The Latest: Pelosi blasts ‘cover-up’, but urges patience
The Latest on Congress and investigations into President Donald Trump (all times local):
10:35 a.m.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, meeting with Democrats behind closed doors Wednesday, tamped down the push among some Democrats to launch an impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump.
She stressed the need for patience and pointed to legal battles that she said have already found success in forcing Trump to comply with investigations, according to a person familiar with her remarks.
Speaking to reporters later, Pelosi made it clear she’s not letting Trump off the hook. She said Trump is “engaged in a cover-up.”
Some Democrats urging impeachment say the move would not necessarily be aimed at removing the president, but instead to bolster their position in court as they conduct their investigation.
Pelosi’s remarks to Democrats were described by a person who spoke on condition of anonymity because the person wasn’t authorized to discuss the private meeting.
–Lisa Mascaro
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8:10 a.m.
The chairman of the House intelligence committee has postponed a meeting to enforce a subpoena against the Justice Department after the department agreed to hand over a cache of documents related to special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
California Rep. Adam Schiff said the department “will begin turning over to the committee twelve categories of counterintelligence and foreign intelligence materials as part of initial rolling production.”
On Tuesday, the department offered to provide documents if the committee agreed not to enforce the subpoena. Schiff had said the panel would take “enforcement action” but had not specified if that would be contempt of Congress or some other sort of action.
The agreement is a rare detente in escalating tensions between Congress and President Donald Trump’s administration over oversight matters.
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12:15 a.m.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is feeling the heat from a small but growing number of House Democrats calling for impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump.
Trump’s latest defiance of a congressional investigation of his administration and his own actions came Tuesday when he ordered his former counsel, Don McGahn, to refuse to appear at a House hearing despite a subpoena.
Pelosi has taken a methodical approach to the idea of impeachment and is calling a meeting on Wednesday to discuss strategy.
Some Democratic leaders are backing Pelosi but signaling that a march to impeachment may at some point become inevitable.
The Democratic majority leader, Maryland’s Steny Hoyer, says lawmakers might be confronting the largest cover-up in American history and that if a House inquiry leads to impeachment, “so be it.”
