Democrats are enjoying throwing around the word impeachment.
They should remember that impeachment is a political process rather than legal one.
The House needs the support of its representatives, and those representatives need the support of voters in their districts to really pull it off.
Expulsion is also a political process. It’s one way to rid the House or Senate of a member whose behavior is illegal, immoral or unconstitutional.
What would qualify a U.S. Senator for expulsion?
Considering every senator swears an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, blatantly violating the Constitution in the course of performing one’s official duties would qualify, but would enough senators and their constituents support the process?
That’s for you to decide.
Article VI of the U.S. Constitution absolutely forbids a religious litmus test for public service. It is simply illegal for a senator to deny a presidential nominee a position in government because that nominee is a devout Muslim, Jew, Baha’I or adherent to any other religious order.
What Senator Bernie Sanders doesn’t understand is that this also applies to Christians.
In no uncertain terms, Sanders declared a nominee to the White House Office of Management and Budget unfit for service for the sole reason that he is a Christian.
You see, this goes back to last year when a Wheaton College professor stated that Christians and Muslims “worship the same God.”
The Christian college administration said, no, no, no, this belief completely contradicts our teachings as clearly outlined in the Wheaton College “Statement of Faith and Educational Purpose.”
Controversy, arguing and great gnashings of teeth darkened the campus.
The professor was fired and many students and graduates wrote to support the decision.
One of those writers is alumnus Richard Vought, whose opinion piece defending the college’s decision, titled, “Wheaton College and the Preservation of Theological Clarity,” includes the theological philosophy that “Muslims do not simply have a deficient (nontrinitarian) theology. They do not know God because they have rejected Jesus Christ his Son, and they stand condemned…in John 3:18, Jesus says, “Whoever believes in [the Son] is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”
Senator Sanders was outraged at this religious belief.
In Vought’s hearing for Deputy Director of OMB, Sanders grilled Vought not on his qualifications or years of excellent service, but rather upon Vought’s personal religious belief.
With no understanding of the term, “deficient” within the theological context of “nontrinitarian,” the remarkably ignorant Sanders went on a red-faced blubber.
“In my view, the statement made by Mr. Vought is indefensible, it is hateful, it is Islamophobic, and it is an insult to over a billion Muslims throughout the world,” Sanders said. “This country, since its inception, has struggled, sometimes with great pain, to overcome discrimination of all forms … we must not go backwards.”
Asked a question about his personal beliefs, Vought stated quite calmly, “As a Christian, I believe that all individuals are made in the image of God and are worthy of dignity and respect, regardless of their religious beliefs. I believe that as a Christian, that’s how I should treat all individuals.”
Sanders continued to listen with his mouth, not his ears.
“And do you think your statement that you put in that publication, ‘They do not know God because they rejected Jesus Christ the Son, and they stand condemned,’ do you think that’s respectful of other religions?”
Notably, Sanders did endorse Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison, whose religion makes some rather harsh claims about nonbelievers. So clearly, he just doesn’t like Vought’s particular religion.
“I would simply say, Mr. Chairman, that this nominee is really not someone who is what this country is supposed to be about,” Sanders said. “I will vote no.”
Under Article VI, the Constitution states, “…no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”
Sanders did just that.
Perhaps it is time to invoke Article I, Section 5, clause 2, the “expulsion” clause.
— Rick Jensen