In one other signal that American politics is trapped within the Upside Down, final week a rogue band of Home Democrats voted to carry Invoice and Hillary Clinton in contempt of Congress.
It was a little bit of a shock flip in these hyper-polarized occasions. The costs stem from the Clintons’ refusal to testify behind closed doorways earlier than the Home Oversight Committee in its investigation of the late intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein.
On Jan. 13, simply hours earlier than Invoice Clinton’s deadline to seem earlier than the committee, the Clintons despatched letters to its chair, James Comer, decrying their therapy and defying their subpoenas. The committee voted to advocate contempt fees to the complete Home the subsequent week. 9 of the panel’s 21 Democrats joined Republicans to cross the measure in opposition to Clinton. Three supported the one in opposition to Hillary Clinton as effectively.
The Democrats did this regardless of pleas from the minority chief, Hakeem Jeffries, to oppose the costs — to offer the Clintons extra negotiating time and to thwart this shameless Republican play to place Democrats on the defensive and fracture the caucus. Publish-vote, Nancy Pelosi, the fearsome Home speaker emerita, privately took the rebels to the woodshed, in accordance with CNN.
I really feel the management’s angst. And the Clintons’ reluctance is comprehensible. Comer’s investigation has been geared primarily towards shifting the warmth off President Donald Trump, a former pal of Epstein’s, and onto distinguished Democrats with previous ties to the disgraced financier. However to the insurgent Dems, I say: Option to go!
Sure, their contempt votes are politically ticklish. And after all Comer is bending the oversight course of to deflect the Epstein focus from Trump. These are darkish occasions, dominated by a morally bankrupt president. However because the Democrats work to regain the general public’s belief and to shed their picture because the social gathering of elites, they can’t be seen as treating elites of their social gathering as above the regulation. Particularly with a scandal about sexual abuse. Much more particularly when the scenario entails Invoice Clinton, whose personal licentiousness has haunted the social gathering for over three a long time. (Each Trump and Clinton have denied any information of Epstein’s purported intercourse trafficking of younger girls and underage women.)
A number of of the Democrats who backed the contempt measures are on the youthful facet (grading on the congressional curve, after all), together with Reps. Summer season Lee of Pennsylvania, Emily Randall of Washington state and Maxwell Frost of Florida. Among the many social gathering’s rising generations, there may be little lingering nostalgia for the Clinton period or the Clintons personally. Removed from it. Many are itching for his or her social gathering to embrace contemporary values, contemporary blood and a contemporary begin.
Refusing to get drawn into this showdown is an effective step towards serving to Democrats ultimately flip the web page on Invoice and Hillary, who for a lot of within the social gathering wore out their welcome way back.
With their votes, the 9 outliers denied Republicans a straightforward line of assault about how Dems don’t give a flip about reality, justice and decency when certainly one of their very own blah, blah, blah. The vote additionally drew a stark ethical line between their caucus and a GOP that acknowledges no larger precept than overlaying the present president’s bottom.
It’s no secret that Trump wants a shiny distraction within the Epstein scandal. When the oversight committee launched a batch of paperwork from Epstein’s property in November, the president responded by ordering the Justice Division to dig for Epstein filth on Invoice Clinton and different Democrats. Pam Bondi, the legal professional normal, jumped proper on that, regardless of her division’s having beforehand asserted that the scandal merited no additional investigation. And regardless of her present slothlike launch of the prevailing recordsdata.
Comer’s subpoenaing of the Clintons, particularly of Hillary Clinton, feels equally noxious and determined. It additionally appears based mostly partly on the calculation that Democrats would really feel compelled to blindly circle the wagons round their crew’s VIPs, as Republicans so typically do round Trump.
However the 2020s usually are not the Nineteen Nineties, and Democrats way back discovered the value of defending a self-indulgent chief from the repercussions of his dangerous conduct. “However what about Invoice Clinton!” has for too lengthy been the GOP’s inventory reply when a intercourse scandal rocks its ranks. Trump himself has repeatedly brandished Invoice Clinton’s sexual misconduct as a technique to distract from his personal. In 2016, Trump even invited a number of girls who had accused Clinton of sexual abuse to attend certainly one of his debates in opposition to Hillary Clinton. It was a gross — and sensible — stunt geared toward undermining no matter ethical excessive floor Hillary Clinton hoped to occupy.
Invoice Clinton insists he has nothing to cover relating to Epstein. Yay for him. However not even a former president can defy a subpoena — issued with bipartisan approval, thoughts you — as a result of he and his spouse think about it unfair. Clinton had a relationship with Epstein. He owes the American folks solutions, even when he doesn’t get to dictate the phrases of disclosure.
The perfect consequence now’s for the Clintons to really feel newly motivated to work out a take care of the committee and short-circuit a Home vote on contempt. Barring that, your entire Democratic caucus might quickly must take a place on this mess. If that’s the case, Democrats ought to take a deep breath, and clarify that they’re on the facet of transparency, accountability and the regulation, regardless of who’s within the sizzling seat.
Then they need to double down on pummeling Comer and different Trump enablers for persevering with to tug American politics down the rabbit gap towards nihilism.
