There are many comparisons between the two presidents who have been accused of influencing elections nearly half a century apart.
In Donald Trump’s highly public efforts to overturn the 2020 elections, there is a reaction to Nixon’s secret efforts to interfere with the 1972 elections.
However This is not the case when history repeats itself. Trump’s efforts were arguably more brave and dangerous, as Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 victory threatened a change of power for the first time since the Civil War, when the southern states withdrew from the Union Army.
January 6th and Watergate Hearing
Meanwhile, the Watergate hearing helped to set foot on the ground and uncover Watergate’s plot.
Almost worn by the Special Senate Committee A year after the White House-supported operatives invaded the Democratic National Committee headquarters, the hearing drew national attention.
Top-ranked Nixon whistleblowers featured at Watergate hearing
Trump’s top aide refused to work with the House Committee investigating January 6.
In contrast, at Watergate’s hearing, Nixon’s White House adviser John Dean turned on the president and told the world about the planned plot at the White House.
Watergate Inquiry Launches Chain Reaction
A Watergate hearing also revealed the existence of the now infamous tape of the Nixon White House conversation, ultimately supporting Dean’s testimony.
Nixon’s efforts to keep these tapes out of the public led to the “Saturday Night Massacre” in October 1973. There, two top executives from the Justice Department resigned in protest.
What to expect at the January 6 hearing
It may be the top aide to former Vice President Mike Pence who will provide compelling testimony at this January 6th hearing. Pence, who presided over the voter vote on January 6, was targeted by the riots.
Senate Republicans have never turned on Trump like Nixon
Nixon resigned because he had no power to defeat the impeachment. A Republican senator told him that he would lose almost all support among Republicans in the Senate and that if he did not resign he would be kicked out in an impeachment trial.
“President, you have five votes, and one of them is not mine,” at the time-Sen. Barry Goldwater, Arizona, told Nixon at the White House, according to Bob Woodward, a journalist at the Washington Post in CNN’s documentary series.
More than a year later, most Republicans stopped criticizing Trump.
Difference between then and now
Trump exerts more absolute power over the Republicans than Nixon. This is either a sign or a factor of the paralyzing power of the faction in today’s politics.
This may be the most important difference between the Watergate scandal and the January 6 investigation.
“What the United States and the world saw in 1974 was that the most powerful man in the world lost his job,” a historian said. Timothy Naftari, a professor at New York University and a former director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, said in the CNN documentary series. “And for those who doubted the strength of the US Constitution, what they witnessed removed those doubts.”
Trump survived the impeachment and did not resign. But when voters left him, he lost his job. The question today is whether his refusal to accept the loss raises new questions about the strength of the Constitution.
But the roots of their sins are the same.
“Both of their crimes began by undermining the most basic elements of democracy,” Bernstein said, “free and fair elections.”
Source: www.cnn.com
