Our Democracy Was Pushed to the Brink

In the early hours of Thursday morning, after hours of terrifying violence, the House and Senate reconvened in a shaken Capitol. Democrats Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were respectively certified as president and vice president. Despite that unprecedented attack, the wheels of government continued to turn.

The dust had hardly settled when Democrats, and at least one Republican, were raising the specter of impeachment or invoking the 25th Amendment to remove from office a president, who, let’s be totally clear, incited his followers to attack the United States government.

Trump begrudgingly announced Thursday that he would offer a smooth transition, even as he continued to spread lies about the election, and vowed that his fight was just beginning, raising the horrifying specter of more violence on Jan. 20 when Biden and Harris are inaugurated.

He has to go. Now.

Trump’s flunkies on Capitol Hill have exactly one chance to redeem themselves.

If the congressional GOP is truly a party of law and order, if they cherish the Constitution as much as they claim, they have to step up to unambiguously demand that the extremists who stormed the Capitol Wednesday be brought to justice.

And they have to support calls for impeachment or removal through the 25th Amendment.

And Saccone? He resigned his post as an adjunct professor at a small college outside Pittsburgh after the school investigated his Facebook video, KDKA-TV reported Thursday.

One way or another, Trump will be joining him on the unemployment line. But it needs to be as soon as possible

An award-winning political journalist, John L. Micek is Editor-in-Chief of The Pennsylvania Capital-Star in Harrisburg, Pa. Email him at jmicek@penncapital-star.com and follow him on Twitter @ByJohnLMicek.