Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Burgess puts impeachment on the table

Burgess Impeachment NE Tarrant Tea Party A brief exchange between US Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Lewisville, and a local Tea Party member is drawing attention this morning as Burgess advocated pursuing impeachment proceedings against President Obama.
As we first reported last night, the impeachment talk came up while Burgess was speaking to the NE Tarrant Tea Party Monday night. Burgess spent much of the evening defending his decision to vote for a debt ceiling deal earlier this month that many Tea Party conservatives hated.
When one attendee suggested that the House push for impeachment proceedings against Obama to distract the president and keep him from getting things done, Burgess was immediately receptive.
He  said Obama backed away from using the 14th amendment to raise the debt ceiling without congressional approval because of concerns about getting impeached. He added that there's also some people who believe Obama violated the War Powers Act when he pursued military action in Libya.
"It needs to happen, and I agree with you it would tie things up," Burgess said. "No question about that."
I asked Burgess about the exchange afterward.
"We need to tie things up," he repeated. "The gentleman was right. The longer we just allow damage to continue unchecked, the worse things are going to be for us. ... People will talk about it."
Burgess continued that he wasn't certain impeachment was a viable course of action.
"The articles would have to be drafted," he said. "They would have to be substantial. Right now, I don't know that you have that substance behind them. It would be pretty difficult to bring this up purely on the War Powers Act though that got a lot of people's attention when there seemed to be a violation of that."
-Aman Batheja

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