Unchecked: The Untold Story Behind Congress's Botched Impeachments of Donald Trump

by Rachael Bade, Karoun Demirjian, Courtney Patterson (Read by)

Overview

A revealing, behind-the-scenes examination of how Congress twice fumbled its best chance to hold accountable a president many considered one of the most dangerous in American history. The definitive — and only — insider account of both Trump impeachments, as told by the two reporters on the front lines covering them for The Washington Post and Politico. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781799946748
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	10/18/2022
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 6.20(h) x 1.90(d)

About the Author

Ava and Alexis McClure, popularly known as The McClure Twins, are YouTube personalities, models, comedians, sisters, and most importantly, each other’s best friend. The identical twin sisters hit the scene with their viral video “Twins Realize They Look the Same.” Following the twins' instant fame, parents Justin and Ami developed the family's YouTube channel, "The Mighty McClures." Since then, the McClure Twins were named the youngest members of Forbes' “Top Kid Influencers”; made their television debut on Good Morning America in 2016; walked in the Rookie USA fashion show during New York Fashion Week; and have modeled for brands such as Levi Strauss & Co., Converse, Hurley International, Air Jordan, and Nike, Inc. Now, they devote their time to the weekly online segment Twin Talk Tuesday and continue to make their audiences laugh.  

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Authors' Note xvii

Prologue 1

Part 1

1 "Impeach the motherfucker" 13

2 "All the subpoenas" 20

3 Pressure Points 31

4 Release Valves 48

5 Trump Freed 57

6 The Runaway Chairman 64

7 Whistleblower 72

8 The Messengers 87

9 A Perfect Call 103

10 Impeachment by Another Name 110

11 "The dynamite line" 119

Part 2

12 The Rise of Schiff 135

13 "Keep your powder dry" 145

14 Spin Factory 156

15 "The one-way ratchet" 165

16 Revenge of the Diplomats 175

17 Defending the Indefensible 183

18 "Get over it" 193

19 The Price of Principle 205

20 Get Tougher 217

21 "More like Nixon" 227

22 Planning Ahead 246

23 Missed Opportunities 252

24 Showtime 265

25 "Build a better case" 283

26 The Client 293

27 Nadler's Last Stand 303

28 Cold Feet and a Defection 314

29 Impeached 322

Part 3

30 "Mutually assured destruction" 339

31 The Moderates 349

32 Trump Whisperer 361

33 Pre-Trial Positioning 367

34 Schiff's Lecture Hall 380

35 Bolton's Bombshell 392

36 Mitch's Pressure Cooker 403

37 The Musk Ox Caucus 409

38 Autopilot 424

39 "Politics will break your heart" 431

40 "The impeachment that wasn't" 443

Part 4

41 Shattering the Guardrails 459

42 Impeachment 2.0 492

43 Speak Republican 508

44 Peer Pressure 519

45 Trial Take Two 540

46 The Other Jaime 554

47 Falling Short 580

Epilogue 593

Acknowledgments 605

Notes 613

Index 659

Editorial Reviews

08/22/2022

Journalists Bade and Demirjian deliver a searing analysis of the “political calculations” made by Democrats and Republicans that led to Donald Trump’s acquittal in two separate impeachment trials. Suggesting that the results were not as “preordained” as many believed, given Republicans’ control of the Senate in 2019, the authors document internal disagreements among Democrats over the issuing and enforcement of subpoenas, the need for “high-profile” eyewitness testimony, the degree of due process to be afforded Trump, and whether it was better to expedite the proceedings or present the fullest case possible. Bolstering the authors’ case that “Trump escaped accountability not simply because his own party wouldn’t stand up to him, but because the opposing party was also afraid to flex the full force of its constitutional muscle to check him,” Bade and Demirjian reveal that Republican congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler’s expressed interest in testifying against Trump in the second impeachment trial wasn’t immediately shared with Democratic manager Jamie Raskin. Throughout, the authors offer fly-on-the-wall accounts of Republican and Democratic strategy sessions and new details about Trump’s pressure campaign on Ukraine, the January 6 Capitol riot, and other events. Though some of the political and legal headwinds faced by Democrats get short shrift, this is a thorough and often riveting account of why the efforts to impeach Trump failed. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

"Revealing and engrossing history." — John Bolton, Wall Street Journal

"A timely reflection . . . a searing blow-by-blow critique . . . with lots of insider scoops along the way." — Washington Post

"A scorching exposé of the inner workings of the two impeachments of Donald Trump . . . A must-read for students of the Trump years and their dreary denouement." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Bade and Demirjian deliver a granular examination of both Trump impeachments and the work of the January 6 committee. Their joint effort is a stinging indictment of what they see as Republican cravenness and Democratic ineptitude.” — Guardian (UK)

“Journalists Bade and Demirjian deliver a searing analysis of the ‘political calculations’ made by Democrats and Republicans that led to Donald Trump’s acquittal in two separate impeachment trials….a thorough and often riveting account.” — Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

★ 2022-06-25
A scorching exposé of the inner workings of the two impeachments of Donald Trump, driven less by constitutional principle than by political calculation.

At every moment of the first Trump impeachment, write veteran political reporters Bade and Demirjian, the principal players in both parties gamed outcomes in an effort to inflict maximal damage on each other. “While Democrats said they wanted bipartisanship,” they write, “when presented with ways to achieve it, they chose paths that guaranteed the opposite.” GOP figures from Mitch McConnell on down forgot their scruples and closed ranks to defend the indefensible. Nancy Pelosi took dangerous procedural shortcuts and effectively hamstrung the House prosecutors’ ability to present an airtight case—and never properly responded to Trump’s refusal to hand over subpoenaed documents. Moderate Republicans such as Jaime Herrera Beutler, who might have voted to impeach, were pushed away by the determination of Democrats to go it alone, lending the proceedings an air of secrecy. If a moderate were rebuffed, then Republican House leader Kevin McCarthy had no problem steering the rest of the conference into opposition. The second impeachment, against the backdrop of the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, was even less well managed. Most Republicans argued that Trump won the 2020 election, while ace Democratic prosecutor Adam Schiff pressed for recourse to the 25th amendment rather than a slower impeachment trial. “At the speaker’s personal request,” write the authors, “he’d been making the case…that if they went after the president in his waning days in office, it would look like they were just trying to keep him from running again.” In the end, Bade and Demirjian argue in this comprehensive narrative, both sides of the aisle compromised and devalued the constitutional power of impeachment, opening the door to its future use as “an everyday vehicle to express the heights of partisan rage.”

A must-read for students of the Trump years and their dreary denouement.

Kirkus Reviews