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Ahead of Impeachment Trial, Trump Suggests Not Having It

Associated Press

   WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump says the Senate should simply
   dismiss the impeachment case against him, an extraordinary suggestion
   as the House prepares to transmit the charges to the chamber for the
   historic trial.

   The Republican president is giving mixed messages ahead of the House's
   landmark vote that will launch the Senate proceedings in a matter of
   days, only the third presidential impeachment trial in American
   history. Trump faces charges that he abused power by pushing Ukraine to
   investigate Democratic rival Joe Biden and then obstructed Congress.
   First Trump was suggesting his own ideas for trial witnesses, then he
   said almost the opposite Sunday by tweeting that the trial shouldn't
   happen at all.
   "Many believe that by the Senate giving credence to a trial" over
   charges he calls a hoax, Trump tweeted, "rather than an outright
   dismissal, it gives the partisan Democrat Witch Hunt credibility that
   it otherwise does not have. I agree!"
   The idea of dismissing the charges against Trump is as unusual as it is
   unlikely. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell signed on to an
   outlier proposal circulating last week among conservative senators, but
   he does not have enough support in the Republican-held chamber to
   actually do it. It would require a rare rules change similar to the
   approach McConnell used for Supreme Court confirmations.
   Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned Sunday that senators will "pay a price" if
   they block new witness testimony with a trial that Americans perceive
   as a "cover-up" for Trump's actions.
   "It's about a fair trial," Pelosi told ABC's "This Week." "The senators
   who are thinking now about voting for witnesses or not, they will have
   to be accountable."
   She said, "Now the ball is in their court to either do that or pay a
   price."
   Voters are divided over impeachment largely along the nation's deeply
   partisan lines and the trial is becoming a high-stakes undertaking at
   the start of a presidential election year.
   A House vote to transmit the articles to the Senate will bring to a
   close a standoff between Pelosi and McConnell over the rules for the
   trial. The House voted to impeach Trump last month.
   Yet ending one showdown merely starts another across the Capitol as the
   parties try to set the terms of debate over high crimes and
   misdemeanors.
   Democrats want new testimony, particularly from former White House
   national security adviser John Bolton, who has indicated he will defy
   Trump's orders and appear if subpoenaed.
   Trump doesn't want his brash former aide to testify. Republican allies
   led by McConnell, R-Ky., are ready to deliver swift acquittal without
   new testimony.
   Trump first said Sunday it's Pelosi and House Intelligence Committee
   Chairman Adam Schiff who should both testify, which would be unlikely.
   The president said he shouldn't have to carry the "stigma" of
   impeachment because he's done nothing wrong. Pelosi said the House vote
   last month means Trump will be "impeached forever" and "for life."
   McConnell is reluctant to enter a divisive Senate debate over witnesses
   that could split his party and prolong a trial that is already expected
   to consume weeks of floor time.
   He is seeking a speedy acquittal and has proposed a process similar to
   the presidential impeachment trial of Bill Clinton in 1999, which would
   start the proceedings and then vote later on hearing new testimony.
   One leading Republican, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, has
   already predicted that the trial would end "in a matter of days."
   Graham and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo. are leading the effort to dismiss
   the charges against Trump.
   Trump delayed nearly $400 million in aide as Ukraine battled Russia on
   its border while he pushed the country's new president to investigate
   political rival Joe Biden. Trump pays close attention to a conspiracy
   theory pushed by his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani about Biden and his
   son Hunter Biden, who served on the board of a gas company in Ukraine
   while his father was vice president. No evidence of wrongdoing by the
   Bidens has emerged.
   Some GOP senators want to turn the impeachment trial away from the
   Democrats' case and toward the theories being pursued by Giuliani. GOP
   Sen. Rick Scott of Florida said Sunday he wants to hear from the Bidens
   "and find out-- get to the bottom of that."
   At least one Republican up for reelection, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine,
   said last week she was in talks with GOP colleagues on a process that
   would allow them to hear more testimony as Democrats want.
   The Democratic-run House has not yet set the timing for this week's
   vote to transmit the impeachment articles to the Senate. Pelosi will
   meet behind closed doors with House Democrats to decide next steps on
   Tuesday morning ahead of the party's presidential primary debate that
   evening, the last before the Iowa caucuses Feb. 3.
   Once the Republican-led Senate receives the charges, the trial is
   expected to begin swiftly.
   While some Democrats have grumbled about the delay, Pelosi and other
   party leaders defended the strategy, saying it produced new potential
   evidence and turned public attention on the upcoming trial.
   "One of the things that holding on to the articles has succeeded doing
   is fleshing out McConnell and the president's desire to make this a
   cover up," Schiff, D-Calif., said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
   Bolton's remarks, which were recalled by witnesses in the House
   investigation, could cut different ways in testimony. He was said to
   have compared the Ukraine actions to a "drug deal" he wanted no part of
   and warned that Giuliani was a "hand grenade"' about to go off.

   House Democrats, who did not issue a subpoena for Bolton last year, did
   not rule out doing so now. Pelosi also left open the door to filing
   more articles of impeachment against Trump.
   "Let's be optimistic about the future ... a future that will not have
   Donald Trump in the White House, one way or another. Ten months from
   now we will have an election, if we don't have him removed sooner," she
   said.