By on Mar 2nd, 2011 at 4:20 pm
ThinkProgress filed this report from the Tea Party Patriots Policy Summit in Phoenix, AZ.
For the hard right, there is no shortage of reasons to impeach President Obama.
Last year, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) hinted at impeaching the president over the issue of immigration, saying that Obama was “awfully close” to violating his oath of office. Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI) followed up by threatening impeachment proceedings against Obama because of the phantom “birth certificate” issue.
Now, in the right’s furor over the administration’s announcement that it will not defend the constitutionality of Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) is calling for Obama to be impeached.
After the Arizona Republican advocated defunding the Department of Justice if it does not defend Section 3 of DOMA – “I would support that in a moment,” remarked Franks – he went on to say that he would “absolutely” favor impeaching President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder if such a move “could gain collective support”:
KEYES: What recourse does Congress have? Could you, for instance, defund the Department of Justice if they don’t reverse course and start to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act?
FRANKS: That’s probably the strongest leverage that we have. [...]
KEYES: Is defunding, using that threat of defunding DOJ, something you would support?
FRANKS: Absolutely. I would support that in a moment. [...]
KEYES: I know Newt Gingrich has came out and said if they don’t reverse course here, we ought to be talking about possibly impeaching either Attorney General Holder or even President Obama to try to get them to reverse course. Do you think that is something you would support?
FRANK: If it could gain the collective support, absolutely. I called for Eric Holder to repudiate the policy to try terrorists within our civil courts, or resign. So it just seems like that they have an uncanny ability to get it wrong on almost all fronts.
Franks is not alone in his impeachment-zeal. GOP presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Herman Cain have both hinted at impeaching Obama if he does not back down on DOMA, with Cain saying Obama’s refusal to defend DOMA is “bordering on treason.” Gingrich, who helped lead the 1998 impeachment of President Bill Clinton, immediately backtracked on the impeachment issue.
