Fired former Trump White House chief of staff Reince Priebus has revealed what the president’s main impeachment defense will be starting next week when he is tried for the high crimes and misdemeanors of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
“So what?”
That’s literally going to be the summation of all the allegations against a sitting president of the United States of America, the supposed leader of the free world.
“Sometimes the best defense is the ‘so what?’ defense. If everything the Democrats said is true, it’s still not impeachable. If everything Lev Parnas said is true, it’s still not impeachable. That’s what this is about,” Priebus, who Trump fired in 2017, told Fox News’ Sean Hannity Thursday night.
Of course, Priebus is wrong. Constitutional scholars and legal experts will have no problem refuting that argument.
Call it the 21st century version of disgraced President Richard M. Nixon’s infamous “Well when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.”
(That is actually false. Illegal is illegal, regardless of whether or not the president is committing the crime, with very few exceptions – like disclosure of classified information.)
The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent calls the new “so what?” defense “particularly ugly.”
Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license