Kevin McCarthy Open To Considering Expunging Trump’s Impeachments
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said he’d take a “look at” attempting to expunge former President Donald Trump’s double impeachments.
The Washington Post It was noted that Republicans had proposed resolutions to extinguish or erase the impeachments in the previous Congress, but they failed to get anywhere.
Asked at a news conference Thursday about expunging the impeachments now that Republicans control the House, McCarthy responded: “I would understand why members would want to bring that forward.”
He added: “I understand why individuals want to do it, and we’d look at it.”
He did not provide any additional details.
Trump was first impeached by the House in 2019 for abuse of power after he attempted to strong-arm Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — while holding up important military aid— into launching a bogus investigation into Joe Biden His expected run for the presidency is a few months away.
Trump was later impeached over his involvement in the Jan. 6 rebellion.
After the violence, McCarthy declared on the floor of the House that the “president bears responsibility for [the] Attack on Congress by mob-rioters. He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding.”
Trump was not convicted in Senate trials following each of the impeachments. However, the House indictment is still in effect.
Noah Bookbinder, President of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics Washington wrote in a tweet that it’s “outrageous that Speaker McCarthy would consider expunging Donald Trump’s impeachments. Trump tried to overturn an election that he had lost by inciting a violent rebellion. Congress should have barred him from office.”
Georgia State University law professor Anthony Michael Kreis mocked McCarthy’s position, tweeting: “Not sure that’s how it works.”