Category: SusanCollins

Susan Collins really doesn’t want to talk about what lessons Trump learned in impeachment anymore

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Following the Tuesday Night Massacre, which happened after last week's revenge binge from impeached president Donald Trump, intrepid CNN reporter Manu Raju caught up with Sen. Susan Collins to see what she's thinking about it all. She clearly did not appreciate the fact that Raju remembered what she said last week. The part about "I believe that the president has learned from this case," which she downgraded to "hopes" after Trump point blank said there was no lesson to be learned because "it was a perfect call."

Fast forward a week, and she really wants to be done talking about it. Asked by Raju if, after the actions Trump has taken, she still thinks there's "any lessons he heard from being impeached," she snapped. "I don't know what actions you're referring to. I've made very clear that I don't think anyone should be retaliated against." Then she launched into lecturing Raju: "That has nothing to do with the basis by which I voted to acquit the president, as I made very clear to you, Manu, on numerous occasions because his conduct, while wrong, did not meet the high bar established in the constitution for the immediate ouster of a duly elected president." Which had absolutely nothing to do with the question at all.

Collins has chosen her side, and Maine knows it. Please give $1 to help Democrats in each of these crucial Senate races, but especially the one in Maine!

Because she doesn't want to answer the question. She didn't want to answer it later, either, when she continued to insist that she bore no responsibility at all for Trump being totally unfettered now. Her vote against impeaching Trump, she told reporters, "wasn't based on predicting his future behavior." Which is a hell of a cop-out for the person who once said impeaching him would be enough to make him curb his future behavior.

Collins is completely abdicating responsibility for both her past and her future failures to do her goddamned most essential job of being a check on the president. What she does think is her job is not obvious (besides granting defense contracts to companies that in turn contribute tens of thousands of dollars to her reelection campaign).

Watch: 

catch that chyron: "GOP Sen. Collins Won't Say If Trump Learned Any Lessons After Acquittal." of course, last week she excused her vote by saying he did learn from impeachment & would be more cautious.....#mesen #mepolitics pic.twitter.com/QMTKd7g2TJ

— Lauren Passalacqua (@laurenvpass) February 12, 2020

MR: In light of the president's actions, do you think there's any lessons he heard from being impeached?

SC: I don't know what actions you're referring to. I've made very clear that I don't think anyone should be retaliated against. That has nothing to do with the basis by which I voted to acquit the president, as I made very clear to you, Manu, on numerous occasions because his conduct, while wrong, did not meet the high bar established in the constitution for the immediate ouster of a duly elected president. And that was the rationale for my vote to acquit him. That is the reason why….

MR: Do you think he learned any lessons?

SC: … In all the years that … since George Washington was inaugurated as our first president that we have never removed a duly elected president from office. It's because the conduct alleged should be so dangerous to our country and so egregious and proven by the House managers that the person should not remain in office one moment more. That was the standard established by the House managers. It was the standard that I used in acquitting President Clinton and that's the reason for my vote and I don't know why you're equating the two.

MR: Well you said the president learned his lesson. Do you think he learned any lessons?

[Collins’ office door slams shut.]

Trump and Barr ramp up their abuses of power—and Senate Republicans are responsible for all of it

Posted on by Laura Clawson

This is what a liberated post-acquittal Donald Trump looks like: not chastened, as some of the more dishonest Senate Republicans said they hoped he would be, but ever more brazen in his corruption and his destruction of democratic institutions. Tuesday was a nightmare for justice in the United States of America, with three top prosecutors either stepping down from the case or resigning entirely as Attorney General William Barr obeyed a Trump tweet and intervened in the sentencing recommendations for Trump buddy Roger Stone.

That came after the news that Barr is working with Rudy Giuliani to dig up and launder dirt on Trump’s political opponents, and after the firing of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his brother from their White House jobs because he testified at the impeachment inquiry. Trump and Barr are committing the abuses, but every single Republican senator other than Mitt Romney gave them permission. Said “Go right ahead, we won’t do a thing about it.”

Every day that goes by and every new abuse that Trump commits shows why it's so important to retake the Senate. Please dig deep to defeat vulnerable Republicans in 2020.

I’m talking about Susan Collins, up for reelection in Maine. Cory Gardner, up for reelection in Colorado. Joni Ernst, in Iowa. Thom Tillis, in North Carolina. Kelly Loeffler, who will be facing Georgia voters for the first time after being appointed to replace former Sen. Johnny Isakson. David Perdue, also in Georgia, meaning there are two Senate seats at stake in one state. Martha McSally, who lost a Senate election in Arizona in 2018 and was appointed to a Senate seat anyway—she needs to lose for a second time in a row. 

Every single one of these people voted to let Trump continue his lawlessness. They voted that way when any halfway sensible person knew that he would take the vote as permission to do more and worse. These senators intended to give him that permission—and do more and worse he has. He has been publicly vindictive against Vindman for daring to testify to what Trump did on Ukraine. His attorney general is systematically perverting the administration of justice to cater to Trump’s personal desires, to protect his friends and persecute his opponents, making a mockery of the Justice Department's mission statement to “ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans.” 

Every Republican senator but Mitt Romney voted to tell Trump that he is above the law. In 2020, voters can make some of them pay for that. Give now to send the opposite message—that no one is above the law—by defeating these Republicans in 2020.

Who’s to blame for the firing of impeachment hero Alex Vindman? Every senator who acquitted Trump

Posted on by David Nir

On Friday, Donald Trump dismissed Lt. Col. Alex Vindman from the National Security Council, months before his tenure was set to expire. Trump sacked Vindman, a Purple Heart recipient and the White House’s top expert on Ukraine, for his courageous testimony during impeachment proceedings in November, when he told Congress he’d reported his concerns about Trump’s now-notorious July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

But who’s truly to blame for this naked act of thuggish retaliation? All 52 Republican senators who voted to acquit Trump for his abuses of power and desperate attempts to cover them up. Most especially, that includes the vulnerable Republicans who are up for re-election this November:

Susan Collins in Maine Joni Ernst in Iowa Cory Gardner in Colorado Kelly Loeffler in Georgia Martha McSally in Arizona David Perdue in Georgia Thom Tillis in North Carolina

Collins is particularly egregious: On Friday morning, before the Vindman news broke, she told reporters, “I obviously am not in favor of any kind of retribution against anyone who came forward with evidence.” What’s transpired since was not only predictable, it had in fact been predicted. Collins and her brethren knew what would happen as a consequence of vindicating Trump. They simply didn’t care.

We, however, do. Every time Trump does something awful from this day forward, we know whom to hold responsible. And we can ensure that his enablers go down to defeat this fall.

Please donate $1 to unseat each of the Republicans who acquitted the most corrupt president in American history.

Susan Collins, now a national laughingstock, has concerns

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Congratulations, Sen. Susan Collins! You've become national figure! Unfortunately for you, it’s as a laughingstock. First she appeared in a Saturday Night Live skit and then in a Stephen Colbert monologue, in which he described her as "the senator who has most successfully talked herself into believing that she believes in something."

Proving Colbert’s point, Collins went on WMTW, Portland's ABC affiliate, to say she "did what I felt was right" in her votes in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, and that this was an even more consequential vote than the one on putting Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court because "removing a president from office" is "overturning an election and preventing the president from appearing in the ballot this fall." About this fall, and if she'll vote for Trump this time around? "You know, I'm not going to discuss presidential politics at a time like this." A time like this being before the filing deadline for Maine's primary. She already made her decision clear, however, in the only vote that really counts—on Trump’s impeachment.

Collins has chosen her side, and Maine knows it. Please give $1 to help Democrats in each of these crucial Senate races, but especially the one in Maine!

She's still trying to convince Mainers that she'll vote to "curb the president's powers." She left out the part about needing to have Mitch McConnell's permission to cast those votes. She also said that she would disapprove of retribution by Trump against anyone who testified. She will tell every reporter she can talk to that she is very concerned when Trump fires Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman from the National Security Council after he testified in House impeachment hearings, or when Attorney General Bill Barr starts investigating House Democratic leadership.

She told Maine reporters after a Friday meeting of the Maine Chiefs of Police Association that she wished there had been witnesses in the Senate trial, proving that her wishes are about as effective as her hopes.

Boy, does Susan Collins look like a craven, partisan hack today or what?

Posted on by Joan McCarter

What a day for Maine Sen. Susan Collins, huh? Her colleague, Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, just provided a master class in political principle, courage, and independence—you know, all those qualities Collins has pretended to possess during her too-long Senate career. How will she look anything other than craven, compared to that? Her actions seem particularly gutless after the cringe-inducing interview she gave CBS to explain her vote to acquit impeached president Donald Trump.

"I believe that the president has learned from this case," Collins said. "The president has been impeached. That's a pretty big lesson." Uh, huh. How much has he learned? The Washington Post's Josh Dawsey tweets the answer, reporting on the pre-State of the Union lunch Trump had with news anchors: "Asked about Sen. Susan Collins saying he'd learned a lesson, Trump told the anchors he did not agree. He had done nothing wrong. 'It was a perfect call.'" So much for that. Now Collins says she shouldn't have said "believe" and a better word would have been "hopes." Uh, huh. 

Collins has chosen her side, and Maine knows it. Please give $1 to help Democrats in each of these crucial Senate races, but especially the one in Maine!

It’s just like the time she "hoped" Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's promise to give her a vote on her health bills in return for her support on the GOP Tax Scam was "ironclad." Just like she hoped that now-confirmed Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh would respect precedent on Roe v. Wade.

She's not impressing anyone in Maine, and her actions are drawing very unfavorable comparisons to Romney with political observers back home. Steve Collins, the State House reporter for the Sun Journal in Lewiston and apparently no relation to the senator, tweeted that the combination of Romney's decision and Trump's disavowal of having learned a damn thing "combine to make her decision to acquit politically dicier." He continues, "She likes to claim the middle ground. But it's Romney, not her, who is standing on it."

Republicans know Trump did it, know it was wrong, know he’ll do it again, still don’t care

Posted on by Mark Sumner

Somehow, Sen. Mitt Romney—that Mitt Romney—has become the conscience of the Republican Party. But despite the announcement that Donald Trump really does have an achievement all to himself, other Republicans have continued to keep up the most shallow pretense imaginable.

Not that Trump is innocent. They know he’s not. Not that this isn’t serious. They know it is.

They’re pretending that Trump is sorry. And they know he never will be.

Susan Collins had the first swing at Trump’s learning experience, when she told CBS News that Trump had learned a "pretty big lesson" from the whole processes of hearings and trial, and that she was sure he would be "much more cautious" about soliciting political slander from foreign governments in the future. "The president's call was wrong,” said Collins. “He should not have mentioned Joe Biden in it, despite his overall concern about corruption in Ukraine. The president of the United States should not be asking a foreign country to investigate a political rival. That is just improper. It was far from a perfect call."

Once he heard of this, Trump was immediately so contrite that he … immediately dismissed the idea that he learned the first thing from his impeachment “lesson.” Instead, Trump showed that he had not moved a single inch from the place he started at the beginning of the whole scandal, calling his extortion “a perfect call.”

But of course, Collins wasn’t alone. Lamar Alexander was first on board the train of Republican senators acknowledging that the House managers had proven their case, and that Trump had in fact tried to force an ally into interfering in the 2020 election by withholding military assistance. Only Lamar! wasn’t about to do anything about it. Instead he’ll go back to Tennessee where people apparently say “Yep, that looks like murder,” and go on about their business.

Lisa Murkowski was also on board the Yes He Did Express. She defended her refusal to call witnesses by saying no witnesses were needed. Because, Trump’s behavior was “shameful and wrong.” But no so shameful that Murkowski would do anything, including allowing the public to hear the full case.

Those three, along with Romney, may have been the Republicans at the center of the will-they / won’t-they / of course they won’t when it came to witnesses, but they’re not the the only ones willing to admit that Trump did a little criming. There’s also Rob Portman. “I believe that some of the president’s actions in this case—including asking a foreign country to investigate a potential political opponent and the delay of aid to Ukraine—were wrong and inappropriate, “ said Portman. Some of Trump’s actions in this case, happened to be every action that the House managers placed in their articles. Still, that doesn’t mean that Portman is going to do anything but collect his ticket to the after party.

Ben Sasse was one of the most Trump-supportive Republicans when it came to tossing softballs to Trump’s defense team. That didn’t stop him from declaring that, “delaying the aid was inappropriate and wrong and shouldn't have happened." Neither should his vote to sustain Trump. But it will.

And then there’s Republican majority leader John Thune. Following the lead of America’s most unpopular senator, Thune declared that Trump was just inexperienced and naive. He’ll be sure to mend his ways and be more careful going forward. Quick. Someone ask Trump about that one.

The truth behind the Republican position is the one that was made clear when Murkowski and Alexander teamed up with Ted Cruz and Lindsey Graham on Team Lickspittle — they do not give a damn. And from the excuses they’re providing, they also don’t give a damn who knows it.

Collins’ legacy: To be ‘remembered not for her courage, but for her capitulation’

Posted on by Joan McCarter

The convention wisdom, for some unknown reason (laziness? lack of imagination?), that Sen. Susan Collins is a "moderate" still persists. Here's a headline in Sunday evening's Washington Post: "Republican Sen. Susan Collins finds it's lonely in the middle."

"Here in Maine," the story says, "where the famously independent Collins is locked in a tight reelection campaign, the choice elicited a wintry mix of cold shoulders and icy glares." The choice meaning her vote for witnesses in impeached president Donald Trump's trial, a vote that was carefully choreographed in Mitch McConnell's conference. That's because her "famous independence" is a sham, and people like Bill Nemitz, Maine's leading political observer, know it. In Sunday's Portland Press Herald, he laid out the whole con job.

Collins has chosen her side, and Maine knows it. Please give $1 to help Democrats in each of these crucial Senate races, but especially the one in Maine!

"She will say she tried her best. She'll note that she voted for witnesses in the impeachment trial of President Trump, but that vote fell short," he writes. "Then, when the final impeachment vote comes on Wednesday afternoon, expect Maine Sen. Susan Collins to fall back into the Republican line and vote to acquit." She has "pages upon pages of detailed notes" to justify her vote, but since they just could hear from those witnesses she really wanted to hear from, the case just hasn't been proven so she, sadly, has no choice. She has to stand with Trump. But Nemitz remembers when Collins "demonstrated integrity," when she wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post explaining "Why I Cannot Support Trump."

"Collins’ statement of conscience bears revisiting," Nemitz writes, "if only to show that while Trump hasn't changed, the senior senator from Maine most certainly has." She's no longer a moderate, an independent voice for Maine, and Maine knows that. This is what Maine is expecting to see this week: "So, come Wednesday and the final impeachment vote, look for Collins to express her deep concern at how nasty everyone has become, wring her hands over how difficult her life has grown and then, ever loyal to a party that now devours those who dissent, vote to let Trump off the hook." Yes, Nemitz knows her very well. "And long after this national trauma passes into history, Maine's Susan Collins will be forever remembered not for her courage, but for her capitulation."

Collins earns a new nickname in Moscow Mitch’s impeachment game: Sidekick Sue

Posted on by Joan McCarter

There's a new nickname for Maine Sen. Susan Collins floating around the internet: It’s #SidekickSue, in recognition that she's Moscow Mitch McConnell’s most valuable player when he's trying to fix a Senate vote. That the fix was in (and that she had a key role in it) was glaringly apparently Thursday night in the choreographed release of statements from Collins and Sen. Lamar Alexander regarding whether they wanted to compel additional witnesses and testimony in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial. (Collins said yea, while Alexander said nay.)

The final cynical fillip came Friday morning from Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the other reliable player in McConnell's game, with her duplicitous embrace of the cover-up with crocodile tears: "It is sad for me to admit that, as an institution, the Congress has failed." But she did her job for McConnell, and she's providing the cover Collins needs. It's not going to work this time.

The jig has been up for Collins since she betrayed every principle she previously touted and voted in favor of Brett Kavanaugh’s conformation to the Supreme Court. "Just as we've known she would, Collins announced her support for witnesses only when the votes were fixed to block witnesses and rig the trial to cover-up the corruption of Donald Trump," Marie Follayttar, co-director of Mainers for Accountable Leadership, told Common Dreams. "We see Collins for who she is—Sidekick Sue to Moscow Mitch and a corrupt and despotic Trump."

Collins has chosen her side, and Maine knows it. Please give $1 to help Democrats in each of these crucial Senate races, but especially the one in Maine!

Collins, Alexander prove that fix has been in all along on Trump’s impeachment trial

Posted on by Joan McCarter

There will almost certainly not be a 50-50 tie in the Senate impeachment trial on whether to have additional witnesses and documents. Sen. Susan Collins, almost immediately following the closing of Thursday night's session, showed that she'd been given the "hall pass" from McConnell to vote "yes" on witnesses. In a three-paragraph statement that was probably written before the trial even began.

Moments after Collins’ statement, as if it were totally choreographed to try to make her look like the hero, Sen. Lamar Alexander announced that he is a "no" because "there is no need for more evidence to prove something that has already been proven and that does not meet the U.S. Constitution’s high bar for an impeachable offense." He goes on to say essentially, yes Trump definitely did it, but we don't need to impeach him over it.

If, as expected, Sen. Mitt Romney votes for witnesses, that leaves just Sen. Lisa Murkowski as an unknown. She’s said she's thinking on it. That's most likely false, because the main thing has been trying to give Collins cover, and McConnell is not going to allow Chief Justice Roberts being in the position of having to decide whether or not to break a tie.

We have to end their hold on the Senate. Please give $1 to our nominee fund to help Democrats and end McConnell's career as majority leader.

Senate Republicans: Screw what voters want. It’s impeachment cover-up time

Posted on by Laura Clawson

Senate Republicans have come back to where they started: they’re going to stage an impeachment cover-up, and they’re not going to half-ass it. With Donald Trump in full public bully mode and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell twisting arms behind the scenes, the number of Republicans willing to vote for a fair trial is expected to be less than the necessary four—and even the one or two Republicans who vote to hear from witnesses will do so with McConnell’s permission, knowing that they aren’t changing the outcome.

This recommitment to cover-up comes as poll after poll shows anywhere from 66% to 80% of Americans—including substantial percentages of Republicans—wanting witnesses in the impeachment trial. Republican senators do not care.

Sen. Lindsey Graham’s take is that “For the sake of argument, one could assume everything attributable to John Bolton is accurate, and still the House would fall well below the standards to remove a president from office.” But we never expected Graham to stand up to the latest powerful figure he’s attached himself to in a bid for greater relevance.

”We don’t need Mr. Bolton to come in and to extend this show longer, along with any other witnesses people might want, and occupy all of our time here in the Senate for the next few weeks, maybe even months,” said Sen. John Cornyn. Heaven forbid the Senate waste its time on frivolous things like finding out how far the president went to undermine American democracy! 

Sen. Susan Collins may vote to hear witnesses, with McConnell’s permission, so she can keep duping news outlets like The New York Times into writing long-discredited nonsense like that “She is the rare member of her party who still seeks to appeal to a broad range of independent and even Democratic voters as well as Republicans.”

Senate Republicans have made it clear: They will acquit Trump even if they are somehow forced to acknowledge that he did what all the evidence shows he did, withholding military aid to Ukraine to pressure the nation to help him out in the 2020 elections by digging up dirt—or at least publicly announcing that there was dirt to be dug—on the Democratic opponent he saw as most threatening at that time. Senate Republicans don’t care what he did. They just want to stay in power, and they think Trump is their best bet for doing so. And even though voters have seen through their intent to cover up, they’re going through with it anyway, because apparently Republicans are convinced it’s better to have people know you’re covering something up than to have them knowing what lies under the covers.