A history professor famous for correctly predicting the outcome of the last nine presidential elections says that an impeachment of Donald Trump would only help Democrats win in 2020, despite Donald Trump’s frequent warnings to the contrary.
American University history professor Allan Lichtman has gained fame for his correct predictions of presidential elections, including calling Trump’s shocking win over Hillary Clinton in 2016. But Lichtman believes that Trump’s time in office could be coming to an end, even as Donald Trump predicts that impeachment will backfire on Democrats. The president is facing a fast-moving impeachment inquiry related to a whistleblower complaint that he pushed Ukraine into digging up dirt on his potential 2020 rival, Joe Biden.
As Newsweek reported, Lichtman said in an interview this week that his prediction model is based on the performance of the party occupying the White House, so it would not hurt Democrats to anger Trump supporters by following through on impeaching the president.
Lichtman also pushed back against the popular theory that impeaching Bill Clinton hurt Republicans in 1998. Though Clinton’s own personal approval actually rose, Democrats underperformed in the next election and George W. Bush was able to win the presidency on a message of restoring integrity to the White House, Lichtman noted.
“The impeachment of Bill Clinton was the best thing that ever happened to the Republicans politically, not the worst,” Lichtman said.
There are other factors in Lichtman’s prediction model that could hurt Donald Trump, the report noted. The model measures things like White House scandals, social unrest, and economic downturns — something that economic experts say could be coming, especially related to Trump’s trade wars.
But in order for Democrats to truly sting Donald Trump, they need to move beyond the initial impeachment inquiry to actually pull the trigger on impeachment, Lichtman added. Though Trump has predicted economic peril if he is impeached and said it will lead to him winning again in 2020, Lichtman did not give credence to these predictions.
Allan Lichtman had previously underscored the importance of impeaching Donald Trump. As The Inquisitr reported back in May, Lichtman said that the widespread idea that impeachment was politically perilous for Democrats, saying it would actually be the key to the party defeating Trump and re-taking the White House in 2020.
“It’s a false dichotomy to say Democrats have a choice between doing what is right and what is constitutional and what is politically right,” Lichtman said. “Impeachment is also politically right.”