How the Republican dam will (finally) break

It's game time on impeachment: This weekend, House committees are writing articles of impeachment, at the direction of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The House vote is just days away. Dear MoveOn member, It's game time on impeachment: This weekend, House committees are writing articles of impeachment, at the direction of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.1 The House vote is just days away. That means Republican members of Congress will soon face a choice: Will they continue to cover up for Trump? You can be sure that they will do what's needed to save their skins. If Trump's approval rating falls even further or if masses of people take to the streets in a big way to show Republicans that they will pay a price for covering up Trump's abuses of power, the Republican dam will finally break. To help that happen, we are planning more than 350 protests in 48 states, which will take place the day before the House votes on impeachment. We've raised enough so far to print and ship jumbo "IMPEACH" lettering to our highest-visibility events; to pay for lighting, stages, sound equipment, livestreaming, and security at the larger protests; and to help get the word out about the events, so even more people can be involved. But we still need to raise $200,000 by Monday to ensure our protests are seen as widely as possible on TV, to buy targeted ads on social media, to ship even more signage and provide other support to volunteer event hosts around the country, and to make sure our events are promoted so well that they are mentioned on local news and in local newspapers everywhere (i.e., the media outlets in their home districts that members of Congress pay really close attention to). Which is why we're asking for your help right now. Will you please chip in $3 to fund MoveOn's critical work to impeach and remove Donald Trump? [Yes, I will help support "Impeach & Remove" protests in communities from coast to coast the night before the House vote on impeachment.]( As constitutional scholar Michael Gerhardt recently testified, Trump's actions "are worse than the misconduct of any prior president," and "if what we are talking about is not impeachable, then nothing is impeachable."2 Constitutional scholar Noah Feldman put it in even more stark terms in his testimony: "If we cannot impeach a president who abused his office for personal advantage, we no longer live in a democracy."3 The bottom line? Trump's actions are far worse than Richard Nixon's Watergate scandal. They’re an attack on free and fair elections—including the integrity of the presidential election next year—and our very democracy itself. And although the Trump White House announced that they will mount NO defense to these charges whatsoever, Republicans in Congress are still peddling debunked conspiracy theories. But that’s nothing new. "The closer President Nixon comes to impeachment, the louder his supporters proclaim his innocence," wrote The New York Times in July 1974.4 But, in the end, Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee voted to impeach Nixon—sealing his fate. Nixon resigned three days later. We still have work to do to flip Republican votes and break the Republican dam. It starts with ramping up the visibility of our events in the coming days. We still need to raise $200,000 by Monday to pay for targeted ads, to make sure that local communities show up in droves, to get so much media attention that our events land on the front pages of local newspapers, to maximize our coordination efforts with dozens of organizations, and more. [Will you chip in $3 right now to make these protests big and successful?]( As Speaker Pelosi told us Thursday night, her decision to draw up articles of impeachment is "quite historic"—and absolutely necessary under the circumstances. Trump’s impeachable acts were "taking us across a threshold," she said, where "we just had no choice."5 Our country is at a crossroads, and what we do now will determine the very future of our democracy. Will we let Trump get away with his abuses of power and rig the 2020 election, or will democracy and the will of the voters prevail? It's up to us, {NAME}. History will judge us for what we do in this moment. [Join us.]( Thanks for all you do. –Kate, Scott, Seth, Jayne, and the rest of the team Sources: 1. "Pelosi’s Leap on Impeachment: From No Go to No Choice," The New York Times, December 7, 2019 [ 2. "Impeachment Briefing: Highlights From Legal Experts’ Testimony," The New York Times, December 4, 2019 [ 3. Ibid. 4. "Republicans Defending Trump on Impeachment Should Fear the Judgment of History," The New Yorker, December 2, 2019 [ 5. "CNN Town Hall with Nancy Pelosi," CNN, December 5, 2019 [ Want to support our work? The MoveOn community will work every moment, day by day and year by year, to resist Trump's agenda, contain the damage, defeat hate with love, and begin the process of swinging the nation's pendulum back towards sanity, decency, and the kind of future that we must never give up on. And to do it we need your support, now more than ever. Will you stand with us? [Click here to chip in $3, or whatever you can afford.]( Contributions to MoveOn Civic Action are not tax-deductible for income tax purposes. This email was sent to {NAME} on December 8, 2019. To change your email address or update your contact info, [click here](. If you'd like to receive less frequent emails from MoveOn, you can [click here](. If you'd like to receive no more than one email per week, you can [click here](. To remove yourself from this list, [click here](.