Impeachment gaining attention in Congress

Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas, recently handed out copies of a book that has been described by its authors as the “articles of impeachment” for Barack Obama, and suggested that special investigations, and possibly prosecutions, are needed over Fast and Furious, Benghazi and other Obama scandals.

But Stockman is not the only member of Congress to discuss impeachment in response to the actions of Obama and his administration. A total of 15 members have discussed this idea recently.

Rep. Bill Flores, R-Texas, was speaking at a town hall meeting when he considered the idea. A video of his comments was posted at the Western Center for Journalism.

“I’ve looked at the president. I think he’s violated the Constitution. I think he’s violated the Bill of Rights,” he said.

He said at some point a decision must be made.

“I think if the House had an impeachment vote it would probably impeach the president.”

But he noted there are only 46 members of the GOP in the U.S. Senate, where an impeached president would be put on trial.

To obtain a conviction, the prosecuting team must have 67 votes, and he wasn’t sure that even all of the GOP members would vote to convict.

Other members of Congress who have made comments about impeachment include Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif.; Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; Rep. Kerry Bentivolio, R-Mich.; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas; Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah; Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C.; Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn.; R-Texas; Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas; Rep. Trey Radel, R-Fla.; Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa; and Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla.

“I think he”s breaking the law if he strikes without congressional approval,” Hunter told the Washington Times regarding Obama’s plan to bomb Syria. “And if he proceeds without Congress providing that authority, it should be considered an impeachable offense.”

Read the definitive case for removing Barack Obama from office in “Impeachable Offenses” by Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott.

WND previously reported Coburn’s statement that Obama is “perilously close” to qualifying for impeachment.

Speaking at the Muskogee Civic Center in Oklahoma, the senator said, “What you have to do is you have to establish the criteria that would qualify for proceedings against the president, and that’s called impeachment.”

Coburn said it’s “not something you take lightly, and you have to use a historical precedent of what that means.”

“I think there’s some intended violation of the law in this administration, but I also think there’s a ton of incompetence, of people who are making decisions,” he said.

A constituent then responded, “Even if there is incompetence, the IRS forces me to abide by the law.”

Coburn said he agreed.

“Those are serious things, but we’re in a serious time,” he said. “I don’t have the legal background to know if that rises to high crimes and misdemeanor, but I think they’re getting perilously close.”

Visit WND’s online Impeachment Store to see all the products related to ousting Obama.

Bentivolio told the Birmingham Bloomfield Republican Club Meeting, “You know, if I could write that bill and submit it, it would be a dream come true.”

He told constituents: “I feel your pain and I know. I stood 12 feet away from that guy and listened to him, and I couldn’t stand being there. But because he is president I have to respect the office. That’s my job as a congressman. I respect the office.”

Bentivolio said his experience with the president caused him to consult with attorneys about what it would take to remove Obama from office.

Cruz responded to a question about impeachment after a speech.

“It’s a good question,” Cruz said. “And I’ll tell you the simplest answer: To successfully impeach a president you need the votes in the U.S. Senate.”

He said he answers, “[I]f we were to impeach the president tomorrow, we would probably get the votes in the House of Representatives to do it.”

But, like others, Farenthold sees the lack of votes in the Senate as a roadblock.

The congressman also worries about what would happen if they tried to impeach Obama and failed. He believes the unsuccessful attempt to impeach President Clinton hurt the country.

In May, Inhofe suggested Obama could be impeached over a White House cover-up after the attack in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012.

He told listeners of “The Rusty Humphries Show”: “Of all the great cover-ups in history – the Pentagon papers, Iran-Contra, Watergate, all the rest of them – this … is going to go down as the most egregious cover-up in American history.”

But even with that searing indictment, Inhofe, too, stopped short of calling for impeachment.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, has offered tentative support for impeachment.

“I’m not willing to take it off the table, but that’s certainly not what we’re striving for,” he told CNN.

One Republican actually has come out and called for the impeachment of Obama, and he did it more than two years ago, before he became a congressman.

Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla., posted on his website in June 2011 a list of reasons for impeachment.

Other figures who have discussed impeachment include Glenn Beck, Watergate investigative reporter Bob Woodward, WND columnist Nat Hentoff and a panel of top constitutional experts.

Stockman recently distributed copies of the book, “Impeachable Offenses: The Case for Removing Barack Obama From Office,” to the other 434 members of the House of Representatives to bolster his case for a special investigation of the President.

The bestselling “Impeachable Offenses” presents an indictment that goes well beyond today’s headlines.

The Daily Mail of London has called “Impeachable Offenses” “explosive,” reporting that the book contains a “systematic connect-the-dots exercise that the president’s defenders will find troublesome.”

“Consider this work to be the articles of impeachment against Barack Obama,” stated Klein.

“Every American, whether conservative or liberal, Democrat, Republican or independent, should be concerned about the nearly limitless seizure of power, the abuses of authority, the cronyism, corruption, lies and cover-ups documented in this news-making book,” Klein said.

The authors stress the book is not a collection of generalized gripes concerning Obama and his administration. Rather, it is a well-documented indictment based on major alleged violations.

Among the offenses enumerated in the book:

• Obamacare not only is unconstitutional but illegally bypasses Congress, infringes on states’ rights and marking an unprecedented and unauthorized expansion of IRS power.
• Sidestepping Congress, Obama already has granted largely unreported de facto amnesty to millions of illegal aliens using illicit interagency directives and executive orders.
• The Obama administration recklessly endangered the public by releasing from prison criminal illegal aliens at a rate far beyond what is publicly known.
• The president’s personal role in the Sept. 11, 2012, Benghazi attack, with new evidence regarding what was transpiring at the U.S. mission prior to the assault – arguably impeachable activities in and of themselves.
• Illicit edicts on gun control in addition to the deadly “Fast and Furious” gun-running operation intended, the book shows, to collect fraudulent gun data.
• From “fusion centers” to data mining to drones to alarming Department of Homeland Security power grabs, how U.S. citizens are fast arriving at the stage of living under a virtual surveillance regime.
• New evidence of rank corruption, cronyism and impeachable offenses related to Obama’s first-term “green” funding adventures.
• The illegality of leading a U.S.-NATO military campaign without congressional approval.
• Obama has weakened America both domestically and abroad by emboldening enemies, tacitly supporting a Muslim Brotherhood revolution, spurning allies and minimizing the threat of Islamic fundamentalism.