senate's capacity to overcome it. again moments like this are why the united states senate exists. i yield the mr. mcconnell: mr. president, for the information of all of our colleagues, earlier this afternoon my friend, the democratic leader, and i had a cordial conversation. we discussed potential paths forward following the house democrats' precedent-breaking impeachment of president trump. our conversation was cordial, but my friend from new york continues to insist on departing -- departing -- from the unanimous bipartisan precedent that 100 senators approved before the beginning of president clinton's trial.

back in 1999, senators recognized that there might well be disagreements about questions that would arise at the middle and end of the trial, such as witnesses. and so here's what happened -- all 100 senators endorsed a commonsense solution. we divided the process into two stages -- two stages. the first resolution passed unanimously before the trial began. it laid groundwork such as scheduling, structural early steps like opening arguments. midtrial questions such as witnesses were left until the middle of the trial when senators could make a more informed judgment about that more contentious issue.

all 100 senators, including me, including senator schumer and a number of our colleagues both sides who were here in 1999, endorse the first resolution as a bipartisan minimalist first step. as of today, however, we remain at an impasse. because my friend, the democratic leader, continues to demand a new and different set of rules for president trump. he wants to break from that unanimous bipartisan precedent and force an all-or-nothing approach. my colleague wants a special pretrial guarantee of certain witnesses whom the house democrats themselves did not bother to pursue as they

assembled their case. or he wants to proceed without giving any organizational resolution whatsoever. so, as i said, we remain at an impasse on these logistics. for myself, i continue to believe that the unanimous bipartisan precedent that was good enough for president clinton ought to be good enough for president trump. fair is fair. now, mr. president, of course there is the matter of the articles of impeachment themselves. in a highly unusual step, speaker of the house continues to hem and haw about whether and when she intends to take the normal next step and transmit the house's accusations over here to the senate. some house democrats imply they are withholding the articles for

some kind of leverage, so they can dictate the senate process to senators. i admit, i'm not sure what leverage there there is in refrg us something we do not want. but, alas, if they can figure that out, they can explain it. meanwhile, other house democrats seem to be suggesting they'd prefer never to transmit the articles. fine with me. and the speaker of the house herself has been unclear on this her message has been somewhat mulled. -- muddled. so here's where we are, mr. president. we had the curious situation where following house democrats' rush to impeachment, following weeks of pronouncements about the urgency of the situation,

urgency swigs, the propers appear to have developed cold feet. the house democrat prosecution seems to have gotten cold feet and to be unsure of whether they even want to proceed to the trial. like i said, a very unusual spectacle. and in my view, certainly not one that reflects well on the house. so we'll see, we'll see whether house democrats ever want to work up the courage to actually take their accusations

>> there are features on previous impeachments. all at c-span.org. the sunday news programs focused on impeachment with satyrs previewing a set trial. chief to mike pence, laid off -- leads off. mr. short: as we transition to the senate, we understand mitch mcconnell and chuck schumer will strike a deal but we do find -- >> you are confident they will strike a deal? what will it look like? mr. short: chuck schumer said he wants to deal like the clinton impeachment yet that was 100-0, including chuck schumer himself voting for the deal