Day 1,101: Trump’s legal team accidentally makes a great case for impeachment witnesses testifying

Senate Republicans have had a game plan for the impeachment trial of Donald Trump: compress the time frame, call no new witnesses, make it a farce and acquit Trump.

After House impeachment managers laid out a damning case for why Trump should be removed, Trump’s legal team, including White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Trump’s personal attorney Jay Sekulow, got its chance to begin their presentation on Saturday. They ended up accidentally making the case for needing additional witnesses to testify.

White House lawyers have opposed issuing new subpoenas. But Sen. Tim Kaine noted that one of their main objections to the impeachment process was that Trump’s lawyers were not allowed to cross-examine witnesses during their initial, closed-door depositions.

“They’re going to stand there and tell us cross-examination is the greatest engine for discovery of truth, but oh by the way we don’t want you to cross-examine witnesses,” said Kaine. “They made the case this morning for why documents and witnesses are absolutely necessary to resolve this.”

Moderate Democrats like Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) were perplexed by the Trump team’s defense, noting that witnesses could answer more questions than lawyers’ suppositions.

And at least one of the more moderate Republicans, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), indicated that he’s now “very likely” to support calling additional witnesses.

For what it’s worth, Trump’s legal defense team also lied over and over during their two-hour presentation.

1,101 days in, 361 to go

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