The president’s lawyers this week floated their catch-all impeachment defense, one tailor-made for President Trump. It is, in essence, that a narcissistic president can do no wrong.
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Alan Dershowitz made the point with the subtlety of a sledgehammer: If “a president does something which he believes will get himself elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment.”
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For a president psychologically incapable of distinguishing between his own personal interests and the nation’s, that amounts to the ultimate get-out-of-impeachment-free card.
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Trump already believes the Constitution gives him “the right to do whatever I want as president.” This self-described very stable genius believes that his reelection, achieved by whatever means necessary, serves the interests of the country.
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But the legal argument is a lie. It’s another example of how Trump corrupts all around him. Following the lead of the political aides and allies who came before them, during the past two weeks it has been the lawyers who have debased themselves.
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Yes, if a president cuts taxes because he thinks it will get him reelected and it will create jobs, that’s fine. That’s ordinary electoral politics.
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But if he cuts taxes because he has an agreement with a major backer that, in exchange for tax cuts, the backer will fund a huge super PAC to support his reelection, that’s impeachable — because that’s a corrupt quid pro quo for his personal benefit.
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So, too, if a president conditions another official act — releasing security assistance to a foreign country — on a requirement that the foreign country smear the president’s political opponent. That’s not politics; that’s corruption.
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And corruption, for all the Trump lawyers’ attempt to muddy the waters with tortured interpretations of the Constitution, is what this impeachment is all about. Trump acted corruptly, and Bolton’s testimony seems certain to underscore that point.
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Which is precisely why Republican senators seem so desperate not to hear it and so willing to entertain a false reading of the Constitution that would effectively render the impeachment clause a nullity.
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Should they do that, they will have sacrificed their own oaths, and the country and the Constitution will have been saddled with a terrible precedent. The Senate will have told Trump that, indeed, he can do whatever he wants.
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