I have had the privilege of being able to watch the entire senate impeachment trial thusfar. Even though I also watched almost all of the House testimonies as well, this is not boring!
During the first day (1pm — 2am), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer brought 11 amendments to the Senate procedural rules, almost all of which concerned issuing subpoenas for documents and witnesses to be heard prior to and in conjunction with the question-and-answer parts of the proceedings. As each amendment was introduced, each side had up to 2 hours to argue for or against the amendment, which would start with arguments “for” from a House Manager, then go to arguments “against” by the Trump legal defense team, then back to the House Managers (often with a handoff to Schiff for additional comments) for a rebuttal if their time allowed. Representative Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) was the House Manager selected to argue for getting Mick Mulvaney’s testimony. In the argument against, Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow did some shouty complaining and asked “Why are we here?”. In his rebuttal, Jeffries said, “We are here, sir, because President Trump abused his power and then he tried to cover it up. And we are here, sir, to follow the facts, follow the law, be guided by the Constitution, and present the truth to the American people. That is why we are here, Mr. Sekulow. And if you don't know, now you know.” (Here’s the video.) I have to wonder how many Senators recognized this line from a very famous Biggie Smalls song (“Juicy”), but I’m going to speculate that the Senators that did catch the reference were largely from the left side of the aisle. (And frankly, thank God for that… the rest of the lyrics to that song might require them to roll in a fainting couch for the right.) My immediate reaction was, “I freaking love this guy”.
On day #2 (1pm — 9pm), the House Managers presented the case against Trump in terms of a timeline walkthrough, where at each part of the timeline, snippets of testimonies and documents from the House inquiry, as well as documents and news reporting (including statements from Trump himself) were used to support the arguments. Each Manager presenting got a chunk of the timeline, and if I may sidebar, because there is so much damning evidence of misconduct throughout the timeline, if anyone were to tune in for an hour or two, they might get a sense that they’ve seen “it all” — or at least enough to know that serious misconduct was done. Anyway, the timeline and background had been laid out by the first few presentations, and (around 4 or 5pm, IIRC) Rep. Jeffries got another chance to present. His section covered the infamous July 25th “perfect phone call”, its context, and its immediate aftermath, including the July 26th call between Ambassador Sondland and Trump from the restaurant in Kiev.
While preserving the first star for the amazingly skilled Adam Schiff, Jeffries’ presentation was a standout among a day of standouts. I would urge everyone to watch this 45 minute video, embedded below. (I will add a transcript if I can find one.) Some highlights:
- [Around 8:30 minute mark of the video] — In the “transcript” of the call, Trump says “They say Crowdstrike...” … “They say Ukraine has it”. … “They say [paraphrasing — the poor performance by Robert Mueller] it all started with Ukraine”. Jeffries asks and answers with clear evidence, “WHO IS ‘THEY’?”. (I’ll give you one guess — see it around the 10 minute mark.)
- [Around 17 minute mark] — Jeffries shows Trump saying to one of his shouty helicopter news conferences that he wanted Zelensky to investigate the Bidens. Jeffries says: “The evidence of wrongdoing is hiding in plain sight.” As he continues through the analysis of the transcript, I kept thinking back to this statement and how true it is. It was a perfect phone call — it exposes pretty much the entire scheme.
- [Around 22 minutes, watch at least until 26 minutes in] Jeffries points out that Trump praises Lutsenko and shockingly bashes (and threatens!) the highly respected and long-tenured Ambassador Yavanovich. This section is shocking and includes Yavanovich’s testimony about what happened when she read the chilling transcript (“she’s going to go through some things”).
- [Around 27 minutes] Jeffries discusses the quid pro quo in the call. “This — for that”.
- [29 minutes in] The Senate is interrupted by a protester (apparently shouting that Schumer is the devil). Jeffries pauses and Justice Roberts orders the Sergeant-at-Arms to remove the protester, Jeffries dispenses with the interruption off-the-cuff by QUOTING SCRIPTURE, and then moves on. (My heart flutters as it did when he quoted BIGGIE the day before, and I’m an atheist.)
- [Continuing from 30 minutes in] Jeffries compares the first readout of the call released by the White House (I didn’t remember this?) with the actual call, and goes back to the quid pro quo in the call, and the reactions from people in the room, including testimony from Lt. Col. Vindman who (among others) reported the impropriety that he had seen to his superiors.
- [At about 35 min in] We hear about the call the following day, including the testimony from Holmes that overheard the phone call from the restaurant in Kiev. It’s a “fun” reminder of that call (which Sondland basically corroborated in his testimony).
- [At about 41 min in] We hear a summary of why the “perfect call” was pretty much the opposite of perfect.
If you don’t know, now you know. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries is terrific and our country is lucky to have him.