Impeachment 3: The MF Has Been Impeached! The Trial Has Begun!

[fraurosena]

WaPo:

Democrats call for Bolton to testify in Trump impeachment trial after new report on aid to Ukraine

Quote

Congressional Democrats called for former national security adviser John Bolton to testify in President Trump’s impeachment trial following a new report that the president told Bolton last August that he wanted to withhold military aid to Ukraine unless it aided investigations into the Bidens.

The New York Times reported Sunday evening that in last summer’s conversation, Trump directly tied the holdup of nearly $400 million in military assistance to the investigations of former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. That is according to an unpublished manuscript of Bolton’s forthcoming book, the Times said.

The book, “The Room Where It Happened,” is scheduled for publication March 17, but a White House review could attempt to delay its publication or block some of its contents.

Two people familiar with the book, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the project, confirmed that it details Trump tying aid to the desire for Biden probes and details a number of conversations about Ukraine that he had with Trump and key advisers, such as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. They said Bolton is ready to testify in the Senate impeachment trial.

In a joint statement, the seven House impeachment managers called the report “explosive” and urged the Senate, controlled by Republicans, to agree to call Bolton as a witness in Trump’s trial, which kicks off its second full week on Monday. Bolton has said that he would testify before the Senate if subpoenaed.

“The Senate trial must seek the full truth and Mr. Bolton has vital information to provide,” the managers said in a statement Sunday. “There is no defensible reason to wait until his book is published, when the information he has to offer is critical to the most important decision senators must now make — whether to convict the president of impeachable offenses.”

Trump is on trial, facing two charges — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

The assertion from Bolton could undermine one core defense that has repeatedly been laid out by Trump, his defenders and his legal team: that there was no explicit quid pro quo involved when the administration withheld the military assistance, as well as a White House visit coveted by Ukraine.

The president responded to the report early Monday, tweeting “I NEVER told John Bolton that the aid to Ukraine was tied to investigations into Democrats, including the Bidens. In fact, he never complained about this at the time of his very public termination.”

The White House has said that Trump’s request for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate the Bidens, as well as a discredited theory that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 elections, was because he was interested in rooting out corruption and that he did nothing improper.

The president’s legal defense team is expected to mount a vigorous defense on Monday when they deliver a full day of arguments against the impeachment charges.

The revelation from the Bolton book was certain to roil the dynamics of the trial this week, when the Senate was expected to face a critical vote on whether to allow witnesses at all.

Charles Cooper, a lawyer for Bolton, said he submitted the manuscript to the National Security Council’s records management division on Dec. 30 for a standard review process to examine potentially classified information. Cooper said they believed that the book manuscript did not include any classified material and that its contents would not be shared with officials outside that review process.

“It is clear, regrettably, from The New York Times article published today that the prepublication review process has been corrupted and that information has been disclosed by persons other than those properly involved in reviewing the manuscript,” Cooper said in the statement.

Sarah Tinsley, a spokeswoman for Bolton, added: “The ambassador has not passed the draft manuscript to anyone else. Period.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and many Senate Republicans would prefer the Senate avoid witnesses, but at least four GOP senators are seen as potential votes for favoring more testimony: Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Mitt Romney (Utah) and Lamar Alexander (Tenn.).

Romney and Collins have already indicated that they are likely to support hearing from witnesses and getting more evidence, and Romney has also said that he would like to hear from Bolton.

“The odds of deposition for new witnesses is certainly rising dramatically,” one senior Republican official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly assess party dynamics, said Sunday evening after the publication of the Times report.

“John Bolton has the evidence. It’s up to four Senate Republicans to ensure that John Bolton, Mick Mulvaney, and the others with direct knowledge of President Trump’s actions testify in the Senate trial,” Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a tweet.

Earlier Sunday, Trump escalated his attacks on Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), issuing what appears to be a veiled threat against the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

“Shifty Adam Schiff is a CORRUPT POLITICIAN, and probably a very sick man,” Trump tweeted Sunday morning. “He has not paid the price, yet, for what he has done to our Country!”

Schiff is the lead impeachment manager in the Senate trial.

Schiff responded in an interview on NBC News’s “Meet the Press,” saying he believes that Trump’s remarks were intended as a threat.

“This is a wrathful and vindictive president; I don’t think there’s any doubt about it,” Schiff said in the interview. “And if you think there is, look at the president’s tweets about me today, saying that I should ‘pay a price.’ ”

“Do you take that as a threat?” host Chuck Todd asked.

“I think it’s intended to be,” Schiff replied.

White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said it was “ridiculous” for Schiff to claim that Trump was threatening him. In an appearance on Fox News Channel’s “Media Buzz,” she accused the California Democrat of “grandstanding,” although she acknowledged that she had not had an opportunity to ask Trump what he meant by the tweet.

“I think he means . . . [Schiff] hasn’t yet paid the price with the voters,” Grisham said.

She also echoed Trump’s attack earlier Sunday on Schiff, saying: “I mean, it seems he’s having a little bit of a mental issue when you sit on the floor for hours and hours and hours. He’s obsessed with this president and trying to take him down.”

Democrats contend that Trump has continued to publicly solicit foreign interference in U.S. elections and that the integrity of the 2020 race is at risk. The president fired back Sunday by leveling the same accusation at his political opponents.

“The Impeachment Hoax is a massive election interference the likes of which has never been seen before,” he said in a tweet.

Some Republicans on Sunday defended Trump’s remarks about Schiff. In an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said he was not troubled by Trump’s declaration that Schiff “has not paid the price.”

“I don’t think it’s a death threat. I don’t think he’s encouraging a death threat,” Lankford said.

Host Jake Tapper responded by saying that “people who are supporters of the president have heard his rhetoric and then actually tried to bomb and kill politicians and the media.”

This prompted Lankford to refer to the 2017 congressional baseball shooting that targeted Republicans and injured several people, including House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.).

“So to be able to say the president’s trying to be able to spur this on would be able to say Democrats were trying to spur on the killing” of Republicans, Lankford said.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), who is also an impeachment manager, called Trump’s tweet about Schiff “really unfortunate” and said the president has said things before “that seem threatening to people.”

“He really ought to get a grip and be a little more presidential,” she said on “State of the Union.”

In a tweet later Sunday morning, Trump also took aim at Todd, accusing the “Meet the Press” host of holding a “softball interview” with Schiff and “never even calling Shifty out on his fraudulent statement to Congress, where he made up ALL of the words of my conversation with the Ukrainian President!”

Both sides continue to spar over the question of whether the Senate trial will include witnesses. Some key Senate Republicans, already hesitant on the issue, became even more so over the weekend after Schiff referred to a CBS News report in which an anonymous Trump ally was quoted as having warned lawmakers, “Vote against the president and your head will be on a pike.”

 

Here's the original NYT article:

Trump Tied Ukraine Aid to Inquiries He Sought, Bolton Book Says

Quote

President Trump told his national security adviser in August that he wanted to continue freezing $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine until officials there helped with investigations into Democrats including the Bidens, according to an unpublished manuscript by the former adviser, John R. Bolton.

The president’s statement as described by Mr. Bolton could undercut a key element of his impeachment defense: that the holdup in aid was separate from Mr. Trump’s requests that Ukraine announce investigations into his perceived enemies, including former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his son Hunter Biden, who had worked for a Ukrainian energy firm while his father was in office.

Mr. Bolton’s explosive account of the matter at the center of Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial, the third in American history, was included in drafts of a manuscript he has circulated in recent weeks to close associates. He also sent a draft to the White House for a standard review process for some current and former administration officials who write books.

Multiple people described Mr. Bolton’s account of the Ukraine affair.

The book presents an outline of what Mr. Bolton might testify to if he is called as a witness in the Senate impeachment trial, the people said. The White House could use the pre-publication review process, which has no set time frame, to delay or even kill the book’s publication or omit key passages.

Just after midnight on Monday, Mr. Trump denied telling Mr. Bolton that the aid was tied to investigations. “If John Bolton said this, it was only to sell a book,” he wrote on Twitter, reprising his argument that the Ukrainians themselves felt “no pressure” and falsely asserting that the aid was released ahead of schedule.

Over dozens of pages, Mr. Bolton described how the Ukraine affair unfolded over several months until he departed the White House in September. He described not only the president’s private disparagement of Ukraine but also new details about senior cabinet officials who have publicly tried to sidestep involvement.

For example, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo acknowledged privately that there was no basis to claims by the president’s lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani that the ambassador to Ukraine was corrupt and believed Mr. Giuliani may have been acting on behalf of other clients, Mr. Bolton wrote.

Mr. Bolton also said that after the president’s July phone call with the president of Ukraine, he raised with Attorney General William P. Barr his concerns about Mr. Giuliani, who was pursuing a shadow Ukraine policy encouraged by the president, and told Mr. Barr that the president had mentioned him on the call. A spokeswoman for Mr. Barr denied that he learned of the call from Mr. Bolton; the Justice Department has said he learned about it only in mid-August.

And the acting White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, was present for at least one phone call where the president and Mr. Giuliani discussed the ambassador, Mr. Bolton wrote. Mr. Mulvaney has told associates he would always step away when the president spoke with his lawyer to protect their attorney-client privilege.

During a previously reported May 23 meeting where top advisers and Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, briefed him about their trip to Kyiv for the inauguration of President Volodymyr Zelensky, Mr. Trump railed about Ukraine trying to damage him and mentioned a conspiracy theory about a hacked Democratic server, according to Mr. Bolton.

The White House did not provide responses to questions about Mr. Bolton’s assertions, and representatives for Mr. Johnson, Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Mulvaney did not respond to emails and calls seeking comment on Sunday afternoon.

Mr. Bolton’s lawyer blamed the White House for the disclosure of the book’s contents. “It is clear, regrettably, from the New York Times article published today that the pre-publication review process has been corrupted and that information has been disclosed by persons other than those properly involved in reviewing the manuscript,” the lawyer, Charles J. Cooper, said Sunday night.

He said he provided a copy of the book to the White House on Dec. 30 — 12 days after Mr. Trump was impeached — to be reviewed for classified information, though, he said, Mr. Bolton believed it contained none.

The submission to the White House may have given Mr. Trump’s aides and lawyers direct insight into what Mr. Bolton would say if he were called to testify at Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial. It also intensified concerns among some of his advisers that they needed to block Mr. Bolton from testifying, according to two people familiar with their concerns.

The White House has ordered Mr. Bolton and other key officials with firsthand knowledge of Mr. Trump’s dealings not to cooperate with the impeachment inquiry. Mr. Bolton said in a statement this month that he would testify if subpoenaed.

In recent days, some White House officials have described Mr. Bolton as a disgruntled former employee, and have said he took notes that he should have left behind when he departed the administration.

Mr. Trump told reporters last week that he did not want Mr. Bolton to testify and said that even if he simply spoke out publicly, he could damage national security.

“The problem with John is it’s a national security problem,” Mr. Trump said at a news conference in Davos, Switzerland. “He knows some of my thoughts. He knows what I think about leaders. What happens if he reveals what I think about a certain leader and it’s not very positive?”

“It’s going to make the job very hard,” he added.

The Senate impeachment trial could end as early as Friday without witness testimony. Democrats in both the House and Senate have pressed for weeks to include any new witnesses and documents that did not surface during the House impeachment hearings to be fair, focusing on persuading the handful of Republican senators they would need to join them to succeed.

But a week into the trial, most lawmakers say the chances of 51 senators agreeing to call witnesses are dwindling, not growing.

Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, said the Bolton manuscript underscored the need for him to testify, and the House impeachment managers demanded after this article was published that the Senate vote to call him. “There can be no doubt now that Mr. Bolton directly contradicts the heart of the president’s defense,” they said in a statement.

Republicans, though, were mostly silent; a spokesman for the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, declined to comment.

Mr. Bolton would like to testify for several reasons, according to associates. He believes he has relevant information, and he has also expressed concern that if his account of the Ukraine affair emerges only after the trial, he will be accused of holding back to increase his book sales.

Mr. Bolton, 71, a fixture in conservative national security circles since his days in the Reagan administration, joined the White House in 2018 after several people recommended him to the president, including the Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson.

But Mr. Bolton and Mr. Trump soured on each other over several global crises, including Iranian aggression, Mr. Trump’s posture toward Russia and, ultimately, the Ukraine matter. Mr. Bolton was also often at odds with Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Mulvaney throughout his time in the administration.

Key to Mr. Bolton’s account about Ukraine is an exchange during a meeting in August with the president after Mr. Trump returned from vacation at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J. Mr. Bolton raised the $391 million in congressionally appropriated assistance to Ukraine for its war in the country’s east against Russian-backed separatists. Officials had frozen the aid, and a deadline was looming to begin sending it to Kyiv, Mr. Bolton noted.

He, Mr. Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper had collectively pressed the president about releasing the aid nearly a dozen times in the preceding weeks after lower-level officials who worked on Ukraine issues began complaining about the holdup, Mr. Bolton wrote. Mr. Trump had effectively rebuffed them, airing his longstanding grievances about Ukraine, which mixed legitimate efforts by some Ukrainians to back his Democratic 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton, with unsupported accusations and outright conspiracy theories about the country, a key American ally.

Mr. Giuliani had also spent months stoking the president’s paranoia about the American ambassador to Ukraine at the time, Marie L. Yovanovitch, claiming that she was openly anti-Trump and needed to be dismissed. Mr. Trump had ordered her removed as early as April 2018 during a private dinner with two Giuliani associates and others, a recording of the conversation made public on Saturday showed.

In his August 2019 discussion with Mr. Bolton, the president appeared focused on the theories Mr. Giuliani had shared with him, replying to Mr. Bolton’s question that he preferred sending no assistance to Ukraine until officials had turned over all materials they had about the Russia investigation that related to Mr. Biden and supporters of Mrs. Clinton in Ukraine.

The president often hits at multiple opponents in his harangues, and he frequently lumps together the law enforcement officials who conducted the Russia inquiry with Democrats and other perceived enemies, as he appeared to do in speaking to Mr. Bolton.

Mr. Bolton also described other key moments in the pressure campaign, including Mr. Pompeo’s private acknowledgment to him last spring that Mr. Giuliani’s claims about Ms. Yovanovitch had no basis and that Mr. Giuliani may have wanted her removed because she might have been targeting his clients who had dealings in Ukraine as she sought to fight corruption.

Ms. Yovanovitch, a Canadian immigrant whose parents fled the Soviet Union and Nazis, was a well-regarded career diplomat who was known as a vigorous fighter against corruption in Ukraine. She was abruptly removed last year and told the president had lost trust in her, even though a boss assured her she had “done nothing wrong.”

Mr. Bolton also said he warned White House lawyers that Mr. Giuliani might have been leveraging his work with the president to help his private clients.

At the impeachment trial, Mr. Trump himself had hoped to have his defense call a range of people to testify who had nothing to do with his efforts related to Ukraine, including Hunter Biden, to frame the case around Democrats. But Mr. McConnell repeatedly told the president that witnesses could backfire, and the White House has followed his lead.

Mr. McConnell and other Republicans in the Senate, working in tandem with Mr. Trump’s lawyers, have spent weeks waging their own rhetorical battle to keep their colleagues within the party tent on the question of witnesses, with apparent success. Two of the four Republican senators publicly open to witness votes have sounded notes of skepticism in recent days about the wisdom of having the Senate compel testimony that the House did not get.

Since Mr. Bolton’s statement, White House advisers have floated the possibility that they could go to court to try to obtain a restraining order to stop him from speaking. Such an order would be unprecedented, but any attempt to secure it could succeed in tying up his testimony in legal limbo and scaring off Republican moderates wary of letting the trial drag on when its outcome appears clear.

 

[Xan]

3 hours ago, fraurosena said:

John Roberts Can Call Witnesses to Trump’s Trial. Will He?

How much of a political conservative is Justice Roberts?

Remember the "hanging chads" debacle in Florida?  John Roberts was one of the lawyers Dubya sent down to create a scene.  I would hope that being a Supreme would have given him cause to think about trying to be impartial -- but I'm not going to hold my breath on that.

[fraurosena]

1 minute ago, Xan said:

Remember the "hanging chads" debacle in Florida?  John Roberts was one of the lawyers Dubya sent down to create a scene.  I would hope that being a Supreme would have given him cause to think about trying to be impartial -- but I'm not going to hold my breath on that.

Never heard of this. Can you elaborate?

[Xan]

3 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

Never heard of this. Can you elaborate?

In Bush/Gore election, the Repubs sent down a bunch of lawyers to "oversee" the process.  They made a scene in the hallway outside the office where people were counting and checking ballots for hanging chads.  (Florida used punch cards and sometimes the punch didn't go all the way through.  The recount office spent time trying to decide if enough of the "hanging chad" was still attached to not count the vote.)

Most recent article about it in the spoiler box below.

Spoiler

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-jul-21-na-recount21-story.html

 

Edited January 27, 2020 by Xan

[fraurosena]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

 

Before 2016, if someone told me I'd agree with either Amash or Walsh about almost any topic, I would have assumed they were on heavy-duty drugs. Now, it's scary that they are saying and writing things that don't repulse me.

[fraurosena]

I am purposely not following the 'defense' during the 'trial', because they're totally predictable and absurd, and they would only make me frustrated and angry. 

I am am enjoying the rebuttals from the House Intelligence Committee though.

 

There are more if you follow the link and scroll.

[fraurosena]

Oh.my.deer.Rufus!

Professor Tribe agrees:

 

[fraurosena]

When even the expert on Constitutional Law that the trumplicans in the House had testify for them disagrees with you.

 

[fraurosena]

And here you have a prime example of how disinformation works.

How I wish I knew how to end this propaganda network without abusing the right to free speech. This network, together with Sinclair, and aided and abetted by McConnell in the Senate, are directly responsible for the rise of the Trump dictatorship. 

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[front hugs > duggs]

I feel like CNN took this very important Impeachment update like 5 paragraphs longer than it needed to be:

[GreyhoundFan]

On 1/25/2020 at 12:03 PM, GreyhoundFan said:

Read what happened after this interview:

Pompeo needs to go.

 

And the fun continues. Of course Pompous Pompeo hates NPR. He hates anything to do with intelligent reporting. I agree with Mr. Nichols.

 

[fraurosena]

Sometimes I think they're undermining him on purpose. Nobody can be this stupid.

 

[fraurosena]

Former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly tells Sarasota crowd ‘I believe John Bolton’

Quote

Asked if Bolton - Trump’s former national security adviser - should testify at Trump’s impeachment trial, Kelly said he supports calling witnesses.

President Donald Trump is denying that he told former National Security Advisor John Bolton he wanted to withhold military aid from Ukraine until the country launched investigations into Joe Biden and his son, allegations that Bolton levies in his new book, according to news reports.

But one of Trump’s former top aides told a Sarasota audience Monday evening that if the reporting on what Bolton wrote is accurate, he believes Bolton.

“If John Bolton says that in the book, I believe John Bolton,” said retired Gen. John Kelly, who served as Trump’s chief of staff for 18 months.

Kelly spoke Monday at the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall as part of the Ringling College Library Association Town Hall lecture series. The general worked with Bolton during his time as chief of staff, which ended in early 2019. Kelly said Bolton is an honest person.

“Every single time I was with him ... he always gave the president the unvarnished truth,” Kelly said of Bolton, who has become a figure of intense interest in the impeachment inquiry.

According to the New York Times, Bolton writes in a new book that Trump personally told him he did not want to release nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine until the country investigated Democrats, including the former vice president and his son.

The House impeached Trump last year, alleging the president abused his power by leveraging the military aid to try to benefit himself politically.

Trump denies ever tying the aid to the investigations.

“I NEVER told John Bolton that the aid to Ukraine was tied to investigations into Democrats, including the Bidens,” Trump tweeted recently, adding: “If John Bolton said this, it was only to sell a book.”

Asked about the passages in Bolton’s book — which has yet to be released — that appear to reinforce the impeachment allegations, Kelly said Monday evening that “John’s an honest guy. He’s a man of integrity and great character, so we’ll see what happens.” Kelly ended his answer by saying he believes Bolton.

There are growing calls for Bolton to testify in the Senate impeachment trial, something GOP leaders have resisted. Kelly said he supports calling witnesses during the trial.

“I mean half of Americans think this process is purely political and shouldn’t be happening but since it is happening the majority of Americans would like to hear the whole story,” Kelly said.

“So I think if there are people that could contribute to this, either innocence or guilt ... I think they should be heard,” Kelly said, adding: “I think some of the conversations seem to me to be very inappropriate but I wasn’t there. But... there are people that were there that ought to be heard from.”

Next we'll hear that Kelly is a never-Trumper.

[JMarie]

8 hours ago, fraurosena said:

And here you have a prime example of how disinformation works.

How I wish I knew how to end this propaganda network without abusing the right to free speech. This network, together with Sinclair, and aided and abetted by McConnell in the Senate, are directly responsible for the rise of the Trump dictatorship. 

The bland fellow on the left is Jeff Van Drew, Democrat congressman who voted against impeachment, then switched to the Republican party the following week. Trump has a (big?) rally in Van Drew's district today.

[fraurosena]

Oh, deer Rufus be praised!

 

Hmmm. Now I’m confused. Do they or don’t they have the votes?

 

[fraurosena]

But, if Rick Wilson says it’s true... then it's true, right? 

 

Good grief, Rufus help me, this yes they do, no they don’t is so frustrating I feel like throwing something!

 

[formergothardite]

I don't want to get my hopes up. I have called and sent emails to my senators. Tillis is up for re election and he is on shaky ground so he might be swayed either way. Piss off Trump and he could lose, piss off everyone else and he could lose. It just comes down to who he thinks has more power over his election, Trump or the democrats in NC. 

[GreyhoundFan]

From Dana Milbank: "Trump’s defense, lost in space"

Spoiler

Danger, Will Robinson!

Republican Sens. Jim Lankford (Okla.) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) came up with a novel plan to avoid summoning witnesses to President Trump’s impeachment trial, despite John Bolton’s late bombshell. They would have senators gather in a secure facility called a SCIF (sensitive compartmented information facility) to read the manuscript of the former Trump national security adviser’s book.

It would be the world’s most highly classified book club! While they’re hanging out in the SCIF, maybe senators could (by unanimous consent, of course) binge-watch some favorite TV shows.

I suggest they catch up on “Lost in Space.” It would help them better understand Trump’s impeachment defense.

In the ’60s cult classic, recently revived by Netflix, 11-year-old Will Robinson and his space-colonizing family, forced to crash-land on an alien planet, must fight to survive in the strange and hostile environment light years from home.

Trump’s lawyers, in three days making their case on the Senate floor, characterized the president in similar terms: surrounded on all sides by dangerous aliens trying to harm him. Jim Comey! Robert Mueller! Peter Strzok! Lisa Page! Bruce and Nellie Ohr! Christopher Steele! Impeachment managers!

“Danger, danger, danger!” cried out Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow. The Trump lawyers invoked “danger” some two dozen times in 90 minutes Tuesday.

The House delayed sending impeachment articles to the Senate.

“Danger, danger, danger!” Sekulow said.

The articles cite no specific violation of law.

“Danger, danger, danger!”

The House managers would trample attorney-client privilege, Sekulow alleged.

“Danger, danger, danger!”

They are setting the “bar of impeachment” too low, he claimed.

“Danger, danger, danger! These articles must be rejected.”

No, Will Robinson! Does not compute! I cannot accept that course of action!

The bizarre closing argument fits neatly with Trump’s worldview, from his apocalyptic acceptance speech to his American-carnage inaugural, to his daily complaints that he is the perpetual victim maltreated by many foes. Trump reportedly found his attorneys’ legal arguments boring on Monday, so they closed with something more his speed: fear.

The president’s entire defense was like a sci-fi series. The plot wasn’t terribly complicated (lawyers used only about 14 of their allotted 24 hours). There were robots (Patrick Philbin) and aliens (Ken Starr, Alan Dershowitz). There were special effects and simulated explosions. And there was an overriding tale of good against evil, in which a perfect protagonist battles powerful, dark forces.

“The president did nothing wrong,” his lawyers wrote in their brief.

“The president has done absolutely nothing wrong,” White House Counsel Pat Cipollone declared in his opening arguments.

“Everything here was done correctly,” Philbin asserted Tuesday.

“The president at all times acted with perfect, legal, authority,” Sekulow echoed.

In real life, nobody believes this; even Starr, in a more honest moment, criticized Trump’s “extraordinarily poor judgment.” But in our sci-fi version, our hero makes the “perfect call” and bravely meets danger after horribly unfair danger.

Philbin declared that the House managers were making a “dangerous” move and that the Framers thought it “dangerous.” How dangerous? “One of the greatest dangers.”

Sekulow followed this warm-up by declaring that “you can’t view this case in a vacuum” and invoked many favorite Trump villains who have nothing to do with impeachment: Comey, Page, Strzok, the Ohrs, Steele, the dossier, the FBI’s FISA court abuses — and that terribly dangerous Mueller. “Bob Mueller allowed the evidence on the phones of those agents to be wiped clean while there was an investigation going on!” Sekulow said.

Like his boss’s Twitter stream, Sekulow’s argument ricocheted from dubious complaint to extraneous grievance: Spies surveilling the Trump campaign. Democrats running for president. Managers criticizing Trump for acting in his own self-interest when he’s working at “the highest level to obtain peace in the Middle East.” A disagreement over whether managers spent 21 or 23 hours making their case. Burisma and those corrupt Bidens! An “ongoing corruption” problem in Ukraine. Bolton’s “inadmissible” allegations in that “unpublished manuscript.” A “scary” situation.

Um, relevance? “You’ve now heard from legal scholars, from a variety of schools of thought, from a variety of political backgrounds,” Sekulow said, “but they do have a common theme, with a dire warning: Danger, danger, danger!”

Repeatedly in his recitation of perils, Sekulow told the senators to put themselves “in the shoes of the president,” and for a moment I was filled with sympathy for Trump.

It must be terribly scary for Trump to be lost on this alien, dangerous planet, with only a robot (played by Stephen Miller) for a friend. And we must do everything we can to help him return to wherever he came from.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Trump’s impeachment defense: Who is paying the president’s lawyers?"

Spoiler

As President Trump faces mounting legal bills from his impeachment trial, he is drawing on national party coffers flush with donations from energized supporters — unlike the last president to be impeached who left the White House “dead broke.”

The Republican National Committee is picking up the tab for at least two of Trump’s private attorneys in the ongoing trial, an arrangement that differs from the legal fund then-president Bill Clinton set up, only to see it fail to raise enough to cover his millions of dollars in bills before he left office.

The law firms of Trump’s lead lawyer, Jay Sekulow, and attorney Jane Raskin, have received a total of $225,000 from the RNC through November, according to the most recent campaign finance reports. The party will pay the duo for their work this month and likely into February as the trial continues, according to people familiar with the arrangement who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal financing.

The president’s legal team also includes celebrity lawyer Alan Dershowitz, former independent counsel Kenneth Starr and former Florida attorney general-turned lobbyist Pam Bondi — all of whom have raised their profiles and earnings potential with frequent media appearances defending Trump.

Because Trump is on trial as a result of his status as an officeholder or candidate, election law allows him to dip into campaign or party funds for his legal bills.

“We are more than happy to cover some of the costs of defending the president from this partisan impeachment sham,” said Mike Reed, RNC deputy chief of staff for communications.

The president is benefiting from a measure in a 2014 law that dramatically increased how much national parties can raise by allowing them to collect large donations for separate accounts to finance presidential conventions, building renovations and legal proceedings. Trump Victory, a joint fundraising committee of the Trump campaign and the RNC, transferred about $2.7 million into the RNC’s legal account from September through November, as the impeachment inquiry escalated, according to campaign filings.

Donors to the RNC and Trump’s reelection campaign have already covered millions of dollars in attorney fees stemming from the president’s other legal travails: former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, court battles over the president’s tax returns, and a now-withdrawn defamation lawsuit filed by a former campaign staffer.

The House investigation, December impeachment vote and Senate trial, Reed said, have been a boon to fundraising efforts. Reed said there have been more than 600,000 new donors since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) formally announced the impeachment inquiry in late September.

“The Democrat impeachment charade is the gift that keeps on giving for our side,” Reed said.

Dershowitz, whose clients have included O.J. Simpson and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, said he will not accept payment for his work. “For me, it’s a matter of principle,” said Dershowitz, who argued Monday that the House charges of abuse of power and obstruction do not meet the constitutional standard of impeachment. “If I am paid, it will go to charity. I will not keep any money I get from this case.”

Among the other private attorneys are Raskin, a Florida-based lawyer who since 2018 has worked for Trump navigating Mueller’s probe; Starr, whose investigation into former president Bill Clinton formed the basis of his impeachment; Robert A. Ray, Starr’s successor in the independent counsel office; and Eric D. Herschmann from the law firm of Trump’s longtime lawyer Marc Kasowitz.

Starr declined to talk about his legal fees or to comment for this story. Ray, Herschmann and Raskin did not return messages seeking comment.

Those lawyers work in tandem with a set of attorneys from the Office of the White House Counsel, led by Pat Cipollone, who represents the president in his official capacity.

Seated around a cramped, arc-shaped table in front of the president’s jury of 100 senators, the government lawyers include Patrick F. Philbin, who worked with Cipollone at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis, and Michael M. Purpura, a former federal prosecutor and top Justice Department official. They receive taxpayer-paid, annual salaries between $168,000 and $183,000, according to an annual report of White House personnel.

Bondi joined the White House staff late last year after lobbying for clients such as the state of Qatar and General Motors. Bondi did not respond to requests for comment about her salary.

House Democrats, who serve as prosecutors at the trial, also have enlisted outside legal help. In a brief filed before the impeachment trial, they acknowledged assistance from 16 lawyers who work for the House, in addition to five attorneys led by David A. O’Neil with the firm Debevoise & Plimpton. Those lawyers are not charging the House for their work, according to a spokesperson for Pelosi.

As Clinton faced impeachment in 1998, supporters established a trust fund to raise money to cover the Clintons’ bills, which eventually exceeded $10 million because of the years-long Whitewater investigation into a real estate deal, the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit and the impeachment proceedings and trial.

“Fundraising would spike when anything significant happened in the investigation or trial,” said Richard M. Lucas, who was counsel to the Clinton Legal Expense Trust. “Average Americans wanted to express their view about what was happening.”

Clinton’s popularity surged after his acquittal by the Senate in early February 1999 and in quick order — by late that month — his legal defense fund had raised more than $4.5 million.

Most of the trust money flowed to two Washington law firms: Williams & Connolly and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.

Yet even with the legal fund, Hillary Clinton said in a 2014 interview that the couple left the White House “not only dead broke, but in debt” as she defended the millions of dollars she and the former president earned giving paid speeches and writing books. The former secretary of state later said she regretted the remark.

Unlike Clinton, who was in his second term during the impeachment trial, Lucas said Trump and the Republican Party have more leverage to solicit donations ahead of Trump’s 2020 reelection bid. “The party has become an extension of the administration,” Lucas said.

As Trump declared in one recent campaign fundraising email: “The Senate Impeachment Trial is today and the only way we can win this war is if every patriot steps up and becomes a 2020 Sustaining Member … I want to raise TWO MILLION DOLLARS in the NEXT 24 HOURS and end this Impeachment Trial Scam once and for all.”

Trump’s campaign committee is not directly paying impeachment-related legal bills, according to a campaign official, although the campaign does transfer money to the RNC from time to time.

The 2014 measure that lifted some limits on national party fundraising means that along with a $35,500 check to the RNC, a donor also can spread $319,500 between the additional accounts for conventions, headquarters and legal proceedings.

The provision was crafted by leaders of both parties with the help of leading campaign finance attorneys, including Marc Elias, former general counsel of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. That the well-known Democratic election lawyer had a hand in expanding the amount the RNC can raise for Trump’s impeachment trial is not lost on some campaign finance reformers.

“It was horrible the way we blew up the limits on donations to national parties because it allows people to buy access and influence,” said Paul S. Ryan, a vice president at Common Cause, a government watchdog group. “Contrary to popular perception, the Democratic Party has long fought to loosen restrictions on money and politics, hand-in-hand with the Republicans. The public doesn’t think that because Democrats on the stump talk about campaign finance reform.”

Elias defended the creation of the legal proceedings account, saying the Democratic Party has used that money to fund lawsuits challenging what it sees as voter suppression tactics around the country. “So while Democrats are using the money to protect voting rights, Republicans are using the money to protect Trump from removal,” Elias said.

One donor who gave the maximum contribution to the RNC in recent months, thereby padding the account for legal proceedings, was New York billionaire John Catsimatidis.

“I want to defend the president,” Catsimatidis said of his donation. “He did not do high crimes and misdemeanors.”

In addition to the two sets of Trump lawyers in the Senate chamber this week, the president’s written legal brief lists another five private attorneys who work for a nonprofit Christian legal organization run by Sekulow.

The group, the American Center for Law and Justice, employs and contracts with several of Sekulow’s relatives and companies they control, The Washington Post has reported. The ACLJ raises tens of millions of dollars each year from supporters of its antiabortion advocacy.

Sekulow’s private law firm, the Constitutional Litigation and Advocacy Group, has received $120,000 from the RNC so far for impeachment work, according to public records. The firm was also paid $6.1 million by the ACLJ in the year ending April 2019, according to a tax return filed to the IRS last fall. Sekulow owns 50 percent of the law firm.

During a break in the trial last week, Sekulow was asked about his role and compensation.

“I wouldn’t say paid adviser, I’m the president’s retained counsel,” Sekulow told reporters. “So I don’t discuss my legal fees, but we’re paid for our legal skills.”

 

[fraurosena]

5 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Because Trump is on trial as a result of his status as an officeholder or candidate, election law allows him to dip into campaign or party funds for his legal bills.

Wtf?? And nobody thought about how this would affect impartiality?

How bloody stupid can you get?

5 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Those lawyers work in tandem with a set of attorneys from the Office of the White House Counsel, led by Pat Cipollone, who represents the president in his official capacity.

This has been bothering me too. It isn’t the WH counsel’s job to defend the person occupying the office. It’s his job to defend the office itself. He has no business defending Trump. He can only defend the presidency. And the presidency is not on trial in the impeachment. Trump is.

[fraurosena]

Schrödinger's book.

 

Edited January 29, 2020 by fraurosena

[front hugs > duggs]

Can somebody please remind him of all the mistakes he makes on TV?

[Flossie]

1 hour ago, front hugs > duggs said:

Can somebody please remind him of all the mistakes he makes on TV?

Mistakes?  He makes no mistakes.  Everything he does is perfect.

Now if it turns out later that he appeared to be mistaken, it was because someone gave him the wrong information or that the situation changed, and how can he be held responsible if that happens?  The horrible media are the ones making it seem like he's wrong.