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When Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced this week that she was kicking off an impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump, she did so because of growing support among Democrats in the House — including from some key members who represent politically diverse parts of the Washington region.

But some of those members came to support impeachment proceedings later than others, reflecting not only personal differences of opinion on if and when Trump should be removed from office — but also political calculations stemming from the upcoming re-election campaigns they will have to wage.

“We have freshmen members elected locally, some from congressional districts that were previously held by Republicans,” said Mark Rozell, the dean of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. “And with Donald Trump being quite popular still with the Republican base, they may have had some political calculation there that held them back.”

Rozell says that was likely the case with U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger and Rep. Elaine Luria, Virginia Democrats who narrowly defeated Republicans in the 2018 midterm elections and could face competitive re-election bids in 2020. While both had demurred on supporting impeachment over the summer, this week’s revelations that Trump had pressed his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate Democratic presidential contender Joe Biden prompted them to change their minds.

Who Changed Their Minds And Why?

In July, there were just over 100 Democrats supporting impeachment. By Wednesday, the number had jumped above 200. That included two other local holdouts: U.S. Reps. David Trone (D-Maryland) and C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Maryland). Now all but one of Maryland’s congressional representatives support impeachment proceedings — Andy Harris from the Eastern Shore is the sole outlier.

Rob Wittmann (R-Virginia) is the only congressman in the Washington region opposed to impeachment.

U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-Virginia) was one of the early supporters of impeachment, knowing that his solidly blue congressional district would support him. He says he understands the political calculations some of his colleagues were forced to make.

“All of us are reluctant to have the agenda, all the press attention — the front page of the paper, NPR — focus on impeachment rather than trying to get guns off the street and housing for everybody and drug prices down and all the constructive things we can do for American families,” Beyer said. “We know that talking about impeachment is going to gobble up everybody’s attention and energy, sadly.”

Spanberger hinted at this concern in a statement she released this week announcing her support for impeachment proceedings, saying that her attention to this point had not been focused on whether to remove the president from office.

“Over the past nine months, I have worked faithfully to deliver on my promises to the people of Central Virginia,” Spanberger said. “I have focused on local issues, and I have introduced and supported healthcare and infrastructure legislation that would make a real difference in the lives of our neighbors.”

But Spanberger also stressed that Trump had crossed the line she set for what’s permissible and what’s not.

“The newest allegations against the President of the United States have started a new chapter, and they must be treated as such. The allegation that the President may have used his position to ask a foreign leader to investigate a political rival to benefit his reelection efforts is shocking,” Spanberger said. “That he may have tried to use U.S. taxpayer-funded security assistance funding as leverage in this effort represents a national security threat.”

Spanberger joined six other Democrats with national security backgrounds — including Luria — in writing an op-ed published in The Washington Post fleshing out their change of heart. In his own statement on Tuesday, Ruppersberger, who represents a district spanning Howard, Anne Arundel and Baltimore counties, struck a similar tone.

“As a former prosecutor, I have resisted calls to begin formal impeachment proceedings against the President until we had clear, indisputable evidence that transcends politics. Follow the facts, I’ve said,” he wrote. “Jeopardizing our national security is where I draw the line. Withholding duly-appropriated money meant to aid a country that could be overtaken by Russia is reckless and dangerous. This is yet another example of the President doing Putin’s bidding.”

National Leadership A Factor

Rozell said there was another dynamic at play: House Democrats not wanting to cross Pelosi, who until this week had opposed moving forward on impeachment.

“They may have been deferential to the speaker of the house who was pushing that the Democrats should hold back on the issue of impeachment until the public comes along,” he said.

That was evident in Trone’s statement issued this week on the decision to support impeachment proceedings, which he attributes directly to Pelosi’s own decision to move in that direction.

“The president has abused the office of the presidency and broken our public trust. Because of this, I support the speaker’s decision to open an impeachment inquiry and do everything in our power to uncover the truth and save our democracy,” said Trone, a freshmen legislator whose district runs from the Maryland suburbs outside D.C. to the state’s western panhandle.

When it comes to the political calculations and potential impacts on re-election, Rozell says Maryland’s Democrats are safe — largely because of the state’s heavily gerrymandered map. In Virginia, Spanberger could still be at risk, but he says that she may think changing her mind with the new facts emerging this week will only help her.

“They may be betting on the fact that as more revelations come out, public opinion is going to move — even within their districts — increasingly toward favoring impeachment,” he says. “They may not be looking at a negative political calculus as they believed that they were in the previous scandals in the Trump administration where there were calls for impeachments largely from the political left.”