US President Donald Trump on Saturday claimed his polling numbers were up after the Senate paved the way for his acquittal next week on impeachment charges of abuse of power. The Senate on Friday rebuffed Democratic calls for new witnesses at Trump's trial, with a vote on whether to acquit him due on Wednesday - the day after he gives his annual "State of the Union" speech.
Trump is all-but-assured of being acquitted by the Senate, where Republicans hold 53 seats to 47 for the Democrats. A two-thirds majority, or 67 senators, is needed to remove a president from office.
"Trump poll numbers are the highest since election, despite constant phony Witch Hunts!" the president tweeted from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
"Tens of thousands of people attending rallies... Fun because USA is WINNING AGAIN!" he added.
Trump currently has a 44.6 percent approval rating in collated polls, almost exactly the same as when he came to office in January 2017, according to the RealClearPolitics website.
Democratic Party contenders competing to take on Trump in November's presidential elections campaigned on Saturday in Iowa ahead of the state's all-important caucuses on Monday.
The outcome could provide a major sign whether Joe Biden has maintained his front-runner status over Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg.
On Friday, just two Republican senators - Mitt Romney of Utah and Susan Collins of Maine - joined Democrats in voting to introduce further witnesses into the impeachment trial.
Democrats thus failed to muster the four Republican votes needed to allow testimony from Trump's former national security advisor John Bolton, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and others.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer called it a "grand tragedy."
"America will remember this day - a day when the United States Senate did not live up to its responsibilities, turned away from truth and instead went along with a sham trial," Schumer said.
Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic speaker of the lower chamber House of Representatives, which impeached Trump on December 18, accused Republicans of being "accomplices to the president's cover-up." "He is impeached forever," Pelosi said. "There can be no acquittal without a trial. And there is no trial without witnesses, documents and evidence."
Democrats had been eager to hear from Bolton following reports that he claims in an upcoming book to have been personally told by Trump that military aid to Ukraine was tied to Kiev investigating former vice president Biden.
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