Sen. Coburn: Obama ‘perilously close’ to impeachment

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) said Wednesday that President Obama was getting “perilously close” to being impeached.

“I think those are serious things, but we’re in serious times,” Coburn at a town-hall meeting in his home state in response to a constituent question about impeachment. “I don’t have the legal background to know if that rises to high crimes and misdemeanors, but I think you’re getting perilously close.”

{mosads}Coburn didn’t get into specifics of Obama’s perceived transgressions but said the president has abused executive privileges with “loose interpretation” and “lawlessness.”

The Oklahoma Republican admitted he doesn’t know “where the level is” when it comes to violations that could amount to an impeachment but said he’s “documenting all this stuff as it goes along.”

“Barack Obama is a personal friend of mine. He became my friend in the Senate, but that does not mean that I agree in any way with what he’s doing or how he’s doing it,” Coburn said. “I quite frankly think he’s in a difficult position he’s put himself in, and if it continues, I think we’re going to have another constitutional crisis in our country in terms of the presidency.”

Coburn is at least the third lawmaker to raise Obama’s potential impeachment in meeting with constituents this month. Rep. Kerry Bentivolio (R-Mich.) this week said he’s consulted with lawyers about impeaching the president, which he said “would be a dream come true,” and Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) said House Republicans have enough votes to move forward with a potential impeachment.

Coburn and Obama are friends. Obama wrote the essay for Coburn’s entry on Time magazine’s 100 most influential people list and praised him as someone who “speaks his mind, sticks to his principles, and is committed to the people he was elected to serve.”