How Romney could help unseat Trump
A showman always, Donald Trump is handicapping the odds of his presidency. His early, unvarnished prediction: He expects to be impeached by the House of Representatives (“they have the votes”) and acquitted by the Senate.
Of course, you might ask, aren’t we getting ahead of ourselves? Isn’t the impeachment inquiry just starting?
In this American melodrama, process is prologue. When the Democrats opened their investigation, they knew how it would end. They knew they would have to impeach Trump. To do otherwise would allow him to dismiss their examination as a “witch hunt.”
Of course, Democrats say they will carry out due diligence before deciding whether the president’s behaviour reaches the level of “high crimes and misdemeanours.”
But they expect to find more evidence of Trump soliciting foreign interference in domestic politics for a quid pro quo.
Moreover, if the administration refuses to let officials testify and withholds documents, they will charge him with obstruction of justice, too.
So, understand one certainty this autumn: Trump will be impeached. Articles of impeachment are expected to land before the House for consideration by late November.
If the Democrats are particularly spiteful, they will vote on impeachment on Dec. 19, 21 years to the day that the Republicans impeached Bill Clinton. (In its perverse way, that would be almost as humiliating as the Germans making the French surrender to them in 1940 in the same railway car, in Compiegne, in which they had surrendered to the French in 1918.)
After impeachment, the other assumption is that the Senate will exonerate Trump. If the Democrats have the numbers to indict, says conventional wisdom, the Republicans have the numbers to acquit.
The arithmetic is compelling. It will take 67 votes of the Senate, which means that 48 sitting Democrats will have to persuade 19 of 53 sitting Republicans to join them. And that’s where things get interesting among Republicans. Is there anyone among them to stand up and show moral leadership?
Enter Sen. Mitt Romney.
Of all the Republicans in the Senate, Romney has been the most critical of Trump. “By all appearances, the president’s brazen and unprecedented appeal to China and to Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden is wrong and appalling,” he said last week.
For this, Trump called Romney a “pompous ass” who “begged” for his endorsement when he ran for the Senate in 2018 and “begged” him to make Romney secretary of state. Trump attacked Romney in 2016 when Romney called him unfit to be president.
But that did not prevent the two from dining together after Trump won. It was quite a spectacle, adversaries eyeing each other nervously, and it seemed that Trump did it to humiliate Romney, whom he had no intention of appointing to cabinet.
Now Romney has a monumental opportunity to break with the Vichy Republicans and establish himself as a figure of integrity. If he plays this right, he could redeem his reputation and more.
Romney has nothing to lose. He is wealthy. He is not up for re-election until 2024 in Utah, a red state suspicious of Trump. He is a former presidential nominee with some stature, even affection, in what remains of the Grand Old Party.
If Romney decides early that Trump should go, he will give cover to vulnerable moderate Republicans such as Susan Collins (Maine), Cory Gardner (Colorado) and Martha McSally (Arizona). Their re-election is uncertain next year. If all lose, the Senate will be split 50-50.
They and their colleagues may consider it in their interest to unseat Trump. Republicans may well waver if they see themselves losing the Senate. The key figure here is Mitch McConnell, who is more interested in remaining majority leader than seeing Trump remain president.
If Romney were to break with the president, he would place himself on the right side of history. He might even carry enough Republicans who would turn to him (not the contaminated Mike Pence) as their nominee, once again, next year.
Mitt Romney, 2020: an unlikely meeting of the man and the moment.