The conclusion of former President Trump’s second impeachment trial and the timeline for increased vaccinations across the country are expected to dominate this Sunday’s talk shows.
House impeachment managers and Trump’s defense team gave closing arguments Saturday following days of evidence and arguments. The Senate ultimately voted 57-43 to acquit Trump, with seven Republicans crossing party lines.
Democrats had argued that the Senate should vote to convict Trump and then vote to prevent him from ever running for office again, while Trump’s defense team claimed the former president’s remarks challenging the results of the 2020 election were covered by the First Amendment and that he did not incite the deadly mob that stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Five Senate Republicans, including traditional Trump ally Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), voted with Democrats in favor of allowing witnesses in the impeachment trial, though this was later walked back with a deal between impeachment managers, Trump’s lawyers and top senators.
Graham’s decision was likely tied to his threat that Trump’s impeachment team would try to call a laundry list of witnesses if Democrats opened the door to depositions.
“If you want a delay, it will be a long one with many, many witnesses,” he tweeted Saturday.
Graham was one of the 43 Senators who voted to acquit the former president.
Graham is scheduled to appear this week on “Fox News Sunday,” as is Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar (Minn.)
Meanwhile, mass coronavirus vaccinations are expected to ramp up in the coming weeks and months after President Biden announced on Thursday that the U.S. had secured an additional 200 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine, thus increasing the supply by 50 percent, to 600 million doses.
He added that the administration has obtained enough doses from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech to inoculate every American by the end of July.
Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), will make a round of appearances on “Fox News Sunday,” as well as the Sunday talk shows on NBC, CBS and CNN.
Below is the full list of guests scheduled to appear on this week’s Sunday talk shows:
ABC’s “This Week” — Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Chris Coons (D-Del.); Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
NBC’s “Meet the Press” — Walensky; Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.); Gov. Larry Hogan (R-Md.)
CBS’ “Face the Nation” — Walensky; British Prime Minister Boris Johnson; Heyward Donigan, Rite Aid CEO.
CNN’s “State of the Union” — Walensky, Hogan
“Fox News Sunday” — Walensky; Klobuchar; Graham
Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures” — Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.); Ric Grenell, former acting Director of National Intelligence; Alan Dershowitz, Harvard Law professor emeritus; Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee; Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.), House Committee on Foreign Affairs.