1. Some good points here, but mixes some apples & oranges. "Motive" is a slippery standard for impeachment; issue should be whether he used public power for objectively improper purposes.
2. Trump has, in fact, expanded executive power much less than his predecessors, and untangling the long-term expansion involves distinguishing which powers properly belong to Congress or courts, vs which shouldn't be federal powers at all.
3. We should be alarmed at making subjective "motive" the standard for impeachment; it's child's play to attribute the worst possible motives to opponents, yet hard to prove to bipartisan satisfaction.
4. By contrast, there are longstanding bodies of law, on which the Founders drew, prohibiting public men from misappropriating public powers mainly for private gain. The advantage of using that lens is that the inquiry doesn't require speculation about POTUS' state of mind.
5. Misappropriation of this nature is sometimes covered by criminal statutes (hence, why Article II mentions Bribery explicitly) but the Framers did not want impeachments to be limited to strictly criminal bribery.
6. We return to my continuing point: abuse of power for personal gain is a political, not legal, basis for impeaching an elected president. It therefore requires bipartisan public legitimacy - especially when the voters get to weigh in on him in a year. That doesn't exist (yet).
7. Unless & until a majority of Republican voters - or at least, majorities in multiple states with R Senators - believes that Trump should be removed from office for abuse of power, their elected Senators are not going to do it.
8. So: if you want Trump impeached & removed from office, no amount of yelling at Republican Senators is going to get you there. Take your case to the voters.
