Democrat Suggests Impeachment Exit Strategy — but Quickly Recants

UPDATE: Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-MI) has withdrawn her suggestion of “censure” instead of impeaching President Donald Trump — a trial balloon for an exit strategy in response to dismal polling for Rep. Adam Schiff’s impeachment hearings.

After her radio remarks blew up overnight, Lawrence issued a statement declaring “I still support impeachment”:

“I was an early supporter for impeachment in 2017,” Lawrence says. “The House Intelligence Committee followed a very thorough process in holding hearings these past two weeks. The information they revealed confirmed that this President has abused the power of his office, therefore I continue to support impeachment.

“However, I am very concerned about Senate Republicans and the fact that they would find this behavior by the President acceptable.”

The original story follows below:

Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-MI) stated Sunday that she no longer believes the impeachment of President Donald Trump is the route Democrats should take to winning back the White House.

Lawrence’s comments on the House impeachment process came during a discussion with Charlie LeDuff on the Michigan radio show No BS News Hour. Instead of removal from office, Lawrence hopes her colleagues will seek to censure the president.

Lawrence said:

We are so close to an election. I will tell you, sitting here knowing how divided this country is, I don’t see the value of taking him out of office. I do see the value of putting down a marker saying his behavior is not acceptable.

I want to censure. I want it on the record that the House of Representatives did their job and they told this president and any president coming behind him that this is unacceptable behavior and, under our Constitution, we will not allow it.

Lawrence added that she aims to have a “discussion with the party and with the caucus” in order to censure Trump, rather than impeaching him.

In contrast to the remarks she made on Sunday, Lawrence once seemed to be on board with impeachment in an October 4th interview with Sirius XM host Dean Obeidallah.

“I feel strongly that for my legacy, for my time in history, sitting here at this table with an oath of office to protect this country, to protect the democracy of the United States of America, I cannot sit silent, that I must move forward with [impeachment] because this is egregious,” Lawrence said at the time.