Impeachment

Floor Speech

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Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, every President swears an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. Every President has a solemn duty to uphold the rule of law and to preserve our democratic system. No one is above the law, not even a President.

President Trump violated his oath. He promulgated lies about the election, used his office to try to interfere with election officials doing their job, and failed to protect our Capitol from a mob that clearly intended to cause physical harm to elected officials and to stop the lawful certification of election results.

For months, President Trump used his platform as President--at rallies, on Twitter, and in press interviews--to spread disinformation, making unsubstantiated and false claims about voting by mail, vote rigging, and fraud in counting ballots. President Trump pressured State and local officials across the country to reject election results without evidence. He called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to pressure him to find the votes he needed to win the State. Even after President Trump lost 61 election-related cases in State and Federal courts, he continued to insist the election was stolen from him. In the process, President Trump sowed doubt and provoked his supporters.

President Trump summoned his supporters to Washington, DC, on January 6. They included known domestic violent extremists, including the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and other White supremacists and far-right militia groups. Federal law enforcement had warned about the threat of violence from armed members of these groups. Nevertheless, President Trump urged his supporters to march to the U.S. Capitol and to fight and told them they will ``never take back our country with weakness.'' He said he would march with them.

Instead of trying to stop them, President Trump continued to support actions by the insurrectionists even after they breached the Capitol Building, overwhelmed and unleashed violence against law enforcement, and put at risk the lives of the Vice President, Members of Congress, Capitol Police officers, and staff members. Four insurrectionists died. In all, 140 law enforcement personnel were injured and 1 police officer, Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, was killed. Two more police officers later died as a result of the insurrection.

Many of the insurrectionists said they were there at the direction of President Trump. And the President did not call on his followers to stand down or send reinforcements to help the overwhelmed law enforcement at the Capitol. Instead, we know from a statement from Washington Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler entered into the trial record that President Trump refused to help bring an end to the insurrection even after House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy urged him to act.

In this moment and in the weeks and months leading up to the insurrection, President Trump violated his duty to the Constitution and his oath of office. There must be accountability. Without accountability, we are setting a dangerous precedent--one that says that the President is above the law and did not uphold his oath to ensure the peaceful transfer of power.

It is also important to recognize that the events that unfolded on January 6 did not occur in isolation. They were the culmination of years of President Trump stoking the flames of racial tension and division, as the House impeachment managers have concisely laid out.

Throughout President Trump's time in office, hate crimes rose to levels not seen in over a decade. The rise in domestic violent extremism has been publicly acknowledged by President Trump's own FBI Director, Christopher Wray, who identified it as the most severe threat to the homeland. Director Wray has testified that racially-motivated violent extremists make up the largest aspect of domestic violent extremist cases, often involving militia groups, such as the ones who were present during the January 6th insurrection.

In the Northwest we have faced threats from racially-motived extremists and armed anti-government militia groups for decades, including the siege of Ruby Ridge, ID, in 1992, the Aryan Nations compound near Hayden Lake, ID, and the attempted bombing of Spokane's Martin Luther King, Jr., memorial march in 2011. Groups that were among the insurrectionists on January 6, including the Three Percenters, the Proud Boys, and the Oath Keepers, all have a significant presence in my State. In the last 4 years, their activity has been on the rise. Following the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, they threatened State capitals around our country, including in my State. An armed mob breached the gates outside of the Governor's mansion in Olympia, surrounding Governor Inslee's residence on the capitol complex while his family was inside. This wasn't the first time, however, that these armed extremist groups have showed up to demonstrations in my State.

As this Senate trial has clearly shown, President Trump has repeatedly inflamed these groups and others. He encouraged violence at his rallies, called White nationalists and neo-Nazis in Charlottesville ``very fine people,'' refused to clearly condemn White supremacy during a Presidential debate, told the Proud Boys hate group to ``stand back and stand by,'' and told the January 6th insurrectionists that he ``loves them and they are very special'' after they had already laid siege to our Capitol and committed heinous acts of violence. That encouragement has had consequences, as we saw in Charlottesville and on January 6.

President Trump's responsibility is clear. He violated his oath of office and tried to overturn the results of the election. Free and fair elections are the bedrock of democracy. Generations of Americans gave their lives for our freedom, for our right to vote, and for the peaceful transfer of power. I voted to hold President Trump accountable for committing a high crime against our governmental system and to safeguard the future of democracy in the United States of America.

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