PBS News Hour - Politics

There is still no official word on when a Senate impeachment trial of President Trump might begin. The lack of forward movement is due to an ongoing impasse between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. To make sense of the situation, Lisa Desjardins talks to Nadeam Elshami, former chief of staff to Pelosi, and Steven Law, former chief of staff to McConnell.

The impeachment process against President Trump has remained largely frozen in place since the holidays began. There is still no firm start date for a Senate trial, and some aspects of how such a trial would be run remain in flux. Among the top questions: would the Senate hear testimony from new witnesses like John Bolton? Yamiche Alcindor and Lisa Desjardins join Judy Woodruff to discuss.

In 2019, the Democratic primary race was dominated by domestic issues. But during the first weekend of the new year, the targeted killing of a top Iranian general in a U.S. airstrike put foreign policy in the spotlight. Sen. Bernie Sanders condemned the action, while Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg and former Vice President Joe Biden questioned its strategic value. Amna Nawaz reports.

NPR's Tamara Keith and Lisa Lerer of The New York Times join Judy Woodruff to discuss the latest political news, including how the killing of a top Iranian general could affect U.S. policy in the Middle East, President Trump's reelection strategy and 2020 Democrats, why Republicans are supporting Trump on Iran, the latest poll numbers from Iowa and why this primary campaign is "unprecedented.

As the 2020 presidential campaign heats up, candidates are facing an unprecedented challenge: the growing scale and variety of disinformation online. John Yang reports on the difficulty of verifying that content is authentic and not manipulated -- especially when it has been shared by a public figure.

Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week's political news, including the U.S. military's killing of elite Iranian general Qassam Soleimani and its potential repercussions and how fundraising and polling numbers are stacking up for 2020 Democrats a month before the Iowa caucuses.

The past year marked dramatic changes and new trends in campaign finance. In 2019, two billionaires bankrolled their own presidential campaigns, while other candidates wooed big donors with pricey fundraisers. And some contenders struggled to take in enough cash to keep their campaigns running. The Washington Post's Michelle Ye Hee Lee joins Judy Woodruff to discuss 2019 money in politics.

President Trump is seeking reelection in the fall of 2020, and to win it, he will be relying upon one of his strongest voting blocs: white evangelical Christians. But are there signs emerging of a rift within this previously solid group of Trump supporters? The Christian Post's Richard Land and the Gospel Coalition's Collin Hansen join Lisa Desjardins to discuss compromise and Christian values.

Before leaving town for the holidays, lawmakers came together to pass a huge federal spending bill that illuminates the government's policy priorities for 2020. The deal allocates a total of $1.4 trillion to the military, education, a barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border and much more. Lisa Desjardins joins Nick Schifrin to discuss where American tax dollars will be going this year.

In the final weekend of the year, candidates for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination traversed Iowa and New Hampshire to rally support for primary contests that are now only weeks away. The end of 2019 also comes with a fundraising deadline. Meanwhile, former Vice President Joe Biden changed his stance on whether he would testify in a Senate impeachment trial. Lisa Desjardins reports.