Khanna says third Trump impeachment would be about ‘setting a standard’

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) on Sunday said a third attempt to impeach President Trump if Democrats take control of Congress in November would be about “setting a standard” of accountability.

Khanna appeared on NBC News’s “Meet the Press” when he told host Kristen Welker that impeaching Trump, who he said has become “in my view, increasingly irrelevant,” would not be a mistake for Democrats. Impeachment is about upholding “constitutional values,” he emphasized.

“Impeachment says that you can’t get into an illegal war in Iran without constitutional approval,” Khanna said. “Impeachment says that you can’t just start firing federal employees in defiance of what Congress says. Impeachment says you can’t do deals with foreign governments to allegedly enrich your own family. It’s about setting a standard.”

“And the Democrats can impeach to uphold constitutional values, and at the same time, have a first-hundred-day agenda that deals with the cost of living,” he added.

Khanna said the Trump administration should accept Iran’s seven-day peace offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and enact a ceasefire, as gas prices soar due to Iran’s effective closure of the strait. He said the U.S. can agree to the deal without agreeing to all of Iran’s conditions.

“In my view, the biggest thing that we need to give the Iranians is an ironclad commitment that we will not have [a] regime-change war,” the California Democrat said. “That’s what they really care about. And you’ve got Trump going to the UN and saying we’re going to blow them all up after he had said that we already blew up all their nuclear facilities, which obviously we didn’t.”

Trump on Saturday rejected the Iranian peace proposal , though Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Welker that Iranian negotiators await “for an official response through the mediators.” He said his country is “ fully prepared ” to resume fighting if Trump authorizes strikes on Iran after the midterms.

Democrats have not ruled out an attempt at impeaching Trump for a third time between his two presidencies. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) has said that senior Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will oversee Democratic action , including impeachment, to hold the president accountable should they retake the House.

Some Republicans, including Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Trump himself , have predicted that Democratic lawmakers will impeach Trump if they win back the House. Jordan told ABC News’s Martha Raddatz on “This Week” that a third impeachment would not be for “legitimate oversight, but to just go after your political opponents.”

“But that’s just part of it. They’re going to investigate the first family, they’re going to investigate cabinet secretaries,” Jordan said, naming FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Todd Blanche, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth as officials who could also face impeachment.