Renato Mariotti writes:

What Trump is alleged to have done is not a garden variety crime; it’s worse. It involved misusing $250 million in aid appropriated by Congress for his benefit—the kind of gross misconduct that easily clears the bar of high crimes and misdemeanors set by the Constitution when impeaching a president. Which means the best way to hold Trump accountable for that misconduct isn’t a criminal trial; it’s for Congress to impeach him.

Pursuing criminal cases that won’t stand legal scrutiny, or arguing that Trump has violated a criminal statute, risks undermining that goal.

First, it gives the false impression that this is something the criminal justice system can deal with. But the criminal system is not built to handle misconduct by a president who is acting corruptly through the use of his immense constitutional powers in this manner.

Second, it suggests that if critics can point out that it is not really bribery or extortion, then it is not a huge problem, which is not true. This is already happening, as allies of the president assert that there was no explicit quid pro quo.

Third, it may give the public a false impression about what happened. Impeachment in many respects is a political act, and that means Congress needs public support to pursue it. Anything that confuses or fails to persuade the public is therefore counterproductive.

Finally, it understates the magnitude of the alleged misconduct. [Continue reading…]

The New York Times reports:

Intensifying a line of attack he and his allies have stoked for months, Mr. Trump said the real problem was Mr. Biden and questions about what the president described as “the Joe Biden demand that the Ukrainian Government fire a prosecutor who was investigating his son.”

Referring to his conversation with Mr. Zelensky, Mr. Trump said: “Nothing was said that was in any way wrong, but Biden’s demand, on the other hand, was a complete and total disaster.”

No evidence has surfaced to support Mr. Trump’s claim that the former vice president intentionally tried to help his son by pressing for the prosecutor general’s dismissal. But some State Department officials had expressed concern that Hunter Biden’s work in Ukraine could complicate his father’s diplomacy there.

The issue strikes a particular nerve for Mr. Biden, who has long feared putting his family under the harsh spotlight of a presidential campaign. During a two-minute encounter with reporters on Saturday morning, he grew irate, angrily insisting that he had never spoken with his son about any overseas work. [Continue reading…]