Washington Free Beacon editor in chief Matthew Continetti said Tuesday that Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D., Calif.) "pseudo-impeachment" proceedings against President Donald Trump may turn into real impeachment proceedings.
"Pelosi has a big problem on her hands, and the problem is that the initial strategy of presenting voters with a pseudo-impeachment by dragging out these hearings was thwarted by President Trump and his policy of no cooperation across the board," Continetti said on Fox News Channel's Special Report. "And so this has now put the Democrats in a box where the only way that they can attempt to get some of the answers or some of the big publicity they want is through impeachment, even though Nancy Pelosi knows it would be futile and likely to backfire politically."
Continetti's comments came after former White House Counsel Don McGahn refused to appear before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. McGahn's absence brought a new wave of House Democrats calling for Trump's impeachment.
"We are confronting what might be the largest, broadest cover-up in American history," Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D., Md.) told reporters, according to the Associated Press. Hoyer added that if a House investigation "leads to other avenues including impeachment," then, "so be it."
Other Democrats voiced more explicit support.
"I think that’s something a lot of members of the committee—and more and more members of the caucus—think is necessary," Rep. Steve Cohen (D., Tenn.) told the AP. "I think an inquiry, as the Senate Watergate hearings were, would lead the public to see the misdeeds of this administration."
A Fox News poll shows 72 percent of Democrats support impeachment, with only 9 percent of Republicans and 33 percent of Independents supporting impeachment. Pelosi will meet with top House Democrats Wednesday morning to discuss new strategies for investigating—and possibly impeaching—Trump.