Trump's legal team gears up for impeachment trial

Impeachment trial preview

President Donald Trump’s impeachment defense team has until noon Monday to file its legal brief to the Senate outlining its case for acquitting him.

With the Senate trial slated to start Tuesday, Trump’s defenders and the House impeachment managers — tasked with prosecuting the case for removing the president from office — went on the Sunday political talk-show circuit to preview the arguments each side plans to make in the coming days.

Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard Law professor emeritus, appearing on ABC’s “This Week” and CNN’s “State of the Union,” argued the two articles of impeachment against Trump did not rise to the constitutional standard for impeachment because they are not statutory crimes.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan), appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” fired back.

He asserted: “There is ample evidence, overwhelming evidence” that Trump acted criminally in his dealings with Ukraine.

“Any jury would convict in three minutes flat that the president betrayed his country by breaking the law,” said Nadler, who is one of seven House Democratic impeachment managers.

For a recap of the Sunday morning shows, read a story by Newsday’s Laura Figueroa Hernandez and Scott Eidler.

Dershowitz's defense

Even as Dershowitz made the Sunday talk show rounds in defense of Trump, he also sought to distance himself somewhat from the president’s legal team, saying he was brought on last week specifically to serve as an “advocate” and adviser on constitutional law issues and was not a part of other strategic discussions.

On “This Week,” Dershowitz was asked about a seven-page briefing issued by two of Trump’s lawyers on Saturday, in response to House Democrats’ 111-page briefing filed ahead of the Senate trial. He repeatedly said he had no involvement with the Trump team's legal statement.

“I didn’t sign that brief,” Dershowitz said. “I didn’t even see the brief until after it was filed. That’s not part of my mandate. My mandate is to determine what is a constitutionally authorized criteria for impeachment.”

Dershowitz is one of four lawyers hand-picked by Trump to add some high-profile names to his team. The president also named former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and former independent counsels Robert Ray and Ken Starr, as well as White House counsel Pat Cipollone and conservative lawyer Jay Sekulow.

Ray, appearing on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” echoed Dershowitz’s claim that the articles of impeachment against Trump were “illegitimate” because abuse of power is not a statutory crime.

“Well-founded articles of impeachment both allege that crimes were committed and that those are the type of crimes that constitute abuse of the public trust,” Ray said.

Awaiting the rules

With two days left until the impeachment trial, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had yet to include Senate Democrats in discussions about the rules that will govern the trial, said Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the No. 2-ranking Democrat in the Senate, during an appearance on "Meet the Press."

“We’re ... a little over 48 hours away from the trial actually commencing, and there hasn't been the most basic negotiation or exchange of information," Durbin said.

Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) offered some insights into the possible structure of the trial, telling "Meet the Press" host Chuck Todd that Republicans are considering a format that would give the House impeachment managers 24 hours, over two days, to present their case. Trump's defense team would then follow with the same amount of time. Senators would then have 16 hours to question both sides, with questions submitted first to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, who is presiding over the trial.

“Then we have, at that point, the opportunity to do exactly what we did after phase one in the Clinton trial, and that is to decide where we go from here: Do we have more witnesses, do we need clarification?” Perdue said, referring to the 1999 impeachment trial of former President Bill Clinton.

Deadlocked over witnesses

Democrats making the Sunday show rounds continued to argue that McConnell should allow additional witnesses to testify and compel the White House to turn over documents that were blocked from release during the House impeachment inquiry.

Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), one of the House impeachment managers, told "State of the Union": "This cannot be the first trial in American history, the first impeachment trial in American history, where we don’t have documents and witnesses produced by the president."

Republicans on the Sunday shows argued that if congressional Democrats can call witnesses, including former national security adviser John Bolton, then Trump’s team should be allowed to call those on his wish list, including former Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden.

“If we call one witness, we’re going to call all the witnesses — there’s not going to be a process where the Democrats get their witnesses and the president gets shut out,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said on "Fox News Sunday."

Twists, turns and firsts

The Republican-majority Senate is expected to acquit Trump, but there are still a number of “firsts” for this, the third impeachment trial in U.S. history.

For the first time, the trial will occur in a divided Congress, reports Newsday’s Tom Brune.

It’s also the first time the Senate is trying an impeachment case with mandatory attendance for its 100 members during an election year. Not only is Trump vying for reelection, but some of the senators acting as jurors in the trial also are sidelined from campaigning as the trial ensues. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) will miss critical time in Iowa, which holds its caucuses on Feb. 3.

For more of what to expect when the trial starts, read Brune’s story.

Janison: The company Rudy keeps

The spotlight is once again on one of Rudy Giuliani’s associates and their ties to a president.

Most recently, Ukrainian American businessman Lev Parnas has come under scrutiny following the release last week of hundreds of documents he provided to House Democrats that detail efforts by Parnas, Giuliani and others to pressure Ukrainian officials into opening an investigation into Trump’s Democratic rivals.

Parnas, in a round of interviews last week, said Trump was fully engaged in the pressure campaign — a claim the president has denied, saying he doesn’t know Parnas.

About 15 years ago, it was another Giuliani associate who ended up embarrassing a different Republican president, writes Newsday's Dan Janison, recalling Bernard Kerik, Giuliani's former NYPD commissioner turned business associate, and the George W. Bush Cabinet appointment that never panned out.

What else is happening:

• Trump addressed the American Farm Bureau Federation's annual convention in Austin, Texas, on Sunday afternoon, using the appearance to tout his trade policies, while asking: "What do I get out of it? I get impeached, that's what I get out of it."
• Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-Garden City), speaking at a forum on Long Island, argued that high housing and college costs and issues with the nation’s immigration system would remain unsolved as long as Trump remained in office, reports Newsday’s Michael O’Keeffe.
• State Sen. Todd Kaminsky (D-Long Beach) has endorsed Mike Bloomberg for president, citing the former New York City mayor’s work to combat climate change, pass gun control and help rebuild lower Manhattan after 9/11, reports Newsday’s Matthew Chayes.