Congresswoman Maxine Waters (CA-43) issued a statement on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s partisan rules for the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, which will operate on a greatly compressed schedule in the dark of night, and, for the first time in U.S. history, will proceed without a guarantee for material witnesses and documents:
“Trump’s criminality and corruption have infected everything he has touched – including the Republican controlled U.S. Senate. The House has presented an ironclad set of facts and indisputable evidence that Donald Trump abused his power and obstructed Congress. He has been duly impeached by the House for these high crimes. In lieu of a fair Senate trial with bipartisan rules, witness testimony, and evidentiary documents, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has coordinated in lockstep with Trump’s lawyers, abandoned his Constitutionally mandated impartiality as a juror, and now, presented a set of partisan rules that will hide the facts and protect impeached Trump from his necessary and well-deserved removal from office.
“There is no question that Trump abused his power by withholding $391 million of Congressionally appropriated funds to Ukraine in order to get dirt on his opponent and aid his pathetic 2020 campaign. It is an absolute fact that he obstructed Congress by blocking all of those who played a role and/or witnessed his offenses from complying with Congressional requests and subpoenas for documents and testimony. In abandoning all precedent for past impeachment trials, blocking material witnesses and documents, producing a truncated and rushed trial schedule, and making room for a speedy dismissal, Midnight Mitch McConnell has abandoned his role as a leader of a coequal branch of government, and emerged instead as nothing more than a Trump crony and co-captain of his criminal enterprise.
“The American people are witnessing a guilty mob boss president who has obstructed all efforts to investigate his crimes and misconduct, and now has a firm grip on weak Senator jurors that fear him and will openly conspire to prevent his conviction. If McConnell and other Trump cronies in the Senate abandon the Constitution and undermine the American people’s right to a fair trial, they should meet the same fate as all others who have joined Trump’s criminal enterprise. We must keep our focus on the facts and our pressure on the remaining Republican Senators who respect the Constitution and have a shred of a backbone left.”
