Senators could face a "slippery slope" by calling witnesses in the upcoming impeachment trial of President Donald Trump, and it's likely that lawmakers will instead base their vote on the testimony provided by the House impeachment managers and White House counsel, Sen. Thom Tillis said Wednesday.
"I believe we will hear enough in those arguments to probably lead the majority of us to the conclusion that we don't need to hear other witnesses," the North Carolina Republican told Fox News' "America's Newsroom."
But if witnesses are called, Tillis said he agrees with Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who said Tuesday that there should be reciprocity when it comes to calling witnesses, rather than to only allow one side to present evidence.
"I think Ted also agrees that even walking down the slippery slope of calling witnesses is something we would like to avoid," said Tillis.
He also said he disagrees with comments made by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell could move to dismiss the trial altogether.
"The resolution we are going to pass next Tuesday clearly says that we are going to hear from both sides, and then the first resolution guaranteed by the organizing resolution is whether or not we should hear witnesses," said Tillis. "This is just another example of Pelosi going down the political path that I believe this entire impeachment investigation has been all about."
Meanwhile, Tillis said he thinks that one of the articles against Trump, accusing him of obstruction of Congress, can be dismissed, because the president was "doing nothing more than asserting privilege."
However, the other article, accusing Trump of abuse of office, could result in calling in Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, to testify, and possibly even the elder Biden "shortly after that."
"That's the sort of thing we're talking about," he added, "If you really want to go down this path and do the work they should have done when they were doing the investigation in the House."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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