Impeachment live updates: Schiff, Nadler are among the House members named as impeachment managers to prosecute the case against Trump
The crux of the case is the allegation that Trump tried to leverage a White House meeting and military aid, sought by Ukraine to combat Russian military aggression, to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to launch an investigation of former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, as well as a probe of an unfounded theory that Kyiv conspired with Democrats to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.
●Impeachment spotlight turns to key question: whether to call witnesses.
●Ukraine prosecutor offered information related to Biden in exchange for ambassador’s ouster, newly released materials show.
●Pomp and a procession, then Trump impeachment trial begins in earnest.
●Capitol Hill reporters protest expected restrictions on media access during Senate impeachment trial.
Which senators support removing Trump | Which House members voted to impeach Trump | House resolution impeaching Trump | Other key documents
Schiff, Nadler are among the House members named to prosecute the case against Trump
Pelosi on Wednesday selected seven House members to serve as impeachment managers in the Senate trial, including Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.).
The group will argue that Trump abused the power of his office and obstructed Congress and should be removed from office. Countering that argument will be Trump’s defense team, which is expected to be led by White House counsel Pat Cipollone.
Besides Schiff and Nadler, Pelosi named as managers Reps. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Sylvia Garcia (D-Tex.), Val Demings (D-Fla.), Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Jason Crow (D-Colo.).
Trump attacks leading Democrats ahead of unveiling of impeachment managers
As Pelosi prepared to name House impeachment managers, Trump took to Twitter to attack her, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.).
“Cryin’ Chuck Schumer just said, ‘The American people want a fair trial in the Senate,’ ” Trump tweeted. “True, but why didn’t Nervous Nancy and Corrupt politician Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff give us a fair trial in the House. It was the most lopsided & unfair basement hearing in the history of Congress!”
Trump declined an invitation by the Judiciary Committee to have his attorney participate in the House impeachment proceedings.
Collins expresses hope about ending ‘sad part of history’
Rep. Douglas A. Collins (R-Ga.), the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said “a very quick debate” on the House resolution Wednesday should lead to “the final stages in which we can now hopefully put this sad part of history behind us.”
During an interview on Fox News, Collins predicted that senators would come to realize how weak a case Democrats have for impeaching Trump and removing him from office.
“Most senators … have not followed it as closely as we’ve lived it in the House, so I think when they start seeing how bad this case is, when they start seeing how weak these articles of impeachment are, and how they’ve been driven by simply a motivation to disenfranchise this president and take him down, I think they’re going to have an interesting perspective and point of view,” he said.
Schiff says McConnell has choice between the Constitution and a coverup
As Pelosi prepared to unveil the House impeachment managers, Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) continued a Democratic effort to portray McConnell as participating in a coverup if the trial doesn’t include witnesses.
“Today, we take the next step to #DefendOurDemocracy, sending articles of impeachment to the Senate,” Schiff tweeted. “McConnell will have a choice: stand with the Constitution, or with Trump’s cover-up. Uphold the rule of law, or help Trump undermine it.”
8:15 AM: Sen. Coons says ‘virtually all’ Senate Republicans have mind up their minds
As Democrats continue to press the case for a Senate trial with witnesses, Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) asserted Wednesday that “virtually all” Republicans have already made up their minds to acquit Trump regardless of the evidence.
During an interview on NPR, Coons pointed to McConnell’s plan to hear opening statements from House impeachment managers and lawyers for Trump before deciding whether to call live witnesses.
“Essentially what McConnell is saying is we ought to have the case in chief presented and then argue whether we need any additional witnesses,” Coons said. (“Case in chief” is a legal term for presentation of evidence.)
“What that’s really pointing to is that virtually all of the Republicans in the Senate have indicated they’ve made up their mind, and they’re going to vote to acquit regardless of what evidence is presented.”
By: John Wagner
As House moves on impeachment, Trump seeks to focus on trade
As the House moves to transmit articles of impeachment to the Senate, Trump is seeking Wednesday to put a spotlight on trade.
He is scheduled to hold a late-morning ceremony in the East Room of the White House with Chinese Vice Premier Liu He to sign a partial trade deal that amounts to a truce in a conflict between their two countries that has shaken the global economy.
As part of the “phase one” deal, Trump has agreed to relax some tariffs that have been imposed on Chinese imports while China has agreed to buy more American products and make other concessions. However, many U.S. businesses will continue to face the impact of tariffs.
Trump and Liu plan to have lunch following the ceremony, according to the White House. Trump has no other public events on his schedule.
Pelosi plans to name House impeachment managers ahead of vote to transmit articles
Pelosi on Wednesday plans to announce the team of House managers who will prosecute the case against Trump in a Senate trial, ahead of a vote on a resolution that will trigger transmission of the articles of impeachment to the other side of the Capitol.
The speaker has scheduled a 10 a.m. news conference at the Capitol to unveil the managers, who are expected to include House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.).
A vote on the resolution is expected during the afternoon.
Following the vote, Pelosi has scheduled an “engrossment ceremony” for the articles of impeachment at 5 p.m. At the conclusion of the ceremony, the impeachment managers, led by the House clerk and House sergeant at arms, are scheduled to walk through the Capitol Rotunda to present the articles of impeachment to the secretary of the Senate.
The procession will come almost exactly four weeks after the House first voted to impeach Trump.
Once that process is complete, the Senate will focus on preparing the chamber — such as where to set up tables for the House members to sit — and arranging for Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. to assume his role in the proceedings.
Roberts is expected to be sworn in Thursday to preside over the trial and then swear in the 100 senators to serve as jurors.
After that, senators plan to go home for a long weekend over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday and resume the more substantive portion of the case against Trump next week.
Ernst says Pelosi ‘couldn’t get her job done over there’
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) knocked Pelosi during a morning television interview for seeking to hear from witnesses in a Senate trial who did not participate in the House impeachment proceedings.
“For heaven’s sakes, she couldn’t get her job done over there,” Ernst said on Fox News. “Why should we do her job in the United States Senate?”
Senate Democrats are pressing to call several witnesses who declined to appear in the House, including former national security adviser John Bolton and acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.
“If they had wanted to call those witnesses, they should have been done in the House,” Ernst said.
The House offered Trump the opportunity to participate in the process, but he refused.
Pelosi presses case that Senate trial should include new documents
Pelosi went on Twitter early Wednesday morning to press the case for a Senate trial that includes new documents and witnesses.
“The President has fought tooth-and-nail to keep thousands of documents away from the public,” Pelosi wrote. “And no wonder — each time new pieces come out, they show President Trump right at the center of the effort to pressure Ukraine to investigate his political rivals. There can be no full & fair trial in the Senate if Leader McConnell blocks the Senate from hearing witnesses and obtaining documents President Trump is covering up.”
Her tweets came a day after House Democrats released new materials that appear to show Ukraine’s top prosecutor offering an associate of Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph W. Giuliani, damaging information related to Joe Biden if the Trump administration recalled the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.
The text messages and documents provided to Congress by former Giuliani associate Lev Parnas also show that before the ambassador, Marie Yovanovitch, was removed from her post, a Parnas associate now running for Congress sent menacing text messages suggesting that he had Yovanovitch under surveillance in Ukraine.
Trump shares McConnell’s assessment that House Democrats are contradicting themselves
Amid a spate of tweets and retweets that stretched into the early morning hours Wednesday, Trump shared video clips of McConnell’s remarks Tuesday on the Senate floor in which he accused House Democrats of a “simple contradiction.”
“The House case cannot be so robust that it was enough to rush into impeachment, and enough for Senate Democrats to start pre-judging guilt, but also so weak that they need the Senate to go fishing,” McConnell said. “These two stories cannot both be true.”
McConnell also accused Democrats of treating impeachment as “one big political game.”
“We’re overdue for some seriousness and sober judgment,” he said. “That is what the Senate will bring.”
Impeachment: What you need to read
Here’s what you need to know to understand the impeachment of President Trump.
What’s happening now: Trump is now the third U.S. president to be impeached, after the House of Representatives adopted both articles of impeachment against him.
What happens next: Impeachment does not mean that the president has been removed from office. The Senate must hold a trial to make that determination. The House will vote Wednesday on a resolution appointing impeachment managers and transmitting the articles of impeachment to the Senate, meaning that a trial could begin this week. Here’s more on what happens next.
How we got here: A whistleblower complaint led Pelosi to announce the beginning of an official impeachment inquiry on Sept. 24. Closed-door hearings and subpoenaed documents related to the president’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky followed. After two weeks of public hearings in November, the House Intelligence Committee wrote a report that was sent to the House Judiciary Committee, which held its own hearings. Pelosi and House Democrats announced the articles of impeachment against Trump on Dec. 10. The Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment against Trump: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Stay informed: Read the latest reporting and analysis on impeachment here.
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