House Democrats began debating articles to impeach President Trump in the Judiciary Committee on Wednesday in an accelerated schedule that party lawmakers plan to conclude by next week.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler opened the hearing by outlining the two charges against the president, which are based on allegations that Trump withheld security aid to Ukraine to win the country’s help investigating former Vice President Joe Biden and the Democrats.
“The first article charges that the president used the powers of his public office to demand that a foreign government attack his political rivals,” Nadler said. “The second article charges that the president obstructed the congressional investigation into his conduct. Other presidents have resisted congressional oversight, but President Trump’s stonewall was complete, absolute, and without precedent in American history.”
Nadler said the two allegations show Trump undermined U.S. elections, put his own political interests above national security, and sought to dodge public accountability by blocking Congress from records and the testimony of a dozen former and current administration officials.
The top Republican on the committee, Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, called the impeachment effort “a sham” and the culmination of a three-year quest by Democrats to eject Trump because they oppose him politically.
“This is as much about political expediency as it is about anything else,” Collins said.
The Judiciary Committee proceeding will stretch over two days and conclude with the likely approval of the two articles along a party line vote.
The articles then move to the House floor for consideration, which will likely happen next week.
Democrats are largely expected to pass the impeachment articles on the House floor, leaving Trump poised to become the third president to be impeached by the House. The last was President Bill Clinton, who was impeached 21 years ago.
Republicans, who are outnumbered on the Judiciary Committee, argued the case Democrats put forward against Trump is too thin to be valid. Democrats dropped the bribery and extortion charges they had been making against Trump, for example.
“This bar is so low that a future president can be impeached for any disagreement when the presidency and the House of Representatives are controlled by different parties,” said Republican Wisconsin Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner.
