House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's comments that Trump was "just not worth" the pain of impeachment came with the caveat that she believed Trump is unfit for office and that she could always reconsider her decision | Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
Trump aides run with Pelosi's comment that he's 'not worth' impeachment
By CAITLIN OPRYSKO
President Donald Trump's aides are happily running with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's comment that Trump is "not worth" impeachment proceedings, using it to apply pressure to her fellow Democrats.
After the California Democrat told The Washington Post she was not going to focus on impeaching President Donald Trump barring major developments, Trump's reelection campaign pushed out a press release asking whether Democrats would stand with Pelosi.
"Speaker Pelosi said yesterday that she doesn't want to go down the path of impeachment because it would divide Americans," press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a statement, demanding that Democrats looking to unseat Trump in 2020 be put on the record about whether they "agree with the Speaker who stands in opposition to baseless impeachment charges."
The alternative, she said, was "fracturing the country by bowing to the radical elements in their party who want to disenfranchise the American people and overturn the legitimate and lawful result of the last election."
The release was particularly novel considering the White House spent the bulk of the midterm election campaign season portraying vulnerable Democrats as rubber stamps for Pelosi's agenda.
Pelosi's comments that Trump was "just not worth" the pain of impeachment came with the caveat that she believed Trump is unfit for office and that she could always reconsider her decision not to pursue impeachment if there was a "compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan" basis for it, something Trump officials declined to mention.
Later Tuesday, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders offered up some praise for the speaker as well.
"I'm glad she sees what the rest of us see, that there is no reason, no cause for impeachment," Sanders said in an interview on Fox News, appearing to suggest that Pelosi put her foot down because she is "clearly already starting to lose control of her party."
While the White House is typically in the position of trying to persuade Democrats to break ranks with leadership, Sanders on Tuesday urged the opposite.
"I think it's time for other Democrats in Nancy Pelosi's party to get on board, start doing what they were elected to do," she said. "Do their jobs and quit trying to focus so much on making excuses for the historic loss that they suffered in 2016. Let's work with the president and solve some real problems."
Asked whether the White House was working on a strategy to deal with Democrats' impeachment threats, which persist despite Pelosi's assurances nothing would happen right away, Sanders dismissed those concerns as the gripes of a party that in her words has a "very, very hard uphill battle" to beat Trump in 2020.
"We're focused on doing with the American people actually care about," she quipped. "Nobody wants to see President Trump impeached — other than Democrats in Congress who are failing, who have no other message — that's because our country is doing better and they know that it's hard for them to run against in 2020."
Impeachments