Dan Abrams Clashes With Law Professor: It’s ‘Nonsensical’ for Dems to Say There’s a ‘Constitutional Duty’ to Impeach
Dan Abrams took shots at both parties over their strategy on the impeachment proceedings, then clashed with a fellow ABC panelist in a fascinating analysis segment.
Speaking during a recess in Monday morning’s House Judiciary hearing, Abrams — the founder of Mediaite and chief legal analyst for ABC News — criticized Republicans for arguing that President Donald Trump threatened to withhold aid to Ukraine over concerns about corruption beyond former Vice President Joe Biden. Abrams noted that not one witness — including those called by Republicans — has testified to broader corruption serving as the president’s motivation.
“That’s the argument they’re making, but there’s no evidence,” Abrams said of Republicans. “There’s no witnesses to back it up.”
Abrams then turned to the other side of the aisle — getting on Democrats for, in his view, overstating their case by saying they have a Constitutional duty to impeach the president.
“You have to be careful about that as well, because there is no such thing as a Constitutional duty to impeach,” Abrams said. “They believe it’s their duty. It’s their opinion it’s their duty. But even if you think that there was wrongdoing, that this wasn’t about broader corruption in Ukraine, this was about a personal favor, the question still remains: What’s the remedy? What should happen? Should the punishment be removal from office?”
Fellow panelist Melissa Murray, a law professor at NYU, pushed back on Abrams.
“It’s true the Constitution does not prescribe a duty to impeach,” Murray said. “But each of those members of Congress, the senators, all of those officers take an oath to uphold the Constitution. And if the Constitution means anything, it certainly means upholding the machinery and apparatus of democratic government including the election process.”
“But that’s an opinion and analysis of what their duty should be,” Abrams said. “Of how they should interpret their own duty.”
“But that’s the whole Constitution, is an interpretation,” Murray replied.
“Right. That’s why when you say constitutional duty, it’s a nonsensical statement,” Abrams said. “Because it doesn’t mean anything. . . . .There’s an interpretation of what they view as their role here. And I think Democrats have to be very careful. They have to be saying, ‘Look, we think this is bad enough, we think this is so terrible that the framers would have said, this is exactly what we envisioned, et cetera.’ But there just is no such thing as a Constitutional duty to impeach.”
“That is what they’re saying,” Murray replied, arguing it is the opinion of constitutional lawyers invited to testify by Democrats that “this is so grave that it warrants impeachment.”
Watch above, via ABC News.
