Gov. Phil Scott said Thursday that he trusts the Republican-controlled Senate to carry out a fair and transparent impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
“I trust the Senate and the integrity of the process to prevail,” Scott said, when asked if he believed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., would hold a fair impeachment trial.
“I believe in the transparency, the openness — taking whatever testimony is necessary — to come to the conclusion,” he said of the prospect of impeaching Trump. “I’ll leave it to the Senate.”
Scott’s comments come as the Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and other Democrats have criticized McConnell for how he plans to conduct the trial.
The impeachment trial officially began in the Senate Thursday. The House voted in December to impeach Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
The moderate Republican governor, who has sought to distance himself from the president, previously went against the grain of his party, and became the first prominent GOP official in the nation to back the House’s impeachment inquiry this fall.
“I believe we need to figure out what exactly did happen, establish the facts, and let the facts drive us from there to where we go,” Scott said in September.
McConnell has signaled he and Senate Republicans have already decided to defend the president in the impeachment process. The majority leader has also pushed for guidelines that dismiss demands by Democrats that new evidence be introduced and key witnesses testify.
“It would seem like a simple thing to say, ‘why not get all the facts’ — especially if we are talking about any way trying to influence or subvert an election in the oldest existing democracy,” Leahy told VTDigger Wednesday.
“That should give everybody pause, no matter what party you belong to,” Leahy added of McConnell’s decision to limit the trial.
Responding to Scott’s comments, former education secretary Rebecca Holcombe, a Democrat running for governor, said Thursday the Senate majority leader will protect the president throughout the trial.
“The governor says he trusts in the process of the Senate. Mitch McConnell has clearly stated: ‘I’m not an impartial juror.’ I believe Mitch McConnel when he says that,” Holcombe said.
Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman, a Progressive/Democrat who announced he was running for governor this week, said Scott could “do more” to speak out against the impeachment process in the Senate.
“I think our governor is in a unique position to really pressure the party that he is representing to help lead them back into the tradition of democracy that we in Vermont know so well,” Zuckerman said.
“The governor could do more,” he added.
