WASHINGTON — Louisiana congressmen took on key roles during the historic impeachment of President Donald Trump on Wednesday.
U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson, one of the first members to speak during the six-hour debate before Trump became the third president in history to be impeached, laid out the GOP’s argument against impeachment.
“Our Democrat colleagues have weaponized the impeachment provision of the constitution to nullify the votes of 63 million Americans who elected President Donald J. Trump,” said Johnson, R-Shreveport. “They are trying to meet their own arbitrary, completely reckless timeline to take down a president that they loathe.”
U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Port Barre, gave a fire-and-brimstone-inspired speech that drew intense interest online.
“I have descended into the belly of the beast,” he said. “I have witnessed the terror within. And I rise committed to oppose the insidious forces which threaten our republic.”
U.S. Rep. Ralph Abraham, R-Alto, called for the ouster of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, eliciting “boos” from the Democratic side of the chamber.
“What is shameful is that Speaker Pelosi has allowed this political witch hunt to move forward,” Abraham said. “Democratic extreme partisanship will set a dangerous precedent for this nation, and mark my words, this sinister attempt to remove this lawful president will not go unnoticed.”
And on the other side of the aisle, U.S. Rep. Cedric Richmond, the only Democrat in the Louisiana delegation, shot back at Republicans’ claims that the impeachment had been fast-tracked to meet an end-of-year deadline.
“This is not a rush to judgment. It’s a rush to justice,” Richmond said. “The longer we wait the more time we allow this president to do irreparable harm to our country and our democracy.”
Trump is accused of leveraging foreign military aid to Ukraine for his own political gain by urging the Eastern European country’s leaders to launch an investigation into 2020 Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.
In 230-197 and 229-198 votes, the Democrat-controlled House formally approved two articles of impeachment against Trump alleging abuse of power and obstruction of Congress’ inquiry into allegations against him. No Republicans voted in favor of impeachment. Two Democrats voted against.
Louisiana’s House delegation split 5-1, along the party line.
The Ukraine inquiry was launched after a whistleblower raised concerns about a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Trump has denied wrongdoing and repeatedly pointed to a White House document that Trump and his supporters call a transcript that is a memo of the incomplete, rough contents of the call.
Democrats, many dressed in dark colors, repeatedly referred to Wednesday’s vote as a solemn occasion.
“I solemnly and sadly open the debate on the impeachment of the president of the United States,” Pelosi said at the start of the House’s lengthy and often confrontational debate. “He gave us no choice.”
House GOP Whip Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, has been one of the most vocal opponents of impeachment, making multiple television appearances in recent weeks to defend the president.
“It’s been clear this is a personal vendetta against the president. It has nothing to do with impeachable offenses,” he said on CBS News as members debated on the floor.
As the No. 2 Republican in the House, Scalise worked behind-the-scenes to keep the GOP caucus together on the vote. He organized closed-door meetings on impeachment every week members were in session beginning in October. Guests in those meetings included former Clinton impeachment managers and close Trump ally Sen. Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina.
The impeachment process now moves to the U.S. Senate, where lawmakers will decide whether to convict and remove Trump from office. The vote would require support from two-thirds of the GOP-controlled upper chamber, which is unlikely to happen.
U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-Madisonville, said he thinks the House probe was “rigged.”
“I don’t want to see that repeated in the Senate,” he said. “My objective, first and foremost, is to be fair to both sides.”
But he also called the impeachment “dead as fried chicken” in the Senate.
“There would be no Republican who would vote for impeachment and one or two Democrats who would vote with us as well,” he said.
U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge, said he has been focused on other policy priorities and not the impeachment.
“I will have to eventually sit through it all anyway,” he said of the looming Senate trial.
As the impeachment debate raged on in Washington, Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, said during his monthly radio show that he also hadn’t been paying too much attention to it.
“I think we have a House determined to impeach and a Senate that will never vote to remove,” Edwards said.
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How the Louisiana delegation voted on impeaching President Donald Trump
Yes: U.S. Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-New Orleans.
No: U.S. Reps. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson; Ralph Abraham, R-Alto; Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge; Clay Higgins, R-Port Barre; and Mike Johnson, R-Benton.
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