It Doesn’t Matter That Collusion Is Not a Crime

Jonathan Cohn: “Although ‘collusion’ per se might not violate federal law, at least outside the context of antitrust, conspiracy to commit some other federal crime would be. Organizing an effort to hack into and expose Clinton’s emails ― or to violate campaign finance regulations, by accepting help from a foreign agent ― would fall into those categories, just to take two purely hypothetical examples.”

“But whether Trump technically violated this or that provision of the federal code is in many respects beside the point, at least when it comes to whether Congress, at some point, should impeach him and remove him from office. ”

“The key thing to remember is that impeachment is not about punishing or deterring crime in the way that, say, a law against fraud or assault is. It’s about removing officials from office because they are unfit or undermining the democratic workings of government.”