Pelosi slams Senate sham trial: ‘You can’t be acquitted’ if you don’t have witnesses

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi hasn't played all her cards yet, and she's already declaring the Senate trial a sham. “I disagree with the idea that he could be acquitted," Pelosi told the South Florida Sun Sentinel Editorial Board on Friday. “You can’t be acquitted if you don’t have a trial, and you can’t have a trial if you don’t have witnesses and you don’t have documents."

Pelosi made the comments heading into a day of closing arguments in which Senate Republicans appeared poised for a vote to quash witness testimony entirely with an acquittal vote soon to follow. (That vote is now expected to be held next Wednesday, following the State of the Union.)

Pelosi also directed withering criticism at Trump's defense team. "To say in a proceeding in the Senate if a president thinks that his election is in the best interests of the country anything is justified," she said, referencing the argument made by Alan Dershowitz, "I don’t know how they have any integrity or respect left.” 

Pelosi said the argument was completely antithetical to the Constitution. “What you heard the president’s lawyer say so undermined what is a democracy, our republic, [by suggesting the Constitution’s] Article II says I can do whatever I want," she said. "No, it doesn’t. That’s not what the Constitution is about."

Pelosi also laid blame for the procedure squarely at Leader Mitch McConnell's feet. “The founders always had in their mind that there could be a rogue president, and that’s why they put guardrails in the Constitution. And impeachment," she noted. "But they probably didn’t figure we would have a rogue president and a rogue Mitch McConnell."

Pelosi said in the interview that House Democrats would continue their push in the courts for oversight and more subpoenas to be honored, “or else we have a monarchy.”

Pelosi clearly isn't finished yet. And given all the loose ends being left by Senate Republicans, she will almost surely spend the rest of 2020 pulling those threads. It's honestly a mystery that McConnell thinks he's going to get away without calling witnesses without Pelosi making life a living hell for Senate Republicans from here till November. 

New Bolton revelation: ‘The kind of bombshell Mitch McConnell has been afraid of all along’

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Former national security adviser John Bolton’s new revelation about White House counsel Pat Cipollone being in on Trump’s Ukraine conspiracy as early as May 2019 is dropping like a bomb on Washington. "This is the kind of bombshell that Mitch McConnell has been afraid of all along," reporter Kasie Hunt said on MSNBC.

Indeed, a day that seemed almost certainly headed toward a no-witness vote and fast acquittal just in time for Donald Trump’s victory laps on Fox News and at next week’s State of the Union address now holds a slew of question marks. Hill reporters are now musing that the Senate trial could go into next week, “maybe even mid-week,” tweeted Politico’s John Bresnahan. Trump’s already in damage control, tweeting out fantasies like a drunken sailor on hallucinogens. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski still hasn’t announced her vote on witnesses, which is bad news for McConnell because she hasn’t owed the GOP caucus anything since 2010, when she won reelection as a write-in candidate. Murkowski’s now a “no” on witnesses.

As Americans, we should still be rooting for witnesses. The citizenry deserves to hear from Bolton in his own words, among others.

But as Democrats, we can also feast on the political peril this represents for Republicans, who have now admitted that Trump did everything House managers said he did and that they just don’t care. As commentators on MSNBC absorbed the new Bolton bombshell, they almost unanimously declared it an electoral disaster in the making for Senate Republicans, especially given where public opinion has been on witnesses all along. 

"This makes that vote against witnesses political suicide,” former GOP operative Nicolle Wallace observed, adding, “I hope they take it."

Even former Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill was bullish on the prospects for Democrats. “If these Republicans shut this trial down and say, No more,” she said, “it is a great gift to the Democrats in November.”

As Sen. Kamala Harris noted before the news dropped, "There can be no true exoneration if there's not been a fair trial. Period." Now more than ever, Senate Republicans are also on trial. At least some of them seem to know it.

Elizabeth Warren asks killer trial question on Supreme Court legitimacy. Chief Justice Roberts wilts

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren clearly wanted Chief Justice John Roberts to ponder his place in history Thursday when she sent this doozy to him to read aloud at the Senate impeachment trial: “At a time when large majorities of Americans have lost faith in government, does the fact that the Chief Justice is presiding over an impeachment trial in which Republican senators have thus far refused to allow witnesses or evidence contribute to the loss of legitimacy of the Chief Justice, the Supreme Court, and the Constitution?” 

In other words: Hey, we all know this is a sham trial, the American people know this is a sham trial. Any chance you’ll do the right thing and protect the integrity of the court and your legacy by casting your vote for witnesses in the event of a 50-50 tie? Kapowie!

Do yourself a favor and watch Roberts read it below.

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We can all stop pretending Republicans want to preserve the republic. They don’t

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

L'état, c'est moi. I am the state. That is where we are—a declaration of self as sovereign once made famous by France's Louis XIV, whose pre-revolutionary reign as king lasted 72 years until his death in 1715. This appears to be exactly what Senate Republicans are preparing to embrace on Friday when they will likely vote against hearing witness testimony so they can summarily move to acquit Donald Trump without engaging even the most basic due diligence of any fair fact-seeking trial.

At least we won't have to endure any more insulting bothsidesisms from the media like this New York Times classic from December asserting that "the lawmakers from the two parties could not even agree on a basic set of facts in front of them." Actually, House Republicans hadn't even pretended to deal in facts, they were too busy deploying the distraction of emotional hyperbole. 

The failure of House Republicans to lay a factual foundation for Trump’s defense is exactly why, over the course of the past week, the arguments of Trump's legal team have effectively devolved from "he didn't commit a crime" to "it doesn't matter if he did" to "it's perfectly legal and acceptable for a president to break the law in pursuit of his self interests because his interests are the state's interests." 

“If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment,” Alan Dershowitz told U.S. senators Wednesday, only to refute himself on Thursday.

“The idea that any information that happens to come from overseas is necessarily campaign interference is a mistake,” White House deputy counsel Patrick Philbin offered. “Information that is credible that potentially shows wrongdoing by someone who happens to be running for office, if it’s credible information, is relevant information for the voters to know about.”

Trump's so-called "information" seeking about Biden was never credible. But that's clearly immaterial to Philbin. He doesn't even think Trump seeking something of value from a foreign government to win reelection is criminal, when it actually is under 52 U.S.C. 30121. But who cares? C'est la vie. He's president. Get over it. 

That's basically the exact same argument Trump made to ABC journalist George Stephanopoulos last June. "It's not an interference, they have information—I think I'd take it," Trump said of dirt offered to him by a foreign government. Trump also told Stephanopoulos that FBI Director Christopher Wray was "wrong" when he advised Congress that politicians should report any approaches made by foreign entities to the FBI.

The next day, Trump was momentarily shamed into walking back his comments, saying "of course" he would report such an instance to the FBI. That whiplash 180 came after Republican lawmakers like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham flatly rejected the idea of accepting foreign help in campaigns. “If a foreign government comes to you as a public official, and offers to help your campaign giving you anything of value, whether it be money or information on your opponent, the right answer is no,” Sen. Graham said on June 14, 2019.

Oh, those were the days, when Trump lackeys like Graham still gave at least some deference to the law.

Now the Wall Street Journal editorial board is endorsing the presidential exceptionalism that Trump’s lawyers advanced. "Every President equates his re-election self-interest with the public interest. It isn’t grounds for impeachment," read the subhead of the board's jaw-dropping editorial. The board cited Philbin asserting, “All elected officials, to some extent, have in mind how their conduct, how their decisions, their policy decisions, will affect the next election. ... It can’t be a basis for removing a President from office.”

In a rebuttal, House Intelligence Committee chair and floor manager Adam Schiff pointed out the disingenuousness of that argument. "We're calling that policy now. It's the policy of the president to demand foreign interference and withhold money from an ally at war unless they get it," Schiff said. "That's what they call policy. I'm sorry, that's what I call corruption."

But by Thursday morning, none other than the GOP chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee was echoing Philbin's folly. “I have no problem with what Philbin said,” Burr told reporters. “I think that the idea that any information that happens to come from overseas is necessarily campaign interference is a mistake. ... If it’s credible information, [it's] relevant information for the voters to know about.” 

In other words, Republicans are removing the origin of the information as the standard of criminality and replacing it with a subjective determination about whether the information is "credible." And according to Trump, the president, his corruption concerns were credible enough to bypass the U.S. Department of Justice on the way to demanding an investigation led by a government so corrupt, he wouldn’t release foreign aid to it. 

It doesn't pass the smell test, folks, but Schiff got it right on both counts. That's corruption, plain and simple. And that's also what Republicans call policy now.

Watch Schiff’s rebuttal.

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If Senate Republicans vote to block witnesses, just imagine what a monster Trump will become

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

It's extremely likely—though not a certainty—that Senate Republicans will make the short-sighted determination that blocking witnesses altogether will at least stem the bleeding for now. Just imagine, as veteran journalist Ronald Brownstein noted, what kind of message that will send to Donald Trump.

Over half the country now believes Trump should be removed from office (51% in both Pew and CNN polling, not mention 50% in Fox). Some 70% of Americans want witness testimony. Some 80% are clamoring by name for John Bolton, an erstwhile conservative hero who has indicated he has direct evidence that Trump did exactly what House managers have charged. Trump's defenders aren't even arguing anymore about whether or not Trump extorted/bribed Ukraine—he clearly did. All they are arguing is that Trump isn't impeachable no matter what he does—a clear shredding of all constitutional precedent and norms. 

Please give $3 to our nominee fund to help Democrats take the Senate back.

And yet, just imagine that against all reason, all evidence, a virtual consensus of public opinion, and a practical death blow to the Constitution, Republicans vote against witnesses and subsequently vote to acquit in time for Trump to take a victory lap on Fox News during the Super Bowl and finally at his State of the Union address. Just imagine how emboldened he'll be, how he'll take aim at anything or anyone with complete and total impunity. Just imagine what an unbelievable monster Senate Republicans will have created. It's frightening. 

Drip, drip, drip: Top House Democrat reveals Bolton expressed deep concern about Trump, Ukraine

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

As Senate Republicans attempt to recover from their tailspin in arguments over calling former national security adviser John Bolton to testify in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump, new information emerged Wednesday directly refuting Trump's assertion that Bolton never expressed concern about his Ukraine policy at the time.

In a statement Wednesday, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Eliot Engel relayed that Bolton "strongly implied" in a Sept. 23 phone call with him that Trump's ouster of U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was improper. “On that call, Ambassador Bolton suggested to me — unprompted — that the committee look into the recall of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch,” Engel said of a phone call between the two men. "He strongly implied that something improper had occurred around her removal as our top diplomat in Kyiv.”

In an attempt to dismiss Bolton's bombshell book excerpts, Trump tweeted Tuesday night that Bolton had said "NOTHING" about his Ukraine policy when Bolton was ousted from the White House last September. "Why didn’t John Bolton complain about this 'nonsense' a long time ago," Trump tweeted. Well, good news, Trump! He did. In fact, Bolton's use of the word "improper" implies that he may have even wondered whether Trump had done something illegal. 

Engel said he had contacted Bolton following his departure from the White House to thank him for his service when Bolton offered the information about Yovanovitch unsolicited. Engel added that he didn't speak publicly about Bolton's disclosure at the time, although he did share the information with his colleagues who were running investigations of Trump. "It was one of the reasons we wished to hear from Ambassador Bolton, under oath, in a formal setting," Engel said. Of course, Bolton refused that invitation at the time.

Now, however, Bolton has offered to testify under oath if subpoenaed by the Senate, leaving Senate Republicans in quite the bind after leaked excerpts of his book revealed that Trump told him directly that he wanted aid withheld from Ukraine until its officials undertook the investigations he wanted.

As Engel noted, Bolton has made clear that he has "more to say on the issue," and he deserves the chance to say it, particularly since Trump has smeared his account. "It's telling that, of all people, John Bolton is now the target of right-wing ire," Engel said, adding that the smears have only heightened the need to hear his testimony. 

Spoiler alert: Senate Republicans are screwed no matter what they do

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Senate Republicans seem to have finally gamed out the witness situation in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump at least a couple months past the actual vote—and they are in deep doo doo, to use a technical turn of phrase. Whether or not former national security adviser John Bolton appears as a witness in the Senate trial, his account is going to come out in book form mere months from now. As my colleague Mark Sumner writes, that's exactly why Senate Republicans are newly trying to sell the fantastical reasoning that Bolton's account doesn't matter one way or other, no matter what he ultimately says. That way, whether Americans get Bolton's account through testimony now or through his prose months from now, Senate Republicans can dismiss it as irrelevant to the matter of Trump’s removal from office. Again, this is an otherworldly take in which Trump is king and above the law, and Republicans completely shred the Constitution and everything it stands for in support of the most incompetent and corrupt president America has ever seen.

Now, as a practical matter, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell doesn't currently have the votes to quash Bolton’s testimony, as he has said. But why end the bluff now? First, so that the White House and other Trump cultists can apply maximal pressure to the Republicans who are potentially poised to make the rest of the GOP caucus look horrible by voting in favor of the only intellectually honest thing to do—hear from witnesses. McConnell's other concern is that he's up for reelection back home, where he's deeply unpopular, and he doesn't want to be caught solely holding the bag for losing this critical vote.

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All that said, anything can happen over the next couple of days of questioning in the Senate trial, which, it's worth remembering, will be curated by McConnell and will not be an organic process by any means. Nonetheless, perhaps more information à la another Bolton excerpt or a Lev Parnas interview will drop, completely roiling the GOP caucus. Or not. Although Utah Sen. Mitt Romney continues to say he wants to hear from witnesses, perhaps Trump's maximal pressure campaign will squelch the Romney faction, leaving only Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski (for process reasons) and Maine Sen. Susan Collins (for electoral reasons) to vote with Romney. That would leave the witness faction one vote shy of the four Republican votes necessary.

Whatever happens, my personal belief is that Senate Republicans will either fall short of what's needed to call witnesses or end up with more than four votes. No one wants to be tagged as being the "fourth vote," but if it starts to become clear in hushed conversations that the votes are there, then the witness faction will likely pick up several more votes rather than just one. People such as Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander and Ohio Sen. Rob Portman are potential additions, more for legacy reasons than anything else. And perhaps a vulnerable Republican such as North Carolina's Thom Tillis will join Collins in determining that a no vote on witnesses would be nearly impossible to defend. But again, outside of Collins, most vulnerable Republican Senators (e.g., Tillis, McSally, Gardner) appear to have determined that hugging Trump is the only way to win reelection (or perhaps lose but still have a future in GOP circles). In any case, my guess would be that the witness vote either falls short or draws four-plus support, depending on what happens between now and Friday.

Now for a couple of side notes: Don't fall for any of this ridiculous "witness trade" talk. Not only would it be stupid for Democrats to welcome a materially irrelevant witness like Hunter Biden in order to hear from Bolton, but the whole concept of a trade is a red herring. If Republicans have the votes to call Hunter Biden or Adam Schiff, they could and can do it. They have enough people in their caucus to authorize those witnesses without getting Democrats to sign off on it. So just let them stew in their juices over that. Democrats should remain focused on Bolton. And, as Schiff pointed out Tuesday, if they want a 1-for-1 trade, let them call someone relevant, such as acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, who has contradicted Bolton's account.

Finally, let's remember where this entire inquiry started—it was deemed a plank walk for Democrats at the outset when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi first announced it last fall. But she has played it masterfully, threading the needles of duty, oath of office, and public opinion all the way through. House Democrats managed to execute an inquiry that was seen as fair and has convinced a majority of the public that Trump should be removed from office, according to a preponderance of polling over the last month. Senate Republicans, at the moment, are now on the wrong side of the polling no matter what they do—whether they vote for witnesses and then acquit or forgo witnesses altogether and then acquit. Frankly, forgoing witnesses is their worst option, as a national consensus has emerged that witness testimony must be heard. If Senate Republicans choose to ignore some 70% of the population, they will pay the price at the ballot box in November. However, if they vote for witnesses, it opens a Pandora's box and McConnell loses control of the process. Win-win for Democrats. 

Ultimately, regardless of what Senate Republicans do, House Democrats still have the final play. If they aren't satisfied with the process the GOP-led Senate has undertaken, Pelosi and Schiff now have more reason than ever to subpoena Bolton's testimony. No one can be 100% sure of what Bolton would say under oath, but House Democrats still have the opportunity to have the final say on what the public hears when Senate Republicans conclude their sham trial. That's pretty damn close to a checkmate in terms of congressional chess-playing. 

To GOP’s delight, Trump’s attorneys turn impeachment trial into a Biden disinformation campaign

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

When Trump's personal attorney Jay Sekulow opened the floor arguments Monday in defense of his client, he had a simple message: Just the House facts, man. "We deal with transcript evidence, we deal with publicly available information," Sekulow said. "We do not deal with speculation—allegations that are not based on evidenciary standards at all." Trump's legal team wouldn't be dabbling with anything outside of the case that was transmitted to the senate by the house. In other words, the John Bolton bombshell directly implicating Trump in an extortion scheme was entirely off the table. 

What Sekulow forgot to mention was that, when it came to conspiracy theories about Joe and Hunter Biden, Team Trump would let their imaginations run wild. In fact, Trump attorney and former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi quoted a 2014 Washington Post article citing Hunter Biden's position on the Burisma board as “nepotistic at best, nefarious at worst.” Bondi claimed that the House managers referenced Biden or Burisma "over 400 times" as they made their case for impeachment, as if that alone was somehow an incriminating fact. In other words, Bondi quoted House Democrats who were quoting the disinformation injected into the ether by Trump and his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, and then she charged that the sheer quantity of those mentions was somehow dispositive. In reality, what she latched on to was nothing but a feedback loop created by Trump and his henchmen.

Bondi also implicitly put Biden on trial, making the ridiculous claim that Democrats must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump's accusations about the Bidens were baseless. She added that Democrats, by noting all those accusations had been debunked, were just creating "a distraction."

Actually, no. Bondi was creating the distraction—dangling her keys as it were before the American public in order to direct its gaze on Biden rather than Trump, who's the person actually on trial. 

But Senate Republicans were just thrilled by all that key dangling. Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst could barely contain herself as she was musing later about the effect all that disinformation might have on Biden's chances of winning Iowa.

"Iowa caucuses are this next Monday evening. And I'm really interested to see how this discussion today informs and influences the Iowa caucus voters, those Democratic caucus goers," Ernst said late Monday, beaming with the enthusiasm of a high school cheerleader. "Will they be supporting Vice President Biden at this point? Not sure about that."

Wow. Senate Republicans, supposedly weighing whether the nation's commander in chief tried to corrupt the 2020 elections with bogus investigations, are gleefully finishing the job Trump started. 

Wanna put the Senate back in the hands of people who actually put the country before their personal interests? Give $2 now to the effort to flip the Senate to Democratic control. 

Watch Ernst gush.

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As Republicans grapple with mounting pressure for witnesses, Americans have already decided

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Once again, the GOP is just catching up to where the nation already is, even as Republicans fight to remain in their hermetically sealed Fox News bubble. Following the bombshell John Bolton news, Senate Republicans are reportedly pulling each other aside and talking in hushed tones about potentially calling a witness or two during Donald Trump’s Senate impeachment trial. Gasp. 

Naturally, they're following the nation instead of leading it, as is the GOP way. If there is such thing as a national consensus these days in American politics, voters' desire to hear from witnesses is about as close as it gets. As MSNBC's Steve Benen pointed out, three major polls in the past week have all shown that at least two-thirds of respondents want new witness testimony in Trump's impeachment trial.

That includes:

66% in the latest Washington Post/ABC poll 68% in the latest AP-NORC poll 69% in the latest CNN poll

That’s about as much agreement as we’ll get on anything as politically charged as an impeachment trial. If Republicans blow it to protect Trump, their complicity in the cover-up will be more obvious than ever.

How desperate are Senate Republicans to silence Bolton? Desperate enough to throw away the republic

Posted on by Kerry Eleveld

Republicans don't give a damn about how dangerous Donald Trump is, or about the fact that he's selling our democracy to whichever foreign governments will help him get reelected. They are absolutely desperate not to hear directly from former national security adviser John Bolton. In fact, nothing could be worse than simply calling Bolton to testify under oath about what he knew and what he heard directly from Trump about withholding aid to Ukraine in exchange for investigations into Trump’s domestic political opponents, the basis for Trump’s impeachment.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said that the Bolton account wasn't worth exploring because it was just a marketing stunt: “This looks like a marketing tactic to sell books is what it looks like to me.” Gee, John, why not find out by calling Bolton in and asking him?

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Sen. Deb Fischer of Nebraska prefers a statement to actual testimony: “It doesn’t take a subpoena to put out a statement. I think if Ambassador Bolton has something to say he could  do that.” Also, Fischer is pretty sick of being asked about the biggest news of the day and likely even the entire impeachment trial so far: “Do you guys have memos on the same question to ask all the time? Just curious.”

Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri doesn't really care what the facts are—he's in Trump's camp no matter what: "I can’t imagine that anything he would have to say would change the outcome of the final vote."

Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming applied his blindfold to the "so-called blockbuster" Bolton report: "To me, the facts of the case remain the same."

Sen. John Thune of South Dakota echoed Barrasso’s nothing-to-see-here take: “I don’t think it changes the facts. ... I don’t personally see it as a game changer.”

And—wait for it—Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri is confused about what constitutes a first-hand witness: “Well, I don’t know. Is he a firsthand witness? I’m not sure.” LOL. Man, what a complete joker, unworthy of holding elected office—a proud moment for Missouri, no doubt. 

And Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst—who's already declared her undying fealty to Trump and the White House’s distorted version of events—is waiting to hear White House lawyers declare the earth is flat once again so she can agree with them wholeheartedly: “I’m sure they will address this now, and we go from there.”

Yep, that may be the one truthful thing uttered so far by Republicans on Monday morning. The White House counsel will absolutely try to twist the Bolton revelations one way or the other. Asked by a chorus of reporters about the Bolton report Monday morning, Trump was unusually short on words. "False" was all he offered. 

Senate Republicans were heading into an all-caucus meeting just before the impeachment trial resumes, and they will likely come out with a more tailored set of talking points intended to blunt the damage of the bomb that just dropped on them. They will also surely apply immense pressure on Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, the only GOP senator to signal any interest whatsoever in hearing from Bolton. Romney called it “increasingly apparent that it would be important to hear from John Bolton.” That’s what counts for courage these days in the Republican Party.