Anonymous ID: a2131f Jan. 14, 2020, 9:31 a.m. No.7811003   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Pelosi sets Wednesday votes to send impeachment to Senate

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — After weeks of delay and strategizing, the U.S. House is planning to vote Wednesday to send the articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump to the Senate to start the trial on removing him from office.

 

Speaker Nancy Pelosi met privately Tuesday at the Capitol with House Democrats about next steps, ending her blockade a month after they voted to impeach Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

 

Pelosi said the House will vote to transmit the charges and name the House managers for the case. She warned the Republican-led Senate off any idea of simply dismissing the case against Trump.

 

“The President and the Senators will be held accountable,” Pelosi said in a statement. “The American people deserve the truth, and the Constitution demands a trial.”

 

The action will launch the Senate proceeding, only the third presidential impeachment trial in American history, a dramatic endeavor coming amid the backdrop of a politically divided nation and an election year.

 

Trump was impeached by the Democratic-led House last month on charges of abuse of power over pushing Ukraine to investigate Democratic rival Joe Biden and obstruction of Congress in the following probe.

 

The trial would then begin in a matter of days.

 

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell opened the Senate on Tuesday scoffing at what he called the “bizarro world” of Pelosi’s impeachment strategy that delayed transmitting the charges for weeks.

 

“Do these sound like leaders who really believe we are in a constitutional crisis, one that requires the ultimate remedy?” McConnell asked. He rejected Pelosi’s recent suggestions that whatever the Senate verdict, Trump will be “impeached forever.”

 

“It will fall to the Senate to end it with seriousness and sobriety,” he said.

 

https://apnews.com/8276d7dc28f15fc46d1b6c546dd66382

Anonymous ID: a2131f Jan. 14, 2020, 9:38 a.m. No.7811068   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>1104 >>1214

GOP leadership: There aren't 51 votes to dismiss Trump articles of impeachment

 

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) told reporters on Monday that the Senate Republican caucus doesn't have the votes to dismiss the articles of impeachment against President Trump, who endorsed an "outright dismissal" over the weekend.

 

"I think our members generally are not interested in a motion to dismiss. … Certainly there aren't 51 votes for a motion to dismiss," Blunt, the No. 4 Senate Republican, told reporters after a closed-door leadership meeting.

 

Republicans have warned for months that they will not dismiss the two articles of impeachment against Trump, predicting a trial will end with votes on either acquitting or convicting him.

 

But Trump revived talk of trying to dismiss the articles over the weekend, saying the Senate was "giving credence" to the allegations against him by having a trial.

 

"Many believe that by the Senate giving credence to a trial based on the no evidence, no crime, read the transcripts, 'no pressure' Impeachment Hoax, rather than an outright dismissal, it gives the partisan Democrat Witch Hunt credibility that it otherwise does not have. I agree!" Trump tweeted on Sunday.

 

Dismissing the articles of impeachment would require 51 votes. Because no Democrats would support the effort, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) could afford to lose only two GOP senators and still successfully dismiss the articles.

 

Multiple Republicans, including Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Rob Portman (Ohio), have indicated they would oppose a motion to dismiss, arguing that both Trump's legal team and House impeachment managers should be able to make their case.

 

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/478080-gop-leadership-there-arent-51-votes-to-dismiss-trump-articles-of-impeachment