Republicans Step Up Pelosi Attacks Amid Trump Impeachment Talk, Graham Says Her Job 'At Risk'

Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina continued Republican attacks on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., stating on Fox News Sunday that “her job is very much at risk.”

Last Thursday evening, President Trump tweeted a doctored video of Pelosi which made it appear she was stumbling over her words in a news conference. Then on Friday, a second doctored video of Pelosi began circulating on social media, this time making her appear intoxicated or otherwise disabled. The video had been slowed down, and the pitch of her voice adjusted to make it sound normal.

Graham said that "Pelosi is riding a bucking, wild bronco called the Democratic Caucus."

In addition to the haranguing Pelosi has taken from Republicans, Graham noted that she is also being pressured from her own party, as 70% want her to begin impeachment proceedings against Trump.

“She knows that impeachment would be political suicide because there’s no reason to impeach the president,” Graham continued.

“If she goes down the impeachment road, Republicans take back the House, we keep the Senate, President Trump gets re-elected,” Graham added.

Pelosi has erred on the side of caution, according to many in her party. She has said repeatedly beginning impeachment proceedings is premature, and Democrats should allow the courts to remedy the administration’s stonewalling tactics.

Three Trump administration officials — Attorney General William Barr, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and former White House Counsel Don McGahn — have ignored congressional subpoenas when called to testify on Capitol Hill. The en masse refusals is unprecedented since the lead-up to the resignation of President Richard Nixon in the wake of the Watergate cover-up by his administration.

A variety of commentators, including Trump’s only Republican adversary William Weld, a former Massachusetts governor and legal counsel for the House Judiciary Committee during Nixon’s impeachment inquiry, has said Nixon’s cover-up pales in comparison to what the public may eventually learn about the Trump administration.

Pelosi and Trump exchanged verbal barbs all last week. Trump walked out of a meeting with Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., after Pelosi said Democrats believed the president was involved in a cover-up, as evidenced by ignoring requests for administration officials to testify, or in the case of Mnuchin, to release Trump’s income tax records.

Trump left the meeting after about three minutes and went to the Rose Garden where a podium, signs, and reporters were waiting. He told those assembled he would not work with Democrats on their legislative agenda unless they abandoned inquiries associated with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign.

Pelosi later said she thought the president “was crying out” for Democrats to begin impeachment proceedings against him, to divert attention away from a number of scandals plaguing his administration.

Trump is in Japan, where he awarded a 60-pound trophy known as “The President’s Cup” after a Sumo wrestling competition Sunday.