Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday that the House would finally forward the two articles of impeachment passed Dec. 18 against President Trump to the Senate next week.
“I have asked Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler to be prepared to bring to the Floor next week a resolution to appoint managers and transmit articles of impeachment to the Senate,” Pelosi wrote to her House colleagues.
She added that she’ll consult with the caucus Tuesday on “how we proceed further.”
The decision came after the speaker withheld the articles for weeks saying she would not turn them over until Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell outlined ground rules of an impeachment trial.
Transmittal of the documents and naming of House impeachment managers are the next steps needed to start the Senate trial.
Yet questions remain in the Senate on the scope and duration of the trial.
McConnell wants to launch a speedy trial without new witnesses but Democrats point to new evidence that has emerged as they press for fresh testimony.
Trump mocked Pelosi with his tweets Friday and derided her and other Democrats late Thursday in Toledo, his first rally of 2020.
McConnell, indeed, had told Republicans during a private lunch Thursday to expect the impeachment trial to begin next week.
Three GOP senators said the Kentucky Republican warned lawmakers during the lunch that they should not expect to be able to go home next weekend, indicating that the long-delayed trial will be underway.
Pelosi, despite rising pressure from Senate Democrats and even cracks within the House, had dug in her heels Thursday, telling reporters she still wanted to know the rules of the Senate’s impeachment trial and would forward articles of impeachment passed by the House “when I’m ready.”
“I’m not holding them indefinitely. I’ll send them over when I’m ready and that will probably be soon. I think we should move smartly and strategically,” she told reporters at her weekly press briefing.
The California Democrat insisted her caucus wasn’t trying to dictate the rules, as McConnell has accused her of doing.
“We don’t have to like the rules. We just want to know what they are. We need to see the arena in which we are sending our managers. Is that too much to ask?” she said.
Critics from both sides of the aisle had stressed how the House had treated impeachment as an emergency when they voted to charge Trump with abuse of power and obstruction of justice — but that Pelosi then sat on the articles for weeks.
But the House speaker defended her approach in the letter Friday, stressing important new information on the Ukraine controversy at the heart of impeachment that came to light after the vote.
“I am very proud of the courage and patriotism exhibited by our House Democratic Caucus as we support and defend the Constitution,” she wrote.
She continued to press the Senate, as she has for weeks, to conduct a “fair trial” with witnesses and documents.
“In an impeachment trial, every Senator takes an oath to ‘do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws.’ Every Senator now faces a choice: to be loyal to the President or to the Constitution,” she wrote. “No one is above the law, not even the President.”
Trump has repeatedly affirmed that he did nothing wrong and the impeachment as a partisan “hoax” intent on undoing his 2016 election win.
Leading senators such as Majority Leader McConnell and Lindsey Graham have shared that sentiment.
Pelosi and her allies wanted to ensure that the Senate heard from key witnesses who were current or former administration officials, including John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser.
But McConnell, who had said he was working with the White House in coordinating the trial, insisted that it begin before any decision was made on witnesses.
The Republican-led Senate is expected to acquit the president.
Democratic senators, meanwhile, urged Pelosi to quit stalling.
“I think it’s time to turn the articles over,” Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said Wednesday on Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom.” “Let’s see where the Senate can take it.”
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., also called out Pelosi for the delay.
“The longer it goes on, the less urgent it becomes,” Feinstein told Politico. “So if it’s serious and urgent, send them over. If it isn’t, don’t send it over.”