Looks like the House may send that single article of impeachment over to the Senate as early as tomorrow.
"A group of Senate Republicans is warning Mitch McConnell, now the minority leader, of backlash if he votes to convict the former president," Poppy Harlow said.
"CNN's Lauren Fox is on Capitol Hill. For more on this, Lauren, this is your reporting. If the articles go to the Senate on Friday, how soon could a trial in the Senate begin, and is there talk of it being as short as three days?" Jim Sciutto said.
"Well, Jim, this is certainly part of the effort to move this process along so that it does not overshadow Biden's presidency for very long. Essentially, what we have heard from two sources now is that the plan could be to send these articles over as soon as tomorrow.
"Now, one of the complicating factors is the fact that former president Trump does not have a lawyer yet and that is essentially giving Democrats a little bit of pause about how fast they want to move forward with this. Remember, they are trying to make a case to the Republican colleagues in the U.S. Senate that this is a fair trial. Essentially, they want to make sure that he has representation. But we're hearing that these articles or this article could be sent over as soon as tomorrow. That potentially could put the Senate on track for having an impeachment trial as soon as next week.
"Now one of the other complicating factors here, of course, is whether or not any Republicans would vote to convict former president Trump. You've already heard from some Republicans who are arguing it's unconstitutional to hold an impeachment trial on an ex-president. You also have some Republicans saying that justice needs to be done here. So essentially a little bit of a divide. Meanwhile, minority leader Mitch McConnell has not said which way he would vote on a conviction charge. And you have Republicans who are arguing that the party cannot move forward without president Donald Trump in office as someone they can look to. So here's what Lindsey Graham said yesterday on Fox News."
"Again, McConnell facing potential backlash if he voted to convict former president Trump on that charge, that article of impeachment for inciting insurrection. But a lot of pressure here. Republicans still working through how to move forward in the days ahead," Fox said.
