Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) addressed the media on Thursday morning, the day after the House of Representatives voted to impeach President Donald Trump for abusing his power and obstructing Congress. While this was happening, President Trump dared Pelosi to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate.
“Pelosi feels her phony impeachment HOAX is so pathetic she is afraid to present it to the Senate, which can set a date and put this whole SCAM into default if they refuse to show up! The Do Nothings are so bad for our Country!” he said.
The “What are you afraid of?” and “See, they know they have no case” type of argument will likely function as a template for Republican lawmakers on how to respond to questions about Democrats potentially delaying the process of sending articles of impeachment to the Senate for a trial.
Pelosi said it “would have been our intention” to send the articles over, “but we’ll see what happens over there.”
Democratic lawmakers want guarantees that key witnesses like acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and former Trump National Security Adviser John Bolton will be called to testify at a Senate trial. They also want assurances, in the wake of comments by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), that the trial will be a fair one.
Impeachment managers also need to be selected, and Pelosi said, “We cannot name managers until we see what the process is on the Senate side, and we hope that will be soon.”
“So far we haven’t seen anything that looks fair to us, so hopefully it will be fair,” she said.
The vote in the House on the abuse of power charge was 230-197, with one voting present. The vote for the obstruction of Congress charge was 229-198, with one voting present.
No Republican representative voted to impeach the president.
[Image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images]
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