U.S. Republican Senate candidate Bill Hagerty said this week he believes it’s improper for four Democratic U.S. senators to participate in impeachment hearings when they are running for president against Donald Trump.
Hagerty said in a press release that he agreed with U.S. Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, who first questioned whether these four Democrats are acting properly.
“This impeachment process is a total political charade, and the Democrats are focused on two things: undoing the 2016 election and impacting the 2020 election,” the press release quoted Hagerty as saying.
“These radical liberals know they can’t beat President Trump at the ballot box, so they are attempting to remove him through the impeachment process. Senator Blackburn is exactly right, the four Democrat Senators running for President should recuse themselves.”
As The Tennessee Star reported this week, Blackburn said the four senators she was referring to were Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Michael Bennett (D-CO) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN).
“To participate in this trial would be a failure of the oath they took to be an ‘impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws,’” Blackburn said.
“Their presidential ambitions prohibit their ability to view this trial through an objective lens.”
Blackburn cited the 1868 impeachment trial of former U.S. President Andrew Johnson.
“In Andrew Johnson’s impeachment trial, an objection was lodged against an Ohio senator who was next in line to become President, if Johnson were removed,” according to Blackburn.
Also as reported, Jeff Webb, founder and chairman of The New American Populist (TNAP), praised Blackburn for what she said.
“What Senator Blackburn has done is expose the hypocrisy of the Democrat impeachment ploy by calling for these senators to recuse themselves,” Webb said.
“Since they have a great deal to gain if President Trump were to be removed from office, they are themselves using their positions for personal political gain, the very thing they contend the President did.”
Webb said a vote by these four senators would be “an insult to the institution of the Senate, as well as the American people.”
In addition to praising Blackburn’s Senate comments, Webb asked Tennessee’s other senator, Lamar Alexander, also a Republican, to also ask these four senators to recuse themselves.
“Along with thousands of Tennessee citizens, I hope that our senior senator, Lamar Alexander, will join with Senator Blackburn in pressing for this simple fairness,” he said.
“Senator Alexander is well known for defending the institution of the Senate. There can be no greater defense of the institution than to demand open and obvious conflicts of interest be set aside.”
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
