House Democrats will slap US President Donald Trump with two articles of impeachment on Tuesday, according to multiple reports in the US media.
Nancy Pelosi will announce at a press conference at 9 a.m. ET that they are obstruction of Congress and abuse of power, according to The Hill, Washington Post, and CNN.
A third article is still under consideration, according to the outlets. It is expected to relate to obstruction of justice.
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House Democrats are reportedly preparing to hit US President Donald Trump with two articles of impeachment: obstruction of Congress and abuse of power.
The news will be announced by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at 9 a.m. ET Tuesday, The Hill reported, citing two sources familiar with impeachment proceedings, including an unnamed senior Democratic Party aide.
The Washington Post, CNN, and NBC also reported the news, adding that a third article of impeachment is still under consideration.
The subject of the third article is likely to be obstruction of justice.
In former-special counsel Robert Muller's investigation into Russian interference in US elections he stated there were 11 occasions where Trump had obstructed justice.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with committee leaders including Adam Schiff, head of the Intelligence Committee and Jerrold Nadler, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, on Monday.
At an event on Monday evening, Pelosi declined to comment on whether the articles would be introduced Tuesday, the Washington Post reported.
"You think I'm going to tell you the articles of impeachment?" she said.
"We're in a place where our members, our leadership of our committees of jurisdiction have now gotten the last input."
"They'll make a determination, a recommendation as to how we will go forward and what the articles will be."
Pelosi's office said late Monday night that she plans to "announce the next steps in the House impeachment inquiry" on Tuesday, but did not elaborate, NBC News said.
On Wednesday last week, three out of four legal expert witnesses who testified to the House Judiciary Committee said Trump abused his power and should be impeached.
The experts said Trump should be impeached with articles of abuse of power and bribery, obstruction of justice, and obstruction of Congress.
Trump has refused to participate with the impeachment inquiry.
CaptainNoBoat on December 10th, 2019 at 15:09 UTC »
People wondering why there aren't more articles: This is catered for the Senate and the American people, based on specifically Ukraine.
The Senate has to weigh these separately. They will undoubtedly try every trick possible to make the trial into a vindication of Trump for the American public (which is not invested in this enough to absorb all the details), while maintaining the thinnest thread of legitimacy. Narrowing the articles down makes it harder for them to do this.
-Obstruction of Congress is as straightforward as it gets: Virtually every person that could possibly be involved was directed by the WH to ignore all oversight, withhold all documents, and not cooperate at every turn. You couldn't try to obstruct Congress more if you possibly tried.
-With Abuse of Power, you can fit the withholding of Congressional Aid, Witness Tampering, Soliciting/extortion/bribery, subverting official channels, and more under an umbrella article. They would have to summarily dismiss all abuses of power with one fell sweep when they acquit. Might work for them now - going to look pretty unbelievable for the history books.
If you expanded this to the 5-6 articles, or went back to Mueller/Cohen to introduce more articles, the focus would become muddied. The Senate could pick whatever they believe is the weakest one, focus on that, and use it as a baseline for the others and deteriorate public confidence.
With these acutely defined articles, the Senate is going to have to squirm looking through the evidence, and the optics are not going to be pretty for them. Now that it's their turn to host the trial, they can't 100% rely on bashing "The process is unfair." They are the process, and it's defined by precedent and the Constitution, and is overseen by Justice Roberts.
Sure, it's going to be a shitshow and he will almost certainly be acquitted, but they know they have to milk it out a couple weeks to avoid looking absolutely corrupt.
iamagainstit on December 10th, 2019 at 13:53 UTC »
So why aren't Obstruction of Justice and Bribery articles being brought at this time?
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Edit: for clarity, the relevant charge of bribery would be 18 U.S.C. ยง 201
In this case, Trump is a public official who demanded something of value (public announcement of investigation into Biden) in return for being influenced in his performance an official duty (pass along duly proportioned funds, schedule a whitehouse visit). This fits the legally definition of bribery.
The relevant charge of Obstruction of Justice would the the 10 cases detailed in volume II of the Mueller report
benjamoo on December 10th, 2019 at 13:45 UTC »
Does the Senate vote on each article independently, or do they have to make a judgement on all articles as a whole? Like could they find him not guilty of abuse of power but guilty of obstruction?