Trump lawyers Sekulow & Philbin argued against calling witnesses in Senate impeachment trial (Jan 31, 2020)


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Trump’s legal team used just 27 minutes of their two hours allotted. This compressed version is only 20 minutes after removal of silences and pauses. Note that the Senate voted later not to call any witnesses.

The president’s defense team argued that additional witnesses aren’t necessary because the president’s behavior doesn’t constitute an impeachable offense.

Both White House deputy counsel Patrick Philbin and the president’s personal attorney, Jay Sekulow, argue that hearing from additional witnesses would be asking the Senate to do something the House should have done in its investigation.

“I think it’s very dangerous if the House runs up, which they did, articles of impeachment quickly, so quickly, that they are clamoring for evidence despite the fact that they put all of this evidence forward,” Sekulow said. “They got their wish of an impeachment by Christmas, that was their goal, but now they want you to do the work they failed to do,” he said.
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Philbin argued the framers wanted the impeachment trial process in the Senate to be “swift” with the House handling the potentially slower investigation to present the case, something they allege Democrats’ rushed because of the partisan nature of the charges against President Trump. “That’s all part of what makes this even more political especially in an election year. It’s not the process that the framers had in mind,” he said.

“The Senate is not here to do the investigatory work that the House didn’t do. Where there’s been a process that denied all due process, that produced a record that cannot be relied upon. And the reaction from this body should be to reject the articles of impeachment, and not the condone and put its imprimatur on the way the proceedings were handled in the House,” Philbin said.
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