President Trump on Tuesday compared the impeachment inquiry to a “lynching,” saying House Democrats are acting “without due process or fairness or any legal rights.”
“So some day, if a Democrat becomes President and the Republicans win the House, even by a tiny margin, they can impeach the President, without due process or fairness or any legal rights,” he wrote on Twitter. “All Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here — a lynching. But we will WIN!”
So some day, if a Democrat becomes President and the Republicans win the House, even by a tiny margin, they can impeach the President, without due process or fairness or any legal rights. All Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here – a lynching. But we will WIN!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 22, 2019
Trump’s use of the word “lynching” — with its grim racial connotations — angered House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-SC), an influential black lawmaker.
“That is one word that no president ought to apply to himself,” Clyburn said on CNN. “I’m a product of the South,” he added. “I know the history of that word. That is a word that we ought to be very, very careful about using.”
Another black congressman, Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL), said Trump should delete the tweet.
“You think this impeachment is a LYNCHING? What the hell is wrong with you?” Rush wrote on Twitter. “Do you know how many people who look like me have been lynched, since the inception of this country, by people who look like you.”
You think this impeachment is a LYNCHING? What the hell is wrong with you?
Do you know how many people who look like me have been lynched, since the inception of this country, by people who look like you. Delete this tweet. https://t.co/oTMhWo4awR
— Bobby L. Rush (@RepBobbyRush) October 22, 2019
It was the second consecutive day Trump has blasted the impeachment inquiry. The president spent more than an hour on Monday blasting Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“I think that she’s done this country a tremendous disservice. She’s created a phony witch hunt another one. First one failed. They’re all failing. This one is just absolutely crazy,” Trump said at the White House.
Democrats have moved to impeach Trump, whmo they say demanded a quid pro quo from a foreign leader in a July 25th phone call. A transcript of that call, though, shows Trump did not demand that the president of Ukraine investigate the business dealings of Joe Biden’s son in the country in return for U.S. aid, but rather asked for “a favor.”
“All you have to do is read the transcript of the call. Read the transcript. This is a open and shut simple case. They’re desperate because they know they are going to lose the election. They are desperate to do something because they know they are going to lose the election. This administration has created the strongest economy in the history of our country. We have the greatest stock market. We had over 100 times we broke the record for stock market,” Trump said.
“I think they want to impeach me because it’s the only way they’re going to win,” he said. “They’ve got nothing. All they have is a phone call that is perfect. All they have is a whistleblower who’s disappear. Where is he?” the president said.
Democrats, he said, are just “playing games.”
“They figure they can’t win the election so maybe we can find some ground — we will get somebody that Trump never met and maybe they will say something bad about Trump. And if they do really bad maybe it can stick a little bit–I don’t think it’s going to work. They have treated the Republican party with great disrespect.”
“It cannot be the way our founders, our great founders, meant this to be,” he said.