Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., told Newsmax on Wednesday that the House has pushed back on delivering the articles of impeachment against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas because there is an advantage to having them delivered at the beginning of the week versus the middle of the week.
"The challenge is when the House actually gives it to the Senate," Lankford said on Newsmax's "Wake Up America." "Then it sets up an immediate swearing-in, basically, of jurors at that point, and then it shifts over to 24 hours later, when the actual trial begins. That would mean it would start on Thursday afternoon. We know that [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer is going to want to try to end this as quickly as possible. We want more running room in a week. So, if the House sends it over to us on Monday, we pick it up on Tuesday, we've got a week to be able to fight this out, rather than trying to be able to cram it against a weekend and it all disappears in the news."
Lankford added: "We want to be able to keep the focus where the focus should be. That is, number one, there's never been a time in American history any impeachment of any type of any official has just been tabled in the Senate. We've always had a trial, so we want to be able to keep that. Number two is we want to be able to make sure that the American people hear what's actually happening on the border right now, and it doesn't need to be weekend news. It needs to be driving during the week so people can hear it and see it."
Asked if the delay is due to lack of preparation on the Senate's part, Lankford stressed that the reason for pushing the delivery off to next week is because once the House sends the articles of impeachment over, "the Senate sits as jurors at that point."
"We receive the case and then make the ruling," he said. "What Chuck Schumer wants to do is never have a case at all. Just table it and ignore it and pretend this never occurred at all. And try to use a procedural motion to literally never have a trial."
Lankford also commented on the Arizona Supreme Court's Tuesday ruling that the state can enforce a near-total abortion ban based on an 1864 law.
"This will be the prime example of what President [Donald] Trump talked about, where a state has to step in, and they're going to actually clarify what does this mean?" Lankford said. "Are they going to put in a rape and incest and life of the mother exception? What are they going to do with this process?
"President Trump talked over and over again about this is a heart issue. It is also a legal issue, but it's a cultural issue as well. It begs the question: When is a child a child? That is the most simple thing here. We talk about abortion, and the left talks about reproductive freedom and all those things. The first question is when is a child a child? And what is it that our state, in particular, is going to do about that?"
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Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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