Join the Citizens’ Movement to Impeach Tyrant Trump
He is a dangerously unstable, egomaniacal, eruptive personality, wielding the most lethal powers of anyone on Earth. He needs to go.
A man holds a sign reading “Impeach Trump” as he takes part in the “No Kings” national day of protest in Howell, Michigan, on March 28, 2026.
(Photo by Jeff Kowalsky / AFP via Getty Images)
Ralph Nader
Apr 11, 2026
Common Dreams
This week two events (1) the citizens’ “Expert Legal Symposium,” and (2) Rep. John Larson’s introduction on April 6, 2026 of House Resolution 1155 “Impeaching Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors in violation of his constitutional oath of office to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States” may spark the rise of citizen movement to impeach President Donald Trump. Already a majority want him out!
Rep. Larson (D-Conn.) is a mainstream Democrat serving his 14th term of office. The 13 articles in his H. Res 1155, drafted with constitutional law specialist Bruce Fein, portray the violations of the most lawless president in American history. Trump’s dictatorship is rapidly intensifying (though his support is dropping in the polls). Trump regularly boasts that “I can do whatever I want as president,” “Nothing can stop me,” and “This is only the beginning.”
Over 1 Million Americans Say Impeach and Remove Trump Ahead of ‘No Kings 3’ Rallies
84% of Democrats and 55% of Independents Support Impeaching Trump a Third Time
Chronically lying Tyrant Trump is an open, clear, and present danger to our Republic. He is driven by a fact-deprived, perilous, megalomaniacal, and vengeful personality.
The citizens’ symposium, first of its kind held inside the House of Representatives, gathered experts and advocates for Trump’s removal from office to provide the legal case, highlighting three planks. They were:President Trump’s usurpation of the congressional war power;
The credible fear that President Trump will obstruct, interfere with, or invoke the Insurrection Act to outright cancel the 2026 midterm elections; and
Trump’s “industrial scale bribery and extortion.”
Audience questions following each panel expanded on the presentations. You can see the entire four-and-a-half hours on C-SPAN: https://www.c-span.org/program/public-affairs-event/activists-lawyers-and-others-discuss-possibility-of-additional-trump-impeachment-proceedings/677013.
Participants at the symposium exhibited a strong sense of urgency, not just from Trump’s escalating war crimes but from the lassitude of Congress, whose bipartisan leadership never considered canceling their two-week recess to address the burgeoning violent outlawry pouring from the White House, most prominently illegally blowing apart Iran and indirectly Lebanon.
The event was co-sponsored by Essential Information, RootsAction, and Free Speech for People with participants from Public Citizen and the Cato Institute.
The Republican Trump lapdogs continue to betray, with historic cowardliness, the people of America.
FOR TRUMP, IT IS ONLY GOING TO RAPIDLY GET WORSE, MUCH WORSE. The strongest critics of Trump can’t keep up with his onslaught, understating his foreign and domestic crimes. He is a dangerously unstable, egomaniacal, eruptive personality, wielding the most lethal powers of anyone on Earth.
Not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, which he craves, by asserting falsely that he had ended eight wars since January 2025, Trump told the dumbfounded prime minister of Norway, “your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize” so he no longer felt “an obligation to think purely of Peace.” That was Trump’s signal that he was going to be engaging in wars. What’s the street language here—a head case in the White House.
Trump constantly creates or fails to address catastrophes. Recall, his calling the climate crisis “a hoax,” that Covid-19 is just like getting a cold, losing valuable time in 2020, costing many American lives. Trump stereotypes journalists as “deranged and demented,” as he extorts millions of dollars from television networks via grossly malicious lawsuits.
The question is why 77.3 million voters support a man few would want as a friend, co-worker, or neighbor, much less a boss with the power of life, death, deprivation, and tyranny over them.
Having pardoned over 690 convicted violent criminals and additional fraudsters, he lets it be known that his loyal, extremist supporters can do what he wants and expect to be pardoned.
Credit Trump with teaching us how weak our democratic institutions are to thwart the US fascist dictatorship emerging from the 2024 election. He taught us, with luminous exceptions, that the media, the academic world, the legal profession, the labor unions, the retired military (brass who despise Trump and his norm-busting secretary of defense), and the civic community, among other constituencies, have not risen to the urgent need to counter tyrant Trump. He has issued one illegal executive order after another and then transgressed beyond those dictates in fits of fearsome rage.
He also reminds us that there has been a price to pay for pushing aside civic education, teaching civic history, skills, and providing students with “learning by doing” in their community or neighborhood. Decade after decade of vocational and rote teaching for multiple-choice testing ignores critical norms of moral restraint and accountability. No wonder they atrophy.
Two examples illustrate how low our standards have fallen. President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s chief of staff, Sherman Adams, a former governor of New Hampshire, had to resign after a press report that he accepted a vicuna coat as a gift from a textile industrialist friend. Later, in 1984, Sen. Gary Hart, competing for the Democratic presidential nomination against Vice President Walter Mondale, was photographed with a young lady—not his wife—on a small sailboat off Miami (he denied an affair). The norms of that time pushed him to quit the race.
Fast forward. Any one of Trump’s many vile transgressions would have stopped anyone from being a candidate, much less getting elected President. He is a daily chronic liar about serious matters and his business and political record as well as about people he dislikes; he is a convicted felon (and was under four criminal indictments); a draft dodger; a mocker of people with disabilities; serial adulterer; he consorted with pedophiles; he is an intense racist and brutal misogynist; and a business crook who cheats workers, consumers, and creditors. He openly committed many violations of federal statutes in his first term, when he also defied over 125 congressional subpoenas (Nixon was about to be impeached for defying two in 1973-1974); and he is an inciter of violence at his rallies and in his remarks. The list goes on.
The question is why 77.3 million voters support a man few would want as a friend, co-worker, or neighbor, much less a boss with the power of life, death, deprivation, and tyranny over them. That question is best answered by the so-called leaders of the Democratic Party, who, instead of landsliding this loser, this crusher of decency and truth, lost both the popular and electoral college presidential vote.
A mere switch of 240,000 votes in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin in 2024 would have sent Trump back to golfing at Mar-a-Lago. That could have been achieved had the Democrats really championed raising the stagnant federal minimum wage to $15 per hour instead of the $7.25 per hour still today (that would help 25 million workers) and cracking down on corporate greedhounds stealing from consumers and lobbying against raising the Social Security benefits, frozen since 1971, paid for by raising the limit of Social Security taxes on higher income people (over 60 million people benefiting).
(For many more vote-getting compacts shunted aside by the dominant corporate Democrats and their corporate-conflicted consultants, see winningamerica.net).
This week two events (1) the citizens’ “Expert Legal Symposium,” and (2) Rep. John Larson’s introduction on April 6, 2026 of House Resolution 1155 “Impeaching Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, for high crimes and misdemeanors in violation of his constitutional oath of office to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States” may spark the rise of citizen movement to impeach President Donald Trump. Already a majority want him out!
Rep. Larson (D-Conn.) is a mainstream Democrat serving his 14th term of office. The 13 articles in his H. Res 1155, drafted with constitutional law specialist Bruce Fein, portray the violations of the most lawless president in American history. Trump’s dictatorship is rapidly intensifying (though his support is dropping in the polls). Trump regularly boasts that “I can do whatever I want as president,” “Nothing can stop me,” and “This is only the beginning.”
Over 1 Million Americans Say Impeach and Remove Trump Ahead of ‘No Kings 3’ Rallies
84% of Democrats and 55% of Independents Support Impeaching Trump a Third Time
Chronically lying Tyrant Trump is an open, clear, and present danger to our Republic. He is driven by a fact-deprived, perilous, megalomaniacal, and vengeful personality.
The citizens’ symposium, first of its kind held inside the House of Representatives, gathered experts and advocates for Trump’s removal from office to provide the legal case, highlighting three planks. They were:President Trump’s usurpation of the congressional war power;
The credible fear that President Trump will obstruct, interfere with, or invoke the Insurrection Act to outright cancel the 2026 midterm elections; and
Trump’s “industrial scale bribery and extortion.”
Audience questions following each panel expanded on the presentations. You can see the entire four-and-a-half hours on C-SPAN: https://www.c-span.org/program/public-affairs-event/activists-lawyers-and-others-discuss-possibility-of-additional-trump-impeachment-proceedings/677013.
Participants at the symposium exhibited a strong sense of urgency, not just from Trump’s escalating war crimes but from the lassitude of Congress, whose bipartisan leadership never considered canceling their two-week recess to address the burgeoning violent outlawry pouring from the White House, most prominently illegally blowing apart Iran and indirectly Lebanon.
The event was co-sponsored by Essential Information, RootsAction, and Free Speech for People with participants from Public Citizen and the Cato Institute.
The Republican Trump lapdogs continue to betray, with historic cowardliness, the people of America.
FOR TRUMP, IT IS ONLY GOING TO RAPIDLY GET WORSE, MUCH WORSE. The strongest critics of Trump can’t keep up with his onslaught, understating his foreign and domestic crimes. He is a dangerously unstable, egomaniacal, eruptive personality, wielding the most lethal powers of anyone on Earth.
Not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, which he craves, by asserting falsely that he had ended eight wars since January 2025, Trump told the dumbfounded prime minister of Norway, “your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize” so he no longer felt “an obligation to think purely of Peace.” That was Trump’s signal that he was going to be engaging in wars. What’s the street language here—a head case in the White House.
Trump constantly creates or fails to address catastrophes. Recall, his calling the climate crisis “a hoax,” that Covid-19 is just like getting a cold, losing valuable time in 2020, costing many American lives. Trump stereotypes journalists as “deranged and demented,” as he extorts millions of dollars from television networks via grossly malicious lawsuits.
The question is why 77.3 million voters support a man few would want as a friend, co-worker, or neighbor, much less a boss with the power of life, death, deprivation, and tyranny over them.
Having pardoned over 690 convicted violent criminals and additional fraudsters, he lets it be known that his loyal, extremist supporters can do what he wants and expect to be pardoned.
Credit Trump with teaching us how weak our democratic institutions are to thwart the US fascist dictatorship emerging from the 2024 election. He taught us, with luminous exceptions, that the media, the academic world, the legal profession, the labor unions, the retired military (brass who despise Trump and his norm-busting secretary of defense), and the civic community, among other constituencies, have not risen to the urgent need to counter tyrant Trump. He has issued one illegal executive order after another and then transgressed beyond those dictates in fits of fearsome rage.
He also reminds us that there has been a price to pay for pushing aside civic education, teaching civic history, skills, and providing students with “learning by doing” in their community or neighborhood. Decade after decade of vocational and rote teaching for multiple-choice testing ignores critical norms of moral restraint and accountability. No wonder they atrophy.
Two examples illustrate how low our standards have fallen. President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s chief of staff, Sherman Adams, a former governor of New Hampshire, had to resign after a press report that he accepted a vicuna coat as a gift from a textile industrialist friend. Later, in 1984, Sen. Gary Hart, competing for the Democratic presidential nomination against Vice President Walter Mondale, was photographed with a young lady—not his wife—on a small sailboat off Miami (he denied an affair). The norms of that time pushed him to quit the race.
Fast forward. Any one of Trump’s many vile transgressions would have stopped anyone from being a candidate, much less getting elected President. He is a daily chronic liar about serious matters and his business and political record as well as about people he dislikes; he is a convicted felon (and was under four criminal indictments); a draft dodger; a mocker of people with disabilities; serial adulterer; he consorted with pedophiles; he is an intense racist and brutal misogynist; and a business crook who cheats workers, consumers, and creditors. He openly committed many violations of federal statutes in his first term, when he also defied over 125 congressional subpoenas (Nixon was about to be impeached for defying two in 1973-1974); and he is an inciter of violence at his rallies and in his remarks. The list goes on.
The question is why 77.3 million voters support a man few would want as a friend, co-worker, or neighbor, much less a boss with the power of life, death, deprivation, and tyranny over them. That question is best answered by the so-called leaders of the Democratic Party, who, instead of landsliding this loser, this crusher of decency and truth, lost both the popular and electoral college presidential vote.
A mere switch of 240,000 votes in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin in 2024 would have sent Trump back to golfing at Mar-a-Lago. That could have been achieved had the Democrats really championed raising the stagnant federal minimum wage to $15 per hour instead of the $7.25 per hour still today (that would help 25 million workers) and cracking down on corporate greedhounds stealing from consumers and lobbying against raising the Social Security benefits, frozen since 1971, paid for by raising the limit of Social Security taxes on higher income people (over 60 million people benefiting).
(For many more vote-getting compacts shunted aside by the dominant corporate Democrats and their corporate-conflicted consultants, see winningamerica.net).
OPINION
ROBERT REICH
U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks to members of the Republican Party, at Trump National Doral Miami in Miami, Florida, U.S., March 9, 2026. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
April 13, 2026
ALTERNET
Speaking at a January 6 retreat for House Republicans, Trump stated, “You gotta win the midterms ‘cause, if we don’t win the midterms, it’s just gonna be — I mean, they’ll find a reason to impeach me. I’ll get impeached.”
This was before Trump’s agents murdered Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, before the Justice Department released more Epstein files, before Trump’s disastrous war in Iran, before Trump threatened death to the entire Iranian civilization, before a gallon of gas hit $4 or more, before other prices also began rising because of the blockage of the Strait of Hormuz, and before additional price hikes associated with Trump’s tariffs had kicked in.
It was also before Trump’s polls slid to record lows, before the MAGA faithful began complaining that Trump had betrayed his promise to avoid foreign entanglements, and before a slew of special elections in which Democratic candidates have won Republican districts (and even when they didn’t win, lost by far smaller margins than Trump won by in 2024).
Until recently I thought impeaching Trump and convicting him in the Senate was a pipe dream. I was concerned that even talk of impeachment at this stage might distract attention from the affordability crisis brought on by Trump and could even fortify Republican charges of Democratic “extremism.”
No longer.
The president of the United States is stark-raving mad. He’s a clear and present danger to America and the world. The American public is beginning to see it.
We’ve got to do whatever we legally can to remove him from office. The 25th Amendment would be useful if Trump’s Cabinet and key advisers had any integrity, but they don’t. They’re ambitious, unprincipled traitors.
Which leaves impeachment.
You may be skeptical. After all, he’s already been impeached twice, to no avail. How can the third time be the charm?
Because it seems likely that Democrats will retake control of the House and the Senate in this fall’s midterm elections (unless Trump prevents free and fair elections).
And because it’s also possible that there will be enough votes in the Senate starting next January to convict Trump of impeachable offenses and send him packing.
I understand how difficult this may seem. Both times Trump was impeached in the House, he was saved by the Constitution’s requirement that two-thirds of the Senate (67 senators, assuming all 100 are present) convict in order to remove a president.
The highest Senate vote count against Trump came in 2021, and it was 10 votes short of the constitutional requirement. Fifty-seven senators, including seven Republicans, voted to convict him of inciting an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. It was the most bipartisan impeachment vote in U.S. Senate history, but it still fell well short of the 67 votes needed to convict Trump.
So why do I think it’s possible now? Because public sentiment has swung further against Trump now than it was in 2021. And it’s likely to swing even further against him, because he’s going out of his mind at a rapid rate.
The way to accomplish this is to defeat enough incumbent Republican senators who are up for reelection in 2026 to create a Democratic majority in that chamber, totaling some 54 votes, and pressure at least 13 Republicans up for reelection in 2028 to vote to convict him.
That’s not impossible. In the upcoming midterms it’s likely that Maine Republican Senator Susan Collins will be replaced by a Democrat (either Janet Mills or Graham Platner). I also assume that former North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper will replace Republican Senator Thom Tillis, who’s retiring.
And I’d like to believe that the good people of Ohio will see the light and reelect Sherrod Brown over Jon Husted, the dullard who was appointed to fill the remainder of JD Vance’s term.
James Talarico could take the Texas Republican Senate seat now occupied by John Cornyn. In Alaska, I’d put odds on Mary Peltola defeating incumbent Republican Senator Dan Sullivan. In Nebraska, assume that Dan Osborn prevails over incumbent Republican Senator Pete Ricketts. And so on.
Republican senators last elected in 2022 who will be on the ballot in November 2028 include some who are vulnerable because they’re in swing states, such as North Carolina’s Ted Budd and Wisconsin’s Ron Johnson; or are in states that could be competitive, such as Indiana’s Todd Young; or are vulnerable to internal party shifts, such as Louisiana’s John Kennedy and South Carolina’s Tim Scott.
Those vulnerabilities mean that their constituents could push them to vote to convict Trump in an impeachment, or else threaten to vote against them in 2028.
So it’s possible to get the 67 Senate votes, my friends. And it’s absolutely necessary that we try.
The vast No Kings demonstrations should be considered a prelude to targeting enough Republican Senate incumbents and open races to flip the Senate this fall, and pressuring Republicans up for reelection in 2028 to do their constitutional duty.
Now is the time to show the size and intensity of America’s commitment to removing Trump from office, for the good of us all.
Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/.
AOC: Iran Deal “Changes Nothing” on Need to Impeach Trump for Genocidal Threat
Trump “threatened a genocide against the Iranian people, and is continuing to leverage that threat,” she said.
By Sharon Zhang ,
Trump “threatened a genocide against the Iranian people, and is continuing to leverage that threat,” she said.
By Sharon Zhang ,
April 8, 2026
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) attends a news conference with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) to announce the Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act in the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, March 25, 2026.Tom Williams / CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) has reiterated that the call for President Donald Trump to be impeached or removed from office remains as urgent as ever after his genocidal threat toward Iran, regardless of the president’s announcement of a temporary ceasefire on Tuesday evening.
In a post on X, Ocasio-Cortez said the deal “changes nothing.”
“The President has threatened a genocide against the Iranian people, and is continuing to leverage that threat,” the lawmaker wrote. “He has launched a massive war of enormous risk and of catastrophic consequence without reason, rationale, nor Congressional authorization — which is as clear a violation of the Constitution as any.”
On Tuesday, just an hour and a half before his deadline to decimate Iran’s civilian infrastructure, Trump announced that the U.S. and Iran had agreed to a two-week ceasefire, with the potential to negotiate a long term end to the bombardments. During the pause in fighting, the U.S. would cease its bombardments of Iran, while Iran would reopen traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
The announcement came after Trump had, earlier on Tuesday, threatened to destroy all of Iran. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” he said.
The statement was swiftly met with a deluge of calls for Trump to be impeached or removed via the 25th Amendment, which allows the president’s cabinet to declare him unfit. Over 70 lawmakers joined the calls, with the comment being so alarming that even far right figures like Candace Owens and Alex Jones called for Trump’s removal.
But the calls seemed to lose momentum after the threat didn’t come to pass on Tuesday, and as Democratic leaders declined to demand his removal. Some Democrats and liberal commentators even mocked Trump, taunting him with the “TACO” insult, standing for “Trump always chickens out,” or criticized him for the deal after it was announced.
Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Arizona), who is Iranian, said that it was callous to taunt Trump for not following through on his threats of genocide.
“I do not appreciate anyone — Democrat or Republican — taking this moment to make TACO jokes to say Trump ‘chickened out,’” Ansari said. “The president was threatening genocide against 90 million Iranians. I’m grateful there’s a ceasefire & scores of innocent people didn’t die tonight.”
Ocasio-Cortez said that it’s important that Democrats keep their foot on the gas. She said that Trump’s corruption and profit-seeking are also clear cases for Trump to be ousted.
“All of these incidents, and plenty more, have clearly driven our country past the threshold for impeachment or invocation of the 25th amendment. We cannot risk the world nor the wellbeing of our nation any longer,” she wrote. “Whether by his Cabinet or Congress, the President must be removed from office. We are playing with the brink.”
Ocasio-Cortez was one of the lawmakers calling for Trump’s removal on Tuesday, saying that his “civilization” threat was a “threat of genocide” that “merits removal from office.”
“The President’s mental faculties are collapsing and cannot be trusted,” she said. “To every individual in the President’s chain of command: You have a duty to refuse illegal orders. That includes carrying out this threat.”
As the lawmaker warned, the ceasefire is indeed already in danger. Just hours after the announcement of the ceasefire, Israel bombarded Lebanon with its most intense attack in decades, leveling buildings across the country, including in the densely populated capital of Beirut.
Israel and the Trump administration claimed that Lebanon was not included in the deal, but Pakistan, which was the key intermediary between the U.S. and Iran for the deal, said that it was. Meanwhile, in retaliation, Iranian state media reported that Iran has once again halted all traffic through the strait because of Israel’s strikes on Lebanon.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) has reiterated that the call for President Donald Trump to be impeached or removed from office remains as urgent as ever after his genocidal threat toward Iran, regardless of the president’s announcement of a temporary ceasefire on Tuesday evening.
In a post on X, Ocasio-Cortez said the deal “changes nothing.”
“The President has threatened a genocide against the Iranian people, and is continuing to leverage that threat,” the lawmaker wrote. “He has launched a massive war of enormous risk and of catastrophic consequence without reason, rationale, nor Congressional authorization — which is as clear a violation of the Constitution as any.”
On Tuesday, just an hour and a half before his deadline to decimate Iran’s civilian infrastructure, Trump announced that the U.S. and Iran had agreed to a two-week ceasefire, with the potential to negotiate a long term end to the bombardments. During the pause in fighting, the U.S. would cease its bombardments of Iran, while Iran would reopen traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
The announcement came after Trump had, earlier on Tuesday, threatened to destroy all of Iran. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” he said.
The statement was swiftly met with a deluge of calls for Trump to be impeached or removed via the 25th Amendment, which allows the president’s cabinet to declare him unfit. Over 70 lawmakers joined the calls, with the comment being so alarming that even far right figures like Candace Owens and Alex Jones called for Trump’s removal.
But the calls seemed to lose momentum after the threat didn’t come to pass on Tuesday, and as Democratic leaders declined to demand his removal. Some Democrats and liberal commentators even mocked Trump, taunting him with the “TACO” insult, standing for “Trump always chickens out,” or criticized him for the deal after it was announced.
Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Arizona), who is Iranian, said that it was callous to taunt Trump for not following through on his threats of genocide.
“I do not appreciate anyone — Democrat or Republican — taking this moment to make TACO jokes to say Trump ‘chickened out,’” Ansari said. “The president was threatening genocide against 90 million Iranians. I’m grateful there’s a ceasefire & scores of innocent people didn’t die tonight.”
Ocasio-Cortez said that it’s important that Democrats keep their foot on the gas. She said that Trump’s corruption and profit-seeking are also clear cases for Trump to be ousted.
“All of these incidents, and plenty more, have clearly driven our country past the threshold for impeachment or invocation of the 25th amendment. We cannot risk the world nor the wellbeing of our nation any longer,” she wrote. “Whether by his Cabinet or Congress, the President must be removed from office. We are playing with the brink.”
Ocasio-Cortez was one of the lawmakers calling for Trump’s removal on Tuesday, saying that his “civilization” threat was a “threat of genocide” that “merits removal from office.”
“The President’s mental faculties are collapsing and cannot be trusted,” she said. “To every individual in the President’s chain of command: You have a duty to refuse illegal orders. That includes carrying out this threat.”
As the lawmaker warned, the ceasefire is indeed already in danger. Just hours after the announcement of the ceasefire, Israel bombarded Lebanon with its most intense attack in decades, leveling buildings across the country, including in the densely populated capital of Beirut.
Israel and the Trump administration claimed that Lebanon was not included in the deal, but Pakistan, which was the key intermediary between the U.S. and Iran for the deal, said that it was. Meanwhile, in retaliation, Iranian state media reported that Iran has once again halted all traffic through the strait because of Israel’s strikes on Lebanon.
Top Democrats Make Momentum Behind Trump Impeachment Screech to a Halt
Rather than calling for impeachment, Schumer criticized Trump for what he said was worsening Iran’s “nuclear ambition.”
By Sharon Zhang ,
Truthout is a vital news source and a living history of political struggle. If you think our work is valuable, support us with a donation of any size.
Awave of momentum behind impeaching President Donald Trump for his genocidal threats toward Iran on Tuesday came to a screeching halt by the end of the week as Democratic leaders like Senate and House minority leaders Chuck Schumer (New York) and Hakeem Jeffries (New York) hand-wrung over such a process being a “distraction,” reporting says.
After Trump threatened that “a whole civilization will die tonight” on Tuesday morning, over 70 lawmakers, including a handful of senators, called for Trump to be impeached or be removed via the 25th Amendment over the threat. His threat was so beyond the pale that even far right figures like Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson criticized him, and called for an end to the war.
This was the biggest wave of calls for impeachment during Trump’s second term yet, coming as speculation flew over what horrors Trump would unleash upon the country of 93 million people — amid a war in which the U.S. and Israel have killed over 1,700 civilians thus far, including at least 254 children, according to human rights group Human Rights Activists News Agency.
But the calls likely won’t lead to consequences for Trump any time soon. Time reported on Friday that “[b]oth paths — impeachment or the 25th Amendment — are, to the mind of party Leadership, a distraction from their planned midterm campaign focused on high costs and unchecked corruption.”
Neither Jeffries nor Schumer has called for impeachment or removal in response to the threat. Their refusal to act is sure to ignite further fury as the Democratic Party still manages to garner worse approval ratings than Republicans due to widespread views that the party is weak and ineffective.
On Wednesday, Schumer, a longtime supporter of Israel, held a press conference criticizing Trump for the war and the ceasefire — making critiques not necessarily of the concept of war with Iran itself, but of the way that Trump is going about it.
“The Iranian regime is still standing. Not just standing, but now emboldened,” he said. “Iran’s nuclear ambition, worse. The bottom line is that Iran still has its nuclear stockpile. Its nuclear ambitions are still unchecked, if not accelerated.” He said that the Senate would undertake a war powers resolution next week — far past Trump’s deadline for civilization-wide annihilation that ultimately did not come to pass on Tuesday.
Party leaders evidently believe an impeachment effort highlighting Trump’s horrific war would fail, and thus isn’t worth trying — even as Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) pointed out that introducing articles of impeachment is a way to demonstrate the gravity of the situation. Jeffries directly stated he wouldn’t be backing an impeachment effort, saying: “I don’t want to get out ahead of that discussion … we want to be able to do [impeachment] in an informed way.”
Time further reported: “A failed impeachment effort, a party leader suggested privately, risks being framed as tacit approval of the President’s conduct, while also diverting attention from the party’s core economic message on affordability and health care — issues party leaders believe resonate more directly with voters.”
This belief simply isn’t true, and ignores the support that Democrats could gain by taking a principled stance.
Trump’s approval has been driven to new lows amid his war on Iran, which has broken records for unpopularity. Polling for IMEU Policy Project and Demand Progress by Data for Progress recently found that 43 percent of voters say they are less likely to vote for Republicans due to the war, demonstrating a huge swath of voters that the Democrats could appeal to by staking out an anti-war stance.
Further, affordability issues are directly tied to the war, with the U.S. and Israel’s aggression prompting the retaliatory closure of the Strait of Hormuz, causing energy costs — and costs of goods downstream from that — to soar. Republicans are reportedly even considering enacting further cuts to health care subsidies in order to pay for the White House’s towering $200 billion supplemental funding request for the war.
Rather than calling for impeachment, Schumer criticized Trump for what he said was worsening Iran’s “nuclear ambition.”
By Sharon Zhang ,
April 10, 2026
U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries hold a press conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on January 8, 2026.SAUL LOEB / AFP via Getty Images
Truthout is a vital news source and a living history of political struggle. If you think our work is valuable, support us with a donation of any size.
Awave of momentum behind impeaching President Donald Trump for his genocidal threats toward Iran on Tuesday came to a screeching halt by the end of the week as Democratic leaders like Senate and House minority leaders Chuck Schumer (New York) and Hakeem Jeffries (New York) hand-wrung over such a process being a “distraction,” reporting says.
After Trump threatened that “a whole civilization will die tonight” on Tuesday morning, over 70 lawmakers, including a handful of senators, called for Trump to be impeached or be removed via the 25th Amendment over the threat. His threat was so beyond the pale that even far right figures like Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson criticized him, and called for an end to the war.
This was the biggest wave of calls for impeachment during Trump’s second term yet, coming as speculation flew over what horrors Trump would unleash upon the country of 93 million people — amid a war in which the U.S. and Israel have killed over 1,700 civilians thus far, including at least 254 children, according to human rights group Human Rights Activists News Agency.
But the calls likely won’t lead to consequences for Trump any time soon. Time reported on Friday that “[b]oth paths — impeachment or the 25th Amendment — are, to the mind of party Leadership, a distraction from their planned midterm campaign focused on high costs and unchecked corruption.”
Neither Jeffries nor Schumer has called for impeachment or removal in response to the threat. Their refusal to act is sure to ignite further fury as the Democratic Party still manages to garner worse approval ratings than Republicans due to widespread views that the party is weak and ineffective.
On Wednesday, Schumer, a longtime supporter of Israel, held a press conference criticizing Trump for the war and the ceasefire — making critiques not necessarily of the concept of war with Iran itself, but of the way that Trump is going about it.
“The Iranian regime is still standing. Not just standing, but now emboldened,” he said. “Iran’s nuclear ambition, worse. The bottom line is that Iran still has its nuclear stockpile. Its nuclear ambitions are still unchecked, if not accelerated.” He said that the Senate would undertake a war powers resolution next week — far past Trump’s deadline for civilization-wide annihilation that ultimately did not come to pass on Tuesday.
Party leaders evidently believe an impeachment effort highlighting Trump’s horrific war would fail, and thus isn’t worth trying — even as Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) pointed out that introducing articles of impeachment is a way to demonstrate the gravity of the situation. Jeffries directly stated he wouldn’t be backing an impeachment effort, saying: “I don’t want to get out ahead of that discussion … we want to be able to do [impeachment] in an informed way.”
Time further reported: “A failed impeachment effort, a party leader suggested privately, risks being framed as tacit approval of the President’s conduct, while also diverting attention from the party’s core economic message on affordability and health care — issues party leaders believe resonate more directly with voters.”
This belief simply isn’t true, and ignores the support that Democrats could gain by taking a principled stance.
Trump’s approval has been driven to new lows amid his war on Iran, which has broken records for unpopularity. Polling for IMEU Policy Project and Demand Progress by Data for Progress recently found that 43 percent of voters say they are less likely to vote for Republicans due to the war, demonstrating a huge swath of voters that the Democrats could appeal to by staking out an anti-war stance.
Further, affordability issues are directly tied to the war, with the U.S. and Israel’s aggression prompting the retaliatory closure of the Strait of Hormuz, causing energy costs — and costs of goods downstream from that — to soar. Republicans are reportedly even considering enacting further cuts to health care subsidies in order to pay for the White House’s towering $200 billion supplemental funding request for the war.
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