Trump Responds to Pelosi’s Threat to Delay Sending Impeachment to Senate

Trump Responds to Pelosi’s Threat to Delay Sending Impeachment to Senate
R-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). (House Television via AP); L- President Donald Trump. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump on Dec. 19 responded to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) threat to wait on sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate.

“I got Impeached last [night] without one Republican vote being cast with the Do Nothing Dems on their continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in American history. Now the Do Nothing Party want to Do Nothing with the Articles & not deliver them to the Senate, but it’s Senate’s call!” Trump wrote on Twitter.

“‘The Senate shall set the time and place of the trial.’ If the Do Nothing Democrats decide, in their great wisdom, not to show up, they would lose by Default!” the president added.

After the Democrats impeached Trump on Dec. 18 in a partisan vote, Pelosi told reporters that she may consider delaying sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate. Pelosi appeared to suggest that she will use the delay as leverage to negotiate what she called “a fair trial” in the Senate.

“We have legislation approved by the Rules Committee that will enable us to decide how we will send over the articles of impeachment,” Pelosi said. “We cannot name [impeachment] managers until we see what the process is on the Senate side.”

All of the Republicans voted against impeachment. Two Democrats broke ranks and voted with the Republicans on the first article of impeachment. Three Democrats broke ranks on the second article of impeachment. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) voted “present” on both articles.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has said that he will coordinate the trial with the White House. He expects the president to be acquitted by the Republican-majority chamber. McConnell prefers a relatively short trial, where House managers present the case to remove Trump and Trump’s defense team offers counter-arguments.

When asked by a reporter, Pelosi wouldn’t answer questions on if she was looking to indefinitely hold the articles of impeachment in the House.

“We’re not having that discussion,” she said, according to The Washington Post.

Josh Holmes, an adviser to McConnell, tweeted mockingly on Dec. 18: “Folks, this might be the greatest compliment McConnell has ever received. They are seriously entertaining holding a grenade with the pin pulled rather than facing what happens when they send it over McConnell’s wall.”

In an interview with Fox News on Dec. 17, McConnell said the Senate has to take the matter up due to its rules.

“We’ll listen to the arguments that the House managers appointed by Pelosi make, we’ll listen to the response from the president’s lawyers, and we’ll have a period of written questions, and then the Senate will have to make a decision,” McConnell said.

“Do we know enough, have we learned enough after listening to all this that we want to vote on the two very weak articles of impeachment? Or do we want to have a show trial in which both sides try to embarrass the other and put on an embarrassing scene, frankly, for the American people,” McConnell stated.

Jack Phillips contributed to this report.

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