Trump impeachment: What Nancy Pelosi is hoping to achieve by delaying the president’s trial

The House speaker has shown herself to be an unparalleled political operator, writes Andrew Buncombe

The speaker is playing her hand to push for a deal (Getty)

The invitation could not have been more polite. “In their great wisdom, our founders crafted a constitution based on a system of separation of powers: three co-equal branches acting as checks on each other,” Nancy Pelsoi wrote to Donald Trump. “In the spirit of respecting the constitution, I invite you to deliver your State of the Union address on 4 February.”

Reports said the timing of the speech, and the invitation – which was accepted by the president – had been agreed in advance. Which implies both Republicans are Democrats believe the Senate trial of the president will have been concluded by that point, unless Trump intends to address the two chambers as it plays out.

What, then, explains the speaker’s decision to delay sending the two articles of impeachment passed by the House to the Senate, a hold-up Trump’s lawyers may try and use to claim he has not technically been impeached?

Put simply – leverage. Back in 1998 when Bill Clinton was impeached and Democrats controlled the Senate, Republicans wanted to call a number of witnesses, just as Chuck Schumer has demanded now.

By contrast, Clinton and the Democrats, wanted to limit such testimony. At the time, Clinton felt he may be forced to resign from office, as Newt Gingrich, the Republican speaker who had pushed for his impeachment had been forced to do, when as news emerged of his extra-marital affair. Indeed, Gingrich quit a full six weeks before the president was censured.

The solution to the stand-off between Senate leader Tom Daschle and his Republican counterpart, Trent Lott, was to hammer out a deal.

In the end, just three witnesses, Monica Lewinsky, Clinton’s friend Vernon Jordan, and Sidney Blumenthal, a White House aide, were deposed on video and excerpts played in the Senate, where the trial was overseen by then chief justice William Rehnquist.

As legislators from both parties this week departed Capitol Hill for the holidays without a deal yet in place about what happens in the Senate, it seems Pelosi is playing her hand to also force some compromise from Mitch McConnell, the top Republican.

McConnell has so far rejected Schumer’s call to have four current or former White House officials testify. He also trigged controversy when he conceded he would not be an “impartial juror” in the president’s trial. “I’m not an impartial juror. This is a political process. There’s not anything judicial about it,” he said.

In the end, a drawn out Senate trial benefits neither party. Republicans are confident they have the majority to clear the president, and he himself has demanded an “immediate” hearing.

Democrats, meanwhile, are barely a month away from the first primary ballot to select a presidential candidate for 2020. They do not want an impeachment trial to distract from that, especially given four of the top tier candidates – Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Corey Booker and Amy Klobuchar – are members of Senate and will have to attend those impeachment hearings.

What this is, as with so much of what transpires in Washington DC, is politics, plain and simple.

And there is nobody better at it than Nancy Pelosi.