WASHINGTON — U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska is the first Republican senator to join calls led mostly by Democrats in Congress for President Donald Trump's resignation.
The Anchorage Daily News reports Murkowski said Friday in an interview that Trump should resign the presidency immediately. She said Trump incited his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol after his speech near the White House Wednesday.
She also said she is uncertain she has a future with the GOP if the political party can't distance from Trump.
“I want him to resign. I want him out. He has caused enough damage,” Murkowski said in a telephone interview with the newspaper.
The violent mob of Trump supporters that entered the Capitol had forced a lockdown, with lawmakers hunkered down and being rushed out. Five people died in the riot, including a Capitol Police officer.
Murkowski says many people felt she became an independent when she lost her Republican primary in 2010 but won the general election by write-in. She has been in the Senate since 2002, replacing her father, Frank Murkowski, who took office in 1981.
“If the Republican Party has become nothing more than the party of Trump, I sincerely question whether this is the party for me,” she said.
She added, “He needs to get out. He needs to do the good thing, but I don’t think he’s capable of doing a good thing.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, along with dozens of other Democrats, are publicly calling for the 25th Amendment to be invoked and for Trump to be removed from office.
The 25th Amendment allows for the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet to declare the president unfit for office. The vice president then becomes acting president.
At a press conference Thursday afternoon, Pelosi said "this is urgent" and Trump is a "very dangerous person" and needs to be removed before President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration Jan. 20.
Pelosi said that if Vice President Mike Pence and Trump's Cabinet don't act, then Congress may move forward with impeaching Trump again.
While Pelosi had acknowledged there's just 13 days until Biden's inauguration and Trump is out of office, she said that "any day can be a horror show for America."
Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger is so far the only Republican in the House to join the calls for Trump's removal.
The Associated Press contributed.