The mayor of Salem, Mass., told President Trump to “learn some history” after he alleged that people accused in the Salem witch trials were given more due process than he has received in the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry.
Mayor Kim Driscoll (D) in a tweet Tuesday included a screenshot of a letter from Trump to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in which the president decried the impeachment inquiry and made the claim about the Salem witch trials.
“Salem 1692 = absence of evidence+powerless, innocent victims were hanged or pressed to death,” Driscoll wrote.
“#Ukrainegate 2019 = ample evidence, admissions of wrongdoing+perpetrators are among the most powerful+privileged,” she added.
“This situation is much different than the plight of the witch trial victims, who were convicted using spectral evidence + then brutally hanged or pressed to death,” Driscoll wrote. “A dubious legal process that bears no relation to televised impeachment.”
Trump wrote in his letter to Pelosi that “more due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem Witch Trials.” The president’s letter came one day ahead of an expected House vote to impeach Trump over his dealings with Ukraine.
Driscoll said evoking the witch trials is “offensive to the descendants, those victims that this their legacy is being twisted in this way,” according to local news outlet WCVB.
“People in Salem want this history remembered so that it acknowledges going forward what never, ever should happen again,” Driscoll said.
Trump has compared his situations to witch trials previously, and frequently called former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into foreign interference in the 2016 election a “witch hunt.”