Mitch McConnell: Senate Impeachment Trial Likely to Begin Next Tuesday

Senate Majority Leader Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks after a luncheon on Capitol H
Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
Joshua Caplan

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said Tuesday that “in all likelihood” the upper chamber’s impeachment trial will begin next Tuesday.

“We’ll be able to go through some preliminary steps here this week, which could well include the Chief Justice coming over and swearing-in members of the Senate and some other kind of housekeeping measures…which would set us up to begin the actual trial next Tuesday,” said McConnell.

The announcement comes after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) told lawmakers that she will transmit two articles of impeachment — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — to the Senate on Wednesday, clearing the final hurdle for a trial against President Donald Trump to begin.

Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO) said Pelosi also would hold a vote on the House’s trial managers Wednesday. Other Democrats said the speaker did not name the managers at the meeting.

Pelosi said Friday she would send the articles of impeachment to the Senate this week, ending a weeks-long impasse with McConnell.

The Democrat from California has delayed sending the articles to the Senate since the House voted to impeach President Trump on December 18. Pelosi said last week she’d withhold the articles until McConnell unveiled a resolution detailing the guidelines for the Senate impeachment trial, including whether witnesses and new evidence would be allowed.

But McConnell gained enough to support from Republican colleagues to begin the trial without making a commitment on witnesses and on Friday Pelosi hinted the standoff would soon end.

“I have asked judiciary committee Chairman Jerry Nadler to be prepared to bring to the floor next week a resolution to appoint managers and transmit articles of impeachment to the Senate,” she wrote in a letter to House Democrats on Friday.

President Trump has called for the articles to be dismissed, rather than going ahead with a trial, which he’s repeatedly called a “hoax.”

“Why should I have the stigma of Impeachment attached to my name when I did NOTHING wrong? Read the Transcripts! A totally partisan Hoax, never happened before. House Republicans voted 195-0, with three Dems voting with the Republicans. Very unfair to tens of millions of voters!” the president tweeted over the weekend.

The UPI contributed to this report. 

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