As House Democrats lay out their impeachment case against President Trump before the U.S. Senate, critics say their accusations ring hollow.
That’s because Democratic lawmakers, including several members of the impeachment team, have used similar rhetoric in the past, including the phrase “fight like hell”. One House Democrat actually vowed to “fight like hell” against Trump during the House’s impeachment hearing.
Others even called previous elections stolen, which is one of the points they’ve attempted to make against Trump. For example, House impeachment manager Jamie Raskin issued a challenge against certifying President Trump’s 2016 electoral win.
Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky told CBN News the impeachment managers have failed to prove that President Trump committed an impeachable offense.
“I think the case that the violence that happened on January 6th was abhorrent and that the people who committed it should be punished, sure they’ve done a good job of that. But they’ve also admitted that the President’s words did not incite the crowd,” Sen. Paul said.
“Interestingly, one of the House Managers, David Cicilline, on the first day of the trial he stood up and said the President’s words are not why we’re convicting him or impeaching him, they said it was because he promoted this big lie that the election was stolen,” he continued.
“The lead House manager stood up in 2017 and said Trump stole the election and he voted not to cede the electors from Florida,” Sen. Paul pointed out.
“Hypocrisy and this idea of a double standard just doesn’t look well, I don’t think this is good for the country, it’s in no way unifying, and I think it just furthers the bitterness and rancor of the election, so I think this is a huge mistake by the Democrats,” he said.
“The thing is you have to look at the President’s actual words. What did he say? He said go fight. Let your voices be heard, and he said march peacefully and patriotically. How can you twist that into words that incite violence?”
“But I can give you Chuck Schumer’s words when he stood in front of a mob in front of the Supreme Court and he said, ‘Kavanaugh and Gorsuch, you have unleashed the whirlwind and you will pay the price, and you won’t know what hit you’,” Sen. Paul recalled.
“Immediately after Schumer spoke those words, the mob charged the door of the Supreme Court and they tried to tear it down. They stood on top of statues, they were confronting and belligerent, they threw stuff at the Supreme Court Justice’s cars, all after Schumer spoke. So if we’re going to judge political speech on the actual words, let’s use one standard and I think Democrats if they look in the mirror, they’ve been guilty of much more than they’re accusing Trump of.”