Ted Cruz, who sits on the Judiciary Committee, said this morning that the Senate has decided that there will be no pre-trial dismissal vote on the impeachment articles when Pelosi finally sends them over:
Rather, Cruz explains how the impeachment trial will proceed in the Senate:
(1) Opening Arguments:
It’ll start with opening arguments from the House managers. We’ll give them a full and fair opportunity to present their case.
Then it will move to opening arguments from the White House defense team. Unlike how House Democrats did it, we’re gonna give the president a full and fair opportunity to present his case and defend himself.
(2) Questions from Senators in Writing:
We will then move to questions from Senators and the way that’ll work is they won’t be orally. Instead Senators have to write down our questions. We submit our questions in writing and the Chief Justice will ask the questions for us.
(3) Debate on whether to dismiss, vote, or take up witnesses:
It’s at that point then that I think the debates will happen about whether or not to dismiss the case or to vote to final verdict then, or whether to take up witnesses.
Cruz went on to say that he doesn’t believe impeachment will be dismissed at that point, but rather it will receive a final verdict of ‘not guilty’:
“I think at the end of this process, these Articles of Impeachment are going to be thrown out. And I think it’s going to end, not with a dismissal, but with a verdict of not guilty. And the way it works in the Senate, when you come to vote on verdict, you vote on each article, and each senator will vote either ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty.’ The reason why this ends with an acquittal is very simple; the House hasn’t met the constitutional threshold.
The Constitution specifies for impeachment of a president that you have to demonstrate bribery, treason or other high crimes and misdemeanors. They haven’t done that. In fact, this is the first time in the history of our country any president has been impeached without even so much as an allegation of criminal conduct. They have not alleged in these Articles of Impeachment the president violated any criminal law. They haven’t alleged he violated any civil law. They haven’t even alleged the president has a speeding ticket. And for that reason, this doesn’t meet the constitutional standard of high crimes and misdemeanors. And so the end of this process will be an acquittal and I think that’s probably in about a couple of weeks.
There’s more from Cruz on his views about calling witnesses, so be sure to watch the full interview above.