The White House shot back at House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Tuesday for calling talk of impeaching President Barack Obama a Democratic "scam" to raise money.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest named several House Republicans who have made statements about impeaching the president. (AP Photo)
In response, White House press secretary Josh Earnest named several House Republicans who have called for the president's impeachment.
"If that's the case, then I suspect there may be members of the Republican conference who didn't receive the memo," Earnest said. "We've seen comments in recent months from Congressman Steve King from Iowa, Congressman Ted Yoho from Florida, Congressman Lou Barletta from Pennsylvania, distinguished Congressman Steve Stockman from Texas, his fellow Texan Blake Farenthold has raised this prospect. We've even seen Kerry Bentivolio from Michigan call this a dream come true."
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has raised $2.1 million from 114,000 online donations since Thursday, its best four-day haul for the election cycle, according to the Washington Post. The DCCC is the primary fundraising organization for House Democratic races across the country.
On Friday, White House senior advisor Dan Pfeiffer and Earnest both said they believed senior Republican leaders wanted to pursue impeachment against Obama.
The Republican-controlled House is moving forward with a lawsuit against the president charging executive overreach and saying he is not faithfully executing the law. Many Democrats insist it's a framework for impeachment.
During the Tuesday press briefing, Earnest was asked if he coordinated his comments Friday about impeachment with the DCCC. Earnest answered, “Not that I'm aware of.”
Pressed on the matter, he said, "That was not an answer I discussed with anyone at the DCCC in advance. That was my own reading of the newspaper."
On Tuesday, House Speaker John Bohner (R-Ohio) called the impeachment talk "all a scam started by the Democrats at the White House."
"This whole talk about impeachment is coming from the president's own staff and coming from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Why? Because they are trying to rally their people to give money and to show up in this year's election," Boehner told reporters Tuesday morning. "We have no plans to impeach the president. We have no future plans."
The most prominent Republican to talk about impeachment has been former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee. After Palin first called for impeachment, the DCCC raised $500,000 in 24 hours.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who tapped Palin as his running mate in 2008, told the Post he opposes any plan to impeach Obama.
“I respect always Sarah Palin’s views, but my particular view is that we should devote our energies to regaining the majority in the Senate,” McCain said, according to the Post. While he voted to remove President Bill Clinton from office, he said it was “not a good thing to do."
“The American people didn’t like it. The American people wanted us to do their work and that was overall opinion at the time. It did not sit well with the American people," McCain said.
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