Politico reports:

Democrats insist that their march toward impeaching President Donald Trump is simply about doing the right thing. But a growing number of them see a real political upside, too: It might help them win back the Senate.

Senate Democrats are growing increasingly giddy at the prospect of seeing a half-dozen vulnerable senators squirm for weeks and months about Trump’s behavior before eventually being forced to go on the record to convict or acquit Trump if he’s impeached by the House. While conventional wisdom holds that trying to remove the president could cost House Democrats in battleground seats that Trump won in 2016, there’s a sense in the party that it could improve Democrats’ bid to seize the Senate.

“Voters are going to see this as a stinking fish. I don’t think voters are going to want their member of Congress or Senate to be up here defending the president’s actions,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). “It’ll be interesting to see what happens when Republicans come back from this [October] recess.”

Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) argued, “We need to do the right thing regardless of who’s benefiting,” before noting that there is an outsize number of Republican seats up for grabs next year. [Continue reading…]