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Monday, February 1, 2021
New attorneys for impeachment
Trump is rebuilding his defense
Donald Trump puts his defense in new hands. A few days before the impeachment process begins, the former president changes his legal team. The reason apparently is differences of opinion about the correct process strategy.
Shortly before the impeachment process against Donald Trump began in the Senate, the former president of the United States reorganized his defense. Trump’s office announced Sunday night (local time) that the new defense team would be led by “highly respected trial attorneys” David Schoen and Bruce Castor.
CNN broadcaster reported Sunday that the previous team had “practically collapsed” because the five lawyers who had been proposed so far would not represent Trump. The reason for this was differences in defense strategy, CNN reported. Trump demanded that lawyers focus on his unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud rather than questioning the legality of impeachment proceedings against a president who has already resigned.
The process in the Senate will begin in the second week of February. Before that, the first written statements of the defendant and the House of Representatives are planned. The announcement from Trump’s office said that Schoen and Castor agreed that the trial against Trump was unconstitutional. A large majority of Republicans in the Senate also recently adopted this view: 45 of the 50 Republican senators in the chamber supported a motion from their own ranks in which the process was described as unconstitutional because Trump has already left office.
The House of Representatives, controlled by the Democrats, decided to open an impeachment process for “inciting a riot” on January 13. The background was the assault on the Capitol by Trump supporters a week earlier. Following Trump’s conviction, Democrats are calling for the former president to be suspended for life at the federal level. This would rule out a possible Trump candidacy in the 2024 presidential election. The two-thirds majority in the Senate, which is necessary for a conviction, is not emerging. This would require 17 Republicans to vote with all 50 Democrats.
It is also controversial among lawyers whether impeachment procedures against a former president are constitutional. The corresponding constitutional article explicitly names the presidents, vice presidents, and government officials against whom such procedures may be directed. However, the Congressional Scientific Service (CRS) writes: “It appears that the majority of scholars who have studied the issue have concluded that Congress has the power to extend impeachment to government officials who already They are not in Are’s office. “
