We know, we know! J.D. Vance wouldn’t be our first choice either.
Back before his livelihood and political career became dependent upon Donald Trump, Vance famously wondered whether his now-boss was “America’s Hitler.” He also called him a “cynical asshole,” “an idiot,” and “reprehensible,” argued that he was “unfit for office,” and declared, “I can’t stomach Trump.”
Quite the endorsement of the man whose administration he now serves.
Yes, we know. That was then, and this is now. But among Vance’s attributes is a remarkable degree of malleability. And in this political climate, we have come to regard his spinelessness as something of a virtue.
Most importantly, though, his greatest asset is this:
He’s not Donald Trump.
Vance does not command an army of loyalists willing to overlook the most egregious conduct, the most childish insults, or the most brazen disregard for the constitutional constraints upon the office of President of the United States.
At least, not yet.
Without Trump’s peculiar cult of personality, Vance would have considerably less freedom to indulge the same behavior without political consequences. He might actually have to answer to Congress, the courts, and the American people. Hell, the Congressional Republican party might actually remember it belongs to a coequal branch of government and find itself again. (Yeah, we don’t think so either, but it would certainly be more possible than it is now.)
Imagine that. A president constrained by the Constitution.
So yes! We say it proudly.
And no, this is not just a shameless plug for our parent company’s companion project.
But since you brought it up, here’s a shameless plug for our parent company’s companion project: VANCE 2027!
Visit Vance2027.com, where you can explore the project and shop impeachment merchandise.
We began VANCE 2027 and The Removal Advance as a call to impeach and remove a man barely qualified to work the overnight shift at Denny’s. But it is more than that. We wanted to provide news, analysis, and commentary about politics, law, the courts, and impeachment within the constitutional framework of our beloved United States of America. We wanted to provide an outlet to voice our grievances, but also to shine a light on all the reasons to be optimistic for a future after this dumpster fire.
Now, for those of you inclined to shout “TDS,” you may already be screaming at your monitors:
“WHY?! IMPEACHMENT FOR WHAT?!”
We’re glad you asked.
The reality is that Trump should have been convicted during his first impeachment.
Remember that one?
That was when his private lawyer—and disgraced former hero once affectionately and unironically known as “America’s Mayor”—was running around Ukraine seeking politically damaging information about Trump’s opponent.
That alone raised serious questions about the use of presidential power for personal political advantage.
But then came the telephone call between Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump asked Zelensky for a favor involving investigations that would have benefited Trump politically. Meanwhile, his administration had placed a hold on congressionally appropriated military assistance to Ukraine.
The central impeachment allegation was that Trump used the powers of his office, including military assistance and the prospect of a White House meeting, to pressure a foreign government into providing him with a personal political benefit.
That should have been the end of his presidency.
Mike Pence should have become the 46th President of the United States.
And if impeachment operated like an ordinary judicial proceeding, with adjudicators insulated from partisan considerations, the outcome might well have been different.
But impeachment is not an ordinary criminal trial. It is a constitutional remedy administered by political institutions. The Constitution establishes the standard; Congress decides whether the evidence and circumstances warrant removal.
And therein lies the problem.
A constitutional safeguard is only as effective as the people entrusted to enforce it.
That’s where this project comes in.
Now, if you were asking the impeachment question in good faith, there’s no shortage of conduct warranting serious constitutional scrutiny.
There were the allegations concerning classified national-defense information and obstruction of the government’s efforts to recover it.
There are serious questions about the boundaries of executive authority, constitutional protections, compliance with judicial orders, and the separation of powers.
And there is the ongoing constitutional controversy surrounding military operations against Iran, including whether the president has exceeded his authority to engage in hostilities without congressional authorization.
Not every allegation establishes a crime. Not every unlawful act automatically warrants impeachment. And impeachment does not require proof of an indictable criminal offense.
Impeachment also has no double-jeopardy constraints. So all that stuff Trump did before? There’s nothing in the Constitution expressly preventing Congress from blowing the dust off it and impeaching him again. And unlike the criminal courts, Congress doesn’t need a new indictment, a new offense, or permission from the Supreme Court.
But the cumulative question is unavoidable: At what point does the repeated disregard of constitutional restraints become intolerable?
Of course, here’s the beauty of this entire exercise.
You (the person still screaming “TDS” at the monitor) have already made your position abundantly clear.
Between Trump’s 34 felony convictions, the federal prosecutions that ended without verdicts, his efforts to overturn an election, and the controversies surrounding his exercise of presidential and military power, you’ve repeatedly determined that none of it is a deal-breaker.
Perhaps you dispute the allegations. Perhaps you accept the conduct but reject its significance. Perhaps you believe the political consequences of removing Trump would be worse than leaving him in office.
Fine. Those are arguments we can examine.
But if your position is that nothing could justify his removal, we beg to differ.
You have defended a single person like the mother of an accused drug trafficker defends her baby.
And the Constitution was not written to accommodate your favorite person.
Which brings us back to the reasonable people who have reservations about J.D. Vance.
We understand.
He’s spineless, feckless, and possesses the charisma of a mediocre insurance salesman. (And if you’re reading this, and you are an insurance salesman. Don’t be offended. You’re not mediocre, you’re a fantastic insurance salesman.)
But Vance does not possess Trump’s extraordinary hold over a contingent of Americans apparently willing to sacrifice every principle they once professed in order to defend him.
Vance may be ambitious. He may be opportunistic. He may be capable of extraordinary political contortions. [We had a couch joke here, but it got lost between the cushions.]
Those are ordinary political defects.
And after years of treating extraordinary presidential misconduct as ordinary politics, ordinary political defects are beginning to look rather appealing.
We’re not asking you to love J.D. Vance.
We’re not even asking you to like him.
We’re asking you to consider the possibility that a president who must worry about losing public support, congressional backing, and political legitimacy might be preferable to one whose supporters treat accountability itself as an act of betrayal.
The bar is embarrassingly low.
But here we are.
So, again, we proudly say:
VANCE 2027!
Impeach. Remove. Then Add Vance.