Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell does not support a House resolution aimed at providing a “path forward” on impeachment proceedings.
The Kentucky Republican said the outline of the plan released Tuesday by the House Rules Committee and scheduled for a vote Thursday does nothing to provide rights or equitable treatment for the House GOP minority or President Trump, whom Democrats are seeking to impeach.
“The resolution merely seems to contemplate that, maybe, someday in the future, at some other phase of this, due process might finally kick in,” McConnell said on the Senate floor Wednesday, referring to the text of the resolution that provides the Majority Democrats with authority over the impeachment process. “But only if the House Judiciary Committee feels like holding hearings and calling its own witnesses. In other words, no due process now, maybe some later, but only if we feel like it.”
House Democrats will vote on a resolution tomorrow that sets out a path for concluding the closed-door depositions in hearings the House Intelligence Committee is leading.
The Senate GOP’s view of the process is key because if the House approves articles of impeachment, the Republican-led Senate must vote on whether to convict the president.
[Related: Republicans blast impeachment resolution as 'Soviet-style' process]
So far, Republicans have rejected the idea of removing Trump from office, in part because they view the House impeachment proceedings as unfair.
The House resolution seeks to counter the GOP’s claim.
It authorizes both the Intelligence and Judiciary committees to hold public hearings and allows the GOP to call witnesses and issue subpoenas if they are first approved by the Democratic panel leaders.
House Democrats say the process is similar to a bipartisan path lawmakers agreed on during impeachment hearings regarding President Bill Clinton and it provides due process to Trump, who they accuse of obstructing Congress and abusing his office for political gain.
“Unfortunately, the draft resolution that has been released does nothing of the sort,” McConnell said. “It falls way short.”
The House resolution allows the Judiciary Committee to “conduct proceedings” relating to impeachment that would include “such procedures as to allow for the participation of the President and his counsel.”
But McConnell said the House process cuts out Trump’s White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, “in an unprecedented way” because the closed-door proceedings have thus far excluded him.
In the new resolution, Democrats have authorized the House Intelligence Committee, rather than the Judiciary Committee, with the task of holding public impeachment hearings and there does not appear to be any opportunity for Cipollone to participate in those proceedings, either.
Instead, Cipollone’s appearance is limited to the Judiciary Committee, which will be tasked with marking up impeachment articles and is also authorized to hold a hearing as well.
“It does not confer on President Trump the most basic rights of due process or, seemingly, alter Chairman Schiff’s unfair process in the House Intelligence Committee in any way whatsoever,” McConnell said. “Chairman Schiff can continue doing this behind closed doors without the president’s participation so long as he holds at least one public hearing at some point.”
McConnell pointed out that the House process does not require Schiff to release the transcripts of the closed-door proceedings to accompany a report he’ll file to the Judiciary Committee.
“He alone gets to decide what evidence goes into his report,” McConnell said.
