Republican rep. responds to birther: 'Probably' enough votes to impeach Obama

In response to a so-called birther constituent who believed that Barack Obama was not born in the United States, Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-TX) said at a town hall event over the weekend that Republicans "probably" had enough votes to impeach the president.

According to BuzzFeed, Farenthold was taking questions at the Civic Center in Luling when a woman asked him if he would join Reps. Steve Stockman (R-TX) and Ted Yoho (R-FL) in introducing legislation to investigate whether the president was a legitimate U.S. citizen.

“I think unfortunately the horse is already out of the barn on this, on the whole birth certificate issue," Farenthold explained. “The original Congress -- when his eligibility came up -- should have looked into it, and they didn’t. I’m not sure how we fix it.”

The woman insisted that "a felony has been committed" and wanted to know if Obama would be allowed "to go unpunished."

Farenthold replied: "You tie in to a question I get a lot, 'If everybody is so unhappy with the president, why don't you impeach him?' And I'll give you a real frank answer about that: If we were to impeach the president tomorrow, you could probably get the votes in the House of Representatives to do it. But it would go to the Senate and he wouldn’t be convicted."

The Texas Republican pointed out that a similar situation happen with President Bill Clinton and the result was "we redefined what sex is for a lot of our young people and we've said it's okay to lie to Congress."

"And that failed impeachment attempt has actually damaged the country," he added. "What message do we send to America if we impeach Obama and he gets away with what he's impeached for and is found innocent? What do we say then is okay? I mean, aside from the fact that it wouldn't be effective, I think there is some potential damage to society that would be done with a failed attempt at impeachment."

"I think there is potential damage to society that this [birth certificate] issue will not be brought up by anybody in the media!" the woman exclaimed. "There's something very sinister going on here. It's terrible."

Watch this video, uploaded to YouTube on Aug. 11, 2013.

[Photo: Flickr/Darrell Issa]