"The President Isn't Above the Law"

What law?


As the impeachment trial winds down today, the Dems are pulling out all the stops trying to prolong the process. First, the NY Times comes out with a new "revelation" that Trump gave John Bolton some sort of instructions to pressure Ukraine, blah, blah blah (according to the manuscript that we have not yet seen). Naturally, CNN is all over it. We have three more hours before some other blockbuster leak hits the airwaves trying to get a couple of Republican senators to vote for witnesses and documents. That is the theme of the arguments from the House managers today. Acquittal, if a vote happens today, is a foregone conclusion.

And as every day, the House managers keep insisting that the President should not be above the law.

The problem is that they have not charged him with any crimes in their articles of impeachment. Indeed, they are arguing against Alan Dershowitz that an actual crime isn't necessary to impeach.

The articles are: Abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

First of all, there is no crime on our law books for abuse of power. That is because it is too broad, too general, and too vague. Virtually every president within memory has been accused of abuse of power by his political enemies. So clearly, on this count, there is no law charged for the President to be above.

Then there is obstruction of Congress. Wow. That means that in our co-equal branches of government, anything the executive branch does in opposition to a Congress controlled by the other party can be called obstruction. Obstruction of justice is a crime. Obstruction of Congress is not. For the President to go to the courts to fight subpoenas by Congress is his legal right.

So I wish the House managers and their cheerleaders in the media would stop throwing that claim around that Trump isn't above the law. Of course he is not, but the articles of impeachment do not contain any laws that have allegedly been broken.