President Trump’s looming acquittal in his Senate trial doesn’t mean he’ll be off the hook in the Democrat-held House that impeached him.
If anything, say House Democratic lawmakers, investigations are likely to ramp up in the nine months before Election Day. That means the Senate impeachment acquittal set to happen Wednesday concerning charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress related to the Ukraine military aid affair will be just a midpoint rather than an end of clashes between the Democratic House majority that took power in January 2019 and the Trump White House.
The impeachment trial of Trump, 73, is set to end Wednesday. The only lingering question in its outcome is whether any Republican senators will defect and vote to convict Trump. Two Republican senators bucked their party to vote for witnesses in the trial — Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah.
The House Financial Services Committee, led by Chairwoman Maxine Waters, is expected to continue its investigation into Trump’s banking lenders when he was in private business, including Deutsche Bank AG and Capital One Financial Corp. And House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal is still looking to compel the Treasury Department to release Trump’s tax returns.
The House Judiciary Committee is also in the midst of a lawsuit that its chairman, Jerry Nadler, filed to obtain the grand jury transcript of former White House counsel Don McGhan from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. Additionally, the House Oversight Committee is the focus of a Supreme Court case related to whether Trump’s accountants at Mazar USA LLP should be mandated to turn over his financial information to the government.
“I think we have to continue and make sure that we continue proper oversight,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, told the Washington Examiner. “This isn’t an isolated incident. And what he’s being referred to for impeachment right now simply is just a fraction of many of the offenses that this president has committed. So, I think continuing to conduct proper and appropriate oversight is an important duty that we have to commit to.”
Rep. Tom Malinowski, a New Jersey Democratic and the first swing-district freshman in his caucus to announce support for an impeachment investigation, told the Washington Examiner that actions House Democrats take following the final vote during the Senate impeachment trial on Wednesday relies heavily on whether additional witnesses would ever be called in the Senate.
“It’s never been a binary choice between acquittal and conviction,” Malinowski said. “So one question is, should we call certain people back to the House? I don’t know what we’re going to do, but that’s certainly an option. But that might be considered, yeah.”
Not all House Democrats think their caucus will go directly to investigate the president right away.
“I think we’re going to start to work on lowering the price of prescription drugs and working for the people, which is what we’ve been doing,” Rep. Debbie Dingell, a Michigan Democratic, said. “I think we’ve got to really make sure that we’re focused on the people.”
