Senior White House officials want the Senate impeachment trial President Donald Trump to last as long as possible because they want Democrats to "own this bill and they want them to wallow in this, because they think it's gonna boomerang," Fox News chief national correspondent Ed Henry said Friday.
"I'm hearing from senior people inside the White House they want as long a Senate trial as they can get because they think this case is falling apart," Henry said in an analysis of the House Judiciary Committee's vote to approve two articles of impeachment against Trump.
"I'm told by people close to the president [that] they want to see Democrats own this bill — and they want them to wallow in this, because they think it’s gonna boomerang."
The Democratic-controlled Judiciary Committee voted 23-17, along party lines, to approve the articles — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — based on Trump's alleged Ukrainian activities.
The full House could vote on the articles by Christmas — and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said late Thursday that "zero chance" existed that the Republican-dominated chamber would remove President Trump from office.
"The case is so darn weak coming over from the House," McConnell told Fox News' Sean Hannity before the committee's vote. "We all know how it's going to end.
"There is no chance the president is going to be removed from office," the majority leader said.
Henry, who covered the Clinton impeachment in 1998, noted the deep partisanship in Friday's vote.
"The fact of the matter is [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi [D-Calif.] began this process just a few months ago, saying you can’t move forward unless you have some bipartisanship," he said.
"She would point the finger at Republicans and say that they haven't bought into any of this investigation, but Republicans would say based on how it was not just put together, but the fact that at the end of this process, think about the articles, the substance of what they just voted on, there's not a single crime in there.
"Bribery, which we heard from Adam Schiff for weeks," Henry continued, referring to the California Democrat and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. "Weeks on weeks. Not in there.
"Instead, it comes down to obstructing Congress, abuse of power," he added. "Republicans think they can swat that away."