This is the Impeachment Briefing, the Times’ newsletter on the impeachment investigation. Sign up here to get it in your inbox.

  • At a press conference, Spokeswoman Nancy Pelosi declined to tell reporters when House Democrats could bring the article on the lone impeachment of President Trump in the Senate, and questioned when a trial could begin.

  • In her remarks at the Capitol, the speaker made it clear that her first priority was to ensure the safety of the building and the legislature before Mr Biden’s inauguration next week.

  • Behind the scenes, the Democrats worked with Republican leaders to come up with a proposal that would allow the Senate to split the time between the impeachment trial and considering Mr Biden’s agenda, including his cabinet candidates.

    Editor’s Note: This newsletter will not be published next week as much of Washington will be focused on the inauguration of President-elect Biden. We will be returning on Monday, January 25th – unless events dictate otherwise.

I asked my colleague Nick Fandos, who is covering the Congress, what we can expect in the coming days.

Nick, what are legislators working on right now?

There have been so few impeachment trials in American history. At the beginning, the senators have to agree on the parameters of a process. How long will the indictment last? How long will the defense last? Will there be witnesses? Once they do this, a process begins. It goes on until the senators feel they have the information they need to vote or condemn.

Shall we wait a while longer?

The reason there is currently a lull is because the House and Senate will try to get this process through at a really precarious time, when a new president is sworn into office and the Senate is about to confirm his cabinet.

Even before the article goes out, the Republicans in the Senate and House of Representatives, in consultation with Nancy Pelosi and the Biden team, are trying to see if they can agree to a set of rules that will allow the Senate to set up a double lane that will be half the day used for hearings and votes to confirm Biden’s cabinet, and half the day could be used for a Senate trial.

With the ongoing threat of unrest in the country, there is additional pressure to achieve this. The new administration must be able to put a team in key national security positions in the Justice Department and the Pentagon. For example, if Pelosi holds on to the item until a week after Biden’s inauguration, the Senate will have the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday after he is sworn in to vote on national security affirmations.

What kind of legal proceedings does the legislature want to hold? Is the timing important?

The property managers who will be pursuing the case are also currently debating whether to try to move really fast and have a quick action, as if they had a quick impeachment, trying to use the simple facts related to the uprising. There is overwhelming anger in the Senate and the property managers can try to get the Republicans on record quickly.

But there is a competing school of thought among Democrats that the more information comes out about the insurrection, the worse the case against President Trump becomes. They could call witnesses and evoke more Material. A stronger case might mean a more likely conviction, they would argue, but building it up also slows Biden’s agenda.

Then what can we expect next week?

The House Democrats could well submit the article shortly before or after the inauguration, and then the Senate would have to quickly move into litigation mode. But it is hard to imagine that we will deal with the flesh or substance of the process until next week.

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