Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour(WASHINGTON) — The House is expected to vote on an impeachment measure against President Donald Trump Wednesday evening over the objections of Democratic leaders, the first time the chamber will take up the divisive topic under Democratic control.
Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, forced consideration of the measure after introducing articles of impeachment Tuesday evening in the form of a privileged resolution, requiring the House to take up the measure within two legislative days.
Democratic leaders oppose the effort, and aides said it’s unclear how the chamber will consider the resolution. Under House rules, the House can either take up impeachment, move to table consideration, or refer it to the House Judiciary Committee.
“If I had my druthers, I suspect we’re not ready to debate that,” House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., said Wednesday.
Green has pushed to impeach Trump since 2017, and forced several votes on impeachment in the last session of Congress. On Tuesday, he took to the floor to introduce the measure, which cites Trump’s attacks against four Democratic congresswomen of color. The House voted to condemn the president’s Twitter attacks congresswomen of color on Tuesday, with four Republicans voting alongside Democrats.
Green said on Wednesday that the condemnation did not go far enough.
“If you did what the president has done, you would be punished. What we’ve done so far doesn’t fine him, and it does not remove him from his job. You would lose your jobs. The president cannot be above the law,” he said.
Nearly 60 Democrats backed an earlier version of Green’s measure in December 2017, which was successfully killed by Republican leaders at the time.
But with the House now in Democrats’ hands, the subject is one that party leaders have been reluctant to take up, and have instead called for the continued investigation of the president and the Trump administration.
Democrats harbor political concerns about the vote — dozens of moderate freshmen would rather discuss the party’s agenda than take up impeachment before they return home for the six-week August recess. And while at least 86 House Democrats support launching impeachment proceedings against Trump, according to an ABC News analysis, some said they considered Green’s effort premature ahead of special counsel Robert Mueller’s testimony next week.
Green’s impeachment resolution makes no mention of the findings of the Mueller report and the administration’s refusal to comply with congressional subpoenas for documents and testimony, which Democrats have labored to highlight in a series of hearings and additional investigations.
“I think there are legitimate reasons to favor impeachment, but I think we need to hear from the man that wrote the report,” Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., said on Wednesday.
A former high school history teacher, Clyburn suggested the House might not have to impeach as a result of Democrats’ investigative work, pointing to the high-profile witnesses whose testimony eventually forced President Richard Nixon to resign during Watergate.
“It was John Dean’s testimony, Alexander Butterfield’s testimony,” he said. “We never got to the point of impeaching Nixon, we didn’t need to because we did good investigative work.”
Green said postponing consideration of impeachment until after Mueller’s testimony would be “justice delayed.”
“I will do this even if I am the only person who is involved in the process,” he said. “There are some times on some issues where it’s better to stand alone than not stand at all.”
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