No timeline yet for impeachment trial of president
WASHINGTON — Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday that House impeachment managers were preparing to prosecute President Trump in the Senate, but she refused to offer a timeline for when they would move forward with a trial.
At a news briefing two days after the House impeached Trump, Pelosi made clear that her first priority was ensuring the security of the Capitol and lawmakers before Presidentelect Joe Biden’s inauguration Wednesday.
Pelosi vowed accountability would soon follow for Trump, whom the House charged with “incitement of insurrection” for his role in egging on a violent mob that stormed the building. She also pledged to pursue the perpetrators of the rampage as well as farright lawmakers if they were found to have aided in the assault.
Pelosi could transmit the article as soon as Monday, prompting the start of a trial just as power is being transferred to Biden.
The House was waiting, at least in part, to determine the outcome of negotiations between Senate Democrats and Republicans over the shape of a highly unusual proceeding. On the cusp of taking unified control of Washington, Democrats were working to draft rules that would allow the Senate to operate on dual tracks to confirm Biden’s Cabinet and begin moving his legislative agenda while trying Trump.
Unlike a year ago when he sought to use the trial rules to undercut the prosecution, Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, who is said to approve of the impeachment drive, appeared more willing to work in concert with Democrats.
Meeting privately for a third consecutive day, the House impeachment managers, led by Rep. Jamie Raskin, DMd., raced Friday to assemble a trial strategy. They announced they had retained Barry Berke, a leading New York defense lawyer, and Joshua Matz, a constitutional scholar, to serve as counsels for the trial. Both men served similar roles during the first impeachment.
Senators and their aides were also trying to determine how they could alter the physical layout of the Senate chamber to operate the trial safely during the pandemic.
It remains unclear who would defend Trump or whether he would mount a defense. A mix of White House and private lawyers did so last time, but people familiar with the president’s thinking said Friday the leading candidates were Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, a conservative constitutional scholar who recently resigned from Chapman University in Southern California.