After months of back and forth on whether the House will proceed with impeachment against President Donald Trump, Speaker Nancy Pelosi is reportedly moving closer to those Democrats who want to remove the president from power.
Pelosi is sounding out her caucus again to see if the lingering story of a White House whistleblower who is charging Trump with grave misconduct has sufficiently galvanized the pro-impeachment forces in the House, the Washington Post reported Monday.
U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) holds a weekly news conference with Capitol Hill reporters in Washington, U.S. July 26, 2019. REUTERS/Erin Scott
Pelosi will discuss the way ahead at a 4 p.m. meeting Tuesday, according to Post reporter Rachael Bade:
FLAG IT: House Dems leaders have called a caucus meeting tomorrow at 4 pm to discuss you know what: questions of impeachment.
Here we go …
— Rachael Bade (@rachaelmbade) September 23, 2019
Pelosi’s office would neither confirm nor deny the meeting when asked about it by the Post. (RELATED: Nunes: Ukraine Will Sink Biden’s Candidacy, Not Trump Presidency)
Ukraine has denied that Trump applied any pressure during a July phone call between Trump. And his Ukrainian counterpart and the alleged whistleblower had no direct knowledge of the alleged diplomatic offense, where Trump supposedly demanded that Ukraine investigate former Vice President Joe Biden’s relationship with the eastern European country.
Pelosi is reportedly canvassing House committee chairpersons to determine the administrative steps to impeachment and the whistleblower is allegedly the catalyst that ignited the current enthusiasm for impeachment. Pelosi wants to see the details of the whistleblower’s allegations, according to the Post. (RELATED: Trump Calls Whistleblower ‘Highly Partisan,’ Denies Wrongdoing)
On Monday, Trump denied any quid pro quo relationship between offering military aid to Ukraine and Ukraine opening an investigation on Biden.
President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, on Sept. 16, 2019. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images)
The alleged Tuesday meeting also could coincide with Pelosi’s demand that the acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, release the whistleblower complaint to Congress.
Pelosi is determined to draw a line in the sand over these allegations writing in a Sunday letter: “If the administration persists in blocking this whistleblower from disclosing to Congress a serious possible breach of constitutional duties by the president, they will be entering a grave new chapter of lawlessness which will take us into a whole new stage of investigation,” the Post reported.
The letter did not define “new stage of investigation” as necessarily referring to impeachment. But sources tell the Post that Pelosi has undergone a transformation of late and is now seriously charting an impeachment course.