Nearly a decade ago, in the months leading up to the 2014 midterm elections, more than a few Republicans talked up the idea of impeaching Barack Obama. The incumbent Democratic president hadn’t done anything wrong, and when pressed, GOP officials struggled to articulate why, exactly, they thought Obama deserved to be impeached, but many in the party were eager to pursue the priority anyway.
As regular readers may recall, the chatter grew loud enough that Democrats started fundraising on the issue — letting supporters know that Republicans were talking about the possibility of going after Obama — which proved to be a good idea when the Democratic base had a strong response.
It reached the point that GOP leaders had to start downplaying the talk — then-House Speaker John Boehner told reporters the impeachment idea was “a scam started by Democrats,” which was the opposite of the truth — not because they were sympathetic to Obama, but because leading Republican officials feared the effects of a Democratic backlash.
It was a straightforward calculus: The more voters on the left believed Republicans might actually try to impeach Obama, the more motivated Democratic voters might be to open their wallets and show up on Election Day.
In time, rank-and-file GOP members, reluctant to screw up the party’s broader 2014 strategy, got the message and the issue quietly faded.
This came to mind reading CNBC’s report on a Republican impeachment push creating another fundraising boost for the party’s target.
Republicans’ impeachment efforts are paying off — for President Joe Biden. A fundraising email from Kamala Harris attacking House Republicans for voting this week to authorize a “ridiculous” impeachment inquiry has already become the vice president’s top-performing pitch of the entire re-election, a Biden campaign source told CNBC.
The unnamed source on the president’s campaign added that the financial boost is “a testament to the energy against this…
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