When Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away this September, Mitch McConnell urged his Republican colleagues to “keep [their] powder dry” in his exhortation to not make an immediate, public decision on whether to consider seating the next nominated Supreme Court Justice.
It’s not clear if McConnell used the same language this week in his latest letter to his Republican colleagues, this one on the topic of Donald Trump’s impeachment. This article from Politico, which focused on Lindsey Graham’s efforts to elicit votes against convicting, did use the phrase:
“[McConnell] also urged his colleagues to keep their powder dry in the run-up to the trial.”
In other words, it’s unclear if McConnell returned to the same metaphor. But the idea behind it remains. ‘Don’t commit,’ McConnell seems to say. ‘Wait until we know more. Or, if you’ve decided, let the rest of us wait to know more.’
Predictably, McConnell’s decision to not attempt to begin the trial immediately drew criticism from those who want Trump convicted. The argument he used in his public statement on the matter was one of precedent:
“Given the rules, procedures, and Senate precedents that govern presidential impeachment trials, there is simply no chance that a fair or serious trial could conclude before President-elect Biden is sworn in next week. The Senate has held three presidential impeachment trials. They have lasted 83 days, 37 days, and 21 days respectively.”
It’s possible McConnell’s decision was, indeed, motivated by a desire to not rush the proceedings. But it’s also possible McConnell had other motivations. The first could be, given that McConnell himself has reportedly indicated at least a lean towards a vote to convict, that the outgoing Majority Leader wants to weaken any precedent-based arguments, like those used by some House Republicans to oppose the impeachment vote. The second could be, once again, that McConnell wants to keep his powder dry.
There is a lot we don’t know about last week’s armed revolt. Details continue to emerge about what exactly happened, what exact plans rebels had, and what role certain members of the House may have had in the insurrection, not to mention whether a similar uprising will be attempted over the next week. Our knowledge of the facts is evolving.
But there’s something else that’s evolving too, and that’s the nation’s political/legal environment. Trump is struggling to find lawyers to defend him at the trial. Trump and many of his most rabid supporters have lost their access to mainstream social media, and thereby a great deal of their access to the public. Various traditionally-Trump-supporting media outlets and personalities are on the verge of having to battle a slew of defamation lawsuits holding them responsible for just one category of their baseless election fraud claims (the category involving Dominion Voting Systems), something that could theoretically hamper their willingness to side with an open revolt against the country. Major corporate donors are pausing political donations, most commonly to those who voted against certifying the votes of the people, as the uprising’s fallout continues. It’s unclear when Chuck Schumer, the new majority leader, would begin the trial following his assumption of power. Perhaps most importantly, it’s somewhat unclear what the public thinks, just as it was unclear in the immediate wake of Ginsburg’s death this September.
There is, to be sure, plenty that will remain unknown even after the trial commences, and even after it concludes. Whether conviction upon impeachment bars someone from again running for the office of president is evidently an area of at least a little disagreement among legal scholars; as is whether Congress’s 14th Amendment power to ban rebels from running for office applies to the office of president, and whether it would apply here (there’s also evidently still some legal disagreement as to whether a president can, indeed, be convicted following impeachment after his successor has been inaugurated, so unless I’ve missed something on that front, there’s still a chance the judicial branch is asked to weigh in at on the trial’s constitutional basis in that respect).
But more information is, indeed, coming out by the day, and it raises both a possibility and a near-certainty.
The near-certainty is that McConnell wants this trial to happen later for reasons related to gauging the political landscape. Will GOP fundraising be sunk for a decade if Trump is not convicted? Will Trump hold enough political sway in the days after his presidency to continue motivating his shrinking-but-still-sizable base? Are any bombshell reports on their way about the role of those Representatives, or potential roles of Trump administration allies and officials? These are major practical considerations, all of which align with McConnell’s seeming guiding motivation: Republican control of the Senate.
The possibility, meanwhile, is that McConnell is indeed leaning to vote to convict, and that he believes the landscape a delay affords will be one in which more of his colleagues will make the same decision. Whether the motivations for this would be Machiavellian (practical power considerations) or Washingtonian (principled regard for right and wrong in the realm of patriotism) is as unclear as whether this possibility holds water. But the possibility is there.
We don’t know what Mitch McConnell had in mind as he declined to immediately begin the trial. We don’t know what he has in mind right now. For the time being, like him, we must keep our powder dry.
