× Expand Michael Vadon and Nick-D During the 1973 Watergate crisis involving Richard M. Nixon, a lead editorial in ‘The Progressive’ asked, “Will we permit our highest and most powerful office—an office whose occupant can literally decide the future and even the survival of the nation and the world—to remain in the hands of a man who has, in the words of the American Civil Liberties Union, ‘made one thing perfectly clear: He will function above the law whenever he can get away with it?’ ”

Donald Trump’s sudden firing of FBI Director James Comey shocked Washington, D.C., the American public, and Comey himself—who reportedly found out about it from a television news report while he was giving a speech, and thought it was a joke.

Trump’s explanation: that Comey was fired for publicly discussing an FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton’s private email server before the election—arguably helping Trump to win—makes little sense.

More to the point, Comey was leading a criminal probe of the Trump team’s collusion with Russia and Russian meddling in the U.S. election. CNN reported days ago that a grand jury in Virginia was issuing subpoenas, which it called “the first sign of a significant escalation of activity in the FBI’s broader investigation.”

Trump made a point of referring to the Russia probe in his letter dismissing Comey: “While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the bureau.”

So now, what will become of the Russia probe? If the FBI is frozen, can a parallel investigation by the Senate Intelligence Committee pick up the slack?

Lisa Graves, executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, and a former deputy assistant attorney general and chief counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee, says no.

“The willingness of ‘leaders’ like Mitch McConnell to put their party above our country above the sacred trust of defending our Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic who would try to subvert our democracy and the rule of law, demonstrates that a closed-door Senate examination is insufficient,” Graves says.

Even a truly bipartisan Senate investigation could not match the intelligence and law-enforcement firepower of the FBI to expose the relationships between Trump, his family members, businesses, advisors, and the Russian government, Graves points out.

She calls Trump’s firing of Comey a “constitutional crisis” and says the Justice Department must appoint a special prosecutor.

“Trump is not king. The United States is not a monarchy. Any leader who fails to join the call for a special prosecutor must be considered an abettor to his subversion of the rule of law.”

“Trump is not king. The United States is not a monarchy,” Graves says. “And any leader who fails to join in the call for a special prosecutor or who attempts to minimize the crisis Trump has caused must be considered an aider and abettor to his subversion of the rule of law. And a majority of the American people will hold them accountable.”

In 1973, when President Nixon fired special prosecutor Archibald Cox while Cox was investigating the Watergate break-in, the lead editorial in The Progressive was “A Call to Action.”

From The Progressive, March 1973.

A “crisis,” the editors declared, “swirls around the person of the President of the United States . . . . We are confronted, suddenly and dramatically, with fundamental questions that demand swift and decisive answers.”

The fundamental questions are the same today: “Will we permit our highest and most powerful office—an office whose occupant can literally decide the future and even the survival of the nation and the world—to remain in the hands of a man who has, in the words of the American Civil Liberties Union, ‘made one thing perfectly clear: He will function above the law whenever he can get away with it?’ ”

Journalist, history professor, and Nixon scholar David Greenberg believes the comparison between Trump’s firing of James Comey and Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre, which got rid of Archibald Cox, is not overblown:

“The parallels here are undeniable,” Greenberg says. “In both cases, a president fires the man investigating whether he committed or covered up crimes against democracy in the previous year's presidential election—in the hope of snuffing out the investigation.”

“The parallels here are undeniable.”

The firing is legal, Greenberg adds, but it “violates our fundamental understandings of how justice and law are supposed to function in a democracy.”

So now what?

In 1973, The Progressive called on readers to exert “immense and unremitting pressure” to convince Congress to impeach Nixon: “Public opinion has already persuaded some legislators to abandon their customary vacillating stance. Public opinion, forcefully applied, can move the requisite number of Representatives to embark on the process of impeachment.”

On Friday, May 12, progressive members of Congress will be holding town hall meetings in Congressional districts around the country where Republican members have refused to meet with constituents. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee and Indivisible are launching a new Adopt a District guide to help voters set up empty-seat town halls to hold their own members of Congress accountable.

Let the forceful application of public pressure begin.