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Romney: Senators & Representatives too afraid to convict [1]

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Date: 2023-09-14

Mitt Romney had a portion of his upcoming memoir, Romney: A Reckoning featured in the The Atlantic (may be behind a paywall) www.theatlantic.com/… with a long story of how great Mitt Romney is, but these paragraphs tell of tale of the cowardice of the Republican party to “do right”.

Some of the reluctance to hold Trump accountable was a function of the same old perverse political incentives—elected Republicans feared a political backlash from their base. But after January 6, a new, more existential brand of cowardice had emerged. One Republican congressman confided to Romney that he wanted to vote for Trump’s second impeachment, but chose not to out of fear for his family’s safety. The congressman reasoned that Trump would be impeached by House Democrats with or without him—why put his wife and children at risk if it wouldn’t change the outcome? Later, during the Senate trial, Romney heard the same calculation while talking with a small group of Republican colleagues. When one senator, a member of leadership, said he was leaning toward voting to convict, the others urged him to reconsider. You can’t do that, Romney recalled someone saying. Think of your personal safety, said another. Think of your children. The senator eventually decided they were right. As dismayed as Romney was by this line of thinking, he understood it. Most members of Congress don’t have security details. Their addresses are publicly available online. Romney himself had been shelling out $5,000 a day since the riot to cover private security for his family—an expense he knew most of his colleagues couldn’t afford.

This is wrong. I don’t understand it!! And the GOP has continued to be terrified by their own voters.

We AREN’T afraid of them. We misjudged them in 2016. We are going to have to fix the American democracy and drag the Republican Party with us, because they won’t do it themselves. Vote, folks.

The Founders risked death by seeking independence and inspired the Ben Franklin quote:

“We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”

Thanks.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/14/2193275/-Romney-Senators-Representatives-too-afraid-to-convict

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