Pelosi Threatens To Delay Sending Impeachment To The Senate

ollowing last night’s impeachment of President Donald Trump by the House of Representatives most observers expected House Democrats to name impeachment managers, i.e. prosecutors, and to refer the matter to the Senate for a trial. In 2019, however, that would be too simple. Today, Speaker Nancy Pelosi is hinting that the House may delay in sending the impeachment resolution to the Senate.

The pretext for the possible delay stems from statements made by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and other Republicans over recent weeks that suggest that Senate Republicans are working with White House lawyers to dispose of the matter as quickly as possible. McConnell told Sean Hannity, “There’s no chance the president’s going to be removed from office” and now Democrats using that statement to claim that the fix is in.

“So far we haven’t seen anything that looks fair to us,” Pelosi told reporters after last night’s vote, per Politico. “That would’ve been our intention, but we’ll see what happens over there.”

Senior Democratic aides said that Democrats complete the steps for sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate before early January. Earlier this week, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer had proposed that the Senate take up pre-trial matters on January 6 while requesting that the Senate allow impeachment managers to call witnesses.

McConnell rejected Schumer’s request, saying, “The House chose this road. It is their duty to investigate. It is their duty to meet the very high bar for undoing a national election. If they fail, they fail. It is not the Senate’s job to leap into the breach and search desperately for ways to get to ‘guilty.’ That would hardly be impartial justice.”

The witnesses that Democrats had asked to subpoena were also subpoenaed by the House. The Trump Administration ordered those witnesses, not to contest the congressional subpoenas but to ignore them.

Even though the House has already passed the articles of impeachment, refusing to refer the matter to the Senate gives Pelosi a measure of control over how the trial is run. It also gives the Speaker a chance to correct what many see as the mistake of ramming the impeachment through too quickly and without enough evidence.

Without their self-imposed deadline, Democrats could have asked courts to enforce the subpoenas and pursued other leads such as testimony from Lev Parnas, a Ukrainian-born Republican fundraiser who worked with Rudy Giuliani. Parnas is currently under house arrest in New York on charges of ” funnel[ing] foreign money to candidates for federal and state office so that the defendants could buy potential influence with the candidates, campaigns, and the candidates’ governments,” per the indictment. Parnas is also facing bribery charges in Ukraine.

Delaying the impeachment referral to the Senate has been advocated by a number of Trump critics in recent days. Former Republican congressman David Jolly and Charlie Sykes discussed the plan in a Bulwark podcast earlier this week. Afterward, Sykes wrote a Bulwark article describing the strategy.

“The key here is that there is no requirement that the House immediately send the articles of impeachment to the Senate. This is Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s final card to play,” Sykes wrote. “So here is a modest proposal: the House should (1) vote to impeach on Wednesday, and (2) withhold sending any articles which pass to the Senate unless and until a majority of senators commit to holding an open and fair trial in accordance with the Constitution.”

An open and fair trial is a reasonable request. As my Resurgent colleague, Steve Berman, wrote this morning, voters deserve to know the truth about what happened in connection with the Ukrainian aid. Even if you are a Trump supporter who is totally fine with a quid pro quo for aid, you should have the facts about President Trump’s actions and character.

When the Trump Administration was offered the chance to present evidence and witnesses that could have exonerated the president during the House impeachment process, they refused. Maybe Mr. McConnell can convince the White House to help Congress find the truth.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Resolutions for politicians and celebrities

Is this Lady Gaga or a scene from the Day the Earth Stood Still? (Noble Monrose)

As a public service, I have taken the time to recommend New Year’s resolutions for political and public figures.  If they choose to adopt these resolutions, I’m sure it will make for a better 2011 for everyone.

President Barack Obama:  I will listen to the American people when they say no.  Whenever I make a compromise, I’ll try to remember that I made it of my own free will and behave accordingly.

Georgia Governor-elect Nathan Deal:  I will avoid any appearance of impropriety and make sure that my personal business dealings are kept separate from state business.  No more business loans to relatives.

Former Georgia Governor Roy Barnes:  After losing twice, I’ll leave the gubernatorial campaigns to someone else.

Boehner:  The Man with the Tan

Rep. John Boehner (Minority Leader and likely next Speaker of the House):  I will remember that the people sent Republicans to Congress to stop the growth of government and skyrocketing debt, and that they can fire me as easily as they fired Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats.  I will start using a sunscreen with a higher SPF.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi:   I will stop confusing San Franciscans with average Americans. 

Rep. Hank Johnson:  I will study geography and geology to ease my fears about Guam.  I will retire.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton:  I’ll start quietly putting together a campaign committee for 2012… just in case.

Mike Huckabee:  I’ll try to remember that “pardon me” is just an expression.

Christine O’Donnell:  If I ever run for office again, I will not campaign on a platform of “I am not a witch.”

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:  I will realize that I’m living on borrowed time and that, if the US doesn’t get me, the Israelis will.

Kim Jong Un (new leader of North Korea):  I will realize that nuclear weapons does not a great country make and tall hair and platform shoes does not a tall man make.

Snooki and the Kardashian sisters:  I realize most people have no interest in me and I promise to keep my personal life to myself.

Johnson:  Ready for Retirement?

Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook creator):  Whenever we make changes, people always complain.  I won’t make any further changes without winning over focus groups in beta testing.

Oprah:  I promise to follow through with my retirement and not taunt men everywhere by making repeated comebacks.

Rep. Ron Paul:  I will try to get my supporters to calm down and not scare people with outlandish conspiracy theories.

Lady Gaga:  I promise to start buying clothes off the rack and stop looking like a space alien from a 1950s science fiction movie.

Michelle Obama:  I resolve to wear sleeves so fashion reporters can stop joking about my right to “bare arms.”

Who can get enough of Snooki? (Jeff Lewis:  chicagophotoshop.com)

Tiger Woods:  I’ll keep my putter in the bag unless I’m on the golf course.

Osama bin Laden:  I’ll redecorate the cave and become a martyr to the American Predators or Delta Force.

Democrats:  We’ll rethink the whole Keynesian economic theory.  In retrospect, it seems like a bad idea.

Georgia Democrats:  We’re starting to realize that this is a conservative state and Pelosi-Reid-Obama politics doesn’t work here.  We’ll start running candidates who are more moderate to avoid losing everything but metro Atlanta and Athens to the Republicans.

Happy New Year!

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