Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law. Some complicated international law issues here,
Speaker 1: and what kind of docket is Chief Justice Roberts facing
Speaker 1: interviews with prominent attorneys in Bloomberg Legal Experts. Joining me
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg New Supreme Court reporter Greg Store, Neil Devans,
Speaker 1: Professor at William and Mary Law School, and analysis of
Speaker 1: important legal issues, cases and headlines. President Trump lost resoundingly
Speaker 1: in the circuit courts and unusually large number of immigration
Speaker 1: cases Bloomberg Law with June Grasso from Bloomberg Radio. President
Speaker 1: Trump's legal team continued their argument in the Senate impeachment
Speaker 1: trial against him. Lawyer Ken Starr, whose Independent Council investigation
Speaker 1: into President Bill Clinton resulted in his impeachment, argued that
Speaker 1: impeachment is being used as a political weapon. The Senate,
Speaker 1: in its wisdom, do well, and its deliberations to guide
Speaker 1: the nation, in this world's greatest deliberative body, to return
Speaker 1: to our country's traditions when presidential impeachment was truly a
Speaker 1: measure of last resort. Joining me is Neil kin Caper,
Speaker 1: Professor at Georgia State University College of Law. Give me
Speaker 1: your your general take on the defense. Well, I think
Speaker 1: they don't have much of a defense to present, and
Speaker 1: today's presentations I think really illuminated that. First, just the
Speaker 1: decision to ignore John Bolton's statements in his book is
Speaker 1: just completely irresponsible. Those statements are out there and they
Speaker 1: are direct evidence that the President regarded this whole matter
Speaker 1: as a quid pro quo. Then they stand up and
Speaker 1: say there is no evidence of a quid pro quo.
Speaker 1: That's true. If you ignore all of the evidence that
Speaker 1: exists of a quid pro quo, it's just bizarre, and
Speaker 1: ken stars presentation was galling, requires us to ignore the
Speaker 1: role he played in impeachment and in politicizing our politics.
Speaker 1: How important is what people are calling the bombshell information
Speaker 1: about John Bolton's book. It's crucially important because there is
Speaker 1: a mountain of evidence that would lead any fair minded
Speaker 1: person to believe that President Trump created a quid pro quote,
Speaker 1: that he was withholding the aid in order to get investigations.
Speaker 1: But his defenders have said over and over again, there
Speaker 1: is no direct evidence. No one testified that they directly
Speaker 1: were told that it was either their presumption, it was
Speaker 1: their understanding, but it was never expressly stated. Well, for
Speaker 1: people who want to hang on to that thin read.
Speaker 1: Bolton's evidence completely destroys it because the reporting is that
Speaker 1: he is saying that Trump told him directly that there
Speaker 1: was a link between releasing the AID and the beginning
Speaker 1: of those in investigations. Now suppose they called John Bolton
Speaker 1: to testify, then what it opened the door to more witnesses,
Speaker 1: because now you have Mick Mulvaney saying that what Bolton
Speaker 1: said is not true, and the same Mike Pompeo. So
Speaker 1: then would you need to call them as well? I
Speaker 1: don't know about need to. Certainly Mick mulvaney should be
Speaker 1: called to answer if that's not true. Why first of all,
Speaker 1: why he said it was true when when he spoke
Speaker 1: at his press conference um and also to talk about
Speaker 1: the whole process of how the money came to be
Speaker 1: held and the way in which and this is something
Speaker 1: that the office he headed, the Office of Management and Budget,
Speaker 1: is deeply involved with. It violated the federal law, the
Speaker 1: Impoundment Control Act. Reportedly, John Bolton is a copious note taker. Well,
Speaker 1: I think it bolsters his credibility. And you know, so
Speaker 1: he has notes and there's nothing that would prevent him
Speaker 1: bringing those along with him to the Senate they don't
Speaker 1: appear to be property of the federal government that can
Speaker 1: be forbidden to him. Um, and those can corroborate the
Speaker 1: statements he's making about what the President told him. Let's
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about some of the points made
Speaker 1: by the defense, including on Saturday where White House Council
Speaker 1: Pat Cipolone said, we're here to perpetrate the most massive
Speaker 1: interference in an election in American history. According to what
Speaker 1: he said, wouldn't any impeachment proceeding be an interference in
Speaker 1: an election? Any impeachment proceeding against the president? Yes? Um, right,
Speaker 1: The President Nixon could have made the same argument. President
Speaker 1: Clinton could have made the same argument President Johnson. Any
Speaker 1: president who's being impeached can say it's subverting an election,
Speaker 1: which is how I got into office. Um. And And
Speaker 1: the further point that Sippoloni was making is that it
Speaker 1: would take Donald Trump's name off the ballot this November. Um,
Speaker 1: that's not necessarily the case. And I'm sure if somehow
Speaker 1: Donald Trump were convicted, Sipoloni would make the argument that
Speaker 1: he should not be UM barred from running. The Senate
Speaker 1: can impose that punishment, but doesn't have to. Um And
Speaker 1: has only imposed it twice in history. It is part
Speaker 1: of the articles seeking to have Donald Trump prohibited from
Speaker 1: ever holding office again. But I could imagine Republicans in
Speaker 1: the Senate saying, well, the American people should get their
Speaker 1: decision um, and we want to do something that's consistent
Speaker 1: with democracy, so we won't borrow from the ballot. I've
Speaker 1: covered many trials and you rarely, if ever see personal
Speaker 1: attacks on the lawyers who are doing me arguing, whether
Speaker 1: it's defense attorney or the prosecutor. But in this case,
Speaker 1: the defense decided to attack Congressman Adam Schiff. How unusual
Speaker 1: is that and is it appropriate? It would be perfectly
Speaker 1: appropriate if there were any merit to it. I think
Speaker 1: Adam Schiff ran a perfectly fine process. The problem is
Speaker 1: the President is running out of arguments, and now that
Speaker 1: he can no longer with a straight face claim that
Speaker 1: the AID was not linked to investigations, the only thing
Speaker 1: he has left is to say the process has been unfair,
Speaker 1: and that requires you to attack Adam Schiff and the
Speaker 1: process that he ran back in the House of Representatives.
Speaker 1: Let's turn to Kenneth Star for a moment. He said,
Speaker 1: we are living in what I think can aptly be
Speaker 1: described as the age of impeachment. So we talked about
Speaker 1: impeachments becoming too common and that impeachments should be bipartisan.
Speaker 1: What's your take on his approach to this. Well, for
Speaker 1: him to make that claim is just outlandish. And he
Speaker 1: is the one who made impeachment weaponized. UM. It would
Speaker 1: his report, which was designed at every turn of the page,
Speaker 1: was designed to compel the House of Representatives to impeach
Speaker 1: President Clinton. Um. And that after an investigation that was
Speaker 1: designed to find anything it could. Remember he was appointed
Speaker 1: to investigate the failed land deal Whitewater. He found nothing.
Speaker 1: He found nothing. Um. It was only when he could
Speaker 1: then turn it into President Clinton's personal scandal that he
Speaker 1: was able to concoct the grounds for impeachment. That's his record,
Speaker 1: That's what he did. He acknowledged none of that. He
Speaker 1: also made the demonstrably false claim that the articles of
Speaker 1: impeachment brought to the Senate showed criminal misconduct beyond a
Speaker 1: reasonable doubt. In fact, the articles brought to the Senate
Speaker 1: did not prove UM. The case against Bill Clinton. If
Speaker 1: you recall Arlen Spector attempted to vote not proven when
Speaker 1: when the question was called um, Bill Clinton was not
Speaker 1: impeached because, in fact, Republicans voted to acquit, specifically because
Speaker 1: the evidence was lacking. Looking at this in the light
Speaker 1: of the defense can be seen best. What are they
Speaker 1: trying to do here? I think they're trying to emphasize,
Speaker 1: first of all, that the bar to impeach a sitting
Speaker 1: president should be very high, and I think everyone should
Speaker 1: agree with that. And if we were to look at
Speaker 1: Keen stars oration charitably that that was his claim, um,
Speaker 1: that bar I think has clearly been met, but that
Speaker 1: that was his claim. The other claim is that, well,
Speaker 1: the House managers decided to proceed with the evidence they
Speaker 1: had before them, and that didn't include John Bolton's book,
Speaker 1: and so we shouldn't include it now. Um. That seems
Speaker 1: to me just wrong. And if if it were to
Speaker 1: come out this morning that UM, President Trump had actually
Speaker 1: conspired with Vladimir Putin to rig the election in U
Speaker 1: it would be preposterous to claim that the Senate could
Speaker 1: not take that into consideration. The Defense and Republicans keep
Speaker 1: bringing up, well, if you wanted to call witnesses, if
Speaker 1: you wanted to call Bolton, why didn't use subpoena him?
Speaker 1: What the Democrats response is, well, it would have taken forever.
Speaker 1: Look at where are subpoena against Don McGann for for
Speaker 1: White House Council is We're still not even close. But
Speaker 1: should the Democrats have kept those subpoenas in play while
Speaker 1: this process was ongoing. I don't think it would have
Speaker 1: done any good. The problem is precisely the one that
Speaker 1: you point to um. It takes a very long time
Speaker 1: to litigate those disputes. It takes years and years to
Speaker 1: litigate those disputes. Ken Starr made the point today that
Speaker 1: sometimes litigation happens very quickly. He going into the famous
Speaker 1: Pentagon Papers case. That's one case in the more than
Speaker 1: two hundred year history of the Supreme Court. This litigation
Speaker 1: was not going to move quickly, and the Don McGann
Speaker 1: subpoena is a perfect example of how these matters were
Speaker 1: not being treated with the speed that was given to
Speaker 1: the Pentagon Papers case. But the other point is the
Speaker 1: one that ken Starr also made. He was making the
Speaker 1: argument that we're already too close to the election for
Speaker 1: the Senate to subvert the upcoming election in his terms.
Speaker 1: If the House of Representatives had pursued those subpoenas and
Speaker 1: litigated them even with incredible dispatch. The earliest they could
Speaker 1: possibly have been decided would have been this coming summer,
Speaker 1: and then those arguments would have been made and made
Speaker 1: with real force, that the election is right around the corner.
Speaker 1: Why don't we just leave this to the election into
Speaker 1: the judgment of the American people. The point in going
Speaker 1: forward now was twofold, first of all, to maintain a
Speaker 1: respectable amount of time between the impeachment and the next election.
Speaker 1: And second of all, it embodies the judgment that it
Speaker 1: is too dangerous to leave Donald Trump in office because
Speaker 1: the wrongdoing he's accused of specifically relates to subverting the
Speaker 1: integrity of the upcoming election. And so it's too important
Speaker 1: to move forward and remove from office someone who would
Speaker 1: use all the powers and trappings of the office for
Speaker 1: his personal benefit rather than for the public benefit. And
Speaker 1: so it's we shouldn't have to wait for the d
Speaker 1: C District Court and the d C Circuit Court and
Speaker 1: the d C Circuit Court on bonk before the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court before finally removing someone from office when the case
Speaker 1: is already so strong. Neil ken Starr mentioned it today,
Speaker 1: and we expect to hear more from Alan Dershowitz about
Speaker 1: crimes being necessary. There has to be a real, stated
Speaker 1: crime in order to go forward with impeachment. Would the
Speaker 1: Democrats have been smarter to charge a real crime, so
Speaker 1: called real crime, let's say extortion. Would they have been
Speaker 1: smart to do that just to get rid of this argument? Well,
Speaker 1: I think the problem of that argument is that then
Speaker 1: it changes the nature of the preceding. Instead of being
Speaker 1: a proceeding that focuses on Donald Trump having abused the
Speaker 1: office in this extortionary way, all of the discussion would
Speaker 1: be around the legal technicalities of extortion, which may or
Speaker 1: may not be met, and whether they are or aren't
Speaker 1: is entirely beside the point. The point is Donald Trump
Speaker 1: abused his power and abused his office for personal gain
Speaker 1: and for personal gain in a way that subverts the
Speaker 1: upcoming election. That is simply intolerable, whether it fits in
Speaker 1: the technical boxes of the federal Dorsian Statute or not.
Speaker 1: And that's the reason that in fact, the impeachment um
Speaker 1: clauses in the in the Constitution are not drafted to
Speaker 1: require an actual crime. Let's just say that they decide
Speaker 1: to allow some witnesses at least to call John Bolton.
Speaker 1: In the end, there are going to be enough Republicans
Speaker 1: to call for Trump's moving from office. So then is
Speaker 1: it just an exercise and futility to have Bolton testify? Goodness, no,
Speaker 1: it is crucial to have Bolton testify. And first of all,
Speaker 1: remember who John Bolton is. He is a conservative and
Speaker 1: a Republican to his core. He is not a liberal.
Speaker 1: He is not part of any deep state. For him
Speaker 1: to come forward with this testimony is going very much
Speaker 1: against his interest, against his orientation, against his loyalties, and
Speaker 1: so the credibility of that evidence is very, very high,
Speaker 1: and it's important for the public to That's Neil Kincoff,
Speaker 1: a professor at the Georgia State University College of Law.