Senate Republicans are threatening to turn former president Donald Trump's impeachment trial into a circus, but one conservative urged Democrats to call their bluff and bring in the ringmaster himself.
Sen. Lindsey Graham and other Republicans have signaled they'll vote to acquit no matter what, and they'll engage in "pedantic" and "preposterous" stunts to obfuscate the former president's role in provoking a violent assault on the U.S. Capitol, but conservative Tim Miller argued in a new column for The Bulwark that Democrats should dare Trump to take the stand.
"The turf where they lose? Donald Trump's actions. His ongoing refusal to own up to his lies," Miller wrote.
"That's why the Democratic senators should call Lindsey Graham's bluff," he added. "If Trump's defense team wants to call pro-coup witnesses, have at it. But Donald Trump himself should be one of them."
The former president publicly called on supporters to rally on his behalf as Congress certified Joe Biden's election win, and he exhorted them to march on the Capitol -- where many of them stormed inside looking to lynch Vice President Mike Pence and execute lawmakers in an effort to overturn Trump's loss.
"Most Senate Republicans aren't in a position to disavow Trump's stolen election lies because their voters think that they are eternal truths provided to them by the Mango Moroni on gold lamé tablets," Miller wrote. "They want their representatives to Fight for Trump, not nitpick his narrative."
"And thus the best way to force the impeachment conversation to be about Trump's actions and lies — and congressional Republicans' complicity in them — is to demand he testify at the scene of the crime," he added.Compelling his testimony should be easy enough, Miller argued, if Democrats exploit the same personality defects that prevent Trump from admitting he lost the election.
"He should be repeatedly called out as a coward and worse if he refuses to take the stand in his own defense," Miler wrote. "Trump will become apoplectic if he is derided and taunted and mocked without having the White House bully pulpit and a united Republican caucus to defend him as he did during the last impeachment."
"This is a time to hold his feet to the fire," Miller added. "He must not be allowed to try to end American democracy without having to answer for it."
