Partisan Fingers Pointed as Trump Impeachment Reaches Day 9
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We ran the numbers: There are 6472 news articles covering this topic. 45% (2893) are left leaning, 41% (2642) center, 14% (937) right leaning.
As the impeachment proceedings against President Trump reach their ninth day, the conditions in Washington are continuing to heat up.
What’s especially interesting is that they’re largely heating up along party lines. In both of the previous presidential impeachment efforts -- Andrew Jackson (1869) and Bill Clinton (1998), senators crossed partisan lines. However, the current impeachment proceedings are not following the historical precedent. With a few exceptions, like Republican Senator Mitt Romney (Utah), the current proceedings are sticking to partisan boundaries.
Despite the explicit conclusions that can be drawn from the transcript of Trump’s July call with the Ukranian president, which was released by the White House itself, Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) said that jumping to conclusions doesn’t serve the country. “No one should be making judgments or pronouncements without hearing from the whistleblower first and carefully following up on the facts,” said Grassley.
Drawing comparisons between Trump and former President Richard Nixon, Carl Bernstien, who helped report on the Watergate scandal, said that both presidents wanted to “undermine the very basis of American democracy, free elections.” With the current proceedings largely falling along party lines, it’s no surprise that the majority of the news coverage on the subject of Trump’s impeachment originated from the left.
Left-leaning articles from The New York Times largely focus on the President’s defense of the impeachment inquiry against him. According to The Times, Trump took to Twitter on Tuesday night to claim that the current impeachment proceedings are actually an attempted coup. The President said that, with each day, he is “coming to the conclusion that what is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a COUP, intended to take away the Power of the People.” The Times also reports that many right-wing advocates like Tucker Carlson, Breitbart, and Rush Limbaugh claim that the current proceedings are an attempted coup d'etat.
Centrist articles like this NPR article, highlight the admission from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that he was on the July 25 call between Trump and the Ukrainian president. For NPR and sources like it, this admission from Pompeo is newsworthy because it comes 10 days after he deflected questions during an ABC News interview regarding the Trump-Zelensky call. According to NPR, hours after his Pompeo’s comments, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that the Trump administration is a threat to the U.S. system of checks and balances.
From the right
Adam Schiff too 'biased' to lead Trump impeachment probe Rep. Jim Jordan tells Hannity
Fox News