Pelosi Caves: House to Send Articles of Impeachment to Senate Next Week

Ending delay, speaker to prepare resolution that would initiate President Trump’s trial

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) said the House would move forward next week on sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate, ending a tense standoff and setting the stage for the trial of President Trump, the third of its kind in the nation’s history.

Mrs. Pelosi had withheld the articles for several weeks as Democrats sought assurances that the Senate trial would include new documents and testimony from witnesses blocked previously by the White House.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) made no such guarantees and said he would set his own rules. On Thursday he signed onto a resolution to dismiss the articles against Mr. Trump unless they were sent over soon, a move that Mrs. Pelosi said prompted her to act.

“A dismissal is a cover-up and deprives the American people of the truth,” Mrs. Pelosi wrote in a letter to colleagues Friday. “Leader McConnell’s tactics are a clear indication of the fear that he and President Trump have regarding the facts of the President’s violations for which he was impeached.”

Asked about Mrs. Pelosi’s announcement, Mr. McConnell said, “About time.”

The Senate leader has ramped up his criticism of the delay in recent days, saying Thursday that Democrats “have initiated one of the most grave and most unsettling processes in our Constitution and then refused to allow a resolution.”

To send the articles to the Senate, the House must vote on a resolution that names impeachment managers and delivers documents to the chamber. The vote would transmit the articles and automatically trigger a Senate trial. The exact timing of the vote is unclear. Mrs. Pelosi said she had asked House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D., N.Y.) to prepare that resolution for a vote next week and said she would consult with House Democrats on Tuesday.

The Democratic-led House approved two impeachment articles in late December. The first alleges that Mr. Trump’s efforts to press Ukraine to launch investigations that could benefit him politically in the 2020 election constituted abuse of power. The second article alleges that White House efforts to block key witness testimony amounts to obstruction of Congress. Mr. Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and he has urged the House to send over the articles so the Senate could begin its trial.

Mr. McConnell, who has been coordinating with the White House on the impeachment strategy, has said he has enough Republican support to move forward on the proceedings without bipartisan agreement on the trial’s structure. Under his plan, senators would wait to determine whether to include witnesses until after the trial begins.

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Pelosi folds, will transmit articles of impeachment to Senate next week

Nancy Pelosi will send articles of impeachment to Senate next week

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