Will Impeachment Trial Keep Bernie Sanders Off Campaign Trail?

Just like it did in 2016 — déjà vu all over again.

And it looks as though the DNC enlisted the services of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat who’s been holding up the articles of impeachment against the president — purportedly to strong-arm the GOP-controlled Senate.

Without surprise, the delay had no effect on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The Kentucky Republican even found her game-playing humorous.

But House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, D-Calif., disclosed on “Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo” that he believes the delay had nothing to do with any attempt to control the Senate trial — it was about pushing Sanders out and nominating former Vice President Joe Biden.

“This is the dirty little secret that no one is talking about — why the speaker held these papers,” he said.

McCarthy observed that the impeachment trial of former President Bill Clinton lasted five weeks, and that during an impeachment trial, senators are required to sit silently for six hours a day, six days a week.

“The senators have to be in their desks. They cannot have a phone, they cannot talk to one another, and they stay in their desks,” he said.

Before the House can even get the articles of impeachment over to the Senate, the lower chamber “first has to name the managers and vote on it,” McCarthy told Bartiromo. “I find it very difficult for the Senate to even start impeachment this week.”

That would put the earliest possible opening Senate trial date at January 20.

The Senate Democrats running for president who will be chained to their desks Monday through Saturday every week of the trial would include Michael Bennett of Colorado, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and of course Sanders.

February kicks off the Democratic presidential caucus and primary season, beginning with:

• February 3: Iowa Caucus
• February 11: New Hampshire Primary
• February 22: Nevada Caucus
• February 29: South Carolina Primary

Super Tuesday is scheduled three days later, March 3, when 14 states plus American Samoa and Democrats living abroad will vote for Democratic presidential candidates.

McCarthy observed that “What this does is this benefits Joe Biden and harms Sen. Sanders, who’s in first place [in Iowa] and could become their nominee, because he will be stuck in a chair, because Nancy Pelosi held the [impeachment] papers different than what she said to the American public why she had to move so urgently.”

What McCarthy didn’t add is that Pelosi delayed sending the articles of impeachment as long as she could. She didn’t agree to do so until late last week, after McConnell said he would support a resolution changing the Senate rules to allow that body to dismiss the articles of impeachment before the House even sent them over.

After that Pelosi had no choice but to agree to release them. It was either that or watch the Senate dismiss the articles altogether, freeing Sanders to campaign unabated.

Donna Brazile, the former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee, revealed in November 2017 that Hillary Clinton took over the DNC and unfairly denied Sanders any chance at the 2016 presidential nomination. Her campaign was even funded in large part by the DNC during the rigged nomination process.

It was for that reason that Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., resigned as DNC chairwoman during the Democratic National Convention. Brazile’s revelations added detail and confirmation to what was initially only suspected.

When Brazile’s findings were revealed, former Sanders campaign staffer Tezlyn Figaro told Fox News host Tucker Carlson that it corroborated everything she’d been saying all along.

“I can’t say ... whether he would have won the nomination or won the presidency,” she said. “But what I do know is that he did not receive a fair shot.”

One thing’s pretty obvious: The Republican National Committee didn’t place so much as a pinky finger on the presidential nomination scale. Almost no one calling himself an “expert” expected him to be the Republican nominee.

But Trump, as it turned out, lit a spark within non-establishment Republicans — just as Sanders did and continues to do with non-establishment Democrats.

But Republicans were willing to allow the process to play out; Democrats did not, and if McCarthy is correct, they still won’t to this day.

Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and has been a frequent contributor to BizPac Review and Liberty Unyielding. He is also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and an enthusiastic Second Amendment supporter, who can often be found honing his skills at the range. To read more of his reports — Click Here Now.