House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., signaled there is little appetite for judicial impeachments among House Republican leaders.
He said a bill passed by the House earlier this year, aimed at limiting federal district judges from issuing nationwide injunctions in most cases, was a "silver bullet" against activist judges.
Johnson refused to pull impeachment off the table indefinitely when pressed by Fox News Digital, but he cautioned that there was a high bar for such maneuvers, while noting that getting enough votes to impeach in the House and remove in the Senate is an uphill battle in itself.
"Look, impeachments are never off the table if it's merited. But in our system, we've had 15 federal judges impeached in the entire history of the country. I mean, there may be some that I feel merit that, but you’ve got to get the votes for it, right? And it's a very high burden," Johnson said.
"And by the way, even if we could get an impeachment article through the House on a federal judge, it's unlikely that they would be tried and convicted in the Senate on that, with the divided number we have. So, short of that, what can we do?"
The speaker said House Republicans had "done everything within our power to solve that problem."
"Darrell Issa's bill is a great response: The No Rogue Rulings Act would prohibit a single individual judgment issuing a nationwide injunction like that to stop the entire policy of an administration," Johnson said.
"We passed it to the House, we sent it to the Senate with every expectation that they should be able to take that up. And I certainly hope they can, because, again, shouldn't be a partisan issue."
Some conservatives, however, are still hungry to pursue the impeachment route. They could force the House to do so by introducing a "privileged" resolution, meaning Johnson would need to take it up within two legislative days.
However, it is a politically risky undertaking that is ultimately guaranteed to fail in the Senate, where at least several Democrats would be needed to meet the two-thirds threshold for removal.
It comes amid the Trump administration’s continued standoff with the courts over a litany of the new White House’s policies — from deportation flights to the Department of Government Efficiency.
Republicans have dismissed the rulings as political decisions by activist judges, while Democrats accuse the White House of waging war on a co-equal branch of government.
The Trump administration, meanwhile, has consistently said it is complying with all lawful court orders while denouncing activist judges in court and in the media sphere.
A lawyer who represented a government whistleblower in a case that led to President Donald Trump's first impeachment sued the Trump administration on Monday for "unconstitutional retaliation" after his security clearance was revoked.
Lawyer Mark Zaid argued that the administration's decision to pull his clearance in March was in retaliation for representing former Department of Homeland Security intelligence chief Brian Murphy, who was key to Trump's 2019 impeachment.
Murphy filed a whistleblower complaint in 2019 alleging Trump, amid his re-election campaign, pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate then-U.S. presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter's business dealings in Ukraine.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted later that year to impeach Trump for abusing the power of his office and obstructing Congress, but he was later acquitted by the Senate.
Zaid's lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., claims the decision to rescind his security clearance represents a "dangerous, unconstitutional retaliation by the President of the United States against his perceived political enemies" that "eschews any semblance of due process."
The complaint accuses the Trump administration of violating the Administrative Procedures Act, the First Amendment and parts of the Fifth Amendment.
"No American should lose their livelihood, or be blocked as a lawyer from representing clients, because a president carries a grudge toward them or who they represent," Zaid said in a statement. "This isn’t just about me. It’s about using security clearances as political weapons."
The lawsuit cites a 2019 incident in which Trump called Zaid a "sleazeball" at a Louisiana rally and told reporters that the lawyer was a "disgrace" who "should be sued."
The move to pull Zaid's clearance was "a bald-faced attack on a sacred constitutional guarantee: the right to petition the court or federal agencies on behalf of clients," the lawsuit says, noting that an "attack on this right is especially insidious because it jeopardizes Mr. Zaid’s ability to pursue and represent the rights of others without fear of retribution."
Trump has also revoked clearances of several other political foes, including former President Joe Biden, former Vice President Kamala Harris, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and his own former national security advisor John Bolton, as well as attorneys at other law firms.
Zaid urged the court to rule that Trump's revocation decision was unconstitutional and reinstate his clearance. He has had access to classified information since 1995 and a security clearance since 2002.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment.
Attempting to deflect from courts repeatedly ruling against his immigration policy, President Donald Trump lied to reporters on Monday, claiming that the courts fabricated the need for cases to be heard—despite the right to a trial being a constitutional law for more than 234 years.
“The courts have all of a sudden, out of nowhere, they said, ‘maybe you have to have trials.’ Trials, we’re going to have 5 million trials? Doesn’t work, doesn’t work. You wouldn’t have a country left,” he said.
Trump has been under fire for denying detainees due process. Students like Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk have been abducted for their pro-Palestinian advocacy, and legal U.S. resident Kilmar Abrego Garcia was wrongly captured and deported to El Salvador.
On April 30, a court ordered the release of Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian immigrant who was held by the Department of Homeland Security while it tried to find a reason for his deportation.
Contrary to Trump’s statement, the U.S. Constitution explicitly lays out the right to a trial in the Sixth Amendment:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
These rights were part of the ten amendments ratified in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, and nothing in U.S. law or Trump’s executive orders have nullified them. The Sixth Amendment ensures that accusations leveled by the government against people have to be proven in a court of law and not just by royal fiat, as was done by the British government in the colonial era.
Trump’s unconstitutional remarks come just one day after he told NBC “I don’t know” when asked if the president needs to uphold the Constitution. Like every president before him, Trump took an oath of office, making it clear that this was a core element of his presidential duties.
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.
The oath is not ambiguous, and defense of the Constitution is not optional.
Trump’s ignorance of U.S. law and history was also on display when he recently argued that the Declaration of Independence was a “declaration of unity and love and respect.” The document famously severed the relationship between colonists and England, leading to the bloody Revolutionary War where hundreds of thousands died.
Of course, Trump is the only president who has been impeached twice. In both instances, he was found to be in violation of the Constitution.
No wonder he thinks the right to a trial came “out of nowhere.”
Late last month, in his official capacity as presiding officer of the Judicial Conference, Chief Justice John Roberts got sued by America First.
That’s the legal group that Donald Trump’s senior adviser and chief ghoul Stephen Miller founded. America First typically keeps busy by suing everyone Miller finds insufficiently racist. This lawsuit, though, is wholly designed to do Trump’s bidding.
Yes, the lawsuit that would drastically shift power from the judiciary to Trump’s White House was basically engineered by someone who works in Trump’s White House.
You’re probably wondering why this hasn’t been splashed all over every news source, particularly since it was filed almost two weeks ago. It’s a direct challenge to the authority of the judicial branch, yet there’s been nary a peep until Talking Points Memo reported on it Friday. No official statements from the court, no missive from Roberts, no Justice Sam Alito penning a whiny op-ed. Just meek silence about an existential threat.
That meek silence might not seem so distressing if the justices were always close-mouthed about challenges to the judiciary, but that’s not the case. Roberts knows how to issue statements about threats to the judiciary’s independence because he does it routinely. Alito knows how to run to the Wall Street Journal when he wants to complain.
America First’s lawsuit is ostensibly about whether the Judicial Conference of the United States and the Administrative Office of the United States Courts are subject to the Freedom of Information Act. But what it’s really about is a demand that the White House be given control over an arcane, but crucial, part of the judiciary by declaring it part of the executive branch.
Stephen Miller, Trump’s chief ghoul.
Without getting too deep into the brainworms of this theory, it goes something like this: The Judicial Conference is an agency, not a court, because it doesn’t issue decisions. Instead, it is a body that makes rules for the courts. It’s also a body that must respond to congressional oversight requests. The chief justice has the power to appoint people to committees, so, according to the lawsuit, he is “acting as an agency head.” Rinse and repeat for roughly the same argument about the Administrative Office.
You know where this is going, right? If it’s an agency, it’s part of the executive branch. If it’s part of the executive branch, it’s under the control of the president.
In theory, the lawsuit is only asking for this so that those entities would have to respond to America First’s FOIA requests, but the only way that can happen is by saying they’re part of the executive branch, because their current status as part of the judiciary makes them exempt from FOIA.
So, what power would the president gain if both were under his control? Well, the Judicial Conference manages administrative and policy issues for the federal courts.
That sounds fairly benign, but in that role, it handles complaints against federal judges and workplace harassment issues in the judiciary. It prepares plans on how to assign judges if necessary. It promulgates the regulations for financial disclosures and other ethics rules. Imagine a White House that could weaponize complaints against judges it hates while ignoring any ethical lapses by reliable favorite judges.
What about the Administrative Office? It’s what it sounds like. It provides all the administrative support for the judicial branch, including financial, technology, legislative, and program support services. It also develops the annual judiciary budget and carries out Judicial Conference policies.
Imagine a White House that completely controls how resources are distributed across federal courts or decides which program initiatives the courts can undertake. Imagine that White House slashing that funding to the bone or letting Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency run roughshod through confidential databases.
Shifting both of these over to the executive would have another effect, which is that it would undermine congressional oversight. Right now, those offices respond to oversight or investigation requests from members of Congress. In theory, those offices would still have that responsibility, but they’d be controlled by Trump toadies.
Conservatives like Trump and Miller are unhappy that Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island had the temerity to inquire into undisclosed billionaire-funded freebies received by Alito and Clarence Thomas. Those inquiries came after the April 2023 ProPublica report that Thomas failed to disclose literally dozens of destination vacations, private jet flights, and more from his billionaire buddy, Harlan Crow. The report sparked Whitehouse’s 2023 request to the Judicial Conference that it refer Thomas to the attorney general for investigation.
Justice Clarence Thomas was the subject of extensive ProPublica reporting about his failure to disclose all of the gifts he’d received from rich benefactors.
So, a close adviser to the president is puppeteering a lawsuit that would strip the judiciary of the power to oversee its own affairs and would hobble its ability to work with Congress on meaningful oversight.
But the most vocal conservative justices do not see this blatant power grab as problematic. At least, that’s what we can deduce from the fact that they’ve said nothing, despite being perfectly happy to speak out on far lesser matters.
Remember when the chief justice was so concerned that Congress not exceed its authority over the judiciary that he refused to appear before the Senate in April 2023 to answer questions about court ethics after news broke about Thomas? About a month later, he touted the judiciary’s “status as an independent branch of government under the Constitution’s separation of powers” as a reason not to allow Congress to impose any code of conduct on the court.
So what exactly does have to happen to rouse Roberts to raise the alarm? Well, apparently, a milquetoast statement from a Democratic senator.
In March 2020, while making a speech outside the Supreme Court, Sen. Chuck Schumer said of Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch, “You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You will not know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”
Heavens! Roberts rushed to get a statement out that named Schumer, quoted him, and said that "threatening statements of this sort from the highest levels of government are not only inappropriate, they are dangerous.”
By contrast, look at the statement Roberts made after Trump went after Judge James A. Boasberg, the judge who blocked the Trump administration’s deportation of Venezuelan immigrants.
“This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED,” Trump declared on social media. He also called Boasberg a “Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator.”
And it wasn’t just Trump. Multiple elected GOP officials have introduced articles of impeachment against multiple federal judges. Trump supporters have threatened the families of at least 11 judges who have ruled against the administration.
Did Roberts call anyone out by name? Did Roberts quote Trump? Haha, of course not.
Here’s the whole of Roberts’ statement: “For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”
That’s telling ’em, John.
What about Alito? He’s someone who has not been shy about making public statements whenever he feels attacked. When Alito learned in June 2023 that ProPublica was publishing a story about his failure to disclose a fancy vacation paid for by billionaire Paul Singer and to recuse himself from cases related to Singer’s hedge fund, he had an op-ed over at the Wall Street Journal before the ProPublica piece even ran.
Justice Samuel Alito published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal to attacks reporting about him.
One month later, he was back on the op-ed pages, the subject of a fawning interview co-authored by David Rivkin Jr., an attorney who had a tax case before the Supreme Court at the time of the interview. In refusing to recuse, Alito explained that Rivkin, when writing the articles, was magically “a journalist, not an advocate.” Sure.
Alito also took the opportunity to declare that Congress can’t regulate the Supreme Court, period, because there’s nothing in the Constitution that says so. It sounds like Alito is very concerned when the other branches try to intrude on the judiciary’s authority! Oh, wait, that only applies to Democrats in Congress. Apparently, when the executive branch makes a power grab, that’s just fine.
A few years ago, the America First case would have been the sort of lawsuit only brought by the weirdest pro se litigants who were convinced that Roberts was Illuminati or some such thing. The notion that the whole of the constitutional order should be upended, that the judiciary’s administrative functions secretly belong to the executive branch, would have been treated like the nonsense it was.
Now, though, this sort of nonsense is being pushed by one of the president’s closest advisers and just happens to track the president’s goal of eradicating the independence of the other branches of government. But still, from the Supreme Court? Silence.
Rep. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., suggested impeaching President Donald Trump a third time to stop Republicans following the 2026 midterms, as she seeks to become the next governor of New Jersey.
"I think you have to test yourself. I think it’s not enough to take on one tough fight. I think there’s a lot of tough fights going on," Sherrill told supporters during a campaign event at Ridgeway Volunteer Fire Company Station 34 in Manchester Township on April 26, according to the New York Post.
Sherrill, 53, was first elected to the U.S. House in the 2018 midterms, winning the state's 11th congressional district that had long been considered a Republican stronghold. She voted for both of Trump's impeachments during his first administration.
"When I impeached the president the first time — who knew I would ever be saying–" she was saying at the campaign event last week when an audience member interjected that she should "do it again," leading to laughter from the rest of the crowd.
"Yeah, exactly. We’ll see," she replied. "Maybe we’ll go for the trifecta."
The congresswoman added: "But when I impeached him the first time, I thought I would probably lose my seat after that because of my district."
Earlier this week, Rep. Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., filed articles of impeachment against Trump for several alleged high crimes and misdemeanors, including for eliminating federal programs without congressional authorization, violating First Amendment rights and refusing to follow court orders to facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the U.S. after he was sent to a prison in his home country of El Salvador.
The administration purports that Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang, although a judge previously granted him a form of protected status known as "withholding of removal" after finding that he would likely be a target of Salvadoran gangs if deported to his native country. Democrat lawmakers, many legal experts and other critics of the move to send Abrego Garcia to the Salvadoran prison say this was done without giving him the opportunity to exercise his due process rights.
Trump's "unlawful actions have subverted the justice system, violated the separation of powers, and placed personal power and self-interest above public service," Thanedar said in a statement when introducing articles of impeachment against the president.
Sherrill explained at her event how Democrat-led states could challenge Trump’s agenda.
"I was on the floor on January 6th. And he has no intention of leaving in four years — zero," Sherrill said, as Trump has floated the idea of bending the constitutional rules to run for a third term.
"It’s up to, again, all of us to make sure that we are there, mobilizing, bringing people together as he’s trying to divide us apart, finding ways around and, kind of, to block and tackle in the states," Sherrill said.
"I have to tell you it’s all down to federalism, in my mind. It’s down to the states — and taking them to court as they’re trying to meddle in our election system," she added.
Others facing Sherrill in the Democrat gubernatorial primary include Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, former Montclair mayor and president of the New Jersey Education Association Sean Spiller and former state Senate president Stephen Sweeney.
Current Democrat Gov. Phil Murphy is term-limited.
FIRST ON FOX: One of the major players in the crypto and artificial intelligence (AI) industries attempting to cozy up to the Trump administration is a longtime Democratic operative and donor who has backed anti-Trump efforts and candidates while working for companies stacked with Democratic activists.
Chris Lehane, a veteran political strategist dating back to the Clinton administration, has donated over $150,000 to Democrats, FEC records show, and many of those Democrats have been outspoken Trump critics for several years.
Lehane has been a major backer of Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, who voted to convict Trump during his impeachment trial in 2021 and against several of Trump’s Cabinet nominees. He also hosted a San Francisco fundraiser for the Virginia senator, along with Open AI’s Sam Altman, in March.
Warner has been a key figure in the resistance to the Trump administration, including being a vocal critic of the Trump administration's "sloppy" Signal chat controversy and pushing back on the administration's DOGE push against waste, fraud and abuse in government. Lehane also donated thousands of dollars to the Biden and Harris campaigns.
In 2024, Lehane joined the board of Coinbase, which operates one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world, and has taken an active role influencing crypto and AI policy in recent months.
Coinbase’s Board of Directors has donated more than $22 million to Democratic candidates and committees while donating less than $5 million to Republicans, FEC records show.
Those donations include almost $50,000 to Kamala Harris' campaign since 2009, including to her presidential campaign, from board member and top Democratic donor Ron Conway.
Conway has donated over $300,000 to the DNC, over $1.5 million to the DCCC and millions to the House Majority PAC and Senate Majority PAC, FEC records show.
Since 1999, board member Fred Wilson has given over $2 million to political campaigns and committees, and only $17,600 of that went to Republicans, FEC records show.
Additionally, Coinbase’s Global Advisory Council is laden with Trump critics, including John Anzelone, a pollster for Biden, Obama and Hillary Clinton; former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper; former Democratic mayor of Los Angeles Antonio Villaraigosa; former GOP Sen. Pat Toomey, who said in September he would not vote for Trump; and former Democratic Congresswoman Stephanie Murphy, who served on the January 6th Select Committee.
Julia Krieger, Coinbase's head of U.S. public affairs, previously worked for American Bridge, a Democratic opposition research firm, and Media Matters, known for organizing pressure campaigns against conservative voices it opposes. She also held multiple roles in the Biden administration and the 2020 Biden campaign.
Coinbase does have two Trump allies on its advisory board — David Urban and recently appointed Chris LaCivita, who served as the Republican National Committee's chief operating officer and held multiple titles on the successful 2024 Trump campaign. Additionally, several members of Coinbase's executive team have donated to Republicans, including Brian Armstrong and Paul Grewal.
Armstrong, the company's CEO, was present at the Trump White House crypto summit earlier this year.
Open Secrets data from the 2024 election cycle shows a roughly 50-50 split between Coinbase's donations to congressional Democrats and Republicans.
"Our focus has always been mission first, to support candidates that support crypto and blockchain innovation, and we're proud to do so," Coinbase Chief Policy Officer Faryar Shirzad, a former top NSC official under President George W. Bush, told Fox News Digital.
Lehane also serves as the vice president of global affairs at OpenAI, a company that Fox News Digital reported on recently. It partnered with a new AI initiative led by a group co-founded with outgoing Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry that has pushed left-wing causes and has several board members aligned with Democrats.
The longtime Democratic operative is also an operating partner at Haun Ventures, which is staffed by employees who appear to donate almost exclusively to Democrats. Since 2022, individuals listed as being employed by Haun Ventures have made 43 separate political contributions totaling over $110,000. All 43 of those were to Democratic candidates or organizations.
Lehane is credited with coining the phrase "vast right-wing conspiracy" to describe the Monica Lewinsky scandal while he was working for the Clinton administration and has been labeled in the media as a "master of the political dark arts."
"Shocking, another Trump hater is trying to cozy up to Trump for business purposes," a person close to the Trump administration told Fox News Digital. "Trump won’t be fooled."
Lately, Lehane has been vocal about efforts to cozy up to the incoming administration, which has made advancing crypto and AI technology a priority, and even visited the White House in March. He "has had many meetings with Trump administration officials about AI policy, and expects a full strategy to be released by the summer," Axios reported.
"There's a real focus from the administration on developing an AI strategy to ensure U.S. economic competitiveness and national security are prioritized," Lehane told the outlet.
"Our work stream is intersecting with where the administration is going."
Lehane penned an op-ed for Fox News in March, "Securing the AI future: How President Trump's action plan can position America for success."
A former top advisor to ex-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., suggested House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., is not meeting the moment in the current Trump era.
"Trump is just giving us all this incredible red meat. I mean, I've never seen anything like this before. It's like the biggest gift any party has been given by the opposition, and we're just squandering it, to a degree," former Pelosi advisor Ashley Etienne told Politico's Deep Dive podcast.
Etienne helped Pelosi oversee Democrats' messaging during President Donald Trump's first impeachment. She also previously worked for former Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign.
She said Jeffries was "doing well" in many areas and said she had "a tremendous amount of respect" for the New York Democrat but signaled that he was missing opportunities on anti-Trump messaging.
"He gave a speech this morning. I don't have any talking points in my phone about what he said. And I'm going to be doing TV and this interview all day. That's a failure," Etienne said.
"How do you get to discipline if you're not telling people what the hell you want them to say? At least emphatically, at least tonally."
Jeffries' allies pushed back against that characterization, pointing out that intraparty friction was taking attention away from Trump's low poll numbers and Republicans' policies.
"Donald Trump’s approval ratings are plummeting, and he’s bringing House Republicans down with him. Extreme MAGA Republicans have been forced to delay their plans to advance Trump’s centerpiece legislative priority due to intense backlash against their scheme to enact the largest cuts in history to Medicaid and food assistance. Let’s keep the main thing, the main thing," Jeffries spokesperson Christiana Stephenson told Fox News Digital.
Just Friday morning, Jeffries released a statement hammering House Republicans for having to delay part of their legislative work to advance Trump's agenda.
But Etienne's comments are a notable rebuke from a former senior Democratic leadership aide to one of the party's most powerful current officials, which comes after months of Democrats being plagued by infighting over messaging woes.
Etienne noted that Democrats had scored several wins on the messaging front, like having "successfully demonized Elon Musk" and Sen. Cory Booker's recent record-breaking filibuster speech.
But she singled out liberals' protests during Trump's speech to a joint session of Congress as an "embarrassing" setback for the party and Jeffries.
"If you look at the headlines post-the speech, even during the speech, it was more about Democrats and Democrats protesting rather than what Trump was actually saying. And in those kind of moments, you don't want to become the story. You want Trump to be the story," Etienne said.
"And I also thought it was a problem for Mr. Jeffries. I mean, it really says a lot about how people value his leadership. He asked for no protest. And what did they do? They protest 50 different ways."
Both Pelosi and Jeffries' offices told Politico that the latter often seeks the former's input, and Jeffries' spokesperson pushed back on Politico's reporting that House Democratic leaders were seeking to move past Pelosi and that Jeffries was not doing enough to help Democratic groups with messaging.
One of those groups, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), pushed back on the assertion they were not hearing enough from Jeffries.
PCCC sent out a press release that read, "Today, in a POLITICO article we are not interested in dwelling on, a former Pelosi staffer attacked Hakeem Jeffries. PCCC co-founder Adam Green said, ‘We hear more from Jeffries than we ever heard from Pelosi.’"
Meanwhile, a House Democratic aide told Fox News Digital that Jeffries held "multiple calls" previewing his earlier speech on Trump's first 100 days in office, as well as talking points "emphasizing the Leader’s message that President Trump’s first 100 days have been a disaster for the American people."
Stephenson, Jeffries' spokesperson, also posted on X of Politico's report, "Can anyone tell me how grandstanding like this is anything other than a gift to Republicans?"
But House Republicans' elections arm was quick to pounce on the discord as well.
"Hakeem Jeffries is the so-called leader of a team that doesn’t fear him, doesn’t follow him, and now, doesn’t even pretend to respect him," National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) spokesman Mike Marinella said in a statement.
And Democratic strategist Julian Epstein, a former chief counsel of the House Judiciary Committee, criticized Jeffries' leadership but said that Trump was not Democrats' main problem.
"He's not a particularly effective speaker, gives no sense of direction or purpose, seems intent on not offending anyone, and has a leadership style that seems extremely passive," Epstein said.
"The Democrats in the House just seem like a big blob that goes wherever gravity takes them, and right now gravity is taking them to the hard protest left. But no matter who the leader is, if the Democrats are selling a product that voters don't like, it won't matter."
Pelosi's office did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment.
President Donald Trump fired off a scathing Truth Social post late on Thursday night as he is once again targeted for impeachment, floating the idea that Republicans should target Democrats for expulsion from Congress.
"The Democrats are really out of control. They have lost everything, especially their minds! These Radical Left Lunatics are into the ‘Impeachment thing’ again. They have already got two ‘No Name,’ little respected Congressmen, total Whackjobs both, throwing the ‘Impeachment’ of DONALD J. TRUMP around, for about the 20th time, even though they have no idea for what I would be Impeached," Trump declared in the post.
Earlier this week Rep. Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., announced articles of impeachment against Trump.
Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, applauded the impeachment effort and declared during a speech, "Add my name to your articles of impeachment."
Green also plans to introduce his own articles of impeachment targeting Trump.
"These Congressmen stated that, they didn’t know why they would Impeach me but, ‘We just want to do it.’ The Republicans should start to think about expelling them from Congress for all of the crimes that they have committed, especially around Election time(s)," Trump asserted in his post.
Thanedar's resolution includes seven articles of impeachment: "OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, VIOLATION OF DUE PROCESS, AND A BREACH OF THE DUTY TO FAITHFULLY EXECUTE LAWS," "USURPATION OF THE APPROPRIATIONS POWER," "ABUSE OF TRADE POWERS AND INTERNATIONAL AGGRESSION," "VIOLATION OF FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS," "CREATION OF UNLAWFUL OFFICE," "BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION," and "TYRANNY."
The House impeached Trump twice during his first term in office, but in each case the Senate vote failed to reach the threshold necessary for conviction.
The second impeachment occurred at the tail end of Trump's term in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, and the Senate vote resulting in acquittal occurred after Trump had already departed from office.
"These are very dishonest people that won’t let our Country heal! Why do we allow them to continuously use Impeachment as a weapon against the President of the United States who, by all accounts, is working hard to SAVE OUR COUNTRY. It’s the same playbook that they used in my First Term, and Republicans are not going to allow them to get away with it again. These are total LOWLIFES, who hate our Country, and everything it stands for," Trump declared in his late-night post on Thursday.
"Perhaps we should start playing this game on them, and expel Democrats for the many crimes that they have committed — And these are REAL crimes," he declared. "Remember, ‘Shifty’ Adam Schiff demanded a Pardon, and they had to use the power of the Auto Pen, and a Full Pardon, for him and the Unselect Committee of Political Thugs, to save them from Expulsion, and probably worse!"
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson warned Thursday against attacks and pointed rhetoric against the judiciary in an unsubtle reference to President Trump's criticisms of judges ruling against his policies.
