Trump impeachment likely if Democrats win midterms, Wilbur Ross warns

As Republicans fret over their party’s chances in the upcoming midterm elections, a former official in Donald Trump’s Cabinet has warned that this year’s elections carry "extremely high" stakes for the president.

Wilbur Ross, who served as commerce secretary for the duration of Trump’s first term, told Newsweek he has "no doubt" that Democrats will move to impeach the president should they win the House in November, and that securing the Senate would likely pave the way for a successful conviction.

"For the president, the stakes are extremely high not just in terms of his legislative agenda," he said. "If the Democrats gain enough control over the House I have no doubt that they will vote to impeach him and if they also control the Senate they will uphold the conviction."

Trump was impeached twice during his first term. First, in 2019, for alleged abuse of power and obstruction of Congress after pressing Ukraine to conduct an inquiry into Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. The second came in 2021 and concerned Trump allegedly "inciting violence against the Government of the United States" ahead of the January 6 Capitol riots.

Both efforts made it through the Democratic-controlled House but failed in the Republican-controlled Senate.

And several leading Republican voices have in recent weeks issued warnings over a repeat of these episodes.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said that this was a risk if Republicans lose the House, and said he believed Democrats would also use their control over the lower chamber to "go after" Trump’s family, associates and Cabinet members.

"Half of you in this room will be targeted. I run the protection program. I'll take care of you," he told attendees at a Faith and Freedom Coalition conference on Friday.

And Trump, too, has expressed concern about this possibility.

"You’ve got to win the midterms," he told House Republicans at a GOP retreat in January. "Cause if we don’t win the midterms, they’ll find a reason to impeach me."

Certain Democrats—like Michigan Representative Shri Thanedar and Texas Representative Al Green—have already taken steps to impeach Trump since his return to the White House, motivated by a range of reasons but all ultimately failing to gather sufficient momentum.

In March, Punchbowl News interviewed several lawmakers who dismissed the idea as a strategic misstep, with California Representative Pete Aguilar, chair of the House Democratic Caucus, saying: "Literally no Democrats are talking about this. This is not something that comes up in our discussions at all."

But that stance appears to have shifted amid developments in the Iran war.

In April, after Trump warned that a "whole civilization will die" if Tehran did not lift its blockade on the Strait of Hormuz, dozens of Democrats voiced support for removing Trump from office—either through impeachment or by his Cabinet invoking the 25th Amendment.

In a recent interview with CNN, Senator Brian Schatz said Trump had committed "a million" impeachable offenses, but described the matter as an "important tactical question."

And Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, speaking at the CNBC CEO Council Summit in Washington early this month, likewise said that impeachment was not the party’s principal priority five months out from the midterms.

"We haven’t ruled anything in; we haven’t ruled anything out," the New York representative said.

Regardless of whether the party prioritizes impeachment after winning the House or Senate, Ross told Newsweek that their victories over the two chambers would leave the remainder of Trump’s legislative agenda "in disarray."

According to Ross, the success of Trump’s party in this year’s elections will hinge on a number of related matters.

These include whether voters agree that the U.S. won the Iran war and "that the exercise was worthwhile," and whether the president is able to tame inflation, and rising gas and food prices in particular.

Ross also noted that "stylistic issues" could also swing certain moderates, while pointing to Trump’s attempts to rename the Kennedy Center and "his use of profanity."

But Ross said that the success of Trump-endorsed candidates in recent House and Senate primaries proves that "the hardcore Republicans…very much continue to follow his lead."

With slim majorities in the House and Senate, most pollsters currently give Democrats favorable odds of victory in both.

According to the latest probabilistic election model from Race to the White House, the party is in with a 71 percent chance of securing the House, with projections pointing to around 229 seats compared with 206 for the GOP.

The Senate outlook is narrower: The same model puts Democrats’ chances at 53 percent, though control is expected to hinge on a number of closely contested seats and "toss up" races.