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Expect Democrats to spend a lot of time this week attacking Senate Republicans for attempting to speed through the beginning of the impeachment trial against President Trump.
Under the resolution the Senate will take up Tuesday and likely pass with GOP support, each side in the impeachment trial will have 24 hours over up to two days to make their case. If House Democrats or the White House try to use all of their time, they could be making arguments until late at night.
Democrats appear poised to try to capitalize on the optics of the Senate debating the removal of President Trump from office at hours when many Americans may be asleep. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), who has spent weeks calling for the process to include witness testimony, immediately slammed the proposed Republican rules in a statement Monday.
“Senator McConnell’s resolution stipulates that key facts be delivered in the wee hours of the night simply because he doesn’t want the American people to hear them,” he said.
Republicans have repeatedly dismissed the two articles of impeachment the House passed last year as nothing more than a politically-motivated assault on Mr. Trump. Mr. McConnell’s resolution allows the Senate to vote on calling witnesses after each side has offered their opening arguments and senators have had the chance to ask questions.
A new poll from CNN shows Mr. Schumer may have a favorable wind as he tries to pressure some Republican senators to vote in favor of witnesses.
The poll shows 69% of respondents calling for new witnesses to testify during the Senate trial, with 51% of respondents supporting Mr. Trump’s removal. More than 1,150 people responded to the poll, conducted between Jan. 16 and Jan. 20, giving it a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.
Write to Andrew Duehren at andrew.duehren@wsj.com
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