WASHINGTON -- House Democratic leaders Tuesday formally called for President Donald Trump's removal from office in two articles of impeachment that charged him with abusing his power and obstructing Congress, asserting that he "ignored and injured the interests of the nation."
At the heart of the Democrats' case is the allegation that Trump tried to leverage a White House meeting and military aid sought by Ukraine to combat Russian military aggression to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to launch an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, as well as a probe into the theory that Kyiv conspired with Democrats to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.
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"In all of this, President Trump abused the powers of the presidency by ignoring and injuring national security and other vital national interests to obtain an improper personal political benefit," according to a draft of the first article. "He has also betrayed the nation by abusing his office to enlist a foreign power in corrupting democratic elections."
A second article charges that by ordering across-the-board defiance of House subpoenas for testimony and documents related to the Ukraine matter, Trump engaged in "unprecedented, categorical and indiscriminate defiance" that harmed the House's constitutional rights.
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Trump responded angrily to Democrats' announcement, taking to Twitter to proclaim their charge that he pressured Ukraine "ridiculous."
The articles of impeachment came as no surprise to Rep. Bruce Westerman, a Republican from Hot Springs.
"I'm not shocked at all. All along, I think it's been in their plans. I just wish it would hurry up and run its course," Westerman said. "They haven't changed my mind with their hearings or the two articles of impeachment that they put out today. I'm still going to vote 'no' on it. I don't expect any Republicans to support the articles of impeachment with the knowledge that we have."
Westerman said he won't back either impeachment or a motion to censure Trump.
"I think they've made a mockery of the system the way they've done this. So at this point, I'm not supporting anything that they put out," he said.
Sen. John Boozman predicted "several Democrats" in the House would join with their Republican colleagues in opposing impeachment. Not enough, however, to derail the effort entirely.
"They've got the votes, I believe, to pass it, so it will come over to the Senate and then we will take it up early in January," the Republican from Rogers said.
Based on the facts thus far, Boozman said he doubts any Senate Republican would vote to remove Trump from office.
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"At this point, I think their evidence is pretty shaky," he said.
In a written statement, Rep. French Hill accused Democrats of attempting to "undo the 2016 elections."
"[T]he facts did not demonstrate any offense sufficient to justify removing a duly elected U.S. president from office," the Republican from Little Rock said.
In a written statement, Rep. Steve Womack said the Democrats are "hell-bent on removing" Trump from office.
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"The articles filed today are baseless and unsurprising. They won't go anywhere in the Senate," the Republican from Rogers said.
DEBATE, VOTE
Democrats unveiled the draft articles Tuesday before a meeting of the House Judiciary Committee as soon as today, where the panel will debate and vote on the charges. The panel could vote by Thursday to recommend them to the full House of Representatives for final approval. If the House follows through as expected next week, days before Christmas, Trump could stand trial in the Senate early next year.
Less than a year before the 2020 election, the action sets up a highly partisan constitutional clash between Trump and congressional Democrats.
But Democrats argued that the political calendar made their endeavor even more urgent, given the nature of the charges against the president, which they called part of a pattern of behavior that began when Trump welcomed Russia's help in the 2016 election and would continue into 2020 if they did not act to stop it.
"The argument 'why don't you just wait' amounts to this: 'Why don't you just let him cheat in one more election?'" Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the chairman of the Intelligence Committee who oversaw the House's Ukraine investigation, said at a news conference steps from the Capitol dome to announce the charges. "Why not let him cheat just one more time? Why not let him have foreign help just one more time?"
Democrats left out an article that had been the subject of internal debate among Democrats in recent weeks that would have charged Trump with obstruction of justice based on alleged attempts to thwart Robert Mueller's investigation into the Trump campaign's reported ties to Russian election interference in 2016.
It had been championed by progressives including Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, but moderate lawmakers, many of them freshmen, had long signaled that they would not support impeaching Trump based on Mueller's report.
During a Monday night huddle, 10 moderate Democrats from Trump-carried districts discussed their desire to vote to censure rather than impeach Trump, according to a person familiar with the conversation who requested anonymity to share private conversations. The idea had been batted around by moderates worried about political blowback since the Thanksgiving break.
Other moderate Democrats, eager to show independence from the party, have discussed voting down the article of impeachment pertaining to obstruction of Congress. These Democrats worry that there's not enough evidence to suggest Trump tried to flout the Legislature's authority since ultimately these matters will be decided in the courts.
The White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, accused Democrats of "manufacturing an impeachment inquiry and forcing unfounded accusations down the throats of the American people." Their goal, she said, was to try to use the House's impeachment power to weaken Trump's chances of reelection.
"The announcement of two baseless articles of impeachment does not hurt the president, it hurts the American people, who expect their elected officials to work on their behalf to strengthen our nation," Grisham said in a statement. "The president will address these false charges in the Senate and expects to be fully exonerated, because he did nothing wrong."
Speaking earlier Tuesday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and leaders of six key committees said Trump's actions toward Ukraine, and his efforts to block Congress' attempt to investigate, had left them no choice but to pursue one of the Constitution's gravest remedies.
Nadler said the president "holds the ultimate public trust. When he betrays that trust and puts himself before country, he endangers the Constitution; he endangers our democracy; he endangers our national security."
GOP BLASTS DEMOCRATS
At a Tuesday morning news conference, House Republican leaders slammed their Democratic colleagues.
"They were committed to impeachment regardless of the facts," said Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., He accused Pelosi of "[bowing] down to the most radical elements of her base."
"They're impeaching him because they're afraid he'll get reelected. ... That's the abuse of power," he said.
Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., maintained that "this president did nothing that is impeachable."
Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale insisted Tuesday that Democrats are pushing for impeachment of Trump because they don't have a candidate who can beat him at the ballot box in November.
"For months, Nancy Pelosi said she wouldn't move forward on impeachment because it was too divisive and it needed bipartisan support," Parscale said in a statement released shortly after Pelosi joined other Democrats in announcing the articles of impeachment.
"Well, it is divisive and only the Democrats are pushing it, but she's doing it anyway," Parscale said.
The impeachment effort would face an uphill battle in the Republican-controlled Senate, where it would take the support of two-thirds of the chamber to convict Trump and remove him from office.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he would be "totally surprised" if there were 67 votes in the chamber to convict Trump, and signaled options for a swift trial. He said no decision had been made whether to call witnesses.
Separately, Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, said Tuesday that the president has asked him to brief the Justice Department and Republican senators on his findings from his recent trip to Ukraine.
"He wants me to do it," Giuliani said in a brief interview. "I'm working on pulling it together and hope to have it done by the end of the week."
However, it is unclear whether GOP senators or Justice Department officials want information from Giuliani.
In a recent interview, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said he had no plans for Giuliani to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has launched an inquiry into Biden and his communications with Ukrainian officials.
Information for this article was contributed by Nicholas Fandos of The New York Times; by Lisa Mascaro, Mary Clare Jalonick, Julie Pace, Alan Fram, Colleen Long, Laurie Kellman, Matthew Daly and Eric Tucker of The Associated Press; by Josh Dawsey, Devlin Barrett, Shayna Jacobs, John Wagner, Kayla Epstein, Rachael Bade and Mike DeBonis of The Washington Post; and by Frank E. Lockwood of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
A Section on 12/11/2019