‘It must be done’: Pelosi vows to move quickly on Trump impeachment trial over Capitol riots

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowed Thursday to push ahead quickly with the impeachment trial of ex-President Donald Trump over his role in inciting the violent storming of Congress on Jan. 6.

The top Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives could send the article charging the former president with “incitement of insurrection” to the Senate as soon as Friday, setting up a near-immediate trial.

Democrats say lawmakers can move quickly because they were all witnesses to the siege, many of them fleeing for safety as the rioters descended on the Capitol.

US Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, speaks during her weekly press briefing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on January 21, 2021. (NICHOLAS KAMM/)

However, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky told his fellow GOP colleagues on a call Thursday evening that he wants to push back the start of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial by a week or more to give the former president time to review the case, ensuring due process.

The timing will be set by Pelosi (D-Calif.), who can trigger the start of the trial when she sends the House charges for “incitement of insurrection” to the Senate, and also by McConnell and new Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who are in negotiations over how to set up a 50-50 partisan divide in the Senate and the short-term agenda.

Pelosi pushed back emphatically against the idea that Americans should let Trump off the hook for his role in inciting the riot because he has left office.

“The fact is POTUS committed an act of incitement of insurrection,” Pelosi said. “I don’t think it’s very unifying to say: ‘Let’s just forget it and move on.’”

Pelosi said she believes there is a huge difference between this impeachment trial and the first one, which focused on Trump’s effort to bully the president of Ukraine into digging up dirt on Biden.

“The whole world bore witness to the president’s incitement,” she said.

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, (R-S.C.) would not answer questions about the former president’s representation before Congress but told reporters that “I think he’s going to get a legal team here pretty soon.”

Democrats would need the support of at least 17 Republicans to convict Trump, a high bar. While a handful of Senate Republicans have indicated they are open to conviction, most have said they believe a trial will be divisive and questioned the legality of trying a president after he has left office.

With News Wire Services