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Lawyer Heading ‘Impeach Donald Trump Now’ Group Says Movement Is ‘Well Underway’

Published on: February 4, 2017 at 2:52 PM
By Christine Beswick

NPR reports that over 50 lawsuits spanning 17 states have been filed against the sitting President of the United States in his first two weeks of office. This has never happened. News.com out of Australia reports that Trump also has offended Mexico and Australia in the past two weeks. Additionally, more than half a million signatures have accumulated on a petition to impeach Donald Trump, in an “Impeach Trump Now” movement that the lawyer spearheading the petition says, is a movement that is “well underway.”

News Australia reports that as of February 2, over 580,000 people have signed the petition at the Impeach Donald Trump Now website. Attorney Ron Fein, legal director for Free Speech For People, the group that is running the petition says the following.

“No modern president has displayed the casual indifference to the Constitution and the rule of law that President Trump shows. The violations, the corruption, and the threat to our republic are here now, but they will only get worse the longer he stays in office. Americans deserve a president who is not beholden to foreign governments to keep his businesses afloat, and whose decisions about bread-and-butter, not to mention life-and-death matters, will not be used to prop up Trump Towers around the world.”

Trump has not only offended Mexico and Australia, he’s also offended some Canadians when he used the recent terror attack known as the Quebec mosque shooting as an example to justify his travel ban.

Trump is also not doing well in his own country, with the lowest favorability rating in history for a new president. In addition to being one of the most protested presidents in American history, he is also the subject of over 50 lawsuits spurred within the first two weeks of his presidency reports NPR . Some are related to the travel ban, deemed a ban against Muslims and religious freedom, others are related to financial conflicts of interest. All of these reasons are among the many cited as cause for a Trump impeachment.

The Toronto Star out of Canada concurs, and reports, Donald Trump is “ planting the seeds of his demise ” and refers to the recent actions of the current president as “carnage.” The Toronto Star notes the “shell shocked reactions of Western leaders” to Donald Trump’s actions, leaders that were once American allies.

Trump’s reaction to the Quebec mosque shooting, a terror attack that occurred 48 hours after Trump’s Muslim ban order was executed, is also one that has left many Canadians shaking their heads. Donald Trump did call Prime Minister Trudeau in a private phone call to express his condolences after the Quebec mosque shooting, but has said nothing publicly other than to use the attack as justification for his travel ban.

Global News has counted how many times Donald Trump has tweeted since the attack, including a tweet out to France when the Louvre was recently attacked. But Donald Trump has not said anything publicly to Canada. The Toronto Star reports that such actions of Trump, or lack thereof, will lead to his own demise.

“We could even detect traces of Trump’s racist influence in the horrific massacre last Sunday at a Quebec City mosque. The 27-year-old Laval University student charged with the murder of six Muslims was described by friends as being inspired by the extremist politics of Trump and France’s National Front leader Marine Le Pen.”

In the immediate aftermath of the actual carnage happening in Canada from the Quebec mosque shooting, the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., was reportedly “liking” things on Twitter that spurned the hope that the killer of the Canadians at a Canadian mosque was a Muslim. If the killer did turn out to be a Muslim, that would give Trump Jr.’s father “political capital” according to a tweet favorited by Donald Trump Jr.

The Toronto Star also notes that the resistance to Trump is building “in every corner in America and in many parts of the world.” A declining spot in the world of America could play a factor in impeachment.

[Image by Kamil Zihnioglu/AP Images]

In America alone, the resistance is building. Salon Magazine reports that Public Policy Polling report shows that 40 percent of voters want to impeach Donald Trump. This number is up from 35 percent of voters that wanted to impeach Trump one week prior to this most recent poll. Fifty-two percent of the same respondents said they want Obama back, and 43 percent said they preferred Trump.

And then, the lawsuits. Attorney General for Massachusetts Maura Healey has been very vocal about the unconstitutionality of Trump’s travel ban. She recently tweeted the following.

NPR reports that most of the “50-plus” lawsuits filed against Donald Trump are related to the travel ban, but his business dealings are also a source of concern in the scores of lawsuits launched within the last two weeks. NPR reports that the amount of lawsuits currently against the president of the United States is “far more” than his predecessors ever experienced.

The lawsuits span 17 states and arise from doctors, students, professors, and many of the hundreds detained unlawfully in American airports last weekend. An entire family in one instance, including a five-year-old child, was handcuffed last weekend per Trump’s executive order. Lawyers suing Trump over these actions are citing violations of the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments that refer to religious freedom and due process along with equal protection under the law.

The City of San Francisco has also sued Trump after he withheld funds from sanctuary cities. A conflict of interest lawsuit has also been filed against Trump by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington over his business dealings, a suit that Deepak Gupta says could have “broad implications” reports NPR .

“This is about testing the proposition that the framers really meant it when they said the president has to have undivided loyalty to the American people and should not have financial entanglements with foreign governments.”

In addition to the movement to Impeach Donald Trump Now, Congress is starting to take notice too, and the impeach Trump movement does appear to be “well underway.” A GOP Congressman has referred to Trump’s travel ban as a ban that is eroding the trust of the world in the United States and opening the door for terrorists to recruit across the world.

And a Democratic Congressman from Texas Joaquin Castro says the travel ban is grounds for impeachment reports the Independent . An investigation to determine if Trump violated his oath with the travel ban, which would be an impeachable offense, is reportedly underway.

News Australia reports that to impeach Donald Trump would only take a vote from Congress. Opponents to this idea allege that with a Republican Congress, that would be unlikely. But in the event of a Trump impeachment, Vice President Mike Pence and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan would resume the Oval Office, and the Republicans would still maintain control of all three branches of government.

Right now, America is falling in the world’s eyes. The travel ban and Trump’s refusal to divest his financial dealings before taking the oath to “preserve, protect, and defend” the Constitution are being considered as “high crimes” by those in favor of an impeachment.

[Image by Matt Dunham/AP Images]

But Gorana Grgic a professor of politics at the United States Studies Centre at Sydney University says that she “doesn’t see it” as far as an impeachment is concerned, reports News Australia . She is one of the arguments that says a Republican-controlled Congress would never do it, and that impeachment before 2018 would have disastrous consequences on the mid-term elections.

This could mean that if the Republicans are considering setting the stage for impeachment, Americans may have to wait until after 2018 elections. But if Trump does something unconstitutional, or the travel ban is deemed unconstitutional after the investigation, they won’t legally be able to wait at all. So far, the travel ban has not held up in court and is one that multiple federal judges have deemed causes “irreparable harm” to American residents.

And therein lies the problem. Many believe that the unconstitutional acts by Trump have already begun. The resistance to Trump is not just a movement in America, as protests erupted all over the world this weekend in Indonesia, Britain, and France, among many other locations.

Ron Fein, the attorney heading the Impeach Donald Trump now group, says he’s already “been in discussion with several members of Congress and anticipate that [impeachment] happening in the near future….as time goes on, more and more evidence will emerge that the President is not just violating, but openly flouting the Constitution.”

[Feature Image by Dita Alangkara/AP Images]

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