'The moral centre': how Jamie Raskin dominated the stage at Trump's trial

[marmar]

(Guardian UK) Jamie Raskin had finished a face-to-face interview with the Guardian and was on his way home. It was late on Saturday night in October 2018. But then he thought of a point he hadn’t made and, ever fastidious, restarted the conversation by phone.

“Straight white men are already a minority in the Democratic caucus but when the big blue wave hits, we’re going to be moving much closer to parity in terms of women and men, at least on the House side,” he said, a prediction that came true a month later in the midterm elections.

He had only taken office himself in January 2017, representing Maryland’s eighth congressional district. Just four years later, the proud progressive finds himself lead prosecutor in the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump. Senators, pundits and millions of TV viewers have heard his deceptively soothing tones eviscerate the former president.

They were doubly awed when he wove together the political and the personal to share unfathomable grief: his 25-year-old son, Tommy, killed himself on New Year’s Eve after years of struggle with depression. Tommy was buried on 5 January – the day before a violent mob mounted a deadly insurrection at the US Capitol. ............(more)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/13/jamie-raskin-trump-impeachment-trial