During the late-night "hand-off" between CNN hosts Chris Cuomo and Don Lemon, the former explained how the president could have gotten himself out of being the third president in history to be impeached. What stopped him, according to Cuomo, was Trump's pride.
"He did what he did. He said what he said," Cuomo said. "That -- nobody else deserves any blame for. However, he could have not been impeached, there's a likelihood, if he had played this differently. If he had been compelled by himself or any of the voices or the Republicans, as you suggest, to admit that he did something wrong, but he didn't do it for the reasons that the Democrats are accusing him of, and he doesn't want foreign interference, he may have aroid avoided this because Nancy Pelosi did not want to go down this road when a lot of other Democrats did, and it was a tough push for them."
Lemon said that he blamed Republicans for spending the last several years enabling Trump's bad behavior.
"Bill Clinton was contrite. He apologized," Lemon recalled. "Donald Trump has done none of that. And guess what? When I watched every single person, every Republican who got up today and spoke, not one of them said he did anything wrong. Not one of them said it was inappropriate. Not one of them chastised him for anything he did on the call or for any of his behavior. They have been enablers throughout this entire process."
He said that Republicans could have said that what Trump did was inappropriate but didn't rise to the level of impeachment. Republicans have defended the president's actions, regardless of whether they are unethical, inappropriate, or worse.
"Imagine if he had said, 'Listen, I didn't mean to do that,'" said Lemon. "If he had said, 'Listen, I'm really sorry. Maybe the call wasn't perfect. Maybe it came out wrong."
Instead, he doubled down and proclaimed his innocence. Cuomo said that going that route would have really hurt the Democrats' case against him that the president not only asked for foreign interference in an election, but he continues to do it.
"Because he's certainly not a continuing threat now," Cuomo explained if Trump had simply apologized and accepted responsibility.
"If he just said, he knows he did this the wrong way, and he didn't even have to give as much as you're suggesting," Cuomo continued. "He could have just said, 'Look, I don't trust the State Department. I think they're out to get me. I don't trust any of these institutions. I think they're out to get me. That's why I put Rudy in there. I didn't have some parallel anything going on. I didn't do this for foreign interference. I don't need any help to beat [Joe] Biden...that alone would have made the Democrats unable to argue he was a continuing threat."
Cuomo cited Proverbs: "Pride comes before the fall," saying that when Trump refuses "to admit you did anything wrong and you blame everybody else around you and the facts are as clear as they are here, you're going to get impeached, and that's what happened."
Watch the full exchange below:
