Across a divided nation, skepticism about impeachment

Washington Post

By Jenna Portnoy, Scott Wilson, Tim Craig, and Marc Fisher

They don’t ordinarily agree with each other. They watch different channels, hear different versions of the news and view neighbors across a gaping, painful political divide. But in swing districts across the country, the idea of impeaching the president has brought some Americans together: They’re wary of deploying the Constitution’s ultimate weapon — one that takes the decision about who is president out of voters’ hands.

Derek Tsao is a Republican in California who has grown tired of President Trump’s behavior. Curtis Johnson is a Democrat in Florida who could never quite fathom why his fellow Americans chose a man like Trump. Lisa Foulds is a lifelong Republican in suburban Virginia whose kids have pushed her toward the center, so much so that she voted for a Democrat for Congress last year.

They all say the president may have crossed a line when he pressed his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate one of Trump’s main political rivals. And despite their political differences, they say the Democrats’ move this week to start impeachment proceedings against Trump is the wrong tactic at the wrong time.

Polls have shown that public opinion has shifted slightly in favor of impeachment, but many still see it as “an exercise in futility,” as Johnson put it.

The retired steelworker from Indiana, now living in New Smyrna Beach, Fla., said he’s eager for Democrats to find a candidate who can beat Trump next year, but he fears that impeaching the president will make Trump’s reelection more likely. “There’s not enough time before the election and nothing will come of it,” said Johnson, 71. “This is going to hurt the Democrats because everyone’s going to say, ‘You’re putting all your energy into this?’ ”

Tsao, 27, who is studying to be a physical therapist, has followed this week’s news only glancingly, but he’s all for investigating any credible accusations.

“If a crime has been alleged, you should find out more about it,” he said. “I fear, though, that it’s just another anti-Trump move.”

Launching an investigation and potentially putting Trump on trial in the Senate strikes Foulds, a 50-year-old who still considers herself a Republican after voting for independent Gary Johnson in 2016, as “a waste of the taxpayers’ money.”

“For something as trivial as gaining dirt on somebody? It just seems petty,” she said. “I just think it has to be much more egregious.”

As events in Washington unfolded at a breakneck pace this week, many Democrats and Republicans interviewed in swing districts across seven states were united in their exhaustion — with politics, with polarization and, even among some of his supporters, with the president. Many said they chose not to follow every twist and turn in the Ukraine story because their views about Trump had long ago solidified, pro or con.

Voters across the partisan spectrum argued that next year’s election — not impeachment — is the best way to resolve the country’s struggle.... (continued)