Schumer Announces Plan for Trump Impeachment Article
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced that the Senate will receive the House’s article of impeachment against former President Donald Trump on Monday, triggering the start of the impeachment trial.
“I have spoken to Speaker Pelosi who informed me that the articles will be delivered to the Senate on Monday,” Schumer said Friday, according to CNN.
If the article is delivered on Monday, the Senate trial would begin at 1 p.m. EST on Tuesday, unless Senators agree to push the trial back.
Senators and the presiding officer would be sworn in at that time and the arguments would begin on Wednesday.
It is unclear at this time if Chief Justice John Roberts will preside over the trial.
Sources that CNN did not name said the trial is expected to be shorter than the 2020 impeachment trial, which lasted three weeks.
Whether the Senate can hold an impeachment trial for a former president is still up for debate.
Sen. Tom Cotton argued last week that the Senate “lacks constitutional authority” to hold the trial because the impeachment process was not created for the Senate to go after private citizens.
“The House has passed an article of impeachment against the president, but the Senate under its rules and precedents cannot start and conclude a fair trial before the president leaves office next week,” the Arkansas Republican said.
“Under these circumstances, the Senate lacks constitutional authority to conduct impeachment proceedings against a former president.”
“The Founders designed the impeachment process as a way to remove officeholders from public office — not an inquest against private citizens,” he added. “The Constitution presupposes an office from which an impeached officeholder can be removed.”
Schumer pushed back on the argument and said that legal scholars have not set a precedent for it.
“The Senate will conduct a trial of the impeachment of Donald Trump,” Schumer said.
“It will be a full trial. It will be a fair trial. But make no mistake, there will be a trial, and when that trial ends, senators will have to decide if they believe Donald John Trump incited the insurrection against the United States.”
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has proposed delaying the trial until February in order to give Trump’s legal team a “full and fair process” and time to prepare his defense.
“Senate Republicans are strongly united behind the principle that the institution of the Senate, the office of the presidency, and former President Trump himself all deserve a full and fair process that respects his rights and the serious factual, legal, and constitutional questions at stake,” McConnell said.
“Given the unprecedented speed of the House’s process, our proposed timeline for the initial phases includes a modest and reasonable amount of additional time for both sides to assemble their arguments before the Senate would begin to hear them.”
Pushing the timeline forward would mean delaying the confirmation of Biden’s Cabinet nominees as well as other important American business.
“We won’t be doing any confirmations, we won’t be doing any COVID-19 relief, we won’t be doing anything else other than impeaching a person who’s not even president,” Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said.
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