The Briefing Room

General Category => Politics/Government => Topic started by: 240B on December 20, 2019, 03:06:49 am

Title: Harvard Law professor says president isn't impeached yet because Nancy Pelosi won't send articles to
Post by: 240B on December 20, 2019, 03:06:49 am

DailyMail
By GEOFF EARLE and EMILY GOODIN
PUBLISHED: 19 December 2019

Donald Trump demands 'immediate' impeachment trial as Mitch McConnell declares 'impasse' with Chuck Schumer—and Harvard Law professor says president isn't impeached yet because Nancy Pelosi won't send articles to the Senate

• Nancy Pelosi forced the Trump impeachment across the finish line Wednesday
• Now the process moves to a U.S. Senate trial but Pelosi said she's in no hurry
• She blasted Senate leader Mitch McConnell for saying he's not an 'impartial' juror, and declared she won't hand him the baton without a pledge of 'fairness'
• Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is pushing for witness subpoenas that Republicans don't want to agree to
• Impeachment trial can't start until Pelosi and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy choose 'managers' to carry the House's case to the Senate
• McConnell slammed Pelosi in a floor speech and warned the Senate's more patient pace will have a 'calming' influence after 'slapdash' impeachment
• President Donald Trump warned that '[t]he Do Nothing Party want to Do Nothing with the Articles & not deliver them to the Senate, but it's Senate's call!'

(more)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7812103/Mitch-McConnell-declares-Donald-Trumps-impeachment-trial-IMPASSE.html

Title: Re: Harvard Law professor says president isn't impeached yet because Nancy Pelosi won't send article
Post by: 240B on December 20, 2019, 04:02:06 am

If Pelosi sits on the article forever, which she has strongly indicated she will, then the impeachment process is incomplete and is never certified. The House does not supercede the Senate or the Constitution. Pelosi cannot simply make up her own Law as she thinks it should be. If the impeachment is never completed and certified, it becomes more of a "censure" motion instead of a formal impeachment. That is, according to the House Trump was found meeting the standard of impeachment, but was never actually impeached. That is censure.

On the other hand, McConnell could hold a trial without the documents and simply dismiss the whole issue outright. He could hold a trial and then declare a mistrial. This would mean that Trump is exonerated.

I do not see a way that Pelosi can win this war with the Senate. McConnell is never going to give her control of a Senate trial that she is trying to extort. If she continues to flout the rules of proper procedure, McConnell can simply call 'foul' and dismiss the whole thing.

Title: Re: Harvard Law professor says president isn't impeached yet because Nancy Pelosi won't send article
Post by: 240B on December 20, 2019, 05:22:08 am

OK, the latest that I am hearing.
If Pelosi feels that she can ignore the rules, that the rules do not matter, apparently McConnell has obtained his own copies of the Articles.
He no longer needs Pelosi to do anything. If Pelosi feels that the written and time honored guidance of impeachment procedures are up to personal interpretation, then the Republican interpretation is they already have copies of the articles.

They are going to use those and go ahead with the trial with Pelosi out of the loop.