Beyond the politics and partisanship of the moment, President Donald Trump and majority Democrats in the House of Representatives are colliding in the most extraordinary test of the Constitution’s separation of powers in many years.
“We are heading rapidly towards a constitutional crisis,” David Rothkopf, a political scientist and specialist in international relations, told MSNBC. This is because Trump doesn’t accept the legitimacy of Congress’s bid to impeach him as sought by House Democrats, and the House under those Democrats won’t back away from efforts to punish him for what critics call abuses of power.
“It’s headed, I think, for the Supreme Court,” says Rutgers University political scientist Ross Baker.