Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said he and fellow Democrats will not support a Republican-led effort to impeach federal judges who rule against President Trump.
Mr. Schumer, in an interview with NBC that will air Sunday on “Meet the Press,” called Mr. Trump “a lawless, angry man” and warned the president is creating a constitutional crisis with his call to impeach a judge who overruled him on an immigration deportation case.
“He thinks he should be king. He thinks he should do whatever he wants, regardless of the law, and he thinks judges should just listen to him,” he said. “Now we have to fight that back in every single way.”
Mr. Schumer said the president is “infuriated” by the more than 100 court cases in which Democrats have had success in pushing back against executive actions they believe are unlawful.
“Let me tell Donald Trump and the American people, Democrats in the Senate will not impeach judges,” he said. “Full stop.”
Mr. Trump called for U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to be impeached after the judge sought to halt deportation flights taking to El Salvador hundreds of Venezuelans who the administration says are gang members.
“This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be impeached!!! We don’t want vicious, violent and demented criminals, many of them deranged murderers, in our country,” the president said on social media Tuesday.
A group of House Republicans have filed legislation to impeach Judge Boasberg and a few other judges who have issued rulings thwarting some of the president’s executive actions.
The House would have trouble passing any impeachment resolution given Republicans’ threadbare majority and bipartisan concern about punishing judges for disagreeing with the administration.
Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. even weighed in publicly, saying “impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision.”
“The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose,” he said.
While impeaching a judge would only require a simple majority in the House, a conviction would take a two-thirds majority vote of the Senate.
Mr. Schumer’s warning that Democrats would not support removal of judges who overrule the president, if it holds, guarantees that none will be removed.
But the Senate Democratic leader suggested the impeachment of judges, which his party can stop, worries him less than the possibility of Mr. Trump simply defying court rulings.
“I don’t trust him. We have to watch him like a hawk,” Mr. Schumer said of the president. “Defying court orders is why our democracy is at risk and we’ll have to do everything to fight back in that regard.”
