House Democrat pushes to impeach 'authoritarian' Trump

Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, is once again calling on his colleagues in the House to impeach President Donald Trump, saying the president has "devolved American democracy into authoritarianism." 

"I pen this communique with a heavy heart, driven by a conscience that will not allow me to ignore my well-founded, strong pre-election condemnation of Donald John Trump as a threat to American democracy that has now become our reality," Green wrote in a letter urging his colleagues to impeach the president.

Green argues that, contrary to what many believe, there does not need to be a constitutional crisis in order to impeach a president.

HOUSE DEMOCRAT ANNOUNCES ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT AGAINST TRUMP

On Thursday, he filed H. Res. 415, "Impeaching Donald John Trump, President of the United States, of high crimes and misdemeanors."

In the articles of impeachment, Green claims that Trump has engaged in authoritarian rule, violated due process, denigrated federal judges and ignored court orders, including ones from the Supreme Court. He also claims that Trump condoned "untruthful statements" against the Court’s opinion regarding the deportation of accused MS-13 member Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

TOP HOUSE DEMS SAY THEY'LL JOIN GOP TO QUASH TRUMP IMPEACHMENT EFFORT

"An authoritarian does not have to commit a codified statutory offense to be impeached. The constitutional law that authoritarian President Trump would have Congress use to impeach a federal judge for ruling against him (Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution) is the same law that has been used, and can be used, to impeach him again for making his threats to democracy a reality," Green wrote in the articles of impeachment, He then vowed to "use that law again."

Green is the second member of Congress to issue articles of impeachment against Trump in the president’s second term. Rep. Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., also called for Trump’s impeachment, but he later withdrew the bill after getting backlash from party leadership. Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., reportedly called the bill "idiotic," according to Axios. However, Nadler was previously a sponsor of the measure.

In his letter, Green made it clear that he was not afraid to "stand alone" against Trump.

"I encourage all members to vote with their conscience. As for me, I stand where I have stood on impeachment, which is a question of conscience, even when the odds are against me — it is better for me to stand alone than not stand at all — it won’t be the first time," Green wrote.

Green has never been silent about his opposition to Trump, even making multiple attempts to impeach the president during his first term. In March 2025, he was removed from Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress after he heckled the president. He was eventually censured for the protest.

JONATHAN TURLEY: Biden not the only loser revealed by shocking Hur audio

"For posterity's sake."

Those words from President Joe Biden sum up the crushing impact of the leaked audiotapes from the interview between him and Special Counsel Robert Hur. Not only did they remove any doubt over Biden committing federal crimes, but they also constituted what is akin to a political racketeering indictment against much of the Washington establishment, from the White House staff to Democratic politicians to the media.

The interview, conducted from Oct. 8-9, 2023, has long been sought by Congress, but was kept under wraps by Biden's Justice Department even as Biden campaigned for a second term.

BIDEN REPEATEDLY SAYS ‘I DON’T REMEMBER' REGARDING CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS IN NEWLY RELEASED HUR INTERVIEW AUDIO

Many of us balked at the conclusion of Hur that no charges were appropriate despite the fact that the president had removed classified documents for decades, stored them in grossly negligent ways, and moved them around to unsecure locations, including his garage in Delaware.

Given President Donald Trump's indictment for the same offenses, it was hard to imagine how the special counsel could not recommend the same criminal charges (presumably after he left office).

Instead, Hur declared it would have been hard to get a jury to convict Biden because he was "a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory."

It appears that Trump, on the other hand, was presumptively not sympathetic or well-meaning and possessed a good enough memory to face prosecution.

The contrast was glaring and only reinforced the view of many citizens that there are two tracks for justice in Washington.

Soon after the report's release, Biden gave an irate press conference at which he lied about the findings of his culpability and lashed out at any suggestion that he had gapped or stumbled in the interview.

For example, when reporters raised Hur's assertion that Biden had forgotten when his son Beau died, Biden angrily responded, "How in the hell dare he raise that?" Frankly, when I was asked the question, I thought to myself it wasn’t any of their damn business."

However, it was not Hur but Biden himself who raised the death of his son, and he forgot a wide array of dates, including when he served in office.

The interview shows that in 2023 it was clear that Biden was mentally diminished despite claims from many allies and former aides that there was a sudden loss of capacity just before the disastrous debate in 2024. It is now undeniable that the White House staff actively hid the president's incompetence from the American public. That includes the White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki (who left her post in May 2022) and her successor, Karine Jean-Pierre, who insisted that Biden was sharp and "running circles" around the staff.

Of course, the media is now covering the story after the public saw the truth in the debate. Figures like CNN's Jake Tapper have even written books that belatedly pursue the question despite previously insisting that there was no evidence of a diminishment in Biden's mental state.

Tapper repeatedly dismissed the claim and even excoriated Lara Trump for raising it. In one interview, he pushed a White House talking point that such suggestions were mocking Biden for a childhood stutter.

"It's so amazing to me- a ‘cognitive decline,’" he told the president's daughter-in-law. "I think you were mocking his stutter. Yeah. I think you were mocking his stutter and I think you have absolutely no standing to diagnose somebody's cognitive decline. I would think somebody in the Trump family would be more sensitive to people who do not have medical licenses diagnosing politicians from afar."

When Lara Trump insisted that this was clearly evidence of a "very concerning" cognitive decline, Tapper dismissed her statement by saying, "Thank you, Lara. I'm sure it's from a place of concern. We all believe that."

Keep in mind that others beyond Lara Trump were raising this issue and there were tapes showing obvious physical and mental decline. The media simply refused to seriously pursue the story until the cover-up no longer mattered after the debate.

Over on MSNBC, Joe Scarborough was equally apoplectic at those raising the issue and stated

"Start your tape right now because I’m about to tell you the truth. And eff you if you can’t handle the truth. This version of Biden intellectually, analytically, is the best Biden ever. Not a close second. And I have known him for years…If it weren’t the truth, I wouldn’t say it

This media effort continued all the way up the debate itself. On CNN.com, Oliver Darcy wrote "Right-wing media figures are desperately pushing conspiracy theories about Biden ahead of the debate."

Once the public found out, the media was ready to tell the story when it became impossible, and no longer politically beneficial, to deny it. Articles began to appear with the same realization of, "Oh you meant THAT mental decline. Well sure."

It was the same belated acknowledgment that came, after the election, with Hunter Biden's laptop. The media just moved on with a shrug and a collective "our bad" concession.

As for the then-president himself, the one moment of clarity in the interview may have been his most incriminating line. When asked why he removed classified material on Afghanistan, Biden admitted "I guess I wanted to hang on to it for posterity's sake."

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That is precisely what critics on CNN and MSNBC accused Trump of doing: removing material as types of keepsakes or trophies.

One president was indicted for that and one was sent along his way to pursue a second term in office.

The real indictment that comes out of these tapes is a type of political racketeering enterprise by the Washington establishment. It took a total team effort from Democratic politicians to the White House staff to the media to hide the fact that the president of the United States was mentally diminished. It there were a political RICO crime, half of Washington would be frog marched to the nearest federal courthouse.

Of course, none of this complicity in the cover-up is an actual crime. It is part of the Washington racket.

After all, this is Washington where such duplicity results not in plea deals but book deals.

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