Rachel Maddow explains how Democrats are overthinking impeachment: 'Who cares who it’s good for?'

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said the political considerations of impeachment are beside the point.

Maddow appeared on "Late Night With Seth Meyers," where she told the host that Democrats had a constitutional duty to investigate President Donald Trump by opening an impeachment inquiry -- regardless of the unknowable political consequences.

“If a president commits high crimes and misdemeanors," she said, "the way the Congress is supposed to hold him accountable is by opening an impeachment inquiry, doing an investigation and then voting on whether or not they think that it rises to that level."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has so far resisted calls for impeachment from dozens of House Democrats, saying she preferred to see the president voted out next year instead of exposing the party to political risks for an impeachment process that would almost certainly end in the Republican-controlled Senate.

“Whether or not that hurts the president, helps the president, hurts the Democrats, helps the Democrats, A, is unknowable and, B, should be beside the point," Maddow said, "and if you are doing it for the right reasons I think you are more likely to persuade the country that you’ve done it for the right reasons, rather than you having tried to think everybody around the corner in terms of how this is supposed to work out."

Maddow urged Democrats to launch an impeachment inquiry “in terms of the constitutional imperative.”

“Who cares who it’s good for?” she said.