Adam Schiff is sworn into the Senate, where he wants to be more than an opponent of Trump

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrat Adam Schiff stood in the Senate as the House impeachment manager nearly five years ago and passionately argued that Donald Trump should be removed from office for abusing the power of the presidency. “If the good doesn’t matter, we’re lost,” he told senators, his voice cracking at one point.

The Republican-led Senate was not convinced, and senators voted to acquit Trump on the Democratic-led impeachment charge over his dealings with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump would survive a second impeachment a year later, after his supporters stormed the Capitol and tried to overturn his defeat.

Now Trump returns to the White House, politically stronger than ever and with a firm grip on what will be a unified Republican Congress. And Schiff, one of Trump’s leading opponents, will be sworn in in the Senate on Monday as part of a Democratic caucus that is moving toward the minority and has so far been reluctant to oppose the returning president, taking a more wait-and-see approach is. approach in the weeks before he is sworn in.

As California’s newest senator, Schiff says he won’t shy away from familiar territory: opposing Trump when he sees fit. But he also hopes to be known for his bipartisanship, having campaigned in Republican parts of his state and worked to learn more about rural issues that were not in his portfolio in his urban Los Angeles House district.

“I think being out there and letting people get to know me and pushing the envelope a little bit helps overcome some of the stereotypes of Fox News,” Schiff said of the conservative news channel’s focus on him when he Trump challenged in his first term. He says he also sees this information as a way to understand the direction Democrats are moving forward after losing in the November elections.

Schiff will be sworn in weeks before the new Congress convenes on January 3 as he fills the seat of former Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein, who died last year. He will join the Senate early this week along with Democratic House colleague Andy Kim of New Jersey, who is filling out the term of former New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez after he was convicted of federal bribery and resigned.

Bipartisanship was important to Feinstein, who often worked across the aisle and developed close relationships with other senators. But her work with Republicans also drew frequent criticism from California’s liberal voters.

Feinstein “was able to do a few things at once, which I’m going to have to try to do as well, and that is working with others to get results for the state, working across party lines to get things done, and at the same time Come on and defend people’s rights, their freedom and their values ​​when these things are threatened,” Schiff told The Associated Press in an interview before his swearing-in.

He says that in the age of Trump, these priorities will often conflict, “and so I’m going to have to try to do both.”

Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, who has spent time with Schiff as he prepares to join the Senate, says he thinks Schiff has the “right approach” of asking questions of other senators and refraining from ” to express an opinion at every opportunity’.

“Everyone knows his abilities, but he also understands that he is a freshman,” Schatz said, and it is appreciated when “someone of his stature understands that he is joining a team here.”

Still, Schiff, who was censured by Republicans in the House of Representatives last year for his involvement in investigations into Trump’s ties to Russia, will not immediately be able to shake off his long-standing role as the main Trump antagonist. The former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee is better known than most of his fellow incoming freshmen, and he has challenged Trump on social media in recent weeks and criticized some of his Cabinet nominees as many of his fellow Democrats have chosen to remain silent to stay. .

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He could become part of the story, just as Trump has vowed revenge on people he considers his political enemies. President Joe Biden has considered preemptive pardons for aides and allies like Schiff who tried to hold Trump accountable for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Trump once suggested that Schiff should be arrested for treason, calling him an “enemy from within.”

However, Schiff says he doesn’t think that’s necessary. He said Biden should not use his remaining days in office to defend him or others in Trump’s crosshairs.

And the former prosecutor has long experience defending himself against Republican attacks. Following the House censure, which occurred when fellow California Rep. Kevin McCarthy was speaker and Schiff was already running for Feinstein’s Senate seat, Schiff traveled to McCarthy’s district and met with local leaders. When asked by a conservative news outlet what he thought about McCarthy calling him a liar, “I replied something along the lines of, well, coming from Kevin, I’m sure he means that as some sort of compliment,” Schiff said . .

Schiff is unlikely to similarly go after his colleagues in the Senate, which he says is “culturally a very different place than the House of Representatives.” He has already tried to make inroads with Republicans, including new Senator Tim Sheehy of Montana, with whom he has talked about working together on wildfire legislation important to both states.

And he could potentially win some grudging respect from more experienced Republicans in the Senate, some of whom praised him during the 2020 impeachment trial even as they strongly disagreed with his premise and voted not to convict Trump.

After the first day of arguing, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina shook his hand and told him he did a good job. Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, who will become Senate majority leader next year, said at the time that Schiff “was passionate and his case was well stated.”

Schiff said he got the sense that some Republican senators were “a little surprised that I wasn’t this caricature,” and also that the Senate is a more collegial place than the House of Representatives.

“I don’t think it was a hurtful introduction,” he said.

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