A majority of Democrats in the House now support an impeachment inquiry

It's official: more than half of House Democrats are in favor of opening an impeachment inquiry.

Rep. Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) on Thursday became the latest Democratic lawmaker to come out in favor of launching impeachment proceedings against President Trump, doing so by way of an op-ed in the Sun-Sentinel. By Politico's count, this means 118 of 235 voting Democratic members in the House now support this move that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has resisted. Pelosi in recent months has cautioned that were Democrats to pursue impeachment at the moment, Trump would simply be acquitted in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Deutch, Politico notes, is the 23rd Democrat to come out in favor of an impeachment inquiry since Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified before Congress about his report into Russian interference in the 2016 election, which did not establish a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia and did not make a determination about whether Trump obstructed justice while laying out instances of potential obstruction and concluding that the Trump campaign welcomed Russia's interference.

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Some outlets' impeachment count differs from Politico's, which reporter Kyle Cheney explains is because "we included in ours everyone who confirmed — either to us or in statements — that they would vote for an inquiry. Some members were explicit with us but haven't been public about it otherwise."

In his op-ed, Deutch argues that an impeachment inquiry is effectively already taking place in the House. "Sorry, Mr. President, the question is no longer whether the House should vote to proceed with a formal impeachment inquiry," he writes. "The inquiry has already begun."

This comes after House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) made a similar point last week; when asked if the committee's current investigation into the president is effectively the same thing as an impeachment inquiry, Nadler said, "in effect."