”

Rounds Accuses Trump Of Lying To His Supporters

Rounds went on to say that many of Trump’s supporters were misled by him when it came to his claims of voter fraud in the election.

“When the story of this last 90 days is told, they will clearly lay out that the president of the United States misled very, very good, honest, patriotic Americans by telling them time and again that the election was stolen,” Rounds said. “I believe that history will hold him accountable.”

After the House voted to impeach Trump for a second time on Wednesday, Rounds added that the timing of impeachment for the purpose of removing Trump from office seems “moot.”

“The timing right now with the removal of office being the primary purpose would seem to me to be moot,” Rounds said, adding that he does not think Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) will bring the Senate back into session before Trump leaves office next week. This means that an impeachment trial wouldn’t begin until he is out of the White House.

This piece was written by James Samson on January 14, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

The post Top GOP Senator Says Trump May Be Criminally Prosecuted Over Capitol Riots appeared first on The Political Insider.

CNN’s Don Lemon Shames Trump Voters – Lumps Them All In With Nazis, KKK, Alt-Right

Posted on January 14, 2021 by LifeZette

CNN host Don Lemon shamed all 74 million Americans who voted for Donald Trump in this past election, not only lumping them all in with Capitol rioters, but also with Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan.

Lemon Shames Trump Voters

While sending off his own show to Lemon’s, Chris Cuomo asked for his fellow host’s reaction to, “Now what you hear is, ‘Well, you can’t say that everybody who voted for Trump is like the people who went into the Capitol.'”

“You need to think about the side you’re on,” Lemon responded. “Principled people — conservative or liberal — never on the Klan side. Principled people — conservative or liberal — never on the Nazi side. Principled people who are conservative or liberal never on the side that treats their fellow Americans as less-than.”

“That says that your fellow Americans should not exist,” he added. “That says your fellow Americans should be in a concentration camp or that sides with slavery or sides with any sort of bigotry.”

“Right,” Cuomo said. “And if they say, ‘I don’t agree with those people, I just like Trump’s policies—'”

“Well, then get out of the crowd with them,” Lemon fired back. “Get out of the crowd with them.”

Cuomo And Lemon Double Down

That’s when the two engaged in a deranged role-play, with Cuomo taking on the role of Trump supporter.

“I wasn’t in the crowd; I just voted for Trump,” Cuomo said.

“You’re in the crowd who voted for Trump,” Lemon replied. “If you voted for Trump, you voted for the person who the Klan supported. You voted for the person who Nazis support. You voted for the person who the alt-right supports. That’s the crowd that you are in.”

“You voted for a person who incited a crowd to go into the Capitol and potentially take the lives of lawmakers, took the lives of police officers, took the … innocent lives of the people who were at the Capitol that day,” he continued.

“You voted on that side,” he added.

Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro said it best when he branded this entire exchange as “vile.”

He later added, “It’s this deliberate attempt to lump together anyone who voted for Trump and the Capitol rioters that undermines the possibility of unity. It also happens to be false and indecent.”

Vile https://t.co/qF8VVjTX3j

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) January 14, 2021

This piece was written by James Samson on January 14, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

The post CNN’s Don Lemon Shames Trump Voters – Lumps Them All In With Nazis, KKK, Alt-Right appeared first on The Political Insider.

House Republicans overwhelmingly stood behind Trump after he incited white supremacist insurrection

Posted on January 14, 2021 by Ashton Lattimore

The House of Representatives voted to impeach President Donald Trump for a historic second time on Jan. 13, and in the process confirmed that even after he incited a white supremacist insurrection at the Capitol building, an overwhelming majority of Republicans see still no problem with Trump’s conduct. While it is technically correct that the 10 Republican votes in favor of impeachment made it “the most bipartisan one in history,” as described by the The Washington Post, The New York Times, CNN, and others, that’s an extremely low bar to clear. In fact, the vote numbers don’t suggest bipartisanship in any meaningful sense, but rather paint a stark portrait of a political party that has almost unanimously aligned itself with white supremacy and the white backlash to BIPOC political ascendancy. As if to drive home the point, GOP representatives even booed Rep. Cori Bush for denouncing white supremacy during the hearings. Rather than rushing to lionize the handful of Republicans who momentarily broke with the party—and did so only after their own sense of safety was threatened—news coverage needs to reflect these realities.

There are 211 Republicans in the House of Representatives, only 10 of them voted in favor of impeachment. That means over 95% watched as insurrectionists broke into the Capitol with Confederate battle flags held high and white supremacist symbols adorning their bodies as they apparently searched the building for government officials to execute, and decided, “This is fine.” Of course, the overwhelmingly white Republican caucus may have correctly surmised that they weren’t the ones in mortal danger on Jan. 6. Rather, Democratic members of Congress—especially women and Black and brown members—represented the primary targets of the mob’s ire, as newly emerging details have revealed.

The same day the impeachment vote was taken, the Boston Globe reported that as Rep. Ayanna Pressley and her staff barricaded themselves in her office to keep safe from the intruders, they discovered all of the panic buttons in the office had been torn out. On Instagram Live the evening before the vote, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that during the attack she “had a very close encounter where I thought I was going to die.” Both Pressley and Ocasio-Cortez are part of The Squad, an outspoken group of progressive Black and Latina Democratic representatives elected to the House of Representatives in 2018 and 2020, which also includes Bush and Reps. Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Jamaal Bowman. As highly visible avatars of women and BIPOC’s growing political and demographic power, members of The Squad have long been on the receiving end of racist rhetoric and right-wing death threats. The events of Jan. 6 suggest at least some people had designs on carrying those threats out, possibly even with help from members of Congress who graciously offered “reconnaissance tours” to the insurrectionists.

The attempted coup also posed a significant risk to a great many Black and brown people who aren’t lawmakers. The residents of Washington, D.C. itself—a largely Black city—along with Congressional support staff and Capitol building custodians had to contend with the trauma of being descended upon by a white supremacist mob, and afterward, were left to clean up the mess that same mob left behind. Overly credulous news coverage praising “principled” Republicans not only threatens to miss the racial realities of where most of the party stands, but also the narrowly circumscribed and race-specific extent of its support for the working class.

With the looming threat of more insurrectionist violence in the coming days, it is of the highest moral and political significance that so many House Republicans condoned and aided the racist incitement that put the republic, fellow Americans, and the lives of their own Congressional colleagues in serious peril. And because the animating impulses behind the Capitol insurrection won’t wane with the dawn of the post-Trump political era, it’s imperative that we in the media don’t close our eyes to what the impeachment vote actually has to tell us about race, politics, and power in the United States.

Ashton Lattimore is the editor-in-chief of Prism. Follow her on Twitter @ashtonlattimore.

Prism is a BIPOC-led nonprofit news outlet that centers the people, places and issues currently underreported by our national media. Through our original reporting, analysis, and commentary, we challenge dominant, toxic narratives perpetuated by the mainstream press and work to build a full and accurate record of what’s happening in our democracy. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.