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Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders.
- Democratic presidential candidates are torn over the
politics and consequences associated with impeaching President Donald Trump. - Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris are the most high-profile 2020 candidates to announce their support for beginning impeachment proceedings against Trump following the publication of the Mueller report.
- But other prominent candidates, including Sen. Bernie Sanders and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, are concerned that impeachment proceedings could hurt Democrats' chances of winning back the White House in 2020.
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Ever since the Justice Department released special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation report last week, Democrats have become increasingly divided on whether to immediately move forward with impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump.
Those divisions are most visible among the nearly 20 Democrats running in the 2020 presidential primary.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren became the most prominent Democrat and first presidential candidate to call on the House to begin the impeachment process last Friday.
Warren made her case the day after the release of the Mueller report, which did not find sufficient evidence to accuse the president of conspiring with the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 election.
But, Warren pointed out, Mueller did not come to a conclusion on whether Trump illegally obstructed justice in his handling of the investigation and explicitly names Congress' authority to investigate and hold the president accountable in this situation.
Warren argued that it's Congress' constitutional duty to pursue impeachment.
"There is no political inconvenience exception to the United States Constitution," she said on Monday night.
Sen. Kamala Harris on Monday became the second major 2020 candidate to come out in favor of beginning impeachment proceedings, arguing that Mueller has laid out substantial evidence of the president obstructing justice.
But several other Democratic presidential candidates don't support moving forward with impeachment proceedings immediately. They say it should stay on the table, but that Congress needs to investigate Mueller's findings further before moving on impeachment.
Sen. Bernie Sanders said on Monday night that he's concerned impeachment would distract from the Democratic party's 2020 message on policy issues like healthcare, making it more difficult to win back the White House.
"At the end of the day, what is most important to me is to see that Donald Trump is not re-elected president," Sanders said.
Here's a rundown of the 2020 Democrats who have taken a public stance on impeachment: