The News
Republicans are warning of a third impeachment if they lose the US House next year, but Democrats are far more likely to give President Donald Trump a different headache — the first real oversight of his second-term agenda.
A Democratic House in 2027 would present a systemic shock to a Washington that has, under unified GOP control, offered almost no substantial resistance to Trump. Republican leaders in both chambers of Congress are so unwilling to push back on any presidential plans that Trump has reportedly joked he is the real House speaker.
Rare cases of public disagreement with Trump, like eliminating the filibuster and importing more beef, are voiced in gentle terms. The scant Republican opposition to his unbridled use of executive power is aired by rank-and-file members, not leaders.
Democrats, loath to divert focus from their midterm campaign trail, insist their plans for a possible House majority remain nebulous. But they’re simultaneously amassing a growing stockpile of potential targets, from Trump-affiliated digital assets to his White House renovations to his airstrikes in the Caribbean.
“It’s an overwhelming picture,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., the party’s former top oversight committee member and now its Judiciary Committee leader, told Semafor. “Our challenge will be how to categorize and synthesize the different levels of corruption and lawlessness we’re facing.”
Raskin said Democrats aren’t “sitting around trying to prioritize these things right now” — but they will have to eventually. Their list of possible Trump investigations is so long that there are already some fault lines over which approach to spotlight.
Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., predicted that presidential corruption, including the Trumps’ sale of affiliated cryptocurrency to foreign investors hoping to sway the administration, would be “front and center.” But others would prefer to focus on agency mismanagement instead.
“I personally don’t think we have to chase everything,” Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., told Semafor. “The corruption in the White House is real,” he said, but added that he’s “focused on the things that affect Americans.”
Horsford pointed to the Treasury Department’s effort to funnel billions of dollars to Argentina. Other potential targets include Trump’s impoundment of funds already spent by Congress and his effort to end birthright citizenship.
As they race to cut Democrats’ midterm odds by redrawing as many congressional districts as possible, Republicans say they must keep the House to push through more partisan legislation. Speaker Mike Johnson has also pitched his majority as a bulwark against a third Trump impeachment, which he recently described as a foregone conclusion.
But many Democrats are openly skeptical an impeachment would be worth their time with so much else to pursue (and the Senate all but guaranteed to acquit Trump).
“What we’ve seen from the utterly failed experiment with impeachment that the Republicans did against Joe Biden, and what we’ve seen even from the utterly meritorious impeachment trial of Donald Trump for inciting insurrection against the union, is that in the former case it is extremely difficult even to get articles to the floor,” Raskin said.
“And in the latter case, even in the face of overwhelming evidence, it is very difficult to reach that two-thirds [Senate] majority required,” he added.
Republicans acknowledge a tidal wave of Democratic subpoenas and depositions would be enough to bog down Trump for the rest of his administration.
“I don’t think you have to be Nostradamus to predict that they would do some pretty crazy stuff,” Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., told Semafor. “They impeached him twice over baseless stuff; I think that would just be an appetizer, probably, for what they would want to do.”
Said Sen. Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo.: “It would be detrimental, to put it mildly, to the last two years of the president’s term.”
Know More
House Democrats’ Litigation Task Force, established earlier this year to challenge Trump, has already penned reams of amicus briefs, resolutions of inquiry and more. That work serves as a helpful roadmap for what Democratic-led committees might dig into.
“It’s not much of a mystery,” said Raskin, who co-chairs the task force, adding that “there are letters out there on everything we’re focused on,” from the ballroom to crypto to immigration.
For now, the White House can ignore those requests. That will change if Democrats get the gavels.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., another task force co-chair and top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, told Semafor that Democrats “will jump off that bridge when we get to it.” But she pointed to Trump’s firing of the Commission of Fine Arts, which would have overseen his White House renovations, as well as the administration’s strikes on alleged drug boats off the coast of Venezuela.
“There’s not a shred of information about Venezuela,” DeLauro said.
Illinois Rep. Sean Casten, the No. 2 Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, told Semafor that lawmakers should weigh referring the strikes to international courts. He also floated investigations into illicit finance using Trump-affiliated cryptocurrencies and into other countries attempts’ to sway the administration by purchasing those digital assets.
The administration said earlier this year it would allow the United Arab Emirates access to key AI chips two weeks after the UAE’s state investment firm entered into a $2 billion deal with a crypto firm backed by the sons of Trump and his adviser, Steve Witkoff. Trump later pardoned the convicted cofounder of Binance, another crypto firm that also participated in the arrangement.
Any bills a Democratic House passes to constrain Trump would likely either die in the Senate, where Republicans face a more favorable midterm map, or get vetoed. But they’d still force GOP lawmakers on record, which could prove potent when it comes to Trump’s tariffs or military actions.
Democrats could also try to attach their priorities to government funding bills, potentially prompting more shutdown fights. Casten even floated using that process to check the judicial branch.
“A number of us … have been talking about the fact that Congress has never given the Supreme Court less than their requested annual appropriation,” Casten said. He suggested making the court’s funding contingent on implementing stricter ethics rules.
“Congress has the power of the purse,” Casten told Semafor. “If you have the strength, and a bully comes up and kicks you in the shins — you punch him in the goddamn mouth.”
Room for Disagreement
As split as House Democrats are about trying to impeach Trump again, Johnson isn’t the only Republican betting that oversight ends up taking a backseat.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., predicted to Semafor that impeachment would be Democrats’ “No. 1 issue” in 2027 if they win the House.
The View From The White House
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement that Democrats “should spend less time thinking about how to hurt President Trump and more time reopening the government.”
And Trump allies have fodder to push back on Democratic plans: Former President Joe Biden also replaced members of the Commission of Fine Arts, for instance, and the International Criminal Court does not have the jurisdiction over the US it would need to take up the boat strikes.
In addition, Trump told CBS News he didn’t know Zhao before he pardoned him.
“My sons are involved in crypto much more than me,” Trump said. “I know very little about it.”
Eleanor and Burgess’ View
Sounding the alarm on impeachment makes sense for Republicans, who want Democrats to appear as histrionic as possible. But it’s clear Democrats feel they can do far more damage by focusing on oversight — and that’s probably true.
But with Election Day a year away, a more formal game plan won’t materialize for a while, nor should it. That could leave enough time for Democrats to splinter over how to use their potential power.
We’re especially interested to see whether anyone shares Horsford’s view that allegations of Trump corruption may not be their best target.
Notable
- The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee’s approach this Congress to documents related to sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein provides the caucus with “a potential blueprint for navigating Trump’s second term,” the Associated Press reports.
Shelby Talcott contributed.