Divided Dems kill impeachment try

Democratic brass in the House sided with Republicans and killed a long-shot push for impeachment on Wednesday, but a significant number of progressives nonetheless voted in favor of the measure to remove President Trump, escalating intraparty tensions on the hot-button issue.

Texas Rep. Al Green, who has unsuccessfully introduced articles of impeachment twice before, took another crack at it and proposed a resolution Tuesday night calling for Trump removal proceedings to begin.

Green’s latest resolution, which is the first impeachment attempt since Democrats took control of the House in January, charges Trump is “unfit” to serve and should be removed over his “racist” Sunday tweets calling on four progressive congresswomen of color to “go back” to their countries. All four women are American citizens and only one of them is foreignborn.

But the House — in which a majority of Democrats are hesitant about impeachment and all Republicans vehemently oppose it — passed a motion to table Green’s resolution in a 322-95 vote, effectively killing it.

The vote pitted Democratic progressives against moderates and could intensify clashes between the two factions, which have openly feuded in recent weeks over impeachment and other issues.

Ninety-five Democrats voted against tabling the resolution while 137 voted for it, meaning more than 40% of them are now on the record backing impeachment. By contrast, only 66 Democrats voted against tabling a similar resolution in January 2018.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler — whose panel is the first line of offense in impeachment proceedings — significantly voted against the motion to table, putting him at odds with Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“I opposed this procedural motion because this article of impeachment should have been referred to the House Judiciary Committee,” Nadler (D-N.Y.) said in a statement, referring to another process by which Green’s resolution could have been kept alive.

But Pelosi, whose consent is ultimately mandatory to move forward with impeachment proceedings, slapped down Green’s dreams before the vote even got underway.

“I think we’ll get rid of this right now,” Pelosi told reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day.

Pelosi (D-Calif.) has long favored putting off impeachment and pursuing a fact-finding mission instead. She stressed that six House committees are investigating Trump and his administration to that effect and that impeachment should be a last resort.