-Without objection, so ordered.
The Senate is adjourned.
-Drumroll! -Hello, guys.
Good to see you.
-I have a constitutional responsibility to be a juror
in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump.
-The US senators who are running for president flock to Iowa
as soon as President Trump's
impeachment trial adjourns for the weekend.
They have 48 hours to campaign.
And the first-in-the-nation caucus is just over a week away.
-Thank you, Ames! -Meanwhile,
in spite of the impeachment trial,
the president's re-election campaign is in full swing.
-The American people are disgusted by the Washington
Democrat wish -- And you see it.
You see it.
Which is worse?
The impeachment hoax or the witch-hunts from Russia?
-I love my country and our Constitution.
I will argue that our Constitution and its terms,
high crimes and misdemeanors,
do not encompass the two articles
charging abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
-But will Republicans call in witnesses
or will there be a swift acquittal?
-Alright, here we are.
It's week two of the impeachment trial.
We are into what is the second day
of the president's defense team and their presentation.
But their presentation got a little bit rocked
on Sunday night when "The New York Times"
had confirmed the reports that John Bolton's book,
the former National Security Adviser,
who's writing a book about his days
inside the Trump White House,
would include dozens upon dozens of pages
outlining what he experienced regarding the Ukraine campaign.
-Senate leaders from both sides reacted to Bolton's book
on Tuesday morning.
Up first, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.
-Ambassador Bolton essentially confirms the president
committed the offenses
charged in the first article of impeachment.
-Two Republicans, Senator Mike Braun and Senate Republican
Conference Chair John Barrasso, send mixed messages,
saying the book isn't worth the excitement,
but that it could influence how their party votes
on hearing from witnesses.
-I think there's gonna be something new coming out
every day, very similar
to what we saw in the Kavanaugh trial.
-But I'm not gonna deny it's gonna change the decibel level
and probably the intensity
at which we go about talking about witnesses.
We're not gonna overturn one election and prevent another.
Thank you. -Where's Senator Graham?
Where's Senator Lindsey Graham?
-He was surrounded by press on the first floor
and couldn't get out.
-They liked that. -Yeah.
-Senators, happy Monday.
-While the public gets to see senators and both legal teams
from a single video feed inside the chamber,
most senators at the trial are out of view.
Inside the Senate Chamber,
Trump's legal team includes eight high-profile attorneys,
who outline a wide array of defenses against Trump's
alleged abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Kenneth W Starr is a familiar face,
because, in 1998, he was the independent counsel
who investigated President Bill Clinton's impeachment case.
Trump's team largely avoids the topic of Bolton's book.
-Those of us who lived through the Clinton impeachment,
including members of this body, full well understand
that a presidential impeachment is tantamount to domestic war,
albeit a war of words and a war of ideas.
But it's filled with acrimony
and it divides the country like nothing else.
-Quid pro quo alone is not a basis for abuse of power.
It's part of the way foreign policy
has been operated by presidents since the beginning of time.
-Trump's team also brings in Harvard
law professor Alan Dershowitz,
who provided commentary during Clinton's impeachment.
White House counsel Pat Cipollone is leading
President Trump's defense team.
-They have been trying to impeach the president
from the moment of his inauguration -- for no reason.
-Today's Trump presentation has dramatically shifted in tone.
-Years later now, former Vice President Biden
publicly details what we know happened --
his threat to withhold more than $1 billion in loan guarantees
unless Shokin was fired.
-They shifted gears and they've gone
into a more aggressive offensive posture
in which they're trying to really prosecute
the case against Hunter Biden and Joe Biden.
We've really hit a sort of turning point in the trial,
and not sure where it's gonna go.
-Please be seated.
If there is no objection,
the journal of proceedings of the trial are approved to date.
The Majority Leader is recognized.
-We expect several hours of session today
with probably one quick break.
-President Trump's lawyers wrap up their defense presentation
in just two hours on Tuesday.
They reiterate much of what Trump has said himself.
-To remove a duly elected president,
which is what you're being asked to do,
for, essentially, policy disagreements --
They didn't like there was a pause on foreign aid.
I laid out before that there was pauses
on all kinds of foreign aid.
It's not the first president to do it.
-Some Republicans agree with Dershowitz
that witnesses aren't necessary.
-There is no conflict here.
-While another group of GOP senators isn't convinced.
-The criteria that I offer I have long called
"the shoe on the other foot test."
As a thought experiment, I respectfully urge each of you
to imagine that the person being impeached
were of the opposite party of the current president
but that, in every other respect,
the facts were the same.
-I am pretty sure that the Republicans,
if President Obama had done any of this,
he would have been impeached so fast, your head would spin.
-Thank you. -Okay.
-Mr Chief Justice, I ask unanimous consent
that the trial adjourn until 1:00 pm,
Wednesday, January 29th, and that this order
also constitute the adjournment of the Senate.
-Without objection, we're adjourned.
-After adjourning, the divided GOP caucus follows
Leader McConnell into a private meeting
to strategize for the next day's trial
and to discuss the question of witnesses.
House impeachment managers quickly respond to the defense.
-The bulk of Mr Sekulow's argument was,
"This is merely a policy difference."
No one believes that.
-With both sides' opening arguments complete,
the Senate turns to a 16-hour session of questions
and answers spread over two days.
-Thank you. I send a question to the desk
on behalf of Senator Patty Murray and myself.
-Mr Chief Justice, I send a question to the desk.
I send a question to the desk.
-The pace of today, first of all,
is incredibly different from the entire trial so far.
It's quick.
They get five minutes, each side.
There's a question from the Senate Republicans.
-"Why did the House of Representatives not challenge
President Trump's claims of executive privilege?"
-And then a question from Senate Democrats.
-"Is there any way for the Senate
to render a fully informed verdict in this case
without hearing the testimony of Bolton, Mulvaney,
and the other key eyewitnesses?"
-They didn't even subpoena John Bolton below.
-Of course we asked John Bolton to testify in the House,
and he refused.
-Ran into Cornyn, who's the longtime GOP rep.
He said there aren't the votes there for witnesses.
I actually think there's more cold water
on the whole witness scenario right now on the GOP side.
-Alright, well -- -So, I think --
At this point, it's what? 10:00 am?
I think, by the end of the day, the story could be
"support for witnesses rocky."
-Or does Bolton drop some other card on the table?
Okay. -Alright.
Alright.
-Cool. I'll see you.
Um -- Give me one minute.
-And 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.
-Substantively, today has been a little bit less partisan.
They've gone into some deep legal issues here.
And Alan Dershowitz sort of elongated on this legal theory
that even if Trump did it, he wasn't guilty.
Democrats were furious about it.
And Republicans have generally been very happy with Dershowitz,
because he sort of allows them to say, "Yeah, Trump did it.
Trump did some stuff we don't really like.
But it's not really impeachable."
-"That's what he said? Whatever I want?
Here's what I want.
I want Adam Schiff.
I want Hunter Biden. I want Joe Biden."
And, by the way, if we get anybody we want,
we will be here for a very long time.
-"We, the president's lawyers are gonna make this endless.
If you have the unmitigated temerity
to want witnesses in a trial,
we will make you pay for it with endless delay."
-The Senate adjourns after 93 questions have been asked,
and they're only halfway through the Q&A period.
Senators return for a final eight-hour question-and-answer
session on Thursday.
-"Have you ever been involved in any trial --
civil, criminal, or other -- in which you were unable
to call witnesses or submit relevant evidence?"
-The House could have pursued Ambassador Bolton.
Even if he gave that testimony, the articles of impeachment
still wouldn't rise to an impeachable offense.
-Well, I will make an offer to opposing counsel,
who have said that, "This will stretch on indefinitely
if you decide to have a single witness."
Let's cabin the depositions to one week.
-And we got into some fireworks very quickly.
Rand Paul wanted to ask a question
about someone who he has alleged is the whistleblower,
and they rejected the question.
-The presiding officer declines to read
the question as submitted.
-And while the questions tackle a wide range of topics,
the real question everyone is asking
is whether Republicans will vote
for or against calling witnesses to the trial.
Several Republican senators begin to indicate
they're in favor of witnesses.
-I think it's increasingly likely that other Republicans
will join those of us who think we should hear from John Bolton.
-Democrats pin their hopes on four senators in particular --
Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska,
Mitt Romney of Massachusetts,
and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee.
That night, President Trump holds a rally in Iowa.
-It's a happy period, because we call this "impeachment light."
This is light.
"Crazy Schiff." "Shifty Schiff."
He's a sick puppy.
But you know what? Today, you saw it --
I hit my highest poll numbers since I got elected.
-Hear ye, hear ye, hear ye.
All persons are commanded to keep silent,
on pain of imprisonment,
while the Senate of the United States
is sitting for the trial of articles of impeachment
exhibited by the House of Representatives
against Donald John Trump, President of the United States.
-On Friday, the Senate returns for final debate
and then a vote on the witness question.
-There is no precedent in a presidential impeachment inquiry
to have open hearings where the president
and his counsel were excluded.
The Senate is not here to do the investigatory work
that the House didn't do.
-Do these articles -- these allegations
rise to the level of a --
sufficient for a removal of office
for a duly elected President of the United States?
It doesn't.
And especially so --
especially so when we are in an election year.
-According to "The New York Times,"
more than two months before he asked Ukraine's president
to investigate his political opponents,
President Trump directed John R Bolton,
then his National Security Adviser,
to help with his pressure campaign
to extract damaging information on Democrats
from Ukrainian officials,
according to an unpublished manuscript by Mr Bolton.
-After 51 Republicans vote not to bring in witnesses --
-The yeas are 49.
The nays are 51.
The motion is not agreed to.
-Democrats try to force several amendments
that would subpoena Bolton and others.
-I send an amendment to the desk to subpoena Mulvaney, Bolton,
Duffey, Blair and The White House, OMB, DOD,
and State Department documents, and I ask that it be read.
-Trump leaves Washington without speaking to reporters.
Each of the amendments fails,
and the Senate pushes a final vote
on Trump's impeachment to next week.
-And, finally, I ask unanimous consent that the trial adjourn
until 11:00 am, February 3rd, and that this order
also constitute the adjournment of the Senate.
-Without objection, so ordered. We are adjourned.
-We have breaking news in the Slack Channel
of "The Washington Post."
They're gonna break, come back in Monday
for six hours of closing arguments.
We are looking like a Wednesday vote.
You will have, then, a series of incredible events --
the Super Bowl on Sunday, the Iowa caucus on Monday,
the State of the Union delivered Tuesday night
in the House Chamber.
Trump will know that he's not going to be removed from office.
He knows he will be acquitted.
And then -- boom -- on Wednesday,
we will have a vote that acquits Trump.