WASHINGTON – Senate leaders struck a deal on Friday to delay ex-president Donald J. Trump’s impeachment trial for two weeks, giving President Biden time to set up his cabinet and start moving a legislative agenda before starting. a historical process for judging its predecessor.
The plan ensures that the trial, which promises to unearth the horrific events of Trump’s last days in office and resurgence deep divisions over his conduct, will weigh heavily in Biden’s early days at the White House. But it will also allow the president to put crucial team members in place and move forward on a coronavirus aid package that he said was his top priority.
Democrats began to fear that these measures would be subsumed by the rush to try Trump.
“We all want to leave this terrible chapter of our country’s history behind,” said Senator Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat and majority leader. “But healing and unity will only come if there is truth and responsibility. And that is what this test will provide. “
Mr. Trump, the first president to be impeached twice and the only one to face trial after leaving office, is accused of “inciting insurrection”. The House approved the prosecution with bipartisan support last week after Trump incited a crowd of his supporters who stormed the Capitol in a violent riot on January 6.
Spokeswoman Nancy Pelosi announced on Friday that House impeachment administrators would take the prosecution through the Capitol to the Senate at 7 pm Monday, and Schumer said the senators would be sworn in the next day. But under his agreement with Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, the chamber will pause until the week of February 8 to give prosecutors and defense time to write and exchange written legal documents.
“During this period, the Senate will continue to do other business for the American people, such as cabinet nominations and the Covid relief bill, which would provide relief for millions of Americans who are suffering during this pandemic,” said Schumer.
The deal does not specify how the trial will take place when oral allegations begin on February 9, but both sides have indicated that they intend to compact it in a handful of days, allowing senators to reach a verdict by the end of that week.
The delay represented a compromise between the two Senate party leaders, who have been struggling in the days since Biden’s inauguration to agree on how the equally divided chamber should work. Still, the broader disagreement persisted on Friday, hampered by a dispute over obstruction, which allows a minority to block legislation.
For McConnell, who has signaled that he is open to condemning Trump and has indicated in particular that he believes the former president has committed impeachable crimes, the deal to delay the trial has political advantages. This allowed him to argue that the process was fair, giving the former president enough time to present his case, and he bought more time for him and other Republicans to evaluate how they would vote.
“Senate Republicans strongly believe that we need a complete and fair process where the former president can mount a defense and the Senate can properly consider the factual, legal and constitutional issues at stake,” said McConnell.
Democrats were weighing up conflicting interests, including Biden’s agenda, a desire to dispatch his predecessor’s trial quickly and force Republican senators to officially declare Trump’s actions while the memories of the riot were still fresh.
They agreed to the postponement after Biden said on Friday that he was in favor, as a way of keeping the Senate focused on confirming members of his government and getting to work on the next round of federal coronavirus aid. He tried to avoid the content of the trial.
“The more time we have to prepare and run to face these crises, the better,” said Biden at the White House.
The Biden Administration
As part of the deal, Schumer announced that the Senate would vote to confirm the nominee for Biden Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, just before the impeachment article arrived Monday night.
It is almost unthinkable that the Senate could adopt the $ 1.9 trillion Biden coronavirus relief plan – a complex law that is likely to face substantial Republican opposition – before the trial begins. But Democrats hoped to overcome several procedural hurdles needed to do so.
McConnell had initially proposed to postpone the impeachment trial for another week, until February 15. She cited the need for Trump’s newly hired legal team on Thursday to prepare to present a full defense. Doug Andres, a spokesman for McConnell, called the deal “a victory for due process and justice”.
Mr. Trump, now based in his private club in Palm Beach, Florida, struggled to form a legal team willing to defend him, finally settling in Butch Bowers, South Carolina.
While Trump was defended at his first trial by the White House council, private lawyers and leading constitutional experts, Mr. Bowers appears to be handling the task more or less on his own for the time being and must quickly become familiar with the case. He has little outstanding experience in Washington, but he defended several Republican governors in his home state, including Mark Sanford, when he faced a possible impeachment in 2009.
Preparing for a potentially quick trial, House administrators said their case would be relatively simple, especially compared to Trump’s first impeachment trial. This process sparked a long and complex campaign of presidential pressure on Ukraine, which took place largely out of public view.
“Much of what led to this incitement to violence was done in the public eye – both in the president’s demeanor, in words and in tweets – and was broadcast in real time to the American people on television,” Rhode’s David Cicilline Island, one of the managers, said in an interview.
Mr. McConnell was reprising a role he played in Trump’s first trial, representing the interests of the defense. But this time, he made it clear that he is not planning an acquittal.
The Republican leader said this week that the former president “provoked” the crowd that invaded the Capitol. And although McConnell has yet to say how he would vote in the impeachment trial, he has privately indicated that he sees the process as a potential means of ridding the Republican Party of its former flagship.
Still, with many in his party already lining up against the conviction and the right wing of the party shouting for his resignation, McConnell was proceeding with caution.
It would take 17 Republicans to join all 50 Democrats to condemn Trump. If they did, they could then proceed to disqualify him from any future office by a simple majority of votes.
Several Republicans were already pointing to the speed of the process to argue for Trump’s dismissal, saying the House’s action for impeachment – which took place exactly a week after the January 6 riot – was too hasty.
“It is a serious matter, but it is not a serious effort to meet the requirements of due process of the Constitution when it comes to impeachment,” said Sen. John Cornyn, a Republican from Texas.
Senate Democrats were just as eager as McConnell to ensure that the trial was considered fair, especially among Republicans who they believe could agree to condemn Trump. They listened carefully when Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, one of the former president’s most virulent criticisms who praised the House’s impeachment, said she found McConnell’s suggestion of postponement “eminently reasonable.”
Other Republicans argued that it was unconstitutional for the Senate to try a former president because the constitution only explicitly provided for the impeachment of current officials. Many jurists disagree with this position, as does the Senate itself when, in the 1870s, it found that it had the authority to try a former war secretary.
Mr Schumer, anticipating his objection, said the argument was “totally repudiated, debunked by left, right and center constitutional academics, and defies basic common sense”.