Expressing concerns about the potential bias of a Senate impeachment trial, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday that she would not immediately be transmitting the articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump to the Senate.
“We’re not sending it tonight,” Pelosi told reporters shortly after the House voted to impeach Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
The House leader would not commit to any timeline for sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate but said Democrats would make a decision “as a group” on the matter.
Pelosi said Democrats could not name impeachment managers for the Senate trial “until we see what the process is on the Senate side, and I would hope that it will be soon.”
She added that, “so far, we haven’t seen anything that looks fair to us, so hopefully it will be fair ― and when we see what that is, we’ll send our managers.”
When asked what she would consider a fair trial, Pelosi responded by quoting Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s recent remarks on the impeachment proceedings.
“This is what I don’t consider a fair trial ― that Leader McConnell has stated that he’s not an impartial juror, that he’s going to take his ‘cues,’ in quotes, from the White House, and he’s working in total coordination with the White House counsel’s office,” she said.
Pelosi would not say whether she’d wait “weeks” to transmit the articles to the Senate and initially sidestepped a question about “never” sending the articles over.
She later clarified that she “never raised the prospect” of not transmitting the articles at all.
“It’s up to the Senate,” she said when asked about a timeline.