Former GOP Senator Jeff Flake Warns Republicans That They’ll Be On Trial Along With Donald Trump
As Republicans in the U.S. Senate prepare to conduct President Donald Trump‘s impeachment trial, former Republican Sen. Jeff Flake warned the party that it’s not only the president who will face a trial when the impeachment matter is moved from the House of Representatives to the Senate.
According to Fox News, Flake — an outspoken critic of Trump who left the upper chamber earlier this year — penned an op-ed for The Washington Post on Friday in which he sent the stark warning to his party.
“President Trump is on trial. But in a very real sense, so are you. And so is the political party to which we belong,” Flake wrote, referring to his Republican colleagues.
Flake had a lot to say about Trump’s impeachment, none of which was favorable to the 45th president or House Republicans, whom he implied displayed blind loyalty in defending the president while ignoring the alleged misconduct that sparked the impeachment inquiry in the first place.
“The willingness of House Republicans to bend to the president’s will by attempting to shift blame with the promotion of bizarre and debunked conspiracy theories has been an appalling spectacle,” Flake wrote.
“It will have long-term ramifications for the country and the party, to say nothing of individual reputations.”
The former Arizona senator pointed out that Republicans would have likely been quick to bring former President Barack Obama on similar impeachment charges had he committed similar acts during his time in the White House.
“You would have understood with striking clarity the threat it posed, and you would have known exactly what to do,” Flake wrote.
Flake generated headlines in September after claiming that Trump could face a real threat in a Senate trial if there was a secret vote, saying that nearly three dozen Republican senators would possibly vote to remove the president from office. That number, assuming all Senate Democrats voted to remove Trump as well, would suffice to secure a two-thirds majority vote to take the president out of the White House.
As previously reported by The Inquisitr, Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld recently claimed that up to six Republican senators might break rank with Trump and the White House, and vote to remove him in a Senate trial.
When asked to clarify his statement, Weld pointed out that he has close relationships with a number of GOP senators and suggested that there could be more defectors than others are predicting.
“But yeah, I would say they’re four to six votes for removal right now,” Weld said in a recent interview with The Hill.
