Jonathan supports the impeachment of the president and the vice-president. He also supports the censure proposal by Senator Russ Feingold and, as the Senator from New York, would work hard to rally support for Feingold and his proposal.
While impeachment is a very serious step that should not have been trivialized the way it was during the last presidential administration, it is also an indispensable part of a system of checks and balances that sustains our democracy. When strong evidence exists of the most serious crimes, we must use impeachment or lose the ability of the legislative branch to compel the executive branch to obey the law.
This is not a question of supporting one party over another, but of upholding the rule of law over both of them. Jonathan supports impeachment not to promote a party, but to protect our democracy.
President Bush and Vice-President Cheney deserve to be impeached because their actions rise to the Constitutional threshold of “high crimes and misdemeanorsâ€:
1. Intentionally misleading Congress and the public regarding the threat from Iraq in order to justify a war against Iraq, and intentionally conspiring with others to defraud Congress in this regard.
2. Ordering the National Security Agency to conduct electronic surveillance of American citizens without seeking warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review, as required by law, specifically, Title 50 United States Code, Section 1805. Bush has openly confessed to this crime but claims to have the right as president to commit it. The right of a president to secretly violate the laws of Congress, while lying to the public about it, does not exist in the US Constitution.
3. Conspiring to commit the torture of prisoners. Bush and Cheney say they do not torture. The evidence overwhelmingly says otherwise. This crime violates the "Federal Torture Act" Title 18 United States Code, Section 113C. It also violates the UN Torture Convention and the Geneva Convention, which are U.S. law under Article VI of the U.S. Constitution, which makes treaties ratified by the US part of US law.
4. Ordering indefinite detention without access to legal counsel, without charge, and without the opportunity to appear before a civil judicial officer to challenge the detention, all in violation of U.S. law and the Bill of Rights.
A majority of all Americans favor impeachment for those violations of law. Bush committed crimes and it is our duty to oppose those crimes regardless of our chance of success.
