“None of this would've happened without Donald Trump.”Įven while still mourning Tommy’s death, Raskin is immersed in the details of building a case that he and the other House managers will present to the Senate in a trial that could begin as early as this week, within days after Trump leaves office. “As Congresswoman Cheney put it, ‘He summoned the mob, he assembled the mob and he lit the match that led to that confrontation,’” he said. But this month, the impact of Trump’s actions became frighteningly real. At that time, the threats Raskin warned about seemed remote. “In case of emergency, smash glass,” he told Yahoo News at the time. He focused then on the 25h Amendment, sponsoring legislation to create a body that would allow Congress, and not just the Cabinet, to initiate the process that could remove the president on the grounds that he is unable to fill the duties of his office. More than three years ago, Raskin was warning that the unstable behavior of Donald Trump could threaten the country and provoke a constitutional crisis. In many ways, Raskin is uniquely qualified to lead the House case against the president. “And I’ve got to tell you, when I finally sent Tabitha and Hank back home to be with the rest of my family … I said, ‘Tabitha, I promise you it’ll never be like this in the Capitol again.’” “Really, all of us could have died at the hands of that violent insurrectionist white supremacist mob,” he said. They all survived, but an emboldened Raskin is now more determined than ever to uphold his constitutional duties and hold President Trump accountable for what took place. So for nearly an hour, Raskin, a week after the death of his son, feared for the lives of his daughter and son-in-law. Raskin’s chief of staff, Julie Tagen, who was with them, grabbed a poker from the fireplace, ready to fight back and wield it against any rioters who made it in. Terrified, they hid under a desk as the rioters slammed repeatedly on the door, trying to break in. When the attack began, they barricaded themselves inside House Majority Leader Rep. She and Raskin’s son-in-law, Hank Kronick, the husband of another daughter, had accompanied him to the chamber that day. As he and other members were soon escorted to safety, Raskin and Tabitha were separated. People were crying.”īut foremost on his mind: the welfare of his daughter. “You could hear people screaming, ‘Where’s Nancy?’ You could hear people basically trying to barrel down the doors, and then they told us we were going to be shepherded out. “You could hear people shouting and yelling, you could hear, ‘Hang Mike Pence!’” recalled Raskin. But as the mob closed in on the House chamber, he and other members, were rushed out by security, first into a room where, he says, they donned gas masks to protect against chemical sprays while the crowd outside the doors screamed threats. Raskin, wearing a torn black ribbon on his lapel as a sign of mourning, received an emotional standing ovation on the House floor that day as he rose to rebut Republican efforts to challenge the slate of electors from Arizona and other swing states won by Biden. Update your settings here to see it.Īnd Raskin, in turn, has been designated by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the honor - and burden - of leading the team of House managers who will prosecute President Trump in his upcoming impeachment trial in the Senate. This content is not available due to your privacy preferences. A Capitol police officer was killed, and members of Congress and staffers, huddled together for hours in windowless rooms, were exposed to COVID-19 by Republican colleagues who refused entreaties to wear masks at least five House members have since tested positive. Capitol, breaking through barriers and smashing windows. Raskin’s courage was tested that day when a furious mob of Trump supporters assaulted the U.S. “I wanted to be close to her, and she wanted to be close to me.” ![]() “We wanted to be together,” Raskin said in an interview on the Yahoo News “Skullduggery” podcast. “I’ve got to go.” He invited Tabitha to come with him. ![]() “I swore a constitutional oath,” he told his daughter. I want you to stay home,” his daughter, Tabitha, pleaded, fearing possible violence. 6, having just experienced the most painful of tragedies: burying his 25 year-old-son, Tommy, a gifted student at Harvard Law School, who had taken his own life on New Year’s Eve after a bout of deep depression.īut this was the day Congress was to officially certify Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory - and with scores of Republican lawmakers vowing to object, Raskin, a constitutional law professor, had a job to do: He had been slated to help lead the Democratic response in a crisis that threatened to upend American democracy. Jamie Raskin was grieving on the morning of Jan.
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