Lincoln Project adds to impeachment calls

by Justine Coleman - 01/06/21 5:54 PM ET

The Lincoln Project joined the calls for President Trump’s impeachment on Wednesday as pro-Trump rioters overtook the Capitol building.

The anti-Trump GOP group labeled the violence at the Capitol as “the direct responsibility of Donald Trump.”

“The House should immediately impeach Donald Trump for directing and provoking this attack,” The Lincoln Project said in a statement, calling on the Senate to “immediately vote to convict and remove him from office.”

The group said all congressional lawmakers who decline to vote to remove Trump from office “should be considered a co-conspirator.”

“While our democracy has been under attack since Donald Trump was elected in 2016, today’s domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol highlights just how much Trump and his enablers have entirely abandoned the principles of the Constitution and the Republic,” The Lincoln Project said in a statement.

“This is no longer simply about Donald Trump’s charade,” the statement continued. “It is an armed, violent, and planned insurrection against the United States of America. It is a moment where the tenets of Trumpism replaced the tenets of American democracy with the inevitable, violent results.”

The Lincoln Project co-founder Rick Wilson released a statement calling the violence “sedition and insurrection.”

“People have long asked why the Lincoln Project has targeted Trump’s Republican allies, and today they have their answer,” Wilson said. “Those Republicans who have endorsed and encouraged Trump’s lawless coup attempt in the House and Senate deserve to be prosecuted, not seated in the halls of government.”

Several Democratic lawmakers, including Reps. Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), David Cicilline (R.I.) and Ilhan Omar (Minn.) have called for impeachment after the rioters raided the Capitol Wednesday afternoon.

Others, including Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), requested Vice President Pence invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.

The storming of the Capitol forced the House and the Senate to halt their debates on the Electoral College and lawmakers to flee to secure locations.