Biden campaign: Impeachment ‘may be unavoidable’ now

Former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign took its strongest position yet on impeachment of President Trump on Wednesday, with the campaign saying it “may be unavoidable” in the wake of special counsel Robert Mueller’s remarks earlier that day.

“Vice President Biden agrees with Speaker Pelosi that no one would relish what would certainly be a divisive impeachment process, but that it may be unavoidable if this Administration continues on its path,” the statement reads. “For all these reasons and many more, Vice President Biden will continue to make the case as to why President Trump should not be re-elected.”

.@JoeBiden for President statement on Bob Mueller’s comments earlier today: pic.twitter.com/dxiNl2ZmH0

— TJ Ducklo (@TDucklo) May 29, 2019

{mosads}In his remarks Wednesday, Mueller emphasized that while his investigation should not be interpreted as an exoneration of Trump, Justice Department policy prevented him from charging a sitting president with a crime.

“The Special Counsel made clear that it is incumbent that Congress pick up the pieces of his report on which he did not reach definitive conclusions or that he could not act upon due to Department of Justice guidance,” the statement reads. “Congress must do everything in its power to hold this Administration to account. That is what Congress is doing and should do: continue to investigate.”

The Biden campaign’s emphasis on allowing congressional investigations to play out echoes that of Democratic congressional leadership. Earlier this month, after reportedly initially pressing Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to be more open to impeachment, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) counseled patience on the various House investigations, citing court victories in House Democrats’ efforts to subpoena various records from the White House and Trump’s businesses.

Biden’s statement accuses the Trump administration of “throwing up roadblocks” against congressional investigations and calls Attorney General William Barr’s investigation into the origins of the Russia probe an “extraordinary internal vendetta against law enforcement and intelligence community investigators who were doing their job.”

Several of Biden’s fellow presidential candidates went further in the wake of Mueller’s comments, with Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) calling for impeachment while Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) reaffirmed earlier calls for impeachment.