Dear Mitt Romney: History Is Watching and Future Americans are Depending on You

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Dear Senator Mitt Romney:

It seems like we have been in similar situations before, though it feels they have never turned out all that well. Once again, America needs someone in power to stand up and do the right thing, even though they will only be punished for it, at least in the short-run.

We both know that the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump is sure to be at least somewhat of a sham, with his acquittal by the rigged process even more of a slam dunk than your election as a GOP senator from Utah was just over two years ago. Consequently, our country desperately needs someone to preserve the ability of a future Congress to remove a theoretical future tyrant from the office of the presidency.

Unfortunately, you are the person best suited to jump on a metaphorical hand-grenade by being potentially the only Republican to vote to remove Trump from office. My sense is that you know this is the case, but that you are also likely rationalizing that such an act of near political suicide would not be worth whatever might be gained by casting a vote solely based on what is right, and on symbolically preserving the historical record of what really happened here.

Before you come to a final conclusion on that question, I beseech you to at least hear me out. I know that you can’t leave the Senate during the trial, so I am pretty sure you will have lots of time on your hands for such consideration.

We both know that Trump is clearly guilty of both of the articles of impeachment brought against him. Heck, he and his minions have essentially admitted as much.

Abuse of Power and Obstruction of Congress strictly on the Ukrainian matter are not the charges which I would have brought against Trump — the whole thing feels like trying to get O.J. Simpson on the Las Vegas heist after he got away with double murder — but he obviously committed both of these transgressions. And yes, despite what his legal team is bizarrely claiming, they are indeed impeachable offenses.

Consequently, a vote to remove Trump would be warranted based simply on the factual record, even if there was no chance at all that he will actually be removed. In theory, there would be value in just doing what was right based on the facts, but the real stakes here are far higher than just a (now rather quaint) concept of a politician voting one’s conscience only because it was the principled thing to do.

Mitt, let’s face it, there is a canyon of difference between how this impeachment will be perceived, both during this critical election year and far into our future (assuming we as a country survive that long) if Trump is acquitted with no Republicans voting to remove him, or if even one GOPer casts a ballot to do so. This is especially the case if the person who takes that courageous dive just happens to be the man who was the last GOP presidential nominee not named Trump, and someone whom the current president enthusiastically endorsed during that election of 2012 (which probably feels to you like it happened closer to 1912, as I know it does for me).

If no Republicans vote to remove him, Trump will be able to plausibly claim that the whole thing was a partisan “hoax” and that he did not even do anything wrong. After all, if he had, surely at least one current Republican in either the House or the Senate would have voted a life-long liberal from Manhattan, one who just cost the GOP control of the House, guilty of these charges.

Under this scenario, Trump’s re-election bid is obviously boosted, but the potential effect would go far beyond just impacting his chances of winning another term in office. It would set a precedent that such presidential behavior may not be impeachable at all. Someday, it could mean the difference between a Congress being able to remove an even greater threat to the Republic, or having that would-be king free to “abuse power” with impunity after the impeachment authority was rendered impotent in this area during this current fiasco.

While there are no guarantees, should you vote to convict Trump, it is likely that would give enough cover for a couple of other Republicans to join you, thus magnifying your vote’s impact, while mitigating the amount of incoming fire any of you would take (conversely, if even you decide to not vote to convict, I can assure you that NO other Republican will feel safe to do so). However, given the abject cowardice of humans in general and politicians in particular, if you are going to go down this path you must be prepared to go it alone.

I’m not going to lie. It would not be easy.

You would get crushed by the president, his GOP sycophants, and his state-run media for the foreseeable future. You would be so radioactive under the “lone dissenter” scenario that you probably couldn’t even get a post office renamed in Utah (unless it was for Ivanka Trump), and, if Trump won re-election, it would be easy to see him successfully target you in your 2024 re-election bid, which I doubt you would even bother to undertake.

In short, the rest of your political career would be crippled, if not decapitated. On the bright side, however, none of this would have much impact on the things you claim to be most important in your life. Your very large family will still love you, you will still be very rich, and in many circles, especially in the eyes of history, you would be highly respected throughout the rest of your days, and beyond.

But, perhaps mostly importantly, you have so many grandchildren that you have literally lost count. They will still be here long after you are gone, but the influence of your vote on impeachment may still have a real bearing on them and the country for which you clearly have deep affection.

Please consider casting your vote on impeachment based on what your grandchildren and other Americans of the future might likely face someday. They won’t care at all if you go with the GOP herd and safely vote to not make your life a lot less pleasant, but it might very well might mean a lot to them if your vote helped, even a little bit, allow future senators to save their country from a very serious threat to our entire way of life.

Mitt, based on your past record of eventually wimping out on matters of principle, I am fully expecting you to do the same here (my guess is that you will lamely think that fighting for witnesses is doing your duty, and then you will claim that the fake trial didn’t produce enough evidence to warrant conviction). But I am begging you to have your final political chapter be one which dramatically flips that script and does what is best for the long-term future of this country, by voting to remove President Trump from office.

John Ziegler is a senior columnist for Mediaite. He hosts a weekly podcast focusing on news media issues and is documentary filmmaker. You can follow him on Twitter at @ZigManFreud  or email him at johnz@mediaite.com

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.