- The House introduced an article of impeachment and plans to vote on it this week.
- Democrats charge Trump with inciting an insurrection after a mob spurred by the president attacked the Capitol last week.
- The House plans to pass a resolution calling on Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.
- The House could choose to delay sending the article of impeachment to the Senate, as it likely would not be able to hold a vote on convicting Trump until after he leaves office next week.
The House moved closer Monday to impeaching President Donald Trump an unprecedented second time, this time for inciting his supporters who invaded the U.S. Capitol during Congress' electoral vote count last week.
Democrats introduced an article of impeachment Monday that charges Trump with high crimes and misdemeanors for whipping up an insurrection and disrupting the peaceful transfer of power. The chamber will take two separate steps to try to spur Trump's removal, according to the office of House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md.
- First, the House plans to pass a resolution Tuesday night calling on Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office. Pence has showed reluctance to take the step.
- Then, the House will meet on Wednesday morning to consider impeachment.
Reps. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., David Cicilline, D-R.I., and Ted Lieu, D-Calif., led the drafting of impeachment article, though it is unclear whether the House will ultimately consider that measure or a separate one. In a tweet, Cicilline said the article has at least 213 co-sponsors. He added, "we now have the votes to impeach."
The full House would need a 218-vote majority to impeach Trump. The number could end up lower due to vacancies and absences. Democrats hold 222 seats.
Although the effort came with only eight days left for the Trump administration, impeaching him could bar him from public office in the future.
During a brief pro forma House session Monday, Hoyer tried to unanimously pass Raskin's 25th Amendment resolution that the full House will vote on Tuesday. Rep. Alex Mooney, R-W.Va., objected.
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said the 25th Amendment would be the most effective way to remove Trump. In a statement Monday, she said the House wants Pence to respond "within 24 hours after passage" of the resolution.
"As our next step, we will move forward with bringing impeachment legislation to the Floor. The President's threat to America is urgent, and so too will be our action," she said.
The House will likely vote to impeach Trump only a few days before President-elect Joe Biden will take office one week from Wednesday. Democrats say taking no action against Trump before then raises the threat of more violence and lets the president off unscathed for spurring a mob that stormed the Capitol, resulting in the deaths of a police officer and four other people, and threatening the lives of Pence and lawmakers. A second police officer who had been at the Capitol died off-duty this weekend, and the cause of death has not been disclosed.
Trump exhorted his supporters outside the White House to march on the Capitol shortly before the Capitol siege and repeated lies that widespread fraud cost him the November election. On the day of the vote tally, he falsely claimed Pence had the power to stop the vote count himself and send the process back to states.
The impeachment article drafted by Raskin, Cicilline and Lieu, titled "Incitement of Insurrection," charges that Trump "engaged in high Crimes and Misdemeanors by inciting violence against the Government of the United States." It cites his repeated false claims that widespread fraud led to Biden's win, and his comments to his supporters Wednesday, including an assertion that "if you don't fight like hell you're not going to have a country anymore."
The article also points to Trump's pressure on Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to "find" enough votes to overturn Biden's win in the state.
The Senate likely will not have time to convict Trump and remove him before the president leaves office. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a memo that the chamber would not receive impeachment articles earlier than Jan. 19 — the day before Biden's inauguration, according to NBC News. The Senate must promptly start a trial once it receives articles of impeachment from the House.
House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., told CNN on Sunday that the House may delay sending articles to the Senate until after Biden's first 100 days in office. He worries the Senate spending time on a trial in the early days of the administration would hamper Biden's early agenda, which would include confirmation of Cabinet members and coronavirus relief legislation.
The White House and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., have argued impeachment would divide the country. McCarthy, who objected to counting Biden's valid and certified electoral wins in Arizona and Pennsylvania even after the mob stormed the Capitol, said he reached out to Biden about uniting the country.
In a letter to GOP colleagues Monday, McCarthy floated the idea the House voting to censure Trump.
Supporters of impeachment have said moving on without holding Trump accountable for the attack on the democratic process will make further insurrection more likely.
By the time the Senate votes on impeachment, the chamber could be split 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans. While the chamber could not remove Trump from office at that point, it could prevent him from becoming president again if he tried to run in 2024.
If all Democrats vote to convict Trump, 17 Republicans would have to join them to meet the needed two-thirds threshold. It is unclear now if Democrats can muster that much GOP support.
Two Senate Republicans, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, have called on Trump to resign. Another, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, said he would "consider" any impeachment articles the House sent to the Senate.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, was the only GOP senator to vote to remove Trump from office last year.
