Pelosi: ‘It Doesn’t Matter’ if Impeachment Costs Democrats the House

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Sept. 28 that the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump would still be worth it even if the Democrats lose a majority in the House.

Pelosi (D-Calif.) said it’s more important for Congress to uphold its duty than for the Democrats to control the lower Congressional chamber.

“It doesn’t matter,” Pelosi replied when asked by Texas Tribune CEO Evan Smith if she is worried about the Democrats’ ability to keep the House majority if their push for impeachment goes poorly.

“People say you have to take a political risk doing that,” she said.“That doesn’t matter. Because we cannot have a president of the United States undermining his oath of office, his loyalty to his oath of office, undermining our national security, and undermining the integrity of our elections.”

The longtime legislator added that the House’s responsibility is to “protect and defend” the U.S. Constitution.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) departs the Capitol en route to a speaking event in Washington on Sept. 24, 2019. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

In order to impeach a president, the House would need a simple majority before it is turned over to the Senate, which would need over a two-thirds majority, or 67 percent, to remove a president.

Earlier this week, Pelosi announced that an effort to inquire about impeachment is “moving forward” against Trump after reports of a telephone call between him and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, where he discussed former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.

A day later, the White House released a transcript of the phone call showing that Trump had asked Zelensky to look into Biden, but he did not exert any pressure and neither was there any quid pro quo—which had been the center of a controversy.

On Friday afternoon, three House committees announced that one of the committees has issued a subpoena on Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over documents relating to Ukraine dealings as well as scheduled dispositions for five state department officials as part of their inquiry.

President Donald Trump disembarks after arriving on Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Md., on Sept. 26, 2019. (Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)

On Saturday, Trump slammed critics of the call on Twitter: “The Whistleblower’s complaint is completely different and at odds from my actual conversation with the new President of Ukraine. The so-called ‘Whistleblower’ knew practically NOTHING in that those ridiculous charges were far more dramatic & wrong, just like Liddle’ Adam Schiff.”

Regarding the impeachment charges, Trump said that it’s a “scam,” adding that Democrats are trying to tear the country apart.

“What’s going on now is the single greatest scam in the history of American politics,” Trump said in a video over the weekend. “The Democrats want to take away your guns, they want to take away your healthcare, they want to take away your vote, they want to take away your freedom, they want to take away your judges, they want to take away everything. We can never let this happen.”

“We are fighting to drain the swamp. And that’s exactly what I’m doing and you see why we have to do it because our country is at stake like never before. It’s all very simple. They’re trying to stop me because I’m fighting for you. And I’ll never let that happen,” he added.