House Democrats are learning that President Trump is a papier-mâché man. The paste that holds him together is a mixture of bluff, myth, and his opponents’ insecurity. In the 1980s, according to The New York Times, he scammed investors by pretending to be a corporate raider. He would purchase a bunch of shares in a company, leak a rumor that he planned to take it over, then sell the shares after they rose. He played on the twin myths that he was good at business and had the competence to take over major companies—and he bet that investors would be too sheepish to question either one. It worked, for a while. But investors eventually got wise and Trump lost $35 million.

The same thing is finally happening in Washington, D.C.

Trump seems to have thought he was in the clear. The day after former FBI Director Robert Mueller testified to Congress and House Democrats made clear that they still had no intention of impeaching him, Trump called Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and pressed him to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son. What he didn’t realize was that some Democrats, as Bloomberg reported, “regret their timidity on Mueller report and think it signaled to president that he was above accountability.” So when the Ukraine news broke, Democrats didn’t hesitate. More than 20—including prominent hold-outs—came out for impeachment overnight. Ignoring White House spin that nothing inappropriate was said on the call to Zelenksy, Democrats pushed aggressively for a call record and the full whistleblower complaint to be released. When they were, Democrats didn’t hesitate to call the contents what they were: a smoking gun.

The lesson is that pressure works against Trump. His decision to release the call record and whistleblower report was a massive mistake, one that was hotly debated within the White House, according to the Washington Post. But when you apply pressure, you force your opponent to make mistakes.

Now that a majority of the House supports impeachment, Democrats should plan a process that exerts maximum pressure on Senate Republicans. They have largely escaped the limelight and benefited from the assumption that they’ll vote against removing President Trump. But that assumption deserves scrutiny: even if they do, the vote is likely to be messy, painful, and cost them dearly in 2020. There is a lot of uncertainty ahead, but here’s what a process that puts a squeeze on Senate Republicans could look like.

First, Democrats should immediately start hammering home the fact that if the House votes to impeach Trump, he is impeached. The two-front war against impeachment from right and left muddied this message and it needs to be re-emphasized. Article one, Section two of the Constitution states that the House “shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.” The Senate only gets to decide what to do with Trump. Neither of the two presidents in American history to be impeached were removed from office by the Senate, but history regards them as having been impeached. Establishing this principle early is important.

Second, House Democrats would be wise to keep the scope of the inquiry focused on the Ukraine news. There is some disagreement about whether to open a more sprawling inquiry on the left, but the most important goals here are to impeach this president and send the most compelling possible case to the Senate. The Ukraine news is damning, clear as day, and impossible to explain away. And it provides a rock-solid foundation for a story about a president who extorted the power of his office for personal gain, and tried to cover it up when he got caught. The Mueller report provides important context and establishes a pattern of behavior, including the President’s efforts to obstruct justice and Congressional investigations, and can be included to help tell the story.