Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) will reportedly side with Senate Democrats on Tuesday and will vote to convict and remove President Donald Trump from office. The freshman senator says he will vote to convict on House Democrats’ first article impeachment and vote to acquit on the second article.
“The allegations made in the articles of impeachment are very serious,” Romney said on the floor of the Senate. “As a Senator juror I swore an oath before God to exercise impartial justice. I am profoundly religious, my faith is at the heart of who I am.”
“I take an oath before God as enormously consequential,” Romney continued. “I knew from the outset that being tasked with judging the president, the leader of my own party, would be the most difficult decision I have ever faced. I was not wrong.”
“The grave question the Constitution tasks Senators to answer is whether the president committed an act so extreme and egregious that it rises to a level of a high crime and misdemeanor,” Romney later added. “Yes, he did. The president asked a foreign government to investigate his political rival. The president withheld vital military funds from that government to press it to do so. The president delays funds for an American ally at war with Russian invaders. The president’s purpose was personal and political. Accordingly the president is guilty of an appalling abuse of public trust. What he did was not perfect, no, it was a flagrant assault on our electoral rights, our national security, and our fundamental values.”
“Corrupting an election to keep oneself in office is perhaps the most abusive and destruction violation of ones oath of office that I can imagine,” Romney continued. “I acknowledge that my verdict will not remove the president from office.”
Romney then appeared in a prerecorded interview on Fox News with Chris Wallace immediately following his remarks on the Senate floor.
“Do you believe that Donald Trump is unfit to serve as president and should be removed from office?” Wallace asked.
“I believe that the act he took, an effort to corrupt an election, is as destructive an act on the oath of office and on our Constitution as I can imagine,” Romney claimed. “It is a high crime and misdemeanor within the meaning of the Constitution and that is not a decision I take lightly. It is the last decision I want to take. The personal consequences, the political consequences that fall on me as a result of that are going to be extraordinary.”
“But I swore an oath, before God, and I’m a religious person, that I would imply impartial justice and implying impartial justice said, ‘what the president did was grievously wrong,'” Romney continued. “And I had to vote if I was going to live with my own conscience in a way that was consistent with that oath of office.”
“Again, do you believe that Donald Trump is unfit to serve as president and should be removed from office?” Wallace pressed.
“I do believe that he should be removed from office, that is the vote that I will take in just a short while,” Romney responded.
This is a breaking news story, refresh the page for updates.