“WE’RE here to follow the rules,” Gov. Ralph DLG Torres said regarding the Senate impeachment proceedings.
He noted that the House has its own rules while the Senate also has its own rules, referring to the House leadership’s insistence that there should be a team of five House impeachment prosecutors instead of just one House prosecutor as stated in the Senate rules.
“There are the rules that the Senate has, so…we’ve got to follow those rules,” the governor said.
The Senate is scheduled to hear the governor’s motion at 10 a.m., Tuesday, April 19, to dismiss the articles of impeachment against him.
The governor was impeached by the House of Representatives on Jan. 12, 2022 by a vote of 15 to 4 with 1 abstention, on allegations of felonies of theft, corruption and neglect of duty. He has denied the charges.
At least six of the nine senators must vote to convict in order to remove the governor from office.
Torres, a Republican, is seeking reelection in November. His running mate is Senate Floor Leader Vinnie Sablan.
For her part, the Democratic candidate for governor, Rep. Tina M. Sablan, said the House, since the previous Legislature, has been “diligently conducting an investigation into Governor Torres’s public expenditures and violations of law.”
She added, “It was a painstaking investigation, huge volumes of documents, as well as hours and hours of testimony….”
That investigation culminated in the governor’s impeachment, she said.
She also noted that the Office of the Attorney General has filed criminal charges in Superior Court against the governor for his first-class off-island travels and failure to comply with a subpoena issued by a House committee investigating his public expenditures.
Sablan said these charges are reflected in the articles of impeachment, as well as in the record of impeachment that the House tried to submit to the Senate for the impeachment trial.
Ralph DLG Torres
