The House Judiciary Committee voted along party lines to support articles of impeachment against Donald Trump on Friday after an abrupt end to Thursday’s 12-hour marathon debate over their merits, a session characterised by Republican stalling and heated protestations.
Following the votes, the president announced a trade deal between the US and China will begin lifting tariffs on Chinese goods by 15 December — a deal he previously said wasn't likely until after the next election.
Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell meanwhile gave an interview to Sean Hannity on Fox News yesterday evening and pledged “total co-ordination” between GOP senators and the White House should a trial take place in January, raising fresh concerns about impartiality.
President Trump himself has congratulated British prime minister Boris Johnson over his party’s landslide win in the UK general election on a record-breaking day of tweets and his hosting of the Christmas Congressional Ball at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Meanwhile, Democrats on the 2020 campaign trail have rallied behind union workers at Loyola University in California ahead of next week's debate there.
That solidarity was first expressed by Elizabeth Warren, who said she would not cross a picket line for the debate.
Soon after, virtually every candidate who has qualified for the debate.
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House Judiciary Committee to vote on impeachment articles after 12 hours of debate
The House Judiciary Committee will vote on the articles of impeachment against Donald Trump on Friday after an abrupt end to Thursday’s 12-hour marathon debate over their merits.
Democrats delayed the vote just before midnight, incensing Republicans and setting up the Friday showdown over President Trump's future. The committee had been expected to approve the two articles late on Thursday in order to set up a vote by the Democratic-controlled House next week that is expected to make Trump the third president in US history to be impeached. Instead, as the clock ticked toward midnight, Judiciary Committee chairman Jerry Nadler sent lawmakers home for the night and said members would return to vote on Friday at 10am EST (3pm GMT). Asked why the votes did not occur late on Thursday, Democrat Mary Gay Scanlon said "the American people deserve to see the vote."
The scheduling appeared to have nothing to do with the substance of the impeachment fight nor was it a sign that Democrats lacked the needed votes. But it outraged Republican leaders, who said afterward many had been planning travel home on Friday and would now have to reset their schedules.
Doug Collins, the top Republican on the panel, appeared shocked by the announcement and immediately reacted with anger, saying the rescheduling was done so Democrats could hold their vote when more voters would be watching on television. "This was the most bush league thing I have seen, forever," Collins told reporters. "This committee is more concerned about getting on TV in the morning than it was finishing its job tonight and letting the members go home. Words cannot describe how inappropriate this was."
Democrats had expected to wrap up the hearing early in the evening, but Republicans, led by Collins, proposed a series of amendments that had no hope of passage. Republicans offered hours of remarks on their amendments, frequently repeating the same prepared commentary and often veering into other topics that ranged from natural gas drilling to the state of the economy.
Much of the impeachment focus has been on a 25 July phone call in which Trump asked Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who was on the board of a Ukrainian gas company. That is the basis for a charge by Democrats that Trump abused power.
Trump has also instructed current and former members of his administration not to testify or produce documents, leading senior officials like secretary of state Mike Pompeo to defy House subpoenas. Democrats say that behaviour constitutes obstruction of Congress, forming the basis of the other impeachment charge.
Trump denies any wrongdoing and has condemned the impeachment inquiry as unfair. His Republican allies in Congress argue that there is no direct evidence of misconduct and that Democrats have conducted an improper process that did not give the president an opportunity to mount his own defence.
If the House impeaches Trump, who is charged with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, he would then go on trial in the Senate. The Republican-led chamber is unlikely to vote to find the president guilty and remove him from office.
Republicans on the committee said that there were no crimes alleged in the impeachment articles and that "abuse of power" had become a catch-all for Democratic complaints about Trump. "This notion of abuse of power is the lowest of low-energy impeachment theories," said Republican congressman Matt Gaetz.
Here's Andrew Feinberg's full report.
Trump ally Matt Gaetz attacked for raising Hunter Biden's substance abuse history
Before the shock postponement, yesterday's session was characterised by Republican stalling and heated protestations.
Raking GOP member Doug Collins branded the proceedings “an embarrassment” and a “kangaroo court” and accused the opposition of "lowering the standard of impeachment " but chairman Jerrold Nadler held firm and reminded the panel: “Nobody can be a dictator”.
Georgia Democrat Hank Johnson attacked Gaetz for raising Hunter Biden's past drug problems, stating: "The pot calling the kettle black is not something we should do." Johnson was referring there to the Floridian's own drink-driving record.
Another fine line came when Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell accused Republicans of "contorting" the facts more than a yoga teacher.
But Cedric Richmond of Louisiana probably just about edged it - comparing the GOP to Judas, bought by 30 tweets from Trump in place of 30 pieces of silver.
An additional moment of drama came when a Reuters photographer was asked to leave the chamber after being accused of taking pictures of members' notes. Republican Mike Johnson raised the alarm...
...before this senior adviser to House speaker Nancy Pelosi sought to dispell the controversy.
Trump tells UK to 'celebrate' Boris Johnson’s landslide victory
The president himself wasted little time in cheering his British tribute act Boris Johnson's landslide election win in the UK general election last night, promising a "massive new Trade Deal after BREXIT".
You can, incidentally, follow the latest on our national waking nightmare right here as Britain regresses back into the bad old days of the 1980s, a period of authoritarian government and Liverpool topping the league.
For more on Trump, here's dear old Tom Embury-Dennis.
President breaks own record with 123 tweets in one day despite claiming to be 'very busy'
Trump yesterday outdid himself on Twitter, surpassing his personal best by posting 123 tweets as he attempted to firefight the impeachment messaging by bombarding his followers with partisan denials and conspiracy theories.
The most noteworthy tweet of the day was surely his breathtakingly petulant attack on teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg after she beat him to the cover of Time magazine.
With a hilarious lack of self-awareness, he told a summit on child care and paid leave at the White House yesterday morning that he was in the middle of "a very busy day".
Clark Mindock has a full round-up of his prodigious Twitter output.
Mitch McConnell instists 'no chance' Trump will be removed from office, pledges 'co-ordination' with White House
Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell was interviewed by Sean Hannity on Fox News last night and promised unity among the Senate GOP would ensure the president is not impeached.
"The case is so darn weak coming over from the House. We all know how it's going to end. There is no chance the president is going to be removed from office," the Kentucky senator said.
"My hope is there won’t be a single Republican who votes for either of these articles of impeachment," he continued. "And Sean, it wouldn’t surprise me if we got one or two Democrats.”
McConnell said he hopes the impeachment process in the Senate will be "shorter" so as not to distract from the 2020 election and pledged "total co-ordination" with the White House as and when impeachment reaches the upper chamber:
"There will be no difference between the president’s position and our position as to how to handle this - to the extent that we can. We have no choice but to take it up. But we’ll be working through this process, hopefully in a short period of time, in total co-ordination with the White House counsel’s office and the people representing the president in the well of the Senate.”
So that's all right then.
Fox host says Trump has engaged in 'sustained assault on the freedom of the press'
Speaking of Fox, anchor Chris Wallace gave an address at the Newseum in Washington on Wednesday in which he corruscating the president, saying Trump has "has done everything he can to undercut the media to try and delegitimise us" in an attempt to "raise doubts" about critical reporting".
Heroic stuff.
Wallace also offered the alarming opinion that Trump is already campaigning for a third term.
Alex Woodward has more on remarks that bear repeating.
Ex-AG Eric Holder says William Barr unfit for office
Former US attorney general Eric Holder has written a scathing op-ed for The Washington Post arguing that his Trump-appointed successor, William Barr, is not fit for office.
Barr this week disputed the conclusions drawn by Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz in his report exonerating the Obama-era FBI of wrongdoing in its investigation of the Trump campaign in 2016.
His comments, Holder says, are part of a pattern of behavior that "have been fundamentally inconsistent with his duty to the Constitution".
Trump hosts Christmas Congressional Ball
While the president's crimes were being discussed on Capitol Hill yesterday, the man himself was descending a White House staircase in black tie to host the annual Congressional Ball.
"We’re very proud of this country, we’re very proud of this home, we call it a home, some presidents called it a house and some presidents called it much worse than a house..." Trump rambled in his introductory speech, forgetting he once referred to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as "a real dump".
A typically glitzy affair, the Christmas trees turned out to be cheap fakes though, which says it all.
Trump attempts to spin abrupt Judiciary hearing finish
The president's first tweets of the day find him praising Republicans and attempting to spin the latest impeachment hearings, quoting that uncited poll state he loves so much and knocking Pelosi.
Speaker declines to pressure moderate Democrats on impeachment
Nancy Pelosi and House minority leader Kevin McCarthy gave competing press conferences yesterday as the impeachment briefing war continued.
The speaker said she would not be pressuring moderate Democrats to back the president's ousting, after a group of 10 reportedly discussed their preference for simply censuring Trump instead to avoid alienating voters in their home states.
"I have no message to them. We are not whipping this legislation, nor would we ever with something like this," Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol. "They'll make their own decisions. I don't say anything to them."
She also elaborated on her reasons for not including bribery among the articles of impeachment and got in a particularly pithy jab at Trump too:
McCarthy meanwhile was much less good humoured and appeared to suggest the Democrats themselves were on the take:
Desperate stuff indeed.
Lara Trump derided for claiming president 'fighting for animals'
Trump's daughter-in-law Lara Trump is being ridiculed online for claiming the president is "Fighting for all Americans, and animals too!"
This image naturally featured prominently in the replies:
Her tweet would have been laughable anyway even if it didn't follow immediately on the heels of this atrocity from her brother-in-law...
Trump team considering drafting in controversial lawyer for impeachment defence
The president's impeachment defence operation, reportedly running out of a bunker beneath the Oval Office, is said to be planning to draft in professor and attorney Alan Dershowitz to boost its cause.
Dershowitz spoke at the White House Hanukkah party on Wednesday and has been regularly called upon to appear on Fox to promote arguments in favour of the president.
He also - get this - once represented a mutual friend he shares with Trump, a certain Mr Jeffrey Epstein, whom you may or may not recall...
Dershowitz has even been forced to vehemently deny allegations made by Virginia Roberts Giuffre in courts documents that she was lent out to him for sex by Epstein, according to ABC News.
Senate recognises Armenian genocide in defiance of Trump
The Senate has passed a resolution recognising the Ottoman Empire's killings of Armenians in the early 20th century as a genocide, a move that Trump's administration has tried to block several times.
Alex Woodward has the full story below.
Governor lifts lifetime ban on voting for more than 100,000 former felons
Andy Beshear, the newly-elected governor of Kentucky who embarrassed Trump at the polls last month, has restored voting rights to more than 100,000 people with past criminal convictions, reversing a ban that activists have called an "ugly holdover from our Jim Crow past".
Here's Clark Mindock's report.
Trump promotes Fox and Friends, slams Wall Street Journal
What else is new, right?
Here's the latest from El Presidente as he continues to fight the impeachment fight on Twitter by denouncing his media rivals and saying it would be "crazy" to remove someone who has achieved as much as he has is taking credit for.
President meeting Paraguayan counterpart as Judiciary reconvenes
This is Trump's schedule today as the Judiciary Committee resumes its final hearing on the articles of impeachment: he's meeting the president of Paraguay, the lucky fellow.
We're moments away from a third day of impeachment hearings at the House Judiciary Committee following a last-minute, late-night break after yesterday's 12-hour hearing.
It's Friday the 13th.
Republicans have some new visual aids. From The Independent's Andrew Feinberg, who's reporting from inside the room:
Adam Schiff: 'This is about what's going on today'
The House Intelligence Committee chair was on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert last night to say that the Trump administration misconduct uncovered by the impeachment inquiry is still ongoing and that the Republicans who have defended him face a future of "nothing but shame".
A case in point...
Rather than vote in the middle of the night, Republicans now are complaining that the impeachment vote from the House Judiciary Committee will be held today.
Doug Collins: "The chairman just ambushed the entire committee and did not have any consultation with the ranking member."
