Caution on impeachment

Pelosi preaches caution on impeachment as pressure builds

House Democrats hold a closed-door meeting, with the speaker eager to tamp down calls for Trump’s removal.

By JOHN BRESNAHAN and HEATHER CAYGLE

Speaker Nancy Pelosi is trying to hold the line — no impeachment. At least not yet.

It’s a familiar message for Pelosi, who will deliver it once again at a closed-door meeting of House Democrats on Wednesday morning. But the gathering, which is members-only with no aides allowed, comes at a critical moment as a growing number of Democrats are ready to consider impeaching President Donald Trump.

Pelosi has long sought to dissuade her colleagues from trying to remove the president without winning bipartisan support. And as she repeatedly reminds Democrats, that isn’t happening. Only one GOP lawmaker — the libertarian gadfly Rep. Justin Amash (Mich.) — has called for Trump’s impeachment following special counsel Robert Mueller’s evidence of obstruction of justice.

So Pelosi will implore Democrats to stick with her plan of continuing to investigate Trump on multiple fronts, with legal action as the backup when necessary. Pelosi will argue, as she has repeatedly in public and private, that Democrats should gather information that could be used for impeaching Trump, if the threshold for Republican support can be reached, according to Democratic aides and lawmakers.

Of course, it seems unlikely that will ever happen; Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has repeatedly said that the Mueller probe is over and Democrats should move on.

The six committee leaders investigating Trump, his administration and personal finances — including Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) and Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) — will give updates at Wednesday’s meeting, according to a source familiar with Pelosi’s plans.

House Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.), Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) will also speak.

The senior lawmakers will discuss Monday’s victory for Democrats upholding a subpoena for Trump’s financial records from his accounting firm — which Pelosi will point to as proof that her plan is working — and a court hearing on Wednesday focused on the president’s effort to stop the Democratic investigation into his dealings with Deutsche Bank.

The court hearing comes one day after Senate Democrats berated a top Treasury Department official over reports that Deutsche Bank blocked employees from reporting suspicious activity tied to accounts linked to Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Democrats will also receive updates on their effort to sue Trump over violations of the emoluments clause and the House Judiciary Committee decision to subpoena two former top administration aides on Tuesday: Trump confidante Hope Hicks and White House deputy counsel Annie Donaldson.

Pelosi remains firm that trying to remove Trump from office without any GOP backing is pointless and could backfire on Democrats. They’re mindful of what happened to former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) when he impeached President Bill Clinton in 1998 — Clinton was acquitted by the Senate, Republicans lost seats in the midterm election, and Gingrich lost his job. (Though others note the GOP did win the presidency two years later.)

“In reality, I don’t think you ought to start something if you’re not prepared to finish it,” said House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), a key Pelosi ally. “I don’t think we’re at the point now that we can finish the way we want to finish it, so we ought not start it until we get to that point.”

And while more than 20 Democrats are now calling for Trump’s impeachment or at least the start of an impeachment inquiry to help bolster their legal case against the president, Pelosi’s hold on her caucus remains rock solid. Even impeachment advocates say they aren’t going to go against her decision.

“I don’t think anything happens without the speaker,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), a member of the House Judiciary Committee and co-chief of the progressive caucus, who came out in favor of opening an impeachment inquiry this week.

“We really want to keep people united. We’re not going to take action if the speaker is not there. I think the speaker is very strategic, very smart. We’ve got to show her where the caucus is,” added Jayapal. Asked about Pelosi's belief that the caucus doesn't support impeachment, Jayapal said, “I think that’s what she thinks. We want to see if that’s true, so we’re working on that.”

Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), one of the first Judiciary Committee Democrats to support an impeachment inquiry, said her conviction has only grown on that front, but said she doesn't anticipate trying to work around Pelosi's opposition to impeachment.

“I think a lot of times with leadership, it’s not what you do, it’s when you do it,” Demings said. “In the last two weeks, the president has continued to obstruct justice by not respecting subpoenas for people in his administration and people outside his administration. So we’re running out of options."

Some Democrats — including members of Pelosi’s leadership team — reached a breaking point Monday after Trump officially blocked former White House counsel Don McGahn, a central figure in the Mueller probe, from testifying before the House Judiciary Committee.

The White House move roiled the Democratic Caucus and sparked a closed-door clash between Pelosi and other top Democrats, led by Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), who argued it’s time to open an impeachment inquiry into Trump.

Pelosi and her top deputies, including Clyburn, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (Md.) and Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.) pushed back forcefully. The leadership group later held an emergency meeting with Nadler on Monday night to shut down the brewing revolt within the panel. Nadler followed Pelosi's order on Tuesday — the topic of impeachment was never raised during a quick committee hearing bashing McGahn and the White House.

Several other Democrats said Tuesday while they were angered over McGahn's no-show but were not ready to join calls for impeachment. However, these lawmakers said the final straw for them would be if Mueller is blocked from testifying about his two-year probe.

House Democrats are still struggling to secure a public appearance by Mueller after weeks of negotiations. Mueller and his staff are concerned about what public insight he can share, according to several sources.

And even some of Pelosi’s most loyal chairmen, antsy about the ceaseless stonewalling from Trump, are starting to talk more openly about impeachment. Schiff said the case for impeachment is getting “stronger," while Cummings said he is “getting there” on Tuesday.

"I think what the president has done has put us in a position where we cannot get any information to do the oversight that we need to do. And that basically ties our hands and makes us, with regard to oversight, powerless,” Cummings said on CNN.

“The question now becomes: Do we allow this to continue? And where do we end up if we do that? That is the question,” Cummings added. “And I'm still mulling it over and talking to my colleagues when I get on the floor in a few minutes. But I'm getting there.”

But for Pelosi and other top Democrats, the upcoming Memorial Day recess can’t come soon enough. If Democratic leaders can successfully navigate Wednesday’s meeting and get members out the door on Thursday for a 10-day break, they hope that could help break the impeachment fever spreading within the caucus.

Once lawmakers return from recess, they’re only in the Capitol for three days before dozens of members depart for a trip to Normandy, France, in honor of the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion in World War II.

And the longer Democratic leaders can delay impeachment, the less likely it may become as Washington shifts its focus to the 2020 election, according to multiple members and aides.

“I think if [impeachment] happens this summer, that’s fine,” said House Budget Committee Chairman John Yarmuth (D-Ky.), a supporter of impeachment. “I think if it goes into the fall or next year, I think that’s probably too late.”