What follows below is a letter I wrote and mailed to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in December 2019 after hearing a statement from him on television stating that he was not going to listen to evidence in President Trump’s impeachment trial. In that trial among many other things that have come to light rescently, it is alledged that our president directly oversaw a conspiracy where he threatened to sell our ally Ukraine downriver unless said country assisted him in cheating in the 2020 election. As a key player in the current constitutional crisis McConnell threatens to use his parties Senate Majority to simply rule to dismiss the trial entirely or rule to not have any witnesses/evidence at the trial. And with that action he directly threatens to end our democracy - making Trump the first unnacountable to the people king, since the signing of our Declaration of Independence 239 years ago in 1776!
In posting this letter I hope to inspire you to contemplate what’s happening and consider writing a letter to key Republican senators as well — urging them to uphold their oaths, protect our constitution and carry out a legitimate trial with witnesses and evidence
I am fulfilling my civic duty in writing you this letter and hope that you get the opportunity to read it in person.
This year I had the privilege of serving our country as a juror on a criminal case in San Francisco. Over the course of three weeks of testimony and a week grappling with the facts of the matter I had to personally decide based on the information I was given if the accused was innocent of any involvement or guilty — beyond reasonable doubt. And this experience, more than any other, has made me proud of our United States and the foundation of laws on which our country was started.
23 years ago I immigrated as a child from the capital of the former Soviet Union. At that time my family was not even aware that there could be a land who’s people lived under a functioning legal system of the people, by the people, for the people. The dictatorship under which I was born was a nation of men and not a nation of laws, in which the use of propoganda, torture and arbitrary execution was used by those in power to make the citizens of Soviet-controlled territories their defacto slaves. The Cold War like the Second World War was fought for the right reasons — to oppose lawless tyranny and a nightmare future for humanity. In the end it was not a physical battle that defeated the Soviet Empire, but its own internal corruption, centralization of power, and enslavement of its citizenry which caused it to cave in on itself.
It is therefore most troubling for me to hear that you stated your intent to not work in the common good of the people in reguards to the presidentail trial, no matter how personally unfair or ficticious you may feel it to be. If the facts prove our presidents innocence it is still your responsibility as our elected representative in the senate to objectively go through the constitutionally-prescribed processes and uphold our democratic values of liberty and justice for all. If you fail to uphold our constitution and the spirit in which it was written, when we fought with and overthrew a king, you risk putting us on a path to the kind of lawless dictatorships which now prosper in Russia, China and Iran.
Every soldier who has fought on behalf of the United States since the revolution and every foreigner who has fought for our American ideals is looking up to you in this moment to not falter and destroy the bountiful freedoms they bled and died to defend. As are every man, woman and child in every country still yearning to breathe free
So I ask you — Will you fulfill your congressional duty with respect to the constitution and the legitimately elected House of Representatives decision to have your side of our united republic look into the matter further?
Thank you for taking the time to read my letter and I wish you good health in the new year,
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