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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Wednesday held a special closed-door meeting with her caucus on impeachment, according to reports.
“Are you ready?” the California Democrat asked her caucus, reported Politico, the Washington Post, and CNN. She asked the question before outlining the constitutional circumstances posed by President Donald Trump’s alleged misdeeds in office.
A senior Democratic official told Politico that Democrats “overwhelmingly” showed support for advancing the impeachment inquiry “one step at a time.”
“There is this somber almost resignation that yeah, this is something we’re compelled to do, and we have to do,” Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.) told the outlet. “We don’t really have a choice here,” he added. “We look at the facts, we read the Constitution and then we have to decide whether or not we’re going to do our job.”
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told the website that “if the Judiciary Committee comes forward with recommendations, I think there’s time do it” by the end of 2019.
“The direction we got from Chairman Schiff was, we’re not going to wait endlessly for John Bolton to decide that the country is more important than his book deal,” said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) to the Post.
According to The Hill, the meeting on Wednesday was largely designed to allow Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) to summarize his 300-page report. The findings were sent to the Judiciary Committee.
Pelosi, in the meeting, told Democrats to try and stick to the carefully crafted message that has been put forth by Schiff, Politico reported.
The Judiciary Committee is expected to hold at least three hearings on impeachment, including a session where lawmakers might vote on articles of impeachment.
At the first hearing, the three legal experts called by Democrats backed impeachment. Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law School professor, said he considered it clear that the president’s conduct met the definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Pamela Karlan, a Stanford Law School professor and former Obama administration Justice Department official, said the president’s action constituted an especially serious abuse of power “because it undermines democracy itself.”
Republican witness Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, said that the Democrats were bringing a “slipshod impeachment” case against the president. He doesn’t back impeachment.
During the Judiciary Committee hearing, Democrats shot down two motions to call up the whistleblower at the center of the impeachment inquiry as well as House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).
Last month, Trump said he wants a trial in the Senate and the chance to call up witnesses.
“I want a trial,” Trump told “Fox & Friends” in a morning interview on Nov. 22. “There’s nothing there.” He added, “We wanna call the whistleblower. But you know who I want as the first witness, because frankly, I want a trial.”
Trump said that there “should never be an impeachment, that phone call was totally appropriate.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
This article is from the Internet:‘Are You Ready?’: Nancy Pelosi Suggests to Democrats That Impeachment Is Coming