Impeachment Trial Set To Begin with Dems Urging Senate To 'Eliminate the Threat' of Trump
House Democrats claim in the opening statement they have filed for President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial that the Senate must “eliminate the threat that the President poses to America’s national security.”
The statement claims that Trump tried to manipulate Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 presidential election.
“President Trump’s solicitation of foreign interference in our elections to secure his own political success is precisely why the Framers of our Constitution provided Congress with the power to impeach a corrupt President and remove him from office,” the House impeachment trial managers wrote.
“The Framers therefore would have considered a President’s attempt to corrupt America’s democratic processes by demanding political favors from foreign powers to be a singularly pernicious act,” the House Democrats wrote in justifying their allegation that Trump abused his power as president.
The statement also claims that because Trump refused to collaborate with House Democrats in the many sundry investigations against him, “President Trump’s conduct is the Framers’ worst nightmare. “
The report also focuses on the report of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who was hired to investigate whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia and ultimately ruled that it did not.
“Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation — like the House’s impeachment inquiry — sought to uncover whether President Trump coordinated with a foreign government in order to obtain an improper advantage during a Presidential election.
“And the Mueller investigation — like the House’s impeachment inquiry — exposed President Trump’s eagerness to benefit from foreign election interference,” the document said.
“History will judge each Senator’s willingness to rise above partisan differences, view the facts honestly, and defend the Constitution,” the managers added, directly addressing senators who will be jurors in the trial.
“The outcome of these proceedings will determine whether generations to come will enjoy a safe and secure democracy in which the President is not a king, and in which no one, particularly the President, is above the law.”
Trump’s legal team filed an answer to the Senate summons over the weekend.
“The Articles of Impeachment submitted by House Democrats are a dangerous attack on the right of the American people to freely choose their president. This is a brazen and unlawful attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election and interfere with the results of the 2020 election — now just months away,” Trump’s filing said.
“The highly partisan and reckless obsession with impeaching the President began the day he was inaugurated and continues to this day.”
Trump’s filing said the articles are “Constitutionally invalid” and “an affront to the Constitution of the United States, our democratic institutions and the American people.”
The filing said Trump denies the allegations against him, and calls upon the Senate to reject the articles.
“In order to preserve our constitutional structure of government, to reject the poisonous partisanship that the Framers warned against, to ensure one-party political impeachment vendettas do not become the ‘new normal,’ and to vindicate the will of the American people, the Senate must reject both Articles of Impeachment,” the filing said.
“In the end, this entire process is nothing more than a dangerous attack on the American people themselves and their fundamental right to vote,” the filing said.
Trump has also taken his opposition to the articles to Twitter.
I JUST GOT IMPEACHED FOR MAKING A PERFECT PHONE CALL!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 16, 2020
Words of wisdom. Thank you Ted! https://t.co/LRyAHS9VEL
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 17, 2020
The Senate impeachment trial will begin Tuesday.
It is expected that a vote will be taken in the Senate over whether the trial will include new witnesses whose testimonies were not heard by House Democrats.
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