U.S. Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-MI-14) said over the weekend that she would rather censure President Donald Trump instead of impeaching him, but quickly retracted her comments Tuesday when the story was picked up by national media.
In a Sunday appearance on Charlie LeDuff’s “No BS News Hour,” Lawrence said she planned to have a “discussion with the party and with the caucus” about abandoning impeachment and censuring the president instead.
“We are so close to an election. I will tell you, sitting here knowing how divided this country is, I don’t see the value of taking him out of office,” she said. “I do see the value of putting down a marker saying his behavior is not acceptable.”
“I want to censure,” Lawrence continued. “I want it on the record that the House of Representatives did their job and they told this president and any president coming behind him that this is unacceptable behavior and, under our Constitution, we will not allow it.”
The comments were surprising given the political preferences of her district, which encompasses portions of eastern Detroit. Hillary Clinton won the district by more than 60 percent in the 2016 election while Republicans haven’t represented the district in Congress since 1948.
Lawrence came out in support of impeachment as early as 2017 and was promoting her support for the inquiry on her congressional website throughout October.
Her office released a statement Tuesday afternoon to clarify that the congresswoman continues to support impeachment.
“I was an early supporter for impeachment in 2017,” she said. “The House Intelligence Committee followed a very thorough process in holding hearings these past two weeks. The information they revealed confirmed that this president has abused the power of his office, therefore I continue to support impeachment.”
“However, I am every concerned about Senate Republicans and the fact that they would find this behavior by the president acceptable,” she added.
A new poll released Monday by The Hill showed that Democrats were losing interest in the impeachment inquiry. The number of Democratic voters who said they are following the inquiry closely dropped by five percentage points to 73 percent.
Another poll from Politico found that 62 percent of independent voters believe impeachment is “more important to politicians than it is to me.”
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Anthony Gockowski is managing editor of Battleground State News, The Ohio Star, and The Minnesota Sun. Follow Anthony on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
[…] Michigan House member to change their tone on impeachment. Last week, Rep. Brenda Lawrence said she would censor Trump rather than impeach him with the 2020 election being only less than a year […]
[…] Michigan House member to change their tone on impeachment. Last week, Rep. Brenda Lawrence said she would censor Trump rather than impeach him with the 2020 election being only less than a year […]