Toomey Joins Murkowski’s Call For Trump To Resign: ‘Best Path Forward’

WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 14: Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) looks on during a tax reform hearing before the Senate Finance Committee on Capitol Hill September 14, 2017 in Washington, DC. President Trump has indicated that ... WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 14: Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) looks on during a tax reform hearing before the Senate Finance Committee on Capitol Hill September 14, 2017 in Washington, DC. President Trump has indicated that tax reform should be a major legislative goal this fall. (Photo by Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images) MORE LESS
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Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) on Sunday took his stance on President Trump having “committed impeachable offenses” further by calling on the sitting president to resign, following the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol earlier this week that Trump incited, during an interview on CNN.

Toomey is the second Republican senator to suggest that Trump resign. On Friday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) called on Trump to resign.

Appearing on CNN Sunday morning, Toomey said he agrees with Murkowski in calling for Trump’s resignation.

“I think at this point, with just a few days left, it’s the best path forward, the best way to get this person in the rearview mirror for us,” Toomey said.

Toomey said that although “that could happen immediately,” he is “not optimistic it will.”

Toomey reiterated his argument that Trump committed impeachable offenses, but expressed doubts about the practicality of the House moving ahead with impeachment proceedings this week.

“I don’t know as a practical matter it is actually even possible to do an impeachment in the handful of days that are left. It is likely if the House does pass articles of impeachment, we wouldn’t get them until I don’t know Tuesday or Wednesday,” Toomey said. “We are less than one week to go at that point.”

Toomey added that he is also unclear whether it is constitutionally permissible to impeach the President after he has left office.

“So there may not be a viable impeachment route at this point,” Toomey said. “But certainly, he could resign and that would be a very good outcome.”

Toomey said that Trump should face consequences, however, and that the President potentially faces “criminal liability” and “has disqualified himself from ever certainly serving in office again.”

“I don’t think he is electable in any way,” Toomey said. “And I don’t think he’s going to be exercising anything like the kind of influence that he has had over the Republican party going forward.”

Asked later about he has regrets about not doing more to stop Trump from inciting the attack on the Capitol on Wednesday, given how the Pennsylvania senator called the President a “demagogue” in light of the Capitol siege, Toomey insisted that the President’s behavior after the election was wildly different than his behavior before.”

“He descended into a level of madness and engaged in activity that was absolutely unthinkable and unforgivable,” Toomey said.

Watch Toomey’s remarks below:

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Notable Replies

  1. “I don’t know as a practical matter it is actually even possible to do an impeachment in the handful of days that are left.

    “I mean,” he continued, “It’s not like it’s a Supreme Court Confirmation or anything like that.”

  2. Convenient, since he is retiring and won’t face the wrath of his voters in PA.

  3. another Profile in Discourage

  4. Toomey is no Martin Luther King. The fact that a man like Toomey has said this puts Marco Rubio’s comical attempt to “BothSides” Trump’s depravity and, somehow, straddle some sort of “fence” in a better (and more accurate) light.

    Like Trump, Rubio, too, is unelectable

  5. The GOP wants to have it both ways–Trump gone without thhem soiling their hands.

    It won’t work. We will remember.

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