When it comes to impeaching Trump, Democratic House candidates are in no rush

Charles Stile | NorthJersey

Show Caption Hide Caption Trump denies colluding with aide George Papadopoulos The President tweeted, "The Fake News is working overtime" and that they should "check the Dems!"

After back-to-back bombshells rocked Trumpworld last week, House candidate Tom Malinowski declared it time for both parties to hold President Donald Trump "accountable" for undermining the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign.

Yet, nowhere in Malinowski's 350-word "call to action" manifesto will you find the I-word.

"I think it's a mistake to talk about impeachment before the evidence is in,'' Malinowski, a Democrat who is running in the 7th Congressional District in central Jersey, said in an interview. "In our system, impeachment has to be seen as the patriotic, not the partisan thing to do."

Malinowski's reaction was fairly typical among Democrats — and most of their allies — after last week's developments that suggested special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation was picking up steam and closing in on Trump and his inner circle.

Perhaps most damning was the admission of former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen that Trump directed him to funnel hush money to two women during the 2016 campaign about affairs they claimed to have had with Trump. That admission — made as Cohen pleaded guilty to multiple counts of tax evasion and one count of bank fraud — came shortly before former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort was convicted in a separate case on eight counts of bank and tax fraud.

But Cohen's account implicated Trump in an illegal scheme to evade campaign finance laws, a felony. Political analysts quickly claimed that the revelations have virtually ensured that impeachment will become the centerpiece issue of the crucial midterm campaigns for Congress.

Yet Democrats running for the House — who if elected could approve articles of impeachment — are downplaying the impeachment talk. Most are taking their cues from embattled House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi and other party leaders who fear that an obsessional focus on impeachment could backfire and thwart the party's chances of recapturing the House for the first time in eight years.

The rationale boils down to this: Impeachment is not a priority for most voters, and to demand Trump's head before Mueller has completed his investigation could turn Trump into a sympathetic figure and rile up the GOP turnout in battleground races. It could make Democrats look hellbent on trying to reverse the results of the 2016 election.

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"As a practical matter, if you are conceivably going to be voting on articles of impeachment or conceivably be voting on removing somebody from office, you have to be circumspect about that. You’re almost a juror,'' said Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute of Politics at Rider University. "I think getting ahead of yourself would be a real mistake before all the evidence is in."

Legal analysts also expect Manafort and Cohen to cooperate with prosecutors to avoid prison time. And prosecutors offered immunity to Trump's longtime accountant and to David J. Pecker, publisher of the National Enquirer tabloid, which allegedly participated in the hush-money scheme.

Those developments are likely to ensure that Trump's legal troubles — and the threat of impeachment — will remain at the forefront of the midterm campaign. Democrats can let the headlines speak for themselves.

Clamoring for impeachment would also crowd out discussion on other hot-button issues that boost Democratic candidates chances, like Trump's efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act.

Democrat Mikie Sherrill, a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot who is running for the Morris County-centric 11th Congressional District, said being "appalled" by Trump motivated her to run last year. But last week, Sherrill, who is also a former federal prosecutor, said voters she has met on the campaign trail are more concerned about restoring the state and local tax deduction, which was curtailed by Trump's tax overhaul last December — not impeachment.

"As a federal prosecutor at the U.S. Attorney's Office, I know that we considered legal proceedings only after law enforcement had finished collecting evidence and presented their findings,'' Sherrill said in a statement. "Congress should support Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation and allow him to finish his work."

It's a view shared by other Democratic challengers, such as Andy Kim, a former Obama administration officials who is running for the 3rd Congressional District, which stretches from the Philadelphia suburbs to the Jersey shore in Ocean and Monmouth counties.

"Andy believes that the Mueller investigation and any independent investigations by the Senate needs to be finished without impediment,'' said Forrest Rilling, Kim's spokesman. "Any conclusion based on those finding will be dealt with at that time."

Yet not every Democratic-aligned group agrees with the cautious, wait-and-see approach. Liberal billionaire Tom Steyer has been running television and digital ads calling for Trump's impeachment for much of the past year, angering establishment Democrats.

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Last week's revelations — coming only a month after the furor over Trump's siding with Vladimir Putin over the nation's intelligence agencies — only has deepened the resolve to make impeachment a centerpiece issue in the midterm races, according to Kevin Mack, chief strategist for Need to Impeach, Steyer's group.

Mack says Democrats now have a "moral obligation" to discuss the issue, and he disputes strategic concerns that impeachment talk will rile up the Republican base. He says immigration, Pelosi and taxes are the mainstay issues of Republican attack ads so far.

"There has not been a single one yet that says the word impeachment,'' Mack said of the GOP ads. "If it were such a great election issue ... why are they not spending any money behind it?"

Meanwhile, Mack argues, impeachment is supported by a large majority of Democratic voters. He said the Democratic establishment is "leaving on the table" an issue that "could really make a difference in this election cycle."

Yet even ardent grass-roots activists and moderate Democrats, who are united in their loathing for Trump — are comfortable with the wait-and-see approach. Mike Greenspan, who runs a small pharmaceutical company in Montville, says Democrats should be more "calculated in how they approach this" rather than start "shooting from the hip."

"If we shoot now, we’re going to blow our political capital, in my opinion,'' he said.

The fallout over Mueller's probe has complicated the campaigns of New Jersey House Republicans. While Republicans from Trump's base in the Midwest and South have clamored for Mueller to quickly wrap up the investigation, New Jersey Republicans have struggled to navigate a more centrist path.

Rep. Leonard Lance, R-Hunterdon, the 7th District incumbent who is being challenged by Malinowski, tweeted last week that the Manafort and Cohen convictions "only bolster my belief that the special counsel must be allowed to finish his investigation unimpeded by pressure from the White House, elected officials or the public." Lance also co-sponsored a resolution in July endorsing the intelligence community's assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 election.

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Republican Rep. Tom MacArthur, the 3rd District incumbent, has backed Trump on high-profile initiatives, such as voting for the tax overhaul and brokering a compromise on a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. But MacArthur has also consistently defended Mueller's probe and still does, according to a campaign official.

Jay Webber, the Republican state lawmaker who is facing Sherrill in the 11th District race said, "The investigation has not found any evidence of such collusion, and at this point it seems unlikely that it will. I think it's important that the investigation wraps up in a timely fashion, the public gets Mr. Mueller’s full report, and we move on.''