Impeachment Pressure Grows Among House Democrats

Key figures lean toward beginning proceedings after Trump told Don McGahn to defy a congressional subpoena

House Democrats faced a weekly closed-door meeting Tuesday morning prepared for a new round of debate over initiating proceedings for the impeachment of President Trump after former White House counsel Don McGahn said he would honor Mr. Trump’s order that he rebuff a congressional subpoena.

The House Judiciary Committee’s Democrats had already felt that the White House had been thumbing its nose at the committee. But Mr. McGahn’s refusal to appear Tuesday before the panel appeared to have exacerbated frustration among the panel’s Democrats, who were also annoyed that Attorney General William Barr didn’t show up to answer their questions and that the Justice Department hasn’t made available a fully redacted version of the report from special counsel Robert Mueller.

“If Don McGahn does not testify tomorrow [Tuesday], it will be time to begin an impeachment inquiry,” Rep. David Cicilline (D., R.I.) posted on Twitter Monday. Mr. Cicilline is chairman of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee and sits on the House Judiciary Committee, making him what aides see as an indicator of a shift within the Democratic caucus.

“You probably need to start impeachment inquiries,” Rep. Steve Cohen (D., Tenn.), another member of the panel, told CNN about the president. “He has run roughshod over the Constitution and he is disdainful of the American public and rule of law. He has engaged in a serious cover-up…and for the House to sit there and take it is wrong.”

Any impeachment proceeding begun in the House is expected to fall short of conviction in the GOP-controlled Senate.