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The Democratic-led House Rules Committee on Tuesday began a marathon session to prepare the ground rules for what is almost certain to be a furious showdown vote on the House floor to adopt articles of impeachment against President Trump.
The panel’s meeting will give an initial picture of what the House debate on Wednesday will look like, and what the timetable could be. Rep. Norma Torres, D-Calif., told Fox News that “we’re settling in for a long meeting” on impeachment.
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The committee writes the procedures and other guidelines for debate, including how much time is given to issues and what amendments will be in order. Yet, despite the often dry material that is up for debate, the panel’s meeting could also be a feisty one as partisan lines have been firmly drawn in the impeachment fight.
At the core is Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Democrats allege that Trump’s push for investigations into the 2016 election and former Vice President Joe Biden’s conduct in the country was part of an attempted quid pro quo in exchange for a White House meeting and the unlocking of military aid.
“The president withheld congressionally approved military aid to a country under siege to extract a personal political favor. He did not do this as a matter of U.S. policy, he did this for his own benefit. That is wrong and if that is not impeachable conduct, then I don’t know what is,” Chairman Jim McGovern, D-Mass., said Tuesday.
Trump has denied the quid-pro-quo allegations and claimed that Democrats are engaging in a “witch hunt” against him. Republicans in the House have made similar claims, accusing House Democrats of running a “kangaroo court” as they dominate proceedings and push the House toward impeachment.
“This is not the result of a fair process and certainly not a bipartisan one. Sadly the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry has been flawed and partisan from day one so I guess it should come as no surprise that Democrats’ preordained outcome is also flawed and partisan,” Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., said at Tuesday’s session.
The House Judiciary Committee last week voted to send two articles of impeachment to the House floor, alleging obstruction of Congress and abuse of power. Articles related to other Democratic allegations, such as bribery, were notably absent. In the vote itself, it is likely to go down mostly along partisan lines. There are no signs that any Republican will vote for impeachment, although it is possible that several moderate Democrats in pro-Trump districts could oppose the historic step.
“The House Rules Committee is about to meet on impeachment. But why bother? Two-thirds of the Democrats on the committee voted to impeach the President BEFORE the Ukraine call even happened,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, D-Calif., tweeted. “For Dems, this is about pure politics. Not facts.”
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The House is composed of 431 members, meaning Democrats would need 216 yeas to impeach Trump. There currently are 233 Democrats, so they could lose only 17 of their own and still impeach the president — or 18 if the lone independent backs impeachment. The articles still appear to have enough votes to pass, which would send them to the Senate for a trial. There, where Republicans dominate, Trump is almost certain to be acquitted.
Having the Rules Committee take the lead is a different approach from the Clinton impeachment in 1998 and 1999, where the articles came up on the House floor via a procedure known as “privilege.” The House secured a unanimous consent agreement to continue the articles over a two-day period.
But while the debate could be feisty and angry in the Rules Committee, the Democrats have the upper-hand in terms of power. The Rules Committee is sometimes called “The Speaker’s Committee” because the speaker runs it, even though they are not a member of the committee.
The committee will present a rule for the floor debate, which will then be debated by the House first thing Wednesday morning. Once adopted, then the debate on the articles themselves will begin.
Fox News’ Gregg Re contributed to this report.
