Mark Meadows expressed confidence that the Senate will reach a “bipartisan agreement” to put a swift end to former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial.
The former White House chief of staff exuded confidence that the result will be an acquittal as he predicted the upper chamber to come to an agreement on witnesses in the next 48 hours so that lawmakers can turn their focus to pressing issues affecting people across the country, such as passing new COVID-19 relief legislation.
“I’m optimistic that we will find a bipartisan agreement that says, let’s get this thing over with very quickly,” Meadows said on Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures. “Let’s move on to things that the American people are concerned about and hopefully will bring unity, whether it’s help through a stimulus or actually putting people back to work on Main Street, and focus on the real thing that matters to most Americans.”
Meadows, who recently joined the Conservative Partnership Institute, also took aim at the House, controlled by the Democrats, for moving so quickly on the vote to impeach without calling witnesses. Ten Republicans, including third-ranking GOP Rep. Liz Cheney, joined the Democrats in voting to impeach Trump. Trump’s trial is expected to start on Tuesday after the 45th president was impeached on a charge of incitement of insurrection in connection to the U.S. Capitol riot one month ago.
“Generally speaking, that is something that should have already happened in the House,” Meadows said. “They should have called witnesses. They should have gathered evidence. But they were so — so impressed to try to get this done, so that they could score a political point, that they actually bypassed all of that in the House.”
Meadows, himself a former Republican congressman from North Carolina, took the side of Trump’s legal defense team, who argue that the proceeding is unconstitutional because their client is no longer in office.
“This is all about a political theater. It’s really about Democrats trying to once again make a political point,” he said. “Listen, this whole impeachment is designed to remove someone from office. President Trump is a private citizen at this point. And yet what they — they can’t stand it. They have to continue to go ahead and try to put forth some kind of narrative that scores political points.”
He also referred to Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul’s failed motion to halt the impeachment trial, but with 45 GOP senators on board, signaled that Trump will emerge victorious.
“The American people are not going to have it. We have already had 45 senators say that this is unconstitutional. But it’s more than that. It’s a violation of due process. It’s not what our founding fathers set up. And it sets a very bad precedent for future — of future officeholders,” Meadows said.
